Category: SARS-CoV-2

Destiel fannage

Added later, watched the Supernatural from last night, it was adorable, there was just so much squee with the boys.

Mailed a letter to mOm and another to Barry. Yes I said I mailed it already. No I didn’t actually until now. Mild chest pain (completely normal at this point) on the way up the hill; the problem is that if I stop I fall down or want to, and it’s been raining, so no work in the garden. I think I’m going to have to get one of those stool canes. I had rocks to sit on in Mt. Seymour but they’re thin on the ground in urban settings. Best part of the walk was no mask.

I should walk some more later, perhaps I’ll be able to talk Jeff into coming. Maybe not so much hillage with the walkage

terrifying podcast about what canada should do in case of political instability before/during/after the election and during the transition period, if any.

 

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This is absolutely terrible but it made me laugh.

Welp, I’m awake. Guess I’m having a cup of tea and some breakfast.

Had a nice long talk yesterday with my mOm about my medical woes. I’ll be fine, I’ll be fine; but my body fell apart after that infection in March, and there’s one symptom in particular that makes me think it’s post COVID, but I guess I’ll never know and should get right with not knowing, while I’m working on improving things.

Here’s Jan M. as a retail worker in 2020

She’s been posting costumes every day on her ‘gram, and some of them have been awesome, why she even did a Castiel the other day. AND I DEAD NOW

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that’s how you advertise

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Give the people useful info!

Slept most of the day yesterday, still managed to do a load of laundry and sleep a full night just now…

more from England, in this case from @JonnElledge, for pOp

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donated to the Potlatch Fund today.

I want a proper breakfast and I already ate one. GREEDY GUTS

remember went pOp didn’t hear the woman trying to plead guilty when the cop didn’t show?  This university professor SHOWS THE SAME ENERGY

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Yesterday and today

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I do believe you have to be human to die of COVID so I’m assuming most of these people are safe. Yes indeed Trump has tested positive for COVID. It’s the biggest security risk possible and Pence must be just drooling over how Trump could be permanently rendered unPresidential. I really only care about Stephen Miller. If I could publicly announce what I intend to do if he dies of COVID I’m not sure any of you would enjoy it. Trump needs to stay alive because Pence is worse.

Tom needs a heart valve. Schedule willing and the surgeon don’t catch COVID he’s having surgery next week. Tom is one of my favourite people and I like Peggy even more than that so the stress and confusion and foreboding they must be feeling is something else and I guess today is the day I get off my ass and make bikkies for Peggy.

I had a really productive day yesterday, (I pulled up the dead vines in the garden, still need to finish that) and wrote a letter to a family member and did a load of laundry and rehearsed on  three instruments and worked more on You do me Wrong)) and then lost my cell phone. I mean I hiked a reasonably challenging trail with Paul, whose foot seems completely healed. It’s only 3 k, but we went to Goldie Lake, and I took some great pictures, and then somewhere between the last marker post and the parking lot I lost my phone.

Paul took pictures. I’ll keep bugging him until he answers.

somebody shot heroin in Mt Seymour Park I found the needle.

Did I mention in December we have to stop having that little rent break. It was only 25 bucks a month but there’s nothing like feeling you’re putting one over on your landlord.

Now I have to buy a pomodora clock and a proper alarm clock and go back to a paper/electric calendar. Life is twagic.

My phone was set to send me a notification of my meeting with the RN yesterday but it didn’t go off, and that’s another reason I’m glad I lost my phone.

I hated my phone because at this point 3/4 of my calls were spam or phishing texts or women exhorting me in Toisanese or Mandarin.

I’ve actually wanted to stop having that bill every month. Seventy bucks for shitty service and overages after 2 gigs, **** my **** and then there’s the issue of having a cop in my pocket.

I cancelled my service and had to deal with two humans over half an hour to make that happen. I changed the most important passwords just in case there’s something in my phone that will enable them to get my shit. So Google, the blog, my social media accounts…and I went very crunchy and hard and strong on the passwords this time.

Roses are red

Sydney’s in Australia

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courtesy of @thesarahyork

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omg @Stonekettle on twitter this morning saying “If you want sympathy look in the dictionary between shit and syphilis” with respect to Trump’s positive COVID test.

wringing sweat

Work’t in my garden. f’in hot out there. This involved sweeping up lawn clippings so you can actually see the walkways and driveway, watering the squash, (I could hear them slurping, it’s been ages and I think there may be a single lone pumpkin in the pile) and walking the boundaries to pick up the inevitable logo’ed paper and plastic trash that’s blown in. I also carted the cactus soil and the deck salt out to the locking side of the carport so they aren’t posing a tripping hazard by the back door any more..

Now to collect the clean mats from the dryer, except that I have to sweep the kitchen floor and mop it first, which I am now by the power of mental effort going to try to silently encourage Jeff to do.

later: Jeff did sweep but I hadn’t yet cleaned out the hellhole under the kitchen table, and now you can see all of the floor and it’s all clean, hallelujah. There’s a tiny bit of paper cruft to sort, but I could probably throw it all out and not lose anything. Also: cleaned the extraneous paper cruft from the side of the fridge.

and i am STILL WRINGIN’ SWEAT YEAH

Finally got hold of the doctor and gave her a piece of my mind, but of course it makes no difference. Managed to winkle out a prescription renewal. Why do we need gp’s again, blech.

I’ve already practiced three instruments and done my shoulder exercises this morning. I’ve even written a little. 13,301

u/Zinan took this flying out of YVR this am, check the haze effect on the mountains

ermagerd, somebody I really like on twitter retweeted something nasty I said about Trump and Nate Silver so I am ha ha’ing to myself.

The McDonald’s closest to my house has a worker sick with Covid.

fucking ronald damn his eyes

now it’s time to unionize

Jeff and I never go there, it’s the second worst Ratlands between the Port Mann Bridge and Main Station. (The worst one is right on Main. WHAT A ZOO)

I KNOW that none of you care, but today’s the last day on set for Supernatural after 15 seasons, and the people who guest star are openly weeping about it, and it’s a Thursday, and Castiel is the angel of Thursday, and now it’s over.

Bed back together

I now have a fresh mattress on my bed. As I was putting the weighted blanket back in its cover, I became glad I have two covers thanks to the kids (they gave me an extra cover, I guess they know me or something) because the zipper broke on the winter-weight one. BUT I HAD A SPARE and carried on regardless. I’ll get the other one repaired.

I should call Burnaby pickup.

My west coast Indigenous style masks came. They look like this. and this. I was going to give the hummingbird one to mOm but I think I’m going to keep it, it’s fantastic, and I do love the other ones. And I is greedy. Anyway mOm if you do love the hummingbird one so much you have to have it, just make sure you wash it when I bring it o.O he he

 

I see from social media that cousin Alex is making a skirt for herself today, and as she wryly commented it was a better activity choice than doomscrolling through the news.

9859 10059 words on the fic

Weather continues unbelievably fine

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scanged from twitter

Some son of a seacook stole my bank card details so TD fraud prevention called me and cancelled it and I went in to the New West branch to get another one. Much standing in line, but they come out and bring the elderly into chairs, so that was okay. Picked up batteries for the D’Addario tuner Mike bought me at London Drugs. Also some thumb drives, the 64 gig ones were cheap like borscht.

Poked my head into the New Westminster Library; there’s this writer called Silvia Moreno-Garcia I follow on twitter (I almost met her in real life but she’s TOO GOOD for spits (dunnett events) so No) and she’s forever going on and on and fucking on about a book she wrote called Mexican Gothic, so I put it on hold at the library. I poked my head into Freshii and got a strawberry banana smoothie – delightful, rather small, and not too sweet – and picked up some plant trays for the seedlings I’m growing indoors and finally moved them to their permanent spot in the only remaining south facing window, the one under the cat tree.

Walked about 1.5 k in total, and now I am home. Stayed masked the whole time, took the bus into New West and wandered around. You are obliged to wear a mask on transit now.

an anonymous wikipedia edit

Someone really useful on twitter just blocked me because I ‘sexualized their feed’ well THEY WERE THE ONE TALKING ABOUT SLOPPING DOWN FORTY GALLONS OF HUMMUS lands’ sakes. That has nothing to do with this:

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Wikipedia editor MN070 is responsible for this gem, which has probably already been edited back out, but isn’t it a sweetie?  someone with a lot of neck in Irish slang is a chancer, someone with a lot of nerve, who takes liberties….

slime bunny

Giant African Snails make great pets, said no one ever, except some people do keep them.

r/aww - The Giant African Snail. It's a slimy bunny

 

I made an online order. They said they delivered the printer ink… it was a yoga mat. I did actually order a yoga mat, but the one they sent is the size of a bum imprint. I am not confused and angry! I am just confused!

r/Art - Maskissing, Johnson Tsang, Digital, 2020

This image shows two offwhite masks, formed into human faces and kissing. Maskissing, Johnson Tsang, Digital, 2020

 

Bee democracy. I think I want to read that book. Did I tell you Lois and Bob have bees. They had an empty hive and put attractant in it a couple of years ago, no dice. Then this year a swarm appeared and moved in. Now we know how they made the decision! By consensus!

a baby hummingbird drinks from a raspberry while in a woman's palm. It has just voided onto her hand.
Baby hummingbird

Baby hummingbird drinking from a raspberry and peeing cause that tiny bod ain’t got no room to store anything

stolen from @ddoniolvalcroze on twitter

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LOLOLOLOL

Okay so in this picture of two merged transit ads, there was a KFC ad underneath and a VW car ad on to…. the mashup, with the corporate logos on either end, reads as follows:

A car powered on ~ free range chickens

& designed by a team ~ of hand picked potatoes

Experience driving on ~ Mushrooms & Coke

Stolen from @ghostwoods on twitter

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I died when I saw this. It’s a picture of a man dressed in  ice cream cone – as in, looking exactly like a man sized cartoon-eyed ice cream cone –  taking a selfie in the BR store bathroom with the legend “How tf am I essential worker”

I stole from @dannolan, goodness alone knows who made it or how he tripped over it.

equilibrium

The president of Belarus shut off the internet in his country to prevent the spread of a viral video in which a large audience of workers started shouting at him to resign. (apparently he said the only way you’re getting rid of me is killing me and he got the response he oh so richly warranted.) The tankies are sad for him. What is a tankie? It’s a fascist who wants statist communists with brutal regimes to be perfect and powerful. They defend governments like North Korea. No, I’m not joking, I wish I was.

I have re-achieved emotional equilibrium. I wrote another 700 words after I finished the last edit to my blog yesterday. Jeff took me to breakfast. I wear a mask at IHOP whenever I’m not at my own table. I know it’s not ideal, but it’s better than nothing. My current fave mask is the one I got from Vancouver Aquarium. Next fave is the first one I made, the white one. It’s very comfortable and the most adjustable. Next fave is a standard medical mask. I ordered a bunch more cloth masks from an Indigenous supplier; one of them is a brilliant blue with Coastal art hummingbirds all over it so I bet I know where that one will end up. The other ones I think have stylized orcas, I might be wrong. Kima would be pissed.

There is fresh tea. I make a couple of pots a day and transfer most of it into the iced tea container, once it’s cooled off.

Operation Pee Constantly is still going well. The last lingering wackiness amidships from the kidney stones and the mild infection afterwards is done, thank glob. I’m still getting used to exactly how MUCH more water I have to drink every day to keep this happy state of affairs going, but hopefully I will retrain my body to properly experience thirst.

I am still drinking black tea, but it’s not recommended for a kidney diet, so I’m trying to have at most two cups a day.

Katie recommended bocconcini pearls for cheese and no sodium cheese is a wonderful damned thing, let me assure you. I’m also drinking the low sodium V-8, which tastes weird, which makes me want to put Worcestershire sauce in it, which vitiates its low salt status. La la la. Change of habits continues. Jeff hasn’t minded the not buying treats regimen – we have a whole line of treats we bought pretty much every time we went out to Save-On but I’ll have to make do with home made cinnamon buns, scones and cakes, what a tragedy.

There’s a Buy-Low opening August 26 walking distance from here; they’ll have in house butcher and bakery, among other things. I know people who dislike this chain but they are distinctly cheaper than Save-On, and possibly they will deliver, so we shall see. Anyway it’s close enough to walk. It will be interesting to see where to park for this critter and which roadway one exits from.

Glucose tolerance test on Friday. This will be the fourth time in my life I’ve taken it. This time it’s likely that the DIABEETUS DONE GOT ME although of course I can always adjust my diet (not really, but).

Used the word vitiate in a tweet today. Thought I was using it correctly, looked it up anyway, I was.

mood crashed again

after a couple of days of feeling better I’m feeling iffy again. I think I’ll force myself out of the house to go to a farmer’s market up at Brentwood this morning. Jeff hasn’t shown any interest in going, so I’ll suit up and take the bus, since it’s just one hop.

The pumpkins and the two surviving sunflowers are doing well, and I did get some carrots.  Everything else in my garden sucks because you have to water things. My mOm knows about how to get things to grow but I’m forgetful and lazy and those are two things a farmer cannot be.

Five hundred words on the fanfic. Inexperienced character is being exposed to ETOH, hijinks ensue. (ETOH means al k hall)

Image Erica Henderson, Eisner-winning artist, made this

@ericafails on twitter

THE US IS A FAILED STATE

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Looking Inside Myself, 2002, carved whalebone by Susie Silook, artist of Siberian Yupik, Inupiaq descent

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Rogers, 2012, Post Gazette

Rob Rogers was fired from the Post Gazette in 2018 because all mainstream media outlets in the US are owned by right wing oligarchs

ah the good old days – open in a new tab and it should be (just barely) readable.

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Post COVID paper

Infographic about post-COVID

If you click on it, it expands to a readable size.

Katie and Mike BOTH dropped by yesterday, Mike to pick up lentil soup and drop off sous-vide chicken breasts, nom, and Katie to just lay eyes on me and tell me about her life updates, which include what appears to be a shot at being happy, so, I’m like. YEAH SURE I want you to be happy, why the fuck wouldn’t I. She’s known him since high school, it’s not like he fell out of the sky. I haven’t met him, mostly because I don’t have to during a pandemic, but Paul and Keith have.

We talked about how the world is half mad with grief, and those who show no grief show fear and anger.

No walkies with Paul.

Made more lentil soup, made more dough for cinnamon buns; the ones I made yesterday morning are, like, gonzo. I guess Jeff and I really really liked them.

Finished watching season two of the Alienist. It’s much like the first season in some ways, but they handled a trope about as tastefully as one can, and the man follows the woman to her new job rather than the other way around, so that was a nice break, and there was an extremely satisfying revenge killing, one of the best and promptest ever. You killed my brother, I ain’t giving you the CHANCE to prepare to die, I’m just going to shoot you in the back. YES.

When I was researching the show I learned that the author of the original source material had a family story that possibly affected his writing; his dad committed a murder that was embedded in scandal and served time for it. Then he had a fifty year career in newspapers. I wish I was a white guy.

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This is a Balmain dress from the 50s. Dress looks like she was hung by her heels, dipped in white chocolate and rolled in glitter-encrusted dust bunnies.