Day four – good news, bad news

The good news is that I’m sitting at the computer at 9:30am. Some improvement on time management. I was in bed just after 11:30 last night.

Not so good news is that I didn’t turn the lights out at 1am. I only had 25 pages left in my book. It would have been rude not to finish it, wouldn’t it? Also, I didn’t get to the gym yesterday. For this I do blame Jane and her black and white photo challenge. No time between writing and pool with Pat to make it to the gym.

The bad news is that it snowed on Wednesday and it’s snowing again today. This is very bad news indeed. Why? Snow in early November on a Gulf Island? What the fuck? This is not supposed to happen. I thought I was going to have enough wood in the shed for this winter. Then Frank, the chimney guy, told me my pile of Arbutus needed another year to season. A big chunk of the wood in the shed is Arbutus. If I can’t burn that, I don’t have enough wood in the shed – especially if I have to start burning it during the day. Of course, I could turn the electric heaters on during the day, but I can’t afford to do that either. My plan, such as it was, was to be very, very British and wear multiple layers of clothes during the day, only lighting the fire early evening. (Or not at all if it was reasonably mild. That’s what blankets are for, isn’t it?) This plan, such as it was, is not viable if it’s going to be this cold this early. Fuck.

So, I have the front room heaters on as I write. I can almost hear the electricity meter spinning into overdrive. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

What to do?  Well, I guess I’m going to have to send a good chunk of my first paycheque in two years to BC Hydro so I don’t end up with a completely unaffordable bill at the end of the winter. Good that I actually have some money coming in. Bad that it needs to be spent on simply staying alive this winter. I had rather more important plans for that money, like refilling the wine rack, down to one bottle of Irmani’s very kind Oyster Bay present, or ordering the most important items left on my Amazon wish list, or buying myself some flowers and prosecco and getting my hair cut for my birthday next week. I did not expect to have to spend the money on not freezing to death. Brrr. Grrr.

Time to go to a costume fitting.

Here’s the second photo of the challenge.