Musings of a marginally sane feline-appreciating female.

It’s a bit windy out there, BUT THERE IS SUN! A LOT OF IT! And there is supposed to be sun ALL DAY!! And for the next few days! And it was pleasant enough to eat outside after work yesterday to boot!

You never really realize how much the seasonal depression has been hitting until it lifts, and this winter, well, oof. And our winter was pretty damn mild, but I’m gonna go out on a limb and say the continuing pandemic and unending firehose of terrible news around the world really didn’t fucking help matters at all.

But hey, I’ve landed on the sunny side of the street, both literally and metaphorically, and I’ve taken notes for next winter, so it’s all good.

Honestly, I was pretty damn giddy running errands today – it’s been waaaaaaay too long since I could cruise around with the windows down and the music cranking. Even makes up for the ADHD tax on cat food. (Two Chewy boxes in the house that I swore I had completely unpacked and just not broken down – nope, still had some goodies in them. Discovered after I put in the next Chewy order.)

How great am I feeling right now? Saw something skitter across the carpet, thought it was a spider, but no, it was a waspy type thing. Captured and released with zero freakout. (It seemed to be near death anyway which made it easier, but hey, no freakout and no waspy thing in the house!)

And the O’s game is on and me and the LilyMonster are gonna enjoy it.

You have a fantastic day.

OK, I started watching this last night based solely on the tiny trailer on Netflix – knew nothing else about it other than seeing the title in passing in entertainment headlines. To be clear – I don’t hate it. It’s got a great cast – I’d watch Liam Cunningham read a phone book if we’re being honest, and I love seeing Benedict Wong and Rosalind Chan do anything, too. Visual effects are great. I’m only 6 episodes in and maybe this will all be resolved in the next two, but I don’t know…

If you like SciFi that is mostly earth-based/current reality, I’d give it a shot. I didn’t realize when I started watching it that it was based on a Chinese novel – so, at least you know that all these references to China/Chinese history are because the author was Chinese, not that the TV writers had some damn Asian fetish.

It’s super fucking weird but I got through 6 episodes in one sitting, so if nothing else, it’s definitely gripping and the only reason I stopped watching was that it was near 2AM in the morning.

So – let’s bring on the beefs!! There are spoilers, so I am putting space in here so you can leave the page or scroll really fast and not see it.

SPOILERS BELOW!

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SPOILERS BELOW!

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SPOILERS BELOW!

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• This is NOT about a human computer made of millions of soldiers in the Ghengis Khan era, as suggested by the little Netflix preview/trailer thing. To go from that to the Cultural Revolution in China in the actual opening scene was a little jarring. (I am blaming Netflix for this one.)
• Bearing in mind that it has been 30+ years since I took a physics class and damn near failed – I had to look up what the 3 Body Problem is and whether or not it is a) real and b) unsolvable. I still cannot wrap my head around the fact that physics can’t figure it out. Physics and math can figure out everything. OR SO I WAS TOLD.
• The aliens have figured out 1% light speed interstellar travel (amongst other things) and they somehow haven’t figured out the 3 Body Problem with regards to three known stars in their own system? Seems sketchy.
• The aliens will be here in 400 years, but we have to stop them now so they don’t conquer the world when they get here? Pretty fuckin’ bold to think that this place will still be fit for human habitation and anyone would be left in 400 years.
• We’re gonna get the whole world to cooperate to build a nuclear staircase so the probe can get to the alien ships? HAHAHAHAHAHA.
• What happened to Ye Wenjie’s boyfriend who gave her the copy of Silent Spring?! She saved his ass and I’d LOVE to see him pop up in the present somehow and be like, “WTF, I didn’t give you the book for all this shit to happen. How the fuck did you get ‘start an alien worship cult’ from this?”
• When Alex is walking out in the water and sees the origami boats – I couldn’t have been the only one fully expecting him to look back and see his own deceased body sitting in the beach chair, right?

Here is some stuff I loved:

• Thomas Wade (Liam Cunningham) – He is SO good at playing the rat bastard, no-nonsense good(ish?) guy, who just wants to get the fucking job done. (The “open the window” scene…)
• Da Shi (Benedict Wong) – I suppose you could say it’s copaganda, but he’s really just an investigator trying to figure this shit out. But I love his character, and though we don’t see much about his personal life/backstory, there is an interaction with his son, who is gay, and it’s just not a thing other than “he has terrible taste in men” – loved that.
• The “video game” visuals are really cool and well done.
• Ye Wenjie telling the aliens, “Fuck it, come and get it” – absolutely ill advised, but I totally get it. (And it wouldn’t be much of a story if she hadn’t done it.)

So, we’ll see if any of this is resolved in the next two episodes.

But yeah, 4.8 quake in North Central Jersey, apparently felt in NYC and beyond. 4.8 isn’t terrible, but having lived in Japan and been through more than a few quakes, they can be a bit unsettling, and thankfully this appears to be nothing like what happened in Taiwan earlier this week – that one was BAD.

Things are quiet and FUCKING GREY AS HELL here in the DMV – I swear, we’ve not gotten more than 3 hours of sun in the last week. I know, it’s spring, it’s cloudy, it’s rainy, it’s normal, but fuuuuuuuuck me I am tired of not having sun. Or, having the sun show up and I get all excited and as soon as I leave the house, it’s gone again.

Work is work, but I at least have a three day weekend, and the timing is perfect, because damn that place kicked my ass this week. Found a last minute bug like, 36 hours out from when we were supposed to release, dealt with some petulant people, started on a new feature that is gonna be a bitch and a half to test, and had a moment where I looked at a Teams post and literally said, “What the Kentucky Fried Fuck?” (It’s fine, it was just one of those moments.)

But I got to sleep in today, got paid (and watched most of that money u-turn back out the door, LOL) and outdoor market season is kicking off! My brother found a spring market tomorrow not too far from here, and I’ve found an Asian food market that is once a month starting at the end of April, and the farmers market opens in 2 weeks! And not a moment too soon, cause I really, REALLY need the weather to shape up, and fun outside things to do, especially if they involve any kind of food. My brain is fucking DONE with the indoors.

Speaking of food, like many folks (at least I hope many folks) – I have a whole damn folder of saved Instagram cooking reels and I am finally gonna make something! Of course, it is the easiest thing I’ve seen, LOL, but it looks so good. It’s a tortilla pizza/Italian quesadilla kinda thing – tortilla, melted garlic butter, mozzarella cheese, another tortilla/butter/cheese and stick it in the oven at 425 for 5-6 minutes. (400/5 minutes for the air fryer.) I mean, it’s hard to go wrong with garlic butter and cheese.

You have a fantastic day, and get some cheese, it fixes just about anything.

And I am SO glad it’s the weekend.

The LilyMonster had her followup vet visit on Tuesday and the sore/mass/IDKWTF in her mouth was still there. We were able to get a biopsy done Thursday so we can at least know what we’re dealing with. The vet said that he thinks it is a carcinoma, but we’ll know for sure when the lab reports come back and we’ll figure out what’s next. If it can be treated in a way that isn’t totally traumatizing for her, great, if not – the spoiled kitty will be even more spoiled on comfort care. I would do pretty much anything for her, but there is only so much I will put her through, ya know?

Her biopsy recovery is going well, despite the fact that her dumbass human short-measured her liquid pain meds Thursday night and yesterday morning. She was not feeling awesome yesterday, but once I realized my fuckup and fixed it with the next dose, she was MUCH happier. This morning she was all roly-poly and wanting belly rubs and I’ve had to get her off the not-allowed counter twice already today.

Thursday when she got home, no food or water for 2 hours and “keep her calm”. HAHAHAHA! She hadn’t eaten since 9PM the night before and spent the those two hours just going from place to place in the house that she’d ever gotten food hoping it would magically materialize. Adding insult to injury, when she could eat, I only let her have a spoonful every half hour to make sure she didn’t have an upset stomach. (The instructions were “1/4 of regular amount of food” – she eats on demand, I have no idea how much “regular” is, LOL.)

She understandably didn’t want to eat much yesterday with the vet sedation worn off and not enough painkillers, but has had a bit this morning and we’re bringing out the big guns food-wise this weekend. Today there will be tuna and I’m making chili shrimp tomorrow and a few will be set aside and butter poached for her majesty. And I just put down a licky stick for her and she sniffed it and walked away and I looked again probably 30 seconds later and she’d hoovered it, which is excellent.

So yeah, VERY tiring week.

And on top of all that, on Friday, the full scope of one of our CTO’s decisions has come to light and JFC dude, did you think that a) no one would find out and/or b) when we did, we’d go “yeah, great idea!” (I see why my VP quit.) Cause, it is NOT a great idea, but it does make me realize he was not brought in to innovate, but to cut costs. I think we’re definitely looking at a false economy here, but whatever, not a damn thing I can do about it.

But it’s Saturday, it’s sunny, Lily is happily snoozing, and everything is good enough for now.

Yeah, had to pull out the ol’ days count since we’re just 3 days shy of starting YEAR FUCKING FIVE of this goddamned pandemic. In a nod to tradition, I did pick up donuts today. And yes, I’m gonna be pissed off until the day I die about how our elected representatives on all sides of the aisle just abandoned us for any number of reasons.

I mean sure, I didn’t really know what I was expecting, first pandemic and all, I guess I just thought we’d all do a little, um, better? I didn’t expect so much WTF.

Work has been…interesting this week. We got a new CTO last year, I don’t think he’s a bad person, but he is just trying to do too much all at once, it’s “leadership by edict” and I think some of our big clients aren’t going to respond to his proposals the way he expects and I think we’re gonna have some ugly times ahead. The VP I work with so much is leaving (I firmly believe it is because of the CTO) and our CEO is moving to our parent company. They say they worked really hard to make sure that the incoming CEO is a culture fit, but given how the CTO is, I am wondering exactly what “culture” the new guy is a fit for. Ah well, if all else fails, have camera & feet, will open OF account.

Now, thanks to all that, this week I’ve had zero left mentally at the end of the day and have only managed the barest of bare minimums in the rest of my life. It was gonna be a whole reset weekend. HAHAHAHAHAHA. Somehow it is now 2PM on Sunday, LOL.

But I’ve got my comfy pants on, found my headphones, and I’m gonna get the critical stuff done, get my to-do list re-sorted and not worry about trying to “catch up” and then I can take time to steel myself for whatever nonsense the new week may bring.

You have a great afternoon and don’t let the bastards get you down.

* Yes, it’s still a pandemic. Yes, I am still voting for the D’s – I can be pissed and not vote for a fascist at the same time. Multitasking!

Had a birthday a few days ago and of course it got me thinking about how much change I’ve seen in the world in my life – the good, the weird, and the utter shit – and I don’t know that I’d believe myself on 99% of it.

• That Apple IIE computer with it’s TWO 5 1/4 disk drives and monochrome monitor that you’re having so much fun with? You’re going to have a computer you can put in your pocket which will be hundreds (IDK, thousands?) of times more powerful. And you’ll be able to watch a baseball game being played 2600 miles away on it.
• Thanks to that little computer and vastly improved communications in general, you’ll know more about what is going on in the world than you ever have. This is a double edged sword, cause there is a lot of shit out there.
• Still haven’t nailed peace in the Middle East. It’s a cycle of improvement and then goes to shit. Well, it’s kinda that way everywhere – they kinda forget to tell you in school that the US is quite the destabilizing force around the world.
• There is so much shit they’re not teaching you in school. SO MUCH. It’s easy to think America is reasonably good when they skip the bad stuff. When you do find out about the bad stuff, it’s gonna hit hard and hurt, but you’ll be better for knowing it.
• You will use geometry and low level algebra in life. Everything after that? Not once.
• The Republican party will go from being garden variety shitbirds to full on genocidal fascist maniacs – like, really damn scary people.
• The Democrats will continue try and make improvements and be good at getting in their own way, but they’ll also become a damn wholly owned subsidiary of Corporate America.
• Neither party will take criticism particularly well.
• Both will gaslight the fuck out of you.
• You’ll still end up a Democrat, cause fuck the fascists.
• One of those fascist psychos became President and probably will do it again.
• Capitalism suuuuuuuucks.
• HIV/AIDS will go from being a certain death sentence, to a chronic condition manageable with meds. (But not before the Reagan administration basically says “fuck the gay community” so it will take a while.)
• There will be another big, ugly, worldwide pandemic and it will not go well AT ALL.
• Jimmy Carter. He’s just started working with Habitat for Humanity – he’s is gonna be the most amazing former President. Like, absolutely fucking amazing.
• We pretty much did away with acid rain, and that hole in the ozone layer got fixed, which is pretty cool. But, the environment is still really hurting and fucking oil companies are blaming YOU – despite individuals doing more to protect the environment than they ever have – it’s just not enough to make up for corporate and governmental pollution.
• Terrorism. You’re already familiar with the concept, but it’s gonna start hitting at home and in more than a few cases, the call is going to be coming from inside the damn house.
• Tattoos! You know how they’re kinda just for sailors and bikers and ne’er-do-wells? They’re for everyone now and no big deal.
• You’ll have purple and silver hair. It’s fuckin’ sick, kiddo.
• Outside of the awesome hair, you’re not gonna function super well outside of work. You’re gonna spend a lot of time thinking you’re a failure over it – but you’re not. Your brain just doesn’t work like other folks, and it’s gonna take you a really long time to figure that out – but once you do, things start to get a little better. The reason you’re OK at work is because your work suits your brain and you’re terrified of being homeless. (See: Capitalism.) Looking back, I don’t even know how you managed school so well.
• There is gonna be a Black President. He won’t be perfect, but he cares about the country. You won’t believe how angry the Republicans will get over the fact that this man exists and people like him enough to elect him.
• There will be cats!!
• There is also gonna be a fuckton of trauma that you won’t actually recognize as trauma until well after the fact, cause you’ve kinda been raised on “Well, shit happens and we muck through it.”
• The Supreme Court is totally fucking useless and corrupt. lt’s not good.
• Oh, you’re not straight.
• Know how the Republicans are very anti-USSR? Uh, not so much anymore. It’s weird.
• The American culinary landscape is going to be pretty fucking awesome. You’re gonna eat a LOT of really good food and try lots of new things. (You’ll never really develop a taste for sushi though, ebi is pretty much your limit there.) And so many taco options.
• No flying cars, but we do have exploding hoverboards, so, um, that’s something?
• Did I mention the cats?

Like, I swear it was just Sunday of last week. Been a quick week for sure, but also fuck all tiring – sort of a mild general life malaise. Ya know, a wee touch of the morbs.*

No one thing, just a bit of everything. Worries about the LilyMonster – who is doing well and eating like a small horse – some corporate gaslighting at work**, and all the damn freaking news, very little of which seems to be good. Oh and I had a dentist appointment Friday and they had the audacity to NOT reschedule at the last minute.

Just one of those weeks where I got very little done outside of work and wasn’t really good at the whole looking after myself. I spent yesterday numbing myself with Mexican food and Instagram reels. Not ideal, but better than drugs or getting blackout drunk, right? Plus I have even more recipes saved that I’ll probably never make, LMAO.

So, today needed to be a reset day. Off to a slightly bumpy start cause it rained a bit last night, then the temps plummeted, and when I went to get coffee, my car door was frozen shut. Remote start for melting FTW.

Got past that, got the car gassed up and washed, and hit the market. Got home and got into comfy pants and it was off to the races. Music on, daily and weekly to-do’s all done and sorted. Sunday is the kitchen day and it is much shinier now. Did my damn yoga, which I’d not done all week and it felt SO GOOD. Then a long hot shower and washed my hair.

Yo, brain, please remember how nice this feels to clear the to-do list and do the yoga, OK? Please?

And now I can just chill the rest of the day and not have my brain screaming at me to Get Things Done.

You enjoy the rest of the weekend.

*Got the morbs is the a fantastic bit of Victorian slang that really needs to come back and I am doing my part.
** Corporate gaslighting is something I’m totally used to, but this was just a bit more “Wow, you really do think we’re stupid” than usual.

I don’t say this with any snark – just more frustration and bewilderment than anything.

Like, did you decide that taking precautions was “living in fear”? Just a YOLO thing? Is it because the news isn’t talking about it at all anymore? Because health departments barely mention it anymore?* Because what little guidance coming from the CDC is basically “fuck it, no one listens to us anyway”? Is your risk tolerance just really high?

Seeing someone else in a mask when I’m out and about is a fucking rarity anymore, and pretty much everything I do is a shit-ton of risk calculations.

Yesterday I had to drop off my car at the service station, and we put in an online order for food to pickup and for whatever reason, the restaurant didn’t respond, the order got canceled (I got a text en route) and so we decided to eat in, but only because it was 4PM on a Sunday, they were at about 25% capacity, we could choose seats well away from others, the place has high ceilings and lots of fans, etc, etc. Just so much fucking mental math just to sit down and eat. (The last time I ate indoors, I can’t even remember.)

And on the other side of the restaurant, there was a party of folks all jammed together and pretty much on top of each other for a birthday. Sure, maybe they’ve all been super diligent everywhere else in their lives so they *can* do this, which would be great! But, um, yeah. And then in Starbucks this morning, six folks jammed up around one table – WITH A FUCKING INFANT.

I guess this on top of seeing multiple folks I know this week going, “Hey, look at us at this crowded indoor event!” was just a bit much, while I’m desperately hoping I’m not putting anyone else at massive risk just to sit down and eat.

I know – trust me, I KNOW – how much of a toll Covid has taken on everyone’s mental health. Isolation, canceling plans, saying no to so many things, constant risk assessments – it’s so much. But what’s been worse for me, is watching people decide they just don’t give a shit anymore about themselves or anyone else.

I know it’s not everyone – but it is just So Many People, and for whatever reason, it’s hitting hard this week.

ETA: I know that disabled folks have to do risk assessments/cancel plans/say no 6 days a week and twice on Sunday – I know my experience here is not unique, I’m just needing to get my feelings out about it.

* Even my own state health department, which had been pretty good – the website is starting to break down to lack of maintenance and the latest data download is 20 days out of date. Maddening.