MS Word crash *sigh*

Song of the day: “I cried for you” by Katie Melua. I've had it before, and will probably have it again. *Sigh*
I know, I'm runing behind terribly again. My only excuse is that the weather has been absolutely divine these past few days and we've been just so busy outside, that I've barely had time to sit down for writing, let alone to do my blog.

Talking about writing. I managed to put down a couple of pages last night, after work was done, and since we went through it today, I realized that it worked out well. Thankfully. The story is coming together nicely, and we've already past the halfway through mark, so, yay!

Bad news is that my Word program crashed, making me lose a couple of paragraphs since it was an irreversible error. Seriously, I almost had a heart-attack. I don't like it when my computer acts funny, and definitely not while I am working. Jeez. I often have nightmares about my computer crashing, falling, or just giving up the spirit for some unexplainable reason, and when it starts screwing around on me, I am not a happy person.

But anyway, I salvaged what I could and am now learning to work on OpenOffice, which is not all that different, just...well, different. I hate change in that regard, even though I shouldn't. Change, on the most part is good no matter which way you turn it, but it just feels uncomfortable. Like I'm working on someone else's computer. I've been working with word she 1998 and back then I had similar problems since I was a loyal Word Perfect user. But anyway, I will complain a bit, whine some, and then I'll just have to cowboy the heck up and just continue on writing.

Enough of that, let's get to the projects: For the most part the past two/three days have revolved around garden work. There is always earth to turn, reed barriers to keep the dogs out to put up, and planting stuff. More peppers went in, along with lettuce and the long rows of beets, green beans and carrots that I sowed. Yesterday I worked on creating a small terrace for my herbsies, which are now sweltering in the full sun during the day (poor things).

Fortuyn (pointer) has been going bonkers, by the way. He loves it when we work in the yard, and will be flying back and forth every time we throw a root, rock or leaf out of the way. Seriously, he sails through the air. Absolutely insane! Hah.
While yesterday lunch consisted of mashed potatoes with red cabbage, today I went into the yard early to cut off loads of chard. Half was used for lunch (with macaroni) while the remainder went into the fridge.

Tenant also came down today, which was nice. She sat in a mix of shade and sunshine, which is her favorite, I'm thinking. There was a cool breeze, and after the morning clouds dissipated, we had sun all day long...the same couldn't be said about yesterday, where the sky was overcast 'till late in the afternoon. Heck, yesterday morning it was even cold, which I didn't appreciate at all.

Laundry of course. The day wouldn't be complete without it. Hah. Several of the plants that I've put aside for underneath the future porch are really bursting from the seams. They can't wait to get into the soil...or that's how it looks, in particular the bushes, which are starting to get lush for sure. As for the vines they are all over the place. Soon they'll literally be lying in the basin.

Though there was some rain, we did have to water some of the new stuff during the course of the day, in particular because of the wind...which reminds me, there was a rather magnificent storm last night. Not here with us, but over the sea. From east to west clouds lay massively in the air, lighting sparking wherever the eye could see. Very impressive.

We did one last sand hauling trip, which should bring us up to the minimum we'll need to finish the wall. Sure it took some effort, loading, unloading and hauling it in ourselves, but it was worth it in the end. Saved quite a mint there.

Now all that remains are the trips for clay, rocks and cement...which should keep us busy for a while yet.

What else? Well, big brother had to fix the stand of grandpa's moped. The stupid thing just fell off. There was a trip to town to figure something out about our phone bill, which was a tad high again. Luckily the weirdness of my phone having an internet connection (without me asking for it) has been put straight. Phew. Now it remains to be seen if we get to have a refund somehow, but I'm not holding my breath. We also had to get a new piece of fence for grandpa, seeing as we kept forgetting these past two weeks.

For a while we were basically prisoners in our own home (not that I minded, mind you. I kinda like it that way, hah) due to a rally. From mid-afternoon to late in the evening rally cars were screaming past with exploding exhausts, roaring engines, and an audience all the way along the road, shouting, laughing and applauding. I don't see the attraction, really. If I want to cars flying past I can side beside the road on any given day. Not much difference. Hah.

Added to the fun of the roaring cars during the day, there was also a party of sorts going on in the valley, filling the air with music and shouting of what I guess to be inebriated people having fun. Luckily getting my hands dirty is much to nice for me to mind either way. Hah.

Well, that's going to have to do for today. I'm beat and, well, I should do some work yet...maybe I'll do some kick boxing yet. Oh, I forgot to mention that, didn't I. I had a thorough workout the day before yesterday and wasn't half as sore as I was the last time.

Going.

Naked? Seriously?

Song of the day: “Taking back my love” by Enrique Iglesias. Such a catchy song, eh? Gotta say that Enrique does them well.

Before I start, let me run something by you. You see, I’m reading this romance novel and I’m a little confused about something. I mean the story is fun, and everything, and the idea of some feller coming from the future to set right a wrong is always great, but I don’t get what the author was thinking when she decided that future-lings would no longer wear clothes, just body paint. I kid you not. Paint! Only! And this dude is running around, fleeing from pursuers, carrying the wounded heroine and everything, and he’s doing it, basically, NAKED!

Now don’t get me wrong. Nothing against naked, but has this person ever watched someone run naked? Really watched? (And I don’t mean the porn kind of watched, as in, OMG I’m getting hot just watching that chick/dude run.) Seriously watched the human body when it runs. There are “dangling participles” that flop every which way, getting IN the way and everything and it just distracts from the beauty. Not to mention that it is just downright unhandy.

And running…running can be so absolutely beautiful. I mean really, Tom Hanks in Forrest Gump. Beautiful aesthetics, wonderful stride, so much power and so wonderfully smooth. Now imagine him doing it naked. Eeeewwwww. So many examples of where bodies function beautifully. Gymnasts, sports people in general, now imagine it all NAKED (or with body paint only). There is a reason why we wear clothes when in the company of those who are not our significant other and it’s called aesthetics.

Good example: I am a huge fan of Viggo Mortenson. Aragorn in LOTR, Master chief in G.I. Jane, or cowboy Frank in Hidalgo, it mattered not. He is just a pleasure to watch, and I love him…or at least I used to, right until I saw Eastern Promises. Nothing wrong with the movie. Wonderfully dark, gritty and intense and scarily realistic with excellent acting…wrecked by this sauna scene where someone decided that it would be a smart idea for him to fight with a bunch of goons in…hold your hat…the BUFF! Full frontal, side and back, he wasn’t spared (or I wasn’t) a single side to keep my prudish fantasies intact

*shivers* I am sad to say that I can never look at him the same way. He is still a good actor, and I still like a lot of his movies, but I keep seeing that seen and this is not a good thing. I’ve got to repeat what I already said: What was someone thinking???
Aaaargh!!!

But enough about that. In the end it doesn’t really matter because it is a matter of personal taste I guess. One person’s poison is another’s ambrosia, so to speak, eh?

So what’s been going on besides outraged hilarity about men (and women) running around naked, we’ve been working on the wall, of course. Another foot was added to the height, which brings us a bit closer to completion (duh). Soon we’ll be able to continue with the wall’s length (seeing as we’ll have eradicated the danger of crumpling) which still has about five yards to go…I know, daunting, right? Well, wouldn’t want to have nothing to do, hah.

Yesterday we spent several hours in the yard, turning earth and planting tomatoes, peppers, zucchinis and some iceberg slaw. In one word, wonderful. It absolutely was divine going into the yard and just getting my hands in the mud again. I missed it these past couple of weeks, due to the freaky weather. But the weather now is gorgeous. The sun is out, only a few scattered clouds are in the sky and the wind is fresh. Seriously, I couldn’t get better weather if I Fed-Ex-ed it. Hah.

The purple vines are blooming, and so are several of the bougainvillea and Oleander. The jasmine is going strong, so are the eucalypti, hibiscus, passionflowers and just about every weed growing in the wild. Between all the green (thank you, wet spring) there is a wealth of color. Yellows, purples, reds and whites. At times my eyes get a sensation of color overload, almost.

Ooh, ooh, before I forget. The first tomatoes are turning red in the greenhouse, thank you very much. I can’t wait for them to be done, because they are looking bloody sumptuous. Same goes for the chard, (we gotta eat that again soon) the lettuce (we’ve been eating the purple lettuces for several days now) the white cabbage, red cabbage and of course the onions.
And then I’m not even talking about all the little pots filled with rapidly growing herbs like basil, parsley, chives, sage, marjoram, and oregano. Gawd, just thinking about it makes me want to eat right now.

Okay, the in-between story we’re working on at the moment is going rather well. We’re already well on our way to halfway through, so it should be done in a few days from now.

There was sand hauling, rock hauling and all that jazz…ehm, laundry, yeah, of course. Luckily with the change in weather the drying is going a lot faster. Yay.
Cleaning is always a necessity, and this morning I decided to stop prevaricating and cleaned the sheets on my bed.
Did some cooking too, while I was at it. In fact, this very morning I baked red cabbage to mix with cheese and potatoes so we can eat a hot oven dish this evening. I can hardly wait!

Well, that’s about it, I guess. I’m sure that I’m leaving stuff out, but who cares. There will be other days.

Stupid knee

Song of the day: “Hit the road Jack” by Buster Pointdexter. Finally I found out the name, because when I looked the one from Ray Charles up, it really wasn’t the one I had in my head.
But there you go…it sure explains the “buster” remark in the song, eh. Hah.

I know, I know. I’m running way behind, and I really should have posted a blog this afternoon, but since we were working on an in-between story, I was kinda distracted and then just forgot all about it while we dove into the story. So I wrote this one (the story that is) in 1999/2000 I think, and though we worked on it a couple of years ago, I had almost forgotten that I wrote it. I know, weird, but there you have it. You can’t remember a hundred stories (even if you wrote them yourself) word for word, so it has been a wonderful discovery.

It’s a bit of a mixed up love story. A bit of Cinderella, a bit of Les Miserables, set in Chicago’s turbulent ‘20s with bootleggers and gangsters and jazz. *sigh* It’s been so long ago that I wrote it, every page is a friggin’ surprise…which worries me a little since it means that my brain is leaking again. Darn it!
But anyway. It is fun to do, and though we’re cutting a lot from the story the characters are still fun, and the writing not half as bad as I’d feared when I first opened the file. In a way the story is a lot like the W.I.s, designed for the specific purpose of distracting me during the post-writing blues. You see, after a big project I tend to throw myself head-over-heels into a new project, only discover that the inspiration dwindles after just a few weeks, leaving me with just another half-finished book in my files. And thus the “short love stories” (and W.I.s) came into existence.
They’re cute, they pack an emotional punch and are SHORT with capital letters. Translated: fun to do in a I-have-got-to-stop-mooning-over-the-friggin-long-manuscript-I-just-finished. Hah.

In case it wasn’t obvious, we finished the paper edit of A.T.O.L., which is like, wow! But still, there is this threatening sense of depression in the back of my mind, even though I am of course psyched to have it done at last. Seriously, it is not every day that you finish the edit of as 110.000 word count manuscript. YAY!

Okay, enough about that. Let’s get to the daily drag, shall we.
What with the atrocious weather (it didn’t clear up until later today) there was a lot of nasty cleaning chores to see to. There was the 26 year-old kitchen lamp (yes I am that old that I remember mom first bringing it home way back when) which’s shells (it is made of small shell disks dangling from fishing lines) were no longer white but a grimy yellow from dirt. It took a couple of hours but now it looks wonderful again.

Another thing that had be cleaned was the kitchen fan, which hasn’t been taken down in three years and really needed to be scrubbed clean by yours truly…whenever I could squeeze in an extra ten minutes. Grandpa needed help sawing long beams for what will soon be the supporting fence of the raspberries in the lower yard.

Since I was in a cleaning frenzy anyway, I also cleaned my office. It was starting to get ridiculous, really. There was such a thick layer of dust on everything that the flies were leaving tracks (so yeah, that’s a slight exaggeration, but that’s what it felt like anyway. Hah). It was a mess but now it is starting to look decidedly better. At least I recognize the yellow paint we slapped on everything during construction. Hah.

What else? Well, like taxes there was laundry of course. Lots of it my own, even though I haven’t gotten around to changing the sheets on my bed yet. I really should do that tomorrow, darn it. What with the weather cheering up that should lessen a little in the near future, I’m thinking.

The majority of this morning was spent unloading the sand from the car, and though we’re going to have to do the same thing tomorrow too, I’m not going to bother to explain much more than the fact that I had shoveling out duty, and taking care of tenant (her caregiver was out to her second job again). It takes time, but we do chat, and that’s fun enough. It was good that mom and middle sister took her out to town this afternoon, because she has been spending way too much time inside these weeks past.

We checked out the engine of the Land Rover. Oil, cooling fluid, etc. Went over the tire pressure, the paperwork and then messed around with the engine some more. Hah. The dogs made moving around “interesting” as usual, of course, preferring to stay in front of our feet at any time, and almost causing near disaster while I was trying to turn around a full wheelbarrow.

Rocks got hauled down the mountain again…not me, though, seeing as I have only lifting duty these days, what with my bum knee and all. It’s a total pain in the behind, but rather than risk permanent damage, I am not allowed to wheelbarrow heavy stuff down anymore (for a while at least). Instead I shovel sand into the wheelbarrows, or unload rocks, which is what I spent yesterday’s afternoon doing, FYI.

This afternoon was spent doing masonry on the wall, of course. We brought it up another foot, meaning that we’re well past half of the wall. Only lifting and masonry for me, no hauling, darn it. It is beautiful, in case you’re wondering, and I am taking daily pictures to show off once it’s all done. Not yet, though. I want the end-result too.

Which reminds me, it is almost midnight and the end result of this blog is me saying: “Seeya later alligator.”

I know, tacky, but what the heck. Hah.

Yay for kickboxing

Song of the day: “Getaway” by Bryan Adams. Well, that’s something different at least. Though I love his music, it isn’t stuck in my head all that often. A good thing, I think. Hah.

Let’s see if I can keep it short today, because I was incredibly tired this morning and dozed off just now, meaning that I’m behind, again, darn it.

A bit of good news is that the paper edit is almost done. About ten more pages to go, so either we’ll get it done today, or tomorrow. Yay. Not bad. I’ve gotta say that I am rather pleased with how it turned out. The characters are splendid, the humor vastly entertaining, and the story…well, simple but nice, I’m thinking. What more can I ask? It is exactly that what I would look for when I’m browsing for something new to read.

Activities the past couple of days have been limited what with the horrible weather. In fact we had to take most of the plants that we’d put outside in the garden pit for hardening back into the greenhouse, because the poor darlings were dying of cold and wetness. *sigh* The plants already outside are surviving, but not doing well at all because it is almost as if we’re back to wintery temperatures. Darn it.

We did get a bit of sunshine yesterday afternoon, which made working on the wall rather pleasant. Got a good section up now. One more layer and we can continue widening the wall towards where the new septic tank will be. It’ll be gorgeous once we’re done, mark my words. Hah.

The day before yesterday (in the afternoon again) we had a bit of sunshine too when we went out to get more rocks. Knight II went along, of course, and at least he ran around a bit…he’s still a whiner about exercise, though. He goes around the place once and then wants to get back into the car. Silly dog.

Yesterday morning was spent looking for wood to put new bottoms in the drawers that grandpa wants to set up in the carport. After that we cleared the spot and prepared it enough so we could work on it today. We did, and now the thing is standing there. That should make grandpa happy, ice he can toss metal supplies in it. Hah.

There was of course the car to unload yesterday. Which was wildly fascinating, as I’m sure you can imagine. (NOT) Neither was the stint of laundry worthy to write about, so let me this just wrap this up by sharing that I spent last night working out in the carport, kickboxing the boxing ball to an early grave (it ripped, can you believe it) and bumming my knee some more. I guess I got a little over-enthusiastic, because none of the movements hurt…at least not until I got to straight forwards kick which was, like…ehm, totally uncomfortable. Hah. So I did that one only a few times and then got back to the good stuff, yay.

So yeah, today my knee’s a little sore again, but other than that, all is well. Okay. Big brother finished reading A.T.O.L. (paper edit is officially done) so now I should open up the file and put them in. Yay. I can’t wait to start on a new project!