Song of the day: “Come on” by Will Young. It was a deliberate earworm, if for no other reason than to get Gotye out of there. Seriously, three days was enough.
I’m late. I’m sooooo late, darn it. Why are there only twenty four friggin’ hours in a day darn it? Oh yeah, right. Because if there were more I would be even more tired right now. Hah. Never mind then. Let’s see. Well, yesterday started a little early because Cousin Ed’s birthday was there, and I had to make a apple pie for the occasion. Didn’t take all that long, really. Half an hour at most and then…wel, it was worth every minute, seeing as we still enjoyed pieces of that today. Yay.
Regardless of the happy occasion normal food had to be made as well. I’ve been wanting to experiment with chickpeas and chicken broth for a long time now and I figure they worked out rather well. Tried them today on burger rolls. They were yummy. For a moment there they tasted like McChicken. Yay.
Had to go out after breakfast to pay for the cottage. Was worried for a bit that I might not be able to find it again, but I did, and the lady was really nice, again. She invited me into her own home while she wrote out a receipt, and was proud as a fiddle about showing off her designer skills. It did look charming, I’ll admit, despite all the reds on white. Hah.
There was tiling to finish. The final edge before the new kitchen counter, and since Cousin Ed insisted on doing the actual laying, I did the cutting while cooking supper in the meantime. There was some serious debate with grandpa prior to starting, about whether to use a red tile, or a yellow one, but (thankfully) he opted for the yellow, which is good since red would have been really busy. *Phew* I was much relieved.
Most of that done (grandpa and big brother were in carport working on the cupboards) big brother and I had to go out to pick up a donation. A very nice Schottish woman who was sorting through the “mess” in her house and wanted to get rid of a lot. It was an experience, I tell ya. Hah.
Once home we got to work on A.I.L., of which we have to cut a 1100 synopsis into 750 something words too. OMG, I hate this part, but it’s gotta be done. Luckily this is not such a complicated story such as Saving Nina, because over there ever single cut felt like I was amputating an arm, or something.
Was a little late getting to bed, seeing as I got distracted (after work) online. Those Amazon Chats are just too much fun, darn it. But no matter. I was up on time this morning to get to the workout. Did the double time thing again, adding some extra reps just to see if I could. It didn’t help that I did some situps last night, but all in all I managed well enough. Whatever else I can say about that workout this morning, my body felt nicely oiled in the joints today.
There was laundry, two dog feeding sessions (yesterday too, of course) and breakfast…after big brother picked up Grandpa. His moped is playing up again, meaning it had to be brought to the shop for an overhaul. The guy checked it through during the day, but except for the fact that there was not smooth enough oil in it, (or something along those lines) he couldn’t find anything wrong.
Unloaded the car, and sorted through some tiles. The supply piles are a mess after all the work we did with them so far. Jeez. It’s going to take me ages to get that cleaned up again.
Couldn’t waste too much time there, either, since we had to head down to the yard and water a large part of the terraces. Took a moment to clean up most of the mess in the greenhouse, since I was there anyway, checking the tomato plants. There was some harvest too, but since we already cut most of today’s veggies yesterday, there wasn’t much needed. Did get some nice lettuces for consumption, along with a big batch of broccoli and a white cabbage.
The remainder of the day was spent cleaning up. First hauling pallets to the storage. There were six of them lying about, so those had to be gathered and carried away. What followed was a big stack of plants, which grandpa wanted in the storage, covered by a blanket to prevent them from curving from the sunshine. Lastly was carrying some more tiles to the corner of the storage. For the record, I’ve got to say here for a moment that I calculated the amount of tiles for the kitchen just right. Yay. *pats own shoulder* “There’s a good Sammi.”
I finished up, up there by gathering building debris which we’re going to have to drive to the dump one of these days. It does look way better over there now, which is a good thing, and about time.
That done, I went to the carport to get a broom and shovel (big brother and grandpa were working with the cupboards in the kitchen) and moved on to the basin terrace. Took most of the furniture from under the plastic coverings, set it all up for the field kitchen in a few weeks, and then swept the floors until there was actually space to move again. Yay. Looking much better now, if I must say so myself. I promptly felt like sitting down there, hah, watching Gada stretch out in obvious bliss.
That done, it was back up where tenant was waiting to go on up to her cottage, and to bike on the bicycle for a bit. She held out for about five minutes, but then it was agreed that she still had to walk up the mountain, so that was enough. She was a little embarrassed about taking to long, but I was honestly grateful for the quiet moment where I just needed to stand there, making sure she didn’t lose her balance.
Which brings us to now. Another editing session through the synopsis behind us and my eyes already halfway shut. Seriously, it is time to call it a day.
Showing posts with label tiling. Show all posts
Showing posts with label tiling. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 25, 2012
Sunday, April 22, 2012
Couldn't help it
Song of the day: “Somebody I used to know” by Gotye and Kimbra. Yep. It’s been those sort of days again where a single song will be stuck in my head for endless hours, driving me bonkers, while at the same time charming me too. Strange how that works, really.
Right. Got less done then planned, but we found a rather wonderful location for tenant’s relatives, so it wasn’t for nothing. By some miracle I had forgotten to tell Ox that we had already had found a finca in the country, so when he called yesterday morning, and said he had found a nice place just outside the village with a nice English lady as the owner, and a better price than the other one, we couldn’t resist and headed out to see. The owner met us half the way, drove ahead and led us straight to this cute vacation paradise, overlooking the village. Gawd, I can tell ya we were properly stunned and could do nothing but nod and say, wow, while she led us around. It was so cute, a neat living room, kitchen, new bathroom, two bedrooms and a recently filled pool. Cousin Ed and I were more than a little relieved at the realization that we had been reluctant to make any deals with the nice fellow of the finca, because this one would be so much more suited for a nice vacation. And the owner was such a nice lady, too. And she had two dogs. And the views, well, they were splendid. Luckily tenant’s relatives didn’t mind the third change in plans at all and really took our wishy washy-ness rather well. Hah.
But okay. One disaster dealt with, we are of course on tenterhooks about the fact that the owner of the cottage won’t be home today, and wasn’t home either yesterday, so I’m crossing all my appendages that this doesn’t go wrong again. Never knew that renting something was this much of a bother, but there you have it. *sigh* Did get to see lots of fun places, though, going on roads that I otherwise would have no business traveling. So there’s a good side to everything, right?
So let’s get to business as usual. What with grandpa and big brother still working on that kitchen counter, I’ve been scrambling a lot to keep things going that need to be done routinely. Like the dog food. Two batches of vegetables that needed to be cut. Leftover leaves from the cabbages, nopales, tomatoes that are getting wrinkly, pumpkins that can’t be saved anymore, the leaves from beets, and all that good stuff which they so clearly love. There was most of that to chop, which takes about thirty minutes a day, and in the mornings, after the veggies have boiled on the woodstove for most of the precious evening, it is time to knead water soaked bread and mixing the lot with dog kibble. Gawd, it is rather nice to do this part. I will be standing at the table, mixing everything up, while around me more than twenty dogs are watching every move I make. If I raise my hand (I know, very mean, but it’s hilarious) all heads will tip back and tongues will slide over lips in restless anticipation. It is almost like a cartoon. Hah.
But anyway, they will dig in fast enough…too fast in fact, seeing as Chaos, Indigo, Ama, Labhana, Gada, and Tadaika need to be separated in the carport to prevent them from reaching their ultimate goal: the bottom of the bowl. Jeez. Those babies can seriously eat. If we don’t set them aside, they’ll eat about two thirds of the total…and they’re already fat, for crying out loud!
Yesterday, what with big brother and grandpa so busy, I spent most of the afternoon on my own in the yard. The plan was only to water some of the plants that really needed it, but after I checked, I saw that really most of them needed water, so what followed was three hours of watering, going up and down the incline, harvesting, gathering our own veggies as well as that of the dogs. I was seriously pooped by the time I came up, had cut everything up and then headed for the kitchen (I want my outside kitchen, darn it. The day was too grand to spend it inside) to cook supper. Not bad at all, a mix of cauliflower, broccoli and corn, served with macaroni and a white green herb sauce…in fact, it worked out so well, that grandpa stole it this morning, and used it for his own meals. Which had me scramble a little today, since I had counted on that particular leftover, hah.
We sent out “Saving Nina” last night. Yay. It took some doing, we spent the past few evenings hacking our way through that synopsis, a character description, best line of dialogue, best scene, the query and all that jazz. A pity that you can’t just send a story without anything extra, but such is not the nature of the beast. It has to be just so, and like in any other business, you have to adhere to the standard. *sigh*
This afternoon, due to the fact that somehow we didn’t manage to get around to it before, cousin Ed and I spent most of the time on our knees scrubbing the tiles that we did the grouting of the other day. Yep. It was a royal pain in the behind, seeing as all the excess had been stuck in place, and we had to use scrapers, sanding paper and in the end a mop to get the job done. It is beautiful, though (got pictures, I promise, I just haven’t taken them off my phone, yet) and exactly as we planned. The colors go together splendidly, and it is more like art than a floor. Hah.
Yesterday evening was spent fixing the old chainsaw. Rust, grease and whatnot had stuck everything together, so everything had to be soaked in petrol and then put back in place. Nothing quite as exciting than turning a machine on that wasn’t function before. Yay.
There was a workout this morning, of course. I was a little late getting up, but since I didn’t have to account for the dogs of the younger sibs, (market day) I could take that little extra time before going down for a shower and doing the laundry.
Made patties, despite the fact that the kitchen is momentarily missing. Got a bit annoyed when Ayana decided to steal part of the dough, though. Little monster. I turned my back for five seconds (and of course I can’t expect big brother to notice something like that) and a third of the dough was gone without a trace. Grrrr. Luckily there’s enough left, eh? Went for a chickpea with chicken broth mix today, to see if I can make it taste more like chicken.
Was starving again about two hours after supper, so when big brother went back to the kitchen to deal with his own problem, the conversation went like this:
Me: “Take something nice down, yeah?”
Big brother: “You want a hotdog?”
Me: “Eeew. Never mind. Don’t take ANYTHING down for me. Jeez”
At which point I grabbed for a bag of cornflakes and dug in. Hah.
Tick hunting: Yes, the time is getting to be in full swing. One of the few things I really dislike about summer ‘round these parts. Sooooo many ticks. They’re everywhere, and about an hour a day is spent removing ticks. Not one session, or anything, but every time you pet a dog, there’s another one, and another, and another to remove. Luckily they love the attention.
Well, that’s about it for today. I’ve got to prepare A.I.L. for sending out to a publisher as well, so that ‘ll take a few more days at least, and then, yes, I am already gladly anticipating the grand event (don’t trip over the sarcasm) it is…(drum roll please)…back to editing. *sigh*
Right. Got less done then planned, but we found a rather wonderful location for tenant’s relatives, so it wasn’t for nothing. By some miracle I had forgotten to tell Ox that we had already had found a finca in the country, so when he called yesterday morning, and said he had found a nice place just outside the village with a nice English lady as the owner, and a better price than the other one, we couldn’t resist and headed out to see. The owner met us half the way, drove ahead and led us straight to this cute vacation paradise, overlooking the village. Gawd, I can tell ya we were properly stunned and could do nothing but nod and say, wow, while she led us around. It was so cute, a neat living room, kitchen, new bathroom, two bedrooms and a recently filled pool. Cousin Ed and I were more than a little relieved at the realization that we had been reluctant to make any deals with the nice fellow of the finca, because this one would be so much more suited for a nice vacation. And the owner was such a nice lady, too. And she had two dogs. And the views, well, they were splendid. Luckily tenant’s relatives didn’t mind the third change in plans at all and really took our wishy washy-ness rather well. Hah.
But okay. One disaster dealt with, we are of course on tenterhooks about the fact that the owner of the cottage won’t be home today, and wasn’t home either yesterday, so I’m crossing all my appendages that this doesn’t go wrong again. Never knew that renting something was this much of a bother, but there you have it. *sigh* Did get to see lots of fun places, though, going on roads that I otherwise would have no business traveling. So there’s a good side to everything, right?
So let’s get to business as usual. What with grandpa and big brother still working on that kitchen counter, I’ve been scrambling a lot to keep things going that need to be done routinely. Like the dog food. Two batches of vegetables that needed to be cut. Leftover leaves from the cabbages, nopales, tomatoes that are getting wrinkly, pumpkins that can’t be saved anymore, the leaves from beets, and all that good stuff which they so clearly love. There was most of that to chop, which takes about thirty minutes a day, and in the mornings, after the veggies have boiled on the woodstove for most of the precious evening, it is time to knead water soaked bread and mixing the lot with dog kibble. Gawd, it is rather nice to do this part. I will be standing at the table, mixing everything up, while around me more than twenty dogs are watching every move I make. If I raise my hand (I know, very mean, but it’s hilarious) all heads will tip back and tongues will slide over lips in restless anticipation. It is almost like a cartoon. Hah.
But anyway, they will dig in fast enough…too fast in fact, seeing as Chaos, Indigo, Ama, Labhana, Gada, and Tadaika need to be separated in the carport to prevent them from reaching their ultimate goal: the bottom of the bowl. Jeez. Those babies can seriously eat. If we don’t set them aside, they’ll eat about two thirds of the total…and they’re already fat, for crying out loud!
Yesterday, what with big brother and grandpa so busy, I spent most of the afternoon on my own in the yard. The plan was only to water some of the plants that really needed it, but after I checked, I saw that really most of them needed water, so what followed was three hours of watering, going up and down the incline, harvesting, gathering our own veggies as well as that of the dogs. I was seriously pooped by the time I came up, had cut everything up and then headed for the kitchen (I want my outside kitchen, darn it. The day was too grand to spend it inside) to cook supper. Not bad at all, a mix of cauliflower, broccoli and corn, served with macaroni and a white green herb sauce…in fact, it worked out so well, that grandpa stole it this morning, and used it for his own meals. Which had me scramble a little today, since I had counted on that particular leftover, hah.
We sent out “Saving Nina” last night. Yay. It took some doing, we spent the past few evenings hacking our way through that synopsis, a character description, best line of dialogue, best scene, the query and all that jazz. A pity that you can’t just send a story without anything extra, but such is not the nature of the beast. It has to be just so, and like in any other business, you have to adhere to the standard. *sigh*
This afternoon, due to the fact that somehow we didn’t manage to get around to it before, cousin Ed and I spent most of the time on our knees scrubbing the tiles that we did the grouting of the other day. Yep. It was a royal pain in the behind, seeing as all the excess had been stuck in place, and we had to use scrapers, sanding paper and in the end a mop to get the job done. It is beautiful, though (got pictures, I promise, I just haven’t taken them off my phone, yet) and exactly as we planned. The colors go together splendidly, and it is more like art than a floor. Hah.
Yesterday evening was spent fixing the old chainsaw. Rust, grease and whatnot had stuck everything together, so everything had to be soaked in petrol and then put back in place. Nothing quite as exciting than turning a machine on that wasn’t function before. Yay.
There was a workout this morning, of course. I was a little late getting up, but since I didn’t have to account for the dogs of the younger sibs, (market day) I could take that little extra time before going down for a shower and doing the laundry.
Made patties, despite the fact that the kitchen is momentarily missing. Got a bit annoyed when Ayana decided to steal part of the dough, though. Little monster. I turned my back for five seconds (and of course I can’t expect big brother to notice something like that) and a third of the dough was gone without a trace. Grrrr. Luckily there’s enough left, eh? Went for a chickpea with chicken broth mix today, to see if I can make it taste more like chicken.
Was starving again about two hours after supper, so when big brother went back to the kitchen to deal with his own problem, the conversation went like this:
Me: “Take something nice down, yeah?”
Big brother: “You want a hotdog?”
Me: “Eeew. Never mind. Don’t take ANYTHING down for me. Jeez”
At which point I grabbed for a bag of cornflakes and dug in. Hah.
Tick hunting: Yes, the time is getting to be in full swing. One of the few things I really dislike about summer ‘round these parts. Sooooo many ticks. They’re everywhere, and about an hour a day is spent removing ticks. Not one session, or anything, but every time you pet a dog, there’s another one, and another, and another to remove. Luckily they love the attention.
Well, that’s about it for today. I’ve got to prepare A.I.L. for sending out to a publisher as well, so that ‘ll take a few more days at least, and then, yes, I am already gladly anticipating the grand event (don’t trip over the sarcasm) it is…(drum roll please)…back to editing. *sigh*
Monday, April 16, 2012
Some more tiling of course
Song of the day: “Lonely goatherd” by Julie Andrews in the Sound of music. Hah. They do stick in ones mind, don’t they. Besides, tenant kinda enjoys those, and since cousin Ed and I were working on the floor there again, it was as good a song as any to sing.
So yeah, a couple of busy days, thank you very much. Good thing I like being busy, ‘cause otherwise I would really be disliking my life at the moment, hah. Seriously, though. Now that the paper edit of V.L. is over and done with, we’re taking a small break by working on A.I.L. and adding that scene that we didn’t manage to fit in the other time. It would be better with it, we think, so there’s no reason for us not to put it in after all before we send it out to a publisher. So far it is working out well, most of it makes sense, and even though we still need to check if there’re no repetitions in the rest of the manuscript, it seems to fit.
Yesterday morning I was so very sore when I woke up, that I barely managed to get out of bed, but what the heck. What else is new, right? Apparently I’m using this machine (aka my body) just fine if all those muscles are complaining from a little bit of bending. Hah. I gotta hate that the bending, kneeling, squatting and more bending is about the only thing I dislike about tiling…well, that and the dry hands. Seriously, they feel like sanding paper right now. But it’s all for a good cause. Basically the tile floor is in, managed it all with the tiles and the pattern I’d planned and I think it will look grand. Yes, I will post pics of it. Not the before shots, thought, because I forget to take those. *sigh* Definitely losing brain cells again these days.
I made veggie burgers, (or should I keep calling them patties. I’m still not convinced. Cousin Ed is insisting I call them samburgers, but I don’t know) and they worked out really well. A simple taste these, on a basis of chickpeas and white beans, meaning that they look nice and pale. Sorta like chicken, if you must know. Hah. Seriously, if do them on a sandwich bun, with some lettuce and mayonnaise, it’s like you’re eating a friggin’ McChicken. I should franchise the darn things. Ah well, maybe some day.
Lots of time in the yard yesterday too. Harvested a bunch load for ourselves as well as the dogs. Got a nice mix going too, seeing as there wasn’t enough of one thing, but more than a enough from lots of different stuff. In the end it was so colorful that it was smelling like human food, for crying out loud. The thing that cinched it for the dogs was the old fat of the deep fryer. Oh my. This morning, when they ate it, was pure feasting for them.
But anyway, since the fat needed to be changed anyway, I figured I might as well clean the darn thing from top to bottom, which was quite a task, actually. It took more than an hour to get it semi-clean for crying out loud. Sometimes that dratted thing seems more trouble than it’s worth, but then, like today, it made for such an easy supper that I was really, really happy to have it clean again. Hah.
There were two sessions of chopping dog food. All sorts of cabbage leaves, herbs, nopales, pumpkin, too old tomatoes and some potatoes. It’s a good thing they like it so much, because you wouldn’t think it from looking at the lot. In fact, we have to be careful with the fresh lot, since there are a few of the dogs (Bora, Abacara and Tadaika) who really LOVE the fresh stuff.
Though today’s weather was wonderful (albeit a tad nippy due to a south western wind) yesterday was rather wishy-washy. We actually had some rain, of which the drops were downright icy while I was harvesting in the yard. Still, despite all that, the chilliness in the air makes for breathtaking views at the moment. Lots of times we’re able to see Africa these days.
There were the usual chores such as laundry, lighting the stove, cooking, and all those small little things that make up life, that I’m not going to bother telling about right now. Because, who cares, right?
My doggies, for one, are not at all pleased with the tiling business. Seeing as tenant’s and grandpa’s dogs are up there as well, and since those can’t be inside while cousin Ed and I are working on the floor, my dogs have to content with being locked up in my cabin. On the most part they’re a lazy lot (in particular Chaos) who will just snooze the day away. Of course they will be absolutely bonkers by the time I let them out and try to keep Knight II from getting his teeth into Jelly. The latter thinks it’s a good idea to challenge the Great Dane, and will stand below my porch, barking his head off at Knight, who will bark right back. Idiots.
Grandpa and big brother are still working on the cupboards for the kitchen, which is taking a lot longer than expected because grandpa is rather particular about this project for some reason. *sigh* In fact he’s working on my nerves. Usually I can handle him just fine, but at the moment I’m doing the “I’ll bite my tongue…instead of his” bit, or else I might end up conking him on the head with something. Hah. I hate picky, and try not to be that myself, if I can help it. *double sigh*
More tiling today, of course. Managed to get the rest of the new kitchen floor in, minus the edge of the kitchen counter. Have to wait with that until big brother and grandpa are a bit further along with the cupboards and until the new parts have dried enough for us to take out the old counter. I think it is going to look rather splendid once we’re done.
Oh, there was the rather splendid workout this morning. Gawd, I really needed that. Went double speed again, because, yes, I was a little late getting my lazy behind out of bed, and pounded the bag, pumped iron and moved around like the usual nimwit who likes to work out just because it feels so nice. Hah.
And last, but not least, there was a wood working session for me. Yep. At the moment I'm repairing a wooden outside table, and since the old thing misses several parts of it's lower section, I'm working on replacing the missing pieces with hardwood. Not going bad either, seeing as now I only need to put it all together for the table to be whole again. I'm now doubting where I'm going to put it once it's done. Either the basin terrace, or the old paddock up on the mountain.
Well, that’s about it. I have some reading to do and then *glances at watch* I might actually get to bed before one in the morning…Hah! Hey! A girl can dream, right?
So yeah, a couple of busy days, thank you very much. Good thing I like being busy, ‘cause otherwise I would really be disliking my life at the moment, hah. Seriously, though. Now that the paper edit of V.L. is over and done with, we’re taking a small break by working on A.I.L. and adding that scene that we didn’t manage to fit in the other time. It would be better with it, we think, so there’s no reason for us not to put it in after all before we send it out to a publisher. So far it is working out well, most of it makes sense, and even though we still need to check if there’re no repetitions in the rest of the manuscript, it seems to fit.
Yesterday morning I was so very sore when I woke up, that I barely managed to get out of bed, but what the heck. What else is new, right? Apparently I’m using this machine (aka my body) just fine if all those muscles are complaining from a little bit of bending. Hah. I gotta hate that the bending, kneeling, squatting and more bending is about the only thing I dislike about tiling…well, that and the dry hands. Seriously, they feel like sanding paper right now. But it’s all for a good cause. Basically the tile floor is in, managed it all with the tiles and the pattern I’d planned and I think it will look grand. Yes, I will post pics of it. Not the before shots, thought, because I forget to take those. *sigh* Definitely losing brain cells again these days.
I made veggie burgers, (or should I keep calling them patties. I’m still not convinced. Cousin Ed is insisting I call them samburgers, but I don’t know) and they worked out really well. A simple taste these, on a basis of chickpeas and white beans, meaning that they look nice and pale. Sorta like chicken, if you must know. Hah. Seriously, if do them on a sandwich bun, with some lettuce and mayonnaise, it’s like you’re eating a friggin’ McChicken. I should franchise the darn things. Ah well, maybe some day.
Lots of time in the yard yesterday too. Harvested a bunch load for ourselves as well as the dogs. Got a nice mix going too, seeing as there wasn’t enough of one thing, but more than a enough from lots of different stuff. In the end it was so colorful that it was smelling like human food, for crying out loud. The thing that cinched it for the dogs was the old fat of the deep fryer. Oh my. This morning, when they ate it, was pure feasting for them.
But anyway, since the fat needed to be changed anyway, I figured I might as well clean the darn thing from top to bottom, which was quite a task, actually. It took more than an hour to get it semi-clean for crying out loud. Sometimes that dratted thing seems more trouble than it’s worth, but then, like today, it made for such an easy supper that I was really, really happy to have it clean again. Hah.
There were two sessions of chopping dog food. All sorts of cabbage leaves, herbs, nopales, pumpkin, too old tomatoes and some potatoes. It’s a good thing they like it so much, because you wouldn’t think it from looking at the lot. In fact, we have to be careful with the fresh lot, since there are a few of the dogs (Bora, Abacara and Tadaika) who really LOVE the fresh stuff.
Though today’s weather was wonderful (albeit a tad nippy due to a south western wind) yesterday was rather wishy-washy. We actually had some rain, of which the drops were downright icy while I was harvesting in the yard. Still, despite all that, the chilliness in the air makes for breathtaking views at the moment. Lots of times we’re able to see Africa these days.
There were the usual chores such as laundry, lighting the stove, cooking, and all those small little things that make up life, that I’m not going to bother telling about right now. Because, who cares, right?
My doggies, for one, are not at all pleased with the tiling business. Seeing as tenant’s and grandpa’s dogs are up there as well, and since those can’t be inside while cousin Ed and I are working on the floor, my dogs have to content with being locked up in my cabin. On the most part they’re a lazy lot (in particular Chaos) who will just snooze the day away. Of course they will be absolutely bonkers by the time I let them out and try to keep Knight II from getting his teeth into Jelly. The latter thinks it’s a good idea to challenge the Great Dane, and will stand below my porch, barking his head off at Knight, who will bark right back. Idiots.
Grandpa and big brother are still working on the cupboards for the kitchen, which is taking a lot longer than expected because grandpa is rather particular about this project for some reason. *sigh* In fact he’s working on my nerves. Usually I can handle him just fine, but at the moment I’m doing the “I’ll bite my tongue…instead of his” bit, or else I might end up conking him on the head with something. Hah. I hate picky, and try not to be that myself, if I can help it. *double sigh*
More tiling today, of course. Managed to get the rest of the new kitchen floor in, minus the edge of the kitchen counter. Have to wait with that until big brother and grandpa are a bit further along with the cupboards and until the new parts have dried enough for us to take out the old counter. I think it is going to look rather splendid once we’re done.
Oh, there was the rather splendid workout this morning. Gawd, I really needed that. Went double speed again, because, yes, I was a little late getting my lazy behind out of bed, and pounded the bag, pumped iron and moved around like the usual nimwit who likes to work out just because it feels so nice. Hah.
And last, but not least, there was a wood working session for me. Yep. At the moment I'm repairing a wooden outside table, and since the old thing misses several parts of it's lower section, I'm working on replacing the missing pieces with hardwood. Not going bad either, seeing as now I only need to put it all together for the table to be whole again. I'm now doubting where I'm going to put it once it's done. Either the basin terrace, or the old paddock up on the mountain.
Well, that’s about it. I have some reading to do and then *glances at watch* I might actually get to bed before one in the morning…Hah! Hey! A girl can dream, right?
Saturday, April 14, 2012
Another tree, another edit
Song of the day: “I will survive” by Gloria Gaynor. It was rather suited for today, seeing as we were ridiculously busy.
Tenant’s getting visitors, and she’s ecstatic. Yep, the visit of tenant’s daughter is a go, so the way we figure we might as well shift some work stuff around and move tiling tenant’s kitchen floor up to the top of the list. Sure, she said that it wasn’t necessary, but sometimes there’s just no such thing like the present for stuff like that.
This means that cousin Ed and I were hauling, measuring and cutting tiles most of the day, laying at least the first section of the floor. It took some figuring, the colors the pattern, but in the end we did agree on one and stuck to it.
Of course this wasn’t the best day to start tiling. The sky was overcast, and we actually had some rain, which meant that the poor doggies got wet, and got in the way while we were working with the tiles. Then Grandpa stood on one of the tiles we’d just stuck to the floor, then my big toe hit the same spot half an hour later, forcing me to fix the dratted thing again. Then, because it was located on such an unhandy spot, cousin Ed also hit it, leaving us with a little tile that is just slightly off. Hah. No matter, though, no one is likely to notice.
Got half the floor done, meaning that we have one more session to do on Monday, or the day after, to finish the floor. It will be very cute. Yellow tiles with a nice flowery border to break the monotony a bit. Tenant likes it, and nor does Grandpa hate it…a good thing since it is their shared kitchen.
No time for supper, regretfully, so we ate fried potatoes, a salad, and some other fry stuff. Not bad, and it filled the gaps, of course, but still, I had been looking forward to beets, darn it
Tiling was preceded by blanching cauliflowers for freezing. We’re having way too many in the yard, so rather than eat ourselves sick on them, we decided to use this technique for preservation. Didn’t take all that long, really, less than a couple of hours since tenant assisted, of course, by cutting most of the cauliflowers into manageable flowers.
But okay, there was the dog feeding bit in the morning. They really do like the mixes, so if we can, we’re definitely sticking with those. Cabbage leftovers, pumpkin and in this case the plant side of beets. They dove into the mess as if we’d been starving them for the last week, while they had the same kind of meal yesterday morning (they ate that with just as much gusto, thank you very much). They went through their within no time whatsoever, and Knight II was once again making his way through the masses as if he just couldn’t eat anything unless he ate every single bit from a different bowl.
The dog feeding was preceded by a quick trip to the veggie garden where everything that needed watering got watered, and where I harvested four more cauliflowers to add to the four we already had in the kitchen. Also more broccoli to gather, along with a red cabbage and some Alfa Alfa and fennel to add to the dog food the first for omega 3 and the latter for their eyes. I wanna see if perhaps it will prevent cataract from getting the overhand.
The yard was preceded in turn by laundry and such chores, naturally. And before that I woke too late to do a workout, darn it. Well, luckily I did manage one yesterday morning, which went far better than I’d expected. Seriously, I went through the routines at top speed, meaning that I did the entire session in lest that fifty minutes. Gawd, that’ll wake you up without a doubt.
The usual morning stuff followed (talking yesterday here, and yes, I know I’m messing this recount up completely and utterly. *sigh*) in a bit of a rush because I received a letter and a quartet of pictures for tenant which needed to be printed. Worth the effort, considering she got all choked up again seeing pictures of daughter and grand daughter. When she heard that they wanted to come visit, her week, month, or even year was made. Hah.
Which reminds me, this afternoon big brother and I checked out a small apartment in the village to see if it would be suitable to rent for the coming visitors. It was tiny, cozy and with a wonderful balcony, so it worked out well, I think. We’ll see how it goes.
But back to yesterday, Tenant happy, breakfast eaten and everything sorted out, our order of two 3000 liter tanks arrived, along with one of the two gates that we still need to set at the jobsite in the mountains. The delivery arrived right on time, and we had to come up from all the way down in the yard, but the tanks got unloaded, carried over to where they will be safe from the wind, and tied up, and then the same with the gates.
That done, we headed down into the yard to cut down one of the 30-foot eucalypti trees. It’s been getting to be too big, obstructing sunlight in the greenhouse, so we decided to make the Y shaped mammoth into an I. Big brother wielded the chainsaw, while grandpa and I stood by with the axes. Three minutes after starting the tree gave a noisy snapping sound and tumbled down right where we’d planned it…well, almost. It hit a couple of branches of the poplar, and it ruined a branch of the eucalyptus below it. Other than that the beets survived the ordeal, or so we found while grandpa and I tackled the branches and worked our way down the terraces until the big trunk was completely stripped. It’s still down there, seeing as we haven’t managed yet to clean the entire mess up, but all in all it went rather well. Yay. I have pictures, of course, but I am way too lazy to post them now. Hah.
That particular adventure (we had to lock up the dogs until we were done, because we just didn’t know how things would go) was followed by the released dogs dashing down to the fence where they keep an eye on us as we took to watering the younger plants and harvested what needed to be harvested for ourselves and the dogs.
Highlight of my day was finishing the paper edit of V.L. Seriously, it took forever, but there you have it, second edit is over and done with, and with one more proof reading session ahead of us, I will be able to send it out to beta readers soon. Such an exciting stage, that, getting the outside input on the story. *sigh*
Since we need a short break before we start reading the story again, we are now working on adding a scene to A.I.L. because we have decided that 65K words is nicer than the 60K it now is. Hah.
Well, I’ve got to go. It is well past midnight and I need some serious shuteye before I fall asleep working on this very blog.
Tenant’s getting visitors, and she’s ecstatic. Yep, the visit of tenant’s daughter is a go, so the way we figure we might as well shift some work stuff around and move tiling tenant’s kitchen floor up to the top of the list. Sure, she said that it wasn’t necessary, but sometimes there’s just no such thing like the present for stuff like that.
This means that cousin Ed and I were hauling, measuring and cutting tiles most of the day, laying at least the first section of the floor. It took some figuring, the colors the pattern, but in the end we did agree on one and stuck to it.
Of course this wasn’t the best day to start tiling. The sky was overcast, and we actually had some rain, which meant that the poor doggies got wet, and got in the way while we were working with the tiles. Then Grandpa stood on one of the tiles we’d just stuck to the floor, then my big toe hit the same spot half an hour later, forcing me to fix the dratted thing again. Then, because it was located on such an unhandy spot, cousin Ed also hit it, leaving us with a little tile that is just slightly off. Hah. No matter, though, no one is likely to notice.
Got half the floor done, meaning that we have one more session to do on Monday, or the day after, to finish the floor. It will be very cute. Yellow tiles with a nice flowery border to break the monotony a bit. Tenant likes it, and nor does Grandpa hate it…a good thing since it is their shared kitchen.
No time for supper, regretfully, so we ate fried potatoes, a salad, and some other fry stuff. Not bad, and it filled the gaps, of course, but still, I had been looking forward to beets, darn it
Tiling was preceded by blanching cauliflowers for freezing. We’re having way too many in the yard, so rather than eat ourselves sick on them, we decided to use this technique for preservation. Didn’t take all that long, really, less than a couple of hours since tenant assisted, of course, by cutting most of the cauliflowers into manageable flowers.
But okay, there was the dog feeding bit in the morning. They really do like the mixes, so if we can, we’re definitely sticking with those. Cabbage leftovers, pumpkin and in this case the plant side of beets. They dove into the mess as if we’d been starving them for the last week, while they had the same kind of meal yesterday morning (they ate that with just as much gusto, thank you very much). They went through their within no time whatsoever, and Knight II was once again making his way through the masses as if he just couldn’t eat anything unless he ate every single bit from a different bowl.
The dog feeding was preceded by a quick trip to the veggie garden where everything that needed watering got watered, and where I harvested four more cauliflowers to add to the four we already had in the kitchen. Also more broccoli to gather, along with a red cabbage and some Alfa Alfa and fennel to add to the dog food the first for omega 3 and the latter for their eyes. I wanna see if perhaps it will prevent cataract from getting the overhand.
The yard was preceded in turn by laundry and such chores, naturally. And before that I woke too late to do a workout, darn it. Well, luckily I did manage one yesterday morning, which went far better than I’d expected. Seriously, I went through the routines at top speed, meaning that I did the entire session in lest that fifty minutes. Gawd, that’ll wake you up without a doubt.
The usual morning stuff followed (talking yesterday here, and yes, I know I’m messing this recount up completely and utterly. *sigh*) in a bit of a rush because I received a letter and a quartet of pictures for tenant which needed to be printed. Worth the effort, considering she got all choked up again seeing pictures of daughter and grand daughter. When she heard that they wanted to come visit, her week, month, or even year was made. Hah.
Which reminds me, this afternoon big brother and I checked out a small apartment in the village to see if it would be suitable to rent for the coming visitors. It was tiny, cozy and with a wonderful balcony, so it worked out well, I think. We’ll see how it goes.
But back to yesterday, Tenant happy, breakfast eaten and everything sorted out, our order of two 3000 liter tanks arrived, along with one of the two gates that we still need to set at the jobsite in the mountains. The delivery arrived right on time, and we had to come up from all the way down in the yard, but the tanks got unloaded, carried over to where they will be safe from the wind, and tied up, and then the same with the gates.
That done, we headed down into the yard to cut down one of the 30-foot eucalypti trees. It’s been getting to be too big, obstructing sunlight in the greenhouse, so we decided to make the Y shaped mammoth into an I. Big brother wielded the chainsaw, while grandpa and I stood by with the axes. Three minutes after starting the tree gave a noisy snapping sound and tumbled down right where we’d planned it…well, almost. It hit a couple of branches of the poplar, and it ruined a branch of the eucalyptus below it. Other than that the beets survived the ordeal, or so we found while grandpa and I tackled the branches and worked our way down the terraces until the big trunk was completely stripped. It’s still down there, seeing as we haven’t managed yet to clean the entire mess up, but all in all it went rather well. Yay. I have pictures, of course, but I am way too lazy to post them now. Hah.
That particular adventure (we had to lock up the dogs until we were done, because we just didn’t know how things would go) was followed by the released dogs dashing down to the fence where they keep an eye on us as we took to watering the younger plants and harvested what needed to be harvested for ourselves and the dogs.
Highlight of my day was finishing the paper edit of V.L. Seriously, it took forever, but there you have it, second edit is over and done with, and with one more proof reading session ahead of us, I will be able to send it out to beta readers soon. Such an exciting stage, that, getting the outside input on the story. *sigh*
Since we need a short break before we start reading the story again, we are now working on adding a scene to A.I.L. because we have decided that 65K words is nicer than the 60K it now is. Hah.
Well, I’ve got to go. It is well past midnight and I need some serious shuteye before I fall asleep working on this very blog.
Thursday, February 2, 2012
Checker tiling.
Song of the day: “Mongo Bongo” by The Mescaleros, Joe Strummer. Weird song, really, but big brother and I got into it after the movie Mr. & Mrs Smith, and it’s been on our iTunes ever since.
It’s been a busy couple of days, mostly involving putting in tiles in grandpa’s kitchen. Not the actual cooking area, but the dining area. In checker pattern, no less.
When I suggested doing it on Wednesday a few days ago, he was adamant that it might rain and that he’d go bonkers from the barrier that we’d need to put up to protect the new tiles from the dogs. And then, suddenly, yesterday morning he threw it on me and said he’d changed his mind and wondered if I could put the tiles in after all.
Now I am very much about spur of the moment, but you gotta understand that grandpa is not at all good at it. When he suggests something spur of the moment you can bet that stuff goes wrong. And it did. Multiple things. So much in fact that there was a point in the middle of the afternoon (when the twentieth thing wrecked my concentration while I tried to figure out with which side, tile and whatnot to start) where I just had to laugh.
Things that went wrong:
1. A bucket broke. White stuff flew all through the carport and streamed down the incline. He was not amused…I was.
2. Wrong tile glue. Grandpa made the stuff that turned hard within an hour and a half, meaning we lost two buckets of the stuff (and the buckets) within the first two hours.
3. Lost a bunch of tiles. Walked back and forth about six times before I finally found them all.
4. Twisted my ankle. Nothing too serious, but the foot started whining because of it, so I wasn’t happy about that.
5. The dogs kept making a racket, until I locked mine up.
6. Grandpa had to head back down to the carport twice for every one time, because he kept forgetting stuff.
7. I forgot something four times, and had to head back from whichever location I came. Aaargh.
8. What could have been done in six hours, was done in nine instead…but who cares. It’s looking good. Hah.
Where was I? Ah, right. I was heading down to lock my dogs up in my cabin because Sitabah was constantly attacking the fence of grandpa’s little yard (she has a thing with his dogs) and it was driving him bonkers. Hah. But anyway, I’d been “preparing” to lay tiles for three hours already, and every time I tried to get seriously into it, something would happen. So I laughed, and then with cousin Ed helping I started laying the tiles.
In the mean time big brother was dividing his attention between spray painting the damaged part of the Opel, and small repairs in the carport.
Grandpa, of course, started getting concerned around that time, making multiple suggestions for me to only do half, rather than laying it in one day (because it was already late) because he can’t stand the thought of working past seven in the afternoon. Can’t blame him, but since I knew I would have another day of finishing the edges anyway, I rather finished the majority all at once. I confidently told him that now that we’d gotten started it would only take a couple, or three hours, and did it in five to six (I feared it would take seven so six was good for as far as I was concerned. Hah).
Big brother and grandpa finished up the day by putting a wooden barrier around that section of the room, and I headed for tenant’s to sit with her for a bit by the stove and hope that my feet would carry me down to my cabin. Hah. It is normal to have a sore lower back, aching thighs, calves, feet and shoulders after tiling, so I wasn’t at all surprised that my gait was a little unstable on my way down. I relaxed with a book for about half an hour, and then headed for the computer to start on the day’s editing session.
Cousin Ed thankfully offered to make dinner of leftovers, so there was no cooking involved either. Yay.
Editing…Oh. My. Gawd!!! We are having so many rows these days. I think that at the moment our problem is a difference in style really. Where big brother likes the straightforward and simple cause and effect, I like the drama and the flair. Guess we’ll have to settle on a middle ground somewhere. I did manage to hold onto my equilibrium, and though frustrated I didn’t fight the urge to conk him on the head. Hah.
Was late getting to bed because we decided to watch an episode of Dexter. Though I still like the concept a lot, I didn’t really enjoy the episode (had to do with me, rather than the show, I think) for some reason. In the end I wished I’d opted for bed instead, but there was no helping it, I guess.
As for this morning…I slept through the night without interruption, waking up toasty warm with four dogs tight around me. Jeez, I was wrecked. You cannot turn around properly with four bony bodies pressed against you. *sigh* But anyway, I was running behind but decided to have a workout anyway. I was sore as heck from the tiling, and some exercise could only improve my condition for as far as I was concerned. Went through the entire routine at top speed, then headed down to do a massive batch of laundry, and settled for a short time into devouring breakfast. Hah.
That done, we headed down into the yard to water stuff (the winds have been increasing again, meaning that the ground is drying pretty fast), check for bugs and harvest cauliflower and broccoli. The latter would serve as today’s supper.
That done we put the new berry bushes, raspberry vines, and three plants called Hardy Kiwis. Very strange little berries, supposedly tasting like kiwis, only sweeter. I wonder how they’ll flourish in this climate. We’re going to have to find a watery spot for sure. Be that as it may, we put them all in pots, and since they’re all weak little plants from the store, we’ve decided to try to nurse these in the greenhouse (and pots) for a year or so and give them time to develop a root system.
There were dog food stores to check. Expiration dates have a knack of sneaking up on us. Hah. Found a full batch that will need to be exchanged for a new batch within the next few months, so we did that while we were at it. Carla (red cocker spaniel) discovered the pile and spent the majority of the afternoon guarding the bags and snacking from the corner he’d chewed open. Hah.
As for my Jack Vance venture…I can’t admit to liking this one more than the ones I read already. (Lyonesse: Suldrun’s garden) In fact, compared to his other stories this one is a little grittier with a sometimes even unpleasant undertone. I get that the atmosphere of the “mid-evil” kind of era has something to with it (the others were leaning toward sci-fi after all) but still; there is a darkness to this story that unsettles me at times. Though I am enjoying the experience, in particular due to Vance’s colorful and elegant writing style, I do understand why I was unable to get into this particular writer when I was a young girl. His worlds, his vocabulary and his sense of adventure is splendid, but his sense of romance, character development and dialogue leaves me somewhat hanging, I fear.
Ah well, once outside work was done, and water for spagetti was on the fire, it was time to finish the tile floor of yesterday by putting in the final edges and cleaning out the grouts. Dani did the latter while I worked on the edges and grandpa supplied whatever it was we needed. I don’t know why, but I was in a strange mood today. Off humor, and giddy snorts and chuckles were the main theme by the time I started to get tired and it became clear that there would be no time to finish the actual grouting before the evening arrived. No matter, by that time I was so cold that I didn’t care one way or other (seriously the floor was freezing). Hah.
While grandpa and Dani finished up with the floor I started on supper. Broccoli, spaghetti and the satay sauce big brother made. I had planned to ad chickpea burgers (I made them during breakfast this morning) but since the broccoli was plenty, I decided against it. It was surprised how nice the broccoli went with peanut sauce. Hah.
So now I have to call this the blog, because I really, really want to go to bed in time tonight, and the edit is still waiting. Grrr.
It’s been a busy couple of days, mostly involving putting in tiles in grandpa’s kitchen. Not the actual cooking area, but the dining area. In checker pattern, no less.
When I suggested doing it on Wednesday a few days ago, he was adamant that it might rain and that he’d go bonkers from the barrier that we’d need to put up to protect the new tiles from the dogs. And then, suddenly, yesterday morning he threw it on me and said he’d changed his mind and wondered if I could put the tiles in after all.
Now I am very much about spur of the moment, but you gotta understand that grandpa is not at all good at it. When he suggests something spur of the moment you can bet that stuff goes wrong. And it did. Multiple things. So much in fact that there was a point in the middle of the afternoon (when the twentieth thing wrecked my concentration while I tried to figure out with which side, tile and whatnot to start) where I just had to laugh.
Things that went wrong:
1. A bucket broke. White stuff flew all through the carport and streamed down the incline. He was not amused…I was.
2. Wrong tile glue. Grandpa made the stuff that turned hard within an hour and a half, meaning we lost two buckets of the stuff (and the buckets) within the first two hours.
3. Lost a bunch of tiles. Walked back and forth about six times before I finally found them all.
4. Twisted my ankle. Nothing too serious, but the foot started whining because of it, so I wasn’t happy about that.
5. The dogs kept making a racket, until I locked mine up.
6. Grandpa had to head back down to the carport twice for every one time, because he kept forgetting stuff.
7. I forgot something four times, and had to head back from whichever location I came. Aaargh.
8. What could have been done in six hours, was done in nine instead…but who cares. It’s looking good. Hah.
Where was I? Ah, right. I was heading down to lock my dogs up in my cabin because Sitabah was constantly attacking the fence of grandpa’s little yard (she has a thing with his dogs) and it was driving him bonkers. Hah. But anyway, I’d been “preparing” to lay tiles for three hours already, and every time I tried to get seriously into it, something would happen. So I laughed, and then with cousin Ed helping I started laying the tiles.
In the mean time big brother was dividing his attention between spray painting the damaged part of the Opel, and small repairs in the carport.
Grandpa, of course, started getting concerned around that time, making multiple suggestions for me to only do half, rather than laying it in one day (because it was already late) because he can’t stand the thought of working past seven in the afternoon. Can’t blame him, but since I knew I would have another day of finishing the edges anyway, I rather finished the majority all at once. I confidently told him that now that we’d gotten started it would only take a couple, or three hours, and did it in five to six (I feared it would take seven so six was good for as far as I was concerned. Hah).
Big brother and grandpa finished up the day by putting a wooden barrier around that section of the room, and I headed for tenant’s to sit with her for a bit by the stove and hope that my feet would carry me down to my cabin. Hah. It is normal to have a sore lower back, aching thighs, calves, feet and shoulders after tiling, so I wasn’t at all surprised that my gait was a little unstable on my way down. I relaxed with a book for about half an hour, and then headed for the computer to start on the day’s editing session.
Cousin Ed thankfully offered to make dinner of leftovers, so there was no cooking involved either. Yay.
Editing…Oh. My. Gawd!!! We are having so many rows these days. I think that at the moment our problem is a difference in style really. Where big brother likes the straightforward and simple cause and effect, I like the drama and the flair. Guess we’ll have to settle on a middle ground somewhere. I did manage to hold onto my equilibrium, and though frustrated I didn’t fight the urge to conk him on the head. Hah.
Was late getting to bed because we decided to watch an episode of Dexter. Though I still like the concept a lot, I didn’t really enjoy the episode (had to do with me, rather than the show, I think) for some reason. In the end I wished I’d opted for bed instead, but there was no helping it, I guess.
As for this morning…I slept through the night without interruption, waking up toasty warm with four dogs tight around me. Jeez, I was wrecked. You cannot turn around properly with four bony bodies pressed against you. *sigh* But anyway, I was running behind but decided to have a workout anyway. I was sore as heck from the tiling, and some exercise could only improve my condition for as far as I was concerned. Went through the entire routine at top speed, then headed down to do a massive batch of laundry, and settled for a short time into devouring breakfast. Hah.
That done, we headed down into the yard to water stuff (the winds have been increasing again, meaning that the ground is drying pretty fast), check for bugs and harvest cauliflower and broccoli. The latter would serve as today’s supper.
That done we put the new berry bushes, raspberry vines, and three plants called Hardy Kiwis. Very strange little berries, supposedly tasting like kiwis, only sweeter. I wonder how they’ll flourish in this climate. We’re going to have to find a watery spot for sure. Be that as it may, we put them all in pots, and since they’re all weak little plants from the store, we’ve decided to try to nurse these in the greenhouse (and pots) for a year or so and give them time to develop a root system.
There were dog food stores to check. Expiration dates have a knack of sneaking up on us. Hah. Found a full batch that will need to be exchanged for a new batch within the next few months, so we did that while we were at it. Carla (red cocker spaniel) discovered the pile and spent the majority of the afternoon guarding the bags and snacking from the corner he’d chewed open. Hah.
As for my Jack Vance venture…I can’t admit to liking this one more than the ones I read already. (Lyonesse: Suldrun’s garden) In fact, compared to his other stories this one is a little grittier with a sometimes even unpleasant undertone. I get that the atmosphere of the “mid-evil” kind of era has something to with it (the others were leaning toward sci-fi after all) but still; there is a darkness to this story that unsettles me at times. Though I am enjoying the experience, in particular due to Vance’s colorful and elegant writing style, I do understand why I was unable to get into this particular writer when I was a young girl. His worlds, his vocabulary and his sense of adventure is splendid, but his sense of romance, character development and dialogue leaves me somewhat hanging, I fear.
Ah well, once outside work was done, and water for spagetti was on the fire, it was time to finish the tile floor of yesterday by putting in the final edges and cleaning out the grouts. Dani did the latter while I worked on the edges and grandpa supplied whatever it was we needed. I don’t know why, but I was in a strange mood today. Off humor, and giddy snorts and chuckles were the main theme by the time I started to get tired and it became clear that there would be no time to finish the actual grouting before the evening arrived. No matter, by that time I was so cold that I didn’t care one way or other (seriously the floor was freezing). Hah.
While grandpa and Dani finished up with the floor I started on supper. Broccoli, spaghetti and the satay sauce big brother made. I had planned to ad chickpea burgers (I made them during breakfast this morning) but since the broccoli was plenty, I decided against it. It was surprised how nice the broccoli went with peanut sauce. Hah.
So now I have to call this the blog, because I really, really want to go to bed in time tonight, and the edit is still waiting. Grrr.
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
Dreams of reality?
Song of the day: “Sunlight” by…I have no idea, actually. Hmmm. It’s an annoying song anyway.
“So. Where are we going?”
The man, walking ahead of me, doesn’t pause, nor does he glance back. I double up, stumble a little as I try to shift the bulk of my backpack into a more comfortable position. It is a cold day, somewhere near dusk I think, and we’re walking through a forest cast in a variety of grays that range from white all the way to black. It is like I’m walking through one of those old B&W movies where you can only guess which color is what. But this isn’t the movies, this is real…or is it?
Ahead of me, the man points straight ahead, and seeing as I’m not paying attention to where I’m walking, I stumble over a big root sticking out of the floor. My boots, heavy with mud and even some specks of snow, are in good shape, and for a change I can’t feel my heel. I think part of the reason why is because of the cold. It is pressing against me from all sides, penetrating through several layers. A padded coat covering a ragged woollen sweater, two flannel shirts and a tight T at the bottom. My legs are encased by heavy Jeans and a thick sweatpants which just barely keeps me from freezing my bum off.
“What’s over there,” I wheeze at my companion, doing a clumsy skip, and then again as I try to keep up with his quick pace. From what I can see, his face partially concealed by a deep red scarf that is wrapped around his jaw up to his mouth, and a snow cap pulled down to his brow, he, for some reason, reminds me of a bearded Vin Diesel. Which is weird, since he doesn’t share any resemblances to the actor at all. He just reminds me of him. Must be some long forgotten movie, or something.
On his back, over a bulky backpack that is twice the size of my own (damn, the man doesn’t even have the decency to appear out of breath from the brutal pace he is setting) he carries a heavy duty riffle that gleamed from a recent polishing, I’m sure.
It might be my imagination, but it looks like he shrugs. I can hardly believe it, and hurry up to grab hold of his arm.
“Did you just shrug at me?” I demand, holding on for dear life while he continues on as if I am not even trying to stop him. “I want to know what’s over there in the direction we’re going?”
The way I figure, I have a right to know, what with me following his lead because he appears to know what he’s about. I’ve gotta be on time, after all…for what, I’m not entirely sure.
Strange.
He stops at last and turns to look at me. He’s got dark eyes, high cheekbones and more than just a five-o’clock shadow, and perspiration coats his wind-blown face. Thankfully he doesn’t appear to be as impervious about our stark surrounding as I first thought.
“I don’t know.” His voice is heavy, gravely, as if he hasn’t used it much.
“I beg your pardon?” I blink at him, for a moment not having a clue as to what he’s talking about. Then it hits me. “You mean you don’t know where we’re going?” I demand, outraged all of a sudden. How can he walk with such purpose and not know where we’re going, darn it. It just isn’t fair.
“Sure I do. We’re going that way.” He jabs a thumb in the direction we’d been heading. “But you don’t know what is there?!” I practically shout at him,
“Doesn’t make a difference,” he points out calmly, as if he is making all the sense in the world. “We’re going where we need to go, and it’s over there.”
“I swear, if you point your thumb in that direction one more time, I’m going to break it,” I threaten, getting a mite huffy when he only laughs at my threat.
In hindsight, I can understand why, seeing as he is at least a foot taller than I which is…well, weird, considering I’m six foot tall, but what the heck.
“Ron, we can’t just walk around aimlessly. It’s freezing out here and we…”
“Trust me,” he cuts in, and I can only stare at him as he shakes off my hand and continues his way through the muddy trail that we’ve been following for ages, or so it seems.
“This is not a matter of trust,” I call after him, scrambling to catch up, and almost landing flat on my face when another root appears to wrapped itself around my foot. Drat.
When I do finally catch up with him, I just barely manage to catch a branch he lets go after his passing, and grimace at the sudden increase of light now that we have reached the end of the forest.
“What are you trying to do, have me…” He stops and I literally slam into his backpack and the cold metal of his riffle. I swear under my breath and scramble back a step or two before going to the side so I can give him a piece of my mind. But before I can open my mouth to do so, the view beyond him takes my breath away.
There, in the distance, following a mountainous slope that leads straight into a long stretching valley a city lays. At first it is a city like any other, high-rises and suburbs surrounding it, but then I see it, the biggest difference of all. All through the mega city plumes of smoke rise high into the evening air, light glimmering, but it isn’t street lights. Fires rage within the streets, and the skyscrapers that should have glimmered with light on any normal day are dulled with age and lack of glass. Even from this distance I can see the damage to several stories, but it is not that which holds my attention. Instead my gaze is drawn to where something dark, something dangerous lurks. I know, and yet I cannot see it, but then, my hand automatically latching onto Ron for support, I…wake up with Knight II slapping his paws onto my chest with enough force to slam the air from my lungs. Jeez!
What did you think? That’s not my reality, of course. though admittedly at the moment it is chilly enough for me to feel as if I’m face a snowy day of sorts. Hah.
It was a dream, naturally, but it was so vivid that I just had to share.
Okay, enough dawdling, let’s get down to business and get this over with. I’ve got another edit to face (getting nearer to the end of this one, yay) so I better rush through this a little.
I woke up, sore all over. I’m thinking that Knight II thought it a good idea to press himself against me throughout the night, meaning that I spend the majority of the night trying not to fall off the bed. *sigh* I love Knight II to pieces, really, I do. But sometimes I also want to strangle him. Aaaargh.
No workout, again. There just isn’t time. What with winter rapidly settling in, we are putting more of a rush on the stove in the house, meaning that we went down there early once more to get to it. Change of plan though, seeing as I discovered a load of water in the hallway when I finished my morning shower and fully intended to start tiling.
Turns out the main pipe of the house’s sewage was plugged, filling the hallway with all sorts of nasty. This meant that the next two hours were spent unplugging the pipes with a garden hose. Big brother shoved it up there and a few minutes later the whole mess came sloshing out. Eeewww! Then came the cleaning bit, mopping up the mess and everything, trying to breathe through my mouth rather than anything else, and failing miserably since the smell stuck to my nostrils the rest of the day, darn it.
So by the time we finally had it all done, the only thing we could do for the stove was clean the tiling of the day before, check if it hadn’t sagged, take off the small moulds and then cover it all up again when the younger sibs got up and let their dogs out. Rather than risk some serious “discussions” between the pack, I totally don’t feel up to that early in the morning, we took out tools and postponed the efforts to today.
What followed throughout the day was painting the storage barrel, which was starting to get seriously rusty. That done, there was the metal works waiting for me. To fully install the stove, we need to make a hole in the second floor, through which the pipe needs to be led, and a protective coating for around the beam of wood under which it passes. This took some time, the cutting, bending and then polishing, but I’ve got it ready and waiting.
While big brother made dinner (red beets with mashed potatoes) I made a tomato soup for later in the evening when that little snack would go down really well.
Next I hauled wood down to the terrace where we burnt a nice barrel fire to chase away the cold of the evening while we worked on the edit. I love an open fire. Hah.
Which brings us to today, doesn’t it? Well, the morning started early once again, and the chill was pretty intense. Grandpa estimates that we’re only a few degrees away from the freezing point these days. (Bonkers! Especially for Southern Spain, for crying out loud.)
Did work on the stove spot today, though I started after big brother who is working with those glass bricks to create a protective corner for the pedestal. While he was doing that, I headed down into the yard to water the small seedbed and open her up for the sunny day (too windy to be warm, but sunny at least). Same goes for the greenhouse, which needs to dry whenever possible, lest we’ll have plants dying of molds. Lost another top of a tomato plant to leaf miners who think it funny to dig into the young top stems of the plants and kill them.
That done, I headed down to check on the cabbages and such. I watered the young ones, checked them for caterpillars, and then did the same with the big ones. Found only a few of the pests, but then went up to see if I could start tiling the last bit of the pedestal yet.
Yep. The pedestal is basically done for the stove now. All we need to do is build the glass brick corner around it (big brother only did one edge today. We need to add three more layers) and then we can start putting the thing in. It is going to be interesting to see if we’ll manage to get it in place without disaster occurring. The stupid thing does way a ton, and we will need to life it a solid foot + several inches. Ah well, we’ll cross that bridge when we get there.
The day’s efforts successful with the last tiles added to the construction, it was time for breakfast and other tasks. Which consisted of some repairs for mom today. Big brother worked on her sewing machine, while I fixed the large construction we designed for her bag designs at the market. Apparently they lost four pegs during transport at some point, so I had to see if I could make new ones. Ended up fixing suitable replacements, so all’s well in that regard.
Next the barrel had to be painted again, followed by a session of working on the gate, which needs a new lick of paint as well. Rust was breaking out everywhere, and since we found the right paint once again (don’t understand why they stopped making it) and managed almost half before it was time to head out in the car and drop Sally off at her job.
That done it was time for more soup (I had one cup during the paint job) some crackers, and then making tea on the barrel stove before I started on the blog and the ever-lasting edit…for which the time has arrived now.
“So. Where are we going?”
The man, walking ahead of me, doesn’t pause, nor does he glance back. I double up, stumble a little as I try to shift the bulk of my backpack into a more comfortable position. It is a cold day, somewhere near dusk I think, and we’re walking through a forest cast in a variety of grays that range from white all the way to black. It is like I’m walking through one of those old B&W movies where you can only guess which color is what. But this isn’t the movies, this is real…or is it?
Ahead of me, the man points straight ahead, and seeing as I’m not paying attention to where I’m walking, I stumble over a big root sticking out of the floor. My boots, heavy with mud and even some specks of snow, are in good shape, and for a change I can’t feel my heel. I think part of the reason why is because of the cold. It is pressing against me from all sides, penetrating through several layers. A padded coat covering a ragged woollen sweater, two flannel shirts and a tight T at the bottom. My legs are encased by heavy Jeans and a thick sweatpants which just barely keeps me from freezing my bum off.
“What’s over there,” I wheeze at my companion, doing a clumsy skip, and then again as I try to keep up with his quick pace. From what I can see, his face partially concealed by a deep red scarf that is wrapped around his jaw up to his mouth, and a snow cap pulled down to his brow, he, for some reason, reminds me of a bearded Vin Diesel. Which is weird, since he doesn’t share any resemblances to the actor at all. He just reminds me of him. Must be some long forgotten movie, or something.
On his back, over a bulky backpack that is twice the size of my own (damn, the man doesn’t even have the decency to appear out of breath from the brutal pace he is setting) he carries a heavy duty riffle that gleamed from a recent polishing, I’m sure.
It might be my imagination, but it looks like he shrugs. I can hardly believe it, and hurry up to grab hold of his arm.
“Did you just shrug at me?” I demand, holding on for dear life while he continues on as if I am not even trying to stop him. “I want to know what’s over there in the direction we’re going?”
The way I figure, I have a right to know, what with me following his lead because he appears to know what he’s about. I’ve gotta be on time, after all…for what, I’m not entirely sure.
Strange.
He stops at last and turns to look at me. He’s got dark eyes, high cheekbones and more than just a five-o’clock shadow, and perspiration coats his wind-blown face. Thankfully he doesn’t appear to be as impervious about our stark surrounding as I first thought.
“I don’t know.” His voice is heavy, gravely, as if he hasn’t used it much.
“I beg your pardon?” I blink at him, for a moment not having a clue as to what he’s talking about. Then it hits me. “You mean you don’t know where we’re going?” I demand, outraged all of a sudden. How can he walk with such purpose and not know where we’re going, darn it. It just isn’t fair.
“Sure I do. We’re going that way.” He jabs a thumb in the direction we’d been heading. “But you don’t know what is there?!” I practically shout at him,
“Doesn’t make a difference,” he points out calmly, as if he is making all the sense in the world. “We’re going where we need to go, and it’s over there.”
“I swear, if you point your thumb in that direction one more time, I’m going to break it,” I threaten, getting a mite huffy when he only laughs at my threat.
In hindsight, I can understand why, seeing as he is at least a foot taller than I which is…well, weird, considering I’m six foot tall, but what the heck.
“Ron, we can’t just walk around aimlessly. It’s freezing out here and we…”
“Trust me,” he cuts in, and I can only stare at him as he shakes off my hand and continues his way through the muddy trail that we’ve been following for ages, or so it seems.
“This is not a matter of trust,” I call after him, scrambling to catch up, and almost landing flat on my face when another root appears to wrapped itself around my foot. Drat.
When I do finally catch up with him, I just barely manage to catch a branch he lets go after his passing, and grimace at the sudden increase of light now that we have reached the end of the forest.
“What are you trying to do, have me…” He stops and I literally slam into his backpack and the cold metal of his riffle. I swear under my breath and scramble back a step or two before going to the side so I can give him a piece of my mind. But before I can open my mouth to do so, the view beyond him takes my breath away.
There, in the distance, following a mountainous slope that leads straight into a long stretching valley a city lays. At first it is a city like any other, high-rises and suburbs surrounding it, but then I see it, the biggest difference of all. All through the mega city plumes of smoke rise high into the evening air, light glimmering, but it isn’t street lights. Fires rage within the streets, and the skyscrapers that should have glimmered with light on any normal day are dulled with age and lack of glass. Even from this distance I can see the damage to several stories, but it is not that which holds my attention. Instead my gaze is drawn to where something dark, something dangerous lurks. I know, and yet I cannot see it, but then, my hand automatically latching onto Ron for support, I…wake up with Knight II slapping his paws onto my chest with enough force to slam the air from my lungs. Jeez!
What did you think? That’s not my reality, of course. though admittedly at the moment it is chilly enough for me to feel as if I’m face a snowy day of sorts. Hah.
It was a dream, naturally, but it was so vivid that I just had to share.
Okay, enough dawdling, let’s get down to business and get this over with. I’ve got another edit to face (getting nearer to the end of this one, yay) so I better rush through this a little.
I woke up, sore all over. I’m thinking that Knight II thought it a good idea to press himself against me throughout the night, meaning that I spend the majority of the night trying not to fall off the bed. *sigh* I love Knight II to pieces, really, I do. But sometimes I also want to strangle him. Aaaargh.
No workout, again. There just isn’t time. What with winter rapidly settling in, we are putting more of a rush on the stove in the house, meaning that we went down there early once more to get to it. Change of plan though, seeing as I discovered a load of water in the hallway when I finished my morning shower and fully intended to start tiling.
Turns out the main pipe of the house’s sewage was plugged, filling the hallway with all sorts of nasty. This meant that the next two hours were spent unplugging the pipes with a garden hose. Big brother shoved it up there and a few minutes later the whole mess came sloshing out. Eeewww! Then came the cleaning bit, mopping up the mess and everything, trying to breathe through my mouth rather than anything else, and failing miserably since the smell stuck to my nostrils the rest of the day, darn it.
So by the time we finally had it all done, the only thing we could do for the stove was clean the tiling of the day before, check if it hadn’t sagged, take off the small moulds and then cover it all up again when the younger sibs got up and let their dogs out. Rather than risk some serious “discussions” between the pack, I totally don’t feel up to that early in the morning, we took out tools and postponed the efforts to today.
What followed throughout the day was painting the storage barrel, which was starting to get seriously rusty. That done, there was the metal works waiting for me. To fully install the stove, we need to make a hole in the second floor, through which the pipe needs to be led, and a protective coating for around the beam of wood under which it passes. This took some time, the cutting, bending and then polishing, but I’ve got it ready and waiting.
While big brother made dinner (red beets with mashed potatoes) I made a tomato soup for later in the evening when that little snack would go down really well.
Next I hauled wood down to the terrace where we burnt a nice barrel fire to chase away the cold of the evening while we worked on the edit. I love an open fire. Hah.
Which brings us to today, doesn’t it? Well, the morning started early once again, and the chill was pretty intense. Grandpa estimates that we’re only a few degrees away from the freezing point these days. (Bonkers! Especially for Southern Spain, for crying out loud.)
Did work on the stove spot today, though I started after big brother who is working with those glass bricks to create a protective corner for the pedestal. While he was doing that, I headed down into the yard to water the small seedbed and open her up for the sunny day (too windy to be warm, but sunny at least). Same goes for the greenhouse, which needs to dry whenever possible, lest we’ll have plants dying of molds. Lost another top of a tomato plant to leaf miners who think it funny to dig into the young top stems of the plants and kill them.
That done, I headed down to check on the cabbages and such. I watered the young ones, checked them for caterpillars, and then did the same with the big ones. Found only a few of the pests, but then went up to see if I could start tiling the last bit of the pedestal yet.
Yep. The pedestal is basically done for the stove now. All we need to do is build the glass brick corner around it (big brother only did one edge today. We need to add three more layers) and then we can start putting the thing in. It is going to be interesting to see if we’ll manage to get it in place without disaster occurring. The stupid thing does way a ton, and we will need to life it a solid foot + several inches. Ah well, we’ll cross that bridge when we get there.
The day’s efforts successful with the last tiles added to the construction, it was time for breakfast and other tasks. Which consisted of some repairs for mom today. Big brother worked on her sewing machine, while I fixed the large construction we designed for her bag designs at the market. Apparently they lost four pegs during transport at some point, so I had to see if I could make new ones. Ended up fixing suitable replacements, so all’s well in that regard.
Next the barrel had to be painted again, followed by a session of working on the gate, which needs a new lick of paint as well. Rust was breaking out everywhere, and since we found the right paint once again (don’t understand why they stopped making it) and managed almost half before it was time to head out in the car and drop Sally off at her job.
That done it was time for more soup (I had one cup during the paint job) some crackers, and then making tea on the barrel stove before I started on the blog and the ever-lasting edit…for which the time has arrived now.
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
Blasted geyser
Song of the day: Well, a whole bunch of Katie Melua songs, actually. They’ve been flip-flopping through my head all day.
It was a busy day today, but first I better get to yesterday.
First off, after the usual morning rituals down at the house, I went up to help tenant out and made paddy dough while I was up there. This time I experimented with white beans, rather than chickpeas and lentils. I didn’t dislike it, that’s a fact, and it did go rather well with supper later in the day.
But anyway, after that, leaving tenant to watch Animal Planet, which she loves, I went down to the greenhouse to water plants. Same went for the raised seedbed, in which I had to re-sow green beans and lettuce. I think the ants got to them, seeing as they really like lettuce seeds. As for the green beans, I have no idea why only five of the twenty three I put in came up. So I redid that, watered the whole lot and went through the yard in search of veggies. Found enough for a full meal, and then started checking the cabbages and such for caterpillars and leaf miners. (Still got a bloody lot of them.) By then, I had to go back up the mountain to check on tenant.
She decided to come down with me, after all, and chatting all the way, we headed down to the sunny, windless spot by the basin, where she could enjoy the remainder of the afternoon. Having gotten her settled, I went to the igloo to get out three pillows for my dogs. Gada has been disagreeable with the floor now that temperatures are dropping during the night. In fact, in the evenings, when big brother and I work on the terrace in front of my cabin, we are obliged to put down blankets on the floor for our poor little four-legged darlings.
Though I was a bit in a rush, grandpa did talk me into cutting the big rugs that we’re no longer using. We decided to cut them in strips for storage and use them through the winter instead of blankets…at least in our office. It’ll sure be warmer.
It took a bit to cut those things into eight manageable strips, but in the end I handed them over to grandpa and went back down to start on supper with tenant. What with her cutting most of the veggies, it was basically a question of throwing everything together for me.
That done it was up and got to work on my messages and then wrote some more for the Banshee story. That done there was of course an edit, which didn’t last as long as it should have, but since we wanted to do a workout in the morning, I figured some zzzs wouldn’t go amiss…of course I ended up lying awake most of the night. I can’t even explain why…well, there was the nightmare that continued after waking up six or seven times through the night. It was about bugs, thousands and thousands of bugs, and they were crawling all over me, and I was itching and scratching and that kept waking me up, time and again, until in the end my alarm went off and I had to get up. *sigh*
Had a good workout this morning regardless, even though my shwung was a little off.
That done, there was laundry, followed by breakfast and being startled by a huge truck arriving at our neighbors. They were from the phone company and they worked there for a solid day with this humongous generator roaring like mad. They did make for life entertainment for tenant, who finally wanted to go out into the sunshine around 3 in the afternoon.
But anyway, a trip down to the greenhouse to open everything up and water stuff followerd. With big brother’s help, we finished checking everything in about two hours, at which time we headed up with a big crate filled with young plants to put in the ground up in grandpa’s little yard up by the storage.
Those set, we tacked this humongous branch of a eucalypti that was really starting to become too big and threatened to break off, right on top of grandpa’s roof. It took a while, but we did manage taking it off, without damaging anything unduly.
Now that the wreck is gone from the storage, I got the chance to cut up a couple of pallets and started hauling the tile supplies to the far corner of the old paddock. The majority is now in place- While I was doing that, grandpa and big brother hung an old geyser in grandpa’s bathroom, but after they went through all that trouble, they discovered that there was a leak after all, meaning that our arching session was cancelled and we had to head for the city to get supplies and a new boiler. Sure, in summer it doesn’t matter if you don’t have hot water, but in winter that’s a little uncomfortable. Blast that old geyser for being broken, darn it.
My foot was downright killing me by the time I came back up from the yard, where the greenhouse and raised seed bed had to be closed for the night. Since the seedbed looked rather dry, I also watered it quickly, and went up to change clothes for the trip.
We went to several stores, and ended up with a semi cheap one that is going to be a bitch to hang, what with grandpa’s bathroom being so small that we’ll have to make adjustments to fit it in.
The dogs were upset with me when I got home and let them out the cabin. Knight II grabbed hold of my arm, and Sitabah was screeching at the top of her lungs. When she does that, I have a severe inclination to wring her little neck, darn it.
And just about now I’m starting to get cross-eyed, my foot hurts, and well…it’s been a long day *sigh* and I'm outta here.
It was a busy day today, but first I better get to yesterday.
First off, after the usual morning rituals down at the house, I went up to help tenant out and made paddy dough while I was up there. This time I experimented with white beans, rather than chickpeas and lentils. I didn’t dislike it, that’s a fact, and it did go rather well with supper later in the day.
But anyway, after that, leaving tenant to watch Animal Planet, which she loves, I went down to the greenhouse to water plants. Same went for the raised seedbed, in which I had to re-sow green beans and lettuce. I think the ants got to them, seeing as they really like lettuce seeds. As for the green beans, I have no idea why only five of the twenty three I put in came up. So I redid that, watered the whole lot and went through the yard in search of veggies. Found enough for a full meal, and then started checking the cabbages and such for caterpillars and leaf miners. (Still got a bloody lot of them.) By then, I had to go back up the mountain to check on tenant.
She decided to come down with me, after all, and chatting all the way, we headed down to the sunny, windless spot by the basin, where she could enjoy the remainder of the afternoon. Having gotten her settled, I went to the igloo to get out three pillows for my dogs. Gada has been disagreeable with the floor now that temperatures are dropping during the night. In fact, in the evenings, when big brother and I work on the terrace in front of my cabin, we are obliged to put down blankets on the floor for our poor little four-legged darlings.
Though I was a bit in a rush, grandpa did talk me into cutting the big rugs that we’re no longer using. We decided to cut them in strips for storage and use them through the winter instead of blankets…at least in our office. It’ll sure be warmer.
It took a bit to cut those things into eight manageable strips, but in the end I handed them over to grandpa and went back down to start on supper with tenant. What with her cutting most of the veggies, it was basically a question of throwing everything together for me.
That done it was up and got to work on my messages and then wrote some more for the Banshee story. That done there was of course an edit, which didn’t last as long as it should have, but since we wanted to do a workout in the morning, I figured some zzzs wouldn’t go amiss…of course I ended up lying awake most of the night. I can’t even explain why…well, there was the nightmare that continued after waking up six or seven times through the night. It was about bugs, thousands and thousands of bugs, and they were crawling all over me, and I was itching and scratching and that kept waking me up, time and again, until in the end my alarm went off and I had to get up. *sigh*
Had a good workout this morning regardless, even though my shwung was a little off.
That done, there was laundry, followed by breakfast and being startled by a huge truck arriving at our neighbors. They were from the phone company and they worked there for a solid day with this humongous generator roaring like mad. They did make for life entertainment for tenant, who finally wanted to go out into the sunshine around 3 in the afternoon.
But anyway, a trip down to the greenhouse to open everything up and water stuff followerd. With big brother’s help, we finished checking everything in about two hours, at which time we headed up with a big crate filled with young plants to put in the ground up in grandpa’s little yard up by the storage.
Those set, we tacked this humongous branch of a eucalypti that was really starting to become too big and threatened to break off, right on top of grandpa’s roof. It took a while, but we did manage taking it off, without damaging anything unduly.
Now that the wreck is gone from the storage, I got the chance to cut up a couple of pallets and started hauling the tile supplies to the far corner of the old paddock. The majority is now in place- While I was doing that, grandpa and big brother hung an old geyser in grandpa’s bathroom, but after they went through all that trouble, they discovered that there was a leak after all, meaning that our arching session was cancelled and we had to head for the city to get supplies and a new boiler. Sure, in summer it doesn’t matter if you don’t have hot water, but in winter that’s a little uncomfortable. Blast that old geyser for being broken, darn it.
My foot was downright killing me by the time I came back up from the yard, where the greenhouse and raised seed bed had to be closed for the night. Since the seedbed looked rather dry, I also watered it quickly, and went up to change clothes for the trip.
We went to several stores, and ended up with a semi cheap one that is going to be a bitch to hang, what with grandpa’s bathroom being so small that we’ll have to make adjustments to fit it in.
The dogs were upset with me when I got home and let them out the cabin. Knight II grabbed hold of my arm, and Sitabah was screeching at the top of her lungs. When she does that, I have a severe inclination to wring her little neck, darn it.
And just about now I’m starting to get cross-eyed, my foot hurts, and well…it’s been a long day *sigh* and I'm outta here.
Monday, July 4, 2011
Shaking...Hah
Song of the day: “What’s a woman” by Vaya Con Dios. I heard it this morning on VH1 and it has been going through my head ever since. Ah, the good old days.
Let’s get to it. I feel a little shaky at the moment, considering I just had a massive scare. Silly me had intended to put my computer on standby while we moved up to the terrace in front of my cabin, rather than the one by the basin, and forgot to save the two pages that I’d written in the two hours down there in the fresh summer breeze. Aaaaargh!!! Seriously, I haven’t made a mistake like that since I lost seventeen pages of “A Deadly Legacy” in ‘98 due to a power outage. Gawd! What a horrible feeling. Even now, my hands are still trembling. I know, it is a weird thing to get upset about, but even though you’d think that you can just rewrite the pages, it just won’t ever be the same again. Somehow you just always keep stumbling over “that lost scene”. Really frustrating. *sigh*
But anyways...for the past two days I’ve been friggin’ sore from the six hour tiling spree, which was followed by the two hour grouting spree, which then was again followed by today’s six hour tiling spree. Seriously, there was a change in plans at the last possible moment, meaning that I couldn’t use the already picked-and-ready earth-red tiles for the finishing edge of tenant’s bedroom. Instead I had to head back to the storage to find out if we could use something else. I ended up working with the last few spotted gray, and light yellow tiles of the floor. This of course meant that I had to measure and cut every single tile in the right size, and then make sure that the finished decorative edge was pointing outward. Have you any idea how much cutting and measuring you have to do on four whole tiles and about six damaged and broken ones to fill a four inch ledge that is about twenty feet long? Well, it took six hours, so, blegh. Luckily it looks good, because otherwise I would be seriously Poed.
Which reminds me, yesterday’s grouting went well. It only took a relatively short time and it really did make the floor look like a whole. The small error I made during laying was still there, but on the overall the whole looks good. Of course the grout work won’t be white for long. It never is. Have you any idea how hard it is to have anything white while you love with several scores of dogs? Impossible! I mean it.
Cooking wise, yesterday was relatively simple. Left over sauce hollandaise mixed with left over pasta and fresh veggies. Nutritional and tasty. Can’t ask for more can you? Today, on the other hand, was an absolute treat. Though I was feeling a tad harried (due to being behind on everything) I did manage to put together a nice batch of baked red beats with potatoes, onion and cheese. Seriously, we ate our way through the entire pan and left only traces of red for the dogs to lick off. Hah. It was delicious, and since it was seven and my breakfast was at eleven, I was friggin’ starving.
While I did the cooking, and before that finished up tiling, and helping tenant to the pool for a dip before she walked down with me (didn’t get there until past six) all refreshed and up for dinner until caregiver returned from her day job.
Yesterday afternoon was spend shaving Nata (golden retriever) who’s now that he’s getting older, less capable of keeping himself clean—strangely enough, we have noticed that as soon as dogs get old, or sick, their fur no longer stays clean. Perhaps it’s a lack of grooming, but I think there is more to it—meaning that we had to do something about the mess on his thighs and chest. So he looks like a badly trimmed poodle at the moment, but at least he’s a lot more comfortable.
I did finally get around to taking my winter sweaters from my wardrobe and stuff them in the storage box under my bed, but I still have horizontal surfaces covered with clean laundry that I really have to put away soon.
This morning I also finally got around to doing some cleaning in the house again. Seriously, in there all the vertical surfaces are the problem. Hah. This morning I rediscovered the redness of the kitchen drawers, the transparency of the glass doors of the storage closet, and that the corners of the house are indeed square...or so the sudden disappearance of spiderwebs showed me. Hah. Afterwards I managed a quick rub-down of the washing machine and the flat surfaces around it. Phew. Glad that is over again.
Took Knight II and Chaos along for a dip in the pool too, since the latter is really bothered by the heat. Chaos was downright uncomfortable during the night. He was crying and didn’t quiet down until I dragged him onto the bed and allowed him to lie in the stream from the fan.
So anyway, I took him and Knight II into the pool. Chaos went into the water like the amphibious tank he is, and when I called Knight II, he took two steps down the stairs (staring at me wide-eyed) and then leaped until his front paws almost speared me. Jeez. I just barely managed to dodge, and then he spent the next two minutes demanding that I keep him in my arms like the puppy he really isn’t. *snort* Seriously, he’ll pull all fours to his body and float against me for eternity if I don’t order him out of the water...looking all insulted, of course. Hah. Idiot!
Be that as it may, I’m going to try to get back into the writing spirit now that the scared-shakes of almost loosing two pages (only lost a few paragraphs after big brother go involved and discovered an unexpected backup hidden in a folder somewhere) and then call it a day.
Let’s get to it. I feel a little shaky at the moment, considering I just had a massive scare. Silly me had intended to put my computer on standby while we moved up to the terrace in front of my cabin, rather than the one by the basin, and forgot to save the two pages that I’d written in the two hours down there in the fresh summer breeze. Aaaaargh!!! Seriously, I haven’t made a mistake like that since I lost seventeen pages of “A Deadly Legacy” in ‘98 due to a power outage. Gawd! What a horrible feeling. Even now, my hands are still trembling. I know, it is a weird thing to get upset about, but even though you’d think that you can just rewrite the pages, it just won’t ever be the same again. Somehow you just always keep stumbling over “that lost scene”. Really frustrating. *sigh*
But anyways...for the past two days I’ve been friggin’ sore from the six hour tiling spree, which was followed by the two hour grouting spree, which then was again followed by today’s six hour tiling spree. Seriously, there was a change in plans at the last possible moment, meaning that I couldn’t use the already picked-and-ready earth-red tiles for the finishing edge of tenant’s bedroom. Instead I had to head back to the storage to find out if we could use something else. I ended up working with the last few spotted gray, and light yellow tiles of the floor. This of course meant that I had to measure and cut every single tile in the right size, and then make sure that the finished decorative edge was pointing outward. Have you any idea how much cutting and measuring you have to do on four whole tiles and about six damaged and broken ones to fill a four inch ledge that is about twenty feet long? Well, it took six hours, so, blegh. Luckily it looks good, because otherwise I would be seriously Poed.
Which reminds me, yesterday’s grouting went well. It only took a relatively short time and it really did make the floor look like a whole. The small error I made during laying was still there, but on the overall the whole looks good. Of course the grout work won’t be white for long. It never is. Have you any idea how hard it is to have anything white while you love with several scores of dogs? Impossible! I mean it.
Cooking wise, yesterday was relatively simple. Left over sauce hollandaise mixed with left over pasta and fresh veggies. Nutritional and tasty. Can’t ask for more can you? Today, on the other hand, was an absolute treat. Though I was feeling a tad harried (due to being behind on everything) I did manage to put together a nice batch of baked red beats with potatoes, onion and cheese. Seriously, we ate our way through the entire pan and left only traces of red for the dogs to lick off. Hah. It was delicious, and since it was seven and my breakfast was at eleven, I was friggin’ starving.
While I did the cooking, and before that finished up tiling, and helping tenant to the pool for a dip before she walked down with me (didn’t get there until past six) all refreshed and up for dinner until caregiver returned from her day job.
Yesterday afternoon was spend shaving Nata (golden retriever) who’s now that he’s getting older, less capable of keeping himself clean—strangely enough, we have noticed that as soon as dogs get old, or sick, their fur no longer stays clean. Perhaps it’s a lack of grooming, but I think there is more to it—meaning that we had to do something about the mess on his thighs and chest. So he looks like a badly trimmed poodle at the moment, but at least he’s a lot more comfortable.
I did finally get around to taking my winter sweaters from my wardrobe and stuff them in the storage box under my bed, but I still have horizontal surfaces covered with clean laundry that I really have to put away soon.
This morning I also finally got around to doing some cleaning in the house again. Seriously, in there all the vertical surfaces are the problem. Hah. This morning I rediscovered the redness of the kitchen drawers, the transparency of the glass doors of the storage closet, and that the corners of the house are indeed square...or so the sudden disappearance of spiderwebs showed me. Hah. Afterwards I managed a quick rub-down of the washing machine and the flat surfaces around it. Phew. Glad that is over again.
Took Knight II and Chaos along for a dip in the pool too, since the latter is really bothered by the heat. Chaos was downright uncomfortable during the night. He was crying and didn’t quiet down until I dragged him onto the bed and allowed him to lie in the stream from the fan.
So anyway, I took him and Knight II into the pool. Chaos went into the water like the amphibious tank he is, and when I called Knight II, he took two steps down the stairs (staring at me wide-eyed) and then leaped until his front paws almost speared me. Jeez. I just barely managed to dodge, and then he spent the next two minutes demanding that I keep him in my arms like the puppy he really isn’t. *snort* Seriously, he’ll pull all fours to his body and float against me for eternity if I don’t order him out of the water...looking all insulted, of course. Hah. Idiot!
Be that as it may, I’m going to try to get back into the writing spirit now that the scared-shakes of almost loosing two pages (only lost a few paragraphs after big brother go involved and discovered an unexpected backup hidden in a folder somewhere) and then call it a day.
Saturday, July 2, 2011
Tiling = backbreaking. Hah
Song of the day: “I’m just a boy” by Reba McIntire. Yep. I was curious about this particular artist, and ended up downloading several of her songs. Very nice.
Not so much busy these past couple of days, just properly filled with certain project that require patience, more than anything. First of all yesterday was wonderfully quiet as we spent most of it at home, working in the yard.
The weather was most peculiar for this time of year. The temperature was in the mid eighties, which is totally unheard of, and clouds covered the sky until well past four in the afternoon. While big brother made use of the clouds by working on the ladder he’s been making for the Land Rover’s imperial, I was in tenant’s kitchen, making chickpea/lentil burgers. They were going to be lunch together with freshly baked green beans with a white herbal sauce that was absolutely delicious. It worked out really well, if I do say so myself.
There was some serious tile hauling involved, by the way. Grandpa made these stands up by the storage where I’ve been sorting through our stash of tiles. I got enough for tenant’s bedroom, now all I need to gather is for her kitchen and grandpa’s bedroom. He hasn’t made up his mind about his room yet, but I’m betting that sometime next year we will be putting a proper floor in for him as well...for me too, for that matter. I want my hardwood floor, darn it.
Yesterday was definitely a good writing day. Within three hours of computer work (separated in two sessions), I managed to get six pages jotted down that bring the manuscript up to 77 pages, I think. Not bad. Not bad at all. Yay.
In the yard yesterday there was loads to do what with us having been so friggin’ busy this past week. We had harvests to do, weeds to pull, and also, of course, water to dole out. Got a full basket of vegetables to show for our efforts, not to mention a rather pleasant mood once it was time to start working on the computer. Seriously, nothing is quite as relaxing as going through rows of tomatoes, cucumbers and green beans to bind young vines to the support brackets. And those suckers go fast. Jeez, we’re binding new stuff up about every week.
Rather than get sand we went to fetch some filler clay yesterday evening. Since we’re going to have fill up a lot of empty space behind the new veranda wall, we really shouldn’t dawdle too much hauling it into storage.
Grandpa had to go out yesterday morning to get spare parts for his moped, again. The darn thing keeps dying on us, meaning that soon we’ll be forced to do a complete overhaul.
While working on my last blog (you might notice that there were quite a few errors in it, hah) I watched the Crazies and had a blast. Such a long time since I saw a similar one that I enjoyed so much. I’ve gotta admit that Timothy Oliphant is definitely growing on me. Who’d have thunk it after the “Hitman” disaster. But together with Radha Mitchel he made the movie quite entertaining.
Yesterday was finished of with a rather wonderful kick boxing session. Seriously, there is little in this world than can serve as a unwinding as a session attacking a big boxing ball. Now that’s what I call therapy. Hah.
Today, well today was a whole different kind of thing. Today Dani and I tiled tenant’s bedroom. It worked out pretty well, if I do say so myself. Her room now has a beautiful spotted gray border past the wall, with in the center a sixteen-tile square of spotted creme and yellow. At decision time, tenant came inside and opted to go with a bright ocher border around the creme and yellow, and I do admit that it looks good now that it’s all in. The darker yellow makes the center tiles brighter and more yellow than creme, which is good. It gives the room and air of cheerfulness.
So yeah, those were my past six hours, of which my back feels every single second. Jeez. All that bending over, measuring, cutting and gluing really gets to me. I, more than anything, was relieved when I finally finished for the day and was free to get some chow and then head down for a quick dip in the pool. I was seriously overheated. All that needs to be done is taking out the separators crosses and grout work, then the floor will be done. Yay.
My poor doggies, though. What with tenant and grandpa's dogs up there, I had to lock my up in the cabin, lest we'd have a constant orchestra at the fence. Silly Sitabah, just refuses to stay put if I don't close everything up. Poor things were in my cabin for a solid four hours and were none to happy about it either. *sigh*
Which brings me to now. I need a nap, I need to write, and I’m seriously thinking about food again. I have not decided in what order yet, though. Hah.
Not so much busy these past couple of days, just properly filled with certain project that require patience, more than anything. First of all yesterday was wonderfully quiet as we spent most of it at home, working in the yard.
The weather was most peculiar for this time of year. The temperature was in the mid eighties, which is totally unheard of, and clouds covered the sky until well past four in the afternoon. While big brother made use of the clouds by working on the ladder he’s been making for the Land Rover’s imperial, I was in tenant’s kitchen, making chickpea/lentil burgers. They were going to be lunch together with freshly baked green beans with a white herbal sauce that was absolutely delicious. It worked out really well, if I do say so myself.
There was some serious tile hauling involved, by the way. Grandpa made these stands up by the storage where I’ve been sorting through our stash of tiles. I got enough for tenant’s bedroom, now all I need to gather is for her kitchen and grandpa’s bedroom. He hasn’t made up his mind about his room yet, but I’m betting that sometime next year we will be putting a proper floor in for him as well...for me too, for that matter. I want my hardwood floor, darn it.
Yesterday was definitely a good writing day. Within three hours of computer work (separated in two sessions), I managed to get six pages jotted down that bring the manuscript up to 77 pages, I think. Not bad. Not bad at all. Yay.
In the yard yesterday there was loads to do what with us having been so friggin’ busy this past week. We had harvests to do, weeds to pull, and also, of course, water to dole out. Got a full basket of vegetables to show for our efforts, not to mention a rather pleasant mood once it was time to start working on the computer. Seriously, nothing is quite as relaxing as going through rows of tomatoes, cucumbers and green beans to bind young vines to the support brackets. And those suckers go fast. Jeez, we’re binding new stuff up about every week.
Rather than get sand we went to fetch some filler clay yesterday evening. Since we’re going to have fill up a lot of empty space behind the new veranda wall, we really shouldn’t dawdle too much hauling it into storage.
Grandpa had to go out yesterday morning to get spare parts for his moped, again. The darn thing keeps dying on us, meaning that soon we’ll be forced to do a complete overhaul.
While working on my last blog (you might notice that there were quite a few errors in it, hah) I watched the Crazies and had a blast. Such a long time since I saw a similar one that I enjoyed so much. I’ve gotta admit that Timothy Oliphant is definitely growing on me. Who’d have thunk it after the “Hitman” disaster. But together with Radha Mitchel he made the movie quite entertaining.
Yesterday was finished of with a rather wonderful kick boxing session. Seriously, there is little in this world than can serve as a unwinding as a session attacking a big boxing ball. Now that’s what I call therapy. Hah.
Today, well today was a whole different kind of thing. Today Dani and I tiled tenant’s bedroom. It worked out pretty well, if I do say so myself. Her room now has a beautiful spotted gray border past the wall, with in the center a sixteen-tile square of spotted creme and yellow. At decision time, tenant came inside and opted to go with a bright ocher border around the creme and yellow, and I do admit that it looks good now that it’s all in. The darker yellow makes the center tiles brighter and more yellow than creme, which is good. It gives the room and air of cheerfulness.
So yeah, those were my past six hours, of which my back feels every single second. Jeez. All that bending over, measuring, cutting and gluing really gets to me. I, more than anything, was relieved when I finally finished for the day and was free to get some chow and then head down for a quick dip in the pool. I was seriously overheated. All that needs to be done is taking out the separators crosses and grout work, then the floor will be done. Yay.
My poor doggies, though. What with tenant and grandpa's dogs up there, I had to lock my up in the cabin, lest we'd have a constant orchestra at the fence. Silly Sitabah, just refuses to stay put if I don't close everything up. Poor things were in my cabin for a solid four hours and were none to happy about it either. *sigh*
Which brings me to now. I need a nap, I need to write, and I’m seriously thinking about food again. I have not decided in what order yet, though. Hah.
Friday, March 18, 2011
Feels like Spring!
Song of the day: “In and out of love” by Armin van Buuren and Sharon den Adel. I know, who’d have thunk I’d ever like anything by a DJ, but there you go. Hah.
I just got back from a run with the Knight…right after I had to replace his bandage for the third time, darn it. It seems that every day he gets it in his head that he needs a clean one, and will rip the old one off. Luckily he lets me put a new one on his stump, because what with his tendency to walk into stuff, I am rather afraid to leave it all out in the open. On the most part it doesn’t look bad. All the stitches, except for one are holding, and though it bled a little last night after he licked at it (he sticks the stump into his cone to get to it) there doesn’t seem to be a lot of damage done. Other than that, he appears to be healing well and easily kept up while we ran today.
As a treat he’s been getting sausages, and tomorrow grandpa will buy a pound of liver for him so we can substitute the blood-loss a little.
Okay, let’s move along. Since yesterday was a virtual loss with another trip to town, I’m just giving a sum-up rather than a detailed description.
I started the day making fresh cream cheese and chilli for lunch.
There was some gardening, checking up on the veggies, planting cauliflowers, sprouts and leek, and walking tenant down into the yard.
She went all the way down to the terrace of the arches, which was at least twenty yards further than usual. Hah. She did excellent, and really enjoyed the sunshine while we ate Chilli, followed by continuing with the arbor for the brambles and raspberries. We had wanted to finish it, but considering I had to go to the store to pick up my fixed phone, visit our insurance agent (little sister still didn’t receive her replacement card) and then to the industrial area to pick up the woodstove we ordered for the big house the other day.
We were successful in all endeavors and my phone works again, so by the time we got home, big brother and I started on the edit and that was that.
The only good really good thing was that the weather was splendid...and still is, for that matter. Not cold at all anymore. Felt like spring, in fact.
Which brings us to today:
It’s been a tad busy, in particular since I started the morning making dough for a chard pizza, and a normal one, because let’s face it, the sibs are still picky eaters. *sigh*
Next, after a rather late breakfast and a long session of folding dry, and hanging wet laundry, and then getting the stuff I needed to continue with the tiling of the laundry corner. Oh, did I mention that in one of the previous blogs? Well, anyway, I am tiling the corner for the washing machine. Yep, the mess in that corner was driving me friggin’ bonkers for years and I finally decided to do something about it.
While big brother and I are putting up a days of sorts and tiling the lot, grandpa is doing the wood-work for the large folding table I’m getting there, along with two large baskets that will hang underneath to hold the dirty laundry. It is starting to look more and more like a bath house and this is somewhat entertaining.
Regretfully we ran out of glue before we were done, so we stopped and went down to have lunch with tenant (she insisted on going down again) before doing some mild gardening and continuing on with the framework for the arbor. Two more slats to go and it will be done. Yay.
After this came the running, of course, well after doing Knight II’s tail of course. Such a stubborn boy, our Knight. But anyway. I was off to a bad start, but finished with a good sprint that made up for it in spades.
Which means that I am now done with the blog, because I need to edit and catch up on my messages. Gotta go.
I just got back from a run with the Knight…right after I had to replace his bandage for the third time, darn it. It seems that every day he gets it in his head that he needs a clean one, and will rip the old one off. Luckily he lets me put a new one on his stump, because what with his tendency to walk into stuff, I am rather afraid to leave it all out in the open. On the most part it doesn’t look bad. All the stitches, except for one are holding, and though it bled a little last night after he licked at it (he sticks the stump into his cone to get to it) there doesn’t seem to be a lot of damage done. Other than that, he appears to be healing well and easily kept up while we ran today.
As a treat he’s been getting sausages, and tomorrow grandpa will buy a pound of liver for him so we can substitute the blood-loss a little.
Okay, let’s move along. Since yesterday was a virtual loss with another trip to town, I’m just giving a sum-up rather than a detailed description.
I started the day making fresh cream cheese and chilli for lunch.
There was some gardening, checking up on the veggies, planting cauliflowers, sprouts and leek, and walking tenant down into the yard.
She went all the way down to the terrace of the arches, which was at least twenty yards further than usual. Hah. She did excellent, and really enjoyed the sunshine while we ate Chilli, followed by continuing with the arbor for the brambles and raspberries. We had wanted to finish it, but considering I had to go to the store to pick up my fixed phone, visit our insurance agent (little sister still didn’t receive her replacement card) and then to the industrial area to pick up the woodstove we ordered for the big house the other day.
We were successful in all endeavors and my phone works again, so by the time we got home, big brother and I started on the edit and that was that.
The only good really good thing was that the weather was splendid...and still is, for that matter. Not cold at all anymore. Felt like spring, in fact.
Which brings us to today:
It’s been a tad busy, in particular since I started the morning making dough for a chard pizza, and a normal one, because let’s face it, the sibs are still picky eaters. *sigh*
Next, after a rather late breakfast and a long session of folding dry, and hanging wet laundry, and then getting the stuff I needed to continue with the tiling of the laundry corner. Oh, did I mention that in one of the previous blogs? Well, anyway, I am tiling the corner for the washing machine. Yep, the mess in that corner was driving me friggin’ bonkers for years and I finally decided to do something about it.
While big brother and I are putting up a days of sorts and tiling the lot, grandpa is doing the wood-work for the large folding table I’m getting there, along with two large baskets that will hang underneath to hold the dirty laundry. It is starting to look more and more like a bath house and this is somewhat entertaining.
Regretfully we ran out of glue before we were done, so we stopped and went down to have lunch with tenant (she insisted on going down again) before doing some mild gardening and continuing on with the framework for the arbor. Two more slats to go and it will be done. Yay.
After this came the running, of course, well after doing Knight II’s tail of course. Such a stubborn boy, our Knight. But anyway. I was off to a bad start, but finished with a good sprint that made up for it in spades.
Which means that I am now done with the blog, because I need to edit and catch up on my messages. Gotta go.
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
Warm summer day...the first.
Song of the day: “A little bit” by Maria Mena. Good one.
An actual summer day has come to pass; sweltering air, no breeze to speak of, the sun pounding down relentlessly and basically it’s a day for slow motions, languid speech and leisured start ups. Not necessarily a bad thing, but still; it is so unexpected that it is hard to shift gears.
Usually we have about a month or so to get acclimated to the summer weather but today (yesterday too, I guess) was just a tad sudden. I think I’m gonna need at least a week before I can be happy about this change in temperatures.
A plus: the dogs are remarkably quiet most of the time. They sure know when to lay low…warm weather being the magic stuff in that regard, hah.
Well, considering that there was lots of going back and forth to the village today, it wasn’t such a bad thing.
But I’m getting ahead of myself…call it impatience.
I wake up with a fuzzy head; it is something that always happens when the temperatures rise, so the first thing I do when I get up is stick my head in the tub, I’ve filled in the sink, to get rid of it.
The morning rituals follow; the dogs already rushing back into cabin in record time, because, let’s face it, the sand is too hot for their poor little feet. Feeling a little daunted, too, I quickly head down to the house where the temperature will stay a lot more bearable for a while yet, and slap my computer bag down on the table so I can quickly get to the laundry.
Later on it will be bone-melting hot under the corrugated-aluminum roof of the courtyard; getting the laundry tackled before noon is rather essential if I don’t want to be covered in sweat within two minutes.
That thankfully done and the dry folded and put away for later pickups from the rest of the family, big brother and I settle down to work on the synopsis for real. In the next five hours, we tackle the distilling task of getting the story down to the bare basics and are actually forced to give it up. I need to take Amri (mix breed) and middle sister’s Angie (Basset Hound) to the vet.
Amri has been troubled by a rather massive growth on his chest…it’s a little gross description, bit it was starting to look like a large pair of testicles, dangling between his front legs…so I figure it’s time to have it removed.
Angie, on the other hand, has been secreting mucus from her nose and eyes, so rather than risk the parasite that at one point bothered one of our huskies, Sama, we want to have her checked out.
In the village, it is even hotter, and even though the vet is a miser when it comes to using the AC in his hospital, it is relatively cool inside the building. We’re inside a long time; Amri is not a problem. He just needs to stay there for the night so they can operate on him this evening, or in the morning.
Angie, on the other hand, doesn’t appreciate the exam at all. It doesn’t help that the vet needs to use a sharp, very small melon scoop, to get a blood sample. It once again demonstrates the aristocrat-attitude Bassets appear to possess. “Oh Lord almighty; the shame! I will never look upon you again.” A Basset can give a very typical look when it does not agree with the treatment it’s receiving, and it practically speaks those exact words, hah.
Regretfully the poor girl needs to stay for a few hours too. They want to check her to see if she hasn’t got one of the horrific grass seeds in her nose (remember the Clue debacle, and the way the seed has torpedoed its way through his body?) just to be on the safe side.
Middle sister and I head home, making a short stop at the ferreteria for glue and then returning in time to have a quick dinner. I’ve only got forty-five minutes before we need to head back to pick the Basset up. I still need to finish the pool tiling thing, and I manage just barely before we’re off again.
We sit at the hospital for almost and hour…they’re operating Amri…and then head out to get a quick load of rocks while the vets finish up with the operation. Fully loaded up we return, and get a temporary prognosis that Angie is likely suffering from a rather common problem in these regions: Leishmania.
I still think that it’s the parasite, but we’ll see. Amri’s operation went well, the vet claims, and we can come pick him up tomorrow…because they want to keep an eye on him.
Once home, we unload, of course, and then head inside to have a quick snack and watch “Twilight”. It wasn’t bad, I’ll admit, but…well, slow. I was just going through some scenes wondering when something was going to happen. Hah.
Midnight has arrived quickly, and the heat is persisting, and rather than settle on my bed for tonight’s Blog, I sit down on my porch instead. It isn’t until three in the morning has arrived that the wind picks up a little and brings the temperature down at least a little.
Well, on the overall today wasn’t bad, so I guess we’ll have to catalogue it in the good-side section. Hah.
An actual summer day has come to pass; sweltering air, no breeze to speak of, the sun pounding down relentlessly and basically it’s a day for slow motions, languid speech and leisured start ups. Not necessarily a bad thing, but still; it is so unexpected that it is hard to shift gears.
Usually we have about a month or so to get acclimated to the summer weather but today (yesterday too, I guess) was just a tad sudden. I think I’m gonna need at least a week before I can be happy about this change in temperatures.
A plus: the dogs are remarkably quiet most of the time. They sure know when to lay low…warm weather being the magic stuff in that regard, hah.
Well, considering that there was lots of going back and forth to the village today, it wasn’t such a bad thing.
But I’m getting ahead of myself…call it impatience.
I wake up with a fuzzy head; it is something that always happens when the temperatures rise, so the first thing I do when I get up is stick my head in the tub, I’ve filled in the sink, to get rid of it.
The morning rituals follow; the dogs already rushing back into cabin in record time, because, let’s face it, the sand is too hot for their poor little feet. Feeling a little daunted, too, I quickly head down to the house where the temperature will stay a lot more bearable for a while yet, and slap my computer bag down on the table so I can quickly get to the laundry.
Later on it will be bone-melting hot under the corrugated-aluminum roof of the courtyard; getting the laundry tackled before noon is rather essential if I don’t want to be covered in sweat within two minutes.
That thankfully done and the dry folded and put away for later pickups from the rest of the family, big brother and I settle down to work on the synopsis for real. In the next five hours, we tackle the distilling task of getting the story down to the bare basics and are actually forced to give it up. I need to take Amri (mix breed) and middle sister’s Angie (Basset Hound) to the vet.
Amri has been troubled by a rather massive growth on his chest…it’s a little gross description, bit it was starting to look like a large pair of testicles, dangling between his front legs…so I figure it’s time to have it removed.
Angie, on the other hand, has been secreting mucus from her nose and eyes, so rather than risk the parasite that at one point bothered one of our huskies, Sama, we want to have her checked out.
In the village, it is even hotter, and even though the vet is a miser when it comes to using the AC in his hospital, it is relatively cool inside the building. We’re inside a long time; Amri is not a problem. He just needs to stay there for the night so they can operate on him this evening, or in the morning.
Angie, on the other hand, doesn’t appreciate the exam at all. It doesn’t help that the vet needs to use a sharp, very small melon scoop, to get a blood sample. It once again demonstrates the aristocrat-attitude Bassets appear to possess. “Oh Lord almighty; the shame! I will never look upon you again.” A Basset can give a very typical look when it does not agree with the treatment it’s receiving, and it practically speaks those exact words, hah.
Regretfully the poor girl needs to stay for a few hours too. They want to check her to see if she hasn’t got one of the horrific grass seeds in her nose (remember the Clue debacle, and the way the seed has torpedoed its way through his body?) just to be on the safe side.
Middle sister and I head home, making a short stop at the ferreteria for glue and then returning in time to have a quick dinner. I’ve only got forty-five minutes before we need to head back to pick the Basset up. I still need to finish the pool tiling thing, and I manage just barely before we’re off again.
We sit at the hospital for almost and hour…they’re operating Amri…and then head out to get a quick load of rocks while the vets finish up with the operation. Fully loaded up we return, and get a temporary prognosis that Angie is likely suffering from a rather common problem in these regions: Leishmania.
I still think that it’s the parasite, but we’ll see. Amri’s operation went well, the vet claims, and we can come pick him up tomorrow…because they want to keep an eye on him.
Once home, we unload, of course, and then head inside to have a quick snack and watch “Twilight”. It wasn’t bad, I’ll admit, but…well, slow. I was just going through some scenes wondering when something was going to happen. Hah.
Midnight has arrived quickly, and the heat is persisting, and rather than settle on my bed for tonight’s Blog, I sit down on my porch instead. It isn’t until three in the morning has arrived that the wind picks up a little and brings the temperature down at least a little.
Well, on the overall today wasn’t bad, so I guess we’ll have to catalogue it in the good-side section. Hah.
Monday, June 1, 2009
First WARM day. Yay.
Song of the day: “Grace Kelly” by Mika. Such a funny song. Wonder if that means I was in a cheerful mood. Hah.
So, yesterday I didn’t have time, as some will undoubtedly have noticed. Let’s see if I can hit some of the highlights and then smooth you on onto today’s events without too much of a hassle.
Well, I really said it all in that ridiculously short sum up. The only thing I really failed to mention was that we saw the movie “Australia” and I’ve got to admit that I was pleasantly surprised. I went in, fearing a second “Moulin Rouge”, and came out with a rather content overall feeling. Almost as if I’d seen some old movie, rather than one of the latest newcomers in the DVD section.
You know what I mean, right? One of those classics that are hardy and rich on the story line, lots of drama, lots of information, all nicely combined into a couple of hours of entertainment while still sending you on a pleasant adventure.
It started out a little iffy, I’ll admit. For a while, I wondered whether good ol’ Bazz couldn’t decide if he was making a comedy or something a little more serious. But then, slowly and steadily, the story actually managed to capture my attention the way his “Strictly Ballroom” always does. A little bizarre at time, sure, the “start up” special FX were far from stellar, and the acting…well, not wowing, but still it was basic fun to watch. I’m glad that I overcame my general fear of the Bazz after the M.R. debacle.
But enough about that semi-review, let’s get on to the day.
I oversleep this morning, aaargh, so I’ve been running behind most of the following hours. There’s laundry to tackle, of course, and I get to it first thing, if for no other reason than to have it over and done with. I spend a little time disciplining Knight II; the big lug is really getting to be unmanageable. Gawd, he’s so stubborn. Training him is going to be a royal pain in the butt.
Luckily, we manage to squeeze in a five-hour edit, so we get through a load of pages. We charge bravely through the grammar, astonished at how the scenes change with a slight shift here and there, adding and subtracting a semi-colon, a colon or a comma/punctuation; it makes quite the difference from the oh-so slow progress of the rewrite-edit.
Most annoyed, when I realize that our time is up, I head on outside to start on today’s building. After setting mom up by the carport, for yet another low wall, I aim for the pool where tiles need to be put up on the section of the skimmer receiver that was added recently. I have to wade through the water to get in place to actually be able to get to it, but what the hey; it’s a warm day, and the slight cool-off doesn’t go amiss at all.
Of course there is not enough of the tile glue present, so I only manage to get down the basics…don’t you just hate Sundays when you can’t go to the store to get stuff like that…and finish up about two hours before sunset. There’s another section in the tub-like skimmer that needs to be plastered with cement, so since I’m in there already (my trousers wet up to my knees) I figure I might as well get to it. I can’t stand plastering natural rock walls. They’re so hard to treat. Stuff just keeps falling off, time and again, until I want to scream. Much to my relief, it really is just a very small section.
That done, I make my way up to the carport, where mom and little sister have just finished their small wall. Since there is still a lot of cement left, big brother and I add another step to the stairs beside the new section; it brings the total up to four, and it does improve the overall image of the terrace we’re creating on top of “the Wall”.
Today we’ve planned to go for a run just after we’re done with building. Even though we’re late, we do manage to get out to a new spot that is a wonderful change from our usual path. Since we’ve already had a full day behind us, we decide to keep the run relatively short, a couple of miles at most…regretfully middle sister didn’t hear the agreement, and goes the extra mile, forcing big brother to go after her. She is properly exhausted by the time we return to the car, and looks more than a little startled when it becomes clear that we still have to get a batch of rocks: poor thing.
Added to the slightly longer-than-planned run middle sister and I both forgot our gloves, so we end up hauling rocks into the back of the truck with our bare hands; it is a mistake I don’t intend to make again, I assure you. My hands feel like they’re missing at least one layer of skin: much like they were treated by sandpaper. Hah. Much to our relief we do find a pile of rocks that need only be transferred up to the truck bed, so we’re done in less then fifteen minutes.
We arrive home around dusk and spend, what feels like, an eternity unloading. Middle sister is too exhausted to finish up, but luckily, little sister arrives to take her place. It’s already dark when we enter the house-the dogs going crazy, as usual-and I head for the shower for a much-deserved wash-up. Dust is everywhere.
Dinner consists of panir (or paneer, as I’ve learned it’s really called) and salad, but there is too little of it, what with everyone having eaten already. So, I end up eating a piece of French bread with cheese to fill the remaining gap; it does the trick well enough, I suppose.
For the hour that remains of the evening we watch the tail end of a “Prison Break” episode, followed by a similar cut from “Medium” and then it is time to head to my quarters at last. Big brother and I debate our present project for another hour or two, but then the night comes to an end at last, and I can focus on today’s Blog.
I gotta admit that today’s heat didn’t much help the energy levels: warm days have a way of draining you somewhat.
Even now, well after midnight, it is still warm enough to sit in a sleeveless top, somewhat futilely hoping for a breeze from the completely still night air.
Ah well, I better get used to it, since this is the weather I’m going to be “enjoying” for the next three to four months. Hah.
So, yesterday I didn’t have time, as some will undoubtedly have noticed. Let’s see if I can hit some of the highlights and then smooth you on onto today’s events without too much of a hassle.
Well, I really said it all in that ridiculously short sum up. The only thing I really failed to mention was that we saw the movie “Australia” and I’ve got to admit that I was pleasantly surprised. I went in, fearing a second “Moulin Rouge”, and came out with a rather content overall feeling. Almost as if I’d seen some old movie, rather than one of the latest newcomers in the DVD section.
You know what I mean, right? One of those classics that are hardy and rich on the story line, lots of drama, lots of information, all nicely combined into a couple of hours of entertainment while still sending you on a pleasant adventure.
It started out a little iffy, I’ll admit. For a while, I wondered whether good ol’ Bazz couldn’t decide if he was making a comedy or something a little more serious. But then, slowly and steadily, the story actually managed to capture my attention the way his “Strictly Ballroom” always does. A little bizarre at time, sure, the “start up” special FX were far from stellar, and the acting…well, not wowing, but still it was basic fun to watch. I’m glad that I overcame my general fear of the Bazz after the M.R. debacle.
But enough about that semi-review, let’s get on to the day.
I oversleep this morning, aaargh, so I’ve been running behind most of the following hours. There’s laundry to tackle, of course, and I get to it first thing, if for no other reason than to have it over and done with. I spend a little time disciplining Knight II; the big lug is really getting to be unmanageable. Gawd, he’s so stubborn. Training him is going to be a royal pain in the butt.
Luckily, we manage to squeeze in a five-hour edit, so we get through a load of pages. We charge bravely through the grammar, astonished at how the scenes change with a slight shift here and there, adding and subtracting a semi-colon, a colon or a comma/punctuation; it makes quite the difference from the oh-so slow progress of the rewrite-edit.
Most annoyed, when I realize that our time is up, I head on outside to start on today’s building. After setting mom up by the carport, for yet another low wall, I aim for the pool where tiles need to be put up on the section of the skimmer receiver that was added recently. I have to wade through the water to get in place to actually be able to get to it, but what the hey; it’s a warm day, and the slight cool-off doesn’t go amiss at all.
Of course there is not enough of the tile glue present, so I only manage to get down the basics…don’t you just hate Sundays when you can’t go to the store to get stuff like that…and finish up about two hours before sunset. There’s another section in the tub-like skimmer that needs to be plastered with cement, so since I’m in there already (my trousers wet up to my knees) I figure I might as well get to it. I can’t stand plastering natural rock walls. They’re so hard to treat. Stuff just keeps falling off, time and again, until I want to scream. Much to my relief, it really is just a very small section.
That done, I make my way up to the carport, where mom and little sister have just finished their small wall. Since there is still a lot of cement left, big brother and I add another step to the stairs beside the new section; it brings the total up to four, and it does improve the overall image of the terrace we’re creating on top of “the Wall”.
Today we’ve planned to go for a run just after we’re done with building. Even though we’re late, we do manage to get out to a new spot that is a wonderful change from our usual path. Since we’ve already had a full day behind us, we decide to keep the run relatively short, a couple of miles at most…regretfully middle sister didn’t hear the agreement, and goes the extra mile, forcing big brother to go after her. She is properly exhausted by the time we return to the car, and looks more than a little startled when it becomes clear that we still have to get a batch of rocks: poor thing.
Added to the slightly longer-than-planned run middle sister and I both forgot our gloves, so we end up hauling rocks into the back of the truck with our bare hands; it is a mistake I don’t intend to make again, I assure you. My hands feel like they’re missing at least one layer of skin: much like they were treated by sandpaper. Hah. Much to our relief we do find a pile of rocks that need only be transferred up to the truck bed, so we’re done in less then fifteen minutes.
We arrive home around dusk and spend, what feels like, an eternity unloading. Middle sister is too exhausted to finish up, but luckily, little sister arrives to take her place. It’s already dark when we enter the house-the dogs going crazy, as usual-and I head for the shower for a much-deserved wash-up. Dust is everywhere.
Dinner consists of panir (or paneer, as I’ve learned it’s really called) and salad, but there is too little of it, what with everyone having eaten already. So, I end up eating a piece of French bread with cheese to fill the remaining gap; it does the trick well enough, I suppose.
For the hour that remains of the evening we watch the tail end of a “Prison Break” episode, followed by a similar cut from “Medium” and then it is time to head to my quarters at last. Big brother and I debate our present project for another hour or two, but then the night comes to an end at last, and I can focus on today’s Blog.
I gotta admit that today’s heat didn’t much help the energy levels: warm days have a way of draining you somewhat.
Even now, well after midnight, it is still warm enough to sit in a sleeveless top, somewhat futilely hoping for a breeze from the completely still night air.
Ah well, I better get used to it, since this is the weather I’m going to be “enjoying” for the next three to four months. Hah.
Wednesday, December 24, 2008
The day and a short rant.
I was having a particularly pleasant dream about my books being in the bestseller lists when the monster Boxer awakened me from blessed sleep about three hours before it was time for me to get up. The disturbance was certainly at a most inopportune time, erasing most of the details on the dream, only leaving me with that solitary memory to hold onto when I grabbed the beast and dragged her onto the bed.
I’d fully intended to continue on with the dream, but of course failed when I dropped off into unconsciousness and didn’t surface until the alarm started screeching, causing the usual riot from the pack, demanding to be let out.
Still exhausted, I watch them dash out into the cloudy daylight, hesitating for only a moment before I stagger back to the bed, set the alarm for another forty minutes and crawl under the blankets for “just a few minutes more”.
The extra sleep has helped considerably when I finally do get up, prying my eyes open and carefully evading the pack that has gathered around my bed with apparent indignation of having been left to their own resources for a measly forty, bloody, minutes.
Chaos is actually staring up at me in accusation when I literally step over him to get out of the bedroom uttering an occasional yap, while Lhabana and Gada, the two lovable Labs, are bouncing up and down in front of me to get their much needed pat on the head. You’d think I’ve been gone for a day, if their behavior’s any indication.
I hurry through the morning rituals and head on down to the house, pleased to note that big brother took his time as well, and arrives ten minutes after I do.
Still in my rest days, I don’t feel inclined to do exercises today, and since no laundry has been done during the night, I have a quick breakfast, feed Yadzia, and settle behind the computer with a mug of coffee beside me in record time.
Messages and chats follow, after which I open the psychic drama file and start reading. It’s been a while since I wrote the beginning of the story, and in order to get back in the flow I’ll need to read everything I already wrote down in the past.
CNN is on, just as it is most days when we’re working on the computers, and it distracts us into a heated rant when the reporters start talking about the changing climate.
It amazes me how people still trust scientists that make all sort of predictions about when the icecaps will melt completely. I remember clearly, just a decade ago at most, when all those “knowledgeable” folks were claiming that it would be at least another fifty-to-a-hundred years before things got as serious as they did this year, but there it is. Storms raging all over the globe, temperatures out of whack, it’s visible everywhere, setting all sorts of records.
Also those that claim fluctuations to be normal and that we, as humans, have nothing to do with it…OMG. And these people went to universities, studied for this? It baffles the mind. How can a species counting more than seven billion bodies, NOT have an effect? It’s basic math, really.
If a large bunny population is crowded on too small a territory that area will rapidly disintegrate. How is this any different? Does the regular human being have more or less waste? Do bunnies drive cars; fly planes and whatnot all known and accepted as major polluters? Like I said, basic math.
Focus isn’t all that easy to find today. For some reason my mind keeps drifting off the story as I try to delve into the writing mood. Still, I manage to go through about ten pages before it is time for us to get ready to go to town.
I’m not at all looking forward to our lessons, but it has to be done, and I know it while we drive down the mountain and drop little sister off at the dentist. Once we arrive at the school we’re informed by our teacher that the computers are down, so we get two folders and a couple of test forms, and are send to the back where we are to do everything “the old fashioned way”. Pen, paper and crossing out multiple-choice answers for the next hour and a half.
It doesn’t go bad, or anything. We have done the questions on the computers often enough to get the majority of the questions right, but the mind-shift is somewhat disconcerting. In the time we usually manage at least eight tests, we now only manage four, and are feeling somewhat out of sorts when we leave the school and head to the waiting car to return home.
More than a little pleased that we did the groceries and other shopping yesterday, allowing us to go home immediately for a change.
After the familiar noisy greeting of the pack, and stuffing down a quick snack of French fries and veggies, I start cleaning up the kitchen in preparation of today’s “project”.
More tiling’s in the plans, and I’m just about done setting everything up when the sibs join me.
While little sister starts painting the recently revealed wall for the second time, middle sister prepares the glue for the tiles that I begin cutting for the last section of the floor. It takes some fancy cutting, since there are nooks and crannies, but it goes remarkably well by the time the glue’s done and middle sister cleans up the bare concrete for the actual laying.
For some reason, whenever we are trying to do something on the floor, all the dogs grow this major fascination for that particular section: Each and every one of them gathering around, crowding closer and preferably lying down on a tile we’ve just put down with quite some effort for putting it in right.
In the end we decide laying them in twos, covering them up with a board as soon as they’re down and thus saving them from being jarred by the dogs.
By the time we’re done with the floor, and halfway through the glue, middle sister and I move on to the part of the wall behind the counter that still needs to be done. With me cutting the tiles once more, she starts putting them up.
Big brother works on getting the electrical wiring for the fridges placed on the other side of the kitchen.
Since the freezer and fridge are still in their old place, big brother and I start moving them, giving room to middle sister who then continues with the wall tiles on her own.
Cleaning up the mess that has somehow gathered behind the machines takes at least thirty minutes, and we check the wiring before starting the laborious chore of moving the heavy machinery clear across the kitchen and settling them against the freshly painted wall.
There is a slight hiccup when one is in place. There are three big holes in the wall where old outlets were, and deciding to shut them, I use the leftover glue fill them up and smooth them over until they are once again part of the wall.
That done, the fridge is placed beside the freezer at last.
As soon as they’re set in place, the kitchen suddenly looks totally different. The dimensions have altered, dwarfing the rather big coolers, now that the ceiling is only a couple of feet above them. It also makes the counter cozier while creating lots of space on the other side, where a large expanse of wall has been opened up.
Cleanup. It is a big mess all through the kitchen and it takes us almost an hour to get it all cleared away. It is already past midnight when we are finally done, and I sit down to watch the final episodes of “Frasier” while discussing the vampire saga big brother and I are working on.
At long last, having caught my breath, it is time to head on up to my cabin where I feed the dogs and get ready for the night. It’s been a long day, and I can feel it in my bones by the time I settle behind the computer for a few quick chats and the Blog, of course.
I’m actually happy for the holidays for a once. It means that we won’t be going out and this will certainly allow us to just fall back into the pleasant routines of work and play without annoying interruptions.
I’d fully intended to continue on with the dream, but of course failed when I dropped off into unconsciousness and didn’t surface until the alarm started screeching, causing the usual riot from the pack, demanding to be let out.
Still exhausted, I watch them dash out into the cloudy daylight, hesitating for only a moment before I stagger back to the bed, set the alarm for another forty minutes and crawl under the blankets for “just a few minutes more”.
The extra sleep has helped considerably when I finally do get up, prying my eyes open and carefully evading the pack that has gathered around my bed with apparent indignation of having been left to their own resources for a measly forty, bloody, minutes.
Chaos is actually staring up at me in accusation when I literally step over him to get out of the bedroom uttering an occasional yap, while Lhabana and Gada, the two lovable Labs, are bouncing up and down in front of me to get their much needed pat on the head. You’d think I’ve been gone for a day, if their behavior’s any indication.
I hurry through the morning rituals and head on down to the house, pleased to note that big brother took his time as well, and arrives ten minutes after I do.
Still in my rest days, I don’t feel inclined to do exercises today, and since no laundry has been done during the night, I have a quick breakfast, feed Yadzia, and settle behind the computer with a mug of coffee beside me in record time.
Messages and chats follow, after which I open the psychic drama file and start reading. It’s been a while since I wrote the beginning of the story, and in order to get back in the flow I’ll need to read everything I already wrote down in the past.
CNN is on, just as it is most days when we’re working on the computers, and it distracts us into a heated rant when the reporters start talking about the changing climate.
It amazes me how people still trust scientists that make all sort of predictions about when the icecaps will melt completely. I remember clearly, just a decade ago at most, when all those “knowledgeable” folks were claiming that it would be at least another fifty-to-a-hundred years before things got as serious as they did this year, but there it is. Storms raging all over the globe, temperatures out of whack, it’s visible everywhere, setting all sorts of records.
Also those that claim fluctuations to be normal and that we, as humans, have nothing to do with it…OMG. And these people went to universities, studied for this? It baffles the mind. How can a species counting more than seven billion bodies, NOT have an effect? It’s basic math, really.
If a large bunny population is crowded on too small a territory that area will rapidly disintegrate. How is this any different? Does the regular human being have more or less waste? Do bunnies drive cars; fly planes and whatnot all known and accepted as major polluters? Like I said, basic math.
Focus isn’t all that easy to find today. For some reason my mind keeps drifting off the story as I try to delve into the writing mood. Still, I manage to go through about ten pages before it is time for us to get ready to go to town.
I’m not at all looking forward to our lessons, but it has to be done, and I know it while we drive down the mountain and drop little sister off at the dentist. Once we arrive at the school we’re informed by our teacher that the computers are down, so we get two folders and a couple of test forms, and are send to the back where we are to do everything “the old fashioned way”. Pen, paper and crossing out multiple-choice answers for the next hour and a half.
It doesn’t go bad, or anything. We have done the questions on the computers often enough to get the majority of the questions right, but the mind-shift is somewhat disconcerting. In the time we usually manage at least eight tests, we now only manage four, and are feeling somewhat out of sorts when we leave the school and head to the waiting car to return home.
More than a little pleased that we did the groceries and other shopping yesterday, allowing us to go home immediately for a change.
After the familiar noisy greeting of the pack, and stuffing down a quick snack of French fries and veggies, I start cleaning up the kitchen in preparation of today’s “project”.
More tiling’s in the plans, and I’m just about done setting everything up when the sibs join me.
While little sister starts painting the recently revealed wall for the second time, middle sister prepares the glue for the tiles that I begin cutting for the last section of the floor. It takes some fancy cutting, since there are nooks and crannies, but it goes remarkably well by the time the glue’s done and middle sister cleans up the bare concrete for the actual laying.
For some reason, whenever we are trying to do something on the floor, all the dogs grow this major fascination for that particular section: Each and every one of them gathering around, crowding closer and preferably lying down on a tile we’ve just put down with quite some effort for putting it in right.
In the end we decide laying them in twos, covering them up with a board as soon as they’re down and thus saving them from being jarred by the dogs.
By the time we’re done with the floor, and halfway through the glue, middle sister and I move on to the part of the wall behind the counter that still needs to be done. With me cutting the tiles once more, she starts putting them up.
Big brother works on getting the electrical wiring for the fridges placed on the other side of the kitchen.
Since the freezer and fridge are still in their old place, big brother and I start moving them, giving room to middle sister who then continues with the wall tiles on her own.
Cleaning up the mess that has somehow gathered behind the machines takes at least thirty minutes, and we check the wiring before starting the laborious chore of moving the heavy machinery clear across the kitchen and settling them against the freshly painted wall.
There is a slight hiccup when one is in place. There are three big holes in the wall where old outlets were, and deciding to shut them, I use the leftover glue fill them up and smooth them over until they are once again part of the wall.
That done, the fridge is placed beside the freezer at last.
As soon as they’re set in place, the kitchen suddenly looks totally different. The dimensions have altered, dwarfing the rather big coolers, now that the ceiling is only a couple of feet above them. It also makes the counter cozier while creating lots of space on the other side, where a large expanse of wall has been opened up.
Cleanup. It is a big mess all through the kitchen and it takes us almost an hour to get it all cleared away. It is already past midnight when we are finally done, and I sit down to watch the final episodes of “Frasier” while discussing the vampire saga big brother and I are working on.
At long last, having caught my breath, it is time to head on up to my cabin where I feed the dogs and get ready for the night. It’s been a long day, and I can feel it in my bones by the time I settle behind the computer for a few quick chats and the Blog, of course.
I’m actually happy for the holidays for a once. It means that we won’t be going out and this will certainly allow us to just fall back into the pleasant routines of work and play without annoying interruptions.
Monday, December 22, 2008
Is the day over yet?
Strange dreams this night. First there was a confusing mixture of the last episode from “Dexter” and “CSI” which confused me to some extent. And then, after the monster Boxer woke me up for the second time this morning, I think I had a dream about Posh and Becks, and them needing a nanny for their kid. They have several I believe, but in the dream there was one. Weird.
Don’t know where the heck the dream came from, considering I haven’t been a nanny in…gawd, ten years, and of course the fact that I never met, and rarely even hear about the Beckhams these days.
In the dream they did have a wonderful house, however. It was huge, halfway underground, I believe, filled with plants, large windows, wonderfully eclectic furniture, and a toddler that was really sweet.
Dreams. They’re odd things, when all’s said and done. Take this one for example. What is the use of it? I can understand interesting and adventurous dreams, I even get the scary ones, but these are about as comprehensible as daytime television.
I’m feeling pretty miserable when I wake at my usual time and shove the monster Boxer in the back and let the rest of the dogs out into the yard.
The feeling’s both physical and mental, with no way to explain it or make it go away. I’m actually close to tears, which makes no sense at all as I procrastinate through the morning rituals and then head down to the house.
What with the recent escapes of several pack-members, we planned to do some fence fixing today. Seeing my mood, grandpa and big brother don’t push for me to join them, and leave me in peace while I give Yadzia his extra meal. The poor lab has been loosing weight this past week, and starting to get concerned I use the leftover soup to poor over dog food, bread and whatever else I can find to make a big portion so I can fatten him up a little.
It takes a bit of effort to be able to separate the blond Lab from the rest of my pack, eagerly trying to sneak their way between my legs as I open the pantry door and call for Yadzia to come and eat.
I actually need to wedge Knight II against the wall with my knee, in order to get the Labrador inside without company, and stand there at the door, occasionally chancing a peek inside, for ten minutes while he devours the meal with obvious enthusiasm.
At long last he’s done, wagging his tail like mad and bouncing around me when I take the advantage of Knight II wanting to check out the empty dish by locking him up so he won’t try to bowl me over when I head out into the yard to join big brother and grandpa near the section of the fence where the holes have been made.
They’re pretty much done by the time I arrive, but I do manage to make myself useful by braiding wires through the last hole. Next grandpa and I spend several minutes on the ground, sorting out a pile of bolts and screws that have somehow ended up in the middle of our rocky dirt road, digging it all out and placing it in a plastic bag when the small box that had contained them has obviously been crushed by the truck.
I’m thinking that when we repaired the gate the other day we forgot the box and left it on the middle of the road where it stayed until we left for town on Thursday. I do faintly remember hearing a thud, without being able to identify the cause on that day.
But anyways, once we’ve saved what we can from the supply, I head back down to the house to start on today’s laundry. There’s a nice dry batch, and a wet one to hang, and I do it by rote rather than thinking about it. Routines are marvelous on days such as these, I’ll admit. They allow me not to think about anything and still do my chores.
Since I’m feeling nauseous I don’t have breakfast, and start the day on a glass of orange juice rather than anything more substantial.
The few Sunday messages get worked through after I turn on my computer, and afterwards, big brother and I go over the last few pages we changed yesterday. At long last we declare the vampire story done and I’m more than a little relieved.
Its not like the story is bad or anything. Not at all. The story’s great, but my present mood just doesn’t allow me to enjoy it.
What follows is writing a query letter and a short synopsis. It takes a solid hour, but in the end we both agree that it’s good and transfer everything to big brother’s computer so he can send the entire package out, while I half-heartedly start searching through my files to see if any of the stories draw my attention.
In the end I narrow “my next project” down to two stories. One is a paranormal, drama/thriller, about a psychic who’s reluctant to help the authorities due to some events in the past.
The second one’s a comedy romance, about a writer with disastrous luck, which has made her a famous reporter.
Tough choice, I’ll admit. I would put the question in a survey, to see which would get the most votes, so to speak, but…well, not right now. Maybe later.
Dusk has settled by that time, and I decide to do something, anything, lest I start screaming, or worse. I would call it the screamy/headbangy feeling, but that would be overstating it, I think.
Dinner. It has to be made, and since all the ingredients are available I start preparing a solid chili-sin-carne for this evening’s meal.
The power goes off halfway through the preparation and lasts for fifteen minutes before suddenly turning back on. Looks like it’s going to be another one of “those” nights, I muse while blowing out the oil lamp I lit just minutes earlier and scowl.
It takes little time, and once the meal’s done, I actually manage to choke down a small portion. I’m far too stressed out to calmly digest the food, though, and soon I head on out to the courtyard to get a bucket of soft-yellow paint, so I can start on the wall that we displayed with last night’s demolition.
The paint in the bucket is a bit thick from a full year without use, but after adding some water to make it useable, I start slapping it on the wall. I usually am rather quick at painting, but not today. Since I’m doing this particular chore with the intension of keeping myself busy, I go through the motions slowly and steadily, actually grabbing a chair for the ground level sections and just slapping the paint on.
The electricity goes off again, but I pay it little heat after I light the oil lamp again and continue to paint that way for the next ten minutes of darkness before it switches back on.
By the time I finish with the wall, both sisters have come down and we decide to start tiling the section of the floor that’s bare now that the old counter’s gone.
Back, when it was built the house was barely done with only concrete floors. Since we needed the kitchen sooner than the actual floors, we’d put it in before the tiles, leaving middle sister and me with the not-so-wonderful chore of fitting and matching new tiles into the missing sections.
While middle sister is mixing the glue I get down on the floor to clean it properly before use. There are layers of grime to scrape off, and an actual chisel is needed when I find big lumps of the old glue sticking out from the edges of the tiles already there.
It takes some time to get it all ready but in the end, middle sister takes over the actual laying while I start cutting the tiles we need to fit in. The new ones are not an exact match, but they’re close enough as slowly the biggest part of the concrete is covered.
While we’re in the midst of laying the tiles, the dogs decide to come check out why we’re working on the floor, thus making it necessary for little sister and brother to get a large board to block the part of the kitchen we’re working on. This, of course, is not something the dogs appreciate, and the majority of middle sister’s and my pack are gathered behind the board, occasionally hopping up to peer at us with miserable expressions on their faces.
Finished with the section of the floor that was planned for today’s laying, we move to the counter, and use the remainder of the glue on the cooking side of the kitchen, where small blue and white tiles will cover the wall.
It is close to midnight when we’re finally done, and the other sibs join us in the cleanup. There’s a small disaster while we’re shifting the protective board to lay it over the newly laid tiles, however. My pack is eager to join me in the large niche that was closed off for a full two hours, and while they’re crowding close, little Dax’s paw somehow ends up under the board big brother and I are putting over the tiles.
Now this wouldn’t have been a big deal if Yadzia, Chaos and Amri–all big and heavy dogs–hadn’t decided to bounce right on top of the board big brother and I just barely manage to keep from smashing right down to the floor…and therefore sparing poor Dax some serious damage.
There is a lot of noise when the Pocket Beagle (Dax) squeals, and the rest of my pack thinks that there’s some excitement going on, but in the end the paw gets freed and calm returns.
Once cleanup is done, I eat a few crackers with apricot jelly before big brother and I spend about an hour at the kitchen table discussing the possibilities for the next book project.
With the arrival of one in the morning I call it a day and head to my quarters.
Sleep. It is all I really want at this time.
Don’t know where the heck the dream came from, considering I haven’t been a nanny in…gawd, ten years, and of course the fact that I never met, and rarely even hear about the Beckhams these days.
In the dream they did have a wonderful house, however. It was huge, halfway underground, I believe, filled with plants, large windows, wonderfully eclectic furniture, and a toddler that was really sweet.
Dreams. They’re odd things, when all’s said and done. Take this one for example. What is the use of it? I can understand interesting and adventurous dreams, I even get the scary ones, but these are about as comprehensible as daytime television.
I’m feeling pretty miserable when I wake at my usual time and shove the monster Boxer in the back and let the rest of the dogs out into the yard.
The feeling’s both physical and mental, with no way to explain it or make it go away. I’m actually close to tears, which makes no sense at all as I procrastinate through the morning rituals and then head down to the house.
What with the recent escapes of several pack-members, we planned to do some fence fixing today. Seeing my mood, grandpa and big brother don’t push for me to join them, and leave me in peace while I give Yadzia his extra meal. The poor lab has been loosing weight this past week, and starting to get concerned I use the leftover soup to poor over dog food, bread and whatever else I can find to make a big portion so I can fatten him up a little.
It takes a bit of effort to be able to separate the blond Lab from the rest of my pack, eagerly trying to sneak their way between my legs as I open the pantry door and call for Yadzia to come and eat.
I actually need to wedge Knight II against the wall with my knee, in order to get the Labrador inside without company, and stand there at the door, occasionally chancing a peek inside, for ten minutes while he devours the meal with obvious enthusiasm.
At long last he’s done, wagging his tail like mad and bouncing around me when I take the advantage of Knight II wanting to check out the empty dish by locking him up so he won’t try to bowl me over when I head out into the yard to join big brother and grandpa near the section of the fence where the holes have been made.
They’re pretty much done by the time I arrive, but I do manage to make myself useful by braiding wires through the last hole. Next grandpa and I spend several minutes on the ground, sorting out a pile of bolts and screws that have somehow ended up in the middle of our rocky dirt road, digging it all out and placing it in a plastic bag when the small box that had contained them has obviously been crushed by the truck.
I’m thinking that when we repaired the gate the other day we forgot the box and left it on the middle of the road where it stayed until we left for town on Thursday. I do faintly remember hearing a thud, without being able to identify the cause on that day.
But anyways, once we’ve saved what we can from the supply, I head back down to the house to start on today’s laundry. There’s a nice dry batch, and a wet one to hang, and I do it by rote rather than thinking about it. Routines are marvelous on days such as these, I’ll admit. They allow me not to think about anything and still do my chores.
Since I’m feeling nauseous I don’t have breakfast, and start the day on a glass of orange juice rather than anything more substantial.
The few Sunday messages get worked through after I turn on my computer, and afterwards, big brother and I go over the last few pages we changed yesterday. At long last we declare the vampire story done and I’m more than a little relieved.
Its not like the story is bad or anything. Not at all. The story’s great, but my present mood just doesn’t allow me to enjoy it.
What follows is writing a query letter and a short synopsis. It takes a solid hour, but in the end we both agree that it’s good and transfer everything to big brother’s computer so he can send the entire package out, while I half-heartedly start searching through my files to see if any of the stories draw my attention.
In the end I narrow “my next project” down to two stories. One is a paranormal, drama/thriller, about a psychic who’s reluctant to help the authorities due to some events in the past.
The second one’s a comedy romance, about a writer with disastrous luck, which has made her a famous reporter.
Tough choice, I’ll admit. I would put the question in a survey, to see which would get the most votes, so to speak, but…well, not right now. Maybe later.
Dusk has settled by that time, and I decide to do something, anything, lest I start screaming, or worse. I would call it the screamy/headbangy feeling, but that would be overstating it, I think.
Dinner. It has to be made, and since all the ingredients are available I start preparing a solid chili-sin-carne for this evening’s meal.
The power goes off halfway through the preparation and lasts for fifteen minutes before suddenly turning back on. Looks like it’s going to be another one of “those” nights, I muse while blowing out the oil lamp I lit just minutes earlier and scowl.
It takes little time, and once the meal’s done, I actually manage to choke down a small portion. I’m far too stressed out to calmly digest the food, though, and soon I head on out to the courtyard to get a bucket of soft-yellow paint, so I can start on the wall that we displayed with last night’s demolition.
The paint in the bucket is a bit thick from a full year without use, but after adding some water to make it useable, I start slapping it on the wall. I usually am rather quick at painting, but not today. Since I’m doing this particular chore with the intension of keeping myself busy, I go through the motions slowly and steadily, actually grabbing a chair for the ground level sections and just slapping the paint on.
The electricity goes off again, but I pay it little heat after I light the oil lamp again and continue to paint that way for the next ten minutes of darkness before it switches back on.
By the time I finish with the wall, both sisters have come down and we decide to start tiling the section of the floor that’s bare now that the old counter’s gone.
Back, when it was built the house was barely done with only concrete floors. Since we needed the kitchen sooner than the actual floors, we’d put it in before the tiles, leaving middle sister and me with the not-so-wonderful chore of fitting and matching new tiles into the missing sections.
While middle sister is mixing the glue I get down on the floor to clean it properly before use. There are layers of grime to scrape off, and an actual chisel is needed when I find big lumps of the old glue sticking out from the edges of the tiles already there.
It takes some time to get it all ready but in the end, middle sister takes over the actual laying while I start cutting the tiles we need to fit in. The new ones are not an exact match, but they’re close enough as slowly the biggest part of the concrete is covered.
While we’re in the midst of laying the tiles, the dogs decide to come check out why we’re working on the floor, thus making it necessary for little sister and brother to get a large board to block the part of the kitchen we’re working on. This, of course, is not something the dogs appreciate, and the majority of middle sister’s and my pack are gathered behind the board, occasionally hopping up to peer at us with miserable expressions on their faces.
Finished with the section of the floor that was planned for today’s laying, we move to the counter, and use the remainder of the glue on the cooking side of the kitchen, where small blue and white tiles will cover the wall.
It is close to midnight when we’re finally done, and the other sibs join us in the cleanup. There’s a small disaster while we’re shifting the protective board to lay it over the newly laid tiles, however. My pack is eager to join me in the large niche that was closed off for a full two hours, and while they’re crowding close, little Dax’s paw somehow ends up under the board big brother and I are putting over the tiles.
Now this wouldn’t have been a big deal if Yadzia, Chaos and Amri–all big and heavy dogs–hadn’t decided to bounce right on top of the board big brother and I just barely manage to keep from smashing right down to the floor…and therefore sparing poor Dax some serious damage.
There is a lot of noise when the Pocket Beagle (Dax) squeals, and the rest of my pack thinks that there’s some excitement going on, but in the end the paw gets freed and calm returns.
Once cleanup is done, I eat a few crackers with apricot jelly before big brother and I spend about an hour at the kitchen table discussing the possibilities for the next book project.
With the arrival of one in the morning I call it a day and head to my quarters.
Sleep. It is all I really want at this time.
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