Shining the light of God's word into our confused world.

Month: March 2013

Easter Sunday

Well, this last week kind of went off the rails after we took Sasha to the vet on Wednesday, where we were told that it would take nothing short of a miracle to save her and that she’s probably only got about two months left. That’ll definitely put a damper on your day, to put it lightly. So the focus now is on trying to help her feel better and keep her quality of life up for as long as possible. Of course, we’re still praying for that miracle, because you never know.

At any rate, for the last few days I’ve only been as productive as I had to be, and Matt and I have both been spending most of our free time pampering and loving on our kitty. We’ve been taking her outside to enjoy the lovely weather, which I suppose to an indoor kitty is tantamount to going to Disney Land.

Yesterday was actually a great day, in spite of everything — I jotted down some scene prompts on note cards in preparation for Camp Nano, then after a Walmart run (the only unpleasant part of the day) we swung by the deli at Harp’s and picked up some fried chicken and catfish and had an impromptu early Easter dinner. On the way out of Harp’s, we met a lovely gentleman who had injured his leg in Viet Nam and wanted to share some prosthesis advice with Matt, which turned into an interesting conversation in the middle of the parking lot, as these things do.

After stuffing ourselves full of chicken and catfish (and fried potato wedges and coleslaw and dinner rolls), we spent the afternoon hanging out in the back yard with Sasha, Pete, and Matilda the turtle (Niblet and Boudica were both content to stay inside and snooze), soaking up the warm weather and semi-fresh air. After we came back in, I made a pair of earrings for a friend’s birthday, and then we got in bed and watched a couple episodes of Justified while I finished up this belt that I’ve been working on for about a month.

Today, we’ve had church, and some Easter candy, and I’m waiting for some boiled eggs to cool so I can devil them and we can have protein munchies along with more Easter candy, to balance out all that sugar. And then I will make some more jewelry, since all my tools are already out, while I catch up on my shows. We might take Sasha outside again at some point, and later on we will surely watch Doctor Who and more Justified (we were planning to watch The Ten Commandments, but apparently this is the year that they finally decided to stop showing it every Easter, for some reason). We could have gone to my mom’s today for a big family Easter to do, but I’m at a place right now (and I believe Matt is, too) where it’s just too hard to be the odd childless couple out on kid-centered holidays. It’s all just too much of an in-your-face reminder of what we’re lacking. But we’ve been enjoying our low-key, child-free holidays surrounded by our fur-babies and the freedom to act like big kids ourselves.

Tomorrow: Camp Nanowrimo kick-off, client stuff, and Sasha goes back to the vet.

Happy Easter, everyone.

On the Versatility of Spaghetti Squash. And Some Minor Publishing Plans.

Today is groceries & Bible class day, so no time for writing. The grocery shopping’s done, and I stocked up on vegetables in an attempt to get myself back on the low GI wagon. I bought a big spaghetti squash to stand in for all the noodles I’ve been eating lately, and I actually picked out some recipes from my Low GI board in Pinterest and lined up a menu for the week.

I’m mostly looking forward to making (and eating) this Spaghetti Squash Pad Thai (or at least, my own version of it). For the leftover squash I picked up some pesto mix and I’ll just toss it with that and some chicken and Parmesan and pretend it’s pasta. This avacodo, cucumber and tomato salad is on the lunch menu. Hopefully this week will remind me that vegetables can actually be delicious and cleanse all that starch and sugar out of my system so I’ll stop craving it so much. Of course, not looking at Pinterest so often would also help with that.

Later: lunch, then client projects, then Bible class and giving Sasha the rest of her meds. Then we’ll get in bed and watch Justified. We started the first season last night. So far it looks like a keeper.

Weekend plans: I need to give my current book listings some attention and make sure all my author profiles everywhere are up to date, and I need to add some content to the pages of this here blog. I might do a new cover for Restless Spirits, since my graphic design skills have improved so much since the last cover, and also because I’ve been told by male readers that they loved it but were reluctant to read it because the cover is too “romancey.” I’m also thinking about experimenting with changing my pen name from my full name to just J. M. Bauhaus to see if that helps to lure in more male readers (and isn’t it a shame that that’s even something I have to consider in this day and age? Sigh. Boys.), but that might cause me to lose my reviews on Amazon, so we’ll see.

Update on Sasha Kitty

So we’re back from the vet, and it’s worse news than I’d anticipated. Sasha’s cancer is back, and so is the infection. She was dehydrated and running a fever, so they gave her some IV fluids and antibiotics and loaded us up with two different kinds of oral antibiotics and some vitamins.

The vet sounded hopeful and said she believes there’s a good chance that by taking care of the infection Sasha’s immune system will become strong enough to keep the cancer from growing and spreading, and then we can figure out what to do from there. And I might end up having to learn how to give her subcutaneous fluids to keep her properly hydrated. At any rate, we’re asking those in our circle who pray to do so for our kitty. She’s a tough girl. She came back from that surgery fighting and we believe she can beat this, too.

Loosely Held Together

I’m astounded whenever I get a comment — which happens more often than you’d think — from someone saying how impressed they are that I’ve got everything so together, or that I’ve got things figured out. I am, frankly, astonished that I ever even manage to give anyone this impression, considering how so much of my blogging and tweeting and Facebooking is just me flailing about and waving my hands, chronicling one failed experiment after another, aiming for goals that I always somehow manage to miss.

I suppose if there is anything to admire, it’s the way I keep going, keep trying, keep making goals, instead of admitting defeat and giving up and going to lie down and/or have a stiff drink. But I’m not sure whether that’s admirable or just the definition of insanity. And the truth is that I don’t know anything. I’m 28 days away from turning 40 and I know NOTHING. I just make it all up as I go, being an adult, being a wife, being a writer, being a freelancer, hell, just BEING and it’s just one long series of throwing stuff at the wall to see what sticks, cleaning up the ensuing mess and moving on to the next boiling pot of life spaghetti and wondering if I’ll ever get good at cooking any of this stuff.

It’s really quite exhausting.

And then there are days like today, when the hormones explode and the self-doubt creeps in and the mean voices whisper that it’s no good, that I’ll never amount to anything, never achieve my dreams, and maybe I really should just quit and go lie down and have a nap and a drink and then look for a less complicated way to make a steady living and spend all my free time just watching TV, because hey, I love TV, and that just sounds so much more relaxing, and why am I doing this to myself, exactly?

But I seem to be pathologically incapable of giving up for good. Again, not sure whether that’s admirable or insane. Or just stupid.

And since this is supposed to be my author blog and I write to a secular audience and try to make everyone feel welcome, I try to avoid getting religious or political (as I wish most other writers and entertainers would do, but that’s a topic for another post), it does bear pointing out that the reason I don’t give up, the reason I have the strength to keep going, the only reason I ever manage to give any kind of impression of having it all together, is because of my faith in and my relationship with God, my belief in His promises in scripture and that He is a trustworthy God who keeps His promises. And one of those promises is that I CAN do ALL things through Christ who gives me strength, which I cling to and remind myself of daily, because without that strength I really would be completely useless.

So there you have it. If I’m together, I’m held that way by faith and determination and duct tape and spit. Don’t have any illusions to the contrary.

This disemboguing of forthrightness and brutal honesty is brought to you today by the letters P, M and S.