My baby is home

Song of the day: “Some Nights” by Fun. Awesome song. Only discovered it this morning, but it is settling nicely in my brain so far. If you haven’t heard it, you should it. I think the dude’s a good mimic because I hear a wonderful mix of other singers in the song. Excellent song. Haven’t heard anything like it in a really long time, and that’s saying something.

Okay, good news first. I phoned the garage around four thirty where the nice receptionist told me she didn’t think the car was done yet, because the mechanics were still working on it. So, somewhat disappointed about the fact that we wouldn’t know what was up with the car until later, I hung up and got back to writing. Twenty minutes later my phone rang, and the receptionist informed me that the car was done, and I could come pick it up.

I was astonished, I was astounded, and could ask her to repeat that it was indeed ready and that we could go over to get it. Seriously, I didn’t know what to think, the mechanic had warned me that it was likely to take at least a week, if not more for them to fix the injectors, or replace them.
We didn’t waste time wondering about it, but headed out to pick it up.

Our mechanic saw us coming, and said “All done, let me just get the keys.” I went after in and asked what the problem turned out to be. Something about the wiring on top of the injectors having come loose, so he took the whole lot off, cleaned them up, sprayed everything and took the car for a test drive to Malaga, and the problem didn’t return. So I got into our baby, turned her on and…SHE SOUNDED BEAUTIFUL again. I mean it, if she was a kitten I would have called it purring. No more chugging, no uneven rhythm, just beautiful engine sound that was strong as it used to be. And she pulled again, boy did she pull, I almost speeded just because I was listening. Hah.

I don’t even care that we smelled fuel inside the Opel and that when the mechanic checked it turned out that there was a leak in the tank, meaning we have to go back one of these days. *sigh* I. Don’t. Care! Our baby is working again and that is all that matters right now. Yay!

So that’s the good news…well, there’s more of course, seeing as yesterday’s writing session left me with a solid 7 pages. Seriously, it went well. I worked on two different scenes and the hours flew past like mad. Very intense scene, one of the back-up characters almost died, and the hero would have been devastated if he hadn’t been able to save the old fella. It was a touch and go (some tears escaped…mine, in case you’re wondering. *sigh*) but he survived, just barely. It went well. Same went for today for that matter. The scenes a little less interesting seeing as the hero and heroine are making out, but still, such things happen in life, and thus they also happen in fiction. Gotta keep it all realistic, after all. Right?
But anyway, what with yesterday’s and today’s progress combined, I’m at page 190. Yay. Getting closer to the end…while still having enough word count left to add some seriously good scenes.

What else. There was cooking, naturally. Yesterday a fresh vegetable mix of three color tomatoes, two colors of peppers, some zucchini and fresh onion. All of that over a bed of pasta went down well after a day of writing. Today was a different matter. Made mushroom Vol-au-vents, with fresh mushrooms, onions, cheese and a sauce hollandaise. Should have also made a salad with grilled nopales because tenant has a slight bladder infection again, but I forgot. Will do that tomorrow. Or at least make something with nopales in it.

There was gardening, of course. Watering plants, yanking weeds and harvesting. What with the hot weather of late, it really is the nicest moment of the day. The temperatures tend to drop around that time, the light turns somewhat magical, and you really just calm down from everything around then.

Once we were done, the dishes set for tomorrow, we all got a couple of bags of dog food from storage and headed on up to my terrace for the evening.

This morning was spent cleaning up down by the basin terrace, by the way. What with the shortage of time of late, there were four days worth of dishes waiting for us when we go down, so while big brother wiped horizontal surfaces clean, I washed up and got everything settled in their usual spot.

The younger sibs were busy today too, painting the igloo on the inside. Cousin Ed and I had planned to do it together with Sally tonight, but mom let me know that the younger sibs wanted to do it instead. We’re having a friend staying for a week or so at the end of the month and since Sally has the basin apartment these days, the igloo is back to serving as a guestroom. It’s cute, and she’s a family friend who’s stayed there before, so it doesn’t really matter. I’ll take a picture or two when we’ve got it furnished again.

Tenant came down with us today, and she seemed in a fine mood. Sally, on the other hand, is not doing all that swell. Her memory is fading, not to mention that her balance is shot most of the time. I think that the gluten free diet she’s following isn’t doing her much good. Not that I can say anything about it, of course. It being her own choice and all that.

Another bit of good news is that we didn’t have to take Kollosus to the vet. The growth” I noticed the other night was gone. Either she had an infection of sorts, or she’d got something stuck between her teeth right then. *phew* A big relief that.

Cousin Ed has been busy at work planting an acasia near her bus. Grandpa did a couple of others these past few days, and boy will they look nice once they start growing in the next few years.
There were dips in the pool, laundry, dogs to feed, and dog food to prepare, life going on as usual, of course.

Now a short rant at the end here. I just finished reading a book, and Oh. My. Gawd. It was friggin’ awful. I mean, the book wasn’t anything to write home about, but the ending…OMG! I am still…well, the mind boggles.
So, imagine this. The hero knows that the heroine is in danger. He sneaks up the stairs of an apartment building, hears a shot, starts running up to see the love of his life struggle with an armed killer. He doesn’t dare shoot, but the killer starts firing at him, missing him by a hair three or four times (while fighting with his love, of course) then, when she brings the weapon up to bear on his love, he risks a shot and hits…yes, hold your breath here…he shoots the killer in the wrist! No, I’m not kidding. There’s a fight going on, the killer is firing the gun, the hero is still coming up the stairs, his love is somewhere in between, and he (a former FBI agent) shoots the self-professed killed in the effing wrist!!! First of all, have you any idea how good your aim has to be to pull that off? Secondly, law enforcement is taught not to take risks, and go for the three tap (chest and head) always. Thirdly, the timeline of it all was off, leaving the heroine to be, well, I don’t know where, actually, and the hero with no time to do what he did. And fourth…why the wrist? Couldn’t the author pick something a little harder, like a pinky? For the love of Gawd! Where’s the realism? Where’s the common sense? Seriously, someone’s about to kill the love of your life and you shoot at a wrist? You take the time for that? The author really, really needed to let us readers know that he was THAT good? *shakes head* Bonkers! And to think that this shot in the wrist was undoubtedly done to keep the so-called-violence to a minimum, leaving the killer to try to hurt the heroin, after all, before tumbling over the edge of the stairwell and dying anyway. Well…I was just flabbergasted. It’s been a while since I had to suspend my disbelief to such levels or else risk throwing the book out the window. (Can’t do that to a book. It might be bad, but it is still a book, or crying out loud.) *sigh*

That is it for today. Jeez, I yapped for two pages and a half. I’m outta here.

Something new

Song of the day: (this is a little embarrassing) “Twilight” by Cover Drive. I know, right? What am I, fifteen years old? *sigh* I don’t even like the song all that much, darn it, but there you have it.

Writing still…I know, very boring for you, my poor readers. Just me, standing at my computer, tapping away at the keys, adding pages, scenes (had a hot one today, hah) while music blasts in my ears, filling my head with all sorts of images that really get things working to my way of thinking. Luckily I didn’t get that voyeurism feeling today. That could be because the scene was mostly about kissing, and not…well, other stuff. Hah. Regardless, the story is developing nicely.

But enough about that, there was gardening. Watering the veggies, of course, yanking out weeds, and basically gathering veggies for the dog food. Meaning that there was dog food to hand out…and before I forgot, that friend with the store…we got a whole batch of one day too old meat, and old bread. The dogs loved it! Seriously, absolutely loved it. There was ham, sausages, bacon, and chicken fingers. You should have seen some of their faces, they were drenched in the stuff up to their eyeballs. Gada was literally grinning with a slab of ham hanging down her lips…before Sitabah ran off with it. Hah. Even Knight ate a quarter more of his food than usual, which is rare.

Did some cooking. Made pasta with fresh fried veggies on the side, topped by a satay sauce that made it all go down really well. The fact that I was incredibly hungry helped with making it vastly edible, of course. Hah.

Yesterday afternoon while I was writing, big brother had to head out with the car to jumpstart the Opel, which mom was using for the afternoon. We’ve been having some battery trouble, and they apparently got worse, because half an hour later mom phoned again to say that they were stuck for the second time. Big brother wasn’t even back yet, so I waited until he was back, jumped in the car and we drove back to town. Took no time at all to jumpstart the Opel again, and did some groceries and a new battery before we went home. Turns out we got the wrong battery, meaning we had to go out again today, hoping that like the rest of the stores at the big shopping center that shop would be open too. It wasn’t, so that means we have to go out again tomorrow, darn it.

Did speak with an American (he owned a golf course, apparently) who was comparing his own Land Rover to mine. His was a pickup, ya know, and, well, I do love those kind of chats, and he was a nice older fella, who for some unfathomable reason preferred to drive his Volvo, rather than his Land Rover (which he normally only used for work). I told him he was bonkers. The Land Rover is more than comfortable enough, hah.

What else, well, there was laundry, cleaning a little in my cabin. The bathroom was a friggin’ mess, so that really had to be done. Hah.

Yesterday was definitely a scorcher. The temps went up into 100, and seriously, while we were out and left town (where a fresh sea breeze cooled stuff down) the heat coming into the car was like a physical slap in the face. Luckily I didn’t mind at all. In fact, I kinda liked it. Hah. Today, on the other hand, it was downright nippy. I mean it, we were in the high eighties instead, which made the difference somewhat daunting, right? No matter. I enjoyed the low temps too. Hah.

Today, while we were out, we got hailed by a couple of dudes (they clearly had a beer or two too many) who seemed to like to chat with a bunch of stranger. One was a trucker, and boy did he like to talk, and the other lived in this RV (we got invited inside) and liked to talk even more. It was fun, the way they kept exchanging barbs, and yapping on, curious as heck because we often pass where the RV is parked. Decided against taking a beer, or coffee for that matter. We didn’t have all that much time to begin with, and it was fun to hear about their adventures. One had just recently been to Finland, where the weather was downright nippy, and his girlfriend invited him for a ride on a horse. He said, no way. Not unless you tie me to the horse, before he doubled over at his own joke. Seriously, the trucker insisted on shaking my hand at least five times (kept forgetting he’d already done that, I think) and then started telling all over how he had been to Finland recently and how he loved dogs (thumping his chest all the while). It was a fun chat…though I fear they now expect us to come visit more often. Hah. Crazy drunken lot…but friendly at least.

Well, that’s about it for me. I’ve a need to get horizontal fast, and the day is definitely at an end.

Cheese, cheese and more cheese

Song of the day: “Next 2 you” by Chris Brown and Justin Bieber…again. Not that I mind the song, I like it after all, but it’s just a little embarrassing since I don’t know all the lyrics yet. Hah.

Busy day for as far as I’m concerned. It all started yesterday when we discovered that the boiler we had bought for a bargain (it had been damaged during transport, so they took 150 off the price) was too damaged for use. Big brother and I messed with it for more than two hours, trying to fix the problems it had (bent in three different directions, a few missing screws, non-functioning display, and so on and on) but in the end failed in our endeavor. It was really a lost cause, so we packed the bloody thing back up, put it in the car and departed to the city…again.

The positive news of that disaster was that we got a phone call of that shop owner we got milk from the last time. Turns out he had restocked wrong again, and had 175 liters of whole milk that he needed to get rid of. They were a couple of days past the expiration date, but since he is no longer allowed to sell them after, he figured he could do us a favor, for the dogs and us, of course. (He’ll be getting some ecologically grown veggies in the near future, hah.) Milk and cottage cheese, in fact. This of course meant that all that milk had to be processed ASAP…but I’ll get to that later. First the geyser story.

We got the hardware store on time, talked with the girl who sold us the thing, and got to an agreement of exchanging the geyser for a boiler instead. Darn it. We had so wanted a geyser because the three in the house are already drawing more than enough power, thank you very much. Ah well, no helping it. Sally does need her shower fully functional and since the boiler is much bigger than her geyser used to be, we’re going to have to use the angle grinder to open up the entrance of the niche in which it hangs. Boy, is that going to be a mess. That bathroom is tiny, with only a small window and a door that opens inward. *sigh* We’ll just have to wait and see how that works out then. It would have been nice if we’d done it today, but there was all that milk. Hah.

Oh, there was a workout yesterday, of course. It went rather well, even though I was ridiculously late getting started. Since the entire workout now officially takes an hour and a half (if I don’t rush it, which is not good) I was running behind on everything for the remainder of the day.

Got news from the computer repair guys that they’re not sure yet about big brother’s computer. They’re still running diagnostics, and won’t be able to give us a definite price until after Monday. Darn it. Poor big brother. So bravely trying to remain positive, but also clearly pessimistic whenever there’s no news. Ah well, we’ll know next week.

Once at home, it was time to prepare. Cheese making (or paneer, depending how you wanna call it, hah.) Yep, pans were taken out of the closets, half a gallon milk bottles got carried down, vinegar, salt, lemon juice and cheese cloths.
While big brother checked the packets of cottage cheese and threw them in the big freezer, cousin Ed and I started on the milk. Using three bottles per time, the cheese got made and bagged so we could freeze them too. Yay. We did have to get rid of some of the older bags of veggies, but since they are, as of today, boiled in whey and tossed into the small bathtub for the dogs’ dinner, they’re not by any means wasted. Yay.

So yeah, last night, while editing an occasional page, half of the milk was processed into a crumbly cheese that will be frozen for the next few months’ use. It was a tough job, but someone had to do it. Hah. Did get to bed in time (sorta) and had a good night’s rest (sorta) only to start again around noon today. Yay.

First there was laundry, however, along with a nice quick trip into the yard where everything got checked (that last rain did the smaller cabbage plants a lot of good; they were preening) before I head for the greenhouse to open it all up, select some fresh tomatoes which were ripe enough for shelf ripening. We got quite a lot at the moment. Six pounds, maybe. Awesome.

Then it was up for breakfast. Pancakes of whey, which is really nice and incredibly healthy because there are so many minerals in the stuff. And all this while cousin Ed had already started early and had dealt with three new batches. Yay.

My turn, and since I felt like experimenting, big brother made three molds and a press, so we could see what kind of hard cheese we could make of the curd. They’re now, after seven hours of hard work, under the press, and doing fine, I think.

The dogs love this experimental food thing. In particular because they get to clean dishes (now don’t say eeewwww, we wash it afterward) scrape out pans (yes, those too) and basically devour anything that falls, either accidentally, or on purpose. About four hours into the endeavor they were snoozing with fat stomachs. Hah.

Except Chaos and Groovy, the latter of which had found the bathtub filled with food and was hanging in it as if he hadn’t eaten in weeks. Chaos, in turn, didn’t appreciate this form of gluttony, and was trotting back and forth behind the boxer, barking his head off in outrage. Seriously, I could hear him cry, “What are you doing, you vile creature? Why are you eating MY food? Get out, get out, get out!” while Groovy continued on as if he didn’t hear a thing. *sigh*

Tenant came down from her place and sat on my porch for company. The sun was bright, the air not too cool and the sky without clouds for the most part of the day. Perfect outside day. She’s doing better, by the way. Talking clearer again, more THERE, if you get my meaning.

At the moment the rest of the dogs are eating, unsure whether they are able to finish the lavish meal, but sure making an effort. Hah. Heck, even Knight II is still eating.

I better start cleaning up. We made a mess with this cheese making business, and there is still lots to do before the end of the day is there. If am looking forward to that time, however. I think I’m running on fumes again.

4 in a row once more

Song of the day: “Man down” by Rihanna. Following “Men in this town” by Shakira, which was haunting me since I woke up this morning. Hah.

I am totally drawing blanks at the moment, so don’t blame me if I mess this up. I have faint memories of all that happened in the past three or four days, but to organize them would take way too much time. I’m just going to write them down as they come and leave you to guess as to which happened when.

Easiest memory of all is of course today, which was not only wet with rain and hail, but also freaky cold for as far as I’m concerned. I’m thinking low thirties, and I am not a happy camper. Seriously, my feet are all tingly because they felt frostbitten most of the day. Grrr. I am sitting in front of the stove now, though (about one foot away, hah) so I am gradually defrosting.

Another thing I’m most unhappy about at the moment is that for the past three days in a row, we have been forced to get out of the house every single afternoon. Seriously, it is enough o drive me bonkers. And if it were over now it would be fine, but nope, the fun goes on. Monday we’ve got to bring the car to the MOT, the next day I’ve got to head to the doctor’s to pick up my new insoles (please let them be done, my feet have been effing killing me for days now…seriously, I’m considering just chopping them off and getting it over with. It’s like walking on glass with bare feet for crying out loud!) And after that it is the day of days, the most splendid event of the month. Grocery shopping day. I am psyched, I assure you. *snort*

Okay, what else? There was the burning of six reed mats, which used to lie rotting in the yard. I finally had enough of them, got the big barrel down from storage and lit the whole lot up. It took a while, but finally the mats were gone, leaving nothing behind but half a barrel of charred remains that will serve as excellent fertilizer. Yay. The dogs loved this little venture seeing as it was cold out. They were all snoozing in a three feet radius, regardless of the rocky ground under them. I would have taken a picture but I didn’t get my phone back until this afternoon. Hah.

There were two kickboxing workouts. One went splendidly, the other only so-so. The wind was gone, though, so that made both rather pleasurable in my estimation. Nothing like standing on the terrace overlooking the valley (working out) while the sun comes up and crawls over the hills and valleys with fingers of gold.

Since four days past there were three mornings spent in the yard. We had to water (hopefully it will rain enough to fill the half-full basin again) the terraces on all occasions, in particular the newly sowed fields and the smaller seedlings.
I chased, hunted and killed bugs. The little buggers are extremely good at hiding, but I’m onto them *ponderous laugh* and will persevere.

Harvested a nice batch of broccoli, and yesterday two big bushels of kale which I bundled up with celery and fresh herbs to bring on over to the vet with a couple of pumpkins. She was most appreciative, also because we were there to pay for the latest operation (Amos had a hysterectomy, and there was still Amri to pay for, too). Her assistant was out, however. A family emergency.

One of the trips was heading to tow drop of mom’s computer at the computer repair shop, another was to pick it up…along with the one for little sister, both of them fixed, thankfully.

Since we were in town anyway, we went past the garage as well. The other day we detected a disturbing sound in the Land Rover engine, so we had the mechanic check. He couldn’t find anything, and that was reassuring at least. Best case scenario we heard something that isn’t different at all, just something we never noticed before. Hah.

The jackhammer! I worked with the jackhammer the other day…why did I…oh right. Now I remember. I had to take the ramp out of grandpa’s doorway. It was solid concrete and he asked me to do it so he could start mixing concrete for his new floor.

A long afternoon was spent up in the old horse paddock. There cousin Ed, Dani and I puzzled with tiles for several hours, coming up with a proper pattern for grandpa’s kitchen. At the same time grandpa and big brother were pouring concrete in the same kitchen, removing the knotted old concrete floor and making it smooth for tiling.
It took a while, and five different patterns to come up with a proper solution, but when we did we figured out a pattern and coloring that worked to everyone’s satisfaction. An apricot and white checker pattern in the dining area and a big L of soft yellow tiles in front of the kitchen counter and from the door. Gawd, for a while I thought we were never going to agree…in particular not with grandpa who can be really picky about such things.

Cousin Ed and I unloaded thirty bags of cement from the car, storing them behind my cabin for easy use. And at another time we unloaded groceries (several boxes of fruit juice, so we won’t have to get them on Tuesday) which were the result of a fruitless trip towards a different town than usual because we had to check if a certain sale was there. It wasn’t, darn it.

Oh yes, the argument with big brother. Seriously, I was this close to doing him some serious damage. He was going through a car scene and suddenly decided that this would be a good scene to take out, so we could put back the attack scene that we took out a couple of weeks ago. I was like, “WHAT?” You can’t take this one out, it’s vital, while the attack scene was a mistake I realized I’d made after I wrote it. Also, there was a certain point during the edit where big brother got all huffy and asked “Why did you do this that way?”
I ground my teeth and slowly turned my head to look at him. “What always makes you think that I do anything for any reason. This is a first edit. I wrote this in one session without conscious thought, just following the story as it developed. There’s no thought process involved, thank you very much.”
At which point he abated and gave up being huffy in favor of thinking along while we tried to find a solution to the sentence structure he found offensive, for some reason. Grrrr.
Seriously, though. I might complain a lot, but I do know that the edits are vital. With every edit we do, the story gets a little better. It is just a question of getting through the process without committing homicide. Hah.

I distinctly remember hauling stuff, which includes rubble, and several slabs of heavy marble, which will be part of my future outside kitchen, thank you very much. One was almost too big for carrying, but what the heck. The storage area is sure starting to look much better. All the messy plastic stuff is gone (had several garbage runs over the past couple of days), the tiles are all gathered in one corner on pallets and tables and the wood is neatly piled. Heck, some day we might actually look respectable up there. Hah.

Sally is having some health problems. She fears cancer, but the doctors can’t find anything so it is all just a matter of getting stressed out about the what ifs. I understand the reason, but I also know that stress is not going to help her. Ah well, none of my business, right?

There were several hours spent in the kitchen, making paneer and ghee (the latter took ages, but was well worth it). Since I was standing in the kitchen anyway for one, I figured I might as well make the other too. And since this was taking a long time anyway, I made dog food as well, figuring our little darlings needed a treat for a change. Afterwards I fled into the yard, thank you very much.

I did take an hour or so last night to get fully up to date with personal messages. I’d been postponing forever and ever, meaning that I was a handful of letters behind, which I went through ASAP before continuing on to the daily edit. Was nice to get that done at last…along with getting up to date on old friendships.

Grandpa is really happy with his new pocket watch. The other day I came up to his bungalow he asked, eyes shiny, “Do you know what time it is? I do!” and proceeded show how well it had dried and saying how much he liked it. Very gratifying, that.

Tenant is a little sleepy the past few days. Winter tends to do that to her, really. She’ll doze in her chair a lot, won’t want to go out to get a breath of fresh air, which makes it worse, of course. Ah well. Those are her choices to make, naturally.

And that is about the limit of my memories of the past couple of days. I’ve got an edit to do, a bed to visit, because let’s face it, the time is just past ten and it’s already luring me. Hah. Gotta go.

Smut or realism?

Song of the day: “Hold my hand” by Michael Jackson, of course. Splendid song. Such a pity that there won’t be any new stuff anymore. *sigh*

Luckily I am in a far better mood than the last time, today. Frustration bubbled down during the passing of time, and we are once again back to editing. Sure, there are times when I either want to bash the computer, or big brother. Hah. But anyway, that is only a temporary problem, and now I’m right as rain again.

So the past couple of days were mostly busywork, involving another trip to town, which I could have done without, thank you very much. But I’m getting ahead of myself, aren’t I, let’s start with yesterday and work our way to today.

I overslept, of course. It is a common effect of summer, really, but I hate it. It made me rush through all the morning rituals, do the laundry and then head on up to tag my canning. Got a nice big load going now, with a bit of diversity, which will keep meals in winter interesting. Got myself green beans, tomatoes (of course), pumpkin, zucchini, pickles, and peppers. Added to that we have a whole bunch of beautiful pumpkins that will see us through to January, or February. Gawd, I love preparing for winter that way. Makes me feel very much in touch with nature. Hah.

That done, I took the opportunity to spray clean my winter comforter. It was seriously necessary, what with last winter, but I think it worked out well. It smells all nice again, and the worst of the discolouring is gone. Now I’m going to let it hang and sun bleach for a bit, and then it will be ready for use again. Yay.

Afterwards I headed on up to tenants place because for the past couple of days grandpa and I have been working on her new ceiling. Yesterday, grandpa, Danni and I, took out the old ceiling, (boy, did a mess come down. Yikes!) and sawed a load of MDF boards that needed to be painted today, but weren’t (long story, I’ll get to it later on). It took a while, the sawing, but we did get it all done before six in the afternoon when it was time for me to stop for the day and get to work on the edit.

Due to the little mishap the other day, big brother and I decided that he’s going to do the S.N. edit separate from me, and then we’ll go over it together, rather than me sitting around while he’s working on a sentence. While he’s working on S.N. I’m going through the first edit of V.L., rather than just twiddle my thumbs.

Which reminds me, due to the fact that I’m seriously pondering of changing my genre, (got to thinking due to an internet buddy who read S.N.) I’ve been reading some thrillers at the moment and I’ve got to say I’m not impressed. Seriously, this particular book (I’m not saying names because I don’t want this to become a bash fest) makes me wonder if the writer is obsessed with sex. I’m not kidding, here I’ve always heard derogatory remarks about my favorite genre (romance), and yet, now that I’m giving the average thriller section a try, I’m tumbling from one sex-laden scene to the next.

Seriously, if I were to believe this book, the writer must have been suffering from a perpetual hard-on. (Such a sad condition for a guy to be in, really. Must make life very uncomfortable.)

I am reading this story with a mix of awe and horror, really. Here we have a brutal murder, a genuine who-dunnit, and yet, every ten pages or so I have to read about this person “doing” that one, people talking about “it”, people thinking about “it” and not being particularly picky about it all. Happily married couples are easily pondering promiscuity, in-laws are just a little too appreciative of each other, people go from same-sex to what I’m suspecting is necrophilia and…well, I’ll repeat, I’m not impressed. *sigh*

I will say that I won’t take this fine sample of writing as my main example in the genre, because then I’d be pretty much doomed. Hah. And then they dare to say that romances are only about sex. Jeez! Nothing against sex if done tastefully and kept in its place (preferably between the two leads only, and not too much described, thank you very much) but not with the so-called realism of this particular author who lost complete sight of a vastly interesting plot.
For the most part this reads like smut, while pretending to be realistic. Sure, sex is on a lot of people's minds, but not THAT much...I hope. *sigh*

But back to reality.
There were dips in the pool, another short harvesting session, and this very morning a trip to town.

The other day we acquired a new jackhammer, and after it turned out to be non-functional, we exchanged it for another one during the weekend. Now, when that one turned out to be broke as well, you can imagine our chagrin for having to return to town this very morning. Now, what really got my knickers in a twist was that the store refused to give us a refund and would only give us another of the mal-functioning lot. Since we didn’t have much of a choice in any regard, we just finally took the new jackhammer and left, hoping that this one was the last of the bad batch.

It was. Big brother made sure to check it out immediately after we got home, and while grandpa and I resumed sawing for tenant’s ceiling (the decorative slats this time) he made a nice start on the concrete that needed to be tackled up by the old horse paddock.

The weather was pleasantly hot today, even though the increasingly shortening of the days is making it blatantly clear that summer is rapidly coming to an end, darn it.
Well, big brother is impatiently waiting for me to get this blog done so we can get started and maybe manage a short workout tonight. I sure hope so.

Stinking bureaucracy!

Song of the day: “Under di mango tree” by the Mango kings. I know, weird huh. The stuff my mind thinks about, well, I never claimed it made any sense, hah.

Oh dear, here I’m sitting in the summer sun, overlooking a somewhat hazy valley, and I’m drawing a complete blank as to what I have been doing these past couple of days. It is rather frustrating I’ll admit. Hmmm. Looks like this is going to be a short one.

Okay, I made zucchini soup from our own yard harvest, and it was delicious. For a big two gallon pan I just filled it three quarters with sliced zucchini, vegetable broth powder for the same amount of gallons, one leek, two onions, grinded chili peppers, salt, a bit of sugar, minced fresh basil (a lot), parsley, oregano and chives. I tossed the lot in, and put the heat on. I let it boil for about ten minutes then mashed the stuff with the emersion blender until it was a nice even soup. After adding half a cup of cream and two spoonfuls of cream cheese, it was ready for consumption.
Gawd, I’ve been eating it for two days now and it still tastes great.

What else…well, of course we’ve been harvesting our meals almost every day now. Green beans aplenty, zucchinis, naturally, leek, onions, potatoes and my favorite: the herbs. I love those. Hah.

Yesterday started early, by the way, mom and the younger sibs had wanted to go to the market, but then the car battery decided to be depleted, so the first thing we did was head on up to the car and hook it up to the battery loader. Then it was to hoping that it was hoping that it was JUST an empty battery and not something huge that would force one of us to sell a kidney, or something, hah.

Around ten in the evening, after cleaning the pool mind you, (yes, it is high time for that) we attempted to start the engine and YES, the engine worked just fine so, phew! Had a hauling trip to celebrate it.

Also cleaned out the little courtyard in front of the greenhouse, because, let’s face it, it was a bloody mess. Debris, plastic, dirt, and Gawd knows what else. It took me eight trips with a couple of huge buckets but in the end the courtyard thingy was semi clean…I gotta say that I am rather looking forward to when we’ve added the natural rock wall to it, along with the plant containers; it should give the impression of a little slice of paradise in the end…I hope.

Seriously, I have been paying way too little attention these past few days, ‘cause I’m having the hardest time remembering activities. There was weeding involved, I know that much. Hmmm. I actually managed some chats on Amazon. Cleaning, yep, I remember prune hands.

Apparently, Ambah’s passing affected me more than I had anticipated, ‘cause I was a little sobby yesterday. Didn’t help much either that at some point I couldn’t find Bommel and I promptly burst out in tears from fear that he was just lying dead somewhere. Jeez. Talk about stupid thoughts, sometimes I really don’t know where ever the hell that stuff comes from because I sure don’t look for it. *sigh*
But anyway, Bommel was fine, just snoozing away in the office, where he had somehow managed to get while I was gathering my computer.
I would like to say that I managed an early night, but I didn’t, so that means I got too little sleep again today when we had to get up early to take tenant to the consulate where she had to renew her passport.
Almost went wrong to boot, considering her passport had expired three years ago, just prior to her stroke, in the end we did manage, however, with a form from town hall, but it was a close call.

Can I just say (again) that I seriously dislike bureaucracy? Really, they added another ten bucks to the cost of a passport, bringing it up to €60.10 so they could put a chip in the little booklet. And as an added bonus tenant got to have her fingerprints taken to boot, which is just honkeydory. Did she get asked if she wanted that? Did they ask me, seeing as I will need to get a renewal in just a few more years.

Truly, there are days when I would like to join those curmudgeon conspiracy theorists, ‘cause let’s face it; it’s just bonkers. Who do they think this is going to help, really? It’s like no gun laws. The only people who end up without them¾or in this case end up with the full hassle, are the good citizens, ‘cause criminals really won’t bother with following all those rules. It is exhausting, really.

Okay, that’s gotta be it for today, I’ve got an edit to see to…which reminds me, the query letters for publishers went into the mail today, so keep your fingers crossed for me, please. There’s gotta be some savvy editor out there who is just waiting for a manuscript like Saving Nina, darn it.

Time to get to it!

History...it's as good a title as any.

Song of the day: “If you go” by Sophie Ellis-Bextor. Had it before, but I still enjoy the song tremendously, so it doesn’t matter.

So yeah, I’m running a little behind, in case you hadn’t noticed…I mean, seriously, I could, like, ignore it, pretend that I’m here the same time as always, but alas no cigar. Gotta fill up some space anyway, so I might as well tell.

Let’s get yesterday over and done with then, seeing as it has already past and will, as of today belong to blogging history. Hah.

Big brother and I are really trying to get into the new routine, so that meant getting up half an hour, to an hour earlier yesterday and head out into the yard without breakfast. (Just coffee. Can’t be without coffee, now can I?) Considering that we had an edit to get to right around noon, we unloaded the car from the night before, sawed three big wooden planks and then headed down to take the old wooden top of the terrace table. Turns out that was a lot harder than we’d anticipated, by the way. Apparently the one who decided to make it wanted to do some serious overkill and bolted the top to the metal frame with, I kid you not, 28 bolts, yep, not even I, the queen of overkill is that bad. Hah.

We checked the plants, finished taking off the top and then went up to the office to start on the day’s edit. It didn’t go bad at all, I’ll admit. We managed a solid five pages in the few hours available to us that day: we had to go to Marbella, you see, to a computer store where they work with Macs. Considering middle sister’s hard drive crashed and that it is a factory error from Apple, we should get a new one within the next week, or so the dude at the store informed us.

So there was a three-hour trip for us, followed by a quick trip to a big chain supermarket to get some scented bags for little sister…yep, tomorrow morning is the day for the youngest sibs to go to the market and try their hands at sales. I’ll be curious to see if they like it. But anyway, it was past eight when we finally got home, so we headed immediately down to the yard to water the plants. Didn’t finish until the light was gone, and even then we had only managed the bare minimum.

This brought us right to this morning, where we managed to stay in the same routine (as planned) and were out in the yard at 10 in the morning. Managed to get two trays of chard into the ground along with a hundred or so leek and onions, and water the absolutely necessary before it was time to head back inside.

Another reasonably good edit, I’ll admit. Big brother made a remark that fell rather well, if you must know. Apparently, at the moment, the scenes we’re working on, are working really well for him. He says that right now he can look past the sentences and punctuation and see the story + characters the way I really meant them and I’ve got to say that I rather like that. Hah.

After the edit, there were some messages I really had to take care of, but then we were back outside. Big brother joined grandpa up by the old horse stable for some contraption grandpa needs for storage, and then dealt with the clogged washing machine of our tenant.
In the mean time, I worked in the lower yard, putting in more chard and then watering everything that we didn’t have time for yesterday. Considering our tenant insisted on sitting in the sun, her caretaker joined me, and together we got quite a bit done. In fact, the entire mess was over and done with by the time big brother came down and worked on the new tabletop that still had to be put together.

We finished that together about an hour before nightfall, and then climbed down into the basin. Seeing as the edge really needs a balustrade, we spent the remainder of daylight putting in wood and bolts where we can soon attach the railing that should keep both dog and human safe.

Nighttime was already in full swing when we finally came inside…there was some cleaning to do afterwards and since the sibs are occupied with the market stuff, it’s really just the three of us…and could start on shoveling down food. Mom had made baked potatoes with baked white endive on the side, yum.

Well, that about sums it up; fascinating, isn’t it. Hah. I’m going to see if I can get another hour of editing done and then I’m off to bed, thank you very much.

I don't know. Just a day.

Song of the day: “By your side” Sade. A gorgeous song; I love listening to all the different instruments in the song, and considering I did just that last night, I couldn’t get the actual song out of my head during the course of the day.

Okay, the day:
After the usual morning routines, I headed down to the house on this rather cloudy morning. It’s amazing, but we’re well into August and we’ve got actual clouds. I mean seriously, this hasn’t happened in the thirteen years that past since we moved here. It’s just weird, I tell you.

But anyway, I did laundry, some other chores and then settled down for the edit. We managed a few pages and then a particular idea came to mind, which I just had to write down. A scene in “Commanding Morgan” that just fit. Until now the story was basically written from the perspective of the hero and heroine, but it was the perfect moment to add a new perspective: that of the man who’s tracking them.

The fun part is that this tracker is also the lead for “Saving Nina” (you know, the one that’s at a publishing house right now, and of which I STILL haven’t heard anything yet, aargh) so I got to write about an entirely different side of him. Kinda interesting; turns out that he’s a cool dude, chilly really, which is a fun facet of a character - especially to write.

I manage two whole pages in the new scene, and by then my head feels like mush. So I head outside instead, knowing full well that there’s only an hour left or so, for us to do some work outside. Today we plan to go to the second hand bookstore where we intend to exchange some books for new (old) ones.

You never know how short an hour really is until you actually have to do something in it. I only managed to chop and shovel away several wheelbarrows of dirt from under the carport. The plan is to expand the roof considerably, and then bring it out to the rock wall beside it where we will then build a small tool and work area. I couldn’t even get it done, because we had to check and clean the books we were returning. Right on the dot we leave.

So yeah, this was the first time that we had to park the Land Rover in an underground parking area. When everything appears full, we intend to head a story lower, but stop just in time when the sign says that the ceiling is actually lower than our car. Yikes. We just barely manage to back up again and promptly find a spot where the car fits with just a foot on each side to spare. Getting out is a little tricky, but soon we’re underway to the bookstore.

We find seven books in total, yay, so we actually have something new to read in the next few weeks. Next, we head to the video store to return out DVDs, and then the home improvement store to get some screws, which grandpa needs. While there we see a sale on Jasmine bushes, only four buck per plant, so we take two of those since we have been wanting to get them for a while now.

That done we headed into the country, or at least we tried to. Instead, we got a little lost in the neighborhood of mazelike streets. We do find a wonderful stash of wooden boards in the industrial area we pass through. New wood, that has been discarded in a dumpster, so we pile it up in the back of the car and head home on a long road that is under construction.

By the time we get back home, it is really dark, and the temperatures are downright chilly. Weird, I tell you. This is full summer for crying out loud. Chaos and Bommel are waiting for me up by the cabin, and jumping up against me…or at least Chaos did, seeing as Bommel is getting to old for that sort of thing.
The rest of the dogs are howling down in the courtyard, so I hurry inside before they go completely insane.

With a bami dish that little brother prepared, for dinner, the evening quickly draws to an end. Yep, just another edit to go and then I can call it a night. Strangely enough, even though the physical activities were minimal today, I still feel somewhat tired. Go figure.