The Neon Nurse's Charting

Hey, snow! Several whole inches worth! And also, it is cold!

Not that this was a HUGE surprise. We look at various weather venues daily and knew it was coming. So why I FORGOT to drain the pump in the wellhouse before the hoses all froze, I dunno. I hope none of the pipes crack and break. It's annoying when that happens. Also expensive. But on the plus side, the antifreeze in both cars is still good down to -25 or so. Two outta three ain't bad.

For your amusement, more True Life Crime reports from the Lamar Daily Snooze:

10:44 a.m. Suspicious Person - An officer responded to the 600 block of Willow Valley on a report of a person looking through a house window. Upon arrival the reporting party advised everything was alright (sic) and advised it was the painter who was painting her house.

11:53 a.m. Animal Problem - Animal Control advised a citizen at 604 E. Oak St. chickens are not allowed in-side (sic) City of Lamar.

***

Mike recently went yard saling with Caro and bought a grain car for his model train. It needed a different type of connector to match up to the rest of his set, though. Today we finally caught up with the train store guy and got the goods, and Mike's Under the Tree Special is now running with a full roster of cars.

The train guy was hard to catch up with this week because he is also the chief of the rural fire department, and there had been an ongoing problem with someone's 30 year old private dump catching fire and stubbornly refusing to go out. So he was out of the store a lot. Driving by there all the time is probably what put me in mind to (finally) do the photo essay page of the time we burned down half our back lot and most of the next as well.

People who have been on my Flist since June 2004 have seen this, but it will be new to a few.

Finally, here is today's Neon Hearts chapter. This one is a particularly pernicious bit of fanfic, because I commit the high crime and misdemeanor of giving myself and my family a cameo role! Beware!

Part 22--Life in the Breakdown Lane: Hank and Cassie are stuck with a flat and no jack, until a carload of strange folk stop to help.

Nothing especially entertaining happened around here today, so let's jump straight to the Tune!

This is Loudon Wainwright III (father to Rufus, for you youngsters and/or music buffs), and I really SHOULD have posted it right after Halloween, because:

"Suddenly it's Christmas,
Right after Hallowe'en.
Forget about Thanksgiving;
It's just a buffet in between.
There's lights and tinsel in the windows;
They're stocking up the shelves;
Santa's slaving at the North Pole
In his sweatshop full of elves.

There's got to be a build-up
To the day that Christ was born:
The halls are decked with pumpkins
And the ears of Indian corn.
Dragging through the falling leaves
In a one-horse open sleigh,
Suddenly it's Christmas,
Seven weeks before the day.

Suddenly it's Christmas,
The longest holiday.
When they say "Season's Greetings"
They mean just what they say:
It's a season, it's a marathon,
Retail eternity.
It's not over till it's over
And you throw away the tree...."

http://download.yousendit.com/084F62AC12741542

Speaking of things that are unnaturally long, here's your Neon Hearts link for the day:

Part 21--Grand Lake: You can't go home from vacation without presents! But the fun is cut short by unpleasant news when Cassie calls home.

Back to what passes for normal around here after a hard-workin' holiday weekend. So far our holiday decorating features a naked tree with a train going around it. But it's a start.

Today is another holiday, though. Ten years and a bit more ago, I made this Halloween pumpkin for my daughter Damaris (this is one of the recently re-found pics I have been talking about!):



It was supposed to be the view from the ultrasound. She did in fact look as though she was smuggling a very large pumpkin under her shirt at the time.

Then, on Thanksgiving Eve of that year, the grandgirlies decided now was the time to give the family another two things to be thankful for!

So today we are saying Happy Birthday to Marisa and Morrissey!

Speaking of holidays, if people want to take up a collection and buy me one of these, I would not say no:

From Dave Barry's Annual Gift Guide, The Cruzin Cooler!

You could just call me Cruzin Susan!

Neon Hearts Update--BEWARE!

Part 19--The Road Less Traveled By: Hank muses on his muddled feelings, after a call back to the mansion.

Part 20--Shadows in the Starlight: A little communing with Nature puts things in perspective.

After a day of herculean effort, we have achieved very minor progress in the Clean Up/Re-derange/Decorate Up marathon.

I keep saying I want to run away from home and live under a nice, quiet bridge, but Caro keeps saying no. So I guess I am stuck here.

I was feeling better after a nice hot bath, and was going to go lay down in my bed and relax for a while. But sadly, Climber had been doing the same thing when she had an Unfortunate Reaction to too many surplus turkey bits. The kind of reaction that means washing everything on the bed....

Tomorrow is Free Dump Day. See me dance in the streets.

But here is your annotated update for today:


Part 18--Room Service and Other Comforts: Postponing their camping trip for a day, Hank and Cassie try to relax at a nice hotel.

Like when Souvenir has a nap attack on my left typing hand.



And another pictorial excuse under the cut--a larger closer-upper:



Also, another chapter, again with new annotations and PICTURES embedded!

Part 17--Taking Chances: A near tragedy causes Cassie to reassess her concerns about getting serious.

I was very tired when I came home yesterday. I trudged around to the back door with my heavy suitcase so I could go more directly to my bedroom and put away my laptop. I remember noticing a scrap of newspaper with a burned edge, and also that the ground was damp. Strange, no rain had been predicted....

When I got inside, Caro greeted me and then said, "Don't worry, I already yelled at him."

???, I wondered.

"For setting the lawn on fire while I was gone."

See, we live in the country where it is common to keep a burn barrel for combustible trash. It is one of Mike's jobs to take the trash out and set it on fire. For some reason, he got all responsible for the first time in ever and decided to get right on that job while Caro was at the store acquiring Thanksgiving goods.

THEN he decided to be REEEELY helpful and throw in a few of the stacked up tumbleweeds which came to our house to live after the most recent windstorm. But one of them, being a TUMBLEweed, tumbled itself right back out of the barrel and onto the nice dry grassy patch we laughingly call a lawn.

The good news is that he did not panic, but went to the wellhouse, turned on the pump and hosed the fire down all on his own. For which we are certainly exceedingly thankful.

But it was weird that I didn't see, smell or notice it at ALL!

We have had a nice holiday here. Caro took charge of all the cooking, and I did quite a bit of hauling Christmas type things up from the Basement o' Doom, plus other busy little tasks that needed doing. Once I was done with that for the day, and happily digesting the lovely turkey and dressing and pie and stuff, I got another section of Neon Hearts posted. There is another embedded picture this time--I've decided those are fun!

Oh, and I added a new annotation to Chapter 9, but to save those interested the trouble of hunting it up, I will just add it here:

[1] My version of Xavier is not much like the movie one. Patrick Stewart portrayed a much kinder, gentler Professor, but in the comics, our favorite mutant mentor had an enormous trust fund of Crankypants, and he wasn't afraid to withdraw a bundle any time he wanted!

Weirdness alert: When I tried to write this annotation, I was drawing a blank on the name of the actor mentioned above. Forcing my mind to try harder made it pop up with the name Jon Stewart. 0.o Picturing the headliner of the Daily Show in the Xavier role made my head go to a very weird place, and it took a while for me to find my way back, I can tell you!

Part 15--Beware of the Cat: Hank meets Cassie's pet--'nuff said!

Part 16--Plans and Possibilities: Hank learns more details about Cassie's past, which leads to tentative discussions of their future.

Here is an oldie but goodie, the Thanksgiving Weather Forecast:

Turkeys will thaw in the morning, then warm in the oven to an afternoon
high near 190oF. The kitchen will turn hot and humid, and if you bother
the cook, be ready for a severe squall or cold shoulder.

During the late afternoon and evening, the cold front of a knife will slice
through the turkey, causing an accumulation of one to two inches on
plates. Mashed potatoes will drift across one side while cranberry sauce
creates slippery spots on the other. Please pass the gravy.

A weight watch and indigestion warning have been issued for the entire
area, with increased stuffiness around the beltway.
During the evening, the turkey will diminish and taper off to leftovers,
dropping to a low of 34oF in the refrigerator.

Looking ahead to the next two days, high pressure to eat sandwiches will be
established. Flurries of leftovers can be expected both days with a 50
percent chance of scattered soup late in the day. We expect a warming
trend where soup develops.

By early next week, eating pressure will be low as the only wish left will
be the bone.

***

I missed Tune Tuesday because of going out of town, but that gives me the perfect opportunity to present THIS link:

Arlo Guthrie - Alice's Restaurant Massacree
http://download.yousendit.com/6C02EBA3388C772A

And to go with your Thanksgiving Dinner that can't be beat, here's a wish that can't be beat!

Sorry for the short absence. I just got home from a trip to Denver to see my friend Richard--I meant to mention on Monday that I was going, but you know how it is when you are trying to go on a trip, there are always things you remember at the last minute that you HAVE to do before you go....

Or is that just me?

I'm glad that I went. Richard is much lessened from how he was the last time I saw him, but he is still Richard and it was good to have one last nice time with him, to remember.

While I was driving up, I was trying to think of funny Richard stories. I did come up with a few, but the main thing I thought was just...Richard was always there. If we were going to a MileHiCon or a DASFA meeting or something like that, you would no more wonder if Richard was going to be there than wonder if the HOTEL was going to be there. Of course he was. And he would be having fun, helping make the fun, BEING the fun by being who he was.

Anyway. I didn't forget about FotoFriday last week. I actually did start a page, but it is going to be kind of long and I'm not done with it yet. I decided I am going to have a Memory page of people I miss. Pets too. (Hey, it's my page and they're people to ME.) So far it's only about half done, but I hope to finish it over the holiday weekend.

I don't know if you remember me talking last year about being so happy because I found a box of photographs that had NOT been destroyed with all my other ones in the (first) basement flood. I sorted all through that in case there were any from cons that might have Richard in them, for the collection his family and friends are making. No, but I did find a lot that I will want to use for my Memory page, plus a few that I will just have to share.

Unfortunately, my new printer/copier/scanner turns out NOT to be the kind of scanner that makes a .jpg file, but the kind that scans to print it. Which is okay, but not what I needed for these. So I experimented a little and managed to use my camera to take "good enough" digital versions until I can make some space around this desk and put in a for-reals scanner again.

The following is one I took of my mom at White Sands. It has some fuzz on it, sorry, but I still like it. Slightly large for LJ, so I will put it behind a cut:

# posted by Susan : 7:54 PM

I have been continuing my self-assigned task of putting one segment a day from Neon Hearts in its own little journal, , but I haven't been posting about it here, partly because it seemed a little out of place next to my post about my friend with the terminal illness.

Still, mindlessly coding has a certain appeal when you don't like to be thinking too much. I have now gotten through all the parts I had already HTML'd and annotated, which means from here on out I have a little more work to do per chapter. I think I'll be able to meet my goal of having everything that is already written up on LJ before JaNoWriMo.

(Is it just me, or when you see NaNoWriMo do you picture a Mork and Mindy fanficathon? Or am I just hopelessly OLD?)

So here's what is newly posted:


Part 8--Public Appearances: Hank shows Cassie his image inducer, and they discuss the pros and cons of his wearing it.


Part 9--First Impressions: The professor's reaction to Hank's new friend is somewhat less than enthusiastic.

Part 10--Dangerous Dreams: The X-men deal with an anti-mutant riot in the Danger Room, and Cassie has to deal with what this tells her about Hank's life.


Part 11--Picking Winners: Attending an awards ceremony with Cassie, Hank finds more evidence that the Friends of Humanity are still a minority.

Part 12--Hank's Bad Day: One of Those Days for poor Hank. It includes kitchen fires, uncooperative machinery, and a highly personal chat with Professor Xavier.


Part 13--Happy Landings: Cassie gets to see the image inducer in action. Hank gets to see the infamous Denver International Airport.

Part 14-Meeting the Folks: Dinner with Cassie's parents at Casa Bonita (now with embedded pic!), a Unique Dining Experience in more ways than one.

# posted by Susan : 11:42 PM

I took this picture in January of 2001. My daughter and grandkids and Mike and I had made plans to meet him and his daughter at the National Western Stock Show, to see the moocows and such. We had been pleasantly surprised to accidentally meet up a little earlier on the shuttle bus.



Richard is one of the nicest, funniest, kindest, smartest yet self-effacingest people you could ever hope to meet. His wife is exactly that same type of person. I haven't had the privilege of being around their daughter much, but when I have been, she's been sweet, cute, smart and darling.

It's a good thing I don't expect the universe to be fair, or even to make sense, because damn, this doesn't. The brain tumor had cowered back a while under the onslaught of radiation, but it started up again and the prognosis is very negative.

I think I am going to print this picture out, and tape it up here at my workspot, as an antidote for those times when I foolishly and for very little actual reason feel sorry for myself.

OK, that was unexpected.

I often say that when you work for yourself, if you don't have the meanest boss in the world, you shouldn't be working for yourself. I'm lucky, though, because my usually Mean Boss also has a Thing about doing her Civic Duty. That means that today when someone called and asked if I could come down to the county courthouse and be part of the After Vote Ballot Audit, I was able to talk myself into letting me postpone the packing I had JUST been about to start, and go help out.

It was interesting--the overall process, at least. Not so much the part where one person read from the paper record and the other person counted and we made sure the paper trail from a random sample matched the machine vote. But kind of nice to see that in at least one spot, a view of the behind the scenes stuff wasn't hideously shocking, appalling and enough to make a person use the kind of language they shouldn't in front of Mike.

It was also nice to have a chance to chat with the County Clerk about what caused some of the problems with the voting in Prowers County, and what progressively-minded groups might be able to do, in a volunteer capacity, to help make it work better NEXT election. So doubly a good use of my time this afternoon!

I will just have to pack more earnestly and efficiently tomorrow.

(Link below to another old chapter of Neon Hearts, like you couldn't guess that.)

Part 7--The Morning After: (explicit) Unwilling to end their time together any sooner than he has to, Hank invites Cassie home for lunch. Speculation from his teammates begins.

After last week's Tune from 1776, I wouldn't blame you if you thought I was starting a scary trend! But that isn't my intention. (Although I DO rather like musicals--hey, I LOVED Cop Rock!) It's just that today we've been having one of those typical SE Colorado days where the balmy breeze is a steady 30-50 mph all day long and late into the night. So wind was on my mind.

They Call the Wind Mariah - Paint Your Wagon

Today I had a pretty good day. We spent our three day weekend digging into some of the assorted stacks, still working on the bringing order out of chaos thing, and today I had both the time and solitude to consolidate some of those gains. The place still looks like all that wind today blew in and circled around a few hours---but there is progress!

Anyway, the unsettled interim condition made me want to listen to a song about someone with a bigger mess problem than I have! It's by the cult a capella group, The Bobs.


Trash - The Bobs

"If cleanliness is next to godliness
(One year of Sunday papers blocking the door)
Then my baby is a heathen and a heretic
(Ants so thick your feet never touch the floor)
He worships at the altar of sloppiness
(And fills the collection plate with cigarette butts)
I'm gonna lace his food with arsenic
And have him hauled away...."

***

And here is today's update, for those of you playing along at home:

Part 6--Specters of the Past: (explicit) The blossoming relationship is threatened by Cassie's fear of physical intimacy.

# posted by Susan : 9:55 PM

If I hadn't been reluctant to break my fic posting streak so soon (you have to admit, slacking off after ONE day would be kind of lame!), I wouldn't have twisted my own arm to make me post this.

It's the kind of day where the store clerk gave me a total of $64.54, and I thought I would like some spare cash, so I wrote out the check for...$60.00. If those dozen and a half orders I wrapped today are all actually going to the right addresses as we speak, it's pure luck.

Also, a good friend of mine is very sick and has taken a turn for the worse. I know it's crazy of me, but I was telling the clone it seems especially unfair to be happening to a science fiction fan. Where are our flying cars and robots and nano-tech medical techniques when we NEED them?!

Dammit.

I shouldn't swear, I know. I was doing that today because of my defective tape dispenser, and Mike chided me, saying, "Susan, I know we have talked about this before...."

Anyway, here's the link to the next post. (And a BIG blushing thanks to those who have friended the journal already!)


Part 4--Falling In Slow Motion: More conversation, on a slightly more personal level. What do Hank and Steven Wright have in common?

Part 5--At Silver's: Their evening of fun is cut short because of an attempted assault by a mutant-phobic punk.

# posted by Susan : 10:58 PM

Okay. Probably some of you already know that a WAAAAY long time ago, I used to write a Marvel-comics based X-men fanfic called Neon Hearts. Some people kinda liked it.

I stopped writing it about the time I got sick with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and pretty much re-ordered my whole life. That was more or less ten years ago. But I always intended to start it up again, since I had such a huge batch of notes to go forward on.

So that is what I plan to do for JaNoWriMo this year.

To help me build back up for it mentally, I have started an LJ account called "neonfic", and I plan to add in a new chapter (NOW with ANNOTATIONS!) most days between now and December 31st.

I'm trying to work out the backwards posting thing that lets the journal have it all in one place in order. We'll see how THAT goes.... But for now, if you WANT to, you can click on the quoty-link below for the first three (short) chapters.

Cassie was just coming out of the huge building, still a little disoriented by the sudden noise of the street, when she first saw him, so it was no surprise she didn't at first believe her eyes. An intensely red sports car, tiny to the point of circus eligibility, had spotted the departure of a gleaming black Buick Pretensia and whipped into the parking spot it was vacating. But that wasn't the odd part. The thing that set this vehicle apart from the common throng was the driver.

She stood caught in delighted amazement as a man in a sports coat with leather elbow patches and a similarly jaunty leather driving cap, who was undeniably blue, leapt with inhuman grace from his spot behind the steering wheel.

Yay, got the photo essay done!

Click here to see my grand-daughters in their opening game of third grade flag football (from 2005, but hey, who's counting?)

I am thinking seriously of buying myself this shirt:



The only thing holding me back is that I am trying to be fiscally responsible in the leadup to Christmas, and sell more stuff than I buy.

HERE is where they can be purchased, for those with more liquid finances than I:

Almost $30 for a T-SHIRT?? Well, okay, I guess....

Also, I DID break down and make the art for a poster or postcard or whatever, re the renaming of Colorado (Spanish for "colored red") to reflect our new Blue status.

Welcome to Colorful Colorazul!

I think I messed it up when I accidentally saved my final version as a .gif instead of a .jpg, but I had already been fighting Paintshop tooth and nail for a long time and didn't feel like starting over from scratch.

In other news, we've been having a jolly productive weekend, and I HAVE been working on the girlies' photoessay as well! So stay tuned!

Okay, settle down, it's only a joke. We aren't really renaming the state after Tuesday's rather fab election results.

I saw a kind of helpful line that explains the general excitement, though. The last time the Dems controlled both Colorado Statehouses and the governorship, JFK was still president, Neil Armstrong had not yet walked on the moon, and the Beatles were all still young men.

(Gah, now I feel OLD.)

Tuesday I was kind of busy during the day, and then went to a little gathering in the evening to watch election returns. Man, now I remember why I never watch TV news. Talking head syndrome much? But I thought, no worries, I can do all that catching up stuff I have been planning starting tomorrow....

THEN (dun-dun-DUN!) I got up to find an email from eBay, saying that they were having ANOTHER special price listing day. THAT DAY! WEDNESDAY!!

Of course I whined and thrashed around and tried to tell myself it was only a fatigue induced hallucination, but it was no use. Those of you who do not belong to the eBay hive mind can't understand. But I can tell you, a werewolf would have better luck shrugging off a full blown full moon than a die-hard eBayer would in ignoring a Dime Listing Day.

So there went Wednesday. Thursday I had to finish packing up all the bulky, uncooperative items we sold from the PREVIOUS special day (I know, it's $$, I shouldn't complain.) and today I did much the same. So now I am KINDA caught up.

Not enough to have managed my photo essay for FotoFriday. But to try to make sure I DO it, here is a sample of what I am GOING to do, that I should have done last year. Since it's fall, that means Football!



Specifically, shots from my twin granddaughters first game of flag football!

It's Election Day here in the US! I tried to think of the perfect song to celebrate that, but no one tune seemed exactly right, so here are several. Everyone's bound to find ONE they like!

We'll get started right from the beginning! :)

1776 - Sit Down, John

Adams: Oh, good God! Consider yourself lucky that you have John Adams to abuse, for no sane man would tolerate it!
Congress: John, you're a bore; we've heard this before.
Now for God's sake, John, sit down!
Adams: I say vote yes!
Congress: No!
Adams: Vote yes!
Congress: No!
Adams: Vote for independency!

***

Who remembers this one from Disney's Mary Poppins? Laugh if you want, but I bet it was a starting point for a lot of the young women who got into "women's lib" later in the 60s and 70s!

Mary Poppins - Sister Suffragettes

"We're clearly soldiers in petticoats
And dauntless crusaders for woman's votes
Though we adore men individually
We agree that as a group they're rather stupid!

Cast off the shackles of yesterday!
Shoulder to shoulder into the fray!
Our daughters' daughters will adore us
And they'll sign in grateful chorus
'Well done, Sister Suffragette!'"

***

'Course, when you vote, what you tend to get is...politicians. (By the way, someone who isn't me could turn this into a really funny songvid for Nathan from Heroes!)

Byrds - I Wanna Grow Up to Be a Politician

"I wanna grow up to be a politician
And take over this beautiful land.
I wanna grow up to be a politician
And be the old US of A's number one man

I'll always be tough, I'll never be scary
I want to shoot guns or butter my bread
I'll work on the towns or conservate the prairies
And you can believe the future's ahead...."

***

Finally, here's my vote for the best country protest song evar. It was put out in 2004, but is still sadly relevant.

Honky Tonkers for Truth - Takin' My Country Back

"And I'm takin' my country back
Son, you ain't been doin' her right
Oh, I've been watching you and I don't like
How you been treating my Stars and Stripes.

You took our jobs and sent 'em overseas,
Now we owe billions to the Red Chinese.
You blew the budget and you botched Iraq
So I'm taking my country back."

***

Have fun! Let's get out there and win in a mudslide!

I took advantage of the pieces of quiet here last night, when the clone and Mike were off at the middle school dance, to finish up a half-done photo essay page so I could entertain you all with it today!

This is a three page photo essay of our visit to Lakeside Amusement Park in Denver last summer. Lakeside has been doing business in the same location for over 100 years, and sometimes you can tell. The landscaping was looking good when we went, and it was VERY affordable, only $11.75 for a ride wristband on a Friday afternoon! Strangely, though, there are old abandoned, broken down rides still right there in the park. Not that *I* minded, because those can be the most interesting to photograph.

The coolest stuff is on the last page, which shows what I found when I explored their onsite DUMP, and also the ruins of the old Lakeside Speedway track!

Click here to start!