Who's in Store?

Here's a weird little idea.

I think I posted about this before, and it might even be an official day in some country somewhere. Anyway, I thought I'd put a bug in some ears.

I shop weekly, sometimes several times a week, at our local stores. In that time, although I sometimes don't even know the person's name, I've started to develop favorites. When they're working at the registers, I go to their line even if it's longer. I say hi. Sometimes we politely chat about social nothings. Some of them went to school with my kids--now they've been employees for years and we still exchange 'say hi to's' with each other.

Where I work, I have favorite customers, and I've become a favorite employee for some. In fact, all of us at work have someone or several someones who will wait longer to be waited on just to ask how are you doing, or who will come in on a particular day knowing that person will be in the store on that day.

One of these people recently turned in a comment card about one of my coworkers along the lines of 'so and so is always helpful and polite, and I shop here because of her.' It made me realize that I don't do that enough.

So, the next time I'm at the grocery store, I'm going to look at some name tags, and start filling out comment cards for them. If you've got a favorite employee at a local store, won't you consider doing the same? It's not likely to lead to any perks unless that store has an employee of the month program or something like that, but that doesn't matter. Because of a customer's thoughtfulness, for at least a month if not longer, my friend at work will come into the work and see that tangible evidence that her efforts and time away from family are truly appreciated. So often a retail employee's day is stressful and marred by cranky or abusive customers, fear of making errors, and aches and pains from being on their feet all day (literally--I don't sit down except for two breaks and during my lunch, and sometimes I walk to the store to buy my lunch. And this is the norm for retail jobs). One brief note, just a few words of praise, weighs like gold against the balance of all those featherweight fears and annoyances.

Bring a little joy into the world. Please write a comment card about someone who makes your shopping experience easier and more enjoyable. Spread the word. It's a simple, free, and civilized gift to give to members of our community who are often overlooked as something just barely more noticeable than the counters and the cash registers.

The Great Outdoor Mind Expander

We had a little bit of rain last night, and I wore a jacket to work.  It feels good.  And, bonus, the weather report claims we'll have a nice, warm afternoon.

With the next four days off, I'd planned on writing, editing and working on book covers for various Wyrd Goat Publishing projects, but with weather like this I'd much rather be gardening.  I may have to embrace the power of 'and'.  I'll probably be sore, tired, and coming back to work at the end of it will become needed recovery time.

It'll also be a good opportunity to write, edit and design book covers outside.  I think differently when I'm outside.  Something about the environment makes different parts of my brain activate.  I'm not sure it's quantitatively better, but when your focus is creativity then anything different from the norm is better for future work, learning, expanding, all that good stuff.  So the quality of work is probably the same, with some parts getting worse and other parts better thanks to the change in external environment, but overall because I'm doing some new things, in theory my work overall in the future will be better.

That's my theory and I'm sticking to it.

Pretty soon it's going to get pretty uncomfortable to be outside, not to mention that once the rain begins, it would be pretty dumb to expose my computer to that.  I think it's past time to pledge to work on my computer for at least an hour outside everyday, weather allowing.  We'll see how long I stick to that.  I'll keep y'all posted as far as things that change in my prose, editing style and artwork.  Anyone else want to give the challenge a try?

Adventure in a Box

Yesterday we got something in the mail.  Everyone should get  something like this at least once in their lives.  Not necessarily what we got, but something along these lines in this fashion.  Because getting a big wooden crate from overseas is really awesome.
Cue the Indiana Jones theme music (and ignore the existence of the last movie while you do it, please.)
It arrived while I was at work.  I didn't get a phone call from my daughter, (though my DH did--what's with that?!) so I was totally surprised.
Being surprised is super-fun, so actually I didn't mind not getting the call.  And I was working, supposedly.  I just have to publicly hassle my family once in a while.
Anyway, I got my camera and started snapping pictures.  The girl had a hammer ready.  I think she was a little excited too.  :-)
The thing was built like Fort Knox.  Now that I've read 1776 by McCullough, the name Knox has a whole new depth to it.  It's a rockin' name, and a great book.  Highly recommended.  I regret not getting the illustrated edition.  BTW, I have a weird association with McCullough the author and Support Your Local Sheriff, where the bad guy Joe Danby asks what the hero's name is and he replies with Jason McCullough in the middle of a cute, funny section of dialogue.  Also also highly, highly recommended movie.  But I digress.
Getting the box opened was no easy feat.  I had to use my very modest carpentry skills to do it.
Now you can cue the creepy Indiana Jones music where they're about to open the Ark of the Covenant.
And inside the box ... was another box!
I had a flashback to a scene in The Emperor's New Groove.  Also highly recommended.  I don't think as many people saw The Emperor's New Groove as some of the other Disney movies, which is a shame.  It's one of the better ones.  I've rewatched it many times, of my own free will, with no small children to prompt me to do so.

Inside the box was an egg-like object, something wrapped in bubble wrap that was then wrapped in brown mail packaging tape so thoroughly that you couldn't actually see the bubble wrap.
We got a knife and began extracting the contents with surgical care.  My surgical nurse provided tension as I cut and peeled the bubble wrap apart.
This was what was inside.
I gasped.
.... it's so beautiful ....
But our faces didn't melt off.  We were safe.  You can go back to the adventure theme now, if you like.
We put it up on a shelf in the entryway.  Then I started to have waking nightmares about cats hopping up there, as they often do, and knocking it down.  I could actually hear the crash of it hitting the floor in my mind in the middle of the night, followed by the skidding and scrabbling of kitty feet on laminate flooring so that I couldn't even identify the perpetrator that I would have to hunt down and kill.
Not literally kill.  Or even hit, or curse at, actually.  Mostly I would just hug a pillow and rock and sob and tear my hair and throw ashes on my head.  Part of that is very Greek, appropriate in this case.

So we moved some books out of our built-in bookshelves and there it sits in a greek wine amphora-sized cubby.  The cats may still knock it down, but they would really, really have to work at it this time.  It's also nicely at eye level.
It's a replica, of course.  If it was the real thing, I would have to put it in a box.  Preferably a glass box, but back in the wooden box in the meantime, and of course I would never get around to getting the glass box, and no one would ever see it.  Which would be a shame.  But it's a replica, so it's all okay.

I won't have anything nearly so nifty to post about in a while, so enjoy the moment.  I'll get back to our regular boring stuff tomorrow.

Weather Whiner

Here I am, suffering at our local McMenamins, eating fish and chips and trying out a new drinkie. (Bourbon Furnace--recommended as a nice alternative to a hot buttered rum or hot toddy if you like hot, sweet drinks with a little zip, which I do.) I've made quite a bit of progress on Confidante and I'm excited about re-releasing Masks with a new cover at the same time Confidante comes out. My DH is reading weird and funny facebook quotes to me. Life is good.

Life is also, apparently, cold. They (and we know they're all liars!) said that there would be some clearing today with an occasional shower. Well. My tomatoes and I are quite disappointed. They're all inside where it's relatively snuggly and warm, though I was shivering most of the day even with an extra pair of socks on, but the lack of light is going to make them all spindly and unhappy.

I know, I know. This is the Pacific NW. The weather doesn't really start to turn nice until June. Also also, we've had some very nice days, for which I should be grateful. I am. But really, isn't it kinda hard when you get a nice atta boy at work and then get yelled at for the rest of the week?

At least the rain doesn't stress me out, and I don't get depressed. But I do get whiny (obviously) and I'm tired of whining.

I'll still do a wee bit more, though.

I wanted to go fishing todaaaaaaay! Wah!

Diseases and Taxes

My son just picked up his first tax form and booklet ever. I barely remember the 1040EZ, except that it was, well, easy. Hence the name, I guess.

We use a tax service. It just seems too complicated for us, even using software, not to mention the software isn't exactly cheap either. Also also, we can go in any time during the year (for free! We like free) to have them run a wee little estimate so that we know where we're at as far as owing or not owing. When you're running your own business, this isn't just a great idea. Our preparer told us that, as far as small businesses are concerned, we do really well. Too many don't pay enough taxes during their quarterly periods. They end up owing, and put themselves on a payment plan, meanwhile still paying their regular quarterly taxes for that same year. If they can't make ends meet they become tempted to pay a little less on their quarterly taxes then they ought to, and end up with another year of payments after coming up short for that year ... and they never catch up.

A friend of mine has whooping cough. It's going around in our area, and may be spreading around the U.S. in general. Be careful out there. Check with your doctor or local pharmacist and see if it's a good idea to have a vaccination. They don't last forever, so if you had one as a wee babe, it's probably no good anymore. It's especially critical for folks who are elderly, kids in school, and people with infants in the household less than 2 months (who are too young to be vaccinated, and are also the most likely to die if they catch it.)

The world is wonderful and beautiful and all that, but it's also full of icky diseases. Sometimes it's easy to brush off the idea of vaccinations. Medicine seems like it's pretty powerful. But even the bugaboos that we've supposedly 'conquered,' like chickenpox and pertussis (whooping cough) can still kill, and pretty nastily too.

Be careful!

Masks and Website Updates

Masks is finally up on Smashwords and Amazon. On Smashwords you can get the first 20% free. Warning: if Brokeback Mountain made you feel uncomfortable, the romantic elements in Masks is not going to be any more fun in a setting with flintlock pistols, tall ships and manor houses.

I also updated my website and put up a website (finally!) for Wyrd Goat Press. I'm hoping to have the sequel for House of Goats, House of Chickens, written and put up by mid-summer. Steve Perry wrote a wonderful review for House of Goats (thanks Steve!) on Amazon, and blogged about it too.

I think this post holds the record for most links in a single paragraph, at least for my blog.

Now it's time to take Wizard home from the vet. He had to have a few stitches. Apparently he had a close encounter with a barbed wire fence. He failed to mention this (he didn't even limp!) so who knows how long he hobbled around with that one inch opening in his flesh before my daughter noticed. But he should make a full recovery. I'm sure we'll hear him yowling (he hates to be confined) the second we walk in the door. That'll be sweet music to my ears. I worry about our silly kittehs ....

All but finished, and begun again

I finished the floor upstairs. Well, finished might not be perfectly accurate. I have three transitions and the baseboard thingy/stuff to do. Then I'll be done. We still have to put the ceiling up downstairs, and we have to finish our front porch, but the upstairs will finally be homey again. It's a really good feeling. It'll be an even better feeling when I can sweep and mop the last of the sawdust away. I've gotten about 90% of it, but it'll keep shaking off of furniture and we'll be dusting it off of all the horizontal surfaces for a quite a while, not to mention I have to get all those bits and pieces leftover out of the house and the tools (all sawdust covered, of course) returned to their proper owner or put away. Thanks again to our friend D. for loaning us his very kewl chop and table saws.

I'm writing on the third book in the Masks series again, tentatively titled Innocence and Silence. So far so good, at least as far as I can tell. Writing in series is always a chancy proposition. There are all those details to keep track of, and there's a higher chance that the story will run away in directions that won't work either forward, backward, or worst of all, both. I'm trying not to let it distract me. The most important thing is to tell a good story, right?

Oh, and it snowed today. There's enough on the ground that the steadily rising temperatures aren't enough to melt it. I had that magical feeling waking up with everything white. I don't think that feeling will ever go away, at least as long as we're on the warm side of the mountains.

So it's been a productive, snug, brandy and hot chocolate sort of day. Tomorrow it's back again to the day job, assuming the road conditions are good enough for me to get down the hill. Right now I'd say it's probably fine, but if it keeps snowing all night or the temperature drops, turning the slushy underbelly into ice ... yeah. We'll see. If I can't make it I won't be too sad, though. I'll just spend the day writing.

Home Town

My DH mentioned yesterday that I connect our family to the community at large simply by seeing the same people every day. I don't always know their names, but I recognize them at the grocery store, the hardware store, at the Christmas tree stand, and I often say hi when I have time if they don't look too busy.

I want to say that this is important, but is it? Maybe in an emergency a person who recognizes me might be more likely to stop and help, but even in that unlikely situation I think a good person would stop and help regardless of whether they're a friend or a stranger.

Is it important for people to know their neighbors, or at least recognize them?

I don't think there's a clear answer. I just know that I enjoy living in a place where I can go to the post office and small talk about the new building going up with my vet and the person who bags my groceries and the person I helped with a return the previous day.

For my fellow Nanoers--have you backed up your Nanowrimo project? Don't put it off!

Long days, and darkness comes sooner

We had a big day today, the boy, the girl and I.  At the end it doesn't seem like that much, but we're all pooped.  We barely got through it all--as the season turns the days grow noticeably shorter.  It already smells like autumn.

We got a shovel, bought three automotive belts on two trips (and returned two,) got a toilet part, and a shovel.

We installed the correct belt (finally) on the rototiller so that I could prep for leeks and kohlrabi (I know, I know, I'm about a month late.)  I managed to condition soil in a 20'x20' plot, which is a nice start, before it got too dark to work.  

I got the part into the toilet so that we'll have no more ghost flushes several times an hour.  Ah, silence.

And the boy and I cut down a not-insubstantial tree, both to thin our woods (for health, the tree was sick) and for firewood.  I'll mark more trees for thinning/firewood sometime in the next few days, with strict instructions not to cut them down w/o my supervision (with cell phone in hand in case there's an accident.)  One that I'm hesitating on has dead tips of branches all over it and dropped all around it on the ground, but it appears to be recovering.  It's a very nice-sized tree, so I would hate to lose it, but if in infects the others, well, I'll be a lot more sad.  I'll try to discover what ails it, but these things are notoriously tough to do.

Tomorrow will be another long day of hard labor, and then in the evening, writing!  But now, to bed, and my half-hour of reading.  My latest book:  How Not to Write a Novel.  I borrowed it from the library, and I'm really looking forward to reading it.

Yays Galore

A gratuitously adorable kitty and girl pic.

Congratulations to INK member C.S. Cole for her first short story sale! More announcements about that at the appropriate times.

Also, our household had money fall out of the mail the other day. It's great to get royalty checks, especially right now.

More yay as far as the upcoming weekend weather--we should be warming up. Right now it's colder here than in Juneau, Alaska, where the temperature is around 27 degrees F. Compared to us in the teens and smaller twenties. I'm very grateful that the winds have calmed down substantially today, and I'm looking forward to Friday, when the temps will start to rise. Of course as they rise we're supposed to get some incoming dampness. Or the incoming dampness will warm us up. Either way we may get snow or freezing rain, but that'll be fun, too, since none of us really need to go anywhere or do anything important. I'll have to remember to stock up on fresh meat Friday morning, in case we can't get down the hill for the next little stretch.

At some point we'll take advantage of our relatively wind-free, sunny weather and cut a few trees. Which, even more yay, we can add to our firewood stockpile, a pile that is looking pretty scary-small. Yeah, I know, it's sad to cut trees, but these trees are bad. Actually, they're not bad, but ... We have a couple of very dense patches of volunteer douglas fir and the remaining trees will grow much taller, faster, and fuller/healthier with a few of their fellows gone. Mother Nature thins trees at a much slower pace, a combination of chemical warfare and suffocation/smothering that really doesn't seem any less cruel than converting the ones that will get choked out anyway into fuel to help keep us warm. Yay to being warm, especially if our power goes out and we're snowed/iced/snow-iced in. Then the dead trees will be our only source of warmth.

I guess that we're helping the tree bullies win, but it doesn't make horticultural sense to help the weak, possibly already dying trees survive and cut down the healthy ones. Alas, the laws of tooth, claw, branch and root. But, as a gardener, I'm used to the cruel realities of both the natural and the cultured plant world. I've slaughtered thousands of weeds, heartlessly, even gleefully, and pile the corpses to convert into soil for new garden beds.

Now I'm creeping myself out.

Last yay for this entry, I now have 15 manuscripts out in the mail looking for homes. A while back I had ten, the most I'd ever had out in the mail, ever. I'm aiming for at least one new manuscript out in the mail every week for the foreseeable future as part of my new commitment to put my typing where my mouth is. Or something like that.

That's all for now. Stay tuned for more blog posts as weather allows.

The Day in Pics

Sometimes I clean. Yes!  It's true. 

No, seriously.

Shut up!

Okay, this time I have proof.  With massive help from the boy and a little IKEA shopping trip, I replaced the falling-apart wire shoe container of doom with a sofa table that's just perfect for tucking away our gizillion shoes that we wear on a regular basis.  I don't even want to think about what we've got put away.  Why do we have so many shoes?  Back in the day, people were lucky to have two pair--one for working in and one for Sundays.

 Anyway, moving on ... this morning when I found myself at loose ends, did I get in some serious writing?  No.  (I did send out a story, though.)  Did I eat bon bons and watch movies?  Too easy.  I decided to tackle the evil kitchen cabinets from heck.  I got the one under the sink with the garbage all prettied up, and then tackled the really nasty one that the girl and I toss whatever won't fit anywhere else into.  Some of the stuff in back was dusty, and there was flour in there from way back when I had to store a large sack of flour in there temporarily.  It was bad, waaaay bad, but now look how Stepford wifey it looks!  Yay!

It was too gorgeous not to go outside after my forays into the yuck of my two worst cabinets, so I went out, first for a stroll, then with a camera because the late afternoon sun was just too good, and the sky ... well, you can see, it was ugly.

The heart is a calla lily.  I hope that eventually the lilies will take over one side of the firepit.  Burgundy clematis trail up a trellis (with bonus tiny image of goat in there.)  Clematis are difficult to establish and hate being transplanted, but once they're yours they're yours forever and are some of the most rewarding and reliable bloomers in the plant world. 

A bug enjoys the shade inside a canterbury bell.  

And no, I'm not going to kill the bug.  I don't care!  Look how cute the little antennae are.  I mean, really.  And if it had a face, I'm sure it would be an innocent face.

Last but not

 least, the catness, It Runs in Front of Me (Katherine,) posed for me.  Y'all may recall the sad story of IRiFoM.  Thrown out of a moving vehicle, she hit the pavement hard enough to scrape up her face.  She took refuge from the snow and sleet (literally, this was a couple of winters ago) in our garage.  

The boy mistook her for Huntress, our other tuxedo kitty, picked her up and, when she didn't protest, took her inside where she's been ever since, except when we take her to the vet.  That she doesn't like so much.  But this?  Napping in the middle of a pile of clean blankets and pillows ain't bad.  She's shiny, a healthy weight, and has no problems with parasites or chronic illnesses.  I like her because she doesn't barf on my stuff and she actually uses the litter box.

Speaking of which, the cleaning around the shoe area?  OMG.  Cat barf had actually splashed onto the wall.  I was scrubbing Huntress upchuck across two large surfaces.  She'd decided to go for it from the top of the dividing wall between the entry and the stairs.

Stupid cat.  But it's clean now, so it's all okay.  And that, ladies and gents, has been my day.  So far.

Looking for work and working for looks

I think my exam thingy went well today.  There was a math component, and a detail focus test, and filing, and stuff.  I didn't finish first, but I was one of the early ones to leave.  There was only one problem that really bothered me.  I came up with an answer that wasn't one of the multiple guess.  After I finished everything else, I stared at it some more, and still couldn't sort it out.  So I figure I got that one wrong.  I just need 70% to pass, so I didn't stress over it.  It just bugs me because of the principle of the thing.  Next stage will be the verbal interview thingy in a couple of weeks.  I'd better get some laundry done before then.

In other news, I've been working on tidying and organizing the house some more.  I'm actually starting to see progress.  I also got some writing done.  I'm hoping that very soon I'll have time to post about Ireland, and put some stuff into a memory book about it, and start on that article that I've been doing too much thinking and too little writing about.  Ideally I should have written it while I was over there.  20/20 butt sight.

And here's a reminder to check out what your local high school drama department is doing.  Support a good cause, and let the high school kids wow you with what they've accomplished at their young (but very mature, they assure me) age.

Stream of Consciousness (might have giardia)

Incredibly sunny outside.  I have all kinds of energy, but watched A Beautiful Mind for lunch anyway.  I'm trying to get a mental angle on writing about Ireland, and not succeeding very well.  Non-fiction is hard.  It's full of facts and personality and stuff.  (Ahem.)  But I have confidence that I'll figure it out by dinnertime.  I have a test that I need to take tomorrow, but I don't know what it's about, except that it will have something to do with my job application for an administrative staff position.  I put the cushions on the outside furniture, and imagined that the cover for the gazebo would be filled with spiders, so I procrastinated by planting 11 red nicotiana (the 2 six packs had one missing--I was totally ripped off to the tune of about 30 cents--or maybe they were on sale and I got ripped off less.)  I stared at my tree peony, which exploded and now is really, really pink with flowers so huge they're ridiculous.  The tree peony really needs to get bigger so it's not so disproportional.  Even Cyrano de Bergerac would laugh.  I may have to paint and drink wine later today.  I painted and drank wine during a blackout yesterday with my friend R, and watched a power station thingy burn, and bought paint brushes and indigo watercolor because I wanted more versatility in shadows.  I pushed a wheelbarrow that was so squeaky we couldn't stop laughing about it.  After dark, a nighthawk screeched just outside the house.  It was beautiful, at first.  I now have a cat in my lap, which means I have a sudden urge to get up and do something urgent, because I'm pinned by cuteness and I realize that I can't get up and do something urgent lest I disturb the cuteness.

My life is beautiful.  I hope I don't get an awful disease and die before I can see how it all ends.

Intermission

By the time you read this, I'll be in stranger climes, drinking wine and tasting the sea salt that's settled on my lips each time I sip.  I might even be relaxed.

Travels (by kzmiller)

The drift, the swift lift, the breathless drop away

The sea, the bright sky, the boisterous, idle play

To wander, to see

emerald, sapphire and gold

To listen, to be

more than can be told 

All in the moment, today

Tomorrow we'll go another way

Still Sore

I'm still sore, but recovering.  Once I get moving, I'm fine.  It's just the getting moving in the first place after, say, sitting for five seconds.  That's way too much staying still, apparently, and the legs refuse to work without shouting chants like "hell no we won't go!" and waving banners and generally putting up a fuss.

Tough, I say.  Time to get back to work.

Oh, and you legs are not getting fed today.  It's a fast day.  I don't want to hear anymore whining--this happens every other day, it's not like it's a surprise or anything.

Huge to-do list today, and I was tempted to put it online, and then I thought no, it would be boring and dumb, and then I thought hey, accountability, and then I thought no one gives a darn about accountability, and then I thought no one cares about all my personal stuff anyway so why do I bother blogging, which wrapped me back around full circle to the people who are at least vaguely interested in my life check in here and might be interested in a dumb list so might as well post it:

done Workout

done Redraft cover art so the shell looks less like a spine and the ear is lower

done Mail box 

         and manuscripts

done Make photocopies onto kewl paper

Dishes

Laundry (especially wash bed sheets)

Start packing for Norwescon

Finalize some sort of itinerary for Ireland

Pick a castle and book a night there

Build twelve front and back book covers from photocopies

done Buy office supplies

Practice reading Inner Skull for Norwescon

Pack bag for workout tomorrow (decided to skip workout to get stuff done)

done! Garden if there's time (yeah, right)

done Write after dinner

done Ack, almost forgot--shop for my mom's birthday present

I'll mark things I got done if I have time, or relist tomorrow so y'all can see how lame I am.  Today, that's literally lame.  [limps off to start list]

Here's the final (reverse) image of the cover I'm doing--it's meant to be coloring book style so that people can personalize their book covers.  My scan bed is out of touch with my confuter, so this is a photobook image.  Just as well ... less likely that the author of Russet Noon will steal it like she stole the cover art of the book she will fail to produce.  Oops, was I snarky just now?  Oh well.

I'm leaving the rest of the list for tomorrow.

It's Quiet ...

But not too quiet.

I've been enjoying an evening home alone.  Considering the amount of time I have to myself, and how respectful the kids are of my space, it amazes me that this should feel special.  It does, though, in that 'only have to do my own dishes and laundry,' 'don't have to make dinner for anyone but myself' kind of way.  Any mess made is a mess I made myself, and any mess cleaned up stays cleaned up.

Ahhh, bliss.

There are many kinds of bliss, so I don't feel a need to cling to this.  I do appreciate it, though.

In other news, I got a heap of writing done.  As much as writing on novels feels rewarding, writing on short stories and non-fiction feels more sane at the moment.  Is it the sense of quick response?  I don't know.  The novels are not abandoned, but they are resting for the next little bit, possibly until after Ireland (though just typing that fills me with anxiety.  No working on novels until mid-May?!!  Really?!!)  I've also got a heap of reading done.  Lots more to do for the master's class and the literary award I read for, but I see lights at the end of the tunnel, and I hear a strange, uplifting music that summons me closer ... 

Cave sirens.  Such a menace.

My Hum Hum Day (Ho is ruined for me)

I got some critiquing, email responding and a bunch of laundry done.  I really wanted to go outside for a long walk, but the weather was iffy (lots of unpredictable downpours interspersed with some pretty sunshine and soft sprinkles that didn't last long) so I opted for indoorsy stuff.  I'm impatient for daffodils.

Two of our mousetraps disappeared.  I'm still trying to figure that out.  Rats?  Raccoons?  Really Big Mice (TM)?  I think I'm going to have to get new mousetraps and wire them to something sturdy.  They're not that expensive, but you know, it's the principle of the situation.  I may have to get a rat trap just in case there is something big.  There's something that sounds bigger than a mouse above my office right now.  Noises on a drum-like surface can be deceiving, so I'm not going to leap off of any cliffs of conclusion, but still.  Between the disappearing traps and the loud bangs and scuttles, I'm leaning toward the idea that we may in fact have at least one rat living among us.

I'll have to close the garage, which I don't like to do because it may trap bats inside.  I just worry that a cat may get a paw caught in a rat trap.  Maybe there's a covered trap that will keep everyone safe except the intended targets.  All our cats are indoors enough that it's highly unlikely one of them would get hurt, but we do have feral cats around.  I haven't seen False or Patches around, but that doesn't mean they're not still with us, hiding out in the barn or whatever.

I hope I can go for a walk tomorrow.  I've got that penned-in feeling.  Standing on the deck for a few minutes is great, but not the same as roaming around the garden or walking up the road.  I'm long overdue for a classic constitutional.

The Big Picture

I did it.  I called around, and discovered that the beautiful LCD TV I'd been looking at for the past several months at Costco is over $100 cheaper than the least expensive television of the exact same size at the place advertised as saying "shop around, but if you don't shop at XXXXX XXXX, you'll be sorry!"  I guess I won't be sorry.  

At first I'd planned on waiting until February 15th, and then when the government extended the HD deadline (um, why are we waiting?  Television is not exactly a crucial service, hello!  But I guess I'm being insensitive,) I thought what the heck, I'll wait until June.  But then I went by my daughter this afternoon sitting a couple of feet away from her brother's laptop, watching what should have been a horrific pageant of a war display (Braveheart) but was instead a cute miniature action scene, and I wondered about what waiting would really buy me.  I'd hoped a lot of saved money with the advent of plummeting sales, but the TV I wanted was already half the price of the least expensive big TVs and the prices hadn't budged on President's Day like I expected them to.  

I bet the 'big' TVs I think about are average in most people's minds.  Yikes.  To me, those 50" things are as big as I want to imagine, and those would fill up half our living room (and not in a nice way.)  Our brand new, gorgeous television is 32" and it looks plenty big to me.  Not bulky--it's smaller and lighter than our big box, but the screen is actually larger, and clearer.  I have a hard time imagining one of those monstrosities in the main aisle looming in our living room.  Actually, I take that back.  I can perfectly imagine it, more intrusive than Darth Vader and more obnoxious than Jerry Lewis.  [ducking to avoid protests thrown by Jerry Lewis fans] 

Yeah, yeah, I'm going into raptures over a dumb appliance.  Still, it's good to have our family tradition of the TV dinner theater not just return to its former glory, but exceed it.  Since we go out to the big screen theater maybe once or twice a year, don't have the television turned on from morning to night, don't watch Saturday cartoons, or late night SciFi, and we might catch the news only once a month, the TV was never about mindless passage of time, flipping channels and enduring commercials.  It's about entertainment, and culture (and because I have family members who enjoy that sort of thing, the eye-gouging 'humor' that is Robot Chicken.)  It's about storytelling, and art, and fun for a couple of hours.  With the occasional weekend marathon of our favorite TV series.  I love those.

It'll be fun exploring our DVD collection all over again.  How does The Dark Knight look?  How about Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon?  Pride and Prejudice?  Phantom of the Opera?

I'll enjoy finding out.  Now I'm totally motivated to clear off our dining table and turn it into the center of our social lives again.  We can see the big picture from there.  Crystal clear.

I'm Back!

I never really left, actually, but I'm juggling a lot of balls and they all ended up on the ground.  Time to pick a bunch of them up.

Writing--gotta write today.  It's Tuesday!  Gotta write on Tuesdays.  Gotta.

Laundry--I have no socks.  Well, okay, I have one last pair of socks on my feet right now.  Thankfully I have laundry in the washer right now, 'cause my slippers, well, ew, I need socks.  I should probably toss my slippers in there too for good measure.  I'll still need socks in that case for when I venture outside.

Birds--When it snows the birds come from miles around to feast at the feeders.  If I stop feeding them, they'll go elsewhere.  I don't want my cats to get rusty speaking in the language of the birds, so I guess I'll have to go out and feed them.  I've got my boots on.  I'll be out there in a sec.

Concert for Cline--I have to start an email list or something so that we're all talking.  If we don't talk, how are we going to get together to rehearse or whatever?  Since a musical thing requires (at least for some people) practice, well, better the dialogue begin sooner than later.

Radcon/Reno Bid Party--I'm 99% there.  That last one percent is a killer, though.  Hey, you know, I just realized that I'll probably need socks for Radcon too.  D'oh!

INK--we have an INK meeting coming up.  I have a small round of brie cheese to bring with.  Yum!  I also would like to submit a story for the following INK meeting.  This means writing.  Writing is on my list, right?  Oh yeah, there it is at #1.  Go figure.

Endeavor Award--I'm supposed to be reading.  Um, uh, well, I'm mostly done with the book I'm on now, with four in the queue.  Must ... read ... faster ...

Speaking of submissions, I'm supposed to have a query out by Friday and it's now Tuesday.  Ack!!

101 program--I'm keeping up with the Tibetans, fasting when I'm supposed to fast, and meeting my goals, except for one day on a fast day when I had a handful of popped potato chips.  They were good, too.  But I'm not going to do that again.  That was bad, not because a handful of popped potato chips is a big deal, but because I broke a promise to myself.  Breaking promises is not good.  Bad habit, hard to break.  I'm fasting today, and my stomach is starting to seriously growl, so I'm going to shut it up with a cup of nice hot tea while I write.  After I feed the birds.

Am I forgetting anything?  I'm sure I am.  For all y'all who are counting on me for stuff, please, ping me and remind me!  Or just kick me in the butt.  It's right there, all hanging out, now that I'm bent over picking up all these balls.  Hmm.  Is there one more under the couch?

This is not my beautiful house!

I've got Talking Heads on the brain.  

The downstairs has taken over my daily life, which is fine.  It's coming together nicely.  The boy has put the most work in, so his room is closest to being complete.  We ran into a hitch with one of the girl's shelving units--the holes weren't drilled correctly.  Right place, wrong size.  We'd just put together an identical unit the day before (but in a different color) so we knew we weren't just being creative with the destructions--er--instructions.  So I'm charging up the drill battery while I'm typing and will soon expand those holes so they're a snug fit to the dowels.  And yes, the dowels are the right size.  They fit correctly into the opposing holes.  It's all very aggravating, but of all the things that could have gone wrong, this is not a big deal.  And frankly, changing the size of the holes is far less intrusive than driving back to IKEA and getting a replacement, which may only lead to us bringing home another one with the same flaw.  It all relies on how long the person operating the drill for that batch was asleep at the wheel.

I'm staying busy enough that it makes it challenging to get anything unrelated to the downstairs done.  That includes things like dishes, laundry, vacuuming, basic hygiene (sorry INKers if I was extra stinky at the meeting!) and writing.  But I did get a little flash done, and it got a wow response when I read it, so I'm eager to smooth it out and send it on its way.  I'll send it to my favorite flash fiction site first, Flash Fiction Online.  I like the editor's style, and I like what he publishes, so I'm hoping eventually something I write will mesh with what he publishes and then huzzah! I'll have arrived in flash fictiondom.  Or something like that.

Speaking of great online magazines, check out Beneath Ceaseless Skies.  It's a visually beautiful online magazine, and this first issue features a story by my friend, writer extraordinaire and fellow Lucky Lab, David Levine.  Like Flash Fiction Online, there's a forum where you can discuss the stories, something I personally get a kick out of (when I have time!) because I can read about how other people perceived the story and compare notes as far as symbology and impact.

In the good news arena, I had a short story accepted for publication.  I may have mentioned this earlier, but I never get tired of writing it so tough.  I'll announce which story and where as soon as I'm cleared to do that, probably about the time I learn what issue I'll be in.  It's in a SFWA qualifying market, so I'm hoping if I'm dedicated about sending out stories and keep plugging away at the craft, I'll eventually become a SFWA member and maybe get a little more attention for my novels.  I very much enjoy writing short stories when I get a story idea that fits into a tight corner, but I love writing novels.  I want to write lots and lots of books and get paid for them so that I can keep writing lots and lots of books without having to worry about whether we'll have to do something else for retirement if our retirement fund goes poof.  I'm willing to work at other jobs, but I'd rather focus on the written word full time.

If there is such a thing as writing full time.  I'm starting to wonder.  The trouble with working at home is that you're working at home, and there are other things to do.  Fortunately there's not as much to do at home under normal circumstances.  Things will get back to normal soon.  Or else.

Just in time for Nanowrimo, I suspect.  I have so much going on at the tail end of November I have to get done before OryCon30, which means I need to write about 3000 words a day.  Shouldn't be an issue,  but if I get behind it'll be much, much harder to recover.  Big changes, big goals, big accomplishments.  It's been a wild year.