Kentucky Mountain Girl News by Henrietta Asher Handy

Here on Stinnett, The Husband and I do not have cable.  It is an expense we can live without, especially since you can watch TV and movies via Netflix, Sling, and Prime.  Sometimes it is like playing a fun game of good show/bad show because you never know how good the movie is until you are about 30 minutes in.

We have picked some really good ones of late.  The most recent one is Beyond Skyline.  It is the post-apocalyptic follow-up to Skyline – it is good, too – when the world was invaded and a different perspective, i.e. from the civilian perspective.  There is a lot of action, some pretty good acting, a good story, and … wait for it … heroism!  Another nice surprise was humor.

In the movie, a cop gets sucked up into an alien spaceship during an alien invasion.  I need to stop there because if I go any further I will give away the movie!  It has some pretty interesting complications, and, yes, the story has been done before, but this version is surprisingly good!

The movie took itself seriously enough to be fun and watchable, even collectible, but didn’t take itself so seriously as to be hokey or over – or under – the top.  It knew the place it should be in, and so did the director and editor, as well as actors, and they achieved it wonderfully.

I didn’t intentionally watch this movie either.  I was heading off to write and the movie’s story and action kept bringing me back until I gave up and watched the movie before going to work.  This doesn’t usually happen.

Beyond Skyline is a decent 3.75 stars in my book.  It is on Netflix this month.

Wagner’s Einsug der Gotte is playing as I sit down to take a minute and just some time to flow through the blehs.

Blehs are when you are in a blah mood and nothing encourages you to get out of it, so you’re also just meh.  Thus – bleh.

Today is very gloomy outside.  Somewhere is getting rain I am pretty sure with the way the sky looks.  The pressure has adjusted, but not in a positive way for me.  This is the first serious pain day I’ve had since being home.  I am truly blessed.  Now I will see just how well my planned regimen really works.  As long as I can stay on top of it everything will be fine.

FK – YA novel – is standing still.  It is only because the pain encouraging the blehs doesn’t encourage some creative activities like writing.  I am also reconsidering the scenario that last went down and I am not at all certain it…works.  It might work in a different place.  So, I am taking advice, the same advice, by the way, from The Husband and Cheyenne and just cutting and pasting the scenario I am so uncertain about into a different word document and just step back and see what comes next.

The bullet journal I am using for FK is now invaluable!  Since the last few scenes of the story keep coming back to haunt me, I’ve been writing down questions, high lighting them, and when I know the answer, going back and filling it in.  I can also put a notation of it in the bullet journal index as to where the information is if I think it warrants that much importance.  So far, only three of the questions I’ve asked have been plot changers.  A couple of them I did not want to make, but the story works better if some things don’t happen in specific chapters or areas of the story as I originally had them.

Each time I work seriously on a piece, it seems it teaches me something important about the craft of telling a good story.  There is always something new to discover about the art of it all.  And, this does not mean I am calling myself an “artist” because an artist brings about true beauty and teaches us something about the appreciation of life and living.  I am a story teller.  It is enough.

Today there was a massive storm!  Rain fell so fast and so hard it was white outside the window!  Thunder rumbled overhead and the lightning was so intense it took out the modem!  There was a super-loud “SNAP!” and all the dogs that were in the living room were fighting to get into my lap.  Big ol’ Willie Fu tried to get in my lap, but he just couldn’t get all of him in my lap while Wicket was positive the world was ending and the only way it was going to be stopped was if he was in Mommy’s arms.  Bucky, the newer pup, was content to be under the wheelchair.  Chewie, on the other hand, pressed himself against me so hard after he found me – his eyes are bad now – I made sure to power off the chair because if the controller was bumped and the chair moved at all, he would have been hurt.

I managed to get everyone soothed a little by going into the living room and sitting in my normal spot with my feet propped up.  Willie reluctantly got on the couch and Wicket was pressed up against my left leg and foot.  Chewie decided he was OK and lay between the TV and me – not so far he couldn’t find me quickly, but not so far away either.  Bucky, this time, pressed himself up against the right wheel of the chair but put his head on his paws.  However, after the next big rolling rumble of thunder, we had to move into the kitchen where the little dogs got under the table with my feet, while the two bigger ones grabbed a side press themselves up against the wheels as hard as they could.

It wasn’t until the storm was over, except for a little more rain, I was finally able to leave the kitchen and go back into the living room where the sound came from and all the dogs.  It took only a few seconds to locate the source of the loud snap.  The modem was in death rows of blinking lights, sequences varied.  It was also humming faintly.

Willie watched the blinking lights intently.  If I was close to that thing that scared him, he was going to have my back.  When I moved back away from to see if I could zero in on where it was plugged up.  I was on my way to unplugging power from the back of the modem when The Husband came in from having to go to the store.  As you can probably imagine, there was !MUCH! rejoicing!

Luckily, there weren’t any other electronics harmed, and I was able to get hold of a real person at TDS to get a new modem sent.  I asked if someone from the company could just bring one and set it up for me, but the customer service rep said, “I understand ma’am, but this is the procedure.  Your new modem should be in within the next 5-7(?) business days.”  So, I’ll just expect in within the next ten days.

In other, non-storm-and-dog-modem-related adventures, The Husband and I went to my sister’s in Clay County!  We ate good food.  Had good company.  We laughed and talked.  It was rejuvenation to my very Soul!

Rain is hitting the tin roof of the house and all else is quiet.  Cars aren’t going up and down the road very much.  Birds are singing joyfully as if they are giving thanks for the rain.  The dogs are circled around me dozing, contented.

This is a good day.

Last night I wasn’t very sleepy so I went to work.  Writing between 10:30 PM and 3:30-4:00 AM is a magical time to write.  The house is quiet.  Most of the day concerns are settled or put to the side until the next one and the mind is freer to be creative.  No wonder Emily Dickenson loved to write around three o’clock in the morning!

Words 7/5/18:  2447

Goal:  100,000

Total word count:  as of 7/5/18  8,301

Words remaining:  91,699