As many of you know, I write full time from home, which is an amazing boon and one I’m grateful for each day. I even have my own office where I’m supposed to split my time between writing, sewing, and making jewelry. Except that over the last five years or so it’s gotten difficult for me to sit for long periods of time because my knees lock up and my ankles start to swell (this getting old shit sucks, I’ll tell you). The logical answer to that is to get up every hour and walk around for awhile, but sometimes that’s difficult if you’re hip-deep in a scene and don’t want to leave it. So you keep writing, then get up and almost fall over because your legs have turned to wood. Same problem when sewing or working on jewelry.

So for writing I moved downstairs into the living room, where I would sit with my feet extended on a footstool. It worked pretty damn well for a couple of years because Ramón would head off to the office and I’d have the house to myself, free to tap away on a story while keeping an eye on (and acting as a perch for) the cats. All was well, and many books were written.

And then last year Ramón was laid off in October. It quickly became apparent that working in the living room wasn’t, well going to work anymore. It was fine when I was the only one in the house, but when Ramón was also home all day looking for work, doing phone interviews and the like, it was like trying to write in a particularly loud Starbucks where the barista interrupts you to ask where his clean suit is.

Also, I have a tendency to talk to myself when I write, especially when I’m doing dialogue. And it can be problematic when you’re working on a scene and suddenly your beloved says, “What did you say, sweetie?” Not good when you realize you’ve been saying some really filthy things under your breath. And yeah, okay, I’m just gonna say it. It’s hard to write a hot M/M sex scene with my husband sitting next to me. Go figure.

But he got a new job in March so everything should be copacetic now, right? It is … except that he now works from home. And he likes to eat lunch while watching TV. And during his breaks he likes to check his email and read news on his laptop in the living room. And sometimes the silly romantic fool just likes coming downstairs and kissing me because he can, bless his heart.

Which means that the goal now is to turn the living room back into the public area it’s supposed to be and get my happy ass back into my office for work, and towards this end I have a plan. Thanks to EoS royalties I recently bought a lovely faux leather wingback chair that is also a recliner (in fact, I’m sitting on it right now) and put it in our front room/library. But that’s still a public area, and while it’s peaceful in here it’s also right next to the staircase which mean I now get all of Ramón’s comings and goings in the corner of my eye while working. I’d wanted to put the recliner into my office and work from there, but all available space is pretty much taken up with furniture and computer carts (my office holds the printers and routers).

So I threw this problem to Ramón, who is the master of spatial relations. It turns out that the printer cart is on wheels, and the router cart is 85% full of stuff that doesn’t need to be there (software DVDs and manuals, and a half-finished dollhouse. He suggested that I pick a time when we can disconnect the modem and router temporarily, move the dollhouse and software stuff Elsewhere, move the printer cart over to where the router cart is, find space on it for the modem and router, and reconnect them. That leaves a tidy chunk of open space right next to my office window, which would be a faboo place to put this chair.

So that’s on the cards for this weekend, which means as of next week I actually get to go work in my office AND CLOSE THE DOOR IF I WANT TO. Heaven. Of course the cats aren’t going to like it, so I’m going to have to negotiate visiting hours with them. But soon, my precious, very soon…