Musings of a marginally sane feline-appreciating female.

OK, most days I can’t even with it.

Let me preface this with: I like the work I do, I like enough of my coworkers, I know it’s pretty much shit everywhere, and the job market is garbage, so “Go somewhere else” isn’t helpful. But that doesn’t mean things don’t drive me up a fucking wall, and sometimes a rant is needed.

So, 2024 was a really good year at my company. We hit a milestone we’ve been chasing for revenue – it’s a nice shiny round number and it’s nice to hit it. Revenue growth is better than industry average by a decent amount, which is great. We’re profitable and our profit grew nicely year over year as well, with a good margin to boot. Parent company is on track to net about 1.4 billion with a B.*

So, you’d think the message would be, “Whatever you did in 2024, especially Q4, keep doing that!”

LOL, no. A fucking great year and it’s not enough to satisfy the greed of the investor class. The investor class that has been getting 22% a year since our parent company acquired us 8 years ago. (Yes, ups and downs, and stock prices don’t always reflect reality but rather “how well did you guess your results in advance” but still, 22 fucking percent.) But we have to focus harder on growth.

And before anyone chimes in with “Well, you should invest in your company!” – most of us aren’t making enough to put our eggs in that basket**, and there is also the whole “don’t shit where you eat” thing. We already invest ~2,000 hours a year in the company.

And I know my company isn’t unique. I know the goal of capitalism is to make sure that when money is exchanged for goods and services, as little as possible goes to the people actually making the goods and providing the services.

I know all this, but it’s just weighing heavier than usual this week, and the fact that I feel so very stuck in it. So much of the day to day necessities have to come through some multi-national corporation that is screwing over it’s employees at every level and probably giving a fuckton of money to fascists to boot. So much of my money just goes off into the ether where the folks doing the actual work don’t benefit.

And I try to be mindful of this, but we’re not exactly flush with small independent businesses where I live. That’s why I love the farmers markets, arts & crafts markets, and finding artists online so much. My money is going to the farm, small restaurant, baker, cheesemaker, artist – directly to those very real people. And I get food, sweets, cheese, and art in return! Banger of a deal if you ask me. Regular ol’ commerce with people is nice.

And I don’t have any good answers other than we all just try the best we can, and while there is “no ethical consumption under capitalism” it’s so often unavoidable anymore and we shouldn’t kick ourselves too hard over it. Cause if you’re getting artisanal handmade adderall, I think that might be meth? And we don’t all have access to farmers markets, or they not open year round, or there just aren’t a lot of small indie businesses, or Walmart is just all you can afford.

And my very small “fuck you” to capitalism and hustle culture today was to spend time sketching out one of my projects for my fused glass class next month. A class where the money goes to the instructor and local arts center and doesn’t just vanish into thin air, and I get back joy and pretty melted glass.

* That is a fuckton of unpaid wages per employee across all the subsidiaries. Like, life changing amounts of money that just seems to disappear. Also – publicly owned company, so I’m not disclosing anything confidential – parent Q4 numbers not official yet, I just did the math based on Q1-3 which is publicly accessible data.
** Hell, at rate things are going, we’re heading back to not being able to afford regular eggs, much less nest eggs.

My heart hurts so much for everyone in Los Angeles. I cannot even imagine how terrifying it must be to be there. The fires themselves – scary enough, but then there is so much uncertainty. So many people just going, “What do we do now?”

I know we like to say “things can be replaced, people can’t” – and it’s true up to a point.* But we all have some things that just can’t be replaced, and to just lose everything – that has to be so traumatic and overwhelming.

I’ve sent a donation to World Central Kitchen because I don’t really know what else to do – they’ve kind of become my go-to for disaster relief, because if nothing else, while I may not have any idea what the immediate needs are of folks in disaster areas, I do know that everyone needs to eat. And they handle that very well.

Then of course, everything else goes on, because it just does. We had a big snowstorm at the start of the week, and more last night, so that had to be dealt with, and work still had to be done, because bills still have to be paid. And it feels downright selfish to be stressed about shoveling snow and worrying about work when there are folks losing homes, livelihoods, just everything – cause I’m sure they’d much rather be shoveling snow right now.

There is the bonus of knowing insurance companies are scrambling to figure out how to deny as many claims as possible, because what better business plan is there than “take money and never provide services”? And companies like TikTok telling Los Angeles employees to use their PTO or sick leave in the midst of all this. (I’m sure they’re not the only one, they’re just a big one we’ve heard about. Fuck any company doing that.)

On top of this, we buried Jimmy Carter this week, our shitassed judicial system let Trump skate, Mark Zuckerberg decided to openly be the hateful ass we all knew he was, Elon Musk just continues to exist in the public sphere, and probably some other traumatic things I’ve already forgotten. You’re forgiven if what happened *last week* has already escaped your consciousness.

So if you’re tired, it’s OK and understandable. Wherever you are, stay as safe as you can, help where you can, and try to stay somewhat sane.

Hugs to all.

* And I think it’s easier for me to say because my brain is kinda fucked – I have Lots of Things in my house, but I don’t feel particularly attached to any of it, while I have lost many people over the years. Bonus for ADHD lack of object permanence – I am not sure I’d even notice what things I didn’t have anymore if it was all gone.

For a 3 1/2 day week, that was long. And I knew 2025 was going to be a mess, but I didn’t anticipate 2 domestic terrorism events in the first 12 hours. I am so heartbroken for the families of those who died, and for those who were hurt.

And in true, maddening American fashion, January 2nd it was full speed ahead as though nothing had happened. My entire adult life, every time something Very Bad has happened, it’s always “get back to work, press on, keep going, cause if you’re sad the Bad People win” and I suspect it’s because if we were really allowed to stop everything and truly grieve and reflect – we’d burn the country to the ground.

Myself, I found myself at work careening between “welp, gotta get shit done” and wanting to scream “what the fuck are we doing?”

I get that the world still spins on it’s axis, the bins need to get out, the pets need to be fed, dinner still needs to be made. But we so need to give ourselves the time and space to even breathe.

And on the heels of all this, it hit me that Monday is certification day. “But why would you worry, the Republicans won?” Because even though they won, their base is still fucking mad about it. The only saving grace that I think will keep stupidity to a minimum is that we’ll be getting somewhere between 5 to 10 inches of snow starting Sunday night.

I still won’t let 2025 break me.

You’d best strap in, because I am not stuck in here with you – you are trapped in here with me.

You and the horde of Republican domestic terrorist chucklefucks you’ve brought along for the ride – you will not break me.

I will help people.

I will make art.

I will find joy.

I will take care of myself and others.

And because I am a deeply flawed person, should we be lucky enough that any of these shitbirds keels over, I will be dancing on graves.

I will do something every day to annoy these terrorist twatwaffles. (Beyond just existing, even though that already annoys them – thought I may lean on it if it’s a busy day.)

I will annoy the everloving fuck out of all my elected representatives and yes, I will likely get myself on a watch list by emailing the White House every time they do something stupid or cruel. (Who am I kidding, I’m probably already on a list for all the times I’ve hollered at *this* administration.)

I will stick it to the man, gum up the works, fight the patriarchy, and probably say, “WE FUCKING TOLD YOU SO” a lot.

Tread fucking lightly, 2025.

And apparently traumatizing enough that I don’t remember SHIT about it. Glad I took pictures and wrote things down.

I think the closest thing I did to personal growth was taking the fused glass class, which was awesome.

We lost my beloved Lily, but gained Sean and Jorge. I think she would find it fitting that it took two cats to fill the void she left.

Got a new dryer, yay!  Got Covid, booooo.

Went to the beach and Baltimore.  Ate so much good food in both places.

Lots of arts and crafts fairs! Many nice Saturday mornings at the farmers market.

Finally saw an aurora!!!

We shall not speak of November.

Work was work.

Had a lovely Christmas.

So, not all bad by any means.

We are in that “what day is it” holiday space and coming back from the coffee shop, I see a gentleman walking his dog. He is in khakis, a buttondown, and blazer. SIR, I WAS PRETTY SURE IT WAS SATURDAY AND YOU’RE OUT HERE DRESSED FOR WORK.

Yes, it is Saturday, whew.

Last night my brother & I went for dinner at a friends house, and it was great – good food, we played Monopoly and no one cried or flipped the board*, and my friend Amy got me this mug – she KNOWS me:

It was good to talk with another gal about this shitshow – we both thought that white women were at least in agreement that bleeding out on an ER floor is bad and this administration would make more of that happen, but NOPE.

Christmas was lovely around these parts. Excellent brunch, great presents, and most importantly – Jorge & Sean had an awesome day! They got toys, and each got a blanket of their very own, and a whole bunch of brown crinkly packing paper.

On the US shitshow that is the incoming administration – the Republican base appears to be turning on the techbros, which is not the worst thing, I guess? Laura Loomer, who isn’t exactly the most rational or stable of folks, has lit into Musk & Ramaswamy for wanting to expand H1B visas. If she is in the same room as either one of them, she’s gonna shank someone.

Broken clocks and all that, but she has a point. Granted, she doesn’t want more H1B folks cause she’s racist trash – I don’t want them because employers use the process and visa holders to exploit workers. But at least someone gets that they are NOT on our side? Sort of?

I also didn’t appreciate Ramaswamy’s “American parents are trash and immigrant parents are better” tirade – dude, that “superior” childrearing you’re describing? It’s just abuse. But it does turn out kids who become adults who cower at any perceived authority, so I see why you’d like it.

Such weird fucking times.

My plans for the remainder of 2024 is googling “what activities are bad luck on New Year’s Eve/Day” and making sure I’m NOT doing them. (Sure, they’re all old wives tales, but why take chances?) May also finally crack open the “anti-planner planner” I ordered a while back. It was recommended by a fellow ADHD’er and true to form, I ordered it, misplaced it, found it, and have just glared at it every time I walk by it.

I also need to hit up Kohls for my moisturizer. I am trying very hard to avoid Amazon, because of the strike and Jeff Bezos being an unrepentant ass. But it so often feels like I’m just trading one huge, shitty multinational firm for another one, and Amazon has just fucked up everything so badly. Oh that thing you needed this week? The only place that carries it locally is closed until January 2nd, the other place that has it online costs 2x as much and won’t arrive for 12 days.

So, 2025 will also be the year of planning better in buying so I am getting things locally, and preferably not from Walmart, even though it’s probably gonna cost more in actual price, and time hauling around to find shit. But let’s be honest, 2025 will also probably be the year of “buying as little as possible” because nothing will be affordable.

Alright, enough dithering about on the sofa, it’s time to go face Kohl’s the weekend after Christmas. Spare a thought for me. (Yes, planning better is definitely something I need to do in 2025.)

Enjoy the rest of your Saturday!

* Amy won the game, but when we eat all the rich, she will be exempted, she was exceptionally generous in buying other players properties, routinely paying 2x market price, LOL.

You made it and that is worthy of a high five and a pat on the back. Well done! And it is candy and cookie season and if you had that for breakfast, I am sure as hell not gonna judge you for that.

And here is a Jorge in the (not really) FORBIDDEN ROOM to celebrate the end of the week!

We still have roughly 9 hours to avert a government shutdown here in the US – we’ll see what happens there. If the R’s can come up with a CR that isn’t complete shit and doesn’t cut things like CHILDHOOD CANCER RESEARCH, I’m OK with the Dems going along with it. But I see no need for Democrats to help the Republicans out of their devils deal with Trump and Musk – the R’s have enough votes on their own, if they can’t get it done, that is on the Republicans, no matter how many times they try to say otherwise.

If we shut down because at least some Republicans don’t want to kiss Elon’s unelected ring – fine. We just need everyone to understand – THIS IS NOT A DEM SHUTDOWN. And I am totally confident that the media will report it as such. HAHAHAHAHA.

I swear, if I had to go back and try to explain all this to a younger me, I think younger me would say, “Are you high?” and I’d have to be honest and say “Well, weed is legal in Virginia and I did have an edible last night, but it isn’t so much a “high” as a very slow acting imperial stout, and I took it like about 15 hours ago, so it’s all done by now, and yes, it’s ALL THAT FUCKED UP AND WEIRD WHICH IS WHY I GOT THE EDIBLES.”

Yes, I did finally try the edibles last night – since I don’t have anything on my plate today, it seemed a good low stakes window to give them a whirl in case I had an unpleasant reaction*. I have 5mg dark chocolate (cause I hate gummy anything) and while there was a slight weedy undertaste, they’re like, 2 bites, so that doesn’t even last. If there was any “high”, I slept through it, LOL. I did feel a little calmer, but the biggest thing I noticed was somewhere between the 1 and 2 hour point that my jacked up arm and shoulder wasn’t hurting at all. (The 2 hour mark was when I said, “I am pleasantly tired, I am going to bed.”)

And the thing is, I know what I’ve needed is just a damn muscle relaxant to keep my arm/shoulder from being too tense to heal up, but I also know that walking into a medical facility and asking for a muscle relaxant will get you major drug-seeking side-eye. Why it did not occur to me that the THC in marijuana can act as a muscle relaxant is beyond me, especially when I know so many people that use it for pain management. Even today, my arm is still feeling pretty good, probably cause I wasn’t unconsciously tensing it up all night in my sleep.

So yeah, 2 thumbs up on the edibles, and I think my timing of “take 12 hours before you need to be functional” is good – I slept well, no weird aftereffects this morning when I got up, and my resting heart rate overnight was as low as it has been in a month. As someone brought up with Nancy Reagan screaming “Just say no!” – it’s still really weird to me that this is all legal now.

Christmas prep continues, and the only thing left to do outside the house is getting a danish for Christmas Day. One item has had a shipping delay, so I checked online to see if it is available in a brick & mortar shop, but no, so my brother may be getting a New Year’s Eve gift. Inside the house, it’s just doing a clear up in the living room, and wrapping presents. Feeling ridiculously ahead of things this year – which is good, cause like everyone else, I could use something to feel good about.

Enjoy the rest of your day, have a great weekend, and if you’re celebrating next week – have a great time!

* I was once given some kind of anti-anxiety med before a sedation dental procedure. It was supposed to make me calm & relaxed, but it made me angry & paranoid and I almost punched a dental tech – so I’m very wary of anything that supposedly is calming.

And not a moment too soon, cause my stress levels are a bit on the high side, and I fear I’ve been on the snippy at work, so an extended break is not a bad idea.

Though, I can’t imagine why I’d be at all stressed, it’s not like we’re staring into a black hole of not knowing WTF is going to happen in this country other than it is probably gonna be bad, with the bonus of our CEO making a few somewhat boneheaded comments that left me going, “Dude, WTF?” (Nothing bad, just very tone deaf.)

Life with President Elon is super fun so far. We’ve got 30 some odd hours to avert a government shutdown because that unelected jackass won’t shut up and just mind his own business, and he probably thinks this is all fucking hilarious.

Proof positive that the existence of billionaires is a policy failure.

I really, REALLY need the Furry Hacker Mafia, Techie K-Pop fans, and Techie Swifties to clear out all his accounts and break all his toys. He needs to be sad and broke. And the inevitable infighting that is going to make Trump throw him under a bus cannot come soon enough.

Then we have dipshit Rand Paul floating the idea of Musk as Speaker of the House, with some on the left going, “Do it! Just make everything awful to prove the point!” So much for principals of harm reduction, I guess.

This level of uncertainty is…a lot. I don’t really know how to describe it, but damn, I spent the bulk of my formative years under the constant threat of nuclear annihilation and honestly, that was less stressful than this.

I keep reminding myself that my situation is reasonably stable, and though I am a woman (big strike these days) – I am at least past childbearing age. I have two awesome cats. I have good family & friends who are like-minded. I can help people. I can continue to yell at my elected representatives. (Even today!)

Treading that thin line between trying to be prepared without catastrophizing is a challenge, though.  But I’ll get there, and this time off will be good for continuing to figure things out.

And at least I have this:

And for me, that means going to the local dispensary and getting my medical cannabis card today. I’m not really a weed gal – I average one joint about every 15 years, but I’m feeling like having legal access to edibles with regulated quantities of the good stuff may not be the worst idea given what is coming.

I have a dear friend who works in mental health who I would trust with my life, and he wholeheartedly endorses legal maryjane – he says as far as he is concerned, it’s the best thing out there for the “AHHHGGHHHHHH!” that is our current hellscape.

And in other fun capitalist hellscape stuff, this week we had our quarterly all hands, combined with some holiday activities and a happy hour at the office – perfectly nice gesture, but I passed on going into the office for a myriad of reasons, the biggest one being, “I have work to do and I no longer have control over my fucking face when folks say things.” And then folks got shit stolen from the office during the party. Hella endorsement for getting folks to come into the office for any reason.

Later today it’s off to one last Christmas market for the season, because I LOVE A CHRISTMAS MARKET! And this one is legit 5 minutes from the house, and there will be a bake sale to support a local historic landmark to boot! So really, it’s a community support activity. 🥰

After pretty much ignoring the cat shelf turned into Christmas shelf, Sean decided he wanted to be part of the Christmas decor – such a handsome lad! (I want to put him in a green and red plaid bow tie SO BADLY.)

And Eclectech over on Mastodon has been putting Santa hats on folks’ pets and LOOK HOW ADORABLE SEAN AND JORGE ARE!!

Then I gotta figure out how much Christmas stuff I need to do.  The great thing is that I’ve gotten presents ahead of time this year.  But I’m not totally sure where everything is, LMAO.

Short week coming up, yay!  Cause I’m definitely gonna need those extra days to get ready for the holiday.

Enjoy your weekend and hang in there.

So, by now I think most folks have heard about the CEO of United Health Care being killed in the middle of the day in NYC. And given that UHC is notorious for denying insurance claims – 32%, highest in the industry – and made 22 billion with a B in PROFITS last year – there wasn’t exactly an outpouring of sadness.

And I’ll be honest, when I heard the news, I had very mixed emotions and one thought was, “Kinda surprised this didn’t happen sooner.”

And then in the most spectacular example of tone deafness I’ve seen in a while, the interim CEO says, “We have to guard against unnecessary care.” Dude, THAT is your takeaway? But I suppose it tracks with the rest of the industry deciding that between doing some real introspection or just taking down leadership pages on websites, they decided hiding was the right answer.

The BBC was pretty spot on with this headline: Killing of insurance CEO reveals simmering anger at US health system. Though the push notification I got from them was “rage” vs “anger” – and frankly, rage is more accurate.

I don’t think this is a one-off. I think we may be seeing the start of a reckoning here in the United States.

Everyone has a breaking point – and I think a lot more folks are a lot closer to it since the election, and the realization is setting in that as far as these CEO’s and billionaires that bought the election are concerned, we’re nothing. Just figures in their little Sims game, to continue to be sacrificed at the altar of profits & shareholder value. And maybe the problem isn’t the day laborers outside the Home Depot, but instead the CEO’s and billionaires who are making it impossible for people to survive.

It’s not like we have the courts anymore, not that they were much good before – it’s not like anyone really has the resources go up against these assholes when they hurt people.

So yeah, I think we’re going to start seeing more extrajudicial actions from people who have hit the point where they have nothing to lose. And I don’t think the 1% have any idea how many of them are out there.