It's a hard few days lately.

Photo copyright Aji, 2024; all rights reserved.

Another dusting of snow in the early hours of this morning, just a little over an inch. Enough to make everything feel clean again, but not much in the way of accumulation.

We did, however, get the elk at the same time as the snow, somewhere aroud three-thirty this morning. They were so serene this time; they didn't make a lot of effort trying to get under the tarps to get at Miika's hay, apparently just fed on the small amount of bad stuff outside it [bad for her and thus discarded, not bad for them], then settled down into the snow in a circle of sorts, the new snow falling gently onto their coats as they slept.

Wings is back to plowing the snow, though. It's like dog hair; it gets out of control fast if you don't keep it in check. Lots of wind again today, still lots of clouds, and it'll be very cold again tonight. Which means that there will be no let-up in the pain levels that are killing me right now. It's a hard few days lately. 

But January's always hard anyway, regardless of weather. Aside from taxes, it's one of our two most costly months [the other being July], when we have a disproportionate number of one- and two-off expenses [insurance; several business-related renewals like site hosting, software platforms, domain services, etc.]. Coming on the heels of such a terrible sales year, it's not good. It's even worse since, once again, my Patreon is short ~$250, and made worse still by the new $600-800 a month for septic service all winter and half of spring ($200 of it paid out last Saturday, and the next round will probably be Tuesday, given Monday's holiday]. This week, I have to pay the monstrous truck insurance bill, plus multiple platform and software renewals related to the site, and it will well over a thousand in cash at the door before I'm done. I've been hanging onto it for dear life, knowing it's coming, but we made no sales last week, and so I have to make up for that with two this week.

Because the need to make at least one sale a week never lets up, no more than the physical pain that makes everything so much more impossible. We were blessed with one the first week of the year, but now I need to do the same for this one, as well as make up for the lack of one last week. He has a new necklace in the works, his fourth [recent] naja, done save for the bead strand; I'm hoping it'll be done so that I can feature it on Tuesday. A fifth is in the works. And also as always, all the links are listed below, and sales are the most important:

• Sales here; 
• Testimonials here; 
• Amazon wishlist here (priorities now are the liquid soaps and especially the vacuum, because mine has died a complete and ignominious death, and if I don't vacuum every single day, the dog hair takes over completely [and the dustbuster is just not cutting it]); 
• Patreon here;
• Ko-fi here.

There's lots of fabulous work on the site about a dozen all told over the last three weeks or so, cuffs and earrings and pins, plus the necklaces to come. After such a grim 2023, we really need to get this year started off on a better footing, so please share all of the links. 

All content, including photos and text, are copyright Wings and Aji, 2024; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.