It took six days but…

My hand has finally stopped hurting. I was getting into bed last night and I didn’t really have to think about where to rest my hand. It was also the first night where I didn’t slather that hand in Voltaren, or consider taking a pain reliever to go to sleep. Mind you, I had about five or so shoveling sessions, so I don’t know if that helped or hindered the process of healing my hand. Who knows. I still don’t even know how I hurt it while sleeping. One of my life mysteries at this point.

The sun is out again! Yay! Which is nice. We’ve reached the last day of January, and I’m not really sure how. Felt as though this month just sort of drove on by without stopping. All that rain, and plus ten weather was awful strange. Not that I enjoy the minute thirty that’s coming in Feb, but a little normalcy could go a long way. Sounds as though we are to have an ultra cold Feb. So snowpants & neck warmers it is then!

Just about two weeks until Valentine’s Day, so take heed, and grab a card now, while you don’t have to rush, or throw elbows to get the last decent card on the rack. Still reeling from Christmas, so I’ll chill out this year for V Day. We have bags of old chocolate eggs & hearts in the pantry, so perhaps we can limit the candy we give the kids. Hell, we still have a full box of Halloween candy laying around the kitchen, so yeah – we’ll put a hiatus on candy purchases until Easter I guess. Our skin will thank us later on.

Yesterday was Domestic Duties Monday, so I was a bit busy getting things around the house cleaned up for the week. Putting clothes in the wash is one thing, but sorting and hanging it all up is another. Not my favourite part, the sorting & hanging. Oh well. Could be way worse. Could have to hand wash all these clothes, towels and bed sheets. Glad I don’t have to do any of that! Yay for appliances!

Almost done my sixth book, it’s a bit off the beaten path, so I’m sure the ending will explain it all, but as it stands, right now I’m a little confused. Is it time travel, a time loop, aliens, a mental condition, somebodies coma induced jumbled dream? I just don’t know, it’s a little weird. But as the last book in a trilogy, I kinda need to finish it to see where it all ends.

Superbowl, and the whole production that surrounds it.

Well both the AFC, and NFC divisions have declared their winners, and both the Eagles and Kansas City are Arizona bound for the next Superbowl. Will I watch the game? Yeah – most likely. Am I more eagerly awaiting the new commercials, half time show, and all the lead up, build up to the actual event? Yes, yes, and yes. The game will be nothing new. They don’t spontaneously play an altogether different game, or use all new rules, so it’s just another Sunday football game for those playing the home game. Except you can bet on the length of the national anthem, the coin toss results, and any manner of other things related. It can get pretty rabbit hole(y), and ridiculous. But if you’ve got pizza, wings and nachos at the ready, an entertaining afternoon awaits you!

A solid foundation of snow accumulation.

It started snowing and it just keeps snowing, more and more, centimeter on centimeter. When will it stop? I don’t personally know. Hard to predict the weather, and the weather men’s best guesses need to be taken with a grain of salt. So suit up, replenish your fluids. Slather on the Voltaren, and just keep on digging out from under it all. Happy Sunday! Football game this evening, so I’ll get my shoveling out the way now, so I can sit back and watch guilt free tonight. Perhaps with a beer or alcoholic beverage in hand.

The face for radio, and a voice for silent movies.

Also, no set, nor ring lights, mics, or a script. So I won’t be knocking on Hollywood’s door any time soon with my own miniature terrain building show. Though the YouTube market place is flooded with them already. Great ones, good ones, and everything else in between. Epic builds, dioramas, water effects, painting gurus, everything under the sun oh my! Rock moulds, static grass applicators, tufts, and pre-made flowers, rocks, sand, screed and multi coloured grouts. So many options for paints, and finishing styles. You can go ultra realistic, campy, grim-dark. Washes, glazes, over sprays and dry brushing. So much content on all of it. I like watching people make 4 x 8ft boards that have various zones of scenery types. Mountain range, valley, river bed, open water, temple ruins, an open field, stands of trees, bridges… the list can be endless. I’d make it all, if I could. I build mine on 2 x 2ft plywood squares. It was meant to help me store them, but I keep them all together in the basement. I have plans for four more boards to complete my designs. But where can I possible put eight feet of terrain in my house? I can’t do it. Going to have to wait until the kids get older and we sell off, donate a whole whack of childrens gear. Clothes, toys, change tables, tool benches, and tote boxes worth of accessories. Going to be a while. Also, I want to build my own over sized gaming table for the basement, so having that would help out too. I’ll make mine with a deep inset pocket so that I can put toppers on to cover our games/puzzles that are on the go. Very much Wyrmwood inspired that way. Stay classy San Diego.

In the arid desert they drink the blood of goats…

Mixed with their milk. Just a small knick in the artery and a skin with some milk in it, and away you go. Handy, straight from the beastie beverage. Not quite a Shirley Temple nor a Ceasar, but in the harsh reality of the desert, a refreshment worthy of kings. Not my tempo, but sure, you do you. Adapt or die I guess. I’m thinking that they don’t dress it up with celery salt around the rim, or a lemon wedge garnish, or perhaps a tiny paper parasol poking out the top. No thanks, I’ll pass.

Well, we did it, we made it through to another Friday. Congratulations to you all. It was tough out there, didn’t know if we’d make it. Some didn’t but, life goes on, and the big wheels keep on turning. We have here now, however briefly, a blue sky and some sunshine. Looks good glistening off of all that new snow we have. I was told there would be more either tonight, or on Sunday. My hope is later tonight, like in the wee hours of the morning. I don’t have to be anywhere tomorrow, so I can take my time to clear it on Saturday morning. But if it snows late Sunday, then I have to get cracking first thing Monday morning. To which I say boo! Boo-Urns! Boo, boo! To you. Not that the weather cares one whit about what I want, and why should it. I am simply giving my opinion.

Makes me wish I had a side by side with a plow on it. Like a *V* blade plow, that I can shape shift and be real nimble with when clearing my driveway. That’s overkill obviously. I live in a smaller suburban community, so I don’t have a kilometer long driveway, or homestead grounds to maintain. Would be cool if I did. But then I’d have a heated shop/studio space, and lots more to do around the property, and in this fantasy situation, I’d be ridiculously wealthy, and tell no one, but there would be signs of it, I’m sure. Buying property, and a side by side plow would be a dead give away, but you know, whatever. Yeah – I know a tractor would be better, and far more versatile, I’m just spit balling fantastical situations here. Jeez! Gosh!

Finished book five yesterday. I didn’t even look back at the Bob Evans book. I went straight for the Adrian Tchaikovsky novel. The last part of a trilogy. Hope it’s good! The first two were pretty great. So good I picked up two of the three available parts of a different trilogy. I eagerly await the last entry in that series too. Even though I’m off to a cracking start to the year, I know my interest will wane, and my focus wander. Soon it’ll be warm enough again to be in the wood shop during down time. I have my model kit about 45% built, so that’s moving forward, albeit a tad slowly, but progress is being made little by little. I think the resin kit may continue to remain shelved for the time being. Oh well. Also, I have done (0) zero work on my children’s illustrated book this year, thus far.

I haven’t had anywhere near the same amount of downtime as in years previous. I used to have between 9 & 11 weeks with nothing. So far I’ve only gone about six days without getting anything new in, which is astounding. Those down periods were in effect prior to Covid, so I’m just as excited about all the new work as you are shocked to hear it. How long will it last? I don’t know. But I’ll ride it out while I have it!

According to my back, that felt like twelve inches of snow – if not more.

Why oh why must it all come at once. I’d have been just as happy with three days with four inches of snow each. But no! Gotta dump at once. With more coming on Friday evening. Might make the Saturday birthday party a hassle to get to but oh well.

I gotta invest in Voltaren or A535 rub, or Icy Hot or something, because I need that shit more & more as the years progress. Three sessions of snow shoveling, and each time it was wet, heavy and deep AF. Plus the wind chill was up today, minus 1 feels like minus ten. Cheeks are feeling it this morning, lordy lordy. I will say this though, all that shoveling seems to have helped my hand from yesterday. So that’s good news, to me atleast.

Lots on the books today to accomplish, so I best sign in and get to work. Ciao Bella.

Clear signs that I am aging.

Slept on my hand a bit funny last night, and it woke me up around 2:00am, and kept waking me intermittently throughout the night. Feels as though my body weight shifted some bones in my hand. The use of my thumb and pinky finger together is nearly impossible this morning. A very prominent ache sings from my knuckles to my wrist on the three fingers furthest from my thumb. The tendons ache as well. Brushing my teeth was so bothersome I switched to my other hand. I know that if I sit on either foot I can cause myself some momentary aches and pains, but three or four hours of sleep has really left a mark on my right hand this morning. I slept poorly afterward because I couldn’t find a comfortable position for the hand so that it didn’t hurt. I may wind up being a grumpy sob today. I’ll try to keep my mind on something other than the throbbing pain in my hand. So, yeah – aging is fun. I’ve got that going for me, which is nice. Ha.

It’s bothersome, sure, but I don’t imagine it’ll last more than a few days before it subsides or disappears altogether. Lesson learned. Don’t sleep on your hands! And other timely lessons I am bound to learn in the coming years. Such as, don’t let the Tums run out. Have aspirin on hand, buy a decent medical/emergency kit, own atleast one tourniquet, fix small problems before they balloon into giant costly ones. Simple things like that. Experience you earned by being dumb, so now you seem old and wise regarding your experience with such things.

Wednesday, humpday, middle of the week, day. All of the above! Snow is inbound. Snow is imminent! How much snow? Yeah I don’t know. I need to look it up. But the white stuff is coming to town once more, so warm up those shovels, and keep the Voltaren handy! Looks like a few days of constant accumulation, so don’t leave it all for the last day, but don’t rush out there right away, you’ll just wind up adding one additional shovelling session to your to-do list.

Finished book four, a good ways into book five, and then it’s back to the Robert Evan’s old Hollywood autobiography- again. And that means I have until the end of June to finish it, and still maintain my schedule for 12 books in a year. I would like it to not take that long, but it could if it had too. Though, not to lie, if I don’t finish it in another week, I’ll swap out for the Adrian Tchaikovsky book I got for Christmas, and will read that instead. I have a feeling I’ll still be trying to get to the end of the Bob Evans book around Christmas of this year! Ha. Can you imagine.

I bought an N.K Jemison trilogy that I’ve heard rave reviews of, and they look long(ish), so I can’t be dragging my feet if I want to complete the reading list. As a new to me author, I’m not sure what to expect. Will I fly through it, like a John Scalzi, or Michael Crighton novel, or will I slow walk it like a Stephen King, or a George R R Martin tome? I hope that for my sake they are fast and exciting reads. It’s great to finally find and add a new good author to the list. However to do that, you do wind up reading some less than stellar stuff too. That’s the gamble. Rave reviews by people you wouldn’t like don’t mean much. Have to pull those reviews from trusted sources, which can be difficult these days. Is it paid? Are they friends? Are the blurb authors from the same publisher? Do you trust the judgement of said blurb authors? All sorts of things factor in. Have they given you good references before to find books you enjoyed? Or did their previous endorsements kind of suck – at least in terms of your own interests. But I digress.

In positive news I don’t need to buy my books as large print just yet. My eyes, at least for now, seem to be holding up. My hearing is dog shit, but it’s been that way for a huge portion of my life. I do – *technically* need at least one hearing aid, but they are expensive, and I try to get all of my briefs, and change requests in written form, so that staves off much confusion from accents, speech volume, or ambient room noise that I find distracting. Also leaves a paper trail of why changes were made, and whom asked for them. Also, I don’t have an immediate boss, so I don’t need to listen to anyone talk on the daily, and that relieves stress in my life like you wouldn’t believe. Probably why I dislike books on tape so much! And why I watch the bulk of my movies and tv shows with the closed captions on.

Huh, aging, ain’t it grand! Ciao Bella!

Dribble, drip, drab, dram, & drop. One of these words is not like the others…

Tuesday! It is here, and the sky is grey – again. A real Debbie Downer of a winter. I now realize why I was so happy and excited for the sunny blue skies last year. It’s because we usually just have this drab grey monotonously neutral coloured sky. These shades of grey do not inspire any sense of joy at all. But a beautiful blue sparkly, twinkling winter’s day, omg, that could be one for the story books. The gloom really does add a layer of suck, to an already dreary season. All the leaves, and flowers are gone, the colour sucked right out of the everyday. No green vibrant grass. The trees are all grey/brown, the streets are grey, the side walk, curbs, and gutters grey. Ugh! Hideous. But a big, bold, open crystal clear blue sky adds so much to a regular day. It’s a shame we do all of our lights based holidays before winter really gets going. January & February need their own lights show extravaganza of a holiday. Otherwise it all looks so damn bleak. Boo!

Almost done with January as it is. Not much longer and we’ll be looking at Valentine’s Day, then March Break & St. Patrick’s Day, then Easter, then the May 2-4 of Victoria Day, and by then POW! All the colour has come back, and lawn mowing is a thing, same with park play dates, bike riding, skateboards, and playing catch on the lawn. Spring, Summer and Fall are far superior seasons to our southern Ontario winters. So much more to get out and do! Bring it on!

Oh, reminds me. I need to sort and hang up all of yesterday’s laundry. The cycle, it never ends!

I had to put a pin in the Bob Evans book, to read something a little more contemporary & light hearted. Just opening up more space to get through it all, by reading other books from this years list now, which are shorter and less dense, as the length of the Evans book might take me a while to get through. I don’t want to miss my twelve books in a year goal, by getting slowed to a halt by one of the longer, and more densely written autobiographies. So, I figure when I feel it start to drag, I’ll put a pin in it, pick up another book that I can finish quickly, then go back to it, knowing that I haven’t squandered all of my time by not being smart about it. If that makes any sense.

Old Hollywood is intriguing, but – so many names, and places, and people, and actors, and motion pictures, and studios to keep track of. I have to look many of them up to get a sense of what he was gossiping, or spilling the tea over. My knowledge of Pre 1980 Hollywood is pretty bare bones to begin with. I thought this book might ignite something like an renaissance of old movies for me, but not really. At least not yet. I like it, but it’s longer than a good chunk of my other books, and even after reading seventy-eighty pages at a go, it feels as though I’m making little to no headway on finishing the damnable thing! It’s like the page count is growing as I’m reading it. Ha. I know it’s not, but it feels that way to me.

So I’ll detour for a day or two into some Fantasy realm type stuff, then hop back into the autobiography. Bim, bam, boom!

Oh!, are we doing this again? Ok… um… let me think. Hmmm…

We started off Domestic Duties Monday with a blitz! Had to rush into Markham for an oil change and get gas for this evenings extra curriculars with the kids. Lots of running around to do each evening from now until April or so. Then I hope we can cut back on something, for May & June. Though as the weather clears it isn’t so bad doing all this evening running about, playing chauffeur, papa coach, cheer leader, and equipment manager. So today includes, dishes, laundry (gotta keep all of these uniforms clean, and organized), vehicle maintenance, recycling gathering & sorting, and getting my day job projects off for approvals. This DDM is going to be chock a block with things to do. So much to do, so little time!

I’m super happy I don’t have to add commuting into the mix here, or a micro managing boss. The PA Day on Friday was a bit strange, as we couldn’t do much outside as there was little to no snow, but I hope that will change for the February 3rd PA Day now that we have snow on the ground, with an expectation of more to come. Hell, I even had to shovel the driveway, and paths to make way for all that should be coming later this week. Hopefully not 18 inches in one dumping, but eight to ten inches over three days wouldn’t be awful. The kids love making snowmen in the yard, or throwing tiny snowballs at the house as we mockingly shake our fists at them through the windows in faux outrage. Get some mileage out of their snow suits, and the yard too! Goes untouched for days or weeks if it’s cold but has no snow in it.

Took the kids for a walk at the mall to stretch our legs, look at stuff, then pick up lunch to bring home for all of us. We kept it together for about 90 minutes. And you know what? I’ll take it. No fights, no squabbling, no tantrums, and we all wore our masks, and got a warm comfortable stroll under our belts out in public. And, what’s better, about 80% of the people we saw, outside of the food court were masked up, so I was pretty happy about that. Lots of decorations up for the lunar new year, and we loved to see it all. Lots of red and gold accents. And lots of rabbit imagery which my kids enjoyed. A great lazy Sunday mooch about. I hope to one day be able to spend the whole day walking Square One in Mississauga, have lunch, watch a movie, wander around just looking at stuff. Perhaps shop for an item or two. Spend some quality time with my kids on our own, as my wife “HATES” to walk around a mall aimlessly or to go shop in person. I like it. I loved it as a kid, and I love it now. Beyond food, and maybe buying a new book it wasn’t to spend money, but get out, to walk in comfortable temperatures, watch people, and see what’s new in fashion and other things I don’t really keep tabs on anymore. Plus if we can work both a lunch, and a movie screening into the deal that will give my wife six to eight hours of alone time to nap, or work, or read uninterrupted for a change. I think the kids are still too young for an outing of that length, but over time we can build up to it. That would make me happy. Maybe in the late spring I’ll try for a day at Wonderland with the kids, see if an amusement park can bump up their daytime outing hours? Possibly. Depends on work, but I think I can swing it!

I must have been talking in my sleep – to myself.

Because I would swear up and down that I had the perfect topic to write about today, and that I came up with an exceptional title, and had several points I was going to cover, and now I’m here, and… – blank. Damnit! It’s right there, on the tip of my brain, I know I went over it a bunch of times. Had to of been a very convincing dream/partial waking moment. I don’t know what to say. Oh, oh that sparked it!

I was going to write about how in my dreams I misremember the way architecture looks about places I have spent a lot of time, and over the years (after leaving) I have the same reoccurring dreams that utilize this new, and fantastical designs for the school campus, that when I go back after a few decades I’m shocked to recall just how off my dreams of the places really are. And it’s really very offputting. I have a terrible memory for picking out the year that things happen. Unless it’s really recent, or super huge, like getting married or the birth of my kids. But other life events, no chance. It all runs together in a big muddy puddle. That’s beside the point. I convince myself after years of the same dreams about places, where everything is somewhat similar to reality. Like the entrance to rooms, carpet, tiles, cement structures are very much real, but my dream moves them into new layouts or positions on the grounds, and after repeat exposure I become certain that that is how it actually was. But then you go back and it’s like – oh yeah!, my dreams totally rearranged things, how could I forget! What else am I misremembering? You know, do I recall things about other people that are cobbled together from real actions, but are attributed to the wrong person/people? Am I misremembering things that I think I have/not done? Makes me wonder. Is any of that normal? Also why am I dreaming about these regular places but giving them fantastical redesigns, and then sticking with the redesign when I recall things that have happened there? Did I dream those things that happened too? No, I have ticket stubs, photos, uniforms, text books, pages of notes, and various diplomas and certifications as receipts for being there. It’s not a delusion. Ha.

I bet that if you visited all of the universities, colleges, and training centers I have attended, and those I just visited (like U of G or U of T) you could stitch together photos of real spots to recreate a mosaic of much of what I misremember these places looking like in my dreams.

Otherwise today is Sunday January 22nd of 2023. We had a very light sprinkling of snow last night, the temperature is hovering around minus three, which is warmer than it should be. Usually by now we get in to the late teens, early twenties of below zero temperatures. According to ten years worth of facebook memory posts that is.

So I did have the conversation with myself in bed this morning. It must have occurred right as I was in the middle of coming to though. Ha. What a way to start my day. Ciao Bella!