Charlie finally said something nice about retirement this last weekend.
At about four in the afternoon, with a smile on her face, she said that it was nice that she didn’t have to go into the computer room and type out her lesson plans.
Sleep
We sprang forward that day, and for the first time in sixty years I didn’t have to worry about the effects of losing an hour’s sleep on that weekend. I’m retired, and the clock really doesn’t matter.
Her knee is getting better.
She is throwing a retirement party for herself at the end of the month.
We went to her school today and brought some of her things home and gave some of her teaching materials away–to those who will use them to advantage.
and Dream
I did some editing on my novel and finished reading one written by someone else.
Drank a beer in the garden as I read the book–while most were at work.
The last two weeks were very eventful for Charlie and I (me, us).
After thirty-some years in junior high, she decided to retire. It was a matter of circumstance rather than preferred choice–she’d rather have retired at the end of the school year in June, but that was not to be.
Mist & Smoke Window
We’re going to have a retirement party for her at the end of the month.
The best thing about this is no more commuting back and forth to her school everyday. (Yeah, but I still wake up early every morning as though she still goes to work.) We still have to go back to her classroom and bring home the things she wants to keep. (What? You really think the school provides all of the supplies teachers need to teach? When did you fall of the turnip truck?)
I finally finished my first novel (first draft). My goal was to tell my story in about 100,000 words. Yeah!
Mist & Smoke Blanket
When I taught history (and other subjects), I often told stories. I would allot myself five or ten minutes for the story in my lesson plans. Hah! I never did figure out that each story told itself–in however many minutes it decided it needed. Give it five, and it took ten. Give it ten, and it took twenty-five.
Stories have a life of their own. They don’t limit themselves the way we try to limit them. The story tells itself in its own good time.
So it was with this story. I aimed for twenty chapters and 100,000 words. The story decided it needed twenty-six chapters and 120,000 words.
Who am I to argue with the story?
There were a couple of stories within the larger story that I thought could stand on their own. I took one of them and re-wrote small sections of it. I submitted it for publication in a sci/fi/fant periodical. Will I get it published? Don’t know, but I’m trying. If I do sell it, it’ll be my first sale–I’m keeping my fingers crossed.
Finished my first edit of the novel yesterday and found a number of stupid errors. Corrected most of my errors dealing with punctuation of dialog–NO, I don’t remember learning it in school, but, assuming I did, I forgot an awful lot of it.
I did find some good sites about how to do it, however.
Got up to move the car for street sweeping about 8.00 this morning and found the city
Tree Before Cutting
setting equipment up in the street. Turns out the olive tree across the street and another tree several houses down were being cut down and had bee nests in their trunks.
The nests/hives were in the dead and hollowed out
Chainsawing in Bee Outfit
bases and could not be saved. For the next couple of hours a city crew used chain saws to cut the trees down. The workers were in bee suits. They had to avoid the telephone/power lines with the saws.
Before they could actually get at the bees they had to
Zap
chainsaw the bases of the trees. The bees were not happy. (But, they stayed away from me as I took pictures and pulled weeds in my front yard.)
The tree stump in front of my house had to be ground almost to pavement level to get at the last bees. By noon things were pretty well taken care of in my area but the other
One of the nice things about being retired is that I have a few hours of free time most days.
After taking Charlie to work today I came home, exercised and read several chapters of David Drake’s Monsters of the Earth. I then fixed lunch and headed for the beach. (Chuckle – 64° and sunny) I sat down and completed the puzzles from both the Times and the Register and then read some more and then did some more puzzles, left over from last week. By then it was three o’clock and I had to pick up Charlie.
I brought her home, fixed her some Earl Grey tea. Then to the gas station to purchase petrol for the next week and to the smoke shop for her cigs.
She did some school work; I worked on my book (105,000+ words, two and a half chapters to go). Fixed her some soup for dinner while she watched a dvr’d episode of Criminal Minds.
I ate in the spare bedroom and enjoyed an adult beverage, a cat in my lap and an anime on the boob tube.
Netflix has some good anime, both movies and TV series. Tonight I watched the last couple of episodes of The Devil is a Part-Timer. Are you in need of a few good laughs? Watch this one.
I suppose, if you really wanted to, you could say that it’s a story about the mutability of character under changing circumstances or the perception thereof. But, nah, don’t read anything serious into it.
At any rate the next to the last line is a spoiler.
Oh, yeah, remember those container ships I occasionally talk about? You know, the ones that bring those (cheap) foreign goods you buy in W – – – – t? Today I counted thirteen of them off the coast. According to the TV news stations there are actually more than thirty of them waiting to be unloaded at Los Angeles/Long Beach.
Don’t hold your breath.
He finds work as an assistant manager at a well known international burger franchise.
Time to get a re-fill on the adult beverage. Good Night.
A married Irishman went into the confessional and said to his priest,
“I almost had an affair with another woman.”
The priest said, “What do you mean, almost?”
The Irishman said, “Well, we got undressed and rubbed together, but then I stopped.”
The priest said, “Rubbing together is the same as putting it in. You’re not to see that
woman again. For your penance, say five Hail Mary’s and put $50 in the poor box.”
The Irishman left the confessional, said his prayers, and then walked over to the poor box.
He paused for a moment and then started to leave.
The priest, who was watching, quickly ran over to him saying, “I saw that.
You didn’t put any money in the poor box!”
The Irishman replied, “Yeah, but I rubbed the $50 on the box, and according to you,
that’s the same as putting it in!”
