It's A Lovely Day!

This is Revere.  He's Kelly's cat, but when she's not here, he thinks he's mine.  I decided to wash three Portuguese flannel blankets that we have from the Vermont Country store- the best flannel blankets money can buy- that the three of us used when we all came down the some nasty virus last month. I washed them, then brought them upstairs where I threw them onto my chair. As I was folding the light blue blanket I happened to see, from the corner of my eye, the red plaid blanket moving on the chair. Taking a closer look, I discovered that Revere had burrowed into the twisted remaining two blankets and made himself a cozy cave!  So, while Kelly has been exploring a beautiful cave in Portugal, her cat has been exploring a cave of his own making in a pile of Portuguese flannel blankets here at home.

It's such a gorgeous day today! Got out a little this morning to run some errands. Put gas in the car, checked out the Honda HRV at Balise, a car that Kelly and John had looked at before she left on vacation. It's on her short list of vehicles she's considering to replace her 2007 Toyota Corolla, her college car, which was a huge step up from her Saturn SC2 which was her high school car. She's ready to buy her first brand new car to handle those commutes to work, and visits to Raynham and Providence that she makes. The guys from the trolley barn should fit into the back seats when they go to lunch. It got the Mom Approval Nod today. The problem is that they are selling as fast as they come onto the lot right now, so there may be a wait time to et what she wants. There's also a Subaru she likes. She's like her father when it comes to making decisions. I'm very decisive. I know what I want and I buy it without all the agonizing that they do when it comes to buying anything- the woe of being an analytical person- you can analyze something to death and still not be able to make a decision. John doesn't want to be wrong if he makes a wrong decision. I've learned not to make the big decisions by myself- been there, had the guilt dumped on me once and that was one time too many for me. So- had lunch at Debbie Wong's, the buffet so I could pick and choose what I wanted to eat today, then picked up cat litter and cat food in Agawam, my prescriptions in Westfield. John washed the cars- the first time he's actually done something in like 9 weeks since he broke out with shingles. He has zero pain tolerance. The past two months have been nothing but high drama as he's suffered, moaned and groaned his way through each and every day. It's like living in the midst of a theatrical production. Thank God the air conditioner was on and the windows closed for some of this drama or else people would have called the police thinking that I was torturing him with vice grips and red hot pokers- if only! I feel bad he got this but it gets to the point where the sympathy well begins to run low.  I have been doing everything I can to make his life easier so he just has to lie on the couch zonked out on gabapentin and oxycodone- which has set off a big flare up of my rheumatoid arthritis, but I have a higher tolerance for pain, so I run up and down the cellar stairs with the laundry basket and the trash and change the litter boxes, etc. I did a happy dance while watching him wash the cars this morning- maybe this is finally the bend in the road we've been waiting for and he can limp along the road to full recovery at last!

Finished the big edit of Stage Stop this morning. Also did the final edit of The Magic of Cross and Crowe because, you know, even after five edits and proof readings I can still find mistakes thanks to the maddening magic of technology- damn you autocorrect! John was watching Penn & Teller-Fool Us! on Demand. I thought it was ironic that they performed a knife throwing trick- that's how Simon Crowe lures Tessie "Pepper" Riley on stage, to assist him with the knife throwing act at the start of the story.  And in Miss Peculiar's Haunting Tales, Volume II, the first dedication is to Penn & Teller, my favorite magicians (Penn Jillette is from Greenfield, MA, after all- where I had family when I was growing up.) Life is a web that connects us all in one way or another.

Printed off a fresh copy of The Winter Solstice Ball- a holiday novella I wrote about four or five years ago. It's always been a favorite of mine.  I need to start going through all 25 Christmas stories now...tick tock! Tempus fugit! Putting the holiday stories into book form has been a goal of mine for years, and every year has been a huge disappointment because I failed to get my act together and get it done.  I lacked confidence in myself- probably still do, but since I have taken the plunge into self publishing, maybe now it will finally get done?

Just to keep things fair, here is our other literary feline, Riley-Beans, aka Bunny. He's my cat, but he's not above lounging on the couch with John in the evening, while waiting for John to get up and go so bed so he can have the entire couch! He's right here on the den floor lounging in a sun beam as I write this.