52 thoughts on “Working Wednesday, July 8, 2020”

  1. Taxes here too. They were due yesterday. They’re almost done.

    Other than that, I tidied up our lounge because we had people over and it feels much more friendly and welcoming. That was a nice feeling.

  2. I worked on my Never Have I Ever fanfic. I did my brain dump of everything that I could hear the characters saying and now it’s the harder part. Shaping it into something coherent.

    I’m doing something different that usual. I used to write a whole draft, then polish, but I found that doesn’t work as well for fanfic as it does for original fiction. I’m still not sure exactly why. It may have something to do with getting bored with the characters if the TV show moves in a different direction or writing so slowly that I see someone has written a similar story I like better.

    My last fanfic project I actually wrote, polished, and published one chapter at a time. I had a vague sketch of how I wanted the whole thing to go, but I rusted just trusted I would get there and not have to go up and clean up a bunch after the fact (or give up b/c it got too hard). Knowing people wanted to keep reading kept me from quitting.

    It felt more like building a brick wall (each part was completed and then a new part stacked on top) than creating the foundation and scaffolding of a house (don’t look down draft, then subsequent drafts). It helped that I had no deadlines, no real genre requirements (other than knowing what I personally like) and no particular length requirement.

    I liked that style but I can already tell this story is a bit more complicated (dual POV being just one part of that) so I’m trying a weird hybrid. For July nano, you are encouraged to draft your own plan rather than the November 50,000 word goal. So I decided to write 2,000 words for each scene I’ve already jotted down (ideally over two days) and it can be any combination of notes to myself, dialogue, description, etc. Just get down as much as I can get of that little chunk in that time frame and then I move on. When I get done with my chunks, then I’ll try to go back and polish. Time will tell if this is a good working plan or a disaster. I’m (mostly) having fun either way.

    Other than writing, almost nothing. I mopped the bathroom floors the other day and I’ve taken the boys on several excursions to the park (I’m very happy the playground is open again).

  3. We turned in taxes, which is a weight off my shoulders. I’ve started back to work-work part time this week after lolling around the house last week post surgery. Since we’re working from home, it’s really not too much of an effort. But I still feel the need to knock off early and rest – so I do!

    I did get the binding done on the giant cat quilt. I’m needing to put a label on the thing before I send it off to its intended recipient. I also started putting a crochet border around the little squares I made back in February.

    On the health front, a week after surgery I went in to have a drain removed. That thing was seriously long! I also made an appointment with my endocrinologist for the follow up once the surgeon is done with me. I’m glad I went ahead and did that as her appointments were few and far between!

    This coming week, I hope to get back to sewing – and after next Tuesday’s appointment with the surgeon, I’ll probably take an hour long shower, as sponge baths are really no fun at all.

  4. Wow, I am gratified not to be the only person in the world who needs to finish their taxes.
    This week is very hard, for some reason. I’ve gardened my right arm into tendonitis, so I’m quite achy and don’t have my usual release.
    There’s a big Trump rally just down the road from us in New Hampshire, so I’m concerned about all the mask-free people who will be in the area. We’ll see how it’s attended.
    I really need something to look forward to, and I need a job.
    However, I’m off to learn about recording from our new music director, so I’ll probably have a whole new world view after I’ve sung.

    2. I’m on a “no news fast” and it is helping immensely with my mental and emotional well being.

  6. I’ve started daily progressive muscle relaxation exercises before work, and some days more.

  8. Worked a little on novel. (Note to self: do this every day; it feels good.)

    Then, I managed to blow right through the agoraphobia. How did I do this, you ask? By leaving the house carried out by a couple of strapping young EMTs and spending around 30 hours in the hospital! I now know that I am very healthy and that my brain is in the right place and that all the parts are there. This is good. In unrelated news, the ‘hospitalist’ (a doctor who just works on patients in/from the ER, I guess), I have , which is that my parathyroid glands are overproducing calcium, which means they are probably leaching it from my bones. They have to come out, but it is not a major surgery and I’m not dying. I just need a couple of more tests, a bone scan, and to schedule this minor surgery. So at least one thing was good about going to the hospital and having all the tests, because I don’t know how anyone would have figured it out otherwise. The Dr. noticed that my calcium levels were high and ordered some more lab work because she could and she could do it immediately. Yay!

    Why did I get carried out of the house by strapping young EMTs? In the wee hours of the morning (4 am), I got out of bed and could barely stand. Legs weak and wobbly and everything spinning and woozy, not in a vertigo way. I should have gone in right then instead of “hoping it will get better” because maybe they’d have seen something right then. It was a *little* better when I called later that morning. The neurologist finally concluded (after all the tests) that I probably had an extreme high blood pressure event, which can mimic neurological symptoms. It was very high when the EMTs came and continued to drop through the day and into the next until it reached a stable and healthy much lower level. The body is weird, but at least I don’t panic when I contemplate leaving the house! (See! I can be optimistic! Nothing but good times, well, better times, probably, ahead. Heh.)

    1. Speaking from experience, bone density test is stupid easy. You lie there while they xray you in specific places. Mammograms are definitely more uncomfortable.

  9. I applied for a new job today. One that doesn’t put me in contact with the public and germy little children. (I love the students but I’m in a high-risk category when it comes to COVID.)

    Wish me luck.

    Also – finishing up my ghostwriting. If I knew how to make this work I might be tempted to try it full time again.

    1. Fingers and toes crossed for you. Our school district has not made a final decision about how next year is going to go, but I’m already worried for the teachers and other adults in the building. A lot of them have risk factors and kids will be kids.

  10. I wrote and posted a small thing on Archive of our Own. It’s only 157 words and it’s more of a class action lawsuit ad for Umbridge and her Blood Quill than an actual story but it’s being rec’d well, by my standards at any rate.

  11. Yesterday I washed the slipcover for the loveseat. It is pretty much a planned chore because it came in pieces, a base that covers the back, arms and the bottom surround and is also fun with Velcro to keep it attached especially right out of the washing machine. I hung the base on the clothesline till damp dry and ironed the bottom and then wrestled it on. The cushion covers I put right on the cushions just out of the washer and dried them on the deck chairs outside and flipped them like pancakes till they dried. It was due to be cleaned anyway but the grandchildren and granddog moved the timeline up. And I didn’t get frustrated.

  12. I’ve been battling with the day job: I do hate having to immerse myself in books I dislike and/or which are depressing. So I’ve decided to take a few days once I’ve finished the current job, to work on marketing myself to new clients. I’ll go for gardening books first, then other illustrated books. I really need more cheerful, better paid work. Not too optimistic about finding it, especially at the moment, but I shall get my head straight and give it a go. At least I can do Zoom interviews, if it gets that far, rather than having to organize a trip to London. (Which could be fun, but also expensive.)

    At least I finished ‘Burmese Days’ today. All the characters were horrible. I don’t suppose ‘Keep the Aspidistra Flying’ will be much better, but at least there won’t be appalling racism or leopards being shot.

    1. Yikes! No, that doesn’t sound like fun. Working with gardening books would be so much better.

  13. Snap, I worked on finding a number of desks and two tables for reasons similar.

    On Saturday, I will be doing my first formal yoga class for certification as a teacher. Please send best teaching vibes, best tech vibes since most of my students will be online, best protection vibes for needing to be out during the pandemic and general “let good sense prevail” vibes for the world.

    As usual, lotsa food pics. https://www.instagram.com/p/CCZBRu3g3gG/?igshid=jl1r6lfcjlkw

    4. Good luck with the first class. Starting off with an online course sounds difficult, but also unavoidable these days.

      I loved the potato salad picture; it brought back good memories of happy picnics. Have you ever tried tossing the warm potatoes in a vinaigrette instead of the seasonings? My Mom taught me to do that and it gives the potatoes another layer of flavor. Then you just stir in the mayo and adjust the seasonings at the end. Other additions (onions, celery, hard boiled eggs, etc.) can be added whenever you prefer.

      1. I do a vinaigrette for potato salad for 20 people. Dried marjoram and oregano rehydrated in a little water, then I mix in balsamic vinegar. Add to hot potatoes with flat-leaf parsley. Yum.

  14. Taxes here too – for myself and various family members. I can’t believe I put it off for so long. At least all is done now so I can go back to reading Ngaio Marsh mysteries.

    Other than that, the only work that has been going on (besides the Day Job) is a deep house cleaning to get rid of all the cat hair that seems to be everywhere. The cat died this weekend, so it seemed like a good time for a deep-clean.

    4. Oh, that’s hard. I’m sending you lots of hugs to help you deal with the loss.

  15. Cleaned the kitchen.

    Got the new car yesterday so now have to move stuff out of the old car, sort, and put (not all of it!) in the new car. I took out the back seat cover (dog) and washed it (fun with Velcro). I’ll put it in tomorrow and start on the trunk. I need to gt this done by the weekend so I can start the donatin process (I think NPR/local PBS).

    Also, craft stuff delivered. I’m going to try some Tunisian crochet and make a house number sign to ‘plant’ in one of my planters-just some paint on wood. I really need a more prominent number.

    Oh, had the follow up with the cardiologist re: heart catharization. Only 10% narrowing in one artery. Apparently, breast tissue sometimes interferes with the stress-test camera. So all the scheduling, postponment, additional time quarantining, and sister driving up from VA was my boobs fault.

  16. Oh – and my bedroom ceiling fell in. I did a lot of cleaning of mouse poop and dirt off my bed. Lots of laundry and moved my bed out from under the hole. A friend will come over tomorrow to help me staple the roof back up. I’m tempted to tear it all down and have tall ceilings, but that would be so much more work.

  17. Mostly I’ve been working the real job. I haven’t even been able to get to the garden because we’ve been having late-afternoon thunderstorms.

    I really need to start getting up earlier, but instead I keep going to bed later. I swear if if I let my body do its own thing that I would go to bed at 5am. Of course I’m yawny now, but come 1030 or 11pm I will start to perk up again. Apparently I need to live in Spain and enjoy a siesta and late-night dining. And sleeping in.

  18. Our taxes. My sons taxes. Started my daughter working in her taxes. Tonight my moms taxes. Tomorrow my nonprofit s taxes.

    And I have two grant reports and three grant proposals to write in five weeks. Which would be ok except I’m writing two with other people which is much more painful.

  19. I procrastinated on writing by chasing down some very convoluted and fascinatingly frustrating historical rabbit holes, including but not limited to Japanese mythology and star worship, Shinto mysticism, shrines, etymology, and shamanism. Either what I’m looking for doesn’t exist in any meaningful way, or there are some truly interesting, and possibly deliberate, gaps in the history.

    Either way, my Fushigi Yuugi fanfic is ballooning into unexpected directions.

  20. My big accomplishment this week is that I finally got together with my sister to pick up some lumber to put under my mattress to offset my sloping floors. The last time I did this, they had some scraps in the box that they gave me for free. This time it was not so easy. Not only did they not have any scraps, but they were completely out of the size of board I wanted. So my long suffering sister drove me to a larger Home Depot where we found a board with a flaw in it so that they both cut it to size and gave it to me for free. I am now seeing if glue will fix the splintering. I hope so, because I don’t own the tools I’d need to file them off and I don’t want to drag the board across town on public transportation to borrow them.

    I now have a bed that is raised at the head to offset my acid reflux and no longer rolls me off onto the floor. The floor seems to have settled a little more than when I tried this the last time, but it is still SO much better that it once was that I smile every time I climb into bed,

    1. Sandpaper? A coarse grade should work. Should take less time and effort than transporting the board to a power tool.

  21. Lots of writing about ball bearings and batteries and…boarding schools. Bringing my “A” game to the Bs.

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