1,507 new words today. Onward, onward; chipping away at the plot. Maybe four or five chapters left, now.
I feel rushed, because I’m going out tonight and the next two hours are going to be squished full of fetching boy and cooking/eating dinner and getting ready to go. I hate feeling rushed.
Also, whatever’s chewing away at my back can take a hike.
Liam woke up at 5:20 this morning, which means I have now been up for six hours. I’m stiff and creaky and nothing’s flowing. He’s woken up crying at odd times every couple of days this week; I wonder if the molars are doing sneaky secret molar-stuff under the gums.
And this morning I bid a sad farewell to Knick-Knack, the best cat with whom I ever worked. May there be plenty of BBQ Ringolos for you to mooch in the Summerlands.
The problem with being virtuous and not buying cookies or ice cream while grocery shopping means that there’s never anything sweet in the house to satisfy the sudden violent craving that hits now and again.
Which makes me cranky while fighting said craving.
And sure, I could bake cookies, but I did that the other night. I’m snacky now, not an hour from now.
In her ongoing efforts to inspire more environmentally friendly living, ai731 has created a meme!
Here’s how it works:
A. Copy the list below to your own journal and
Bold the actions you are already taking
Underline the actions you plan to start taking
Italicize the actions that don’t apply to you
B. Add one (or more) suggested action(s) of your own
C. Leave a comment to her original post, so that she can track the meme to your journal, and copy your suggested action(s) back to her master list. In a couple of weeks, she’ll post again with the expanded list, and possibly some comments about the most (and least) popular actions.
1. Replace standard incandescent light bulbs with compact fluorescent light bulbs [We’re doing this as they burn out.]
2. Choose energy efficient appliances [As appliances require replacing, yes.]
3. Wash clothes in cold(er) water
4. Turn the thermostat of your hot water tank down to 50°C (125°F) [It’s a bit higher than 50, actually, but it has been turned down significantly.]
5. Install a programmable thermostat (or turn the heat down over night and when you’re out of the house) [The latter.]
6. Register with the Canadian Marketing Association’s Do Not Contact Service to reduce the amount of junk mail delivered to your house.
7. Eat less meat (particularly feedlot beef) [We eat mostly chicken anyway, free-range when we can get it.]
8. Walk, bike, carpool or take public transit as often as possible [This one is difficult with a baby/toddler who only has a finite amount of time between meals/naps, since public transport tends to take longer as the trip isn’t direct. If we do go out in the car we go as many places as possible to reduce the number of trips out. If we’re traveling long distances, we try to fill the empty seat with another passenger.]
9. Make sure you know what can be recycled in your area, and try to recycle as much household waste as possible [We’re really proud of this one: we realised a few months ago that we’re down to one small bag of garbage a week, and we need a second recycling bin to contain all our recyclables properly.]
10. Compost using an outdoor compost bin or an indoor vermicomposter [We do this more in the summer, but we’ll be building a better composter next to the house this year to facilitate winter use.]
11. Clean or replace filters on your furnace and air conditioner [n/a — electric heat, window-unit a/c which is vacuumed regularly while in use]
12. Buy local, organic or fair trade food where possible
13. Reduce air travel [I think I’ve travelled by air once in the past five years. If we’re not traveling by car, I prefer the train.]
14. Wrap your water heater in an insulation blanket
15. Use a clothesline instead of a dryer whenever possible
16. Plant a tree
17. Buy fresh foods instead of frozen (Frozen food uses 10 times more energy to produce) [I prefer fresh in general anyhow, and try to freeze my own]
18. Keep your car tuned up and your tires inflated to their optimal pressure
19. Use biodegradable dishwashing liquid, laundry soap powder, etc. [Just started — yay!]
20. Drink tap water (filtered if necessary) rather than buying bottled water [I usually carry a bottle of filtered water from home with me, but if I do have buy bottled water while I’m out, I save the bottle and refill it at home.]
21. Turn the tap off while brushing your teeth
22. Unplug seldom-used appliances and chargers for phones, cameras, etc., when you’re not using them
23. Plug air leaks and drafts around doors and windows with weatherstripping
24. Switch from disposable to reusable products: food and beverage containers, cups, plates, writing pens, razors, diapers, towels, shopping bags, etc. [We do this as much as possible. We use cloth diapers/training pants half the time, and disposable the other half. Cool thing: we used fully biodegradable diapers for the first couple of months after the boy came home.]
25. Consider garage sales, Freecycle, eBay, or borrowing from friends/family before buying a new tool or appliance [This just makes sense — what’s the point in buying something you may only use once or twice if you can borrow/rent it?]
My suggestion:
Carry reusable bags with you when shopping. [I try to do this, I really do, but my success rate punged like a stone once the boy joined the ranks of those who go shopping, because I’m so focused on getting him and his gear out of the car that I’m lucky if I remember my shopping list, let alone the canvas bags in the trunk.]
Okay, upon rereading the meme I see that this kind of slots into the general suggestion of #24, so here’s another one:
Showers use less water than baths do.
There are 2,316 new words in The Moments of Being Pandora. I wasn’t aware that they were piling up like that. A pleasant surprise, after feeling like I was working uphill all afternoon.
Also, there have been four and a half loads of laundry done. Go me! And two more small meals eaten. Yikes.
After an entire frustrating morning of having my Owldaughter server down, it’s back. A slew of spam has just been released through my site-related e-mail accounts, but not a single bit of e-mail I was hoping for — namely, shiny and effulgent messages of “We loved your editing test, please work for us!” from at least one of the handful of jobs I’ve applied for over the past two weeks.
Teh Sicque is still dogging our steps in this house. After dealing with HRH being under the weather for the past handful of days, and Liam dealing with whatever it is that almost-twos deal with (like molars you can’t yet see and frustration with limits and the desire to brush tiny teeth seven times daily and disinterest in food other than crackers and the need to watch a movie over and over and over again when we’re limiting TV time), I find that today I’m quite tired. Liam’s regular Monday with the caregiver was switched for today, and I’ve done some writing, but it’s going so very slowly and I’m fighting deep physical exhaustion. I’ve eaten twice since breakfast, but I’m still flopsy. I’m loath to go curl up under the afghan and doze because then I’ll feel like I’ve lost the day. I don’t even have a good book to read, although last night I pulled Patricia Wrede’s Snow White Rose Red off the shelf to be reread when I finished the latest Nora Roberts fluff with which I was distracting myself. Actually, I don’t really want to read, which alarms me.
I’m also experiencing stupid little crises centered around how I feel like I’m only pretending to be a real writer, and if I’ve published three books shouldn’t I feel different, and have more to show for it? And if/when my fiction gets published, will that better validate my work in my own eyes? Who knows. The mice in the wheel that powers my brain can take a break, though, because I feel like I’m chasing my own inadequacies in circles today.
If it weren’t minus 33 with the windchill out there, I’d go for a walk to clear my brain, get a drink, and perhaps treat myself to an Easter Creme Egg.
I have no idea what to do for dinner this evening. My meal creativity ran out last night.
Back to work. I’m going to start skipping scenes in Pandora and expanding the ones that exist in note form. I’ll go back and bridge them later, when I have the energy to write transitions properly.
HRH: Home in bed. The gastro has struck back with a vengeance.
Liam: Home. There is unpleasant roommate upheaval at the caregiver’s.
Me: Oh look, a rush editing job just landed in my inbox.
*headdesk*
Thank goodness we had a nice visit with the ADZO crew yesterday to have provided me with some sort of break. Liam discovered sledding and loves it with a violence heretofore reserved only for Mermy and Thomas.
Also: BSG? Well done, destabilising the viewers.