A little bit of everything - Drama - Busy - Life

I haven't been posting a lot. Between work last week, my birthday and sister visiting, it was just too hectic!! Which is good :)

I can say that I do miss my sister. It was so awesome having her here! I really wish I could see her (and my niece and dad of course) more often, as in we lived closer to each other. I know that's not going to happen any time soon, because I don't think they will move to this general area and I know I don't want to live in CA.

Also: Coffee. Sheetz has the best caffeine kick (at least for me). I've had 2 3 cups of coffee from work and I am still sleeping as I type. Whereas, Sheetz gets me wide awake. Hmmm....

So I've started downloading my emails back into outlook, it's been forever since I've done that. Then sorting/deleting (which I need to do more of) and figuring out what I need to keep and what I should let go. I have some really freaking OLD emails. I see that I am a pack rat that way. I think it's time for those emails to go on the way side of things.

Drama last night: The Kid realized we had not seen Tiamet all day. This equaled an immediate freak out at 9 pm, a search of the house, a shake of the treat bags to coax any possible cat from a hiding/sleeping spot. No Tiamet. The Kid called his dad, after I attempted to reassure him that I would call the Humane Society and our vet in the morning to let them know she was missing...My very very good/awesome/amazing friend/bf was over and I guess checked my back yard to see where it was possible she could have gotten out at. Well, he found there was only 1 real spot by my side gate and he checked around front and saw her sitting on the porch!! He came in and told us, so I grabbed the bag of treats and went out front. She had gotten scared and darted under the neighbors porch. But my calling and the bag of treats shaking convinced her to come back inside. I fed her a hand full of them, then promptly gave her a bath. Because, yeah, no idea where she had gone. I don't think she has fleas, didn't see any on her. So, after a bath (btw, she was originally freaked out, but calmed down as it went on...and she really likes to be dried off!), she had food, water and lots of love. The Kid called his Dad and let him know and then went to bed. Diego is not at all happy with her smell and is growling/hissing at her and anything/one that walks by him. Good times...

I have also found out who the culprit is that has been pissing on my bath mat/towel/anything on the floor in front of the tub. Puck. He did it right in front of me. I am wondering if his caterwauling at night is because he CAN'T get into the bathroom to do his evil pissing. Now, I know that once a cat finds a spot, that is not always the easiest to get them to stop. So I will be bleaching that spot and then taking both him and Tiamet to the vet, since she had her little escape episode last night. Oh the joys!!

 The Kid has after school band practice this week and next week. Which means I will need to work some extra hours in order to leave early for those days. His first football game is coming up soon too, oh and 2 parades! Yikes! Busy kid this month!!

Also: I would like one of those Elusive Naps please. See, they even now get their own Capital Letters!!

It was awesome seeing my sister :) I know I already wrote that I miss her, but you know, sometimes just SEEING someone face-to-face, makes such a world of difference!!

I have my cruise coming up in just over a month. OMG, I have no real idea of what I'm wearing either. I need to go shopping...

And now working on cup of coffee # 4...

Back to shopping, I need some shorts. And maybe 1-3 tops for traipsing across foreign lands. And possibly some shoes for this as well. As for the more dressy gowns, I have a couple of those. One I need to try on and see if it still fits well though. It's one of those body hugger ones and shows off my back. Oh I wonder if I can get some pics and will post them :)

As I wrote before, I splatted my phone. I was originally expecting my new phone to come in by Thursday but Amazon notified me that it will be Tuesday. Hurray! See, at the AT&T store, the phone I liked was $99.99 plus all the associated fees. On Amazon, it was $19.99 (plus all the associated fees) - so yes, I will save $80 thank you very much. I will run another back up on my phone Tuesday, and download all the pictures off of it. Then start that fun fun fun process of getting my new phone up to warp speed. This sucker has a 13 mp camera! WOOT. It's bigger than my current phone, but really light. I am hoping my new(praying) indestructible case I bought to put on it doesn't add too much weight.

I think one of the reasons I have the dropsies right now (oh did I mention I dropped my coffee this morning? Not all of it, but hello!) is because I haven't been reading as much. Today, at lunch, I will - I WILL - read. Oh snap, that might be kinda hard WITHOUT A BOOK TO READ!! So, ummm, yeah scratch today off that option!! Ok, so tomorrow night. Tonight, I have to organize some shit from my dining room table and office desk at home. Because, yeah, that shit is a little bit (read: WAY) disheveled.

Ok, time to actually eat something (left overs from dinner the other night) and maybe read the news.

Donating to Habitat for Humanity and more things going on

Well, the couch we've had for the last several years is just going to have to go. And my old desk. Because, they don't fit well enough in the house.

So, I called Habitat for Humanity, and they will be coming to pick those up (hopefully today). Which I think is an awesome solution. I know they will go to a good home and make someone else happy and I don't have to worry about finding a way to get rid of them!!

My lawn mower is being delivered today (yay!) - Have I mentioned I love Amazon? It's a reel lawn mover, which means it's not electric or gas - just an old fashion push on. No carbon print, more hard work. Which suits me just fine for the little yard that I do have :) I've also ordered a trimmer on Amazon, because even with my 10% discount at Lowes, Amazon is still cheaper (and I have free 2 day shipping still).

I've put together the 2 end tables and coffee table - they were bigger than I thought! Wow. Only 1 of them wobbles a little bit, but will figure out how to fix that. I also put together one of the cat litter disguises, which was fun. Love me some drill action ;) I was going to do my dining room table, but my brain just rebelled against the idea so I did some laundry, put the empty & broken down cardboard boxes into my car (and put in recycling at work this morning), put away some clothes, and watched TV. Oh and I hung up (badly) 1 too short black out curtain in the Kid's room, but it's only temporary anyways until his room is painted and we get the curtains he really wants in it. But I could tell it at least made the room less hot. His gets FULL sunlight all morning long, so I hope to get the 2nd curtain up this weekend. I should also do my room - am trying to figure out what I want in there. I am definitely going to paint it, just need to figure out a good color :) Maybe a pale violet? And have an accent wall painted something else? Not sure yet!! I am also researching how to how to paint to that faded look - for the office and the kids room. He wants a moon on his ceiling, and we've talked about a using a semi dark twilight color. He said he wants it to fade lighter though. So, I will paint the office first, trying to see if I can get it fade from dark to light well enough to do that in his room.

My jeans are still a little bit loose, which is nice :)

I need a freaking nap though.

Oh, last night - July 4th?? Well, we're about a block or so over from a large park where they do fireworks every year. You could totally see them from our front porch! It was awesome! And because of how the wind was blowing, it looked like they were aimed directly for our house! OMG, I wish I had taken pictures. And then we noticed, it sounded like it was raining...Well it wasn't raining, it was just the blown up pieces of fireworks!! It was a trip. Inside the house, the booming was super loud, some of the windows rattled a little bit and the cats - awww the poor kitties - hid until it was over and then were still a bit freaked. Next year, I am soooo taking pictures though!

We have these Evergreen scrubs along out fence and by the side of the house. I've read that they are poisonous to cats and they certainly attract a lot of freaking flies - I am going to cut them back a lot (once my trimmer is here) and then see what I can do to replace them with something else - you know, something maybe berry/edible that would also look nice? or at least flowery and provides shade? I don't mind bees, but I don't like flies.

Last night I put out the trash, thank the gods. It is supposed to normally go out on Wednesdays, but due to the holiday it was last night. I had plenty from moving and unpacking so now I am looking for a large outdoor trash bin to shove it in every week. And work gloves. And a step ladder for inside (will need a larger ladder for outside, but later) and pad locks and a hose! So much to do!! I need a nap!

I am not sure if we're going to make it to IKEA this weekend. Am dropping off the twin mattress to my cousin tomorrow afternoon and I really need to get some more stuff put away/together before I add even more furniture/stuff to the place. But I don't want to go alone next weekend (the Ex has the kid and it's a 1 1/2 hour drive each way). So, hmmm. I will figure something out. I also need to go grocery shopping so we have real food and not just snacks in the house.

So tonight, after heading over to Lowes for some minor stuff, I need to change out one of the shower heads to mine, put in a shower liner in the downstairs bathroom (oh and change that shower head when I find the freaking thing - also need to figure how to switch from bath to shower!), and see if I can get my internet up and running. That is a must.

Good times!!

Novellas vs Books

I've been noticing that a lot of authors that I like publishing Novella's. It's harder for me to get into these works because of the cost. If they were priced right, I would probably purchase them.

Case in point, Neferet's Curse: A House of Night Novella by P.C. Cast. P.C. Cast is well known author and published a slew of books.

This Novella is 160 pages and Amazon has it "on sale" for $10.39 as of today. The retail pricing is $12.99

See, if a normal paperback book is $7.99 and is on average 350 pages, that's $.0228 per page. So, a Novella would be $ 3.65 for the 160 pages like the one from P.C. Cast. Of course, I have no idea how they calculate the price, but coming from a logical/data stand point, it seems a little more fair. A great example is Feral Magic by Robin D. Owens (one of my favorite authors) who has also writtens tons of books. Her Novella is 96 pages and is only $2.99 for the Kindle version. That's $.0311 per page. This one I will probably end of getting once I have some of my other books read.

What I'm say is that if authors want more readers, more sales, then their publishers need to be a bit more realistic. The pricing structure needs to be amended to something us readers can afford to pay for these smaller installments that we would like to read. And yes, of course that means that the authors would get less per sale - but maybe it would even out in the end??

Now I'm not saying that authors don't have a lot of stress, it's not easy to be creative and write well. I know that they have dead lines and normal every day life as well. And I would totally love to read many of the novella's that I am seeing published lately.


To me, especially with how fucked up the economy has been for the last several years, I have been very careful (aka frugal) in my book purchases. I use my local (and state wide) library system for most of my reading needs. When I do purchase books, I try to get the most bang for my buck. I will buy used books through Amazon (those priced less than $1.00 and have $3.99 shipping or free shipping) or locally at Wonder Books. For instance, I just book 7 books for $28.86 which is an average of $4.12 per book and that was because there was some tax added in. My other criteria are: Most amount of pages, most recently related books read, favorite authors, something I've been waiting & wanting to read.

Also, it's not very often I buy hard backs anymore, unless I can get them on sale or 2nd hand and a whole lot less in price. Unless it's a book that has a ton of pages and is one of my favorite authors and I've been dying to read it. Though, now that I have a Kindle Fire, I will look at the Kindle price and might get it that way. Or I will wait.

I honestly doubt it's the writer/author that's putting the price on these things. It's the publisher and merchant. They need to be shaken so that their sense or reality can be resettled into their brains. That way we can all win. Less price =  more sales = happy readers = more sales = more $$ for author/publisher/merchant. At least, that's my theory and opinion. I could be wrong...

Books that I ordered through Amazon: All purchased based on the Best Price and Free Shipping from Amazon.