Month: February 2021

visit

Very pleasant to see Tammy (she was wearing the LionessElise jewel I gave her) and she covered my taxi rides and gave me some book tips. The Air bnb was and end unit and had one of the strangest (but effective) layouts I think I’ve ever seen in an apartment. Nice location though, and quiet. We got food from Sula, which was uniformly excellent, the samosas were like heaven.

The pandemic sure is affecting people’s mental health everywhere. I had two masks on most of the time I was out although I had to remove them while I bolted my food.

Came home and collapsed, pretty much. Fantastic letter from Lois, she and Bobby have a new dog and it’s LOVE for ROJELIO, whose name means ‘request’. Also her comments about being on a church board rang so true I dropped into a funk considering her words (a thinking funk, not an unhappy one.)

It continues to surprise me when I open up my blog and there are all these POSTS that I do not actually remember doing the work on, until I vaguely do. I mean, the tapioca song is in June.

Expanse is done for this year. Another great season, and Naomi the Belter and her ‘Belter ingenuity’, wow.

We’re coming to the end of Time Team, and it maketh me sad, I can’t imagine us finding something that big to watch again anytime soon unless we take on corry street or dr. who or a telenovela.

NO CRUISE SHIPS IN BC UNTIL FEBRUARY 2022 and I feel sorry for people in the biz but it’s a safety issue, truly.

Scorn Daphne Bramham.

 

RADAM RIDWAN

SO, who is my model not model but yes model for Slider? but no I actually wrote Slider before I knew about Radam. On Instagram @radamridwan on twitter @radamridwan – a writer, a model, a legend, and although Slider is a little more academic and a lot less colourful and more comfort oriented (and more into bodily modesty ha ha), when I think about a fabulous non binary transgender person with more attitude than one can pack in a steamer trunk….. they’re the them.

Tammy’s in town

Off to have a social distanced visit with her this morning.

Two letters in the mail yesterday; one to Tom, one to Alex.

Managed to shake off my blues long enough to go get some food and reserved library books yesterday (Jeff gave me a lift). The sun being out did not hurt.

Time Team episode was ‘Hadrian’s Well’ which I like because experimental archaeology is always a favourite with me. (They reproduced a Roman waterworks in Roman Britain.)

Work on UPSUN and the destiel fanfic has ground to a halt. I have posted songs to the end of February and well into March (with scatterings later in the year).

mOm will be happy to hear that I FINALLY HAVE AN APPT with my doc, since the neurologist finally read the EEG this week, I don’t even have to wait that long.

Caspell Junction (new name for Planet Bachelor) remains quiet on the news front. Don’t know what new school rules for the pandemic will do. Hope Alex likes his letters.

Artificial Happiness

When I was younger I knew how to be sad
I didn’t run away, I didn’t even flinch, I gave it everything I had
Now I’m too overbooked to cry
I ask how much, instead of why
you gotta notice when it goes, to miss it when it dies
It’s the exchange I make these days I guess
trading my genuine misery for artificial happiness

I wanted my moods to go on a diet and wither away
all the voices in my head to just be quiet and stay that way
all I sought was peace where I went was numb
and millions like me have been that dumb
Only I know how frozen in my anger I’ve become
It’s the exchange I make these days I guess
trading my genuine misery for artificial happiness

Sweet domestic scene, exhausted from play, they sleep in their beds
and why would I wish this brutal unease on their innocent heads
I know that I walk, feels like I crawl
I’m standing up and I’m two inches tall
only the web of habit keeps me going at all
It’s the exchange I make these days I guess
trading my genuine misery for artificial happiness
trading my hunger for god for a seminar on success
trading these low down blues for a brand new party dress

really not great

My mental health is as bad as it’s been in years. I won’t talk about the repetitive thoughts, the existential dread, the total sludginess, my disordered eating, how fucked and excessive my sleep is. Instead I’ll mention how happy  I am that Jeff ran that dishwasher this morning.  No crying though – that’s a blessing. I hate crying.

I will continue to work on posting songs.

Barry has written – he got two handwritten letters in one day, one from me and one from Mary. I laughed out loud when I read that. Only laugh I’m likely to get today.

I’m hoping picking up some books at the library will provide me with some lift, but right now I feel like rocketship 9 … looks fine, fails to light two engines, crashes…. but in my case, it’s not even a spectacular memorable crash, it’s just February, the light levels, the regular thing. AND STILL NO WORD ABOUT THE EEG I’m twisting in the wind here.

The Evening News

A professional musician and educator told me this was the most nearly perfect folk song he’d ever heard and yes I’ll provide his name if pressed.

There are eight tall lombardy poplars at
the back of the factory
They nod their heads like people gossiping
but they’ve nothing to say to me
If I enter all this data then a slave will be set free
but they’re just pixels on a monitor, they’ve got nothing to do with me
The news is full of violence but it’s quiet on the bus
we’re all being civil what’s the story got to do with us
I get off and dodge great big trucks carrying tons of stuff
and the weather’s good and the stores are full and few of us have got it rough
But in the middle of this plenty I can still find time to want more
Those who are happy with little they’re the ones who really know the score
If I bring you hourly updates the news is seldom good
but there are old people talking on porches when I walk through my neighbourhood
My senses tell me that life is fine, the news is full of death and woe
or else it’s ‘LOSE WEIGHT WITHOUT EXERCISE! and this man can suck and blow!
the news theme’s like a bennie (benzedrine) and my heart’s an 88 (mm, like a cannon)
sure the world is sliding into a pit, but everything is going great

well I told you that I love you in the middle of the roar
and you said that you love me and I forgot what my heart is for
then you said that you would trust me I had to learn to breathe again
how can life be bad, how can I feel sad, when there’s moments like this now and then

where no good deed is punished HEY mOm

Jan says through Instagram OMG allegra.sloman This is the best package of fabric off cuts EVER! Holy crap, my brain is spinning with all the things I can do with these… thank you, my darling, for a much needed surprise and the excellent mood elation! So gorgeous and rich. I will do your mum proud.

And now I must ponder how to best utilize the space babes…

here’s the pic, photo credit J Maxwell, from instagram

From my mOm to my fRiend

Hey mOm isn’t that a little shot in the arm!? I decided I wasn’t going to do anything with and actually gave it to someone who could and the world is now officially a better place.

aw shucks there’s more

she says she’s rich with opulent schmatta, these fell behind a chair LOLOL how can you tell she’s my fRiend

Yet more fabric, isn’t it wonderful

recording & cleanliness

So we’re into February, my worst month of the year, and my sleep is completely funky. Tammy is in town, I’m to see her Thursday. I had a shower and feel like a hoomin again but man did I mention my sleep is screwed up.

I’ve started making these Breakfast Cookies, original recipe here

But I made modifications, regarding salt, substitutions, and cooking time, so here’s the scoop. They are vegan and gluten free and I’ve made them twice and they are REALLY GOOD.

INGREDIENTS
1 cup rolled oats
1/2 cup oat flour
1/4 cup pumpkin seeds
1/4 cup sliced almonds
1/4 cup dried cranberries
2 tbsp hemp seeds (omit and sub pumpkin seeds or almonds)
2 tbsp chia seeds (omit and sub pumpkin seeds or almonds)
2 tbsp flaxseed meal (ground flaxseed)
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt (see note in 3.)

1/2 cup nut butter (almond, peanut, cashew, sunflower)
1/3 cup maple syrup
3 tbsp melted coconut oil*
1/2 tsp vanilla extract

INSTRUCTIONS
1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
2. Combine rolled oats, oat flour, pumpkin seeds, sliced almonds, dried cranberries, hemp seeds, chia seeds, flaxseed meal, ground cinnamon, baking powder, and salt (see note) in a large bowl. Mix together.
3. In a separate bowl, add nut butter, maple syrup, melted coconut oil, and vanilla extract. Mix together until evenly combined.
NOTE: if the nut butter is salted you can omit salt from the dry ingredients
4. Pour wet ingredients into the dry ingredients. Mix together.
5. Scoop cookie dough into 10 – 12 balls and place on the baking sheet. Press each ball into flat cookies.
6. Bake for 15 minutes and turn the oven off so the cookies continue to crisp up without burning. Alternately bake 14-20 minutes until golden and crisp around the edges and cool.

 

*seriously, melt it, it makes a difference

Leah Feldman AND Nestor Makhno

warning this gets weird

Here’s a bio: Leah Feldman who worked with Nestor Makhno. He stole my rellie’s watch, he won’t get his own page even if I read that dreffle book. (History of the Makhnovist movement.) (ALSO THIS ***IS*** HIS OWN PAGE, THIS POST IS ALMOST A THOUSAND WORDS LONG AND I HARDLY MENTION LEAH FELDMAN, WHO WAS A MENSCH.)

I almost want to translate it (History of the Makhnovist movement) into internet-friendly contemporary English ’cause the translation verbs the galactic noun into a state of noun. Why am I compelled to pay attention to him? is it because he was one of John’s special favourites?

check out the turgid first three paragraphs, administered first aid by yours truly in italics.

As the reader approaches this book (When you first pick up this book you’ll want to know, is this serious shit, or serious horseshit?) he will first of all want to know what kind of work this is: is it a serious and conscientious analysis, or a fantastic and irresponsible fabrication? Can the reader have confidence in the author, (Is the author tripping balls, or are the dates, facts and maps straight?) at least with respect to the events, the facts and the materials? Is the author sufficiently impartial, (Is he telling the truth with some understanding of his own biases) or does he distort the truth in order to justify his own ideas (and piss on his opponents?) – I went a bit off the rails there but I hope you can see why I’d want to rewrite the book in a light hearted and humorous vein.

These are not irrelevant questions. (This subject is important enough in terms of anarchist and world history that you should care if the author got it right. which is not a direct translation and couldn’t possibly be, this is a gloss.)

It is important to examine the documents on the Makhnovist movement with great discretion. (Good luck with that they’re all in Russian and Ukrainian and did anyone ever tell you that translations are political? yes they are.) The reader will understand this if he considers some of the characteristics of the movement. (THE READER IS A FUCKING GIRL and I’ll understand more if you blow less.)

a hunnert pages of this…. I have to finish Moloch and UPSUN’s HOTM before I even touch that as a side project, that seriously would be something I’d do in jail.

So I continued anyway…..

On the one hand, the Makhnovshchina (Mack NOV shin a)  [Makhnovist Movement.]  – an event of extraordinary breadth, grandeur and importance, which unfolded with exceptional force and played a colossal and extremely complicated role in the destiny of the revolution, undergoing a titanic struggle against all types of reaction, more than once saving the revolution from disaster, extremely rich in vivid and colourful episodes – has attracted widespread interest not only in Russia but also abroad.

EXCUSE ME while I enjoy someone who can put titanic and colossal in the same paragraph without even a hint of jocularity!

 

The story of the Macknovshchina is so powerful, colourful and historically important that interest in the story is not confined to Russia. Fascists and reactionaries hate its truths, deride its outlandish tales of luck, betrayal, revolutionary fervour and derring-do, and cast doubt on its morality, as well as that of Makhnov himself, in an effort to dislodge him and it from the collective memory. That’s mostly because he kept the fucking revolution alive along with his anarchist principles and when he diverged organizationally from the soviets, they didn’t want to be beholden or get into it ideologically so he had to go — and to the horror of those who loved him he ended up drinking himself to death in exile. But we’re not going to talk about that part of his life in this book, that’s for the Netflix series. NOW THEN, IS THAT NOT BETTER AND MORE USEFUL THAN THE TWO PARAGRAPHS I COMBINED INTO ONE ??? (ie the foregoing paragraph and this next one, which is clunkier than a 30 year old Corolla.)

The Makhnovshchina has given rise to the most diverse feelings in reactionary as well as revolutionary circles: from feelings of fierce hatred and hostility, of astonishment, distrust and suspicion, all the way to profound sympathy and admiration. The monopolization of the revolution by the Communist Party and the “Soviet” power forced the Makhnovshchina, after long hesitation, to embark on a struggle – as bitter as its struggle against the reaction – during which it inflicted on the Party and the central power a series of palpable physical and moral blows. And finally, the personality of Makhno himself – as complex, vivid and powerful as the movement itself – has attracted general attention, arousing simple curiosity or surprise among some, witless indignation or thoughtless fright among others, implacable hatred among still others, and among some, selfless devotion.

 

 

anyway you can understand why the project has some appeal, it’s essentially a complete gloss / rewrite, but it could really be fun. It’s also fanfic in a really hilarious way. Oh, oh, oh I just had a story idea.

I posted this in early January, and on the 18th I woke up from a sound sleep with THIS in my head

TTTO Battle Hymn of the Republic

Nestor Makhno stole my great great uncle’s watch
Nestor Makhno stole my great great uncle’s watch
Nestor Makhno stole my great great uncle’s watch
He sold it to buy beer (or guns, that works too)

 

When someone’s pet dies

They will not go quietly,
the pets who’ve shared our lives.
In subtle ways they let us know
their spirit still survives.
Old habits still can make us
think we hear them at the door
Or step back when we drop
a tasty morsel on the floor
Our feet still go around the place
the food dish used to be,
and, sometimes, coming home at night,
we miss them terribly.
And although time may bring new friends
and a new food dish to fill,
That one place in our hearts
belongs to them….
and always will.

This was on a Hallmark card Lois sent us after Bounce died. It’s still the best poem on the subject I’ve seen, apart from the dead kittens poem from Lindsay M that I dasn’t reproduce here.

There’s a gazebo out back of the fOlks’ place where Bounce, and other pets besides, are memorialized. She’s buried out back, but she has company now.