Wednesday, with Heat, And Battle Won

Monday night, as we were about to go to bed, T. wandered outside.

“What’s going on?” thought I to myself.

“Whatcha doing?” asked I.

“Checking the heating oil levels,” quoth he.

“Why’s that?”

“The boiler isn’t burning.”

Brr!

We made the executive decision, after reading up online, to call the boiler repair people to come in the morning, rather than pay for the emergency service. After all, we’ve lived with furnaces that shut off randomly before.

Our house loses ~1 degree F an hour. So the morning was cold but not unbearable (57F, down from our normal 68F)

When the repair guy came… turned out that our oil had gelled. *Facepalm* So… cost us the cost of a visit from him, and that’s it. And, luckily, we got our oil/kerosene delivered yesterday, so we have a higher kerosene mix in the tank now.

Yay, adventures in home-ownership!

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/196177.html. You can comment here or there.

Monday after Giddy Sunday

Dec12

I’m into work stupid-early this morning because there’s, in theory, a VIP coming in at some point. On the other hand, I get to leave early too!

This weekend was awesome! Saturday was a lot of housework – finishing painting the trim, moving the old sink out of the utility room, that sort of thing – not as much painting as I’d wanted but still productive.

Sunday, we took a long drive (go to the bottom of the lake, turn right. Go to the top of the lake, turn left. Go over the top of another lake….) to a place called The Wizard of Clay that does awesome pottery and has for over 30 years (My parents have housewarming gifts from there).

On the way back, we hit a few wineries, including Four Chimneys, which is a teeny tiny winery with some really awesome wines. I <3 living in wine country!!

In other news…

ysabetwordsmith has posted some more poems from the fishbowl, including “The Leaning of Life”, from my prompt.

clare_dragonfly has posted some more fiction from her Garden of Prosy, including The Other Side of the Gate, from my prompt.

meeks has posted a sketch dump, including a sketch from my story “Creeped Right Out.”

and

anke is calling for prompts, with a theme of “horror or dark fantasy”

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/196007.html. You can comment here or there.

Tuesday with PLUMBER!

Dec6

Guys, I’m SO EXCITED!

As we speak, the plumbers are either on the way to or at my place, fixing the baseboard heaters, the shower, and the sink that needs to be removed.

THIS MEANS that we can get the carpet installed!!

It also means that we need to get off our butts and do everything else for the bedroom, namely:

Finish painting all the trim
Case and trim the window. Trim the door.
Sand the door & contemplate painting it
Figure out how to do the closet
Cut and stain the closet pieces
install the closet

Guess what I’m doing for the next two weeks!

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/191073.html. You can comment here or there.

Friday, Bruised

Dec2

An informal survey of my friends suggests that this week is fired.

Love to all of you, and the weekend is coming.

On my own front, I managed to give myself a shiner (black eye) (well nearly) by walking into the back of a bike rack. Ow! Missed my eye by less than 1/2 an inch… glad I’m not shorter!!

(The sort mounted on the top of the car, sticking out the back by a couple feet…. grumble)

In positive news, I FOUND A PLUMBER!!! So soon, I will be able to shower and then we can have carpet and maybe be in the new bedroom by the end of the year!!

This weekend I shall paint trim, and maybe start on building the closet.

meeks has posted a preview of an illustration she’s doing for Mother-Tongue by jjhunter.

ysabetwordsmith is hosting 2011 Winterfaire at her journal.

(very belated) If you haven’t checked out HaikuJaguar‘s bazaar, I strongly recommend you do so.

ysabetwordsmith‘s Fishbowl will be this coming Tuesday. The theme will be “chocolate and other foods.”

And my Giraffe Call will be two Saturdays later, 12/17/11. The theme will be “Gifts, gifts, and the Gifted.”

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/188886.html. You can comment here or there.

Thursday, Giving Thanks

Nov24

It’s Thanksgiving here in the States (though I’m really celebrating more on Saturday).

I have tried, in the past to list something I was thankful for every day of November. This never worked really well, since I’m not very good at keeping with such things.

So today, I shall give you thirty things I’m grateful for.

(1) My husband, always my beloved T. Things would not be good nor awesome without him.
(2) My new friends, particularly daHob, Capriox, and Cluudle, with whom this past year would have been a lot harder
(3) My old friends, particularly E.Mc., for never not being there, and Eseme, for reading nigh on everything.
(4) My parents! I know I’m more lucky than many in that regard.
(5) Awesome internet people – artists like Djinni and Meeks and Micah and writers like Ysabet and Rix and Clare and readers like Anke and kelkyag and yes I know all those categories overlap.
(6) A job that pays the bills and leaves us some left over for fun
(7) HOUSE!! House house house house house!
(8) Lovely little car that goes zoom
(9) Triple-A, and not having to use it.
(10) Wildlife, and not hitting any.
(11) Lovely Drakey kitty, and his health. happy fat kitty!
(12) the internet. Seriously. It makes life so much more connected and so much more … well, fun. Easier. Recipes!
(13) Okay, another things gratitude: appliances that work. really work, and well.
( ) Did I mention HOUSE?
(14) Living in a country where one can speak a dissenting opinion legally.
(15) The right to vote.
(16) Having the same rights across the board as the guy next to me, regardless of said guy’s gender, race, or religion.
(17) Awesome internet fiction
(18) Awesome print fiction
(19) (with overlap) Awesome readers, who give support and feedback
(20) The skills and knowledge to do what we need to do with the house.
(21) Parents we can call on when our skills and knowledge fail.
(22) My grandpa’s hammer – and everything that comes along with it.
(23) A good, free education
(24) Public libraries
(25) I live in a lovely town, I really do
(26) I live in a lovely state, too
(27) I’m blessed with people. Just across the board.
(28) My aunt is in remission from cancer. My uncle is in remission.
(29) My father, despite failing to quit smoking, is in good health since his heart attack.
(30) I had a grandmother who loved and cherished me very much while she lived.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/184249.html. You can comment here or there.

Monday, monday, Monday!

Nov21

Woosh! I have paint everywhere!

This weekend, I finally got out the paint sprayer and started painting the bedroom.

This thing takes a little more getting used to than I’d hoped, but it seems to work very nicely. Next time? Wearing a face mask.

We also: trimmed the lilac making horror-movie noises against the gutter, cut apart an old, broken kids’ pool, T. planted some garlic, I painted some window trim, and bought cider without, for the first time this year, getting lost.

Oh, and made butternut-bread-casserole for dinner. Om nom nom nom!

Painting the bedroom makes me feel like we’re moving along somewhere on this thing. T’s gotten a lot done – this weekend he also cleaned up the pantry/basement stairwell quite a bit, pulling out 2 dozen old canning jars, too, from the crawl space, and over the week he discovered that our dining room is painted over old wallpaper (ack).

All in all, a very nice weekend.

How have you all been?

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/181879.html. You can comment here or there.

Hump Day!

Nov16

Yesterday was mellow, getting-over-sick and somehow writing 4025 words (woo).

We made “pumpkin” “pie” for the first time this season, one of my favorite desserts.

(make pie custard with butternut puree, then pour into a casserole sans crust and bake. Nom! Also much lower-calorie that way).

We bought a nice Dremel for T. to do some work with, and he enjoyed making wood chips all over the living room.

(The situation: the “card room” is a small former-porch-maybe, 8’x8′, off the living room, next to the bedroom. Its floor is 4″ higher than the living room, and will hopefully be lowered next year. Its ceiling was just a scoootch lower than the living room’s, the difference covered by a styrofoam wood beam. We removed the beam to find that someone had cut off the wall studs about 1″ lower than the ceiling. So to cover the hole smoothly, we needed to saw off these Very Very Firm Studs. hence, tiny Dremel saw!)

(Also? Tiny Dremel saws are awesome.)

((Also? I finally have a Dremel and now I don’t want vampire fangs O_O))

I posted 100 more words on the linkback incentive (LJ) for ysabetwordsmith‘s signal boost, but I have a feeling I’m missing some. 550 words = 11 linkbacks.

And, since the prompts stay open until I write the last prompt, I’ve still got two to go!

On LJ – http://aldersprig.livejournal.com/316593.html
and on DW – http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/170868.html

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/177469.html. You can comment here or there.

Monday and still a little sick

Nov14

Good morning. My throat is raw, but that doesn’t stop me from typing!

This weekend was full of painting (trim for the bedroom, inside and out) and mudding (bedroom), shopping (bulk food store, mostly for spices (we were out of cinnamon) and the Asian market for garlic to plant (yes, we decided to go with store garlic and hope for the best). It was also the Giraffe Call and working on nano, hindered by my body continuing to declare “sleep time now!”

This week, I am hosting at poetree; if you’ve been reading 1000 years or so and there’s a poem of mine you like & think I should share, please let me know.

Michikip is hosting a Free Icon Day!!

cluudle has been posting some delicious fiction; go read!

And ysabetwordsmith has up a poll for fishbowl themes

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/174189.html. You can comment here or there.

Friday Morning

Nov11

Been sick for a couple days, which throws everything off. Sort of moping around eating too much – not a good idea while trying to diet, but the carrot cake was really, really tasty.

Hoping for a productive weekend, though. There’s stuff I want to do – now all I need is the energy to do them!

We missed the window for buying garlic to plant in the local stores. Buying it online is shipping-expensive. But it’s one of those things we use a lot of, and being able to plant it would be awesome.

Looking at this icon – I haven’t knitted since we moved. I don’t know that there’s time around nano, but maybe in December I’ll start again. The newest Knitty’s out, and there’s stuff in there I want to knit.

This post is kind of all over the place – which suits my mood, too. Not really a bad mood, just a random one.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/170477.html. You can comment here or there.

I do believe it’s Thursday, Right?

Nov10

Yesterday, a 70F day in mid-November, I stayed home sick (actually sick, but mostly a mild office cold I was trying to beat before it was no longer mild), wrote 3500+ words, over 2100 of which were for my Nanowrimo, and sorted the last of the apples.

I need to get back into the swing of house stuff before it’s too cold to do anything, but the plumber prospects are at least looking up.

Newest house weirdness: it appears that, sometime along the line, someone actually taped the drywall corners…

…wait for it…

…with masking tape. *facepalm*

ysabetwordsmith is taking ideas for future fishbowl themes here.

And if you have not yet read her epic Igor’s Creature, I strongly suggest you do so now. Right now. Go. I’ll be here when you get back.

meeks has worked her magic again, and it’s thematic to my nano!

Go see her sketch of Autumn, updated.
(and on LJ).

And Rix_Scaedu has two amazing new pieces up:
Tales Behind The Verses: Between Eighteen and Nineteen – Part 1 and Astrith.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/169674.html. You can comment here or there.

Alder's Grove Fiction

The Worlds of Lyn Thorne-Alder

Archives