Inspirations, the Stories Space Coffee House: If you're reading this it just might mean I'm back, sorta. If you're not reading this, well, congratulations.

No snow falling here. We've actually lost most of ours after a couple warm (relatively) wet days. Been very windy today, though.

Hope you're all keeping well in spite of the continuing insanity from your side of the border.

We had a couple of warm days. It was nice for a change. Now it's back to rainy and cold. It matches my mood.

I hate government red tape. My Mom died over a year ago and was on the waiting list for burial at Arlington Cemetery. It's always over a year wait, typically. That was not an issue. Finally got a call saying she was in the queue, and we could now schedule her service. (We had submitted all the paperwork and had approval.) But on review, they discovered that her middle name on her military service forms had an h in it, and the death certificate did not. I had to provide her birth certificate, and her middle name did not contain an h. So I am now responsible for correcting her military record. I found the Air Force website and forms. Their website states there is no telephone number to call. Everything must be done online or through the mail. Then I read the note at the top. It takes an average of 291 days to make corrections. So it will probably be another year before we get a date.

I'm upset and mad, and it brings back all the grief and the anger I have about dealing with insurance companies, Medicare, Tri-Care, and long-term health insurance problems. I am so tired of things being unnecessarily difficult. So now Monday will be another day of filling out forms, requesting information, etc. Other than that, things are great.

I hope everyone is having a better weekend than I am. Take care of yourselves.

Vibes, Gil. There's nothing worse than a bureaucracy trying to make a minor correction in the 21st century. "Oh, we can just tell people to do it online, then we can hire fewer people" seems to be the attitude nowadays. That goes for government, finance, insurance, and a raft of other so-called "service" industries.

Snow is back here, though fairly light so far. No shoveling needed yet, anyhow.

I'll put on some Wild Goat (yes, that is the new name for local roaster Fire Roasted) Snow Day Dark Roast. Teas are Canadian Breakfast and Sunday Tea. Pitchers are washed and refilled with unsweet iced tea and lemonade. Soda stock is good. There's hot chocolate available with mini-marshmallows for a suitable garnish.

Quote by gillianleeza

We had a couple of warm days. It was nice for a change. Now it's back to rainy and cold. It matches my mood.

I hate government red tape. My Mom died over a year ago and was on the waiting list for burial at Arlington Cemetery. It's always over a year wait, typically. That was not an issue. Finally got a call saying she was in the queue, and we could now schedule her service. (We had submitted all the paperwork and had approval.) But on review, they discovered that her middle name on her military service forms had an h in it, and the death certificate did not. I had to provide her birth certificate, and her middle name did not contain an h. So I am now responsible for correcting her military record. I found the Air Force website and forms. Their website states there is no telephone number to call. Everything must be done online or through the mail. Then I read the note at the top. It takes an average of 291 days to make corrections. So it will probably be another year before we get a date.

I'm upset and mad, and it brings back all the grief and the anger I have about dealing with insurance companies, Medicare, Tri-Care, and long-term health insurance problems. I am so tired of things being unnecessarily difficult. So now Monday will be another day of filling out forms, requesting information, etc. Other than that, things are great.

I hope everyone is having a better weekend than I am. Take care of yourselves.

All that because of an "h"? Nuts. Just nuts. Sorry Gil.

Same old thang here, after a rather busy December. Started a new novel. Still in its infancy. Competing with my writing aspirations is the PS5, and shiny new games like baseball and No Man's Sky.

Did I tell everyone I got a tattoo? The Pleiades! My daughter got a matching one. My first tattoo!!!

Peace. Coffee please.

My tat.

Interesting tat. If I get one, maybe something like that would be good. Less inking involved than some of the wildly elaborate ones. Except with my crappy skin, it might be hard to tell what's a star and what's a blemish/lesion. 🙄

Another brief warm spell is ending here today and a squall warning is out for the next 24 hours. By tomorrow, it will be cold again. Hope it gets better by Friday. I have visitors at work from Newfoundland and they head home Friday morning.

Refreshed the coffee and tea and I'll put out a pie.

Quote by Mendalla
Interesting tat. If I get one, maybe something like that would be good. Less inking involved than some of the wildly elaborate ones. Except with my crappy skin, it might be hard to tell what's a star and what's a blemish/lesion. 🙄

It was surprisingly painless. I like the lack of detail and simple inking.

Sick as a dog for 36 hours, and then fine. We think it was a norovirus, though it was over so fast, who knows? Talia luckily didn't get it. I puked HARD for 12 hours (TMI, I know), slept miserably for another 12, and then recovered. Nasty. But I woke up early this morning, and my first thought was, "I'm well!"

Coffee please.

Very nice tattoo. I'm sorry you got the dreaded norovirus. It went through my house as well.

An update to changing my Mom's military record. You can do it online, and after struggling to even comprehend what I was reading, I gave up and called my son. He accessed my computer remotely and helped me. Even with his expertise, it took over an hour because of the way the government insists you do things and the programs they require you to use. I have no idea if it was submitted correctly, and probably won't know for months. All because of a typo in her middle name.

Between that, the news, and being sick, I am finding it very hard to be positive about anything. It's all exhausting.

Stay healthy, everyone, and be kind to yourselves. It's crazy out there.

Quote by verbal

Sick as a dog for 36 hours, and then fine. We think it was a norovirus, though it was over so fast, who knows? Talia luckily didn't get it. I puked HARD for 12 hours (TMI, I know), slept miserably for another 12, and then recovered. Nasty. But I woke up early this morning, and my first thought was, "I'm well!"

Yeah, that really sounds like norovirus. Brief and brutal. Been there, done that, didn't want the t-shirt (it needed to be washed anyhow).

Quote by gillianleeza
You can do it online, and after struggling to even comprehend what I was reading, I gave up and called my son. He accessed my computer remotely and helped me. Even with his expertise, it took over an hour because of the way the government insists you do things and the programs they require you to use.

Well, I guess that's sort of an improvement. Bureaucrats really do not know how to design effective online systems and should just specify the end goal and then leave it to the pros.

Good morning! We are back in the throes of winter here. Negative (Celsius) temps and chance of flurries basically everyday for the next week, or so says the forecast.

TGIF!

TGIS!! (I know, that's not really a thing)

Good morning. Putting on a fresh pot of Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee and some Assam and Cream of Earl Grey teas. Other fine teas are in the cupboard behind the coffee bar. Hot chocolate is available and probably necessary in a lot of the Northern Hemisphere. Mini-marshmallows are there, too. If you are the rare person in need of a cold beverage in this season (say, you're an Aussie or Kiwi), then there's lemonade, iced tea, and assorted sodas in the fridge.

I am back to my big project, probably mentioned here before (a "Robinson Crusoe"-esque story about a woman in exile who is living alone on a "deserted island" that turns fantastical when she finds the island is not quite as "deserted" as she thought). The realization that starting in medias res was becoming a problem led to a new first chapter or maybe prologue filling in a healthy chunk of the protag's backstory. She's living in exile but filling in the details of what happened to send her into exile through flashbacks and exposition was just not working for me so I decided on this route. Then I just need to allude back to it or fill in gaps as needed. There's a still a burst of exposition filling in a gap between the end of the prologue and the beginning of the story proper. That might end up getting broken out as well, though I don't know that there's enough content there for a chapter and I don't want two prologues. We'll see.

Cool, Ape. Big projects are exciting!

I have a very short horror story coming out this week in an anthology - it's the one about the haunted garbage disposal, if you remember me babbling about that awhile back. So, that's cool.

Lazy day today. I got Talia one of those bird feeders that identify the bird (SO COOL!), and we've been experimenting with different spots. We finally found the best spot and I hung it. Now I'm playing video baseball and wishing for Spring.

Seize the carp!

Quote by verbal
I got Talia one of those bird feeders that identify the bird

Smart Bird Feeders? That's a new one but definitely cool. I think I know most of the winter birds around here but who knows, maybe I would learn something? Does it identify the squirrels, too (I recall my parents' bird feeder being as much a squirrel feeder)?

Good morning. Winter continues. -8C with light wind and occasional gusts here. Light snow right now.

Fresh coffee and tea are on. Here's some goodies for the week.

Hi, everyone!

Big snowstorm headed my way… biggest I can remember—15-19 inches.

Hope you all are doing okay. There’s a bit of new stories coming in on the home page which is nice. I like the SciFi.

Quote by verbal

Cool, Ape. Big projects are exciting!

I have a very short horror story coming out this week in an anthology - it's the one about the haunted garbage disposal, if you remember me babbling about that awhile back. So, that's cool.

Lazy day today. I got Talia one of those bird feeders that identify the bird (SO COOL!), and we've been experimenting with different spots. We finally found the best spot and I hung it. Now I'm playing video baseball and wishing for Spring.

Seize the carp!

Cool to be in an anthology!

Quote by WriterGirl

Cool to be in an anthology!

Thanks, WG!

I hope everyone is safe and warm and have no reason to leave the house until the cold goes away. We hunkered down here with snow flurries and temp in the teens.

A hot coffee would be swell.

"Cold enough fer ya?" is the question of the day, I'm finding. -15C or so here with wind chill down to -27. And I'm hearing about wind chills in the -40s out West.

Bit of a lively week at work so mostly just resting in my off hours. Might work on a story this weekend, just not sure which one. Need to find something shorter to work on so I can actually get something new on here. I haven't posted since the last comp, basically.

Oh, and we had snow yesterday so I had to shovel this morning.

I hate shoveling, Mr Ape! So, I may be snowed in until March after this weekend’s snowstorm.

I’ll take a hot cocoa, please. Gonna wrap up in a blanket and maybe scribble a little. 😊

Cold here, but the snow has stopped. I gotta shovel soon. I enjoy shoveling.

Calm weekend, and should be a calm week. I am slowly making progress on Mr. Novel.

I have a bit of memoir up here, from my days in Minneapolis: https://www.storiesspace.com/stories/memoirs/two-neighborhoods.

Things seem a tiny bit more optimistic in the United States this morning.

I'm certainly in a better mood. Still cold here, but the snow and wind have stopped.

We had a junco attack a finch on the bird cam yesterday. Dive bombed her! Marking territory I guess. No birds appeared to be harmed.

Coffee!

Quote by verbal
We had a junco attack a finch on the bird cam yesterday. Dive bombed her! Marking territory I guess.

Birds can be incredibly aggressive. I've seen jays go after squirrels and I've been dive bombed by a redwing blackbird whose nest was close to my deck and BBQ. Just remember that they are distant cousins of theropods like tyrannosaurus rex and it makes perfect sense. 😊

Quote by Mendalla

Birds can be incredibly aggressive. I've seen jays go after squirrels and I've been dive bombed by a redwing blackbird whose nest was close to my deck and BBQ. Just remember that they are distant cousins of theropods like tyrannosaurus rex and it makes perfect sense. 😊

Dinosaurs fighting in the back yard is a great image with which to begin the day.

Slowly warming up here. We should have a chill day today. The new novel is frustrating right now - I'm playing with backward voices with an app on my phone now, trying to get an idea. gnikrow ton s'ti.

Cooofffeee!!!

Quote by verbal
Dinosaurs fighting in the back yard is a great image with which to begin the day.

It's amazing how much scientists accepting the hypothesis that birds originated as theropod dinos has increased my enjoyment of them. 😊

I am kind of toying with lots of stuff but am often too worn down in the evening to write much so I am only writing on weekends right now. Got a couple ideas started plus my ongoing project. I have removed a bunch of backstory exposition and replaced it with "chapters" that fill in those blanks in the back story (basically explaining why the protagonist fled her homeland and filling in some details of how she ended up where she is) but not sure if those should be earlier chapters, turning the story into something bigger than I had thought it would be, or just flashbacks in the story as currently written. I don't actually have chapter breaks inserted yet so I am not sure how I will fit them in if I do flashbacks but I think they work better that way.

Slowly digging out from the weekend's snowstorm. We didn't get as much snow as predicted, but the sleet and freezing rain that fell all day on top of the 6 inches of snow created a mess. Everything was covered in ice, and it won't get above freezing until next week. Breaking up the ice on top and then shoveling the ice and snow was back-breaking and exhausting.

Thankfully, we didn't lose power, but schools are closed all week, so no work for me, yay. It's been nice to be stuck at home. My husband and I painted the living room and dining room since we were stuck at home. I've been doing a lot of cooking and baking and ignoring the outside world.

I hope everyone is staying warm and healthy. I'm off to tackle another cooking project. Cheers.

Quote by gillianleeza
Slowly digging out from the weekend's snowstorm. We didn't get as much snow as predicted, but the sleet and freezing rain that fell all day on top of the 6 inches of snow created a mess. Everything was covered in ice, and it won't get above freezing until next week. Breaking up the ice on top and then shoveling the ice and snow was back-breaking and exhausting.

We just caught the edge of it but parts of Ontario to the east of us like Toronto got smacked hard. Right now, we are in a cold snap but it's supposed to "warm up" for certain values of "warm up" next week. Meaning -4 to -5 instead of -10 to -15 (all Celsius). Nice to see you. At least you go something productive done amidst it all. Our place is probably coming due. We last painted after our son moved to Ottawa for university but that will be a decade next year.