Sunday Update - Week 17

Hello!  It's Sunday morning and I'm running late again.  On the upside, I feel like a got a good night's sleep for a change, so let's go...

I did some writing this week!  Yay!  It was only one day and only about 1300 words, but it's a start.  No editing.  No marketing.  I did start a freebie thing for UP WISH CREEK yesterday, but I haven't marketed for it yet.  Still, I've moved a few copies even without marketing, which tells me my other marketing efforts are doing something out there.  Yay.

I did some reading, as you can see from yesterday's post.

I also did some baking.  I made a chocolate oil cake with strawberry jelly and vanilla frosting.  Except I didn't have enough powdered sugar for the frosting.  I tried 'making' powdered sugar using my little food processor.  It wasn't nearly as fine as I hoped it would be and the frosting is gritty.  Oh, well.  Live and learn.  I also ended up doing stuff chicken breast for Easter, which turned out super yummy.  

On the activity front, I did something 5 out of 7 days.  I took 3 walks for 2.4 miles.  I weeded and did other garden stuff for 2.5 hours.  Unfortunately, I just stepped on the scale and bleh.  Weight: 176 even.  :shrug:  I feel good, so that's really the point, isn't it?

In the gardening realm, all the beds have been weeded.  (A couple already need to be weeded again, but that's how weeding goes.)  I planted all the seeds in the cedar bed - 3 packages of mixed wildflower seeds and one package of marigolds.  I think I'm already seeing some of those come up.  I also planted an old seed packet of basil that I found when I cleaned out my junk drawer.  We'll see if those even bother to come up.  Additionally, I planted some volunteer trees.  It's been a green time here at Sanderson Acres, lemme tell ya.

Speaking of cleaning the junk drawer, I did that.  I threw out some stuff and organized the rest.  Considering I've been meaning to do that for months now, I'm calling it a win.  Now, I really need to reorganize the storage cupboard.  Maybe today.  Maybe not.

On a cooler morning, I went into the woods along the road and attacked some vines that had escaped my snippers.  Those are dying nicely now, tyvm.  That will probably be my last venture into the woods until fall.  The ticks are out.  I had three on me already this month.  None of them bit me, but just seeing them is enough to warn me away.

Speaking of ticks, Hubs sprayed the lawn.  Die evil bastard bugs.  

Okay, I think that's about it.  Have a great day wherever you are and here's to a productive week for us all.  :waves:

Sunday Update - 2025 Week 8

Woke up late, got distracted, and here we are...

I finished inputting the second round of edit notes this past week, and I started making the next batch of notes.  This batch is the one where I make notes and then go enter them, so I'm done with about 61 pages worth of manuscript now.  Woot.

Marketing this week was focused on Blink on an I.  I only moved 50 copies.  :sad trombone:  I don't have anything set for this coming week because the majority of my books are set to renew their 90 days in KDP on Tuesday.  The only book that isn't with the others is SSS and I'm not sure I'm up to another week of lackluster downloads.  I'll probably wait and hit the genies books starting in March.

Still no reading.

In baking/cooking news, I made some awesome soup that I've now decided to call Chicken Cheddar Chowder.  Say that three times fast.  With that, I whipped together some biscuits.  Yum.  And later in the week, I did Parmesan-crusted pork chops.  Mmm.

On the activity front, I cleaned the dishwasher.  (If you don't think that's an active thing, you try getting in there and scrubbing the inside of your dishwasher.)  I also went grocery shopping - also an active thing if you do it right.  And yesterday, I went into the woods.  Walking up and down the hill in melting snow with mushy ground underneath will certainly get you using muscles you didn't know you had.  I'm feeling it this morning, lemme tell ya.  No stepping on the scale this week, though.  It's too cold to get naked unless it's for a shower and I'm not showering first thing in the morning until the temps rise.  

Speaking of temps, this past week gave us here at Sanderson Inc. LLC a low point of MINUS 5.  (Which was about on par with my mom in Michigan, but way too cold for SW MO.)  We also got like 6 inches of snow.  On the upside, we're supposed to hit the upper 60s sometime this coming week, so most if not all of the snow will disappear.  The robins I saw this week will certainly appreciate that.

Oh, the reason I went into the woods was to see if I could locate tracks near the hole where I suspect some critter has taken up residence.  Well, if they have, they've been inside since the snow fell because I didn't find any tracks near there that I couldn't identify as deer.  Coming back up the hill, I did see fox tracks, though, so yay.

Well... I think that's about it.  Sorry I was late today.  Have a great rest of your day, wherever you are.

Thursday This n That

 I woke up late, hurried through some marketing, and called Mom.  Then I forgot I needed to post until I saw a friend talking about how her post was late today.  I'm so derpy sometimes.  Anyway...

Yesterday, I spent the morning scrubbing the drip pans on my stove.  Bar Keeper's Friend is an amazing product for stuff like that, but it's not infallible, and these were pretty far gone after 12 years.  After a while, I gave up and ordered new ones.  And new burner covers... because at least once a year, I accidentally turn on the wrong burner and end up burning the cover over it.  (If you've never done this, all kudos to you, you awesome person.)  While I was looking for new covers - I got black, by the way - I saw someone selling WOOD burner covers.  That seems like a horrible idea, especially given my penchant for burning the damn things.  A metal one just gets discolored.  A wood one would set the whole damn place on fire.  

Do you use burner covers?  My mom doesn't, and I didn't used to, but I got tired of wiping off the damn burners after every meal, so I got burner covers.  I can throw those in the dishwasher, easy peasy.  I'm lazy that way.

We heard foxes in the woods yesterday.  I think I found a spot where they're making a den.  There's been this hole in the woods for years.  Just recently, I've noticed fresh excavation signs... like a big pile of dirt outside the hole.  No paw prints in it, but someone is making a home.  I do hope it's foxes and there's a female making a home.  Baby foxes!  Yay!

On the way out of our neighborhood the other morning, I came around a curve on a hill and up ahead were several vultures huddled around something in the ditch.  As I approached, the vultures flew off and that's when I noticed the bald eagle standing over whatever carrion was there.  When I got closer, the eagle tried to take off with the carcass still clutched in one foot.  He made three attempts to fly away and finally dropped the dead thing in the middle of the road.  He perched in a tree and watched me as I continued past.  He was gorgeous.  The perfect example of an adult bald eagle.  Breathtaking.  (Yes, Virginia, eagles are carrion eaters.  Not exclusively, but hey, a bird's gotta eat.)

My dogwood seeds are germinating.  I checked the baggie in the fridge and I can see several white 'hair's in there.  So, we have roots!  Yay!  Not sure about any of the other seeds.  Time will tell, I guess.  If all I get are dogwoods, I'll still be happy.  

Okay, I think that's enough out of me this morning.  Time to get on with the rest of my day, especially since I'm running behind.  Derp.

Sunday Update 10/13/24

What a week, eh?

Let's see... I didn't do any writing again.  I did work on edits.  I'm up to like 60% of the books that now has edit notes.  I also did some marketing.  Unequal was free Sunday - Thursday but I only moved 18 books. Not sure what the dealy-bob was there.  Perhaps Sunday is not the best day to start these marketing blasts.  Maybe I'm reaching saturation.  I guess we'll find out.  I have Wish Hits the Fan set up to go free tomorrow.  None of the other books are on sale.  Well, Wish in One Hand is set at 99c, so there's that.  Get the whole 4-book series for less than $9.  It's a pretty good deal, if I do say so myself.

Once again, I didn't do any reading.

In baking news, I made a chocolate oil cake.  This time I used corn oil rather than vegetable oil.  I'm not sure if that made a difference.  Maybe it was a little more moist.  I also made a pizza.

On the activity front, it was a wild week of cleaning, cleaning, and more cleaning.  The house looks lovely.  I also did one walk.  Mileage for the year: 51.25. Weight: 173.8

The reason for the cleaning... I mean, other than it needed to be done?  We had visitors yesterday.  Just low impact, casual chatting.  We had pizza for lunch and ate cake.  It was all good.  Well, except for the cats.  We never have visitors, so they were both totally freaked out and hid under the bed.  After a while of them not coming out, we transferred their food and water, and their litter box, into the bedroom and closed the door.  Poor things.  They finally got back to normal last night.  Little xenophobes.

Today should be back to normal all the way around.  The plan is to not do anything active and just veg.  I'll probably work on the editing notes.  Maybe I'll take a little walk.  Tomorrow, I'll be back to marketing so I should probably spend some time today working on marketing materials.  We'll see.  

How are things in your world?

Thursday This n That

Why is it that when I do anything super-active, the aftereffects don't fully hit me until the day after the day after?  I felt pretty darn good yesterday after Monday's window washing marathon.  Today?  No so much.  Blerg

Monday's window washing marathon... It all started at 8:30 with the thought that since it was cold I could finally tackle that wasp's nest in the window space with the broken screen.  I was just going to pop out the screen and the storm window and knock that thing out.  I had planned on worrying about the cleaning part later.  Then I didn't.  I went after that window and the next and the... well, you get the point.  5 good-sized windows, 4 with screens and storms.  5 window wells that were full of crap  - leaves and dust and dead bugs, etc.  All of it needing a good cleaning.  Then Hubs caught the same bug I had and he did the parts that can only be reached from outside with a ladder.  (These windows are easily 10-15 feet off the ground.)  We finished about 12:30.  That was just the sunroom.  I still have the rest of the house to do.  Not that day.  Not yesterday either and today ain't lookin' too good.  

I derailed on writing this book.  I think I'm thinking too much.  I need to just sit and write, and when I come to something that takes a lot of thought and/or research, I need to skip it and move on.  Maybe tonight that'll happen.  We'll see.

On the bright side, I'm making headway on the first round edits of the other book.  Yay.

As the election approaches, my mood is taking a shit.  Yesterday, I reminded myself that there is nothing I can do about any of it.  I'll vote, for whatever good that'll do, and what happens after that is out of my power.  I need to focus on the things I can do here in my own life and not let all of THAT get to me.

Well, I think that's about all I've got this morning.  Have a great day.

Sunday Update 7/14/24

 Welp, it's Sunday again.  If you don't know what happened in the news yesterday, some asshole tried to assassinate Trump.  He'll be fine and at least two other people fared much worse.  If you want to know more, there are a million articles about it out there now.

Onward to my world...

I wrote every day but one this week.  I took Tuesday off.  Still, I ended the week with 5058 new words added, and the book is at 14098 total.  I'm trying to remember to make a little note about Ju-Lo-Wri-Mo at the end of every blog post here, but I'm also adding it the widget over there on the right.  In addition to actually putting words on the page, I have notes of things that may or may not happen farther done the storyline, which is always a good thing to have.  It's kind of money in my writing bank.

The PROJECT HERMES freebie thing ended with me moving a total of 82 books.  No sales or page reads off this yet.  (And if it hasn't happened by now, it most likely won't.)  Derp.  

In reading news, I finished two books this week and I'm currently working on an Agatha Christie I've never read before.  Yay.

I didn't do too much in the activity column.  Two days walking, one day cleaning and rearranging my closet.  (I cleaned and rearranged my closet because Hubs found a brown recluse spider in our bed, so I made it a less welcome environment.)  I also cleaned other areas of the house that day.  Also, I went grocery shopping, which sorta counts as an activity because it involves a lot of walking and pushing the cart, etc.  

On the baking front, I didn't.  It's too hot to bake.  I did make a batch of no-bake cookies, though.  Also, yay.

The fawns are getting bigger and we're seeing them more frequently.

I really need to clean the house today.  Regular cleaning as opposed to 'OMG there's a nasty spider in our bed better clean where I don't usually clean' cleaning.  I also need to figure out my next move in the book marketing scheme of things.  I'll probably go with the genie books.  We'll see.  Right now, though, I should probably get dressed and go for a walk before it gets ungodly hot again.  

What happened in your world last week?  

Ju-Lo-Wri-Mo Day 13
Starting Word Count: 13285
Ending Word Count: 14098
New Words: 813

Monday Update

Apparently, I'm not quite into the swing of being 'retired' again because I totally forgot to post yesterday.  Bear with me.  I'm workin' on it.

So, last week was my first full week of being back to being a private citizen / hermit again.  Here's what happened:

I wrote words!  Not every day, but I did manage to write twice for a total of 1733 words.  Not great but not horribly shabby either.  I learned that I am totally not up to any kind of marathon writing yet.  My hands start to be little, whiny babies at about 800 words right now.  That amounts to about a half hour of continuous typing.  I'm hoping that, by the end of July, I can be back to a sustained 60-90 minutes at a time. 

The story my brain wanted to work on was Duke Noble's.  I ended up restarting the next book in the series.  Right now, it's called Thicker than Water.  Once before, I started this story, and I may end up using some of what I wrote previously.  But since I got stuck, I probably needed to just jumpstart this sucker.  We'll see.  

I'm also working on getting back into the swing of reading.  I finished a Sherlock Holmes compilation and started a Hercule Poirot one.  Right now, I'm feeling mysterious... what can I say?  

On the activity front, I did something active 5 out of 7 days.  I'm not back to walking yet. There's so much other stuff I'm behind on that walking seems unproductive.  Instead, I spent time either cleaning or gardening.  Weight: 166.4

Cleaning is more exercise than you'd think.  And man, am I not used to doing it anymore.  I found muscles I forgot I had.  Oof.  It's not like Hubs wasn't doing it and doing a good job at it, but I'm a control freak sometimes, so as soon as I could take that job back, I did.  He's still doing dishes, but only because he gets to them before I think about it.  I did dishes once since I've been back and oh my aching back, I'd forgotten how much doing dishes hurts.  Oh well.  The job needs to shift back over to my list and get off of Hubs' list.  Jus' sayin'.

Gardening was mostly weeding and digging up beds because they are in such a state.  My poor shade bed... the astilbes are down from 6 to three and those were getting choked out.  I thought my two coral bells were toast, but one of them send out shoots and there are two little bitty live shoots from that.  The other variety is gone.  The lily-of-the-valley that was doing so good is left with one shoot that the deer have munched.  On a positive note, the tomatoes I planted a few weeks ago appear to be growing right along.  No signs on flowers yet, but I have hopes.

I made homemade cinnamon rolls on Friday.  I have had such a craving for cinnamon rolls like you wouldn't believe.  But I can't ever seem to find a recipe that makes me want to dive in.  Cinnamon rolls are such a pain in the butt to make, after all.  What I ended up doing it modifying my recipe for Tasty Buns.  I made the dough per the recipe, but then instead of making buns, I rolled it out into a rectangle, covered it in a butter/brown sugar/cinnamon mixture, and made cinnamon rolls.  They turned out super yummy.  The recipe ended up producing two pie pans worth or about 14.  Mmmmm.

Okay, I think I've bent your ear (bent your eyes???) for long enough.  Go forth and have an awesome day.  I'll try to remember to be back tomorrow.  How are things in your life?

Sunday Update - Week 47

 At least I think it's Week 47.  :shrug:  Anyway...

How did the week shake out?  Hmm...

Well, we started out last week with a walk in the woods.  First time since the Spring, so yay.  Nothing major to report down in there.  All the paths are leaf covered.  Not much new deadfall.  

I read some last weekend and finished two books.  I finished another one yesterday.

I didn't bake anything, which was weird because, for the first time, we had Thanksgiving with no dessert.  :sadface:  Well, I did have ice cream, but I always have ice cream.  Hubs roasted a most excellent turkey, though.  

In addition to our walk in the woods, I got active on Friday when we cleaned and decorated the office.  Total exer-cleaning day there.  I haven't weighed myself since Thanksgiving, but at last check... Weight: 158.8.  I haven't been in the 150s since like 2006.  

Speaking of weight loss, my new sweat pants arrived.  They fit.  But it's weird wearing sweats that fit now, so they seem too tight.  What I really need is a pair with a large waist and XL legs.  Ma legs need room to breathe, doncha know.  And before you remind me about the drawstring, there comes a point when no matter how much you pull on the drawstring, your pants still fall down.

Okay, so cleaning and decorating, I got to work at 7:30, slapped some Christmas music on, and got right to it sweeping.  I started on the right, and swept every room but one.  (And that's because the other gal was doing her own office.)  Then I dusted damn near everything.  I took breaks to answer the phones (they weren't ringing that much) and to do a few actual office things that needed doing.  After lunch, we decorated.  Then I went back to work on that big box of filing.  Then the mail arrived, so I dealt with that.  And then I got back to filing - which I finished with a few minutes to spare before clock-out time. Yay.  The office is so merry and bright.  And tidy!  (I still want to wash the windows, but cleaning time is over.)

I spent yesterday reading and relaxing.  And recovering from my exer-cleaning. Who-waa, I found muscles I'd forgotten I had.  We're also working our way through all those turkey leftovers.  Yay.  Today will be more of them same.

How was your week?  Did you have a nice Thanksgiving?

Sunday Update - Week 45

 Well, hello again.  Let's see if we can rebuild this past week, eh?

No writerly things.  To my amazement, I sold a book.  Woo.  Which meant I needed to update my book sales spreadsheets.  (They were still on September, even though I sold a book in October, too.)  I did that yesterday.

I didn't finish reading anything.  I DNF'd two books before yesterday's post.  I'm DNF'ing the book I started after the post.  It's just weird and I'm tired of trying to make it make sense.  I'm sure it probably does at some point, but meh.

In baking news, I made an apple cranberry crisp last Sunday, then nada.  I do have plans to make a layer cake this week.  I bought pans for it and everything.  I haven't made a layer cake since Owl was a baby.  Wish me luck.

On the activity front, we walked last Sunday and then we went fishing.  Friday, I cleaned the bathrooms at work.  Took me like 20 minutes.  No weight loss this week.  I mean, I got down to 164.4, but then yesterday, I was 166.4, so up and down.  :shrug:

No one made me clean the bathrooms, btw.  I have a low tolerance for scudge in bathrooms. Rather than whine about it, I clean it.  2 bathrooms - each with a toilet and a sink.  I did the floors and the mirrors, too.  Are they perfect?  Nope.  That would take longer and I didn't have longer.  Are they presentable?  Yep.  I also take the garbage out on Fridays because the thought of garbage sitting over the weekend makes me gag.  They're my quirks and I own them.

As for fishing, we didn't catch anything but it was nice to just be at the lake drowning worms with my favorite person.

We got snow Friday night.  It was just a dusting.  Barely enough to make the grass white and leave some on the car.  I can handle that.  No more, though, please.

I went to the thrift store yesterday.  I was looking for an overcoat, but since they didn't have one of those, I picked up 6 books.  4 paperbacks and 2 hardcovers - $2.  Yay.

Work is work.  Like my weight, it's up and down.  The creeping crud is making its way through the staff.  I spent the last two hours of Friday by myself in the office because all the other office staff went home sick.  (I am fine, by the way.)  It was awesome.  I threw a rave.  Hundreds of people showed... :shudder: I can't even joke about that.  I enjoyed the quiet and got some stuff done.  I finally organized the surplus inventory room so it doesn't look like a tornado went through there.  All my filing is done.  Score.

I might zip down to the Wallyworld this morning and see if I can find a turkey that doesn't cost a wing and a drumstick.  (See what I did there? ROFL)  Seriously, though, I've heard turkeys are hard to find and that they're REALLY expensive this year.  Keep your fingers crossed for me.

Okay, that's probably enough out of me.  Nothing much else is going on.  How are things in your world?

Thursday This n That

Remember that Jon Lovitz character from SNL who always had a story about how he did whatever the other characters were talking about?  I think I've reached the point in my life where I am that character.  I mean, I'm 52 and I've been all over, doing all sorts of things, so yeah, I pretty much have a story for loads of situations.  And I'm my father's daughter, so I tell the stories.  The difference between me and Lovitz?  My stories are true.  :shrug:  

Yep, Dad was a talker.  He had a story for any situation and they were true.  And if he didn't have a story, he told a joke.  Dad's jokes... totally NSFW.  

So, I'm working full time and I'm still doing spreadsheets for the office.  This was busy spreadsheet week.  Eight spreadsheets.  Well, 7 spreadsheets came in Mon-Wed and those were worked into 15 other spreadsheets.  So, another 4-5 hrs worth of work.  Plus another single spreadsheet came in with 3 tabs that need to be worked into 6 total sheets.  I gave up last night and sent my time sheet in.  I'll do that last bunch tonight.  Woohoo.  No seriously.  It's good to be busy.  

Speaking of busy, Hubs has been deep cleaning the house and rearranging to make things tidy.  Not furniture.  Like closets and junk.  Well, he's moving furniture to clean under it, but he's putting it back where it was.  It's all good.  He moved all the extra pillows and blankets out of the closets, put them in their own bags, squeezed all the air out, and slapped labels on them.  Then he took a shelving unit and put all the bags on it in the storage closet.  It's genius.  And we now have scads of room in the closets.  I tell ya, Hubs is better at this than I ever was.  LOL

I've been searching for clothes online.  Shirts are easy.  I found some nice breathable polo shirts for like $15.50  each.  Huzzah.  And I raided Hubs' closet, so I'm good until I get new shirts.  Trying to find pants that I can wear to work that will be comfortable enough to wear all day, that won't cost both my legs to buy, isn't easy.  Between day-job and pay-job, I have the money.  I just hate spending more money on something than I think is necessary.  I may have to suck it up and spend more for pants.  Blerg.  The tightwad in me is squealing like a wee piglet.  

I'm wondering if I should change the name of this blog.  I'm not really writing much anymore.  Eh, that may change, so I'll leave it for now.

Okay, I got a late start today, so I guess I'd better get my buns a-movin'.  Have a great day wherever you are.  And drink plenty of fluids.  It's a scorcher out there.  Yuck.

Sunday Update - Week 14

Hello again.  We're 14 weeks into this bad devil called 2022.  Things are exponentially worse than they were on 1/1/20 and the crap seems to be picking up speed as we roll merrily along toward the dark and fiery pits.  Yippee and weeee.  Keep your hands inside the ride at all times.  

Okay, so writing last week was pathetic.  I mean, I wrote, which is better than some weeks, but only 663 words and the result was not good.  And now I'm in a slump.  

No editing or marketing either.  

I read two books and most of a third.  I also made some small progress on The Three Musketeers.  Long book, but I'm determined.

Not much happened in the baking sphere either.  Cake cookies and then scalloped potatoes with cheese and ham.  

On the activity front, I did one walk.  And yesterday, I deep cleaned my bathroom.  Well, most of my bathroom.  I lost gumption before I did the floor, and the light bar over my bathroom counter still needs to be washed.  But man, my shower sparkles.  By the way, if you've never used Invisible Glass, it really took the gunk off my old bathroom tiles.  (I'm pretty sure what I used it for was 'off label', but hey, it worked and no harm done.)  Oh, and since I have been unable to find Soft Scrub in any variety but Bleach, which I can't use because it eats my hands, I picked up a container of my old-old standby Barkeeper's Friend.  Awesome stuff.  It just requires more elbow grease than Soft Scrub.  Needless to say, I am a bit worn out today.

Has anyone seen Spic and Span in the dry form anywhere lately?  I used to love that stuff.  But I digress...

I started out last week by doing our taxes.  That is sure to drain the life right out of you.  So maybe that's why my week was so unproductive.  Did the taxes, sent them in, and by the end of the week, the state refund was in.  Wow.  Go, Missouri.  

I've been cutting Hubs hair.  I mean, I've done my own for years, so why not?  I did that on Monday after I got back from grocery shopping.  This time looks pretty good.  (Last time, was passable, but he had like a divot on the side there until it grew out.)  Thank goodness for the clippers I bought years ago to use on Max the cat.  Anyway, there's 18 bucks we're not spending every 6 weeks.  Yay.

Elmer the elm tree has lots of leaves and is getting baby branches.  So are Cecil and Cedric the cedars.  

And that's about all there is for me.  I lead such an exciting life.  Even more so now that gas prices are too high to warrant going anywhere.  How was your week?

Sunday Update - Week 13

The thirteenth week... I guess I never noticed before it has April Fool's Day in it.  :cue spooky music:  Ahem... Anyway...

There was writing, but not a lot of it.  1796 words.  Woohoo.  Then I hit a patch of 'why bother?' and skidded out, went in a ditch, and hit the proverbial tree.  I did spent some time working on a marketing thing, which also went in the ditch.  The only thing productive I actually accomplished this week was getting SSS into print format, uploading it, and ordering the proof copy.  That should be here like Friday.  I think.  If the mails are running the way they should and Amazon doesn't fuck something up.

I finished reading two books last week.  And then I started The Three Musketeers, which is slow going, but good.  It's a big book.  :shrug:

On the baking front, I did granola bars, cake cookies, and zucchini bread. Nothing new or exciting, but yummy.

In activity news, I was active 4 out of 7 days.  Wandering the yard, working in the woods, doing a hard target walk, and deep cleaning the fridge.  (And if you think cleaning the fridge isn't active, you've obviously found an easier way to do it than I have.)  I'm up to 13 miles walked for the year.  Weight: 177.6 - so eating less and getting more active is working.  Imagine that.

Speaking of cleaning the fridge... I actually started out yesterday with the idea of deep cleaning the whole kitchen.  In determining the plan, I realized that I couldn't do the floors until I did everything above the floors... natch... and that goes for counters, too.  Well, one of the things above the floor that desperately needed a cleaning was the fridge, so I filled the sink and dove in.  I moved everything out of the door and onto the shelves inside the fridge, then took out all the little shelvey things.  Closed the door and washed those.  Then I washed the inside of the door.  Dried the shelves and put them back.  Refilled those with all their stuffs.  Did the same with the drawers.  Then the big, heavy, glass shelves.  Moving everything around inside the fridge and then putting it back as I went.  In the end, nothing was out of the fridge for very long and the damn thing is clean.  Then I did the outside of the fridge.  Of course, by the time I got done with all that, I was pooped.  I didn't do the freezer, but it's pretty clean anyway.  Today, I'll finish the kitchen or die trying.  *

I also cleaned the coffee maker yesterday.  This new maker beeps when the coffee is done.  And when it needs cleaning, it beeps before the coffee is done, so that's how I know to clean it.  About once a month.  Which is what the specs for this thing say anyway.  

It must be Spring because I'm starting to see bunnies when I'm out walking.  Yay.

Okay, it's time again to take myself in hand.  I've been letting everything get to me and when everything is getting to me, I have a tendency to let the things I need to do slide.  Housework, yardwork, work-work, etc.  I've started cleaning, so that's something.  Now I need to get back to writerly pursuits as well.  Today.  Now.  Alright, maybe not NOW.  It's early and I'm gonna need a lot more coffee before I do anything productive.  

What did your week look like?  How's things?  

* I did our taxes instead.  Now I don't feel like doing anything.

Sunday Update - '22 Week 3

 Hello again.  Let's dispense with the folderol and jump right in.

Last night, I finished the round of editing I've been working on since December 4th.  Out of 47 days, I missed 11.  That's about a 77% working percentage.  Not bad.  I wish I could do that all year.  For the record, people who work M-F only work 71% of the days.  On the other hand, I usually only work a couple hours a day.  Can you imagine if I worked all those days at 8 hours a day.  I'd rule the world.  So, you're welcome.  (Although, if I ruled the world, there'd be a lot less bullshit in it.)

All of my books are now uploaded to D2D.  And all of them are now available at the big distributors - Apple, Barnes & Noble, Kobo.  Also, they're available through library distributors like BorrowBox and OverDrive.  (All of them are still waiting on Hoopla to accept them.)  I sold a book last night through OverDrive, so I've got that going for me.  Now to add some marketing to the mix and see if I can generate some sales.  

As for other writerly news, I began working on the cover for Untitled Fantasy.  I'm building a dragon out of used lizard parts.  It's painstaking work.  I'm blowing the sucker up to 1000% and trying to do a pixel by pixel thing.  :shrug:  It'll keep me out of trouble, that's for sure.  And I'm liking the overall results.  May have to change lizards, but I'm also learning what works and what doesn't as I go.  It's all good, baby.

On the reading front, I start out the week pretty lame.  Four DNFs in a row.  After that, I managed to finish two books before my Saturday Wrap-up, and I finished another one yesterday afternoon.  It's all good, baby.

In baking news, I made coffee cake.  I used my regular yellow-cake recipe, but I dolloped applesauce all through the middle layer.  So yummy.  I also made a vat of spaghetti sauce, which netted me another 3 meals worth of leftover sauce.  Yay.

Activity... well, it wasn't a good week.  I spent one morning cleaning.  Dusting and vacuuming everything but the office, so about 1300 square feet.  I never did get around to the office.  It's hard to clean in here when Hubs is working and when he's not working, I don't seem to be in a cleaning mood.  :shrug:  It was too cold for much else, but that's a lame excuse.  I can use the damn bike.  Sheesh.

Needless to say, my diet isn't going well.  Being gungho about curbing the food intake is one thing, actually adhering to the plan is other.  And, like always, every time I think about watching what I eat, I'm thinking about food and that makes me want food.  But the results on the scale weren't as bad as I feared.  Weight: 183.6 - so only up a pound and a half since 1/1.  Still, that much in three weeks is not good.  Perhaps I'm just fluffy for winter.  Yeah, yeah, fluffy for winter.  That's the ticket.

Because of the cold, we're seeing a lot of deer in the yard, gulping down corn in copious amounts.  Most of them are hale and hearty.  And super fluffy because they fluff their coats when it's cold to retain body heat.  Unfortunately, one of our does broke something, probably the ankle, on her back right leg.  Poor baby.  There's nothing we can do, and research told me deer can often do well with a broken leg.  It heals, they go on with their lives.  Killing them isn't the answer.  The best advice was leave them alone, because trying to help will only make things worse.  Hubs saw the same doe a couple days later and her foot wasn't curled under like when we'd first seen it, so she was walking on the hoof and not her ankle.  Ouchie.

Tax time approacheth.  I'm waiting on the mail to deliver 1099s.  I already got the notice that Amazon's 1099s are available for download, so if you haven't gotten yours yet, poke somebody.  Or go into the tax area and see if they're there for you, too.  Not that the news on the 1099 is good.  About $145 for the year.  :sadtrombone:

Since I'm taking today off of writing, I should be able to accomplish some other stuff today.  We'll see.  And it's supposed to warm up a little, so maybe I can get out in the woods again.  Stupid snow.  Anyway, I'm trying to be optimistic.  Strange for me, I know, but you gotta start somewhere.

How was your week?  Accomplish anything?  Was it a week off for you?  (Totally cool, because we need time off every know and again.)  

Thursday This n That

I'm on Linked In and I occasionally get job listings in my email.  One yesterday sounded interesting - Remote Proofreader.  Cool.  I went over to look at it.  The listing was rife with weird characters and grammatical issues.  I wonder if they put it up that way as an initial test for people applying for the job.  Sort of an "if you can read this and fix it, you're the person for us.  ROFL  (There were parts of the job, once I parsed it out, that sounded hinky, so no.  And no, I'm not really looking for a job, but if something amazing came along, who knows?)

Today, the last of my books drops out of Kindle Unlimited.  I'll get it set up and uploaded to D2D this weekend.  

In case you're not on FB or you missed it, here's a pic of one of the foxes that traipsed through my yard a couple days ago:

Yeah, it saw me and bolted, so I didn't get a chance for a good pic.  If it hadn't stopped under that oak, I wouldn't have gotten one at all.  

Yesterday, I dusted and vacuumed everything but the office.  And now I'm sore.  That's just not fair.  Getting old sucks.  Sore or not, I'll get the office done today.

I also rearranged the spare room.  I put the exercise bike under the other window, so I have a view of the bird feeder while I ride.  Of course, moving that there meant I needed to move the table with my radio and cassettes next to it (for better indoor biking), but to do that I had to move the little bookshelf where I keep the stock of my paperbacks and also the plant stand and the chair.  Anyway, the room's like I want it.  For now.  Unfortunately, I was too tired to actually ride the damn bike yesterday.  Maybe today.

:sings: Maybe today, we can put the past away...

Funny how certain phrases can make a song instantly pop into my head.  That was Jumper by Third Eye Blind.

Hey did you hear YouTube, Twitter, and Facebook are merging?  They're calling it YouTwitFace.  ROFL

And with that, I'll leave.  Have a great day, everyone.  And drop a comment on your way out.  

Sunday Update - Week 51

We're almost done with 2021.  Yay!  That's the great thing about the end of one year... There's always hope for next.

This past week... the week of Christmas... went about as expected.  I did some editing, but not as much as I would've liked.  I got thirty-seven pages done and added about 300 words.  I'm at pg 116 out of 351 pages now.  I spent part of Friday undoing some things I did book-wide because I got to a part where the changes didn't make any sense, so I undid them.  

I uploaded 5 books to Draft 2 Digital.  There are only 4 books still wide with Amazon - the SCIU books and Project Hermes.  If you haven't read them in KU, you better get started.  DE and EG drop out on Tuesday and Wednesday respectively.  FG drops out on January 14th and PH drops out on 1/20.  

It was a pretty good reading week, but with Christmas, my update was delay to tomorrow.  I hope to finish the book I'm currently reading today so it can go on that update, too.  We'll see.

On the baking front, I did cake cookies with chocolate stars pressed into the middles and another pumpkin cheesecake.  (Note, do not buy cheap brown sugar again.  It's missing flavor.)  I also did a stuffed turkey tenderloin, a pot roast, and yesterday's big ol' ham.  Wow, that ham was amazing.  If you can find the, I totally recommend Frick's Meats... a company name that lends itself to my calling it 'the best frick'n ham'.  (I think it's a waste the company doesn't use that slogan.  Hubs says it's in poor taste and they don't want their hams to taste poor.  Ba dump bump.)

In activity news, we spent four days this week working on the front flower bed.  It's all dug up and new dirt/fertilizer/etc. has been added.  Hubs has about 2/3rds of it turned so the new dirt mixes with the old.  He'll do that to the rest of the bed today.  I also did a little cleaning.  Weight: ?  I'm not crazy enough to weigh myself right now.

One day this past week was spent driving to the county seat, so we could visit the title company and close on our new strip of land.  .32 acres worth.  It was our Christmas present to each other.  This coming week, we plan to take our pretty pink string and run the property line, drive a few stakes in... you know, mark our territory.  Part of the problem with that is a few large trees that have fallen across the line.  We'll figure it out.  We always do.  

This coming week ought to be filled with year-end stuff.  I never did work on those spreadsheets like I wanted to earlier in the month, so I have to do them now.  And I have to clean.  I've been such a toad about cleaning lately and the dust is starting to pile up to the point that I got sick of it and did some spot cleaning yesterday afternoon.  Gah.  Christmas cleaning?  No one is supposed to clean on Christmas.  Hell, I didn't even do the dishes.  Which I need to do right after I get this post finished.  LOL

Anyway, I hope you all had brilliant holidays and I hope the end of the year does right by you.  If not, there's always next year.  :hugs:

What were you up to last week?  Get anything good from Santa?

Randomosity

So apparently Facebook went down yesterday for about six hours.  I noticed because as I play poker, I like to scroll through the feed when I'm not in a hand and when I tried, I got a note from my browser that there was no Facebook.  I shrugged and went on with my day.  I totally forgot about it until later when I clicked my link and in my feed people were talking about the outage.  Some people are joking that Facebook banned itself.  Others are joking that this outage was due to some whistleblower and Zuck needed to shut down to delete stuffs.  

Last night I made a dish for dinner using chicken, onions, baby potatoes, and mushrooms sauteed in butter with salt, pepper, and basil.  Dished it up and drizzled BBQ sauce over it.  Pretty yummy stuff there.  Hubs has been off chicken lately, but he said it was good, so there's a win.  Yay.

We're at that point in the year where I have no idea what to wear.  Too hot, too cold, too hot, too cold.  Shorts and then sweats and back to shorts.  Put on a sweater, take it off.  

I'm up to almost 300 million in poker now.  When you're playing with 20 mil at a whack, it's easier to go up quickly.  There's also the chance you'll go down just as quickly if you aren't careful... and lucky.  Like I was at 200 million and went down to 91 million over the course of a day.  And it took a couple weeks to get back to 200 mil.  :shrug:  Yesterday, I jumped from 245 to 298 thanks to a couple good hands and some other minor wins.  Waxed a couple of people when I went all-in with pocket aces.  That netted me 37 mil.  Got another 10 mil with a flush on the river.  I was third on the leader board for the week for that buy-in level last I checked.  Go, me.

My arms are still pretty much toast from the work I did.  This makes reading hard.  Holding up a book or an ereader for any length of time exacerbates the ouchy.  Typing for too long is also a no-no.  This is the excuse I'm using for not writing again yet.

Yes, mousing is also hard, but I try to limit that when I play poker.  And I don't play for too long at a stretch.  Play a little, take a break.  I think this might be the key to getting back to writing/editing.  Do a little, take a break.  Lather, rinse, repeat.  We'll give that a whirl today.  Maybe.

I cleaned my bathroom.  This is notable because I haven't done it in months.  Because reasons.  Now it's so pretty!  Makes me not want to take a shower in there and mess it up.  

I really need to cut my hair.  This, too, will mess up my bathroom with hair bits which I will have to vacuum up.  Which reminds me... I have to shave my legs, too.  Blerg.  Too much information?  LOL

And on that note, I'm going to wander off.  Got anything random to add?

Sunday Update - Week 33

 At least I think it's Week 33.  :shrug:

I'm still plugging along on the edit notes for Untitled Fantasy.  I think I'm at 49%.  I had a new idea last night that would seriously slow this whole thing up but might make it all so much more awesome.  We'll see if I move forward with that.

Tomorrow marketing starts up again with the freebie deal for Wish in One Hand.  

In reading news, I actually finished a book last week.  Woohoo.  Go me.  

On the baking front, I did cake cookies in bar form and zucchini bread this past week.  Yes, the zucchini bread was from one of the plants I grew from seeds.  But it was one of the ones I gave to a neighbor.  

One of the things I spent time on this past week was a project Hubs and I have been thinking about doing for a while now - converting all of the slides his Dad left him to digital format.  One of his brothers bought a device to do it with and after he did his, he sent us the device.  Which was weeks ago.  Part of the delay for us was looking through all the boxes to find the slides.  Which I did a while back.  Then I procrastinated.  Then I sat down to do it and realized the cable was not in the box.  Ordered a new cable and waited for it to arrive.  It arrived Friday and I got to work.  All the slides are now digitized.  Yay.  Then I made a spreadsheet key to what each of the picture files actually is.  Tada.  I need to do a key for the files his brother sent us.  Next up... scanning our photos so those are digitized, too.  

Another thing I've been busy with is cleaning.  Specifically, dusting.  I started dusting early in the week and then noticed how cobwebby the ceilings were.  So I high dusted the house.  Then I was too tired to complete the regular dusting.  I did finish the room I was working on when I stopped and another room.  I did the rest of it yesterday.  1500 square feet of various flat surfaces, knick-knacks and tchotchkes, bookshelves, etc.  It's a bear, but it looks nice when it's done, so that's why I do it.

Another thing taking up my time was watering the gardens.  It has been hot-hot-hot.  I do the container garden every day, but with this heat, Hubs pointed out that my in-ground gardens were looking peaked.  So, I've been outside, dragging the hose all over the yard drenching my plants.  Takes me about 30-45 minutes.  Between that and the dusting, there's my activity for the week.  Woohoo.

I also did a Wallyworld haul.  Man need food.  Ug.  

Other than that, it's been a lot of laying around in the AC trying not to melt.  We did get one hell of a rainstorm a couple days ago, which cooled the temps off some, which helps.  

And now I'm off to get back to my cleaning to-do list.  What was up in your worlds last week?  Anything exciting for the week ahead?

Sunday Update - Week 17

 Seventeen weeks into 2021 and it's getting weirder by the day.  By the way, it's National Zucchini Bread Day.  As if it wasn't weird enough to have that day in freakin' April, I went looking for info on it and one site says zucchini bread was invented in the '60s by hippies.  Umm...  I think my grandmother was making zucchini bread way before that.  (It also said that's when banana bread was invented.)

Anyway, it wasn't the best writing week I've ever had, but writing did happened, so that's a win.  4332 words for the week.  And then I hit a mental block.  I figured it out last night when I should've been sleeping.  I need to delete the end of that last scene and the block should disappear.

I tried to do some marketing, because the Model Curse books are on sale, but I got crickets and then I got discouraged.  Then I went crickets.

Only one book read last week, mainly because I'm still working my way through that NF.  

It was kind of a baking bonanza, though.  I make drop biscuits, oatmeal raisin apple cookies, and chocolate walnut upside down cake.  

I did something active 6 days out of 7, but not hugely active things.  Spot cleaning, some yardwork, a little gardening, and fishing.  Weight 184.6.

Tuesday we got snow.  Heavy, wet snow. 

I was out there in it trying to knock snow off the cedars and the bushes and my plants, because the snow was heavy enough to drag everything toward the ground.  I got super wet and freakin' cold and it was an exercise in futility.  Although, I think it saved the peonies, so that's something.  All of our black walnuts trees are hurting.  Their new leaves couldn't take the cold and nearly all of the leaves are black and curled up/crunchy now.  The big trees will survive.  The little trees?  Time will tell.  

My container garden was inside, so it's all good.

I finally got my filing done.  I don't think I filed anything after the chaos started, so there were months worth of bills in a stack on the top of my printer/scanner.  I can see the top now!  Yay.  

The windows still aren't finished.  I did another third of them and then my arms said 'oh, hell, no'.  I'll get the last three windows done today - the spare room and Hubs' bathroom.  Then I can cross that off my to-do list until Fall.  

And I'm still playing poker.  I'm around 42 million now.  

I think that's it.  There may have been other stuff.  I'm kind of manic right now, using busyness to avoid the news and the world.  

How are things going for you?  

Thursday This n That

This has been the longest week ever and it ain't done yet.

I really need to wash my monitor screen.  Yuck.

Speaking of cleaning up, I've been buying these baby wet-wipes.  The kind without anything in them - no aloe, no scent, etc.  I started buying them when we had Max, because his mouth was nasty and he couldn't wash himself.  They're perfect for cats and I use them for Kira now.  They're also great for quicky clean-ups - hands, face, etc. and spot cleaning counters, floors, walls - when you don't have time to actually wash and you want something that won't leave a residue.  

I spent a half-hour before bed last night listening to classical music, hoping it would help my brain wind down.  It was nice.  But nope.  The brain still wouldn't shut the hell up so I could sleep.  Blerg.

Zipped into Wallyworld yesterday for a few things (yes, a FEW things) to discover they'd rearranged it all again.  Oh, they'd already done the 'non-food' half of the store, but this time, they'd moved the food, too.  I never did find where they moved the coffee to.  Not a big deal since I was only looking for instant this time and I wasn't there for a full on shopping experience.  Next time... well, I'll deal with that when the time comes.  Personally, I think it was immensely stupid of Walmart of rearrange any its stores this year.  Like shoppers don't already have enough to deal with.  But that's me.

I really really REALLY need to get some exercise.  My whole 'activity every day' thing fell apart a couple weeks ago and I haven't done diddly-squat.  I've only walked like a half a mile since the 11th.  And I'm paying for it, lemme tell ya.  I always feel crappier when I get sedentary.

Last night, as I was listening to music, I made a decision.  I am not going to let them take my happy.  If this goes the way its looking like it's going to go, they're going to be taking a lot of other things from us all, but they cannot have my happy.  Don't let them have yours either.

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?