Hacking Things Together

Seventeen to Aged Mother

Picked up a box spring to go with the mattress we’ve already got. It doesn’t match. Not a problem though; we can just switch it out with the box spring that we’re using on our bed. It’s the original b.s. that goes with the mattress for Aged Mother. The box spring that goes with the mattress we sleep on wouldn’t fit down the stairs so we jury (jerry?) rigged a b.s. and foam combo.

D.I. was out of single bedframes. Not a problem either. They gave us a sheet of plywood and we’ve got cinderblocks in the garage. Wouldn’t be the first time I’ve hacked together furniture. It’s a skill I learned from A.M.

Picked up a reading lamp, end table, mattress pad, sheets and a blanket. Also got a few sweaters for A.M. to layer on when when it gets cold. A.M. would probably say that wasn’t necessary so I probably won’t tell her until she gets here. Better safe than sorry.

Clothes For Mother

Eighteen To Go

Picking up more furniture tonight. Also supposed to pick up extra clothes. Shopping for my mother? What size is little old lady?

Will stick with coats and sweaters I think.

Entertainment Possibilities

Nineteen To Go

Last night Nizzibet and I went and picked up a television that TwoM had in storage. We figure that with Aged Mother here we’ll want to spend more time at home. That means less movies at the theatre and more watching videos/DVDs in the living room. I don’t think that we’ll be getting cable back. The only show we thought we watch this season was Angel and since we’ve missed the first few episodes now we’re planning to just catch up when it comes out on DVD in a few years. And Aged Mother hasn’t watched TV in quite a while herself.

Because I Have a Life …

If I didn’t have a life I’d pick up a bottle Cuervo Gold and a pack of clove cigarettes on my way home. Then I’d alternate sitting on the porch smoking with sitting in the basement writing, drinking the whole time. Ideally it would rain.

I love my life. And I miss the days when I didn’t have one. Viva Los Gemini!

Vanity Googles

Found more google listings for namesdatabase.com this morning. Maybe I wasn’t putting in the correct info yesterday? Still, there’s nothing showing that has someone talking about the site. Not really. There are some text pages that look like a form email from the site and a couple of mentions in people’s blogs. The mentions don’t say if the site provided them with what they were looking for. Still suspicious.

Net Paranoia

There’s something called the Names Database at namesdatabase.com. According to my paranoid mind it’s some sort of name and email harvesting engine. I ran across it in my semiregular googling for old friends. Lo and behold, a friend’s name showed up in their little google snippet. That was unusual right there. Bernice Jinkerson doesn’t show up anywhere.

Thing is, in order to long on to the Names Database you have to give it the names of five people. But if you give it a name it’s already got, it asks you for another name. And another. I never got to the Important Page that I was looking for because, after feeding it a dozen email addresses I gave up. No worries anyone, I didn’t give it your address. I made up addresses. A random name generator could do that.

The weirdest part is that there’s no other listing in google regarding “namesdatabase.com”. Even more suspicious.

Moving Mom

Aged Mother will be moving in soon, probably the first week of November. We could take her this weekend if she didn’t mind sleeping on a mattress on the floor. Nizzibet spent much time yesterday moving books and furniture out of her office and then rearranging things downstairs to fit the new arrivals. Jaydogg pitched in on moving the bigger pieces of furniture. I spent some hours last night moving books and more furniture. More work will be done tonight.

This weekend we’ll work on getting bedroom type furniture – a box spring and bedframe, a lamp or two, a little heater maybe. We might get around to cleaning out the garage. That job is unrelated to Aged Mother’s arrival. It’s just that once you start moving furniture you might as well keep going until everything has a home again. There is much in the garage that needs to find a home somewhere other than the garage. Preferably on someone else’s property.

Ahead

Project Updates

I’ve updated the front page at Sentient 39. Finally some original art – giving a hint to what the series will be about.

No 2004 calendar. I needed to have managed my time better this year. Ah well, I’ve got a head start on 2005.

The Black Seal #3 is scheduled to go to press in December. Lots of illustrations to finish for that.

Illustration work for Mandate of Heaven continues, a little bit at a time.

Searching. Finding. Asking.

Some days I find myself searching the internet, almost randomly, clicking from site to site, following links further out and googling for new info on old subjects. Yesterday was like that. No matter what I found, that wasn’t what I was looking for. I know on those days that I’m searching for an epiphany – an answer to a mystery that I can’t define. A piece is missing. I don’t know what it looks like or what will happen if I find it but I feel compelled to look. It’s pretty much guaranteed that I won’t find it. Once I recognize that that’s what I’m doing I’m usually willing to do something else.

On the way home I stopped in at one of the local used book shops. I wanted to pick up a copy of Mallory’s Oracle for BigSister. Since she likes Andrew Vachss’s work I figure she’d like Carol O’Connell. No luck with Mallory. But sitting on the shelf were Night of Morningstar and Dragon’s Claw, two Modesty Blaise novels. Hello! Good condition paperbacks at a low price. Best part is, it was a complete surprise. I’ve so rarely seen Modesty Blaise books in stores that I’d forgotten to look for them.

To top the day off I called the Mother and invited her to come live with us. She didn’t say yes. She didn’t say no. She was happy I asked. If she does say yes there will be a lot of things to arrange to make this work. But one thing at a time.