The Blue Star Drive is rounding the corner and heading into Week Six.  However, the going has been slow in getting donations in ... currently there's only been one taker, and our total on our tote board stands at $35.

This has gotta improve.  For the sake of our vets, we need more contributions.

If you support veterans' charities, if you support veterans, if you support our military ... if you support helping your fellow person, period ... then you need to contribute to the Blue Star Drive.  10% of total proceeds from DCP's books and our Zazzle store will go toward a veterans' charity (you can vote for which charity in an earlier post on this very blog!).  100% of proceeds from DCP's Blue Star line of merchandise (t-shirts or pendants) will go to the charity.

Get the word out to your friends.  They need to know that this is going on.  Tweet it, Like this page, post statuses on Facebook, send out e-mails, talk to your friends and neighbors, just get the word out there that we're trying to help our vets.  I'm trying to do my part by publicizing this drive via my blogs here and at Goodreads, as well as with my Goodreads giveaway of Dinétah Dragon.  If you read this, pass it along to three of your friends.

If you're entered in the giveaway, good luck.  While you're waiting for April 30th to come around, and especially if you know someone with a family member overseas in harm's way, go to the Zazzle store and look for Easter gifts of Blue Star merchandise, or other DCP products.  If you're looking for gifts for friends, look for DCP's books and get your direct or Internet retailer orders in.  Get the word out, get the money coming in, and we'll make the lives of our vets that much better this year!

Last week we started our Blue Star Drive for veterans' charities.  It remains in effect until Memorial Day: pick up a copy of any of our books (The Advance Guard or Dinétah Dragon), a Kindle edition of The Advance Guard, or any standard item of merchandise from the Zazzle store and 10% of the proceeds would go to a veterans' charity; purchases of Blue Star merchandise (now encompassing a t-shirt and a pendant) would sent 100% of their proceeds to the charity.

Of course, here's the thing ... I don't know what charity to send the money to.

So I'm going to leave it up to the readership.  You, whose hard-earned money will be going toward these products and, through them, to the charity, should be the ones who choose which veterans' charity it is that should benefit from this program.

Below is a list of several veteran support charities in a survey.  Place your vote there.  This list of charities was assembled with only two guidelines: they could not have received an F rating from Military-Money-Matters.com, who assembled a list of vets' charities and rated them based on how much money from donations went to the charities; and they had to support all branches of the military, not just one or two.

Place your vote, then make your contribution!  You'll be helping a great cause, doing your good deed of the day, and receiving some really cool stuff in return.

As a wise man once said, "Merchandising ... where the real money is made."  I'm taking that to heart, readers.

Maybe you haven't checked out the merchandise store yet.  You really ought to, there's some neat stuff there.  One of the wonderful things about Zazzle is the wide range of stuff they offer, and I'm attempting to take advantage of all of that, to be honest.

So with no further ado, I present a merchant panel!  As you can see below, we have a pretty decent range of stuff we're offering.  Coffee mugs, hats, bumper stickers, shirts, even neckties.

And don't forget our Blue Star shirt.  Right now, that's the most important one in my book.  The Blue Star's profits all go toward veteran's charities, so don't miss out on that!  (A percentage of the profits of all my merchandise goes to vets' charities as well, so don't feel guilted into getting just the Blue Star.)

Be my guest there and check the place out!

This week, the ongoing conflict in Afghanistan hit home for us at DCP.  My brother-in-law, an Army 1LT, had his unit dispatched to northern Afghanistan from their normal base of ops in Germany, and they're expected to serve a one-year tour in the war zone.

If there's any single thing we like doing as far as social issues go, it's showing as much support for our troops as possible.  Call it our over-inflated sense of patriotism at work if you like, but we want to do something to help our vets.  This weekend, me and my wife sent him a giant package of snacks (and pondered that there should be a tax credit for buying things to sent to troops overseas), but I thought I could do more.  What better thing to do for them than what we're best at ... writing stuff.

So here's the deal.  We'll be offering some special projects to help our vets, in honor of my brother-in-law the lieutenant.  Order any books (either The Advance Guard or Dinetah Dragon) or any Zazzle merchandise through our store, and 10% of our proceeds from the sales will be donated to veterans' service organizations, such as the Veterans of Foreign Wars, the Disabled Veterans of America, or the Wounded Warriors Project.  In addition, there will be special "blue star" merchandise available as well: 100% of our proceeds from the "blue star" edition merchandise will go to the charities.

This offer will run from March 1st through Memorial Day.  In addition, if you order a book while this program is in place, I'll sign it for free.  I'll even pay your postage.  Just let us know through the "Contact Us" link which book you bought, and we'll send you an e-mail of where to send it.

Let's all come together and support our vets.  They gave a lot of themselves, and still give for our peace and tranquility.  The least we can do is give back.