30 January 2016

Update on grandma and her foot

Sometimes you just need wine.
See... lots better.
So it's been a month now since grandma's foot fiasco and I'm happy to report is mostly healed.

That being said, my relationship with my grandmother is on the downwards slope again. It always seems to have this same rollercoaster of emotions with her. We have a fight, usually money themed, and we just seem bitch at each other for a couple weeks. I take a weekend to just get away. Then when I get back she's all "you are the best granddaughter ever" and we are good. For a few months.

Then the cycle begins again.

It sucks not having a good relationship with your only living grandparent.

It sucks worse when people think you don't care.

08 January 2016

Friday Fun-times - sculpting

I've been sculpting little trolls recently. They are cute in a weird sort of way.

So far I have made 2 of a set of 4 and one extra.

Here are pictures!
This is Askr [pronounced Oscar] and he is the Spring Guardian. He is actually the first one I made.

This is Yuki the Ice Princess.

I have plans for Summer and Autumn... well, kinda. All I know for certain is that Summer will be lying on her stomach with a dragonfly on her feet. And Autumn will have fallen leaves... duh.

I just need to buy more clay.

And random crafty bits for decorations.

Now, this one is not completely finished. He doesn't even have a name yet. I've been calling him Neo because he kinda looks like Neapolitan ice cream, but I don't really like it. He's definitely an ice cream troll. I don't know quite how else to decorate him yet. I feel like he should be sitting in a cloud of whipped cream, but how would I do that?

Anyway, those are my babies.

06 January 2016

Workday Wednesday - Fanfics

I find that most of my stories these days start as fanfics. What’s a fanfic, you ask? Well, it’s a story that takes place in a pre-existing story-verse or uses someone else’s characters. For example, [and I can’t believe this would be the best known example] 50 Shades of Grey started out as a Twilight fanfic. The author took the characters Edward and Bella and said “what if I make these two have all sorts of sex?”

Actually, most fanfics that are out there are basically “what if [insert two or more characters] had sex?”

I don’t write that kind of fanfic.

I write “author inserted” fanfic.

I write stories where the main character is new to the story-verse and is a perfect version of what I would do in the story. The best example I can think of of this is Dante’s Inferno. I mean he made Virgil, an actual person, his best bud and guide.

The first story I ever finished [because I have a problem] was an Andromeda fanfic. It’s actually where my internet persona is named. Enigma Harper. My main character in an Andromeda fanfic.
Here’s an excerpt…


You would not believe how much I loved this show.
Andromeda was basically just Canadian Star Trek.
And yes, that's Kevin Sorbo.
After classes I toured the space station. It was huge. It was like a small planet. My favorite part of the tour was the docking bay. Ships came everywhere to get supplies. All the different beings that got out of the ships were amazing. There were several ships that I wouldn't mind travelling on. I started to dream about the many places I would go. I must've been quite out of it because I finally snapped out when someone tapped my shoulder.
"Um. excuse me, miss. I've been all around the galaxy and I have never seen a finer looking alien."
"What? Finer? I don't understand your..." I glanced at the round metallic disk inserted into the side of his neck, "AI slang."
Now he looked confused. "AI? I ain't no robot, lady, if I can call you that. I am all human. Straight from Mother Earth, herself."
"Well, I'm sorry if I offended you. I couldn't tell with that thing in your neck."
"What? My data port? This is really useful. I can connect online with my ship and go to the source of any problem."
"You have a ship? Which one?"
He pointed to a beautiful ship. I don't think I could describe it justly.
"That's her. The Andromeda Ascendant."
"Named after the chained maiden in Greek mythology. Was offered as a sacrifice to the Cetus to save Ethiopia."
He stared at me, slack jawed.
"What?" I looked around. "Did I do something wrong?"
"No. I just never met an alien that knew so much about ancient Earth culture."
"Oh. I know much about every culture in the galaxy. Like the infamous Krikket Wars and ... Why do you have that look on your face?"
"I was just thinking. Do you know anything about the Commonwealth?"
"Just that is was a great thing until it fell, and that some 300 year old High Guard captain is trying to pull it back together."
"Where are you staying? I need to tell Dylan about you."
"At the University, in the Lowi Wing. My name is Enigma." I held out my hand.
"Harper," he shook it, "do you mind visitors?"
"No, not at all. I live by myself."
"I'll see you tonight then."
"Sure."
He walked off. I think he was planning something. He wasn't too bad looking. Better than most back home. I decided to write Mother about my day.

Keep in mind I wrote this … 15 years ago. Goodness, has it really been that long? Anyway, as you can see I borrowed a lot from what was influencing me at the time. Greek mythology and Douglas Adams. And I didn’t edit any of the spelling errors. Believe me, there are a bunch of errors all over the place.

I hope you learned a bit today. If anything, I hope you enjoyed my humble beginnings.


Harper, OUT! 

04 January 2016

Family Friday... on a Monday

Grandma's first selfie.
This is my grandmother. You are seeing this picture first because the rest of the pictures will be graphic in nature and I needed a buffer picture so my links were not immediately accompanied with a gross picture.

Anyway, my grandmother is 85 years old. She is borderline diabetic [this is a complicated statement], hard of hearing, has macular degeneration, peripheral nerve damage in her feet, and is a staunch Democrat. She is mobile, but needs a walker and has a lot of difficulty making it up the three stairs in her home.

She is adamant about living independently. She currently lives across the road from us in her ranch style home. It is all one level [save for the three steps it take to get to the attached garage] and even her washing machine is on the main floor.

I'm telling you all this as a background.

December 21st we [myself and my mother] get a call from the nice lady [and family friend] that helps grandma clean her house. She saw that grandma had an open wound on the back of her foot. When asked about it grandma said she first noticed a blister back there on Saturday [the 19th] and to not tell us about it because we'll just worry over nothing.

This is a normal statement from Grandma.


So naturally, she called us and told us about it and we went over right away to look at it. We found this. For size reference... grandma wears a 10WW shoe.

Grandma assured us that she was fine and didn't want us to worry about her.

We didn't listen to her and took her to the emergency room.

Once the slipper was removed we noticed something else.


The wound was just the top of a popped blister. A blister that measured 4.5 cm tall and 6 cm wide. That is a Post-It note sized blister... that we only were just told about!

Now I know that at least one person is out there going, "Why don't you do daily checks on her?"

We do... I do.

Grandma is a special case. She is kinda paranoid. Like "the government is trying to steal all my money" paranoid. She is considered "too rich" to qualify for an in-home care program and "too poor" to move to a care facility. So she has me as a care provider and our family friend as a maid. I take her to appointments, get her groceries, make meals, and pick up her prescriptions. If she needs something from me, she calls me up and I go right over. She has a Life Alert necklace [that she keeps on her walker because... reasons?] incase she can't get to her phone.

But mainly it is her decision to do anything. And she likes to prove this by not telling us about her ailments for a few days. Even when we are sitting in front of her.

So the ER doctor says that the blister is probably from either her cellulitis or her lymphedema.

In other words... no big deal?

They send us down to wound care for debridement... aka the removal of dead tissue so the wound can heal. It looks like this.

Just so you know, I'm apparently a ninja when I take pictures. The doctor didn't even know. But I knew I needed to be able to tell other family members what was going on.

So I became the Ninja Photographer!

Long story short, Grandma is healing well. Actually she only had to go to 2 debridement appointments. The doctor said she was healing nicely and that all she needed was someone to change her bandages.

That would be me.

Woo...