Dog with egg.

Photo copyright Aji, 2020; all rights reserved.

Dog with egg. Yes, I know it's out of focus; she's always in motion.  We scored something like seven eggs from the chickens yesterday; I collected the first two early on and Wings got the rest later in the day. Chinook was tagging along with him, and she grabbed one of the turquoise ones, so four for us, one for her. And she carried her prize around in her mouth for a seemingly endless amount of time, eventually lowering it gently to the deck where she pushed it around with her nose to watch it bobble. Then she picked it back up and wandered off with it again, eventually, apparently, burying it somewhere. Whole, uncracked, and entirely unharmed. She was very proud of her prize, and of her ability to carry it without breaking it. Hey, when I'm dealing with this kind of disabling pain and dysfunction, I have to take my amusements where I find them.

Late on this today because we had to run a couple of errands, and everything takes longer than you think it will. It's about fifty degrees (which is too warm), but you wouldn't know it because the freaking wind is like ice. Yesterday was just constant motion, with five loads of laundry, one of dishes, two bathrooms to clean and a rug to pre-spot and haul outside, ribs to marinate for dinner, and beads to lay out for his next three pieces of gemstone bead jewelry, which I think he might actually have finished this evening. If so, I'll post them then. There might also be another three, because he wanted to get through two sets this weekend, but that will require me to get to that group of beads and sort through them and lay them out first, and I don't know if he'll have time by then. Either way, look for some new, moderately priced informal sets (necklace, earrings, coil bracelet) to appear in the next day or two.

Meanwhile, not much is changing on the pain front for me. I'm at an end for the moment, and with the spring winds apparently nearly here, it's only get to worse (much, MUCH worse). The pain and the breathing problems these last two or three weeks have buried me. About ten days, two weeks ago, I had the first really terrifying episode I've had in while, since switching up my meds and getting the ibruprofen entirely out of my system. I've had a number of smaller ones since, and it's probably mostly down to the asthma, but nothing's working. The headache is rooted in equal parts pollen and pred, and nothing's working. January was, quite frankly, a hell month, and this one is shaping up to be much like it. In the meantime, I have to navigate the weather and pain and expense and find a way to bring in income.

Also unfortunately, I'm still reduced to trying to get work done with a torn ankle and subluxed forearm, hips, and knees, and now two barely functional hands, and a laptop that continues to deteriorate by the day (a camera, too, and both are essential for our work — not just mine, but his). The pain is . . . very bad these days. It's not a function of weather or cold, mostly, but of deterioration. In desperation, I've added one last supplement, a costly one, in hopes of getting it to ease off even a little; I won't know if it's going to work for at least a month yet. I'm also trying to plan for all the expenses of winter to come. The Pueblo closure started two weeks ago, and as I said above, is slated to last two full months this time, so it will be worse than usual. In that period of time, there will be taxes to pay, his scrip to keep refilling, his dental work to try somehow to get done, and forget about my own follow-up tests, to say nothing of plumbing/wall repairs or all the work still unfinished on the house; I'm scrapping everything, because we can't afford it. Yes, I'm due for follow-up scans and biopsies already, and they're not going to happen, because we don't have five figures' worth of scratch to waste on it. I've still got to make sales, try to drum up new Patreon subscribers, do whatever I can to bring in more money, all on top of everything else. Folks can help in several ways (sales are always preferred). Oh, and I posted four new works a week or so ago, here and here, and I added something new, seasonal, and absolutely fabulous a few days later, so please share the links (also, BUY! they're all perfect for spring, Easter, upcoming festivities of any kind):

• Sales here; 
• Testimonials here; 
• Patreon here;
• Ko-fi here.

Please share everything. Thanks.

All content, including photos and text, are copyright Aji, 2020; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.