Fran's Ramblings

Video Tuesday

Brain dead.  Totally in a fog.  So here's videos instead of witty repartee and, y'know, general blathering.

 

 

 

 

And with this last one, it seems slow at first, but after the first 45 seconds, it does take off.  Seriously.

 

My stance

Even if

-- there were no more orphanages because there was no longer a need

-- there was no longer a need for social workers or child protective services

-- there were no more instances of rape and incest

-- there was no domestic violence anywhere in the world

-- there was no hunger anywhere in the world

-- every child had a supportive, loving and nurturing family, of whatever gender orientation and diversity

-- education was treated with the same financial respect as the military

-- universal and complete health care was available to all

-- there was no need for any child to grow up in poverty

I would still support a woman's right to determine her own reproductive situation.

I believe women deserve to determine how their uteruses should be used. 

I believe that any and all reproductive choices ultimately are a woman's responsibility. 

I believe those decisions are between a woman, her doctor, her conscience and any higher power she may hold dear.

I believe the man may be included in the decision-making process, but that is the prerogative of the woman, and there are certain instances when the man absolutely has no say in the matter.

I believe ultimately it is her burden to live with, no matter what decision she makes, and no one can truly know what's going on in her heart.

I have known a woman who had an abortion, a woman who gave up her child for adoption, and I took the other choice, to bear and raise.

I know that with only one or two factors either way, I could have been either of my friends.

I know that all I could ever do for them was love them, hold them when they cried, and let them know that I in no way judged them.  It isn't and was never my place or right to do so.

I know beyond doubt that my son knows he is loved and wanted because I had ALL the options and I had to face them, examine them, and then decide.

Because I had the freedom to choose.

Hibernation

It's been snowy and cold here, and I've missed two days of work, which would be a nuisance on a lot of levels, but it turns out to be okay this week.  So I've spent a lot of time just hanging around the house, not really accomplishing anything, just kind of having a mini-vacation.  I'll go back to work tomorrow (weather permitting and it will permit, darn it!), but the last two days have been restful.

There's a lot to be said for just hiding out and hibernating for a bit.  How many times have you gone away on vacation and then come back exhausted?  Needing a vacation from you vacation, y'know?

I didn't read much, basically puttered around the house and played on the computer.  Oh, I did accomplish some things.  Or rather Lillian did, and I helped.  Our washer and dryer decided to have their hoses go kerplooey at the same time, so there was water everywhere for a while.  But all is fixed now -- yay, Lillian! -- all the drenched towels are washed and dried, and we're back in business.

And we got a cord of wood, which was delivered in the snow, naturally.  But it's here and that's nice.  We've kept a fire going the last few days, and that's helped the whole relaxation atmosphere.

So yeah, I've been following the news, but I don't have lots to say because I've been on vacation.  I'm thrilled that the DoJ isn't going to be defending DOMA, and I'm glad that folks are seeing the real agenda behind the union busting. 

But for now, I'm pleased the washer and dryer are functional, that everyone's home safe, that there are leftovers in the fridge, and that we have a heated mattress pad.  Sometimes it's the small things, right?

Have a grand Friday and a warm and wonderful weekend!

Post Apocalypse

I told you about several of my favorite urban fantasy authors, but for some odd reason (go figure!), I've been thinking about some of my favorite post-apocalyptic novels.  These are the ones that I thought of off the top of my head, but I'm sure there are lots more. 

Obviously, there's the Stephen King classic, The Stand.  I even liked the movie.  And this was one of the books that my mom and I could and did discuss at length, so it's special in lots of ways. 

 

 

 

 

Another classic that was made into a movie was Nevil Shute's On the Beach.  It's not my favorite of Mr. Shute's work; that would be A Town Like Alice.  But this captures the post World War II despondancy that afflicted so many.

 

 

 

 

 

One of the first post-apocalyptic novels I read was Robert Merle's Malevil, a name I liked on a lot of levels, which is why I picked up the book without knowing anything about it.  It's a period piece now, as is On the Beach, but it's still a good read, as I recall.







I was also fond of Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle's Lucifer's Hammer, and in fact the ideas there were the springboard for a one act duet play I wrote, with multiple endings as it turned out.  But that's another story. 











Most people who know of John Wyndham's work will immediately think I'm going to choose his classic The Day of the Triffids, and I do like it, like it a lot.  But it's not my favorite.  Rebirth, published in England as The Chrysalids, is my fave.  It deals with the fanaticism of religion, and the witch hunts for people who are different, especially those who are different but who look just like everybody else.





I've been a fan of Laurie R. King's for a while now, mostly her Kate Martinelli series rather than her Mary Russell series, although I enjoy that as well.  But a lot of folks don't know that she published this post-apocalypic novel under a pseudonym, Leigh Richards.  I'd love to see her expand on Califia's Daughters someday.



But my favorte of all times is a book that leads up to the apocalypse.  I wasn't raised Catholic and my knowledge of its practices is all second hand.  But Morris West, best known for The Shoes of the Fisherman, does understand the Catholic Church, and he takes a different look at it in The Clowns of God.    I try to read this one once a year, and I try to read the copy my mother read, because she loved it too, and she highlighted passages that spoke to her.  It's an amazing and complex book, and I think I may have to stop reading what I'm reading now and dive into this one again, just because it's time.

So then, which ones have I missed?  Which do you like best?



Here's why I'm scared

I'm becoming more and more disturbed about trends in this country.  There are things going on that are beginning to seriously terrify me, to the point where Lillian and I have talked at length about emigrating somewhere else.  Yeah, that nervous.  My home country is frightening the shit out of me.

Here are some examples.  There are plenty of others, and if you want to know what they are, I'll follow up.

Like the Republican theory that the only abortions that can be funded are those that have occured during "forcible" rape.  That means that if your date plies you with roofies and has his way with you, that's not "forcible" -- not the way the amendment is written, you didn't actually say "no", nor did you fight back -- nor will statutory rape be covered, and the only time incest would be covered is if a minor is involved.  At what point, exactly, did rape stop being inherently forced? 

Who thinks that way?

A committee in Montana passed a bill that will now go to the State House of Representatives that would bar any municipality in Montana from protecting its LGBT citizens.  It would repeal the protections already in place in Missoula.  Montana's a beautiful State, and its motto is "live and let live", unless, apparently, you're gay.  This trend scares me.  It's not just Montana.

Consider, folks.  At some point Lillian and I want to move back to New Mexico.  But how do we get there if we want to drive?  Look at all the States that Do Not Want Us to even come visit:  Montana, Wyoming, Utah, Arizona, Texas, North and South Dakota.  We can drive to Oregon and California.  Then we have to play straight to get to New Mexico.  So much for the Land of the Free. 

I'm completely livid about Congress defunding Planned Parenthood.  Planned Parenthood provides much more than abortions; they provide family planning and birth control to people who are financially strapped, and nowadays that's more and more people.  They provide mammograms.  They provide care for STDs.  I've used Planned Parenthood frequently in the past, and I've never had an abortion.

And the stupid, stupid part of this is that by defunding Planned Parenthood, by reducing the number of people who are getting birth control, Congress is INCREASING the number of women who are going to get pregnant and who will have abortions -- back alley if necessary, because do not ever kid yourself, abortions will never, ever stop.  Never.  -- many more abortions than are happening now.

If you're truly anti-abortion then supporting Planned Parenthood is an aid to that.  But Republicans (and it is primarily Republicans and Tea Partiers, let's be honest here) have always struck me as fishermen.  Throw 'em back until they're old enough to kill.  Swear to god, it pisses me off.  Because how many of these same Right To Life folks are pro death penalty?  Lots.

Oh, but birth control is okay for some.  Well, for horses.  Congress has no problem funding that. Oh, and NASCAR ads.  Those are okay.  And despite calls for civility, a death threat to the Democratic Representative that suggested defunding NASCAR is. . .what, par for the course?  To be expected?  Because I haven't heard people denouncing the guy who threatened her.

This is fiscal responsibility?  And let's not overlook the fact that the poor women who are going to get pregnant because they don't have birth control and who don't have abortions are going to have more children while they're on welfare.  Good planning, folks.

Oh, and in Georgia, Bobby Franklin (R, duh) has set out a bill that would have all miscarriages investigated as possible murders.  Even if it doesn't go anywhere, the fact that this sort of thing is considered to be acceptable LAW scares me.  Apparently Republican/Tea Partiers want government to be small enough to climb into my bedroom or into every woman's uterus. 

And for those of you who are anti-abortion, how many people do you know who have had one?  I can think of only one person I know of who had one -- my friend, Lou -- and while I chose not to have one (that, to me, is the true meaning of being pro-choice, to choose whether or not to have one, and that choice is between the person, her conscience, her religious beliefs, and not any of my business), I absolutely respect her decision.  Abortion is legal, but it's certainly not readily available. 

Gays have been under attack all along, but when did women become targets?  Or have we always been targets, especially of white Christian men in power.  And if you think I'm being stereotypical and wrong, look at the folks who are proposing these bills.  Yeah, there are some women jumping on the Ban The Gays bills, but most of the people who are proposing legislation to oppress are white men who are spouting off Christian mandates. 

Not all Christians are saying this, nor are all white men.  But overwhelmingly, that's the demographic. 

Right now there are functionally two and a half (R, D, TP -- and I have to say I like the symbolism of a "TP party") political parties in this country, but I believe that if the unions are struck down, busted, then the Democrat party will fall because there's no way it can compete financially with the huge corporations supporting the Republicans under the Citizens United Act that SCOTUS thought was a good idea.  So we'll have centrist Republicans and Tea Partiers as the two main parties, and under those conditions, my gay liberal ass will not be welcome in this country.  In fact, if the religious right has their way, my gay liberal ass will be illegal. 

And I can see that happening.  And it scares the shit out of me.

Shopping

I missed work Friday because I felt punky, thought I might be coming down with something flu-ish.  Achy all over, incredibly tired, but no congestion. 

And by Saturday, I felt better although the congestion was beginning to rear its ugly head.  Still, in an effort to ignore it, Lillian and I went out and did some shopping.  Not your typical shopping, but fun type shopping. 

Now in the normal course of events, I'm not much for shopping as a pasttime.  I know it's the preferred therapy of millions, but in general, shopping just makes me cranky.  But we went to a sporting goods store, and we puttered around looking for camping stuff.  We've got a lot, but Curtis wants us all to go camping this summer, and there are a few things we've put off getting.  Sporting goods stores can be like office supply stores -- huge fun under the right circumstances.

And the circumstances were right, so we meandered about and ended up looking at handguns.  The upshot is that I'm on the 5-day waiting list to be cleared by the feds for a sweet little Browning semi-automatic .22 pistol that slipped into my hand and made me just grin.  The guy at the store just nodded and said, "Your hand knows what gun is right for you" and this one suits me nicely.

So that was exciting and fun, and completely different.  We ended the day by driving through the countryside, getting lost and just looking at places we've never been before.  That's actually one of our favorite things to do, just wander around having mini-adventures.

But by the time we got home, I was way exhausted.  Somehow all the little things we'd done, the sports store, Goodwill, even just driving, wore me out to the point where I was over-tired, irritable and too twitchy to sleep.  It wasn't great fun, but the day had been.

So then today, Sunday, we decided to bite the bullet and go to some outlet stores to buy "foundation garments".  Underwear's no big deal, but guys, when your ladies need to buy bras, just smile and nod.  It can be a serious pain in the patoot, and good ones are not cheap. 

But we found what we were looking for, and on sale at that, so we were relieved.  It was a fairly hefty expense, but these things reach a point of being non-negotiable.  Yay.

On the way back, we passed another sporting goods store, a huge one that's part of a chain, called Cabelas.  We've enjoyed going through one of their other stores in the past, and we figured we'd check this one out.

The first indicator that this might not be a happy repeat of the previous day's fun was when we got into the parking lot, which was huge and packed.  I mean, super-Wal-Mart huge, and day-before Christmas packed.  While we were scouring the place looking for a slot, we saw people tailgating.  In Cabela's parking lot.

And we realized we were entering redneck heaven.

Now make no mistake, both Lillian and I have good, solid redneck roots, and we can hold our own at any county fair, so that was not meant as a disparagement.  Just an observation.  It told us how we had to behave (no overt PDAs, no "honey"s, generally playing straight.  Easy enough), and so we entered the hallowed ground, lavishly scented by the kettle corn being freshly popped outside.

The parking lot did not lie.  It was packed.  Two floors of all kinds of people, from barely hatched to wandering around with their walkers.  Granted, pretty much everybody was caucasian, but that wasn't entirely a surprise.  Not really.

There's a huge display in the middle of this store, and it has all manner of stuffed animals in a fibreglas rendition of their "natural" habitat.  Bobcats and a polar bear, pronghorns up the wazoo, elk and mountain goats and sheep.  It was so huge and impressive it scared one poor toddler to tears.

And, as I found out later, there's a tunnel through it with some kind of display in there too, but it was packed and I just couldn't be bothered to fight my way in.

We started looking around upstairs, gravitating toward the archery section, and that was fine.  But by the time we hit the camping section and were headed to the guns, we wer both beginning to hyperventilate.  There were just too many people.  It was hugely crowded. Almost every aisle had at least ten people wandering through, picking things up, pricing them, shouting to their friends/family in the next aisle about something.

Eventually I fled to the ladies room, where I knew I'd have a small bit of personal space, at least for a few minutes. 

We bought our stuff and escaped, both of us shaking and wide-eyed and wound up.  There were far too many people, and we've discovered neither one of us likes crowds at all.  I've been to the Minnesota State Fair.  I won't go back, and this had that same energy, but it wasn't a festive, fun feeling.  It was more. . .purposeful.

As we drove away, Lillian observed that it was because we ended up in places like this that we don't have rainbow stickers on the car.  There was a definite feeling that had we been at all obvious, we would not have been welcomed.  It was acceptable for us to be there playing straight, but out and gay?  Bad, bad, bad idea.

Now, that being said, we do plan on going back, but on a week day, not a holiday/sale weekend.  I'm positive the vibe will be different.  And I want to see what's in that tunnel.

But we were reminded of a few other times when we started to investigate someplace and listened to our guts and re-thought our decisions.  Could be we're making a Something out of a Nothing, but we'd rather not take that chance, y'know?

So I've had enough retail therapy to last me for quite a while.  I'm not that fond of it to begin with, and to end up in a crowded, potentially hostile place while recovering from not feeling too well to begin with?  Yeah, I'm done.

But, on the plus side, we've been home for a while, and I'm not nearly as exhausted and crabby as I was last night, and my respiratory system never did become a mucous factory, so all in all, I'm pleased with the way the weekend turned out.

Happy President's Day, one and all!

Urban fantasy

My friend, Dina, observed over on her blog that she had begun listening to Laurell K. Hamilton's Seduced By Midnight, and wondered if it was indicative of all her writing.  I had to shake my head.  What a rough way to be introduced to her writing!  So I told her to start with the first Anita Blake and read maybe the first seven or so.  I know I stopped reading after Obsidian Butterfly because it was, in my opinion, basically porn with a few arguments thrown in occasionally.

But then, full disclosure, I tend to skip the sex scenes in most books.  Male/female, male/male, female/female, I skip on past to the next scene.  That's just me, and since romance books are selling quite nicely, I know I'm in the minority.  I'm cool with that.

I told Dina that I'd tell her about some urban fantasy series I really like, so that's what I'm here to do today. 

First, when I use the term "urban fantasy", I'm refering to books that are set on this planet but that have fantastic, otherworldly elements.  Vampires, ghosts, were-whatevers, things that go bump in the night.  And this is by NO means complete.  It's just what I thought of this evening, so suggestions and additions are always welcome!

Okay, in no particular order, urban fantasy series I like.

Kat Richardson's "Harper Blaine" series.   It's smart, she expects you to be intelligent and it's complex.  The fact that it's set in the part of Seattle where I work is just kinda cool, but let me tell you, if you're ever in Pioneer Square at dusk, everything she's written is believeable, including the ghosts and vampires.

 

 

Speaking of series set in Seattle, Wendy Roberts' "Sadie Novak" series is darker than the cover    might   imply.  It looks light and cozy, but Sadie cleans up after violent acts, and Wendy's not shy about describing them.  Oh, and Sadie sees ghosts.  Sadly, I think most of these are out of print, so you may have to scrounge a bit, but I definitely found them to be great.

 

 

Yasmine Galenorn has two series, and both are excellent, but her "Otherworld Sisters" series has the unique format of giving each of the three sisters her own book.  The series starts with Witchling, which is told from Camille's point of view, then Changeling from Delilah's POV, and Darkling with Menolly.  Then as the series progresses, the sisters get their turns in rotation.  Each voice is decidedly different, as is their takes on what's going on.  This is set in Seattle as well. Witches, shapeshifters, vampires, demons, they're all here, along with some steamy stuff, so be forewarned.

 

 

Speaking of steamy stuff, Australian writer Keri Arthur has created an interesting protagonist with her half-vampire/half-werewolf heroine, Riley Jenkins.  And before you groan, believe me, she handles it well.  The catch is, the first two books in the series are fairly heavy handed when it comes to the steamier side.  There's lots of it.  But I'm glad I didn't skip either book, because the set-up is so complex that had I jumped in with the third one, where the action really takes off, I'd've been lost.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Speaking of groaning and looking sideways at something, some of you may do what I did and be tempted to skip Carrie Vaughn's "Kitty Norville" werewolf series because, well, the covers are a bit misleading and the titles are too cutesy for words.  But like Wendy Roberts' books, the covers are a bit misleading.  The Kitty books are consistently gripping, fast-paced and -- in a turn that I find definitely appealing -- theh good guys don't always win.  Carrie has a couple of stand alones and they are bloody brilliant.  In my humble opinion.

 

Another author with more than one series under her belt is Caitlin Kittredge.  Her "Luna Wilder" series has vampires and werewolves galore, but what makes Luna special is that she is pack-less, and that makes her both weaker and more dangerous, and that's a combination I really like.  She truly is a lone wolf.  Caitlin's "Black London" series is much darker than this one, but equally good.









You may have heard of Cherie Priest because of her steampunk novel, Boneshaker, but I'm here to tell you that Raylene Pendle, her vampire thief, charmed the socks off me.  Okay, and it didn't hurt that she's a little OCD, which works nicely, and that her sidekick is an ex-Navy SEAL turned drag queen.





D. D. Barant has created another interesting character, one who is fully human with no special or paranormal abilities, which is a fabulous change.  "The Bloodhound Files" featuring FBI profiler Jace Valchek follow her exploits in an alternate dimension where vampires, werecreatures and golems are the predominant species, and humans are rare and protected.  Jace is pulled out of our universe to help them out, and she's more than ready to come back to her real world, but she's got a job to complete first.







 And then there's Cate.  My friend, Cate Culpepper, has written a lyrically beautiful story set in Old Mesilla, dealing with the legend of La Llorona.  Grady Wrenn, cultural anthropologist, experiences the terror of hearing the wails of La Llorona, and her search to find out what it means changes her forever.  One of the things I loved best about this book was how it took me back home.  Damn you, Cate, for your most excellent description of the food at La Posta!  *huge grin*







I know I've missed bunches -- I deliberately skipped Jim Butcher, by the way, because I haven't read him yet (I know, I know, but I haven't!) -- but this is just a little list.  If you've got suggestions, send them along.  Who knows, if you've got enough alternate titles, you may get your own guest blog post here!

Befuzzled and moody

Oddly, there's so much running through my head, I can't capture one idea to talk about.  I'm feeling scattered and fussy.  Not pissy pants fussy, just. . .kinda bemused and irritable.  If that makes any sense.

I've been off-and-on moody all day, no idea why.  But there ya go, I am.  So I'm going to bed, and I have tomorrow off, so perhaps fun things wil happen and I'll babble on endlessly about it.

In fact, one of the things I'm thinking of doing is listing some of the urban fantasy series I like, just to say that I like 'em.  Do you have any series you recommend?  Not straight-up fantasy but fantasy that is based here on Earth. 

I dunno.  I'm off to bed.  Have a lovely Wednesday!

Preparedness rocks!

The other day, I gently teased Lillian about being "paranoid".  She has made sure that all of us have knives, that the house is ready for disasters, that we have back-up plans.  It pleases me no end, and I love it, and her.

Of course the fact that I love sharp pointy things doesn't make our knife collection get any smaller.  I carry one with me all the time, a total of three if I have both purse and backpack, another right by my half of the love seat, and others scattered around the house.  And those are just mine.  I can't even begin to imagine how many we have altogether here.

But that's not where I was headed with this.

There are times when I notice patterns in things.  Not always, and probably never when it really matters, but once in a while I see patterns in events.

One of the patterns I've noticed here in the Pacific Northwest is that after we have serious, drenching rain, we have wind.  Not each and every time.  Mother Nature's never that predictable, but I suspect that if a study was done, it would show that after serious rain -- either torrential downpour or days of soaking rain -- there's a wind storm. 

And then?  Trees come down and power goes out.  That's without fail, if the first two conditions are met.  Drenching, soaking rain followed by windstorm equals trees down and power outages. 

Which makes sense.  Trees up here don't have deep taproots; they don't need them.  The soil is fertile, the climate is moderate, and trees don't have to dig in. Trees grow quickly and tall, hence the logging industry.  It's part of the amazing beauty of the Pacific Northwest, where we still have ancient rain forests.

But when you add in housing and roads and a Starbucks on every corner, the infrastructure there weakends, and after a storm, the dirt becomes liquidy and bam!  Tree down, power out.  Not to mention damage to houses and cars, sometimes even fatalities. 

We had a storm today.  Incredible pelting rain soaked the area, and wind has come howling through.  I'm watching the news and the lead story was power out and damage done.  Predictable.  Like clockwork.

So I teased Lillian, but I did it with love (as she knows), and with a fair amount of pride because we're in fairly good shape.  If/when the power goes out here, we've made some plans.  We had the two trees from the front yard removed, and that pine tree could very well have come down, ideally toward the street but more tragically possibly on the car, the house, or a neighbor.  We're incredibly glad it's gone.

We have food in the pantry.  We may not always like it after a while, but it's sustenance.  We have water frozen in the bottom of the chest freezer, which serves two purposes: keep the food frozen, and water should we need it.

Generally gas still flows even when the electricity quits, which means we're okay for hot water and we can use the burners on the stove.  But we also have a wood-burning stove and wood.  And after our time in the SCA, cooking on the woodstove isn't an impossibility, more of a nuisance.

We're hounded in the media to prepare -- Three Days, Three Ways -- but the last time there was a huge storm that knocked out power for days, people were threatening violence over gas for their cars so they could find an open Starbucks.  Have I mentioned that people up here seriously love their coffee?

So the wind is growling through the sky, and it's driving the rain up against the sides of the house, but I'm not worried.  If the power goes out?  I'll oversleep.  But we'll be fine. 

Would you be?

(What, you were expecting a mushy Valentine's Day post?  LOL!)

Stop talking, already, and do it!

There were several reasons why Lillian and I bought this house rather than others we looked at.   It has three bedrooms (we made the den into a fourth), two bathrooms, enough yard for the houndage, and the garage had already been converted into a woodshop.  And the kitchen and master bedroom are beautifully large.

Not beautiful, you understand.  Just large.  And I was jazzed about that after tiny kitchens and squeezed-in bedrooms.  For those of you who remember my townhouse on Triviz, our bedroom puts that one to shame, size-wise, and that was a lovely large bedroom.

Our bedroom is an expansion of the original master bedroom, and it's twice the size of the original bedroom, and that's even without the bathroom.  There's kind of a natural divider between the two spaces where the original wall was, so we've turned the farther/new half of the rooom into the sleeping area, and the original/nearer half into dressers and closets and stuff. 

The sleeping half has all the windows, and a smaller closet that is basically Lillian's.  I say "basically" because anyone who knows us knows that I raid her closet for shirts all the time. The dressing area is less well lit but has the walk-in closet.  We know whose clothes are in there.  It's not huge, I'm not a major clothes horse, but it serves nicely.

No, I'm not giving you pictures.  Use your imaginations.  The walls are white, the carpet is chocolate brown (with white cat fur that continually evades the vacuum), the curtains are gold with cabbage roses on them.  Well, and a fair amount of Geordie fur, since he loves sitting in the window.

So we've been talking all along about doing some renovations in there.  Just some touches to make it more "us".  Lillian has already put in more lights, cannister lights that have made things much brighter.  She also installed a ceiling fan in the sleeping area since there's no air conditioning and sometimes summers get hot.  I love that fan; the light looks like parchment and it's on a dimmer.  It's gorgeous.

But we've thought for a while we should paint in there.  We agreed early on that the walls should be green, which will go with the gold curtains nicely, and when we replace the carpet, we'll find a sandy berber, perhaps.  And we agreed that the dressing area should be a paler green because it's already so dark in there, but the sleeping area should be a deep green because we're both prone to migraines and we need it to be very dark sometimes. 

We've been looking at various colors, comparing, taping them on the walls and making selections.  We think we have it nailed down.

At least we hope so.

See, today we went to Lowe's to get samples, which we've done in the past.  Except this time, we got gallons.  The paint lady was busy talking to a friend, and she gave us full gallons instead.  We were surprised, to say the least, but there you go.  We figured the Universe was saying, "Stop talking, and do it, already!". 

So we came home with two gallons of paint we hope we'll like.  We've painted one of the dressing area walls already, and it's drying now.  We're both hoping it's gonna dry darker, because right now it's kinda loud, but we have hopes. 

And I discovered that some training never fails.  Back in college, one of my jobs was in the set construction portion of the theatre, and one of the things our tech supervisor, Marty Sachs, taught us was how to clean brushes and rollers and paint trays.  So there I was, cheating a little using mildly warm water as opposed to the freezing cold water I've used in the past, but making sure all the paint was out of everything.  The old techniques came right back as if I'd never stopped.  It was kinda cool.

So wish us luck.  We're planning on getting the dressing area done by the end of next weekend, and then we're going to have to do some major rejuggling of things to get the sleeping area done.  But it'll be good for us, make us get rid of stuff that we've let pile up. 

Of course you know what this ultimately means, don't you?

New curtains!