Archive for the ‘real life’ Tag
Fur Family Update
Still no photos of the other two cats… Serena had a mat in her fur, Spooky Man tried to cut it out; one snip went wrong and she now has a bandage on the small hole in her skin.
Spooky Man feels awful, since he’s the only human she really likes. No photos until she heals, which might take a while — she’s going to be 20 years old around the first of September, which is about the human equivalent of 120.
Tuffi acquired an abscess at the base of his right ear that he scratched open. It was ugly; at one point, he had gotten all the fur off his right ear and had what appeared to be a gigantic hole in the skin. The original scab looked like it covered half of his ear, and the rest of the ear had that glossy look of burned skin.
He was not pleased about the wound cleaning, the peroxide treatment or the surface antibiotic. He was not pleased about house arrest, either. I wasn’t pleased about holding down a growling cat built like a linebacker, with only a towel between us, while Spooky Man cleaned, disinfected and applied antibiotic ointment.
The fur is starting to grow back (Spooky Man was concerned that he’d have a bald ear forever) and the scab is now smaller than a standard pencil eraser. So he won’t be ready for a portrait until his ear is fully recovered.
Some people’s furry kids.
Sleep Deprivation in American Kids, a small rant
Fact: obesity, “metabolic syndrome,” and type 2 diabetes are rampant in the United States.
Fact: Americans are chronically sleep deprived, with adults averaging less than seven hours a night, when that average should be eight or nine hours a night. Children need more sleep than adults; 10-12 hours a night is recommended up to age 12.
Fact: Sleep deprivation has been linked to metabolic syndrome, obesity and type 2 diabetes, along with a host of other medical issues.
Fact: I was in a grocery store after 9 p.m. on a Tuesday in early May and saw multiple families, with grade-school aged children, shopping. School is still in session in this city in early May.
Opinion: Take your kids home and put them to bed, my friends. Keeping them up after 9 p.m. when they have school in the morning is Bad for them.
It can elevate their fasting blood sugar, impair their ability to control appetite, and even interfere with their memory of stuff they’ve recently learned.
And while you’re at it, go take a nap, because you don’t need those things to happen to you, either.
End of Rant. I feel much better now. Thanks for listening.
Parting is Such Sweet Sorrow
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: real life, writers life, writing
Leave a comment One of my critique partners is moving away. To Tampa. Next weekend. Well, actually I think she and the dog are boarding the plane on May 1st, but it’s close enough.
We’re having our last In Real Life (IRL) meeting on Good Friday. Somehow it’s appropriate. Endings and beginnings.
She’s beginning her new life with her old husband (they’ve been separated since January) and can’t wait to see him again.
And now the Moxie Quartet (our informal name for our critique group) is down to two. But life goes on and there is Skype.
It makes me think of Ecclesiastes, as interpreted by The Byrds. They called it Turn Turn Turn: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=odj2kNn3_v0&NR=1
I’m just not a Luddite, I guess
Five years ago, I didn’t have a cell phone. Then Spooky Man and I went on a cruise to Alaska, which meant the dog had to have a babysitter. Said babysitter required the ability to get ahold of us at any time. So I grimaced and bought a Tracfone.
Then the economy went off a cliff in 2008 and the phone billl crossed the $75-a-month mark for basic service plus voicemail. Yup, it was cheaper to get cell phones and get rid of the regular phone.
I hedged, though. I bought a MagicJack, just in case. We’re not using it right now, because the computer it plugs into needs a new fan, but that’s on my to-do list.
Then there was the DVD crisis. I bought a copy of Red (Retired, Extremely Dangerous) for Spooky Man’s birthday, and the DVD player locked up during the shipping-container firefight. I had to do, well, something. It was his birthday present.
I bought a blu-ray player with wireless Netflix streaming. It was cheaper than a Wii and will allow us to cut back our cable bill. I know, I know, but the DVD player *died.* And it will be less expensive to get movies from Netflix.
Now, the battery in my LG phone won’t hold a charge and we’re eligible for an upgrade. Yes, I went there. I bought Droid Xs. They should be delivered tomorrow.
I would hang my head in shame, except they’re so dratted useful; MP3 player, GPS receiver, internet access, camera/vidcam, Angry Birds and you can make phonecalls.
Spooky Man approved the purchase because, he said, there’s an app to make the camera work with night vision (see why I call him Spooky Man?).
Now that I have a VOIP home phone, a Droid smartphone and a wireless blu-ray player, I think I have to get a geek card.
Just don’t ask me to program C#. Please.
Spooky Man is an Unspecified Number of Years Old Today
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: real life, Totally Off Topic
Leave a comment I could tell you how many years, but then he’d have to kill you. And since he’s old and decrepit, you’d have to hold still for it; it’s just easier all around not to reveal the number.
Happy Birthday, honey. Love you.
A Seriously Eventful Week
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: coping beans, real life, writing
Leave a comment This week the mystery readers/writers group had a minor emergency–they didn’t have enough people attend the last two meetings to have an election.
Out of approximately 50 paying members, maybe five or six turn up on any given month. They’re considering some significant changes to meeting venue and date to reverse the problem. I hope it works, because I miss seeing the interesting (in a good way!) people who love mystery literature.
Then the writing conference board had a meeting and Mayhem In The Grove won’t be in the Centre on the Grove this year. We just can’t afford it without charging attendees too much (you would not believe, for example, how much they want for a gallon of coffee).
We also had to withdraw from the agreement Michael Hauge, the screenwriting guru who was going to teach the master class. It hurts (he’s a marvelous teacher), but the money just didn’t work.
And then a critique partner called to say she’d not be attending this weekend’s meeting because her husband just received a fabulous job offer in Tampa, Florida. She’s not moving immediately, but probably will be joining him within a year.
To put that in perspective, we live in Boise, Idaho. It’s not commuting distance for anything but electrons. I’m trying not to sulk. Or pout.
Oh, and a U.S. representative was shot outside a supermarket yesterday. A federal judge and a nine-year-old girl were killed in the incident.
When you start shooting children at supermarkets over politics, rhetoric has taken a turn for the psychotic. I don’t care if you’re a liberal democrat, a fascist, or anything in between.
Mom warned me there would be weeks like this. She was right.
I Hate Change…Purse Trauma
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: real life, Totally Off Topic
Leave a comment I am female. And I am abnormal. How abnormal? I hate shopping, I own 12 pairs of shoes and I’m having mental trauma over replacing my one-and-only worn-out purse.
My taste tends to simple design, but at the same time I’m very particular–like the recent car commercial, “almost” isn’t the same.
When I figure out what I’m looking for and I can’t find it (or can’t find it for a reasonable price, which is a different issue), I become highly perturbed and end up creating it for myself. As a result, shopping is pretty much useless for me, unless I’m buying raw materials.
Then, three to five years later, when I don’t want/need that particular thing anymore, it turns up everywhere. At a reasonable price.
Some people think I’m cheap, but I’m not, really. Take the purse, for example. I’ve been working with leather since, well, grade school (girl scouts, 4-H, etc.), so I understand what’s involved. To me, no bag/purse on Earth is worth US $400 for the privilege of advertising someone else’s brand.
It doesn’t work any better than the generic version. I’m not interested in impressing my neighbors with my poor financial acumen (I blew a car payment on this handbag!). And shouldn’t the designer be paying me for advertising space? I’m just sayin’….
So. My purse/bag has been in the process of wearing out for two years. The strap is cracking and falling apart. The zippers are fraying and getting stuck. I’ve nursed it as long as I could, but time catches up with everything.
For approximately 18 months, I’ve been waffling between three leather organizer models that all cost less than $30 online. I’m going to keep and use this one bag for eight to ten years (or whenever it wears out), so it has to be the Right One.
Last week, I gritted my teeth and made the selection.
Today it arrived. Spooky Man sent me to my room after dinner to load up the new bag (he knows change makes me cranky), and…everything fit.
It’s still going to take some getting used to, because it’s different. But I think I’m going to be okay.
And now for my next trauma…Spooky Man muttered something about it being time for a new coat. Gulp. Couldn’t we just buy a photovoltaic grid instead and turn up the heat? Those are easy.
What is it with all the cancer in the last week or so?
Last week I had my now-yearly dermatologist checkup–I’m boring, if you recall. Grin. The next day I found out my friend Robin Lee Hatcher was diagnosed with breast cancer on the day before Thanksgiving (I was diagnosed with breast almost-cancer, DCIS, on the day before Thanksgiving last year).
Robin found it early and has a very good prognosis, but still, the timing coincidence is a little creepy.
Colleen Lindsay, who I started following on Twitter when she was a literary agent, is currently in the adventure of chemotherapy. She left agenting at the end of summer this year, but her tweets are so fabulously entertaining that I couldn’t stop following her.
Tonight, she said her chemo docs probably wouldn’t approve of her sharing apple pie with her cat. I’m not sure her vet would approve, either, but if Colleen and Stinkyboy (the cat) are okay with it, it works for me.
Now I have to split my thoughts, prayers and general good vibes between Colleen and Robin. Kick its [bleep], ladies.
And we lost Elizabeth Edwards on Tuesday. Sad and annoying; a life well lived, but…too short.
I’m healthy as a horse these days, at least according to all the new doctors I’ve collected over the last year and a half. So now the rest of the world needs to catch up.
In the world of writing, I didn’t get to 50,000 words for National Novel Writing Month, but I did get to 20,000 words. And I plotted a sequel cyberpunk romance novella. And I think I have the beginning of a third, which would mean all three could be packaged together as an anthology if anyone else likes them as much as I do.
Now, back to the manuscript critique on which I’m supposed to be working.
Sometimes Boring is a Good Thing
Today I saw my dermatologist…for my annual exam after having squamous cell carcinoma removed from my nose in spring of 2009. She went over my skin with a lighted magnifier and pronounced me boring.
Oddly enough, the medical oncologist I had to see in September as a follow-up to the DCIS in my left breast also pronounced me boring. Well, she actually said my DCIS was pretty boring.
So, if anyone is counting, in the last five years I’ve been diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis, Celiac Sprue, Squamous-Cell Carcinoma and Ductile Carcinoma In Situ.
It turned out the MS was really a neurological symptom of Celiac. When I stopped eating gluten the symptoms all resolved within about six months and haven’t been back in five years. It got old about four years and eleven months ago.
As for the other stuff, I’ve never been so happy to be boring.
The Quest for Coping Beans continues
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: coping beans, real life, writing
Comments (1) So I’ve gotten back the coping beans from worrying about the car, although I still have the nervous tic (I glance at the temp gauge every five seconds while driving, just in case).
My local RWA chapter has its elections this weekend; I’m giving up webmaster. I’ve been doing it for two years, and I’ve sucked at it for the last several months, so it’s time. Yes, the burning smell is me.
My term of office as president of Popular Fiction Association of Idaho, Inc. (which puts on the only yearly genre fiction writing conference in Boise) ends at the end of February. The lovely and talented Amberly Smith has been unanimously consented in as the next president already. More coping beans will be freed up by that.
By the way, Amberly’s debut novel, Rinse and Repeat, will be coming out in January from Dreamspinner Press, just in time for her to finish her bachelor’s degree in Communication. I’ve read parts of this book and I think it’s delightful: Groundhog Day meets Quantum Leap.
More coping beans returned: The single intersection I must pass through between home and work has been under construction for 10 months, but they painted the lines and took away the orange cones today. This should cut my commuting time in half.
Now all I have to do is cut back work hours to 40 per week, wean Spooky Man from needing me to pick up something from the store every bleeping day, and get all the furry children cycled through their immunizations by Christmas.
NanoWriMo: 5 days in, only 1,000 words. I am sooooo behind.
Who would have thought cancer treatment would have been the easiest part of the year?
