Warning: Not for sensitive viewers

Last night, my husband came down to my basement office and uttered what are perhaps my least favorite words in the world: "Do you smell something?"

Nothing good ever comes after that question.

He can't describe what he's smelling, and I don't smell anything, so we get to play 20 questions. "Is it a plastic smell? Is it a cat gack smell?" Finally we settle on an "earthy" smell, and he's localized it to the outside corner of the room. You know, the one with all the bookshelves. I unloaded one bookcase and moved it out of the room, then gave the other one a mighty shove (Thank you, adrenal rush) so he could see the corner.

Sure enough, it wasn't good. The best way to put it is to say the wallpaper was attempting to escape from the wall. It was bubbling and peeling in a very suspicious way. After a brief conference in which we discussed how we were intending to remove the wallpaper this summer anyway (I hate wallpaper, it always looks dirty to me; we've been taking it off the walls of all the rooms of the house systematically and my office is the only room left), Quin reached down, snagged a corner, and pulled it back.

Like I said, nothing good. But the deep chest cold I couldn't shake for February and most of March makes sense now, if I've been sharing airspace with this for who knows how long:

As you can see, the evil wallpaper is now gone. Evil carpet will have to stay for a while longer. Of course this sort of major home project has to rear its head when Quin is not only doing tons of overtime, he's going out of town for two days next week. So it's all on me (in a surprising reversal from his usual "I'm the only one qualified to do this" stance, I've gotten the spousal OK to take this on). There are four bookcases in that room, so every other room in the house is taking on the extra book load for a while. I have books coming out my ears. Not to mention, the biggest case I had to unload was Quin's books from college. Architecture books, coding, private pilot books. Everything big, everything hardcover. I went to bed last night very, very tired.

Today I stripped off the paper (and took the pics). Everything has been sprayed down with mildew and mold killer. Let me tell you, my office stinks. Worst of all, I discovered as I pulled the paper that it wasn't just this corner. It runs along the floor down both of the outside walls. Check it out:

Ugh. The suck part is that I have to work in that room. It's the only one with the phone line for the Dictaphone. And the weather, which has been warm for the past few days, is getting chillier again today. But it's not like I'm going to close those windows. I don't know what's worse, mold or mold remover.

Oh yeah, I'm smelling it now. So if it's been a few days, and you haven't heard from me you might want to stop by, just to be sure I don't look like this:

Gorram cat...

It being that spring time of year (and being that I live in MN), I started my garden indoors last week, planting seeds in starter boxes. I have a tray of sweet pea vines (which I've never grown before) and a tray of morning glories, which I do every year for our lightpost and trellis. The seeds sprouted just fine so I set them by the sliding glass door (being my only southern light option besides Oliver's room, which really isn't an option). I do this every year, and it's never been a problem, but this year we have a new kitty. A kitty with a taste for greens, apparently. I have been spending the last few days trying to keep him away from my sprouts, but he's nipped the tops of most of them (and spread a lot of dirt around in the process). Spike Spiegel has not been my favorite cat lately.

But then last night he started acting weird. He wanted to sit on my lap, but he wouldn't purr and he made weird moaning noises when I touched him. I got on the internet and googled "morning glories, cat" and found out they are toxic plants. I had no idea. The websites I clicked to all recommended an immediate trip to the vet. Having had my last cat die quite suddenly, I panicked. (Side note - cats are like kids, these things never come up during normal office hours). Having paid nearly $1000 to keep that last cat alive one extra day because I thought the emergency vets were telling me he'd pull through (when in fact it would have required many more $1000 days of care), I put my husband in charge of things this time. I'm not capable of saying "That's too much, go ahead and kill my cat". My husband, who is still hoping for a flatscreen TV by Christmas, can make those kinds of judgement calls.

So Quin called the emergency vet, and they gave him the number of some sort of veterinary version of Poison Control, but that was a $60 phone call. Quin suggested we wait until morning and see if Spike wakes up dead. I didn't find this funny. I was also not amused by his intention to get on the internet then and there and google "Wake up dead" because he thinks it's a Bible quote. By this time I'm very upset (also the game's about to start, in case you thought he was the only one with screwy priorities). So he makes the call.

In the end, we paid $60 for a vet tech to tell us our cat was tripping. She laughed, apologized for laughing, then called a vet who confirmed that Spike was tripping. Morning glories are hallucinogenic. Now I regret not handling the phone calls myself, as my husband is wondering how hallucinogenic they are, how many you'd have to eat to feel the effects, and how nauseous you'd be before they kicked in.

Numbercrunching with writing

You can always count on Tobias Buckell to tell it like it is. He did some number crunching regarding his short stories which is interesting. I was also about 15 when I wrote my first not-for-school story (and I wrote that first novel at 16), but my time since then has not been anywhere near as productive as his. But I also have two wonderful sons to show for my time so I can't kick myself too much. At any rate, I find the last figure he mentions particularly telling: Tobey figures he's made about $1 an hour at his writing overall. Hmm. I'm working on the third novel, I've written about 30 or so short stories. I've made a grand total of $25 from my writing (also when I was 16). I'm not crunching my own numbers, it will only make me cry.

Yet another Timberwolves post

On Tuesday I got to go to my second ever live Timberwolves game. This went much better than last year, although watching a 14 point lead dwindle away to nothing and having not one but two cliffhanger endings (the ref set the clock back 0.9 seconds after it ran down the first time because someone fouled Kevin Garnett) made for a high pressure evening all the same. I'm still liking Ricky Davis, he has a real flair to his play, but to be honest I think that individually the whole team is there. Reed, Blount, and Banks are playing better for us than they ever did for Boston, Rashad McCants is showing potential, and Marko Jaric still makes sweet steals when they let him play. Yes, they are there as individuals, but they are not there as a team. I think the reason we keep hosing things up in the final seconds is that the guys just don't know each other well enough; they don't gel like they should.

So I would say this year is a wash (mathematically we haven't been eliminated yet, but come on), but next year... Next year will be our year. Give these guys an off-season to gel and they've got it.

I'm not betting money on this, though. I'm an optimist/realist.

Poor little blog...

...you have been woefully neglected. The novel progresses slowly (see the handy-dandy little counter to the left). My goal is to be done by Christmas. There are two kinds of writers: writers who blast through their first drafts and then go back and rewrite (I envy them), and writers like me who take three steps forward than two steps back then three more forward... The upside of that is when I'm done, I'm done. I'll do one last read through to polish this and that, but nothing major. The downside is each chapter gets written and rewritten about ten times before I call it "done", and even then about every three chapters I back up and go over the old chapters again before I move on. I don't keep very close count of my words, but I would guess the 1000 words a day I write only translates to 1000 a week of keepable prose. So there you go. And forget about the month or two I spend on the outline. I am a pokey little puppy.

Good news: I've finished the short story that will be my WOTF entry this quarter, and I love it. It's my favorite thing I've ever written. Of course whatever I've just finished writing invariably becomes my favorite thing. But this is really good, and the research I did opened so many doors, I just might have to set a novel there someday.

You know, when this one is done.

My son, the android

Aidan was spinning in circles last night and then complaining of feeling dizzy. Oliver advised him to "just lower his dizziness levels. That's what I do!" Umm, OK. And this was before we let them stay up late to watch Futurama with us. It was the one with Beck in it, so Oliver was enraptured. They had to get to bed before Boondocks, however, even though it was the episode with "Mace Windu" (Sam Jackson). It's hilarious; he plays a son of a congressman/wigger and has a monologue combining his "say what again" speech from Pulp Fiction with Rumsfield's knowns/unknowns speech that's quite brilliant. But there's a reason they play this show on Adult Swim.

The bigger news is Oliver got a haircut, or half of one anyway. It happened while I was working. Apparently he had caked his hair with food one too many times for Dad, who cut him some bangs and then stopped. Quin says he was going for Dutch Boy, but I see Willy Wonka. Which I probably shouldn't have said out loud, because now Oliver wants to keep it that way. I'm not sure if that was why he was wearing a dress shirt and tie when I got up this morning; some things are just inexplicable.

Aidan also got a hair cut, but since he always wants his hair short, the results are somewhat less dramatic: