To be honest, it’s been a good, but hard (writing-wise) couple of months. August was hot, and I was trying to get some writing in, (I did manage some writing), but not the same momentum I had before my depression crash in May. I did get a lot of doctor appointments done, though, and it appears I’m in good physical health (although the usual fatphobic medicine stuff made it rough going, even with the overall great Swiss medical care).

In September we did a lot of travelling, which was great fun! The Wife bought a Porsche 911 Turbo, which is quite the sexy car (very fitting for her!) and we went road trippin’. We took our first spin up to the Schilthorn, which is where, if you didn’t know, the James Bond film “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service” was filmed. Of course, we had to go to the James Bond Brunch at the 360 Restaurant! The weather wasn’t cooperating with the view from the top, but that didn’t stop the trip from being amazing!

The Wife made a little video of the trip:

Yes, that was our view out of our hotel room. It was glorious! We’re definitely going to go back again for another weekend!

The week after the Schilthorn, we took a massive road trip to show off the car to my Father-In-Law in Mallorca, Spain. We first went to Geneva, where I finally got to see the UN Building there. I’ve now been to all three major sites for the UN (NYC, San Francisco, and Geneva). I know, a strange kind of goal, but I’m a history nerd, what can I say?

After a couple of days in Geneva, we drove to Perpignan, France. The drive was really nice, and the French countryside, even from the highway, was really beautiful! The only not-so-great place was a rest area restaurant where there was cafeteria style food that was completely unattended and looked extremely unappetizing. Weird for France, I know! We left there pretty quickly, and just decided to go to our hotel, where, even though it was a really basic hotel, the little restaurant made up for the nasty rest area!

We also had a couple of kitties come and join us for dinner. They were super cute, and pretty smart. The waitresses tried to shoo them away, but there were many of us diners who snuck them some chicken or sausage. This tabby seemed pretty fond of us, even before we got our food. Probably figured us for the witches we are!

The funniest thing to see was all of the men have their brains explode a little when they saw us get out of the Porsche. When we pulled into the hotel parking lot at Perpignan, there were a lot of construction contract workers in the parking lot. They all turned their heads to check out the car (of course, right?), but you should have seen their jaws drop when we got out. This happened a lot during the trip, and I can’t lie, I got a certain bit of satisfaction watching it happen. 😉

The next day, we drove to Barcelona. Finding where we were supposed to be was rough going, but after several roundabout circuits, we finally managed to figure out where the ticket office was. There was even a part where The Wife had to play “dumb tourists” to a cop because we were so turned around. (No worries. I think he basically said the equivalent of “friggin’ tourists!” in Spanish and let us go on our way.) We finally made it to the parking area to wait to get on the ferry, and eventually onto the ship itself. I’d never been on a ferry like that before, and while it was a good experience, we both decided that we’ll stick to flying for future trips.

We had a lovely time in Mallorca, very chill, with lots of good food. We even saw some hot air balloons on our way back to Palma for the trip back to Barcelona!

After surviving Barcelona traffic and a night at a hotel after the return ferry, we went back through France. This time we stopped in Grenoble. The hotel was just outside the city, but it felt like it was in the middle of nowhere. We had a great dinner and breakfast, and I also whipped out the camera to take pictures of the beautiful scenery just outside our window!

After that we made it back to Zuerich, and we were quite happy to do so. It was an awesome trip, but it’s always good to come home again. We’re planning many more road trips for the future.

This month, so far, I’ve been planning for Samhain, taking our friend Kat up to the Schilthorn, and recovering from the road trip. I’ll post pictures from the Schilthorn trip in another post, as I need to brag about my new camera!

But right this second, I’m trying to clear the decks in preparation for NaNoWriMo. I hope to either completely finish my novel, or at least get this next part of the novel done. If you’re also doing NaNo, come friend me over there!

Writing:

• Unity Space Corps: This is a military hard sci-fi novel set in a future where humans have colonized several other planets. The main character is a Religious Program Specialist and Senior Communications officer who has PTSD and works with the station’s Chaplain to figure out why the colonization survey they’re supporting isn’t going according to plan.
  • Finished Draft Part 1 (Chapters 1-17!)
  • Started Chapter 3 of Part 2
  • Word count as of today: 63077
• The Four Keys: A spiritual prose journey to the underworld and back.
  • Needs final edit pass and cover for e-book version.
  • Graphic novel version on hold for the time being.
• The Little Tarot E-book: This is a book started for my tarot class here in Zuerich
  • Still in draft. Need to finish Major Arcana and more spreads.
  • Edits will happen after NaNo

Travel:

• Next Introvert Trip: Maybe back up to the mountains, or Lugano? Maybe in November.
• Florida Trip: Going to Florida from January 7-21, 2020 to visit my parents.
• Possible Road Trips to Various European Places: Still deciding
• Rome/Vatican: Will definitely be going, but still need to plan.

Fiber Arts:

Now that Fall is settling in and it’s getting closer to Winter, I’m starting to pick up my fiber stuff again. I decided to sell my tapestry loom, since, while I like it, I don’t love it like I do rigid heddle weaving or the inkle loom. I’ve sold it to a nice person in Iowa, and I hope they get a lot of great use out of it!

I’ve also decided to get an electric wheel. I love my Louet Victoria, don’t get me wrong, but the way we have things arranged in our apartment, it’s not as practical for me to spin with the Victoria while watching TV anymore. An electric spinner is going to solve that problem quite nicely. I’m going to get the Ashford E-spinner 3, which comes with the spinner, foot pedal, 3 bobbins, Lazy Kate, and a bag to carry it all in. There’s a local Swiss fiber place where I can order it, too! (Yay! No VAT!)

I’ve also started crocheting again, and at the moment have picked back up the Bacon Scarf I’ve been making for Sarah. (I am actually using a bacon colored yarn, and it sort of looks like bacon. Pics coming later!) I also have a project that is months overdue on the loom, but I think I’ll get back on that horse, too. Winter is a really good time for it!

Photography:

I’ve been really getting into photography in the last few months. I’d been borrowing Sarah’s Nikon Df for awhile, and I love the camera, but we both realized it was time for me to get my own camera and lenses. After much discussion, I decided on a Fuji X-A3 and three lenses. I’ll write more nerdy details about it in another post, but I’m really enjoying it so far. Still learning the tech stuff, but it’s been really fun!