Almost Doing It Again

I’m considering a weekly schedule, mostly for “hello, I’m breathing” sake. Posting daily at DUF takes out much of the oomph to post here too.

Lee ended up being much alarm about nothing really. But if I hadn’t prepared for no electricity, the power would have gone out. Only lost one tree on the border of the lawn and the woods and it didn’t hit anything. The enforced quiet time to work on Stellar was a boon I’ve missed in the weeks since—especially this week.

Last weekend I spent with Eric and Suzanne and the break was worth the havoc on my sleep schedule.

This week the home computer is being a pain in the butt. McAfee Security Center developed a tick that I had to contact tech support over (the program came free with the new computer). The fix last night doesn’t seem like it held and now the computer is freezing up the first program opened. Before leaving for work, when I should have been working on budget stuff, Quicken froze up so I told the computer okay, it could reboot and examine the RAM. An hour later it was still logging off. I have no idea what I’m going to find when I get home, but I’ll be running Malware Bytes or something else to see what I’m missing. Unless some of the RAM died, I should have issues with it this soon.

Paying job: 312 lawsuits to go before the backlog of paid for dismissals will be finished. I’ve promised myself the day after I finish them is a vacation day and now it’s easier to slough through them.

Project 333: There’s fifteen days before I switch my current closet for the October, November, December set. So I should probably analyze what isn’t worth saving in this set. I already killed one set of sadals. There’s a skirt I never wore once. Thinking about this reminds me of the formula developed by What Not to Wear for putting together an outfit: “love, like, plus bling squared.” I’ll have to use that as a fine tuner for the next set.

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Tropical Storm Lee update

Haven't lost power yet, so maybe we won't. *Knock on wood* But the storm is going nowhere quickly, hovering on our coast and in sending feeder bands of rain. They issued tornado warnings yesterday, but I never saw weather that bad at my house. The center is around Morgan City, but it is very undefined there. The feeder bands are now stretching from Tampa, FL to Louisiana.

The back bedroom leak has nearly filled the bucket, so I need to use a lull and dump that. The kitchen had a few drops when I woke up yesterday morning, but since I spent most of yesterday writing at the table, I never saw more water pour in. The back porch yikes. Even the light fixture had water running over it. I need a new roof, but I can't complain too bad about the water. We need it to put out a marsh fire near New Orleans and my yard is soaking it up like a sponge.

I finished crushing all the cans to get a little exercise during the lulls and to make sure the porch wasn't going to sling junk at my parents' house. I got my words done for NPI and have reached Chapter Eight in the rewrite of Stellar Gift of Death. Today's plans: laundry, dishes, Stellar Gift of Death rewrite, vacuuming, any other housekeeping chores I've put off, paperwork, cleaning up the book list project that I put on hold, and I think that is enough.

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Don't Know Why I want to Remember This

On the old saw that “relationships take work”:

I think of this in terms of maintenance vs. repair.

All relationships take maintenance, just like cars. For a car, you have to put gas in it, and change the oil, and wash it, and get the engine checked, and rotate the tires. If you don’t, your car will stop running, no matter how good a car it is.

For a relationship, you have to treat your partner with respect and kindness (even when you’re tired and stressed, or mad), consider their needs and wants as well as your own, pay attention to how they’re doing, speak up, respectfully, when you have a problem, and listen honestly when they do the same. You have to make time and energy for you as a couple — date nights, pursuing mutual interests. And if you pay attention to maintenance, when a serious problem does come up (and it does), you have the foundation to weather it.

On the other hand, “relationships take work” should not be used as an excuse to do the relationship equivalent of buying a 20-year-old beater with faulty brakes and no floor, and pouring all of your money and energy into trying to get it to run, because you’re never going to get a reliable car out of it.

If your partner doesn’t care about whether you are happy, doesn’t regard you with respect and doesn’t think there is a problem (or vice versa), all the work in the world isn’t going to make a healthy relationship out of the two of you. If you have to work to put up with them or enjoy their company in the early stages of the relationship, it’s unlikely to improve.

As a corollary, sometimes it’s a great car, just not one that serves your needs. If you have four kids and live in a snowy climate, you’ll regret buying that sports car, no matter how good it looked.

J. Carolyn Hax Sept. 2, 2011 Column

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Really, it’s Friday

Blogger is trying to roll out a new interface. I tried it, got aggravated, and told them my complaints. So I’m not rehashing here but it is a good opportunity to make sure all my labels are more appropriate to the titles before the old interface goes away. For example, “Zy’s Novel” is now “Stellar Gift of Death” and I decided on “Zy Universe” for a series title (as far as DUF in concerned—this is no reflection on what the books may have).

Already getting rain from Lee as I drive into work.

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Tropical Depression for the Weekend

Looks like I better cancel my weekend plans and bunker down. Craptastic, I better ask what are the contingents for NPI.

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The BookWorm