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Short post tonight
Posted by doggonedmysteries
Things have been hectic around here. DH was much improved by tonight. However, Gavin ears have flared up again. Is there really such a thing as sleep?
I did manage to get a couple of short naps but that’s about it. We’re hopeful that by (checking the clock) hmmm, later today DH will be much better.
We’ve rain and wind. The temperature is in the forties. More crocuses have bloomed; the daffodils and jonquils have grown noticeably higher since yesterday.
I hope you all have a good day today.
Posted in Misc, Writer, Writing
Tags: Author, Beads, Bones, books, Books on writing, Bull Terriers, Care giving, Caregiver, Coffee, Craft of writing, Dead, Disability, Doggoned, Family, Fiction, Home, Life, Love, MS, Multiple Sclerosis, Writer, Writing
Warning about Tea Tree oil products for MS patients
Posted by doggonedmysteries
Yesterday DH was suddenly weaker than normal. After he showered tonight he could barely stand up. A few hours later, he couldn’t stand up. In fact his legs and arms didn’t want to work at all. This very sudden onset led me to believe it was something new in the house that caused the problem and not his MS.
I think we found the culprit. There was only one new thing around here. He got his hair cut yesterday and they used a conditioner on his hair containing Tea Tree Oil. He liked it and bought a bottle. He used it again tonight.
I did some research and found that sometimes people are hypersensitive to Tea Tree Oil and can have muscle weakness and tremors from using it. I’m betting that with his MS, DH is hypersensitive to it. He won’t use it again and we’ll see if his strength comes back.
At this point, we will take the bottle of conditioner back (it wasn’t cheap) and ask for a refund we will also tell them they need to warn customers that there can be a side effect. From now on he will tell anyone who cuts his hair to NOT use any product containing Tea Tree Oil on him.
Posted in MS related
Tags: Author, Beads, Bones, books, Books on writing, Bull Terriers, Care giving, Caregiver, Coffee, Craft of writing, Dead, Disability, Doggoned, Family, Fiction, Healthcare, Home, Life, Love, MS, Multiple Sclerosis, Murder, Mysteries, Mystery, Novel writing, side effects of Tea Tree Oil, Writer, Writing
A mystery writer’s alphabet
Posted by doggonedmysteries
A is for assassin. B is for blood. C is for cop. D is for dead. E is for elephants to hide the little clues. F is for facts we keep them accurate. G is for guns we like to use them, lots of them. H is for hunt our protagonists must hunt for clues and killers, or homicide if that’s what you choose. I is for interest we must keep yours. J is for jail where we hope our killer goes.
K is for killer, or knife, or even keep it simple. L is for love life does the main character have one? M is for murder of course. N is for nefarious our bad guys must be this. O is for outline a pain in the butt. P is for plausibility. Q is for questions we ask and answer. R is for rewrite we do many. S is for study. T is for tension. U is for usage think Strunk and White. V is for variety. W is write, and write and write some more. X is the spot marked on the map. Y is you the reader we must satisfy. Z is the end.
Posted in My blog, My books, Writer, Writing
Tags: Author, Beads, Bones, books, Books on writing, Bull Terriers, Care giving, Caregiver, Coffee, comedy, Craft of writing, Dead, Disability, Doggoned, Family, Fiction, Home, Humor, Life, Love, MS, Multiple Sclerosis, Murder, Mysteries, Mystery, Novel writing, Writer, Writing
We didn’t win the lottery today
Posted by doggonedmysteries
Gosh, darn it. However, we didn’t play it today either. G and I play two lottery games. We each put in $3.00 and she buys the tickets when she’s at the grocery store. She does the buying because she always goes shopping the same day every week like clockwork. I don’t shop until I absolutely have to shop.
The plan is to split our winnings the day we win. (With our luck, everyone and his brother will hit the same day and we’ll make only enough to buy another ticket.) What the heck, we keep playing. We have dreams.
We both dream about new houses. Our plan is to hire a realtor to find us our dream homes within walking distance of each other. Neither of us wants a huge, fancy house but we want comfortable homes. It’s not that our homes aren’t comfortable, but we both have steep stairs to climb, and we aren’t getting any younger.
G dreams of being able to put her grand kids through college. I dream of not having to worry about DH and him climbing stairs. I don’t want to worry if we have enough money to pay for his medications and the bills each month. I dream of taking care of my cousins and aunties. G and I both dream of having our very first new cars. We’ve always had used ones. Compared to many people our dreams are simple.
If you hit the lottery for megabucks, what would you do?
Posted in Misc, Writer, Writing
Tags: Author, Beads, Bones, books, Books on writing, Bull Terriers, Care giving, Caregiver, Coffee, Craft of writing, Dead, Disability, Doggoned, Family, Fiction, Home, Life, Love, megabucks, MS, Multiple Sclerosis, Murder, Mysteries, Mystery, Novel writing, What would you do if you hit the lottery, Writer, Writing
Let the gardening begin!
Posted by doggonedmysteries
We had a gorgeous day with plenty of sun and the temperature in the mid fifties. I dug out my leather work gloves—oops, going to need to shop for new ones, mine are full of holes. Oh well, I tugged them on anyway and began the slow process of cleaning out the garden beds. I cleared over half of the pond garden, backwashed the filter, and added some fresh water to the pond. After three hours of work, I took a short break and brought the dogs out for a romp.
I didn’t do much work on the side garden today since we do have a little bit of snow left in there. However, I did drag out the rake and cleaned up many of the seed pods from the sweet gum tree. At least those that were in the grass. They look like teensy hedge hogs. I did an hour of the rake, stoop, and pick up dance. I have a ton of those seed pods in the side garden I need to remove yet but I’ll do that another day. It was more important to get the ones up from where we walk. Those suckers hurt when you step on them, even the dogs hate them.
I hauled a garbage can outside the fence and began to clean up after the slobs who litter around here. I swept up glass, picked up paper litter, plastic cups, and bags, filling a large dog food bag with the detritus from the litterbugs. That alone took me two hours. Yes, a whole two hours wasted cleaning up other people’s garbage.
Where was DH? He was keeping the dogs company watching the TV. It was a darned shame too, because he missed seeing the Downy Woodpecker feeding on the suet, the Cardinals taking a bath in the top of the waterfall, and the Black-capped Chickadees watching me from the fence.
Posted in My blog, my garden, Writer, Writing
Tags: Author, Beads, Bones, books, Books on writing, Bull Terriers, Care giving, Caregiver, Coffee, Craft of writing, Dead, Disability, Doggoned, Family, Fiction, Gardening, Gardens, Home, Life, Love, MS, Multiple Sclerosis, Murder, Mysteries, Mystery, Novel writing, Pond, Ponds, Writer, Writing
A Murphy’s law sort of day
Posted by doggonedmysteries
Have you ever had one of those Murphy’s Law days? You know what I mean, one of those days where everything that can possibly go wrong does. That was my day today from the beginning.
Knowing that today was going to be sunny and warm I wanted to get up earlier than usual so I could enjoy it. That didn’t happen I slept in later than normal. I forgot to set my alarm.
I wanted to see snow free gardens. I did, but then I also saw how much clean up work I have ahead of me. I wanted to take the dogs for a walk but a stray pit bull decided to hang around the neighborhood all afternoon. Patty does not like pits. Gavin will ignore leashed dogs on a walk but he is hostile to dogs on the loose. No walk.
I thought I’d grill our dinner. I took my time cleaning the grill and making it sparkle. Did you know you can’t cook on a gas grill without the gas? Yep, the tank was empty. Out came the frying pan.
There wasn’t much on TV tonight but DH did find that Castle was going to be on at ten. We’d stopped watching the show and figured that we probably had missed the episode. Nope, they’d repeated that one twice already and we’d seen it both times. At least DH kept quiet while I worked on my books.
Tonight I set my alarm clock. Tomorrow the weather is supposed to be nice again.
Posted in Misc, My blog, Writer, Writing
Tags: Author, Beads, Bones, books, Books on writing, Bull Terriers, Care giving, Caregiver, Coffee, Craft of writing, Dead, Disability, Doggoned, Family, Fiction, Home, Life, Love, MS, Multiple Sclerosis, Murder, Mysteries, Mystery, Novel writing, Writer, Writing
They keep us laughing.
Posted by doggonedmysteries
If it weren’t for the dogs, I do think we wouldn’t laugh half as much as we do. If dogs had day planners, harass Gavin every minute today was in bold print in Patty’s. She didn’t give him one second’s peace at all. It might have something to do with the improvement of the weather.
DH said that she started early this morning. She enticed Gavin into bully runs and teased him by hucklebutting on the couch with the bone of contention in her mouth. (The bone from the pictures below.)
When I came down, Patty went into her mine, mine, mine it’s mine dance. At one point, after leaping about on the couch with the bone, she shook her head. The bone flew out of her mouth, and landed on the coffee table with a crash. The pups know that things on the coffee table are out of bounds. She stared at the bone willing it to move.
DH figured we’d get a few minutes of quiet. He was wrong. By that time, Gavin had enough of Patty playing queen of the hill. He walked over to the table, delicately lifted the bone, took it to his crate, and closed the crate door behind himself. We didn’t know he could do that.
Posted in Dog related, Misc, My blog, Writer, Writing
Tags: Author, Beads, Bones, books, Books on writing, Bull Terriers, Care giving, Caregiver, Coffee, Craft of writing, Dead, Disability, Doggoned, Dogs, Family, Fiction, Home, Life, Love, MS, Multiple Sclerosis, Murder, Mysteries, Mystery, Novel writing, Rescue Dogs, Writer, Writing
I see flowers starting to grow
Posted by doggonedmysteries
The yard is almost void of snow. A stroll around the gardens revealed numerous spring flowers trying to push through the mulch. I can’t wait for them to bloom.
Both the dogs were past silly with this noticeable change in the weather. They don’t care that March came in like a lamb they’re happy it’s getting warmer and the snow is leaving. They leapt about the yard in wild abandon.
The birds were also letting us know that the weather was improving. I haven’t heard so much birdsong in months. What a joy it was.
DH was in a jollier mood. I even took two walks, one with each dog. It was nice to get out.
We’re looking forward to this weekend and the predicted temperatures of the mid fifties with sun, lots of sun.
Posted in Dog related, Misc, My blog, my garden, Writer, Writing
Tags: Author, Beads, Bones, books, Books on writing, Bull Terriers, Care giving, Caregiver, Coffee, Craft of writing, Dead, Disability, Doggoned, Dogs, Family, Fiction, Gardening, Gardens, Home, Life, Love, MS, Multiple Sclerosis, Murder, Mysteries, Mystery, Novel writing, Rescue Dogs, Writer, Writing
They say a picture is worth a thousand words…
Posted by doggonedmysteries
-
- Mine! {Sigh, baby sisters are a pain}
-
- I said gimme!
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- Gimme
-
- I want his
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- Bone chewing time
Gavin can be so tolerant…
Posted in Dog related, Misc, My blog, Writer, Writing
Tags: Author, Beads, Bones, books, Books on writing, Bull Terriers, Care giving, Caregiver, Coffee, comedy, Craft of writing, Crafts, Dead, Disability, Dog humor, Doggoned, Dogs, Family, Fiction, Home, Humor, Life, Love, MS, Multiple Sclerosis, Murder, Mysteries, Mystery, Novel writing, Pet humor, Pets, Rescue Dogs, Writer, Writing
In a pickle regarding my concentration
Posted by doggonedmysteries
Describe it? How does one describe that? I would have given the giant a proper answer, but I couldn’t concentrate on his question. What a pickle.
The giant impatiently drummed his fingers on the counter top. This made a din as loud a midsummer thunderstorm. I barely heard his next question. “Is it bigger than a pile of troll poop?”
“How big is a pile of troll poop?” After fleeing from a few of them this past night, I had a general idea, but it couldn’t hurt to be sure.
“About as big as you, you little human turd.”
“My, aren’t you the sweetheart. Does your mother know you talk this way?” How about that. I made a giant blush. “Isn’t there some other way to find my concentration without a description?
“You could hire a guide gnome and go look for it in the back.”
“What’s that going to cost me?”
“You have a garden?”
“Um, yeah.” I shuddered at the thought of having a gnome in my garden. I doubted my gargoyles would approve. Would they go on strike? Oh dear, imagine that picket line.
The gnome guide led me through the weirdest collection of items I’ve ever seen. He kept singing a little ditty under his breath about having to get out of here.
“You’ll know you’ve found it when you feel a tug on your brain.”
“A what?”
“A tug. A pull. Are all of you humans so dense?”
We were on the second floor near the back wall when I felt a yank not a simple tug. I still can’t describe it but as it settled onto my head and sank into my brain, I felt at ease once again.
Hey Jim, your balance should arrive soon. I told them where to send it.
Posted in Misc, My blog, Writer, Writing
Tags: Author, Beads, Bones, books, Books on writing, Bull Terriers, Care giving, Caregiver, Coffee, comedy, Craft of writing, Crafts, Dead, Disability, Doggoned, Family, Fiction, Home, Humor, Life, Love, MS, Multiple Sclerosis, Murder, Mysteries, Mystery, Novel writing, Writer, Writing
The hunt for my concentration
Posted by doggonedmysteries
A loud buzzer sounded inside. The door, groaning on its hinges, opened at a snail’s pace. Shades of a D grade horror film. I hate horror films.
A green cloud billowed out of the opening. The foul stench made me gag. I thought nothing could be worse than Gavin’s farts—I was wrong.
Two steps in found me hopelessly tangled in a spider’s web of sticky, red tape. My muse wasn’t kidding. All I needed now was to have some giant, horror of a spider skulking above me. Don’t look. You won’t be happy if you look. Beads of nervous sweat rolled down my back.
I used my trusty little pocket knife to hack through the gluey strands. Like a jungle explorer, I slashed my way forward. Eight struggling steps brought me to a tall counter, the top of which was even with my forehead. I had to back up two steps to see over it. I wished I hadn’t.
“Fee Fi Fo Fum. I smell a human who must be dumb.” The giant glared at me.
My first attempt to answer came out as a mouse squeak. I cleared my throat and answered again. “Not dumb, determined. I lost my concentration and I need to find it.”
“Can you describe it?”
Posted in Misc, My blog, Writer, Writing
Tags: Author, Beads, Bones, books, Books on writing, Bull Terriers, Care giving, Caregiver, Coffee, comedy, Craft of writing, Dead, Disability, Doggoned, Family, Fiction, Home, Humor, Life, Love, MS, Multiple Sclerosis, Murder, Mysteries, Mystery, Novel writing, Writer, Writing
At the lost and found warehouse
Posted by doggonedmysteries
We’d been driving through the Whimsy Warehouse District for over an hour when my muse pointed at a nondescript, three floor high cement block building. “There it is, over there.”
“It had better be the right building this time.”
“I’m sure it is.”
“That’s what you said at the last half dozen or so buildings. Just for the record, I’m not fond of being chased by vicious trolls with huge teeth.”
“You don’t have to be mean.” My muse’s lower lip quivered and her eyes filled with tears. “I told you I was sorry. I haven’t been out here for over a quarter of a century. ”
“No need for waterworks.” I parked in front of the building. A small sign with ‘L&F’ crudely painted on it hung above door. “It really doesn’t look as if they want this found.”
“They don’t.”
“Does that mean more trolls?”
“Um, not so much.”
I hesitated on opening my door. “What does that mean?”
“Red tape. Lots of red tape.”
“No trolls?”
“No trolls.”
I got out of the car but my muse didn’t. Red flags went up. “Are you coming?”
“I’d rather stay in the car.”
“Why?”
She refused to answer. I shrugged, trudged through the flags to the door, and rang the tiny doorbell that was nearly out of my reach…
Posted in Misc, My blog, Writer, Writing
Tags: Author, Beads, Bones, books, Books on writing, Bull Terriers, Care giving, Caregiver, Coffee, comedy, Craft of writing, Dead, Disability, Doggoned, Family, Fiction, Home, Humor, Life, Love, MS, Multiple Sclerosis, Murder, Mysteries, Mystery, Novel writing, Writer, Writing
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