Welcome to my journal! Feel free to read, to friend, to be yourself. All I ask is that you treat me and the people in the comments with respect.

I also have an art journal, art_at_large, in which I post stuff about the art I do. I don't update it as often as I do this one, but it sort of goes in fits and starts.

I may or may not add you to my reading list. If I don't it's probably because I've looked at your journal and it didn't seem like something I would want to read. Sometimes it's because there's nothing but memes, sometimes it just doesn't capture my interest. If your journal is primarily friends-only and you think I'd enjoy your locked entries, by all means drop me a comment and tell me so. Also, if I don't friend right back, please don't take it personally. I have a terrible streak of procrastination in me and it sometimes just takes a while.

So, I think that's that. I do have filtered posts and I have a number of different filters. If I do know you IRL, let me know and I'll put you on that one.

Have fun and thanks for reading.

A little night snow


It's been showing softly all day and I didn't even notice until I looked out the window before going to bed. Not a patch on the East coast right now, but I wanted to capture that silent dreamlike landscape just as it is now. In the front, all the evergreen boughs are heavily laden with their freight of white, swaying and dipping, strained almost to their limit but pulled back each time by the anchored trunk. Safe.

We are all safe in here, too, tucked away in our separate dens watched over by cats, by glowing glass owls, by heavy glass doors protecting but allowing the winter magic in.

Good night.

On Friday, October 23 at 11:30 am, my father, Galen Smith, passed away. He was complaining of weakness, dizziness and nausea the previous morning, so I called emergency services and they took him to the hospital. He'd experienced similar symptoms two months before and turned out to be experiencing atrial fibrillation and tachycardia. In that instance, they were able to stabilize him quickly and let him go home the next day.

This time, when we arrived at the emergency room, the doctor who met us said it was indeed the same issue and they were just starting the process of shocking his heart back into rhythm, for which he was sedated. The next thing I knew, there was a staff member astride him on the bed performing CPR. The got his heart beating again, but there was a lot of damage done from loss of blood to his vital organs and his brain. He was admitted to the ICU and they kept his body going through the night but by morning he was in multiple organ failure and he'd suffered several seizures. There was no possibility of him regaining consciousness. I was there with my mother and brother Damon, who lives here in town, and a dear family friend when we made the decision to make him comfortable and withdraw the life support. We held his hands and talked to him while his breaths grew shallower and then he was gone. It had been 16 hours since he had been admitted. He was 89 years old and he and my mother had been married for 65 years.

We are all in shock. My brother Peter flew down from Alaska and we've been dealing with all the stuff one needs to when something like this happens. At least, I've been dealing with all the bureaucratic stuff and making arrangements and all that, and the guys have been cleaning out the garage and going through his emails and spending time with Mom while I am busy. Mom's short-term memory has been getting more and more flaky and her version of Dad's passing bears almost no resemblance to the actual event. I am not correcting her. If she wants to believe he was sitting up and talking to her before he lay down and closed his eyes and just stopped breathing, I for one am not going to take that memory away from her.

My coping strategy is to keep busy every minute of the day taking care of business and caring for Mom. Peter's has been in taking long walks and making dinner. Damon has been doing what needs to be done including his own work, and then spending time here. Mom appreciates having them around, and I like that she gets to talk to them about the past while I take care of the messy details.

Tomorrow I talk to the funeral home and the bank and call the lawyer and financial adviser. And have lunch. One breath after another, one tick mark off the list at a time.

Memories later.

And no cat on my lap at the moment, so you get a post!

It's a brutal -18F here today, one of the coldest days in Wisconsin in quite a long time. The high is only supposed to make it to -14. Needless to say, I'm staying in today. Baking is scheduled, because what else do you do when it's frozen out there? I may have made a tactical error there, though, as I was confident I had all the supplies I needed when I went to the store on Friday but didn't do a thorough check, so I barely had enough buttermilk for one loaf of robot bread and there is enough all-purpose white flour for only a single batch of cookies. Whole wheat bread flour, pastry flour, stone-ground flour, white bread flour, rice flour, buckwheat flour, potato flour... got plenty of those. All-purpose white flour? Not so much.

I'm also knitting again and in the last two weeks have produced four hats, one of which fits me and I am wearing a lot. The first two were too small and have been sent off as surprise gifts to someone else's grandchildren. I hope they find them useful and pretty. They have cables.

Right now I'm knitting a black and white short-row scarf with some mill-end yarn I bought on sale at the craft store. It's very thick and the scarf is knitting up very dense, but I hope that this will be a good thing in the long run. It's good to have something to do with my hands besides eat left-over holiday cookies.

I bought a TV and smart Blu-ray player on which I can get Netflix, so I have been burning my way through series that I missed the first time around or lost track of part-way through. I enjoyed Heroes, am halfway through season two of Once Upon a Time, which I like quite a bit, but I am taking a break and watching season five of Dexter, which just became available. I'm looking forward to watching all of Alphas, which I've caught kind of hit-or-miss over the years. I occasionally watch PBS with the folks, and we had people over for the premier of season four of Downton Abbey, to which my mother is addicted. It was fun but contained few surprises beyond the one revealed in the opening minutes.

My reading has sputtered to a hiatus after a binge reading of all the Harry Potter books and Libriomancer by Jim Hines for the fantasy book group I've joined. I'd blame the TV, but I was blocked even before I got it. There are plenty of books on my "unread" shelves, but none of them really draws me right now. Maybe when I'm tired of knitting and can let myself just read I'll give it another try.

Time is passing very strangely for me. It's hard to describe beyond "slipping away un-noticed". If I get two things done in a day I feel accomplished. If I get five done, I feel exhausted. There's always tomorrow, because life has become a series of identical days punctuated by pre-set activities and the occasional social invitation or doctors appointment.

OK, I have been informed by Beamer that I have done enough typing for the time being and she would like her lap back, please. Next time I have the chance, I'll put in some pictures.

Take care, everyone, and stay warm wherever you are.

This entry was originally posted at http://moderate-excess.dreamwidth.org/320914.html. Comment there using OpenID, or here. Either one works for me. Comments are lovely.

Hi Folks. I know I owe you a good, long update, but I have no time yet. So many things going on. But I wanted to make a short post for a good cause. As a life-long bibliophile, I have always loved going to small, independent book stores. They are getting thin on the ground these days, so when I have a chance to support one, I try to do so.

My LJ friend editrx recently bought a small bookstore in New Hampshire and is raising funds for needed improvements and inventory. There are 12 hours left in the Indigogo campaign and she needs $1000 to make her goal. She has some lovely incentives (I'm getting a pin) and I think it's something well worth supporting. Since I don't have an extra grand just lying around, I figured I'd mention it here. It would be wonderful if we could get her to her goal today.

The campaign can be found here: http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/star-cat-books-acquisition-fundraiser

Thanks! Reporting will resume soon, I promise!

This entry was originally posted at http://moderate-excess.dreamwidth.org/320512.html. Comment there using OpenID, or here. Either one works for me. Comments are lovely.

In the past month I have: helped design and buy furniture and display cases for a trade show in NYC, updated the company web site, unpacked and shelved the better part of 16 large boxes of leather-bound journals from Italy, worked at the pen shop as needed including running to the storage unit for inventory, completed blasting a 6' tall octopus on tempered glass to go in a bathroom door, designed and blasted two shower panels, the glass for which was not delivered until last Friday, oversaw and coordinated (long-distance) a complete remodel of the basement room at my parents' house in Madison, Wisconsin into which I will be moving, packed all the books and loaded them and as much stuff as I could manage into three ReloCubes to be shipped to Madison ahead of the move, packed the rest of my things, including the entire sandblasting studio, rented a 26' truck, loaded a 600 pound compressor onto it, and in general juggled cats until my arms were tired.

Today is moving day. Everything has to be finished being packed and get loaded onto the truck, including all the rest of the equipment from the studio. Laundry to be done, cats loaded into carriers, final shopping taken care of. There are people I didn't get to see before I go and things I never got to do. Everyone tells me I must come back, and I will, but I don't know when.

I've meant to post photos of the glass in progress, and the piles of boxes rising higher and higher, but time got away from me again and so you'll just have to imagine or wait for me to gt around to it once I get to Madison.

Thanks goodness I have had help, in the form of bibliofile, who has been invaluable in helping pack things while I've been sandblasting and keeping me company and giving me an excuse to eat at some of my favorite places one last time. And she will continue to be invaluable when it comes to driving the car and two of the cats up to Madison, while I pilot the huge-ass truck and its loudly complaining feline passenger. She's lucky; she gets the boy-cats, who are gentlemen in the car. Also thanks to Laura, the professional organizer I hired to help pack, event though she packed things I told her not to pack and put things in weird places. Control freak freaks out. But it's all good, and this too shall pass.

And now it's time to shut the computer down and pack it into a box and do the laundry and pack the remaining items and my suitcase, and, and, and...

If I didn't get to see you to say goodbye here in NOLA, please know I really wanted to but time got away from me. I hope to see you when I come back for a visit.

Goodbye, and thanks for all the fish beads.

This entry was originally posted at http://moderate-excess.dreamwidth.org/320367.html. Comment there using OpenID, or here. Either one works for me. Comments are lovely.

Has anyone had any experience with using either PODS or ABF U-Pack relo-cubes for moving? I have quotes from both which are coming out within about $200 of each-other.

Relo-cubes are 6'x7'x8' and can be put in my driveway by fork lift. PODS are either 8'x7'x7' or 8'x8'x16' and are delivered by lift system, which might not fit in the driveway and may need to be put in the street. I could have the pod for an entire month to fill if I needed; with the relo-cubes I get 5 days.

Any experience you can share with me about either of these options would be valuable.

Thanks!

Off to pack more boxes of books.

This entry was originally posted at http://moderate-excess.dreamwidth.org/320120.html. Comment there using OpenID, or here. Either one works for me. Comments are lovely.

Well, here I am. I made it to Springfield, Illinois last night and then an easy drive today. I'm still figuring out the plan of action and learning my parents' routines and how I can best be of use. Socializing will happen once I've gotten a feel for things. More later, as the squash needs checking.

Pictures below the cut because I care. ( Read more...Collapse )

This entry was originally posted at http://moderate-excess.dreamwidth.org/318635.html. Comment there using OpenID, or here. Either one works for me. Comments are lovely.

Thanks to the willingness of my co-conspirator iridium, pie was achieved last night out of available ingredients. It was a total wing-it adventure but it was gooood. Apple pie with streusel topping.

(Pictures to follow when I get back after the market, for which I am late.)

This entry was originally posted at http://moderate-excess.dreamwidth.org/318266.html. Comment there using OpenID, or here. Either one works for me. Comments are lovely.

My parents are getting older, and I've been looking to see how much I can do for them at a remove to supplement the times I am able to help them in person. Last year after Thanksgiving, I found a device for my Mom to help her get in and out of the car more easily as she was having trouble swinging her legs in and out. It's basically a padded swivel seat and she says it helps a great deal.

When I was up there, she asked me to help her put her sock on her right foot, as with her knee and shoulder problems she isn't able to do it herself. I know that my dad helps, but his back has been giving him a lot of pain lately and so I've been looking into various assistive devices. The most promising looking is called the Easy On/Easy off sock aid kit (http://www.colonialmedical.com/easy-on-easy-off-sock-aid-kit-P-7614.html), which looks pretty good, but I wonder how well it would work with her knee socks.

Does anyone have any experience with this or other such devices? There are many out there with straps and handles and such, but this one looks simpler to use, especially for someone with shoulder issues. I would appreciate any feedback y'all might have on this.

This entry was originally posted at http://moderate-excess.dreamwidth.org/317432.html. Comment here, or comment there using OpenID--really, comments rule anywhere.

Just a quick post before I head off to work.

Every time I go away for a while, the cats get up to more mischief than usual. This time, iridium emailed me a picture of The Moo Cat's latest shenanigans. This is what she found when she returned home from work: ( Read more...Collapse )
Thank goodness for kind and understanding room-mates. With smart-phones.

This entry was originally posted at http://moderate-excess.dreamwidth.org/316768.html. Please comment there using OpenID.

I've been thinking about how to write about the brain weasels, and I'm still mulling it over. Most of my friends understand the term and wrestle with their weasels on various levels. The ones that yammer at me the most at the moment have to do with my fluctuating weight--after a magnificent run of losing weight, I've managed to regain more than I'm comfortable with, and it's proving very difficult to reverse. I blame the onset of winter; it seems to be a time for storing up resources and my body is very enthusiastic on that front. But I'm not going to write about weasels right now, because it's morning and my thoughts haven't cohered sufficiently.

The boy cats now have microchips and thus can, in theory, go outside again. I am oddly reluctant to let them out and am waiting for a day when I am home and able to let them back in as desired and reassure them that they still have a home. They have chips because on Friday, my room-mate iridium found that the Moo cat (most likely suspect) had stolen her glasses and left teeth marks on one lens and abandoned them in front of the door where they could be crunched by the incoming termite guys. Yeah. I made the appointment that day and took them in on Saturday.

Work at the market has been... sporadic. I've had excellent days and crappy days, and lately we've had cold weather. My income is not what I would like. I know that I should do something about getting my work into a gallery, but the brain weasels have things to say about that.

Plans have been made to fly to Madison for thanksgiving with the Old Folks. I considered driving, but 4 days on the road to spend three days in Madison isn't a great idea, imho. So I am flying, but booked with an airline going into Madison so at least I don't have to deal with the bus.

Wow. Wasn't that just *fascinating*? Oh the glamour, it never ends. Off to work in the market.

(I have set the preferences for the crossposting from Dreamwidth footer. With any luck, it will appear properly.)

This entry was originally posted at http://moderate-excess.dreamwidth.org/316484.html. Please comment there using OpenID.

Crossposting from Dreamwidth now (when I can make myself write). I'm moderate_excess over there, and if you have a DW account, I'd really appreciate you adding me. At the moment, my reading page there shows a fraction of the entries on LJ, and I'd like to be able to duplicate my LJ list as much as possible.

Thanks!

Upcoming posts I hope to write: finished glass commissions and pictures thereof, fun with cats, French Market follies, recent visitors, and the ongoing adventures of the brain-weasels. Commenting may affect this.

Also, I need mailing addresses for the following people: scarlettina, sillylilly_bird, tn_grrl* (kept getting an error message on your user name), and amusingmuse. I hope you all remember why...

I don't think I mentioned it here, but I agreed to design the pocket program and schedule grid for Chicon 7 in a moment of weakness, flush from the success of doing the Readercon souvenir book. I expected to be able to go to the convention, but in the end it became apparent that there was no way I could do so and I canceled my plans.

I did finish the pocket program and grid, however, and made the rather insane deadline in the face of constant updating of the data. I've gotten a little feedback through comments on lj, but the following was just posted to the concom list by a staffer and I want to preserve it for posterity (and those times of feeling low):

"The thing I heard the most positive feedback about was the pocket program book with the map in the back flap, and that the grids had numbers which allowed quick look-ups for more information."

I fought tooth and nail for those numbers and I feel entirely vindicated. Yay!

The power came back on at 6:15 pm today, which was wonderful. So nice to have air conditioning and a working washing machine. And internet. Oh, sweet internet... So that makes 2 1/2 days without power which, all things considered, isn't that bad an ordeal. The worst part was trying to sleep. Tuesday night when the storm hit, I didn't put my earplugs in because I wanted to hear it if something hit the fan (so to speak). I got very little sleep as I kept waking up at every little noise and the wind was howling around the house. At around 6am I woke up to discover the electricity had gone out (thank goodness for cell phones and battery-powered wall clocks).

Wednesday was spent mostly reading with the cats and obsessively making rounds of the apartment checking for leaks. My landlord set up the generator late in the day and I got out the really long extension cord to run around the house and into my front living room window (the only one in my apartment that a) has a screen that opens and b) is protected by the deep porch. I plugged in the refrigerator, torchiere lamp on a long cord that I carried from room to room like a lantern, and my cell phone charger. Later I plugged in the modem and router, but the cable was down so I unplugged them again and plugged in my big box fan.

The wind was howling down the length of Carrollton avenue and I went out on the porch to watch the trees dancing. The huge old oak in front of the house is an impressive sight when the big limbs start moving, but I was never in fear that they would break. Some trees just as large and old lost that battle and I saw their enormous fallen bulks spanning streets or slotted neatly between houses when I finally ventured out today. The palm trees shook and bent and tossed their crowns and rained fronds down over the roads and neutral grounds and the street became a stream covered in leaves. It was a kind of fairy tale transformation of the familiar into the strange--full of the eerie light of the storm and the sound of the wind in the trees and the rain, and nowhere a car or electric light or man-made sound. The direction of the wind and the break provided by the house and bamboo stand next door made it possible to stay on the porch and feel only the lightest of breezes. I opened the window onto the porch all the way to help with the stuffiness and stillness of the air in the apartment, but without another window open there was only the slightest effect.

My landlord (A) and his wife (D) and three sons went out and played in the water and waded in the stream down to the corner in each direction and back. They reported deep lakes over the sidewalks and reveled in the rain, which had quieted in a lull between storm bands. I was glad I had moved the Camry I'm trying to sell onto the neutral ground, to a spot carefully chosen to be out of the path of any large tree or limb and in an area I knew wouldn't turn to swampy mud. I kept an eye on it throughout and it made it through beautifully. The Prius I parked in the driveway between my landlord's car and truck where it accumulated some leaves but nothing more. Higher ground at exactly sea level.

The water in the street subsided a bit and during one of the longer lulls the intrepid thewronghands and project_mayhem came over and spent some time hanging out and being gracious about the lack of a/c. It was really nice to see them, especially as my ability to go out and seek out social encounters was at a low point. They headed off on their rounds and I went back to my book.

Wednesday night passed much like the previous night, but without the comfort of air conditioning and the ceiling fan. The generator was turned off at midnight and the still, muggy air became quickly oppressive. It was hard to sleep and the wind and the rain, now coming from the opposite direction, rattled the windows and shook the house. It was the hardest night to get through. I eventually slept, but woke up frequently. There were occasional mysterious crashes that shook me out of bed to make more rounds of window checking. Thank goodness for preparation and a good supply of batteries for the flashlights.

Thursday it was clear the worst had passed, and the landlord's family were all out cleaning up the yard and putting things to rights, even when the rain would start up again. They shamed me into doing a modicum of straightening in my own room, putting away things I'd allowed to pile up for months. It's still a disaster, but less so. When I got too hot I sat and drank ice water and read again. At one point I went out to see if the Camry would start (it had needed a jump in order to move it to the neutral ground in the first place) and the battery was dead, dead, dead. I could have called AAA at that point, but figured they were probably busy with more urgent calls.

That evening was lovely and clear and I went out onto the back patio and joined A & D and the kids in a game of cards by candle and torch light. They had just gotten a beautiful and sweet ginger tabby kitten and had it playing in the garden around us. The game was frequently interrupted by the toddler coming by and wanting to grab everything on the table, but it was a nice, relaxing evening. I had planned on dinner with thewronghands after she finished the fitness portion of the evening, but neither of us knew what was in store for her when she agreed to go out on a run with the Hash House Harriers. A nice 4 mile run through the city--that should take about an hour... Hahaha. Not when it's through storm water and up levees and through dense woods and brush along the river and weaving through darkened neighborhoods dodging downed trees and power lines. When she did make it back to her phone and got in touch dinner was really not an option. I only teased her a little about making me worry that she was dead in a ditch, and then I went inside and made myself a salad followed by a bowl of ice cream.

She and project_mayhem came by early this morning and kindly gave the Camry a jump so I could move it off the neutral ground before the tow trucks got to it. Not having access to the news meant I had no idea when the city would lift the permission to park there and on my way out to the car to wait I saw a squadron of tow trucks headed down the street. I still haven't watched or listened to the news despite having had the power on for a whole 5 hours.

Today was the kind of relaxed, laid-back day I enjoy when a friend comes in from out of town and there's no particular plan. The airport reopened this morning and thewronghands' plane was due to leave on schedule, so we had most of the day to just do whatever we wanted. First order was checking my email on her laptop, followed by breakfast. In a city with massive power outages, that can be a challenge. I didn't want to go down to the quarter for breakfast as I assumed it would be mobbed, so we headed off down Magazine. Almost everything was closed and some streets were blocked by trees. We saw a sign for the Laurel Bakery and headed there, but they had only croissants, bagels, and biscuits. A biscuit for me and a can of orangina for thewronghands and we continued the quest. The first open restaurant we saw was Slim Goodies Diner and we pulled over. There we were offered the dazzling choice of scrambled eggs with bacon and hash browns or scrambled eggs with bacon and pancakes. We both opted for the scrambled eggs with hash browns, no bacon, and it was delicious and the server delightful.

After giving up our seats to some of the waiting throng, we headed down to the quarter and stopped at the French Market when I saw people I knew set up. A pleasant time was spent walking the market and talking to people and finding out who had power and who didn't and talking about the whole event. Eventually we headed out of the quarter and up to Bayou St. John where we discovered the Parkway Bakery and Tavern not only had no power but had a downed awning and some other wind damage that I hope was minimal. On to the lakefront where we hiked up the levee and looked at the remaining pools of water from the storm surge, then back along the bayou where we saw egrets and Muscovy ducks (we had to look them up--they are very weird looking and seem like a cross-breed between ducks and geese; we were calling them deese gucks). By this time lunch was in order and after reconnoitering Oak street and finding nothing open, we headed down St. Charles (with a detour for fallen trees) and found ourselves at the restaurant on the corner of Napoleon and St. Charles that opened where Copeland's had been before The Storm. (Yes, I've forgotten the name.) Their power was out, too, but they were serving a limited menu which included catfish po-boys and catfish with etouffee. This was an acceptable thing and lunch was delicious. I was an evil person and suggested Sucre for desert, as we had noted it was open when we drove past earlier. We both had small cups of gelato that we couldn't finish, but oh, was it good, and they had air-conditioning! We arrived at the perfect time, just before the rush of mothers with their small children in tow.

Sadly, at that point I had to drive thewronghands out to Elmwood to connect with her ride to the airport. It was a truly delightful day and a wide range of topics were discussed. I feel enormously fortunate to have had so much time with her--usually her schedule is packed tight with activities but the hurricane forced her to do an unfamiliar thing and just relax. Ha!

When I got home the power was still out and I was ready for a nap. But then the phone rang and a text from my room-mate came in, and in the middle of measuring the kitchen drawer for her the power came back on. Every since it's been laundry and catching up on internet stuff and now writing this post which has to be one of the longest ones I think I've ever written. Suddenly it's almost midnight, and I am working in the market tomorrow.

So there you are, all caught up on my little slice of this particular storm. Friends in outlying areas didn't fare as well, but that's their story. I'll most likely turn the television on for a bit before bed and see what the news has to say. Goodnight, everyone, and thanks for your words of concern through all this.

I'm still here, muddling through with no a/c or internet/cable (oh, woe). The landlord has a generator and I have a really long extension cord, so my fridge is running, the light is on, I can charge my cell phone and the box fan is doing its best under the circumstances.

I've been less get out and be social than I was the last time I rode out a big tropical storm, but times change and my neighborhood is different. I'm different. Much more inclined to stay home, but open to company.

This has to be short as I'm posting from my phone and even with Swype my hand is cramping up. When the internet is back I'll make a proper post.

...run in circles, scream and shout.

Nearing the seventh anniversary of Katrina, we have a mass of swirling clouds in the gulf seemingly aimed directly at us. This sucks on a number of levels including emotional flashbacks. This is not a Katrina-sized event, however, and the pumps, floodwalls, and levees are in much better shape now. It will probably be a cat 1 or tropical storm and we'll get heavy rain. I'll park my car in the driveway or on the neutral ground and we may lose power. I have lots of candles and somewhere I have oil for the hurricane lantern. I have a lot of books I haven't read yet. And my landlord has a generator for the refrigerator, so I'm not terribly worried about losing power. I have absolutely no plans to evacuate, but I did fill up the tank of the car yesterday. Just in case. Because I'm not an idiot. I had to wait in line to get gas and the first station I went to was completely sold out and the second and third had lines too long. I didn't have to go too far to get to the fourth, so that was good. I got a little more food just in case. I did not buy water. I have a slew of containers I can fill with good old tap water should it come to that.

I'll be working in the French Market today because I have to in order to maintain seniority. I've been off for a week for complicated health reasons I don't want to go into here. It will be interesting to see how many people are down there. I imagine the hurricane party people will be out, as the quarter is one of those "safe" places. It does flood when it rains hard, though. I hope they've gotten sandbags for the shop and can get the inventory up off the floor.

I had originally planned to be in Chicago this weekend for Worldcon, but I'm actually relieved that I changed my plans and will be home. It's incredibly stressful to watch something like this from a distance. Those of you who are at the con, have fun, raise a glass for me, and think good thoughts. (Oh, and please be gentle when you critique the pocket program and grid. I had very little time and some difficult circumstances in their creation. I didn't even put my name in them.)

OK, this has been a rambling update post. Just wanted to touch base and let you all know what it looks like from down here. If you need to watch any local weather people talk about the storm, the best one is Bob Breck on local channel 8 (Fox). He's one of the few meteorologists who doesn't give in to the panic mentality and actually talks a lot of sense about what's actually happening and what isn't. He's an odd little man, but he's honest.

OK, time for me to go to work. I'm surprisingly calm.

[update] Perhaps surprising no-one, the Market isn't going to be open today. Patrick just called and said there was nobody down there. I reminded him to get things off the floor at the shop and he said "oh, good idea!" He doesn't have sandbags, but maybe he'll get some now that I've reminded him of what happens when it rains hard.

So I guess I'll be working on the glass design for those windows today. I got a lot done over the past three days and may actually be able to finish today. That would be nice.

Just to let you know that I have lowered the price on my little fish glasses and small bowl over on etsy. Check it out: http://www.etsy.com/shop/nevenah

Probably the best cat portrait I've ever taken. ( Cut to spare your friends pageCollapse )

And, of course, mere moments after posting, etsy went down. *facepalm*

They assure us that it will all be fixed soon.

Please do check back. I want you to see the new stuff.

I'm still working on getting all the glass I have for sale up on etsy. The most difficult part in all of this is the photography. You guys, do you have any freaking idea how difficult it is to photograph this stuff without a professional set-up? And no, I don't have the money or the space to set one up for myself or hire someone to do it for me. So for now, it's a piece of black velvet draped over stacks of stuff in the box room and natural light. A few pieces look pretty spiffy on the kitchen counter, too, but it's a bit of a crap shoot there.

New today: Lizards and a giant squid! Check it out.

ANYway, I'm off to do some grocery shopping (making groceries). More slogging in the picture mines when I get back.

In the meantime, any and all signal boosting for this is greatly appreciated. That link again, for your shopping pleasure, is http://www.etsy.com/shop/nevenah.

I just got back from a week in Wisconsin and the 2,000 mile round trip drive there and back, and I'm about to leave for a 3,000 mile road trip on Tuesday. Yes, I'm crazy. I quit my job driving long distance so... that I could drive the same distance for fun! Yeah!

So, anyway, I'll be headed up to Readercon. I've been searching for contact information for my artist friend in Athens, TN, whose house is at the perfect 1-day drive stopping place, but I can't find it! I also can't remember her last name. I fail.

So I thought maybe I'd go on here (in the middle of the night, so no one will ever see it) and see if anyone in the Chattanooga to Knoxville range of the interstate might have crash space for me on Tuesday night. I don't smoke or snore loudly, and I don't think I have any other bad habits. I can even come bearing goodies from New Orleans.

Please let me know if you can help! Otherwise, it's Motel 6 for me.

Greetings from the Ghost in the Machine. I'm still here, still alive, and still reading LJ faithfully. Still, obviously, wrestling with the ability to update.

So. a series of brief updates:

1) I have a new room-mate. She's great. She's one of the first people I've had living here who really wants to make this her home, too, and we have been working together to create space for her. To that end, we tackled the storage area in the laundry room. OMG, y'all.* I threw out a huge stack of empty boxes that once contained a variety of products from popcorn poppers to printers, hauled out Mardi Gras beads by the bag (and bag, and bag...), sorted out all the obsolete electronics I'll never use and don't need, found the boxes of old St. Nicholas Magazines and took them out and put them on shelves, cleaned out all the old paint cans and other chemical detritus left on the shelves from the previous owners, put all the boxes of National Geographics on those shelves, sorted out all the odds and ends I don't need that could go to charity, pulled out several boxes of old Playboy magazines I'm hoping someone might pay for, went through the packing supplies in my box room and transferred a healthy proportion to the laundry room, and cleaned and swept and re-stacked what was left. All in one day. The transformation is amazing. I'm wishing we'd taken "before" pictures. The plan is to shift more stuff from the box room to the laundry room so that it becomes a use-able space for her to store her own things.

I should point out that my room-mate worked tirelessly along-side me, taking stuff as I handed it down (the storage space is at the top of a ladder), helping me decide whether it went or stayed, did the bulk of the cleaning after the paint cans were gone, and put most of the boxes on the shelves. She is a hero of the revolution and I couldn't have done it without her.

Yesterday, I took an entire car-load of beads to The ARC of Greater New Orleans, which works with developmentally disabled adults. They use the proceeds from the sale of Mardi Gras beads to fund some of their programs. Then I took a car-load of donations to Bridge House, which is a center for helping people with substance abuse issues. They are not religious, and do a pretty good job. I put all the computer stuff on the front porch and contacted someone on Craigslist who said he wanted old computers. He was supposed to come yesterday to pick it up, but didn't. I'll contact him again today to see if I can get rid of it.

2) The cat situation had a little set-back the other day, when Beamer jumped up on my lap and proceeded to pee on me. It was a nice, steady stream, so it's not a bladder issue. I surmised that she was having difficulty getting to the litter box because Spot and The Moo Cat like to chase her, so (after I put my clothes and lap towel in the laundry), I filled a plastic bin with litter and put it down in my room and closed it off to the other cats. Beamer used it immediately and seemed quite pleased with it. I've brought in cat food and water for her and continue to keep the other cats out and she seems much more relaxed and calm now. She even played with a toy yesterday! It's a little tricky at times keeping up the segregation, but I think it's good for her. I may consider allowing brief, supervised visits by The Moo Cat at some point, but they are adolescent males and don't understand that they shouldn't chase the elderly cat.

3) I had an amazing WisCon and the Tiptree Auction went very well. I spent some time at home taking care of things around the house for the folks, and having serious discussions about the future. In the interests of my being able to drive up to see them instead of flying, and because my old Camry wagon is now 19 years old, they bought a red 2006 Prius with 146,000 miles on it for themselves to drive around town and gave me their old  2005 Prius with 47,000 miles on it to drive long-distances. I drove it home (through an amazing storm that hit just north of Blytheville), and it's great. I'm heading back to Madison tomorrow for my high school re-union (33 years!) and it will be nice to not have to worry about the car falling apart or bankrupting myself for gas.

4) While I was gone, my landlords finished remodeling my bathroom. They had started two weeks before, and I had to make do with using the powder room and taking sponge baths, with the occasional shower upstairs in their apartment. When I got back, I had a beautiful new bathroom with marble tiles on the floor, new sink and bath-tub and subway tiles, and a gorgeous purple and white paint job (I picked out the color to match my towels). They really did a fantastic job, and it was all finished before my room-mate arrived.

5) I'm still working at the French Market, but Sunday we had temperatures in the mid 90's and I had a terrible time. Yesterday the heat index was 105 and I was glad I had the day off. With temperatures today scheduled to top that, I canceled the market for today, too. I suspect I'll be down there fewer days during the summer, but I kind of expected that. I still have work to do on a glass job, and I'm putting in a bid for another.

6) I designed the Readercon souvenir book again this year, and I think it came out rather nicely. I'll be driving up for the convention, which should be fun.

OK, that's enough for now. Keep writing, and I'll keep reading, and who knows, every once in a while I'll open up a window here and let you peek through the curtains.


*Yes, I really did just say that. It seems appropriate. Live with it.

OK, so supposing I got a wild hair and decided to go to 4th Street Fantasy, who else is going, and do any of you have space in a room? Also, maybe a ride to Madison afterward.

I imagine this will come pretty out of the blue to most of you, as I haven't been very good at sharing my thought processes here lately, but I gave notice last week on my art driving job.

My heart hasn't been in it for the last several shows, and I needed a change. 4 years is a long time to do something that physically grueling, and without a single pay raise in all that time and a growing sense of alienation, I decide enough was enough and it was time to part ways. I sent Kate an email late Wednesday night and I haven't heard back from her at all. However, there is a new ad on Craigslist for my position, posted on Friday, so I think that's a pretty sure indication that she got my email. It was a very positive email, too, no bridges burned, but I think it says a lot about how she's been treating me that she hasn't even deemed it worth responding to me. The last straw for me was her decision to have someone else work for her at Jazz Fest, and telling me about it only a few days ahead of time. No discussion, no question, just "oh, hey, you're not working." Yeah.

Anyway, I'm working more often in the French Market and making decent money (at least as much as I would make on the road, if not more) and getting to go home every night. I also went with Gerry to bid on a job reproducing two antique acid-etched windows for a house here in NOLA, and we got the job! It's a lot of work, but it's good money and it will be an enjoyable challenge. I feel good about having more time at home to work on my art. And there's the almost total lack of a social life that needs to be rectified. I've been hanging out with a bunch of vendors from the market, and it's been really fun. It will be nice to get into a routine with them, instead of scheduling around my trips.

I'll still be going to WisCon (I have my tickets!) and Readercon, and I'm planning a trip to Madison at the end of June for my high school re-union. I wish I could go to 4th St. Fantasy, but I do need to work sometime in order to pay the rent. Alas. I have some hope for Worldcon, and I have a supporting membership.

I'll miss the friends I've made on the road and some of the pleasures of travel. I won't miss the brutally hot shows, setting up and tearing down in all kinds of weather, driving 12-16 hour days, and being treated like a second-class citizen (whoops, did I say that?).

Time for the next phase of my life, one hopefully with a lot more of my own art-making in it, and better success marketing it and making more of a living from it. This new commission is a step firmly in the right direction, and it feels like a big thumbs-up from the universe telling me I made the right decision!

I was going to make a mopey post today about the fact that the Moo Cat seemed to have disappeared. I came home from the most recent show to find that when the room-mate moved out on Sunday, the Moo Cat also vanished. My landlord and his son went out that evening to let the cats in, and could only find Spot. When I got home on Monday, I called and called, and the Moo never answered. I went out several time that night and the next morning, but nothing. I made up signs and posted them all over the neighborhood (in the pouring rain) and called for him as I went. Nothing. Then today, as I was paying for my groceries at the Roberts up the street, my landlord called.

"Are you still looking for Moo Cat"
"Yes!"
"Well, I'm lookin' at him. He's in the neighbor's yard, behind a car. He's stalking something."
"Keep an eye on him, please, I'm on my way!"

When I got home, I jumped out of the car and headed behind the neighbor's house. I didn't see him, but I called and heard his little meow and soon he was snaking his way through the fence from another yard. He ran right up to me and I picked him up and snuggled him. I carried him back down the driveway, at which point he started to freak out a bit and struggle, but I hung on to him and got him in the house. As soon as he was inside, he relaxed and trotted straight into the kitchen to the food bowl. As I cut up my watermelon, he came over to me at regular intervals to slam his head into my leg and get petted, then back to the food bowl. He and Spot also spent some time having a little love-fest, including head licking, butt sniffing, and purely ceremonial paw swatting. He climbed into my lap when I sat down at the computer, and Beamer came over and sniffed him and sat next to him. Which is pretty amazing right there. Spot also came over and for a little while, all three of them were within inches of each-other and there was no feline drama at all!.

Now the Moo Cat is reclining in all his spotted length on my bed. I just glanced over at him and he's asleep. Aww. I tell you what, I don't think I want to let them out after this. I was so worried and miserable!

In other news, met with R____, who came to look at the room for rent, and I think it went quite well. She told me she'd spent a fair amount of time being driven around to look at places she didn't want to live, and she met my landlady who told her she could pick the colors the room would be painted once all the repairs are complete, so those bode well for me, I think. I'll know in a few days.

In other news, the Houston show went well, even though the weather sucked rocks. It was hot and very windy the first day, then windy with threats of torrential thunderstorms the second day, and they let us pack up early. It started to rain in earnest after being all indecisive about it for a couple of hours, but fortunately I was just finishing loading the van and nothing got wet. I picked up a few things for the kitchen at IKEA, and discovered they had the light green glass votive holders I couldn't find before, so I bought a few.

I've been cleaning and tidying and settling back into my home, and it's very nice. I'll be home for a few weeks before the next road trip, and I'm looking forward to that. The box room needs sorting, and I'd like to set up a little photo area for the glass. I'm not, however, looking forward to the bathroom being out of commission. Ugh. I just hope they'll be able to put it back together in fairly short order. I spent a bit of time in Home Depot today, looking at bathroom fixtures and bath-tubs (and kitchen sinks and faucets--one can always hope) and getting an idea of how much they cost. Not as much as I had feared, it turns out. Very nice porcelain-glazed metal tubs can be had for $125. Color me surprised.

Work at the French Market tomorrow, which is why I was at the Home Depot to begin with. I'm trying to get a tall canvas-back director's chair, and they seemed to be available at the HD, but alas, it was a web-only special. I left chair-less. It appears I'll have to order one, which I don't like to do without a chance to try one out. Unless you have an idea where I could get one. Web searches are tricky; several results seem to indicate you can get one at a local store, but that turns out to be an illusion in most cases. And I'm not looking to spend more than $50, so that's Brookestone right out.

Well, my view is now blocked by a fat black cat who wants her lap back, so I'd better finish up.

That's the news from my restored household. How's by you?

Hello. I'm still here. Still reading all your posts, just been in a period of internet quiet.

So, I've been working a *lot* lately, both on the road and in the French Market and the pen shop. The market has been pretty good recently, and this has allowed me to actually buy something I've wanted/needed for over a year. That's right, I have a smart phone. After much research and back-and-forthing, I chose the Droid Razr. In Purple. To match my fountain pen. Yep, that's me, feet planted firmly in two eras. It's very shiny. I've had it two days and am figuring out how to make it dance. So far I've gotten it set to Swype, which I love, downloaded Dropbox, downloaded a Dr. Who ringtone, figured out the navigation feature, and a few other things. Stuff I have not figured out yet: how to get it to use a different ringtone for text messages vs email notifications and how to turn off the 4G feature so that it will connect to the web only if there's a wifi connection available (which will also, I understand, save on battery life). If you know the answer to these, please do let me know.

Otherwise, life goes on. Smudge the cat disappeared as suddenly as he showed up, and I suspect he was re-claimed by his owners, or by someone else. I'm not terribly sorry, as he was an incredibly destructive and disruptive influence on the household. Spot and Moo Cat are integrating nicely, and Beamer has actually tolerated the Moo Cat on my lap next to her (!), although there was some ear-flattening and growling when he leaned a little too close.

I'm trying to get out more, socially, and have made friends with a bunch of people from the market. They hang out at a local gay bar, which is pretty small and low-key and features art on the walls, so I may go there after work more often. The only drawback is the cigarette smoke.

My current room-mate is leaving April 15 (while I'm at the Woodlands, TX show, of course), and I am corresponding with someone who sounds like an ideal candidate. We'll meet after I get back from Woodlands.

(I feel I should have used bullet points. Oh, well. I trust you to visualize them if you want.)

The landlord is planning to tear out my bathroom (the only one with a bath/shower) as soon as the room-mate leaves, so I will be shower-less and living alone until that gets finished. The floor is cracking, and the state of the underfloor is, apparently, alarming. He wants a month and a half to do the work, so we're shooting for a June 1st availability date for someone to move in. In the meantime, they've offered the use of their shower upstairs. I'm still a little uncertain about this.

I'm still making my own bread, and trying to eat just one slice a day. I'm back on the eating plan, as I've managed to regain some of that lost weight. So far so good, and I'm down 5 lbs from starting it up again. Today I made several batches of my low-fat hummus, so I'm well and truly back on track. I'd forgotten how delicious it is, so I'm looking forward to having it for lunch again. Dinner has been huge salads of spinach, red bell pepper, seedless cucumber, 2 oz feta cheese, and a quarter cup of toasted sunflower seeds. Yummy, and pretty balanced. I like the seedless cucumber and am looking forward to having some with the hummus.

So that's the current state of things. I've had things to say over the months, but not found the will to put fingers to keyboard. I have, however, been keeping a paper journal for about a month now, so I may post some highlights from that.

OK, off to a baby shower. Love to all of you (whoever is still reading and even those of you not. But how would I know?).

Hi there! Posting from not at all sunny Orlando (because it's the middle of the night). I'm ensconced in a Super 8 motel with a decent wifi connection (but not the Motel 6 I'd planned to stay at, as they only had smoking rooms when I arrived) and a pretty nice big bed, but the weirdest bathtub I think I've ever seen. It has the drain on the side, and it's elevated about 6 inches above floor level. The bottom is oddly flexible, and feels as if they installed it over nothing, when it's meant to be installed over a subfloor. It made a lot of odd flexing sounds when I shifted my weight. Good thing I'm on the first floor.

So I didn't decide on the audio books for this trip until this morning, as I am completely off my rhythm after 2 months at home. I finally settled on three books; one stand-alone (I think) and two in a series. The first is Throne of the Crescent Moon by Saladin Ahmed, and the others are Habitation of the Blessed and The Folded World by Catherynne M. Valente. I admit I'm a bit prejudiced toward these books as one of the authors is a good friend, and the other is someone I've met a few times and who strikes me as a lovely person. Also, I heard good things about his book from people whose opinions I general trust.

So I'm listening to Saladin's book first, and I'm really enjoying it. Oddly, even though it is set in a non-western world, much of the story feels comfortable and familiar. It took me a while before I realized that it reminded me strongly of the Jim Butcher Dresden novels. The protagonist fights evil with magic, and has a kind of world-weariness and perpetual longing for a normal life and a love out of reach that seems to haunt gumshoes across time and genre. But the world Ahmed creates is a wonderfully rich and beautifully realized middle-east of the past. There are just enough cookie crumbs for someone with as slapdash an understanding of world history as myself to pick up to clue one in on the geographical area and time period in which the book is set, but without any hand-holding or expository lumps. I'm about 3/4 of the way through it, and I'm very glad to have chosen this book for the drive down.

Tomorrow I head for Ft Lauderdale to pick up a member of our group, and thence to Coconut Grove, where we'll be setting up for the show this weekend. It's going to be a long day tomorrow, so I think I'd better sign off here and get to sleep. With any luck I'll be able to connect at the Mutiny Hotel, and update tomorrow night. If I'm not dead, of course. Good night!

Wow. After reading this: http://www.fastcompany.com/1809674/the-return-of-livejournal, I think the migration to DW might be in my best interest. I emphatically do not want LJ to go the way of FB and if it does, I'm getting off the bus.

I've had an account on DW for quite a while now, though it's been dormant pretty much since I created it. I've just been going through and adding people from here who have accounts there, but I suspect I'm missing a few. As people post, I'll try to add them.

I have a different journal name over there. I'm moderate-excess, which is the name of the journal I set up here for talking with local people about a smaller subset of interest. I let that lapse when it became too much to maintain two journals, and when my interests in those original subjects began to wane.

Please feel free to subscribe to me over there. A version of this post will go up on DW, and then I have to figure out this whole cross-posting thing.

In a little while I'll be out the door and on my way to the wilds of Slidell for (insert secular holiday of choice here). I've been baking bread (seeded rolls, challah, and spiced pumpkin bread) all day and getting ready to make cookie dough to take with me. I also did the layout for the Smith Family holiday newsletter again, and got it to my brother *before the 25th*! That's gotta be a record. Maybe next year we'll shoot for the week before X-mas rather than the day before.

Oh, and I ordered a new laptop. My holiday present from the folks. Thanks Mom & Dad! It's a Dell Latitude, and I'll post pictures and specs later. Right now, it's dough making time!

Play nice, y'all (I'm looking at Moo Cat and Smudge here) and I'll see you Monday morning.

(Oh, and I guess I'd better use this icon while I can.)

I went back to the gallery today to deliver some gift boxes for my little origami crane ornaments (selling well), and took the opportunity to take some additional pictures of the wave vase. I'm putting up four different views to give you an idea of how the patterns overlap and interact.

( PicturesCollapse )

I mentioned making these in my last post about glass, and  pameladean expressed an interest, so here they are. I'm giving you the right of first refusal, Pamela!



In the gallery, they'd go for $65 for the pair, but I'd be happy to work something out for you. I have two more of these, and then that's it; this glass isn't available in the US anymore (I found them in the UK, but it would be too costly to try to get them shipped).

I posted a bit about this on FB, but haven't gotten around to doing a proper post here until now.

I mentioned the cat I was calling the Volunteer Cat (AKA Spot) in a post quite a while ago. I did budget money to get him checked out by the vet, who proclaimed him healthy if a bit undernourished, and already neutered. So he was definitely a house cat. (He drinks out of the bathroom sink exactly like Harley used to, but his paws are considerably dirtier.)

In the week before I took him to get checked out, another cat started showing himself--a little skinny thing, white with black spots--and making his presence known (loudly). The landlord started calling him The Sheriff because he was always yelling at people (I don't know) but that just didn't seem quite right to me. Because of the Holstein patterns, I started calling him The Moo Cat. (At the time I thought he was a girl cat, and added the name Mimi. When the vet determined he was a male, I changed it to MeeMee, but I mostly just call him The Moo Cat.) 

On the day I brought Spot home from the vet and into the house, The Moo Cat tried to come in with us. And when I kept him out, he sat outside on the windowsill and howled. I think I lasted about 5 hours before I opened the window and he waltzed right in as if he owned the place. Great. Now I had two new cats. After keeping them indoors for a couple of days I relented to their constant pleading and let them out during the day. They came back in the evening and sometimes begged at the window to be let in early, so that seemed to be OK. 

I went away for a weekend to do a show in Florida, and when I came back I found that another black and white cat, suspiciously similar to The Moo Cat, had started hanging out on the porch and howling at the doors and windows. He came right into the house with me when I opened the door. I had just finished a very long drive and I was tired. I considered letting him stay, but then the Moo Cat went over to my big chair and peed on the slipcover. I couldn't deal with that and put the both of them out. (And sprayed the slipcover and chair with Nature's Miracle.)

The next day I let the Moo Cat back in; his companion wasn't in sight and I had de-stressed a bit. The other cat showed up soon, though, and make quite a racket and tried to come in every time the door was opened. On the third day I finally relented and let him in. There were no further incidents with the chair. He acts as if he's always lived here (in truth, both the black and white cats do) and has turned out to be at time aggressively affectionate, attempting to stuff his entire head up my nose a couple of times. He loves to sleep with me. It took me a few days to come up with his name, but I finally settled on Smudge. The pictures will explain why. He can be a little boisterous and a bit bitey when playing with The Moo Cat, but all in all he's a fine cat. He loves to play and will drag the ribbon-wand toy around with him from room to room and will come and drop it at your feet. Collectively, I refer to the two black and white cats as The Brothers Moo, even though I haven't had him checked by the vet and thus am not entirely sure of gender.

So now I have three new cats. And Beamer is Not Amused. I had hoped she'd enjoy a little company, and I think if it had been just Spot she would have adapted better. She does not like having the rabble around her and spends much of her time in my desk chair or on my lap if I'm sitting in it. She has touched noses a few times with both Spot and The Moo Cat, but she growls at Smudge and usually growls at all of them if they get too close. It's an uneasy detente, but at least none of them have been aggressive towards her. I am hoping things will calm down and she'll relax. I'm considering some Feliway.

And now, some pictures ( (behind the cut because I care).Collapse )

 

That's odd... Semagic won't open. Hmm.

A few things banging around in my head, so I thought I'd put them down here and see if I can move on.

Some time ago (middle of August, I think), I went rummage sailing looking for a few things for the new room-mate's empty room. Among other things I came across, I happened on a little yard sale on Freret St. The heat was getting to them, so they were loading everything in a truck to take to Goodwill. I was told to pick what I wanted and make an offer. I got a nice cake pan, a clock that turns out to need new works, a few other odds and ends, and a bread machine. They didn't know if it worked--never tried it--so they offered it to me for $1. Sold!

I found the manual on-line, printed it and a few recipes, and gave it a whirl. Yep, it worked. And that first loaf wasn't half bad (too much of a strong molasses flavor, though, and I didn't care for the cumin seed). The next loaf was a total disaster, as I made too many substitutions and the liquids must have been off. I went back to the internet and found a recipe for seed bread that looked good and tried that. I've now made it four times, tweaking it a bit each time, and I'm really enjoying it.

I used to bake a lot of bread, when I was in my teens and twenties. I enjoyed the smell of the yeast, and the feel of the dough as I kneaded it on the old kitchen table. Of course, it took all day and a a lot of wrist strength. I have the time, but not the healthy wrists, and even though I also have the Kitchen-Aid with the dough hook, I haven't really felt like making bread the old-fashioned way again. I am really enjoying the machine, though. There's something wonderful about putting everything in the machine around noon and having freshly made bread for dinner. It is difficult not to eat too much of it right away, of course, but I am managing.

The current recipe is a whole wheat bread with added rye and buckwheat flour, as well as some wheat bran and corn meal. The seeds I'm adding are sunflower, sesame, toasted pumpkin, and flax, along with a little millet. I think the next batch will have more sunflower seeds, as I like the taste.

I know a few of you out there also have bread machines. Any good recipes to share?

___________________

I've been rattling around the house for the past few days, not feeling like going out and being social or doing much of anything. I'm still all broken up about Harley, but I don't know if I'm ready to write about it. Maybe I don't need to. The volunteer cat has been putting in a good bid to become a member of the household, but I'll need to save some money to get him/her checked out and given a clean bill of health. That is, of course, if it would be ok with the kid upstairs, who is very fond of him/her (I used to be able to tell easily--now I'm not so sure). Beamer is, I think, a bit lonely. She has been running around playing with rubber bands (not eating them, thank goodness) and a stray earplug, and yesterday I got out the cat wand and she went after the ribbon like a kitten. She played with it for a little while tonight, too. I may get her a fuzzy ball. Maybe her personality is starting to develop after all these years in the shadow of the big boys. (That's her in the icon from about seven years ago.)

___________________

I went to the doctor yesterday so of course my finger started feeling better on Tuesday. I went anyway, and he sent me to get an x-ray and put me on a course of cortico-steroids. I'm hopeful that will at least help with the tendonitis flare-up I've been having. He also gave me a set of exercises to do to strengthen the finger and I've been trying. It's amazing how much I've compensated for not having the use of my index finger. Even now, I am typing entirely without using it at all. It'll have to be a conscious effort to bring it back on line.

___________________

I've been trying to work on some glass, but my heart just isn't in it. And I went looking for my large sketchbook today to get started on the new octopus drawing I did in it, and I can't find it. Not only that, but I don't have a good mental image of where I saw it last, which worries me. I'll look again tomorrow and maybe get a little straightening done while I'm at it. My room really needs it.

____________________

Still trying to figure out how to convey to the room-mate that it's the polite thing to do to leave the bathroom door open when it's available for use. I have already made a point of it on several occasions, but it doesn't seem to have sunk in. She's done it *twice* this evening alone! Gah! I *hate* that. It's one of my biggest peeves, especially in the morning. I hate lying in bed, my bladder bursting, waiting for the bathroom, only to discover she's not in it. I really, really, hate it. With a passion. I don't want to be a bitch about it, but really! Fuck. Don't even get me started on the messes she leaves in the kitchen. It's only til April. It's only til April...

____________________

The weather here has been beautiful and I have the windows open. That's a good thing, yes. I sat out on the porch today with VC (volunteer cat), AKA Spot, on my lap. It was nice, and he/she didn't want me to leave. Tomorrow I may try to get out of the yard.

And that's the news from Lake Woebegon.

I can't tell you guys how touched I am by your generosity. I honestly wasn't expecting much, but you, my friends, have really helped. I have a little over half of Harley's final vet bills, and it's a huge relief. The amount doesn't seem quite as insurmountable.

Is there something I can do for those of you who have donated to the cause? Some service or tangible thing... I know others have put up fiction in exchange for financial help, but I haven't written anything in years and I'm not sure that would really be such a reward in any case. Ha! I could send New Orleans-themed packages (coffee, beignet mix, beads) or baked goods, or bring something with me if I'm coming to your city. Let me know, please.

And if you haven't donated and would like to, I could definitely use a little more help getting to my goal.

Here's that button.

So yesterday was a bad day. I think you can understand. But I wasn't the only person being dealt a crappy hand.

I had committed myself to working at the gallery on Magazine street for Art for Art's sake yesterday, so I pulled myself together as much as possible and went and did my job. (I also sold the new octopus vase I didn't get a chance to photograph.) On the way home, I picked up a chocolate cupcake, because damn. Sometimes you just need a chocolate cupcake, yanno?

Just after I turned onto Carrollton my phone rang; it was my room-mate, asking if the white car in front of the house belonged to one of the landlords. Um, no, and why do you ask? Because they might need to move it to get the tow truck in. There had been an accident right in front of the house. When I got to my block, I found traffic being routed around, so I had to park on the side street. There was a police car in the travel lane with its lights on, and when I came up the sidewalk, I saw my old neighbor who is selling his house on the phone, and a big SUV with severe front end damage up against the curb. What I thought at first was the neighbor's car in his driveway turned out to be the other vehicle involved in the accident--it had been hit from behind and pushed over the curb, grass and sidewalk, and had partially crushed the big iron security gate across the neighbor's driveway.

There were a few people standing on the corner, and a woman and a man on my front steps, the man talking on his cell phone. As I came up the walk I saw the woman go into the house with my room-mate. It turns out that they were the drivers of the second car and they had been coming to visit the room-mate. They'd just slowed down, had their blinkers on, and were pulling over into the parking spot in front of the house when the other driver slammed into them. Witnesses said he'd been going a pretty good clip when he hit them. He had been taken to the hospital. Apparently, alcohol was a factor.

The landlord called to find out what was happening. He and his wife had also been out for the evening and had gotten a call about the accident from their teen-aged son, who was home. He'd called the neighbor, too, which explains why he'd been there (the neighbors moved out quite a while ago). They arrived not too long after, and we stood around sympathizing and looking at the flattened plants and marveling that the second car had gone through a pretty small gap between the big oak tree in the front and the afore-mentioned white car. On closer inspection, you could see a scrape along the rear bumper of the latter, but no real damage.

Eventually, the tow truck came, and after a lot of faffing around and trying to drag the car around, someone had the bright idea to see if it could be driven out of its position. They managed it with a lot of scraping and grinding of metal and a little smoke from the front tire. Somebody came out and swept up all the debris--not sure if he was with the city, or the tow company.

Room-mate's friends decided discretion was the better part of valor, and called a cab to go to the emergency room to get checked out, just in case. I would have driven them, but until I clean out the car, there's only room for one passenger.

I came in and turned on the TV, ate my cupcake, and then settled in with some water and pretzels. The room-mate (I have to come up with a good nick-name for her) came in after her friends had gone and kept me company. We watched a couple of episodes of Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives and chatted about inconsequential stuff, which was about all I could handle at that point. I'd been exhausted when I'd left the gallery, and it all finally hit me like a brick and I turned off the TV and said goodnight at about 12:45.

I hear her moving around in the kitchen, so I'll go ask how her friends are doing.

I hope your weekend is better. (And my sympathies to another friend in California who was also in an accident yesterday, while taking her cat to the vet. She and the cat are ok, thank goodness.)

1996(?)-October 1, 2011. You were a great cat, a wonderful and loving companion. You will be missed.

I'm in Portland, about to get back in the van to drive to Kansas City, thence to the airport and home for a week. The last show of the great traveling Summer roadshow is the following weekend in KC; after that it's one-day drives.

This last weekend has been great fun--celebrated the 50th birthday year and 20th anniversary of dear friends kateyule and davidlevine, met a lot of neat people and saw a lot of old friends. I didn't do half the things I thought I would, but I did do some unexpected things (glow-in-the-dark pirate-themed mini-golf)(which just used a week's supply of hyphens). I finally got to meet lj friend calendula_witch and her sweetie markferrari, as well as e_bourne and markbourne. I didn't have much of a chance to visit with the latter, but had a delightful and funny conversation with calendula_witch and markferrari.

My finger still hurts. I looked it up, and the initial injury was on July 13. WTF, body? I'll be definitely going to the doctor when I get home.

I stayed in Portland today because I thought it would give me a chance to do some last minute things and see a few people I'd missed. Alas, none of that happened. Queries went unanswered, phone calls weren't returned, and here I sit at the computer thinking I should have just left this morning after all. Well, I'll go in the morning and have two very long days of driving. On Thursday evening I'll be home. That will be nice.

I've been home for two weeks and I don't feel as if I've accomplished a damned thing. Which is probably justified. I mainly sat around on my ass and looked at the computer; playing games, reading LJ and occasionally FB, doing crossword puzzles. I did get the internet hooked up, and bought a couple of used TVs from a hotel, got a free TV that needs work (but then, you know all this if you've been paying attention). Sold two little pieces of glass and promised to make at least two more on my return. Bought some books to replace the ones the cats peed on.

Utterly failed on: getting my ex-room-mate to call me back, going to the doctor to get my damned finger looked at, getting my book-design website up and running, reading more than one book, and contacting Patrick at Papier Plume in time to actually do some work for him.

On the other, other hand, I did get out of the house about half the days I was home, I made it out to a movie with friends (Guns, Germs, and Steel, all three parts), had people over here to watch a movie (Amelie), lost some of the weight I'd gained on the last road trip, and stocked up on all the things the room-mate will need to look after the cats.

Why yes, I'm about to head off again. Back to Portland, OR, for the Art in the Pearl show, then staying on for a week for a social engagement. I had thought I might be able to head up to Seattle for a few days after that, but Kate booked my tickets without consulting me and now I'll have to leave that Monday to drive to Kansas City, where I'll be parking the van and flying home for a week. *sigh* It's probably better for my wallet, but I am sad that I won't be able to see some people (lintninja, I'm looking at you).

After the KC show, we'll still be pretty busy, but I'll be able to come home in between shows. That will be nice. I think I need to move stuff around in my work space now that the couch is back in the living room. There's something about either this corner of the room or this chair that aggravates my allergies. I may need to cover the chair or get a new one. Who knows. And yes, I'm rambling. I put color on my hair 17 minutes ago and I'm letting it process. Oh, that's another thing I failed at. I bought a new kind of hair color (only ten minutes!) but then mixed the conditioner into the squeeze bottle instead of the color activator. D'oh! That's $10 down the drain. At least I know this brand and color and I had it on hand. I should have had my glasses on when I was reading the little tiny type identifying the tubes of substance. Does this mean I'm old? Grey hair and reading glasses... Bah.

OK, I'm not really grumpy. My ride is picking me up at 4am to catch my 6am flight, so I may just stay up all night reading. Or I may snooze. Isn't this exciting? Which will it be! OK, it's almost time to go rinse this stuff out. See you on the flip side.

Greetings faithful readers (if there are any left). When last I wrote I was in sunny Seattle looking for people to have dinner with. I am now home (until Thursday). So what's been going on, you ask? Let me get out this handy nutshell here...

Readercon was a blast.

Driving from Boston to Ann Arbor long but uneventful.

Ann Arbor art fair was incredibly hot (several people from the fair ended up in the hospital), and then it rained on the last day during load-out. We have a new booth which is heavier and takes a lot longer to put up and take down. In the process of loading the bundles of steel poles from the frame, I jammed my right index finger. I shrugged it off at the time, as we were trying to get everything in the van without getting it soaked, but it started to really bother me after we'd finished.

The drive from Ann Arbor to Bellevue went well. I was able to stay with my parents the first night, and discovered that apparently every hotel room in the state of North Dakota is booked for the summer. Who knew? I ended up staying in an outrageously expensive room in downtown Jamestown, that had a jacuzzi tub in the bedroom and a swag valence over the bed with a little crown on it. I saw some amazing dust devils in Montana.

Bellevue art fair went well. We stayed withing walking distance, which was nice. My finger was hurting more and more, though, and it was a challenge to write up the receipts.

After the art fair, I stayed with friends (anoisblue and kenhighcountry) who have a beautiful new house on Star Lake in south Seattle. A trip to the drug store netted me a handy little finger brace, as I figured a doctor wouldn't be able to do much other than immobilize the finger, broken or not. I made a few trips north to socialize and managed to see a few people. Lunch and a trip to the Ballard Locks with juliebata, a movie and dinner with holyoutlaw and randy_byers (Cowboys and Aliens: "no cliche left unturned," but a lot of fun), lunch with kate_schaefer, and dinner with Andy Hooper (winolj) and Carrie Root (winolj, iirc). The rest of the time I relaxed by the lake, sat in the hot tub, wrestled with banks on the phone, and went to another movie with anoisblue and kenhighcountry (Midnight in Paris, which I was seeing for the second time and love). Also dinner at the Night Kitchen with Eileen Gunn and  John D. Berry, followed by a Vanguard at a spectacular house in Queen Ann, attended by many of the usual suspects. Have I left anyone out? I hope not. I ran out of energy and didn't organize a big get-together and missed a few people, but may head up to Seattle after the Portland show.

Drove from Seattle to Portland, OR to get the van's emissions testing done and renew the tag, then to Sun Valley, Idaho. It was nearly a  perfect show. The weather was fabulous, the people were all lovely, and Kate brought along a friend who has been working with her in New Orleans. She was delightful to get to know, and wonderful to have helping in the booth. I jammed the finger again at load-out and engaged in some rather colorful language. A trip to the bookstore I remembered (now in a new location and sadly reduced in the used book department) netted me a lovely little limited edition book with illustrations: Creatures by Padraic Colum with drawings by Boris Artzybasheff, number 9 of 300, signed by both author and illustrator. I got it for half-price, which was a really good deal. The illustrations are stunning, the poetry rather less so.

Drove from Sun Valley to Portland. On the state highway leading to the interstate, I drove through a lot of haze, which smelled like smoke from wildfires, but I never saw anything or heard anything on the news.

From Portland I flew home. I could have driven form Sun Valley to Reno for the Worldcon, but the old room-mate had moved out and the new one moved in while I was gone, and I had the feeling I really needed to get home. I'm very glad I did. When I got in I discovered a number of unpleasant things, including that the old room-mate, Al, had stopped scooping the litter, and my desperate cats had resorted to using a pile of paperback books on the floor of my library and the toolbox in my craft closet for their needs. I lost two out of the three October Daye books I'd gotten with my birthday gift certificate as well as an Alexander McCall Smith book, two Sookie Stackhouses and two Dexters. Also lost were the first two Girl with the Dragon Tattoo books. The worst discovery, though, was finding that the new room-mate was giving Harley his pill in half cans of commercial cat food rather than the tiny amounts of tuna I had specified. Despite having reminded Al countless times that he should not feed Harley anything other than his prescription food, apparently he thought it was OK to give him regular cat food anyway. I'm just grateful that Harley doesn't seem to have developed dangerous symptoms from his FUS. As the new room-mate seems to operate on the ask forgiveness, not permission model and has trouble with communicating, I shudder to think what might have happened if I hadn't come back and Harley had gotten blocked up. I also had to do a fair amount of setting things to rights and moving furniture, but the apartment is almost back to normal now.

I felt a bit bad about having so many problems to explain to the new room-mate, who didn't know any better. I should have left an instruction sheet, I now realize. But I suggested we paint her room, which appeared quite dingy, and she eagerly agreed. A trip to Lowe's and a day's labor later and her room is now a buttery yellow, which is much nicer. I also picked up a bookshelf and a little storage tower  for her from the curb.

The finger still hurts. It's been over a month. I called my doctor, but couldn't get an appointment until September, which is fairly unusual for them. I am distressed, as there is glass work I want to do and I don't think I can do my precision cutting with my index finger out of commission.

In an attempt to replace Al's big screen TV, I ended up buying two 27" TVs from a hotel that's upgrading to flat-screens. I didn't realize until I got them home that they reeked of cigarette smoke. I don't know if I can do anything to get the smell out. I also found someone on Freecycle getting rid of a 51" rear-projection TV, so I borrowed a truck and some strong backs and picked up up and brought it home. Alas, the color guns are out of alignment, and the image is warped. Not sure if it can be fixed.

There was a movie night on Tuesday with the Intelligent Conversation Meetup people: a German film, Antibodies (Antikorper). We had a rousing discussion afterward about what worked and what didn't and why.

Thursday I fly to Portland for the Art in the Pearl fair, and then I'll be staying for an anniversary/birthday party the following weekend. I'm not sure if I'll be driving to the next show city (Kansas City) and flying home from there or leaving the van in Portland, then making the long drive just before the show, or taking my time driving back and visiting people along the way. I really need to make up my mind soon.

And, as usual with these things, that ended up being a largish nutshell. Hamlet sized, perhaps. Now to answer some emails and run some errands.

I'm in Seattle for a few days in between shows and really getting into just relaxing and seeing a few people and not stressing. That said, I do want to see folks. I'm planning on attending Vanguard on Saturday night, but have that day wide open. Anyone want to get together?

I appear to have a room-mate. At least until April 15. Now all I have to worry about is the current roomie moving out without letting the cats out, and the transition going well in my absence. I admit to a bit of trepidation about not being here, but it can't be helped. I've removed all my things from the TV cabinet and the coffee tables, all my wine is out of the wine cabinet, all my glass and extra books out of the bookcase in the hall, and I've gotten down my microwave from the storage area and the furniture pads he brought with him. I think everything's set. Tomorrow I'll close the pocket doors to make it easier to isolate the cats during the move.

I leave tomorrow afternoon and won't be home again until after Aug 15. The new girl seems to have a good head on her shoulders. I'll leave instructions on giving Harley his pill and such like. I don't think I'll really count on it until the old room-mate is out and she has moved in. You never know. At least if the worst happens and she can't move in after all, the landlords said they'll take care of the cats.

[edit] I'm really going to miss the big TV and the movie channels. And I'm going to have to have the cable modem transferred to my name. I don't know if that can be done while I'm gone, but I'll have my room-mate look into it. I need to remind him that the router is mine and the cable modem also.

Today I'm attempting to write a journal entry in the morning, rather than thinking about doing it late at night and deciding against it. I think one of the reasons I don't generally do this is that as part of my morning routine, as soon as I sit in my desk chair with my coffee and toast with chevre, Beamer (the fatter of the two black cats) claims my lap. Often she will occupy it for several hours, and I have a hard time kicking her off in order to write. In part because she will then sit on the edge of my desk, in front of the monitor and stare uncomprehendingly at my lap and the keyboard thereon, with occasional attempts to take back the territory. If I wait for her to leave on her own, it's not a problem. (When I sit at the computer, I lean back in my chair and put my feet up on a little cabinet under the desk. The mouse sits on the desk to my right, and when I decide to type something, the wireless keyboard gets moved to my lap.)

So here I am, writing in the morning.

Harley woke me up several times in the wee hours by having a love-fest in my hair. Covering my head with a pillowcase didn't deter him this time and I had to go fully under the covers for as long as I could stand it. And then I had awful dreams with people in parades getting horribly maimed in IED attacks. I woke up out of one at 8 am and decided to get up even though I hadn't gotten to sleep until 3 am.

On the fourth, I worked for a while on the website for Papier Plume (no tricky coding, just adding things to the site) and then shot off an email to someone in my Intelligent Discussion meetup group to see what they were doing. Going to the movies, it turned out. I finished my work, dithered for a few minutes, then headed out for Elmwood. I wasn't thrilled about the choice of movies (they were going to see Bridesmaids and Transformers 3) but I decided I could stand the first as long as I was seeing it with friends.

Can I just say that, as I am not a fan of humiliation humor, Judd Apatow movies are really not for me. I laughed a little, squirmed a lot, and found myself grateful for the romance plotline, as filled with fail as it was. And the woman next to me, who is an otherwise delightful person, comments in a normal speaking voice on the action and scenery. She did it during The Tree of Life, too, but I put that down to the odd venue. Nope. Note to self: don't sit next to her during a movie you actually care about watching.

After the movie, I met the other person who had come (I was late), had a nice chat with him and encouraged him to come to tonight's showing of Memento at my house, and then the organizer of the meetup and I discovered that we were the only people left. I expressed my sincere doubts about seeing Transformers, and he suggested that he was open to seeing something else. I was interested in two films: Super 8 and Midnight in Paris. The former wasn't showing for another hour, and it was only 20 minutes to the latter, so we opted for that.

I'm not going to post a detailed review (partly because I hate to write them) but I will say that while I enjoyed it, my companion said it wasn't as good the second time around, which I can totally understand, and the little inner critic only reared its head a few times to snark about ( spoilerCollapse )but overall it was fairly inoffensive.

I came home to a slightly freaked out Spot, who was outside the fence but was happy to come in when I opened the gate. It's not an impermeable fence by any means, but I think he was disoriented from all the neighborhood explosions and alarums. I petted him for a while and gave him some food, and he was back to himself in short order.

Yesterday I went to the optometrist to have my eyes checked and found that a) more time had passed than I had thought (3 years) since my last exam, and b) my eyes had changed quite a bit and new glasses were definitely called for. I picked out some nice frames that fit my criteria (won't fall off my face and have clip on sunglasses) and happily discovered that they were on sale for 60% off. Of course, my eyes were dilated when I picked them out, and I had a bit of trouble focusing, so I hope they look good when I can see. During the exam, we discussed the fact that I have an unusually large optic nerve, and she recommended that I get a full workup for glaucoma. My eye pressure is fine--even excellent, but she seemed to think there was reason for concern. Huh. I mentioned that my doctor in college had remarked on the anomaly and hadn't seemed to think it was a problem, but hey, that was 20 years ago. Medicine moves on. So I'll see my new doctor when I get home and see if it's possible to get that done without bankrupting me. (Well, maybe not. A quick search shows that it is a known genetic anomaly, and is responsible for a high number of misdiagnoses of glaucoma.)

Last night I made banana bread rather than throw out the over-ripe bananas I hadn't gotten around to putting in my fruit salad. As usual, I ate about 1/4 of the first loaf shortly after taking it out of the oven (in small slices... many many small delicious slices). At around midnight I noticed a small figure on my porch and looked out the window to discover my landlord and family were home from their summer trip to Colorado, and they had brought a muscle car on a trailer which they were backing into the driveway. I went outside, chatted a bit, helped guide the trailer in, and gave them one of the loaves.

Tonight, I have a bunch of the meetup folks coming to see Memento, so I need to clean. Naturally, I am sitting here writing long-winded journal posts. Ha! Work-avoidance at its finest.

Wow, that ended up being longer than I expected. Oh well. It'll end up in the tl:dr category for some people, I imagine. The rest, will, I hope, be at least moderately entertained (or at least diverted).

What I've been doing lately:

Trying to find a room-mate.

Designing and laying out the Readercon Souvenir book. (Done)

Working for Papier Plume in the French Quarter.

Getting to see a few friends as they come through town for various conventions.

Still looking for a new laptop, with a 17" screen at least. Suggestions welcome.

And today, it being a day off, I decided to go rummage sailing, and found a nice wire shelving unit that works perfectly for organizing all my shipping supplies, a set of 5 lb weights so that I can work on my arms, and a sack full of books from a delightful older lady who is selling her big, beautiful house and now must clear out 40 years' worth of accumulated stuff. Meeting her was the highlight of my day--fellow bibliophile, lover of  fairy tales and classic children's literature, art, etc. We had a great chat and I would like to keep in touch with her. She may be moving to an apartment not too far from me, so that would be nice.

A terrific thunderstorm blew through about 3 hours after I got home, and I hope she was able to get everything inside. It came down in buckets, with intense thunder and lightning. My power flickered, just enough to turn off the computer and the cable box, but otherwise stayed on.

The volunteer cat has taken to expecting his dinner when I come home. He's a sweetie. The kid upstairs calls him Spot, and when I called him by it today, he turned around to look at me. His bigger, oranger brother hangs out every so often, but doesn't want attention the same way. And the other day I saw a small black and white cat under the car in the driveway, and a gray and white kitty with a collar on the sidewalk. Spot was in the yard, and acted very territorial. Heh. It all ended peacefully, though, so I am glad of that.

I have an appointment with my optometrist on Tuesday. I'm hopeful I can get a new pair of reading glasses that are not bifocals this time. The ones I have drive me crazy, and have lost their power to let me see in extreme close-up. The drugstore ones work in a pinch, but a few hours of wearing them to work on the laptop or read, and I get a headache.

The cats are well. Harley still stands on my head in the morning when it's time for his pill. No sleeping in for me!

Aaaand I still haven't found a new room-mate. The girl I met last week seemed great, but the apartment is just too far by public transport from where she needs to go every day. *sigh*

And that's the news from the swamp, where it's in the 90's every day, with afternoon thunderstorms.