Wednesday, January 16, 2008

Happy new-ish year

I hadn't intended to be quite so lazy about posting. I've had a change in meds, and they have left me either 1) Too tired to get dressed, or eat, or even read, or 2) So wired I jangle and quiver whenever I stop moving. In between these mood swings, I have a short little span where I am awake and focused, but instead of blogging, I seem to do things like scrub the bathroom, straighten the linen closet, OR... shop! The sales! The springy weather (well, except for the 10 inches of snow). I've sold some more books on ABEbooks.com, several of them the high-priced SF classics. I wish it didn't take so much effort to list each book. I have to describe the condition of the book (cover faded, corners bumped, 1/4 inch tear at top right spine, bookstore stamp inside) and then I add something to describe what the book is about. Sometimes I just copy off the cover teasers, but sometimes they don't really say much. So instead I write a little 3 sentence plot synopsis; it's a little like writing a book report, only doing one hundred a week. I still have to do a price comparison (can anyone enlighten me why a paperback book by Eve Forward called "Villains by Necessity" is selling for $25-40?) and then decide if my copy is equal, better, or worse. Rinse. Repeat. At least there is a database program to organize all this.

The puppies are about the same size now, Raven the one-year-old is heavier and longer through her body, while Maggie is just as tall, but of slimmer build, at 6 months old. They enjoy being outside where they can run in and out of the barn and the back yard, or they come up on the back porch for a nap, or come in to torment the cats. They track in a HUGE amount of dirt, as you might imagine.

Update: Man, I have really sloughed off on getting this done. Let's see: tonight the low is forecast to be 9 degrees. We rugged up the horses in their down-filled blankets (oh, they are so spoiled), and switched the water buckets to the heated ones. This is the first winter with the new barn, and it holds in the heat very well, as long as the doors are shut, there is a small oil-filled electric heater for the corner where the dogs sleep in the hay, and some heat from the two heated rooms. The ceiling is insulated, and all the stalls are double walled, and one fourth of the barn has 600 bales of hay stacked to the rafters, which is a really thick insulation itself. [ Edible insulation! What a great idea... you could put it in your house too for the winter, a nutritious mix of bags of marshmallows, shredded wheat, crackers, flour sacks, you get the idea, and then in the summer you eat it all up so the wind can move freely through. Then the next winter you won't need to replenish the insulation, because, like polar bears and whales you now carry all that, um, fat, to keep you warm, your own biodegradable, 100% natural body insulation.] And of course the horses themselves throw off a lot of body heat too. I'm writing this mostly to convince myself that it will be OK. If this turns out to be a rough cold winter, I'm going to see about getting an industrial force air heater/blower before next year.

I think I have bored everyone enough so far, the two readers who have made it this far show your fine perseverance, I thank you both.

And now I'm going to sleep... perchance to dream... ah there's the rub!
Nothing like stickin some Shakespeare in to classy-up the blog...

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