What a Month!
I know a lot of social media sites don’t show everything. (Sigh.) ICYMI, I had a very bad week a couple of weeks ago. Rather than reiterate, I’ll let you read it if you haven’t already.
Following on, things are nearly back to normal as far as the cats are concerned. They’re all getting along (as well as they used to). Yuri came out of bathroom jail after only five nights because Mischa finally calmed down. And he’s being a good boy about taking his medicine. Yesterday was the first day I didn’t have to get up to an alarm, so there’s progress on that front, too. Now all we have to do is figure out how my husband can give him his medicine. He’s 6’4” and scares the beejesus out of Yuri most of the time. But until that happens, I can’t go far…
My friend is doing well…as well as can be expected for someone who’s lost a spouse. We’re slowly sorting through all the things that need to be done.
On to better things:
Home Maintenance
As I mentioned last month, there’s a lot of work to be done around here. When we built, I wanted everything to blend with the woods as much as possible so we have a chocolate-brown wood-sided house, wood retaining walls, wood stairs… Besides trying to plug all the damned carpenter bee holes on the fascia, I’ve been re-staining all the things: thus far, 500 square feet of deck (two coats*) and 45 feet of stairs. Still have a lot to do and with the heat so bad (and me not being a morning person), it’s going slowly.
*For the first time ever (more than 20 years), birds are shitting on the deck. It’s now chocolate-brown spotted with white. Since the deck gets full sun about 10 hours a day, that crap bakes on and does not scrub off. Needless to say, I’m upset that all my work is now decorated until I stain again.
Spam, Spam, Spam
Honestly. The spammers are getting more and more…stupid is the only word I can come up with. When I (mostly) retired in December, I disconnected my VoIP office telephone. The subscription doesn’t run out until next month so I put an outgoing message, “The number you have reached has been disconnected.” At least twice a month, someone leaves a message (I get them as .wav files via email)!
The most recent email scam targeting authors is someone contacting you, crowing about your book (which one?), and offering to help with marketing. The email address is from gmail and there’s effectively no internet presence to check them out. Victoria Strauss of Writer Beware mentioned it on BlueSky a couple of weeks ago but I’ve been getting three or four a week for a couple of months. Normally I roll my eyes, right-click, and delete, but this one had me ROFL:
Hope I gave you a giggle on this Monday.
It’s BIRD Seed!
Earlier this month, I bitched about how much seed the birds were going through. Like, three or four pounds a day. Reader, it wasn’t all birds:
I stared out the window for a while to figure out how they were getting onto it. We trimmed two pine branches and thought that would be the end of it. Nope! I caught them skydiving off another branch of the same tree. (About 80% success rate, too!) It was so high up, my aforementioned tall husband had to stand on a step ladder and reach with the clippers to pull it down far enough for him to grasp before cutting it.
It’s amazing how long the seed in the feeder now lasts!
What I’ve Been Reading
Honestly? Not a lot. Or at least, not as much as I usually do. As I mentioned in that blog post, I was a zombie for a couple of weeks. But in addition to working my way through Jenny Schwartz's oeuvre (I’m about halfway), I read these:
Ticket Out: Traffic Warden Mysteries Book One by Michelle Diener. Gabriella Farnsworth is a London traffic warden (what we in the US would call a meter maid) in the summer of 1963. She finds first one body, then a second on her route. It’s discovered that an art gallery near the deaths is actually a front for manufacturing and distributing LSD (which, at the time, wasn’t illegal). And…the boss over heroin distribution in the same part of the city isn’t happy. But, it’s more than a drug turf war. Gabriella is in danger and the New Scotland Yard detective assigned to the case is more than worried about a witness.
Apart from a couple of historical inaccuracies, it’s a good yarn. We don’t find out who the killer is until it’s nearly too late. 4½ stars, only because the author obviously didn’t speak with anyone who was alive back then – I would have never done The Twist to Lesley Gore’s “It’s My Party.” 😊
The Dark Lord’s Guide to Dating (and Other War Crimes) by Tiffany Hunt. I wasn’t familiar with this author and wasn’t prepared for the pages of explicit sex. But apart from that, this was a funny story. Kazimir (aka The Dark Lord) has to marry to activate an ancient artifact that will give him nearly unlimited power. He kidnaps Arabella, the daughter of a neighboring lord and, he thought, forced her into marriage. What he didn’t know is she hated her father (who was only using her as a political pawn), consented to the marriage, and embraced the dark side of her magic, not just the healing magic her father encouraged. And…they start falling for each other. It’s a story of them fighting their attraction to each other while fighting a king, some lords, and an evil cartel, of which Kaz is a member.
Although a good book, I won’t read the next. Explicit sex scenes aren’t my thing.
Espresso Yourself: A Paranormal Comedy with Heart & Brew Diligence: A Paranormal Comedy with Heart (Maya’s Blogs Books 1 & 2) by Lara McKenzie. These were so cute! Maya is a 28 year old human barista who still lives with her parents (and a sibling or two – the number of those isn’t specified). She takes a job at a coffee shop in a building full of supernaturals. It’s written as a blog (the author says in the foreword of book one this is intentional for ADHD folks who can’t read long chapters). The first book covers a little over six months, with Maya detailing her experiences with supernatural coworkers and customers, a recalcitrant espresso machine, and a stalker. The blog goes viral. Maya gets merchandise deals, TV spots, and starts saving money for her own apartment in addition to raising funds for a supernatural women’s shelter. Each chapter says how many readers of the blog and has a few of the comments at the end. Book Two continues on but the number of readers is now in the millions. Maya enters a relationship with a shadow demon, damned near dies by the hands of a warlock, and is saved by a mermaid’s kiss. If you’re looking for something really lighthearted as a palate cleanse after reading something intense, these might be what you’re looking for. (Book Three came out 23rd July & I haven’t gotten to it, yet.)
So…
I hope your July was better than mine. I still don’t know if I’ll have enough energy to schedule posts for August but I’ll try to be around social media a little more.