The AH Coffee Shop and Reading Room 09

[_Lynn_]

Your utilities seem pretty undependable. First it was the gas, and now the electricity. How's the water supply?

I finished the large raised bed. It needs a lot of water, but aside from that I'm ready to start the only crops I sow directly: sweet corn, cantaloupe, and Armenian cucumbers. I started tomatoes, jalapenos, New Mexico chiles, and bell peppers in nursery pots. I've planted gladiolas every week since the first weekend of April. I have enough to plant this weekend and next, and they're done. The garlic (planted in Nov. or Dec.) acts like it might come in early.

I'm almost hydrated. I'm gonna kick a cat off my bed and take a nap.

Yeah. It has been an eventful year. So far, the water still works.

 

[ChloeTzang]

We have electricity again. It went out Thursday evening during the storms we had. Several tornadoes hit less than two hours from me. Trees and power lines are still down here. Today is cold (50 degrees) and breezy. During the storm days it was 85.

ETA: Our small village/town has more damage than I thought. Roofs are off and roads are still closed. I went to the local grocery store with a neighbor and it was packed. It's the same story from whoever you talk to: they lost everything in the refrigerator and freezer. I can relate.

Always a good idea to have a few weeks worth of dried or canned food stored away, as well as a week or two's worth of bottled water and a camping stove of some sort. The stores can run out really quickly and it doesn't have to be anthing fancy. I pack away lentils, dried peas and canned tomatoes as well as some dehy potatoes and canned meat. We have a generator and some gas in the shed and we can use that to keep the fridge running and power some electric heaters in winter. Mind you, that's assuming the shed remains LOL....

 

[Kumquatqueen]

Total scenes as my local team won the FA Cup for the first time ever. (Richmond in Ted Lasso are based on Palace, and use their ground for filming, hence the same red and blue colour scheme).

I didn't watch but it made for a good mood going into Eurovision, and for once one of my picks actually won! (Austria - though I also picked Iceland who got nul points from the juries...) UK did well with jurors but both they and Switzerland got nul from the public, proving again that voters are mad.

 

[_Lynn_]

Always a good idea to have a few weeks worth of dried or canned food stored away, as well as a week or two's worth of bottled water and a camping stove of some sort. The stores can run out really quickly and it doesn't have to be anthing fancy. I pack away lentils, dried peas and canned tomatoes as well as some dehy potatoes and canned meat. We have a generator and some gas in the shed and we can use that to keep the fridge running and power some electric heaters in winter. Mind you, that's assuming the shed remains LOL....

Good idea if you can eat them. Me? Nope. As for things like a shed or a generator? Not allowed here.

 

[Duleigh]

Good idea if you can eat them. Me? Nope. As for things like a shed or a generator? Not allowed here.

Got them here - I knew enough about the area to insist on them. Also our own septic and water so I didn't have to depend on the city

 

[Purple_Fronds]

Total scenes as my local team won the FA Cup for the first time ever. (Richmond in Ted Lasso are based on Palace, and use their ground for filming, hence the same red and blue colour scheme).

I didn't watch but it made for a good mood going into Eurovision, and for once one of my picks actually won! (Austria - though I also picked Iceland who got nul points from the juries...) UK did well with jurors but both they and Switzerland got nul from the public, proving again that voters are mad.

It was a great game and although not my team very happy they won. 160 years is patient by any definition.

 

[Rustyoznail]

Good idea if you can eat them. Me? Nope. As for things like a shed or a generator? Not allowed here.

When the cyclone hit Queensland earlier this year, plug in hybrid cars saved a lot of people. Most have a standard power outlet, and can run a fridge for days. When the battery gets low, the engine starts and charges it up.

 

[NotWise]

I sometimes look for pictures that remind me of a female characters in whatever work I have in progress. I don't think I've ever done that for a male character. I didn't go out of my way looking for a picture of Grace. The picture fell into my lap. It was an album cover shown on Amazon Music.



Grace wouldn't have a violin, and Esther Abrami is older than Grace, but the look is Grace. She's the (formerly) underage runaway that Zelda found panhandling in a Santa Barbara parking lot. Zelda had her legally emancipated, she learned enough to act as Zelda's personal assistant, and she cleaned up well enough to make a token appearance as a model in Zelda's online cosmetics store. She's somewhere between kinda smart and fuckin' brilliant.

 

[Candy_Kane54]

Living right next to a power substation with underground wires throughout the subdivision means that I've only lost power for more than five minutes once in 27 years. However, the state of the grid throughout the rest of the country is something I worry about on a daily basis. I do have a portable solar panel capable of charging up phones and laptops in case the worst scenario occurs (assuming there's sunlight to capture) ...

For today, there's a fresh pot of dark roast Arabica coffee brewing and the teapot is steaming. There are donuts and cherry turnovers fresh out of the oven on the counter.

I'll be over in the corner making final touch ups to my story before beginning the final edit. I'm finally finished and can start working on my next story shortly.

 

[NotWise]

I'll be over in the corner making final touch ups to my story before beginning the final edit. I'm finally finished and can start working on my next story shortly.

Cool. What's next?

For mine, I'm still molding bricks to be used later. The main one will help build the denouement. Also, I realized over night that I introduced a strong emotional element (jealousy) on day one then forgot about it on day 2. I know exactly where it fits in the rest of the story, but it isn't there yet.

 

[Duleigh]

I found a baby green dragon in my garden this morning. If the birds don't eat him, he'll be large enough to ride in a few years.

https://images.nightcafe.studio/ik-seo/jobs/CTZpMbdXtmeVL1X907hW/CTZpMbdXtmeVL1X907hW--0--yb15u/baby-dragon.jpg?tr=w-1600,c-at_max

 

[_Lynn_]

We rarely get tornadoes or 90 mph winds knocking trees down onto power lines so it's useless to plan ahead. And the gas outage was caused by a contractor digging where a line was. Something else you can't plan for. Neither time did I go without food or shelter. Both are inconveniences for me but nothing more. From all accounts around the area, no one was injured either.

Today is chilly but sunny. A good day to bake something. Bread, maybe. We'll see. The hip is healing well but the knee is still causing trouble. I've moved from the walker to a quad cane when I'm outside where the pavement isn't the best. Inside I don't use either.

 

[PrimalDual]

The weather here is nice today. Got some showers yesterday - sprinkles really. Snow level stayed above 9800 feet according to the weather service. Life is good.

 

[Belegon]

I'm doing okay now, but if anyone who is going to stick a needle in your knee says, "It may sting a bit," is lying to you. I nearly elevated off the table when she inserted the needle and it took nearly fifteen seconds (felt like minutes to me) to get the gel injected.

been there, done that... my sympathies, Candy, It's been many years and I still remember....with me it was cortisone and it burned like hell after they injected it in addition to the needle. I fyuo aver have a biopshy done on your liver, there's a similar level. Only the part they don't tell you on that one is it ain't so bad in the moment, but from 5-10 hours later, it's nasty painful

 

[Candy_Kane54]

I gave my knee a good workout Saturday night, attending a show at a local arena. It ached, but the sharp pains weren't evident so I just need to keep pushing it without overdoing it. I'm certainly getting around better and I may actually attempt some gardening today.

For now, there's a pot of coffee brewing and the teapot is steaming. There are various pastries on the counter for those who want a bite to eat.

I'll be over in the corner editing my story and mentally laying out my next story which I should be starting on next week.

 

[NotWise]

I had my sweaters laundered more than a month ago and put them away, but this is the third time I've had to pull one out. We have wind, rain, and sleet. I don't know who's spring weather we have, but they can come take it back.

I reread the first two days of my WIP. The banter between Zelda and Grace is better on the first day than the second, but it needs to be. There's no sex on the first day. New Year's Eve and the climax of the story are up next.

 

[MrPixel]

We have wind, rain, and sleet. I don't know who's spring weather we have, but they can come take it back.

You can keep it!

Looks like we're having a big storm tonight and then temperatures drop 10° or so. I need to take advantage of the pending rain and drop grass seed in the areas where the mowing guy decided to overuse Roundup instead of a string trimmer next to the buildings and fence. Lawn is beautiful considering the crap I started with 12 years ago... now marred by a dead fringe.

His boss got a polite request for "no Roundup." I know how and when to use it; mower guy apparently didn't get the memo, and even let the sprayer dribble through the middle of a patch of lawn. The old saying, "If you want a job done right..." applies here, but I've hired it this year because we're really busy on other projects and I don't have the time to mess with it.

Making headway on the story that incorporates an incest scene within an orgy. I've moderated my take a little bit, citing "diff'rent strokes" of tolerance, but letting the main characters express their discomfort, including two group members who happen to be lawyers making note it's a high felony where they live, even among consenting related adults.

 

[ItsJustMeApathy]

It's warm here, sadly. Tried the ac last week and it comes on and there's coldish air, but it isn't blowing out very hard. Changed the filter before we turned it on so I know that isn't the issue. Checked around the outside part and it looks fine. No idea what's wrong with it.

Going to be a hot freaking midwest gross sweaty summer I imagine. At least my kids have window units in their rooms upstairs, but I'm stuck on the main floor melting. At least this weekend it's going to be cooler, in the 60s.

I was sick in January, pretty sure we had norovirus since my daughter's boyfriend's family had it and we had the same symptoms. Missed 2 weeks of work. My daughter also had it and missed the same amount(we work at the same place). Went back to work for a week, felt sick again, this time we went to the er, we both had influenza A. Missed another week of work!
Anyway, moral of this story, those 3 weeks I was sick I lost almost 40 lbs. My stomach still is not 100% because I can only eat a few bites of food at a time. I've managed to lose another 15 or so lbs. I keep telling my kids I need to catch influenza A again, it's a great weight loss tool.

 

[MrPixel]

I keep telling my kids I need to catch influenza A again, it's a great weight loss tool.

Been there, sort of. Bout of salmonella after "dining" at McD's. Lost 15 pounds (and a week of work), very miserably. Not a recommended diet regimen.

Speakin' o' weather, we have a tornado-grade storm moving through the region as I write this, adding insult to last week's major destruction. Radar indicates problem areas are missing us by about 50 miles and tracking away, but we're still getting flashes and thunder-boomers, and I just heard some heavy-ish rain on our metal roof. Joyous.

 

[ItsJustMeApathy]

Yeah it was pretty miserable, but I look better than I have in years!

Same weather here tonight. My daughter sat outside for a bit since it's cooler out there than in the house and she said the sound the rain made on the storage containers across the street was very nice.

I try not to freak out about the weather, lived in this area my whole life, but after the tornado last week and even the Zoo getting some damage it's a little scary now. We also had that tornado a few years ago tear through an Amazon warehouse. But still when we hear the sirens or the weather gets bad, we all go outside.

ETA-tornado sirens were just going off. It's after midnight!

 

[dmallord]

Got them here - I knew enough about the area to insist on them. Also our own septic and water so I didn't have to depend on the city

off topic but thought of you...
Woof Brand

 

[old_prof]

I keep telling my kids I need to catch influenza A again, it's a great weight loss tool.

Having my gallbladder taken out two years ago worked for me. Of course, it also involved not properly processing nutrition for three months and ending up in the hospital with no measurable magnesium in me. But I was my lowest weight in almost twenty years at that point.

The bad news was I gained that back when they fixed my digestive system. The good news was I have managed to lose almost all of it again, without surrendering a body part. Or being on a GLP-1. Yesterday, for the first time since the summer I had my gall bladder taken out, I had that same second digit on the scale. Yay! My orthopedist, who has been on me to lose some wait to reduce the strain on my knee will be happy.

 

[Candy_Kane54]

Well, it's a gloomy, chilly, and rainy morning so nothing to brag on. My knee is getting better and even when it starts aching from use, it stops immediately when I take my weight off it. I am hopeful that I'll be able to finally get out and get some gardening done once the rain stops.

At least it's warm and dry in here. The coffee is brewing and the teapot is hot. The cappuccino machine is sitting there sulking but otherwise doing okay. There are danish and donuts on the counter along with a quiche I made for those who missed breakfast.

I'm over halfway through the edit and I'm really excited about getting my story done. However, it won't be published until September as part of the Crime and Punishment Challenge. I am ready to start writing another story as soon as I'm done.

 

[NotWise]

We're having a cold morning, with unusually late freezes for high-altitude communities. It should warm up, though. The weather service thinks our high this afternoon will be 38F higher than our low this morning.

Work is raising it's ugly head again. I didn't check yesterday's email until evening, and now I have a conference call scheduled this morning.

I wrote a few paragraphs into day three of my WIP and found it largely irrelevant to the story. I'll scrap it and start instead with the day's first significant conversation and worry less about explaining why Alex is wearing no shirt and someone else's swim trunks. Most of the rest of the day is either sex or the tense dialog in between.

 

[Duleigh]

off topic but thought of you...
Woof Brand

That looks like an idea I need to play with on NightCafeStudio. I like to fill transparent things with... other things. Mrs Duleigh is kind of bent out of shape that she can't get a proper cup of tea around here





Serves her right for buying those fancy glass teapots