July 18, Astoria: I'm still here

As I write this, I haven't posted on this blog since June 30. I have lots of photos, and may get a chance to catch up somewhat. Everyone I talk to has been getting to hear about the fantastic new shopping cart that's been added to our online gift shop. It IS fantastic. It does what we want and need it to do (it's custom made!) but in the process, since it's one of a kind and the test environment doesn't allow Daryl to completely test before a new tweak goes live, it's been quite a process. In the meantime, the credit card processing company had a fire that kicked them offline and injected some chaos into our days, we also had to get a new printer, which shut down KKEE Radio by accident when we plugged it in, and - you know - just some of the usual stuff that happens day to day. We transferred banks, and we're very happy about that, but with credit card processing accounts and a few little glitches, it's kept me so busy that all I want to do at the end of the day . . . wait! I'm not sure I've been having ends of the day lately.

I started playing a new zoo-building game on Facebook to wind down a little, and I've been posting the Astoria, Oregon, Daily Photo blog every day, then posting it to Facebook and Twitter. It's fun, but most of the time it actually takes longer to post the one photo to that blog than several to this one. It's got a growing audience, and while that is validating, it's also a little daunting to think about. I'm also enjoying networking (visiting and reading the blogs) with the other City Daily Photo people. It takes a lot of time, but it's a great way to see the world, learn a few things, make friends, and bring traffic back to my blog, which helps Google placement for the business. Cool, huh?

Today I also got back to the N.C. Hudson book for awhile. I did more posting than writing, but this is how I wanted to start the project, so I feel good about it. I hope to develop some interest in the book while I keep tabs on the project. I feel today like I got through some of the preliminaries. There are three posts for July 18.

The photo above is just another of the same old wonderful view. I could probably take one 365 days of the year and they'd never be the same.

Tomorrow Lee gets back to Portland from fishing in Canada, and I'll go there for at least part of the day, trying to get back here early on Monday morning. I'd hoped the techno issues would be over with, but that didn't happen by the end of last week, so I should be here. It should settle down soon. It's clear that the shopping cart itself is allowing more people to place orders, and that's fantastic. I still have a bunch of HTML coding to do on some of the pages because the new cart uses a more precise system than the old one and some of the old coding doesn't translate. I like the results, but it will still take some time to get it all done. For instance, since I needed a separate order button for each plastic cup color of each animal, you can now see how each of the colors goes with each animal - you don't have to guess using the drop-down list.

Until the past few weeks, I'd been walking a lot. At the moment, I'm still getting used to taking my first yoga class. It's making me feel good about myself and helping my back, but I gotta tell you that at my age and with fibromyalgia, it's a lot harder on the old bod than a 5-mile hike. My muscles are very slow to adjust to the new stresses, and I've been relying on Torch more than ever to put me back together and keep moving forward. I feel that this week I may be able to do the yoga four times a week and take walks again, too. I'm looking forward to that!

Bye bye Lemon Grass, hello Divine Calm

The lemon grass ginger bath and shower gel (a gift from Kate) has been one of my totally most favorite-ever scents and bath products. It's about gone now, and I'm packing my gym bag with Divine Calm, which seemed like a good choice for a busy world. I got it at one of Laurel's Body Shop parties. Mmmm. Lavender is nice. It seems a little weird mixed with camomile, but maybe it will be relaxing.

I was going to some artwork today after avoiding it for months and months (maybe years), and I avoided it again. I put up more dog pins in the gift shop and on the gift shop blog, cleaned up papers in the office that had been in horrifying stacks for way too long, hand-washed a blouse and dried it on the deck, organized and filed stuff on my desk, moved a lot of file folders, hung up t-shirts (although I need to find a way to fit another hanging rod in here somewhere) and then went to work out at the gym and take a shower. I stopped in to see Margi for a bit, came back and got my credit card info organized (again, after months of avoiding it), got my character in Fate down past dungeon level 40, and then made a couple of posts on this blog, including some older photos of the day I came to Oregon. It's weird how I'll go for so long without organizing things until I'm completely freaked and feeling out of control. I like organizing, but I'll pitch into work or almost anything instead. It felt so good to get it done. I can find things now, and it didn't even take that long. I have to remember that! I still need to move and wash/dust all of the surfaces and the stuff on the shelves once the construction is done in a few days. Most of the remodeling was outside or upstairs, but it knocked things off the shelves and brought down bits of the ceiling. I was surprised one day to find a tapir skull in the middle of the floor. Fortunately the floor was carpeted, and no damage was done. A ceramic tapir on wheels was toppling, and I caught it just in time. I had no idea that replacing siding would be so violent. It seems that buildings on pilings sway more than the average structure. I hadn't considered that! Also, our windows were all replaced and the walls partly re-cut, so there's sawdust in the books, CDs, telephones, printers. . . . Everything. And tomorrow? Maybe after work I'll make a collage. We'll see.