Dear Diary

A 3773-post collection

It's been so long since I went to Hell...

My frelling sleep issues have been acting up. Hello, anxiety. It's been a while since you fucked up my life. Come on in, we're having coffee.

...you little shit...

In brief: woke up at 2AM-ish because I went to bed at 8:30 because I was dog tired because worry.

2AM-ish meant that I would be dog tired AGAIN in the afternoon and I don't need that because I have a firkin physical for insurance's sake, so I did my best to fall asleep and it took an hour.

Woke up dog tired anyway. Fuck my life.

I've had my one coffee of the day and it hasn't done as much for me as I hoped it would. Neither has it done as little for me as it usually does.

What it is going to do is make me pee.

The physical is probably going to eat a majority of my day, so once again, I shall be rushing my novel words in the hope of at least getting a majority done before I must rush off to other things. [Stand on this, stick out that, excrete yadda, does it hurt when bla, tote that barge...]

All this so we can get our financial ducks in a firkin row.

It'd be so much easier if I sold more stuff. Or got more kind contributions from my dear readers. Every retweet and reblog means more potential readers. But I know that the economy has us all in an iron grip.

Everyone's firkin broke.

I have another $50 from Paypal on its slow trip to my bank account. It's a tank of fuel. Or more nibbles for my darlings. Or medicine for my cat. This time, though, it came from earnings from book sales. My writing is supporting us in pinch time. Sort of. At least it's keeping us all going until the next time we have cash.

I've been going super-frugal, knowing we don't have a lot to go about. I shall continue to be so. It's a pain in the arse beyond belief. I've yet to get my hands on Sir Pterry's last novel, and I've been holding out for it for some time. [AND I want hardcover. Time is running out for that. Eeek]

Maybe someone nice will buy me a copy. And while I'm wishing, maybe a Bajillionaire will drop a few million tax-free dollars on me and tell me to have fun with it. [O, the fun I could have... Sigh]

Enough whining. Back to work.

101 reasons to love Steam Powered Giraffe

Before you roll your eyes at me, this is not going to be an enumerated list. You can breathe, now. It's okay.

One Hundred and One is the number of times that I have listened through the Giraffe's most recent album, The Vice Quadrant: A Space Opera. Or just Vice Quadrant for short.

That's two hundred and two hours of music that I have yet to become sick of. Not one song, not one spoken interlude, not one fragment of this double

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Herbing 'till I plotz...

I promised a photojournal entry, and you're about to get a photojournal entry.

We start with a simple, neglected herb garden:

Pictured, smol child, large rosemary Chaos is looking nervous because there was a wasp on the other side.

Chaos showing off a washing basket full of cut herbs We got a basket full of cuttings. most of them were actually useful.

This is just the LEFTOVER rosemary The leftovers. Some sprigs are bundled with the hope of making decent potential tea.

Finished Rosemary oil. It will be going out in much smaller bottles Heat-infused rosemary oil looks gross when its done, and in bulk.

Mint still being processed I had a freaking LOT of mint. So much that

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Post-massacre update

I have successfully mutilated the Rosemary bush and decimated the mint population The house and my hands are redolent with the scent of both.

I tried enlisting some child labour to speed up the process, but Mayhem begged off early [feeling useless and then feeling sick] and Chaos got bored of picking mint leaves.

I have a sink full of unpicked mint, soaking in water and lemon juice to stop them browning whilst I take a well-earned break. And about a double-handful

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Where has all the money gone?

I discussed money issues with Beloved in the evening. As it turns out, most of the expenses were directly related to bills and paying off debts.

We're relatively debt free, right now. But we're also money poor.

And Christmas is going to be hellishly expensive, even with my frugality in the balance. For example: Beloved suggested using actual sealing wax for the gift basket stuff. Two of the lovely bottle types have corks, and they're going to need a functional seal.

I

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Time for Science!

Today, when I'm done with my writing, I am taking one of the pretty bottles I got for my artisinal rosemary product gift basket[now featuring mint], and I am going to use it... FOR SCIENCE!

These are wibbly wobbly pretty bottles, and I'm doing nine of everything, but for these ones... I am measuring their collective liquid volume.

Yep. I'm filling a bottle nine times and emptying it into a measuring cup so I know how much high-quality vinegar to purchase.

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We've started on our supplies...

My goal for this week and next week is to spend as little as humanly possible so that we have more money to save for Christmas.

The artisinal rosemary products are going to crap on that, more than a little. Mostly owing to the fact that I will have to purchase some tools and find a source of bulk white wine vinegar. Might have to discuss that with Beloved.

I'm doing nine bottles of dried leaves, eight of rosemary oil and six

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Squeaky bum time...

We get paid tomorrow afternoon. Right now, we have about $70 collectively to get us through until then.

We have resources. A metric fuckton of tinned tomatoes, loads of pasta, loads of rice. No cheese. Or at least, no cheese that we know how to cook with.

We do have a wedge of the famous Wensleydale, but we need crackers to try it. And the kids might yet turn their noses up at it because some Americans went and put cranberries in

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