A bed of roses

The daughter is due to be induced today because baby is very comfortable where he is thank you very much :D

My mother dropped off a couple of sewing patterns last week - one for a rag doll and one for a pair of clowns. I think the bedding fabric will look better as clowns, so that's what I'm going for. I ordered some haberdashery yesterday - this is JUST the trimmings (ribbon, wool for hair, new scissors, that kind of thing) and it came to £30! Very glad I have the actual fabric. I am really looking forward to making them. It's a long time since I did any sewing - I don't get on with sewing machines, so it'll all be by hand but I'm fine with that. I've got so many ideas for making good use of the fabric.

Husband is due for his second Covid dose - have to go to London Road this time. But it's doable and we can pop in to town to do some shopping afterwards.

One of my colleagues has set up a very funky spreadsheet for tracking when the various stages of a project are due to start and end, and when they actually do. It's all very pretty and works well - on the first worksheet. But if you add extra tabs for extra projects (because it would be VERY nice to have a single document, and to possibly create a summary tab at some point), it carries all the formulae for the first worksheet to the other tabs! I had a dig around in the set up and was quite proud of myself for working out what the problem is and how to fix it - but one of the formulae is so long I couldn't get all the references to change. And it also seemed like a very long-winded way of setting up a new worksheet every time there's a new project. So I asked the colleague who created it to take a look. They are clearly much more expert at Excel than I am :)

We got a phone call from the heart hospital to tell us that they were setting up an angiogram (and possible angioplasty) appointment for the husband but the pre-op consultation would have to be the day before. I heard 'pre-op' and 'procedure' and got - not panicked exactly but it threw me for a loop because it was the first we'd heard about it. The letter explaining it arrived the next day :D Anyway, we now have TWO appointments at Broadgreen - 10am on Wednesday and 8am on Thursday. Which means having to be up, washed, dressed and fed by 7am. Not looking forward to that.

I'm also pondering taking 7 March as leave (I have a whole 2 days that aren't booked!) because we have two appointments at the Royal - or I may get one of them moved.

In good news, the community dietician has discharged us :D We are supposed to be seeing a dietician about cholesterol at some point, though.

Oh, and when I picked up husband's latest prescription, there was a box of sharps in there! Hopefully that means they're now on his prescription. His full sharps box is due to be collected on Tuesday, which means putting it out Monday night.

One of the ways I keep myself sane is by only thinking about the NEXT thing we need to do - today is Covid jab day - because if I thought of ALL of them, I'd just get overwhelmed.

My low-carb cook book came up trumps, at last - the smoked haddock chowder went down VERY well, so that's a keeper.

Finally(!), some of the snowdrops I planted last year have come up! They make me as happy as I thought they would <3

Nano 19 involved not so much writing a novel as planning for a multi-volume epic and in the 50k words that I produced to that end, I think I have something.  Of course, a lot of the characters that appeared didn't have character charts, so that would be a thing to work on.  And the story didn't quite follow the outline I had - but that's the fun of novel writing; finding out how the story REALLY goes.

I also introduced a friend to the fun of writing, which was quite emotional for me.  There's nothing quite like sharing your love of something with another person.

I'm moving to a new desk on Monday.  I moved all my non-tech stuff across last night but the hardware techs move the actual equipment.  I've lost count of how many desks I've had at LJMU.  I could probably work it out, if I had the energy.

One of the knock-on effects of Nano is a real downturn in my energy levels but we can address that during December.  Back to the Chi Qong and meditations!

We have some new furniture arriving a week on Monday, so I need to organise Bulky Bob to pick up the old stuff.

And today is the annual homage to consumerism as the grandson and I go around town with my mother and step-father to spend money.  For most of us, that means vouchers, but the grandson needs clothes, so that will be the real fun.  The UK has embraced Black Friday with a vengeance, so we're hoping to pick up some bargains.  We were supposed to be getting him a bike but it became too much of a Thing, and there were tears and wailing and gnashing of teeth, so clothes it is.  Hopefully that will be less stressful!

My chat buddy was trying to persuade me to look at the Black Friday deals on PS games, but I really don't need any games.  Although I am going to need something for Christmas...  But I have some ideas in that direction.  I definitely need a new journal, and some funky pens would go well with that.  Some nice PJs and slippers, too.  And if there's any cash left, I have a list of potential games that I made ages ago and haven't done anything with.  I'm thinking of looking up some gameplay videos, see if that gives me any idea of what they're like.

There is sooo much stuff coming out about FF7R, even I'm getting excited.  I'm still determined not to buy it, though.  I think the 'whole' version on PS5 is a possibility, but I'm just not enough of a FF7 fan to rush out and get it now.  The fact that they've already started working on Part 2 makes me think they might get the whole thing out on PS4 - although I'm sure they'll have PS5 versions of each part, too.  My current plan is to watch someone do a Let's Play.

I've started watching Let's Plays of God of War (Strange Rebel Gaming, also the voice of Aerith) and The Stanley Parable (Dayglow Buffalo).  Very different games.  I don't think I'd cope with GoW, even on casual, but it is beautiful to look at and the axe looks like fun to use.  The Stanley Parable smashes the 4th wall - whilst surrounding you with walls.

My only real goal gaming wise, though, is to get the Platinum Trophy for FF8R, which is very doable.  And my gamer colleague has offered to lend me Lost Legacy, so that will get me through December.

Well, that's about where life is at the moment.  Tune in next week for another exciting installment...

 OK, here's a bit of trivia for you.  I've been watching a Let's Play of The Bouncer (Square Enix Does Beat 'Em Up), whose MCs are all bouncers at a club called Fate on Dog Street.  In KH2 (Square Enix Does Strange Things With Disney), Pence wears a basket ball shirt with Dog Street written on it.  Nice little nod to the past, I thought.

Yesterday was one of the strangest days I've ever had at work.  I had a 9.30am meeting and just couldn't get a handle on the day after that.  It wasn't a weird meeting in any way but the rest of the day was.  There was a point where I felt if someone had asked me my name I'd have struggled to answer them.  Anyway, the day passed super-quick which is no bad thing and I walked part of the way home with C who lives not far from me.  He paid me a rather sweet compliment, which I acknowledged without either making a big deal of it or reminding him that I'm almost old enough to be his mother (he's about 6 months older than my daughter).

I had a bit of a grumble to my line manager that every time I speak to anyone about the Random-Collection-Of-Things-Usually-Referred-To-As-The-Project I feel like I'm learning something new.  There's a task to be done that nobody has ever mentioned before, or Thing X isn't as far along as I thought, or Thing Y is done and nobody told me.  He said not to worry about it because he feels exactly the same.  He's also frustrated that we can't just leave people to get on with stuff they've agreed to do, but have to keep reminding them or even putting stuff in their diaries for them.  The big problem with this piece of work is that it's really nobody's priority, so nobody worries if it gets pushed out by something else.  But we WILL have it all done by Christmas this year, I swear.  I just want to get on with the rest of my life!

Having said that, I do think it's probably a good First Project.  It really is a case study in 'how not to do a project' and can only be good from a learning perspective.  When I start my First Real Project, everything will be different!

My thoughts on the Possible Nano 2017 are coming along.  Of course, I'm mostly thinking about the nice bits but I do have a sort of plan.  The first third will focus on the MC - the new Sultan - and his descent into horror and madness.  The second third will tell the same story from the point of view of his twin sister, who can only watch helplessly but who then tries to take matters into her own hands.  The last third will tell the story from the point of view of the genie, which will stitch the other two thirds together.  The genie is gender-neutral but appears female to the Sultan and male to the Princess.  It also exists outside our space-time but has interacted with humans for so long that it does understand conventional story structure.  Yay for literary devices!  The final chapter will draw the three strands together to the happy (at least, that's how it's planned at the moment!) ending.  I just need to work on the deep, dark and nasty things that I am going to have to dredge up...

'Liar' finished last night and I am left more than a little disappointed.  I don't know if I can bear to put myself through the second series.  It just got so improbable.  On the other hand, I am curious about who did the deed...

Well, time to get this day underway.  Hopefully, it'll make rather more sense than yesterday did!