I Need a Magic Wand...

to get all this shit done. Why is it that it takes so long to set up a new house? I honestly can't remember how long it took to set up my Sacramento home, but it seems like this one is taking forever. Maybe sleeping around the clock isn't such a good idea after all.

And for all you smart-asses, yes... I do have wands (some of them magic), but they're not geared to do Bewitched-type things.

Here's what things look like at Chez Goddess tonight (and most nights):





There's Hubster and Emma watching TV. Yeah, right. Hubster is watching the insides of his eyelids, and Emma... well, I don't have to say anything about that.





There's the fireplug. She long ago passed pot roast stage.

We just got notice that our daughter is planning on coming for a few days in two weeks. Deadlines. I work well with deadlines, but I don't know if I can pull this one off. Being out of remission sort of puts a dent in one's armor. We'll do the best we can, but I don't know. My foot and ankle are swollen up like a balloon - the skin is stretched so tight that I can barely flex the ankle, and it burns like a mofo when I do. I also can't walk very well. The last time this happened, the skin actually split because there was so much fluid in there. It's about to do that again, so I'm seeing the doctor in town (I think there's only one) tomorrow. I have to see him anyway to get my meds set up (not the pain meds, but the ones that keep my head from sprouting horns and spinning around). Maybe he'll have an idea of what to do. The man who gives me massages told me to drink a lot of water - he thinks that because we're essentially high desert and it's dry, my body is holding on to whatever moisture it can. That's a pretty good theory, except that my ankle split in Sacramento (close to sea level and humid because of all the rivers). This is also something that happens when my body decides to go apeshit on me. So I'll hobble around with a pressure bandage on (I look like a mummy in progress), swear as much as I can, and hope that this new doc will have an idea of what the hell is going on. Nobody else seems to.

I'm also cold - very, very cold. Right now, the house is up to almost 70, but I'm sitting here in sweats, shivering and having a hard time typing because my fingers are freezing. It does no good to bitch, but I do it anyway because... well, I don't know why. Oh well. That's what the blog is for.

My SnB meeting was cancelled tonight due to lack of participation. Last week, there were only three of us. I hope that I haven't scared the shit out of everybody with the TB thing. If so, I'll have to drop out. I don't want to fuck it up for the rest of them. We also found out that having a SnB group means you have to run it according to bylaws or some such shit. I say, drop the name and call it the Idyllwild Knitting Group. I don't think any of us do well with rules.

My readings are going really well. I guess the whole town read the ad in the local magazine and now knows who I am. We had dinner at a little pub the other night, and a waitress shook my hand and welcomed me to town. Wow. People want to meet me instead of running in the opposite direction. I've got posters up around town, too, and I think it's working. I had a lady frantically trying to contact me for a reading this past week. We finally hooked up today, and it turned into a two-hour session. The best part of doing this is that it allows me to help people. Weekends are fun - I sit on the front porch of the shop and knit or play my flute. Both activities draw a lot of attention. The knitters now know that I have a shop which is opening to the public (many happy people there), and the flute makes people stop, listen, ask questions, and possibly want a reading. It's all good.

As you know, my friend Sheryl is coming next month for a two-week (or longer) visit. I tried to get tickets to The Tonight Show so she could see a taping, but they're impossible to get because he's leaving. Oh well. I've got lots of other things planned, but I had wanted to see it, too. We'll have fun, even if we're just sitting on the couch in front of a fire (it still gets cold enough at night to have one) knitting and gossiping about everyone we know. Don't worry - your secrets are safe with me. It's all the other stuff...

Speaking of knitting, I have a pair of socks for me, a pair for Hubster, and a sweater on the needles. I'm going to knit tonight instead of work - I'm just too tired to do anything other than sit. My big chair should be in any day now, so Emma will be able to sleep with me again while I knit. I'm tired of cramming my big ass into the chair we have now, so that will be welcome. In the area of home improvement, I've hung baskets of flowers all along the walkway from the garage to the house. It's gorgeous, although one of them didn't fare well in the cold temps the other night. I might have to replace it, but I hope not. It was one of the prettiest ones, with the flowers hanging down over the edge of the pot. In any event, the colors brighten up the entire outside of the house.

I've decided that I'm just taking the bike out and riding it, class or no class. The damn class is $400; while worth it, I think I learned enough from the last one to stay upright on the iron horse. I'm going to try it as soon as my foot unswells, which means I may be waiting until Halloween. I'm just dying to ride it (and may die doing so); it sits in the garage twinkling at me. During the weekends, the town square is full of riders. My bike is the prettiest one I've seen (preening over here), other than the electric banana yellow trike I saw last weekend. That, and the all-black Corvette Z06 which made me cream my sweats.

Hubster finally told his boss that he's moved to SoCal. She wasn't happy. I told him he should have told her that it's closer than North Carolina, where she lives. He's come up with a plan, though, to keep him from having to fly back to San Jose for meetings. We're getting a note from the doctor saying that I can't be left alone and he has to stay here to keep an eye on me. Heh. We'll fix them.

They'll probably fix us at bonus time - and not in a good way.