Category Archives: Announcements

Status Update

Travel, Illness, Trolls, and the Feeding Thereof.

1 Comment

So it has been a while since my last posting…Understatement, I know. The latter half of December went more than a little haywire, courtesy of the topics in my title.

Firstly, travel: I got called back to New York for a Happy Family Emergency. I’ll post that separately, as it’s a fun story; but the travel home was hellish. Said hellish travel feeds into the other two topics, illness and trolls.

Illness is self-explanatory, I hope. If not, well, you are obviously not someone with the messed up immune system that most people with a chronic pain/autoimmune/genetic disorder have. If I stress, I get sick, if I’m exposed to crowds, I’ll most likely get whatever ick is in that crowd. If I’m exhausted from traveling, having been exposed to crowds and temperature extremes and being stressed at the same time??? SOOOOO Sick. If I come home from this only to find a disapproving Troll on my blog posting negatively?? Cue Sick and Depression Meltdown!

I’ve spent from December 22nd to January 14th in a haze. Depression is made of suck, and it hits everyone differently. Christmas was a haze of blah, despite everything SC did to make things better. A cold that settled in my chest left me with little energy and Depression ate my motivation and all color. Yes, Depression is capitalized. It’s a proper name; Depression is a monster I battle. It wins a few rounds, mostly because it cheats with stress and pain, or I win a few rounds. It’s a cycle. This time it won 3 weeks of my life. I marathoned 12 seasons of both Ancient Aliens and Forensic Files. Mostly because I didn’t have to think while watching them. I did develop a great theory on Giorgio Tsoukalos’s hair.

Thankfully, I have a good support network of friends and family, both IRL and online. They were there when I started to climb my way back out of the colorless Blah of Depression. This is life. My world has color and purpose again; I want to finish the posts I’d planned for Christmas and start my 2019 posts on National Puzzle Day on January 29th, 2019.

And my Troll? I’m going to face them. I’ve found that I have a lot to say. I’ll feed my anonymous troll and hope they choke. 

 

 

Announcements

Announcing PPB’s First 25 Days of XMAS!!

3 Comments

Hi guys! If you were wondering…yes, I love Christmas! So much so that I’ve plotted and planned a full 25 days worth of posts for it! Now, not all of the days will be Christmas themed, after all, Christmas is just one day, and winter is just one season. I hate it when all of my presents are winter themed and I can’t used them out of season.

Also, I’m announcing here and now that PPB will be scaling back the posting frequency for the months of January and February. This is in anticipation of some larger projects I’m planning as well as the fact that I’d like to be prepared for any possible illness that might crop up. There will be things going on my Twitter, Instagram and Patreon, so make sure to keep your eyes peeled!

Announcements, SC Post, Status Update

Life reminds us that some things only depart for a while

Leave a comment

Greetings All!

TL:DR – SC had to medicate PuzzlePaws for pain, so the next post will be late.

SC here, PuzzlePaws is feeling a touch under the weather.  She had an ambitious post planned and was about halfway through the initial filming when her knee (which has almost NEVER been a problem before) declared that now was a good time to report Level 9+ pain for no reason (i.e. injury, impact, weather, etc).

She tried to tough it out and “walk it off” with only OTC painkiller and a muscle relaxer, but the knee wasn’t having any of it (9 -> 7).  I caught her at it, dosed her with Rx painkillers, and sent her to bed for the rest of the day.

At this point, PuzzlePaws can’t string two words together and is grumpily sleeping.  She should be fine in a couple of days (or in less pain).

Chronic diseases are like this.  You’ll get some periods of time where the symptoms are tolerable to non-existent, and then…WHAM! Level 9-10+ pain.  You can’t work through the pain, because it is ALL you can think about.  When you medicate the pain, you can’t work because the medications steal your brains.  (For reference, PuzzlePaws’ pain tolerance is about 2-3x higher than a bog-standard human’s.  A “9” on her scale would put most people (likely unconscious and/or vomiting)  in the hospital.)

Posts from me will be rare (other than the occasional snarky edit here and there). I will be posting how-to videos on the Patreon (and occasionally here) when I have the time.

Ciao, SC

Thanks for reading, and please click the Follow Button under my profile on the right side of the page. To support posts like this in the future, consider joining my Patreon!

Announcements, Video

Hurricane Florence: Evacuations and Safety

2 Comments

So things got a bit crazy this week. I’d been tracking Hurricane Florence for a while, but after Monday’s post, the Governor of Virginia issued an Order of Evacuation for people living in Zone A.  I live in Zone A and had already had an issue with flooding earlier over the weekend. SC and I were taking no chances. We had to hurry!

Thankfully, one of my best friends has a standing offer for us and the cats. We managed to pack all five cats, a tote-full of puzzles and coloring books, clothes, and the computers in under 10 hours. We did our best to place our electronics and valuables out of the way, but flooding is something that is really hard to predict.

Due to bunking down in my bestie’s sewing room and storm preparations, I don’t have any reviews written up. However, I do have a pair of unboxing videos of puzzles that are currently safe in the Tote of Doom! Please be kind, SC wasn’t able to run them through post-production.

Gearheads website

Artifact Puzzles website

So far, we are safe and warm. SC is making curry in the kitchen while it storms outside. I’ll be posting updates on Twitter as I know what is going on and how bad or not! the damages to our house are.

Announcements

Patreon is Live!

Leave a comment

After many suggestions and with SC’s help, I’ve started my Patreon. I know the blog is new and we’re still growing but there’s been some interest in our videos.  We also want to help others create content on a shoestring.

(SC Edit: From personal experience, half of what we do was done by someone else who blogged about it.  Making videos about “How did you two do that?!”, and providing them for free is a perfect form of “Pay it forward”.  To provide video content for free, financial support helps (I work 40+ hours/week, I help PuzzlePaws in my spare time).

Individuals who support PuzzlePaws via Patreon will get benefits based on the level of their contribution including: Content from me (the Spouse-Critter), First-look content (before it is available on the blog), exclusive content, and access to giveaways (we can’t keep ALL these puzzles/coloring books/kits, no matter what PuzzlePaws would like to do!))

Announcements

A new venture

Leave a comment

Welcome to my new venture.  I will be reviewing puzzles, coloring books, and building brick kits that could be of interest to individuals whose minds are sharp, but their mobility is limited.  There will be adventures — and cats, as mine get into everything.

I am currently working on my first puzzle to be reviewed while watching Shark Week 2018. I assure you, the puzzle is appropriately themed!

#puzzlepaws #sharkweek2018

Thanks for reading, and please click the Follow Button under my profile on the right side of the page. To support posts like this in the future, consider joining my Patreon!