This week has been A Lot.
The shelter we adopted the kittens from is going to help us get them neutered. It’s a little wonky at the moment, scheduling-wise, but it means that we might not drown trying to get everything taken care of with a wiped out bank account.
Several wildly generous people donated to the Goblin Boys Medical Fund, which made me cry. The timing was excellent, too, since Bodach developed an eye issue today that, if it doesn’t improve by tomorrow, will need to be seen by the vet asap. So at least I can pay for that from the donated fund.
Depending how nitpicky a mechanic I end up with, my truck might not pass inspection this year, and I’ll have to come up with the money to get a borderline issue fixed immediately. Also got the news that it probably has about a year left before I have to either replace it or spend more than it’s worth to try and limp it along further. Assuming it doesn’t break down sooner. Figures. I just sold Dad’s Tacoma in July, too. It would have been cheaper to fix that up and let the Rav4 retire. Sadly, I needed the money from that to pay the bills on the Albatross House. Need to get rid of that cursed place.
We were trying to avoid turning the heat on as long as possible, given heating oil prices, but my chronic pain informed me yesterday that that’s no longer an option if I want to be able to do anything beyond lie on the couch and cry. Oh, and the first oil delivery of the season and overdue furnace tuneup is just over a week away. Here’s hoping that nothing goes wrong with that, seeing as that is also going to run at least a grand already.
The good news, at least, is that while yeah, most of this is catastrophically bad at the moment, it’s temporary. We just need to manage to ride out a bad month or two and things will improve once we get past this immediate clusterfuck of expenses and not drown between now and then.
On a really exciting note, I’m looking at renting a studio space with a couple of friends at an art community about a half an hour away, which will let me bring some of the projects that are too big or complicated to work on at the home studio (aka, the spare bedroom), give me a space to go that I won’t be tempted to procrasticlean, get to be around other artists, and also have a physical space to sell art directly during Open Studio events so I’m not exclusively online. Folks are aware of the current disaster with the finances, and the limited timeframe on them, and are willing to work with me around it. While I’m nervous about being indoors around other people during a still-too-active pandemic, I’m at the point where I’m going to have to do so if I want to be able to get further than I am. At least the folks I’ll be sharing a room with understand basic safety protocols and are all fully vaccinated, and it’s a giant mill with lots of airspace.
The new studio space? Yeah, turns out it was started last year by a few folks who left the studio colony they were at before to start someplace that was more affordable to smaller artists than the old place had become. The one they left is the same place that I shared a studio with another friend, 12 years ago, that I left because of the Cataclysm of 2008. Assuming we get the space, it’s going to be soooo good to be back in a repurposed old mill full of artists again! I have missed it almost every day since I left.
So yeah….A Lot this week. Art-wise, I’m stuck on the damned Hallows ghost story, again, but I did get a new Foxenwood painting started and am keeping my spirits up by thinking of the days when I’ll be able to work on larger paintings and make brumeries without worrying about a stray metal clipping being eaten by a cat.
Speaking of cats, Oisin is yelling at the door, so I guess it’s time to wrap up and go to bed.
May things get vastly less eventful very soon…