So I figured this was the weekend I would put up all the Christmas ornaments and trees (we have two — one in the library, and one in the kitchen because we can’t see the library tree from the living room). This required me to finish dusting everything in the library, wash both front windows, then bring in the HUGE tree box from the garage and the two tubs of decorations.

One eensy issue — about two weeks ago I somehow managed to strain the muscles in my right mid-back wrapping around to the front. No problem with standing and walking, but if I have to control any sudden front-to-back movement (like if I have to brake suddenly in the car) it spasms. It also spasms when I lift stuff or stretch forward or down. This is problematic when you are lifting large things like tree boxes and tubs full of Christmas decorations.

So there I was, moving all of this crap into the library and swearing under my breath, with that weird side muscle throbbing, and decide I’ll put up the stockings first. We have seven, one for Ramón and myself and one for each of the cats, and I had decided to use a tip I’d read online to get two stocking clips for a mantel and suspend a cafe curtain rod in it, then make little S hooks out of wire and hang the stockings from those.

Except that I hadn’t bought any of that yet. So off to Target I go, wincing at all the stops, and find stocking clips. Four for $20. Fuck THAT noise. Go over to take a look at cafe rods, get a nickel plated one, come back to the Christmas section to see if there’s anything I can jigger for mantel clips, when I find a set of two clips that have cute little chalkboards attached marked down to $8. At this point my back/side muscles are making themselves known, so I bite the bullet and get them. Come home, put everything up, and it looks great. Yay. I finish distributing the rest of the standing ornaments, then pull the ladder out of the closet to put up the garland over the door (which involves lifting and stretching). Also nice, although by now I’m in a certain amount of pain.

Then I dig out the window lights for the front windows. Unsurprisingly both 8-year-old strings are dead (protip — always plug in your lights to test them before putting them up). Back to Target I go, wincing even harder at the stops, and pick up some lights and some peppermint bark Ghirardelli squares (shut up, I earned them). On the walk back to the car the offended muscles go into one massive spasm and announce that I’m done for the night. Not being an idiot, I agree with them, go home, pop two Flexeril and proceed to sleep the sleep of the dead.

Woke up this morning with only a hint of an ache, and proceeded to put up the new window lights while Ramón shuffles around the place coughing his lungs up (there’s a reason why I’m doing all of this myself — he has a sinus infection, is on antibiotics, and feels like hammered shit so I told him to go sit down and rest). Putting up the window lights requires me to use clear push pins between the wires to hold them in the window frame, and to get on a small step ladder so that I can pin along the top of the frame and the decorative half-round glass at the top of the window. First window, the light string is five inches short of reaching the extension cord. Swearing, I pull it down and repin it around the window, taking care to stretch out all the kinks in the wire and keep it as straight as possible. I keep this in mind when I pin the lights around the second window and have no problem reaching the extension cord this time.

Both windows are now illuminated and look great. Meanwhile the tree is still in the box, and the cats are having a marvelous time climbing in and out of it. This, BTW, is a 7′ tree that is a royal pain in the ass to put together, and will require more stretching and bending just to get it upright. My strained muscles are currently saying, “You have maybe another hour out of us, then you will sit your ass down and watch Westworld, do you understand?”

So, yeah, if anyone wants to know why I’m not enthusiastic about putting holiday decorations up every year, now you know.

So I was tapping away at the keyboard today, as you do, when I got a ping that someone had messaged me on my FB page. I thought, “Oh, maybe it’s someone with a question or comment about one of the books, or it’s the translator who’s currently translating Two to Tango into German. I’d better check it out.”

I opened Facebook and headed to the Messages window, where I found the most astoundingly incomprehensible yet vitriolic message waiting for me:

U wndnt know smutt if hit u in face lol

Statin facks .great mate eh funny when no cunt knows when u hit bk x 

Thaught bab writer .u got hidden talent.dnt think so

Now, due to family connections I recognize this as British text speak, most likely from somewhere north of the Watford Gap. I wasn’t sure if someone had gotten pissed off about my recent post about the election or what, so I opened a dialog with the individual to find out what was wrong. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to parse what this person was saying, apart from the interspersed invitation for me to go suck a dick or fuck a guy whose name starts with J. I finally broke it off and blocked her (because life is too short to waste on people who can’t be bothered to use the Queen’s English), then got in touch with the family connection mentioned above to see if maybe this was somehow coming from that direction, including the individual’s FB profile for further clarification.

FC had no idea who the individual was, but did note that the guy I was invited to go fuck was apparently one of the individual’s friends. We decided that this was a case of alcohol meeting vituperative Facebook stalking gone awry.

So, just in case this individual stumbles across this website (because hey, you never know), hon, you made a mistake. I don’t live in England, I’m not fucking this Jamie person, and there are a lot of Nicola Camerons out there and you really shouldn’t jump on the first one you find.

How was your Saturday?

It is no secret among those who know me that I am fond of wearing graphic t-shirts, and have quite a collection of SF-themed ones, often very subversive. One of my recent favorites is the Legends of Science Fiction t shirt (shown at right), which came out earlier this year after a rather distasteful group of people tried to game the 2016 Hugo Awards (one of the major SF literary awards) by using slates to nominate their own hand-picked people. One of these nominees was the inimitable Dr. Chuck Tingle, whose fourth-wall-smashing satirical M/M erotica is admired around the globe. These melancholy mutts got Dr. Tingle’s short work “Space Raptor Butt Invasion” onto the Short Story nominee list for the Hugos, assuming that it would infuriate the “Social Justice Warrior” types that they claimed had taken over the Hugos and ruined them for their proper audience — straight white men (see here for a more cogent explanation of the whole michigas).

Unfortunately, these weepy woofies had their joke blow up in their face when Dr. Tingle found out about this and starting trolling them on line. Hard. One might even say poundingly so. Dr. Tingle didn’t win the Hugo, but his dedication to doing the right thing was hailed as sheer brilliance, and this t-shirt is in celebration of his being a true buckaroo to the SF community.

Cut to today, when I grab a clean t-shirt from the pile still waiting to be folded and put away, not really registering anything about the graphic design other than, “Yeah, this is my t-shirt, not Ramón’s.” I then headed out to go pick up the J Crew some canned cat food, with a stop at the local Walmart Neighborhood Market on the way back to get pop and other comestibles for the evening.

While on my way into the WNM, I was waylaid by a veritable cherub in a Cub Scout uniform asking if I would buy some hideously overpriced popcorn to support his troop. Being a former slinger of Girl Scout cookies, band candy, and other fundraising food items, I felt a pang of sympathy and headed over to this little pavilion to make the purchase and get my tin of caramel corn. This involved chatting with two lovely den moms, a Boy Scout and the scoutmaster while they processed my credit card, after which I headed into the store to get what else I needed. It wasn’t until the clerk asked to see my t-shirt more clearly that I realized what exactly I was wearing.

Um…oops? At least the kids didn’t seem scarred for life, although the clerk was certainly taken aback when I explained about Dr. Tingle’s oeuvre. Just another day in the life, folks…

And with it any hope that I would get Palace out this month. Oh, well. It should be done in a week or so, so I’ll take that as a win.

In addition, I just wanted to show this off. A friend of mine saw the cabs I was wrapped and asked if the labradorite had been spoken for yet. When I said no, he asked if I could do a Slytherin-themed bracelet in sterling with it (“with reptilian wrappings,” he specified).

You know me, I’m always up for a challenge. The result is Salazar, a sterling silver wire wrap and chain mail bracelet with a hand-forged snake as the feature element. I’d forgotten how heavy sterling silver is — this thing has HEFT.

Also? I really need to make enough to buy a jewelry kiln, because I’ve got all kinds of ideas for sculptural jewelry that I could make with precious metal clay. And then, someday, the lost wax casting class. Someday.

On June 9th, I accepted something that I knew was very important to my health but simply didn’t want to face. I accepted that I have both Hashimoto’s thyroiditis and Polycystic Ovary Syndrome, two autoimmune diseases that have insulin resistance and weight gain as symptoms. I also accepted the fact that having these diseases means I simply can’t eat the same amount of carbohydrates as normal people can. A normal woman can eat between 175g and 200g of carbs a day and burn them as she goes. I eat 175g of carbs, and my body says, “What the heck are these things? How weird. Well, let’s just turn them into fat and store them somewhere tidy.”

So I made some significant changes to the way I eat. I consulted a nutritionist who recommended a Hashimoto’s eating plan to me, cut out 95% of the grains I ate, completely cut out all nightshades and soy, and bumped up my intake of lean meat, fowl, vegetables, some fruits (berries, mostly), nuts, and good fats like olive oil, with homemade protein shakes. At the moment my daily carb intake is 120g max, and usually a bit less. Almost three weeks later I’ve lost 10 pounds, I’m sleeping better, joint pain has gone down significantly and it’s a lot easier to walk. As far as I can tell, my body is finally functioning normally after 49 years of limping along with a skewed metabolic system, which is mostly nice.

The part that I can’t honestly describe as nice is how my new eating plan has also apparently joined with my reproductive system to gift me with things I’ve never experienced before, such as exhaustion during ovulation, as well as other things I’m not going to discuss here because, while normal, they’re a little gross.

Oh, what the hell, you’re all adults (and one of you is a nurse). So yeah, I just finished ovulating and I’m experiencing noticeable amounts of egg white cervical mucus. Or as I like to put it, vajayjay snot. Seriously, it looks like I blew my nose after a really bad cold and it came out my hoo-hoo. Apparently this is perfectly normal and indeed indicates that my ovaries have decided to release eggs instead of letting them cyst up on the surface, but I shall be discussing this with my gynecologist, you betcha. Because ew.

Another delightful side effect of my hormones going wacky (although I dunno if this is ovulation-related or perimenopause-related) is that I would cheerfully shank someone for a double Whataburger, a large side of fries, and something chocolate, gooey, and cakey for dessert. No, I am not hungry or depriving myself — I’ve have a metric buttload of food today, I’m finishing up a protein shake as I type this, and I could still eat another 400 calories’ worth of food if I wanted to. But dear Jesus, I want bread and potatoes. Hell, I’d give up the cakey stuff if I could eat some soft pretzels instead.

I miss peanut butter sandwiches. I miss bagels with cream cheese. I miss hamburgers on buns, and french fries, and the awesome sourdough bread you get as a starter at the Cheesecake Factory, and pad thai, and chips and salsa, and chicken verde enchiladas. I miss that stupid KIND vanilla and blueberry cereal that Ramón loves. I miss BBQ ribs and Hawaiian sweet rolls and potato salad. I miss naan bread and rice and edamame and sushi. God, I miss pizza so badly.

But I feel better. I don’t bloat up like a tick for no reason at all. My lower legs aren’t constantly swollen anymore. I still have the issue with the Achilles bursitis which makes walking a bit limpy, but it’s still so much easier to walk. I go to bed, and I sleep instead of staring at the ceiling because all my joints hurt. My brain is on-line all the time and I have more energy. And yeah, I’m starting to fit into some clothes that I haven’t been able to wear for quite a while. I’m seeing muscle definition in my arms and legs. My face is thinner. And the next time I go to the doctor for a renewal on my Synthroid scrip, I want a full blood workup done so that I can see how all my numbers look.

So yeah, I miss a lot of stuff. But the tradeoff is more than worth it. And cauliflower makes an awesome low-carb substitute for rice and mashed potatoes. And pretty much any vegetable becomes delicious if you oven-roast it with olive oil, garlic, and salt (and if you oven-roast finely chopped carrots with butter from grass-fed cows? OMG, so good). And I’m going to keep eating like this for the rest of my life, because I know it’s the right thing to do for my body.

But I’m going to have a Whataburger and fries on my birthday. Because birthday carbs don’t count. It’s a medical fact.

Technically we haven’t had our first official three-digit day in the clavicle of Texas yet, but the heat index makes it feel like 107°F out there at the moment. Why yes, I know this because I just went shopping like an idiot in the hottest part of the day, why do you ask?

But I shan’t complain. People who have to work outside in this heat have it much tougher than I do, and my heart and appreciation goes out to them. And frankly it’s far worse out in the west proper, where it’s predicted to get up to 119°F in Phoenix on Monday. I think the highest temp I ever experienced in Dallas was 116°F back in 2006 or so, and we had rolling blackouts to handle the A/C load. I’m hoping that doesn’t happen again (and I am SO glad we got the furnace replaced in spring since its fan runs the entire house’s cooling system) but this is only June and we have two more months of summer ahead of us here.

But there’s no such thing as global warming. Oh well — I can always remember this flashback to March 2015. Yes, we do occasionally get snow in Dallas. Could’ve used more of that this year.