So Many Things to Do, So Much Life

It's been a long couple of weeks.

Two weeks ago was the loss of my long time fur friend, which I wrote about here.

Last week was a crisis of the extended family which I will not write about. It's not my story, but did have an impact on my immediate family.

But now I have hauled my butt back to the keyboard.

I need to get back to my story,  Renewal, that I've been writing on Wattpad.com.
I need to keep working on my random flash fiction stories on the other blog Elsetime and Otherwhen.

And I need to get back to the things I'm trying to accomplish around this house.

I did manage, in my time away from working, to reorganize my kitchen.

Get my Christmas horde semi-controlled.

My project now is to go through the gazillion pictures scattered around this house. They have been tossed into boxes, haphazardly slipped into albums, and many are still in the envelopes from which ever photo service was used to develop them.

Pictures of Christmases past. Many of my parents with my daughter. Some pictures from the distant past of relatives gone long before I was born.

I call it my ancestral archeology.

There are still farmer's market to browse, since the garden was not at its best this year. I've been able to get some canning and freezing done, but not as much as I'd wanted.

Although, I did succeed at sauerkraut this year!

And of course my long love affair with yarn. I'm trying very, very hard to use up the yarn stash before I buy new yarn.
(No, no I'm not.  I already have new yarn plans.)

So...enough boring life. Off to elsetime. To write stories of otherwhen.

History Avalanche

I'm spending some days in the upstairs of this old house. The one I grew up in, and returned to live about 6 years ago.

There are tons of pictures to be sorted. Some of my mother's family, some of my husband's family, my family, and so much more.

I wrote about the stoppage of time in 1952 here when my grandmother, Minnie, died. I wasn't around until 1956, so I never had the opportunity to know her. Except through my Daddy's recollections. Those came only occaisionally.

But I have a treasure trove of pictures, letters, and insane stacks of household bills from the late 20's until her passing.  A suitcase full of postcards she collected from 189? until shortly before she died.

There are also a few letters and a lot of pictures from my grandfather's side as well. As I am a geneaology freak, I have plans for these. Many of them have names and dates. Some of them are of people I'll never be able to identify. Maybe.

I have a fascination for these things that should have been garbage seventy years ago. Bits of paper with ancient information. Fragile pieces of wood pulp once held by hands long turned to dust.

Not as Much of a Blubbering Mess

She graces the button of this blog. Cat, Herself, Mistress of All She Surveys. She will continue to do so.

This was not the best week. As my Facebook and Twitter friends know, that final trip to the vet had to be made a couple days ago. It sucked.

Today is better.

Today I can remember her with smiles. She was a bitchy kitty. The other two cats that I share space with were constantly on guard. Had Herself had it her way, she'd have been an only cat. Only in her last days did she allow Sir to groom her. And then only for a minute before she growled and sent him on his way.

 Little Wee was always waiting for the ambush that chased her from my lap, the table, pretty much any place that she was settled.  Lap sharing was not big on the Mistresses list of things to tolerate.

This is Wee and Sir. Wee is somewhat camera shy.

 Ocassionally, there was a truce called, usually on chilly days when a lap was what the weatherman called for.

And Catnip parties were always a free for all.

 Though as a rule, she made it clear who was TopCat.

 

There is a dog also. She was very tolerant of Gizmo. Mostly just ignoring him.



This morning Sir spent time luxuriating in my empty lap. That was good. Wee still awaits ambush, but she's beginning to relax some. Gizmo just knows something is wrong, in his dogly way he's trying figure out how to fix it. Mostly by barking at every imagined bump, thump, or breath someone takes.

There is still an empty space in the house. And empty spot where she would curl in my lap and demand her daily belly rub, head tucked into the crook of my arm.

As Sir and Wee get used to her absence, I have no doubt they will fill those spaces.


But, She will always be in my heart.

The Rants ARE Alive and Mostly Well

Well, is this not the saddest thing ever.  I haven't been here in a year and a half.  Hopefully I can get back more often.

Things have changed, the restaurant that had begun to be more pain than pleasure is now a thing of the past Tennis' Ramble Inn closed its doors for good on May 31st. It was a wild weekend. Too many hours worked, so many customers in mourning. We had a great thirty years. But it was time to end.

Due to that ending, I am temporarily unemployed.  And. I. Love. It. It's been thirty-two years since I've been out of a job, and that was only a month. Yes, I will have to find some form of employment, but not for a little while. I plan on looking in September.

This summer is mine!

It has been only two and half months since I've worked, there was the selling of equipment and gutting of a building to be done before it was all over.

So how have I gone from seventy hour work weeks to too much time on my hands?

The first week was spent luxuriating in sleeping in every morning. Until 5:30 am.

Hey, that was sleeping in, I'd been getting up around 4:00 am for years.  It has stretched to about 6:30 now, with the occaisional 7:00.

The hardest part was figuring out what to do. I had a gagillion plans. Including getting back to writing.  The other blog, Elsetime & Otherwhen has seen a little action. But it took some time to get back in the swing. There are a few new stories on the other blog.  And I've been putting some of my older stories (edited a little) onto WattPad.  I'm even working on completing one of my never ending works in progress.

I had to get a scheduling app, I wanted to get so much done I ended up overwhelming myself and accomplishing nothing. I ended up with Schedule Planner Pro for my Kindle.  It has issues now and then, but suffices for my purposes.

I set aside time each day to write. I schedule my daily "chores", things the husband was doing since I was at work ten to twelve hours a day. Each day is scheduled a "big project", rearranging the living room, harvesting crops from the garden. We pulled the fish tanks out of storage and got them up and running again. I needed to organize the Christmas tree hoarde, So much more to do,

I have been doing more at home cooking. Even baking bread! And the kitchen has been organized better. One thing done on the list,

For the first time since we moved back to the family home, I've had time to pick enough of the wild raspberries to make jam.  The Best Crop of Peas ever has already been picked, shelled, blanched, and frozen. Corn and green beans are coming along. And why would anyone ever plant more than one zucchini? That's all I have, but it's making more than I know what to do with.

That is likely enough Rant for today.  But as things progress, I'll be back.

Or you can find me on twitter @2old2tap
And Pinterest, same handle.
I'm here and there on the internets, See you there.