ADF & BBBE Carnivore | Getting On Track To Break A Stall | Journey to One-derland | Week 33 Roundup

I've been a little stuck recently. I haven't done anything very bad, no candy or tacos or Danishes, but I have given in and eaten several processed meats. I've also gotten a little lazy, doing the same fasting protocol every week and not even going for walks or doing any other exercise. So, this week, I tried to change all of that. Did I succeed? And would that even matter or was I on the plateau to stay?

Designer Clothes

I love that my daughter had a Cricut vinyl cutting machine. She's made me a lot of cool custom T-shirts since she got it, and enjoys the process enough that she's never complained about it once. I would have been telling her to go jump in a lake by now if she'd asked me for as many things as I've asked her for.

Today, I asked for a new shirt, and she whipped it up for me. Here it is, any idea what it is?

I absolutely love it. I think it looks so great. The design is in a metallic gold too. You can't tell from the picture, but if you move it, it kind of shines.

Put your guess as to what the shirt is in the comments, and I'll let you know if you got it or not.

Two Weeks Into The New Year

Today was a bit of a red letter day, so it's a good time to be writing my weekly report. First, I'll start with my chart for the month so far.

I made my goal of 1,000 words every day, and that's good, but my goal this month is actually 1,250 words a day. Did I make that? Oops, not today. How could I say that it was a red letter day if I fell 238 words short of my extended goal?

Well, the reason I stopped writing at 1,022 words today was because I was at the end of my book. That's right, I just typed the end on my most recent novel, "Caught Up in Christmas." The book finished off at 76,181 words, and I think it's pretty good. I'll have to see what I can do to have it ready for people's eyes come next holiday season. I'd like to see if I can't get some other books out before that as well. This one is now my fifth finished novel. I wrote Sunny & Gray, Part One: Sunny, Sunny & Gray, Part Two: Gray, The Gauntlet, The Fire at the Center of a Million Universes, and now Caught Up in Christmas.

It's pretty exciting. I'm proud of myself for reaching this level. It's always a feeling of achievement. I'm also scared to death. I have to write 1,000 words tomorrow, and I have no idea what I want to write them in. I was thinking of trying to write my book that I have titled "The Skeleton Crew," but I don't feel like I am at all ready to start on it. I have a few other ideas that I could try, but I'm afraid I may flail around and be lucky to get five hundred words that I'll never use for anything tomorrow. I don't know, we'll see.

So, anyway, back to my goals for the month. I didn't make 1,250 every day, but I am still doing pretty well toward my goal. I was hoping to get a record word count for a month this time, which means I have to get to at least 38,047 words. Here's where I'm at after fourteen days.

18278 / 38047 (48.04%)

I'm fourteen days in, which is 45% of the way through January, and I'm 48% done. So, I'm on pace to beat that record. That's pretty good. Of course, that only matters if I can come up with something to write tomorrow. If I can't get those 1,250 words, then I'll fall behind. I worry.

How's the progress on the year long goal? Add the above chart from January to the below chart for the rest of the year so far, and we get...

83,237 words so far in 2023-2024. That's pretty awesome. I'm really coming along. We're only 21.58% of the way through the year. What percent of the way have I traveled to my goal?

83237 / 304475 (27.34%)

27.24%. That's way above the 21.58% of the year that has passed so far. So, I'm cruising here. I should make it to my goal and then some as long as I keep at it. As long as I can figure out something to write tomorrow. Maybe I should just search for some kind of story prompt and write to that or maybe I should dig out one of those many ideas that I've had over the years but never written because I barely ever wrote.

There's a story that I usually call "Alien Love Story," although years ago I wrote a step outline for the story and decided that the name of the tale would be "Love Walks In." Sadly, I can't find that step outline anymore. I don't seem to have saved it anywhere. I wonder if it might be on my old computer if I fired it up...although I think the last time I tried to fire it up, it didn't want to fire. Maybe I'll try it again tomorrow. 

I once wrote a list of story ideas, putting as many as I could come up with off the top of my head in an attempt to bring them to mind easier. I could look at that...Ooh, maybe I could write the story idea on the list that I had a while back that I called "The Elephant in the Room." That one might be something I could jump on. It should be relatively short, and something I could do starting tomorrow. Maybe that's the way to go, and then I spend time getting my next book ready as well so I can jump on it when "The Elephant in the Room" is done.

Sounds like a plan. Off we go.

Hidey-Hole

Back when we got our floors redone in 2022, all of our baseboards had to be replaced as well. My wife took the opportunity to get taller baseboards because she liked them better. 

That was fine except in one spot. In our bathroom, there were two access panels that covered holes under our bathtub. I assume they are there to make it possible to get in and fix the thing if necessary. The panels were too large to go back in place with the new taller baseboards. We needed to get new smaller panels or alter them in some way to make them fit.

It was one of many things that fell through the cracks since then. It wouldn't take much to fix them and finish it off, but hell we still haven't even painted all of the baseboards yet much less gotten around to other things like this. Until those panels rose in importance to the top level, they were going to be left. We couldn't screw them back in, so they leaned against the tub, mostly covering the holes that they were there for. It was good enough...

...Until now. Maybe you'll remember me talking about getting a new kitten on here the other day. Well, you probably know where this is going now. As most baby animals are, even human babies, the kitten was curious, and determined to completely explore its surroundings. It wasn't long before it discovered these poorly covered holes under the bathtub, found how easy it was to tip the panels over and gain access to what lay beneath, and get inside the best hiding spot ever.

This cat is already a Nervous Nellie, and spends all of her time hiding under the bed anytime I'm around, so an even more secure hiding spot would definitely appeal to her. The other night, my wife said, "Freya keeps going in under the bathtub. Can you get your packing tape and cover it up again so she can't?"

I was certainly capable of that, except that the dang cat wouldn't come out so that I could. I didn't want to seal her up inside after all, but she is probably more skittish around me than anyone, so as soon as I came around, she bounded in under the tub and cringed.

After a time or two of this, I realized that taping it shut was not going to be enough. I needed to make this permanent. I took the panels, measured the size they needed to be to fit the space with the new baseboards, marked them, and took them out to the garage to cut them down. I came back inside, and screwed one panel on, but I couldn't do the second one until the cat came out.

I tried to coax her out, calling her name as sweetly as I could, and dangling her favorite toy in front of the opening, but she never took the bait. I think she might have been utterly spooked by the noise the electric screwdriver had made closing the first panel.

I finally had to go up and grab my daughter and enlist her in the endeavor. She was much more successful. In a few seconds she was able to take this picture of Freya peeking out of the hole cautiously.

A little more time, and she had the cat in hand, and took her to another room to close the door behind her so that I could do my thing. I jumped in there and screwed the second panel down, and now we finally have that job taken care of. 

Maybe sometime soon, we'll even get the baseboards painted as well. Who knows?

Rogue Toy: A Star Wars Christmas Story

I went to a GameStop yesterday, and found a Star Wars Holiday Edition figure that I hadn't added to my collection yet. It didn't have any clearance markings on it, but I asked the clerk, and since I was the only person in the store, he was happy to check the price for me.

It rang up as $5. I was expecting $28.

"Well then, I'll take it," I said, and happily paid the reduced price for the Christmasized C-3PO.

 He also came with a little pal robot that was also Christmasized.

Forgive my lack of knowledge of the ever-expanding Star Wars media empire, but I believe that little robot comes from a video game, and was the little friend of Cal Kestis. Don't hold me to it, though. I think one of the other guys I got back in November came with a different version of the same robot.

Ah yes, it was the K-2SO. Now I'm getting an army of these guys.

After getting a figure for 1/6th its usual price, it makes me want to go out to more GameStops and see if they have any figures left too. Also, there was another one of those K-2SOs at my Walmart. They hadn't marked it down the last time I looked. I wonder if they have now, and if they haven't, what if I asked an associate if it should be marked down like the rest of the Christmas stuff? Maybe I could get another one for $5 or less that way. I'm going to have to see what I can do.

Aww Crap

The weatherman's been talking this week, and everybody is getting pretty nervous. This is what next week is supposed to look like for us here in Southeast Texas.

Monday it gets cold, and then Tuesday and Wednesday it gets significantly colder.  That's damn cold for south Texas. We don't get temperatures like that. Monday's low we can handle, but what happens on Tuesday and Wednesday. I'm sure I'm not the only one who immediately remembers 2021, when the state froze, everybody's pipes burst, and the power went out everywhere.

Hopefully, the measures we've taken since then have made problems like that less likely to happen. ERCOT, the state electricity managing body doesn't seem too concerned about the possibility of the power going out. It's not supposed to rain during that time, so I probably won't have to sleep at the station to avoid death on the drive to work. Hopefully, it'll just be a couple of miserably cold days that pass without much incident. I guess we'll see. If I'm still updating this blog on Thursday of next week, then I guess things went okay.

New Kitty-Cat

Our old cat, Juno, died last month. It was difficult for the family, particularly my youngest daughter, who was the cat's favorite. Juno spent most of her time in my daughter's room, sitting on her lap, laying right next to her head while she slept, and so forth. So, when the cat was gone, my daughter was pretty upset. 

A few weeks after the cat had died, my daughter came downstairs looking a little rough, and my wife said, "Are you okay? You look like you've been crying."

"Oh, I was just thinking about Juno," was her response.

We have another cat, named Jupiter, but she's not nearly as cuddly as Juno was for my daughter...or anyone else. 

She likes to play and run around, but hates being picked up, held, or even to sit next to somebody. That may change when she gets a little older, we only got her a couple of years ago, but for now, that's her temperament. 

My wife thought a good plan would be to get a new kitten to replace Juno. After all, she says, we're a two cat household now, not a one cat household. I wasn't so sure that we needed to remain a two cat household. I like Jupiter a lot, and am happy with her, but I like my daughter even more, and I'm willing to do whatever I can to make her happy, so I agreed.

On Sunday, we got the new cat from Somebody who lives out in Spring. It's a pretty cute cat, but it is painfully skittish. It's so nervous that you can't as much as clear your throat without sending it running, and reaching toward it to pet it is the most scary thing it can imagine. It spent the first several days hiding out under our bed. We gave up and put its bed under there, and it laid on the bed under the bed for the first 24 hours or so.

I wasn't even totally sure what it looked like. When we got it from the woman, it had been in the cat carrier, and wouldn't come out. We had to dig it out and then drop it into our cat carrier to take it with us. As soon as we opened our carrier, it fled under the bed. My son got a few pictures while he was sitting next to the bed, reaching in under to pet her.

He had to use the flash for the picture, because the cat wouldn't come out of the protective dark under the bed.

It wasn't until Monday morning that we were finally able to coax the cat out with a toy that interested her too much to turn down.

She stayed right at the bed's edge, though, and retreated back under it if anything made her nervous at all.

While I was at work on Monday, my daughter and son managed to get the cat to feel a little bit more secure. They decided on the name as well. They were torn between the name Nyx and Freya, thinking both were cute, and wanting to see which went better with the cat itself. It is now decided that the cat will be called Freya.

Days in now, and she's a little more adventurous, but not a whole lot. She still spends most of her time hiding, and we often have to turn our couch upside down and dig her out of the space she's climbed up inside of to hide. Somehow she manages not to just hide underneath, but actually goes up inside the back of the couch. It's a nightmare.

We've tried introducing the two cats, but it hasn't gone very well. Jupiter growls and hisses when she sees the Freya. Apparently, that's the standard, and you have to keep them apart to where they can see each other but not interact with each other until they get used to the idea of the other cat and then you can bring them together. 

I hope it happens. For two years with Jupiter, Juno did nothing but hiss at her any time the two were near each other. I hoped that Jupiter wouldn't act that way because of her past experience, but no, I guess cats are just that way. 

All I can say so far, is that I prefer Jupiter. One of the main reasons I didn't like Juno was because of how much of a scaredy-cat she was. She ran from me every time she saw me as if I had kicked her over and over. That really rankled after a while. My wife insisted it was because I was just the loudest person in the house, and it made the cat nervous. I just hated getting treated like a monster without even getting the joy of being a monster to deserve the treatment.

Now, we've got another skittish cat. My wife keeps saying that I just need to be patient, coax her out, give her time, and so on, but I don't have the time to do all that. I've got all sorts of crap taking up my time, and I can't spend it all sitting around waiting for a cat to feel comfortable enough to come out from under the bed long enough to be touched.

I fear that this cat will always dislike and fear me, and maybe it's my fault, but I'm not sure if I care enough to change that.