Soledad's Journal

... and finally some serious writing, too.

I've started working on the second very floral elephant; the one that will be called Lola, thanks to badly_knitted who came up with the name. I've cut out the parts, stitched together the body and made the ears - well, the second ear is only half-done, but there's always tomorrow.

As for the writing, I've finally written the first draft of the duel scene between Malcolm Reed and the Klingon woman, Officer Bu'Kah from the episode "Sleeping Dogs". The scene will need some serious rewriting, but at least I've got the bare bones of it, which has moved the long-stagnating plot forward. Thank God for small mercies.

Not much else was done today. We had leftovers, watched some telly and took naps. Mine lasted an hour and a half in the afternoon, and I slept so deeply that when Mum woke me (as it was time for my supper) I barely found my way back to the world of the living. Which means it was a really good sleep; I always wake up a bit dazzled after those.

And that was it, basically. I know I'm whining about this all the time, but it's frustrating how quickly the days are over. I never seem to manage half the things I hope to do on any given day. *sigh*

My very first, 16+-year-old mobile phone died on me today. I went to Telekom to have my account modified, and after the nice young man put in the new Sim card, the phone couldn't be switched on again. It's most likely the on/off button that is broken (I couldn't really use it for at least half a year, so the phone had been on continually), and while it's just such a small part, no-one has the ersatz parts or knows how to mend it anymore. Granted, the battery had been weakening for some time, too, but... well, it can't be helped. I'm really sad, though. That phone had gone through so much with me, and I really loved it.

So, right now the Sim card resides in Mum's old phone (inherited from H. about four years ago), until I can get myself a newer model. Also a button-operated one, mind you, I prefer those for simple phone calls. Not to mention that if Mum got to the hospital again (which I hope to avoid in the future, but one can never know) she won't be able to deal with my way-too-smart phone, so yeah. Fortunately, my friend Elise, whom I asked where to find such an old-fashioned phone, told me that she had bought one for her father who didn't like it and never used it. So, she'll bring me the phone next week, we'll try it out, and if it works for me, I'll buy it off her. It would spare me the necessity of running all over town like a headless chicken and trying to find one.

The phone drama cost me half the day. Fortunately, we had cooked in advance yesterday, so no slave labour was necessary. I started on the third elephant instead, mostly to calm down a bit (elwenlj would agree that hand-sewing is very good for that) and even finished it to about 80 per cent. She's very... floral, and I think I'll call her Ellie (very original, I know). I've got more of the same fabric (Granny's old gown) to make a similar one. Then I'll probably declare the elephant herd complete.

I also talked to my friend Evie in the evening. That was very soothing for my nerves, too. Friends are a gift one can't value enough.

I've been planning to mend one of our old, valuable stitched pillowcases (true Hungarian folk art) for months, as the blanket stitch edging has frayed out and is partially gone. Now, after several craft-less days, what did I do? Did I finally start working on the dear old thing? Nah; I started another toy elephant, this time repurposing some old bedlinens and an old nightgown. Those are very different from felt, being cotton, both of them, which is easier to sew through but fray out just as easily. Clearly, I'm not a sane person. But both ears and one panel of the elephant are done, and I've already started the second panel, so it ought to be finished in a couple of days. *fingers crossed*

Other than that, we had laundry day, I made Topfenknödel for lunch, and we watched two episodes of "Savage Hunters - The Restorers" and one episode of "The Repair Shop". That pretty much took care for the afternoon.

I've also started typing up the last chapter of EV II - The Dispossessed. That is a fairly short chapter, so it, too, should be done in a couple of days. Knowing my carefully laid plans and how they usually end, though, I'm being careful with my optimism.

And now that I've managed to wrestle both Pinterest and YouTube into obedience (I only had to restart my PC three times), I'm going to watch a few videos. Among others this recipe. It is very similar to one my Granny used to make, only with jam filling, and I no longer have her recipe (if I ever had; she usually made things by heart). So I'll give these cookies a try. Eventually.

Behold the birthday girl with her cake:



The candle on the cake says 90 - simply because I didn't have the time to hunt down a candle with a 3, but she didn't mind me making her three years younger. :)

There is another picture with her and the toy elephant she had fallen in instant love with. I think she looks great for her age and considering how much she had been through in her life, especially in recent years.

Today we washed her hair (one should look pretty on one's own birthday) and were prepared for a quiet day, with only a few phone calls from well-wishers. Her friends called, my cousin who's currently on the Azores with his second wife, and also my oldest cousin who always calls on important days.

But the great surprise came in the afternoon. Unexpected and unannounced, H. showed up (the first, now ex-wife of aforementioned cousin on the Azores and the finest person we've ever been related to), out of the blue, just to wish her a happy birthday and hand over a lovely potted flower and some chocolate. Of course the birthday cake made another appearance, and we had video chats with H.'s children and their children, all four of them between the age of 3 and 9. Mum was deliriously happy, of course - we really didn't hope to see any family on this day. Especially not in person. :)

So, this is for Mum, the toughest trooper and the very last of her generation still among us:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Sorry, noadvertising, you might want to look the other way briefly. *g*
But yeah, we had cauliflower cream soup and cauliflower Strudel (with ham, cheese and creme freche) for lunch. Yum! And it will be enough for another meal, too, so double win.

Lolek and the girl doll will go to their new home tomorrow. I hope their owners will like them.

I skipped choir practice again. I just can't force myself to leave the house unless I absolutely have to. *sigh*

... namely the toy elephant, is taking shape rather nicely. I think I've solved the biggest problem today: the legs. The original pattern was for a quiet book page and would have resulted in a fairly flat toy, so I adapted an idea from this YouTube video to give it a semi-three-dimensional shape. All four legs are finished and stuffed; the elephant probably won't be able to stand on them, as its proportions aren't the right ones for that, but sitting with all fours in all directions as if it had slipped on ice would look nice, too. Ears and eyes are in place, too; I'll have to make the tail and sew the whole thing together, and then it will be done. Hopefully.

Not much else has happened today. I took down the dried washing, we ate leftovers, watched some telly, and that was basically it. Mum chatted to her friends on the phone and attended to Mass via telly, while I was mostly sewing all day, with a short break around noon, when we both took a nap.

Tomorrow I'll have to leave the house again, so I hope today's nice weather will last. I wouldn't mind if it got colder, either, as long as there won't be any rain or snow.

I've finished my girl doll, and the results are disastrous. It isn't just quirky like the boy one was, it's downright ugly and bizarre. I'm very disappointed; I've worked on this doll for weeks, and yesterday I still thought it would turn out... acceptable, at the very least, but when I put it together today I saw that it was horrible. Simply horrible. The only cute features are its shoes, but those aren't enough to save it. If you're really brave (or suicidally curious) you can take a look at it here.

That is it. I won't ever make a doll again, unless I get a pattern that actually works. Clearly, I don't have the skill to make up a pattern on my own. Of course, the fact that I've sewn on the various body parts instead of using a hot glue gun like the original poster on YouTube only made things worse. But I wanted a doll that was child-safe. I didn't know the sewing would lead to a misshapen one, at least with this (badly reverse-engineered) pattern.

Anyway, that took up nearly all the me-time today, and for what? I did a tiny bit of writing on my private smutty piece (it's like comfort food, only for the troubled mind), did a bit of transcribing for EMV II, talked to two friends on the phone and watched some telly with Mum - and that was basically it. We didn't even have to cook, and yet the whole day went down the toilet due to the doll disaster.

Tomorrow I'll have to bake something to overcome my melancholy.

... of the disappearing cleaning lady. After several days of failed attempts to reach her on the phone, I got the nagging suspicion that she might be blocking our number. So I asked Mum's friend - the very one who had originally found this lady's ad in the local newspaper - to call her and pretend being interested in hiring some cleaning help. And lo and behold! she answered the phone and was more than willing to accept new clients (are they called clients?). I would have left things at that - I had my answer, after all - but Mum insisted on calling her on the mobile phone whose number she didn't know. And she answered the call! Mum asked her why she'd abandoned us straight away... and she hung up on her without a word. No real surprise her after all that had happened, but I find that attitude dishonest and rude. I mean, if she had changed her mind about working for us, she could have simply said so. Why this whole secret agent operation? I'll never understand people.

So we are without help once again. Meaning that the flat will only be cleaned on the ground level for the foreseeable time as I simply can't climb onto ladders. Not that ground level cleaning wouldn't be hard enough in our terribly crowded flat, but there are such things as cabinet tops and windows and the likes... I just hope we'll find someone eventually. :(

Other than that, it was a quiet day. I've made the pants for the girl doll, which didn't really turn out as intended, but they'll do. I hadn't cut the fabric wide enough for the pants to be baggy, so the poor doll now has skin-tight ones. Ah, well, hopefully the dress will cover the worst mistakes. Not having a proper pattern turned out disadvantageous, after all.

There might be some modest progress on the book-selling front, though. I've called the religion teacher of our school, who works for the local parish, and hope to be able to donate some of my religious books to their library. *fingers crossed* I also talked to a lady who works in one of those second-hand book wagons that are parked all over the town and also might be able to donate some of my non-religious books. I really hope to get rid of those books I haven't touched for the last fifteen or more years!

... and the lack of it can ruin your day. I had errands to run in the morning, and they were of a nature that I had to start them around noon. Considering the fact that Mum usually gets up after 9am and doing her morning routine can take as long as 40-50 minutes, not much of the morning was left. Definitely not enough to start anything of importance. Especially as we usually have a fairly late brunch because of my intermittent fasting routine.

I left shortly after noon and got home around half past three in the afternoon. We then had lunch - canned pumpkin cream soup and Flammkuchen that I had bought on my way home, so at least I didn't have to cook - watched some telly, took our afternoon nap (fairly late that one, too), Mum had phone calls from her friends, and with that the day was basically over.

Lolek the rag doll was a great success with my (ex-)colleagues and the kids at Erna's crafting workshop (I briefly visited her at school to help me learn more about my way too smart phone). I think I'll work tomorrow on the girl doll before I'd give his cap a try. Some of the girl doll's parts are still half-finished and don't require much brainpower to complete, so that will be both relaxing and productive.

The physiotherapist lady took a look at my as-yet unfinished little monkey rag doll and commented that he looks like the older brother of the Polish animated series for children, Bolek and Lolek. And she was actually right! The series was a great favourite in my childhood and had a renessaince in her childhood, so we both realized the similarity. So, my experimental rag doll isn't a monkey, after all, but a character from an animated series. What a career!

Today, I finally made his other foot and finished his scarf. Only the baseball cap is left, and then he can pose for a photo. *g*

Otherwise, it wasn't a remarkable day. I've done the second food shopping of the week, the janitor came and fixed things in the bath and the loo, and that was basically it. Mum keeps improving, albeit slowly. I hope and pray that she'll be able to climb back to her previous state.