Meanwhile, house stuff continues. My jewel of a friend Steve suggested looking on Craigslist, and lo and behold, I found a bisque-colored five-year-old gas range in a nearby town for $150, which Steve went and looked at yesterday, as that's the town where his office is, and got it for $125 - it apparently has a few scratches on top, and I'm not sure what that means, but it'll work, and Steve will pick it up for me tomorrow. He also removed the track lighting in the bathroom and covered the big hole with a white plate, since there are sconces ("scones," Jerry inevitably call them) on either side of the mirror, so there is enough light in that room as is without going to the expense and effort of replacing the track lighting. I got the kitchen cleaned up, including using something no doubt horribly toxic to get mineral deposits off the drains in the sink, and still need to polish away the scratches in the Wilsonart countertops, but that leaves only a few rooms left to clean, the porch, the garage and the yard to neaten up.
I've also started an online program to obtain a certificate in copy editing - finally. It's a little less rigorous than I expected - well, a lot less rigorous - but it's useful, because I've never actually worked with a style manual before, and although I'm finding dealing with the nitpicky differences between the AP and Chicago stylebooks annoying, I know it's a major part of professional copy editing. And I do find it fun, given that I'm what the instructor refers to as a "word nerd," so, at least so far, I'm thinking this is the right path to be following.
So: working on getting rid of a headache I woke up with, then it's back to the AP Stylebook and my homework. "Homework" - wow! Very curious to be using that word for the first time since my abortive attempt to learn Chinese in the early 1990s. And I think this is the first time I ever studied something with a purpose in mind, too - how very liberal arts of me.
Wow. An entire blog post focused entirely on ME. How totally bizarre and inappropriate for a personal blog (thanks, Alicia!).
ETA: Oh, whoops, meant to post evidence:
