5 February 2021

Songs I listened to More Than Once
"I'll Still Have Me" - Cyn
"The Night We Met" - Lord Huron
"You Could Be Happy" - Snow Patrol
"Sorry Haha I Fell Asleep" - Egg (That's it. I've found Tree in a song.)

"Half - Jack" - The Dresden Dolls (link)

Actually, this one has a really cool video to go with it for "A Howling In The Factory Yard" from the Take These Broken Wings series by synecdochic (link)
"Time" - Mikky Echo
"Aristotle and Averroes" - Kareem Salama
I found two different Stargate Atlantis vids for this!!! This one (link) is about Rodney and John, and this one (link) seems to be about the Atlantis crew in general, but also about the actors???


Books I've Been Reading
I'm up to 180 on The Ethical Slut! I'm really into the way this chunk was about taking responsibility for yourself, but also about coping skills. I think sometimes that one of the reasons that people seem to struggle with owning where they are is that they just don't know what to do with what they're feeling. Certainly my family didn't model healthy coping skills or teach us how to process what we were experiencing. This is something I had to teach myself from the ground up and I know I'm not always at my best about it under prolonged stress, for example. The fact that this book actually talks through not just what possible techniques are, but how to do them??? I suspect that's really helped people. I've definitely read books that try to make lists of suggestions about how to deal with stress/strong emotions and sometimes I'm just left staring at a suggestion trying to figure out how/why it works.

I ordered some fandom books week early last week when I first started getting obsessive about how the community works. I started reading one of them, The Fangirl's Guide to the Galaxy by Sam Maggs(2015). I'm up to page 64. This is interesting because it does actually seem to be talking about how someone goes from "interested" to "involved," but it's super awkward for my brain because it's aimed at women/girls and the writer calls the reader "girl" a lot. I'm non-binary and really uncomfortable being called that, so it keeps launching me out of the experience of actually being able to focus. In one spot it talked about the concept of bars that are also arcades, and looking up those produced a result in my city, so I now have loose plans with L to visit if it still exists after the pandemic is controlled! It also talks about how to guide your friends into the Superwholock fandom and just seeing that written out sort of mentally yote me right back into my Tumblr Years. Reading the word in a book was just... a very strange experience for me. I don't think it ever occurred to me that I would see it outside of the Internet.

Crafting I've Worked On
I've got the first five inches or so of the yellow vest knit up, and L helped me choose buttons for it! We went on (masked) crafting adventures yesterday because both of us have turned to crafting in our time of need, so I was able to pick up a few things.

I got some nice wool for me to use on the Boundaries blanket (link) on. I... really like cabling, so I'm so excited to get to this! I got some solid colors to work so that the focus would be more on the patterns than the colors. A warm brown, a tan, and a grey. I made L double-check for me that those were Real People Colors before I bought them, so I can be relatively sure I won't be making an eye-sore out of it.

I was also able to find some elastic, so I can poke at trying to make my own cloth masks out of some of the fabric I've had hoarded. I tried to find some a few months ago, but I think a lot of other people were thinking similar things then. I've got a pretty pastel floral and a blue-green plaid that I'd like to put together into a mask for gender reasons.

Things I've Worked On Learning
I journaled and did some of the thinky-thinks. I told Tree we'd have to talk about how this last year went if we're going to manage a friendship going forward. I did spend time thinking about how I relate to others and what I need out of the future.

Other than that, I'm... not really sure. I'm pretty sure I did, but I'm struggling with the notion that I made a post a week and a half ago. I haven't been able to focus at all and it's been hard for me to keep up the clear lines of which day is which. That's actually one of the reasons I've been trying to stay on a weekly schedule, even if I didn't this time.

Cooking
I just... didn't. I did find a place in town that does a baklava that I like though, so there has been some win!

Thoughts on This Week's LoTR Chapter
( The Passage of the Marshes )

Dresden Files
I've now read the first four chapters of The Summer Knight, and I am Concerned for this man. L had to give me some context for what happened in the previous book so I'd be able to track what's going on. Harry being in a position of responsibility right now doesn't seem like a good idea for anyone.

Odds and Ends
I couldn't focus even a little bit this week. I forgot to respond to people multiple times. I'm restless and sometimes irritable about it. I'm sleeping oddly or lightly again. I know a lot of people are struggling right, but ugh. It's been a rough week. I want to go places and do things, and I understand that I can't. K wants me to go check out the region they're living in to see if that would be a suitable place to move next. If I like it there and K's sister is interested, the three of us living in one area would be amazing. We get along so well and we're pretty adventure-compatible.

I've now watched a few episodes of Bridgerton because L wanted me to see it, so I knit while she embroidered and we watched it. This is so dramatic and I love it and hate it in equal measure. I anticipate I'll try to watch more of it relatively soon. XD

Work was busy. We got a new person, so at least we'll probably stop being so understaffed soon! L said our supervisor said that if our working environment had to close for COVID, the rest of our business would have to stop until we were back, and that makes sense. It's... kind of horrifying to think that so much relies on a double-handful of people though. Not all of my coworkers are being careful and I know I'm not doing as well at it as I'd like to be.