The lyf so short

it pours. Which is not fun if you're out camping.

(On the plus side, the new tent has now been properly rained in. And we've got a barn in which we could put it up to dry afterwards.)

It's also not fun to suffer lumbago on the morning of the day when you have to load the car with all (well, most of) our LARP equipment.

Not that I get to do any LARPing while running after the kidlets. But at least the lumbago got better fast.

It's not fun to come back and find out that the husband, who didn't come along because of other appointments, suffered acute hearing loss ("Hörsturz"). Likely cause: Too much stress. Nobody's surprised. Well, I'm surprised that it took this long. I've been expecting acute burn-out for over a year, to be honest. Well, now he's on sick leave for the week. The left ear is almost entirely deaf, the right ear has lost 40% of its capacity. If this hasn't improved significantly by tomorrow, the Otorhinolaryngothingamabob is going to put him on sick leave for at least a month. Also, cortisone with all that entails.

The straw that broke his back (or, in this case, ear) was the fact that our solar heating system broke. Yet again. This time, it blew most of its filling of stinky fluid into the heating/washing room on top of everything.

In that light, it's really silly to get upset (REALLY upset, as in absurdly furious) about the many idiotic things that the mother-in-law does. But when you're already on the edge, the smallest thing can set you off. You know that, I know that, she doesn't. She's really offended because "we always criticise her". Right now, neither Jörg nor I manage to care. She's always like "Well if you reach my age, you'll make mistakes too!" Woman, we make mistakes NOW. But we are aware that we're responsible for our mistakes. Even if we make them based on insufficient information we received by asking the wrong person the wrong question instead of thinking for ourselves for a second. But honestly, you can't always blame your age! Either you're sensible enough to make your own decisions, or you need to be put under tutelage. At whatever age.)

Well, buggre all this for a larke.

Sorry about the negativity. I hope the next post will be nicer.

*snickers*

In Tolkien - specifically, Silmarillion - fanfic, there's a sort of movement that strives to explain the originally mythological goings-on and/or backgrounds in other ways, mostly natural science. Sometimes this results in really awesome stories and thought experiments while sometimes I dislike it because it deconstructs things just a bit too much for my taste. Kinda like in real life, really: If it gets too deconstructive, I'm off...
Anyway, among the MEFA nominees is ( OMG SOMETHING SPOILERIFIC IF YOU HAVEN'T READ 'ON THE TWILIT PLANET BELOW' YET! )

(I thought I'd never get to use this icon. Finally! Finally! >:D)

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In more productive news, I cut all the reeds in our constructed wetland (thank you, al_pha!), because that's what you have to do in autumn to keep it nice and orderly and growing back next spring, or something. Most of the reeds I used as mulch for the garden, but some I kept to try making skeps later on. No, I won't use skeps on my real bees, but they'll be cool to have for LARP events. Remember, guys, it's all fun and games as long as it only happens to fictional people! Or bees, as the case may be.