First Cup of Coffee - April 1, 2019

Happy April! No trickery promise here. General updates here on my weekend (low-key), a funny story about Foster's Lager, and how I'm going to ramp up word count a bit on THE FIERY CITADEL. (I know, I know - but I need to.) Also thoughts on sewing, cupcake-making, and general crafty puttering. 

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Good morning everyone. This is Jeffy Kennedy here with my first cup of coffee. It's April first? A Monday. No foolin'. Uh I've never been a huge fan of April Fool's Day. Um Yeah, uh a lot of trickery to me seems mean. The the best jokes that I've seen work um were hugely upsetting to the person that the prank was played on. And I've just never found that very funny. And then other kinds of jokes are I don't know. Um you know, a lot of them are juvenile. Attempts to be clever that aren't. So I guess the only ones I really like are things like um onion type jokes and the way that our political climate has become. It's they're they're so close to the truth that it's uncomfortable. So there we are. But so you can trust that today's podcast is no April fooling uh of any sort. We have snow on the ground April 1st, uh, and our snow's on the ground. There we go. Uh it was a pretty blistery day yesterday. Actually, it wasn't too blistery, it was cold and with some periods of fairly intense blizzards, uh, but it was definitely a spring type storm. And you know, it was uh started really sticking towards evening, but not too bad. Uh I think it'll be melted off pretty soon here. We went over yesterday evening to Megan Mullery's new house. So it was fun. We'd they'd been moving all weekend and I'd offered to help, and she said no, that they had it. Um and then I found out that she moved using mostly hefty bags because it was like a five-minute trip. So I could totally understand that. There have been times I remember in the past, back in the day, when we would help people move. I remember one friend in particular, they asked us to help move, and we went over there at the time they said, and they had nothing packed up yet. Like nothing. And I remember her, she was my friend, and her husband was a musician, and he was um more of a disorganized dreamer type guy. Uh, someone we liked a whole bunch, but uh organization was not their forte between the two of them. And uh we were, I remember David was really aggravated. We were trying to, you know, we'd brought the truck and they just didn't have anything ready to go, you know, like all this stuff was still in the dressers and all this kind of thing. And I ended up mostly helping her pack, which was fine, but um, it wasn't what we had planned on, you know, like if I was gonna help her pack, I would have just gone over myself to help her. Um so when somebody tells me, no, we've got it handled, we're just gonna do it ourselves, I totally respect that because sometimes you just need to do it yourself. So, but Megan said, come over in the evening pour a celebratory glass of champagne. And of course, I am never one to say no to champagne. So we went over there and we took a few things for them. I made cupcakes yesterday. They didn't come out exactly the way I wanted. Tasty enough, but the texture wasn't the way I wanted. I'm going to have to monkey with the recipe a bit. It's a um recipe from a New York bakery, and I need to adjust for altitude, I think. It didn't came out a little too condensed. So took the cupcakes, took some things, and sat and chatted with them for a little while. They were tired, um, and so we didn't stay very long. It was funny because David asked me if I was getting dressed up. I was like, no, because they're gonna be grungy and we're not gonna stay all that long. But it was very fun. We sat there and chatted with them for a while and got to see the new house, uh, which is very cute. I think they're really going to be able to fix it up into something really special. Um, with Megan's artistic sense, and Charlie loves messing with stuff and loves to garden, so that reminds me he asked me to give him something, some information. I'm going to have to um text Megan and find out what it was that he wanted. I can't think of it now. You know how it is when somebody says, Oh yes, I'd love to have that information, and you say, Oh sure, as you're drinking champagne, and then the next day, like I didn't remember it till just now. So anyway, it'll be fun helping him set up his garden and so forth. We were talking about gophers a lot. Sorry, I was remembering the gopher conversation. So we did that. Um yeah, it was a pretty quiet weekend. Um Saturday morning I did go to yoga and was very proud of myself, and it was a hell of a workout. My body could tell was definitely protesting the fact that I hadn't been there in a while. So, but that felt good. And I was happy because uh somebody else, Melissa, my favorite teacher, was not there, and Lily was filling in. And Lily was saying how excited she was to take over Melissa's class, and she wanted to make sure to do a good job. And as we were all leaving, I heard another gal say to her, Well, you did a good job. And this gal was like in her 20s. Um, she said, Well, you definitely did Melissa Proud. You gave us, you were killing us. So I was like, Oh, good, I'm glad it snatches me. So went to yoga, went and got my car washed. That was pretty exciting. Um I knew it was gonna snow yesterday, but Saturday was sunny, it was kind of cold. But uh my the jack has been in the garage a lot and had dust all over it and tons of kitty paw prints. So because the cats can get in the garage and they think that's pretty funny to walk on my car. So that was kind of a treat for myself to go and get the car washed, and then I came back home and I I'm trying to get back into the mode of we'll see how I do for however long it lasts, of not turning on my computer one day a week. So I did not turn on my computer at all on Saturday, and that definitely gives me a kind of restfulness that is helpful. So I did a lot of reading on Saturday, and then I broke out the sewing machine. I posted a video to Instagram. I don't know why I'm having a hard time saying that. Instagram, because this is the uh sewing machine that I got for Christmas from my lovely mother. She got it for me, and I hadn't had a sewing machine in quite a long time. Not since we moved to Santa Fe, so 10 years. It's amazing to me it's been 10 years that we've been here. Where does the time go? So I used to have my grandmother's sewing machine, which was one of those great um singer built into the table sewing machines, but it was massively heavy and awkward, and David really begged and pleaded with me not to make him move that one more time because we moved together several times. He's like, I don't want to move this to Santa Fe, and I wasn't sure I was gonna have a space for it. I knew that uh space was going to be much tighter in this house. I could have made room for it, but it was getting old, and so I sold it at a garage sale, and the ladies who got it, I gave it sold it to them and sold all my fabric, and so they were delighted they went home with that, and I'm hoping they used it in good health. So, but I think I talked about it on this podcast that I was thinking about starting to get back into sewing again, and I want to make that one dress, right? So finally on Saturday, I broke out the sewing machine and learned how to use it, and it was much easier to learn than I thought. It's um amazingly snazzy that it's all computerized and has um a quilting foot. I could even quilt right on it. I used to quilt on my other one, but it was sort of a a cheat, a little bit of a workaround. So that was that was really fun. And I did some repairs on things. I had this one really full black wool skirt that the hem had been coming out of that I'd been procrastinating and dealing with for a very, very long time because it's so big, and so I did that on the machine and just no time flap. It was awesome. And what else did I do on that Saturday? You know, it's and I took up care of a bunch of piddly things. I finally framed some pictures, some book covers, and hung up some art and organized a few things. So, you know, all those things that you kind of put off doing. And then I went out and I went to Joanne's fabrics because I thought, okay, well, I have my list, I'm armed with my list, and I am going to make this gown that I got the pattern for. And I wasn't even sure Santa Fe had a Joanne fabrics, and so then I found it, and I went there, and oh, it was just so skeezy, you guys. I haven't been in a fabric store for a long time, and I guess the last time I went, I was always looking for quilting fabrics, and they had a nice quilting section, but um the fabrics for dresses were just so cheesy. I found one that I liked, and there wasn't enough on the bolt. And I thought about asking if they had another bolt of it, but I was in there probably 20 minutes at least, going through, you know, up and down and up and down over and over, thinking surely there's something I've missed. And there was this one lady waiting at the cutting counter when I got there, and she was still waiting there when I left. So I was thinking, I'm not gonna get my answer anytime soon. And I don't know, the place was just dusty and gross, and there was like one haggard woman working the checkout counter, and she had a line, and I don't even know what's going on. So I need to figure out something else. I don't know that there are other um dress fabric stores in town. I might check out the one in Albuquerque. I might have to go online. Um, I just don't know. Where do people buy fabric now? I remember back in Laramie, it went out of business, but when I first moved to Laramie, Lothi's many years ago, Jason, you know, that was the 80s, so who knows? There was SoFro Sophro fabrics, and they had great stuff. I remember how beautiful that store was. So, you know, like maybe mostly people don't sew their own fancy dresses anymore. They had a lot of good fabrics for cosplay, and if I could find a good cosplay fabric, I would do that. So we'll see. I need to uh get a little more laser focused on that hunt. If you all know of good places to buy, I'm probably talking to the wrong crowd. I need the uh the sewing podcast crowd. See, here at Jeffy's First Cup of Coffee, we bring you all sorts of artistry, every kind of craft imaginable. An all-purpose podcast for your creative needs. And I also bought, uh, when I was in town, I bought supplies for the cupcakes. So I was proud of myself for doing that. And I went to Total Wine and I got some Brute Kava. And I was trying to get David a six-pack of Foster's lager because he's been drinking beer again lately, which is great. And he's been trying out different beers to see which sits best with him. Um, because he's got, you know, with the Parkinson's, some alcohols affect him weird. And he also has some stomach ulcer issues, so he has to be careful that way. Poor guy, he's like forever finding this balance. So I was looking for, we've been looking for the six-pack of Foster's lager, and at our little neighborhood store, which is actually not that little, it's a really nice grocery store, they only have the foster's oil cans. And we've gotten him that, but he can't drink that much in one sitting. He just drinks like half of it and then has it left over, right? Um so when I went to Total Wine, I thought, well, I'll see if I can't get him a six-pack of Foster's there. And I ended up talking to this guy who reminded me a whole lot of my stepfather, Leo Kennedy. I could have seen Leo Kennedy having this job working at Total Wine and helping people. And he was great. He was very funny. And so he was telling me this story. And I did you guys? I didn't know this. Apparently, a couple years back, there was a huge dock strike in Los Angeles. And Foster's and San Miguel had tankers in the bay full of beer. And those ships sat there for like a year because of this strike, and they lost millions of dollars worth of beer because it just baked there in the harbor. They couldn't offload it. And David asked me why they couldn't sail the ships back, and I don't know. There must be some sort of reason or rule, or maybe they kept thinking that it was going to change and didn't. So ever since then, apparently, San Miguel stopped exporting to the U.S. entirely. They just won't send their beer, and Foster's will only send the oil cans. Who knew? So there's um your little bit of trivia. So unfortunately, we can only get the oil cans now. So I might have to try. He's been trying different kinds of beer. The red stripe works well, so maybe he'll just have that. I was gonna say, otherwise, we could try to figure out a way to, you know, like uh, I don't know. I have a for the champagne, I've been liking the brute kava, that's what I was looking for at uh total wine. It's a little less sweet than the prosecco. So I have one of those corks that pressurizes, you know, to keep the uh bubbly in there. And I wonder if there's something we can do for the open can. Maybe there's like a little insert we could put in there for when he wants the fosters. It's uh always a conundrum, but you know, good problems to have, right? And so I'm going to be really head down on Fiery Citadel. I'm down to a couple of weeks to get this done and turned in, um, which I'm not going to make. Well, I guess I've got a little bit more than a couple of weeks, right? Yeah. Let's see here if I can do this without messing up. Well, it doesn't really matter. So let's see. I've got three weeks, right? The fifth, sixth, seventh. Maybe not. To the 15th. Oh, because the 15th's a Monday. That's what's screwing me up. That's why I was thinking I have two weeks of work. Um, but I might like center part of it. But at any rate, yeah, I know I'm not supposed to, but I am going to crank up above 3,000 words a day because I need to to get this done. And then I'll take some time off, right? Yeah. I know, I know. I'm just gonna try 3,500 words a day and just see how I do on that. So far, I hadn't been hitting consistently 3,000 words a day. I mean, I would do it for several days or in a row, but I haven't had a 15,000-word week in uh quite some time. So I wasn't really hitting that anyway. I don't know why. So it goes sometimes. So I'm going to I'm still doing some revising. I'm going to finish that revising and then really start laying those words down. So wish me luck. And uh I hope you all have a fabulous first week of April. I hope that it um gets to be spring. Uh, you all take care, and I will talk to you tomorrow. Bye bye.