Sinuses, Pumpkins, Colds and Internet Woes or How I Apparently Upset an Ancient Spirit...

Hello Friends,

It has been a crazy few weeks y'all. I don't know what evil spirit I peeved off but dang! So follow me as I go through the craziness of the last few weeks. 

Sinus Woes of Halloween 

So the week following the Smoky Mountain Geek Expo I started having a big shift in my mental heath I wasn't feeling well and we had like a shift in weather it rained a few days which brought my mood down. Well close to Halloween I was noticing a lot mucus building up in me cause of post nasal drip, I was coughing a lot and it was causing chest congestion so I spent a few days panicking trying figure out if sinuses or a cold because I had a convention with the Captain coming up the 1st and she can't get sick. Well we did manage to figure out it was my sinuses, cause the Captain who has sinus problems too was going through the same thing. 

So Halloween came and in the midst of choking on my mucus I managed to carve a freckled face sweetie and My mom utilized pumpkin seeds in her Jack-o-Lantern.

Then we sat down to our Halloween meal that featured this Ham Monster:

                                                   

 We feasted as we watched the old Halloween shows late into the night. Very late...

 

Cons and Colds

Was up early for the Fall WNC Comic Con, which will get it's own post at some point. Captain and I felt great after being assaulted by our sinus issues. Had a good time until we went home and something we were talking about right before I was dropped off triggered my anxiety. So mood tanked again. 

Well the 2nd woke up to take my meds and saw my birth control. It came apparent quickly why I'd felt like crap the last week I was in PMDD H*ll Time. Normally my Mom gives me a heads up, cause she's in charge of filling our meds up in our boxes each week, but bless her she'd been sick, and forgot to tell me. As if that wasn't bad enough I started getting sick as the day went on... Apparently I caught Con crud! I messaged Captain to tell her what happened turns she caught it too! But unfortunately for her she has Cystic Fibrosis which got aggravated by the cold, and I think she is still on meds to heal from it. 

So yeah having a cold and mental health crap sucks, and we're entering that portion of PMDD season right before I start when I become a irritable bear, when my tooth on the right side of my face that's connected to the sinuses starts trying to swell up. I guess sinus issues plus the cold that was working the sinuses and the tooth decided to say "FU". It swelled up a little but not too bad, compare to other times.

Snow Days and the 80's

The 10th we awoke to snow and it brought frigid temps with it.

So this led to my Mom cooking delightful things to warm our body and souls. Like here homemade soup...

 

Cornbread...

And Brownies!

      

The next day it was still really cold, which makes me depressed and as Alwyn Oak would say hibernate. So I had a kind of 80's day. I watched The Last Unicorn, this is the first time I've watched it since I got my new TV, I don't know if it's the higher def or what but I noticed so many details I never noticed before, and saw the pirate cat's appearance at the end of the movie. Someone online mentioned the appearance, I wanna say it was someone on Epbot's Discord. Then I watched The Lost Boys then Tubi decided to line up to play The Lost Boys: The Tribe a movie I just learned existed this year. Wasn't too bad, not as good as the original, but Angus Sutherland was such a good vampire. Seriously how does a vampire hunter create such good vampires. Then we had the northern lights happen in our skies that night, a rare treat.

Internet Hassles and Fires 

The 13th I woke up to my internet being down, and I knew this wasn't just an internet outage. If it had been the top light indicating power to the internet modem would still work, but I had no lights. I unplugged it and plugged it back in. It worked for a bit then out again. I called the company dealt with all that to get a hold of someone. Upon checking they said that the modem had malfunctioned and they scheduled for the technician to come on Monday the 17th. I asked him if it could be cause the modem was just old, it's the one that I got when they installed everything 10 years ago. The guy starts kinda low key freaking out saying don't tell them that! I found it odd given a piece on the satellite for the set up had went out a few years ago and  they replaced it for no charge. That's why we pay extra. Well then the guy abruptly hangs up.

So for the weekend I'm unplugging and plugging this thing to get the internet to work, which was annoying. So it gets to be Sunday the 16th. My Mom is gone with my Grandmother for evening services at the church. So here I am by myself with the cats, it's dark, already a little low key nerve wracking for me, when my sister messages me in a panic asking if we were okay. I'm like why and apparently over the mountain from us a wildfire had started. This explained the sirens I heard earlier. I stepped out on the porch and didn't see flames or smell smoke, but it was slightly unnerving cause that is a fear of mine. Luckily they had it contained in like a couple days.

Monday the 17th comes when the technician suppose to come. I was a little concerned cause they had roads blocked both ways where the fire was and I didn't know if they could get through. Well no one showed up, no call letting us know what happened.  So Tuesday I call to see what happened. They said I hadn't been on the books and the guy had been disconnected and they said we tried to call back.Funny thing we got no call. So luckily they could get a technician to me Thursday the 20th. I picked the morning slot, cause my Mom and I needed to go grocery shopping. Sadly it'd be the day after my online therapy appointment. So Wednesday had to talk to my therapist on the phone.

So I wake up at the butt crack of dawn cause the morning slot would have the technician coming  between 8 or 11. Well waited each hour of the morning slot, no show, I gave him an hour grace period in case there had been issues at a previous job, still no show. 1:45 pm the guy calls saying he's on his way he'll be there in 45 minutes. By the time he gets there to start it's almost 3 and half hour late to the latest of the appointed slot. I'm livid, especially when he doesn't offer an explanation, but I don't say anything. Here's why: I noticed he arrived here at the time for the afternoon slot hours, so I start wondering did they company screw up, they did it before, and as the job went on I had a feeling this might be the case. We were so confused why he was working on the satellite and not the modem. He informed us he'd changed the part I'd just just had replaced a few years ago. Finally figured out it was the modem, and my suspicions correct just old. When we told him that's what the guy on the phone had said, he's like they didn't tell him. I actually brought up about the guy on the phone telling me not to tell him about it was that and he looked at me weird. He couldn't understand why. Then he said he had bad news I have to replace the modem with a new one cause mine was a dinosaur and they didn't make them anymore. My Mom's like do we have to pay for it? He goes no... I'm like I'm failing to see the bad. Hook me up! So he does I have to call the internet company to asked for the equipment upgrade and after a headache we get it. Tech looks at the order they sent him the wrong one. So he's like F it I'll call them on the technician's special line. So after all that got my  modem fixed. Yeah they tech was getting annoyed with the company.

Next day I remember I haven't checked my personal email in weeks. I keep eye on the work more. So I checked it, saw the email from that Monday where I'd made the technician appointment and it said the morning slot. The one they sent on that Thursday to let me know he was coming was changed to afternoon. So it was a mistake on their end. Glad I kept my temper.

Thanksgiving

So Thanksgiving came along and we had a nice spread.

 

At dinner I got to learn a funny story my Dad told my Mom about a prank my Papaw pulled on my Mamaw when my Dad was a little kid. It was a nice Thanksgiving and my sibling called we got to wish her a Happy Birthday which was also that day. 

 

The Last Couple Weeks

 

So the last couple weeks been meh. The 28th the teeth on the left side my face started giving me trouble, luckily that didn't blow up into anything. Monday the 1st we went out to do some essentials shopping. Get to Walmart, and even though it wasn't Black Friday it was crazy. This is the funny thing I can handle a convention crowd but holiday shopping at Walmart, gives me anxiety. I was already stressed trying to get a couple things for people on my list now dodging other shoppers, yeah it about sent me in a panic attack.

So also PMDD time again which has really been rough, even more than last month I think. Sunday the 7th we got a surprise. My Grandmother and Mom had gotten back from church and Mom was telling me about the service when two vehicles pulled up in the yard. I was like what the crap, cause my anxiety was out of sight I was not up for unplanned visitors. My Mom went out to see who it was. Then I hear singing and I'm like carolers?! I stepped out on the porch and sure enough there were carolers. I've lived here 41 years and never had carolers, wanted to do it, but the holler is not built to do it, or so I thought. That's why I went out this was like a rare event.

They were people from church, they prayed with us, and gave us a treat box. 

So yeah that's been the last month. It's taken me weeks to write this because stuff keeps happening and being unwell. I hope you all have a great week! Stay warm if you are in the colder climates, and I'll see ya next time.

*Thrifty Geek* 

I Live Near a Desecrated Cemetery

 Hello my Spooky Loving Friends,

We are in the week of Halloween and we know what that means... It's the perfect time for a Slightly Spooky Story. Currently as I'm beginning the writing of this post the weather is so atmospheric because it's a dreary rainy late October day perfect setting for writing this story...

In the Appalachian Mountains you'll find burial spaces abound. From church graveyards to small family plots, heck I discover a cemetery on a hill overlooking my first elementary school playground. How in the five year I played on that playground my spooky loving butt didn't notice I'll never know. Even the single plot can be found hidden here in the backwoods.

Now within about a mile of my house are four burial areas. There's the church graveyard, where my corpse will be planted when I depart, then on the road to get to my holler there's a road you turn off where somewhere on that property is a forgotten family cemetery that my Dad discovered while hunting. Finally you come to my holler where nestled in the surrounding  shelter of the mountains is two little family plots on my neighbor's property. The first is the newest, my neighbor the Patriarch of the family who purchased the property loved his land so much he decided he wanted to rest in it, so he made a section of his property into a family cemetery. His son has also expressed interest of being buried there. The Patriarch passed a few years ago, peoples it was like something out of old timey Appalachia. His wake was at his house, they set his body up in the living room, and then had a graveside funeral. Now as I mention there's two family plots on the property. Down the hill overlooking my bus stop was another little family cemetery that had family members of our friends who still live nearby. This plot is the focus of our story, of how greed led to desecration and possibly a haunting...

 

I Live Near A Desecrated Cemetery

As a child I loved a good ghost story, of course cause I was an imaginative child that usually came back to bite me in the butt. Now growing up my Dad told me about how our family friends had three family members buried in that spot at the lower part of my neighbor's property, which at this time was hardly used to my recollection. My mother has told me those three are just the ones they know of, so there possibly more could have been interned there. She also said there used to be a rose bush there to mark one of the graves. I always thought this was a cool thing in my holler. 

It wasn't till I was an adult I learned the darker part of this tale. The family whose relatives were interned there had owned a good chunk of land in my community, but had sold of bits and pieces including the property where  the graves were. I guess they figured whoever bought the place would respect the final resting place of the dead. How wrong they were. Before the current owners of the property the land fell into the hands of a realtor. Now this realtor was rumored to have shady practices when it came to selling properties. It was said they had a racket going on with their sibling in the Register of Deeds, if there was any records connected to a property that maybe would make it difficult to sale, the sibling was said to make those records go away, and after the sale they'd show back up mysteriously. My grandmother had spoken to many people who'd have weird file disappearances with this realtor. My family had an incident involving one of his properties and a right away. My Mom had obtain a copy of the survey from the registry of deeds showing our right of way, but when an issue arose about it and they had to go to court, they told my mom they couldn't accept her copy, so she had to get a newer one from the register of deeds, and they couldn't find anything in their records even though it clearly had been on record before. My Mother believes the realtor was trying to force my parents to not use the road my family had been using since my great great grandfather's day to get to our properties. Yeah now I don't know if any record vanishing happened in the case of this property, but it still gives you an idea that this person possibly didn't have a lot of ethics to speak of.

It was in the early 80's not long before I was born, this person, who apparently knew good and well there was a cemetery on the property decided they were going to bulldoze the place.  Now we do know the family had kept a record of where their loved ones were buried, but as for official records no one's sure if any existed at all. Whether there were records or not the realtor proceeded with the bulldozing. It was during the bulldozing my Dad, Uncle, or both of them went up to the guy running the bulldozer and asked him if he knew he was bulldozing a cemetery? The man's face turned white. He said "No and if I had of I wouldn't have done it." So in one act of greed three or possibly more resting places were horribly desecrated. 

Eventually people came seeking to buy the property, one woman wanted to buy that lower half of the property and my parents told her about the cemetery.  Needless to say she backed out. Eventually, our current neighbors bought it, I don't know if they ever knew the creepy history of their property, but yeah they were now the proud owners. I do remember walking up from the bus stop with the Patriarch's grandchildren, and telling them about it, but I don't know if it made it to Granddad's ears.

Well, after hearing the darker version of this as I got older, I'm like "How do we not have a Poltergeist situation?!" These words would come back to haunt, as would my childhood wish to live near a haunted house.

So in my adult years our neighbors had a camper that sat on that section of the property that various I guess family members stayed in over the years. Eventually the camper was removed and the space returned to normal. I didn't think much until around 2021. My grandmother had been talking to the Matriarch of the family when she told my grandmother the reason they got rid of the RV was they couldn't keep people in it. When my Grandmother asked why the Matriarch replied, cause they kept hearing voices... When I found out I'm like called it!

To be honest I was so curious about the voices, and the ghost hunter in me wanted to hang out in the field and get EVPs. I mean it's kinda creepy and cool, except those nights you're up at 3 AM and you think about your what your friend said about why more activity happens at that time, and then the episode of Supernatural you watched that day pops in your head the one with the ghost of the psychic looking menacingly through the window, and you start picturing some old Appalachian's ghost peering through the back door window. Till you remind yourself if they've been haunted the place since their graves been bulldozed and they haven't bothered you once I think your fine. Yeah my imagination still comes to bite me in the butt.

Well that was the state of things for a minute, until one day we're going down the road and saw a house was sitting on that part of the property. Seems one of the Matriarch's grand kids, decided to move a house there, funny given we're sure they were one of the RV people...

So if you're keeping score at home I have a desecrated cemetery that now has a house on it... I affectionately call this house the "Potential Poltergeist House". I mean do you blame me?! This is got the makings of one. Every time I go down the road and see them in the yard it's like do we warn them? I mean if nothing's happening you wouldn't want to ruin that peace, but at the same time I feel like they should have a heads up given some activity has already happened. 

So yes this is the situation in my holler. Disturbed graves, disembodied voices, and now maybe a haunted house...

 

For More Spooky Tales:

So I hope you enjoyed my slightly spooky tale. If you want more scary tales from the area that will probably chill you more than this one I recommend Mountain Ghost Stories and Curious Tales of Western North Carolina by Randy Russell and Janett Barnett. This one has a lot of good stories in it, the one about the Brown Mountain lights was a favorite. I've actually met Randy Russell and he was a pretty cool dude. I also recommend Appalachian Ghosts by Nancy Roberts, if you can find a copy. This was a favorite book among us kids at my old elementary school. Good spooky stories in there.

Well I hope you have a good Halloween and Samhain. Have some sweet treats a few scares and I'll see you next time. God bless!

*Thrifty Geek* 

The Tale of Smoky Mountain Geek Expo 2025

 Hello Friends,

Enter A World of Geeky Delights

So this past Saturday I attended my local convention the Smoky Mountain Geek Expo. It was making its triumphant come back after Tropical Storm Helene got it canceled last year. I was so happy to be back.

History:

This convention started in 2022. It was put together in part by Lee White who owns Geek Mountain in Canton, NC, go check it out it be small but it's awesome, and Lee is such an amazing and welcoming guy. I found out about it by seeing flyers for it at the 2022 Spring WNC Comic Con. I was ecstatic to have a local con, not local in a regional sense, literally local.

Characters:

 

Me: I was Dean Winchester from Supernatural. I will do a little write up about my journey to this cosplay... At some point maybe. But yeah I was armed with salt packets and my dagger, fake of course.

My Friends: Captain was Sylvie from Loki and Fangirl, who opted out of cosplay ,cause not only was this her first convention this year, she'd just had surgery a few weeks before, so she wasn't up for cosplay, so she donned her Scoobynatural shirt and a crocheted wrap she'd made for Halloween. 

 The Road to the Con:

So my friends showed up that morning. As I walk out Captain, our driver, rolls her window down and says"Hey sexy thing, going my way" or something to that effect. I don't if it was cause I was Dean or just to goof with me. I was probably blushing a bit. I go to get in the back seat and Captain warned me she hadn't got it vacuumed from where her dog Brianna had been riding in the back. I looked and there was a lot of dog hair.. I didn't want Dean walking up to the con covered in it so I went back in the house, grabbed two large towels and fashioned me a seat cover. Then we started down my piece of crap road. I'm not kidding when I say my family has cursed this road for a century since my great great Paternal Papaw use to use it to get to his home further up on the mountain. Well as we're being jostled  I was about to say the line Captain's Brother told her and a friend that we love to say at times like this "Hold on to your uterus's girls", I was fixing to say it when it hit me... neither of my friends have uterus's anymore. I told them that and we had a good laugh.

Jack, Captain's Car Skeleton, is the death of the party.

I actually ended up laughing at one point cause I saw Captain's radio display and it was the song Don't Fear the Reaper, which had been used in Supernatural. Well the day was gorgeous, and just a lot of signs it was going to be a good day:

When we get there we were shocked at the line. Now I don't know if this is normal cause we got there an hour later or cause, and this is my hope, that it's getting more popular. 

So after a few minute wait, we got inside in a timely manner, and got stamped. We were officially at the Expo. Sadly the air conditioning was on the fritz this year so we were toasty I was just grateful I was in my 11th Doctor costume.

 

The Con:

 After signing the posters they get guests to sign. My friends got stopped by the 501st Legion who asked Captain what planet was she from. She informed him she wasn't good at improve and said Asgard. 

 

 

The Expo had some new merch and this year they had pins! I was so excited. See I always get pins at cons and occasionally ren faires I attend. I blame my biker Uncle. I saw his riding vest that had all these pins on the back from all the biker rallies he'd been to, and I wanted to start something like that for my events. So I started getting pins at all my cons. Now I've gotten pins before at this con, but what made it special,is that this pin is specifically for this con. I've rarely had where cons actually sell pins for their events, and those that did I couldn't afford them, but yays this one I could. I told the woman at the booth all this and she said she'd tell the guy over it they were a good idea. 

  

 

Merchandise: 

I drooled over so many things this year. This year a table had so many Wonder Woman things. Some vintage. It wasn't the only one either. I got some great pieces for the collection, which we'll cover in the haul section.

 

 

There was a lot of Godzilla this year. It made me so happy. There was a woman helping her son run a booth whose shirt proclaimed she was a Godzilla Mom. I told her of our VHS Godzilla collection as a kid.

 

The booth's owner said he was the best intern

Moisturize Me!

 

There were some surprises at the booths this year like these Lady Cassandra from Doctor Who...pot holders?  I wanna say these were by Twisted Sisters... If it  isn't and you know who it is let me know. I saw the most beautiful glass work by Stoplight Stained Glass. I'm telling you if I'd won the lottery or that inheritance from a kind unknown rich relative had come in, I would have purchased his Leonardo of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles stained glass piece. 

 

 

Of course the year's trend  Labubu made a minor appearance. I saw little Lego Labubus amongst the sea of Lego figures. There was even 3d printed Labubu faces at one of the booths

 

Loved seeing my Morgan's Comics peeps. Hope to start visiting them regularly before long. If your in the West Asheville area look them up their awesome folks with great merch.

 

Costumes: 

 

  

 

 

I saw a Beetlejuice cartoon item at  a booth. Person beside me was like they'd have to get this cause of their tattoos. As I was taking this of them I was thinking this Hazbin Hotel Alastair costume looked familiar. I quickly realized why. They informed me they'd been the one I'd done the Dean vs Alastair photo with at the Spring WNC Comic Con in May. Turns out we live in the same town! I also saw a TV Demon from the show there... I hope they played nice...

 

 

Of course there had to be someone dressed as characters from K-Pop Demon Hunters. I mean even if you haven't seen it, you've heard the songs, their music is so popular it's made it to Jaques the Whipper's banned song request list.

 

The purple haired one, I'm not able to watch the show no clue who she is, and I talked about the mashup fan art people have been doing of K-Pop Demon Hunters and Supernatural. *Ah man! I should have done a fun mash up with them as Dean! ><*

The Dude of The Big Lebowski graced us with his laid back presence. Dudeists rejoice! Not kidding it's a thing.

 

Our con extended to a second building this year that housed gaming tables, VR gaming, and the Cosplay Contest. I encountered beautifully made costumes, I'm not sure who he was but it looked great.

End of the Con:

As we were taking our leave we ran into my holler adjacent neighbor, who I mentioned in my Helene post.
It was his first time there, he'd come with a collector friend. We talked about a neighbor of ours who'd been ill, and the potential poltergeist house on said neighbor's Mom's land. You'll hear about this in next week's post. 

Beautiful views from the grounds the con was held on.

Famished we went to the nearby Waynesville institute Ammon's Drive Inn and Dairy Bar, I've been coming hear since I was a kid, I think it opened the year I was born. 

I got a Double Cheese Burger with Mustard and Ketchup cause of course Dean's gotta have a burger, and Tater Tots

   

The Haul:

So let's get into the con haul... Up first is Pins, key chains, and shirt department.

 

 

The pewter Wonder Woman pin and shield were each only a dollar at this one booth. I wished I knew the name of the store. It was a great thrifty geek find. They explained these were over stocks they were trying to move. I had a lovely conversation about Supernatural with the booth owners. One guy and I talked wanting to go to the Charlotte Convention, how at the canceled con last were we gonna have a actor from the show as a guest, and told them about The Horror Band Wagon's hilarious reaction to the "Skin" episode of Supernatural. Seriously watch it, their reaction to the transformation scene will have you in stitches... The woman is in season 2 of her first watch through.  The shirt was my big spender item, Five whole Dollars. It was made by Gifternaut. 

The robot pin is from the official Geek Expo merch table, the D20 that rolled a one was from a D and D table that had these pins that his kids made. I was drawn to it cause it perfectly reflected my mental state the last few weeks: "How can I Live, Laugh, Love in these conditions?!" Captain said it spoke to her too.

 

Next up is my sticker haul. Stickers are great inexpensive items to get from cons if your don't have a lot to spend. I got a bunch of Supernatural stickers, no shock there, from the booth I usually grab some I believe they are called Steam and Steel Apparel. I also was apparently drawn to unicorn and skeleton stickers that day.

 

 

Lastly my candy haul! Upside to having cons near Halloween is you can get some.. to quote an orange cartoon cat "...candy, candy, candy..." 

  

 

  

 

As always the Smoky Mountain Geek Expo is such a welcoming place for us geeks/nerds in Haywood County. If you are in or around Waynesville, North Carolina next year on October 17th I ask you to come in and stay for a spell.

Live Long and Prosper,

*Thrifty Geek* 

Thrifty Geek's Library- The Answer, My Friend Review

Hello Bookish Friends,

So for the Orrilium Magical Readathon this year I had a prompt where I had to read a book with water on the cover. Luckily The Answer, My Friend And Other Short Stories by the People Who Sell Them fit the bill. I've had this book for a minute that I hadn't read. I got it a year of so ago at a thrift store and was finally glad to have an excuse to finally get it read. 

 

This book was published in 1994, it's a collection of stories from the "Winners of a National Booksellers Writing Contest". So basically people who sell books for a living trying their hand at writing stories. 

Overall this book is a mixed bag, some stories I adored, others not so much, but I enjoyed it enough to give it four stars, and keep it in my permanent collection. So I thought I'd do some thoughts of each story.

 

The Stories

 

The Answer, My Friend by Kathryn Lacey- At first I thought it was someone else painting forty somethings as just grumpy frumpy people, but then you learn what happen to her you understand why she's the way she is. I had a hard time enjoying this one even with the knowledge why she is the way she is. Trigger Warning: Sexual Assault.

 

Going West by Mick Brady - This one was a good one! It's got two aspiring actors in North Carolina who decide to set out to begin their careers in Wilmington, NC. Their start doesn't go so well, and leads to some crazy situations. I liked this story it's funny and if I'm not mistaken takes place in Western North Carolina where I live. So that was also cool. Sorry I have a soft spot for stuff set or filmed in my home state. 

 

A Way with Words by Christopher Hawthorne- A man who has passed left a letter behind to explain. Given the topic I didn't think I was going to like this one, but it was strangely beautiful. Trigger Warning: Suicide.

 

The Mary Pictures by Kathy Conner- A woman recounts a funny summer involving some hilarious religious art she made at a church camp after finding them while packing her Mom's things for the move. I found the last paragraph of this hilarious. It was a funny read.

 

War Hero by Bill Cotter- This is a tale of how a children's summer game takes a dark turn. This had such good imagery. Especially when the girl is watching a storm come in in front of a store.

 

Killing Harvey by N.C. Reynolds-  A man learns his lover is a demon hunting witch, who wants him to join in her crusade. This was one I was looking forward to and it was my favorite. The awesome thing is at some point he asks where the demons come from, and she tells him Kansas, cause there's some disturbance there. As a Supernatural fan I loved that one.

Blanco y Negro by Thomas Cooney-  A man goes to Salamanca for school where he meets an older woman and they form a friendship. He's drawn by her pain, cause he is dealing with pain himself and he needs that now instead of the joys most college people have. This one was a well written one. I really don't have much to say... What? Can't have a novel of thoughts for everything.

Bard's Call by Honore Hillman Foster- While sharing thoughts a bard's lover picks up on past trauma and she tells him of how she was kidnapped by Invaders. This was a rough one to read due to the subject matter. Trigger Warning: Sexual assault.

Wild Women Don't Get the Blues by Nancy Orlando- A woman finding adventure in being a new Mom. This one was a bit sad, but a bit sweet too. 

Come September by Donna Stuart- A Mom is on a mission to get a new vacuum, this leads to reminiscing of another time Momma set her mind to something. This was a cute final story. 

So I hope you enjoyed, check this book out if you can locate it cause there's some good gems in here. Have a good week and read a good book!

*Thrifty Geek* 

The First Anniversary of Helene: A Nerd's Story

 Hello Friends,

Today marks the one year anniversary of Tropical Storm Helene devastateing Western North Carolina where I live. In the wee hours of the morning people's worlds changed, towns were rendered unrecognizable, and communication practically nonexistent. The other day as Mom and I were going outd I was looking a the road were were riding on, and found it hard to believe a year ago it'd been covered in mud. 

There's of course a lot of talk this week of the the 1st year after Helene. So I decided for the anniversary to tell my story of what my family and my's experiences were with this storm. I think this well be a long one so get ready.

In the weeks leading up to the storm I was reading for the Orilium Magical Readathon, and preparing my Dean Winchester Cosplay for my fall cons the Smoky Mountain Geek Expo and the Fall WNC Comic Con. 

 

 

As we saw on the news this huge system could potentially hit our area. My anxiety flared a bit with worry, but reminded myself storms usually lost a lot of power by the time they got to the mountains of North Carolina that my anxiety was just getting me worked up. Of course the peace I had for myself was short lived when my Great Aunt mentioned she was worried, and I'm like if the older folks who've seen a few storms are getting worried, then maybe it's gonna be bad. 

Well a couple days before Helene was to hit a low came in dumping  so much rain on our heads. It was hard enough to knock a big limb out of one our popular trees on the property, and get the streams running high. This of course would add issues to the storm to come.

September 26th- 27th 

As the 26th became night I started doing some prepping. I was checking out the comic books I needed from the digital library, cause I was gonna read those to finish the readathon, and just in case the power went out I wanted to get the books on the kindle app, and do it before the rain knocked out my satellite internet. For most of the night we still had power, it was still on when my Mom eventually went to bed. I think the main part of the storm was still a little bit away from us. 

I come into the kitchen at some point and find a cute little frog:

I'm like your cute but you can't be in the house.  In the process of trying to herd the little thing out the door I scared the cats who bolted out the door and, thankfully, under the truck that was parked in front of the door. It took some coaxing and I think the can opener to get the furballs back to safety. 

At about 3 a.m. maybe we were plunged into darkness.With the power being out I had no way of knowing now where Helene was located. I don't do well in complete darkness so I turned on this string of butterfly lights I had and a battery powered lantern another of my great aunts had given us. This still didn't make me comfortable cause I could still see the dark living room. I don't know if I shut the privacy curtain to make myself comfortable, but either way I settled myself down with my tablet and proceeded to read the comics I got from the library... That's right I'm so nerdy I read comics in the middle of a topical storm. As I read through stories of zombies, vampires, Sherlock and Pumpkin Kings. The wind and rain howled outside. I hoped and prayed the tree outside my window wouldn't come crashing into my room, another reason I didn't want to sleep that night. So there I was on my bed reading trying to keep my anxiety at bay when in the silence of the de-powered dark my phone started buzzing. I looked at the screen it was the emergency signal telling everyone to get off the roads. I had a chill run through me, that's when I knew Helene had arrived. So I finished my nights vigil, I finished my comics and I moved on to a Twitches book. With the coming of the dawn there was still some wind whipping about. When it died down we looked at the damage.  We had a ditch made a little deeper and I imagine some broken limbs and down trees up in the woods. But near the house the biggest loss we had was my Dad's Zinnia's: 

We ended up making a bouquet out of the broken ones. Amazingly enough in a storm that caused so much damage, we somehow came out with minimal damage. After assessing the damage I got me some much needed sleep.

 September 28th

After spending day before reading, I had nothing else to do, and another dark night with no power, my mom feared for the food in our fridge and two deep freezers. So it was decided the 28th we'd head to town to get non perishables so if all our stuff went bad before the power came back on we'd have food. I was also hoping to find working WiFi somewhere to alert my friends and sister we were fine, and I was gonna charge the emergency charger in the truck as we drove that day. So as we left we saw below the house the tile we use to cross over the stream had clogged a bit sending the stream over the road, but it's little enough we could easily cross over it. As we got to the exit of our holler we saw a power line down in our holler adjacent neighbor's yard. As we went down the road we came across a downed tree across the road that luckily curved up into a high enough arch we could get the Tank through it, our 1999 Silverado F1-50.  

We stopped by the church cemetery to check to make sure my Dad's wreath hadn't blown away. Amazingly enough it was still standing just askew, I like to think it was my wreath securing skills, or the Grace of God. 

 

A Downed Tree 

 

We started going our normal route we and ran into the electric company as we started the decent to the riverside area that ran along the Pigeon River. We saw, and dodged rolls of hay, saw silt in the road and a farmer's trailer that'd been slammed into a building on the farm. And right passed it a giant tall bridge, that has weather many floods in it's long life, was ripped from it's banks taking some of the road with it:

 

As we traveled on we saw piles of mud on roads that had been cleared by locals who'd cleared it out with their machinery. This is why if the zombie apocalypse comes I know I'll be fine cause I'm surrounded by good ole country folk who got the things we need to survive, one of the two kinds of people you want having your back in times of trouble, the other my friend Captain says is inmates.

There was a woman we talked to on the side of the road who said she'd just been vacationing here in the mountains. Further along we saw the Pigeon had devastated the roads. 

We found ourselves facing another section of washed away road, leaving a narrow one lane to traverse. As my Mom was maneuvering these narrow passages, I'm was having a panic attack, knowing we're gonna have to come back this way.

 

Of course we came back sooner than we thought, because we eventually caught up to where the locals were clearing. It was a sea of impassable mud. Luckily we were told people were able to get out through the Fines Creek community. So we turned around and headed back the way we came.

We managed to get out Fines Creek way, there was a little concrete washed away but still passable. I just looked in awe that even Fines Creek caused so much damage on it's own, washing away river banks and personal bridges. Many small creeks in the area destroyed houses. 

 

 

So after that adventure we finally made it out of our little community on to 209. Our path eventually took us near the Pigeon again. We know a farmer who lost a large part of his river side fields because Helene redirected the river into half his field permanently.

 

Town was crazy with so much traffic, with lines at banks, and the grocery stores. It just shook me seeing all this. The destruction and the lines everywhere, this was things you saw in the news when tropic systems hit other places. I mean we're usually where people evacuate to in with storms!

We had to go through Frog Level which had so many stores damaged like Charlie's Corner here, they are just now at the time of this writing getting around to working on it. Frog Level has a mural of a frog sitting on a level the level shows how high got waters got there in a long ago storm, Helene matched it or possibly beat that based on the mud on the wall.

I went to Fangirl's Oma's house to see if they'd weathered the storm there since they had a modular home, but they hadn't. I was shocked to see flooding in these neighborhoods:

 Worried about Fangirl we decided to check on her. We got to her side of Canton through I-40. They were fine, and despite not having internet or power and she somehow had been messaging the Captain, who was fine and in limited contact with my sister who was OK, so I asked Fangirl to have Crystal tell my sibling we were fine. So with knowledge my siblings were good, and supplies we finally got home later than we planned. My Granny, who lives above us had been freaking out when we took her stuff to her. See my second cousin had been worried about us, so he hopped on his motorcycle, cause he figured it get around better with the destruction, and came down to the backwoods. He told Granny about the roads and she was fretting about us being on them specially since we were late getting back. See my Grandfather passed the year before and then when my Dad passed a few months later she's taken worrying over Mom and me.

So finally we were safe at home, night was falling so I grabbed a blanket and curled up on the couch intending to read some more Dungeons and Drama by Kristy Boyce I'd been reading on. Shortly into the dark night our power came back on. Mom turned on the TV and found our satellite TV working. So I wondered hopefully did that meant my satellite internet was functional. It was, so I shot messages to my family and I think got to talk to my sister who could get on the WiFi at her partner's work building

 

The Days Following 

I used my internet to help people inquiring about relatives. If I had information that could help people I gave it to them, even encountered a woman seeking info about an area her aunt lived, turned out her aunt was my bus driver. I also saw all the judgement of people not understanding our surprising situation, wondering why we didn't do this and that. To those people I have choice words, but I'm a lady I won't say them, but I'm thinking them at you.  Even Julie Wunder, a former meteorologist turned blogger said in a post and I quote "... I was watching this storm, and I knew is was going to be bad. But never in a million years did I imagine it'd be this bad." Even weather people were thrown off guard by all this!

There was a lot of kindness too so much I think they had to tell people no more donations. Supernatural's Misha Collins, who'd been in Charlotte for the SPN Con, came out to areas in Asheville, Black Mountain, and Swannanoa. I was fangirling, and then feeling the warm fuzzies seeing him trying to help where he could.

My Nerdy Spaces: Geek Mountain and Morgan's Comics opened their doors to give people a reprieve from the surrounding Hell.

Our neighbors tag teamed to stopped up tile to get the water stopped on the road. 

 

I saw the devastation in Buncombe County next door with the River Arts District and Biltmore Village flooded. Towns practically whipped off the map. It broke my heart. Homes we constantly passed all my life eventually torn down due to flood damage... Not to mention hearing the death toll climb.

But we in WNC adopted the phrase WNCStrong. Because we may have been knocked down, but we didn't stay down, we came back roaring.

A Year Later

When I saw all damage I thought how are we going to fix this? How would we recover? But sitting here a year later I'm in awe what has been accomplished. The roads of the riverside area that I thought would require a miracle to fix, were rather quickly repaired and passable and a few months ago repaved. I'm slowly seeing neighbors repair and get back to normal. I joy in every triumph of a devastated business proclaiming they have reopened.

We've been strong and bounced back, we've not fully healed, but we are getting there.

The weather the last few days has reminded me of last year couple days of rain leading up to the 27th, and I'm hearing we may have a tropical system head our way, but nothing like Helene... I hope.

Have a good weekend friends, I thank you for reading much love!

*Thrifty Geek*