Friday, March 15, 2024

 


 Today when I awoke, the mugging feeling inside was gone.  The air felt light and the sun streamed in the kitchen windows now that it is high enough in the sky to clear the redwoods that grow along our back fence. When we planted those trees, it never occurred to me that they would eventually block the sun in the winter.

The hope is that the Santa Ana winds will dry up all the moisture that got under our house during the recent rains, but not drop any live electrical wires in the yard or blow over any of those redwood trees.  As the Gilder Radner character, Rosannadana, used to say "It's always something."

Watching the lime tree shake around with the  almost constant wind gusts has upped my stress level again.  It started with the rain issues on top of deadlines.  I did send in the edits of KNOT DEAD AGAIN on time on  Monday, but it only cleared the way for finishing Classy Yarns by the March 31 deadline.

Luckily, I have come up with a way to deal with it and that gives me something to show for it.  You probably already guessed that it has something to do with crochet.  In the Crochet Series, I talk about one of the characters having an emergency kit  to deal with her anxiety.  It's  a ball of string and a crochet hook meant be used and reused.  She just makes a chain of crochet stitches not meant to become anything.  I wanted some different.  Something that wouldn't make me tenser by being too complicated, but would be pleasing and become something usable.

  I have an affinity for granny squares because,well, leaning to make one literally changed my life.  So I grabbed a J hook and some Red Heart Yarn called Stripes and started a granny square. As soon as it began to take shape, I felt my body begin to unclench. The original plan was to mix in some rows of black yarn, but I didn't want to have to worry about changing colors and weaving in all those ends, so it has become a growing granny square of the the one yarn.  The bright colors make me smile and every time I work on it, I feel the stress dissolve.  Unfortunately, the stress does come back, but then I take a crochet break and feel better.

Eventually, it will be the size of a small throw and hopefully a reminder of how healing it is to work with yarn.

Wednesday, March 13, 2024

Home Again

          

            I was traveling just before the last time I posted here, although I’ve now been home for a week. I set my blog to post before I left since I wasn’t sure what my internet access and time would be. Internet access good. Time iffy since my husband and I had gone to Indiana to take care of our grandsons while our son and d-i-l were on a trip.

             All went well, or at least I think so. Our grandsons were in school some of the time, and told us what they wanted to do when they were home. It helped that our wonderful d-i-l left detailed instructions about what we needed to accomplish, including the times we needed to accomplish them. 

            And I did get a little editing done while the grandsons were in school. Not much other writing, although as usual I came up with, and worked on, new and ongoing ideas.

 I missed our dogs, though. Our younger son, who lives in the L.A. area, took care of them for us so I know they remained happy. But they’ve at least acted like they missed us too. 

Home now. I miss our grandsons. But we do see them on video calls—and we also have a trip with that whole part of the family planned in the future! 

Oh, and by the way, while I was gone I received a box of books: my first Alaska Untamed mystery BEAR WITNESS, under my pseudonym Lark O. Jensen. It’s been republished by Worldwide Mystery,  an imprint of Harlequin, and it’s in paperback form! Hopefully it’ll meet an even wider audience than the hardbacks, thanks to a lower price. It won’t be available until May or June, and I’m not sure where it’ll be available, though definitely on the Worldwide Mystery website.


Friday, March 8, 2024

Ink

 I admit that this isn't the most important of issues, but have you noticed that ball point pens seem to run out ink very quickly? It seems like they used to work forever in the old days.  I bought a wooden pen at Asilomar (the real place that  the hotel and conference center is based on in the Yarn Retreat series).  The original ink cartridge gave out and I ordered refills on Amazon.  They came in a bundle of ten which seemed like a lot until I started using them.  In no time, the ink grew lighter and lighter and then it was just the imprint from the pen tip on the paper.  

I would be happy to buy better quality refills, but it was hard to tell which ones would fit the pen.  It was no help going to Office Depot either.  I need an old fashioned stationery store with people who know about such things

So. I switched to a ball point that was part of a box of pens I got on sale at Costco.  I have been using it for maybe a couple of months and then today, the words started to fade as I wrote in my journal. No worries about refills for it as it's not refillable.

I'm probably a dinosaur for even caring about handwriting utensils since it's all about email, texts, typing into a phone or computer.  There are online journals now, but I prefer to handwrite.  I have been doing it off an on since I was about fourteen.  The boxes and boxes of notebooks are a bit of a nuisance, but it is fun to look at an old one and see how I have changed, or not changed.  I use them to vent and a lot of the complaints are the same over the years.

But writing in them keeps me sane and in a good mood.  I need to find another pen.  Running out of ink could be a real disaster to those around me.

Wednesday, March 6, 2024

Pondering Others' Thoughts

          I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what others’ thoughts are. Oh, not just people, whom I can ask and they might sometimes tell me. Or even my pups who communicate their thoughts in ways other than speech—like staring at me with their heads cocked, especially when treats are nearby.

          But I go to a park usually twice a week to meet up with other women where we join in an exercise program where one of the women leads us and times each of the exercises. And at that park, I also see non-people who intrigue me sometimes. Oh, a lot of people walk their dogs around there, which isn’t surprising. But then there are the crows, who caw and click and fly, and otherwise communicate. There are also parrots—yes, non-native but they’re wild around there, and they also fly and make their parrot calls. And sometimes there are also squirrels on the ground or pavement or trees, who also do their chatter.

And then I come home and watch hummingbirds and squirrels and hawks and several kinds of smaller birds.

In case you haven’t figured it out by now, I’m a real animal lover, although dogs are my favorite. But I love watching other types and wondering what they’re thinking.

 Maybe they’ll tell me someday in a way I can understand, and I can write about it!

 Meanwhile, I’m still working on my usual manuscripts and plottings. And happy March everyone!