When will things finally get back to normal?
What is normal?
I think I'm going to have to readjust just what that is for us.
So what's been happening in the last while?
For starters, Dh has been home for over 2 weeks now. He's been able to work from home for most of that, at least, but some days he's had to medicate more then others, and at that level, it affects his ability to think clear enough to do his job. He's in a bit of a bind. Either he takes the meds to treat the pain and can't work, or he doesn't medicate so he can think clearly, but the pain leaves him with absolutely no patience at all and he becomes very ... snarky. *ahem* Yeah, that's the word. :-/ He's been forcing himself to get outside, even though he's not really improved, just because he recognises that he has to get out and about.
Unfortunately, even when he isn't working, he's still usually on the computer, since that's where he can sit that is least painful on his back. A downside of this is that, because of how he has to sit, plus the constant adjusting to relieve pressure on his back, it's breaking our new office chair. We bought the best we could afford, but we knew it wasn't going to last long. The type of chair he needs is going to cost many hundreds of dollars. Yes, he has a prescription for one, but it's the sort of thing he can claim at tax time, not through insurance, so we have to have the money up front. *sigh* We'll just add that to the list, along with a new CPAP machine.
It's been extra hard on him lately, since his sister has been going through some tough times and he isn't able to be there for her. Even if we could scape together the money to send him out, and get the time off work to do it, he wouldn't be physically able to take the trip. He might be able to handle a flight, but not without crippling himself by the end of it.
He knows being home has completely disrupted our routine. Well, mostly my routine. I haven't been doing much writing at all lately. This at a time when I'm starting to do writing that will pay. Not anything that requires major deadlines, but still a priority. Which means lower priority writing - like blog posts and answering emails - falls farther and farther behind. I'm starting to think I should have got a second desktop instead of the tablet. We're getting good use out of the tablet, but for the writing I do, I need my desktop. And uninterrupted quiet time. The quiet time is actually harder to come by. You see, the only other seat Dh can sit in for any length of time is the armchair. So he ends up either watching TV or gaming. Have I ever mentioned he's deaf in one ear? Yeah. Things end up being pretty darn loud. Especially when the commercials start. Is there some kind of rule that, the quieter the show, the louder the commercials have to be? The kids and I don't watch much TV, but when we do, muting the commercials is a big deal with us. Dh actually likes to watch the commercials sometimes. Either that or, as soon as a commercial starts, he switches to other channels to see what else he can watch.
Then, as if that weren't enough, the pain is messing with his sleep habits. Lying down for a full night's sleep messes him up, so he sleeps for a few hours in the evening, is up for a few hours, then is down for a few more before he has to get up and either work from home or, even if he can't work, take his time and meal dependant morning medications. Now, I've happily been a night owl and gone to bed at 2 or 3 in the morning, but that only works if I can sleep in until 9 or 10 in the morning. That hasn't been happening, so I've been going to bed as early as *gasp* midnight these days. *L* With my own sleep schedule messed up, that means I've been too tired to do any priority writing. Certainly not anything that requires any sort of background research and references.
Ah, well. Such is life. We'll figure something out.
Meanwhile, we've gone all politically active and stuff. Our province is rewriting some legislation, and it involves changing the wording that pertains to homeschoolers, including linking the education act to the human rights act. Since home schoolers don't have that separation between class time and non-class time that is more clearly delineated by going to school, it effectively gives the government control over our daily lives. There are special interest groups behind these changes, but the usual folks are far more incensed over the special interest groups that are alerting parents to the changes and trying to fight them. All in the name of "diversity." The girls and I even went to a protest about it, which is just not something we tend to do. We've taken part in only one other protest since moving here, and the time before that was a counter protest I took part in at the start of the Gulf War.
The first one.
On the more ordinarily front, Eldest is preparing for her first art festival of the year coming up. She's taken inventory of what she has read that she wants to put up, and figure pricing out. That's really hard to do! She's got 29 pieces right now, plus she intends to do more in smaller sizes that will have lower prices; stuff that's more affordable for people who happen through the festival, but aren't up to buying large, expensive paintings. She's also registered for the big art festival she's taken part in the last two years. Next year, we'll have to make a point of being there right when the doors open on the first day of registration. She snagged the last spot available in the location she wanted, and it's not particularly good. At least not compared to the one she had last year.
The weather is turning nice again, so I should be able to get Youngest out and driving again. I want to get her to a point that when I need to go run some errands, I can just grab her along to drive. I need to get that girl out more. :-D
Well, it's coming up on 1 am right now, and I am expecting to get up early to drive Dh to work in the morning - I hope! We shall see how he feels.
Time for bed!
Monday, March 12, 2012
Sunday, February 26, 2012
What's going on...
It's been a while since I've written, so it's time to catch up on what's been going on in the last while.
Things are getting pretty exciting for Eldest in the last while. She has her online comic, Magpies, Killers and Vagabonds, up, currently on her deviantart account. She'll be uploading 3 new pages every tuesday there, until she can get her dedicated website up and running. She's also started a new tumblr page for her sketches and whatnot. Meanwhile, she's signed up for a booth in a street festival in the late spring. The big art festival she's been in the last couple of years comes up for registration soon, so she'll have that. In the early fall, she'll have her art up in one of the various coffee shops that double as art galleries featuring local artists. She's certainly going to have her hands full in the next while to get all she needs for those, while also looking up other venues to see her art.
Youngest is still enjoying her guitar lessons. She's also been extressing interest in a variety of things, such as belly dance and martial arts classes - something more organized and interesting then doing weights and basic exercises at home. Unfortunately, such things are not cheap, though she's been able to start doing some Tai Chi with Dh. He's slowly adding things like that back into his regimine to try and strengthen and stabalize his back, and he's more then happy to teach her. It's been a long time since he's been able to teach martial arts of any kind, and he really misses it.
Youngest hasn't had much chance to practise her driving, unfortunately. Between the price of gas and the current weather, I just haven't been able to take her out much. One irritation about living in the city. It's hard to find someplace safe for her to practise. When I was learning how to drive, there were plenty of empty country roads to use.
Both girls have been on a movie watching blitz again, borrowing stacks of movies from the library. Youngest is still working her way through the libraries graphic novel collection, and they are both completely entranced with the Avatar; The Last Airbender series. There's some really solid story lines in that series.
Raider King just left from an extended visit. He was here for a week, and it was a busy one for him! He applied for a local digital arts college. He managed to get an interview, take the entrance exam and get accepted all in a few days! It's an intense 6 month course (another college has a similar course spread out over 2 years) that has a post graduate hiring rate of 85-90%. Now he has to come up with the money for it. :-/ We've made sure to tell him that he doesn't have to worry about a roof over his head, even if it means he's with us for the entire 6 months. Obviously, he would prefer his own place, and he's looking, but we want to make sure he knows he can focus on paying for his course and not have to worry about paying for housing on top of it until he's in a better position. It'll be another month before he's back, and then it's to stay. He's looking forward to quitting a job he hates, and I'm looking forward to him getting away from a rather negative domestic situation. *sigh* Family. They either build you up or drag you down, don't they? :-/
Dh, meanwhile, is still struggling with his back. It's got to the point that I can't remember the last time he has been able to go to the office for a whole 5 days in a row. I've been driving him to and from work. He's hoping to be able to start walking to work again once the sidewalks are less of a concern and his back has improved, but we shall see. The alternative is the bus, and the few times he's had to take it has not been good for him at all. Meanwhile, he finally has an appointment for an MRI to see just what the heck is going on with the soft tissues. There had been a delay in getting the appointment; his doctor very sheepishly inform him that the ball was dropped in his own clinic, and the request of the MRI had never gone out. Dh has been going to the doctor often enough to have been able to nag a bit, which is good, since that's why the problem was discovered. Once the request actually went out, he got a call within a rather short time with an appointment. Unfortunately, it's not until July. When I'd been sent for an MRI, it was much quicker, but then I was also sent to a hospital in one of the bedroom communities surrounding our cities, while Dh is being sent to a local hospital and not one of the many clinics.
Speaking of doctors and health issues, I've finally made an appointment for myself. I've been feeling some odd pains that I at first thought were pulled muscles. They didn't go away or get better. I normally wouldn't have thought much of it, but after what happened last year, I'm a little more aware of potential problems. I'm starting to think that there's a George Jr. hanging around, trying to figure out what happened to papa. *sigh*
Meanwhile, I'm still supposed to be teaching crochet, but class registrations dropped right off after Christmas. I'm also supposed to be working on my writing; especially finishing off the novel I started during NaNoWriMo. Instead, I haven't been able to do much writing at all, and it's starting to drive me bonkers. When I have something I want to write about, it hangs around in my head while I'm doing other stuff, and I tend to write/re-write/debate and argue points until I can finally sit down and put my thoughts onto text. The problem is, I need uninterrupted time to do that, and I just haven't been getting any. Meanwhile, I've got more and more stuff that I want to write about, and they're starting to mess me up. Last night (a night when I was supposed to get up early, of course, so getting sleep was much needed) I found myself completely unable to sleep. Once I was laying down and no longer thinking about the usual daily activities, all this stuff hovering in the back of my head just burst to the forefront. I found myself lying there, getting increasingly awake, as my brain started writing, editing, and re-writing three different topics at the same time. I tried to distract myself by playing some solitaire on my phone, but at soon as I felt I was finally tired enough to sleep and put the phone away, it all just blasted back again. I finally gave up and got out of bed, but irritatingly, was too tired to actually write! Not that I could have, since that required heading downstairs and firing up the computer, and Raider King was asleep on the couch. I don't think he would have minded, but I do want him to have at least *some* privacy! I need to figure out some way to wrestly that uninterrupted writing time I need, but I'm at how to go about it. There are just too many things to work around.
I'm starting to think we need to get another desktop. The tablet and Eldest's laptop are useful, but not for me, and not for what I need to do. If we get another desktop for the rest of the family, I can take this one and hide it in a corner somewhere upstairs - maybe set something up in the laundry room? - where I can shut away the rest of the world and work.
*sigh* I don't know. Will have to figure it out.
Well, I guess that's the catch up for now. Now to get to all the stuff I have been ignoring so I could at least get this post done!! *L*
Things are getting pretty exciting for Eldest in the last while. She has her online comic, Magpies, Killers and Vagabonds, up, currently on her deviantart account. She'll be uploading 3 new pages every tuesday there, until she can get her dedicated website up and running. She's also started a new tumblr page for her sketches and whatnot. Meanwhile, she's signed up for a booth in a street festival in the late spring. The big art festival she's been in the last couple of years comes up for registration soon, so she'll have that. In the early fall, she'll have her art up in one of the various coffee shops that double as art galleries featuring local artists. She's certainly going to have her hands full in the next while to get all she needs for those, while also looking up other venues to see her art.
Youngest is still enjoying her guitar lessons. She's also been extressing interest in a variety of things, such as belly dance and martial arts classes - something more organized and interesting then doing weights and basic exercises at home. Unfortunately, such things are not cheap, though she's been able to start doing some Tai Chi with Dh. He's slowly adding things like that back into his regimine to try and strengthen and stabalize his back, and he's more then happy to teach her. It's been a long time since he's been able to teach martial arts of any kind, and he really misses it.
Youngest hasn't had much chance to practise her driving, unfortunately. Between the price of gas and the current weather, I just haven't been able to take her out much. One irritation about living in the city. It's hard to find someplace safe for her to practise. When I was learning how to drive, there were plenty of empty country roads to use.
Both girls have been on a movie watching blitz again, borrowing stacks of movies from the library. Youngest is still working her way through the libraries graphic novel collection, and they are both completely entranced with the Avatar; The Last Airbender series. There's some really solid story lines in that series.
Raider King just left from an extended visit. He was here for a week, and it was a busy one for him! He applied for a local digital arts college. He managed to get an interview, take the entrance exam and get accepted all in a few days! It's an intense 6 month course (another college has a similar course spread out over 2 years) that has a post graduate hiring rate of 85-90%. Now he has to come up with the money for it. :-/ We've made sure to tell him that he doesn't have to worry about a roof over his head, even if it means he's with us for the entire 6 months. Obviously, he would prefer his own place, and he's looking, but we want to make sure he knows he can focus on paying for his course and not have to worry about paying for housing on top of it until he's in a better position. It'll be another month before he's back, and then it's to stay. He's looking forward to quitting a job he hates, and I'm looking forward to him getting away from a rather negative domestic situation. *sigh* Family. They either build you up or drag you down, don't they? :-/
Dh, meanwhile, is still struggling with his back. It's got to the point that I can't remember the last time he has been able to go to the office for a whole 5 days in a row. I've been driving him to and from work. He's hoping to be able to start walking to work again once the sidewalks are less of a concern and his back has improved, but we shall see. The alternative is the bus, and the few times he's had to take it has not been good for him at all. Meanwhile, he finally has an appointment for an MRI to see just what the heck is going on with the soft tissues. There had been a delay in getting the appointment; his doctor very sheepishly inform him that the ball was dropped in his own clinic, and the request of the MRI had never gone out. Dh has been going to the doctor often enough to have been able to nag a bit, which is good, since that's why the problem was discovered. Once the request actually went out, he got a call within a rather short time with an appointment. Unfortunately, it's not until July. When I'd been sent for an MRI, it was much quicker, but then I was also sent to a hospital in one of the bedroom communities surrounding our cities, while Dh is being sent to a local hospital and not one of the many clinics.
Speaking of doctors and health issues, I've finally made an appointment for myself. I've been feeling some odd pains that I at first thought were pulled muscles. They didn't go away or get better. I normally wouldn't have thought much of it, but after what happened last year, I'm a little more aware of potential problems. I'm starting to think that there's a George Jr. hanging around, trying to figure out what happened to papa. *sigh*
Meanwhile, I'm still supposed to be teaching crochet, but class registrations dropped right off after Christmas. I'm also supposed to be working on my writing; especially finishing off the novel I started during NaNoWriMo. Instead, I haven't been able to do much writing at all, and it's starting to drive me bonkers. When I have something I want to write about, it hangs around in my head while I'm doing other stuff, and I tend to write/re-write/debate and argue points until I can finally sit down and put my thoughts onto text. The problem is, I need uninterrupted time to do that, and I just haven't been getting any. Meanwhile, I've got more and more stuff that I want to write about, and they're starting to mess me up. Last night (a night when I was supposed to get up early, of course, so getting sleep was much needed) I found myself completely unable to sleep. Once I was laying down and no longer thinking about the usual daily activities, all this stuff hovering in the back of my head just burst to the forefront. I found myself lying there, getting increasingly awake, as my brain started writing, editing, and re-writing three different topics at the same time. I tried to distract myself by playing some solitaire on my phone, but at soon as I felt I was finally tired enough to sleep and put the phone away, it all just blasted back again. I finally gave up and got out of bed, but irritatingly, was too tired to actually write! Not that I could have, since that required heading downstairs and firing up the computer, and Raider King was asleep on the couch. I don't think he would have minded, but I do want him to have at least *some* privacy! I need to figure out some way to wrestly that uninterrupted writing time I need, but I'm at how to go about it. There are just too many things to work around.
I'm starting to think we need to get another desktop. The tablet and Eldest's laptop are useful, but not for me, and not for what I need to do. If we get another desktop for the rest of the family, I can take this one and hide it in a corner somewhere upstairs - maybe set something up in the laundry room? - where I can shut away the rest of the world and work.
*sigh* I don't know. Will have to figure it out.
Well, I guess that's the catch up for now. Now to get to all the stuff I have been ignoring so I could at least get this post done!! *L*
Tuesday, February 07, 2012
Going back in time
When I was a kid, one of the things we looked forward to was getting the new Eatons and Sears catalogs. Many hours were spent flipping through the pages, dreaming of being able to buy some of the stuff in there. For many years, the Eatons catalog was the only way people in rural areas could get a lot of their supplies, and the items listed reflected those diverse needs. Eatons stopped their catalog service in the 70's, if I remember correctly.
Going through this 1920-21 Eaton's Fall and Winter Catalogue is a fascinating glimpse back in time. Enjoy!
(You can use your keyboard arrow keys to flip through the pages.)
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Saturday, January 28, 2012
Welcome
I've noticed quite a few new visitors from Blazing Cat Fur coming over for a visit through my other blog. Welcome! I hope you enjoy your stay. :-)
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