TIME FLIES WHETHER YOU'RE HAVING FUN OR NOT

 

SO ... ARE WE HAVNG FUN YET?

Yes, I know that it's been the longest two weeks in the life of the Universe.

"Two weeks to slow the curve," they said. 

"Everyone just staying inside your own homes will stop it," they said. 

"Masks will stop it," they said, after they told us not to wear them because they don't work anyway. 

"Staying at least six feet away from everyone else will stop it," they said. 

"The vack-seens will stop it," they said.

Since last February they've said a hundred thousand different things. That two weeks to slow the curve has been going on for a year and eight months for cryin' out loud. At no point during that time has anything they've told us been the least bit of fun. And nothing that they told us would stop it has stopped it yet.

My goodness, how time does fly!

I'm pretty sure I don't have to make a list of all the crap that's been seriously not fun since last February. That's February of 2020, mind you, not this year's February. And for quite a while before that, truth be told. I don't know about you, but I'm getting rather sick and tired of us all not being allowed to just have fun.

Even so, for me at least, amid all the crap, there have been moments of laughter.

I tell you true - just lately we've created our own comic relief, albeit generously mixed with the bitter gall of what we've chosen to laugh at.

LET'S go BRANdon!

clap clap clap-clap-clap

There.

I said it the *nice* way because some folks object to the use of a particular F word, and a whole lot more object to the actual word everyone uses instead of BRANdon. Some college kids started it (imagine that) and it's taken off like wildfire. 

Make no mistake here. The people who are chanting that really do mean it, and not in a nice way. 

At the same time, one can't help but be amused to hear tens of thousands of people all over the United States roaring out that chant. 

It's maybe not all that nice, but it beats the heck out of  killing people, rioting in the streets, looting (aka stealing), destroying property, burning whole sections of cities, jacking up prices on just about everything, sabotaging small businesses and big ones like the energy industry among others, scaring people half to death and cranking their anxiety levels up high enough to put their health in danger, siccing the feds on parents who just want to have a say in their kids' educations, forcing said kids to stay home instead of gong to school or even to church, keeping folks from buying whatever products in the stores that they want with their own money, and picking on people who don't happen to have your exact same point of view.

That list goes on and on and on and is no fun to think about, let alone write about.

Therefore, the moments of laughter are much more entertaining, in my opinion.

Here's one I laugh about now, although at the time it wasn't the least bit funny.

This summer just past, I had set my big tipi tent up in my back yard but not staked it down, and a big wind blew it across the fence into the neighbor's yard so I ran lickety split out of the house to catch it before it took off into the wild blue yonder on its way to Kansas. 

I by golly caught it and was hanging onto it for dear life, fighting both it and that unbelievable wind, when the wind blew the back of my sundress up and over my shoulders so there I was fighting the tipi, the wind, and my own dress, which dragged my hair into my face with it, one more thing for me to fight. That wind was fierce, I tell you. Fierce! I'm not even kidding you. 

I was just hoping the tipi wasn't enough of a sail to carry me clear to Kansas with it when I remembered that sundress was ALL I had on, except my flip-flops but they were on my feet on the ground behaving themselves like they're supposed to. 

Now, a chain link fence isn't exactly a nice solid board privacy fence, so anyone who happened to be looking into that back yard would probably have been laughing. If they were, they were laughing too hard to come and help me, which (not coming to help) is very much NOT in character with my neighbors, so I figure I'm safe in assuming that nobody saw anything. But the point is that they could have. 

It just so happens that next door yard belongs to one of my cousins. When I told him how come my tipi was all bundled up in his garage (the closest shelter, as there was no way I would have been able to fight the battle it would have taken to get that tipi back home and would surely have ended up in Kansas with it after all), he laughed too - and told me I better hope nobody had a phone making a video of it.

Frankly, there has been a lot more tragedy than comedy for quite a while now, so I tend to treasure the moments of laughter. Even if they're at my own expense.

There have been adventures too, but I'll share them elsetime methinks. 

Fun Review Time

I just spent some time going back through some of the early days of SONG - the development of setting, people, accessories, activities, historic events, etc.

Some of the story line ideas got changed along the way, the Characters developed their own personalities that surprised me now and then, and at one point I had to go back through all of the previous books to write in a Character who showed up on the radar of my research out of the blue unexpectedly - but he could not NOT be a part of our Story, so ... in he went! As it turns out, he's ended up being key further down the line, and an all-around favorite of many!

As RICIMER progresses, my mind is already jumping ahead to the Short Stories that are on the horizon.

When I finally quit reining them in and give them their heads, our fictional world is liable to burst wide open with the places and times our Characters will throw at us.

From here on out, once RICIMER is in print, we'll be free to roam at will, wherever and whenever our Characters choose to take us!! Wherever and whenever there's a hearth available for a Story to be told, we'll be right there.

If you're familiar with the younger generations of our fictional family you might have some idea about what we might be getting ourselves into. That's a fair warning that all may not go exactly as planned all the time, and that we could just happen to run into some folk of myth and legend at any time, any place.

Going through the chronicles from back then (not so very long ago but it sure seems a lifetime), all the struggles of today balance with the struggles of yesterday - and one way or another we'll come out of it all smiling.

Busy As All Get-Out And Loving Every Minute

Just lately I really have been busy, even more so than usual.

COME  HELL AND HIGH WATER, the Alianora Books of SONG, are all headed for print and the Younglings are clamoring for attention while Sass and Aine are vying to see which will produce the next set of books for SONG. Caileen, being of a more patient nature, stands by, watching the dispute.

Sass' main 'argument' is that she's technically next in the line up.

Aine suggests that the timeline of Sass might be a bit ... tumultuous ... all things considered. She thinks we all need a change of pace. Plus she's in a hurry to get to the New World, and to take us all along with her.

Danann of Dunnottar, their father, stands with Sass, arms folded.

Sidhelagh of Dunnottar, the mother of the Sisters of Dunnottar, just smiles. Me, I have a feeling she might have something up her sleeve, but she's not saying anything. At all. She's just smiling.

Which of the two will prevail is anybody's guess.

The Younglings, on the other hand, are yammering that they want to be about having their adventures. To them, time and place aren't the least bit relevant. Their adventures take them all over the Spiral.

So there's that.

While Aine and Sass argue their cases, we'll likely tend to the impatient Younglings, which is no hardship by any means. Their adventures are going to be a great deal of fun for all concerned.

Meanwhile, I've been focusing on getting a garden going. For the first time in WAY too long, I've got some things planted, and none of them have died (yet). You'll likely see more posts about it along the way. Look for the Straw Bale Garden posts.

Another string to my harp is working that little calf hide. At the moment it's been mostly scraped (another time or two to go as we progress through the procedure) and is in the 'pickling solution'. The posts about it will probably have 'Tan Your Hide' labels.

There are a few art projects in the works, neglected for the moment but I'll soon be back to them.

And I've been reading my way through the remnants of my collection of westerns, books about the American West, so that I can get them into the mail to my grandboy in Minnesota.

Add to all that a full time job that I adore, people around me who are awesome, Duke keeping me company, getting outfits and accessories done for the Character Collections, adjusting to a very definite change in climate :) ... and the meeting of new friends ... not to mention the things I haven't had time to even get started on ... yes I've been busy.

And yes I've been loving every minute of it.

'Shifting For Ourselves'

Having to work holidays doesn't necessarily mean we can't have our own sort of celebration.

New Year's Day of 2016 sees the swing shift 'Shifting for Ourselves' and having a blast with it.

We're having a pot luck meal, but initial reports indicate it might not be what a person would expect.

Here's a list of what we've got on the menu so far, with much more we won't know until the last minute.

Lasagna,

French bread, 

deviled eggs, 

scalloped potatoes and ham, 

knoephle-kraut-sausage combo, 

banana muffins, 

fresh veggie mix, 

black-eyed peas with bacon, 

romaine with lemon, 

cinnamon cider with whipped cream and nutmeg dash, 

sea-salted caramel bits, 

whole wheat dinner rolls, 

dill pickles, 

chilled shrimp with cocktail sauce dip or lemon wedges,
DOT's pretzels (as opposed to the ordinary kind)

 … for starters … 

There are sixteen of us, eight on each of our Units, when fully staffed (which we sometimes are) which gives us a starting point for knowing how much to make/bring of our various contributions. We've also invited some family members as well as some of our co-shifters who aren't scheduled.

Our supper breaks are between six and seven p.m. with two half-hour slots - about half of us taking the first half hour and the rest taking the second which gives us our timing.

We also, if we can fit them in, have a couple of fifteen minute breaks, one between four and four-thirty and the other if/when we find time around nine which gives us set-up and tear-down time.

So each of us will be bringing whatever we choose (accumulating it in the staff refrigerator for a few days ahead of time when possible) and each of us has fifteen minutes to help with the setting up, thirty minutes to eat as we visit, then fifteen minutes later in the shift to get everything cleared up.

When somebody asks if everyone's invited, from the other shifts and departments, the answer is no. We can shift for ourselves, get the set-up and eating and clean-up done for ourselves, but no we do not have the resources to cover everybody. Nor would it be anything like a good idea to have more than five times our own numbers trying to cram into a space (and time-span) that will accommodate half us at a time in relative comfort but not many more than that.

So we say if day shift, med floor, night shift, and departments want to have their own New Year's Day celebrations, they should have at it. Of course a lot of them don't have to work holidays anyway and we aren't overly concerned about those folk. The rest have exactly the same resources that we do. 

This is our own way of taking care of our own selves. We're making the most of what little time, space, and personal resources we've got, fitting our celebration in between the priority of our work requirements. And it must be said that our people have noticed and appreciated our good spirits in the days approaching said celebration. The anticipation and planning gives us a head start on the fun!

Our shift leaders have indeed taken the lead here, sharing their idea with us and being the first to kick in their contributions. We as a team have been more than happy to make this a creatively festive celebration.

We might not have much to work with, but we can by golly get a heck of a lot done in our bits of break time without making a big deal out of it (although it really is kind of a big deal) and without interrupting the flow of our shift or interfering with the care of our people.

One thing I've noticed is that our choices of contributions fit pretty darned well with our work setting - a health care facility. There aren't many (any) junk food types of things represented, not many carbs, lots of healthy and tasty stuff though! 

We do ourselves proud. 

It's a great way to begin a new year!

Short Stories,Tall Tales, and Such : Live on Kindle : Amazon

CLICK

(or get it on Kindle!)

Rua and the Brownies take on some Pesky Pixies in this book of short pieces.

*laughing*

Got that one finished and thought,'Well, this book is about ready to go now!'

Then had a horrifying thought: I had promised somebody a Tall Tale about Paul Bunyan and Babe - and it wasn't written, let alone in this book. 

So I tagged it on at the end of Rua's story since that file was already open and fomatted for this book. Hurried to get it in, and went to work getting it published.

It was only during the final on line editorial preview that I found I had put Rua's story in twice and Babe's love for salted herring and subsequent thirst was nowhere to be found.

*sigh*

So back into the book's working file I went, got it straightened out, changed the name of the file to avoid confusion, and re-submitted it.

This little book has a lot in it, truth be told.

Elves, 

the first adventures of Renegade, Rebel, Rogue, and Riley 

(and introducing Reckless and her horse Roger), 

thoughts on religion, spirituality, and mysticism, 

a bit of family history, 

some Shakespeare, 

a modern day Sass doing what Sass does, 

a couple of esoteric pieces, 

Giant Worms and Skeeters, 

some French History presented by Sass, 

a bit of an introduction to the PHI Line when Brann meets up with Danann of Perth on the Spiral ... 

and of course Rua's Pesky Pixies!

I'm finally getting a few of these projects filed into the 'Finished' folder, trying to clear my desktop for what's coming up next.

Being as I have a couple of days off from shift-work here, now's as good a time as any to get on with getting on!

And so back to editing I go ... this time I think the poetry book. I keep putting it off because I keep writing poems. That's not really a sensible reason to not get a book published when it's ready to go, you know. There are ALWAYS going to be poems coming, one after another after another. I may as well go with what I've already got, and let the new poems go into a book of their own. What the heck. 

I'm just about back 'on schedule' ... getting closer!

Anyway, look for poetry next I think. Then maybe SNARK if I can come up with enough Snarky things to go into it. I hope I can because the next books of SONG (all of the rest of them, when it comes to that) have to have bad guys in them. Seriously bad. I'm not used to writing such things but ... all I can do is the best I can do with what I have to work with at any given time. I'll give it my best shot.

Mittens From a Sweater

First effort here - don't laugh TOO loud !! 

Here's that purple sweater ... I've got one mitten done so used it as a pattern for the other one. The chalk works pretty well for tracing your hand and then tracing around the first mitten ... 

1) turn the sweater inside out
2) put your hand with the wrist about an inch up from the bottom hem of the sweater
3) spread your fingers a little so you'll have 'wiggle room' inside your mitten
4) draw with chalk around your hand
5) stitch it up - for this pair I used a straight stitch AND zigzag but think I'll try it without the zigzag next time ... 
6) cut your mitten out
7) turn it right side out and see what you think!
8) turn it inside out again and use the first mitten as a pattern for the other one

I made this pair bigger because it's for my daughter and her hands are bigger than mine. If they're too big for her all she has to do is turn them inside out and stitch inside the seam. I also used a lightweight sweater because she said she wanted lightweight mittens, like the light little knit gloves that are all over the place - but she wants mittens, not gloves!

And there you go. Simple. Quick. Mittens.

And it's on to the next project!

The 'Plan A' Post is lagging a bit behind the 'Sometimes You Feel Like A Nutt' Post

I have absolutely no idea in this world why those two posts get more hits than the rest, but am giving them this new little boost just to see if it makes any difference.

So here are links to the two of them. Maybe you can figure it out.

http://shielabranson.blogspot.com/2011/11/plan-moving-along-in-orderly-fashion.html


http://shielabranson.blogspot.com/2011/12/sometimes-you-feel-like-nutt.html

Sometimes you have to do things just for the fun of it, to see what will happen.