* Sorted the soil for the first two samples today. I was concerned because the first sample didn't turn up ANYTHING (though maybe the invertebrates did wind up in the preservative after falling through the grid; this was just going through the leftover soil). The first sample was very dry and seemed lower in clay.
I did wind up grabbing some springtails and a couple beetles and a worm from the second sample, so there are invertebrates in the soils.
I will probably do a third one tomorrow.
* I finished "Legends and Lattes." Yeah, it took me a long time, I kept putting it aside when I was afraid a Bad Thing was going to happen. Well, a Bad Thing did, but they recovered from it. I was also concerned - given there's a second book called Bookshops and Bonedust that Viv was going to leave but at least as of the end of the book she didn't.
I also admit I was curious how the author was going to portray the wlw romance in there. It was....really pretty chaste (which was a relief to me, I don't like sex scenes of any variety). But it's clear that Tandri and Viv are "together," and they love each other.
I don't know how "realistic" it was (but then again: one is an orc and the other is a succubus, but).
It was a fun book, though, and nothing too Bad happened in it, which is what you need some times.
* I decided to restart "Dracula," which I had stalled out on. (Yes, I also have "Bookshops and Bonedust" in the tbr pile, but I wanted something a bit meatier for now). And I admit given the hot weather and being tired I find I do crave getting into bed early and reading more right now.
And yeah, Bad stuff absolutely happens in Dracula, but it's not quite the same as in some books because you know it's a melodrama and is not real.
(And I really think, an entertaining animated movie could be made as a fairly faithful adaptation. I know there have been many movies done but the novel has shifting viewpoints - Jonathan Harker, and Mina, and the doctor...)
* I did get the fingerless mitts started. They don't look like much yet; I did the first bit of shortrows (for wrist shaping and am working on the 20 rows for one side of the hand. I did that while watching the re-run of Poirot that OETA does on Saturday nights.
* Mostly this weekend though, I worked on the Moominhouse. (And I got the notice of the charge for another shipment today, so there's at least one more coming - I have like 7-10 boxes stacked up I need to work through).
I did bits and pieces of things - the basement "drawer" which serves as storage, and the basement floor should be totally done now. And I put together a floor clock that was mostly just attaching a couple molded pieces of plastic together.
And then this. I think this was the hardest thing I've made of the whole series of kits
It's a china cabinet. The pencil is for scale - this is a 1:24 kit, so 1" on an item would be 2 feet on its real-life counterpart. This is half the scale of typical dollhouses (1:12 or one inch in the dollhouse equals 1 foot on a real-life counterpart).
It's very challenging and I can tell my dexterity has declined (I am not sure if it's lack-of-practice, age, or my eyes getting worse, though I will say I could grab the tiny soil invertebrates out of the sample today easily enough and didn't notice any difficulties there). I had to cut all the pieces out of the flatpacks, and then partially assemble the case of the cabinet, then paint it (and the paint job isn't perfect, but then again, the Moominhouse is kind of rustic). Then I had to install the doors which was the hardest part. They're supposed to be able to be opened and closed, and they're hung with TINY pins that are a bit wider than a hair.
They included nine pins and you need eight. I wound up dropping and losing three (they are tiny, both small diameter and short, and it's hard to navigate the tiny holes). Fortunately, sewing pins are about the same diameter so I used sewing pins to replace the missing ones and used my nippers to cut off the rest of the pin.
I hope this is the hardest "build" in the kit, I don't like the extreme fiddliness and it seems like a few things COULD have arrived in a more finished state.
* I did also order a couple tiny additional things from an online source - a tiny teakettle and a little bag of knitting yarn (both 1:24 scale). Because I was a little melancholy earlier today (not sure why, though there's been enough bad news*) and
No, it doesn't REALLY help that much (and I don't have a therapist so I have to tell myself "No") but in this case ordering a few bucks' worth of stuff from Etsy sellers will add to the little house. And it IS frankly kind of nice to have something coming in the mail other than bills, charity requests, or political junk mail.
(* and one of the things that makes me sad was the mass shooting in Fordyce, Arkansas. The minister of the church I belong lived not too far from there and remarked he knew there were people in the town who knew both the victims and the perpetrator. And it's just such a sad and awful thing to think of someone with enough hate in their heart to just go and kill fellow citizens, and on the other side of the coin, it is unpleasant to realize that could happen anywhere I might go myself. As much as my schedule permits I admit I go places - like grocery shopping - at times of low crowds (so: not the end of the day). I just dislike crowds and maybe? I tell myself it's maybe a LITTLE safer if you go grocery shopping at 7 am because maybe someone bent on doing evil won't be out by then? I don't know. People just make me sad.)
* I try to do what I can. I can TELL I feel better about myself when I do things that seem to me like they help people. On Thursday, one of our (excellent) research students came to get some help from me (he got permission to change the padlock on one of our Butler buildings to one he would have a key to, so he can use the space in there for his research, and he didn't know who to give the other key to if someone needed to get in in an emergency, and so I offered to take it - on the grounds that I'm nearly always there when campus is open this summer, and even if I'm at home, I'm five minutes from campus. So I put up a little sign giving my office phone and my cell phone (I am doubting anyone would abuse that, and mostly the students text if they have someone's cell number). And today I tried to help another research student who needed to use SPSS, but the site license had expired so I had to call IT, and I admit I made a slightly bigger deal about it than I might because a research student needed it (I referred to him as a "grad student" over the phone, because I thought he was, and he later corrected me: "uh, I'm just a sophomore" but I told him if IT showed up to just PRETEND he was a grad student, because they might fix it quicker). And I got more stuff at the Kroger for the help-to-the-homeless food pantry my church is helping support: they specifically want protein bars and protein drinks and pop-top meal type things (I got little cans of tuna), so people without access to much in the way of food preparation ability can still eat. And yeah, in a more just world we wouldn't have to do that, and people would be able to eat what they chose rather than handout tuna or protein bars, but....
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