climate change

Squirrels are chillin’ while we toil and other fun near the creek

I’ve decided to find it hilarious that I must have thought out 5 different blog posts this month – with interesting titles – but don’t remember one as I start this post, mid-summer afternoon on the last day of July.

Wood has been an interesting adventure this year. Normally, the last of the wood is being put up in September, just when we need to rearrange the house and stack a partial wall of wood near the stove. Instead, the woodshed is as full of wood as we usually have for a season and no end in sight to the pile. I am grateful for the dilemma.

I’m also incredibly grateful for the amazing generosity of fantastic friends. C and Nina Fosati dropped of a stove and this is the part that goes on top.

Isn’t it fancy? I’m a sanding fool, dancing between restoration and good enough. We’ll be painting it in a manner pleasing to the eye and the environment of the patio upon which it will stand.  I’m excited and it’s a boring chore with a vast reward, so I really do find it a cheery endeavor.

Part of my quest to live in a better world involves more color. I painted the awful blue chair – loot a thief left behind – to something less ugly.

This is my first Thistle design and in person, it does not look this boring.  (I was working with flaws in the wood to tell a tale of how I see plants not coping in the conditions they once thrived in.)

Work on the back of the house stalled as paint had to be hunted down and then someone sold one of the four we ordered so hopefully it will be enough.

Omg! The lack of intelligence like that in customer service has recently been wild. I’m especially singling out the “new” girl at Citizens Bank in the Springville Tops. Ffs, I was paying a little extra on two credit cards. She asked how I wanted my change. I was like what? She only applied the amount due to the account, not the amount I wrote on the slip I was playing with. I asked why she’d changed the amount and she snapped back that she had not changed it. She started over, finally got it right. As I was leaving, I said, “You did change the amount. At least own what you did.” I mean seriously, it was a mistake, but to be so snitty about it? Maybe she needs to explore a less public vocation. Tax preparer, maybe? Perhaps a mortician?  

The computer problems I’m having are deflating my gusto toward the written word – reading, writing, editing. As with the wood, I will remind myself that I don’t need to fix everything all at once, just take one breathe at a time. I snagged this guy to help remind me. 

Thank you for stopping by and for the read. I hope your home and world are stable. The weather I’ve heard about/seen clips of from where friends and family live overwhelms me. I am thinking about you and hoping to hear you’re safe. Sending love and comfort to those reading who need it. Take care of you!

Cheers!

Grateful this paticular November is over

Is there is a line between what is a rule at your house and what is tradition? One tradition/rule we have is sitting down at Thanksgiving. Tablecloth, stemware, turkey, hassellbacked sweet potato with butter and brown sugar cooked in tinfoil, green bean casserole from a box, mashed potatoes, pecan pie, white wine. I hadn’t planned to stop at the liquor store the day before Thanksgiving. I hadn’t planned on going to any store at all that day, but ended up needing to get cash for the groomers. The bank – in the grocery store – IS the closest ATM.

I wanted a red for that night’s dinner; we’ve had a bottle of cheap champagne forever and thought we’d open that for Thanksgiving dinner, but walking down the local wine section, I saw this label:

Table white. On sale. Sold. Only later did I see this and thought, “Okay. Let’s giddy up and go.”

My November led into the brambles of fancy terribleness which made me hate having feelings for swaths of time because they were hurt so much. The ghastly lack of ethics in the local school district flabbergasts me. It doesn’t seem to matter to anyone either, that these politicians are so slimy. And their lies. You cannot convince me they are human. (I do have more on this subject, but the hour is closing in on so many opportunities for yeses, so I‘m curtailing a rant for now in order to shine up some stories to submit before the 30 November deadline.)

Speaking of stories…I am honored to have Like A Mango-Basil Smoothie up at Sledgehammer Lit thanks to J. Archer Avary and his incredible team. It’s sans audio, but as I alluded to, this month has been hell. I chatted briefly with Hilary this morning while she was doing a thorough house inspection. She had a similar dark spot in her month. I didn’t mention this to her, but I say the lunar eclipse during the Beaver Moon – a concurrent event not witnessed in some 512 years or so had to have had something to do with the state of the way things are. So say I, writer of this blog…the one who would like to think the chaos of this month with all the ups, downs, and slap-me-sillies happened for a reason. I mean seriously, one might just as well shame midnight and blame the moon.

This is the first “real” snow of the season. I guess we could blame climate change, too.

I’m so grateful that this little one shared some time with me.

Oh, that face! No, sorry, I still don’t know what happened. No, I wouldn’t be surprised to learn Trashzina  took a hit out on a kitten, that lizard woman has shown no evidence of owning a heart. The veterinarian hasn’t called with results from the lung biopsy. Yes, it’s been a while but if a lab is shorthanded, as a pet owner, I’d prefer they deal with tests that could extend the life of a still-alive pet such as this one.

(No, we did not get a new cat. This is a picture of our cat from two years ago)

Or this one posing for a before and after a visit with Dana at Paw Spa.


 I’d started the month fully expecting to work out some scenes and get to know new characters and places during NaNoWriMo. I was also going to write a flash a day. Instead, I have a few thousand words and about 20 flashes – most in need of a severe edit. But, I wrote. I took a Tommy Dean workshop from Pioneer Valley two days after the kitten died which helped so much to pull me away from grief. There was more to come. A friend who moved south in her retirement passed away, as did my aunt. One son got deployed, one fell severely ill. And I was doing as well as I could with that, but there was one more bit of news that broke me. I don’t want to acknowledge any more than this, but after that, the Beaver Moon underwent a lunar eclipse and though I’m struggling, I’m still here. I’m glad you are, too.

Thank you for stopping by and for the read. Salut!

A Thursday in September

9.18E

This year was the earliest we’ve had a wood fire. I’m still appalled by my weakness, but it was so damp and cold, I really couldn’t help it; I needed the warmth. Since then, the weather has brightened but tomorrow a frost is likely. I swear I want to smack a school mate on Facebook who says “Thanks for the Global Warming, Al Gore” each time things like this happen. Climate change is something I notice; it’s regrettable that the words got confusing throughout the years. Crichton harped on the predictions made by the scientists in the 70’s about global cooling. The weather is weird though.

So is life.

I try to roll with the punches, but sometimes, I do wonder what the hell is going on. Yesterday, I started tossing clothes into the washing machine preparing to clean the tub then the rest of the bathroom before mopping the floors. There was a clump. I had hopes it was bit of mud. I feared it was a clump of animal feces. I went to pick it up and the damned thing jumped.

9.18B

The picture is horrid; it was early, I was stressed, the frog was covered in hair and dust and what have you. I gathered the creature, took it to the pond and checking on it later found it had rinsed itself off and was clinging to the wall like frogs do.

I have no idea what it means or why it happened. I still don’t know how it got in to the house.

My life is interesting that way.

Husband is going to the Island soon. The dates for that excursion changed; I’m still kind of stressed about the change, but I’m not going to be upset about it. I just hope there aren’t any YouTube videos about his Juice Box rants this time.

The houseplants are in and thanks to Betty, we got a piece of roofing for the wood shed and i’ts up now. Otherwise, I’m making my way through the latest draft of L&C. I’m on the last “hard scene” that needed reworking, then I want to eliminate a few more characters and send it off to my editor. I will be so happy to be done with this thing.

9.18C

 

I’m etching out the next book–which I have to have 25 pages written for the critique group soon. Way too soon! Plus, I’m trying to get a few things submitted while keeping up with stories coming into r.kv.r.y. and reading a few for Literary Orphans. Alex Pruteanu had his piece, “Bud’s Warehouse,” accepted at LO. I’m pleased Mike Joyce liked it.

9.18A

9.18D

I’m happy you stopped by! I hope to have book reviews put up in the next few weeks.

 

*These are just my creekside reflections. Your experiences may vary.