The Shelter Chronicles, Part II

What's up? I know it's been a while. I've been deep undercover here at the abode, working from home and thinking it's time to try a work-from-home hair color. 😸 Because it's the first time in my life that I've felt that it's acceptable. Seriously, a couple of decades ago, we were told at work that we were not allowed to have blue hair. I didn't have blue hair, but some did, and it was frowned upon. I will not have blue hair, and it will be much more subtle. Just dipping my toe into the river of unorthodox hair colors.

What else have I been up to? I bought a new sofa. Pink. I am officially into unconventional sofa color territory. I ordered a coffee table. That's about the extent of my decorating. I have to get the art wall rehung, which will be difficult because I have to balance sizes and frame colors. The question now is how to balance unchangeable wall color, sofa color, curtain color, and rug color. Rugs and curtains are a future problem to be worked out.

I finished playing a game that I really, really, enjoyed. It's an older game that I had read positive reviews on, Rhiannon and the Curse of the Four Branches. It's set in Wales and involves a lot of Welsh mythology. If you don't like to read or don't like challenging puzzles, it's probably not for you. The game is old, but it was very well done. After that game, I went searching for more point-and-click adventure games and ran across The Cabinets of Doctor Arcana. This is a fairly recent game made in the style of older games. It's more puzzle intensive. I really enjoyed it, and game has 65 5-star reviews. Now I'm about to attempt Dark Fall: Lost Souls. I usually play more hidden object games like Midnight Castle, but I've been doing the Midnight Castle Spring Event for well over a month, and I'm just needing to work on something else. :) I like Midnight Castle a lot, but the challenge was just really a lot of work, and I was getting burned out near the end.

I finally watched The Girl with All the Gifts on Netflix, and it was pretty good, although--again--zombies aren't really my thing. I felt like there was more that could have been done with the story. It had a lot more potential, and I did wonder about the message that it's okay to sacrifice the future of all humanity for the sake of something else not human. The resolution seemed rather selfishly destructive and somewhat unresolutionary. I also finally got to watch John Wick 3. Keanu is one of my favorites. :) So, sure, JW is violent, but it's self-defense, and he's not out to wipe out all of humanity.

I finished reading Voices in the Snow, the first book in Darcy Coates's Black Winter series. It was very good. She always has an unexpected twist, and although this particular sub-genre is not usually my thing, I think I'll read the next one. I'm in the last chapters of one of her older books, House of Shadows (Ghosts and Shadows Book 1), which I'm reading because I really like her style, and because I'm currently brainstorming a Gothic novel and wanted to make sure mine is not too similar, beyond the usual tropes of the genre. I've always been far more of a Bronte girl than an Austin girl, so I like the gloomy atmosphere. There have been times when "I'm Only Happy When It Rains" has been my theme song and times when "Dance Monkey" was my theme song. First, before I launch into writing the new gloomy Gothic novel, I must finish editing this one, which is approaching 99K words during edits. *Le sigh*