Notice:

I can't predict when I have the time to post a new blog, but check occasionally. I'm going to try at least weekly.

Saturday, November 20, 2010

A day early for a change.

Song of the day: “Sympathy for the devil” by the Rolling Stones, right? I don’t know the entire lyrics, ‘cause the only thing that sticks in my head is the beginning, which I remember from the last shot from the movie “Interview with a Vampire”, which was a totally awesome movie.

I know. I’m ahead of my usual schedule, but, even though I don’t need to show up at the restaurant & cocktail lounge if it rains, a brisk wind started blowing about an hour ago, so that could mean that tomorrow the sky is clear again (poor plantsies), meaning I won’t be here to do my blog. So I’ll do a quickie now and get it over and done with. Hah.

I’m doing a bit better. Though I don’t see any use in mourning a beloved companion, my emotions did not agree with it, and decided to linger on the entire mess. So I’ve been a tad down, which doesn’t do anyone any good, I guess. Heck I even had trouble doing my usual rounds on Amazon’s forum at the KTT. Usually that cheers me right up, but I got the heck out of there before my mood became apparent.

Ah well, no harm done in the end. I just went through the day doing my chores and whatnot, and at the end of the day, I settled behind the computer for a wonderfully distracting editing session. Got the second edit up to page 43 so that was good, and when it was time to call it a day, I decided to go for broke and headed for the carport rather than bed.

Nothing like a good workout session of an hour and a half to help you get your mind of things. Never mind how very necessary it is to pound on, and kick at, something after a rather horrible day. Seriously, that bag didn’t know what hit him.

I was properly exhausted by the end of the evening, I assure you. Heck, I barely managed to read a chapter of The Shadow of a Ghost before I passed out for the night and slept all the way through no less.

The dogs were a tad more quiet than usual, I’ll admit. I wonder if they missed Bommel, the way I did, because Sitabah, Touri and Dax didn’t even go through their rat hunting routine when I opened the door for them. Either I’ve gotten so used to the ritual that I didn’t notice it anymore, or they didn’t do it yesterday…whichever it is, it was a tad freaky.

This morning arrived cloudy and cold. According to the weather stations it will rain, but now, at almost eight in the evening, it is still not raining, so I doubt it. First things up were the morning chores such as laundry, of course, after which I head headed up to tenant’s place to see how her night was. She was right cheery, but didn’t feel like doing any exercises today. I headed back down to dig up a white blouse somewhere, because the one I tried to bleach the other day, still didn’t look white at all. It’s almost as if the fabric is pinkish from itself, and thus cannot lose any color.

But anyway, I found another blouse that fits, is clean and after ironing it out it looked neat enough for me to wear tomorrow. Along with my black pants, white sneakers and black T for underneath, I think it will do the trick well enough “at work”. Waiter Sam. Yep. The outfit’s there, now let’s hope that the attitude will follow suit. Hah.

After sorting through the clothes bit, I headed on up to the Land Rover, and once I’d checked the oil, I took one look at the massive piles of rocks littering part of the road, I decided to tackle it post haste.

It took me three hours to haul all the stones from the road and pile them up by the main wall, but now there is a decent amount of space for the Land Rover to park, and all the rubbish that was lying around the spread out piles is now on a pile in the old paddock. We’ll be bringing it to the local landfill by tomorrow.

Seriously, after yesterday’s exercise, followed by the rock hauling, every single muscle in my body was screaming…still is, as a matter of fact. So is my foot, FYI, (had to ice it tonight) but compared to today, tomorrow will be a piece of cake…I hope. Hah. Nothing like hauling two thousand pounds of rocks for a few hours. It’ll get the blood pumping and the muscles hot in no time.

No matter, though. The road is clear, and I got it all done while big brother continued his work on the imperial. He’s almost ready with it by the way and the metal contraption looks awesome, in case you’re wondering. As soon as it’s painted, we’ll put it on the Land Rover so I can take a picture. It makes the car look more squad, if that makes any sense?

I’ve got the ceiling covering for tenant done, by the way, as soon as grandpa has tackled the electrical wiring (he insisted on doing that) I’ll be putting it up, meaning that the solarium will be as good as ready.

After the rock-hauling bit, big brother and I spend about an hour taking apart wooden pallets and such, so grandpa won’t need to, and then after a quick snack of potato cookies, headed out into the yard to do some harvesting. The peppers are doing rather well still. We found a few tomatoes as well, along with two pumpkins and a bushel of celery. The clouds were pretty glooming while we were out there, by the way. The city was literally black with the clouds, and on the western side, over the five-knuckle mountain, thick clouds broke apart on occasion to show bright yellow light falling through. Very impressive, I’ll admit, and I took pictures. Hah.

Well, this should do that trick. I don’t know if I will have enough time to post before Tuesday, but I’ll try.

Friday, November 19, 2010

R.I.P. Bommel

Song of the day: “Forever” by Chris Brown. Still a beautiful song, even though I’ve had it stuck in my mind plenty of times.

A crappy day, so far, in this case because I had to make the dreaded decision once more. Bommel: His time had come, and seeing him struggle to get out of his basket this morning, and then trying to find his way out of the cabin, only to fall off the porch before I could get there to stop him. He didn’t cry out, didn’t move. He just lay there, blinking his confusion. It was enough. I had to say “this is it”, because to let him continue on now that his quality of life has gone down so much that he can’t even complain about pain anymore, would be for me, and not him anymore. I refuse to be the cause for his suffering, and therefore we headed out this morning, after the morning chores.

I got Bommel in January, in 1998. He was about two or three years old and it was my nineteenth birthday. I came up from my room (back then my room was what we now call the guest quarters by the old pool), it was raining, and I had Knight (the first) and Dax (the first too) with me. I entered the house, and there, shivering, smelly and drenched like a drowned rat, he stood. There was a soggy pink bow around his neck, his gray and white fur was still dirt caked but I knew without a doubt that he was a Bobtail, like me beloved Knight.
There was a distinct smell in the air…he came from the breeder where I’d gotten Knight too, who had to get rid of the “left overs”, so to speak…one that I remembered well from when I got Knight. I remember smiling upon seeing the dog that would become Bommel in the many years that would come to pass.
He was a mess, scared as heck for the big outside world (hadn’t seen more than a 9’ by 3’ cage his entire life) but absolutely adorable in a cumbrous sort of way. Seriously, Bommel always reminded me of a buggy in he way he walked with O shaped legs and a compact upper body. He was cheery, grumpy, and everything in-between but a most loyal friend in the past twelve years that past.
Sure, he had problems, ear infections at the drop of a hat, cancerous lumps on his skin and Leishmania which made him blind in the past four years, but he led a splendid life with lots of friends to keep him company over the years.
Gawd. I can hardly believe that except for Djammi (a black cocker spaniel) and Bakti (a black crossbreed) the first round of rescue dogs we took in is no more. Fourteen years and 76 losses: it is heavy on the heart for sure.
There were downs for sure, but also ups that made it well worth the heartache, I guess. Though it hurts on days like today, when saying goodbye to a beloved friend, I wouldn’t have wanted to miss a single day with any of them.

The other dogs looked at me funny when I came home afterwards, they sniffed noisily and kept looking around as if realizing that Bommel hadn’t returned with me. Yes, in Spain it is now also obligatory to leave your pet at the Vet’s for “destruction”. Bastards!
Anyways…I think Sitabah is going to have the most trouble with this for the next few days, considering Bommel always hassled her somewhat fierce on his way up. She’d be screaming like mad, and he’d pretend attacking her, up until about three months ago. Yeah, I think she’ll have a tough time of it. The others, well, they are sufficiently selfish that way, I guess. They’ll hardly notice.

But enough maudlin, this is after all a blog about life, rather than death, and rather than linger on the crappy stuff, I prefer to leave the past where it is. Behind me, out of sight and without regret. Can’t change anything about it anyway, and in all honesty, I don’t think I want to. It is gone, “Dust in the wind, so to speak”

So what’s been going on besides the depressing part? Not a lot, really, mostly away-from-home stuff (which annoys me to no end, I assure you) that made me take a total of four days to finish tenant’s wall. But, as of yesterday afternoon I succeeded in closing the thing off. Windows are in, locks on it, and a closed pane of glass to finish the appearance. It’s looking good, and tenant is psyched. Soon I’m going to put in a new concrete floor and tiles, so the place will be as good as new.

The book is finished. (Did I mention it already? Maybe. I don’t know. I don’t care.)Yes it is finished, the writing and the first edit with it. We are now a quarter into the second edit, and right after we will start on the paper edit, which will be the last one. After that we can send it out.

I sure can’t wait to start on a new story that has been tumbling through my mind constantly, but of course I will have to do the edit of the other manuscript yet. It will be fun to that too, however, considering that we’ll be able to look at it with a fresh pair of eyes now.

I went for my appointment with the cocktail lounge woman, who said I could come on Sunday for my “workday” so all is set for either a future column, or a fun blog…well, even if it is for a column, it’ll end up on here in some shape or form anyway, hah. The only thing I need for Sunday is black pants and a white top…the latter being a bit of a problem since, with all the dogs, I usually go out of my way to NOT have white. But anyway, I managed to dig something up that should do the trick. It was way down in my storage chest, but it was still white and comfortable.
Wish me luck!…which reminds me, I probably need to post another blog tomorrow because that sure ain’t going to happen on Sunday. I’ll be gone for twelve hours at the very least.

After my appointment I took tenant and her caregiver to the looking glasses store so she could be fitted with new glasses. She is going to need to, and in order to safe some money she opted to go for crystal, rather than plastic glasses. Weird how that works, really. I just refuse to see plastic as something that should be more expensive. Fitted her with a pair of silver ones, and light pink ones that look rather sharp on her. It did exhaust her, though, in particular the measuring. In the end she just opted to stare at the floor, rather than anything else.

Well, I rather do something constructive right now, rather than thinking of Bommel again (my thoughts do seem to have an inclination to go back there every five minutes or so) I cried more than enough for today. I’m going to see what project I can rack up to keep me occupied.

Wednesday, November 17, 2010

The monster inside. Hah.

Song of the day: “Point of view” by DB Boulevard. Such an annoying song that’ll just keep tumbling through your head no matter what you do. Grrr.

So the past couple of days were absolutely friggin’ annoying, darn it. Seriously, it felt like we haven’t been home more than an hour since Monday morning and it ain’t over yet either. Yesterday morning we headed for Malaga, to the Land Rover garage with both cars and left our sweetie there for repairs once again. Seriously, I can dream the way there now, which is getting to be way too familiar if you ask me. I am not supposed to know the way to an expensive repair shop at all, but there you have it.

We came away from the experience with a five hundred bucks bill, thank you very much, and are hopeful that by now all the things that can go wrong have gone wrong. I’m not holding my breath, though…but, maybe we are luckier now that we have found a proper garage.

Yesterday afternoon, after we had dropped the car off, we spent a few hours messing around with the ongoing projects, of course. I hung the second window for tenant’s solarium so now it is all a matter of closing the rest off in the next few days. In particular since the temperatures are rather low at the moment. Seriously, if it is twelve degrees I’ll be surprised.

The doggies are not at all pleased with our frequent departures, considering they cannot stay outside (poor darlings will start shaking within half an hour) and have to stay inside, they’re grumpy as heck. Knight II for instance is eyeballing the rest while he vies for my attention and isn’t at all in agreement whenever one of the other dogs comes near. I really have to pay close attention to keep him in check.

Bommel isn’t liking the cold at all either, seeing as he took half an hour to find a soft warm spot near my feet and then flopped down to go to sleep. Poor thing is really having trouble keeping up with us, and though I would much prefer leave him comfortable and warm inside, I don’t want him to just give up and don nothing else with his day than sleep. It is a thing that happens with age. They’ll sleep more and more until at some point the body just stops. Though not the worst way to go, I would like to postpone that just a wee bit longer.

Editing: we’re working on the last dozen pages of the first edit, and big brother is halfway through the second one, so with a little luck we’ll be able to print the manuscript by the end of the week and start on the paper (last) edit. Then, maybe, just maybe, we’ll be able to send it to the publisher by next month.
This is good, considering we can then continue the edit of the vampire novel and send that out a month later, at which time I can finally start writing the new story that had been bursting at the seams to come out of my head. Hah.

The first feedback from a new first-impression-reader yesterday, and after I had beaten the outraged, overly emotional monster that lurks deep inside my spirit back, I could create enough distance to really appreciate her input. I find it strange, this monster that doesn’t like to hear any criticism (be it constructive or not), how it can blind you for several hours until I can make it submit to logic. I mean really, I asked for new readers for a fresh input after all, and yet the first inclination is to feel hurt, or even angry. There are times when I think that the emotional part of me is an actual Alien that has absolutely nothing to do with my intellect. It wants to lash out at those who disagree, without pardon. I have learned to curb the monster, though, and can beat it back to where it belongs so I can actually use the thoughtful suggestions from an appreciative reader.

So, M.L., if you’re reading this (I doubt it, but what the heck) THANK YOU!

Okay, enough of the monster. What else. I should take some time to clean my cabin, but not today. First tenant’s place needs to be finished, because otherwise she has to suffer through the cold way too much, and then I’ll see if I can fit in a quick cleaning.

This morning was also busy, by the way. Big brother and I first had to head for Marbella to pick up our friend for her weekly visit, and then, after dropping her off at home, we drove straight on through to Malaga to pick up the car…ergo the five hundred bucks.

Enough for now. Time to do some serious work.

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

Late quickie.

Song of the day: “Flying Solo” by Ilse Delange. A delightful song, really. I do enjoy country tremendously from time to time.

As you can see, I’m running dreadfully late again, and considering I just came home from “the route” this is going to be a quickie post, I think. Tomorrow will be another early day, since we haven’t done the village yet, and we need to go to Malaga again. The Land Rover garage will be our destination because, those idiots in the village garage definitely messed stuff up when they put in the new juntas. Seriously, two more leaks sprung at the bottom, which we now need to have repaired, again.

There is also the matter of the leak by the joint of the front right wheel, and something with the starter, so that’ll dig into our savings once more. It is almost as if the friggin car is jinxed, or something. I don’t even remember how often we have needed to fix something now…I could of course go back through all the posts of the past year or two, but that would take ages so I’m just going to leave it at a lot.

So let me just bring you up to date as to the projects at home. Put in half the wall of tenant’s solarium, and it looks so cute. Of course there wasn’t enough time to finish it, so now the thing is still half open…and that while the temperatures have rapidly dropped since last night. Under ten and that is incredibly early for this area. Usually we don’t have this ‘till the end of January.

But anyway, we deposited tenant in the full sunshine this afternoon, so she spent the majority of the afternoon nice and toasty on my porch. Which was a good thing, considering she’d been freezing most of the morning.
Considering big brother baked potatoes and nuggets for lunch, we shared it with her and her caregiver, just so she’d have some company. I think she is starting to get used to the fact that we’re not here for mostly two to three days a week.

The dogs were not at all in agreement to the activities of the past couple of days because due to the remodel of tenants place tenant and grandpa’s dogs were running free, which meant that we had to keep our dogs within the center garden rather than risk disaster at the fences. Let’s just say that they were vastly disgruntled every time any one of us got near to the gate, They were of course thrilled when twilight fell and it became time to call it a day.

Gardening: It was wonderful, I know that I keep saying the same thing over and over again, but it just is. If it were up to me I’d spend the entire day down there (was sorely tempted this morning, mind you. I had to get some herbs for the salad I was making for when we went to work) just working in the sunshine out of the wind.

Writing: For the most part I’m wrapping up what is left of unfinished scenes and most of the formatting has been dealt with, so soon we will be able to start on a serious edit, followed closely behind by a paper edit, which is essential when it concerns getting a book publisher ready.

The route: It went well, I think, even though my mind kept tumbling towards the most recent issue of yet another repair. I hate it when I start worrying about things that I cannot change, but there you have it. Not that it mattered, all things considered. The job got done, and I had some nice chats with people along the way.

I’ve got an appointment on Thursday with the nice lady from the cocktail lounge & restaurant. I’m going to outline my plans and such at that time, explain what I want and how I want to do it.
With a little luck I’ll then be able to set a date for when I can start.

A bit of depressing news, I heard that unlike the ten years I thought the average Great Danes live, it turns out that the average age is six to seven, which had me going like “dayam” Seriously, I’m going to be a serious shaite when that moment arrives way too quickly. I’m going to have to strive to getting him to live longer because I cannot deal with just another three to four years.

Okay, moving on because I could lose some serious tears over this if I let myself. Six to seven years? Aaaargh.

Back to the route: I didn’t see the nice Indian waiter I usually banter with. He was busy I guess, ‘cause two of his colleagues were playing cricket on the street. I chatted with the friendly lady at the fish and chips place. She didn’t think her boss had changed his/her mind, so she said to expect to hear from them as soon as possible…after tomorrow since at the moment they are in the UK.

I also chatted a bit (teeny bit) with a guy at a bar, either the manager or owner, who was bored out of his mind due to a lack of customers, and he asked if everything was so bloody quiet today. It was, and I told him such while I cooed at his cute little dog (named Victor) who really couldn’t get enough of my pack-of-dogs-scent.
Fiction wise, tonight was a little freaky. In a book horrific stuff could have happened. Hah.

We were home just after eleven today, so we were definitely well on time. Yay. We got the route down pat now, I think..

Well, time for bed for me. Lots more to do tomorrow, and that is not counting the trip to the city.