puppies, I

Just got back from looking at Aussie pups. The owners met us in Wilber, and we all went to the park and let the dogs out. The father and his grown daughter were wonderful dogs, the mother was shy and undersized (maltreatment by past owners) and the male puppy was, um, favorable. I was looking at the female. We didn't take. She wanted to stick with her family, she didn't like being on her back.....I think she would have been a problem. So we're going to go look at a litter up by Fremont next weekend, see their two bitches, and then if I don't get one of them come back and look at this one again. Sigh. And I'll need $75 more for one of the other litter, because they're $225. Dad says I can work it off. Ack. Debt.

Back from Cortlandfest. Manned the Pioneer Games in period costume, saw the shootout, and I need to go back to Mrs. H's booth and get my crocheted cell phone holders. None sold so far that I know of. It's a relief having it all over.

In which the entire plot of the Lymond Chronicles of more or less spoiled

I like to write. Writing like this--blogging--is a type of talking, which I enjoy doing but feel too guilty about talking over someone when they try to say something to run on to a live audience the way I do in writing. But I also like to write stories, because I like stories. Stories are a large segment of my life. At least a quarter of any given obsession of mine is story-based. My main problem in writing stories, though, is a lack of sadism. Sadism is absolutely essential to a good plotter. A skilled author must be able to frame her hero for treason, with his sister being killed in the event he's accused of setting up and his brother believing the charges; convince the girl he'll marry* in the fourth book that he's a cad and a rogue whom she fears and despises; kill off one of my favorite characters in the first book, although I admit her death was necessary because her fiancee had to marry the woman the histories say he did;** have his brother nearly kill him; have his brother nurse him back to life, which, had you asked him at the time, was worse; have him covertly fighting a man everyone thinks is an angel and thinks he should follow*** who eventually almost gets him killed twice; force him to sacrifice the illegitimate son he was well on the way to adoring in order to take down the aforementioned fallen angel, leaving him to raise the illegitimate son of said enemy; have him learn he's illegitimate****; have him learn he's legitimate but his older brother isn't.....this series is really hard on its hero.


*One of those depressing "convenient" marriages in which there is mutual love, but neither party knows it's mutual, etc. etc. etc. I hate these, but I adore Lymond and Philippa and endure it with them. It took them ten damn years to work everything out though.

**I love her anyway. A wonderful character. The first female/love interest (not really, in Christian's case) to die.^

^Christian Stewart; Oonagh O'Dwyer (books two, three, and four); Joleta Reid Malett (safer to say "opposite female role" than "love interest". Remember Indy's Austrian slut in Last Crusade? Yeah); Kiaya Khatun/Guzel (mainly A Ringed Castle, number five); and lastly, Philippa, who shouldn't be on this list because she survived the last book but I couldn't resist ending with her.

***Lymond isn't very susceptible to peer pressure.

****Somewhat incestuously so. 

Game of Kings
Queen's Play
The Disorderly Knights
Pawn in Frankincense
The Ringed Castle
Checkmate

Well, the goats have just come home. It's nearly eleven, and I foresee many spelling corrections, but I'm getting this in before bed.

We ended up getting three does and two bucklings, probably because of Leeza's lamentable but highly advantageous tendency to give kids away rather than suspect that they'll end up in the ring at Palmyra. I should look up what Paul says about Palmyra. Probably nothing useful. Oh well. Anyway, the does consist of Crazy Horns, with the one curled horn over her head from a botched disbudding; Winter Too, who having no mother around here with first rights to the name will be called simply Winter; and Snowflake, who will adore it here, having been waiting ever since she came of age for a chance to be a herd queen, and will assert herself promptly. The boys, as yet unnamed (we'll argue about this in the morning--we had to dissuade Owen from rechristening Winter Esme (I wouldn't object at all for an unnamed doeling, although I know it would be different if I were acquainted with the namesake here)) are about four weeks old and on two feedings a day. One will be meat.

Dad is telling me to go to bed.

Strange.

I feel quite detestably cheerful, somehow. Inexplicable.

Just got back from an appointment with the dentist next door to the bank across the highway. He was nice. Called me "young lady" and asked what my favorite subject in school is. I think he has grown-up kids, but I wouldn't have guessed it. Although, come to think of it, that is how a parent would think....I have three cavities, which are on the adult teeth coming in the back so he can't do anything about 'em until the teeth are fully erupted. Horrible context to use that word in. Also more detailed bad news about my impacted cuspids, in that he described the orthodontia necessary to bring them down. With sufficiently ghastly detail, even though he was vague about some bits.

Anyway. Mom and Owen are the only ones left. They should be in the chair right now. We all cam home as soon as he finished with us. So nice to live within walking distance of the dentist. Hah. Well, it's over with.

I finished before Pete again~! Muahahaha!

Regular weeding schedules have been established in the garden. Sigh.

Auuuuuugh.

So I was on my way upstairs between turns, and Dad ambushed me, sat me down, and asked me what my plans for the future were. Argh. I wasn't planning to start fighting about this for a few more years. So I stalled a little bit and then said I wanted to go to college and major in English. Further interrogation produced the statement that I'd like to become a writer, or maybe get a job in publishing, the addendum promptly falling by the wayside. He extracted the information that yes, I had written a few stories. Where were they? Scattered around. Could Dad read them? Over my dead body.* Why did I want to become a writer? Because I'd prefer to do something enjoyable with my life. Then he pulled out his specific counter-argument, which was not at all what I expected^, so maybe there's something in what Doug says about preparing specific counters to his arguments, i.e., it's futile.** Anyway. He said that I could not as a good Christian in all conscience go to college, knowing as I do that they are a device for the social engineering of anyone who might still be a Christian into mindless little drones. I think he was afraid I'll come home a lesbian. Um. So he ended up handing me Naomi Wolf's End of America, which I have too started, thankyouverymuch. He said we'll resume when I've finished it.**** I would like to point out that he started this when I had absolutely no possible backup or reinforcements available. Mom was at work, Doug was at class, and Peter, whose assistance would be questionable but might try to help, was in the study at Battleaxe, where he could probably hear but neither see nor interfere.


*In summary. More or less. Condensed form.

**Although I hadn't really tried, not expecting to have this discussion anytime soon.

***And I think I'm ashamed to admit that it only just occurred to me that that's a loophole to not have this discussion for at least another year. Not that it alone would hold it off that long, but at least then I could put it off indefinitely instead of resuming it of my own free will. And he might forget. Another way of looking at it is that he handed me a method for putting this off until I'm ready.

^Further(/other/expected) possible arguments on his part:

It'll all go down the tubes and you'll be away from home.
It'll all go down the tubes before you get a chance to go.
It'll all go down the tubes so you should at least learn something useful.

Any others?