#freelancefriends — Public Fediverse posts

Wed. Jan. 14, 2026: Vacuums and Laundry

Wednesday, January 14, 2026

Waning Moon

Uranus and Jupiter Retrograde

Cloudy and raw

Slogging through the week, here. Yesterday seems like it was far away, somehow.

I did hearth and home stuff, like putting the dinner in the crockpot, dealing with some email, doing some filing, creating the questions for the #FreelanceFriends chat I’m hosting on February 5, taking out a lot of garbage, and finally putting together the new vacuum. Of course, the directions were wrong, and they didn’t mention connecting a rather important hose, but I figured it out.

And it works really well. I spent about 90 minutes vacuuming, which is a good session to get things done for a place of this size, although I’ll leave deep corners and moldings for the deep spring clean in early March. But it does a good job. Tessa, Bea, and Charlotte hid while I worked, but Willa kept pointing out where I missed a spot. The vacuum doesn’t faze her at all.

In the afternoon, there was a webinar with the Author’s Guild about the current Anthropic Settlement. Chances are there will be more suits, since there was a cutoff date and not everyone’s books that were stolen (per the ATLANTIC database) made it into the suit. So there’s a lot of paperwork and a lot of hoops. But it was good to get the information and know the steps.

After that, I did a little prep work for the next ghostwriting assignment, which is due on the 21st.

And then it was time to head out for yoga. The sidewalks were pretty clear, except for a few patches, and I got up there easily. I’d considered skipping it, because the thought of hauling myself out of the house was a lot, but I’m glad I did. We all needed it. One of my fellow yogis is going through a tough patch right now and works almost across the street from me, so I told her if she ever needs to take a break and decompress, to come over, have a cup of tea, and a cat on her lap. At least she knows she has that, if things continue down the current path.

Home, and it was lovely to have the crockpot meal waiting. It was pork chops with apples that had been cut up and mixed with brown sugar, soy sauce, garlic, cinnamon, and ginger. It was good, but I think I would either cook it for a shorter period, or put just a bit more liquid in with it.

And yes, more leftovers. I won’t cook much next week, because we have to eat down the leftovers.

I read in the evening and played with Bea, who wanted extra attention. The catnip crayons are a big hit with all of them. Thank you, Auntie Chris!

Woke up a little after 3 again, and got up around 5 to get the morning routine going and to get things out to the laundromat. Two loads, they’ve raised the prices again, and it’s kind of ridiculous. But we have clean clothes.

It’s easier to fight the world burning down in clean underwear.

Next week will mostly be fabrics from the holidays and the usual sheets and towels, so it shouldn’t be too bad. After breakfast, I will fold things up and put them away. I also have to unbag the 16 pounds of dry food into jars. The little monsters finished everything. They were very happy to be fed at 5 AM this morning, though.

Tessa was waiting for me at the front door when I got back from the laundromat to tell me everything that happened in the hour I was gone. Tessa is rarely down at the door, so it was pretty funny.

Also on today’s agenda: asking my state elected officials to vote “no” on a particular bill, and get on them for not doing enough to protect citizens against the cosplaying domestic terrorists; get on my federal officials (again); work on the galleys for VICIOUS CRITIC; work on the next ghostwriting assignment; work on the next book for review.

I’d rather take a nap.

Have a good one.

#cats #FreelanceFriends #householdChores #laundry #life #vacuum #writing #Yoga

Prepping the #NYE lasagna and thinking about software architecture.

🍝It’s the perfect analogy for MVP development:
The Ragù = The Backend Logic (needs time to simmer/validate).
The Béchamel = The UX (the glue that makes it consumable).
The Resting Phase = The Staging Environment (skip this, and production collapses).

Too many teams try to microwave their MVP. In 2026, let's respect the process.
If you need a "Head Chef" to organize your dev flow this year, my DMs are open.
#DevOps #SoftwareEngineering #MVP #2026 #FediHire #FreelanceFriends #nye2026

Fri. Dec. 19, 2025: Approaching Winter Solstice

Friday, December 19, 2025

New Moon

Chiron, Uranus, Jupiter Retrograde

Rainy and warm

Here we are, at the end of another week, and the final new moon of the year. Can I just say how ready I am to boot this year out the back door?

That is a tradition I’d heard of for years, but only got a chance to practice when I had my own front and back doors. On New Year’s Eve, a few minutes/seconds before midnight, you open the back door to let the old year out (I will be putting my boot firmly on its backside this year). Right after midnight, you open the front door and invite the New Year in. Remember: Year of the Snake/Year of the Horse is part of Chinese tradition. That does not shift on December 31/January 1, no matter what the internet says. Lunar New Year is on February 17, 2026. So we are still in snake, even past the stroke of midnight.

Some idiot was out there yesterday with a leaf blower. Boo, everything is iced down except the sand to keep people from falling. You’re going to cause an accident when you blow the sand away.

Of course, because it was a little warmer, the Sidewalk Chewing Demons were also back. They are the mayor’s pet construction company, so they know they’ll keep getting hired even when they are jerks. So they continue to be jerks.

At least they’re being jerks a couple of blocks away, even though they’re still causing problems on our street with noise and heavy machinery driving the wrong way down the street several times a day.

Wrote and turned in the book review. Requested my next assignment.

I revised the next 3 chapters of VICIOUS CRITIC, about 7.5K words. Decent progress. Lots of detail work and fact-checking at this point, but all good. Did my marketing for the day, per content calendar (I’ve actually stuck to it pretty well this month).

#FreelanceFriends chat was fun, although hashtags weren’t working on Bluesky for whatever reason.

Got the revision notes on the ghostwriting project (not the one I just turned in, the other one). I will get started on those notes today, although I doubt I can get them done before the end of the year. They had me invoice for the last project, which I turned around earlier this week, and for this section of this one. And the money was in my account this morning, which definitely makes for less holiday stress!

After dinner, I put on Real People clothes and some makeup. It wasn’t that cold, so I didn’t need to bundle up in 17 layers like a toddler in a Hallmark Christmas movie. I could just wear a coat.

I walked down to Downstreet, the hotel a few blocks away that’s opened up gallery space to local artists. Two of my Future Labs colleagues had a show opening. It was a good turnout, the space is lovely, and Door Prize NAMA donated the food for the event, which was lovely of them (and delicious). The pieces are interesting, and the comparison/contrast of showing together in such a space was also interesting. I had some good conversations with people, getting to know them better. We are all very excited for January’s show, the workshops, the potluck, etc. It’s a good group of people, who are creative and smart and funny and kind.

When I came back, we put on the tree, and Tessa was so happy! She sat in front of it, enthralled, until we unplugged it at bedtime.

It was 50 degrees when I woke up this morning, which is just wrong for this time of year in New England.

On today’s agenda: library, grocery store, liquor store, writing (work on Nina Bell, the historical mystery, the ghostwriting).

This weekend, we finish decorating the tree on the porch and the front hall. I will finish the textile piece and work on the text portion. At the show last night, I mentioned I was deliberately  printing it out in Calibri, and the artist doing all the labels said she’ll do the same. [If you know, you know, that’s been yet another layer of political ridiculousness here].

Sunday is the Solstice, so it will be about rituals and food and celebration. I am making something for dinner I’ve never made before (I’ll tell you about it next week), and I think I will do a Bishop’s Cake for dessert (from THE SILVER PALATE COOKBOOK).

Have a good weekend, and we’ll catch up next week!

#art #cats #community #decorating #freelance #freelanceFriends #FreelanceFriends #futureLabs #NinaBellMysteries #writing

Fri. Dec. 19, 2025: Approaching Winter Solstice

Friday, December 19, 2025

New Moon

Chiron, Uranus, Jupiter Retrograde

Rainy and warm

Here we are, at the end of another week, and the final new moon of the year. Can I just say how ready I am to boot this year out the back door?

That is a tradition I’d heard of for years, but only got a chance to practice when I had my own front and back doors. On New Year’s Eve, a few minutes/seconds before midnight, you open the back door to let the old year out (I will be putting my boot firmly on its backside this year). Right after midnight, you open the front door and invite the New Year in. Remember: Year of the Snake/Year of the Horse is part of Chinese tradition. That does not shift on December 31/January 1, no matter what the internet says. Lunar New Year is on February 17, 2026. So we are still in snake, even past the stroke of midnight.

Some idiot was out there yesterday with a leaf blower. Boo, everything is iced down except the sand to keep people from falling. You’re going to cause an accident when you blow the sand away.

Of course, because it was a little warmer, the Sidewalk Chewing Demons were also back. They are the mayor’s pet construction company, so they know they’ll keep getting hired even when they are jerks. So they continue to be jerks.

At least they’re being jerks a couple of blocks away, even though they’re still causing problems on our street with noise and heavy machinery driving the wrong way down the street several times a day.

Wrote and turned in the book review. Requested my next assignment.

I revised the next 3 chapters of VICIOUS CRITIC, about 7.5K words. Decent progress. Lots of detail work and fact-checking at this point, but all good. Did my marketing for the day, per content calendar (I’ve actually stuck to it pretty well this month).

#FreelanceFriends chat was fun, although hashtags weren’t working on Bluesky for whatever reason.

Got the revision notes on the ghostwriting project (not the one I just turned in, the other one). I will get started on those notes today, although I doubt I can get them done before the end of the year. They had me invoice for the last project, which I turned around earlier this week, and for this section of this one. And the money was in my account this morning, which definitely makes for less holiday stress!

After dinner, I put on Real People clothes and some makeup. It wasn’t that cold, so I didn’t need to bundle up in 17 layers like a toddler in a Hallmark Christmas movie. I could just wear a coat.

I walked down to Downstreet, the hotel a few blocks away that’s opened up gallery space to local artists. Two of my Future Labs colleagues had a show opening. It was a good turnout, the space is lovely, and Door Prize NAMA donated the food for the event, which was lovely of them (and delicious). The pieces are interesting, and the comparison/contrast of showing together in such a space was also interesting. I had some good conversations with people, getting to know them better. We are all very excited for January’s show, the workshops, the potluck, etc. It’s a good group of people, who are creative and smart and funny and kind.

When I came back, we put on the tree, and Tessa was so happy! She sat in front of it, enthralled, until we unplugged it at bedtime.

It was 50 degrees when I woke up this morning, which is just wrong for this time of year in New England.

On today’s agenda: library, grocery store, liquor store, writing (work on Nina Bell, the historical mystery, the ghostwriting).

This weekend, we finish decorating the tree on the porch and the front hall. I will finish the textile piece and work on the text portion. At the show last night, I mentioned I was deliberately  printing it out in Calibri, and the artist doing all the labels said she’ll do the same. [If you know, you know, that’s been yet another layer of political ridiculousness here].

Sunday is the Solstice, so it will be about rituals and food and celebration. I am making something for dinner I’ve never made before (I’ll tell you about it next week), and I think I will do a Bishop’s Cake for dessert (from THE SILVER PALATE COOKBOOK).

Have a good weekend, and we’ll catch up next week!

#art #cats #community #decorating #freelance #freelanceFriends #FreelanceFriends #futureLabs #NinaBellMysteries #writing

Fri. Dec. 19, 2025: Approaching Winter Solstice

Friday, December 19, 2025

New Moon

Chiron, Uranus, Jupiter Retrograde

Rainy and warm

Here we are, at the end of another week, and the final new moon of the year. Can I just say how ready I am to boot this year out the back door?

That is a tradition I’d heard of for years, but only got a chance to practice when I had my own front and back doors. On New Year’s Eve, a few minutes/seconds before midnight, you open the back door to let the old year out (I will be putting my boot firmly on its backside this year). Right after midnight, you open the front door and invite the New Year in. Remember: Year of the Snake/Year of the Horse is part of Chinese tradition. That does not shift on December 31/January 1, no matter what the internet says. Lunar New Year is on February 17, 2026. So we are still in snake, even past the stroke of midnight.

Some idiot was out there yesterday with a leaf blower. Boo, everything is iced down except the sand to keep people from falling. You’re going to cause an accident when you blow the sand away.

Of course, because it was a little warmer, the Sidewalk Chewing Demons were also back. They are the mayor’s pet construction company, so they know they’ll keep getting hired even when they are jerks. So they continue to be jerks.

At least they’re being jerks a couple of blocks away, even though they’re still causing problems on our street with noise and heavy machinery driving the wrong way down the street several times a day.

Wrote and turned in the book review. Requested my next assignment.

I revised the next 3 chapters of VICIOUS CRITIC, about 7.5K words. Decent progress. Lots of detail work and fact-checking at this point, but all good. Did my marketing for the day, per content calendar (I’ve actually stuck to it pretty well this month).

#FreelanceFriends chat was fun, although hashtags weren’t working on Bluesky for whatever reason.

Got the revision notes on the ghostwriting project (not the one I just turned in, the other one). I will get started on those notes today, although I doubt I can get them done before the end of the year. They had me invoice for the last project, which I turned around earlier this week, and for this section of this one. And the money was in my account this morning, which definitely makes for less holiday stress!

After dinner, I put on Real People clothes and some makeup. It wasn’t that cold, so I didn’t need to bundle up in 17 layers like a toddler in a Hallmark Christmas movie. I could just wear a coat.

I walked down to Downstreet, the hotel a few blocks away that’s opened up gallery space to local artists. Two of my Future Labs colleagues had a show opening. It was a good turnout, the space is lovely, and Door Prize NAMA donated the food for the event, which was lovely of them (and delicious). The pieces are interesting, and the comparison/contrast of showing together in such a space was also interesting. I had some good conversations with people, getting to know them better. We are all very excited for January’s show, the workshops, the potluck, etc. It’s a good group of people, who are creative and smart and funny and kind.

When I came back, we put on the tree, and Tessa was so happy! She sat in front of it, enthralled, until we unplugged it at bedtime.

It was 50 degrees when I woke up this morning, which is just wrong for this time of year in New England.

On today’s agenda: library, grocery store, liquor store, writing (work on Nina Bell, the historical mystery, the ghostwriting).

This weekend, we finish decorating the tree on the porch and the front hall. I will finish the textile piece and work on the text portion. At the show last night, I mentioned I was deliberately  printing it out in Calibri, and the artist doing all the labels said she’ll do the same. [If you know, you know, that’s been yet another layer of political ridiculousness here].

Sunday is the Solstice, so it will be about rituals and food and celebration. I am making something for dinner I’ve never made before (I’ll tell you about it next week), and I think I will do a Bishop’s Cake for dessert (from THE SILVER PALATE COOKBOOK).

Have a good weekend, and we’ll catch up next week!

#art #cats #community #decorating #freelance #freelanceFriends #FreelanceFriends #futureLabs #NinaBellMysteries #writing

Fri. Dec. 19, 2025: Approaching Winter Solstice

Friday, December 19, 2025

New Moon

Chiron, Uranus, Jupiter Retrograde

Rainy and warm

Here we are, at the end of another week, and the final new moon of the year. Can I just say how ready I am to boot this year out the back door?

That is a tradition I’d heard of for years, but only got a chance to practice when I had my own front and back doors. On New Year’s Eve, a few minutes/seconds before midnight, you open the back door to let the old year out (I will be putting my boot firmly on its backside this year). Right after midnight, you open the front door and invite the New Year in. Remember: Year of the Snake/Year of the Horse is part of Chinese tradition. That does not shift on December 31/January 1, no matter what the internet says. Lunar New Year is on February 17, 2026. So we are still in snake, even past the stroke of midnight.

Some idiot was out there yesterday with a leaf blower. Boo, everything is iced down except the sand to keep people from falling. You’re going to cause an accident when you blow the sand away.

Of course, because it was a little warmer, the Sidewalk Chewing Demons were also back. They are the mayor’s pet construction company, so they know they’ll keep getting hired even when they are jerks. So they continue to be jerks.

At least they’re being jerks a couple of blocks away, even though they’re still causing problems on our street with noise and heavy machinery driving the wrong way down the street several times a day.

Wrote and turned in the book review. Requested my next assignment.

I revised the next 3 chapters of VICIOUS CRITIC, about 7.5K words. Decent progress. Lots of detail work and fact-checking at this point, but all good. Did my marketing for the day, per content calendar (I’ve actually stuck to it pretty well this month).

#FreelanceFriends chat was fun, although hashtags weren’t working on Bluesky for whatever reason.

Got the revision notes on the ghostwriting project (not the one I just turned in, the other one). I will get started on those notes today, although I doubt I can get them done before the end of the year. They had me invoice for the last project, which I turned around earlier this week, and for this section of this one. And the money was in my account this morning, which definitely makes for less holiday stress!

After dinner, I put on Real People clothes and some makeup. It wasn’t that cold, so I didn’t need to bundle up in 17 layers like a toddler in a Hallmark Christmas movie. I could just wear a coat.

I walked down to Downstreet, the hotel a few blocks away that’s opened up gallery space to local artists. Two of my Future Labs colleagues had a show opening. It was a good turnout, the space is lovely, and Door Prize NAMA donated the food for the event, which was lovely of them (and delicious). The pieces are interesting, and the comparison/contrast of showing together in such a space was also interesting. I had some good conversations with people, getting to know them better. We are all very excited for January’s show, the workshops, the potluck, etc. It’s a good group of people, who are creative and smart and funny and kind.

When I came back, we put on the tree, and Tessa was so happy! She sat in front of it, enthralled, until we unplugged it at bedtime.

It was 50 degrees when I woke up this morning, which is just wrong for this time of year in New England.

On today’s agenda: library, grocery store, liquor store, writing (work on Nina Bell, the historical mystery, the ghostwriting).

This weekend, we finish decorating the tree on the porch and the front hall. I will finish the textile piece and work on the text portion. At the show last night, I mentioned I was deliberately  printing it out in Calibri, and the artist doing all the labels said she’ll do the same. [If you know, you know, that’s been yet another layer of political ridiculousness here].

Sunday is the Solstice, so it will be about rituals and food and celebration. I am making something for dinner I’ve never made before (I’ll tell you about it next week), and I think I will do a Bishop’s Cake for dessert (from THE SILVER PALATE COOKBOOK).

Have a good weekend, and we’ll catch up next week!

#art #cats #community #decorating #freelance #freelanceFriends #FreelanceFriends #futureLabs #NinaBellMysteries #writing

Fri. Dec. 12, 2025: Tessa Loves the Christmas Tree

Friday, December 12, 2025

Waning Moon

Chiron, Uranus, Jupiter Retrograde

Snow flurries and cold

Happy Friday! I hope you’ve had a lovely week.

Charlotte was delighted with online meditation group yesterday. She’s so funny and purry during her favorite Zoom sessions.

After breakfast, I piled on the layers and stomped out to the bank. It started flurrying as I walked, not badly. With all the street chaos, it was still much easier to go on foot than to drive. But at least it’s clear around the laundromat again, so next week, I can catch up on laundry.

Home, dug the back of the car out (not bad, but I still have to clear off the windshield and the top this morning), did some house stuff that needed attention, then managed to deal with almost 400 emails that have been stacking up. The scammer is still trying to catch me out. I am collecting evidence for the authorities.

The #FreelanceFriends chat was fun, as always.

Dug into the ghostwriting revisions, and did some good work. Still not as far along as I want – I think Tuesday is a realistic finish day for me. Today I will see if I can crack this next bit that has to be torn out and completely rebuilt.

The library trustee meeting tonight was cancelled, so I kept working on the ghostwriting, and then cooked pork fried rice for dinner, which was good.

The library cohort meeting, online, was still on, so I hopped on that at 8 PM, and we had a good catchup, and helped each other with a few things. I made a joke about turning some of my frustrations into an art piece for April’s gallery show, and that was met with enthusiastic response. We brainstormed how to do that, and that might be my second piece, along with the wooden spoon sculpture about women forgotten by history.

Read for a bit and played with the cats after the meeting. Tessa loves the tree so much. The minute we put the lights on, she sits under it until we turn it off at bedtime.

Had trouble getting to sleep, and then overslept, much to Tessa’s dismay. Morning routine was later than usual, but happened, and was good. It’s supposed to flurry on and off all day, so today’s errands will just take longer. And then I’ll go back to the ghostwriting.

I was invited to two things tonight, but I don’t think I can attend either.

Tomorrow, I hope to finally get the cookie deliveries to the neighbors, and then I have one more delivery, to the bookshop. A new thrift shop opened on Marshall Street, across from MASS MoCA – if I’m out and about, I might stop in to check it out. We’ll see how the weather holds. I need to work on the textile piece and do the domestic cards. And finish decorating. Sunday will also be textile piece, cards, decorating.

Have a good one!

#cats #errands #fiction #freelance #freelancefriends #holidays #meditation #writing