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frog chorus
2024-May-08, Wednesday 04:46 pmThe frogs are singing loudly on May 8th, the same date that I recorded video last year.
Enjoy a minute of peace.
still here
2023-Dec-14, Thursday 09:48 pm
I'm still here. Not much motivation, and I'm not even reading much online recently. After next week, there's a mandatory 1-week holiday paid leave, so at least I'll have a break from the stressful job at last.
I ordered some solstice stuff from RLM Art Studio after I saw this very nice image from them on Mastodon. I threw in an extra $5 gift to them with the order, so I feel no guilt about using their image here to let others know about them. If ever there was a good use for NFT, it would be an image that people could get "bragging rights" to share, while simultaneously handing money over to people doing nice things.
I remembered a dream upon waking this morning, so I should make a note to record it for this year's tally.
Read the short, uneventful dream...
I was in a large space with someone. It was like an office space that was converted to living space. There were many rows of library book shelves in it, and I used several of them to store my books while I lived here. I lived here with someone else. (I think this someone was a guy I dated long ago, but within the dream we were just roommates.)
Two other guys showed up, moving in. One of the guys starting filling the few still-empty bookshelves with books from boxes they were hauling in. That guy picked up one of the books and started talking to me. "I noticed your gay section includes a lot of titles about Bears like you. I thought you might appreciate this book too." I looked at the book (I have no idea what the title is now.) and realized it was another gay story, suggesting that these two guys were also gay.
And that's it. End of very uneventful dream. Someone showed me a book.
Nature still lives here. I took this photo of a red Northern cardinal on the ground in my back yard outside my living room window last week. Today, I took this photo of the christmas cactus at that window that is blooming again.
updates from Minneapolis
2023-Nov-10, Friday 08:30 am
I'm pretty sure I saw 2 bald eagles flying over north Minneapolis yesterday. I was waiting for the micro-route bus to take me to the grocery store, when I took this photo of 1 of them almost directly over my house. From this vantage, you can't really see any white feathers on its head, but when they were farther away, it did seem to be there. I tried using the Merlin app from Cornell University to confirm the bird identification, but it was unable to suggest anything from this photo. All I know for sure is that these birds were big.
Earlier this week, I was woken by foot cramp. Specifically, my right big toe was trying really hard to point up to my face for several minutes. It refused to give up on its own, so I eventually used my hand to push down against the muscles and force the toe down (also painful). Eventually the muscle contraction stopped. The only real gluten indulgence I know about is a few slices of English muffin bread (which is mostly air pockets anyway) for my breakfast sandwich, because I was tired of so many months of my smoothie breakfast. I think my neurons are growing more gluten-intolerant over time. This small indulgence wouldn't have affected me so quickly in years past.
During my micro-route bus ride to the grocery store last week, I took this photo of the new JACC (Jordan Area Community Council) poster up near my part of the neighborhood. Their webpage says, "Currently, we are in the process of moving our office location to a new spot on the corner of Penn and Lowry Ave. (“the old Subway location”)." That's nice that they're so close to me now. I might get more involved again, now that meetings are within easier walking distance?
I'm not sure I realized that Subway Sandwiches had moved out. They were located behind the Aldi's grocery store that moved out in February, which is the same corner for that recent news article about the city not cleaning the blood on the sidewalk from a stabbing. Subway had removed all of the tables and chairs from that location when I visited them a few times over the years. It is the same practice at other small fast food businesses in the area. They want you to visit and order, but they don't want you to stay and eat there. That's another consequence of cities refusing to provide housing or actual poverty relief. Business don't want to deal with people seeking shelter inside their establishment. Please, can we just fix these issues rather than perpetually "kick the can down the road" so they're somebody else's problem, removed either to some other geographic location or to some future residents to deal with?
week #21 and stress
2023-Oct-04, Wednesday 04:21 pmI haven't written much. I've continued reading on Dreamwidth, but not much elsewhere. Life has been stressful.
Work has been simply too busy. For "flat" numbers, we've had as many support tickets last weekend as we did the weekend after Semester Start, which was awful. In addition, though, the "feel" of those numbers are different. We're short 1 (of 4) FTEs on first shift for weekends, waiting to hire someone for that position. Additionally, another person took a few weeks of vacation, so we were down to half-staffing, being short 2 of those 4 FTEs. We have several student workers who sign up for 2-hour shifts, but we had empty slots there too. Very hectic. I'm discombobulated.
It doesn't help that Hope may be getting worse. I can see her gaunt haunches just by looking at her now. I don't even need to pet her to know that she has too much bone showing. On Monday, I think, I found 2 clumps of her hair that had fallen out. Not knotted fur or hairball, but perfectly aligned clumps of hair that simply came out of her fur. They were just tiny sections, but it's still worrisome.
I gave up on the full dose of mirtazapine, because it was stressful for both of us. She howled awfully because she was so hungry, but she would still eat solid food only sparingly, so I switched to 1/3 the original dose. More manageable stress levels for us both, but she's still not eating well. She wants to eat, but she doesn't want any food available. I bought some milk replacement that says it's suitable for elderly cats. I made a full dose for her, she lapped it up eagerly, then she promptly vomited out all the milk and former solid food she had eaten. There was no cat hair in that mess when I cleaned it up. Now, she's also hesitant to eat the milk. *sigh*
I'll try smaller doses of milk replacement, so she doesn't flood her tummy. Whatever's going on, it can't be good. :(
I just hauled stuff to the recycling bin in my alley. Walking down the path in the middle of my back yard, I scared off a rabbit that was hiding right next to my path, under the leaf cover there.
I've seen rabbits here during cold weather. Since I had the dog, I think that might be the first time I've seen a rabbit during warm weather in my back yard. I guess my yard finally stopped smelling like a carnivore playground.
The herbivores are back, baby! Yeah!
Edit: P.S. I had my clippers in hand and was ready to cut down some stray tree saplings from my front yard, but I got distracted by the need to feed a local stray cat. I put some dry kibble out front and am now staying inside my house to give it space. Any excuse to not do yardwork, right? Also, I seem to be sending mixed signals here. Is this space for herbivores or carnivores?
