Carolyn

Well fortunately the good outweighs the bad for the weekend - whole 30 is still going great, I got in lots of great walking and geocaching (55 found so far! YAY!), lots of bonding time with the boy puppy:



Got to see my son and his flatemate and play with their new pet snake, Lucifer.

I LOVE HIM!

So much so my son is going to find me my own pet snake!

Yes, I want my own pet snake. It was so relaxing to just be aware of this fragile creature, looping in and out through my fingers as I chatted with the guys. This is Lucifer!



His eye is cloudy because he is getting ready to shed his skin. Pretty cool.

So all in all, such a lovely weekend. Food went great this weekend, and in fact I have more been dealing with not hungry so why eat? Which I know I need to get enough food. One can't just not eat, right.

Anyway, now for the bad:



Yes. That is my window, held together by the film over it. If not for that it would've been an even more horrible mess. My purse which was stuck under the seat out of sight (though my windows are so darkly tinted you really can't see in anyway) was stolen. Credit card, debit cards, insurance card, driver's license, Maddox's brand-new Geodog tag (grrrrr) and just the worse, my favorite Brighton purse that I've had forEVER. Like... nine years. Those purses just do not die. Now I have no purse at all because I never buy new ones, because I had this one. Dammit!

So anyway. I was at the park, innocently walking Maddox for almost two hours (it was that gorgeous out!) and then we come back to that. *SHAKES FIST*

I had to file a police report, and cancel the cards, but thankfully I have a passport so was able to get to the bank and get a temporary debit card.

So, onward and upward! I am about to make some soup for the week, and it will be an odd one. Zucchini soup. Yes. Weird huh. We will see how this goes. Otherwise, other than getting another couple miles in this morning, I have been quite happily lazy. Somehow it seems less awful to be lazy during the day after getting a good walk in in the morning. No guilt!

Back to my new addiction - Great British Bake Off, Great Irish Bake off and Great Australian Bake Off! There is an American one too! I am up-to-date on the British and Irish ones, currently watching the VERY peppy Australian one. :) So much fun to see the different countries' approaches to baking.

I hate baking, myself, and don't like rich desserts so much (but bread, ooohhhh) but I love these shows.

:) (oh and headaches are gone, YAY!)

Today was a much, much better day. I woke up when the pupsters woke me at 7 (the beasts!) but got up and let them out, and oh! the coolness, the breezes, the lovely aroma of Fall! I made myself a cup of my new coffee I bought (mmm so smooth) and sat outside on the porch and sipped my coffee. Even though it is only the second day, I am starting to realize that I have been masking the true delicious flavors of coffee and my favorite tea (Constant Comment :) with Sweet n Low. No more! I THREW IT OUT! I didn't throw it out the other day because in the back of my head I was fooling myself into thinking that I would get back to it. But I've got a new goal to toss in there - no more sweet n low, ever. No more aspartame, no more ANYTHING artificial. Later if I want sugar I will just use sugar, or Agave. Or honey, or pure maple syrup. Those four are at least natural. Yes?

Okay so back to today. It was 8:15 and I said something to Nick about should I make breakfast or go walking and he said GO WALK! So, we did. Maddox is doing much better about harnessing up. Shelby was asleep in the sun in the hole she recently dug for herself so I decided to leave her at home this time and just took Maddox. He did so well! I am so pleased with him. We walked for almost an hour and a half! He also got his very first geocache!



I've ordered him a Geodog dog tag so he can log his own finds. I am sure he is excited about that. (lol)

Got home and made a recipe I found that looked really good - breakfast muffins!



Ever so slightly healthier than the ones I made full of sugar and flour and such last week. These contain kale, eggs, pretty heirloom tomatoes, mushrooms, etc. So good! Well, the only thing I will change about next time is I will use olive oil instead of the coconut oil the recipe called for. I think my coconut oil is just too rich. So there is a slight sweetness to the muffins I am okay with, but not enthused about.

I also made meatballs! Free range beef combined with chopped up green and yellow onions, and sweet potato and spaghetti squash. That was dinner and it was amazing! That will also be lunch tomorrow with my favorite green beans from Trader Joe's.

I also had frozen grapes today. I kinda love that stuff.

It is the end of the day and I have to say I am very pleased. Got good exercise with Maddox, I ate very well, no sweeteners, had a marvelous nap. Emotionally I feel empowered - as one does when doing something like this at first! What was hard though was not being able to weigh! I have a terrible habit of jumping on the scale off and on during the day, apparently. Not today! *bites nails*

And one last thing I did today was attempt to make Ghee. Well, after totally ruining one pound of expensive Irish butter (sigh) I found a recipe to make it in the microwave then put it in the fridge. SO MUCH EASIER. Thankfully I had another pound of the expensive Irish butter (unsalted, btw). I rather like Ghee.

Today was also my dad's 81st birthday, so I called and talked to him for a long time. He finally, FINALLY is doing email regularly, since he got a new Kindle Fire! I have long wanted him to get with the program re: email and he finally has. :)

So all in all a good day. A very good day indeed.

Tomorrow is release day!!! It is currently pre-orderable through Amber Quill Press here.

Did I post the cover? No? Yes? I can't remember! Very happy with it - the background on the cover was taken by yours truly in Cardiff. :) :)



It's been a long long time since I wrote for sheer fun, and this being the very last go round of Paper Legends, the Merlin Big Bang, I just had to sign up. I've got to get this sci fi sent in to its destination, then I have an anthology to write, but after that I am diving into this story whole-hog. It'l be an experiment of sorts - once it is done and posted with Paper Legends, I'm reworking it and am going to stabbity-stab at self-publishing. The PL story is completely AU so that will work out just fine.

Other things - after almost a month of being sick, I am finally finally finally just about well. Wow. Didn't get the flu but got The Other Evil - a horrid respiratory infection with massive horrible hateful cough. Am still coughing a wee bit but nothing horrendous. The cool thing? The steroids the doc gave me for the resp. inf. also hugely helped my sprained knee. It too is much, much better!! What a relief!!

My daughter is home from Florida this week - a friend of hers committed suicide last Saturday. The funeral itself was today, five hours from here, but she woke up feeling crappy so opted not to go. The memorial Thursday was the big thing though. So horrible, so sad. She returns to school Sunday. We had Pho last night which was really lovey. She'll be back home for the summer but will hopefully live with a couple of friends... :) Not a bad idea (plus, I really hate sharing my bathroom...).

Dogs are fine, writing is fine - SO CLOSE to finishing this sci fi story which will then be sent to Liquid Silver Books. Ihope they want it! There would be a sequel! The final edits have been slow going though as I've been so sick I'd come home every night after work, do minimal dealing with the house, then crash. Thursday night was truly the first night in all this illness that I was able to function in the evening, and sleep solidly. Wow, how awesome it is to be able to do that! Wow.

So anyway! Onward! I am considering a nap not because my body is screaming for it but just to be lazy for laziness's sake! And later I might go out and do a little geocaching. :)