A Day Late, but hopefully not a dollar short

It was my monthly date with Autumn Breeze and we lingered over supper, talking. I got home late and then I was dealing with some of mom's paperwork. By the time I got done, it was late and I was tired, so I went to bed.

I bought a birthday card for my sister-in-law and then found out it needed extra postage. It is a lovely card but it meant a trip to the post office. First I found out how much I needed and then decided to get some extra stamps while there. Guy pulled out the new solar eclipse stamps.

solar eclipse stamps from post office

You see the stamp in the lower right hand corner? That's how they look normally. See the stamps in the upper left corner? That's how they look with a little heat applied, like someone put their hand under the sheet. I immediately wrote letters to my usual correspondents; 'hi, how are you? Hope your summer hasn't been too hot? Have you seen these stamps? Aren't they neat!?'

I will be a teacher's aide in two classes at Palmetto tat days. I've started one project, the longer one. It's a name badge lanyard and uses about 170 beads (yay, beadspinner). I've completed it. And I made many, many mistakes. So I will make another one before Tat Days. First, I'll make the bracelet for my other class.

Mom's phone charger had definitely disappeared. CD and I went to jumpstart her car and get it inspected. I decided we could go get her a new charger while it was being seen. It took a looong time to charge her car enough for it to start. It was 'five more minutes and we stop before CD's car overheats'. CD sat with mom's car running (to charge up the battery) while I got her phone and did another look round for her charger.

The plan mostly worked. We did drive it to be inspected. We did get lunch. We did find a charger*, although the Radio Shack I went looking for had closed. However, they were not able to inspect the car. Because the car had been jumpstarted, the computer gave a 'not ready' answer to most of the emission questions. The car had to be driven 50-100 miles to reset the computer.

I plugged mom's phone in with the new charger and then drove home. I immediately drove it to the inspection station near me. The guy was 'oh, it's only half-hour til we close, there's no way we can get it inspected today,' and he was very relieved when I said, 'I wasn't expecting you to inspect it today, I thought tomorrow.' That they could do. Although they already had a line up for Saturday and it might be midday before they got to it.

*The salesman at the phone store was quite insistent on giving me a quote. I had to tell him, "If I have to deal with one more thing, even that, I'll break down in tears" to get him to stop. Even then, he gave me his card, etc.

CD had class on Saturday, so if the car wasn't ready by the time he had to leave, he could drop me off and I could drive to my tatters' meeting from there. It turned out, he had to go buy new shoes. They were both whistling due to holes. He had to go a bit out of his way, but he got a good deal.

The Tatters' meeting was nice. I made good progress on the lanyard (despite screwing up a floating chain). Carolyn had brought in some old workbaskets and I got one from the 1940s. Neat!

Anitra's husband had seen a listing on Craigslist for a woman who used to own a bead store who was gradually selling off what remained of her stock. He made the arrangements and a few of us went to her apartment after the meeting. I got some lovely beads, including some silver(ish) drops that are metal and a tiny bit heavy. They'd be good for something that needs a tiny bit of weight to hang right.

She had two lovely foster dogs. The newer one stayed isolated most of the time. She has a tendency to jump on people, but she's a lovely, friendly, Pit/Lab mix.

Monday, LotRO was supposed to have an update, opening Mordor and High Elves. An annoying bug cropped up and they delayed it until Wednesday. So our LotRO date will be postponed, too. It's going to take at least an hour for the update to load so I'd better take a nap when I get home.

Tuesday, was my monthly date with Autumn Breeze. We went back to our usual diner. It's under new management. They've painted the walls and put a new mirror in the bathroom. It's nice to see more than my face from the nose up while I'm washing my hands.

Wednesday is also the monthly Forum meeting and the committee meeting will be afterwards. Then it's about half hour or so at work, take lunch, and then out to the garden for the Forum sponsored workday. It's going to be a hot one, so I'll really need that nap.

Another picture. I think it's Virginia Creeper.

I hate having a cold

Revolutionary thought, huh? It started hitting me on Saturday, during the tatting meeting. I rested the rest of the day, all day Sunday and I've been off work the past two days. Resting.

We made it to supper on Wednesday. It was excellent food and we were the last to leave. The snow was starting to stick to grass and roadsides as we left. I got most of the way home before it started sticking to the roads. It was a wet, heavy snow. Really pretty.

And really heavy. Our transformer blew a bit after 6 am. We made it through most of the day and the snow started to thaw to slush.

We checked when we should expect our power back and the estimate was 11:45 pm, Friday. That's the outside prediction of course, but even 12 hours earlier was just too late. We went to R's house, because she had gotten power back mid-afternoon. The next morning work was scheduled to open at 1 pm. I checked the bus schedules. It would take me about two hours, one way, to get there. I used vacation leave instead. 

We got home late morning on Saturday. I grabbed a couple things, ate lunch and went to the meeting. I missed my turn, distracted by a car going 10 miles under the speed limit. I ran into....traffic. They were cleaning up an accident and I was about an hour late to the  meeting. Luckily, it's  a very relaxed, come and go, meeting. Leigh was talking about her website, the tatting & other craft magazine bibliography. She convinced me to do some work on the wikipedia entry for tatting. It really needs updating.

I finished one baby bootie. And started the next one.

Since then, I've spent a lot of time coughing, sneezing, and trying to nap. Yesterday, I emailed my boss instead of calling because my throat felt like I'd been gargling glass. Ouch. And I was barely intelligible my voice was so rough.

I do not have the flu. I checked my symptoms. And I am improving, but kind of slowly. Yesterday was the worst. I've made 3 jugs of tea; I just heat a cup at a time to drink it. Saves me both time and energy over making my tea one cup at a time.

I'm still playing Pathfinder Online. It's really sad I can't be away from the keyboard unless I'm playing with someone else. Because of all the PVP. It's still early days and stuff is still being patched and installed on a weekly basis. They installed looting before they installed the defenses. I was relying on the AI NPC guards to protect me in town. Until my character got killed while crafting. Yeah, that left a sour taste in my mouth. As part of the kickstarter, I have a few months of free play. So far, I have not had a play experience that encourages me to buy more time.

I still have my 'practice' MMO, Lord of the Rings Online. I only started playing to practice for Pathfinder Online. I really prefer the PvE experience, which I knew I would. My experience with PvP has emphasized this.

Depression Rears Its Ugly Head

Yes, I've been struggling with depression. Mostly, it's a drain on my energy and enthusiasm. But I'm in the recovery phase where I can do things again. Yay me.

I've started playing Lord of the Rings Online, in preparation for Pathfinder Online coming out. I took part in the Kickstarter so I've prepaid for some playtime. We'll see how much fun I find it once play starts. I am enjoying Lord of the Rings, so if Pathfinder is a disappointment, I have a consolation.

I've just registered for Palmetto Tat Days (I had to deal with paying for car issues before I was certain I had the funds). Here's an image of the possible layout of one of the scholarships quilts. I had a problem with my quilt square. I thought I had a teapot square. I wasn't sure of the due date so I put the teapot I tatted as part of display (in the library where our local group, Triangle Tatters, has our meetings). Where it remained for a month. I got it back after the 'please send in your square' date. And then I found out I had a 'flowers and vines' square. I frantically tried to tat something to fit the theme. In the end, I sent in my tatting and the fabric for the block, with abject apologies.

I enjoyed myself at ConTemporal. But I didn't see the non-gaming schedule until I was at the convention. And I didn't get to spend as much time in the dealer's room as I would have liked (but more than my wallet enjoyed). I did get to meet an online friend in person. I don't think I scared her off.

This weekend is Fantasy Gamers' Conclave. It's a very small con but so much fun. The hosts, Knightly Order of the Fiat Lux, run it to benefit charity; specifically the Autism Society of NC. I will be prepping the intro stuff for walk ins (we get a lot of walk ins). C, R, & I have helped run the Pathfinder games at this con for the past 3 years.

On the tatting front, once I'd finished the stuff for the quilt, I was a little burned out. I wanted to wear lace cuffs with my short sleeves for ConTemporal, but circumstances intervened and I wasn't able to wear a costume. Well, there's next year. I have made a couple edgings and a couple bracelets (don't tell, the bracelets are presents).

No pictures this time, unless I remember to upload them from my iPad. I still don't have a camera.