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Sep. 1st, 2022 08:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkatFamily
Mother is in the hospital again. She called just as I was about to hop into the shower. So there I was talking to my mother, with nothing on but my undies, in my living room - as she told me that she was at the clinic or hospital, I'm not sure which, waiting to see if they could take care of her kidney stones.
That was around 5:30 pm. I've not heard back. I hope she's okay. There's zip I can do in either case. I've been self-medicating with sugar. This is bad. Must stop. I had a small almond and chocolate hershey's bar, and some coffee ice cream after dinner. I did have dinner - which consisted of heating up frozen organic blue corn and vegetable tamales with cheddar cheese, fresh chopped tomato salsa, guacamole, spinach leaves, and clue corn chips.
[ETA: Now she's home. She just called me. They took an X-ray - the kidney stone apparently had moved further down the urinary tract and could be dispelled on its own soon. It wasn't as visible. Also they said that the other option was to put in a stint - but they didn't recommend that - since it could cause problems later on. (I'd agree, so did she). They think it may just dispel on its own - it'll be really painful, but then over. If not, they'll crush it with a laser next week. The problem is that the funeral is coming up soon, with all these people coming. She can't be suffering from kidney stones, dealing with hospitals, and doing the funeral all at the same time. We're also praying we don't get any hurricanes. Shhh. Don't say that too loudly.]
Apartment
Took the recycling to the basement, ended up sharing the elevator both ways with a neighbor, who I rarely see, big heavy set blond woman in her thirties who is married to a big heavy-set black man in his thirties. He's a lot friendlier than she is. Neither has ever worn a mask.
Then during dinner - I heard heavy knocking on the neighbor's door catty-corner to mine.
"Open up the door please. We want to see if you have two children here. There are supposed to be two children in this apartment."
I'm thinking WTF? Right? So I look out the peep hole. There are three big burly police officers in the hallway.
This goes on for about twenty minutes, they knock, the neighbor tells them to go away, they knock, the neighbor refuses to open the door, they knock and threaten...and then finally the neighbor responds.
Near as I could figure, his ex-wife or the mother of the kids, called the cops to check and see if they were actually there. They were supposed to go to school today, and hadn't shown up, the school called the mother, and the mother called the cops. Finally she got hold of the kids, but didn't follow up with the police. [ I did not open my door to check. I decided it was best to stay out of it - not my business.]
Crazy workplace
Workwise...I've made progress. Lawyer told me that my contract was by far the best coordinated contract she'd ever worked on - and she couldn't begin to imagine the amount of leg-work that went into it. It also was a first in many respects, since we had to do things that hadn't been done before. My job is partially to coordinate everyone and everything, which is hard, and often painful. I've become a professional coordinator. So it finally got advertised yesterday, today I was taking reservations for the site tour and track training next week. I was also creating the technical evaluation forms, writing up the pre-bid conference agenda for the meeting I'm hosting next week, electronic filing, etc. Still dreadfully behind on a few things, but I got to get four contracts awarded before the end of the year, and we haven't gotten anywhere close to that point yet.
I feel overwhelmed and silly for being overwhelmed. Like somehow I'm a wimp for feeling this way. It's an odd feeling. I feel like I'm screwing up, without meaning to. I'm not entirely sure who these imaginary people are that are judging me all the time - but I wish they'd stop.
And I just want to work on the many books in my head and in my computer, but also now headspace for it. I've been meditating again - and it's working for the most part - in dislodging negative thought loops and story loops. I don't know if anyone else does this? But I can create an entire narrative in my head, complete with dialogue. It's as if I've played out the conversation or various scenarios long before anything has happened.
Meditation has helped put a halt to that. Telling myself a story is another way to halt it - but it also makes it hard to focus on work or anything really but the story.
Books
Almost done with Spin the Dawn about the Tailor who goes on a journey to capture sunlight, moonlight, and the blood of the stars to make three of the Goddess Amana's dresses for the bride of the Emperor - in order to become the Imperial Tailor, and save her family. If she fails, the bride has condemned her and her family - mainly because the bride doesn't want to marry the Emperor and is a spiteful bitch. Anyhow, the Emperor's Enchanter (a Jinn) goes with her on her journey, and along the way they fall in love. But things go awry, and now he's made a deal with his former teacher, a demon, to take the teacher's place as the Guardian of the Isle of Ghosts for Eternity, in order to free the Tailor from the demon's clutches. It's at the 80% mark, I have a feeling this is ending on a cliff-hanger. Dammit. I don't want to buy the sequel.
I've discovered there are audio memoirs with music on audible. Sheryl Crow, Sting, Common, Smokey Robinson all have them - and they appear to be free.
Interesting.
I was talking to a co-worker about this last week - how I am having issues concentrating on things. Wales is in love with James Baldwin's Another Country, which Chidi was trying to get me to read in 2019. I just don't have the attention span. I can barely concentrate on reading for more than ten minutes at a stretch without my mind wandering. And nothing is really that compelling. It's not grabbing me.
Co-worker told me that a lot of people were having the same issues. He was as well. Difficulty concentrating or getting into a book.
Music Memage
Music Twitter (which along with Art and Cat Twitter) is among the least toxic and least obnoxious of the Twitter groups. Music, Cat and Art fans just like to show-off, they don't appear to want to do much besides that. They aren't nuts like soap, sports, sci-fi, comic book, or film fans. Well, I take that back, they are nuts - just in a different way.
Every once and awhile they do these..."which is your favorite" contests. Most of them are easy, the one's that aren't - are when I have absolutely no clue who the band is or who the singer is or that they even exist. The hard-core Music Fans level of obnoxious - is trying to come up with obscure bands that most people have never heard of. Which is actually kind of charming, if you think about it. I mean you come away from that with a new band to check out. [Or, most people have heard of, and I've even listened to, but I can't remember the name of the band or the singer, and forgot that I had listened to it. This is not a commentary on the band or singer - the fact that I can't remember them has less to do with how memorable or good they happen to be, and more to do with my insane memory, which appears to be horribly indexed, and kind of random.]
Anywho...I went to look and damn twitter is filled to the brim with Liberal Political Twitter, Cat Twitter, and Soap Twitter...with a bit of Book Twitter for good measure. (Spoilers from Soap Opera Digest and Biden spoke so Political Twitter and Soap Twitter took over. Which is the problem with social media - something goes viral, and you don't see anything else. It takes over the board.
My own...from memory:
1) The Who or the Rolling Stones
Stones
2) Pearl Jam or Aerosmith
Pearl Jam
3) Journey or Queen
Queen
4) Heart or Indigo Girls
Heart
5) KD Lang or Sinead
KD Lang
6.) Johnny Cash or Elvis
Johnny Cash
7). Freddie Mercury or Elvis
Elvis...which was harder than the previous one for some reason
8.) Sting or Bono
Sting
9) Peter Gabriel or Phil Collins
Peter Gabriel
10. ) Pink Floyd or Led Zepplin
Pink Floyd
11) Sinatra or Elvis
Weirdly Elvis.
12. ) Lady Gaga or Madonna
Lady Gaga
13) BTS or N SYNC
BTS
14.) Meatloaf or Queen
Queen
15) Bach or Brahms
Bach
16) Celine Dione or Whitney Houston
Whitney Houston
17.) Donna Summer or Dione Warwick
Donna Summer
18.) Aretha Franklin or Tina Turner
Aertha Franklin
19.) Paul McCartney or Billy Joel
McCartney
20.) The Beatles or the Beach Boys
The Beatles.
Mother is in the hospital again. She called just as I was about to hop into the shower. So there I was talking to my mother, with nothing on but my undies, in my living room - as she told me that she was at the clinic or hospital, I'm not sure which, waiting to see if they could take care of her kidney stones.
That was around 5:30 pm. I've not heard back. I hope she's okay. There's zip I can do in either case. I've been self-medicating with sugar. This is bad. Must stop. I had a small almond and chocolate hershey's bar, and some coffee ice cream after dinner. I did have dinner - which consisted of heating up frozen organic blue corn and vegetable tamales with cheddar cheese, fresh chopped tomato salsa, guacamole, spinach leaves, and clue corn chips.
[ETA: Now she's home. She just called me. They took an X-ray - the kidney stone apparently had moved further down the urinary tract and could be dispelled on its own soon. It wasn't as visible. Also they said that the other option was to put in a stint - but they didn't recommend that - since it could cause problems later on. (I'd agree, so did she). They think it may just dispel on its own - it'll be really painful, but then over. If not, they'll crush it with a laser next week. The problem is that the funeral is coming up soon, with all these people coming. She can't be suffering from kidney stones, dealing with hospitals, and doing the funeral all at the same time. We're also praying we don't get any hurricanes. Shhh. Don't say that too loudly.]
Apartment
Took the recycling to the basement, ended up sharing the elevator both ways with a neighbor, who I rarely see, big heavy set blond woman in her thirties who is married to a big heavy-set black man in his thirties. He's a lot friendlier than she is. Neither has ever worn a mask.
Then during dinner - I heard heavy knocking on the neighbor's door catty-corner to mine.
"Open up the door please. We want to see if you have two children here. There are supposed to be two children in this apartment."
I'm thinking WTF? Right? So I look out the peep hole. There are three big burly police officers in the hallway.
This goes on for about twenty minutes, they knock, the neighbor tells them to go away, they knock, the neighbor refuses to open the door, they knock and threaten...and then finally the neighbor responds.
Near as I could figure, his ex-wife or the mother of the kids, called the cops to check and see if they were actually there. They were supposed to go to school today, and hadn't shown up, the school called the mother, and the mother called the cops. Finally she got hold of the kids, but didn't follow up with the police. [ I did not open my door to check. I decided it was best to stay out of it - not my business.]
Crazy workplace
Workwise...I've made progress. Lawyer told me that my contract was by far the best coordinated contract she'd ever worked on - and she couldn't begin to imagine the amount of leg-work that went into it. It also was a first in many respects, since we had to do things that hadn't been done before. My job is partially to coordinate everyone and everything, which is hard, and often painful. I've become a professional coordinator. So it finally got advertised yesterday, today I was taking reservations for the site tour and track training next week. I was also creating the technical evaluation forms, writing up the pre-bid conference agenda for the meeting I'm hosting next week, electronic filing, etc. Still dreadfully behind on a few things, but I got to get four contracts awarded before the end of the year, and we haven't gotten anywhere close to that point yet.
I feel overwhelmed and silly for being overwhelmed. Like somehow I'm a wimp for feeling this way. It's an odd feeling. I feel like I'm screwing up, without meaning to. I'm not entirely sure who these imaginary people are that are judging me all the time - but I wish they'd stop.
And I just want to work on the many books in my head and in my computer, but also now headspace for it. I've been meditating again - and it's working for the most part - in dislodging negative thought loops and story loops. I don't know if anyone else does this? But I can create an entire narrative in my head, complete with dialogue. It's as if I've played out the conversation or various scenarios long before anything has happened.
Meditation has helped put a halt to that. Telling myself a story is another way to halt it - but it also makes it hard to focus on work or anything really but the story.
Books
Almost done with Spin the Dawn about the Tailor who goes on a journey to capture sunlight, moonlight, and the blood of the stars to make three of the Goddess Amana's dresses for the bride of the Emperor - in order to become the Imperial Tailor, and save her family. If she fails, the bride has condemned her and her family - mainly because the bride doesn't want to marry the Emperor and is a spiteful bitch. Anyhow, the Emperor's Enchanter (a Jinn) goes with her on her journey, and along the way they fall in love. But things go awry, and now he's made a deal with his former teacher, a demon, to take the teacher's place as the Guardian of the Isle of Ghosts for Eternity, in order to free the Tailor from the demon's clutches. It's at the 80% mark, I have a feeling this is ending on a cliff-hanger. Dammit. I don't want to buy the sequel.
I've discovered there are audio memoirs with music on audible. Sheryl Crow, Sting, Common, Smokey Robinson all have them - and they appear to be free.
Interesting.
I was talking to a co-worker about this last week - how I am having issues concentrating on things. Wales is in love with James Baldwin's Another Country, which Chidi was trying to get me to read in 2019. I just don't have the attention span. I can barely concentrate on reading for more than ten minutes at a stretch without my mind wandering. And nothing is really that compelling. It's not grabbing me.
Co-worker told me that a lot of people were having the same issues. He was as well. Difficulty concentrating or getting into a book.
Music Memage
Music Twitter (which along with Art and Cat Twitter) is among the least toxic and least obnoxious of the Twitter groups. Music, Cat and Art fans just like to show-off, they don't appear to want to do much besides that. They aren't nuts like soap, sports, sci-fi, comic book, or film fans. Well, I take that back, they are nuts - just in a different way.
Every once and awhile they do these..."which is your favorite" contests. Most of them are easy, the one's that aren't - are when I have absolutely no clue who the band is or who the singer is or that they even exist. The hard-core Music Fans level of obnoxious - is trying to come up with obscure bands that most people have never heard of. Which is actually kind of charming, if you think about it. I mean you come away from that with a new band to check out. [Or, most people have heard of, and I've even listened to, but I can't remember the name of the band or the singer, and forgot that I had listened to it. This is not a commentary on the band or singer - the fact that I can't remember them has less to do with how memorable or good they happen to be, and more to do with my insane memory, which appears to be horribly indexed, and kind of random.]
Anywho...I went to look and damn twitter is filled to the brim with Liberal Political Twitter, Cat Twitter, and Soap Twitter...with a bit of Book Twitter for good measure. (Spoilers from Soap Opera Digest and Biden spoke so Political Twitter and Soap Twitter took over. Which is the problem with social media - something goes viral, and you don't see anything else. It takes over the board.
My own...from memory:
1) The Who or the Rolling Stones
Stones
2) Pearl Jam or Aerosmith
Pearl Jam
3) Journey or Queen
Queen
4) Heart or Indigo Girls
Heart
5) KD Lang or Sinead
KD Lang
6.) Johnny Cash or Elvis
Johnny Cash
7). Freddie Mercury or Elvis
Elvis...which was harder than the previous one for some reason
8.) Sting or Bono
Sting
9) Peter Gabriel or Phil Collins
Peter Gabriel
10. ) Pink Floyd or Led Zepplin
Pink Floyd
11) Sinatra or Elvis
Weirdly Elvis.
12. ) Lady Gaga or Madonna
Lady Gaga
13) BTS or N SYNC
BTS
14.) Meatloaf or Queen
Queen
15) Bach or Brahms
Bach
16) Celine Dione or Whitney Houston
Whitney Houston
17.) Donna Summer or Dione Warwick
Donna Summer
18.) Aretha Franklin or Tina Turner
Aertha Franklin
19.) Paul McCartney or Billy Joel
McCartney
20.) The Beatles or the Beach Boys
The Beatles.
no subject
Date: 2022-09-02 02:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2022-09-03 01:38 am (UTC)I keep stealing time at home to write - when I'm not exhausted from work.
no subject
Date: 2022-09-03 07:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2022-09-11 09:09 pm (UTC)But if you have:
6.) Johnny Cash or Elvis
Johnny Cash
7). Freddie Mercury or Elvis
does that mean:
Johnny Cash or Freddie Mercury results in the answer "Johnny Cash"? Or is it less simple than that?
no subject
Date: 2022-09-11 11:54 pm (UTC)Don't overthink it.