Better Than Dead

1. Under the heading of “No Good Deed Goes Unpunished” I was asked to do a favor for someone I don’t work for. I agreed and set about the proofreading, formatting, etc., of a long document. I spent five hours at this task and sent it back to the author only to discover that I had been given the wrong version. I was unhappy, but not so unhappy as the author who had to do a compare/contrast of my changes/his changes over the weekend. Then I got it back to finish cleaning up.

2. I got a robo-call last week to remind me that I had an appointment at UCLA Med for Monday, October 31. I knew I did—it was my semi-annual thyroid check up. Yet somehow, between now and then, I dropped off the computer. They had no record of my appointment and the doctor was booked solid with other people. I’m glad I took a half vacation day to go to this appointment and that I made special arrangements for a friend to take my mom to dialysis so I didn’t have to reschedule and wait and additional 2-3 months for a new appointment. I’ll be seeing the doctor in mid-December. At least I got to go home for a couple of hours and put my sore knee up with a heating pad (crone!) before picking Mom up at dialysis.

3. Since we usually get home from dialysis between 7-7:30 p.m. (sometimes later), I knew that I would miss most of the cute little trick or treaters that I love giving out candy to. Plus, after a dialysis day, we’re usually trashed and I was so not in the mood this year. So I left the porch light out when I drove to pick up Mom. They had a Haunted House at Westchester Park, about a block from our house, right where Georgetown deadends. As I made the turn from Manchester to Georgetown, I saw hordes and hordes and hordes of older thugs pouring out of the Haunted House, and more parents driving onto our street and disgorging their vans and cars of screaming invaders. I knew we were in trouble. So Mom and I sneaked like felons into our house to avoid the hordes. Even so, as we were letting ourselves into our darkened front door some particularly ambitious candy extortionists followed us up the driveway. “We don’t have any candy here!” I yelled. “Sorry!” and quickly slammed the door. Later, as I was making dinner I was forced to turn on the kitchen light (though the porch light was still out) and as soon as I did kids streamed to our front door yelling, “Trick or treat!” I quickly turned the light out, ignored them, and they departed. Thankfully, it was a school night and everyone had pretty much departed the neighborhood by 10 p.m. Or so I think. I fell asleep in my chair by 8:30. When I woke at 9 they were still traipsing about, and when I awoke again around 10 things had quieted considerably. So I went to bed.

4. This morning while I was showering I noticed the water lapping around my ankles. Sure enough, it was refusing to go down the drain. Simultaneous to this, my mother’s toilet refused to flush and threatened to o’er top its containment vessel. I thought fleetingly, “This must be the trick for refusing to give the treats.” Eventually they both drained, but it took close to a half hour and there was much gurgling and scary sewer sounds. You may remember that we had the entire sewer pipe replaced about a year ago? The plumber who came out today (a different plumber) said that pipe was just fine…but there was this other pipe underneath the house…He’s coming tomorrow morning to replace it. The good news is, we must be getting close to having all new plumbing for this old place. It’s gotten so absurd at this point I just have to laugh. What the hell else am I going to do?

5. Mom seems to be doing better and we have no new doctor’s appointments until Thursday the 10th. I’m hoping we continue in this undramatic fashion for awhile.

6. One more than five! I continue to poke at research for The Numberless Stars, and even did some creative thinking about the plot. There still remains little to no time for actual writing, but you can’t have everything. Some day, however, I may write the Great Crone Epic. I’m wondering if anyone in this youth-obsessed market will even want to read about kick-ass crones?

I’ve edited out the stuff already covered in this week’s blog.  It’s for the best.

Someone in the next hallway is barking like a dog. Either that or their speaker phone is freaking out. Cool either way. 2 Feb

I really must stop assuming people are friends when at best they are tolerating me. Not as emo as it sounds. Just a statement of fact. 2 Feb

Moral victory tastes like…ash and sod. 2 Feb

I finally remembered the name of those hiking boots I bought I long time ago that I loved. Merrell. Went to website, acquired same. 2 Feb

Ha. Made him look. A moral victory if nothing else. 2 Feb

Sometimes I wish I really could Hulk out. Especially on the commute. Not boring old road rage but rip car in half rage. 1 Feb

Not helping with my self-inducted imposturage mood. 31 Jan

We have motion sensor lights in the hallway. Several people moved from this section so as I sit here periodically all the lights go out. 31 Jan

I think I need more coffee. 31 Jan

Is an imposture someone faking bad posture? Prolly for sympathy. A self-induced Munchhausen. 31 Jan

Such an imposter I can’t even spell it. 31 Jan

Yeah, I’m definitely in a “Who am I kidding?” kind of mood. Imposture syndrome is my boon companion.  31 Jan

Random quote of the day:

“We make a living by what we get; we make a life by what we give.”

—attributed to Winston Churchill

Disclaimer:  The views expressed in this random quote of the day do not necessarily reflect the views of the poster, her immediate family, Siegfried and Roy, Leonard Maltin, or the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. They do, however, sometimes reflect the views of the Cottingley Fairies.

1.  It’s busy season at work.  The good news is, we were voted one of the best places to work in L.A.  Some who work here are dubious, but most of those people have never worked in the private sector and don’t realize how bad things can get.

2.  Last Saturday my friends and I prepared a picnic dinner and drove off to San Pedro to see Shakespeare in the park.  None of us had checked the website for months.  The venue had been changed because the city wanted to host “The Taste of San Pedro” in that particular park.  We drove home, built a fire in my fire pit, and ate our picnic in the backyard.  It actually turned out to be quite a pleasant evening.  Once we learned to never build a fire with paper and green kindling and turned on the fan to blow the smoke away from the picnic table and us.  “Hey, it’s Shakespeare for Dummies!” I said.  I smelt smoke for days afterwards.

3.  Maybe I should write erotica full time.  Then again, it’s so boring.

4.  Min has taken to sleeping on the pillow next to me.  I turn over in the night and get a faceful of cat and an indignant “Meow!”  So of course I turn over on the other side so as not to crowd her.

5.  I got really good results on my last blood test so I’ve spent the entire week doing all the things I had to give up in order to improve my blood test.  Penance will begin on Monday.  But first there will be ice cream!

1.  It’s been busy at work and I haven’t had time to do much else besides work.  What a bummer.

2.  The read-through on my WIP progresses nicely, but the first ten chapters or so are the easy part of the ms., the part I’d reworked several times before pushing on through the rest of the story.  This part holds up pretty well.  I shudder to think of the Middle to Come, or the Chaos of Ending.

3.  I finally got my DVD player hooked up after an embarrassingly long hiatus.   I don’t watch many DVDs, obviously, but I’d accumulated enough gifts that I thought I really should start looking at them.  “I haven’t got the DVD player hooked up yet,” was wearing kind of thin to those who queried.  Actually, the cable company had hooked it up when they installed my new DVR box, but it never worked properly and I knew the connections were wonky on the TV end.  I’ve got  one of those huge, honking old 27-inch TVs that weigh a ton, and I knew it would be a chore to shift it around to check those connections, so I was unmotivated.  Lazy swine, am I.  Sure enough, I finally hefted that monster around and it was “There’s your problem” all around.  In about two seconds I had DVD capacity.

4.  I made pork, onion, and green olive empanadas over the weekend.  Muy bueno, if I do say so myself.

5.  I also watched the first five episodes of True Blood, season one. I’d been leery of it, since I loved the books.  I’m actually quite liking it, with a couple of biggish exceptions.

General discussion of series, no real spoilers, but skip to #6 if you don’t want to know.

So far most of the episodes have pretty closely followed the story arc of the first book in the series, Dead Until Dark (which is probably still my favorite of the bunch).  All this time I couldn’t understand why everyone said, “Sam? Eww!” when I said I hoped Sookie wound up with him.  Now I understand: for some reason, the producers have decided to turn Sookie’s one true friend through all the books, the one who’s always loved her for who she is not what she can do for him, the one who’s always been at her back…into a skeevy guy who sleeps with all the women who work for him.  Very unhappy with that.  I also think the guy who plays Eric is seriously miscast.  He’s this tall, effete male modelish kind of guy, when Eric is a large, physically imposing, ex-Viking warrior.  It does not work for me.  This actor is, however, blond like Eric.  He knows how to put on a nice pout when I thinking brooding is more called for…but Bill does enough of that for twelve vampires, so perhaps the producers wanted…contrast.  Yeah, that must be it.

6. When in Ralph’s market Saturday shopping for empanada ingredients, I turned back to my shopping cart to find a woman with her hand in my purse.  I’ve been mugged three times.  I know better than to leave my purse unattended like that, but I had a brain fade, I guess.  When I turned and caught her, she said, “Oh!” and pushed the cart out of the way, like that was her intent all along and her hand just happened to slip into my purse.  She reached behind me, not the cart, to grab some crutons off a shelf and walked away.  I did a quick reconnoiter of my belongings and determined nothing was missing.  I kept close tabs on my purse for the rest of the shopping.