The winner of the $10.00 gift certificate to mybookstoreandmore.com by random draw is…MeriBeth!

And the other $10.00 gift certificate to mybookstoreandmore.com for favorite past life was chosen by a top-secret committee. It was a very difficult choice, because there were some pretty awesome past lives covered, and one member of the panel even had to medicate herself, but the winner is…Mo, for the following entry!

*looking into my lucky magic eight ball to see into Shannon’s past lives……….*

Wash chicken feet. Chop off toenails. Deep fry so they puff up and become light and fluffy. Dunk in secret recipe marinade. Steam for 15 minutes. Le Mei Ling had been doing the same thing in this seedy Hong Kong Yum Char restaurant, famous for its Fung-Jao (chicken feet), for 10 years, ever since her parents had moved there from Canton in Mainland China in 1890.

Two years later a major typhoon hit Kowloon while young Mei Ling was on a junk taking her to a neighbouring island and she was swept away to the murky depths of the South China Sea. *picture fades*

*vigorously shaking the magic eight ball until the fog clears once more…….*

Lady Jemina Heatherington-Smythe has her hands covering her neck and is running around the drawing room. “Mother! No!! Motheeeeeeeeeeeer!! How can you expect me to go to the ball with that horrible dead carcass around my neck!”
“Now dear…. EVERYONE knows that the dried body of a frog worn in a silk bag around your neck is the only thing that will avert one of your dreadful epileptic fits!!” said her mother as she tried to apprehend her wayward daughter. Jemina picked up her skirts and ran out the drawing room, through the front door and to the only place she could think of to find solace. The lake bordering the north of the English estate. Deep in the middle of winter, the lake was mostly frozen over and the picturesque sight would surely bring solace to her anxious heart. However, on her way there, she noticed that a band of Gypsies were illegally camped next to it and walked towards them out of curiousity.

A darkly handsome Romani man with a dried up chicken foot on a necklace walked up to her in an attempt to flirt with her for the hell of it. Oh no! Would he use that horrid foot as a tool of foreplay??? AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHH!! She ran away in fright, slipping on the bank of the lake and onto a thin layer of cracked ice. So coooooolllllld….

*picture fades once again*

Ahhhhhhh so THAT’S why Shannon is so terrified of chicken feet, ice, anything touching her neck… etc etc etc

Congratulations, and I’ll be getting those out to you this afternoon!