She interrupts me. I interrupt her. Elle A. Muse is unfortunately not amused…
To achieve your dreams.
Yesterday I blogged at Nobody Writes It Better about my now-deceased grandfather, who lived to 106 and jumped out of an airplane to celebrate his 100th birthday. He’s my inspiration. Who’s yours? Share your thoughts at Nobody Writes It Better. I’m continuing to drop by today to check the comment trail.
Refer to my Smoke on the Water post from last week.
This weekend, My Liege and I went away for some lake cottage R&R. Unfortunately, that fire I mentioned last week that filled our neighborhood sky with smoke? It came back with a vengeance. Just a few days ago, the people who’d been evacuated from their homes were allowed to move back in. On Saturday night, however, after a peaceful but very hot day on the lake, the fire blazed up anew. A second evacuation alert went into effect, and the road was closed. We weren’t in danger, but watched the following spectacle from the dock. These photos were taken over about an hour, two at the outside (I wasn’t counting, but as the night grew darker the shutter took longer and longer to click).
That’s all she wrote.
And it needs refilling!
I worked incredibly hard on My Liege’s website last week, all over last weekend, and into the beginning of this week. I worked until my shoulders ached and my eyes crossed. And then I worked some more. I love web design, but I seem to lack the capacity to REMEMBER how to go about it. What’s up with that? So every time I attempt a massive update, or, heaven forbid, a re-design of one of my sites, I suffer massive aggravation. Sooner or later, when I’m having problems, it dawns on me—check the code! Check the Freaking Code! So I go to check the code and realize I have no clue what I’m looking for, so I need to re-learn it. THEN check the code.
This is why when writing friends and acquaintances ask if I want to design their site or maintain their site, I have to turn them down. I think I could become very proficient at web design if I did it every day. But my writing would suffer. I know that from experience.
I plan on refilling my well in a major way this weekend. Wish me many Zzzzzzzzzs.
Allie McBeagle will do her part:
“Walk! Walk, walk, walk! Take me on a walk!”
My fellow 007 GH finalist sister, Trish Milburn, has just opened Healthy Writer, a blog devoted to encouraging sedentary individuals to get in shape (you know, those of us who sit in front of a computer all day). What a great idea, Trish. Check it out!
I admit, I am pretty sedentary in nature. Look under Athlete in the dictionary and you won’t find a picture of moi, that’s for sure. I walk every day, sometimes twice a day, thanks to my dog, however. I don’t know if I’d adhere to my schedule without the dog… When you have a dog and you’ve trained them to expect two walks a day, unless one of your kids (like mine) is responsible for the afternoon walks, you’re going on two walks a day whether you like it or not. Dogs are personal trainers in a hair suit.
Every other day, the day we aren’t going on a short (15-20 minute) morning walk, the McBeag and I go for what I call a “run/walk.” It doesn’t qualify as a “run,” because we don’t run all the way. We run about 10-15 minutes to the dog park, then she gets to sniff or attempt to drown herself in the creek (depending on how hot it is), or play with other dogs, then we walk the rest of the way home (about another half hour). If I have to walk her again in the afternoon (every Monday while both kids are home, then two or three times a week once Eldest Son hies himself back to university), then she only gets the short 15-20 minute walk again.
As for the running, I’d try to extend the duration—but the dog park’s in the middle, what can I do? And I can only stand so much torture. I’m not a running fiend, never have been. It’s easier with the dog. Her attempts to sniff everything along the road keep my mind occupied. Without her, I Hate Running. It’s good for my heart, which is why I do it, but it makes my back ache. Oh, well, that’s what massage therapists are for. I could not run every other day without my twice-monthly massage.
How do you cope with the sedentary nature of a writer’s life?
Fire in the sky…
Anyone remember that Deep Purple song?
It’s not as much fun when you’re living it.
We’ve had forest fires in the area. This was the sky outside my house on the worst day last week:
Note: It’s about 10:30 a.m. NONE of that is cloud cover. It’s all smoke! Behind it sat blue sky, mocking me.
My flowers weren’t impressed. I call this one Ashy Petunia, and it doesn’t look that bad, actually:
There was a big fire in the town next to us, but this smoke and the ash on the petunias was from a fire near a huge lake in our town. People were evacuated, and my parents couldn’t get to their lake cottage for a couple of days. Now, forest fires aren’t uncommon in my neck of the woods, but usually they don’t hit close enough that we need to evacuate. They’re always in the next town, or a nearby community, or another town. So far we’ve been lucky. Considering we live within walking distance of a huge provincial park…I shudder to think what would happen if someone dropped a match or a cigarette butt in that park, or if lightning strikes went crazy. Okay, let’s NOT think about that.
A couple of days after this smoke-filled-sky day, we experienced what I fondly call a Torrential Downpour. You know, the type of rain Oregonians might consider normal. We get about 4 Torrential Downpours a year, and it doesn’t seem to matter how often you clean the gutters, the TDs only happen when the gutters are leaf-clogged! So the gutters can’t handle all the rain, which feels like a see-through shower curtain falling from the sky. Hey, I don’t live in the rain forest. I live in semi-arid country. I’m always surprised by the intensity of these rains.
I’m pleased to report that the blue skies are back. The Torrential Downpour flattened my lobelia, but it seems to be making a comeback.
Ain’t nature grand?
Grrr, I’m noticing a decided lack of performance in major appliances around the 15-year mark! Two years ago, we had to buy a new dryer. This winter it was a new washer. Now we need a new stove. The problem? We haven’t decided yet if this is our Until The End of Time house. So when we bought the dryer, we went for the cheapest unit we could find, the reasoning being that we have finished our major laundry years with one son away at university most of the time and the second heading that way in another year. Sure, it would have been nice to buy the new, fandangled washer and dryers out there, but until we know how long we’ll be in this house (and I can’t imagine we’ll decide that for another 5-10 years at the minimum), it doesn’t make sense to me to buy fancy-smanchy stuff.
So…the stove. It’ll cost so much to rebuild that we might as well buy new. Today, while shopping for computer items, I realized the store also sold appliances, so I had a gander at the stoves. I need a self-cleaning model. It’s like air conditioning. Once you’ve had it, you can’t imagine living without it. I’m completely undecided about coil elements vs. a ceramic cooktop. Well, I’m not completely undecided. I’m leaning toward coil, which is what we already have. Why?
I do believe it’s time for one of my infamous surveys (not so infamous, I guess, considering this is the second one I’ve conducted). Have you ever had a ceramic cooktop, and how do you think it compares to coil elements? Would you ever get one again?
Don’t talk to me about gas stovetops. I might have to clout you. My Liege and I had a propane stove when we lived together before marriage, and I totally loved it. I know I would love a gas stove. But it’s not feasible for our circa-1960 house. The cost to get the gas to the stove faaaaaaarrrrrrr outweighs my desire to play with that cute little dancing flame. As it is, you don’t want to know how the electricity gets to the stove. It’s different, I’ll give you that.
So…coil elements or ceramic cooktop? Which would you recommend?
P.S. In case the title of this post escapes you, it’s a little nod to Twitter.