Empty

Shouldn't have bragged about how well Murder by the Mile was going. The writing god was listening and decided to punish me for my pride. How oh how can writing be this hard? How can it hover in the front of my mind day after day and yet no usable words result? It astounds me. What is even more perplexing is that I don't give up. I can only say that I've never been known for my wisdom.

Last week:
- Struggled with MBTM.
- Did household chores.
- Conducted writers group meeting, which went better this time.
- Had a visit from my sister and nephew. I greatly enjoyed spending time with them. I got some bonding time in with my nephew who is a megamind, but shy and quiet. He really opened up to me, particularly after I started talking about comic books and anime that I enjoyed. "You're actually cool," he said, sounding more surprised than was really polite, but I took the compliment anyway.
- Fighting a cold and woke up Sunday with sore throat and aching all over. Slept most of the day and feel some better.

Been empty this week. Empty of talent, empty of hope, empty of effort. Black dog has me.

This week:
- MBTM. MBTM. MBTM.
- Household chores, including laundry.
- Pay bills.
- Lunch with a friend on Wednesday.
- Renew my car's tag.
- Go to water department and pay bill.
- Continue to declutter the garage.
- Fight this cold with Vitamin C, rest, hot tea, soup, and fluids.
- Fight the black dog unceasing.

Hope you have a wonderful week filled with writing and happy things!

CRAMPS!!

My aching gut has been the nexus of my life the past few days. Started low down and mostly ignorable Tuesday afternoon, but has spread steadily upward since and increased in crushing intensity. Can't stand, sit, move, or lay down without clenching pain. Honestly, I can't tell what the problem is - I suspect peri-menopause since my bowels are functioning within normal operating parameters - but I do know I'm tired of hurting and feeling like a whimpering, belly-holding invalid.

Grr!

Okay, on to more standard news. :)

The Good

I've received additional feedback on SPORE (got it a week ago Friday, actually, but seeing as how I've been in pain since Tuesday and can't seem to focus on much else, I haven't made much progress) and it's exciting to work again!! Very, very excited!  I'm looking at sending out my changes to pre readers in chunks of three chapters each so folks won't be slammed with the whole book at once. Most of the changes will be little tweaks in the narrative (chapter 1 was only setting/descriptive changes, for example) and bigger changes in the social media graphics. One more POV character is being added (a computer geek/hacker/activist named Glenn) and I'm hoping the rewrites will all run smoothly. I got all of the changes done to the first three chapters of narrative, and had started on changes to the graphics before my belly decided to mutiny, but since I can't focus/think to write, I haven't progressed much farther other than slowly working through the twitter and facebook avatars to ensure they're all properly sized for hi-res printing, and I either took the pics myself or the person(s) who did gave me permission to use them in SPORE. Since I can do that in short bursts, the PhotoShop work's all done. I'd better get back to narrative soon, though.

If y'all want to see the updates, let me know. I'm currently planning on getting the first chunk out on Monday.

I'm almost done with a quilt that I've traded with a friend for an iPad. The iPad is here, but the quilt is not done, again, because of the troublesome belly. My 'putting on binding' position just plain hurts, but I only have  about an hour's worth of work left on it, then it'll be out the door. I think it's a super cute quilt, and I hope she likes it. (I think she will). I'll post pics on FB after she's received it. :)

Weight loss is holding steady at right around 25lbs down, which is great. I haven't been on plan much lately (the same reason I'm off track with everything else, ha ha) but I've been under points, not over, so we'll see what next week's weigh in brings. It's the lack of exercise that worries me. It seems like I just get into the routine exercise groove then I'm sidelined by an illness. Grr!

The Granddaughter is speaking a few recognizable words, and her babble really sounds like actual sentences. Yay!!

We picked up a stray cat (his pic is on Facebook). He's very sweet and slowly acclimating to our household, even tho he hasn't (as far as we know) left the basement yet.

We're all good, overall. :)

The Meh

The Daughter is working, sort of, part time temp while a gal is out on maternity leave. It's not likely this will become anything permanent or more than part time, but at least it's something to get her out of the house for a while. The area here is really tough, employment wise. People with college degrees and experience are working the drive up window at McDonald's or putting clothes on racks at Kohl's. I am *very* concerned our whole country is shifting to a service-industry focused employment and that's really gonna wreak havoc in a lot of industries that require customers with some discretionary income (as in cars, real estate, and most any retail item beyond what's the cheapest version at WalMart), let alone the legions of working class people struggling to simply pay rent and eat. Thank goodness Bill makes enough to support us, otherwise I don't know how we'd manage. There's just nothing out there other than part time minimum wage crap jobs.

Bill's been working a little overtime (yay) but it's carrying mail in cold, crappy weather (boo) and he's hurting. I wish he'd exercise and stretch more on his days off, but I certainly can't make him. He's still very concerned about the postal mess, but at least the P.O. is getting mentioned in the various budgets put forth by various committees. I don't know what to do to help him worry less. Mostly I'm trying to stay positive and hopeful. Maybe it'll rub off??

House is rather messy since I'm not doing anything. Bill and Laura have picked up some of the slack, so that's good, but I really need to clean the kitchen and fold laundry!!

SPORE needs a new title. Agent likes the idea of it starting with a hashtag, so I need to come up with something there. Maybe #fingerscrossed or #NeedASale ?  ;)  I suck at titles, but something will float up, surely.

The Bad

I have to figure State Taxes. I totally forgot about them, haven't budgeted for them... Not looking forward to it at all but I have to get it done.

Desk and sewing room still a mess. Made some progress in sewing room, then got sick.

More snow forecasted for tomorrow. Would rather have rain.

Next Week

Get to at least Chapter 10 on SPORE, including changes to social media graphics.

Finish quilt and get it mailed to Tina.

CLEAN MY DESK. It's getting really bad, bad, bad.

Scrub my kitchen floor, which will be a waste of time since it's muddy out and the dog will just put footprints all over it, but it's just eeew.

Create quiet time with hubby. We've both been on short rations lately.

Have a loss this week at WW. :)

That's it for me, have a great mid-March, everyone!!  {{hugs}}

Wasted Time

I finally went to the doctor on Wednesday, because I went to bed about six the night before and felt like I had a fever all night -- the digital thermometer repeatedly beeped wildly and flashed 100.5 or 100.6 all night whenever I checked.  I was huddled under blankets and I provided more than enough body heat but never felt warm enough to throw the covers off like I typically do several times a night.  The temperature remained the same in the morning, so I made an appointment with my doctor.  By the time they saw me at 11:30, my temperature was 98.  Go figure.  I still felt like I was running a fever, but it did feel better by the time I got home.  The doctor attributed it to a combination of allergies and viruses, but I have no known allergies.  He gave me prescriptions for a Z-Pack and some cough medicine if it gets any worse and recommended the generic versions of Mucinex DM and Alavert, which I picked up at the grocery store on the way home.  I don't think I'm going to need to fill the prescriptions.

The Good Stuff:

• I've slept much better the last two nights.  Perhaps attributable to the Mucinex DM?  I'm not sure.  I'm coughing while I'm awake, but once I lay down to sleep, I don't appear to be coughing too badly.  Must be partially psychosomatic.
• I have been making some progress on CAT EYES.  The rewrite (and it's an entire rewrite -- no words have been copied or pasted, but characters are being reused) stands at 1300 words.  I stopped at a place last night, because I wasn't sure what the conflict was.  It came to me last night before going to sleep, so I jotted it in the Plain Text app on the iPad to keep it from disappearing.  I've been able to flesh the idea out a little more for a conflict between Fantusie and her mother as well as internal conflict for Mrs. Foster (that I can't show directly, because she isn't a POV character).  We'll see if I can pull it off.
• I rode the bike, did morning pages, and tracked on Lose It!.  If I count the two days I went over by less than a 100 calories as being "under," I hit the five day goal (but the two days I was over were REALLY over).  
• I did get one day's work on the crape (I have been spelling it wrong) myrtles done. I still have three to clear around the bottom, and I have a lot of major pruning to do yet.
• My mom was briefly in the hospital, but they decided a change they made in her medicine wasn't agreeing with her, made the change back, and sent her home saying she was fine, so I hope that's good news.
• Mr. L and I got a few reorganizing chores done this morning.  We moved a dog panel to the shop to form the final roof piece for his tool cage; we got the behemoth 26" TV from the den moved to the shop (we replaced it with a 32" HD flat screen months ago--somehow I moved it up there by myself in 2008, but I could barely lift it this year); moved the dog houses and a metal cot over the the store from out of the garage.  I'm going to use the 26" TV with my Wii instead of the 13" one I was using.

The Not So Good Stuff:

• The heat pump started freezing up (they're only supposed to do that when it's really, really cold -- it was in the 70s here).  A $60 capacitor and labor costs later (got the bill today), it's working great.  Apparently HVAC labor costs go for $160 an hour for a competent technician.  I had two half-competent technicians who, together, formed one reasonably competent one, so I only got charged $80 an hour (times two).  Watching them work, it was as if each one had a piece of the puzzle that the other didn't have.  (Nice guys, but I'm shaking my head -- they installed the unit four years ago, so they aren't that young or inexperienced.)
• No work on PBOTL this week.
• I'm still struggling to know the right way to try to interact with Rossie.  I think I'm trying too hard, but I don't want to just ignore her, either.  She wants to interact with me, but I seem to keep doing something that breaks her tenuous trust, so we don't quite make the connection.  I've apologized to her and told her I'm trying to figure it out.  She just looks at me.

The Week Ahead:

• We've decided to get Ruby and Delta different color collars to make it easier to tell them apart. They are very different cats, but at a glance, I keep calling them by the wrong names.  
• See if I can finish the Cat Eyes draft (and come up with an appropriate name).
• Continue riding, morning pages, and tracking.
• We've decided to resume the annual the yard sale the first weekend in April.  Since I'm having endometrial ablation surgery on April 1, we have to have everything set up before the end of the month, so we're getting the shop ready, setting up tables, unpacking yard sale stuff, and making sure prices are set.  We'll start work on that this week.
• Yard work -- mowing at house and store -- and crape myrtle pruning
• Take Lady for her follow-up with the vet this week
• Heading to Houston Friday for a swap meet and seafood dinner at Babin's.  We'll be back Saturday.  This is an inaugural weekend with all 8 cats left on their own.  Will they demolish the house?

Digging In...

Well, not yet, but soon. It's too soon to start the garden outside, but I will be starting it inside this week. This is the time of year I refer to as the tease. It gets nice and warm and sunny for a few days, and then we get slammed with cold and rain/snow. That usually coincides with one of my friends going to FL for Cardinals Spring Training.

Good Stuff:
- Entered "King Or Country" into two contests. In writing the short synopsis, I realized that main trouble with it is the weak romance arc. That gave me leave to ignore the problem until after the Kiss and Tell class I'm taking in April. I love productive procrastination.
- Made more progress on the house. We've got our bedroom about 2/3 done and the kitchen is coming together. We've been making at least monthly trips to Good Will.
- Eric finished his semester from Hell. He has a whole week off before the next semester starts.
- The last (I hope) pieces for the kitchen came in yesterday. Barring further damaged pieces, the rest of the cabinetry will be installed soon. It looks like we are well on track to being finished before the drop dead, has to be done date of April 30.
- Called maid services for quotes. Since we have so much family coming for graduation, I'm going to have someone come in and do a deep clean.
- Not sure if I mentioned it here, but I found a Judo club about four miles from our church, and I don't have to rearrange my schedule for their adult classes. I'm going to check them out Monday. Hopefully I won't chicken out! This is so far out of my comfort zone, but I think I need to do it. Wasn't it Eleanor Roosevelt who talked about doing something that scares you every day?
- Alex should be home tomorrow for spring break. 
- Started a new bible study about praying circles around problems/people. The concept is based on when the Israelites circled the walls of Jericho. It's been enlightening.

Not So Good Stuff:
- We've made good progress, but there is still a lot to do, even without doing all the pre-company cleaning myself. I feel like I'm going to need the 10 weeks I have left to declutter enough for a maid to come in!
- My Uncle Carl has started chemo for lymphoma. His prognosis is good, but it's going to be a long road for him and his sons.
- Despite my best efforts, I only marked off half my To Do list. It's not even like the stuff still on there is hard. I could knock most of the out in an hour or two, but I haven't.
- As is always the case after a conference, I've had to make a concerted effort to back my caffeine level back down again. It helps a lot with concentration, hence the reason for the spike, but getting where I am from a pot of coffee a day was hard. It's been almost three years and I still flip off the Nicorette commercials because there is no Cafferette. Yes, it's petty.

This Week:
- Make a Honey Do list for spring break. I'm going to have easy access to two able-bodied men, so I need to make it a good one!
- Start seeds.
- Figure out how to send a manuscript to my Kindle app.
- Kick decluttering into high gear.
- Start writing the book I've been plotting, and come up with a working title.
- Finish my To Do list.

Have a good week!

Progress and reversals

What a week it’s been. While there has been progress on many fronts, reversals abound, also. One front that showed significant progress was Murder by the Mile. For some time now I have struggled with a particular section of the book that I felt wandered and didn't add to the overall story narrative. Finally on Wednesday last week, I discovered that the story was missing an narrative thread, and once I started correcting that, the story fell into place.

It's always exciting to me when a story takes some life of its own. In the story, a certain number of pages are torn out of a book. This is important for the plot, and I had thought that the murderer torn the pages out since they pointed to him. However, I was never completely sure about how he knew the pages existed and why he would tear the pages out since the information was available in other places. While working on the book, a different character tore the pages out for very good reasons of her own. And once that character tore the pages out, it opened up a whole avenue that I hadn't even considered.

Mostly I spent this week working on Murder by the Mile. I did some household chores, ran errands, had dinner with a friend on Monday, had lunch with a friend on Wednesday, caught up with several friends on the telephone, spent too much time on Facebook and with Farmville 2, and that’s my week.

Jean read the first chapter of Murder by the Mile, and said some nice things about it, which I appreciated. I think it's the strongest beginning that I've ever written. It's the rest of the dang book has given me so much trouble. I'm on course for the book to come out this summer, barring unforeseen circumstances. I will be pleased when it is published.

There is a personality conflict within the writers group that I'm not sure what to do about. One of the members is a bit overbearing and way too critical. He has alienated several members who came to me after the meeting last Saturday and wanted me to fix the problem. The bylaws of the club really don't give me the authority to remove him from the club, and I don’t want to do that anyway. I also think they should stand up to him more and not expect me to fix their problem. I don't think he's been that bad. We'll see what develops.

This week I intend to:
– work on Murder by the Mile,
– household chores,
– work on decluttering the garage,
– eat at least five servings of vegetables and fruit per day. I just read a book about the health benefits of doing so by Dr. Amen. I don't know if I think it would do everything he says it will do, but I do think it will be good for me,
– update all my various websites,
– launch the publicity for a new Author of the Month,
– work on the new 2013 anthology for the writers group,
– and naturally try to keep my head above water and the black dog off my ass.

I hope things are going well for everyone and that you're getting lots of writing done. Have a great week.

Back. For now.

I'm heading into a busy time. There's a lot to do before everyone shows up for Eric's graduation. Conference hang-over is not helping.

Good Stuff:
- I learned a lot in Destin. No epiphanies this time as such, but lots of things I'd already learned fell into place. Now to apply them.
- Got to hang out with my writing partner and some of her friends. Huntsville AL is a pretty town. We had lunch at a local BBQ place that had St Louis style ribs. I didn't order them, but seeing them on the menu made me laugh.
- Made a few new friends. One of the gals at the conference has family in a town south of us. Her cousin owns the shop here in town where I buy tea and spices sometimes. Small world!
- Hit the ground running when I got home Friday afternoon. Yesterday I went to fencing in the morning (got beat with a stick) and then we met friends from church to see Chris Tomlin in concert. Really, really good show. If you like contemporary Christian music, go see him!
- Spent a good part of today working up a game plan so I can get stuff done. I have a big master list from which I've picked things to do this week.
- My sweet hubby agreed (even before I got home from Destin) to send me off again in April to a mini conference on writing romance. Should be interesting. Several of the gals from Deep Thinkers are going. This one is much less expensive or I wouldn't have considered if for this year.

Not So Good Stuff:
- I got the conference dates mixed up. The page I was looking at said March 22-26. Actually they gathered the evening of the 21st and started the morning of the 22nd, which was the day I was traveling from Huntsville. Luckily I didn't miss anything I hadn't already learned, but I did miss a whole day of bonding, and I scared the coordinators.
- It rained almost the whole time. Not light drizzle. Torrential downpours. Thunderstorms. Flood watches. We did manage an hour on the beach to get pictures and such, and the last day it stopped raining but it was cold and windy. Not that we had time to hang out on the beach, but still!
- There was an issue with the newsletter for the Scottish society and I couldn't get e-mail to send from my iPad, so I asked Eric to e-mail them that I would deal with it when I got back. Instead, they completely reformatted the newsletter, added a few things, and sent it out to membership without letting me know. I found out when the newsletter landed in my inbox. I wanted to send an angry e-mail to the whole board telling them where they could shove the next issue, but Eric talked me off the ledge. They have one more chance before I walk away from the newsletter, and possibly from the group altogether. It's very hard to offend me, but they're making a good go of it.
- Gained 5 lbs last week. That's what happens when there's a good cook and a lot of classroom time, and we won't even talk about the evil chocolate mint malted milk balls.

This Week:
- Whittle down my list. It's too extensive and mundane to list here.
- Start logging food again.
- Back down on my caffeine levels.
- Get back to the gym.
- Start thinking about what I need to do for my writing career business-wise going forward. I think that will be part of this year's learning curve.

I'm All Choked Up

I see I forgot to mention I felt a lot of drainage in my throat as we drove home from Dallas last weekend.  As I feared, it developed into a full-blown cold, with symptoms like whooping cough, but it can't be that, because I got a fresh vaccination for that last June.  Everything (almost everything -- thankfully, no diarrhea -- always something to be thankful for) was running -- eyes, nose, bladder, throat.  Mucous was clear, so no signs of infection.  Just a good, old-fashioned, make you miserable cold.  I'm down to mostly the cough and the side effects of that, which will probably linger for a month or so.

The Good Stuff:

• I got bike rides, morning pages (for anyone keeping track at home, that's every day this year, so far), and reading done this week
• I started the rework of Cat Eyes.  It's going slow, but I'll get it. I hope.
• If Rossie ever lets me catch her again, I'll give her her first dose of Revolution, then everyone will have this month's medication applied.  I'd been holding off on the kittens to see if they would be adopted and let the new owners decide what to do, but spring is coming, and I want to make sure the little darlings are protected just like our big cats are.
• We attended an Eagle Court of Honor this afternoon for our neighbor's boy.  He's 14 1/2 and started Scouts in 2008.  I don't think it's possible to earn Eagle Scout much faster than he did, and watching the support he had from his parents and grandparents to achieve this honor, I'm not sure how a kid does it without such an awesome support force.
• I tracked on Lose It! and was actually under my calorie goal for several days this week -- it did help to be sick; I didn't want to snack.
• The invoice from the vet was legit -- the staff didn't discount the other spays as much as the vet wanted them discounted, so when they applied all the discounts, I'd overpaid and had a credit.  I think this was more than generous, but I had asked her if she could give me a break on the spaying and neutering price, so the staff was puzzled that I was complaining about having a credit. I didn't want them to not get their due. She is running a business, after all.
• I got a few small things done around the house.
• I stopped in at the local appliance store after leaving the laundromat on Friday.  The washer/dryer combo unit we want is $1399.  They have to order it.  If I just want a washer, I can get one off their showroom floor for $549.  I hate having to reach in from the side to load and unload the washer and to shift the loads.  It's very awkward.  I'd much prefer the stacked unit like we have in San Antonio.  Before we can get it, hubby has to cut a new dryer vent on the washer side of the laundry closet and move the gas to the washer side.  We'll probably leave everything set up on the dryer side. (The washer and dryer face one another with a narrow space between them. This closet was built by taking a corner out of the kitchen.) I'm not going to bug him about it.  I'll just haul a couple of loads a week to the laundromat until he gets it worked into his schedule. (That's the plan, anyway. I may run out of patience.)

The Not So Good Stuff:

• I haven't pulled out PBOTL this week.  I'll blame it on being sick, maybe?
• I'd meant to do preliminary work on taxes, but didn't feel up to that either.
• I picked up all the kittens.  Rossie has expanded her range outside the parlor and has found a place to hide somewhere else in the house.  She's more elusive than ever the last two days.  I guess she'll come around eventually.  She's a good house cat, so I guess I'll just accept her for who she is and that's that.
• I received my TRICARE Prime letter that says they won't cover me next year because I live outside the service area.  Except they will, because my doctor is inside the service area, and I can reapply and sign the distance waiver -- which was what I did when I enrolled in 2008.  When they rewrote the TRICARE (the military medical plan) contracts, they wrote it to kick non active duty people outside the Prime Service Areas off the program and dump them onto TRICARE Standard, which has no enrollment and no premiums (and I'm not sure how it's viewed under ObamaCare laws), but you pay everything for the first $3000 out of pocket every year, then, after that, you're supposedly covered.  In theory, I could have a doctor closer to home by using this option, except in 2008, my doctor was the closest one to me who accepted TRICARE.  Since they opened the Scott and White Clinic in my town last year, there actually IS a doctor who will take TRICARE (but under the new rules, it will have to be Standard), but I avoided Scott and White in 2008, and I have no interest in working with them now, even if they are a five minute drive from my house instead of 40. (Prime has a $300 annual premium and a $12 co-pay for each visit.  There are a few other costs for procedures, but it's very reasonable, and all other expenses are covered.  If I get my prescriptions at a military hospital, they are free, but if I get them from a pharmacy, the run from $9-45. It's a very good deal.  I get that, but military members are promised health care for life if they stick it out to retirement.)
• I have to refill prescriptions at the end of the month.  I'll stop at the TRICARE office and pick up a new enrollment form and check with them that I'm understanding this correctly.

The Week Ahead:

• Continue riding, tracking, reading, and morning pages
• See how many days I can remain under my calorie goal this week (last week, it was five)
• Resume work on the crepe mrytles -- the weather is supposed to be beautiful, so it should help me to be outside
• Get the next iteration of CAT EYES down on pixels.

Brother Love's Traveling Salvation Show

Yes, Sir.  Brother Love's Traveling Salvation Show is back home for the moment. Had a successful swap meet in Decatur, Texas, and a good visit with the kids. Even got to see the college student.  She sacrificed some sleep to meet us near campus for dinner last night before returning to her regular semester madness.

Hubby found some car parts and lantern parts at the swap meet, and I found enough ammo to swim in (well, a slight exaggeration), so I'm very happy.  Here goes the weekly check-in:

The Good Stuff:
- I actually got a short story out to critiquers, and the good news is, I learned the premise is completely wrong before submitting it.  Also, there's no conflict.  Also a good thing to learn before submitting it.  You guys are awesome.
- I tracked on Lose It!, upgraded to the premium coverage to be able to track more things, I read, and I did my Morning Pages every day
- Got the kittens to the vet, and the last one got spayed on Friday.
- I got a lot of walking in over the weekend
- My step-daughter showed me an app on her phone (she uses Android) called Workout Trainer. I found it in the App Store and installed it.  I think it may work better on the iPad, though, so I'm putting it on there.

The Not So Good Stuff:
- I got a strange invoice from the vet in my email on Saturday (their system automatically emails receipts when they process a payment).  There are two (positive) possibilities that could have triggered this, and one is not acceptable to me.  The first is what it says, they gave me a spay job.  They already discounted the others, it's not right for them to just give me this one -- I need to pay them.  The other possibility is one or more kittens got adopted on Saturday and they charged enough of an adoption fee to cover some of my costs and credited my account.  There's a third alternative, but it's not pleasant to consider, so I'm not going to.  I'm puzzled, but I'm sure all my questions will be answered tomorrow when I go out to pick them up.
- I didn't get my bike time this week.
- No PBOTL time this week.
- I didn't have any time this weekend to really ponder the CAT EYES story revision, but I did sneak a few minutes reading about plot on my Kindle app.
- I woke up this morning with a lot of drainage into the back of my throat.  The throat is starting to feel scratchy, and I'm dreading what this is likely to mean for the next week.
- The washer is dead, and the one we have on the back porch is also, for all essential purposes dead, so I'm hauling laundry to the laundromat for the foreseeable future until we find the machine we want.  At least the dryer still works, so I wash it and bring it home to dry.

The Week Ahead:
- That said, I want to get more bike time this week
- I need to come up with a good revision plan for CAT EYES
- I need to pull PBOTL out and resume work on it.
- I need to get some things done around the house
- I'm going to do some preliminary work on the taxes
- Pick up the kittens, assuming they haven't all been adopted.

Brainstorming Again :)

Let's start by stating everyone here is good. Nothing totally unexpected, bad, or incredible happened all week, was pretty boring for the most part. I bought some lightbulbs for my fabric closet, that's probably the epitome of this week's life excitement, other than losing 2 of the 3 lbs I'd gained.

But - isn't there always a but? - I have some book news.

The Agent called Friday to discuss the current state of things with SPORE and he wants to see more ideas for media hysteria (especially deflection and containment), the possible addition of one new character to be the nexus of the media mess, and potential different titles that aren't so cheesy. Oh, have Mindy be more pro-active and go after her hubby. Most everything else was gushing.

I've spent the last couple of days reading about media manipulation, hysteria and hype, and I think I have solid ideas for that and potential additional characters, but I'm having a lot of trouble with a new title. That's pretty normal, though, I think.

Anyway, that's where that is. I'm going to get the ideas to him on Tuesday, I think, and we'll go from there.

That's about it for me. Have a great week, everyone!  {{hugs}}

Premium Lose It!

I'd decided I liked Lose It!, and I'd been debating about upgrading to Premium for the nutrition tracking and step tracking capability (the awesome barcode reader is free).  Then I got the welcome email, and they made the push to upgrade.  What sealed it for me is they do not auto-renew.  They send a reminder email, but if you don't renew, they just drop you back down to Free.  How cool is that?  Sold.  I upgraded to Premium this afternoon (one year costs less than the next three months of WW was going to cost, so I figure it's a good thing to try).

I set up goals for carbs, fats, protein, fiber, sodium, and steps.  My protein and fiber is green, but my carbs and fats are in the red zone (using today's numbers).  No surprise there, but I'm glad to know I'm getting enough protein and fiber. The challenge, then, isn't to increase protein but to decrease fats and carbs (well, duh!).

In an aside, I'm so glad I got the iPhone.  It is such a useful tool.  I'm trying the Moves app.  I was a little concerned about it knowing too much about where I was and what I was doing, but it isn't quite that sensitive.  I've spent most of my time the last couple days sitting in front of the computer, so it's atrocious.  Unfortunately, it can't tell when I'm on the stationary bike, so I don't get a cycling "bubble" for that time.  It still shows up as walking, and registers less time than I was on the bike.  I'm still carrying my pedometer in my pocket, but we'll see if Moves "learns" after I've used it more.

I need to check out Tammy's walking video.

Report

I want to talk about my many accomplishments last week. I want to, but I can't because there were almost none. Well, that happens sometimes. I guess.

Last week:
- Did household chores.
- Babied my back.
- Fought a cold and sore throat.
- Set up the Author of the Month at the store downtown.
- Filed and cleaned desk.

And that's it.

This week:
- Household chores.
- Continue to baby back and to fight this lingering danged cold.
- Start publicity for Author of the Month.
- Work on Murder by the Mile.
- Restart my diet and exercise program. I've been unable to really pursue my fitness goals since freaking October when I hurt my ankle and hip. After that, it's just been one illness or injury after another. But I'm on the uphill slope from all that, I feel, so I'm going to slowly, slowly, slowly begin again. As for the diet ... yeah, I'm eating less sugar and more veggies and better protein, but I could be doing so much better, and I know it. I eat when I'm depressed, and I've used food to drug me over the holiday season. Well, there are worse faults. I guess. Anyway, this week I will start doing better.

I do believe in that old, tired adage about "Today is the first day of the rest of your life." I believe in the power of new starts and getting back up after being knocked down. I refuse to surrender my health and happiness just because the odds and habits are against me. I can beat the odds, and I can make new habit. Yeah, I'm trying to convince me, too. But other people do it. Why not me?

Anyway, that's what's going on in my world. Hope things are going well in yours.

Made it through another week! :)

Mostly this past week has been incredibly good. The one thing I can think of that wasn't, really wasn't bad at all, so I'll start with it. :)

The Bad :^( (see the saaaad face? lol)

I was up 3.2 lbs at weigh in on Thursday. While this usually would have me grumbling, I really can't because 1) I had so much 'good' stuff happening I really didn't worry about points, I just kinda bipped through my week tracking but not really caring about the numbers 2) Doc said not to exercise until Friday (poo!!) and 3) these stupid anti-inflamatories seem to make me both hungry and bloaty plus weight gain is a common side effect. So I'm up, but it's okay. :)

As of tonight, I'm no longer taking the anti-inflamatories. Hey, I lasted a week. On an Rx med. Which is just about a record for me for a non-antibiotic. lol I'll just take some ibuprofen if it starts hurting again. They don't make me bloaty. ;)

The meh :^|

Sewing room is in shambles. Again. Desk is a disaster. Must take care of both. Soon.

The Good :^D

I was the first person selected to serve on the City Council and my path to World Political Domination has BEGUN!! Bwahaha!

Just kidding. I have zero desire to progress beyond this point, but my first meeting went well, I voted on some things, and everyone else on the council seems REALLY nice. Yay!! They also videotape the meetings (boo!!). I really do not like being filmed. It's that craptastic self esteem thing, I think, but it'll be okay. No one supposedly looks at them, anyway, and it's just til the end of this year.

I bought a case of Girl Scout Cookies to send to overseas troops this week. That made me smile. :)

Started a table-topper/wallhanging sized quilt for a friend and it's been LOVELY to sew. We're making a trade and I really think she'll like it when it's done. Heck, I'm making it and really like it. I rarely do appliqué since it's so much more work, but this is simply gorgeous!!  I'll post a pic on FB after she's received it, but I'd put a pic of some of the fabrics up there the other day. :)

Money's good, family's good, health's good, pets are good, pretty much everything is good. :)

Picked up the ActiveLink for WW this week, since I started exercising again. It has an 8 day assessment where it figures out your baseline for activity before starting to nudge you forward. Should be interesting to use. :)

I had two - count 'em, TWO - great dates with my hubby this past week. We actually got a little dressed up for the first one (for us, nice shirts and jeans) and went to the nicest restaurant in the area and ordered an appetizer and everything. Why? Just because. And it was awesome.  And I did not care one bit how many points my coconut chicken salad was. So there! ;)

For the second date, it was because it's Free Pie Wednesday at Village Inn and it was like our Valentine's Day Date. We had a nice supper, just us two, held hands the whole time, and split a piece of pie. Also did not care about the points. We talked a lot about my book and the phone conversation with The Agent's assistant and how she wanted to know if I could type up my ideas because The Agent was SWAMPED. But I'd already typed them, and sent them immediately, and she and I talked a little bit about how I'm totally cool with changes, I'm used to it, and feel free to mix and match from the ideas or suggest anything else. I'm raring to go. She was relived to hear it since a lot of authors aren't as open to modifications. So, yay on all that!

Then Friday she sent me an email to tell me The Agent was mulling over my suggestions. He's leaning toward a couple of the ideas and we had some back and forths (mostly me trying not to squee too much while assuring her I was absolutely delighted) and I'm likely to hear back again on Wednesday. So Yay!!!

One of the selections seems to be very likely while the other is still at least partially in the air, so I'm stating making the corrections for the likely change. I'll make a new file, just in case, but this at least will give me some work to do on SPORE.

Given the rest of my week, I'm delighted to take a 3lb gain. ;)

{{huggs}} and have a great week, everyone!!

Getting Ready

I leave Thursday morning for Huntsville AL en route to Destin FL. Between us, I've looked at the forecast for here next week, and I'm glad I'll be there! The only regret is that Eric will have to tough it out all alone. Well, him and the cats.

Good Stuff:
- Got a little work done on King Or Country. The main points are a little clearer, so hopefully I'll be able to cut the fluff.
- The last of our cabinets came in yesterday. The installer is hoping to get them in Monday. I'm hoping for that, too. It still won't be done until March (yeah, I know, that's only 2 weeks away) because it will be at work stoppage while I'm away, but if the cabinets go in Monday, we might get the last section of counter templated before I go, and I'll schedule the install for when I'm back. Even so, we're looking at quite a bit of change in about 2 months, which is less painful than I expected it to be.
- Did a fair amount of house cleaning in areas that usually don't get much attention.
- Eric's Dad and stepmom have bought airlines tickets to come out here for Eric's graduation in May. This is huge. He and his dad are mending fences, and Eric was disappointed that his dad wasn't here for the last graduation. Now I just have to figure out where to put everyone since my parents are coming, too! It's a good problem to have.
- Started packing for my trip. Yup, I'm excited.
- Printed a bunch of recipes to try so I have no excuse for not cooking. Eric asked me if I wanted to go for breakfast this morning and I said, "Oh, yeah, 'cause we never eat out anymore. How about I make us some omelets?" So I did. I'm cooking dinner tonight, too.

Not So Good Stuff:
- I don't see it in the last couple of updates, but I broke down and bought new jeans. I hope to not wear them too awfully long. Certainly I hope to be back in the smaller size by the time Eric graduates. FWIW, Target has several different cuts of women's jeans now with a big poster about the different fits. It helped a lot, and they're reasonably priced, so I'm not stressing about it.
- One of the Scottish societies we belong to has had a serious drop in membership. A new board was elected a few months ago, and I volunteered to do the newsletter, but getting input has not been easy. It doesn't help that we've basically been combing through the ashes of what's left and salvaging what we can. I'm trying to be patient, but it's a service organization and in the year we've belonged to it, we've done no service. Everyone has talked a big game, but there's been no walking the walk. Our membership is paid through fall, I think, so that's the amount of time they have to get it together as far as I'm concerned.

This Week:
- Pack.
- Prep food for Eric so he eats healthier while I'm away.
- Clean out the car. Maybe get it washed if the weather cooperates.
- Get more house cleaning done.
- FINALLY get the rest of the kitchen put together.

Valentine's Day

I took Mr. L out for dinner on Valentine's Day.  He usually buys dinner for us, so I thought if I did it for a change, that would make it a little special.  Of course, we're in Central TX, so our choices are limited to several varieties of Mexican, Italian (owned by Hispanics, but they make the best pizza in town), and an overpriced "bistro."  I opted for the place that makes the best fajitas in town and gave him the option of choosing any other the others for us if he preferred.  We went for the best fajitas in town.  They gave the ladies roses as we came in, and out waitress remembered Mr. L (she always remembers him but not me...it's okay.  She had the baby since the last time we were in, and the neck tat (Jacob) is still there -- nice enough girl, but why do people do that to themselves?)  Ah well.  On to the week:

The Good Stuff:

• Lady and Tarzan have had their annual exams.  Lady has some problems I don't completely understand (it involves ulcers in the back of her mouth and abdominal discomfort).  She got antibiotics and steroids shots and has a followup visit next month.  I hope that does the trick for her.
• Two of three female kittens are spayed.  The last one (Delta) will be done next week.  For the latest on them, check the blog.
• I rode the bike, read, and did morning pages.
• I made progress on the crepe myrtle trimmings
• I decided to drop my Weight Watchers membership for now.  I'm tracking, but I'm not doing what I need to do to make the program effective for me, so I'm not going to spend money on it.  I've been testing the Lose It! app this week and like it.  I'd like a little more detailed nutritional tracking -- I'm not sure the Premium version ($40 a year) will be much more detailed or not, but it's easy to use.  I signed up for MyFitnessPal this morning but I deleted my account when entering my breakfast turned out to be very unsatisfactory. If you have any apps that allow you to enter information from the bar code on your package, it makes data entry a dream.  No more searching the database for the particular oddity you're eating.  In Lose It!, once you've entered the food (or scanned it in), it's in your My Foods database, and it's easy to locate after that.  They don't have an iPad app, but the iPhone version works fine on the iPad.  I mostly use the iPhone version or the web site.
• I got the bills paid that I was wondering about
• Mr. L did a wonderful job decluttering at the top of the stairs while I was gone.  It looks marvelous.

The Not So Good:

• I haven't dug out PBOTL yet
• I didn't do any additional work on my short story after getting off the train
• I don't know where to start with the FM concerns some users have, but, thankfully, Zette says to take my time and not worry about them for now.
• My membership at OS Training expires next month, so I need to get cracking on getting through the Joomla! classes and decide if I want to renew for six months or a year -- the year is most cost-effective.  For now, I think I'll let is lapse.  I can reactivate at any time.
• Haven't decided about the trip to SA yet
• Not sure I'm reoriented to life, but then, was I ever oriented to begin with?  I don't remember.

The Week Ahead:

• Continue tracking in Lose It!, doing morning pages, riding the bike, and reading
• Find PBOTL and get it out
• Declutter the parlor
• Mow the yard, dig weeds, and continue crepe myrtle maintenance plan.
• We'll be in Dallas next weekend visiting the kids
• Look for ways to get more protein in my diet
• Go to the Friends of the Museum party tonight at the bistro mentioned above

Lose It!

I mentioned in my weekly check in I was going to evaluate my participation in Weight Watchers.  I love the program.  It works when I work it, but I haven't been working it for the last year or so.  It's like paying money for a gym membership and not using it, so I decided to look into alternatives. 

I've been tracking my points since the beginning of the year, but I'm not taking the program seriously.  I think there may be a better use of my $50 per quarter.  As a result of that, I checked my iPhone apps and decided to give Lose It! a try (they have a good website, too).  Their basic services and apps are free.  A Premium membership is $40 a year.

I had just discovered Weight Watcher's barcode scanner, but I hadn't used it yet.  Lose It's barcode scanner is wonderful (I imagine WW's would be, too).  Instead of looking up individual food items, scan the package -- I don't think this works for fresh fruits and veggies, but maybe if you have a bag of apples...  This is where the smart phone app shines, but the site works fine with their look up lists as well.  It's simple and uncluttered. 

Also, they appear to have privacy enabled by default.  I don't remember setting up any privacy when I activated my app on the phone, but when I checked settings on the website, they were locked down pretty tightly.  I can choose to open my information up to the world, but I have to go out of my way to do it.  That's important to me.  At the moment, I don't think they even have my name.  I used my pbbs address, and that's what it's calling me.

You can have friends, and you can choose to post to Facebook and Twitter (I'm sure you've all seen some people's posts), but by default, none of that is enabled.  I mention this, because if anyone decides to use the site or is already using the site and wants to use the friends capability, I'll open it up.

As a result of this finding, I plan to deactivate my WW membership before the renewal period at the end of the month.  From my previous experience, my account remains and I can participate in the forums if I want, but I can't use the tools.  At some later date, if I want to reactivate, WW makes it very easy.  I do appreciate this about them.

I looked at Sparkpeople, but they charge for the app now, and when it was free, it didn't work very well at all.  For now, I'm checking alternatives.  One thing I'm noticing from my Lose It! tracking -- I need to get more protein in my diet.  I think if I spring for the premium membership, I can get more detailed nutrient tracking, something that's available free on the SparkPeople site.

Here I am!

Busy weekend. I seem to be saying that a lot lately. Fortunately it's been a lot of fun stuff.

Good Stuff:
- I saw my bard mentor twice this week--once at a meeting for the St Louis Scottish Games (he's on the board, too), and again yesterday to talk bard stuff. He helped me flesh out my warrior queens. At some point (maybe at the St Louis Games) we're going to do a tag team story telling. I'll do my warrior queens and he'll do the men in their lives. Well, some of the men. We don't have time for all of them.
- Got some house work done. I'm always so glad to have it done. Never so glad to do it.
- Did some work on the embryo, and then decided to put it aside for a few days to work on King Or Country a little bit. Sort of a busman's holiday, plus I think I'm at the point on the embryo that things are going to change when I get to the retreat and start brainstorming with Rachel (Hauck) and Susie May (Warren). Why spend time staring at the blank page when what I come up with is likely to be replaced with something better? The embryo already has a LOT of white-out in it!
- Turned in my paperwork for taxes to my preparer (Eric).
- Printed receipts and stuff for taxes for next year, and they're already filed. I know, it's so efficient! Let's hope that lasts.
- Yesterday Eric met a Yorkshire Terrier he liked. There might be hope yet that I'll eventually get a little dog. We might still have to get a big one (he's thinking Irish Wolfhound) to balance it out, though, and probably not while Chloe is still around.

Not So Good Stuff:
- We're still eating out too much. However, we did discuss some strategies for healthier eating for Lent which will hopefully carry on past Easter. Neither of us has been eating as well as we should. I see a variety of salads in our future.
- Still have plenty of housework to do.
- Our re-ordered cabinets are supposed to get to the store this week. There's no telling how long it will take to have them installed. I wish I could nail down a timeline so I could at least know how done things would be before I go to the retreat, but until they come in there's no way to do that. They don't have a regular delivery day; they just bring stuff when it comes. Unfortunately it's shipped from Chicago. If the warehouse was in St Louis, I'd go pick them up myself.
- I'm having the worst time keeping the timetable for the retreat in my brain. For my own edification, I leave Thursday the 21st, where I'll spend the night in Huntsville AL and have dinner with my writing partner, Suzy. The retreat starts at 5 p.m. on the 22nd and goes until the evening of the 26th. The 27th I'll head back to Huntsville to pester Suzy and come home March 1. Maybe now I can keep it straight. Probably not. For some reason it was easier last year when I flew down.

This Week:
- Do the newsletter for the Scottish society.
- Try not to call Lowe's twice a day to see if my cabinets are in yet.
- Do March Powerpoints for church.
- Start a packing list for the retreat. (I can take more since I'm driving. Not sure that's a good thing.)
- Clean out Eric's car.

This and that

Fought with my back all week. Battle is still going on, but it is better. I just have to be very, very, very careful, and that gets old.

Haven't worked on MBTM as much as I hoped. It hurts to sit in my chair very long. Of course, it hurts to do just about anything. But it is better. No, really, it is. I'm just worn out.

Had writers group meeting Saturday. It went well. They are moving from being a social group that writes to being a writing group that socializes, if you get the difference. I'm excited that more of them are writing between meetings. It's been a lot of work so far, but I'm seeing results, so the effort is worth it.

Thought a lot about Jean this week and her trip home. Glad to hear from her. Glad the trip, while sad, was good. Some families behave badly at funerals. I'm glad hers doesn't.

This week:

-- Baby my back.
-- Household chores as I can.
-- Murder by the Mile.
-- Set up a new display and author of the month at the store downtown.
-- Stay on top of the various blogs.
-- Count my blessings one by one.

I hope y'all have a great week. Talk to you later.

And The Angels Sing

I think you all know my grandmother is no longer in pain.  Her youngest child got there last Saturday morning, and by that evening, grandma was gone.  At peace with her God and the world.  I can't feel bad.  She led a full and complete life, and she wasn't able to do anything she liked to do anymore. She will be missed, but it was wrong to try to keep her in this world at this point in her life.  I'm thankful my family knows how to do a funeral.  I'm thankful for the Gunderson Funeral Home in Middleton, WI.  For as long as I know, they have handled our family's burial needs, and they have always done a wonderful job.  It's important to have someone you can trust at times like this.  If I were in in East Liverpool, Ohio, Dawson Funeral Home would be where I would turn.  Alas, in Central Texas, I have no clue. 

We had scrapbooks, Grandma's paintings, one of her quilts and Raggedy Ann and Andy dolls made by her adorned her casket for the visitation.  Dad built a photo slide show of her life (he does a wonderful job of this).  We asked people to write down their memories of grandma and send them to us, and my dad compiled those and printed them for people to read.

Great Grandchildren were the pall bearers -- all between 11 and 24.  They remained composed through the service and until they discharged their duties loading the casket into the hearse.  The moment they came back inside the church doors, they burst into tears and clung to their family members.  It was an emotional moment for everyone.

I still have my Raggedy Ann doll that Grandma made for me when I was young.  I have the quilt she made for my bed when I was a teenager.  I have several of her wonderful water color paintings.  I have a few other things Grandma gave me through the years.  She was blessed with many creative gifts, and she shared the fruits of her creativity with all who wanted them.

I got some of Mom's crocheted dishrags while I was there this time (she mentioned she had some last time I was there, but I hadn't gotten around to getting them before I left), and I got a microwave potato pocket.  Never seen them before, but you wrap your potatoes in damp paper towels and nuke them inside the pocket. It would also work as a trivet if you needed one.

I'm on the train headed home.  I got about three-quarters of a short story written on the way up for the FM Anthology Collection -- prompt is Cat Eyes.  I'll get ready to resume work on it shortly.  I love the train as a writing retreat. 

The Week Ahead:

• Resume work on PBOTL
• Resume work on crepe myrtle trimmings
• Plan when to go to San Antonio again, because I was supposed to be there this week
• Ride the bike, read, write morning pages (I wrote them every day this week, usually before going to bed)
• Decide if I want to continue with Weight Watchers (it's time to renew my plan) or if I want to take a break from it for a little while while still working with myself on a healthier lifestyle.
• Make sure I scheduled bill payments before I left, because I don't remember.
• Take Lady and Tarzan to vet for their annual exams and shots.
• Reorient myself to life. 

It's been a week. {{huggs}}

Good things, bad things, and this coming Monday looks like it's gonna be a corker.

First, the bad. ;)

Kinda got into a Facebook 'discussion' today with a person who can best be described as unbalanced. A friend posted an article about the posty office mess, and she added a comment expressing frustration over the P.O. pre-funding 75 years worth of retirement, then this unbalanced person went off in a caps-peppered rant about wasting money and politics and I honestly could barely make sense of it all. Now, I'm the first to admit there's a lot of screwy, unsound-financial stuff with the posty office, but seeing as hubby's job keeps us housed and fed, we kinda have some skin in the game. I made a nicely worded comment about small towns and people on social security who need their mail, how small businesses often rely on it, then he comes back telling me I wasn't giving him the proper respect nor keeping my place.

Yup. My. Place. Nor properly respecting a ranting asshat. Oh yes.

In my place.

Does that mean I wasn't properly cowering before he backhanded me upside the head or I wasn't scrambling to bring him his beer and supper the moment he entered the conversation?

I have no idea, but my jaw about hit the floor.

As I type my still polite but much less kind response that included saying I had politely disagreed yet his comments were offensive and misogynist, Bill was right there looking over my shoulder. He was LIVID. There was a little back and forth and the whole thread ran pretty long - unlike some of the other folks in the thread I posted three times total and was consistently polite - but the guy kept ranting and finally wandered off.

It upset me a little (asshats are everywhere and far too many seem to be irate men wanting to keep women under their powerful thumbs), but it upset my husband a LOT. Hours later, he was still cheesed that someone talked to me that way. While I know a hater's gotta hate and some people live to be nasty online, I don't see the merit in it. Even when I'm furious - and God knows that happens - I can remain polite. I don't personally attack people, especially strangers, and never on someone else's feed. It's just rude, ya know? What's up with being rude?!?

Nutters are far too common anymore, but it made me wonder what's happened to polite disagreements. Screaming at people and trying to bully them accomplishes nothing. At best, it makes the screamer side of the argument distrusted and ignored, at most it just makes two sides screaming, neither taking a moment to see the other's point of view. Either way, once the screaming starts - and this guy came out screaming and disjointed - there's no possibility for progress.

That's something to keep in mind as my dice get rolled (probably twice) on Monday.

I don't think that I'm mean, angry, rude or a troublemaker (am I???), yet these folks seem to find me and try to pounce. Maybe since I'm 'nice' they think I'm weak? I dunno. My friend kept apologizing, the guy was a friend of a friend, but I told her not to worry, I'm a big girl and no one's gonna win a typed-debate against a writer. ;)

Okay, the meh.

Surely you've all heard about my stupid foot. I have intermittent pain on the outside at the bone, usually when it's jarred or wrenched, and I went in to have it checked out. Doc thought it was a stress fracture with a ganglion cyst, but the xray was inconclusive, so I had to go in for an MRI, all this while wearing a Boot of DOOM for about a week (said boot sucks, btw). Turns out I have some fluid around the joint. Dunno why, not sure how, but these anti-inflamatories should take care of it. Whee. Meds. I hate taking meds, but I'll be on them for a month. I'm supposed to wear the boot for another week, but I'm not. Can't stand the boot and my foot doesn't hurt. I really need to get back on the exercise horse, tho, because a week off has ruined my habit. Grr!

Got taxes done. We're getting a refund. Also did The Daughter's taxes. She, too, is getting a refund. My calculator is tired and thankful that's over for another year.

We all have colds. Sinusy colds. But we're otherwise great. :)

And, finally, the good!

Most of the good is kinda sprinkled with I'm-not-sure-what-I-think-about-all-this, but here we go.

I heard back from The Agent on Tuesday. His assistant actually emailed me on Monday asking if it was okay to call, but I was out and about and not able to check email until after 5pm NYC time. Anyway, we chatted - briefly - on Tuesday. He loved a lot about the book but had three major areas, and a couple of smaller things, he wanted to see fixed. Two of those things are actually really easy to fix. Have the spores come out of something that's not corn, and not a pod. Easy peasy. My mishandling of the media/spectator circus/hysteria, however, is gonna take quite a lot of work. He wanted to hear back from me in a few days.

I've written up three ideas for each problem (corn, pods, media) and sent an email to his assistant Friday morning (going on the assumption that 'a few days' mean later this week, not 'sometime next week'), but I received no response or call. This is probably because of the weather on the east coast, but it still leaves me sitting and fretting all weekend. So yay, but AAACK!!

(Btw, he compared my work to Stephen King, with it being about regular, relatable people in incredible situations. Rather exciting, that!)

I may be on the city council starting Monday.

There are two people leaving - a retirement and a move - so they're two warm bodies short and our City clerk asked if I'd be willing to do the job. I said yes - I mean, why wouldn't I? I'm a big believer in getting involved - but there are 5 people in the pool, so I guess I have a 2/5 chance? Anyway, the city council meeting is Monday and I'm supposed to be there so if I'm chosen I can get sworn in right away and get to work. I'm assuming the other 4 will be there too, otherwise it'll change my odds. ;)  I'd like to serve, I actually ran for a seat a couple of years ago (came in third of five for two open seats) but with SPORE looming and Bill's job nonsense, I don't know if it's the best time. But when would be? Life is always its own brand of wackydoodle.

Anyway, Monday should be interesting. ;)

Oh! I'm down 25.2 lbs. Woot!

Have a great mid February, everyone!!  {{hugs}}

Getting back into the routine

Sort of. Trying to, anyway.

Good Stuff:
- You've likely seen the kitchen pictures to date. We're still on track to have the re-ordered cabinets arrive the week of the 11th. I'm really hoping they can get them installed and the last piece of counter templated before I leave for the retreat on the 21st. So ready to have this done, although it's been a lot less painful than I thought it would be.
- Made some progress on the book prep. I've started referring to the binder of prep material as my book embryo. It sounds better than fetus. Not sure why. TMI, Stephen? ;-)
- Rendezvous laundry is done. Regular laundry is not, but when does it ever stay done?
- The dusting of snow we were supposed to get this weekend showed up last night after I went to bed. It dusted about 3". Not complaining; we need all the moisture we can get to try to bust the drought. Besides, it's pretty.
- The new dishwasher is so quiet! It's like the pitter patter of rain on the roof, as opposed to the old one, which was more like a 747 taking off in my kitchen.

Not So Good Stuff:
- Lots of housework to do. That never stops, and I never seem to get more efficient. Whatever happened to practice makes perfect? Isn't that supposed to kick in eventually? Do any of you clean on a schedule? Does it work for you?
- I'm losing weight at the rate of 1/3 to 1/2 pound per week. I'm about to pack up the smaller size jeans, buy another pair of the bigger size, and call it a day. I'm still within the healthy BMI range, but I am at the top of the scale. Eric seems to like my muffin top anyway.

Ambivalent Stuff:
- I have to renew my website with Go Daddy in April. I'm not particularly happy with them. I don't find them especially user friendly in terms of building or maintaining. I'm open to suggestions for a new host through which to renew my domain. No idea where to start with this, and I'm completely overwhelmed just thinking about it. Makes me want to go take a nap.

This Week:
- Get the kitchen as finished as I can at this point.
- Give the kitchen floor and bathrooms a good scrub.
- Keep working on the embryo.
- Vacuum. Everywhere.

Gotta believe there's something more

That's the lyric of a song by A Great Big World, my new favorite group. I already posted a video from them. They're upbeat and optimist in their music. Not a lot of groups recording music like that.

Last week, I
- worked on Murder by the Mile,
- went to lunch with a friend,
- picked up another client for my blog service,
- renewed an ad for my blogs,
- babied my back, which is determined to put me into therapy again. I'm just as determined that won't happen.
- did the household chores that I could,
- continued to straighten the house now that the holiday decorations are out in the garage,
- paid bills,
- played with my train,
- and talked to two people who might hire me to publish their books.

This week, I will
- continue to baby my back,
- work on Murder by the Mile,
- do the household chores I can,
- try to make it back the gym, depending on how my back is,
- work on my entries for the writers group anthology for this year,
- work on the family newsletter in a (probably vain) attempt to have its publication be more timely,
- prepare for the writers group meeting on Saturday,
- and generally try to keep my head above water and a smile on my face -- or at least not a frown.

Hope your week goes well!

Chase the Clouds Away

It's been an interesting week.  Kind of topsy turvey. 

The Good Stuff:

• I'm reading, doing my morning pages, riding the bike, and recording my points.
• I got some work done on the crepe myrtles this week
• Grandma's still hanging in there
• Floyd is back home after being neutered.  Delta went into heat, and I figured the other girls would soon follow.  The safest approach seemed to be to get Floyd away from them and neutered.
• I created a flier for the four of them at the vet, and they're going to list them on Craig's List, too.
• Our neighbor's son has his Eagle Scout Court of Honor on March 2.
• We got a little bit of rain this week
• I had fresh off the tree oranges.  Good.

The Not So Good Stuff:

• Staying ready to travel isn't very conducive to accomplishing other things.  It's not that I can't get anything done, I'm just constantly mentally distracted.
• I tried a couple of new recipes and I wasn't wild about either one.
• Hubby went to San Antonio and his truck got broken into with a smash and grab for his suitcase.  It could have been worse, but that meant he spent the week dealing with that.  The truck is fixed and he's replaced the critical things stolen (medication).
• I worked an extended period (for me) on PBOTL one day this week.  That's sort of good stuff, but I only did it the one day.
• I tried locking Rossie in the bedroom with me for a couple nights (as suggested by Tash's foster mommy).  In this case, it didn't seem to help.  I'm pretty sure they'll be coming home with me after getting spayed.  I'll give them the run of the house then (well, with the same access as the other cats have), and Rossie will socialize at her pace or spend a lot of time in hiding. She's a good litter box user, and she knows where the food and water is.  I think she wants to come around, but, mostly, she's choosing not to.  If she's on the rocker, she's willing to be approached, petted, and handled.  If she's not, you're not going to do it.  We have an agreement, when I get the crate ready for bed, she sneaks inside to the carrier while the other kittens are winding around me feet for their food bowl.  She spends time around four feet from me.  As long as I don't reach for her, she'll relax there.  I guess that's just her comfort level at this time.

The Week Ahead:

• Maintain the standard morning pages, bike rides, points tracking, and reading.
• Work on PBOTL
• Remain ready to travel
• If nothing happens between now and then, I'm heading to SA for a week on Thursday.  I have some hedges to cut way back there, and February is the time to do it.
• My truck is due for it's 18,000 mile service, so I'll try to get that done while I'm down there.

A Great Big World - This Is the New Year!

Wish I had found this on New Year's Day, but every day can be a new year. Especially for us!

Back!

Just a quick post to let you know I'm safely home, but you probably knew that from Facebook already. Laundry is in process. The fencing foil I picked up at the rendezvous should be here tomorrow. I spent almost as much to UPS it home (it was too long for my suitcase) as it did to buy it. That's fine--it's still a deal.

It was a good trip. It's always fun to hang out with Dad and Linda. We walked into the rendezvous again this year because Dad is rehabbing from neck surgery. His weight restrictions would allow him to set up camp. It worked in my favor because sometime when we were out there I evidently ate something that wasn't quite right and ended up with a mild case of food poisoning. At least I assume that's what it was. I didn't have a fever, but I was VERY glad to have indoor plumbing! It passed quickly and I was fine coming home. It was a good shopping trip, and I've got my Grace O'Malley costume just about put together. I need to sew buttons on the waistcoat.

On the home front, the kitchen will be functional tomorrow. We still have some cabinets to go in and a small piece of counter to order and have installed, but most of it is done and tomorrow the plumbing will be finished. Good thing, too. I missed my kitchen sink.

So that's what's been going on here. Now I'm prepping to go back to Florida next month for the writing retreat. Hopefully I'll have my new project plotted by the time I get there. More on that later.

Final 2012 Christmas

Had my final 2012 Christmas gathering this weekend. It started Saturday and ended today about 4:30 p.m. as the guests departed. I immediately started taking down the decorations. I finished five minutes ago. Everything is down and ready to be moved into the storage building except for the dismantled tree. I'll get out the box for it tomorrow morning and then my living room will be Christmas tree. Even the village is put up.

I love Christmas. I love Christmas cards, the carols, the midnight church services, and the cold clear nights. I love the decorations and my Christmas village. I also love seeing all my family and friends, even if the noise and sheer volume of emotions threatens to tear my head off.

But this looooong Christmas has worn me thin. I'm ready to withdraw into my cave with my characters and stories and not come out until spring. I just want to be alone in my house.

This will pass. Always does when I have an overload and need some quiet time. I don't understand people who live for parties and party all the time. I would go crazy.

Last week:
- Worked on Murder by the Mile.
- Finished, published, and mailed January newsletter.
- Wrote a letter to the editor and a ten-minute timed writing for the writer's group meeting yesterday. As part of my efforts to move the group toward more "writerly" meetings, we've been giving optional assignments at the meeting. Just quick prompts to prime their wells.
- Cleaned house in preparation for visitors.
- Household chores and errands.
- Lunch with a friend Wednesday.
- Writers group meeting Saturday morning. Good meeting about "Archetypes in Writing" by one of our best writers and poets.
- Roomie's grandsons spent Saturday night and today with us. Roomie drove them back home this evening.
- Took down Christmas village, tree, nativity, and boxed everything up except the tree.

This week:
- Finish putting away the tree.
- Household chores.
- MBTM. MBTM. MBTM.

Hope you have a great week!

I really need to post something.

Things are going pretty decent here, even though I still haven't written anything. I did get a copy of Blackbirds - and enjoyed it very much even though it was really dark, darker than what I'm used to - and I've picked up Nicholas Sparks' Safe Haven which I haven't started yet. Maybe tomorrow. :) I've been making a point to read fiction, and it's nice. :)

Weight loss is going well. I was up a little on Thursday at my weigh in (.6lbs) but I wasn't surprised since we attended a postal union a party on Saturday and I ate waaaaay too many hors devours (was 27 points OVER my daily regular points, WHAM!! That's a lot for one 'meal'), plus I was kinda achy/cranky/sleepy/sick all week and barely exercised at all. I perked back up on Thursday (water, fresh stuff, exercise), and by Friday I was down more than a pound. Today (yeah, I'm back to weighing myself before my shower, we all have our compulsions, I guess) I was down to one. pound. above. my. 20. year. low.

One more pound and I'm lighter than I've been since 1992. Twenty one years. Is that crazy or what?!?

Anyway, I'm pretty excited about that! My official weight loss is 20.6 lbs, but I really want to hit a 25lb loss in February. Or more, that'd be cool too. :)

I'm noticing that I'm different. My hands are different. I move different. My face and neck and upper body look different. I sleep different. Weird, but good. :)

The quilt I sent to my old editor for her new baby was very much appreciated - yay!! - and at her urging I sent her a short conceptual paragraph about what I'm thinking for a novel that might work for after SPORE. Maybe. It's about telepathy (among other things) and is a traveling buddy kind of story, sort of like a really twisted Thelma and Louise.  With super powers. Kinda. Anyway, I'm interested to see what she has to say because I'm floating around kind of lost here as I wait to hear back from the agent. I need some solid concepts so I can work. Dubric... his stuff just sits and ignores me when I poke at it. Blah. So maybe something else.

I've injured myself with Richard - kept having some pretty uncomfortable upper back and shoulder pain (I think it's too much upper body work all at once) and I *may* have a stress fracture in my foot (gonna make an appointment to get that checked out next week) so I've switched to Walk Away The Pounds with Leslie Sansone since it's a lot more calm that Richard. Bill was teasing me about needing to do Sit and Be Fit instead, but I'm not that sore. Since I'm no longer flailing my arms around for half an hour like a crazy person, my back/shoulders aren't hurting and my foot really isn't that bad, even tho it's lumpy/swollen on the side and tender to the touch. Might just be some kind of tendonitis or sprain or something, I dunno. I can't afford to be off my feet so whatever it is had better be easy to fix.

Been sewing - the quilting I've done this week is on FB - and I think some is good, some is meh, and some...  Sigh. I seem to be pretty good and semi-random all over patterns (like the curliques on the red flower centers) but more structured quilting (the curved lines on the squares) just isn't working for me. I don't know why I can't get any consistency or even do them straight and smooth. I know how to operate my sewing machine! Part of me wants to rip out all the quilting in the table runner and start over, but it's almost a whole bobbin's worth! That's a LOT of ripping out. But it was a cute table runner until I started quilting it, so I just don't know what to do. It's all part of a learning process, I know that, but I don't want to make less-than-adequate quilts either, so round and round I go. Do I rip out and do over, bind it and decide it's okay to finish something that's not acceptable to me, or just toss it in the trash? Mutter mutter.

That's about it. We're all fine, pets are fine, most things are fine. Just wish I was writing. {{huggs}} and have a great week!

Truckin'

Yep.  Just truckin' along.  Getting stuff done.  Or not.  That's just how it goes. 

The Good Stuff:

• I did a little more this week than last week on PBOTL (not hard to do)
• Rode the bike, tracked points, and did morning pages as planned.
• Made good progress on the crepe myrtles. 
• Rossie likes Swiss Cheese.  She's taken to sitting about 3-4 feet behind my computer chair.  She won't come closer while I'm in it, and I can't approach her, but she sits there -- and not just when I have cheese either.  I think she wants to be a relaxed house kitty but can't let herself relax enough to do it.
• Hubby and I have still been getting along mostly well. 
• I thought I'd misplaced a weapon, but after some semi-frantic searching, a re-look in the safe revealed it was hiding. Whew!
• Got a haircut this week.  First time with a Central TX hairdresser (also one of the two town barbers), and I like how she did it.  I'll be going back to her. (One more step in completing the move here.)

The Not So Good Stuff:

• I'm stubbornly ignoring the changes I know I need to make to effectively lose weight. 
• I'm still not working on PBOTL as effectively as I believe I want to work on it.  It's sitting right behind me.  I could work on it at any time, yet, when I turn to do so, my mind says, "Oh! I need to do this!" And my body wanders off to do it.  I think it's the "Oh!  Butterfly" syndrome Wendy's referred to a time or two.  
• My 95 year-old grandmother is being set up for hospice.  This could mean I'll be making a trip to WI at any time over the next six months.  I've known this was likely for some time, but it became more likely last October when she moved into a nursing home.  Presumably, she's been in a steady decline since then.  She's okay with that.  She's done everything and been everywhere she wants to have been, and she's ready to move on. I can't argue with her about that. Thankfully, my family doesn't do the hysterics, prolong life at all costs approach to things.  Grandma has handled her life very capably, and she continues to do so.  I hope I can do as well with these things as she has when the time comes for me.

The Week Ahead:

• Continue working on the crepe myrtles
• Continue working on PBOTL
• Continue riding bike, tracking points, and doing morning pages
• Hubby heads to San Antonio on Monday morning, so I'm going to try to do a better job of staying within points.  I can't blame him, so let's see how I do. (Yes, it's my fault even when he's here -- I make my own choices)
• I'm going to try a couple of new recipes and make some personal favorites (that hubby won't eat).  I need to get pictures, because I'll be blogging about them in April.
• Try to get a handle on a few troubling problems with FM.

A couple things

1. Happy St Francis de Sales Day, a day late. I'm in Florida with no Internet except on my phone or I'd have been on time.

2. Ignore the email you got a bit ago about the site. That was me. So many passwords, so little brain power.

Back with a full update mid-week.

Crazy Dreams

Had a couple of odd early morning dreams this week, but I guess that's fairly normal.  It's a little disturbing to dream you've removed your cat's paw for some reason and forgot to put it back on, so he'll have to have surgery to repair it.  I have no idea why.

The Good Stuff:

• Rode the bike and tracked points appropriately this week
• Wrote morning pages every day
• Did preliminary planning for April A-Z Blog Challenge for two blogs -- one official participant and one unofficial participant
• Participated in Firearm Appreciation Day today by giving The Great Texas Gun Company some business.  Seems to be a family-owned and operated shop.  The owner and his son were behind the counter.  The son couldn't have been more than 14-15 max, and I really think he was younger, but that young man knew his stuff.  While I was deliberating over my purchase, he juggled at least four or five other people making ammunition purchases and looking at shotguns.  When I decided what I wanted, he handled all the paperwork, provided available options, and checked my paperwork for completeness -- finding one box I forgot to check -- before turning it over to his dad to finalize.
• Down to a stuffed up head and a few coughs here and there, so I think I'm on a path to putting this crud behind me.
• Hubby got his tool cage assembled and set up.  That corner of the shop is really shaping up well.  One part of hubby's crane shipment arrived this week -- on an 18 wheeler.  The driver left us around two and still had two more stops that day, ending in Laredo.  Poor guy.  We off-loaded our part onto a trailer at the shop and sent the guy on his way.  The other half the shipment should arrive next week.
• I began winter trimming work around the bases of the crepe myrtles this week.  If I do the work now, they tend to be pretty manageable over the summer. 
• Doctor did blood tests to check levels, and they came back and said I'm definitely on heading for menopause.  (I guess that's good.)  I could have told them that, but it's good to have that confirmed.
• Reading is way ahead for this year.  I'm finishing a lot of books I started last year.

The Not So Good Stuff:

• Only worked on PBOTL one day again.  I'd say I need to do it.  I'd turn around and shuffle the pages, but I simply wouldn't work on it, so I'm moving it from Good Stuff to Not So Good Stuff, because a token session to say I did it just isn't good.
• Rossie is just not interested in interacting with us.  If she were, these kittens could have the run of the house, but as long as she avoids me, I have to restrict them to these two rooms.  I don't understand why we're so scary to her, but, apparently, we are.  It's troubling.
• I didn't get any parlor decluttering done this week
• I eat way too much, and it's not the good stuff. 

The Week Ahead:

• PBOTL
• Crepe Myrtles
• Work with kittens
• Continue tracking and begin evaluating for changes I want to make
• Continue reading
• Begin extending my work on the bike.  My resting heart rate is way higher than I'd like, so I think more cardio is needed to help that.

I know it's mid week...

but I'm sitting here, a bit after 11:30 PM Wednesday evening, doing some meal/grocery planning and calculating my daily points and otherwise reflecting on my previous week as per the new Weight Watchers 360˚ Tracker. Which I think is helping.

Anyway, I've begun to realize some things and thought they might help you too. Maybe.

This week, as I've reset my WW habits and tracked more than just my food I've noticed (again) that after I eat carbs, especially wheat based carbs of more than a couple of points, I become both HONGRY and cranky/blue a few hours later and it continues all through the next day. All I want to do is eat and grumble. I don't like either of those things, so I haven't really had any pasta or bread, other than a couple of 2 point wraps, since my 'carby meal' (one measly cup of spaghetti that screwed me up for about 30 hours) on Monday.

Holy moley, what a DIFFERENCE, in just two days. Energetic, feeling some creativity, chatty, happy... HUGE difference. Don't really like it - oh, bread, how I adore thee - but it's obviously not good for me to eat that kinda thing at all. This coming week I am going to make a point to look for non-wheat bread sources so I can still have my shaved smoked turkey sammich once in a while, but hopefully without the growly munchies. Maybe I can cut wheat completely out? I know that even whole grain pasta messes me up so I think that's just done. Alas.

Eating more points seems to be helping too - I'm much less hungry overall, less tired and listless (maybe that, too, is related to the bread and pasta??) as has almost daily exercise. I've missed one day this week, simply because we were busy and I just wanted one day off, but after increasing my time with Richard Simmons from 20 min to 40 I can really feel a difference in how I'm moving overall, how I carry myself, and I feel... snug. Not saggy. If that makes sense. Yay!

Lastly, I've switched my week around to start on Thursday and end on Wednesday (instead of Friday/Thursday) because after I weighed in on Thursday (hungry because I had barely eaten pre-meeting to keep my weight a little lower), I considered any remaining plus points to be 'free eating points!!!' and tended to, well, eat stuff I shouldn't. Like fast food, pizza, etc. I know that they're there for life's  events and happenings, but using them to binge... probably not a good idea, especially since I really didn't keep track, I just ATE. But, since I'll be weighing in tomorrow, my unused plus points for this week will remain unused. I think that'll work out well as I continue on this road to wellness.

Maybe these little tweaks can help you too? Is there some thing you're doing that you know you maybe shouldn't but will make a huge difference if you just stop or at least realize it's a problem for you? A little change you can make that will get you back on track?

I hope so, because we all deserve to be healthy and happy.  {{huggs}}