random ramblings

I think the kids learned a lesson, yesterday.  I gave each of them a big, pink eraser, and set them at erasing the scribbles from the pixie's walls.  They worked at it for about three and a half hours--from 10:00 to 11:30, then from 12:00-1:00 (nap time), then for about half an hour after their naps.  After that, we went to Wal-Mart for a few things, got back and preheated the oven for pizza night, and I broke out the Magic Erasers.    Those really are magic, y'know.  Using them meant that the kids got almost every trace off the walls within the thirty or so minutes between getting home, and the pizza coming out of the oven, after having made little progress with the pink erasers. 

They've learned that cleaning up a mess inevitably takes longer, and is much less fun, than making it; and that Mom and Dad will make them clean it up. 

I love the kids.  But there are definitely times that I wish I could just tape them to a wall so I could do a little bit of housework without having them underfoot, "helping," and making things take four times as long, or having them out of sight either fighting with one another, or cooperating to do things like that.

At least I won't be outnumbered this weekend--Odysseus is taking the pixie to Grandma and Grandpa's for an overnight visit.  And the imp is a LOT more help than the pixie is.

One of the things we learned with the kids using the magic erasers in the pixie's room was that part of what they drew on was only primed and not actually painted.  It came off.  So, the pixie now has an accent wall. Thyme flower--sort of half way between pink and lavender.  She is so going to squee when she sees it tomorrow.

I cleaned the toilet in the master bath, this morning.  I was most of the way done (still hadn't put the seat and lid back down, but otherwise finished) when I heard a crash in the bedroom.  Hurried out, thinking I needed to yell at the imp for being somewhere off-limits, and found a fat little black cat in one of the bookcases, staring at a pile of books she'd knocked down in surprise. 

I never remembered to get that toilet seat down.  And Odysseus figured that out in a reversal of the normal female complaint (which is ironic, because Odysseus always puts the seat back down). 

No, the fat little black cat (Shadow really is a chunk--about 12 pounds of cat on a 10 pound frame, where Cricket is 10 pounds of cat on a 12 pound frame) didn't care.  Still doesn't.  She's currently sleeping in a basket of clean clothes in the kitchen.

Cricket, on the other hand, has been mostly a good kitty today, other than flipping one of her toy mice up into the basket of sorted clean clothes, and slapping my hand by accident trying to get it back out.  No, the claws didn't actually penetrate skin.  And no, I didn't rap a knuckle on a kitty skull--I just pulled the mouse out, and skipped it across the floor for her. 

I got a bit stuck on the book.  I think I'm going to have to summarize some time, and get back into the meat to progress the story, at least in this first draft.  Tentative title is The Schrodinger Paradox.  Current word count is 18K words--15.5K in part 1, and 2.5K in part 2, with part 3 only roughly sketched out, and a potential part 4 under debate. 

I also have another short story in the works, this one third person limited omniscient, watching over the shoulder (and thoughts) of a djinn who'd been bound in a cave by a sorcerer king before the rise of Islam, who was freed by American artillery, and attached himself to a special forces unit...I've got about a third to half of the first draft written, and I know where it's going.  It's going in the Normalcy Bias collection of stories (currently sitting at 5 stories and 25K words, and growing, since I have two or three more stories planned/outlined).  I work on the stories when I get stuck on the novel. 

Last, but not least, I got a bit of a chance to read (i.e., made some time to do something I wanted to do), and finished off The Gray Man: Vignettes.  I'm digesting, and planning to write a book review.  Because despite the (few) flaws, it's good.  And huge fun to read.  I'm already planning for a solid four hour block of time for next week to devour as much of the next book as I can in one sitting.