I sat down after lunch to spend some time with Nala the Goffin’s cockatoo and read more of book three of my Fashion and Fiends series, this one called Recovery.
Teenager #1 decided she wanted to go to her dad’s for the afternoon. I wanted to go get my $1 medium coffee at Dunkin. By the time we got organized we were leaving later than I would have liked. And then the dog pooped on the floor. And then the dog peed on the floor.
I decided this meant I needed coffee to survive the night. The line was ridiculous but I had already made the order via mobile so I was committed.
And then the teen forgot her keys. So I had to drop her off at her dad’s office instead of apartment.
Somehow I made it to the Bizzy Hizzy on time.
And I was assigned to pick. I hit 144 and walked about 25,000 steps in the Stitch Fix warehouse.
The big news yesterday was taking teenager #1 for her driving road test, which due to Covid is a swing around the parking lot with the testing official watching from the curb. She passed.
I ended up in pick again last night, but got moved to QC at 10:30 pm.
And now, with Zoom classes and homework done, the teenager has taken my car to run errands— mostly shopping for her pets.
And yes, she’s going to stop and fill up the car with gas and get coffee for mama.
Yesterday, the teenagers spent time out of the house— which meant after chores I had some free time. Especially since teenager #1 took her dog.
I sent manuscript #1 of my old Fashion and Fiends series (Manipulations) and sent it to my friend Gayle for design. I last shopped these books to agents and publishers five years ago. At this point, I want my ideas and words recorded and preserved.
I decided to sit down with a slice of coconut cake (from Tic Toc Diner) at Rosie the new MacBook Air.
I wanted to read the second book of the series, Courting Apparitions. I couldn’t put it down. Gayle found it very amusing how much of my own story I had forgotten. But that is the point of putting a story away for a long time. To judge it with new eyes.
I read all 90,000 words— in six hours.
And for the second time this week set a meal on fire. Which, since it was salmon, actually gave it a nice crisp.
One of the main characters of the series, fictional fashion designer Étienne d’Amille, turns 62 this week. In the series, he is 43 and his significant other, investment banker Basilie, is 45. I am currently 45. And Basilie and her sisters represent some of the strongest women I know, so great homage to Women’s History Month.
The series is a feminine version of horror fiction, or a darkly intense psychological version of chick lit. Manipulations focuses on a supermodel who has uncontrollable water magic, which leads to her fashion world success and gives her healing powers, but also attracts supernatural forces.
Because of the industry and her own past, no one sees the danger of her body image issues and lack of self-esteem instead only seeing her as “the girl in the pictures” which allows her to fall into otherworldly domestic violence.
Courting Apparitions is a ghost story. The characters involved have to cope with their own emotions and relationships as a ghost, and the witches who want its power, haunt them. It’s as much a story about recovering from depression and reconnecting/forgiving loved ones as it is about the supernatural.
Author Jonathan Maberry once told me that if I wrote my stories as paranormal romance, or pitched them as such, I would find success. But as funny and poignant and incredibly sexy these stories are, the romance has a gritty reality to it that I can’t tone down.
Gayle always said I like to torture my characters, but I really just want them to overcome terrible things so I can bring out there strength and admire them. They become my heroes in addition to the heroes of their own stories.
Today was a typical day in the crazy menagerie of our home. But it was delightful. I’ve come to accept that Saturdays are overscheduled and hectic. Sundays are a rest day.
F. Bean Barker woke at 5:30 am— a normal part of the routine in her old home. No one gets up that early here.
I went to bed around 2:30 am so when Ms. Black Bean woke up and barked/whined/howled for 30 minutes, I texted teenager #1. She went down, covered the dog’s crate with a blanket and laid down on the couch beside the dog to go back to sleep.
After that 45-minute disturbance, I woke at 9:30 am. The teenagers finished picking up the house to prepare for the notary arriving at 1 pm.
We cared for our pets and crated Vesta and Minerva of the FURR Roman Pride for the adoption event at Petsmart.
We then stopped at Dunkin on the way home because I wanted to do something to thank my husband for taking the time to come sign this paperwork and for supporting me in the refinancing of the house. It’s been about 20 months since he’s lived here with me. Neither one of us has filed for divorce. So his name is still on the deed of the house and the current mortgage.
This new mortgage will pay off my car, save me $300 a month, though also extend my term five years. Now instead of the house being paid off by the time I am 55, I will be 60. Mortgage payment alone on the the refinancing will pay off is 50% of my take-home monthly income and that makes me nervous.
My hope is that once the pandemic ends and life shifts, new opportunities and stability will allow me to apply extra money to the principal.
And teenager #1 will take her drivers exam Tuesday. If she passes, her dad and I will have a massive insurance bill so my solace is that if something should happen to my car, at least it is paid for.
Teenager’s dad loved his new cold foam chocolate stout cold brew. The closing almost went without a hitch, but Fog decided to saunter across the table amid the notary’s pile of papers. Cats are not allowed on the table. Especially when we have guests.
The teenager got ready for work and we watched an episode of Canine Intervention on Netflix. I wish they had more episodes.
I dropped her off at Tic Toc Diner. I then went to get the kittens.
Those adorable tuxedo sisters then went to Petco (Greenwich Township, NJ) for their adoption habitat.
Minerva (left) and Vesta
Vesta, having spent about three weeks in the habitat at the other Petco, sat there and shook in fear.
I came home planning to walk F. Bean Barker with our neighbors, Jan and her Ladyship Sobaka. But Bean only made it a half-block.
Some of Bean’s naps today
She’s just exhausted.
And then Jan and I went to pick up Nan and have dinner at Tic Toc. The teenager was worried about not having a Braille menu for Nan. As if we need a menu.
The teenager told me the founder stuffed with crab looked really good as the cook took a lot of care in its preparation and plating. I ordered it. With coleslaw. And the silly waitress got me french fries instead.
The dish reminded me of a crab cake wrapped in other fish. So good and a ridiculous amount of food for the price.
After dinner, Nan and I hung out at my house until it was time to retrieve our waitress from the diner.
And then when she got home, she unboxed this month’s box from Witch’s Gifts. These items are so carefully curated. To see the unboxing: March Box Witch’s Gifts
These boxes (and my tarot and witchy podcasts) remind me that I need to pay more attention to my spiritual and magical development.
I only got five hours sleep last night. My emotions were a mess, my body in pain, and I had a sinking suspicion some of my issues are menstrual cycle/hormone related since in addition to my S1 joint issues, I also feel all my cramps in my lower back. PMS week is supposed to start this weekend, but as a forty-something woman I think the party is starting early.
I treated the teens to iced coffee at Wawa. They have a $2 special going on right now and I gotta say I still don’t like Wawa’s iced coffee. I don’t like their flavors. The coffee tastes week. And they never put enough ice in, and I’m the woman that asks for less ice at Dunkin’.
I get to work at Stitch Fix’s Bizzy Hizzy. I see I am once again assigned to QC so I take some ibuprofen and head to my favorite table— Valley 1, line 1B, table 2B.
And after the first hour, the supervisor who also has a disability comes over.
“Angel,” he says, “would you do us a favor and move to pick?”
“Now you know I’m glad to say yes. When?”
I’m thinking after lunch. Nope. He says to go after I finish my cart— which is two fixes!
I only picked 120, and at 11:29 pm my Samsung Chromebook warned me it had 34 minutes left. It died 20 minutes later. Apparently it can’t do math. I only had two more items left to complete my cart, and one was one aisle away. We had to manually get the last items as you can’t restart a pick from the middle.
And I felt better doing all of this than I have all week. Even despite wearing rather impractical shoes.
I came home and took out F. Bean Barker (who I learned is half pitbull/half mastiff). The neighbor’s dog barked as she was mid squat and she refused to go to the bathroom, too afraid.
And then she had explosive, watery diarrhea in the dining room and downstairs bathroom. And we ran out of paper towels.
Sometimes, little incidents can play with the human mind.
This week has not been easy, but we all have days or periods of time where the universe doesn’t feel right.
I’ve been having an issue lately with my necklaces. And amid some changes in routine, some struggles at work and a lack of being able to “nail” exactly what is wrong with my body and how to fix it… life often feels harder than it needs to be.
I have a really beautiful necklace with my birthstone that a friend gave me, but the clasp bent thanks to a tug from my Goffin’s cockatoo. I bought a whole bunch of consignment necklaces from our favorite store, The Attic, in Bethlehem. I wore them so much some of them broke on their own and others became fodder for the beak of the cockatoo.
I ordered a Taurus necklace from Dolls Kill and it never arrived. I ordered some other cheap necklaces and liked some perhaps more than others.
Most of my favorites are in some sort of disrepair right now.
So I ordered another necklace from Dolls Kill, this one from the clearance section, and I loved it. Thin gold and silver alternating circles.
But I put it on before taking the dog for a walk and it fell off. I didn’t notice until I got home.
The next day, teenager #2 said she might have seen it in the street.
I found it in the middle of the intersection in front of our house, smashed to bits.
I’m getting discouraged on this cusp of winter/spring that maybe I shall never wear anything nice again. I work in a warehouse, gained 20 pounds thanks to the stress eating associated with my last job, and with all the fear and guidelines associated with Coronavirus… I wonder if I will ever enjoy something pretty again.
The pretty things bring sparkle to an otherwise dull day.
I don’t know what’s the better feeling— taking off your socks and shoes after being on your feet all night or removing your bra.
I’m in pain tonight, numerically probably only a six, but the discomfort is debilitating. That does quite make sense to me. I’ve hurt more but felt less uncomfortable.
It’s almost 1 a.m. My S1 joint has been giving me trouble all night so all of those muscles are on fire. I poured the last of the Pink Whitney vodka as I ponder my other aches and pains—my right knee, a pulsing pain in the ankle I broke six years ago. The angle I am sitting at right now hurts. But Fog is curled up against me and I don’t want to move.
But I did walk the dog. That felt good. Stretching all those sore parts.
The dog— her name is Freja but Teenager #1 wants to change in to Bean. I suggested F. Bean Barker. She’s doing well. Went to the bathroom outside for us today and less accidents in the house.
Speaking of accidents, I packed up the homemade ham broth and kept pouring long after the container was full. That made a mess.
Then I tried to fry some eggs and started a small grease fire. I extinguished it, but not before teen #1 yelled, “Mom? Is everything okay? I just saw flames everywhere.”
But back to the Bizzy Hizzy at Stitch Fix. I had a “talk back” meeting with some of my leaders. Again, explaining that QC hurts. Talk of doing 4 hours in QC and 4 hours in pick when they roll out split work centers.
And they want me to hit 130 QC fixes. That’s 3 minutes per fix. Tonight, between meetings and pain I only did 91. I did 104 last night. That is 3.63 minutes per fix. Tonight I ended around 3.8.
In better news, my MacBook Air came. Tomorrow I hopefully can do my local taxes (state and federal are done and filed) and work on Finding Hooyo, the Romance/War/Medical novel I would like to be the second book published by Parisian Phoenix Publishing. Manipulations, the first novel for our little imprint and the first novel of the paranormal/romance/chick lit Fashion and Fiends series should be in design now.
If you want to see me unbox the new Mac, the video is here: Unboxing
Freja is the six-month-old puppy of teenager #2’s dog. Or something thereabouts. Last night, the teens went to visit teenager #2’s mom and somehow we got Freja. A week trial.
Meanwhile, Mama Wink has shown me not one more baby as I suspected but two.
I’m going to contact the bird people and see if they have anyone that wants baby budgies.
Kittens, like small children, can get into everything. And while cats, at least most of them, are extremely intelligent and practical creatures, their attraction to climbing, exploring and getting into small spaces can get them into serious trouble.
I like to tell the story of how Oz, the second dumbest cat I have ever owned, used to get his head stuck in every shopping bag or item with a handle he found. And then he would run around the house like the Tasmanian Devil.
This morning, I had a scary experience with my almost seven-month old fosters, The Roman Pride. They are part of the rescue efforts of volunteer nonprofit group, Feline Urban Rescue and Rehab.
Teenager #1 spent the night with her dad. Teenager #2 got up early, fed the household cats and mastered the art of an over-easy egg. I apparently had fallen into a deep, cozy sleep and after several days of getting six hours of sleep, I slept from 11 p.m. to 10 a.m.
I headed to Teenager #’s bedroom after a breakfast of two eggs on a crumpet and a cup of tea, prepared by Teenager #2, and immediately knew something was wrong.
The room looked like this:
And the kittens looked like this:
And my mom instincts immediately were on alert. Headcount… 1… 2… 3… 4…
Where is Mars?
I text Teenager #1 the photos to warn her. I open the wet cat food, which isn’t necessary as they have a self-feeder.
Everyone congregates at the food bowl. Except Mars.
Teenager #1 suggests he got into the closet. That she’ll check when she gets home. But I am unsettled. Other moms will understand. I text Teenager #2 the photos. Teenager #2 comments. And I mention I can’t find Mars. She joins me. And she finds Mars lying docile in a corner.
Now, between Mars and Vesta— the two who did a residency at our local Petco— one of them has loose stools and has peed on Teenager #1’s blankets. We are starting a protocol today to decipher who needs to go to the vet. But meanwhile, I am looking for clues.
Vesta has been a little lethargic lately. Mars is the spunky one, who, often panics when being handled. He bit one of the other volunteers which is why they came home. And he’s not usually prone to biting. I wouldn’t have sent him out to Petco if that were the case. So now he’s missing. Maybe he is the sick one.
When teenager #2 tries to handle him, he doesn’t fight but he doesn’t cooperate either. He sticks his claws in the nearby cat tree. But we found him. So I relax. And teenager #2 leaves. But he’s still not joining the others for food. I open one of the coveted squeeze-up treats. Still, he stays put.
My gut says something is wrong.
Teenager #1, in her second year of wood shop, deconstructed her bunk bed and made it into a loft. On one end of what used to be the lower bunk is a bookshelf and a seat that hides a storage box.
The other side is a cat tree and some cat beds of various types.
Mars is under the cat tree in a cat bed. Between the seat and the cat area, the new soft sided carrier I got for Christmas is on the floor, open. I reach for Mars. He doesn’t move. I pull him up to my lap, the cat carrier bangs into my legs and prevents me from getting him to the destination.
Quickly, with the cat in one hand, my hand supporting his belly, I put it all together. I grab the carrier with my other hand.
I pull everything into my lap. Now this cat is silent and limp. Remember— he’s the spunky one. This is very wrong.
My fear is legitimized. Mars has somehow crawled through the handle of the soft-sided cat carrier and gotten it twisted tightly into a knot around his hips. He has soiled himself— his back legs are wet. And if you know cats, you know they will go to great lengths not to soil themselves.
Do you know that moment in any bad situation where you have to chose between calm and panic? I am thinking about all the ways poor Mars could be hurt and trying not to panic. I need to free him. I’m trying not to think about how long he has been trapped like that.
I have to swirl the bag in one hand over poor Mars to untwist the knot against his belly, again and again. I call for teen #2, verbally as I have no hands left to grab my phone and text her. She runs in. I free him. She gets more wet food. He gently jumps free of me and goes to the bowl.
A few moments later he jumps up to the water bowl and drinks slowly for a good five minutes.
And when he is done, I hug him. He doesn’t fight me. I take the carrier into the hall. Now, if you excuse me— Mars needs another hug.
Tonight my neighbor (Little Dog’s mom) and I went on an impromptu dinner date and she even suggested going to one of my favorite spots— Three Mugs Pub.
I had a Yuengling and the mother clucker sandwich— very crispy and a mix of spicy, tangy and garlicky. My neighbor said she should be rolling the camera, so to speak, for one of my food review videos.
It felt good to laugh.
In a rather impulsive move, I visited the Apple.com site and looked at refurbished MacBook Airs. I ordered the $800 2020 13” in gold. I haven’t had my own computer for about three years, relying instead on an iPad Pro I bought used from Gayle.
The keyboard and the stylus on the iPad doesn’t work anymore. I don’t know if the keyboard died, or Nala broke it, or it merely needs to be cleaned.
In the spring I bought a refurbished HP laptop but hated working on a PC. It was a purchase of necessity as my boss at my previous job demanded I purchase my own PC to work at home during the pandemic.
I sold it to a friend when that job ended.
So if I really plan to start writing again and publishing, I need a computer.
Today started with a groggy Angel that for the second day in a row got less than six hours sleep. I headed off to my amazing chiropractor, Nicole Jensen, to report that despite the grueling work week somehow I was not in pain.
And she indeed found that my body was moving well and that my main issue was stiffness in my mid-to-upper spine consistent with all the snow shoveling needed in the last few weeks. She also asked about my neck as I store all my stress in my neck and shoulders.
After getting a great adjustment and convincing a staff member there that her mother did not want a large bird that talks, I came home and unsuccessfully tried to nap. One of my favorite Sarah’s convinced me to get another Dunkin Cold Foam Cold Brew which I review in this YouTube video: Vanilla Cold Brew with Cold Foam
I texted her to thank her for the advice as it was dead on. And somehow I QCed 105– yes one hundred and five— fixes which is more than the required metric of 104. I finally did it. A mere three-plus hours before the full moon.
It was a successful night at the Stitch Fix Bizzy Hizzy.
Teenager #1 waited up as a bonding exercise before the full moon. Today in addition to chores and school work, she replaced the screen in her bedroom window and embroidered her face masks for work.
Here are some other contemplations and updates at 2:15 a.m.:
I am itching to write fiction again. My friend Gayle has agreed to be my book designer should I decide to publish my books. Gayle and I once had the dream of our own publishing imprint, Parisian Phoenix Publishing.
My mortgage refinance is scheduled to close next Saturday. The refi will save me $300 a month, pay off my car, and leave me with several thousand extra dollars. I am dropping from 3.25 to 2.85% interest and adding five years into my mortgage. But it will also drop my actual mortgage to be less than the current 50% of my net pay. My hope is that when things “look better,” I can pay down the principal.
So the extra money— do I:
Buy myself a computer and put the rest in savings. It’s been about 3 years since I had a computer and I’m an Apple girl so it’s an investment. Adding the rest to savings would give me about 5-6 months income in the bank as an emergency fund.
Put it all in savings to see what happens in the economy next.
Use it to buy the computer and pay teenager #1’s car insurance should she pass her exam March 9. The bill will be $1500 for 6 months. Mine is $488.
Use it and other savings I have to pay down $5,000 on the new loan’s principal.
