Gonzai Gallery

Yup. Just about got Mom's done too. A few stocking stuffers here and there, and that's it. Phew. Yucky freezer picked up and disposed of professionally, car packed for craft show tomorrow, got CJ a new 'cone of shame', watched a bunch of movies. 'Diabolique' was probably something else when it came out, not too bad now. 'Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy' - verryy slow and atmospheric, but a bit of a drag. 'Safe House' - isn't quite over yet. But quite a rollercoaster ride.

As much as I can, anyway. Managed to escape babysitting Friday, because I had a show Saturday no one wanted me loading the van while stepping over kids at 5am. But didn't sleep well, and got up early for the show. Seems Annapolis has changed quite a bit in the last 6 years or so - it looked nothing like it did the last time I was there. Tons of new developments and business complexes, etc, which have kind of ruined the whole historic thing the town had going on. Anyway, my helper for the day was Cecil, who is my nephews' second cousin. He was a ton of help, and there were a few times I really needed it. The kids at the school were very helpful as well, I was completely packed and loaded out 20 minutes after the show ended. Awesome. Oddly, I sold out of...The Buffalo Bills, Detroit Lions, Oklahoma Sooners and South Carolina. Huh? In two shows, I've sold 1 Eagles and not a single baseball ornament. Weird. Ordinarily I'd have been thrilled with the sales - second best total I've ever had - except that the best show I ever had was last year in the same place, in the snow and rain, and I was down 25% from that show. All in all, I made very little money at arts and crafts this year and it's just as well I decided not to run it as a 'business' this year. The numbers just don't warrant it.

Got home and huddled, because I'm getting a cold and I was definitely overheated after the show. Watched Auburn/SC until it got out of hand, then the Merlin finale and some Spooks. Down to one ep of Spooks left. Slept 12 hours straight in the hopes of losing the cold, but I don't think it helped, I'm stuffy today. I took Mom to PetSmart for dog food, and the place was packed with critters. Lots of dogs including an incontinent Lab, a talkative greyhound a teensy husky pup. The adoption crew for the day was there trying to home rabbits. And the whole lot of them were completely upstaged by...a goat. Yes, someone brought a goat to PetSmart. Esther is a 7 month old La Mancha dairy goat with incredible calm. Even with dogs sniffing her all over, she dozed off. Talked to her owners, Esther was bottle-raised in the house after being ill when she was a week old, and even now she lives in a shed attached to the house and spends half her time in the house. She's so people-acclimated she's already going to nursing homes. She was our highlight of the day :)  We picked up some seafood (crabs!) and went home to settle in and wait for the Ravens/Steelers game. Was going to watch the last Spooks, but it turned out instead of having eps 7 & 8, I have two copies of 8. Eesh. So I indulged Mom's sudden crush on Matthew Morrison (CBS Sunday Morning did a segment on him) and played the Glee pilot for her. Now waiting, semi-patiently, for THE BIG GAME. Nervous now...

To all.

Mine wasn't too bad - tons of vaguely related family (all by my brother's marriage into their family), a raft of kids, some stragglers from the neighborhood and somewhere there was a cat. Max was wise enough to hide! Food was good, I didn't overeat anything, taught the kids to play Ingenious and may have recruited the oldest to help at next week's show. Although, next week's show is at a high school that is rival to his own :) Dunno how much Black Friday I'll partake in...guess I'll see when I wake up.

Well, we could start with Donovan. I bet he has that same look on his face today. I love watching the Washington Racial Slurs be humiliated, esp on national tv.

Ah, Andy Harris. Where is the 'I told you so' line queuing up? I've been griping about the jerk since the 90s but nobody in Maryland listened to me, apparently. *kicks 1st District* 

My hands and back are killing me, and I haven't even loaded the van yet. It'll be a fun weekend. Go away, rain.

Spent the day fighting it out with the Green Monster. Successfully cleaned it out, repacked, taped the ceiling back together, etc. But...it appeared the battery was dead. Called AAA and they had a guy out in 20 minutes. He confirmed the battery itself is fine and jumped it. I let it run for an hour, then drove it for half an hour. All was well. Needed gas, though, so stopped for that. And the van wouldn't restart. At all. The cashier pushed the van away from the pumps, and when he got off duty a half hour later we tried to jump the daggoned thing. Took 45 minutes, two sets of jumpers and about 20 tries to restart it. Got home and let it run for 2 hours. Turned it off and tried to turn it back on again immediately. No dice. Not even clicking or the teensiest bit of power. Now I'm thinking it's the battery cables, but even that's not an issue until I can get the darn thing to start again to take it to a garage. And I have a show Saturday. Good thing I cancelled today's show after all. Yeesh.

It's been oddly up and down...

Originally I was supposed to be at a memorial service for my uncle, but his friends didn't want to have one and finally said so a few days ago. So no service. And between the short notice and a broken toe, I didn't think going to the 'restore sanity' gig was a good idea. So no big whoops today.

Went on another 'ornament quest' to Westminster - no ornaments there. They did still have DecoColor pens, which they're clearing out, so I was able to stock up on some colors I could use. Then gaming - a place that usually goes Friday nights when I'm too tired, but ran Saturday this time. Finally learned to play Maori, more than a year after it was first suggested to me.

Home was different too. Did woodburning for the first time in a year instead of doing ornaments. Killed my hand in the process.

Last but not least, I had to unfriend someone who was pretty much the first person I ever friended. We've been RL friends for almost 10 years and often roomed/rode together to events, but she's decided she doesn't want to be friends with anyone who won't switch to Dreamwidth. I'm on more sites/networks/etc than I'm comfortable with in the first place and I don't like being ordered to do something. And she pretty much announced that if you won't switch, then unfriend her. So I did. Not happy about it but I figure it's really her decision - she's the one giving ultimatums. Sad, but clearly we're no longer on the same page, literally.

So far so good. Other than Roxie not letting me sleep, I have managed to prevent disaster from befalling the house with Mom gone. Laundry done, dishes done, trash out, dining room clean for a change, went to the bank, spent 3 hours with Mom, including an hour of being lectured by her PT about what she can and can't do, hit the craft store and glued a bunch of ornaments. It's TV time. Although the craft thing isn't at best - Michaels has few of the ornaments I use and they're the only ones who make them, plus they've decided to stop carrying the DecoColor pens which I absolutely depend upon. Making ornaments will be tough without the pens and impossible without the ornaments. Yikes.

I landed this show literally last night. I found it on Craigslist in a desperate attempt to get into a show today. Turns out the reason I hadn't heard about before was because it was supposed to be last week, but so few people showed up, and it was snowing, that they decided to postpone it until this week. Turns out the snow wasn't the problem. No shoppers was the problem. In 3 hours, I think we had 4-5 people come in. And they didn't buy. All the sales that were made were amongst the vendors. I did make back the table fee, but that was it. Meanwhile I got up at 5:30 and hand-carried all of my stuff in, as the steps made the cart a problem. My shoulders are absolutely killing me now. And they turned on the heat just as we got there (it was 24 degrees when we arrived), and my space was right below the blower. Air blowing on me and Mom, all morning. Except the heat never came on, something was wrong and it just blew cold air onto us all morning. The show was supposed to go to 2, but yours truly and the next two tables over agreed we'd start packing at 11:30, since there clearly wasn't going to be any traffic and we were freezing. Took my time packing, but still out of there before 1.

I suppose I was due for a clunker, but boy did this clunk. I would have been better off skipping this weekend and sleeping in. Nuts.

I just don't really feel right today. Minor things are nagging more than usual. Somehow I managed to lose my change from lunch yesterday, which was $18 and in the small bills I always want for shows. I'm on the wait list for two different shows this Saturday, and the forecast is for snow, which usually scares off vendors, but I haven't gotten a call yet and I'm practically ready to start pacing. The first song I heard on the radio today was John Lennon's 'Nobody Told Me', which put me in an 'I miss John Lennon' funk. Getting very wound up over not much.

It appears from the forecasts that my area will be getting snow tomorrow - for the 7th time in 9 years on Dec. 5th. The last couple years it's been pretty much the ONLY snow we've gotten. They're only looking for an inch, maybe two. And I personally have no problem with snow, other than my body just isn't up to a lot of shovelling.

BUT...

I have a craft show tomorrow. Which might be postponed (I sure hope not) but if it isn't...well, the Baltimore/DC metro area is full of people who panic at the mere word snow. That means super-crazy drivers everywhere, and not many shoppers at the show because they're too busy buying bread, milk and toilet paper for their trapped-at-home-time, all 3 hours of it. Two bad possible developments.

So snow, please, not this year. Heck, even Dec 6 is fine, just not tomorrow. Please. I'm begging of you.