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kicking_k's journal
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bibliomane...  I've just read the entry I wrote on the 28th of April last year (lo, one of only three I managed to write) and am, as usual, amazed at what a bad blogger I am. Life has continued much as it was. I had a wonderful time at WisCon and came home laden with new books and all fired up to do lots of writing and be more involved with fandom and generally not be such a hermit, but... it didn't really happen. Life got to me again. I did find a different job to apply for, but didn't get it. I had mixed feelings about it, really - the job itself was very cool, with the Shakespeare Centre Library in Stratford-on-Avon - but I'd have been the lone archivist, which I'm not sure I'm ready for, and it would have involved moving a long way from my family, which... likewise. It would have been good for J, though, since his own family are not that far from Stratford. C'est la vie. And things ground on in a sort of holding pattern for the rest of the summer. However, in late September J and I decided that after talking about it for a long while, we would actually try to have a baby, and we conceived during my next cycle. I had somehow convinced myself we would have trouble conceiving, so am still slightly amazed that it happened just like that. So I'm pregnant. 33 weeks pregnant at the moment, in fact. In two weeks I'll be on maternity leave; in a month the baby could be here (well, he could be here any time, but I hope he'll stay put until term!) Health-wise I've had a very easy ride through pregnancy, really; no morning sickness, and not even much weight gain yet. Up until 6 months, I was still mostly in normal clothes and didn't look pregnant; I still don't look definitely pregnant, just a bit chunkier than usual in the stomach. But the baby is growing fine (it's all down to my long torso). I have had some pelvic pain, which is made worse by my genetic tendency to extra-lax ligaments, but nothing unmanageable. At the moment I am surprisingly zen about labour. I did my share of tormenting myself mentally during the early stages of the pregnancy (I thought I might be having an ectopic pregnancy, and then I thought every twinge was a miscarriage starting, and then I worried about the Down's test). But most of the things I was worrying about haven't happened. I'm well aware that things don't always go to plan, but... I'm just not worrying too much at the moment. Ask me again in a few weeks. I do have some trouble thinking of this baby as a real person who is going to have a real existence, even though he clearly has a will of his own and boots me in the lungs and kidneys on a regular basis. But in a few weeks we get to meet him. Weird. But cool. But weird! And I'm home again. Wiscon was great. I will blog about it later when I'm not so jetlagged! Current mood:  sleepy.
Hello! I'm in America! I'm in Madison, Wisconsin for WisCon, the feminist SF convention. Blogentries of the trip so far are here and here. The con hasn't kicked off yet, but I am having a good time exploring Madison. Current mood: sleepy.
I never meant to stop posting on here, but about a year ago, I was going through a bit of stress (can't now remember what it was about, but I think J was unwell again) and when I'm unhappy, I tend to avoid blogging because once I write down the negativity it seems more real. So I avoided it for a while, and then I didn't exactly avoid it but I didn't get round to it. I've just had a yen to look, and behold! It is a year to the day since I last posted. Here we go again. ( What I've been doing - or not - all this time ) Recently we have had a bit of drama on the home front, which in my new, posting-about-things frame of mind, I will write about. First, J's grandfather died, which was both a bit sudden and not altogether surprising. He had Parkinson's and was about to have to give up his house (he was in respite care) when he became ill and died within a couple of days. In many ways, it wasn't a bad way to go, but it's been tough for J's family and hard for J being 300 miles away. Shortly after this, we had a crisis with our guinea pigs. I'll keep this short, but Pumpkin and Brownie had bladder troubles which came on simultaneously (one had a stone, the other had calcium crystals which are the precursor to stones). So they both had to go to the vet to be diagnosed, and then we thought they would have to have surgery. Cue lots of stress and unhappiness, because we were half-convinced they would both die and we'd be down to a single pig. In the event, they managed to pass their stones without needing surgery, and they've now been home a week and are doing well. (This is the short version without all the hair-tearing.) I have become quite good at squirting medicaments and vitamins into their tiny mouths, and they're both looking a lot perkier. They have a new diet which we hope will ward off problems in future. It all came rather expensive, though. I was planning to go to WisCon in May and need to sit down with J and discuss whether I can still afford to go - the guinea pigs between them cost about half my budget, and probably the air tickets will have gone up in the interim. Not to say that immediately after the pigs came home, Europe was still a no-fly zone, so I'm not sure if I'd have dared tempt fate by buying tickets then. In the middle of all this, various of my elderly relations aren't too well, which is also a worry (particularly for my mother). Sometimes life seems a bit complicated. But I'm sure other people have more complicated existences and still manage to have, you know, lives... Right now, I can see Pumpkin, who was more seriously ill of the two pigs, eating from her bowl of pellets. That's a nice reassuring sight. Current mood:  pensive.
I started learning to drive in 1996, which means I have been a provisional licence-holder for a substantial chunk of my life. I first took a theory test in 1997, but have never managed to pass the practical (I think there have been four attempts). Anyway, the time seemed propitious for another attempt. Since theory test certificates only last two years, I have to take that again, and since I want to do an intensive driving course which will lead to my sitting the practical test quite soon, I need to get on with it. So last Wednesday I booked a test, online, for today, on the grounds of getting it over with. Then on Friday evening I discovered that my provisional driving licence wasn't where I thought it was (in the box where I keep all my important documents, including old theory test certificates). I spent the weekend going through every box of papers I possess, looking for it. Then, on Monday, having run out of places to look, I discovered that in order to cancel a test you have to do it three working days before - which is to say that I'd have needed to cancel on Wednesday. So I lose my fee, and I still don't know what happened to my licence. I haven't gone looking for it for at least three years, though, so who knows. The other irritating thing is that it was an old-style paper licence, so I will now have to apply, expensively, for a photocard one. Then I'll either pass my test, which will require applying for a new photocard licence, or I won't, in which case I am feeling like just giving up on the whole thing. Because cars are nasty dangerous polluting things anyway and I don't like driving so why am I doing this, exactly? Oh, I'll calm down in a bit. I’ve noticed that a lot of people suffer from a kind of specific retail weakness, which manifests itself in buying a certain item more often than they really need to. This can be either because they don’t remember that they already have plenty of whatever it is, or just because they really like it and can’t resist. Usually the object of weakness is something relatively simple, utilitarian and inexpensive. My sister has a lot of notebooks. My dear J has an impressive stockpile of plain milled soap, because he keeps thinking we must be running low by now (but we never are, because he buys it so often). My particular weakness is socks. ( Cut for excessive socks ) This means that although, like most people, I have only two feet, I have 71 pairs of socks. (I could go for more than two months and not wash any, although that would be disgusting.) This stops now! No further pairs of socks are allowed to enter this house until either some of the above socks have worn out, or I knit some myself. Do you have a retail weakness? What is it? Current mood:  curious.
There is an otherblog post here, with many pics of me, my Bookblogger socks, and the guinea pigs. I am a busy little creature at the moment and am not likely to have a lot of time to post or read others' posts until after the weekend. If you hear from me, tell me to stop procrastinating and get on with my work! Current mood:  calm.
And as a result I have not got much to report that I haven't already said. J is doing well with his new therapist. Mermaidy goodness! ( I did the beliefnet quiz... ) By the way: I know that everyone reading this probably knows me by now, but do I have a particularly masculine-sounding username, do you think? I've been identified as a bloke several times lately. I can see that my default userpic isn't a lot of help if you're not sure. From cabell, and also luckylove:If you saw me in a police car, what would you think I got arrested for? Answer me, then post to your own journal. I am having the sort of day in which I cannot get anything DONE. It took me half an hour to get around to having my lunch. I had intended to pop round to the shops BEFORE lunch, and did I? No. Grrr. (Pause for not being able to finish the post and get it up.) So when J came home mid-afternoon (doctor's appointment) and asked me to get him some chewing gum when I went, I did finally get out. And got the things I wanted to get, including some colourful yarn for my Pratchgan*, which is as yet unstarted although the first patch was supposed to be done by the end of October. Still, I now know what I'm going to do for the first two patches, which is good. And then I came home and made some Nigella mini bundt cakes. Because sometimes that's the only thing to do. I like them because they're very quick, only require one bowl and one measuring jug, and you can kid yourself they're not too calorific since they have a hole up the middle. I fudged the recipe somewhat - we didn't have whole lemons or quite enough white sugar, so I soaked some sultanas and threw them in instead of zest, and made up the sugar with demerara, and hoped for the best. And indeed they taste very nice in a homespun sort of way. So. This is the point at which the tide turns and I start achieving things. Watch my dust. *Basically, a blanket (aka afghan) with a patch referring to each of the Discworld books. Why am I doing this? For my own amusement. And because I think it will force me to try out new knitting/crochet skills in the relatively trouble-free setting of a blanket patch. Current mood: resolute. |
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