Thursday This n That

What a world what a world what a world.  I say this frequently as I scroll through the news each morning.  Every day, something else pops up and I wonder what the hell.  Yeah, yeah, I should probably stop reading the news, but I really don't want to get blindsided, so I keep reading it.  Blerg.

So, last night, I had just barely fallen asleep when a sound woke me up.  And I lay there as the sound continued.  Over and over.  It was maddening. You see, a katydid had decided to sing his song of love on the outside casing of our bedroom window.  I got up and walked over to the window.  He stopped.  I walked away, he started up again.  Since Hubs was also now up, I banged on the window and the bug stopped for a moment, but then started right back up again.  Damn horny bug.  I shined a flashlight but I couldn't see where the bug had stationed himself for his concert.  Hubs and I got up, turned on our computers and smoked while we waited for Horny Bug to find somewhere else to announce his intentions to the world.  I was so tired I could cry, but HB was insistent.  Long about 11:30, I went back into the bedroom with a flashlight and tried to see exactly where the horny bastard was.  AHA!  Right there in the upper lefthand corner.  Now, that particular window has no screen and no storm on the outside, so Hubs grabbed a broom, we shut off all the lights and opened the window.  I pinpointed HB with the flashlight and Hubs took a broom to him.  Yay!  Sleep!  

I picked up more potting soil and nutrients for my garden yesterday.  This morning, I continue the repotting, nourishing of the plants.  If I can keep my eyes open.

If you're vaccinated, you can still catch the Delta variant, but everyone needs to get vaccinated so they don't spread the Delta variant.  Crazypants.

And I'm spent.  Seriously.  I can't seem to make my brain work this morning.  Bring on the coffee!

It's Raining Again.

It's raining again.  It has rained every day since the 16th.  Not all day every day, mind you, but enough each day that I'm pretty much over it.  It wasn't supposed to rain yesterday, but I was sitting here when I heard the sky open up and I had to run outside to shift my garden so the still-small plants wouldn't get flatten by the drops.  We fished in the rain on Friday.  Soaking wet, drops falling from the brims of our baseball caps, standing in mud fishing.  Which was fun... but enough already.  Geez.

It reminds me of that part of Men in Black 2 where the gal is all like 'Lots of people get sad when it rains' and K says 'it rains because you're sad'.  I wish that chick would go elsewhere for a while or cheer the hell up.

These days, though, cheering up ain't so easy.  I mean, have you looked at the world lately?  It should be laughable, but it's hard to muster a chuckle when the things you know to be wrong as the same things other people are embracing as right.   And you're watching the country you love swirl the drain while being told there was nothing to love about the country anyway.  :shakes like a dog:

Up is down and right is left and the sun rises in the west.  And we're living an Orwellian nightmare.  Umm... no.  

On Facebook, you get to select the emotion you're feeling for each post - like, love, care, haha, wow, sad, and angry.  I'm often torn between haha and angry.  I like MeWe, where you get to choose like 4 out of a ton for each post.  (Although when the four have already been chosen, you have only those to pick from.)  So, you can laugh and cry and be angry at the same post.  Because that's the world we're living in currently.  Sort of a "Wow, that makes me so angry I have to laugh at it because it's absurd."

We should laugh at the absurd.  And it should also make us angry.  So, yeah, I'm torn.  If, ten years ago, someone told me this is where America would be now, I would've laughed at them.  Yah, sure, ri-ight.  But here we are.  Senile pedophile in the White House with a Ho next in line for the leadership of the free world and a hag in charge of the House.  Openly racist mayor of Chicago.  Pogroms being conducted against Jews in NY and LA.  Millions giving away their freedoms so that maybe, if they're good boys and girls, they'll be allowed to be free again someday down the road.  Umm... no.

Like I said, it should be laughable.  If it wasn't so sad and super scary.

And you wonder why I occasionally write dystopian.  I guess it's my way of saying 'Look, folks, this is where you're headed if you don't stop what you're doing now'.  Railing against the worst.  In a totally Quixotic way, doncha know.  Maybe that's what all writers of dystopian books are/were doing.  We see a future we DO NOT WANT and try, in our own ways, to stop it through fiction.  Orwell is spinning in his grave.  So's Rand.  And Bradbury.  And Huxley.  

UNEQUAL is near future.  This could happen soon.  BLINK OF AN I is distant future.  That could happen down the road a ways.  They don't have to happen.  We have the ability to shift the course.  

So, yeah, it's raining.  Again.  In more ways than one.  

Thursday This n That

Yes, I went out and filled the car and the gas can this week.  Yeah, it was partially because of the pipeline thing.  But the car was down to a quarter of a tank and the gas can was empty anyway.  As little as I drive, this should last me through into June.  I scored, by the way.  A gal at the bank told me that the gas station I usually use had just that morning jumped their prices ten cents to $2.69 a gallon, but the gas station I don't use often was still at $2.59.  Saved myself like $1.50.  Every penny helps.

I hit Wallyworld yesterday. The number of maskless people is climbing.  It was about 30% mask-free and yesterday it was about 40%.  I had fun joking with a couple of old biker-looking dudes that I kept crossing paths with.  We commiserated over the price of beef.  One steak... ONE... cost me $15.  It was something they were calling a 'cowboy' rib eye.  It still has the rib, so it was a smidgen cheaper per pound.  I also picked up a beef roast, discounted to just under $10.  And a pack of burger - 90% lean - for like $10-something.  2.25 pounds of burger... $4.50+ a pound.  umm, yah

I buy the 90% lean because less of a percentage and you're paying for fat that will drain away.  More of a percentage and you lose flavor.  

Because of the prices, I haven't been buying much steak in the past year or so.  (That and a lot of the supposedly good steaks are grisly.)  I got one this time because the annibirthary is upon us.  The steak is for our anniversary.  I'm not sure what I'll do for my birthday.  Except cheesecake.  I bought the ingredients for cheesecake.  I haven't made cheesecake in years.  Yummers.

Which reminds me.  I like to put brandy in my cheesecakes.  So I stopped at the quickie-mart to see if I could get one of those little airplane bottles of brandy.  Nope.  No big bottles of it either.  Damn.  So I asked for Amaretto.  Nope to that, too.  If I really want brandy, I guess I'll have to hit the liquor store/cigarette/bait shop.  I hadn't planned on going anywhere again this week, so... :shrug:

Which reminds me... I got the stuff to make tacos.  Except I forgot salsa.  AND I forget shredded cheese of a variety conducive to tacos.  (Okay... so I got TORTILLAS... it was only the tortillas.)  Perhaps I do need to go back out again.  Heh.

Oh, well.  I guess I should be getting my buns into some kind of gear this morning.  Anything going on in your world?

Going Maskless - a Chaos Diaries Update

Yesterday, I went to Wallyworld.  Walked right in without a mask.  The old gal who was greeting told me it was nice to see someone smiling.  I couldn't see most of her face, but her eyes looked sad.  Again, about a third of the people in there were maskless.  And she had to wear hers or lose her job.  No wonder her eyes looked sad.

Also yesterday, I heard about an MIT study that said masks are ineffective inside (and I'm guessing they would've said outside, too, but that wasn't the point of the study).  I haven't read the study, but I'm also guessing they referenced the paper/cloth masks we're all using and not the heavy duty N-95 suckers.  

I'm at the point in my life where if I get it, I get it.  And if I die from it, you can all point and say 'if only she'd listened'.  I'd rather die on my feet than live on my knees. Actually, I'd rather live on my feet than die on my knees.  Living is always preferable to dying and being on your feet is always preferable to kneeling.  

Speaking of masks, has anyone else gotten to the point where their brain is just filling in people's faces behind the masks?  I was sitting here trying to remember who was wearing a mask and who wasn't, and the interactions I had seemed like no one was wearing a mask, but when I thought about it hard, I realized all the employees had to be wearing masks, so I was filling in faces in my head.  It'll be surprising if I ever run into them without their masks and I was right about how they actually looked.

Toward the end of my dad's life, he contracted Hep-C and he was genuinely worried he'd give it to Mom.  I don't remember if he wanted her to mask up, but I'm pretty sure he wanted her gloved up any time she had to touch him.  I can't imagine.  Poor Dad.  And poor Mom.  Being afraid to touch your own wife and to have her touch you.  It gives me a sad.

The thought of being so afraid of the 'rona that you live your life under a mask staying six feet away from other humans and sanitizing everything around you gives me a sad, too.  And talking to Mom, who's trapped in Halfwit Land* (aka Michigan) makes me sad.  Unfortunately, I think talking to me down here in Freedom Acres makes her afraid for my life.  I wish I could wrap her up and bring her here, so she could see that things are nearly as bad as she's being led to believe.  

Anyway, I'm going maskless unless and until someone stops me and makes me wear one.  (Which is pretty much how I've been all along.  Walmart was about the only place I still wore one until recently.)

And yes, I am totally on board with people having the right to wear a mask if they want to.  I'm just against people being made to live in so much fear they feel they have to... or they feel they need to make me wear one.

Nuff said.

* Halfwit = the current governor of Michigan

You Really Have to Laugh

I did an experiment yesterday.  A friend got warned by FB for saying something they considered 'hate speech', so I posted the exact same verbiage on my page.  (For the record, saying 'boys are idiots' is not hate speech.  Come on.)  She got warned.  I got nothing.  I'm beginning to feel slighted.  I suspect this is because she is someone with a lot of followers and a reach.  I'm no one in the scheme of things, so they don't give a rat's ass if I post stuff.  Hell, I actually swear and junk... without the asterisks.  Most of the George Carlin words and then some.

I did get warned once for sharing something they'd already considered 'bad'  They told me it was bad and that if I shared it I might be considered bad, too, so I should probably think before I dismissed their warning and shared it on my page.  I shared it anyway.  Nothing happened.

FB has become such a joke.

Basically, I'm at the point where every time FB 'fact checks' something, I assume it's true.  My reasoning?  If it wasn't true, they wouldn't be afraid of it and feel the need to tell everyone how untrue it was.  If I want to check whether something is actually true or false, I go over to Duck Duck Go and look for valid sources.  Multiple valid sources, usually.  I don't rely on FB to tell me the truth.

Speaking of which, a page I follow posted a meme this morning.  The meme showed a see of exactly the same face looking up into the sky and chanting FB's COVID-19 verbiage, which had then been tagged with the same verbiage and then tagged with the same verbiage again.  The meme was tagged with the same verbiage.  Which was hilarious.  

A while back, someone posted something that talked about being unable to understand how a senile pedophile and a high-priced call-girl could've received so many votes.  FB fact-checked it with 'he's not a pedophile!'  I found it incredibly funny that they didn't fact-check his senility or her being a hooker.  Apparently, you can say he's an addled minded old fart and she's a ho, but for godsakes, don't call him a pedophile.

You really have to laugh at this shit.  It's comedy gold, people.

I'm so sad Carlin died.  He'd be calling all of this out, dragging it into the light and showing how astronomically stupid all of it is.

Seriously, though, the only appropriate response to this shit is to laugh at it.  Gretchen Halfwit now says children aged 2-4 have to wear masks.  You can't get kids that age to keep their clothes on and you want to mask them up?  That's going to go over well.  A comedian back in the '80s... I want to say either Robin Williams or Howie Mandel*... has a bit about their kid taking off all their clothes and running around screaming 'LOOK AT ME!  I'M NAKED!'  Keep a mask on that, you silly twatwaffle.  

Sure, it's serious.  Our country is swirling the drain and headed right for the septic tank.  People are dying.  Others are going broke and still others are killing themselves.  Maybe if everyone had laughed at this shit from the very beginning, it wouldn't be as bad as it is.  I don't know.  All I know is if I don't laugh at it now, I'll go nuts.  

*Yes, that Howie Mandel.  He was a comedian before he was a gameshow host.  I still repeat some of his stuff.  It was that memorable.  He was also an actor on one of the most highly-rated medical dramas of the time - St. Elsewhere.  Look it up.

An Afternoon at the Lake

Hubs and I were out at the lake yesterday, drowning some worms.  We won't talk about how they've totally harshed my favorite fishing spot.  (After they harshed my original favorite fishing spot by closing it entirely.)   We only drove through there and decided not to bother.  We went to what used to be my third favorite spot.  The sun was high and hot, which doesn't really make for good fishing, but the only actual goal yesterday was to be out at the lake and to stare at bobbers. 

So, there we were when a father and two small children come along.  The kids are swimming and floating and the boy has his own little fishing pole.  They were over there.  They didn't bother us and we didn't bother them.  

After a while, the little girl starts picking her way along and suddenly, there she is next to me.  Pretty little blonde girl in her pink lifejacket.  I say hello and ask her if she was being very careful.  (Because I'm a mom.)  She immediately strikes up a conversation.  The fish weren't biting, so I reeled in and let her talk.  Boy, she could talk.  Reminded me of me at that age.  

After a while of telling me all sorts of things - about her dad's boat and the cabin they own and her brother and her sister and mom's headache and.... you get the point - she tells me she's in first grade.  Cuz she got left back.  I tell her 'that's okay, you'll catch up in no time'. - because I could clearly tell she was a bright little girl.  She solemnly tells me that she got left back because they couldn't do much school last year.  Because there weren't enough teachers and they had to have two grades in the same class.  And that her mother held her little brother back so they wouldn't end up in the same grade.  Cuz that would be weird.

Meanwhile, Hubs caught a fish.  A 12.5 inch bass.  Not big enough to keep, certainly.  I took the pliers over to him to get the fish off the hook and then called the girl over.  I let her pet it and convinced her to touch its mouth (bass have no teeth, per se, but sandpapery lips.)  Then she was off again, talking.  

After a while, her father wandered over and asked if she was bothering us.  "Has she told you her life story yet?"  Dad knows his girl apparently.  I told him she was fine and that she got to touch a bass.  Apparently Hubs' bass was the only one any of us caught.  

In the times when I could get a word in edgewise, I told her about how my daddy used to take me fishing when I was a little girl.  She doesn't like to fish.  I told her some other things about when I was a little girl.  She asked if we had a TV.  Umm, yes, but we didn't have a color TV until I was ten.  She nodded sagely and said something about there not being TV's before then.  I told her there were TV's but not cell phones or computers.  Shocked, she was.  

Too funny.

Anyway, we fished for probably another 30-45 minutes and headed off.  The family was already gone.  The girl said they were leaving Monday night, and yesterday was Monday, so I'm guessing they needed to get back to pack the car.  I never did ask her name.  She never offered it.  Which was good.  She actually didn't give me any identifying information.  Which was also good.  Sure, she talked to strangers, but all-in-all she was a good girl.  

On the way home, Hubs and I talked about her.  She's one of a huge generation of kids who, because of this chaos, are behind the curve of where they should be.  Kids who didn't get to finish school last year because of the 'rona.  A nation of children 'held back' in more ways than one.  

After we got home, something occurred to me.  I'm old enough to be that girl's grandmother.  If Owl had a kid when she was twenty, the kid would be seven now.  :shudder:  I'm too cool to be a grandma.  (Okay, maybe not cool.  Too mentally young?)

It was an interesting trip, to say the least.  We both needed some lake time, even if we didn't catch more than that one fish.  

Sunday Update - Week 16

 Hello again.  Sixteen weeks into 2021.  The weirdness continues and we're holding our own.

I got back to work on writing Friday night.  Duke Noble 2 is on its way.  Between Friday night and last night, I got out just over 3200 words.  Yay.  Already has a twist.  Heh.

I really need to do some marketing and have a sale.  I'll see what I can do this week to make that happen.

In other writerly news, I received the last proofs and now all of my books are available in paperback form.  In addition to the Kindle form.  I'm still waiting on the author copies of RHI, but those should be here tomorrow.  :fingers crossed:  I have at least two people who want to buy a copy.  Maybe a third, but I haven't talked to her yet and I probably won't see her for another couple weeks.  

It wasn't a great reading week. Only finished one book.  And the Zane Grey I was reading got set aside for another time because I just wasn't into it.  I picked up a fantasy instead.

In baking news, I got a wild hair and created my own recipe.  Chocolate Walnut Upside-Down Cake.  It was awesome.  So I posted the recipe on FB.  Except I forgot to put down something when I wrote the recipe - mini chocolate chips.  Oops.  I bet it's still good without them.  (corrected recipe below.)  I also did a batch of granola bars.  And it's not baking, but I made a vat of beef stew yesterday.

On the activity front, I did something 5 out of 7 days - skipping Friday and Saturday.  The weather was chilly and wet, so I used that as an excuse.  the other 5 days, I walked, did gardening, did some windows, went shopping, and went fishing.  Weight: 185.2 - up 4/10ths of a pound.

When I was fishing I caught 3 little bluegills and a little green sunfish.  None of them were keepers.  

If you want gardening news, go over here.  

Hubs found an antler in the yard!  Eight years we've been looking for antlers and suddenly there it was.  It was only a spike, but hey, it's a start.  It's long past when deer drop antlers.  We're thinking a squirrel found it in the woods and was dragging it somewhere to eat when it dropped it where Hubs found it.  It's in the garage for now.  I'll clean it up and put it in the house eventually.

From the sounds of it, Hubs is killing a mouse in the garage as I type this.  Must've got one in the trap and it didn't die.  I hope it was the one chewing in the wall for the past hour or so.  It was driving me crazy.  (Update:  It was a mouse, but it wasn't caught.  It was running around.  He didn't get it.  Drat.)

Other than that, not much going on around here.  Hanging in there.  Watching the country I love circle the drain faster and faster.  Not much I can do about it.

Oh, I went to Wallyworld earlier in the week.  About thirty percent of the people weren't wearing masks.  So I took mine off.  Freedom!  I still stayed as far away from people as possible - it's ingrained in me now more than ever.  If I get the crud, you can say I told you so.  If I don't... neener neener boo boo.  

Okay, now that's really enough out of me.  How was your week?

Recipe:

Chocolate Walnut Upside Down Cake

1 stick butter

2/3 cup brown sugar

1 1/3 cups chopped walnuts

-------

2 cups white sugar

3 cups flour

2 tsp baking soda

½ tsp salt

½ cup baking cocoa powder

2 cups water

1 cup vegetable oil

1 tsp vanilla

1 Tbsp white vinegar

1/3 bag mini chocolate chips 

Preheat oven to 350F (175C).  While oven is preheating, put the stick of butter in a 9x13" cake pan (sliced for quicker melting) and place the pan in the oven.  Remove as soon as the butter is melted.  Stir in brown sugar until combined.  Stir in walnuts until all nuts are coated and then make sure they're evenly placed.  Set aside. 

In a large mixing bowl, sift together sugar, flour, baking soda, salt, and cocoa powder.  Add water, oil, and vanilla.  Stir until combined.  Stir in vinegar until smooth.  Pour batter over the nut mixture in the pan.  Bake for 40 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean.  Allow to cool completely before cutting and serving.  Overnight is best.  (If you don't let it cool, the still-warm cake falls apart.  Trust me on this.)

 

Sunday Update - Week 34

Well, number 34 is in the books and it was a week I'd just as soon not repeat.  And for this week I'm gonna change the format of this week's update a little bit.

We started the week on Sunday and it was fine.  Monday morning, Owl announced that the university had sent her an email telling her she couldn't move in for an additional three weeks, which sent us all into a spasm.  We got that sorted out and started to be okay with it.  Tuesday afternoon, she got another email saying she was approved for 'special dispensation' and could, in fact, move in on Saturday as planned.  We got that sorted out, too. 

Friday morning, we loaded everything up and headed north to the airport.  The trip there and back was fine.  Her flights were fine.  Everything was lovely.  Until she reached the rental car agency in Detroit and discovered a snafu.  I get a call from her that she is trapped at the airport with no way to get where she needs to go.  After much wrangling and back and forth and phone calls and internet searches - the buses had been suspended, the taxi services all had answering machines, no one at Lyft would pick her up - she finally got a luxury car service to pick her up and take her to her dorm.  Not cheap, but at least she arrived in style in a chauffeur driven Town Car.  She spent the night on a friend's futon, since she wasn't scheduled to move in until Saturday.  The majority of her belongings are still at my mom's place - which was why she was renting a car - but she'll deal with that later.

Needless to say, I lost a pound last week.  Specifically, lost a pound on Friday.  178.4 Thursday morning, 177.4 Saturday morning.  Imagine that.

Also, needless to say, I didn't get a lot of writing done for this last week of AuGoWriMo.  Only about 2900 words on the three days I did write.  Thank goodness I finished Cinder Ugly before last week happened.  I did have some ideas on where to go next with the mystery, which I wrote down, so I do have writing plans.  I just haven't mustered the will to write in the past three days.

No other writerly things got done.  Natch.

I spent yesterday putting the house back to 'hermit couple mode'.  The spare room bed is now up against the wall, giving me room to exercise in there again.  The extra chair we'd put in the living room is back in its place in the office, giving me room to dance around in there again.  The extra desk chair for her in the office has been moved back into the storage closet, leaving Hubs the entire conference table to work at again.

I'm now looking forward to things getting back to as normal as anything can be right now.  I'm still looking for Owl to come walking into the office here and there.  Five months of her being here can't be changed back in a day.  It would be sad if it could. 

So, anyway, that was my week.  How was yours?

And Then This Happened

Last night after dinner, Owl got a message from the powers at EMU (yes, her school is EMU - we don't call it EMU, we call it Eastern - and their mascot is not an emu, which I think is an opportunity missed) that she was approved for special dispensation, so everything that was off yesterday is back on.  So if you heard a huge grinding of gears last night, that was me.

Despite the grinding of gears, hank you to everyone who sent positive thoughts her way for that to happen. 

So, early Friday morning we will load up the car and take the haul to the airport.  She'll hop a plane, take a layover in North Carolina and then head onward to Detroit.  (Don't ask.  I have no clue why the cheapest flight goes from here to way the hell over there and then up.  Maybe Chicago has become such a hole they're routing flights elsewhere to avoid it.)  She'll pick up her rental and be at my mom's place around 6pm.  Then Saturday, she packs all the stuff she left at Mom's and heads down to move into her dorm. 

Anyway, if you don't see me Friday morning, that's where I'll be.  If all goes well, I'll be back by like 9am. 

I still hate all this.

So This Happened

Sunday I made a cake with BYE Owl and a frowny face on it.  Owl also said that with everything being so close, there wasn't any possible way for this to get screwed up.

I think we jinxed it.

Yesterday, Owl came out of her room and I knew something was wrong.  I was on my way out to the smoking porch, but I stopped and asked what was up.  She was all like 'oh, it can wait until after you have your cigarette' and I was all like 'okay, what's wrong? again.  Turns out she'd just gotten an email from the university.

Five days before she is due to fly north, the university announced that they're not allowing students into the dorms for an additional three weeks.  Oh, classes will start on time - online - but no housing.  Because there might be an outbreak due to Labor Day celebrations and they want to wait until after the outbreak is over to let students back into the dorms.  Or some such crap.  So conceivably, the earliest she might be able to move in is Sept. 20th. 

There is an outside chance she will get a 'special dispensation' to move in on time, but she's running out of time to change flights and rental car reservations, so they'd better get off their asses and tell her whether she can move or not.

And, of course, there's no telling whether in three weeks, they'll decide to move the goalposts again.

Needless to say, I spent the rest of the day playing poker because everything else I wanted to do to bleed off stress - throw logs, go fishing, walk - was crapped out by the heat.  I hate this shit. 

Updated 8:20pm:  Owl got an email saying she was getting special dispensation and can move in on Saturday as scheduled.  :cue screeching of tires and grinding of gears:  Thankfully, she did not cancel or change her flights or her rental car.  Everything is back on for Friday.  :collapses in a heap:

Sunday Update - Week 29?

I can't believe it's already Sunday again.  And I damn near forgot to post an Update.  Not that there's much to update.  Life amongst the chaos go on.  To what extent they'll allow it to go on remains to be seen.

When I look back at the week, I realize I did next to nothing.  No writing or writerly pursuits.  I did read a book.  Yay!  Also my activity log for the week only has one entry and that was last Sunday, when I went for an early walk before it got too hot to be outside.

A neighbor gave me zucchini, which I shredded into 8 cups worth.  I made a batch of bread, which promptly disappeared (one loaf to said neighbor and the other down our gullets).  Yesterday, I made another 2 loaf batch.  I still have enough shredded zucchini to make four more loaves.  (I freeze it in 2 cup increments for easy use.  The recipe requires 2 cups per batch.)  And I made granola bars yesterday, too, because I have been remiss in making granola bars and we were out.

I discovered on Monday that Dollar General was going full-on mandatory mask on Tuesday.  Thus, when I went to DG on Friday (I was in town and needed a couple things, so why not?), I masked up.  I managed to make it through without a full-on panic attack.  'Breathe through your nose and don't try to talk' seemed to work.  Both of these are antithetical to my person.  Yep, I'm a :gasp: mouthbreather.  And a talker.  The latter of which should come as no surprise.  But hey, if I have to do those things to get through wearing a mask, which I have to do if I want food for my family, I will do it.  Stupid as it all is.

The fawns are coming into the yard regularly now.  We think we have 5 individual fawns*.  I'll know more as I succeed in getting pictures of them and comparing spot patterns.  The two tom turkeys are also regularly visiting the yard again.

Other than that?  Nope.  What went on in your life last week?

*Update: 6:55am - there are 5 fawns in the yard right now, so it's confirmed.  The light's still to low for pictures.  Sorry.

Thursday This n That - Chaos Edition

Ir may sound silly, but I've been drinking tonic water as a kind of prophylactic measure.  Not sure if the quinine is helping stave off the 'rona, but hey, it can't hurt.  Plus, it's yummy.  Two-thirds OJ, one-third tonic.  It's like a gin and tonic without the pine.  I wonder if there could be some kind of study to see how tonic drinkers rate in the 'rona numbers.  :shrug:  No worries - I don't think this makes me invincible against the crap.  I'm just hoping it helps tamp the shit down a bit.

Well, they finally did it.  Wallyworld caved to the fearmongers and, starting Monday, everyone everywhere will have to wear face masks to shop there.  And so I caved and ordered face masks.  I'm tempted to write things on the outside of mine, but I don't want to smell permanent marker on top of the whole 'I know I'm not suffocating, but I'm suffocating' thing.  I get panicky when I'm breathing my own air.  And then I start to hyperventilate, which isn't good on any given day and can't be good while wearing a face mask.  Bastards.

Note: After thirty minutes of trying to find face masks that were made in America that didn't cost me a tit and a half, I caved again and bought a 50 pack of China masks that are sold and ship out of Dallas.  Only $19.99 and free shipping.  Amazon, of course.  They're due to arrive around the 23rd.  Until then, I'll just avoid Wallyworld - which isn't that hard since I'm pretty stocked up from the last run.

The Kung Flu is still on the rise again here.  Hubs is keeping track of it all and giving me updates.  As I said before, if I wasn't worried about bringing it home to him, I wouldn't give a rat's ass.  At this point, I'm so over it all.  Bring it on.  Except no.

For the record, I don't have a problem with individuals choosing to wear face masks.  You want to wear one, more power to you.  You have to wear one because you're in a high risk group, you do what you have to do.  The problem I have is people, myself particularly, being bullied into wearing one.  America - the land of the kinda free when there isn't a virus about and home of the no-so-brave anymore.  =o(

By the way, even if you're wearing a mask, stay six feet away from me - even after this is over.  I don't want your cooties.

Sunday Update - Week 22

Let's just say it wasn't a great week, k?  The world's gone mad and I'm even more inclined to crawl into my hermit hole and pull really big rocks over the entrance.

This said, is it any wonder there's no writing or editing or marketing in the update again this week?

I only finished one book in time for last week's Reading Wrap-up, and I finished one yesterday afternoon.   Go me.

Because of the swollen lake, there was no fishing.  All my spots are underwater and the one spot where I can fish has no shade.

I was active 5 out of 7 days - yard work, walking, grocery shopping (which totally counts when you're pushing a full cart) - but I gained about a pound.  I need to cut back on the snacks and the size of my portions again.  Weight: 177.  Still down 5.6 pounds for the year, but up 4.4 from my low in March.

The only baking I did was a batch of granola bars.  Oh, and I made a pizza.  I think I overworked the dough, though, so it wasn't exactly my best pizza crust.  :shrug:  We're out of oatmeal cookies, which Hubs totally loves. Unfortunately, it's getting hot, so baking is not high on my list of things to do right now.  I'll probably still get him his cookies.  As long as I can be done with them first thing in the morning.  Not today.  But soon.

Speaking of heat, mid-90s is a bit ridiculous for early June, wouldn't you say?  Ah, well, it's supposed to drop back into the 80s this coming week.  Poor Owl, having to be here over the summer.  She isn't acclimated to this and our spare room faces west for a full blast of afternoon sun.

Mom got back to the office this past week.  Thankfully, Sis had been holding the fort all that time, so it wasn't total spazz-ville.  Luckily, through all this, Mom's a roll-with0it kind of gal.

I think that's about it for me.  How did your last week go?

Thursday This n That

I've been quiet this week.  It's not that I don't have anything to say.  It's that I'm afraid if I say anything, the gates I'm keeping everything behind will shatter and it will all come pouring out, causing death and destruction to anything below the dam.  And no good will come of it.  Shakespeare said it best through Hamlet: Whether it is nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune or to take arms against a sea of troubles and by there opposing, end them.  I'm going with the former.  For now.

Anyway...

The deer are fat pregnant.  And they're starting to distance themselves from each other, so they're coming for food in singles or, when there is a larger gathering, it's all young does.  The big doe with the two buck yearlings has kicked her boys out of her general area, which means the boys aren't coming around anymore.  =o(

My roses went a little crazy this year...

The front bush is still cultivated.  The back bush went feral a few years ago (its original cultivar was yellow).  There was a third bush next to the house, but it gave up the ghost last year.  Those two?  They thrive on neglect.  Other than dead-heading them, I ignore them and they're loving it.  Still, I do have them both tied to the porch so they don't take over my parking space.

Mom made it back to the office yesterday.  Poor lady is up to her ass in alligators after being trapped at home since mid-March.  I mean, she did a lot of work from home, but there's only so much you can do without your computer and filing cabinets.  Sis helped her out a lot, but again, there's only so far anyone else can go to do her job. 

I made unsweetened 'sweet tea' the other day.  It's like regular iced tea, except for adding baking soda to the pitcher before you pour in the hot water.  (The baking soda makes it smooooth.)  I sweeten each glass with my yellow packet stuff.  I know, there are southern women all over the land gasping at this perversion, but I gotta do what I gotta do.  I love sweet tea, but I don't need the sugar.

Yesterday, I got the paver project done under the deck.  I need to snap a picture, but I'm lazy.  Anyway, it looks quite nice - manmade paver-type bricks interspersed with natural flat rocks.  Now, I'm itching to go buy some big blocks to shore up the end and finish the under-the-deck.  And a few bags of dirt.  And more gravel.  And some pretty flowers... like the quiet dam, once this one bursts, look out.  ;o)

Okay, I'm tapped out now.  What's up with your 'this n thats' this week?

Thursday This n That

As soon as I sat down to write this all the ideas I had for this post scurried back into the shadows of my mind.  That's pretty much how writing fiction feels right now.

I'm out of ice cream again.  Hubs was all like 'didn't you just buy ice cream?' and I was all like 'on the 18th'.  Two people - Owl and I - eating ice cream every day tends to make the ice cream disappear quicker.  Blerg.

Amazon finally shipped my order.  There are only two things in it - a bottle of glucosamine pills and a printer cartridge.  Luckily, we aren't out of ink and I've been rationing my pills.  I forgot to buy ink when I was at Wallyworld and they were out of the glucosamine.  Why they were out of those escapes me.  It's not like it combats the 'rona.  Sheesh.

I woke up this morning to a world gone madder. 

I really need to go fishing.  Unfortunately, the lake levels are so high, there's really only one place I can fish right now - the driveway to the parking lot of my normal fishing spot.  The parking lot is now full. 

That's it when the lake is at 930 ft above sea level.  In case you missed it, here's what it looked like on the 21st when it was 925ft.

They're supposed to have started dumping water out of the dams, but we're also supposed to get more sky water, so I don't expect to see much of a change any time soon.

I could probably still fish.  The problem comes when other people are trying to put their boats in there and those that have put in will have taken all the remaining parking spots along the road.  =o(

I could also maybe fish here...

I've fished that road before, there's just no place to park.  Only one person lives along the non-floody part on the east side, and I know her, so I'm sure she wouldn't mind me parking in the road, but parking in the road makes me nervous.

We'll see.

Anyway, that's all I can think to talk about today.  Got anything on your this-n-that today?

Sunday Update - Week 13

Well, that was a Week 13 if I ever saw one.

Still no writing, editing, or marketing.  I keep telling myself I'm going to do something writerly, but then when the rubber meets the road, I can't get any traction.  I need to do something because it's been about a month since I sold any books.

My reading week was weird.  A bunch of DNFs and then I read two books in a series back to back, which I almost never do.  Good series, though.  I wish I had the budget to buy the next three books, but I have other things I need to spend that $12 on right now.

You've already heard about life in the chaos this week, so I'll skip that.  There'll be another Chaos Diaries post tomorrow.

I made another chocolate oil cake this week.  And another batch of granola bars.  I have just enough ingredients to make another batch of granola bars, but I'm out of baker's cocoa, so no more of that cake for a while.  I might make applesauce bread this week.

They will be shutting down Missouri effective tomorrow, but they left a nice wrinkle - we can still outdoor recreate (as long as we follow the chaos rules), which means I could conceivably go fishing.  You know, if it ever stops raining and warms back up because I have no urge to freeze my ass off right now.  Maybe today.  Perhaps tomorrow.

Hubs and I are in discussions as to who's going shopping this week.  He says him because he can get in at 6am on Tuesday.  I say me because I know where everything is and can get in and out quicker.  I really wish I could trust the local grocery store to not poison me, so I could have an alternative to Walmart.  Oh, in case you hadn't heard, Walmart has new shopping guidelines that went into effect yesterday.  There's a set number of people allowed into the store at any given time and once that number is reached, you have to wait until someone leaves before they'll let you in.  Should be interesting. 

Lastly, everyone here is well.  And everyone I'm related to is well as of Friday when I talked to Mom.  I hope all the people I care about beyond that are healthy as well, but since I only communicate with most of them online or face to face (which I can't do anymore), I only know about them if I hear from them.  If you're reading this and you don't usually comment, drop a quick 'Fine here.' in the comments so I know you're okay.  Okay?

What went on in your week last week?