Corner of Bourbon & Division

We're getting a new schedule in November. I've probably written about that before, not too long ago. I think the new schedule will be better for me, overall. I'll be working twelve-hour shifts, which means fewer days at the office, but longer hours. It's a trade-off. It means I'll never have the problem of having to work seven night shifts in a row, which is a HUGE bonus for me. Night shift does nothing good for me.

Near as I can figure, the pattern is as follows: three days on, two days off, two days on, two days off. I spend two weeks a month doing that pattern on day shift: 07:00 to 19:00, and two weeks on night shift: 19:00 to 07:00. It's going to take some serious adjustment, but I think I can do it. For one thing, I'm going to end up working only about half the days of the year, which is really awesome. I'm a bit worried about the two weeks' worth of night shift, but I'm told by people who've worked twelve-hour shifts before that it's way easier than seven nights in a row.

The other bonus is that every six weeks or so I'll have "earned" a day off, by virtue of having worked a few too many hours. So I'll end up with a four-day weekend roughly every month and a half, and that's without touching my vacation time at all. I've already got a pretty significant backlog of vacation time anyway, by virtue of having worked so much overtime in the past couple of years: I took all my vacations from my "banked" time rather than my annual vacation, and my bank is still pretty full.

Yet another advantage is that, unlike my current rotating schedule, which varies all the freaking time, I'll be able to time myself like a metronome. The schedule will remain fixed, with no variation at all. That means I might actually be able to get a routine going. I like routines: they make my life go much more smoothly.


For the moment, I'm stuck on the current schedule until October 30th. That means that in the meantime I have to do all the turn-of-the-season stuff while still working ridiculous shifts. I'm sure I can get most if not all of it done, but I do wish that they'd decided to start the new schedule in October.

I just got a pressure canner! I am very excited, although my enthusiasm was dampened by the *expletive deleted* extra shipping charge that got tacked on AT MY DOOR. Gnarr.

So now I have to get my act together and start canning like a mad canning thing. For one, all the tomatoes that were likely to ripen have ripened, and if I put it off much longer, then they will go bad. In fact, I should freeze 'em, so that they don't go off before I can can them. *goes to do just that* I'm not sure what to do with the rest of them. The poor Brandywines haven't ripened, and I'm not sure if I can mix the green Brandywines with the other green tomatoes in order to make chutney, but I don't see why not.

I want to start canning in larger quantities this year. I've been poking at the Bernardin book and Ball Blue Book of Canning, and with any luck I'll have a lot more homemade food this year. I want to try my hand at canning soups and stews and the like, which ought to make bringing lunches to work much easier. I hope.

Most of the plants in the garden have bolted at this point, but overall for a first attempt at a garden I'm quite pleased. I have to put everything to bed in the next few weeks, and I'm going to try to get my hands on some fertilizer to spread on all the beds for the duration of the winter. Next spring I'll put in some more, and with any luck the weather will be better and I'll have a gorgeous new crops. There's a lot of planning in my future, and, with any luck, with the new schedule at work I'll have time to implement it all.

So the ick has turned into a fully-fledged summer cold. Bleargh. On the plus side, I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of colds I've had in the past five years. The last time I had a cold was last October (according to LJ), and it was pretty minor. Overall, this one feels as though it's not going to be too bad either. I'm congested, but the chest thing seems to have improved. The bad part about not having been sick since last year is that I don't have a single decongestant in the house. Bah.

In non-ick-related news, I not altogether surprisingly didn't get everything done yesterday. I did, however, can all my rhubarb, which once it was cooked and organized turned into less rhubarb than I was afraid I had. I have a little over four litres of the stuff, which is all to the good. The canning appears to have gone off without a hitch, with all four jars going "POP!" when they were supposed to, which makes me very happy.

I also finished the god-blessed baby blanket. Looking at it now, I realize that I probably should have put in at least two more repeats, but I was really sick of it (no pun intended) and it looks fine. Pictures will be forthcoming, as I have once more located my camera cable. ;)

So today is a day for more domestic chores, and then in the evening I will be off to visit the Parental Units for dinner. They have been feeling neglected, and rightly so, since I haven't seen them since the end of July, what with work and WorldCon and the like.

Okay. Off to get coffee.

The garden is booming. The tomatoes have made an appearance, and a few of them have ripened without my noticing. I have ninja tomatoes, apparently.

The peppers are sulking, but while they haven't grown, they have produced flowers, so I am cautiously optimistic.

I got one tiny cucumber off one plant, and the other plant has a cucumber on it too. I hope that next year the harvest will be better.

The herbs survived in spite of my not weeding the garden for about a month. The tarragon isn't very happy but it's hanging in there. The mint had a battle to the death with the bindweed, the clover, and the grass, and came out the victor once I cleared out the debris. I'm vaguely frightened. ;)

My garlic disappeared. I think something ate it. There is *one* bulb left.

The basil has gone nuts and is three feet tall. The carrots that moonandtree planted are doing well, as are the beets.

moonandtree and I got a lot of weeding done today. I am taking a break right now because I'm hot, tired and thirsty, but depending on how the rest of the day goes I'm going to try to get out there again to spread some cedar mulch where we weeded, to discourage the weeds from coming back too strongly again.

I also harvested the rhubarb, which I think I left a little late. I lost some of the stalks to... well, rot, I'm guessing. Still, I have a TON of rhubarb. I see canning in my immediate future. Gotta pull out my canning recipe for rhubarb and make sure I have enough jars for it.

Today's to-do list includes dishes, laundry, gardening, finishing the baby blanket, and getting in some writing. If I have time I'll be canning the rhubarb. If not, that will happen tomorrow at the latest. Oh, and I have to call my mother before she convinces herself that I've decided never to speak to her again.

In non-domestic news, I appear to have some sort of weird summer cold. I had a horrific sore throat all day on Thursday and it got a bit better yesterday, but today I woke up slightly congested and with the feeling that someone had settled a wildebeest on my chest: not quite an elephant, but big and heavy and inconvenient nonetheless, and the occasional racking coughing fits aren't as fun as you'd think. I'm feeling better now —being outside in the warmth helped— but I can feel whatever it is lingering in the background.