blogtober

Weird stuff happening with my blogging software

October 18, 2023 by Susanne Leave a Comment

At least I think so.

So for day now I have been having that weird problem that every time I sent a blog post to my blog the blog went down for a while after that. Yesterday the software told me it couldn’t post but when the blog was up again the post was there. With all the pictures. Which is weird.

There are some things I need to change on the backend but I don’t really have the bandwidth for doing so right now. When I did log on to the site of my web hosting provider I couldn’t get into my web admin space, so that was inaccessible too. Very strange.

I’ve been using the new version of MarsEdit. For today’s post I have reverted to MarsEdit 4. Let’s see what happens! (I mean, I did open MarsEdit 5, looked for the post, refreshed the feed from the blog and bang! Blog gave me an error code in my browser so, well, maybe there is something wrong. I guess I’ll try to isolate factors and see what happens.

Yesterday was a lot of waiting. Waiting for the boy to get up, waiting for him to leave for uni and most importantly waiting for windows guy to come measure everything. Who turned out to be windows guy’s wife measuring everything which was nice. The time window she had given us was 11 to 2 which is pretty big but she showed up at 11.30 and was out the door in no time.

Then I did the dishes and went out to do errands and such. The plan was to walk to the post office to drop off the used printer toner for recycling and to the health food store which are only a 5-minute walk from here but I decided spontaneously to also walk to the supermarket that still has my favorite kind of yogurt. Which meant I walked a total of 25 minutes. On rather painful feet. Which was a mistake.

The funny thing is that my feet don’t really hurt while I walk. They feel good. The blood is flowing and everything is fine. It’s only after that I get the feeling of needles stabbing into my heels. Fun!

As I said, lunch was totally on time and very good:

picture of a pancake with a heap of cooked spinach in the middle topped with some spring onion rings, next to it a glass of water and a small glass bowl with more onions

After that I did the dishes right away and then lounged about eating all the chocolate until it was time to teach.

Then I had one student after the other with a 30-minute break in which I managed to finish the acrylic inventory. All the blanket yarn has now been wound neatly, sorted, measure and put away properly. And I have a list of the colors I have and their quantities. Win!

My last student canceled, which was not unexpected, and this time he mentioned that he really doesn’t have the time and will probably not continue lessons. When I told my husband he said, „Finally he is getting it!“ I like him and I would prefer him to continue playing and having lessons but it was clear that he doesn’t have the space in his life for a while now. And I’m not said to lose a student who comes in at 7 pm.

After that I mostly sat around, after I had finished my own dinner the boy finally came back from uni after a long day there and in the end I was too late with everything to watch a full episode of „Storm Eye“. I got ready for bed as soon as it was clear that nothing else would happen, watched something real short on my iPad and turned the lights out at a reasonable time.

Today I have already managed the full morning routine and now there will be some form of exercise, the usual household stuff and a pretty light teaching day.

So let’s see if the blog behaves or not.

I just love Monday start energy!

October 17, 2023 by Susanne Leave a Comment

Even though I didn’t get enough sleep I did all the things yesterday. Until I ran out of steam in the evening.

I did the morning routine, had breakfast, blogged, opened the manuscript and did half an hour of revision, did the dishes, a load of wool things and got on my bike for cardio for half an hour. Picture of me in my bike helmet and very much not stylish clip-on sunglasses:

And this is where I ended up to turn around. The whole ride was through fields and trees and I just turned around when I reached the next town over in that direction:

(Sorry for no alt text today, I’m pressed for time and am hoping the text includes all relevant information.)

When I came back I thought it was early enough to take a shower before lunch and/or get something else done but husband was in complete cooking overwhelm/chaos. We did have a long and heated conversation about whether it is possible to cook a meal like this on your own. He started the beans at 11 and I was gone for about half an hour and when I came home something was burning while he was getting the parsley ready.

The food was delicious, burgers, red beans, roasted potatoes and fried slices of eggplant:

He almost forgot about the potatoes in the oven until he suddenly wandered what he had planned as a starch. Well. The empty salad bowl was meant to hold red beet salad which he didn’t have time to make. I was all fired up after eating and made the salad after lunch. It did take all of ten minutes. Though I know that all those five and ten minute things do add up.

I did have a quick shower before eating, so that was good, and after the meal I went into full on overdrive, made the salad, did the dishes, folded some laundry and hung up all the hand knitted socks and wool things. Ate some chocolate, and played some games and then went on to teaching.

After work my energy totally flagged which was not unexpected. The boy came downstairs and told me he’d go out with friends which he never does. Good for him, and I’m crossing my fingers he won’t catch any viruses.

Then I sat there for hours, first eating, then playing games, looking at social media, doing Chinese, watching some TV and then I was really unwilling to leave my comfy chair and warm blanket. I did turn the heating on early in the evening so at least the house is slowly heating up.

I went to bed way too late and only realized that I had been waiting for the boy to come back home without realizing it. Dumb mistake.

So. Today I woke up at the usual time, fetched my phone and that was it with my morning. Right now I’m waiting for windows guy which is not ideal. He is supposed to come at some point between 11 and 2. I also want to get yogurt and go to the health food store. There is only one grocery store in town that still carries my favorite Greek yogurt and all the others are clearly inferior. I bought a new brand last Thursday and I can barely make myself eat it. Nope, not going to happen.

Another mixed bag of a day but also – big win!

October 16, 2023 by Susanne 2 Comments

Again with the not sleeping well and going to bed way too late and such. Also with the sitting around not doing much for most of the day.

I did skip my morning routine again but did spend time with my husband and then called my mother on the phone. After that it was a big scramble to get lunch on the table at a reasonable time and I dealt with a lot of laundry. Husband wanted to make paella and that meant a lot of herbs and veggies from the garden. He is very busy right now trying to save what he can since it might be freezing any day now.

After I felt too exhausted for tackling the dishes which was a mistake and then my husband and I had agreed to meet at three to repair the laser printer/copier. The problem had been that it wouldn’t turn back on when turned off in the evening. A round of internet research later I found the YouTube channel of an Australian guy who repairs printers and makes videos about it. The trick of unplugging, waiting, plugging it back in and then turning it on did work but the problem didn’t go away.

So I watched his video and after discussion a potential repair with husband (because I can’t solder) I went and ordered a replacement super capacitor. Well, I didn’t want to order it from Australia so I looked for the part on Amazon, ordered it and then realized my order would be delivered from – China. Ahem.

Husband and I were both pretty cranky and low on energy before we started but I’m proud that we only fought twice. Also, while the repair was tricky, my husband managed to rip off one of the legs he would have needed to solder the capacitor on and I almost managed to destroy the casing when we put the printer back together everything was in working order again. Yeah! The casing has a slight gap on one side but it doesn’t seem to make a difference. I wanted to take more pictures but in the heat of the moment this was the only one I took:

Speaking of pictures, for those of you who read this blog through a feed reader be aware that the feed doesn’t show the pictures. I have started researching a solution to this but it’s pretty low on the list.

The repair took us almost two hours which included watching the 30-minute video and also cleaning the printer, the table it was on and moving the table with the printer to somewhere with better light. (The perils of aging include not only needing reading glasses but having poorer vision overall.)

After that I basically sat there and waited for the day to end. The other two people in the family showed up intermittently and wanted to talk or make themselves something to eat, husband got all angry when he saw at 5.30 that the lunch dishes still hadn’t been done because he had wanted to cook chilis in vinegar to preserve them. Well, I hadn’t known about that plan, and I was very, very happy that he didn’t do it in the kitchen because my asthma had a hard time dealing with the smell wafting over from the annex when he moved his operation there.

I did manage all the Chinese and watching an episode of „Storm Eye“ but went to bed a little too late again.

Today will be a normal Monday but I will get off work a little earlier, my last student canceled. The week looks less tranquil than I would have liked but then it always does, doesn’t it?

Yesterday went a bit off the rails

October 15, 2023 by Susanne Leave a Comment

Of course I knew I would have a hard time getting anything done because of that lunch with uncle and aunt but I did skip my morning routine anyway and then had a pastry for breakfast instead of my usual muesli.

Then I spent all morning unable to start anything because I knew I needed to be ready to leave at 12.15. In the end I did manage to mend the jeans I wanted to wear, since I constantly tug on the belt loops because the jeans tend to wander down at one point pulling on the belt loop ripped a hole in the fabric. So that has been mended and reinforced.

photo of the inside of the top part of a pair of jeans with a scrap of jean fabric pinned to it

picture of the belt loop on the waist of a battered pair of jeans with sloppy stitching to mend a hole. In the backgrouf there is a table with sewing tools

Lunch was really nice and I even managed to only talk a lot but not way too much over everyone else.

picture of a plate with Greek appetizers, fried zucchini, seafood salad, half a stuffed vine leaf, some pita bread and a glass of beer

picture of a table with four plates, two of them holding mixed salad, one with suvlaki, gyros, tomato rice and tsatsiki, one with a lamb shank

It was also way too much because my husband really wanted to order appetizers and I had two beers. Then I decided stepping into a grocery store, buying gummy bears and chocolate and eating all of that while still uncomfortably full would be a good idea.

Yeah, it wasn’t.

And in the evening I ate a whole bag of potato chips and had two more beers. Needless to say I have slept better in the past. My sleep app gave me a readiness score of ‘rest’. Yep, that tracks.

The boy and I watched the last episode of ‘Good Omens 2’ and it was really excellent as usual. I can’t wait for the next season. I might even rewatch it alone to savor everything.

Today I really need to turn this weekend around but I fear that will be hard. There will be the weekly phone call with my mother, doing all the dishes (this morning I was greeted by all the dirty dishes the boy had carried upstairs since Thursday), and all the laundry, trying to repair the laser printer, plan the week, finally open the manuscript, do Chinese, not drink anything but water and tea and go to bed on time.

Wish me luck!

I actually talked to my husband about my harebrained plan to maybe do NaNoWriMo again to which he replied that he is trying a new strategy of just not thinking about everything that is upsetting him so, I don’t know?

Doing it would be a dumb idea because what I really should be doing is to finally get book 1 out into the world. There is a part of me that thinks it would be a lot of fun to write that romance novella I’ve been thinking about since last year or so. And since the first in that series runs at 138,000 words (which is way too long for a romance novel) maybe aiming for a novella might give me a nice short 50,000 word novel?

As I said, dumb idea, plus it hinges on my ability to spend about 2 1/2 hours every day with those final revisions. Um, yeah, sure.

Sorry, for being extra talkative, I’m overtired and just thinking out loud.

So I’m hoping we’ll all have a restful Sunday ahead!

Is blogging preventing me working on my novel?

October 14, 2023 by Susanne 4 Comments

When I stopped daily blogging one reason was that I wanted more time for writing fiction. When I started again a couple of days ago I thought it would be doable to do both half an hour of blogging and half an hour of novel revision in the mornings. Yeah, maybe not?

I always start with the blogging because it’s easier and I know there are people reading. I figure I can do the revision later if I don’t have enough time before lunch. So how has that been working for me?

Not all that well.

So I guess I’ll re-introduce something that I used to be doing all the time, I will try to write the blog post the night before.

So yesterday (actually today but I’m not posting this today) I went into complete overdrive until I ran out of energy.

I did the usual morning routine, all of it, the dishes, some laundry, dealt with the recycling and such, talked with my husband, wrote the blog post and started cleaning the house. At 12. Because even with no writing whatsoever everything that needed to be done in the morning took that long. Well, that and some time playing silly merge games on my iPad.

I did manage to do almost all of the cleaning before lunch, yeah. The meal was excellent, by the way, pasta with zucchini in tomato sauce and an exquisite rosé:

I did start to regret the wine immediately, by the way, my stomach didn’t like it.

After eating I immediately ran the vacuum through the old part of the house and cleaned the washbasins and toilets instead of taking a break. The boy was rather confused when he came downstairs. I also helped him find some tools for the Gundam/Hello Kitty model he wants to build. Five minutes before my first student was due.

I taught my first student, had a cup of tea and some chocolate between students, then taught the second student of the day and sat down to do novel revision.

Gave up after helping the boy find tools some more. Turns out we didn’t have sandpaper that is fine enough so I sent him to the hardware store which didn’t have any either. The model-building store that I found online apparently closed at one point so we ordered online again.

Started writing this post while waiting for my last student, had a nice lesson, put my studio in order, went to the kitchen, made myself a sandwich and talked to my husband again, then the boy, then my husband. Somewhere in between I ate dinner, then sat there on the kitchen bench with social media because I couldn’t make myself move.

Did Chinese, took a shower, did the dishes, watched an episode of „Storm Eye“ and went to bed.

Today we will meet my husband’s aunt and uncle for lunch. I should do some form of exercise but I don’t think that will happen. I would also love to spend several hours revising book 2 but I don’t think that will happen either.

I am looking forward to watching the last episode of ‚Good Omens‘ tonight, though, I’ve been waiting for that for a while now.

And another good day but somewhat tired

October 13, 2023 by Susanne Leave a Comment

Also, why did no one tell me that I had a typo in the headline? Tsk. I only saw it when I replied to Konstanze’s comment just now.

So things continue to be rather busy but I’m doing okay. Ish.

We waited for my mother-in-law to return home until 11 or so, then talked to her briefly. She was very happy to be back home, especially since she had been sharing a bed with her sister-in-law because the other bed was downstairs at the end of the steep stone staircase that she was afraid of going down. My mother-in-law like my husband and son is a night owl but her sister-in-law is a lark and insisted on going to bed around 9 and getting up at 6. Fun!

The whole ordeal brought home to all of us how bad it is to live in a rural place when you’re old, you can’t drive anymore and don’t have any relatives nearby to help you out. The two of them couldn’t even get groceries. The lone grocery store in the village is one kilometer away, at the bottom of a steep hill and the buses are only for carting school children to school and back. Whereas here where we live my mother-in-law can take buses all over town, can easily walk one kilometer because it’s all flat and there are several grocery stores within walking distance for her even when she can’t walk far.

My mother lives in a small town where you can’t get anywhere without a car as well and there are almost no buses and no taxi service. There are some doctors in town but for most things she needs to go to one of the bigger towns a little further away. Nope, I’m all for staying here. My husband has been making noises about maybe moving into his aunt’s house eventually but no, I don’t want to.

I then did some housework, went grocery shopping with my bike, made frozen pizza and had lunch with the boy and then sat around talking to him instead of doing any of the things I had planned to do. My first and last student canceled and one who was supposed to come in today. Did I make good use of the extra time? I did not.

I did eat dinner early, talked with my husband about his lunch date with a friend he hadn’t seen in ages, another tale of how it’s not good to be alone when you’re older. She lives alone in a house too big for her, her daughters don’t come to visit often and she feels rather lonely.

All of that puts all the bickering and fighting with my husband into perspective, doesn’t it? And also, we aren’t fighting a lot at the moment which I really appreciate.

I also had a long conversation with the boy after dinner because he needed to enroll for all his courses for the upcoming semester. He needed to take one course that is not physics. There were a lot of courses like „something, entrepreneurship,global diversity and AI“, one buzzword after the other. He was thinking about taking a language, maybe Chinese but doesn’t want to do team work. He finally settled on „social psychology“ which sounds very interesting (for both of us) doesn’t overlap with any of his other courses and while it is on Fridays it’s not all the way out in Garching (more than one hour each way) but instead right in the middle of Munich (half an hour each way).

I’m trying to make him actually attend his lectures this semester, wish me luck.

After that I did Chinese and then opened the manuscript a little late. I had spent the break between students looking up stats and calculating that I could finish revision for both book 2 and 3 before the end of October if I spend two hours per day on it.

Sure. Piece of cake. Never mind that so far this month I had spent all of 2 1/2 hour all in all. Stay tuned.

And today there will be another jam-packed Friday. On the list there is laundry, dishes, cleaning, teaching only three students again, novel revision, reading, deciding if I want to buy two books about learning or not, Chinese, maybe including some writing which I never do, watching another episode of C-drama and going to bed on time. Bonus points for mopping the floors.

And of course I want to buy the books plus they would be tax deductible. But on the other hand I have hundreds of really interesting unread books sitting there. Hm.

Okay, who am I kidding…