Homemade scones: the way to start a morning. Yum.

And heaven knows I will need every single calorie to keep up with today, based on our experiences with contractors yesterday.

For one thing, just knowing that whoever shows up is going to stay for three hours and become your bestest bud evAR. And that there will be attention paid to the dog, questions about the family photos on the wall... oh, and by the ways, how about if we move the tub into the closet, put the shower where the tub currently is, move the toilet beside the new shower, and at the end of the long corridor through that archway, so yeah, great VIEW!, and then put the closet in the old shower/toilet area.

Um, no. But we can switch the shower and the tub from their current locations, thanks. The toilet will stay where it is, thanks. You know, out of sight.

So interesting progress. We have two bids and four more to go. So far the difference is only 4K, but the total bill for the construction ranges from 24.5-28.5K

I certainly can't buy a new house here for that price, but it does make me wonder about the price of the kitchen to come. (Did I mention the windows? Yeah, those too. And then there's the front of the house and steps to come, and then... once you start, it is never done. Never.)

But we've held off for long enough.

Interestingly enough, there seems to be a range of time spent in construction. The first guy said two weeks, the second three to four.

So yes, a bit more with the cleaning today, like the vacuuming upstairs that I didn't get to yesterday. And then, if I'm bored, there's always the kitchen floor and counters in need of a scrub.

So, housework, two more guys to talk to, and then, for my reward, theater tickets! Woo! (And after the theater, then over to choir practice if it's still going on. And it might be. We've got confirmation to sing on Saturday.

This so does not feel like vacation.

I need to report for jury duty, oh, say... once a week. Or so.

1400 words, and that was despite either falling asleep because I was sitting so much (the typos! Ick!) or wrenching words from my brain via dental surgery. (Okay, maybe not, but damn it felt like it!)

So between these and the 500 I got the other night when I was word racing Amanda and Bear (yes, I lost. D'oh. But 500 words. In less than a half hour!) I'm off to a decent start.

And if that weren't enough to cheer me up, it's Friday and we managed to get the latest Ideo issue up, although it took three of us.

But yay! It's done.

And I have words.

And my car has four new tires, one new brake, and an oil change. Who can ask for anything more? (Well, except for the part where I go pick it up and drive it home. Minor details.)

Finally, we have new music to learn for the concert on the 24th, the Italian canzonetta is progressing, just not as fast as I'd like, and school is sucking time like you would not believe. My principal suggested that I might want to run an after school choir group for the kids, and I managed to stutter out that I'd have to think about it. (Once an administrator learns you're taking voice lessons, it's apparently an easy reaction to believe you can teach singing to kids. Um... right. Thankfully she was reminded that another teacher (who plays piano quite well) wanted that job first. All I can say is yaaaaaaaaaaay!!!)

Oh, and I have discovered Kate Elliot! So I am reading huge draughts of fiction.

Did I mention we're mostly alone this weekend? Yes. We are. There's a concert tomorrow that we're going to attend, and the one I really, Really, REALLY wanted to go to on the 11th is a no-go. The spousling's receiving the St. George medal that night, so it's another dinner. And he'll have a St. George to hang round his neck with that Silver Beaver.

It probably comes with another knot that I'll have to sew on his shirt, too, dagnabit.

There was more writing yesterday. Two days in a row, which seemed to indicate the imminent collapse of the world as we know it.

But it's still here.

And the chores are waiting.

Someone ought to take care of that. (Bear, write me another book. You have a week.)

Yesterday was typical: a reject and slushing. As for the reject, I was very disappointed. Not at the reject itself. I had no high hopes that this market would be interested in that story, but I had planned on that story not returning home for at least another five months.

Where has the sloth gone?

So yeah, over it, had a rejection party, move on. I need another market.

Slush took me a while, because my email server decided to play games and not download stuff. So, I rebooted, added personalities for the slush and query addies (Slush: "Oh, the weather outside is frightful, but, my dear, you're so delightful, and since there's no place to go, let it snow, let it snow, let it snow. On your desktop." Query: "You talkin' to me? You talkin' to ME????!") Try this trick at home under supervision, kids. Once given personalities, they're never the same.

Then there was the cleaning, the writing, and for a reward, I got...

...a concert! A five-piece brass ensemble with trumpet voluntaries.

Lovely, lovely stuff.

And today, we start the whole process over.

I'm going to really love those two trips to Oxnard and back for the Slug's benefit. Really, I will.

Oh, yeah.

Slushing is over for the week, and thankfully, I've cleaned out most of the still-holding bits. I can think of three or four more outstanding, and I believe it will All. Be. Done.

The world is ending. Run! (Or stand still and let it hit you. I'm tending toward that one.)

Within the realm of slush, how not to begin a story:

With a situation that raises such a question in the editor's mind, that she must immediately repair to chat and ask those present if said situation is remotely plausible. (In this case, it was unzipping a pair of jeans with one's teeth. Sadly, I there are gaps in my education. And here, I thought I'd seen it all. Ha.)

End result: Reject. I should care more about the character's issues than the plausibility of sexual contortions. (And what if those teeth were dentures? What then?)

With a sentence so poorly constructed that it becomes the written equivalent of a Mobius strip.

Result: Reject. (And if you haven't been exposed to a sample of this via the Komodo dragon quote, please let me know and I will gladly share.)

With the first few paragraphs' transitions so jumpy, that I must be on uppers to follow.

Results: Mixed. If decent writing follows, no problem. I'll ask for a rewrite. If it's throughout? Reject. But you can save yourself so much trouble by staring at the end of a sentence to see what visual image it leaves the reader with, and then reading the opening words of the next to see if you've started with that image and moved on, or merely leaped to another image. I crave smooth transitions.

I have a number more, but I'm running out of time.

This week's updates in other areas: Grandma didn't bite anyone, with or without teeth, but she does know how to slip out of bed in the small gap between the bed's bars and fall on the floor now. The eldest has never learned to balance his checking account, and thus has financial woes. It would all be solved, I'm sure, if he had work. That, say, paid decently and gave him the hours that he needed. Still, one should not count on money unearned to bail one's self out of money spent today. Eventually it bites you in the ass. We have new music for the upcoming concert in less than two weeks. We will have more new music today. Because after all, we have TWO WEEKS to memorize it all. (Yes, and we are counting our blessings that it is two weeks, and not two days. Which has happened.) Report cards are due the 19th. Guess what I'll be doing next week?

Finally, the dreams have got to stop. Last night's included a pet horse, who followed me everywhere, including into the house and snuggled with me in bed. The soft gusts of warm breath in my hair were particularly convincing details.

It was only upon arising that I realized the dog had intruded upon my nocturnal activities. Again.

And the good news...

...has nothing to do with writing. Still.

It appears that my director is attempting a new choir trip—and very hopeful that our small choir will be going along this time. (Last time, only one member scavenged time in October for Italy; Kevin's planning a summer trip now.)

With separate performances by our small choir (numbering seven, including the two musicians!) in addition to the large choir—um... maybe forty or fifty. (What I don't know is if I'll need to learn two choirs' worth of music. That could be very possible.)

Still! Two weeks!

In IRELAND.

So yeah, Rick (the guitar/mandolin player) and I are definitely checking out the cathedral of St. Guinness.

Best of all, it's sometime during the summer of '08, so I'm going to attempt to add a week on to see Chance (since I already promised her I'd come that summer anyway. Of course, she may change her mind now that she has the flat that she has.)

I'm really hoping this comes to pass. I've always wanted to visit Ireland.

Cross your fingers!

So I head off to school, merrily, this morning, and check the schedule.

Woo! An author is showing up to read his book. That's something that's never happened before in all of my thirty years of teaching.

I look at the name.

Never heard of him.

I look at the city he's from.

Uh... hmm. Small town a few hours northwest of us.

Only one thing to do: I google.

Nothing turns up in his name but I find a book title on a German book seller's page. I google the title.

Wow! A fair number of hits, including Amazon and B&N.

And the publisher?

None other than Publish America.

I bang my head.

He is in my classroom for approximately 10 minutes, and I have to choose between educating him or the kids.

Quality of the book? About what you'd expect for a book by Publish America, although it was probably spelled correctly seeing that he teaches high school, and as hand-drawn illos go, not bad.

Just not... good.

From a kinder (who is terrified of Santa, and while I don't know about the Easter Bunny for sure, I have my suspicions.)

She was doing okay after recovering from the first shock of the messy classroom and shamrock confetti and gold glitter on the floor. Then we found the teensy glittery hat on the doll bed in the dollhouse, where the leprechaun had forgotten it after his nap. Hysterics all over again.

B-

Is it just me, or does anyone else note the significance of 'lepercon?' Leprechauns carry leprosy! Who knew?! And man, I sure don't want to attend that convention, either. Imagine returning home and trying to explain that bad case of leprechauns you caught there. (A cross between lice and dandruff, only greener.)

She was writing another letter for her own front door last night. (Thank god the leprechauns all catch the plane back to Ireland at midnight. And yes, they all do. Because otherwise, we would suffer through leprechaun searches until the middle of July....)

The slush fairy was busy yesterday—thanks, Jaime, I'm glad to know what my alternate persona is. I'm putting it on my resumé from now on.

Of course, there is more in the inbox today, but it will just have to reside there until next Saturday.

Besides, I'm busy with little things like tile. I'm kind of excited this morning because I found a porcelain tile by Florida tile that appears (online, at least) to blend beautifully with the handcrafted tile we're using in the bathroom. Go here and scroll down to check out the slate mosaic from the Solano product line. Next stop, a trip to any of the local stores that carry this line of tile. I will have my trusty samples in hand.

So, yes, the design board is coming together.

Thank heavens I don't actually have to talk to anyone before Wednesday.

For my next trick, I am going to pull together some kind of design for over the tub that echoes the arch doorway. I haven't decided whether stained glass will be enough or if a tile design would work. It may actually end up being both.

Of course, there are windows to worry about (the Spousling scheduled the window guy for Friday) and I haven't even looked at the bathroom downstairs yet. (Yes, because we are insane and are going to do two out of three bathrooms at once. Thank you. You'll know where to find us. We'll be here screaming at each other.)

So, lots to do, and none of it involved with writing, although my dreams are getting more vivid and the urge to write something is growing stronger. Fortunately, another concert is down, we have Confirmation and the Easter Vigil to get through, and then I start learning the music for the Deaconate ordination in June. Notice I've said nothing about school. Yeah.)

Now I'm off to see who's open on a Sunday and to throw on appropriate clothing for exiting the house.

Did I mention that today is the baby's 19th birthday? And we are taking her out to dinner.

It's Aries birthday hell for the next three weeks with the Slug's birthday today, the Spousling's birthday next Saturday, and the Middle Child's birthday on April 14th.

OTOH, once it's all over, I don't have to worry again until the end of August.

The day, which I'd planned to run on fast forward, has gotten off to a slow start.

Not that I'm complaining, mind you.

I am living tile, lighting, and bedroom furniture. Luckily, I have found EXACTLY what I want in the furniture line: the spindle bed and the grand chest. Oh, and I can live with two of those night tables, too. Admire those puppies. Those four items alone run 6K, more or less. But the drawers are solid cedar!

Tom said something about 100K on the bathroom last night, and while I laughed, it was uneasily. That might be bath and master bath. I'm crossing my fingers it'll cover a little more than that.

We went to look at windows yesterday, since eventually we'll be replacing all of these. Add 10K for the pop-in Milgard windows. Make that 30K for the Eagle windows.

It'll be another fifteen years before we pay off the house a second time.

Let's see... fix the house or send another three or four children to college?

At least we're inland enough that when the ocean levels rise, they won't make it over the Santa Monica hills.

This morning, my goal is to get the house decent enough so that when the contractors' bidding parade begins, it'll look like people rather than pigs live here.

Note: You spend the entire day running from store to store to design center, something's gotta go. In this case, it was housework.

But no longer.

Eesh.