Home Improvement

It’s summertime, and I’ve got the bug.

Last winter, a picket fell off our fence. The wood was too rotten to hold nails anymore. Branden and I couldn’t adult our way through it at the time, so we just let the picket lie on the ground near the fence, whose gate was no longer secured and was now swaying in the breeze. Until, that is, our neighbor came over and screwed the picket back onto the fence, presumably because he was ashamed to be associated with such a pathetic structure so near his property.

After that, Branden and I realized that we couldn’t ignore it; we actually had a responsibility to our neighbors to keep the fence to at least the bare minimum of presentability.

But… it was also winter. So we resolved to deal with it once the weather improved.

Winter was extremely weird this year. We had winter-storm-warning-level snow storms all the way through May, then all of a sudden it was in the 80s (if not higher) every day. So, spring sorta rushed by, and then it was summer, and I said—Now! It must be now! before it gets more hot, before all the rest of the pickets fall off. We must take care of it!

Luckily, the pressure-treated posts and cross-bars of the fence are still in relatively good condition. (Not perfect, but they’ll last another five years, easy.) So we decided to do a 75%-assed job and only replace the pickets. My family all flash-mobbed my house over a weekend and got the pickets put up, lickety-split. Branden and I painted the whole arrangement with linseed oil over the remainder of that weekend and the following weekend, and I’m so proud of the result. It looks great.

But it may have created a monster.

After that, Branden and I agreed that it would be way smarter if our cat room had some kind of hard floor, instead of the carpet that was in there at the time. We were trying to keep it “clean” by putting down painting drop cloths when we had kittens, but here, “clean” is a comparative term. It was way, way too much trouble. So we agreed to lay down a floating vinyl floor… ourselves.

Well, we tackled that project this last weekend. I can’t believe how much we got done. We pried off the baseboards. We pulled up the carpet, carpet pad, tack strips, staples, the whole shebang. We bought paint and painted the room. We bought new baseboards. And finally, we laid down the floor. (Check out the kitten blog below for more pictures.)

We still have to put the light switch and outlet faceplates back on. We still have to put down transitions between the carpet and the vinyl. We still have to put up the baseboards. And, of course, we still have to move everything back into the room. But I am so happy with everything, so far. It looks so great, and I can’t wait for it to be done!

This may or may not be obvious to you, but I haven’t been writing much recently. I’m making myself be okay with that. I want to pursue other creative endeavors for the moment, and as long as I’m not being a human slug, I think that’s probably okay. Plus, once Becky’s all moved in, we will surely resume our weekly writing dates, which will get my writing back on track.

Thanks for hanging in there, friends and fans! Until Wednesday!

•••Hey, did you know? I’m fostering kittens! Come follow my tribulations on my kitten blog! Paw-Purr-azzi•••

All the things!

I feel the weight of responsibility on my shoulders, and it makes me increasingly anxious.

Branden and I are hosting our weekly friend get-together this week, and I am maybe taking on too much. Maybe. Except a normal human could do it just fine before Thursday night, so obviously I will come very close to failing and have to spend Friday in bed doing nothing.

I have to make two giant loaves of bread, one less-giant loaf of bread, and roast some figs.

“What madness,” I hear you scream, and I agree.

That… will probably be fine. I’m hoping I can get my act together and tackle a couple of those tasks one at a time. The thing that’s actually stressing me out is: The Racing Snails.

MuckFest season is quickly coming. I haven’t assembled the whole team, done any fundraising, nor—and here’s the stressor—committed the shirt design to digital medium. That… really needs to get done, ASAP.

But it will probably take at least one whole day to do it. Which cuts into my writing time. I always think to myself, “Just do your writing first thing, and do the arting once you’ve hit your word goal,” and what a nice fantasy that is. But considering how I’ve yet to hit 2,500 words in a day (yesterday I managed 255), it just doesn’t seem realistic. I have to choose between them, and at some point, the Snails shirt has to be the one I choose.

It doesn’t help that by the time I’m done checking my internet (about 11am, today), I’m ready to go back to sleep for a couple of hours. Why am I always so tired, this is the worst. I could probably snap out of it if I got up and walked around a little, but the nature of being sleepy is that that’s the last thing I want to do.

Still, I suppose I shall do it. As nice as my naps were last week, I’m not willing to repeat them.

In the spirit of getting the body movin’, I’m gonna go do that now. We will talk again on Friday.

Word count: 4,768 (አ)

Because I said I'd blog more

So far, NaNo in May has been 100% unsuccessful. Naps struck me both Monday and Tuesday. Today I'm antsy and feel like I can't make my brain sit still, so I've written 54 words. Of course, my total is 2,328 so at least I'm not at the very beginning, but I do have mighty catching up to do. Maybe over the weekend. And just because I haven't written doesn't mean I wasn't productive. I worked on art resources for the P&C game my friends and I are percolating, and did some chores, and handled some money matters… not wasted time for the most part, but I still feel kinda irresponsible. Plus there are a couple of things that are in my to-do list that I'm dreading and thus haven't done: phone calls, obviously.

Six months ago I scheduled a Neurology appointment for April 21^st, which (unbeknownst to me at the time) was the same date as the Greeley Jazz festival that I go to every year. I had to cancel my appointment and have requested a new one via the website, twice. But I have heard nothing back, so I have to call them, ugh. Also my insurance decided to stop covering Adderall, which is straight crazy, so… another phone call. Both of these are relatively urgent, and I need to do them, so obviously I haven't.

On the upside, I'm covered in kittens (who have had nearly-immaculate litter box etiquette for a change!), which is probably the best thing ever. Today was a great day, I went for a long drive in the afternoon that unfortunately coincided with rush hour, but it was gorgeous and warm and beautiful. The weather went, in the course of 3 days, from white-out blizzard to have-to-open-the-windows warm, and I'm loving that. I want to make the most of the long days. Days are getting longer until the middle of June, and I want to make sure I squeeze out every last drop of sun! I should swim this year. Swimming is good.

Well, that's all I've got for now. Ciao word nerds!

Tips for overcoming writers' paralysis and cultivating enthusiasm for your writing

Long title is long!

I was at the gym yesterday and I was finishing up my stretches. After stretches, I do ab workout—situps, crunches, leg-lifts, or jackknifes, depending on the day. Yesterday was jackknifes. After that, weights, then a half-hour of cardio. And I was lying on my back, looking at the wasp nest in the highest tippy-top of the cathedral-vaulted ceiling and dreading every single step of it with my whole self.

I probably don’t need to tell you, but dread is one of those ingredients in a workout (or any other chore) that really dominates the flavor and ruins the dish.

So I thought to myself, “Self, stop it! Why do you dread this so hard? You know it exactly. You have done it so many times you could do it in your sleep. Dreading it only makes it take longer; and when that’s not true, it sure makes it seem to take longer!”

“But, Self,” I protested, “What should I do to dispel this awful funk? You make it sound easy. I assure you, it is not.”

“Fear not, Self,” I laughed, “There is a solution! Behold!” I flourished my cape. “When you started coming to the gym, you were infused with feelings of accomplishment, pride, and self-power. These feelings have waned as the gym routine has become mundane, but in truth, the fact that the gym routine has lasted long enough to become mundane is an indication of exactly how accomplished, proud, and powerful you should feel!

“In short, do not focus on the mundanity, the sloggishness. Focus on the things that made you start coming in the first place! The way it draws into focus the ways in which your body is succeeding at being strong, beautiful, bendy—what have you. After all, what are you anxious for? Have you elsewhere to be? I think not. Now is your time. Enjoy it.”

Well, it got me through the rest of the workout, and I realized that the same technique can be applied to most things we dread. Staring at the blank page, fingers poised over the keyboard, thinking, “I know I was gonna say something… what was it again?” we have started looking at our writing as an obligation, a chore. What if we spent a few minutes right before we start writing to remember exactly why we write? If we can recapture the feeling of the joy of creation, the freedom of crafting a world to our own specifications, the way it used to be an escape rather than a prison, then writing will be a breeze.

Yesterday, after my workout, I was victim to a sustained headache and stomach ache and did not return to the world of creation, but I’m going to try out this technique today and see if it works as well for writing as it did for finishing my gym routine. Happy writing, everyone!

Word count: 2,778 (૚)

This book stole my brain last night.

Last night, I was having a little trouble falling asleep. I’d just picked up a new book, shortish; a scant 167 pages. I decided that rather than play phone games (against the rules after 11pm), I’d read a few more pages before trying again to fall asleep.

Though I watched 2am go by, I couldn’t bring myself to stop. There were no chapters, and the “hard breaks” were… not that hard. Finally, minutes after 4am, I finished the book.

Maybe ten pages before the end, I was thinking things like, “Okay, we’ve heard all this before; why are we going through this again; ugh, get out of your head already!” The “twist ending” that I had believed was the twist ending was visible almost from page one and it seemed to be getting more and more obvious as the book went on.

However.

I’m not going to spoil the book at all. I’m just going to say. I was surprised. I managed to fall asleep, and when I woke up this morning, the book was still with me. Solidly. I woke up with Branden at 7:30 and wasn’t able to nap at all, despite considerable exhaustion. And though the fog of the narrative has let me go, I just have to say. This book is one of the tightest I have ever read. It is reminiscent of Hemingway’s six-word story in its capability to pack a ton of punch into a pint of words. It. Is. Creepy. And powerful. And… shiver.

This morning I thought maybe I could still make it to the gym, but wisely I gave up on that idea fairly quickly and decided to tackle the internet instead, which I haven’t caught up on since Thursday. (That’s a lot of missed internet, folks.) I felt that it was probably a lost cause to try to write.

First thing’s first: the foster kitten needs to go in tomorrow for her spay surgery. Call and set that up, no big deal. Then, I decided that ordering my medication was probably a good idea. Which required me to call my pharmacy as usual, then not as-usual to call the neurology department at the hospital. That’s three phone calls for the anxiety of at least six! Have I mentioned that I hate making phone calls?

Then, at lunch, I grudgingly looked at the coupon I had that is expiring tomorrow for a free veterinary exam for my newly adopted kitten. No, I didn’t forget to do this before. I remembered it. I just didn’t want to. So I called and made him an appointment, just under the wire.

Then I emailed my Writers’ Group, to clarify our mission.

Hey, I’m usually a quarter this productive on my best day. WTF?

I was looking forward to playing Don’t Starve since before opening Tumblr, but now I’m feeling like I’ve done all that, plus blogging (plus reading an entire book last night)… maybe I should try to finish my outline. I mean, excessive italics don’t really matter much in an outline.

Today my rambles come in “short” or “ridiculous.” I guess you guys get “short.”