Corner of Bourbon & Division

Yes, I am back-dating this post by one hour so it shows up as being written on April 5th instead of the 6th. It's nearly 1am but it doesn't count as tomorrow because I haven't gone to bed yet. My reasoning is flawless and I will not be taking questions at this time.

So, I may have bought quail at the bird auction. Ahem. They are SO CUTE. I will attempt a longer post about this tomorrow because a lot happened today and I desperately need to go to bed and get some sleep, even if it's crappy sleep. But yes, I bought quail. The lot I bid for and won was a mix of three males and three hens, and they appear to be in pretty good health, although it's obvious the females have been overbred because their backs are in various stages of denudement. Poor biddies. I have separated them for now to give the poor hens a break from their overzealous boyfriends, and the six of them are in quarantine in the laundry room where they will stay for the next two weeks. I don't want them in contact with the cats just in case they're carrying bird flu, which cats are highly susceptible to (at least the current variants of H5N1 floating around out there). 

I visited Dylan and Sarah, who very kindly supplied me with a couple of days' worth of layer feed and some hardware cloth to put over the Rubbermaid bin in which the birds will be spending their quarantine time, and I gave them a bunch of booze that I decluttered from my kitchen last week. The booze was still good, it just wasn't likely to ever get drunk at my house, so now it has gone to a good home where it will be appreciated. 

I came home and got the quail settled and then did the Quaker announcements, and then had the misfortune of checking my emails, all of which had semi-bad news about the house purchase. Namely, all of the emails involve my having to jump through more expensive and flaming hoops in the hopes of getting the financing completely approved for the house. The desktop appraisal now costs $40 because there's acreage, even though it's a DESKTOP appraisal, meaning no one is actually physically going out to the property and they are all staying at their DESKS, so I can't see how adding some land on top of that makes their job THAT much more difficult or complicated. They gave me the option to decline the extra charge, but of course that means they won't perform the appraisal, so they're holding my house purchase hostage unless I pay them more money.

Also, my beloved father insists that he can't get a pdf statement of his bank records because his bank "doesn't give him the option." Except he and I use the same bank, and I have personally obtained pdf statements of my bank records from the online banking site. IT'S NOT HARD. But my father is eighty-three years old, and this is kind of what happens once technology gets a little bit more complicated than you can wrap your brain around. I have noticed it happening to me too with things like TikTok and video editing software: I can manage the very basics, but the bells and whistles are beyond me unless someone sits with me and takes the time to explain things. So I think the best but unfortunately inconvenient solution is to go to Montreal tomorrow and physically show him how to do it, and to also have him sign the letter saying he is giving me the money in person, so that I can then just scan everything myself as a pdf to send to my mortgage broker.

*lies on the floor*

And my mortgage broker still wants me to provide my quarterly statement for my RRSP for the first quarter of the year, which the bank HASN'T PRODUCED YET. I am not sure how she thinks I can influence an entire financial institution to move up their timeline for documents just for my benefit. News flash: they do not give two wet shits about me or my piddly little RRSP. 

*rips out hair and rolls around on the floor for a bit*

So yeah, Today has been a bit of a mixed bag. XD

I am very ready for this stretch of night shifts to be over. Luckily (I think?) tonight has actually been on the busier side of things, which means the time has gone by pretty quickly so far. I’m not even halfway through my shift yet, alas, but the time is creeping up toward midnight, and at 1am I will officially be at the halfway mark of this last twelve-hour shift. I suppose it’s kind of ungrateful of me to be practically counting the minutes until the end of my shift, since this is what pays my bills, but I am nonetheless still rather resentful that capitalism insists on taking me away from all the fun hobbies I want to engage in instead.

Of course, it’s not like I’m engaging in fun hobbies in the meantime. For the moment I am choosing to blame the sleep apnea. I used to have hobbies and go out and do things. These days, not so much. Now I’ve never been a massive social butterfly, and now with Covid still running rampant I have begun embracing my inner hermit even more than I ever did in the past. Still, not that long ago I had activities that I enjoyed doing, like cycling and swimming and of course all the crafting.  These days it takes all my energy to go to work, cook food to keep me and KK from starving, and do a minimal amount of housekeeping.

For now, I am choosing to blame the sleep apnea. I have been trying not to hyper-fixate on it and failing miserably. I suppose I should embrace the hyper-fixation and just go with it. I’ve always had the tendency to go down research rabbit holes about whatever is going wrong with my health at any given time, and long-time readers of my (admittedly boring) blog will recognize this pattern. So, I’ve been doing a bunch of reading about sleep apnea, and the more I read, the more a bunch of my symptoms make sense, including my inability to focus for more than, like, five minutes at a time, my inability to learn anything new except with extreme difficulty, and the constant feelings of exhaustion and lethargy. I also read that sleep apnea can contribute to or mimic symptoms of depression. Now, while I haven’t been depressed per se, I have noticed that I’ve been having trouble mustering the same level of enthusiasm for things I usually enjoy. Hell, even trying to pick a movie or a TV show to watch to keep myself busy on night shifts has been a bit of a struggle because nothing quite appeals to me. I miss just outright enjoying things, you know? There is a reason I have a tag that’s called “Phnee has no chill.” I like enjoying things with unabashed glee, and these days everything just feels kind of muted or dampened. So, my hope is that treating the sleep apnea will get me back to feeling more like my old self. If it doesn’t, I honestly don’t know what my next steps are. More curcumin supplements, I suppose.

I do have another book that I’m hoping to finish tonight after reading the Care Manifesto, called Freedom Is a Constant Struggle: Ferguson, Palestine, and the Foundations of a Movement by Angela Davis. Davis is a towering figure in the world of political activism and philosophy, and while I am familiar with her oeuvre overall, I have never actually read any of her books, so this is my attempt to rectify that oversight. Of course, it will largely be dependent on whether I can muster the concentration and focus needed to read through the book. I am extremely grateful for the existence of audiobooks, but unfortunately a lot of the books I wanted to read this year aren’t available in audiobook form, which is very sad. It’s been phenomenal to be able to enjoy stories again, even in a different format than how I used to read them.

Okay. Time to get back to work. Catch you on the flip side, friends!

I'd forgotten I posted in January. I thought the last time was sometime last summer, and oddly it makes me feel a little better that I didn't abandon this space as long as I thought I had.

As always, a lot has happened since I last posted. Well, a lot, and also surprisingly little, when you think about it. It feels like a lot to me, but to the outside viewer I assume it looks like not much at all. It's all a matter of perception.

The big news is that I did, indeed, get the puppy I'd been planning on. Her name is Peggy, and she is the best Brittany Spaniel ever. She is exactly 12 weeks old as of today (born March 1st). Here is a picture of her under the cut:
( Peggy! )
University is still chugging along. I am averaging As overall (two A+s, one A, one A-, though that last one I am blaming squarely on the group work), and at the suggestion of one of the university staff I've applied to be allowed to switch over directly to the Masters' program earlier than I had originally intended to do. No word on that application yet, but I'm not worrying about it. Either they accept or they don't, the only thing that will really change is what degree I end up with when the dust settles. Either way I will receive the education I want and be able to go about my business. I am really, really enjoying taking this degree. That and the new puppy are the main things keeping my morale up these days, because work is a fucking shit show that shows no signs of improving. That's a rant for a different day, I think.

I kind of dropped the ball on several of my goals for this year, but I'm still trying. It's been a hell of a thing, trying to keep all my plates spinning, and right now it feels like I am surrounded by broken crockery. I had some unexpected expenses (the car required a trip to the car vet for a new exhaust system, and the actual animal vet bills cost more than anticipated), and my bank account is in the red for the first time in over four years. I'm not broke, or anything, but my available funds are, uh, negligible. With that in mind I've signed up for YNAB (You Need A Budget), which I'm still trying to wrap my head around. It's not super intuitive, but it takes a different approach to budgeting than the traditional one that I've been following, and since tradition has not served me, I figure this is worth a shot. I've been socking money away to pay for the house I want to (hopefully) purchase next year, but if I have no actual available funds to, you know, live on, then the point is moot. I am being melodramatic, of course. Things will balance out a bit over the next two months, but between the vet, the car, school bills (God, tuition is expensive!) and just existing in general, my bank account is deeply unhappy these days. *sigh*

In slightly better news, I've been slowly chipping away at making my current house more livable. I realized after I'd moved in a hurry away from Cruella de Frootloops (many thanks to blackmare for the nickname!) that I actually really don't like my current place. It's both too big and too small, in that the spaces I use the most often (the kitchen and dining room) are tiny, and everywhere else in the house is way too big. Everything in my kitchen is cramped, I have no pantry, and the cabinets are shallow and poorly designed so that things don't fit well and there is a ton of wasted space. The rest of the space is huge, which makes it a pain in the proverbial ass to clean, and a lot of it is wall to wall beige carpet. BEIGE. Who does that? Who thinks beige is a good idea for carpet? Anyway, between me, the four cats, and two dogs in succession, let's just say the carpets are, uh, not looking great. I will have to have a professional come in and shampoo them to within an inch of their lives before I leave.

So last... Monday? No, Tuesday, I spent a good chunk of the day reorganizing my entire kitchen so I could have better access to the stuff I want to use. It's still tiny and cluttered and difficult to work in, but it's so much better than it was. I actually took quite a bit of time beforehand to visualize what I wanted, and having a clearer vision in mind really helped it come together quickly and efficiently. I am quite proud of myself for that. I also sorted through a bunch of paperwork several weeks ago, but I only got about, I'd say maybe halfway through if I'm being generous, and then I stopped (it was 2 am and I forced myself to go to bed because 2 am is a poor life choice for me) and never got back to it. Partly my not getting back to it is due to having a rambunctious puppy who is not at all house trained yet (alas).

I'm hoping to be able to get back to it in the coming days. I want the room in which all those papers are piled (boxes and boxes worth!) to be emptied and made into a nice, functional space, and I need to put my bedroom and bathroom in some semblance of order. I am going back to Marie Kondo's book, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up. I am still not a fan of the last few chapters of her book, but the overall method does seem to work, so I will overlook her chirpy claims that decluttering will help me get a "slimmer tummy" and get clearer skin so that I can look good for my boyfriend! (Blech.)

[...]

I got interrupted by work, and now I don't at all remember where I was going with this. Oops? The perils of getting older, I guess. ;)


If I manage to remember this time, I will post the rest later, perhaps tonight during my last night shift. Supposing I don't forget again.

I got home yesterday and, knowing Critical Role was starting around 22:00 (it airs at 19:00 Pacific), I decided a nap was in order. Due to landlady shenanigans and other, less vital things, I didn't get enough sleep the previous two nights, and Critical Role often keeps me up well past 1:00. So I curled up for a nap, and slept right up until 21:50. Not quite my intent, but I definitely needed the sleep, and then CritRole ended up lasting until nearly 3:00, so it worked out for the best.

It also means I didn't write the promised post, but never fear, here it is now!

Okay, again, for the new people, there is something you should know about me:

( A brief history of Phnee and roleplaying )( Excited rambling about Critical Role behind the cut )