I took a walk today, because my heart's been heavy since November and even trips into fandom can't relieve that for long.

So I took a walk, through a park that runs into another park that runs into a nature preserve. It's not a proper woods, there's not a single point you can be without hearing traffic, but it has some important elements of a good woods. Moss and fallen logs and mushrooms and various footprints in the mud, some of which don't even belong to dogs and booted humans. I saw squirrels, and birds flitting in the undergrowth, and I saw a lot of trash in the creek but next time I'll bring a bag and pick some of that up.

It's sort of a resolution of mine, to walk through the park when I can, and when I feel even the smallest urge. At least once a week I try to take a small walk. I take pictures, too, not to share, necessarily, but because taking pictures helps me focus on where I am, and helps me see interesting or amusing or beautiful things all around me. It lifts my mood, and even if that lasts only for the duration of the walk it's still better than if I hadn't walked at all.

I feel filled with despair, to be honest with you. That heavy, irrepressible sadness that comes from knowing too much and feeling powerless to stop any of it. I know too much and not enough -- too many possibilities for how everything will crumble to terrible pieces, and not enough about whether, or how, it actually will.

I'm still in denial over the fact that Carrie Fisher died. I don't know why her death has affected me so profoundly, why it was her death and not any of the dozens of objectively more terrible things to have come to pass lately, but that's how it came down, for me. I can't think about it, because if I think about it, I'll fall apart.

So I took a walk this afternoon, spent over an hour wandering down muddy paths, pausing on bridges and taking pictures of moss and old birds' nests. I heard the crows as they flew to their evening roosts, and I heard the traffic, and saw deer tracks and feathers caught on twigs.

Life will go on. I'm terrified about tomorrow, about the future, about how to effectively push back without endangering myself or my loved ones, but I take comfort in the fact that the crows still roost and the creek still flows.

(back in pennsylvania, and the lack of updates was because i was too busy and having too much fun to actually open my laptop long enough to write. also tonight i saw the latest star wars movie and utterly wrecked me, which was not at all the reaction i was expecting to have, so i'm just going to go to bed right now)

I have made it to Toronto! I left this morning around 8:30 and arrived at about 3:30, and I am so glad I didn't travel yesterday: almost all of my route was snow-covered, and it was clear folks in western New York were still shoveling out from yesterday's snowfall. I am pretty sure some places got a foot or more, judging by the mounds I glimpsed on top of resting cars. The area right around Buffalo was a little hairy -- it was like driving into a wall of grey, one minute the roads were dry and the sky was bright, and the next everything was snow-covered and traffic was crawling. Fortunately it only lasted for a few miles north of the border, whew.

Now it is snowing again: almost three inches have fallen just since about 7pm, but since I don't have to drive in it, I don't care. Look, it's pretty!!

Shortly after I arrived, I joined Peter and Esther in attending a fundraising dinner for a church downtown. It was fun, and the food was delicious, but shortly into the main course I found myself fading a bit. I am really very tired! So I haven't had the chance to really feel how it feels to be back, if that makes sense, but mostly at this point it feels good. Things are a little different, but it's still the same house I lived in for over two years.

Now, though, it really is time to sleep.

Oh hi, how's it going? Oops, it's late again and I haven't written recently. Oops.

I am fine, too-tired but that's not new, and work is going fine, though it's snowed recently, and it's cold enough that the snow is sticking, which makes getting dogs in and out a little more interesting. Kennel/dog-coat negotiations are a whole 'nother layer of fun, let's just put it that way.

I was supposed to drive to Toronto tomorrow, but instead it is going to snow fifty million feet and I will instead drive up on Friday. It has not escaped me that the winter has been fairly mild until just the past week or so -- and that lake-effect snow is, evidently, difficult to predict for anything but a short term forecast. Hoom.

Today I finished an outstanding novella, Binti by Nnedi Okorafor, and I liked it so much I immediately donated it to my local library, because they didn't have a copy and I needed to fix that. I was excited to learn that the sequel comes out in January.

Now I am very tired, and will convey myself to bed posthaste.

I have been informed that my blog contains far too many mentions of canine bowel movements, and not enough discussion of me.

Thank you, Uncle Roy, your opinion is noted.

In other news, having nothing whatsoever to do with canines or their bodily functions, I parked myself in a squashy public library chair today and wrote for almost two hours (go me!). I'd forgotten that next week is finals week on campus -- every desk and table in the library was crowded with students studying (or pretending to study; there were a lot of open binders and laptops going on). Hence the armchair. I balanced my laptop on top of my backpack on top of my lap, so I wouldn't get a crick in my neck from looking quite so far down at the screen, and cranked out almost 900 words.

Not everyone at the library was a student, of course; there was also the usual crowd of browsers, parents with small, hushed children in tow, and an assortment of older folks alternately reading the paper or napping.

One gentleman seemed to be having a pretty rough time of it -- he sat in a chair nearby and commenced sighing and groaning audibly for quite some time. You know the kind of sigh someone makes when they finally sit down after a really long day? It was that noise. About every thirty seconds. The two students studying across from me peered over their shoulders at him, but he was oblivious. Honestly I hope he was okay, but, like, he wasn't visibly bleeding or anything so I think he was rather beyond whatever help I, hanging out in a public library, might offer.

The interesting thing was that, because this personage was impossible to ignore, and because almost everyone else present was being Very Studious, I ended up having a couple of moments with the students across from me, you know the kind when you and a stranger both witness something weird and you widen your eyes at each other? And then after that you kind of have a camaraderie with them? That happened. We were united in our bemusement over this other patron. Eventually they moved on to a quieter location, and I moved on back to my car in order to go to work. I don't know what happened to the noisy-sighing man.

So there. A blog entry that wasn't remotely about dog poop.

:D

( Yours truly with a pupperCollapse )

It's been a while since I posted any pictures of dogs. (Or have I ever? I can't remember!) This guy's name is Liono, after the Thundercat, and he is rather chubby, but it doesn't slow him down. I would not go so far as to say he's happy at the shelter, but he definitely loves people, and so when we have him in the kitchen he's happy to climb onto people's laps and get pets. He was rescued by another local agency from the euthanasia list at a NYC shelter this spring, and I've seen the pictures from his intake: he was so emaciated you could see his ribs and his vertebrae. Now he has little fat rolls. His only quirk (that I've seen) is that he pees like a horse, so if he doesn't get outside in time, he'll leave a puddle in the corner of his kennel. But otherwise he's quite neat (he doesn't step in the puddle, for example, unlike some dogs I know), good on the leash, and generally calm.

There are dogs in the shelter who I know are Good Dogs, but maybe they're also still brainless puppies and so I find myself scrubbing shitstains off their walls almost every day, and I have to admit I'm less inclined to think fondly of them (even if that's unfair of me). Working here has given me a perspective that not everyone looking to adopt a dog gets, but as I've said, dogs behave differently in their kennels than they do in a calmer environment like a home. Maybe the young dog who pees and smears it everywhere in her kennel wouldn't do that in a home. Maybe Liono has triggers can't see yet, because he's living in a shelter.

Anyway, I'm still happy about the opportunity to hang out with dogs nearly every day.

Another Tuesday, another film recommendation!!

(The local cinemas have Cheap Movie Tuesdays, when all tickets are $5, which is half the regular price of admission, which means I go see movies when I remember that it's Tuesday.)

This evening I saw the film Moonlight (trailer), and holy cow it's incredible. It came out well over a month ago, in select cities, but we've finally got it here and I am so glad I braved the miserable weather to go see it.

Here is a piece on the film from PBS NewsHour, featuring interviews from the director, the writer, and two of the principle actors.

One of the things I like best is how this film takes its time. It's sort of a coming-of-age story about a young man growing up in a hard neighborhood, in a hard time, and it follows him as a child, and then a teenager, and then as an adult. And within those different acts, the characters communicate through expressions as much as through words, and the camera lets them. Oh, it is beautiful to watch. Painful sometimes, sometimes aching, but always beautiful.

What I also like is that underneath it all there is always a persistent hope, and goodness. It's a hard world, but it's still a world worth living in.

I'm so happy this film exists. That this team of people came together and made it and that we can go see it now, and see it again if we want. (I definitely want to see it again.) It's a film about Black people, made by Black people, and the fact that this is so quietly remarkable says a lot more about our culture than it does about the film, but it's still an incredible film.

You should see it too, if you can. I highly recommend it.

I was going to do interesting things today, I think, but for most of it I instead looked outside, noted it was cold and grey, and opted to not leave my room. Oops?

Sunday's one of two days off I get, and the one where the library is barely open and the other places I hang out close early, so that's how I kind of justify not leaving the house.

What I did do was spend the afternoon and evening watching the anime Yuri on Ice, which I've been hearing a lot about lately. It is very silly, but addictive. Here is a handy guide to the show, if you're super-curious. (It's also free online, hooray!) I'm trying to get my brother to watch it, because the figure skating in the show is actually quite well done, but I'm not sure he'll go in for the love story.

But I like it!!

I'm trying to figure out if there's any metaphor to be found in the way stinkbugs have chosen my room as their favored hangout spot, and in the way I have adopted a low-tolerance policy as a result of this.

(Hello this is your blogger on too little sleep and not enough inspiration)

Yesterday I found one sneaking across my pillow, and this evening I saw one (possibly the same one; despite evictions they keep wandering back) stalking over the panes of my quilt. My mistake was clearly not going far enough with the eviction process -- flicking them out of my room and into the hallway just won't do. To the freezing outdoors with you, stinkbugs!

Earlier this fall I let down my curtains as dusk fell (I keep them tied up in knots, because there's no real way to pin them back) and each curtain (I have three) was hiding a dozen bugs. Oh hey guys, welcome to my room, now get the heck out. Then the other day I pulled down a postcard from my corkboard and discovered, you guessed it, a stinkbug on the back of it. The same thing happens when I take books off my shelves.

I'm not sure if it's better or worse that I don't kill them outright. Surely flicking them into the yard at this time of year is a death sentence anyway? And I am not usually so callous when it comes to removing members of the local wildlife from the premises (mice and monsterbugs excepted). It's not that I'm afraid of them, not at all, and it's not like they spread disease (don't tell me if they do, you guys, just don't). But they're big enough and solid enough and in-my-business enough to be un-ignorable (unlike the spiders chilling in the corners of my room and indeed all the rooms here), and so I remove them from my presence, since they don't have the decency to do it themselves.

And I am trying to figure out if there is some kind of metaphor to be made here, or some moral or life lesson, and probably if I was another kind of writer I could make allusions to real life experiences, and find some truth mirrored in the undesirability of the lowly stinkbug.

But I'm not another kind of writer and so far I'm pretty okay with sending these bugs caroming across the hall and that's good enough for now.

Last night, walking to my car after the poetry shindig, I heard a crow grumble somewhere overhead and looked up. There in the leafless sycamore tree above me, covering the topmost branches like vaguely pointy blobs of darkness, were dozens of crows. Dozens and dozens: as I kept walking, I saw at least five other trees similarly crow-covered. I realized I was staring, and looked back down at the sidewalk -- proper human posture -- but still, it was remarkable. I know crows roost in the winter, but I can't remember if I've ever seen them gather in quite so public an area, in trees bordering a fairly busy street.

Apparently, according to other posts in that blog I linked above, crows don't care for shiny objects but they do like unsalted, in-the-shell peanuts. Since crows can remember faces, and know their (human) enemies and friends, I always feel like treating them with respect is the right way to go, but especially this time of year. There are rather more of them around than usual...

I am up way too late, but I attended a kind of poetry reading tonight and I have no regrets. One of my high school friends set it up following the election, in order to give people a place to speak what was on their minds, and thanks to what seemed to be tireless promotion on her part (she looked pretty tired by the end of tonight) about fifty or sixty people showed up, and maybe two dozen (or more? I didn't count) folks read or performed a piece.

It was mostly poetry, and mostly poetry by the folks reading or reciting. Some of it was written as a direct response to the election -- much of that I found quite powerful -- and some was poetry inspired by other life events which seemed extra relevant now.

But also there were performances -- several people sang and played instruments, and one person danced. There was a whole range of contributions, both in style and in tone, but I liked that the space really was for anyone who wanted to contribute. (Er, no one present admitted to voting for the slimebucket. Someone came close I think, and had the presence of mind to gauge the audience and rather quickly amended what he'd been planning to say into a rousing call for continued democracy, which, okay.) It definitely was a group of people who felt, at best, confused by the election, and several people admitted in their poems to being terrified. When yet another person described how they spent the day after the election sobbing, I did wonder if any slimebucket supporters were in the audience, and if they were hearing this. Maybe. I don't know.

But I'm glad this event happened, and that so many people showed up, and I'm glad that I went, too, even though today was rainy and grey and would have been an excellent day to just stay inside.

And now, to bed.

I saw Moana tonight on a whim, and I really enjoyed it! Here's the trailer, if you haven't heard of it.

One of the things I really liked was how much the film emphasized community -- the community of family, the community of the place where you grew up, the community of everyone who came before you. This story is a version of the Hero Character Is Unsatisfied & Goes Questing, Learns A Lot trope, but I appreciate how here, Moana always intended to return. Her tension comes from loving her home and wanting to see what's beyond the horizon.

Something else I deeply appreciated was how the There's A Bad Guy! story line was resolved. In nearly every quest story I can think of, the villain must be vanquished, must be killed, in order for there to be peace once more (or whatever). Moana the film and Moana the character offer a truly compassionate alternative and I didn't expect it but it was beautiful to watch. (Especially considering that violence & vanquishing were very much on the table up til a very critical point.) The characters grow, of course -- it's a quest story -- but the ones who gain the most from learning humility are actually the men. I liked that too.

Anyway, yeah, I recommend it! At the very least, I bet it'll make you smile.

Oh, well! Last night I went to a shindig at my friend's house, because my brother and several other friends were also there, and even though I only meant to stay an hour or so, I ended up leaving well after 11, oops.

And now I see it's going to be After 11 again very shortly, oops again.

Also yesterday I hung out with Julia, we went for a walk in the woods and then warmed up over cocoas and lattes at a cafe downtown. We spent time together today, too. I'm glad she came up for Thanksgiving, and I'm glad to hear she may come up again for New Year's, but I will miss her badly in the meantime. Florida is a long ways away.

Julia's leaving tomorrow, and my brother's leaving the next day, and it is not as if I don't have any friends in town, but having two people around whom I tried to see every day, that was really good. Even if it meant I got to bed much later than I ought to have.

I'm feeling quiet and sleepy tonight -- sleepy because I'm up too late, again, and quiet I think because for me it was just a quiet day. Ironically today was that really busy shopping day that you see advertised everywhere; I'd actually forgotten. I came back to my house after work and finished the book I'd been reading for the past week (Crooked Kingdom by Leigh Bardugo, it's the sequel to Six of Crows and set in this alternate kinda Amsterdam with magic and criminals and some very compelling characters, I liked it a lot). So I spent much of the day curled up in bed, which was lovely, or mopping floors and scrubbing cat cages, which was ... not lovely certainly, but not bad either. At least today I cleaned cages recently vacated by cats, instead of cages currently housing cats and all their litter-flinging habits.

But now I am going to bed.

With regards to food, Thanksgiving is a holiday that's easy to side-eye; it's like a celebration of gluttony, and of course gluttony is bad.

But as someone who, lately, has been too-hungry too damn often, I was really looking forward to being allowed to eat as much as I wanted, and then a little more after that.

My brother and I spent the afternoon with my mom and her aunt and her son and his partner (the usual crew), and I got super-tipsy on less than half a glass of wine (empty stomach) and felt generally great. It was good to see everyone again. My brother came in late last night, so we spent the car ride over happily reunion-izing. He's sporting super long hair -- it's longer than mine! -- and a rather majestic beard, and I think, once he gets his hair styled by someone who knows what they're doing, it's a look that could really work for him.

Dinner was fantastic -- all the usual foods, the turkey and the potatoes and cranberries and stuffing (oh the stuffing!) -- and yes, I ate too much. I then went right over to the sofa, laid down and closed my eyes. There is something very nice about dozing while warm and full and in the company of people you love.

Later, as my brother and I were getting ready to leave, my cousin's partner asked if I wanted any leftovers. I admit I was relieved that he had asked, because otherwise I wouldn't have said anything. I don't know: I'm weird about food. I need to be asked. But then I started talking about how often I've been hungry lately, and how constantly stressful it is to be poor, and the cup o' soups are cheap but they're also high in sodium, and anyway they never have enough calories to actually fill me up, but I'm so damn tired when I get back from work that I don't have the energy to make meals from scratch, so sometimes I just eat granola and nuts instead, because if I go hungry for more than a few hours then I get headaches.

Which... is how I ended up with a lot of leftovers, and I had to go in the bathroom for a bit and just cry, because kindesses make me cry even when they're from family.

I have put all the little tupperwares of turkey and cranberries and potatoes and stuffing in the fridge here, in a bag marked with my name, and it is so relieving to know that, for the next couple of days or so, I won't have to worry about how to feed myself.

That's a pretty wonderful Thanksgiving gift.

I don't have a whole lot tonight. I've been getting to bed way-too-late much too often recently, for a variety of reasons, but it's not a good habit to keep.

Work was fine today, though there was an awful lot of urine going on -- you'd think with only 11 dogs in-house there wouldn't be many messes, but some of those 11 dogs are very messy puppers -- and I remain grateful for mops, and hot soapy water, and functioning laundry machines.

Also, my dear friend Julia is back in town, and we spent yesterday afternoon and then this evening hanging out and catching up, which has been lovely.

Now, though, it's bed time.

As you may have heard, police attacked a group of unarmed water protectors on Sunday evening at Standing Rock, North Dakota. I admit today is the first day I've been able to read about this and watch any of the footage (the cops claim they used fire hoses to put out the fires present on-scene; the footage instead shows those hoses being aimed at people standing well away from those fires). It's hard, and one of the reasons why it's hard is that it seems so stupid: The people are saying, Reroute the pipeline. Heaven forbid we listen to them!

And why does this story always contain the same tropes, why does it repeat the same refrains, time and time again? Because one side is saying, This place is more than "resources." And the other side is saying, Resources = profit.

Sure that's pretty simplified, but I've seen this story again and again -- in Standing Rock, in Grassy Narrows, in Elsipogtog, in Barriere Lake, in Shoal Lake 40, in Unist'ot'en, in Mauna Kea... And at the end of the day, it always seems like there's a fundamental difference is understanding what is important.

This essay explores another facet of that difference, and gives me a clue about some possible origins. It's short and poignant and (if you're anything like me) frustrating:

Debate on a Plane: a surprising conversation on the way to Standing Rock, by filmmaker Sterlin Harjo

It's short enough that excerpting it would be awkward, just take my word and three minutes and go read it.

I worked two shifts at the shelter today, with about three and a half hours in between, during which time I lay in bed and read.

Gotta admit, it's not really something I want to make a habit of. Tonight I covered for someone, that's why I went in, but the fact that I don't have to work Tuesdays anymore is really why I offered in the first place.

On the whole I like morning shifts far better than evenings, especially at this time of year -- man, a half an hour after I arrived today, it started getting dark. Nonsense! At least in the morning it starts dark and cold and then probably gets warmer, and certainly brighter.

But I had a realization last night, before I went to sleep, about just how cool it still is that I have this job. I mean, really: I get to meet so many wonderful dogs (and some annoying dogs too okay), and also some interesting cats, and even when they're frustrating (you peed in your kennel again??) they also make me smile.

Plus, I've been around long enough now that all of the old-timer dogs, the ones who've been there for months or more, no longer bark at me when I go by. I sweep and mop the kennel aisles after a shift, and they're curled on their beds, watching, or dozing, or ignoring me. It's oddly satisfying.

Anyway now I am quite tired, and I am looking forward to sleeping for a little while.

It snowed today, less than an inch but enough to turn everything gloomy and grey. I did not venture outside; I barely left my room. Sometimes, I have headaches.

I'm afraid I didn't do very much yesterday, either, besides finish the third season of Black Sails and then go to work. The evening shift is different now, with it getting dark so soon and all.

It's barely 9pm here but I'm going to try to catch up on sleep. That's one thing that landed me in this place. The perpetual need for more sleep.

Surely tomorrow will be more interesting.

Hello yes, I am tired but that is nothing unusual (*resists looking at the time*). Otherwise I am okay -- I sat on a bench outside the library today and people-watched, because it felt like a compromise between laying in bed watching TV and going around Being Active. I saw a person wearing a black leather jacket and rainbow hair -- rainbow! hair!! -- and frankly that made the whole outing worth it.

I also did watch some TV: the other day the library kindly informed me that the third season of Black Sails, which I'd requested weeks ago, had finally come in and was ready for pick-up at the reference desk. I realized as soon as I checked all three discs out that they were all 3-day-loaners. I've watched 6 episodes in the past two days; I have four more to go by tomorrow at 3:30pm, when I need to leave for work. I think I can do it.

I cracked my head on a table corner today, something I have not done since I was average-table-height, and I keep forgetting and then running my hands through my hair and going, OW, WTF. Oh.

(My dear, however did you do something so silly? Well friends, I was industriously disinfecting a meet&greet room at the shelter, and this included crouching down to scrub table legs. Unfortunately I realized one half-second too late that yoinking the table around to better scrub the other legs was a Bad Idea.)

There is a little red lump on my forehead, but fortunately it didn't break the skin. Once I got over repeating "Fuck!" really loudly, I started to laugh. Slapstick humor, at least when it's self-incurred, always makes me laugh (eventually). Fortunately there were no witnesses, so I am free to tell this story my own way. Please imagine me laughing while also holding my head.

Tonight I went to a poetry reading, where folks from different countries read poetry in their own languages first, and then read translations in English. It was cool! I heard poems in Spanish, Slovenian, Russian, Czech, Shona, Hindi, Persian, and Chinese.

I've decided that one thing I can do is just be more engaged in my community. Just go to events, like poetry readings or teach-ins or the theatre. Just pay attention. It won't be enough to turn back any kinds of tides, but it seems better than sitting in my room, retweeting stuff from other places.

It feels pretty good so far, anyway.

Well! Well!!

Last night there was a community event at this funky co-op/business incubator space wherein you got free soup & salad & bread and then people from the community presented ideas on how they are, or would like to, enrich life in this town, and at the end everyone could vote for their favorite idea and the winner got $250. The idea I voted for was to install benches at the bus stops around town, but I think it came in second, after the two young girls and their mom who were making care-bags for the kids who arrive at the local women’s shelter. That won. It was a good idea, but they were already doing it, and there are almost no benches at the bus stops around here.

Anyway! It was actually really fun, and a lot of people showed up, I had some cool conversations, and the food was actually excellent. I’m glad i went.

Then today there was an anti-slimebucket rally on campus, a walk-out actually, organized by students; about 300 people showed up for that. (Maybe more, I’m bad at crowd-estimation and it was hard to see everyone.) I’m the sort of person who’s most comfortable walking around and keeping an eye on things during rallies & protests, and I ended up talking with a faculty member wearing a “Witness” badge. She explained that some of the faculty were here to observe, I think in case asshats showed up; I got the impression they were prepared to intervene should that happen. But she told me about a teach-in that was happening on campus this evening, which I never would’ve found out about if I hadn’t wandered over and asked, “What does ‘Witness’ mean?”

So I went to the teach-in panel discussion thing this evening, and no one asked if I was a student or a faculty member so I didn’t say I’m neither one of those (it wouldn’t’ve been a problem, just a longer explanation), but I’m really really glad I went to that. About a hundred people showed up, and most of them were people of color (something I found both relieving and energizing; man if it had been mostly white folks showing up to a “Where do we go from here?” discussion … listen I would’ve been disappointed and frustrated and I probably would’ve spoken up, probably to disagree with what they were saying, and I didn’t feel the need to do that at all here). (Well no, actually, the there was one white guy who stood up and basically did his best to reenact a rationalist internet troll and I sure did almost cut him off but then the facilitator beat me to it, whew.) I didn’t share anything, but a lot of people did; I clapped and vigorously nodded my head many times, instead.

I’m trying to figure out ways I could contribute that wouldn’t be me taking unnecessary space. But I think I will email some of the panelists and just … explain a bit about my experiences … and that I’m ready & willing to show up, and go from there.

Hello, I don't have much to say tonight except that I'm tired and striving not to argue with people who are Wrong on the Internet (x) like I did the past two nights (did I mention I'm tired), but I actually had a pretty good day.

And not only because there were doggos at work.

:)

This is still incredibly relevant:



(lyrics)

Today's self-care included raking a big pile of leaves over to the side of the shed, with the idea that a pile of leaves is a compromise between not-raking and leaving leaves by the curb for the leaf collector trucks. I noticed there was already a pile of debris against the shed -- sticks and grass clippings and such -- so hurling the leaves on top of that worked well. And hey, maybe we can help shelter some reptile and amphibian buddies this winter!

The games night shindig yesterday was fun, by the way. I observed a couple of games, played a couple more, had fairly tasty food and generally felt like I was in good company. I wish they happened more than once a month, but at least they happen!

- I bought a little pothos plant last week on impulse. I've named it Plato

- I also got some bird seed, again on impulse. Yesterday the birds figured out there was seed in the feeder and ate it all. I begin to see how this could become a problem

- But, so far I've seen tufted titmice, black capped chickadees, and nuthatches at the feeder. And a squirrel. But so far the squirrel's just nosing around under the feeder so it's okay.

- Out the window in general I have also seen: wrens, cardinals, swallows, juncos, blue jays, and crows

- I am pretty sure I saw an owl once too, but it was dusk and I guess it could've been a crow. Awfully fluffy and quiet for a crow, though...

- There is a shar pei mix puppy at the shelter right now, and she is happy to see everyone, which can be very gratifying

- I finished a really excellent book yesterday, Necessity by Jo Walton, and I highly recommend the trilogy it's part of. The first book is The Just City; all three books are now published.

- I'm going to a games night tonight, and I'm trying to psych myself into getting up and getting out, but I will, and I think it will be fun

- I bought food to bring, so I have to go

Sometimes the little things are -- well, if not enough, then a very good start.

Today I am better. Not better like all-better!, but I didn't cry anymore. I woke up a little before my alarm, and I woke up with a clear(er) head, and a stronger sort of mood.

I went to work.

Literally, of course: I had a long shift mopping at the shelter today. But today I also engaged in a way I really could not, yesterday. What that looked like was mostly just reading essays and sharing stuff on social media, but I found a couple of good ones:

- An American Tragedy, from the New Yorker

"Why not leave the country? But despair is no answer. To combat authoritarianism, to call out lies, to struggle honorably and fiercely in the name of American ideals—that is what is left to do. That is all there is to do."

- On 'Woke' White People Advertising Their Shock That Racism Just Won the Presidency, by Courtney Parker West, on Medium

"I get it. It’s awful. It’s terrifying. It’s devastating. But find yourself a white person and complain to them, then get past your feelings because if you really want to be an ally, we don’t need your posts or your shock or even your tearful apologies, but rather your organizing manpower. People of color have always resisted and you can follow us. You can’t be with her anymore, so be with us."

Sounds like a plan.

I'm ... not especially well. I am better than I was this morning, when I woke up from a nightmare sometime before 4am and realized that, no, no, it could actually happen now.

I cried over breakfast, and I cried at work (before and after a very kind co-worker gave me a very gentle hug), and I cried after work. I may be done crying, now.

But it's late, again, and I'm exhausted, and I keep thinking of how many women I saw yesterday, women wearing "I voted" stickers and smiling, and I keep thinking about how, instead, my country has elected a narcissistic misogynistic racist rapist. And then I kind of want to cry again. Or break something.

Instead, I will go to bed, and I will try to sleep.

It's a long, terrible season we've entered now.

If you, like me, would enjoy a break from certain topics repeated all over the place until it seems like nowhere is safe, Emergency Kittens, WeRateDogs™, and A Bear are all quality Twitter feeds with lots of silliness and minimal coverage of all that other stuff.

:)

I took advantage of the extra hour today to go for a drive to a corner of the forest I hadn't visited in several years. It was a stunningly beautiful trip, because all of the oaks are turning and all of the oaks are orange, and gold. But of course the hemlocks and the mountain laurels and the pines are still green, and then the sky was blue ... Yes. I did not drive off the road, peering around me as I went, but a few times I had to rapidly adjust my direction.

Of course I took a lot of pictures, I enjoy taking pictures, even if they don't turn out very well because my camera is not good enough to capture leaves on trees from long distances. They all look a little blurry. It's okay.

( Anyway here are a few of themCollapse )

I went to another shindig last night! Wow, that's two in less than a week! And they weren't even held in my house! They were both held in the same house, though. At last week's Halloween party, Dawn and I found out that we both love Shakespeare's Twelfth Night, and Dawn revealed that she had a DVD of the Globe Theatre's production (here is an excellent scene from it), and announced that we should all get together sometime soon and watch it. "Dinner and a movie!" she said.

I know how these things work -- the best of intentions stated in the middle of parties rarely come into fruition. It was a great idea, and I figured maybe sometime around New Year's we'd finally all get together. Well. On Tuesday I got a text from Dawn -- she was planning the menu. Would this Friday work for me?

It worked. I was a little late, because the cookie recipe I'd doubled produced not four dozen cookies, as the recipe indicated, but nine dozen. Give or take a few. Oops. Fortunately dinner was also running a little late, so I stood in the kitchen, kept out of the way, and was handed wine and a variation on a whiskey sour Dawn's boyfriend concocted. Occasionally Drew and Elizabeth broke away from helping Dawn to dance, because they all dance and they all trade and invent moves and test various songs' danceability together. (The dance class takes place on Thursday nights, and if Thursdays weren't my longass mopping days I'd go. I still may go, if there's ever a Thursday when I'm not exhausted by 5pm.) In between dancing legs and table legs and Dawn bustling back and forth were her two small dogs, Watson and Ham. So really, it was quite a party.

Dinner was barbecue ribs and baked macaroni and cheese and collards and cornbread (and cookies); Ham sat on the bench between Elizabeth and Drew, and Watson sat between Dawn and Brant, and both dogs watched us all enjoy dinner and did their very best to look imploring and also starving. Then we all migrated to the living room, arranged ourselves on various squashy pieces of furniture (or laps, in the dogs' cases), and watched Shakespeare. I didn't get back until well after midnight, and I had a lot of fun.

c:

I am up too late but I was making cookie dough and now it is over two hours past my bedtime.

That's okay, probably.

Tomorrow, or the next day, I'll have cookies.

General announcement that tonight's entry is short because I'm binge-watching the TV show Leverage on Netflix (it's on Netflix if you live in the US!), and I like it because it is silly, doesn't ask me to think very hard, and makes me laugh a few times per episode. Also, while each ep is its own contained story, there's some clear emotional arcs going on between the characters, so underneath all the relative fluffiness there is some rewarding interpersonal relationship drama (the good kind). Anyway I recommend it, especially if you're looking for something to watch while you kinda veg out after a day.

:D

Happy Halloween! For me it wasn't a very different day from any other, but I did take a few moments to pause and reflect, and I walked to and from town -- so, time spent outside instead of driving -- and yesterday I took a contemplative walk in a nearby park, at dusk.

Everyone in my house had dinner together this evening, including a few of the significant others, and we ended up telling spooky stories. Not the kind of spooky stories I told when I was younger, when I borrowed stories from books and TV shows. These, for better or worse, were all based on real life experiences, either our own or those of close friends. Which adds a whole other dimension of spookiness, let me tell you, especially when one of your housemates nonchalantly mentions that the guys who used to live here always insisted the place was haunted.

There's a reason I never look into mirrors in dim light, and why I never have one facing my bed, or anywhere I can see from my bed. There's just some doors I don't need to open, you know?

One of my other housemates was certain every spooky experience amounted to carbon monoxide poisoning, but frankly I'd rather live in a world where that stuff is real, and possible. I'm not knocking on those doors, no way, but I'd rather not pretend they don't exist.

Anyway yeah now I'm going to try to sleep. Hooray!

I didn't update yesterday evening because I went to a Halloween party instead. Before leaving, I looked around my room and thought, Well I will probably be back here by 10, 10:30, so it's okay to not put this extra stuff away. Then, later, at the party, I happened to glance at the clock and realized it was almost midnight!

So I had a good time. Mostly high school friends and their partner-people; Dawn, the hostess, was someone I'm only now getting to know again, because when we were in school she was three grades below me. Now she has a house, two dogs, and a boyfriend. The most surreal aspect was realizing the house she bought actually used to belong to my little brother's old babysitter, back when my brother was ... very small. Like two or three, maybe. The last time I was in that house it was covered in doilies and porcelain dolls. Last night, it was full of people in costumes, tasty food, and rather a lot of glitter. (The glitter was because Jimmy's sister, dressed as Tinkerbell, decided to douse her brother, dressed as a pirate, in two whole vials of purple glitter. Various people spent the rest of the evening employing various methods to de-glitter Jimmy. At one point I looked over and saw Jimmy spread-eagled while Drew gently lint-roller'd his person.) When I walked in, Ian and Jimmy were at the upright piano hammering out various anime tunes, someone was tossing tennis balls across the kitchen and dining room for the dogs to catch, and Dawn's boyfriend was concocting a kind of punch out of several varieties of alcohol and freshly squeezed lemons.

So I stayed until almost 1am, and I laughed a lot, and enjoyed punch and cupcakes and good company. As I left, Dawn was engaged in finding sleeping spaces for those staying the night, putting away the leftover sweets, and planning breakfast. She likes to cook. I'm thinking this new/renewed friendship could be beneficial in multiple ways.

For now though, tomorrow is Monday and my day begins at 6:15. Bed.

Hello readers, I am very tired & headachey tonight so this isn't much of an entry, but today I sat on the floor at the shelter and pet a dog for like five minutes, that was pretty great.

Here are some pictures from the other day, when I drove around and used some gas for unproductive means and did not, definitely not, drive my car into a field or a ditch on purpose




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A short update today because I am very tired, but I went to the comicbook store for the latest issue of Star Wars: Poe Dameron, because I love Poe to the point of being ridiculous about it, and because the comic itself is absurd and makes me happy. (In times of danger Poe Dameron: Greatest Pilot in the Galaxy starts flirting, for example. With Stormtroopers! It never works, but as he says in this latest issue, "it was worth a shot.") I mean, the comic's not gonna win any awards. But I love it anyway.

This has been your moment of nerdery. Thank you for reading.

I tested out a new route to work this afternoon, because it was a nice day and I was looking at a map and thought, Well, why not drive it now to see how long it takes?

The thing about my typical route is that it involves sixteen traffic lights. Sixteen! In five miles! That's ridiculous! Back in my day that same stretch had half as many traffic lights and now look at it! Honestly though if I don't time it right I end up hitting almost all of those lights, and it's infuriating and then I'm late to work.

A few weeks ago I noticed my gas mileage was tanking, which, when you have a car as old as mine, is alarming. What could it mean?? I'm used to the Hondallennium Falcon getting about 35mpg, and it dropped to 29mpg, two tanks ago. Aiee! Then I took a trip involving a lot of highway miles, and the mileage for that tank resumed its normal efficiency. Now, fresh tank, I'm watching the meter sink again.

Sixteen traffic lights.

*shakes angry fist*

So I am going to try this new route, which is longer in distance but -- at least this afternoon, when I clocked it -- takes the same amount of time. It's all the backroads, the narrow roads over tiny bridges and around precarious turns, past many many many election signs (none of them for candidates I'm voting for) and also cows. Already I can tell that it will be way less stressful to drive than yellowlight after yellowlight after peddling out-of-towner looking for their hotel.

I'm curious to find out if this helps improve my mileage. I've taken to just throwing the engine into neutral any time I'm going down a hill, but so far that hasn't seemed to make much of an impact.

At the very least I'm sure that having to stop less often will be better for my (blessed, original) clutch.

Up too late again oh no!

I actually overslept this morning, and definitely went through what is becoming a mantra for me: "My dear, no one is armed, no one is going to die, or be disappeared, or get arrested. You probably won't even lose your job." Over and over again, until I got into the swing of things and out of my head.

I walked downtown and back today -- despite having a bike and knowing how to use it, despite enjoying biking, lately I'm finding that walking feels better. I can think when I walk. When I bike I'm just trying not to die, you know? And today was another nice day. I worked on my application to the writer's workshop, and I also stared into the distance quite a bit. It was okay.

Now though, I really gotta go to bed.

Up too late again, but I realized that if I don't write every day then I don't write, period. So. Another small entry.

- Talked with my friend Matt for over two hours on Skype today, and that was really good

- Actually stayed in bed until after 11am, which was also really good

- Like, it's that kind of thing where I could get up, but it's chilly out there and I don't have anywhere to be so why bother

- A good way to spend a Sunday morning, in my opinion

- I convinced myself to get out of bed by committing to taking a really nice hot shower, which I did

- And used three different Lush products, all of which I came by during last week's trip to Lush's Upper West Side location

- I currently smell fantastic

- By the way I went to NYC last week? Stayed with Mica again, and we attended an old friend's wedding in Brooklyn, and also spent a day wandering Manhattan

- I can confirm that the wee Goodwill on the Upper West Side has Steve Madden pumps on display -- or did, as of last Friday

- Curiously enough Manhattan Goodwill prices are only about a dollar more, for things like jeans at least, than my hometown Goodwill's prices

- Can't say the same for the quality of clothing offered at my Goodwill, unforch

- I just got distracted by Lush's website I want it allllll

- Anyway

- Also this afternoon I took a nice walk downtown; it was a lovely day and it felt good to move without rushing to be somewhere

- Speaking of rushing, tomorrow's another early morning and apparently we have 20 dogs in-house

- Scrub scrub, mop mop

- Sometimes I remember to be grateful that the smell of poop & pee, while gross, doesn't make me nauseated

- There is a cat at the shelter right now named Squishy Pickle. I think he came with that name

- There is a dog named Redbone, who is a very chubby pit bull with a huge grin

- The past few days have been very blustery and downpour-y here, which means that many of the gently-turning-colors fall leaves are now on the ground

- I picked like half a bushel of green tomatoes off of my mother's extremely prolific indeterminate tomato plant this afternoon (this variety; I recommend it, though if you don't sucker the stems then it gets, as mom found out, enormous)

- We haven't turned the heat on in our house yet but I just replaced batteries on the thermostat and discovered that the indoor temperature is around 61°F

- I have four blankets on my bed, plus flannel sheets; the trick is getting out of bed in the morning

- The Cubs are going to the World Series! THE CUBS ARE GOING TO THE WORLD SERIES! Full confession I am more of a Pirates fan than a Cubs fan, but my mom is a huge Cubs fan so I'm hitching onto her excitement about this

- I'm a Pirates fan: I can only imagine what this must feel like right now

- Anyway this is the second late night in a row for me

- Time for bed!

Stayed up late watching the PBS Hamilton documentary, which I really enjoyed! Except for all the weird parts where politicians showed up to talk about Hamilton the historical figure? That was awkward and occasionally irritating. (George W. Bush was one of the talking heads? What the hell?) But all of the parts involving the creation of the musical, the interviews with cast and crew members and of course with Lin-Manuel Miranda, that was great.

For the record it's now been one year plus ten days since I first listened to the original Broadway cast recording of Hamilton and I still love it tremendously. And while I no longer wake up every morning with it stuck in my head, I still sing songs from it almost every day. It really has changed my life, for the better, and I feel quite lucky to be alive right now.

This is a workshop and I'm going to apply even though it's not something I can technically afford and I really don't qualify for the scholarships:

Writing Cross-Culturally, where "... writers will be provided with resources and tools for telling stories that are not their own with care, respect, and sensitivity. We will discuss representation and misrepresentation, as well as the damage it can do, privilege and point of view, cover basic dos and don'ts as well as dig deep into the many ways our own prejudices and privileges connect to every part of the writing and publishing process. Participants will be encouraged to look beyond themselves and their inherent biases, as well as begin to learn how to analyze not only their own internal prejudices but those endemic to publishing as an institution and culture, and the greater cultural system that creates and recreates bias and privilege.

"The workshop will be hands-on, with lectures, group, and individual work, writing exercises, and space created for personal reflection as well as opportunities to break down emotional barriers in conversation with those more practiced at such challenges.

"Our goal is to help participants work through not only the how, but the when, and most importantly, the why and even why not of writing cross-culturally."

Um, yes.

They're asking for a writing sample, and since they don't actually specify what kind of writing sample they're looking for (besides something the applicant has written, obviously), I may submit a scene from the mammoth fanfic I've been working on forever since February. There's no application fee; the most it would cost me is daydreams and hopes.

But, I've read books by two of the three authors in the main faculty, and really, really admire the one, Daniel José Older. I follow him on Twitter, which is how I found out about this workshop at all, just a few hours ago.

Gaaaaaah apply first worry about cost & logistics later!

Though first-first, go to bed. Right.

I kept getting red and yellow lights today on my drive to and from work. It's something I notice -- I mean, obviously I notice it, I have to downshift and brake -- but when they happen in succession I also start thinking about pausing, mentally. Or sometimes it seems like I'm being told to slow down and take a break (and wow I didn't realize the pun potential inherent in this metaphor until I began this post), whether I want to or not.

Anyway what it really looked like was me being late for work. Fortunately this wasn't a huge problem; aside from running a little behind on cleaning kennels I just stayed a few extra minutes on the other end of my shift. Then I ended up staying even longer because, when I went out to my car again, I realized my key had fallen off its fob. I did find it after about five minutes of searching all the likely places (whew), but again, a small thing interrupted my flow.

Later in the afternoon, I ended up taking an hour and a half long nap, somewhat unintentionally, instead of walking downtown and enjoying the beautiful weather as I'd meant to do.

I don't know. Today was full of pauses -- of me, being paused. It wasn't bad, not in any particular way, but I rather hope tomorrow will be better.

Somehow a whole month has gone by? Oops.

Here is the news in brief:

- Survived dogsitting Mia, by which I mean when Mia's human person asked if I wanted her to take over my shelter shift the morning after she'd returned, the morning after I'd finished watching Mia, I immediately said, Omg yes please

- I've been working my way through the money I earned for doing that -- it was all in cash -- and so have not been using my credit card, which feels really good. Having actual cash to spend makes tracking my spending far, far easier, and also makes me more inclined to be frugal

- Not that I'm especially a spendthrift. But $5 here and $8 there can really add up after a while.

- I got on foodstamps!! Yessiree this kid is officially livin' off the government. It's so great. I mean, it is such a relief, I cannot even describe it.

- You ... you mean I can obtain food, to feed myself, so I'm not hungry, but I don't have to use my own money? You mean I can do that?? Oh thank God.

- As someone with a stupidly fast metabolism and who's likely hypoglycemic (or so suggest my symptoms), needing to eat every two to three hours and having anxiety about money is a boatload of fun

- Hooray! Foodstamps!

- For entertainment, I've been embroiling myself in the TV show Black Sails, which is set in the Bahamas in 1715 and it's all about pirates and I love it.

- The show also has some seriously fantastic opening credits, here you can watch if you want, it's only a minute and a half long and will make you want to commandeer a ship

- The shelter work is still pretty great, and I still can't really believe I'm getting paid to do this. Sometimes it is a bit stressful, but it's like ... four dogs pooped in their kennels and I have to clean it all up as quickly as possible levels of stress. Not, I don't know, the secret police are watching our house and one of our friend's lives may be in danger levels of stress. I can handle it.

- I am still writing! I posted another chapter of my fic two weeks ago and the whole thing's almost 40k words and has over 30 comments from appreciative readers, go me.

- One of these days I'll write something that's not fanfic and so something I feel comfortable actually sharing with the lot of you. Until then, just know that a quantity of people on the internet really seem to like what I say. :D

- But it's now quarter to eleven and that's a whole hour past my bedtime, oops again

Ahoy, I am yet again at a different location! 2k16 is basically Me As Bouncy-Ball, isn't it? This time I'm dog-sitting, but at a new place a bit farther away from the other place (and farther away from work, which means I get to find out just how long the drive will be tomorrow morning). I'm watching a brown and white dog named Mia for the week, and she likes to be walked at least four times a day. Wow! Honestly I think if it were up to her, she'd only be out walking, but even she gets tired (as I found out yesterday, when we walked like two miles in one direction and then had to stop every hundred feet for a rest on the return trip). Oh, and she's used to going on her first walk at 6:15 in the morning. So I'm pretty exhausted right now, and it's not even Monday yet!

That's okay: she's a good dog, and very easy to care for, even with the walking. And, you know, it's money.

.

Work is going well: I'm finally getting the hang of the morning shift, even though I still feel like I'm slow compared to folks who've been there longer. As of Friday there were almost two dozen dogs in-house, which is a lot; I'm hoping a bunch of the easy/cute ones got adopted over the weekend. It is sort of funny how the exceptionally cute dogs go so quickly, when I know for a fact that there are some really great dogs in-house who may be older, or have overbites (there's a Pekingese with an overbite, he kind of looks like a small shaggy monster), and no one seems willing to take one of them home.

I was talking with a guy a few weeks ago (or, rather, he was talking to me; my participation was limited to nods and generally affirmative monosyllabic words) who'd wanted to adopt a particular dog from that shelter -- like, he'd gone on the website and found this dog and became enamored with her profile and was convinced she'd be the perfect dog for him -- but when he went to go meet her, she was more interested in exploring the Meet-and-Greet room where they were, well, meeting, than paying attention to him. And for that he wrote her off! He walked away, crushed that she wasn't the perfect dog after all.

Since my active participation in his conversation wasn't necessary I did not tell him it was probably better he didn't adopt a dog -- better for the dog -- but it got me wondering if this kind of attitude is common. I don't know! I'm not an adoptions counselor. But I'm thinking of some of the dogs we have that aren't very happy living in a shelter, and express it by barking a lot (a lot) in their kennels, or jumping manically, or peeing everywhere, and I'm wondering how many people write them off because they're convinced they'll find their perfect dog at first meeting, and those behaviors aren't perfect.

Anyway, I have a dog-filled week ahead of me, and many miles to go before I'm allowed to sleep in again, so I am going to bed. I'll try to update more than once every ten days, let's see how that goes.

I ran into my old English professor out with his family today, and it was so good to see him again. Sometimes you just have those teachers you still think about years later -- in a good way, I mean -- and he's definitely one of them. I had him for Creative Writing in the fall of 2006, which was a decade ago, somehow? That's ridiculous. Anyway, I loved that class, and I loved the stories I produced for it, too. Actually, almost everything about his class was a positive experience for me, from the books we read (Chabon's The Mysteries of Pittsburgh is the one I distinctly remember) to the in-class writing activities to, again, the stories I wrote.

Apparently he feels similarly, because today he said that particular class, along with a poetry class he's taught, were the two best ones he's had as a prof here. That's pretty cool! And he was genuinely impressed when I told him I'd written a 50k word story this spring, even when I said it was fanfiction (you'd be surprised, or maybe you wouldn't, by how many people don't consider fanfic "real" writing), which made me feel warm and fuzzy. He was, and still is I think, the sort of teacher I want to do well for. It has something to do with how good he is at affirmations -- I mean, I remember how he'd always find something true and positive to say about every student's pieces, even when they were halting and stumbling-y and maybe could've used some editing before submission. That's the sort of thing that makes me trust someone, you know?

I took another creative writing class a few semesters later, and that professor ripped students' pieces to shreds, and encouraged others to do that, too. (He also praised one student's work so effusively it was absurd, especially considering that the story was, in my not humble opinion, a boring and cliched take on the white male hero with angst trope.) ("This could be published", he'd said in whispering tones. That was the point where I began wondering if I should feel bad about how me and my friend Julia had literally scrawled and slashed all over my copy of this student's story, with lots of angry arrows and WTFs in pencil. Doo-doo-dee-doo.......) (I didn't really feel bad. I definitely don't now.)

Anyway. It was really excellent to see my old professor today, to be remembered and affirmed, and to know he's still around. He told me he's got a chapbook coming out later this month, so I'm going to look for it at the local bookstore.

Hooray, good teachers!

This morning when I dragged myself out of bed at 6:15, I resolved to be in bed -- in bed -- by 10pm tonight.

*looks at the clock*

Welp.

My room is coming together. There are still some areas I need to organize, for example the table/shelf I bought has definitely just become a Flat Space for Setting Stuff Down On, and I hate that a little bit. But I came back to the house this evening to find all of our kitchen's plastic containers strewn across the floor: one of the housemates had gotten ambitious and was attempting to match lids with containers. Naturally there were about a dozen really random extra lids that didn't fit anything. Anyway, my organizational restlessness is not that bad, yet.

...I really got to get to bed. I'll try to write earlier tomorrow.