Thurs. May 11, 2023: Keeping On Keeping On

image courtesy of Engin Akyurt via pixabay.com

Thursday, May 11, 2023

Waning Moon

Mercury and Pluto Retrograde

You can read the latest garden shenanigans here, on Gratitude and Growth.

As of today, this country declares the COVID pandemic over, which is ridiculous, untrue, and will cost more lives. The only reason is to force workers back into unsafe situations and allow insurance companies to charge more. The CDC and Rochelle Walensky failed us. And now, she’s tiptoeing away and not taking responsibility for selling out the general population to corporations. I was so excited when she was named, and she was a huge (and dangerous) disappointment. May she reap what she has sown.

Today’s serial episode is from Legerdemain:

Episode 84: Jae’s Theory

Jae’s belief that Brone is a pawn could have repercussions beyond Legerdemain.

Legerdemain Serial Link

Legerdemain Website

I belong to a virtual book club hosted by my university. More men than women participate in the club (which surprised me). It means that, whenever a book choice is voted on, books by men tend to get priority. I was deeply discouraged in the current choice list for autumn’s read: two books by women, one by a man, and he’s leading the votes. He is the most well-known author, but still. . .I’m going to read the two books by the women on my own. It’s not that I won’t read his book because of his gender; I will, because I’m interested in it. I just notice how the votes skew, month after month.

I did the social media rounds for The Process Muse, and then, later in the day, for ANGEL HUNT.

I’m still having problems with the Pages On Stages website. It doesn’t come up when I put it in the search bar. I can sign in and work on it: I just can’t see it. My webhost sees it just fine. It’s something in my Chrome settings. When I followed directions to clear the caches, WordPress wouldn’t let me sign into anything, claiming I blocked all cookies. I had to go back and change that. I can get in and work on my other sites now, but still not see Pages on Stages. I’m frustrated.

I got a bit of work done on the Legerdemain site. Not enough, but at least something. I have a LOT of work to do on that site, and I’m hoping that I can do some of it next week. I thought I had the history of Legerdemain written and ready to go, but then a throwaway comment in the episode I drafted yesterday needs to be integrated into it, and I need to write up the Enrique Macallen pirate story.

As I mentioned, I drafted an episode of Legerdemain.

Client work in the afternoon; finished earlier than expected (although I got a request for some additional information from one that I will do today).

Finished reading Cherie Priest’s FLIGHT RISK, which was a lot of fun. Need to start the Elizabeth Siddal biography, which has to go back to the library soon. I was percolating an idea for something built around her, but there’s a slew of projects in various pipelines about her right now, so I will sit back and enjoy them instead. (In case you’ve never heard of Elizabeth Siddal, she was a primary muse for the Pre-Raphaelites).

Put up the new string lights on the front porch. They’re very pretty, and it’s nice to sit there as twilight moves into darkness.

Slept through the night, until the cats rousted me out of bed this morning. Most of the poem for July’s event has formed in my brain, and I woke up knowing how it would flow. I scribbled it down in my “Poetry Adventures” notebook. When I get my starting word, I can write a couple of transition lines, and I’ll still be within the time limit, I think. Before I send it off, I’ll read it a few times with a stopwatch, and make any necessary trims. I mean, I’ll work it and rhythm it and hone it more between now and then, but at least I’m not starting from scratch when I get my opening word, and I can weave it in. Writing the poem in 24 hours is a challenge I met last year; this year, I want to prepare better, now that I understand the overall event.

Figures July’s poem would come at me, when I need to work on the poem I’ll read in a week and a half!

I want to draft another episode of Legerdemain today, and I have to get next week’s episodes uploaded and scheduled. I might go back and add something into yesterday’s episode (the one I wrote, not one already scheduled/dropped). I was going to put that exchange into today’s, but maybe it will work better in yesterday’s? Once I work on today’s episode, I’ll know.

Client work this afternoon, but I hope to be done early, and then that’s it for me for the week. I’ll regret it on Monday, but I don’t care for today and tomorrow!

Have to do a grocery run, a liquor store run, mail something to my insurance company by  Certified mail (because they never admit to receiving ANY paperwork unless it’s certified and when they claim they never got it, I send them a copy of the proof of delivery). Meditation this morning. All I want to do is sleep. I’m trying to pace myself a little better to deal with the fatigue. It’s waning moon, so I’ll also take iron supplements again for a few days. If I take them every day, I get sick; if I take them 3^rd/4^th quarter moon, about every other day, I’m usually okay. As the spring vegetables come out, I’ll round out my diet with more spinach and kale, and will start feeling better again. I haven’t watched what I eat as carefully as usual in the transition to spring, and my diet has been less healthy.

The pollen just wafts past the window in clouds. I’m making eyewashes with chamomile, and setting aside time every afternoon to lie down on the acupressure mat with a chamomile compress over my eyes. I’ll probably start using the air purifier again, too.

At some point this weekend, I’ll climb up onto whatever lets me reach it, and clean the tops of the ceiling fans. We’ll be using those soon, and I want to make sure they aren’t just stirring up more pollen and dust. Hopefully, by Sunday, it’ll be warm enough to take out some plants and set down the rugs out back.

The FALL FOREVER edits are percolating in my brain. The Heist Romance script wants attention, and CAST IRON MURDER reminds me that there are still revisions to do there. Plus the upcoming poem and the flash fiction. By next week, I have to get back on track with the next Twinkle Tavern short, “Labor Intensive.” I had a pithy name for the third one, built around President’s Day, but I didn’t write it in the file. I think it’s in my journal, so I’ll have to go back through that book and find it. And there are some other short pieces that I worked on back in February that are almost ready to go out into the world.

Plenty to keep me busy.

Have a good one!

Wed. May 10, 2023: Good Trellises Make Good Neighbors

image courtesy of Kerstin Riemer via pixabay.com

Wednesday, May 10, 2023

Waning Moon

Mercury and Pluto Retrograde

Sunny and pleasant

It was cold enough, again, for frost on the car overnight, and 33 degrees F when I woke up. It’s supposed to go up to 72 later today.

Over on The Process Muse today, we’re talking about showing up and doing the work. You can read it here.

Today’s serial episode is Angel Hunt.

Episode 31: Battle With the Witch Hunter

Lianna fights the witch hunter with some unexpected weapons.

Angel Hunt serial link.

I was worn out yesterday, from the big client project’s finish and the FALL FOREVER reading done. This girl was tired.

I created the episode graphics for this week’s episodes of Legerdemain and uploaded/scheduled yesterday’s promo. I’m trying something different this month; instead of dropping the episode graphics of the week’s episodes every day, I’m only dropping them on the day they go live. On off days, I will post more general promos for the whole series. We’ll see how that works for the rest of the month.

Twitter’s not driving any traffic to anything anymore (partially because I had to lock my account). But the bulk of WGA info is on there, so I haven’t left completely.

The big morning project yesterday was the proposal for the play commission. So, fingers crossed. It would be a great opportunity.

I did a drop off/pick up at the library. Then I went to the pharmacy and got a last batch of home COVID tests from both my mom’s insurance and my insurance. As of tomorrow, we’re on our own and have to pay for them. Which means people won’t test and will go untreated, and more people will die.

I am highly skeptical that my mom’s illness was “flu” even though she tested positive for it. I think she had a variant. She’s still coughing a little. And exhausted all the time. I may have fought off a variant (hence the fever), and I still have the fatigue (which I figure is the fight combined with exhaustion from pushing on the projects these last weeks). And, of course, now we’re in the season of “is it pollen or is it the plague?” I’m worried that the home tests aren’t picking up the variants, which is why I isolated for several days when I came down with the fever.

Other than being tired, I felt okay yesterday, which is why I ran my errands (although I’m still masking indoors). I got the COVID tests. I swung by a couple of stores looking for some stuff I needed, and they didn’t have it. I mailed some bills. I ordered cat litter.  You know, the basics of keeping a household running.

Ran into the maintenance guy. They’re coming around next week to check on a few things in the apartments and test the smoke detectors, etc. ahead of upcoming insurance inspections. And he’s going to take another look at the dishwasher, and maybe replace the outlet.

We unwrapped the tarp from the bench and bistro chairs on the back balcony and got those set up, along with the bistro table. I teak oiled everything. Hopefully, it’s soaked in overnight and I can add the cushions today. I put out the hanging birdbath. It’s still too cold at night to put out any plants, which means I can’t yet put down the rugs. But slowly, slowly, we’re getting there.

The neighbor whose house back is at right angles to our back balcony (the front is on a cross street) called me over to whine about the bucket truck the landlord keeps parked at the back of the driveway here. I was Very Cordial. Now, anyone who knows me well knows that when I go into Very Cordial mode, it’s best to back away slowly, and, once at a safe distance, turn and run like hell. In my mind, I called her “Aunt Bea” because she reminded me of all the negatives of that character from the ANDY GRIFFITH SHOW. I’m the tenant; I’m not going to tell the landlord what to do, when he’s behaving perfectly legally ON HIS OWN PROPERTY. And, frankly, it has no impact on her property. She said she doesn’t want to look at it, and she can see it out of her window. She said she called the city to complain and they told her my landlord followed all protocols and she should mind her own business. I suggested that, instead of cutting down all the foliage at the fence line, she grow clematis and hops and make a natural screen. She was not amused.

Hey, not my problem. Also, more importantly, not my business.

I, however, am likely to get some clematis and/or hops and put it on that side of the balcony to create a foliage screen. Getting large trellises around here is not a problem. It’s the pot-sized ones who are rare.

I planted a few things where the seeds had cooled in the fridge and want some cold still before they come up. Supposedly, last night was the last frosty bit, so I can start planting more stuff.

I need to get some black-eyed Susan vine going, or it won’t come up in time. And it did so well last year.

Tomorrow’s garden post will have more exploration of all of this.

I did client work in the afternoon. Managed to finish it before yoga. I’d home tested two hours before class, as a precaution. Negative, thank goodness. I was pretty sure it would come back negative, since I felt fine, just tired. But I wanted to be sure.

I kind of dragged myself to yoga, not wanting to leave the house, and then I was happy I did it, because I felt so much better. My teacher also recommended a local vet, which is good, because I need to get the cats in to update shots, etc.

Home, dinner, then reading Cherie Priest’s FLIGHT RISK, which is a lot of fun.

Up early this morning. Did not go to the laundromat. I’ll regret that next week, but I’ll deal with it. . .next week.

I have writing to do this morning, client work to do in the afternoon, probably more planting. I am going to take Friday off from client work to focus on the serials, the Poets in Conversation piece, the flash fiction piece, and maybe go to the Clark to work on that project a bit. So I need to dig in a bit earlier in the week.

I may start loading more client work early in the week in order to keep taking Fridays off from client work. The instinct is to keep Mondays free (Mondays were often my dark day from theatre work), but my brain starts shutting off Thursday afternoons, as far as client work goes, so Fridays might be a better choice. I may have to do more those early days (which, with increasing my yoga classes over the summer, might be a challenge, since I don’t like to come home and go back to the desk, but we’ll see how it goes).

Anyway, that’s the latest. Back to the page.