Dr. Appt Tomorrow

Today another day of loafing and lazing in lower lalaland.

Ate my leftovers for breakfast, so nommy.

Mike and Jeff and I watched The King’s Man and HOLY JEEZ Rhys Ifans as Rasputin is one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen. He fights while doing cossack style ballet kicks (obvs not him, some poor body double sod) and the whole ‘he was very hard to kill’  story gets THE FULL TREATMENT like shitbag he was extremely hard to kill. Anyway I think I had to be in the right mood to watch it and I was, because despite it being ahistorical and goofy as anything it was very entertaining and surprisingly well written and didn’t fall down in the fourth act.

Also the montage ‘once there were three cousins who ended up being the leading rulers in Europe’ really makes you think about the Great War in different terms.

There is a lot of fighting and there is a goat. Jeff called the goat’s behaviour well in advance, but that wasn’t too hard. There’s also a sequence that will not leave you feeling great about the safety of elevators that go by hand crank up a massive cliff side (the dialogue of the poor schmo stuck in it is classic).

This is a graphic of the Peacemaker dance. If you don’t know what that is or why it’s important to the ‘me’, relax. It’s just a dance.

Mike is coming bearing food

He’s off to Balkan House to pick up SCHHHHHHHHNITZEL and oh boy oh boy. He was going to stop off and get beer but we’ve got enough for an evening’s worth and Jeff certainly won’t grudge it if Mike’s paying for din din.

Here I am hopping from one foot to the other waitin’ and anticipatin’.

But I should go downstairs and finish stringing Smokey.

Russian’s invaded Ukraine. May Putin fail and fall.

 

More items off the list

I am continuing to feel much more chipper.  It wasn’t a super productive day, but I walked (really walked, not ambled) and got some social contact and the sun was a benison.

There’s a new game, Semantle. IT’S INSANE MAKING. Wordle is fun and brief and lively, but Semantle makes you understand you don’t understand English at all, and given that it is, “My bag, my thing, my evil specialty” it’s … Okay, here’s the link. Just don’t ever play the game, you will die of frustration. (suitably vexed voice, with shaken fists: CURSE YOU VIXY) —LATER LATER MUCH LATER I’m up to 3hundred and freakn 80 guesses on Semantle, I feel like me brains are leaking out my ears.

It’s supposed to be ass freezing cold tonight until Wednesday. I am not worried; I’ll have the warmth of VISITORS tonight yes that’s right Mike was supposed to come over for ‘za last night but he drank too much with sifu (sifu is master in Chinese martial arts)  and couldn’t manage it, so he’s coming over tonight.

Buster heals and complains about the door being locked.

Yesterday I ordered the bamboo charcoal smell-killers that have worked so well for us. (really helps with the damp smell in the downstairs john).  Why? As mentioned Mike got a right hand drive Delica (which I rode in for the first time when we went saunaing and dining with Jarmo and Susanna) and it’s unfortunately a Japanese vehicle which means it’s been smoked in. So I’ll give him three of those bamboo charcoal smell killers and that will keep the noxious effluvium down to a dull roar, hopefully. I ordered it from Rona and with the exchange and free shipping it’s about the same as if I ordered it from the US, so that worked.

Absolutely delightful walk in the park at Fraser Foreshore yesterday with Paul. I fed the chickadees from my hands for about ten minutes with Paul watching, most entertained; with what delicacy and firmness did they grasp my index finger as they rested a flashing moment to grab a sunflower seed. The sun was just blasting down and there was no wind, so we sat in the sun and basked for many long minutes in companionable silence. Everyone on the trail (except for those two fuckwits on mountain bikes who came through with a gopro and attitude and 90 dB of shitty club music at about 25 kph without a bell or shout) was practically giddy with joy at the warmth and sun, and even though it was the Sunday of a long holiday weekend (it’s ‘Family Day’ in BC) the trails weren’t too crowded. I masked, Paul didn’t.

Then we went back to KC Junction and I ate Keith’s leftovers, a superlative yellow lentil stew with heaps of veg and subtle, lightly heated spicing, and then we ate my choc rice pudding for dessert. (Keith enjoyed it with thanks.) Paul was much more interested in the borscht I brought (he really likes my borscht) and I realized why when I saw the sour cream container. But I can’t eat borscht two days running because anything with oxalic acid makes my kidney output scratchy so I ate lentils instead.

Keith’s loving his job… just loving it. He says it’s only a week and you can’t know for sure, and the pay is not great, but it’s work he can stand and he’s visibly in much better shape than even two weeks ago.

Katie was out with Ryker & Alex and some friends so I didn’t get to see her.

The Russians are claiming that the Ukrainians are ‘reacquiring nuclear weapons’ and I’m like wow, we can’t trust a fucking word you say now, can we.

Worst showing ever in terms of ratings for the Olympics. Why NBC keeps this boat anchor tied to its ass I have no idea. What if they held an Olympics and nobody wanted to broadcast it? That would be choice.

Twitter antifa (canuck division) is rooting around in rural Ontario to find the names of the people who are hiding the convoyancers. So far some son of a sea cook in Embrun who’s the best friend of the mayor there is one of them. LOL they can hide but six months from now the knock will come. Remember they’re still knocking on doors from the Jan 6 rebellion in the US, it’s not like the cops work faster in Canuckistan.

I’m an abolitionist; if they could all be referred to restorative justice and be filling planters and picking up garbage in Centretown for the next two years instead of paying fines and going to jail I WOULD BE HAPPY. Especially if they had to wear a PLEASE DON’T FEED THE HONKIES sign around their necks while they were doing it, but that’s not nice, I know it.

I don’t know if I mentioned it, but if they reboot Futurama without the voice acting talents of John DiMaggio I won’t watch it, even out of whatever is left of my curiosity.

Side note to mOm. The Metformin did it again this morning, fortunately I know how this goes and I had plans in place and managed to deal with it all promptly. What a life.

 

 

 

 

brekky at Fraser Park Restaurant

I had the two slice french toast and two cups of their excellent coffee. And their weird but yummy homemade swossages.  Website.

It’s rainy and windy, not an elegant day at all. Certainly not as bad as poor Britain yesterday, lashed by 90 mile an hour winds and some of the scariest airport missed approaches I’ve seen in a while, trees over and bins in the next county and people racing sitting on skateboards while holding shopping bags and getting blown down the sidewalk.

FINALLY got Mary’s letter in the mail.

I have a three day list of tasks in front of me, let’s see how much I can get done now that I have something resembling energy and mood.

Doreen Manuel a Secwépemc woman made these beaded kicks and they are amazing. Support your Land Water Protectors today!

I made borscht

I didn’t put bouillon on the shopping list so it’s not very salty (or busting with the flavourful) but it’s definitely soup, substantial and hopefully digestible. Had it for supper last night, Jeff had some too.

There are now two soups to choose from, since there’s lentil soup in the fridge as well.

Jeff told me to my horror that my crow feeding has attracted pigeons. I put a post it note on the back door to prevent me from putting food out until Monday. I do not want to encourage pigeons unless I’m trapping and eating them too. There is interspecies signalling of food deposition – the flicker called the crows yesterday, it was amazing to watch. Buster, being trapped indoors, spends a lot of time watching birdies, both from the kitchen table and from his cat tower in the corner of the living room.

Today I’m going to slow roast some veg.

I hope to continue along with the dejunking as well; I am staying on top of the clothing situation and have been merrily throwing stuff out that I either never want to move again or don’t want to make my estate clean out. Also, changing strings, getting the posture ball back downstairs into the guest room, maybe even practicing.

Oh, the alarm’s about to go to tell me to take my BP and Metformin meds.

Still haven’t mailed Mary’s letter, how I wish those sons of sea cooks at the Post Office hadn’t removed my closest mail box. The next nearest one is a ten minute walk, outrageous. And inconvenient, I never go along that street on foot!  Fuck them assholes. Grr.

One little kudo this am, most recent story. Still working up situations for the new ones and staring fixedly at the half dozen or so other stories I would like to finish and post.

Watched the first episode of Cuphead; I think mOm and pOp might like it, it’s a total blast from 30’s animation; everything from the character to the sound design and the little blips that faux age the cartoon is pitch perfect. Also, there’s one bit where I was screaming at Jeff to rewind and replay, lovely use of the cartoon form.

Hey mOm, this is the bead rondel that is Jesse’s ‘badge of office’ when he is visiting elderly people in his building. The green background is a tacit acknowledgement that he’s a settler.

 

Here’s a sketch of Beaky (Pharos) when he was newly born. The eyes and ‘freckles’ aren’t eyes and freckles, they’re pigment patches (since sixers are made of muscle that can see lol and don’t have eyes like mammals do). He appears to have 4-6 legs but one of those forelimbs is a social tentacle. He looks so adorable here and he’s one of the crabbiest sentient creatures that ever lived, and once you know his history, it’s easy to understand why.

 

I have guitar strings!

So I picked up mando and guitar strings yesterday, which is good, because when I play “Gelis and Niccolo” I am pulverizing my guitar strings, which start to blister and unwind and go dead. So I shall take the guitar tool which the esteemed M. Mike provided and change my guitar strings with speed and ease. Also Otto’s strings because he sounds deader than Beethoven right now.

I actually picked up the ukelele yesterday and played for a while!

Buster is PISSSSSED that he can’t go outside. Then he cries like a sad kitten, it’s heartwrenching. But he’s still covered in scabs from his last failure to carry the field, and he cost Daddy somewhat with this last ear ding, so we are being brutal and keeping him in. We may break out the catnip just to keep him vivified.

After some very disturbed sleep and a lot of napping I seem to be back diurnal, sleeping until four in the morning YAY. I don’t like it when Jeff and I are out of sync, even when he’s working it’s like we don’t talk for a day and all of a sudden we’re eating supper in front of Elementary….

The kitchen is a nightmare but I can’t find the energy to clean it. (actually I just emptied the dishwasher and threw out the cruft, but that doesn’t make a visible dent lol)

Fed Paul and Jeff pulled pork sammies on brown buns, smashed taters and green beans for lunch yesterday. Paul and I went for a brief walk and toured around and got veggies and went to the guitar shop. I drove.  Although I have not spoken to Keith, Paul reports that he’s loving his new job. This heartens me; his recent previous brief foray into employment left him quite disgusted with the state of employers, like that is hard these days.

Arrests have commenced in Ottawa; when the aptly named Lich was arrested and went on social media to complain about how the jig was up I really enjoyed that.

Duly noted here is the dubious morality under which I may be said to enjoy the arrest of the people who’ve been making Centertown unliveable for three fucking weeks (as of today), when I have repeatedly (in this venue and others) stated that I am an abolitionist, and wish for the amelioration and end of incarcerated punishment, except where no acceptable community alternative is possible. I am still the child my parents raised and I enforce the carceral state in my life and my mind and with my words and actions, but I am trying very hard to turn from such darkness.

I would like to state here that at all times during the last 3 weeks the cops in Ottawa have had ALL THE LEGAL DEVICES THEY NEED TO CLEAR THE STREETS and they didn’t because AND YOU KNOW WHY, DON’T YOU, MR. JONES. Anyway there’s something called a riot act. The activities downtown WERE and ARE a riot. FUCK THE GUY ON REDDIT WHO SAID IT DIDN’T MEET THE CRITERIA, HE WAS A FOOL AND WRONG ANYWAY.

Not only is this political cartoon one of the weirdest and creepiest I’ve ever seen, it would get me pushed out a window in Russia and disappeared for three months of reeducation and weight loss in China, possibly longer than that. @listen_to_me is the source on twitter; it’s a cyrillic alphabet account I accessed through following @alexey__kovalev, an absolutely hilarious giant-testicled Russian journalist who keeps running afoul of Putin and his slavering minions.

Image

 

Not much to report

Buster is recovering as fast as cats do; the most recent Call the Midwife literally had me and Jeff on the edges of our seats; I hope to call Paul today and go for a walk, mail Auntie’s letter and maybe do some other boring errand-y things; Russia is putting the finishing touches on its invasion plans for Ukraine; I got a single kudo last night for the most recent story; I partially cleaned out the fridge this morning; Jeff and I did a shop this morning and watched a Time Team afterward.

Have some Margot fuzz.

 

Buster is an indoor cat

Buster had an immense weeping ear infection from a long cat scratch down his ear canal. He’s to be kept indoors and fed antibiotics and gooped for the next ten days. We are both very relieved, and Jeff says he was a brave boy at the vet. He peed in his carrier again, but he does that every time. He’s also up to date on his shots again, so tranquillity abounds, etc etc.

I had to replace ALL the ink in the printer yesterday which would have been even more annoying if I hadn’t previously stocked up on ersatz cartridges and didn’t have to go anywhere or spend any money to make it happen. Part of having ADD is hoarding, and part is being therefore prepared, and the rest is having a million iterations of shit that don’t fit. BUT IT IS OKAY because I finally got Mary’s letter printed and I’ll be mailing it today.

Got my balance ball back and that will make making music a lot easier. I love playing music on a bouncy ball, I can really rock out. While looking like a loon.

Saw Ryker the other day, he’s still an adorable baby with a commitment to sleep that outpaces my own.

Absolutely sweet comment – brief, too – on the most recent story yesterday.

Haven’t received word from Keith about how his first day on the job went.

 

Poor Buster

I think he has ear mites. His ear stinks godawful and of course he’s cuddling up to me to be friendly what with Jeff being gone and I don’t want to go near him, bleaugh.

I have put away every scrap of my clean laundry! Now I’m going to clean off the desk (Suzanne cleaned it off once already but paper cruft has crept back onto it.) Then I’m going to set up the speakers, and bring the chair back in here, and dejunk some books, and then tidy the kitchen a little.

This is Buster with Mike a couple of years back.

a lovely lazy day

Called friends and family, practiced music for the first time in ages, ran and dried a couple of loads of laundry.

Breakfast is leftovers. Red hot leftovers and tea.

Buster seems to have an injury to one ear. Jeff will look at it when he gets home. I cleaned it and he sat pretty for me while I did it. The stench was unconscionable.

Happy Valentine’s day for those who celebrate. I think I’ve commented enough on it in the past.

Remember the BATTLE OF BILLINGS BRIDGE!

 

Looks like another nice day

Jeff emailed me late yesterday with an update and advice to ‘let it rip’ as far as giving Buster his can o’ food. So I fed him about an hour ago. I think he ate the entire can in two goes, it was quite remarkable, his slurpy dedication, although he eyed me each time I passed. I made him sit pretty while I said, “What day is it <<<INTERROBANG>>> SUNDAY!” and put the cat dish down.

Wheat toast and a single slice of havarti and lashings of tea to break my fast. I need to do yet another load of laundry, haul the two clean loads upstairs and put them away. This makes me sad because my clean clothes have expanded like land office gits and now even though there are FEWER clothes in those drawers the clean clothes in the return hamper now need more room like Burnaby developers. I had enough room for my clothes and  I did laundry with gaiety and pride when I had SAME FLOOR ENSUITE LAUNDRY. I fucking hate being considered lazy when the world isn’t made for me, and I’m whipped for it. But this situation is of my own making, so I don’t get to make that argument. Unless you want to actively think about ableism, which at the moment, I don’t. And then…

My INCONTINENCE UNDERWEAR arrived last night. I’ve been tracking its approach with disquiet, for Apple Delivery said they were going to get it to me by 9 pm Saturday. Some (statistically, most likely a) dude is not getting a Saturday night or very likely a union paycheque to bring me something that will bring positive peace of mind and negative trails of urine. But such watch? the timing?? I’ll have to get out of bed to get it? ooo  I did in fact pull the plastic wrapped package off the porch in the dark, having checked less than an hour previously. (This was about 8:10 pm.)  Almost a weeks’ worth of underodoureater – must say they are not exactly Wonder Woman like. I fancy I could break the internet, in some tiresome way, if I posted pictures. I quite like the colours and the style. There’s a misty twilight colour but of course I wore the black one first because I only buy beige and navy so I can claim not to wear black all the time (that’s a lie – my tshirts are hella colourful – but a point about my evasively inadequate couture is being made.) Confidential to mOm:  (I chickened out and sent it to her directly – the internet’s forever)