I did get the kittens. Two of them, both absolutely adorable. I did get the yellow girl with white feet (named Bilquis), and her brother (named Sulimon) is a big grey who almost looks like a Russian blue, right down to golden eyes, except he's not a solid grey but has some stripy markings.

I've posted some pictures on Facebook, and here is one for LJ...




Thanks again to those who bore with me through my loss of Yorkie and my acquisition of Sulimon and Bilquis.

So I went to see the kittens yesterday after lunch. They're adorable! It would have been hard to choose if I had to pick them right now. They'll be ready to be adopted in about two weeks, so maybe by then I'll have a better idea of which ones I want. So far the yellow one with white boots (probably the only female) is a strong contender. But that may change. I hope to get over at least once more before Adoption Day to visit again.

I'm still leaning toward one of each color, simply because they'd be quicker to tell apart than if I get a matching pair. But who knows, I may decide to go with a matched pair.

I haven't really LJed since Yorkie died, I see. That's been a while now, and lo and behold I'm going to be getting two kittens in a couple of weeks. They were born the last weekend of September, so they should be old enough in about two or three weeks for me to bring home. One of the teachers where I work has a cat who had the kittens, and there are four to choose from--two yellow and two gray. He's brought in pictures so I can see them, and they are really cute.

So tomorrow afternoon I'm planning a visit to his apartment to see them in person, and see what sort of personalities they have before I choose which ones are best for me. I know that when I got my cat Sheik as a kitten, when I visited him at his mommy cat's home he came right up to me and sat in front of me and looked up as if to say "So you're my new mommy!" I'm not sure I can expect a similar experience with these kittens, but I do know that many times it's the cat that chooses the human rather than the other way around.

So anyway, I am looking forward to the new babies. I'll have to "kitten-proof" my place a bit. Yorkie was such a sedate cat ever since I had him I sort of got lazy as to making sure there weren't things around that a curious cat could get in trouble with. I've been looking my place over and removing a few things that could be too easily swallowed by a kitten, or too easily caught in, or...well, those who own cats will know what I mean.

I did decide on names, tentatively (came up with two of each sex, just to be sure), but I really do want to see them before I saddle them with anything permanent. Kittens are sure to be fun, as well as keeping me on my toes.

Five things make a post...

1) This whole week has been a lovely one, temperature-wise. Highs only in the upper 60s, lows in the low to mid 30s--and the leaves on the trees have finally started to change. Not that we have tons of trees around, but the ones that are have turned some lovely shades of yellow and orange. With the weather changing like it has, of course I now have some sniffles and a little bit of a cough, but I've learned these symptoms come with the changes. I don't feel sick, just sniffly.

2) If you've never seen an Arizona sunset over the stark mesas of the northeastern corner of the state, you've missed a treat. I've always loved Arizona sunsets--you get so many different colors here, and no two are the same. In my many travels (and no, I haven't been everywhere, but I've done my fair share), no sunset can measure up to an Arizona one. Some have come close, though.

3) I'm up to chapter 19 on my final portion of my trilogy. I can see where I'm going to have some heavy duty editing once I'm done, to make everything fit smoothly in all three parts. Still, overall I'm quite pleased with this arc, and even if I never get it published, I've had a grand time writing it. Just don't expect me to leave my day job for a while.

4) I think I'll try Nanowrimo again this year. I've yet to "win" that, and I would like to do so at least once in my life. Maybe the third time is a charm. I'm thinking of writing a "youth of" for my MMC in my trilogy. I already did for the FMC, and I believe it's time for equal treatment. If I like it well enough, maybe I'll have a four-part series rather than a trilogy when I'm through.

5) Many thanks to all those who offered condolences when my cat, Yorkie, passed on. Now it looks like I'll be adopting a pair of kittens from a teacher whose cat just had kittens at the end of September. I'm just waiting for them to get old enough now. I get a choice of colors--the litter has two greys and three marmalades. I'm thinking one of each, so I don't get them mixed up. I don't really care whether they're male or female; either way they'll be neutered once they're old enough. By the time I can adopt them, I expect to have my apartment fully kitten-proofed, though from experience I also know they can still get into a surprisingly large number of adverse situations.

It is with a very heavy heart that I report the passing of Yorkie, my tuxedo cat, this morning at 6:05 am, MDT. I had the care of him for the past 9 1/2 years, and he was a wonderful cat. It happened suddenly, with no warning. He started crying and panting, then went into convulsions. Within a minute, he was gone. I have lovingly wrapped him in a blanket and put him in an open-topped box for later transport to the vet. It's still too early to call to get an appointment.

I don't know what was wrong yet. I plan to take him to the vet for a necropry (whatever the autopsy on animals is) to find out. It almost seemed like he was poisoned, but he was a totally indoor cat, with no access to outside sources.

I will be at work today, since my worksite certainly won't give me bereavement leave for a cat, even though he was like my child. I think, though, that I will forego going to my Eastern Star meeting, so that I can take care of things with the exam and cremation stuff, unless when I call the vet I will have to wait to take in his body.

I know that losing a cat in no way compares to losing a human relative, but the grief and anger and wondering if I could have done more is as real as for any loss. I would appreciate your prayers.

UPDATE

The vet could not do an autopsy because it would have needed to be done within 3 hours of the incident for it to be able to tell them anything, and as I live 2 hours away from the vet, and it was already two hours after Yorkie died that I was able to call...well, that did not happen. The vet did say (based on my description of what happened when he died) that the likely cause was either his lungs collapsed or he had heart failure, and because he did not evince labored breathing, she was leaning toward the heart failure. At least it happened fast, and he was not in distress for long.

I will still have him cremated. I should be able to pick up his cremains the middle of next week. I'm not exactly sure what I'll have done with them, but I want to do something, especially since I never had an opportunity to do anything about my previous cat.

Thank you to all who left kind thoughts and comments. You are a great bunch of friends. I do intend to get another cat soon...in fact, one of my co-workers cats is pregnant and he says I can have one of the kittens, or maybe even two. It will be a little while still, but that will give me time to clean up old cat stuff and see what can be reused and what needs tossed.

To all those who once served, or still currently serve, in any of the armed forces, thank you for your contributions to the safety and well being of our country.

Yesterday was the last day of school for the 2008-2009 school year. Now we get a week off before starting the summer school program. I'm not quite finished with my checkout forms, but all I need is my final room and book inventory stuff. I also want to give my room a good defragging, since I had piles of old papers from not just this year, but the previous year as well. I got about halfway through yesterday, and I'll finish up this morning so I'm ready for next year.

I'm not exactly sure what all I'll be doing this summer. I will have a week-long meeting with a state committee that is reviewing the state standards for English Language Learners, and I'm pretty excited about that. I've been grumbling about the standards since they came out, but I've grumbled even more about the whole "jump-through-the-hoops" the state is requiring of these children. I don't think we'll be addressing the latter, at least not officially, but anything, however small, that I can do to help our students succeed is okay with me.

After my week on the committee, I will be working with incoming freshmen to introduce them to what high school is like. Another teacher, Tammy, will be team-teaching the one-week course with me. I was supposed to work with her for two weeks, but this committee thing came up and as it is a great privilege for someone from my remote district to be invited on it I chose to miss the first week. Sorry again, Tammy!

Then I'll have a few weeks that I can use to visit family and friends before heading off for San Diego the first week of July. I need to call/write/email/contact my cousins there and see if I can drop by for part of the time to visit. I'll be a delegate at the Regional Assembly for the NEA (teacher's union), and it is my first time to go to a national type meeting. I'm totally excited, even though sometimes I take a stand diametrically opposed to the majority of my union on some of the issues that come up.

After the RA, I get to have a couple more weeks of vacation time before we have to report back to work. We start back at work the last week of July. In today's economy, I'm just glad that I was given a contract and can continue to work!

I've been actually writing, both in edit mode and in create-a-new mode. But I decided I'd like a little input, mostly to know I'm not alone in this sort of effort.

So, here's my poll. Be kind, it's the first time I've tried this function myself.

Poll #1386494 When writing...
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 8

I feel most competent in the area of

I work best when

Choosing more than one answer is acceptable, as are comments. I lurve comments....

1. Spring weather is very variable. Since the equinox, we've had snow, rain, wind, dust, and heat, not necessarily in that order. The one thing that marks it for me most personally is that here in the valley I live in, the Russian olive trees have gone into bloom, and that means my allergies have returned. So I have my Claritin and lots of nice soft tissues and cough drops. And I'm praying the allergies don't develop into a sinus infection.

2. Another key ingredient in spring, at least at the high school, is the number of students who have already "tuned out" for the rest of the school year. They're here, they're moving around, but they aren't thinking about school at all. They're thinking about their boyfriend/girlfriend, they're thinking about going down to the canyon, they're thinking about pretty much anything but doing their schoolwork.

This would be less of a problem if this wasn't also a key time for state-level testing.

3. I've been a bad daughter. Haven't talked with my dad for several weeks. I meant to call him this weekend, but I got so busy I didn't. I'll call him tonight (I know he is busy in the mornings, so I doubt I'd get to him until I get off work). I love my family, but I'm such a poor correspondent! I keep making promises to myself that I'll call, or write, or visit, or something, and then don't follow through. Sigh.

4. I have put my writing on hold for a few weeks while I get some other, more urgent, stuff dealt with. I'm hoping by May to be back in the swing.

5. Enough about the Obamas' new puppy, for goodness' sake! I'm glad they have it, but I certainly don't think it's headline stuff that they have a dog now. I'm more excited that the captain was rescued (though I regret that some of the pirates were killed) than I am that Senator Kennedy provided the puppy for the Obamas.

I usually pride myself on being able to put myself into the heads of my characters. I like to think it makes me more able to make them real people, even those who appear for a brief sentence or paragraph. Yet I have some areas that apparently I'm blind to.

For example, in my current WIP, I have a male character. I try to make him think the way I think a man thinks, but apparently men think of sex more than I do. At least, that's what a couple of my (female) beta readers tell me. Now, I realize that men and women do, to some extent, have differing priorities, but surely not so much as all that. I can understand the adolescent fixation on sex, what with having to deal with newly raging hormones, but surely eventually even men outgrow that particular thought process?

This particular story isn't about sex. This particular story is about exploration, about one's past catching up with one, and about growth. I don't particularly want to put in gratuitous sex scenes. I don't like reading them in other authors' works; I certainly don't want them in mine. Sexual tension, perhaps, but not the act.

Ah well, I'll work it out. Eventually. Maybe. Meh.

I was reading through my notes for my third-in-the-trilogy story, and I have hit a road block. I want to show (rather than tell) how sensing other's emotions has had an impact on my MMC. I can tell easily enough, but it's hard to show it.

I'm trying to think of actions that would indicate reactions to people, without repeating things like blinking, staring, wincing, and so forth. I have him blink too much, I think. Or wince. I'm really tired of him wincing, actually--he's not the wincing type!

So, my writerly friends out there--can you help me with a few other ways for him to show his reactions? I don't want to just write "He felt her surprise" or He sensed the other's anger."

I'm so fail here....

I have finished my first draft of the first part of the trilogy. Yay! Not complete yet--not till I have a chance to do some editing (I already know of some I can cut and some I need to add), but the arc works, and goes into part two the way it should.

So to step back for a bit, give it a chance to settle, I'm starting on the final part of the trilogy. Well, starting to continue on it...I have about 100 pages but they're mostly scenelets and they need to be connected into a coherent whole. I've already deleted one entire scene, except for a few paragraphs I morphed into a different scene.

Such a great feeling to be able to say I've gotten this far.

I gakked this from hotarunokokoro. It is surprisingly accurate, except that this particular demon doesn't always stay an inner demon...

Your Cute Monster Says Your Inner Demon is Depression

You are both a realist and an idealist. You're able to see the world as it is - and how it could be. You dream big, and you never give up on your beliefs. You have big plans. Sometimes you build things up in your head. People think you're cute because you're determined. You're a fighter, and that's charming.

Thank God I was diagnosed and received treatment for it. I'm not "cured" but I have learned how to sidetrack it, how to derail it once it hits, and how to deal with it if everything fails and it still hits.

Today I get to go back to work after a 4-day spring break (I'm not counting the weekend--I always get weekends). This is the time of year when the kids either pick up, thinking "OMG it's almost school out and I'm failing and I don't want to have Miss B again!" or they start fading back, thinking "Who cares, I don't want to study, it's too nice outside, and my boy/girl friend is much more important that any of my classes." Come to think of it, that's pretty much how the teachers are thinking, too. Heh.

On the writing front, I have about 2 more chapters to go...one for sure, and probably one more to wrap everything up. The cool thing is I found an old note that I wrote with this ending in mind, and it gave me a whole "Oh! Yes! That's how it needs to go!" so I expect this last chapter (or two) to go rather quickly. Then it's a matter of editing so that it fits with the central story (which may mean editing the central story a bit, too), and then I can start on finishing the sequel. So go me!

I'm back from my trip to Phoenix for a meeting with my OES committee. I don't mind going to the meetings, but it seems to be a lot of travel for a 1-hour meeting. (In my case, at least. It's 10 hours round trip for me. I think the next farthest away has a 5 hour round trip.) The WGM insists that we have at least 2 face-to-face meetings a year, which really isn't all that many, so it's doable. But in this age of internet, really, do we absolutely have to have face-to-faces? Other than to prove we're really people?

That said, the drive was actually very nice. The weather was lovely, the traffic overall rather light (Phoenix on a Saturday noon is never light, but that's the big city for you) and I only had one time I had to stop for some reason on the interstate in the Phoenix area. The biggest problem with having a 7 hour drive in one day (I had made it partway there the night before) is that I would get sleepy behind the wheel, which is a Very Bad Thing. I pulled over four times (that's double what I'd normally do) just to get out and move around so that I could get rid of the sleepies.

Also as usual when traveling, I messed up my eating pattern, which messed up my blood sugars, and this morning, after several days of low blood sugars, they were way too high. So breakfast this morning consisted of two boiled eggs, no bread, but a small amount of apple juice (so I could take my meds). I'll be checking my Post-breakfast sugars in about 40 minutes, to see if I corrected enough.

I'm kinda sorta planning a short trip this summer so I can attend a gathering, though I won't be incredibly disappointed if it doesn't work out. If I do go, it'll probably end up costing about $1500, what with travel, food, and lodging costs plus possible buying and emergencies. Not to mention either boarding my cat or finding someone to keep an eye on him. I'll see what my finances look like after I pay my taxes.

If I can't afford it, oh well. I can have just as much, if not more, fun just visiting relatives and friends in the (relatively) nearby areas. It sure would be nice, though, to be able to travel as much as I liked, without having to worry about such mundane issues as where I'll get the money to do so.

Anyone have a rich uncle who could give me, oh, say, 100 grand, tax-free?

Heh, didn't think so.

I got another chapter in my prequel finished, so go me! I now have to kill off a major character (he has to be dead before the original story's start), and I know how it's going to happen...already wrote that part. I just have to figure out how to get him to where he dies. Then I have to have my protag recover from the trauma of the death, meet her previously unmet half-brother, and set her up to a point where only a few months separate the end of the prequel with the start of the original.

I didn't use to think I could effectively write "Scene X" first, then go figure a way to fit it into my universe. But now I find it's actually making the composition of the interim scenes easier. So I have about 4 scenes pre-written, as it were, and now just have to connect the dots. I figure about 4 or five chapters will finish up this prequel, and then I can work on the editing of it so that it smoothly matches my protag's past with her present. After I've done that, I can start concentrating on the sequel, of which I have about 5 chapters already finished (approximately 1/4 of the story) and another three scenes written that will need the dots connected.

I'm good at writing scenes; I need to improve on finales and on introducing necessary world-building without getting too much exposition so that the reader gets bored. I think (thinking back over the trilogy) that I have perhaps seven or eight spots that I need to split up so that the exposition isn't all in one chunk. The challenge when writing new worlds that are not earth is you want to let your readers know why this isn't earth and how it's different, but you can't drop the action for long or you lose your reader's attention.

And I just want to say a public thank you to my beta readers--you have been a huge help by giving me feedback that's more than just nice words to make me feel good. I realize that one chapter needs more conflict--that's where the editing comes in and I've already got some ideas on how to fix it percolating in my brain.

I remember being at a beach, playing in the sand. I remember the sensation of water rolling over me, the taste of salt water, and the gritty sand. I apparently was submerged by a wave and managed to swallow some of the seawater. From family history documents, this happened when I was about 2 1/2.

I also remember being in the hospital once. I remember the sensation of moving and watching the ceiling lights go by and the elevator door opening. I was three, and my brothers and I were all in to get our tonsils taken out (they did things that way when I was that age). It's the only time I was in a hospital as a patient until I was in my thirties.

No work today...well, no work I get paid for, anyway. Housework, yes. There's also a possibility (not a certainty) that tomorrow we will have another, or at least a half day.

One thing I still need to do is put up the cover on the inside of my wall that blocks the wind that comes through my swamp cooler. At least this year I have an exterior cover, so that blocks some of that cold wind. I was hoping it would be all I need, but apparently not.

Also I'll be wrapping presents.

We have a major weather system moving through our little corner of the world. Yesterday the school went to a "half day" (that means the kids get to go home early--1:35 instead of 3:40), even though we're supposed to be giving finals. Then towards the end of the lunch period, they announced that Wednesday would be a snow day, and so no school. So I get to stay home today and actually get some housework done before I leave for my vacation. I'm currently watching the news, and it looks like tomorrow will just be bringing more snow, so it's quite possible that I won't be going to work tomorrow either. Unless they decide to make it a "delayed start" and give us a chance to give the second half of our finals.

Either way, looks like travel anywhere for a few days at least will be problematic. I looked out my windows and it's definitely snowing heavily right now. I love the snow, so long as I'm not required to drive in it.

And they say we're having global warming.....

Mountains. The ocean is nice, but I love the mountains.