Peeking into the rock

Does anybody else have a dishwasher that periodically blooms all over in black algae or is it mold? That thing of running the washer now and then with a load of vinegar in it doesn't prevent it, though it seems to make the process slower.

I've taken apart what I could, so far, and scrubbed everything with bleach water (I know, you're not supposed to put bleach into a dishwasher, but I washed the parts outside the dishwasher so the rubber bits wouldn't get (much) exposure, and not using bleach has done nothing for me. But I am stymied by the screen at the bottom of the dishwasher which needs washing at least as much as the rest of the machine if not more, or maybe it should be replaced. It will not budge. I have removed all the things that were connected to the top of it and I have removed the visible screws, but neither turning nor rocking nor lifting straight up has an effect, and for obvious reasons I don't feel that I can put all my strength into wrenching it out.

For added hilarity, the Sears website does not admit that my model exists, and their telephone line appears to connect to R'lyeh. The recording says: "Drge'zhum'...gwump'shwawndruk...shtlum..." and a human voice interjects occasional bits of non-helpful non-information before dissolving into clicks and grunts. I am not making this up. My phone is demoralized by this and flashes me a screen asking if I would like to give the mysterious entities a text message or initiate a hangout. For the love of mercy, no! I cry, and terminate the call.

The phone meanwhile has an urgent agenda of its own. I do not understand what it has been trying to tell me the last week. It keeps "notifying me," as far as I can tell, of nothing. I have gone through every menu I can find and I have turned off notifications for email, chat messages, download completions, updates pending, leaving, supposedly, only notifications for text messages. I have as my notification alert sound a very pleasant bird chirping file that can appearently go on for ten minutes without exactly repeating itself. But this is not desirable at half-hour intervals commencing at two o'clock in the morning, when in fact there appears to be nothing nothing nothing anywhere. Not a new text message: not an email: not a chat message: not activity in my account: not a download initiated or completed: not an update. Just a cheerfully insistent telephone with a (clearly somewhat deranged) mind of its own.

I finished a draft of a thing yesterday, but I think it needs another pass before I submit it. It's meant to be a first conteact story but as it stands I think some people might not notice. I began to look at the other thing that's to be submitted today, but mostly I have been battling mold and begging for enlightenment from inanimate objects.

Oh, and ruining my breakfast, but I already talked about that.

On another front, the dog decided she did not approve of my walk itinerary and brought us home. At least we had two tiny walks, though.

Oh, but there was a good thing today! On our first tiny walk we found that a pinr true had fallen over at "the apartments" (as if they were the only apartments in the neighborhood). That's not the good thing. I asked the supervisor of the crew grnding up the tree if I could have a couple branches. So now I have a wreath on the door jamb and some wee pine branches surrounding my wee spruce seedling which sits in a green wooden bucket on a silver platter. It actually looks cute.

Close to 2300 words. Chapter totals: Chapter 5, 6180: and Chapter 6, 1770. According to exact numbers, the novel broke 30 000 today, even though if I was just adding today's total to yesterday's I would have gotten less than 27 000: somehow I lost more than 3000 words rounding down.

I was complaining about the cold on chat last night and Frank said Hana envied us our temperatures. I checked: Our nightly lows are the same as their daily highs in Prague, and also, they are having a kind of weather called freezing fog. And Frank says that people burn random things in fireplaces to keep warm.

I was disgusted at the time -- not a big fan of fireplaces in general, here -- but then I remembered that we all used to put random things in the fireplace, too. I had to fight in the old days to keep the Trollman men from putting plastic wrappings in the fire at Christmas time.

Speaking of Christmas: I still don't like holidays, but the sense of deep dread and foreboding is fading. If I was rich, though, I'd use visiting Frank as an excuse to "get the hell out of Dodge," as my friend Hummah says when she calls up and says she wants to visit and get away from her son. But Prague is tourist destination at Christmas and everything is at least twice as expensive as it is in January, so I think I'd have to be really flush to go.

Anyhow, I accomplished all the rest of the Midwinter humiliations, revealed that the stern tutor is (1) a literal bastard who makes no secret of it and is fiercely proud of his decent status in society in spite of it (tutor to the Duke's own children!) and (2) lovers with the music tutor. This last is important for some reason -- I think I know why: I think he returns after his departure, to advise the little duke on related issues, and also this may figure in his departure: of course it does, he follows the music tutor to some orchestral gig. I also accomplished the confrontation with Yanek's brothers by birth (it does not go well), and Yanek's stint as a pick-up musician at the Midwinter ball (it will be cute, the musicians say, not "You are the greatest musician ever despite being ten years old:" Yanek is competent, and a fast learner, and later he has some flair, but he is not a prodigy, okay? This is not Yanek-is-perfect-at-everything-and-everybody-either-hates-him-or-loves-him-for-it), which lands him in hot water, of course.