dragonimp

Anyone else need a break from politics but feel like they can't because so much shit keeps happening and if you turn your back the world the nation the world is just sort of going to explode?

In other but not unrelated news I think I finally don't have a migraine, which is significant since I've pretty much had one (low grade) since the inauguration. Literally. It started Friday morning, went through Saturday and the March*, kinda eased up Sunday evening, started in on the other side Monday and went through last night. Like. Trump taking office gave me a migraine.

Might see about editing some fic today, though, because I need a break.



*Just a tip, but please do not burn sage or anything else in a crowd, you do not know who among the many around you might have respiratory problems or sensitivities. In this case it was REALLY NOT HELPING THE NAUSIA AND HEADACHE. I appreciate the sentiment but please, just don't.

I had to usher one of my fur-babies off with Bast yesterday... Khaibit's health hadn't been good for several weeks, but we couldn't tell if it was something treatable or not. He would seem to get better, and then slip back. Well, the last couple days made it clear that this was a downward slide, and we made the decision to let him go peacefully.

I don't think I can express how much this cat meant to me. He's been my furry little toddler, my little brat, for 16 years now. At 16-17 years old, we knew he would likely be going soon, but it's always too soon.

Between this and getting really for Christmas, it's been pretty stressful around here, and I've let a lot of things slide. Now I'm stuck in a bit of a "now what?" place now that two major things have been lifted... there's still so much to do, and right now part of me really, really wants to say "fuck Christmas" because it's nothing but a bunch of stress.

I dunno. Maybe things'll get better after New Year's.

Sometime in mid-May I cut out all dairy protein, as well as peanuts and (most) soy, on the theory that these proteins were stressing my immune system and a stressed immune system was the ultimate cause my my allergies. Since then, I've had two migraines, but they've been the wimpiest migraines ever to migraine (they still leave me drained and grumpy, though). I'm considering this a good sign, and hopefully things'll improve more the longer I'm away from these foods.

This does mean, however, that between this and eating low-carb, I've gone from making 75% of what I eat, to having to make 90-95% of everything I eat. Pretty much every commercial protein bar I've found uses whey protein, and often also soy and peanuts. Every brand of jerky I've looked at has some form of sugar in it. It's pretty much impossible to find a grab-and-go or microwave meal that doesn't use flour, cheese or cream, or large amounts of starch. This isn't even touching sugar alcohols, which I can eat in small quantities, which are also often used in anything labeled "low-carb".

I've come to like most of the home-made stuff better, anyway, but the thing is, it just takes time. And it means planning ahead, which, hi, ADHD. It's worth it if I can get rid of the allergies, but I have enough problems already with allocating my time. I'm not sure how I'm going to handle this once I do get a job.

But right now I have to go finish making some egg protein cookies.

I'm on the second day of training, so I think I can consider this a real job at this point ^^;. I've got some temp work for the month of April, so I'm probably going to be kinda scarce. It's nothing exciting, just data entry/data verification, but it's something. For the time being, anyway.

I live out in California, but in the northern half and toward the interior, so winter is a thing that happens. And by that I mean we have a few pieces of clothing that get put away for roughly half the year. The last couple years, though, I haven't had to put on more than a sweater and a fleece jacket most days. So then when we get hit with stuff like this?



We, um, kinda aren't equipped to deal with it.

It's not unknown around here. We've got all the freeze warning stuff down like pipes-and-plants-and-pets etc. And I realize those of you who get an actual winter with ice and snow and all are probably rolling your eyes at us wimps, but - yeah, that's kinda the point, we are winter wimps. Like, unless you're someone who habitually travels up to gold country in the winter, you probably don't own more than one or two actual winter tops, and nothing warmer than a pair of jeans, which, um, isn't that warm. I don't think I own any sweaters that are actually wool, and I'm not even sure where I could get one outside of a sports store. I own gloves, but again, they're the wimpy oh-it's-50-degrees-and-kinda-windy, I-don't-want-to-touch-the-steering-wheel kind of gloves.

Our house isn't that well insulated, either, so the heating bill is going to be fun.

But actually? This is more like what I remember from when I was a kid. I remember having to wear a down jacket and walking to school with frost on the ground. This is still extreme for this area, but I'm also kinda going - oh yeah, winter. It's a thing.

Basically, the overhead fixtures and 2 walls of the living room are all that have power. We've run a heavy duty extension cord from the living room to the family room to plug in the modem, and brought the laptop into the living room to plug it in. But this is very much less than ideal and I have to turn the laptop over to Mom in a bit. I'll have to read all the wonderful Oct.4 fics later ^^;

We will hopefully have someone by today to tell us what's going on and if it can be fixed.

Today was the annual Antique and Craft Fair up in Walnut Creek. I'd been contacted through Etsy about this and had decided why not, I'll give it a go. Well.... I don't think I'll be going back. Mainly because I didn't sell ANYTHING. Technically I sold one item, but it was a Red Cross donation item.
(Plus, I'm pretty sure we were being messed with. Metaphysically.)

Okay, the day started out way, waaaaay too early, and we stumbled out and drove the hour up to Walnut Creek, on the way skirting by a guy in an over-packed SUV who was falling asleep at the wheel. It was thankfully not as hot today as it was yesterday, though it was plenty uncomfortable in the sun. But it was WINDY. And we discovered that my displays have some pretty big issues with wind. But we got it up and mostly secured, aside from one big topple of a display that was mostly bags and other soft items.

The wind backed off about mid-morning, but the whole day it was ... messing with us. Die down and then gust up. Gust in from one side and then come back in the other. Flip the table covering over the first few earring stands (these little dancer stands). Ripple the covering so that a little cascade of the stands fell, usually in such a way that the earrings looped around each other (and the stands) and had to be untangled. I started joking that Loki or some other trickster god was hanging around.

And then we get to the end of the day. The fair was officially over at 4:00, but other tables were starting to pack up as early as 2:00 or so. We'd had such little traffic that we were talking about leaving early as well, but I wanted to wait until 3:00 in case of last-minute shoppers. So it went something like this:

"You could probably start packing up."
"I want to wait until at least 3:00."
"You could at least get those earrings that keep blowing over."
"Yeah okay."
I put them on their storage tray, a mesh document stand, but keep it on the table.
Bit later:
"Let's start taking it down."
"It's not 3:00 yet, it's only 10-till."
WOOOSH-topple-topple-topple.
EVERYTHING on that table - including the items that hadn't been having problems - blew onto the ground.
".. okay, I guess we're doing it now."
That was the heralding of the wind coming back full strength and giving us hell the whole time we were packing up. Like I said, it was messing with us. Add to that the one and possibly two bees that got trapped in our bins...

Well, it was entertaining. But like I said, I don't think I'll be going back.

A skeleton found beneath a Leicester car park has been confirmed as that of English king Richard III.

Which I'm finding fascinating and exciting for all sorts of reasons. But then....

....I realized that the friend who would've been most excited about this died some years ago, after her life had pretty much bottomed out.

So now I'm all excited/fascinated/melancholy.

I think I can stop running now. Maybe. I still have a load of stuff to catch up on online but at least now I have time to sit at the computer. Sometimes.

Christmas went well, but it was a bit of a marathon. Stephanie only got the one day off, so they drove down, visited, presents, drove over to Dad's, visited presents, they drove back. But still, it wasn't bad. And we headed off the imminent plumbing disasters.

I'm going to be working on blocking out my time better so that I get more of the things done that I want to get done - like writing. I don't know if I've even opened Scrivener this December, and that's sad.

I basically lost the last two days to being sick. Some sort of stomach bug - only threw up once, but everything I ate or drank was questionable, and as a result I hardly ate anything at all. It seems to be over - finally - today, which means it's time for Epic Catch-Up. When you can't be vertical for more than 5-10 minutes at a time, not much gets done :/.