Shiny, Happy Saturday to you

Posted on May 8, 2021 by A Dreamer

Don’t know what it’s like where you are, but we’re having a deceptively sunny day – we *might* hit 60 today, and we won’t see the 70s until next weekend. *sob*

I may have put all the plant starts out too early, LOL. Well, another lesson learned for next season.

In the Covid battle, the county has finally passed the 50% mark for first vaccinations and 34% for fully vaccinated in the total population. 64%/43% of the eligible population. We should be seeing a bit of a bump in fully vaccinated folks here in the next week – on April 21, there were 20,000(!!!) first doses – we’re coming up on that 3-4 week point for all of them. (And I get my second in SIX DAYS!!)

It’s just so weird after the first week of full eligibility, it seems like vaccinations just kinda fell off a cliff. I don’t know if we just have that many people who are just not going to get vaccinated at all, or people just don’t think there is enough supply (I know I didn’t expect to get an appointment right off the bat,) or it’s still not really accessible enough for too many people.

I know I sound like a broken record at this point, but it’s time to go hyper-local. Every pharmacy manager in a shopping center needs to be going store to store and asking who needs vaccinations. We need pop-up clinics in marginalized communities with ridiculous hours. I keep seeing announcements for walk-in clinics that you need a car to get to, and end mid-afternoon. Not everyone is lucky enough to have a car and be able to tell their boss, “Hey, I have to leave early” on short notice. (Plus, our public transit is shit these days.) We HAVE to do better.

If people can’t get to the vaccine, we have to get the vaccine to the people.

And if you’re waiting because you feel like you might be taking a dose from someone who needs it more – stop waiting – we have the supply, and here in the US, it’s open to everyone because we *did* hit those vulnerable groups first.

Go get your shot, please. Help someone who is having trouble with the appointment systems. Provide assurance for someone who is just scared.

Let’s put this pandemic in the rear view mirror.

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Oh Glorious Sleep!

Posted on May 7, 2021 by A Dreamer

Two nights in a row! No interruptions! Even the LilyMonster let me sleep through the night!

I could still probably sleep another 12 hours, but damn, sleep is AWESOME.

And – IT’S FRIDAY! And one of our half-day weeks, and everything appears to be under control enough that I will get off on time.

On the work front, that “opportunity” I was presented with earlier this spring… Hoo boy, we had our first meeting and it was, “And Cindy will be doing X…” That is absolutely not what had been presented to me by my supervisor. And after the meeting he hit me up with basically, “it will be what we talked about, really” – yeahhhhhh, right.

But, if I’m stuck with this, I’m going to be brutally good at it, even if the program manager from another department who is guiding our group through getting this project started thinks we’re all idiots. (Look, all I’m saying is if you want people to see a bunch of links and go read them – don’t bury them in a meeting invite that disappears to someone’s calendar as soon as they accept the invite. Put it in a separate email that will actually stay in folks inboxes.)

That all being said, time to do the thing and read the links and figure out how to make this all work.

Have yourself an excellent day.

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Hump Daaaaaaaayyyyyy!

Posted on May 5, 2021 by A Dreamer

And Cinco de Mayo to boot! And another year where I forgot to buy Coronas and limes, LOL.

And I actually got a semi decent nights sleep last night. Did wake up once, again with the effing abdominal cramps, but it only was for a few minutes. No fucking idea WTF is making me so…well, let’s be honest (sorry)- gassy. Remnants of bodily anger over what I ate Monday? Am I suddenly lactose intolerant? (That would SUCK.) Or ya know, sometimes bodies are dumb and farty? But at least I fell asleep again quickly and don’t feel like the mess I did yesterday morning.

To those thinking, “This is not the content I came for” – understandable, but it’s annoying and this is where I get the annoying stuff out of my head.

In other news – former cheeto in chief started a fucking blog. HAHAHAHAHAHA. I don’t know why I find this so hilarious, but I do. And Facebook is deciding whether or not to put him back on their platform. BBC was just talking about how they have all these experts they have reviewing the situation and all I can think is – that ass repeatedly violated all your damn rules, you banned him, it’s done. Social media as a whole has been so much more pleasant since he was deplatformed.

Time to go do the thing for the capitalism.

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Just a couple nights in a row of good sleep

Posted on May 4, 2021 by A Dreamer

That’s all I’m asking.

Last night, took forever to fall asleep. Then there were a ton of little outside noises that kept waking me up, and it never occurred to me to close the window.

Then at 4AM my body decided to inform me that it did not care for my culinary choices yesterday. I didn’t get properly *sick*, but enjoyed an hour of feeling like I was being repeatedly stabbed in the abdomen with a sharpened pencil.

Once it stopped, I passed out hard – but at that point, only 2 hours until the alarm went off.

I’m up and I’ve got my coffee, but I’m still feeling a kinda wobbly this morning. :(

But, this is where working from home (and not dealing directly with clients anymore) is a really good thing. I feel fine enough to quietly sit and work, but if I had to get in a car for an hour to get there? I’d probably call out and have to burn PTO. And I can use my lunch hour for a snooze if needed.

I may not be at the top of my game today, but everything that is due this week is well in hand and if I have a less than stellar day, it won’t cause a disaster.

But a couple weeknights of really good sleep would be welcome.

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Happy Monday!

Posted on May 3, 2021 by A Dreamer

And it’s going to be A Week if I am remembering my to-do list from when I logged off on Friday. I’ve got…4(?) bugs I have to have finished by Thursday. Two are already started and well on their way, two can’t even be *started* until today. I think I can get out of this without 12 hour days, but there may be a late night in there. Bleh. But, it will all get done.

After all of yesterdays repotting, now I’m on the lookout for transplant shock – so far, so good, and I would say that the nerve plant is LOVING having all this new space. It’s like it doubled in size almost instantly.

A nerve plant happily spread out in a new larger pot
Happy Plant!

Half the plants in the window are theoretically blooming plants (no flowers right now) but honestly, if none of them produce another flower again, I’d be OK with it, as I’m just loving having all that green over there in the window. And I’m glad I went ahead and ordered the second set of shelves as the window shelves are getting a tad crowded. It’s coming this week, so that’s a half-day Friday project.

I keep thinking I should move a plant or two upstairs to where I work, but there is also the issue that the space where it would go is also frequented by a certain cat that would absolutely knock it over at 3AM in order to wake me for snacks. I’ll have to keep thinking on ways to have a plant or two in my workspace while also having a LilyMonster.

Welp, time to go to the thing for the capitalism. You have a good day and get vaccinated!

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Success!

Posted on May 2, 2021 by A Dreamer

All.the houseplants have nice new 6 inch pots and uncompacted soil and got a good long soak this afternoon.  Somehow I ended up with a rabbits foot fern at the garden center.   No idea how that happened.

A shelf full of green plants in my front window

Also got all the seedlings moved to the sunniest spot on the porch.  Lesson learned this spring: turn the grow lights on every day – the greenhouse is up against the back French door and while it goes get morning sun, it does not get enough of it.  The tomatoes are a bit leggy and anemic looking.  But still alive!  (The ones on the left got the least sun.)

Two trays of tomato seedlings

The peppers, though – compact, but looking good to me!

A flat of pepper seedlings

I also may have accidentally bought a couple more tomato plants and catnip plants and a pepper plant when I went to the garden center “just for some potting soil”…

I’m just so tickled that so many seedlings made it to the point of getting outside.

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Re-pot-a-palooza on tap today!

Posted on May 2, 2021 by A Dreamer

We’ve got a nice warm day on tap and I am finally going to get around to repotting all the houseplants on the front window shelf, *and* I think the weather has stabilized enough that I can move the little greenhouse outside to start hardening off the seedlings. (And start some new ones that didn’t make it through the past month and a half.) The tomatoes have been going great, and they are starting to actually *look* like little tomato plants!

But, I am also realizing that I am not sure I actually have enough potting soil for all the plants I’ve got. I should probably make a swing over to the garden center and grab another bag. And stay out of their greenhouse, because I do not have room for any more plants in the front window.

But, I have had my eye on this shelving unit that would fit perfectly between the window table and the TV and would provide more plant room…

More plants?!

Fuck it, I’m ordering it – that spot is a mess, it’s where the router is and needs something to keep the stuff there in order. And it has plastic on the shelves so I could keep the router on the bottom shelf and not worry about plants above leaking onto it if I end up with more plants. And I threw in a narrow rolling cart that have been on my wishlist for the upstairs bathroom that will fit right between the vanity & toilet. In for a penny and all that.

I’M GONNA GET SHIT KINDA SORTA ORGANIZED THIS SPRING! (I say this every year, but if this isn’t a year for new beginnings and all that, I’m not sure when it will be.)

Welp, given that it’s already past noon, I’d best get myself out to get more potting soil and then see if I can’t get a whole slew of repotting done this afternoon.

Enjoy your day!

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Things I did not expect…

Posted on May 1, 2021 by A Dreamer

I mean, there are a lot of knock on effects from the pandemic that I didn’t really think about, but I really never expected a cat food shortage. Like, it didn’t even enter my mind.

We already ran into delays with the LilyMonster’s prescription food – managed to snag a case directly from the vet’s office while waiting for Chewy to restock it, and her favorite dry food was out of stock for a while – even Royal Canin’s website was, “Yeah, we know, we’re sorry.”

Today I ran into the market, and they were out of Lily’s beloved packet snacks, along with quite a lot of other things. That was an awkward conversation with her when I got home – it was the insult on top of the injury of my leaving the house in the first place. (According to my brother, there was much wailing and gnashing of teeth in my absence.)

But, we have a metric fuckton of crunchy treats, including some Friskies Party Mix to change things up (we are mainly a Temptations household) and Chewy is saving the day on the packet snacks. (I just wish I’d known they were out when I ordered her other snacks two days ago, I would have had enough for free shipping.)

But, empty shelves in the cat food aisle – never, ever saw that coming.

Ran into my favorite gal that works at the market – she’s fully vaccinated! And they were able to get their shots right at the store, which is great. (Honestly, as weird as the whole county process was, I could see them sending them somewhere else.) She said she loves how many customers have come in going, “I’m good! I’m vaccinated!” And she’s been taking informal polls, and the Pfizer shots have far less after effects than Moderna from everyone she’s talked to.

I love that my community seems to really be embracing getting vaccinated. In the county, we’re at 60% with at least one shot, and 37% fully vaccinated. Our 7 day average for new cases is down to 88 a day – which is still 88 more than I want to see, but it’s SO much better than where we were a few months ago. Combination of vaccinations and folks being able to gather outside now that the weather is nicer seems to be helping.

I’m counting down the days til my next shot. And while there are going to be a lot of nice perks that come along with it – the whole “you can do maskless things now” isn’t even really on my list. Don’t get me wrong, it’s great – but what I’m really looking forward to is just being able to let go of some of my “I will not catch this shit, goddammit” anxiety/anger/whatever you want to call it. I’m not going to start licking doorknobs, but gawd, it will be nice to have some solid biological protection beyond the masks. The masks have been doing their job, to be sure, and I am super pro-mask, but they do feel rather…unsubstantial against something so big.

But it really feels like we’re going to get there. And that is a good feeling.

Someone has feelings about the lack of packet snacks
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Gooooooood morning!

Posted on April 29, 2021 by A Dreamer

Happy…Thursday! Been one of those, “um, what day is it?” weeks.

Padres whomped up on the Diamondbacks last night – our starting pitcher had to leave the game really early, which did not bode well, but damn if we didn’t have some very hot bats and a good bullpen to make up for it.

Very weird dreams last night involving having to evacuate the house because of – get this – potential sinkholes. Not just my house, but like, half my zip code. Where the fuck my brain came up with that is beyond me.

Didn’t watch Biden’s speech last night, but it sounds like at no point did he say, “And we’re gonna maliciously and intentionally fuck over this group of marginalized folks just because we can” and that is kinda refreshing. (Still, Joe, my buddy, my pal – student loan cancelation. You can do it!)

And despite not getting quite enough sleep thanks to the ballgame and a certain kitty who forgets at 2AM that every night I make a big production of making sure she knows she has snacks out and waiting for her before bed – I am feeling oddly perky.

Highs in the 80s again today! Looking good for outside yoga at lunch, YAY!

And the county keeps marching towards good immunization numbers – up to 58% with one shot and just shy of 36% fully vaccinated. And probably even higher than that, because I’ve noticed that in the data drops that the state does, the last 3 days are always low from reporting delays. We’re not there yet, but my god, PROGRESS. We’re opening more walk-in clinics, both county & FEMA based and we are getting shots in arms. If we can keep up our current trend, we’re looking at full vaccinations of everyone over 16 by the end of JULY. And our case counts are finally consistently trending lower, and we’re back to where we were in October before the winter spike.

I do not believe for one minute that we’d be doing this well if that former guy was still in office.

You have a great Thursday, and if you haven’t scheduled your vaccination appointment, do it! I don’t want you to get sick!

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I feel like I’m 108…

Posted on April 27, 2021 by A Dreamer

Went to bed around 11 and then basically stared at the ceiling for near 3 hours.

Started to doze off, and the LilyMonster announced she was DYING OF ALL THE HUNGERS around 2AM. (She had snacks in her snack spot on the dresser, she just forgot they were there.)

She ate, we snuggled up, and started to doze again and the goddamn loudest fox I have ever heard decided to come out of the woods. Even Lily was, “WTF is that?!”

Finally fell asleep around 3:30, and I am DRAGGING, and also feel like someone kicked me in the back. (That is working itself out as I move around at least.)

It’s going to be a fuuuuuuuuuuuuun day….

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