Good grief.
May 7th, 2011It has been a while.
That said, I don’t suppose I’m going to mend my slack blogging habits anytime soon.
It has been a while.
That said, I don’t suppose I’m going to mend my slack blogging habits anytime soon.
Just because “it is what it is” doesn’t mean it has to stay that way.
I think I’m going to have to rename the blog “The Digital Recluse,” though. No promises for future updates—my life in the analog world keeps me off the web most of the time these days, and my projects elsewhere online are taking a higher priority for a while.
Blogging between chores, so this’ll be short and sweet.
New house.
Old walls.
Fresh paint.
Since I’m still settling in, I don’t want to put any new holes in the walls for pictures or anything else. Hang a shadowbox this week, that spot could be behind a bookcase next week, and I’d have marred that bit of paint and drywall forever. (Though if the bookcase stayed put after that, I guess it wouldn’t matter much.) I really don’t want to put holes in the bathroom tile or the basement cinderblock. I’ve had stick-on hooks and holders and whatsits before, and generally they do one or more of these things:
Couple months ago, I found stick-on metal hooks, supported by 3M’s Command Adhesive. They’re attractive, they’re easy to install (the hook you see mounts on an easier-to-position plastic base), and if past experience with the Command stuff is any indication, they’ll remove cleanly.
Time to return to those chores I mentioned. Cleaning the oven next. I’m looking forward to that so much, I wrote a whole product review in procrastination.
Economically depressed. We had layoffs at my day job yesterday. I’m employed, but carrying a bit of survivor’s guilt and a little “what hit me?”
On a road trip last May, I caught the middle section of an episode of This American Life. If you’re not familiar with the show, I’ll sum up. It’s a weekly documentary on National Public Radio. I don’t catch it often, but if I tune in, I stay tuned in. It isn’t that the documentary’s subject is always fascinating—it’s the storytelling.
Anyway, this episode focused on what we used to call the “housing crisis.” (If you’ve lost track, that was between “housing bubble” and “credit crunch,” and well before “credit crisis” and “global financial meltdown.”) It’s called “The Giant Pool of Money,” and you can listen to it online. Adam Blumberg (the show’s producer) and Adam Davidson (NPR financial reporter) not only explain what hit you, but how it got that way. If you have that what-hit-me feeling, too, it’ll help.
A little.
Tip of the Day:
When choosing meds to include in your everyday-carry first-aid kit, (yes, I have one—doesn’t everybody?), go with tablets or caplets, not capsules. In my kit, I had five doses of diphenhydramine (generic, mostly, but I’m going to save typing and call them all Benadryl) in sealed foil packets. My poison ivy is driving me mad, so I pulled out a packet. Contents of packet #1: Fragments of capsule shell coated with powdered Benadryl. Contents of packet #2: Ditto. Contents of packets #3 & 4: Usable but slightly cracked capsules, which I’m taking now and later. I haven’t open packet #5, but it’s caplets (brand-name Benadryl, in fact), and I can feel through the packet that they’re just fine.
My everyday kits gets sat on, pulled on, and stuffed into purses, computer bags, and backpacks where other things pile on top of it or press up against it. It’s crammed near to bursting. The surviving packet (no pun intended) is an oversized (i.e. heavier) one with fancy logos and design, but it did the job. The packets that died on me are all from purpose-built first aid kits, and a decent manufacturer’s kits, at that. They’re trim and lightweight, but they’re staying in the car kit from now on.
Yes, I have it again. This will surprise no one who knows me. And once again, my case has quirks.
Last time I got poison ivy, I picked it up from some azaleas. They’d picked up the urushiol (the oil that makes poison ivy, oak, and sumac so evil) from poison ivy growing on the ground next to them. I was scrupulously careful cleaning
Today’s case, ladies and gentlemen, is a sporty little rash—a small splash of red on my left jawline, a tiny bump or two on my left arm, and a wide (and quirky) band around my right wrist like a bracelet. Again, I knew there was poison ivy out there. Again, I took elaborate precautions. No exposed skin came into contact with the ivy. I wore decent (washable) gloves. Fat lot of good they’ve done me. At first I thought the “bracelet” was the result of reaching up to scratch my right wrist with my contaminated left glove. But as the days go by, things haven’t improved much. New hypothesis: A tiny bit of ivy stem or root must have fallen into my jacket and spread the sap all over the side of my wrist and the sleeve. The stuff is still in there, and I guess it’s been migrating up, down, and around everytime I’ve moved in, put on, or taken off the jacket.
I’m going to know for sure in a few hours—I forgot my hypothesis this morning and pushed my sleeves up to the elbow. I can hardly wait…
P.S. Two best poison-ivy sites I can find: The Poison Ivy Site and the Poison Ivy, Oak, & Sumac Information Center. Get the facts. Take the quizzes. Know thine enemy!
The surge of activity that brought me to post last Friday has dried up and withered. Foolishly, I thought I should start the new year by setting my little domain in order, sweeping out the cobwebs, and doing all my neglected chores. Now that I’ve slogged through nearly a thousand spam comments and found only seven that merit investigating (I’m pretty sure they’re spam, too), I’m staggering to a halt. My last, feeble energies are going into writing this post and turning on the “must be registered to comment” option…
Next time, I’ll start with the fun bits. I promise.
So…since July, I have
I’m back today. I make no promises about tomorrow.
—Kathy
P.S. If you see me, check out my T-shirt. Like, my T-shirt, ’cause I drew it and designed it. I need to write a post about that, actually. I need to write a lot of posts.
* “Quirky” meaning, “strange and geeky enough to want to play Dragon Con as a gig and enjoy it, warts and all.”