"A large income is the best recipe for happiness I ever heard of" (Jane Austen).

Zippy lookin' cute.

Been blocked on the blog all day. Been blocked on everything. I did get the laundry room and upstairs bathroom cleaned, some bread baked, my portfolio edited (60 pages), a horseback ride in with Dad, the garden tended, some writing exercises and reading done, along with a workout, and pizza for supper. Somehow I fell I haven’t gotten shit done today. I meant to blog about ag or farm life today, but haven’t found anything to pass an opinion or report on.

It rained today. I’ll need to pick peas tomorrow. I’m being overrun by zucchini and jalapeños and soon to be inundated with summer squash and cucumber. The potatoes are up to my waist and the tomatoes are so dense you can’t see daylight through the leaves. I still have two that need caging, but I only just got the cages Saturday and forgot to take them with me to the farm tonight. I was busy trying not to run over Max.

Just finished watching Becoming Jane. It was all right, but I liked the PBS version, Miss Austen Regrets, better. Of course, why wouldn’t I plug PBS? I admire Jane Austen. Maybe it’s just because she was a woman writer, earning a living by writing in an age when society frowned on women with an occupation. The Republic of Pemberly discusses Miss Austen and her works at length.

I’m stuck on a short story tonight. A story about Luke, nearly eight years in the making. At first, I always wrote books, planned for books more like. But when I read Strange Candy by LKH, I realized that sometimes a whole world can exist in a short story. So many book-length stories from years ago got condensed down to short stories, where they feel more comfortable. Luke, for instance, didn’t think he had enough to say for a book. And Chi is entirely too modest, a farm girl in a wizard’s tower after all.

Guess I wrote about farm life after all today.