Settler words&music in S'ólh Téméxw, (leanpub.com/upsun) living where privilege meets precarity in MST country. she/her/they———– Novels: Midnite Moving Co., Upsun; Sweep Off Those Waves coming soon, Hair Sinister after that. —Restore All Indigenous Lands!
Paul needed driving around for an appointment yesterday, so I obliged. Went to Merven food truck which is apparently Iraqi style food – for fifteen bucks I got a falafel platter that fed me AND Paul (he was hungry and there was loads – a springy fresh Pita Factory pita, a mound of hummus, fantastic tabbouleh with grated cooked beet on top, five enormous heart shaped falafels with tangy sauce, and rice with sautéed onions on top). So we sat waiting for his blood pressure check and nomming hard. That platter fed two hungry seniors, 10/10 would eat again. Afterward I got in to see the nurse and ask about the ‘driving’ issue, so everyone’s on the same page right now. As things currently stand the doctor has advised Paul not to drive and he’s accepting that, but he’s also thinking he’s going to be able to start driving again and none of us are convinced that’s the case because not all of the tests are back and that will take a while. And in the meantime everyone is safe.
I told Paul that I’ll drive him to the US to see people but he has to cover my housing while I’m there. I can’t just fall out of the sky and land on some Seattle filker for two days when I only see for two days once a year for a con, so I’ll need somewhere to stay while he sees Janice. (She lives with Hank, who’s also a good friend of Keith’s.)
I got a bit of a walk in, in the GLORIOUS sunshine and did loads and loads of laundry, and today I am 64 years old. We’ve got an early supper scheduled.
The world is not at war, the Ukrainians killed two Poles on accident, and shit happens.
Went to Paul’s place to pick him up. Suzanne was there for babysitting Ryker and doing the house – Ryker was asleep when I got there and Katie was out buying work boots – and Paul took so long to get ready I fucking near left without him. Everything is hella slow. Some days I put up with it better than others. Keith mocked me for my asking Paul to shake a leg.
Then checked with him whether he actually had insurance on the car he loaned/gave/handed to me and rather than getting mad at me he just said yes. As Keith has mentioned previously he’s had lots of time to get used to my style.
We went to Foreshore first. I tried to get the little birdies to come to the sunflowers but they were not interested. It was a pleasant walk in the warm sun and the cool breeze, not too many people, and after that we went to the library to drop off Wilful Blindness by Sam Cooper, “The Single Most Depressing Non Fiction Book I’ve Read Since King Leopold’s Ghost”. Then after that to the bank machine at the London Drugs Mall aka the forgettably named Westminster Centre, and then London Drugs itself, where I got a finger splint for Jeff’s ouchy, some dental instruments and finally a bath brush and some of that blueberry acai chocolate candy that I’m addicted to.
Then we went to the Pho Edmonds and I had my usual, the #32 (this time with extra salad and as always it was delicious, filling and a good value), and Paul had a small pho but no spring rolls this time and paid because the last time I paid for the hot and sour soup and sticky rice at Lougheed Mall which they are now trying to call “The City of Lougheed Shopping Centre” which is quite frankly the least exciting and most bloatedly non-informational thing you could call the second biggest shopping mall in Burnaby, after Metrotown, which got its moniker from a town planner in Baltimore in the 60s. OH THE EXCITEMENT OF RETAIL
Lois and Ruth are coming to see their bro in early December. They won’t be here long, sadly, but I am looking forward to seeing them SO BAD.
Today, since Jeff is now caught up on his laundry, I’m going to wash clothes, towels and rugs for a while. A long, long while. And I’m investigating going back on my schedule since my turnip tendencies are starting to irritate me.
Wordle in five this morning. I changed my starter word and that sort of foozled me for a while, but I got it without cheating, so there’s that.
3249 words on ‘special deputy’
9952 words on ‘totally boned’
And I wrote a new poem but I’m not posting it because I’m not really keen on it and I didn’t write it for a mass audience so I sent it to mOm.
It is a brand new top loader. Jeff smashed his left baby finger tip in the process of helping get it into the house; I’d provide a picture but mOm would o,O if she saw it (think of an anxious owl.)
I was supposed to hang with Paul but he never called me back.
Rob W., may the goddess adorn him, showed up with an axe and a plan, but we told him we have to wait for ‘the professionals’ who are being paid by the insurance company to get that treefall fixed, so we gabbed for a couple of hours and then I made him tea and kicked him out. He left his hat.
Jeff and I went for a little walk in the gorgeous sunshine yesterday afternoon. Jeff said that he should go for a walk and I said, “I’m going to stagger up the stairs, stagger up the hill to the park and stagger back again,” and he thought I was joking; he joined me after watching me put my shoes on. This is the same park at the start of the pandemic; the logo has all washed off that hoodie but the hoodie remains.
I missed the DD celebration yesterday. I am not sad, I don’t feel sad. I am somewhat immobilized though.
Russians out of Kherson. They’re starting to put anti tank cement blocks on their side of the border, which triggered Finnish Twitter to do a most pointed and technical takedown of how insanely useless it all was. (Altho the discussion was in Finnish you can translate tweets on the fly and man the Finns were just shaking their heads, it was wonderful. There were also comments that since it WAS useless, some oligarch musta got paid for it, ten times what it’s all worth. Lovely.)
Supposedly the new washer will come in the downstairs back door around 11 am today. No movement on the tree, not that I’d expect it on Sunday.
by aquilegiaformosa on tumblr
guys we’re not being cringe to keep out the twitter users. we’re being cringe to keep out the ALGORITHMS, the CAPITALISTS, the INFLUENCERS. twitter users are welcome as long as they agree this site is UNMARKETABLE
In other words become ungovernable by being someone you can’t make money from…. by being cringe. You know who’s cringe ? autistic people, by virtue of the intensity of their many hobby horses.
I prefer to be ungovernable by having my own website, that nobody ever looks at, but which will be invaluable to my family after I’m dead. That’s how things work. It’s the longitudinal and continuous energy of it, not the content, necessarily.
Worked on yet another fanfic, “Special Deputy on the Run” yesterday. I’ve poked into the file for Part II but I think I added 36 words.
The amount of shit kicking Zibethicus (my name for Elon, means muskrat) has taken on the internet is amazing. In a few short weeks he’s scorched his fortune, facing a lawsuit for over 50 billion dollars from a former investor choked that he essentially stole shares from Tesla, received the brickbats of the commentariat and been held up as a model of everything not to do in business. Every time he says so much as boo on twitter hundreds of thousands of people tell him he’s a fucking idiot; it’s glorious, but not enough to get a twitter account.
Continuing counts in the US election still trend Biden’s way. They didn’t poll people who never voted LOL__ so many pundits have tender buttskin hanging out on this that another public spirited activity on twitter these days is going through the pundits’s last two weeks of salty prognostications and retweeting it, saying things like THIS AGED LIKE MILK or DO YOU SUPPOSE YOU WILL EVER BE RIGHT ABOUT ANYTHING EXCEPT AS THE SPECTRUM FOR YOUR POLITICS etc etc.
It is GLORIOUS and marvellous in our eyes. The night show hosts are having a field day.
Mitch McConnell, easily one of the most corrupt and disgusting politicians in American history, is not Senate GOP Leader any more, and rumblings are someone is going to grab his 15 year old perch in the Senate. The people who are candidates in replacing him aren’t as likely to be as competent at either whipping votes or stealing anything they can reach.
We are about six episodes into Farscape. Every episode is weirder than the next. Truly bizarre show.
Virtually every pediatric ICU in the country is at double capacity. There are so many sick children that you cannot buy children’s aspirin in this country right now.
Spoke to Tammy on the phone the other day, she called. She confirmed that she’s coming at Christmas and I’m seeing her on Boxing Day.
I’m going to take my meds and ignore the world right now. Filk cancelled again, and although it’s Dorothy Dunnett day I have concerns about zooming for a meeting today… oh well.
I have no idea where the above came from.
the hotel room in the Dominican Republic. A married couple who checked in at the same time got a room full of sewage for two days… this room was much better. Also a bottle of rum was like 4 bucks.
Katie was damned lucky I took a spare bathing suit. This is Saona Island.
Elon Musk cannot tell the difference between bots and new users.
He believes he’s driving growth, instead Romanian bot farms are chugging along hard. User numbers are up? Must be his free speechification of the site.
I felt so good this morning and my mood has crashed again. Hard.
Shown below is the Rosette Nebula, credit the Hubble I do believe
To remember is to end all war. I thank my pOp and my unca Dave for serving. Not everyone gets in an airplane during a nuclear crisis and after kissing his baby girl goodbye, prepares for a vile, hot death.
I’m back on twitter. Honestly, I’m back just in time to watch it implode.
Alexis Madrigal: Something I’ve been thinking about Twitter: for those of us who are word people, this was once our place
People took off to Mastodon, another social network, and the previous users attacked and shit upon women of colour. BIG FUCKING SURPRISE
Victor Shi: NEW: data confirms 18-29-year-olds voted for Democrats more than *any other* age group yesterday. Young people literally prevented a Red Wave & saved Democrats. Full stop. If you know a young voter, please thank them. (from the 9th of November 2022)
WT.Social is a heap of dweebs with a user interface like a rainy afternoon in a Welsh mining town.
I was supposed to hang out with Paul yesterday but my gut raunch from the previous day continued. I made cinnamon buns not to make it better but to give me something else to have trouble digesting, I guess. I also made pork stir fry but the onions were weird.
Pawel Kosior painted the above in oils in 2020. Perfectly captures my current mood.
No progress on writing. I do feel much more cognitively with it this morning, we’ll see.
Someone came to take the tree down but it has to be the next door neighbours paying for it and then insurance blah blah I have no idea but the tree is still leaning on the neighbour’s garage. Not exactly sure what the landpeer was up to there, but Jeff seems to think things are headed in the right direction.
The washer? 2 moah day.
I just want to shout out to Jan Maxwell, a friend from Toronto, this morning, because she’s put many smiles on my face over the years and the picture of her and Soon’s grandson on my fridge gives me a smile every time I see it.
I send out love to Dave this morning SO THRILLED about your book and very happy that you’ve survived some ghastly, sad shit over the last half dozen years and remain your relatively good humoured and pragmatic self.
I send out love to Sue Sparlin this morning. I am very very happy she decided to work on being a professional actor and now has a RECURRING PART in a show made here in Vancouver. Big hugs darling.
I send out love to Lois & Bob this morning. I think about the bees and the chickens and that phenomenal steak Bob cooked for me the last time me and Paul were there. I AM CHEWIE I THINK WITH MY TUM. Did you know that Chewbacca’s ‘real’ nickname is CHAINBREAKER!? He spent a lot of time freeing other Wookiees.
I send out love to Onty Mary this morning. I regret that I have not sent you a letter recently, so I’m reaching up to my ancestors and asking them to bless you with a wonderful day of whatever the hell you want to do.
I offer love and thanks to the Best Roommate Evar™ Jeff.
And as always beeg hogs to Ryker and Alex and Keith and Kate.
Midterms went better than expected. Ron DeSantis is now expected to be the Republican candidate for 2024’s presidential election. Everyone Trump rallied for lost; he’s obviously not helping the GOP.
Orcs (a humorous slur for Russians) are getting out of Kherson. Current casualty figures as stated by US military spokesmen is about 100K on both sides.
Spent a chunk of yesterday mall-walking with Paul and running errands, including picking up printer ink for Keith so he can at least try to get his passport application updated and sent (since Paul isn’t visiting friends in the US unless the person driving has a passport), grabbing yummy treats to stick in Katie’s face as she was assembling Ryker’s birthday present (a trampoline with a grab bar WHICH HE IMMEDIATELY COMMENCED TO USE APPROPRIATELY) and eating the amazing gluten free chicken soup Katie made and looking at watches (I want a watch). So I got a meal and a bit of family time. Suzanne was there, getting ready with Ryker for the new routine. I’m sad but what can you do but hold yourself ready for the long campaign?
Spoke to Paul and Keith (separately) about care ideas for Paul. I just can’t believe how emotionally exhausting dealing with all this is; it’s flattening for me. And nothing happens fast. I tell Paul I want a watch and for the next hour he asks me every five minutes if I’m going to buy a watch today. I have to keep cheerfully saying nope. My sheltering tree.
Honestly I think he’s relieved he’s not driving any more.
He always had great nap game but he can now pretty much nap anytime anywhere.
Photo credit Suzanne Palen – she’s claiming Ryker as her grandson on Facebook and I’m thrilled because I’m not believing you can HAVE too many grandmas. And he is Alex’s well-beloved little bro.
I have to CHARGE MY GUITAR isn’t that amusing. So my laptop is plugged in and it’s charging the battery in the new guitar. This looks pale blue, Mike got me a white one.
unique no?
Also, this is just for mOm; you know how I’ve ‘invented’ a disease for Brad… I just read a reddit post and the poster, who’s a caregiver, described her mother’s physical and mental challenges…. and it sounded as if she had symptoms exactly like Brad, and she’s post COVID too. (awake and aware and then just… not)
No progress on writing. FINALLY got my package to m&d into the mail to them; includes Alex’s art and the Guest 23 mag I have a poem in, thanks to Dave.
Ball lightning: shown in the video is either ball lightning or a transformer dying, although there was no ‘bang’. … there are family stories about ball lightning that EERILY mimic a story from 1963 recounted in this article. (pOp saw ball lightning move down the centre of the fuselage of the Argus he was flying in). Also, Grandma Susie Hinde saw a troika of ball lightning moving above the frozen surface of a river, as she told me sometime in the 1980s about an event from her girlhood in SK.
Drove Paul around to run errands and get him out of his apartment yesterday. He was in much better shape than on previous days and we had something approaching fun. Keith was about to go for a walk with a friend and Suzanne was there cleaning when I arrived.
Ukrainians who are Orthodox are switching up when they celebrate Christmas to distinguish themselves from a version of Russian Orthodoxy whose Patriarch Cyrill the Biggass Hypocrite has announced that any Russians killed in the UK campaign go straight to heaven. VOOP! YUP up we go! Local parishes have a choice now about the 25 December or 7 January date for celebrations..
Shlep this morning. I already bought milk at Walmart in Lougheed Mall yesterday. Also came home with about 20 bucks of Purdy’s chocolate TIS THE SEASON.
Justin Trudeau is ‘standing up to China’ which basically means whining and not putting more federal money into chasing down Chinese nationals openly laundering money in this town, the single biggest reason nothing is being done about it.
I realized that what was happening was that I was grieving, so I let Jeff know I’m at a low ebb and gave myself the chance to do that. I had a long soak and washed my hair and smoothed my footies, lit a beeswax candle, listed and grieved for my dead, wrote bad poetry which I won’t share here, acknowledged my other losses, made cinnamon buns, and lay in bed staring off into space (or watched the final game of the world series on DVR while staring off into space.) It certainly was baseball at a very high level in front of an extremely noisy crowd of Astros fans.
I am feeling much better this morning. I will contact Paul later on and ask him what errands he’d like to run today.
