Settler words&music in S'ólh Téméxw, (leanpub.com/upsun) living where privilege meets precarity in MST country. she/her/they———– Novels: Midnite Moving Co., Upsun; Sweep Off Those Waves coming soon, Hair Sinister after that. —Restore All Indigenous Lands!
I have interesting news, which I am waiting to share on the go-ahead of the other folks involved. In the meantime, lip is zipped.
620 words yesterday.
Katie is moving out of her dad’s place on the 2nd. I have rented a truck. It’s going to be interesting, but it shouldn’t be that hard of a move, provided we get at least one other person lined up.
It was a perfectly nice BBC/HBO 5 parter. HBO, so, of course, boobs. I may have to look for the books it was based on; Ford Madox Ford was a feminist when that really wasn’t a popular view for a man to take, so good on him.
Word count yesterday was spiffing. I will complete the book in less than two months at this rate, at which point I’m actually going to EDIT it instead of pronouncing it done and shelving it, and then I’m going to find a decent agent (I have some ideas) and if I can’t sell it, I’ll self publish.
When I’m no longer actively writing it, I’ll go to my next project, Tarot for Atheists, and finish that and see if I can get it published (it will be easier than this one, for sure), and then when that’s done, I’ll probably self-publish my homilies. (Homilies, Essays, Rants and Reviews). Then there’s Broad Hints, which includes my ephemeral writing and then A Filker’s Life for Me (all my filk tunes and lyrics in book form), and A Sacrifice to Chronos (all the other songs worth keeping). After that, there’s Child Rearing for Anarchists, whatever materials I’ve put together for the anti-racism workshop (The Racist in Recovery, with free embroidered hankie for those white women tears, dearies).
Cough, which had been much better, is now suddenly much worse, so I’m glad I’ve got DMDE cough medicine in the house. For the first time in my life I’m actually measuring the dosage. Next dose at ten am – I’ve been up since quarter to 2. Don’t know if it’s the moon, or the coughing, or my brain spinning with what new idiocies my characters are up to (reading Michel’s dialog aloud with a Montreal accent made me start coughing again) but sleep has been hard to come by these last few nights.
Fetched home some schnitzel yesterday for supper. Lost my keys and Jeff found them.
I am so glad Keith is having a good and educational time in Australia. I am so happy and proud, I just can’t express it enough.
Word of the Day: rebarbative.
Katie came by yesterday to cut my hair and listen to the message Keith left (so burbly! So full of enthusiasm! and his pa will join him soon!) so it was a brief but useful interaction. We’re obviously still pretty sore with each other, but life f*cking well goes on.
No word count yesterday; it was a disappointing day but at least Thursday’s trip to the doc reveals me as being, yet again, a dirty great hypochondriac. Honestly, sometimes I think the best thing about me breaking my shoulder was that there was no arguing about it. Everyone agreed, yup, dislocated AND broken; no hypochondria there, girl.
Third series of Sherlock so wombly and disappointing that I nearly screamed with frustration. I put my Darth Vader blankie over my head a lot. (I bought a Darth Vader blankie for 15 bucks at the Interfilk auction at Conflikt).
Jeff took me to breakfast this morning and will be heading out to work at a couple of customers later. I hope I quit coughing long enough to do something useful, like make word count, or rehearse, or do laundry.
Racism workshop two Wednesday afternoons hence at my place. It will be a corker.
I need some tea.
They just sang this in England, at the filk convention there. http://www.leafpress.ca/Mondays_Poems_2013/Chris_Hadfield/Is-Somebody-Singing.htm
Happy sigh.
Yes, I started watching it. Yes, I’m a fool.
This is a pic of two nursing cats who are ‘coparenting’. It is very adorable.
Thank you mOm for the books that came back with Jeff.
Margot wandered around the house making funny noises a lot while Jeff was gone.
I think I need to go see an eye doctor. My right eye has underproduced tears since I was in my teens, but my eye is so dry now that I’m in pain a good chunk of the time – enough pain that I’m not noticing my back or my shoulder. I think today I may get an eyepatch, just to give my eye a break.
This is a simply adorable series of family pictures.
I will be keeping a trip diary and posting irregularly… I have decided not to take my computer because I simply cannot afford to have it confiscated by the US government. I have NOTHING on the computer which would warrant that, but I’ve been complaining under my real name about the US government for 10 years now. Most hotels have a guest computer room.
If I do write any George stuff while I’m gone it will be cursive, or uploaded to Google drive…. they aren’t likely to confiscate that. I will take my phone and charger.
I pack today. It will be a big batch of weird stuff I take, I hope the TSA and Customs can deal with it all.
I’m going to drop the keys for the business off with the landlord. I have been trying and trying and trying to sell it, and almost 60 people enquired, and I showed it to at least 30 sets of people, but I can’t pay rent any more. I closed the file with Fraser Health yesterday. It has been a year out of my life, and we only operated for three months. I learned a lot, got my heart and my shoulder broken, and I really think I’m a better person. I certainly have more self-knowledge, a lot more respect for restaurateurs. Knowing that I will never ever step through that door again is, candidly, more of a relief than I can say. Anything else I say will be oversharing.
I am practicing and writing every day – music or one of my other projects. That’s really the only thing that counts.
Jeff can handle getting a bolus into Eddie by himself with no difficulty, so I don’t feel like I’m abandoning Jeff over that. Eddie is moving as little as possible to accomplish his goals of just barely eating, just barely drinking, and getting to the litter pan. I’ve taken to leaving a hot water bottle next to him as he was cold to the touch the other day, and lifting him up into the chair he is sleeping in pretty much 24/7 these days. Margot is being very sucky towards us and practically knocked Eddie over with her tail the other day, a liberty he simply would not have tolerated a couple of months ago.
So many people have told me how much they are looking forward to seeing me at GAFilk! I feel genuinely underrehearsed, but I recently read that if you’re feeling nervous, make yourself MORE EXCITED. So I will.
ATL is not currently experiencing delays in or outbound with the exception of international flights outbound. Travel will be icky, but not impossible due to weather.
I’d like to call out Patricia for helping arrange a drinkypoo on my return, and a very warm hug for mOm and Chipper, who have been extra specially supportive beta readers for George, and for Tammy, who provided me with the book that unblocked my last objections to the writing. I have something very specific to say on the subject of first contact, which is that we’ve had 100 years of science fiction in popular culture, and we have to start writing first contact fiction that allows humans to respond intelligently to aliens. Not to freak out or say stupid things. To say, “Cool! Weird! How can I help? What’s in it for me? Where’s your ray gun?” when somebody who really does think globally comes along.
Everybody who can, have a good day!
It’s been a lively couple of days. I’ve been writing hard, practiced almost enough, played at church to sincere and life affirming compliments, showed the shop, made the decision to hand the keys over to the landlord, got into last minute negotiations with guys that came in at Christmas, had a spider drop onto my keyboard and scare the shit out of me, I’ve stopped having nightmares but the insomnia has fired up again, we finished watching Jazz, which made me unhappy because it was SO wonderful, and I received some Buddhist wisdom which allowed me to release a lot of stored animus toward my life and situation. I learned that my travel plans into the US are probably going to be completely fucked up by the INSANE weather ongoing in most of the US – shit, it’s warmer in Alaska – which reminds me of the time that I wanted to get to a con which would have been crucial to my development as an SF writer and 9/11 intervened, except this time it’s all expenses paid and guess what, they’ll WAIT for me, as I don’t imagine I’d be stranded more than two days so I’ll still get to do it. I learned that Pearl, Cat Faber’s octave mandolin (ALSO by Peter Cox) experienced technical difficulties and is now in the shop, meaning I do not have an octave mandolin as a back up if United destroys or loses Otto. (And I know that as sad as that might be, I would just ask for the bits back or get Peter to make me another one, him being obliging that way, if remunerated. Who’s to say the replacement wouldn’t be even more amazing?) This means I would have to do the entire concert on a regular sized mando – which I DO NOT WANT – or transpose EVERYTHING to a guitar, which for a couple of songs would be fine and for everything else would probably cause my nervous system to implode – or sing the entire concert a capella, which would be extremely wearing for my audience. I will be taking Lemming’s advice about packageration seriously. I reproduce it below. Jeff invented the word garbarcage to describe when tv shows are shitty because they have too much arc and too little of what we watch the shows for. Eddie is needing fluids at least every other day, he has started to refuse his meds and he’s gone off his food, although he’s still making the trek to the litter tray. Margot has gotten very sucky, which is unusual. I’m making plans to travel after the shop is gone. I found out that the Squamish name for Thomas Mulcair is “Angry Beard” (okay it’s just one Squamish dude who is calling him that, but DID I LAUGH when I read that) and that it’s too cold outside right now for the Lincoln Park Zoo Polar Bear. I’ve been applying for jobs every day, no response. However, I am relaxed about it. What will be, will be. No use flinching or being rebellious. The leathern thong descends whether I’ve been a good girl or not.
Tip #1: Depending on size of body, sometimes banjo cases work for octave mandolin type instruments. Tip #2: A way to save money on a case AND protect the instrument: Call guitar stores in area and see if one will give you an instrument-size box. A banjo box would probably work. Check airline regs for box measurements before proceeding. They’re supposed to allow some leeway for musical instruments. Invest in some bubble wrap. Loosen strings. Wrap instrument in bubble wrap, inside soft case. Wrap case in bubble wrap. Stuff bubble wrap in bottom of box, put in instrument, put bubble wrap on all sides and top filling box, seal box with heavy 2″ wide packing tape, about twice as much as you need. Pack one roll of packing tape so you can re-pack before you leave to go home. Add handle (easy to make one with tape, or tape on a handle, or tie on some rope. Mark stuff on package with large black magic marker “THIS SIDE UP! FRAGILE: DO NOT BEND. CONTAINS ANGRY ELVES WHO WILL HURT YOU IF YOU WAKE THEM UP” or some such thing. Tip #3: First, find out if the planes you’re flying on all have closets. Second, carry the thing with you, in the soft case, but do wrap it in bubble wrap inside the case. Make sure it’s small enough to fit in the overhead. Go up to the counter and ask if they’ll find space in the closet for your instrument. If they’re crazy enough to want to gate-check it, well, that’s what the bubble wrap inside the case is for, but if they do that, ask them if they’ve seen the “United Breaks Guitars” video, nicely. If you have to put it in the overhead, stuff a large coat or something all around it so no one tries to smash it with their luggage. Again, bubble wrap. Bubble wrap is your friend
Oh, and don’t forget the loosen strings part. Most of the time, no difference, but the changes in air pressure in the luggage compartment plus string tension will eventually cause the neck to break at the nut.
And take along spare strings because one often breaks when you retighten.
A good service, enlivened by Rev Deb’s inclusion of both Thomas King and George Carlin. Plus, Beatles, and Dark of Winter, my favourite hymn as sung by the choir. Paul, bless him, is back from his gig in Seattle and gave me a lift to and likewise fro. I sent him forth with chicken breast for sandwiches, my homemade pickled beets (which he adores) and a frozen soup by way of thanks (also he gave me one of his very chiropractic hugs, which by damn I needed!)
Wrote about 750 words on Midnite Moving today.
Practiced HARD this morning. It’s getting close!
Found Keith’s 300$ sunglasses in the couch downstairs. Phoned him immediately and was he glad!
No walkies today. Still a bit nasty underfoot out there. Not like Toronto, though, it’s a freaking mess there.
A*****e McF*****t stood me up for the meet at the shop. Sorry, I’m not in the mood to be charitable. Jeff knows the whole tale and concurs.
Totally took down some asshat on twitter going on about vaccination. The article he linked to said that vaccinations have something to do with infant mortality in the US. ( well they do, just not negatively). The high infant mortality rate in the US has more to do with institutionalized racism and unevenly distributed prenatal care than vaccination, and anybody who says different doesn’t know a FUCKING THING about epidemiology, obstetrics, and forty years of data drawing a line between race and good — or poor — health outcomes. Given that the twitter account is ostensibly an anti racism media site, I unloaded very hard. I do not want persons of colour to put their kids at risk believing this bullshit because ‘da man’ makes bad vaccines. HEAVY HEAVY SIGH.
As a palate cleanser….Cute temporary tattoos!
I am feeling rather wretched about that, but it is what it is. Two other simply lovely things (okay, interesting and fun things) happened today.
The first was the Christmas pageant, which was stupendous (I Augustus Caesar will tax you because I want all the money / we will now take the morning offering) and hilarious (the Christ Child was BLACK suck it haters!) and exceedingly participatory.
The second was me and Keith and Katie and Rob going to the shooting range and blowing holes in shit until we all felt better. It was expensive and noisy and worth every penny. Watching Katie fire a gun for the first time was AWESOMES, since one awesome isn’t enough. And thank you pOp for subsidizing it! I have pictures, which I will share privately.
I tried firing the 9mm but my shoulder said many many rude swearz so I stuck with firing about 3 mags worth of .22. I was not unhappy with my accuracy. My accuracy with the .38 sucked, so I have to assume that heavier firearms aren’t going to cut it until my arm is a lot stronger. I call that motivation.
Peter O’Toole died in London today.
Jeff and I are both crabby, but I still cooked him pork stroganoff for dinner, and he still liked it, so we aren’t being crabby with each other.
Triple amputee zombie pranks Walmart shopper.
Blasted through the last of season 1 Miss Fisher last night. I have a new crush. Nathan Page gets an expression on his face when he’s looking at Essie Davis which is extremely gratifying. Also, as I poked around the internet for more details about him everything I read about him made me think he’s probably a pretty solid customer, with extremely nice legs.
It was midnight before I was in bed… I’m trying to reset my sleep habits; going to bed at 7 is awkward.
Still no repair on internet or furnace. Re the internet, it’s working right now but will probably quit at some point later today, and as for the furnace, there’s no record that the ducts have been cleaned since Mulroney was Prime Minister (bleaugh).
Keith posted this GEM to facebook yesterday: I have a long distance relationship with reality, but it’s terribly awkward when we meet face to face. Given the scansion I think it’s a Keith original.
The landpeers are mowing the lawn – which tells you what kind of fall we’re having since the grass is still growing with unrelenting vigour; I saw a hummingbird yesterday morning – and I walked 5 k today. My feet are singing FUCK YOU in four part discord and my back isn’t much better. Physio entirely KICKED MY ASS and I am more sore in the shoulder than at any point since I broke it. That’s it for physio for me… I can’t afford any more as that was a thousand bucks out of pocket or more sincerely mOm and pOp’s pocket. Anyway I picked up some cables and a tea ball and something to put under Eddie’s dish.
I had brekkie with Katie.
No walking tomorrow, I am very glad to be mobile, and even more glad to be stationary for a while.
Now, some Burn Notice. I am looking forward to some more instruction on the construction of explosive and incendiary devices.
As part of the I need to be sleeping better plan (4 hours with cpap last night…) I have purchased a name brand properly sprung mattress which will be delivered today between 3 and 6 pm.
I have a tremendous craving for fish for lunch. I think I will go get some… something like haddock or cod.
Katie slept over last night.
2020 says I need to replace this freaking mattress.
The day before yesterday I bought dowelling, a pulley, stout cordage and a massive plant hook.
Today I sawed two four inch chunks off the dowelling, drilled a transverse hole through both in the centre, sanded the ends and screw holes, fed the stout cordage through the holes and tied it off, ran it through the pulley and VOILA. I have a shoulder exercise machine with two handles! It ain’t purty but it works. And I cleaned up after myself except for the door lintel, which I should probably do before Miss Moppet drags her way through the debris. She is VERY FLUFFY and staticky right now, and she’s getting matted just looking at me.
Jeff wants the device to be more securely set into the door lintel, and he’s cheerfully fixing that for me now, but I visualized it, bought it, and DID IT. I think I should make a safety cover for it when not in use, some of the men who come through the house on occasion are dashed tall.
Ripped a whole bunch of CDs today, mostly filk, blues and rockabilly. I do like Dr. Crowell; hardly anybody in filk is a music perfesser, so we get a trained voice and unbelievable skill on keys. Sadly, CD Woodbury’s special CD which includes his fine version of My Old School, doesn’t want to be ripped; the drive made a noise that usually presages catastrophic failure in any device emitting it, but I ejected it after an eternity of hideous grinding, and the drive seemed okay.
It’s Remembrance Day. The family tradition is to rewatch Saving Private Ryan, A Bridge Too Far, a Night to Remember or Sink the Bismarck!
Katie has been staying overnight; mostly she’s out hanging with her girlfriends. We all went out to breakfast this morning.
This article goes to a Popular Science link about what happens when you put lego in a washing machine, for science.
I got the materials for my shoulder exercise pulley as well as ordering a new mattress for delivery on Wednesday next, as all of these health considerations move MUCH FASTER when you just go yeah, I have to do that and just quit whining… Now I have to confer with Jeff about where to put the pulley – I’m hoping in the kitchen doorway. Katie came along to keep me company – there are still an excess of relatives at Planet Bachelor. She went out drinking last night and got home late but she’s in a cheerful frame of mind.
Rob is coming over to talk steampunk. That should be fun; we will be reviewing various kinds of fabrics for the purposes of a weskit. (Rob owns more than one industrial sewing machine, which is wootable).
Keith and I have mutually apologized. I must say I am very relieved.
Keith parked in my spot and I yelled at him, mostly because we had a frantic and disgusting drive in from the ferry and I had no spoons left. I still think he was inconsiderate and he still thinks my response was disproportionate.
I hurt my back at the duck pond yesterday (put my feel wrong and hurt the left side L5 S1 area) although feeding the ducks was plenty fun, especially with Lois and Bob in attendance. I told her I was pissed off that she came to Vancouver and didn’t call me, but that’s life when you’re the ex, I guess, and we did have an amazing catch up in Victoria. Bob continues to be so calm and kind and funny and Lois is as she ever was, energetic and fierce and informative and hilarious. She was kidnapping ducks yesterday, my how they flapped until she released them.
Katie made two cheesecakes at the grandparents…. aaaaaand, they’re GONE.
Best night ever on the cpap in Victoria. As always, Katie is right when she opined that my problem with the cpap is no longer the programming on the machine (I adjusted it, it’s fine now) but the total lack of comfort and quality in my mattress. So, off to spend money on the most important six hours of my day today, mattress or bust.
F***** HELL. The light in my bedroom is possessed by Satan.
Much amusement in some quarters that Paul’s girlfriend can’t get up until noon; since I’m no picnic in the sleep department, not to mention snoring like a chainsaw in a bucket of snot, I won’t judge, and I think it has been clearly demonstrated that Paul can tolerate many behaviours in his loved ones, shy of being told what to do. Anyway, Jeff, Paul’s girlfriend’s sleeping habits impacted certain family members, so thanks for the Netflix info, since it allowed certain people to watch tv for 4 and a half hours while the rest of the household was resting in the pale limbs of Morpheus. At least the kids have access here so they can come and go when it gets scary or boring.
I made a list on the ferry last night to try to deconstruct the anguish I’m feeling over certain kinds of decisions. There’s the list of items, the emotional freight each action carries, and the financial implications. I need to go over it again, but is putting COMPLETELY different emphasis on my to do list. I suspect I could refine it further but don’t have to… there’s only so many ways to parse first world problems balanced against, you know, existential threats. Selling the café is obviously a huge boat anchor at this point.
Dishwasher is running. Obviously I should have run it before I left.
I am really looking forward to physio on Tuesday.
Off to do some more research!!
