Hot cappuchino to warm you up on Friday morning. . .
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
skip to main |
skip to sidebar
Let's talk about the pleasures and puzzles of the smaller mystery--mystery novels and other fiction--and the bigger one--life.
Facebook Badge
UPDATED Calendar
My Website
Fun reference sites
Great Blogs
- Beth's travels & adventures
- Boran2, and the painting palooza
- Conda, Being Creative
- Family man's friendly blog
- Farfetched, telling tales at Far Manor
- Ghost's ghostly blog
- Jen, thinking about juicy stuff
- Katiebird's blog about eating & health
- Kimberly the Would-Be Wayfarer
- Knucklehead's phantastic photos
- Man Eegee's thoughtful, passionate blog about immigration
- Maria's otherwordly blog
- Maryblogs!
- Mystery writer's salon (Roberta, Hank, Hallie, Rosemary, Jan)
- Nanette's place, for news and views
- Olivia's photo blog--my daily beauty stop
- Rick, Musing
- Sally's Virtual Porch
- Sarah Weinman's book biz blog
- Wyrdsmiths, help for fiction writers
Websites
Blog Archive
-
▼
2007
(167)
-
▼
November
(31)
- MIZZOU-RAH!
- Yo? No.
- Pull up a chair, 2
- Pull up a chair
- Dream house?
- Happy Birthday, Farfetched!
- Have you ever. . .?
- Sunday Bulletin Board
- Lost glove, found kindness
- Apres-Turkey
- Baby, it's cold outside
- Big, fat, and juicy, 2
- Big, fat, and juicy
- First, we're readers
- Sunday Bulletin Board
- Playing indoors
- Not about writing
- (Not) Gone again
- My plan for Wednesday
- Feeling my way into writing
- Holiday Monday
- Sunday Bulletin Board
- Saturday in the Woods With Andif
- Death on the Armpit Express
- Writer's strike
- You talkin' to me?
- Bless the ones who don't do as they "ought"
- Sunday Bulletin Board
- Boids
- Big Trees
- Finally fall?
-
▼
November
(31)
About Me
Where in the world are we from?
Quote for the week
. . .here is a smoke signal, unmistakable but unobtrusive--we are following what comes, going through the world, knowing each other, building our little fires.
William Stafford
William Stafford
40 comments:
Brrr, it's 24 here and I've just cranked up the stove to get some extra warmth. I love the quiet, comforting, enveloping heat of a wood stove.
Happy no-work day to all the worker bees who aren't one today.
Morning Nancy.
It's 40 here which is cold for us. I'm trying to wake up and get myself going for another day of......Turkeeeee!
Hope everyone has a relaxing day today.
Oh! It's 17 here! 17! On our driveway (we have remote control thermometers so I don't have to go out to look)
Good Morning Andi & Family Man. I hope you have a wonderful day.
Morning everyone.
There's a litle snow in Asheville this morning. I lit the Christmas tree. And the outdoor lights along the veranda. First cup of coffee with the dogs still yawning.
One of my golden-retrvr mix rescue puppies was raised with kittens. She's meowing now. Must be breakfast time. brb.
I got a kick out of this "official list" today and thought you might too. Not even close, as far as I am concerned. How bout you? Remember your worst job?
Worst Jobs: Occupations with the highest concentrations of bad jobs. Article in MarketWatch.
1.Hosts & hostesses, restaurant, lounge, & coffee shop. 87.0% bad jobs
2.Counter attendants, cafeteria, food concession, & coffee shop. 87.0%
3.Ushers, lobby attendants, & ticket takers. 85.4%
4.Fabric & apparel patternmakers. 82.2%
5.Lifeguards & other protective-service workers.81.6%
6.Waiters & waitresses. 80.4%
7.Tour & travel guides. 79.4%
8.Models, demonstrators, & product promoters. 79.2%
9.Dishwashers.78.8%
10.Motion picture projectionists. 78.1%
!! What are they talking about?
How about Testing Gravel for Highway Construction?
Or
Filing Income Tax Returns according to an arbitrary number?
Proof Reading (especially something interesting)?
Counting Library Books on a range of shelves?
Slaughtering Cows? (I haven't done this one though)
Some of the stuff THEY listed sounds like fun to me compared to those.
Hi, andi, fam man, oliva, ghost, and kb. If we huddle, we'll be warmer. I'll bet Olivia has all of us "southerners" beat, even if it is still only 19 degrees here.
Ghost, that's adorable about the dog mewing. Does it hiss, too?
I'm surprised by that list. I'm thinking nobody with heavy labor jobs contributed to it, or those jobs aren't as bad as I thought they were.
Good Morning, Nancy! I'm looking forward to this afternoon. Maybe we could go shopping for wool socks while we're out? (It's COLD!)
Apres? There's waaaayyyyyy too much turkey left for apres in the next few days…
It was about 35 here when I woke up, light overcast. Wonder of wonders, The Boy just walked through on the way to the kitchen; I wasn't aware he'd come home last night. Beth is up but not about, and the other ladies are still in bed. I tried to talk The Boy into poking his head into our bedroom and telling Mrs. Fetched it's time to get up, just to blow her mind, but he isn't interested.
Daughter Dearest will do the annual crawl under the staircase thing & drag out all the Christmas decorations. Mrs. Fetched has already cleared space for the fake tree (amortized over the time we've had it, its cost is pocket change per year) and I'll be decorating whether I want to or not.
I can mostly relate to this article. It's a little extreme even for me, but there are some insights that might apply to writers in general. The companion article is also worth a read.
No sense of reality in that list, Katiebird, Nancy. That's for sure.
Picking beans, strawberries, lettuce or any "piece-paid" farm labor has got to be much worse.
I hauled hay as a kid in h.s. and it was horrid (5-cents a bail). Vaccinating calves was pretty crappy too, ranch-girl Nancy.
I picked strawberries for money and that was the worst for me because I was afraid of snakes.
I only worked one day at a screen-door factory. Ouch!
Guess this is what I am Thankful for. :-) And, Katibeird, I really liked my job as a dishwasher. It was indoors, I got to eat free, and listen to the radio. Except for the grease traps.
Ok, Katiebird: How do you test gravel?????
Not a taste test, I presume. Do you fall down on it; and if it doesn't tear your jeans, it's no good?
It's not quite apres turkey for me. It's actually in between 2 birds, one yesterday during the pleasant time we had at my parents' house and tomorrow's bird at what is gearing up to be a contentious late Turkey day with madame boran's family. But I might at least get an interesting post out of it. ;-)
Shopping for socks! My cold ankles agree with you, kb. Did we decide which coffee shop?
Far, I just now finally caught up with reading Far Future episodes. I am so blown away, always, by how utterly real they seem. You write them exactly the way you write your blog posts, so they seem just as on-the-spot. I feel as if I'm getting emails from a friend in the thick of dramatic events. And the last one was amazing. Did you know you were going to do the singing scene, or did it just come to you as you wrote it? If I sound like a fan, I am. :)
Now to catch up with Jen's writing. She put up a short-short story a few days ago.
What a feast of writing talent we have around here. Jen's story is beautiful and intimate, part romance, part consciousness adventure story.
Picking cotton. I've heard that's awful--your back aches, your fingers bleed.
Fish canning factories.
And we won't even talk about septic tanks.
Far, maybe you could post your photos again? I doubt many people saw your comment last night.
I can say picking cotton, chopping cotton and soy beans is no fun at all. Ghost I worked the hay fields during summers as a kid and enjoyed it compared to the cotton and soy beans. Of course on our farm it was no pay, but I hired out to a few farmers too, and it was $5.00 a day. At the end of the week I felt rich.
Worst job: chicken houses. I don't get paid, it's doubtful that what Mrs. Fetched gets is enough to cover work-related expenses, and I can't quit w/o getting a divorce I don't want to get.
Nancy, thanks for the support! You probably know as well as anyone how good it is to get comments like that. :-) The theme for each episode, including the last one, comes more or less holistically; in the best cases, I'm just transcribing from the Great Beyond and filling in a detail here & there. When this one came to me, I want "oh, coooool!" and started writing! Having said that, the episodes all occupy a place along a (mostly) pre-determined arc. That means I ended up writing an episode a couple of months ago that might not see blog-light for another month or two....
No prob, Nancy: Turkey Day at FAR Manor
Chicken houses! You win, poor baby.
Speaking of fowl. I just looked at the window at the three wild turkeys pecking at seed in my neighbors' yard. I wonder if they make themselves sleepy. :)
Morning Nancy and all,
It's crept up to the mid-30s here in MA. But I had leftover pie for breakfast, so all is well.
I'm no Betty Crocker, but the pie gods smiled on me this year. (I posted a pic of it this morning - http://catherinecairns.com/blog/)
Stay warm!
MMM, I LOVE cold pie for breakfast. Seriously. Cherry is my fav for that.
The pie you fixed is gorgeous!
I added you to my blogroll just now. Anybody who wants to see the handsome Lee Childs--I love his Jack Reacher novels--should hurry on over there to scroll down and find him.
"I just looked at the window at the three wild turkeys pecking at seed in my neighbors' yard. I wonder if they make themselves sleepy."
This is why trukeys NEVER have oral sex.
FamMan: My m.i.l. has cotton. It's all machine picked now, which pisses her off because "they leave cottton in the field." Still, no one is going to go out there and pick it.
They used to cancel school for the cotton crops. Chopping cotton was awful for a kid to do. But I don't think anyone knows what it is anymore. :-)
Ghost, lol! That, and the beaks.
Hey Ghost, I'm the same as the m.i.l. I've been past cotton fields that were machine picked and think of all that cotton left out there. Then I think, thank the FSM I'm not out there picking any. I do remember school closing for cotton time too.
Brr-high today is going to be 34--if we're lucky!
Worst job I ever had: inventory at a semi-truck repair shop. 2 weeks of counting metal bits and pieces--which would have been fine except everything was greased. Every piece. I came home with grease ground into every pore, into my hair, my eyelashes. Nothing got it out. Ugh.
Ghost, I never minded professional dishwashing either. I think it's because everyone leaves you alone to daydream while you work.
Testing Gravel? We went to gravel yards all over town and filled canvas bags with samples. (Not as fun as it sounds)
Then we brought them back to a primitive shack and poured the sample into a steel-cake-pan.
And weighed it.
Then we cooked the sample over a gas flame until all the moisture was out of the rocks.
And weighed it again. (writing down both weights)
Then we poured the sample into the top of a series of screens (from huge screen to tiny gold-fabric-screen) and spun the stack of screens until all the rocks settled at the smallest level they could go through.
And weigh the rocks/dust at each level.
THEN take the dust from the finest screen in the palm of the hand and mix it with a little water. And roll it for a while to see how long before it cracks.
And write down the result.
I also spent a lot of time in a shack that was papered with the centerfolds from a decade or so of Penthouse magazines certifying loads of cement. I didn't do much there except put a checkmark in a box everytime a truck drove off with a load.
That task gave me SERIOUS headaches and I quit.
I was the only girl on the crew.
Dropping out of lurkdom to comment.
The worst job I ever had was working production in a machine shop for 18 months. When I'm stressed (like now--my deadline gets closer every day), I dream about the place. I did on Monday night. Tuesday morning I found a metal "chip" on the bottom of my Croc. I think this time I not only dreamed I was back there again, I really WAS there!
*Shudder*
Thanks, Nancy! I'm really honored to be included. You have such a neat community here.
Lee Child is such a great guy in person. He was the Crime Bake's Guest of Honor and yet hung out with conference attendees all weekend like a regular bloke.
kb, wow, who knew people tested gravel? I agree with you on the daydreaming benefits of prof. dishwashing. At home, I find the warm water is soothing. It's a bonus if there's a window over the sink.
Far, I can so relate to your photo of the after-turkey napper.
Hi, Lorraine, welcome!
Oh, Lorraine, Conda, and Katiebird, those jobs you described! Omg. Dishpan hands would be a luxury compared to those.
Cathy, I'd heard he's a really nice guy. Cute, too. :)
Testing Gravel?
Wow, what a story, KB. Heh, let me just quote Albert Camus:
One must imagine Sisyphus happy.
Hi everyone! Home again after my quick but glorious visit to FAR Manor. You all should try and wrangle an invite - the Fetched clan is gracious, kind, generous, funny, and wonderful. I'll blog about it tomorrow. Glad everyone had a slackerly day.
Worst job? Toss up between the boss who used to close the door and scream at me for 20 min at a shot (my first "real" job - I lasted 3 months), and the boss who let me sit at an empty desk for 5 weeks, promising to give me work "soon." They gave me a big going-away party when I left, and acted like I was a great loss to the company (scratches head).
Watching Boise State play Hawaii, Conda - go Broncs!
Jen, lol.
Beth, welcome home. Judging from the pictures, you and the Fetcheds hit it off like old friends.
LSU lost to Arkansas!
Hi Beth, I can't wait to read about your visit to FAR Manor. The photos I saw looked like fun.
Nancy and I had a lot of fun on our (too quick) visit.
I wish holidays could last forever.
Kb and I always have a great time together, and it is always too short.
:)
We just watched The Family Man with Nicholas Cage. I love it all. But, it REALLY needs an Epilogue. The end is way too abrupt.
Nicholas Cage? I always thought Family Man should be portrayed by a somewhat less abrasive Wilford (sp?) Bromley.
Post a Comment