Hawks and other predators. Subscribers, sales, and shares all very badly needed.

Photo copyright Aji, 2018; all rights reserved.

Once in a while, you can really catch the sense of motion when they're diving. Not often; they're too quick. But he gave me that one yesterday. At least once a day, he comes over to circle directly above me and hover for a moment, tipping his wings. Right now, that's part of what's keeping me sane, especially on days like today.

Plumbers showed up. It was a no-go, but now for a lot more reasons than just the scratch. If you've been following this, this all began 2-3 weeks ago, when the septic guy came out to empty the tank. It shouldn't have needed it — this one is supposed to need emptying only once every couple of years — but Wings kept insisting that the odor that wafted our way every now and then was coming from it. I said it was coming from one of the houses to the southwest (given that was the direction of the really high winds we were having at the time) but does anyone listen to me? 

Rhetorical question.

Anyway, when the septic guy came out, he was shocked to see both openings with water up pretty high, and he said the leachfield must not be working. If the problem had been the groundwater, I kept saying, then the problem should be the French drain, not the leachfield. Does anyone listen to me? Of course not.

Anyway, so the plumber comes out, looks at it, says it should be draining into the leachfield but it's not. Today he comes out and digs, and the water table, which, as you'll recall from last year, somehow diverted itself completely in 6-8 months, hence the drain, has now risen yet another foot. They said the problem was that the drain wasn't draining, because apparently it was too solid beneath it.  They wanted to install a pump and a mound. The quote was something shy of $17K, with more than $10K of that allegedly for materials, so that was a big fat NEAUXPE anyway. Meanwhile, I had a mini-meltdown away from Wings so he wouldn't worry; as I pointed out elsewhere, my concerns about the house being done are due in no small part to concern for him, because given what no one seems to be able to diagnose with me? The fear that I may not be here is a very, very real one, one I have to deal with and then push down every. single. day. just so that I can get on with things. And given that I'm being hassled every single day over the medical bills, the last thing I needed was this.  

But that's what second opinions are for. We got one. We also paid off our relatively small balance with the plumber, who is now our former plumber. Because one fundamental piece of information was completely misrepresented. Talk about predatory. It could, theoretically, still be a problem come winter. If so, we'll deal with it as it comes. With someone else. We'll put up with a lot for good work, but jerk us around like today? Dassit.

Even so. The hounding is relentless, and I spend every day chasing sales and completely without time to do any of my own writing for my Patreon because bills. And bills. And bills. And having hit my head this morning (while preoccupied with the morning's events and not paying attention to the reading glasses on my head and the viga in the way), my head is splitting on top of the fatigue from everything else. The rest is cut-and-paste, and it all holds as true today as it did last week.

I can't emphasize this enough; we need to bring in more scratch. We need to make sales; I need to bring in enough beyond that to free up Wings's studio time, of which he's had almost none for months now. I need subscribers to make this work, and I'm nowhere near hitting my first-level goal. It's not going to happen without help. I need folks to share the links. Not many times a day, just, you know, once every day or so. Endorsements and testimonials to the folks in your circles help, too. But I am at the end of my rope on the bills, and the pressure that has been sitting camped out in my chest since early November is now threatening to suffocate me completely. I mean that in literal terms, not figurative ones; the stress is aggravating my health so badly that the pain is a tangible thing. So please, please share the links:

• My new Patreon, The Interstices (Writing Between Worlds);
• Wings's site, for sales;
• Wings's direct PayPal link;
• A way to buy me coffee (which actually goes to all of our medical bills, which continue to mount; something over $300 for Wings this week, to say nothing of all my own);
• Amazon wishlist, which mostly consists of supplies for half-feral puppies;
• Partial registry #1, from Bed, Bath and Beyond. There are new kitchen-y things on it now, stuff that I didn't realize we'd need to replace (either because the RV ruined it or because we gave it away when we had to downsize).

As always, I have more writing, more editing, and more general work to do, as well as labor of a more physical sort, and I have to get back on it. Much gratitude to all of you, and please continue to share the links.

All content, including photos and text, are copyright Aji, 2018; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.