July 2024

S M T W T F S
 12 3456
78910111213
14151617181920
21222324252627
28293031   

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags
ritaxis: (hat)
Tuesday, December 23rd, 2014 08:38 pm
Of course it's a mixed bag.

Starting with the personal, I rode up PetÅ™in Hill on the funicular railroad in late August and walked down, and in the process came to the revelation that I had only one life to live and it was stupid to live it unable to walk down a hill in a normal fashion. So I concluded that it was time to get a knee replacement or two.So I have been working on that ever since and I have the surgery scheduled for February which is not all that long from now.

I got titanium teeth last spring, so hopefully no more broken ones. I cannot tell you how much better life is with chewing surfaces on my molars instead of ragged holes.

My dog got surgery and now she is a much happier dog. She is thirteen now, which surprises people. They think she looks and acts like a dog who is just beginning to be old, like eight or nine years, but that's because they didn't see her when she was a young, obnoxious, energetic dog.

I did go to Prague for what may be but I hope is not the last time, and I got to listen to an opera while perched on the steep side of a valley in the forest, and to watch a parade of bagpipe players from all over the world many countries in Europe and Asia. It was the wrong time for linden blossoms but it was the right time for new wine, which can only be enjoyed in a small radius of its manufacture because long travel induces explosions.

Next, family: both of my children have acquired the exactly correct jobs. In these times this is a huge, huge thing. Emma had suffered as a theater costume shop seamstress for six years (she had advanced to "first hand," but that made her work even more frustrating), and now she is a full-time, permanent, career zookeeper. She's even getting to design a training program to help the birds keep from going crazy. Frank was in the UK for only a month when he landed a "Senior House Officer" job at Royal Leicester Infirmary, working in the emergency room. I mention the job title because it is silly. It is actually a junior doctor job: it's equivalent to a residency in US hospitals. It is exactly what he needs at this point in his career, and he thought he was going to have to work as a substitute doctor for a year or so to get NHS-specific experience before he could get it. And the setting is what he hoped for (though he would have taken anything)-- a large, urban hospital serving a diverse community.

So even though 2014 had some trying times for both of them, and for their spouses, they're fine now. Well, not just trying: Emma's husband Jason was very nearly killed by a confused action on the part of his sweet but clearly deranged rescue dog. Jason has a pretty remarkable scar but he is otherwise okay. Frank's wife Hana got hit by a virus as soon as they landed in the UK, and hasn't found a job, but I feel that after she worked so hard while Frank was finishing med school and getting his papers together for the UK, she can take her time and find a job she likes. She doesn't quite agree, but I find that the younger generation is understandably anxious about work and money and home.

Speaking of work: I have had two books published this year, a shortish novel and a novella, and a romantic (do you call them novellettes when they are  just shy of novella length?) story in an anthology. I also wrote another novella that was rejected, a short story that was rejected twice and is now in the limbo of long, long, long response times at that publisher that need not be named, a story that's in submission at another place, several stories that didn't go anywhere, and two stories that are almost finished and will be submitted before the first of the year. And another novelette that was accepted and paid for, for another anthology. And another one that was for a just for fun anthology.

The things that were published this year I wrote last year but I spent an inordinate amount of time editing them. There has to be a more efficient way, and I suspect if the publisher was paying a living wage to the editors they'd find it.

Notice what is missing from the work list: not-Poland. I felt it was a year to focus on getting a bunch of easy things published for immediate small payments, and that next year will be the year to finish and submit not-Poland. Among other things. I do need to work faster and harder.
ritaxis: (hat)
Monday, August 4th, 2014 07:14 pm
We all know that I am not a language peever, but I reserve the right to hate the word meme anyhow.

So anyway, this week's game is to grab the book nearest you and read the first sentence on page 45: it is supposed to explain your love life. I did it yesterday and the nearest book was 400 Czech Verbs and the first sentence was some damned thing about the accusative case or something and I forgot. But today I was reminded again and the nearest book was the Czech dictionary (don't get me wrong, I've totally been slacking on studying Czech all year, it's altogether unusual for these books to be anywhere near me). On page 45 there are actual sentences, in a sidebar about distinguishing "breast" from "chest." The first sentence is

The pain spread across the chest.


Being that we are in fact fifteen days from the 6th anniversary of the nice fellow's death, it's actually kind of apposite.

Though I tend to feel it in my head (my physical head, not my abstract mind), not my chest.

.........

How to rescue this post from the abjectly emotional? natter on about my living family.

I think I have convinced Hana and Frank to go to Chemnitz with me. Hana has quit her jobs in preparation for following Frank to the UK whenever his paperwork gets approved, so she's available. At any moment Fank may have to duck out and go to the UK for a last-minute job posting, but I don't mind the uncertainty. He's the reason I have developed a habit of flying to Prague, but he is not the only thing in Prague. I'm flying Norwegian Air from Oakland on the 20th of August, which is a strange day for me but it's good to be busy on it.

Emma has gotten a job with Happy Hollow Zoo as a "temporary" relief zookeeper. It puts a limit on her hours and benefits, but it doesn't preclude her applying for a permanent position, of which there are one or two coming up. She's as happy as she has ever been, her husband Jason said yesterday.

This is after a tragedy: their sweet doofus rescue bulldog got her wires crossed and leaped at Jason's throat, nearly killing him in the process. She had to be killed: and grief for her was almost as strong as the terror around Jason's brush with death.