04.42 pm
Well, I’m a bit late today, but that’s alright, because there’s not really all that much to tell you all! I’ve been really lazy today – I didn’t even log into WoW to see how Ellrevienne was faring – though I did go in and rescue her from her precarious position out in the wilds of the Eastern Plaguelands last night! She’s finished off that entire quest chain and is now resting comfortably at the Inn in Light’s Hope Chapel! No, today I simply “mucked around” – doing a bit of this, playing a bit of solitaire, experimenting with fonts and backgrounds – the background that you’re currently looking at isn’t the one I made earlier today and experimented with… I decided that I didn’t really like it after all, and scrapped it – which meant that I had to either construct a new background toot sweet, or just go for the plain, flat colour, sans pattern or texture, that I went for next. I didn’t like that look either, so… by this time I was starting to sweat! It was almost four o’clock, and I hadn’t devised a workable background! I’ve used another background I rather liked – I’ve used it before, when it was blue… but a blue background wouldn’t go with the green Header – so I re-coloured it, and at the moment I think it looks quite acceptable – though I’m just as likely to decide otherwise in an hour or two! 😉
I also played around with fonts a bit – the one you’re currently seeing in the Header isn’t one of my new ones, it’s actually a much older one that I like a lot, but it’s a “shaded” font and doesn’t work all that well with the styles I use… but I accidentally discovered a hack for that little problem the other day, when I was playing around with one of my newest fonts – which also happened to be “hollow”! I wished that it was a solid font, as I’d be able to use some really spiffy styles on it, but styles lose all their “oomph” on thin lines – which was how this font had been designed. I thought of just “colouring in” the blank bits… and after a small amount of “trial and error” (three attempts/tests, actually) I managed to create a secondary, solid layer of colour underneath my font – I made the solid layer one colour, and the outline of the font above it in a contrasting colour and style, and as the saying goes, “Bob’s yer Uncle”! So anyway, I’d worked out a work-around for the hollow font, and it worked very well, too! In this case, however, I was using a shaded, or textured, font, which I wanted to hide – so I simply added the “solid” layer above the text, hiding the unwanted shading. I’m quite pleased with the effect, actually! I don’t know why I didn’t think of doing something like that ages ago!
While I was pottering away with fonts and stuff, Julian was busy doing “proper” things, like doing a bit more work in the garden to get the veggie bed ready for our tomato planting – hopefully sometime next week… Oh, and he cleaned out our two hard-working “bug catchers” that we have hanging under the ceiling of our rather large outdoor deck, because I’m totally allergic to mosquito bites! After that, he came inside and cleaned out Auric and Dapple’s condominium. Don’t ever fool yourselves that goldfish are “low maintenance” pets! Their tank needs to have 30% of its water “swapped out” every week – that means siphoning out 1/3 of the water and replacing it with fresh, clean water. The glass gets totally cleaned once a week, and Julian does a quick “vacuum” of the gravel once a week too, with a more thorough gravel vacuum, as well as a general plant and decor “de-algae-fying”, every second week. They got the “full” treatment today, so the tank’s looking all sparkly and kleeeen – not that Auric and Dapple are at all impressed! They hate having their peaceful routine interrupted by strange, pale tentacled “things” descending into their home, uprooting rocks and trees, before putting them all back in the wrong places! Tsk! What’s a little fishie to do? (why, cower down in one corner of the tank and wait for the horrible ordeal to be over, of course! That’s what a little fishie’s to do! 😉 ) There are two filters in the tank, and he changes each of the filters on alternate weeks. The water needs regular testing – at least once a week – to monitor the amount of nitrites, nitrates and ammonia in the water, as well as testing its ph balance, and adjustments are made as needed (Julian does this once a week, and keeps a log of the results) So it’s not just a matter of standing there and saying “Awwww! Look at the pretty little fishies!”, and feeding them – there’s also a fair amount of work involved! I generally try to help by keeping out of Julian’s way while he’s doing all of this work…
And that’s about all that happened today – so I shall now get on with the “good” bits! 🙂
Food stuffs. Last night for dinner we had our home-made hamburgers, made with real ham! I mean real pork, not beef! Julian was making them when I wandered into the kitchen at one point, and he said that the hamburgers just didn’t “feel” right when he was making them, and he wondered what he might have done wrong, or left out – so we went through all the ingredients, and he’d forgotten the breadcrumbs! Luckily it wasn’t too late to add them, because he’d gone and bought breadcrumbs specifically for the hamburgers! We had the hamburgers pan-fried, with organic (but not home-grown!) plain boiled potatoes, fully organic and home-grown broad beans, and our usual half a tomato. For dessert I had one of my Corella pears, and a Vaalia Lemon Creme yoghurt. There were a couple of (cooked!) hamburgers left over, so we had those for our lunch today – in a most delicious seeded sourdough sandwich, with a bit of our favourite butter substitute, basil-pesto hummus! 🙂 Tonight we’re having a fairly plain, ordinary dinner, with pan-fried steak, chips, steamed green beans, and our usual half a tomato, and for dessert I’ll have a couple of my yellow Nectarines, if they’re not too soft and squishy, and an Apple Le Rice.
Weigh-in this morning. Was pretty horrific! Bear in mind though that I’m still working those horror pills out of my system – that generally takes about a week and a bit, with a sudden peak between the second and fourth days. Today was the second day – and boy, did I peak! I think I managed to keep a fairly calm face, but every time this happens, I die a little inside. Thank goodness I only have one more lot to take – in another three months, before I see Dr. Y. again, because I can’t keep doing this – I simply can’t! I’d rather go through all the hassles and the very real dangers (for someone on Warfarin, and a long history of clotting) of surgery, if it’ll keep me off these wretched pills! Anyway, I went from 68.6 kg yesterday… to 69.3 kg today… I know it’s only fluid – my feet certainly do look like balloons – but it’s just so depressing… and uncomfortable, as far as walking is concerned… (yes, I did do my treadmilling again today – and all the other exercises that Polly has set for me!) I’d better get off my backside and have that fasting blood test done – not that any of us, including Dr. B, are expecting any different results from the last time I had the tests done… (*gloom*)
And here we are, almost up to tomorrow again! It’ll be fun to get back into WoW with Wynterthyme and Demelzae, and to change Hati’s appearance! I still haven’t decided how I want her to look – but I have a feeling that even if I did decide tonight, it’d still be a split-second decision tomorrow morning, anyway! 🙂 Flipper was a good girl last night, and despite still having access to her pussy biscuits well into the afternoon, she made quite a job of eating her dinner last night! Maybe she overheard me talking to Julian about using the s-y-r-i-n-g-e to get her medication into her! 😉 Anyway, once again, that’s about “it” from me for this evening! Do call in again tomorrow night, to see how my stupid weight went, and what we finally decided to change our respective Hati’s into! 🙂 Until then though, remember that you are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream, and don’t forget to keep warm (or cool) and dry, no matter what the weather’s like, to look after yourselves, and to always drive carefully… but most importantly, please don’t forget to stay safe! 🙂 ciao, all! 🙂
My Word! 