Laura

The Friday Five: misc

2025-11-07T17:51:32Z

https://thefridayfive.dreamwidth.org/145281.html

1. What’s harder to live without, chocolate or alcohol?

I was about to say chocolate, because I cannot stand the taste of alcohol. But honestly, while I love chocolate and would like to have it, rubbing alcohol is actually useful for its purpose, so I might have to go with that. (In the end, absent disinfection needs, both can be done without. As far as food, I vastly prefer chocolate. But.)

2. Does the colour yellow remind you of anything?

Daffodils, the sun, and not much else.

3. Who most annoyed you last week?

Me. Look, forgetting to do things and scrambling to catch up isn't fun.

4. Do you have a cutesy romantic nickname for your partner (or previous partners)?

That is between me and him. I do have cutesy (but not romantic, obvs) nicknames for the kids. And I will not share them either, because they would be rightfully annoyed.

Kala and Maria, however, are "kitchen kitten" or "chaos kitten" or "mighty huntress" (Kala only) or "sili-cat" / "silly cat", among many other things. (They are not kittens. They are still kittens. Chaos kittens go zooming through the halls and then launch, still at running speed, to the top of the cat stand.)

5. What is your favourite Stephen King movie?

This one's easy. I don't like horror in general, but I do like _Firestarter_ which...walks a line, a little bit, at least in movie form. Mostly I'm not a Stephen King fan, but that movie I do enjoy, on occasion.

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The Friday Five: DW

2025-10-17T19:14:19Z

https://thefridayfive.dreamwidth.org/144587.html

1. How long ago did you join LJ (or DW)?

Oh heck I do not know. I joined Dreamwidth in 2009, but LJ...LJ was before that. My parents were still alive, and in fact also joined LJ. My earliest entry is from September 2005 so I'm going to guess around then, maybe.

2. How did you find out about LJ (or DW)?

A friends-group I was part of on another site moved over there and told me about it. I can't remember which site it was any more, some kind of diary site.

3. If someone introduced you to LJ (or DW), is s/he still on your friends list?

At least some of them still are. I don't know if they still use it, but they're still there!

4. Have you introduced anyone to LJ (or DW)?

I have definitely brought over some other friends in time, some of whom have already moved on (maybe all of whom). I've mentioned it to more people without ever knowing whether they joined.

5. Is your LJ (or DW) public or friends only, and why?

Some posts are personal and are locked to friends-only or even to a subset of friends, either for my own privacy or that of my family/friends. But most of the casual babble (like this) is public. I'm trying to post more often but when I do I'm happy to chat with whoever / about whatever or be seen by anyone who wants to. And some people who know about my journal don't have an account. I doubt they check in much either but if they want to they are welcome to.

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Back to (as) normal (as we get)

2025-09-25T15:01:20Z

Scott's jury duty didn't sort out as quickly as I hoped, it was a significant trial and they spent three days on jury selection. Which was a bit stressful because I wanted answers. In the end, he was not one of the selected jurors, so our schedule goes back to normal now. For which I am very grateful, the morning routine is easier with two adults on it!

Tomorrow is a day off for everyone. Not sure what we will do with it. Except I will be returning the cans because the drop bin for bags of cans is usually pretty empty in the mornings. Really I should have done it at the beginning of this week, except see the morning routine with only one of us home!

Also tomorrow I get my flu and covid shots. By Monday I should be back at my normal, but it's going to be another "I love vaccinations but I hate the after-effects" weekend, probably.

Worth it.

One of the cats made an odd noise this morning and I was worried they'd been hurt, but investigation just revealed they had found a spider. Poor spider. Generally I don't mind spiders, they are doing good in the world, but I'm not going to rescue them from a hunting cat in their own house either. Presumably it's been eaten by now, that is the usual fate.

Better than the things a friend's cat eats! He's needed surgery before to get bits of foam or plastic out. She's watching him to see if half a noseplug (swimming) comes out safely at the moment I believe...hope he retains his health, but not the noseplug. Yikes.

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Friday Five, a day late

2024-11-23T22:20:34Z

1. What is your favorite childhood memory?

Hard to say. There are many good ones. Time with my parents and the cats at home is definitely up there, but picking one is not easy.

2. If you could be reincarnated as anything besides human, who would you want to be?

A cat. Preferably a pampered housecat, but even as a feral, I think it would be interesting.

3. If you had to start your life all over, what are three things you would change?

I would write down more things in the moment to help jog my memory later (which I nevertheless still don't do often enough). I would spend more time just talking to my parents. And I'd try to be more courageous about changing jobs more often, rather than staying as long as I did. That has worked well for me but meant I've gotten to do fewer different things than if I'd moved on more often.

4. If you had to forget everything in your life, except one thing, what would it be?

There's no good answer to this. I mean, if I remember my self but nothing else, does that drag along all the how-I-became this way? I think the best answer would be "my family" just because it's pretty broad and I wouldn't want to forget them, but then that implies forgetting non-family friends which just no....

5. Do you have a lucky charm?

Nope. Sometimes we have them for a bit when the boys beg and I'm feeling like a sucker, but otherwise, nope. (No, I don't have one the way the question means it, but how could I pass up a chance to make it about the cereal anyway?)

Questions post

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I swear I still exist

2024-11-11T19:50:27Z

...though I surely don't post like it. October was lovely and I got a lot of things done around the house and taking care of family health. The numbers are working out for me to just stay home, not go job searching. This doesn't preclude my jumping all over a job if someone points it out and it sounds fun/fascinating/interesting/whatever, but the bar is definitely high there, for now. The work itself would have to be worth the time given up to it, not just acceptable in return for money.

Handy, since our youngest has been home sick from school since Halloween with a nasty cough and fever. Negative for flu, negative for covid, negative for patience. Two doctor's appointments this week (the first was 'probably viral, he should get over it, come back if it is not gone by Friday'; the second was Friday). He's on high-powered antibiotics for it now so we will see how that does.

So far either none of the rest of us have caught whatever it is, or we recovered from it easily. (I *think* I may have actually caught it last weekend? But if so, it didn't last a day for me. Maybe I was just having a bad day; who knows?)

I need to find my cute reusable advent calendars and prep them (I need to start finding them now because I am not sure where I last put them away!) - the boys expect one, and I've been buying pre-made ones the past several years, but that costs more and is less personalized, and this year I have time. So that'll be fun.

Maria (tuxedo cat) managed to get some kind of bacterial or fungal infection on her right front paw, so the vet removed all the fur between her paw-pad and toes on the underside and she's been getting an anti-almost-everything cream 2-3 times a day. About half the times I put it on it's uncomfortable for her, and she growls very seriously - the warning rumble of a cat who is about to shred you if you don't stop. For the entire time I'm putting it on. Without following through on the threat. She really is a fairly well behaved cat.

However, it may or may not do the trick - the ointment - because she's SUPPOSED to be in a cone to keep her from licking it off. It took her two hours to figure out how to remove the cone the first time. Second time she did it in under fifteen minutes and it took us until the next day to find it. So I bought one of those orange-shaped donut cone substitutes. Very cute, off in less than half an hour. So I gave up and I cuddle and pet her for a while after most doses (sometimes she leaves too rapidly) to distract her and hopefully keep it on long enough. Statistically I can get her to be petted for longer than the cone or cone-substitute would stay on.

If I call the vet and they want to see her again to check it, I'm gonna say "I told you so" to the cat. And then I may just order this, because it has me giggling a LOT and I don't think she could take it off:

https://www.amazon.com/EMUST-Recovery-Breathable-Adjustable-Alternative/dp/B0CQX832HN/

Sadly the one with the green body suit, which is more accurate and cuter IMO, does not come in a size other than large, and Maria is not large for a cat.

It's finally rainy. I know the state of the world isn't what I want it to be, including climate and weather systems, but it finally feels like a proper fall here all the same.

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Trying to post here more.

2021-08-08T22:40:05Z

Not that my life is very exciting lately, but that's a GOOD thing. After breaking my knee in December and all the stuff that followed, boring is good.

I'm working (going into the office now, but wfh is supported - office is optional and masks in the office are required whenever not in your own office by yourself). I'm arranging the usual bunch of before-school checkups and appointments for the boys. At least right now, they theoretically have school - and mandatory masks - starting in September. I'm waiting to see what happens with that and with the numbers.

Only our youngest isn't fully vaccinated; he's too young for the current approvals. Of course, vaccinated is still pretty vulnerable to delta and sharing it with others, even if not to severe disease. I don't like this pandemic or the way we've dealt with it so far. :P Darnit. :P

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I am tired but mostly grateful.

2019-10-11T01:57:00Z

It has been a very busy week. But the parent-teacher conferences went fine, the appointment went fine, the benefits info for open enrollment this year at work was boring*, we had a team lunch and I was able to order something off the menu adjusted to be fine for me to eat (and it was tasty).

The road construction today was very much Not Wanted - I ended up parking at Graham Oaks and walking to the school (which is about a 5-minute walk) to pick the boys up from their school's-out program (which is at the school). On the other hand, they are doing the stretch in front of the schools today and tomorrow, when they are NOT open so it's just Club K attendees and some staff affected. It was originally going to be Tuesday and Wednesday next week, when it could have snarled up the afternoon school buses (among other things).

* Open enrollment info SHOULD be boring, in my opinion. It's very, very rare that any excitement around the open enrollment is good. I mean, if they want to do something exciting-but-good I won't complain, but I also won't ask for it unless it happens. But I do like to avoid exciting-because-it's-bad news. :)

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Sometimes parenting is just getting up early

2017-10-24T13:57:42Z

(Actually, despite the subject line, I got up at my usual time! I just didn't go into work right away, but woke Andrew up and helped him get ready. I'll work later this afternoon, and get the same amount of time and effort in.)

WHEE. Both boys have a field trip today's; Andrew's is long. He had to be at school at 6:45 (an hour before he normally has to be there) and will be back at the end of the school day. But he got up early (when prompted, but without any difficulty getting up), got ready, and actually had time to play games before he had to go out the door.

Ian is awake and mostly ready; his bus to school isn't for another 20 minutes yet. (Their field trip is three hours start-to-finish, so no early arrival for him.)

I suspect the third grade gathering at 6:45 is partly due to how many things they're packing in, and partly due to the fact that they're headed up the Gorge - which means about a 65 mile drive each way, and that they're running the same direction as commute traffic for the first 25 miles or more. I wouldn't want to do that at 8 am, either.

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Fireworks

2017-07-04T15:51:04Z

That was a good idea AND a bad idea. Last night we went to the fireworks at the Oregon Garden. The garden itself is lovely, supposed to have a good fireworks show, and it was the only one in the area on the 3rd that I could find. I didn't want us all up late and exhausted before going to work/camp/preschool tomorrow. And hey, music from 6 pm while we wait, too.

I knew we'd pay for it in the food on site being marked up (which it was, and which we did), and with leaving at 10:30 and having to drive an hour home.

What actually happened: we joined others who parked at the remote lot and bused up. (We should have tried the main lot, it wasn't full yet. Oops.) Anyway, the evening was nice, the fireworks were glorious, and then at 10:30 we left. The music continued for another hour, but again, hour drive.

Shoulda stayed for the music. Because according to what the guy doing announcements said just before or after the fireworks (I forget which), there were 6000 people there. And a goodly number of them all left when we did.

And the buses had trouble getting through because of all the cars in the parking lot leaving. And a laaaaarge contingent of folks needing the bus left when we did.

We finally got to our car at 11:45. We would've gotten there about 5-10 minutes later if we'd stayed for all the music..... WHEE. (Well, maybe. We also might have missed the last bus, because I'm not sure how long walking down would have taken us.)

Scott ended up carrying Ian for the last 10 minutes of the line, and the entire bus ride, because Ian was too tired to stand up and walk when the line moved, and as you might expect from that description, as soon as Scott picked him up he fell asleep on Scott's shoulder.

They have an on-site hotel that you can check in to and enjoy and watch the fireworks from there, and some year we may do that. But we also may just take July 5th off next year and go to Canby's show. They have a lovely show, it's just on the actual 4th.

Last night was gorgeous, though. Very tired. But gorgeous.

(And nope, for once I did not take photos. I wanted to strictly watch the fireworks and I did.)

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Be what you wish for the world

2017-05-28T17:24:21Z

Today, I re-shared on Facebook something I also shared three years ago - an image of someone giving a cup of coffee to a homeless person, with the statement, "The world is full of nice people. If you can't find one, be one." I added, as I shared it, "This. And if you can find one, be one anyway. The world is full of nice people, and that's something we want to keep going, please."

Yesterday, I needed to go get potting mix. Which meant I was at Home Depot on Memorial Day weekend, which is really not when I would prefer to go there. The parking lot was a zoo. I saw someone start backing up then look THEN stop...just before he would have collided with the woman who had been walking behind his car before he put it in reverse. He DID stop and wait until she wasn't behind him. She was about to return her cart to the corral; I was returning mine and offered to walk hers over, after that incident. She thanked me...and was partway across the same space when she had to backpedal hastily to avoid being hit by the flaming idiot who came into the aisle (it was about the fourth space in) and headed for the space at a decent clip, slowing only a little when they realized SOMEONE WAS WALKING THERE.

When I left the parking lot, I had trouble getting out because of the lines of cars, and someone cut me off when they could visibly see I'd been waiting longer.

All this is to say that I was grumpy, agitated, and very nervous about people in general as I left. And I made a conscious, deliberate decision to let people in. It's too easy when we're grumpy to just go auto-pilot through our day and not delay it any further. After all, I'd already been delayed and worried and bothered! It felt good to be kind instead.

This is not I'm a saint. I'm pretty cruddy at this, actually. But I still do it. Because that's the kind of world I want to live in. Because it feels good.

I'm not saying that being nice or kind or standing up is always easy. Nor that it's always safe; in some circumstances there may be objective risks that outweigh being nice in your circumstance.

( Side note about a good-samaritan case where two of them died, recently in the news )

...but often it _is_ simpler than that. What if you let someone turn out of a driveway during heavy traffic? Let someone with only a couple items go ahead of you in a grocery store? It's a small thing. Maybe all it does is brighten their day. Maybe it actually makes their life much easier than you realize. But if "all" it does is brighten their day, and _they_ go on to interact with the world more kindly....

Well. Many big things are built of lots and lots of small things. Not all. But many.

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Thought for the day

2017-05-01T02:46:09Z

Hope is a verb - an action, not (just) a feeling. It can be a choice.

That doesn't mean it's easy, but it does mean it's possible.

(So is getting to bed on time, if I get back to what I'm supposed to be doing, so I think I'll post this and get back to the evening chores.)

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This is a little bit of nothing....

2017-02-23T04:29:09Z

...but I <3 <3 <3 inline commenting on my reading page.

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Seriously, weather?

2017-02-02T02:25:29Z

So, the current forecast says we're probably getting freezing rain again tomorrow night after midnight (so Friday morning really).

At least it's supposed to thaw off Friday instead of hanging around forever, at least as far south as we are. And who knows? Some of the "storms" we were supposed to have had, barely materialized or not at all. Another was way worse than predicted. I guess we'll see what it looks like when we get there!

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I think I may be winning....

2017-01-30T02:23:55Z

I think my anti-sinus-infection measures are actually hitting it back. It got pretty bad yesterday and this morning, but...I'm doing better as of about noon. Morning will be worse again, it always is, but...maybe just maybe I don't need antibiotics here. That would make me happy.

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Politics

2017-01-29T04:42:30Z

( What it says, not too long )

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Little tasks done, medium tasks done, little landmarks

2017-01-24T02:58:50Z

Andrew's registration fees for the after-school enrichment courses this term is paid. And Ian's kindergarten registration is filed now, and I can forget about it for the time being. Yay! It's different from when Andrew entered kindergarten, but not by a lot. No choice of half-day or full-day (it's all full-day now) and no fee for full-day. But now you need a form that they've had a dental and vision check. Before that was not required (although Andrew had had both; they simply didn't care if I had proof or not).

Also today, Andrew's backup pair of glasses arrived. He likes them, though hopefully he won't need to wear them often.

Tomorrow I have a meeting at Ian's preschool. Wednesday I have my annual physical (and have to fast for it, because blood tests), and Andrew has a dental appointment in the afternoon (which Scott is handling, fortunately for my ability to get work done). Thursday will hopefully be the day that I pick up Apple. Friday we have the gaming group over in the evening.

Saturday I may hibernate. ;)

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Seriously, Mother Nature?

2017-01-16T15:18:05Z

So, we were under a wind advisory as of last night. (Which I largely ignored, but with everything frozen it may not be good for trees/power lines; at the same time, most wind issues here are not a big deal for us personally.)

And starting Tuesday evening through Thursday, we're under a flood watch. (Because after dumping 8+ inches of snow on us, the temp is going to go rapidly up, the snow level rise to 7000 feet or more, and it's going to pour rain down, thus melting most or all of what we got.)

And then, some time last night or early this morning, they posted a winter storm watch for tomorrow, 4 am to 6 pm, because the rain is going to arrive before the freezing leaves.

Yes, we get one last bout of freezing freaking rain. If it materializes. Now, the warning time is for the whole region - where I am, it should rise above freezing at 6 am.

So we'll have water over ice if all this happens. GOODY.

Bets on school starting on time Tuesday? Because I'm thinking we'll be lucky if it's a two hour delay.

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You know, it's just a webcomic....

2017-01-11T04:35:49Z

...and thus in the grand scheme of things this is nothing. But Kevin & Kell, which I normally enjoy quite a bit, is annoying me with the current Lindesfarne-is-pregnant storyline.

First, she throws up, and that's what clues her in that she's pregnant. Because, you know, she couldn't just have the stomach flu or anything...and everyone pregnant throws up. (Pro tip: nope. I never did, with either boy, although there were times when I decidedly didn't feel well, _after_ I knew I was pregnant both times.) I realize this CAN happen and DOES happen to some women, but it really annoys me that it's such a *thing* to do it that way.

Second, they blame it on her quills. You're telling me that a college-educated scientist who was carefully planning to delay children (it's come up before!) was not using ANY form of birth control except condoms? Knowing she was a quilled species???

Third, clues go out everywhere and they realize their relatives are going to all find out, so they announce it and let everyone come over and hug her and horn in on her business.

This last is moderately realistic, and REALLY ANNOYING. This kind of BS claiming of a right to be over-involved in someone's private life, is not okay. And they shouldn't have to share the news before they've even seen a doctor, if they don't want to. Not one person appears to feel bad about this mess. Even Lindesfarne. It'd be more realistic if she was spitting quills.

I'll be interested to see if they lose the baby. They won't, of course; it's a webcomic, and that'd be too deep. And also, the artist would be accused of using a harsh reality for cheap attention. But at the same time, that concern is exactly why so many women don't share their status until later in the pregnancy....

Apparently I need to take a break from the comic for a while. Since I'm glaring at it instead of getting a few seconds' amusement out of it.

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Whee!

2017-01-02T04:21:46Z

Today also brought a late-afternoon unexpected hailstorm that blanketed the roads, sidewalks, etc., in a carpet of snow-like white. Except when you got close it was little tiny hailstones. (About 4-5 needed to achieve a pea-size.) And then, apparently, it laid a thin layer of snow down on it while I wasn't paying attention.

I cleared the front walk, the driveway where Scott would need to access his car and get it out (the man is still on crutches; his purple cast is awesome, but he should not have to slip-slide to his car, and it's possible we won't go above freezing until Friday per some forecasts - but not others, at the moment), the sidewalk from where we set our trash cans to the community mailbox bank. I started with the mailbox bank once Scott could get to his car, actually, no one needs to get hurt getting their mail. But there's a whole stretch in front of the yard I haven't done yet. I was tired, and it was dusk when I started and flatly dark when I finished. (Well, as far as sun in the sky status. There's a perfectly fine street light just across the street, so I could see what I was doing.)

Since the temp was still above freezing then, it had a chance to melt somewhat. But no worries, it should be refreezing now....

Tomorrow is a holiday for our workplaces and the kids' schools, so hopefully given a day things will straighten themselves out a bit and we can resume work on Tuesday without too much winter-weather-drama.

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Happy New Year!

2017-01-01T19:30:16Z

I have been moaning about 2016 for a while, but honestly? Most of my objection is that it piled a good chunk of things on top of each other in the latter part of the year, especially the holiday season. This is not to say there weren't sad and even terrible things this year, because I can't type that with a straight face.

But 2016 did have some good times too, and I'm glad for those. I'm glad for the snow gamely trying to cling to the lavender and the cars out front. I'm grateful for Scott's recovery which is going well. I'm glad Andrew is enjoying school and Cub Scouts. I'm glad Ian got to move to a great new preschool with more outdoors time/space, which he is loving. I'm glad I made a little time for photography. I'm glad for some new recipes we've found that we enjoy. I'm glad for the good friends who were with us physically or virtually (or both) this year. I'm glad for sharing, and smiles, and pears. I'm glad for tea, and kindness wherever and whenever it manages to creep in.

I'm glad for improving my accountability and tracking of various things, including budgets and to-do lists.

I'm also glad for sleep. I hope 2017 will manage to be a good year - I'm a bit worried about it, but I can't do much of use about those worries at this very minute, so right now I will just hope - but however much I hope that, I still let it ring itself in last night. I watched the ball drop for midnight on the east coast, and then I finished chores and went to bed.

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Well, THAT was an odd interlude.

2016-11-20T19:31:42Z

A few weeks back there was noisy construction activity at the corner of the apartment complex near our house. We had not been notified of anything, but I thought nothing of it: while our back fence and theirs are adjacent, this was -nowhere near- our house, being a tenth of a mile away and around a corner (4 houses down or more depending on which side of the street you use to measure, because of the curve).

After a couple days it was done and was clearly a mini fenced-in dog park in an unused corner of the grounds, under the trees. Black chain fence enclosing it, bark mulch laid down, etc. Not huge; big enough for small dogs, less-active medium dogs, and maybe large dogs who wanted to nap off-leash. I don't think the complex allows large dogs in residence, so this is probably the perfect size for their residents. It was not very pretty, but it wasn't ugly, and I am always glad for more off-leash areas to discourage people from (illegally, but it does not stop them) having their dogs off-leash on sidewalks/in parks without such an area/otherwise in the open).

A week later, we got a notification from the city of a retroactive permit request for construction of the off-leash dog area. Apparently they did not actually request a permit, and someone turned them in (it was very visible from the street, so I suppose almost anyone who has cause to come down here could have; while there are not too many houses down here, there is one senior center, and so rather more people than a dead-end street would otherwise see). I mean, I assume so, although it's possible they went "oops!" and filed the request on their own?

2-3 days ago the fence was gone, the bark mulch and underlying weed cover done, and then the bare ground was re-seeded.

And yesterday's mail brought the notice of administrative decision from three days ago denying the permit.

Before undertaking construction, know your local permitting requirements and follow them. You...would think the management company for a large, established apartment complex would already be aware of this.

I imagine the residents with smaller dogs who had been using it were, however, disappointed. I feel bad for them. I didn't mind the dog park, and had it stayed I would not have minded. They got a nice new thing...and then in days to weeks after it opened, poof, it went away again.

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Post-election, what I ask or hope for....

2016-11-09T23:40:56Z

First, I supported Bernie. Absent Bernie, I supported Clinton. I find Trump's win as worrisome at best, scary at worst. That said, he _is_ now President-elect, and I have to live in this reality and not another one.

That's my bias. This is not, however, going to be about that, but about what I hope we will all - regardless of how we voted - act _now_. If you'd like to skip over the rest of this post, ( here's a cut tag, but I hope you'll keep reading )

* This is actually my one sticking point. If you supported Trump to upend Washington DC, or because you liked other parts of what he said, or because you hated Clinton - I don't agree with you but I'm not going to argue it. At this point history will sort that out. But if you supported Trump or wanted to support Trump because you think people of another race, or of another religion, or of another gender, are less-than and should be treated as such?

If that's the case, please unfriend me. I'm not unfriending anyone over politics. I will unfriend over bigotry if it's there.

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Well, that was not much of a storm here, thankfully.

2016-10-16T04:40:51Z

The high wind warning was originally to expire at midnight, but they changed it to expire at 9 pm. We did have some pretty good gusts and Scott (who took the boys to a friend's birthday party this afternoon) tells me there were some tree branches down, but it was nothing like as bad as the worst-case scenario.

Here.

The coast had a really brutal time of it. The Portland NWS issued *10* tornado warnings (previous record, at least as far back as 2005, was 2...). I could then claim they were being alarmist because of the forecast, except that there actually were two confirmed tornados on the coast. (One in Manzanita which did a fair amount of damage, and one near Oceanside that...wandered on to the beach and that was it. Thank goodness for that, at least.)

Meanwhile, I planned my cooking to hopefully have everything done before the hours of likeliest power outage. We didn't have a power outage, but we did have a yummy lunch and dinner, so that worked just fine. :)

And hey, it spurred me to get some chores done early, which means I have a little bit of flexibility in my weekend for tomorrow. (...because we didn't do anything outside the house except the birthday party, today, and I was home doing chores and cooking during that....)

My house is warm and safe and comfy, my family is secure in it. The boys are asleep and after a bit more that needs to be done, I will be.

For this, I am thankful.

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Books: Mercedes Lackey, Hunter and Elite

2016-10-09T00:51:15Z

So, I've been reading this series. I wasn't actually too impressed with the first book, and yet I enjoyed it so much that I needed to read the second, and now I definitely need the third. This is VERY typical of my experience of Lackey, whose tropes are some of my own favorite mind-candy.

That said, these books are not so awesome in terms of continuity. Friends who know me: I spotted continuity issues on the first read-through.... Yeah. Not good. I cannot really explain them without spoilering things to heck and back, but there are blatant continuity errors. Largely unnecessary - you could achieve the story without them.

But the underlying story - assuming you like Lackey's favorite trope of a young person who is All That And More - is pretty fun and the world is fascinating.

What I really do NOT understand is all the complaints about Joy - Joy is our main character - and how she figures things out and how come no one else is.

( I don't think there are spoilers here, but my generalizations might let someone who then read the series figure things out ahead of time here and there )

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CSA fun

2016-05-19T01:19:31Z

Well, the boys were "okay" with their eggs and pleased with their garlic bread tonight. Didn't get them to eat the salad. (Didn't try hard, either. WHY do people love "spring greens"? I consider eating them a necessary evil when they're what I have, but if the taste were any sharper, I could've used it to cut the garlic bread.)

We are getting a CSA share from OurTable this summer: http://www.ourtable.us/news/springsummer-local-food-boxes-week-3 was this week's.

Garlic bread made with the white part of the garlic and a whole lot of butter (and a loaf of Italian bread from the store); eggs cooked with the green garlic (for the boys and Scott) or with zucchini, some radish greens, and a bit of choi (me, because cannot have garlic); and, urgh, spring greens in a salad.

Not too shabby. I'll enjoy eating the actual radishes tomorrow, and I have another serving of my eggs and another of theirs left over. And enough greens for argh. They were really generous with the salad greens.

I'm actually looking forward to "oh GOD they planted ZUCCHINI" season because I love all the options zucchini provides. I realize this makes me a freak. But...we got our first zucchini this week. YAY. (Extra yay, because joking aside, that means we'll lean more toward strawberries in a future week, and if you ask me if I want 'extra strawberries' or 'extra zucchini' to be a thing in a week that already had some of whatever-it-is, well, extra strawberries are more-appreciated by the rest of the household and equally appreciated by me, so. But I also have a lovely chocolate-zucchini-muffin recipe that will probably get some play time this summer. Tonight I didn't have the energy for it tho.)

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