Talk About Tuesday

 

In Which I Don't Even Know, Man...

I have not felt like doing much of anything lately. It's not laziness - laziness is a delicious and hedonistic desire to stay still, and what I've been feeling is absolutely not delicious or hedonistic.

I've been stuck.

I'm back to chugging too much coffee, back to losing time, back to being tired all the time, back to losing interest, back to anxiety at weird times when nothing's wrong.

In short, I think I'm having a very annoying depressive episode.

I'm not in any danger, though. No Bad Thoughts or anything, just... meh. Not feelin it, lately.

I'm pretty sure it started when I realized at the end of September that my wrists ache. There's a feeling of stiffness and soreness just above the knob of my wrists, and it's worse on the left than the right. I started feeling a little melancholy - mid-30s is a bit early for arthritis, and there's no inflammation or swelling. They're just a little stiff and sore. They've always sounded like they've got gravel in them when I rotated them. Same with my ankles, though they're not sore yet.

The discomfort isn't too much, but it does interfere with my art and crochet, so I'm very behind on Cozytober and haven't done too much crochet lately.

Aching wrists aside, we're fixing the deck this month, and I absorb other people's stress like a sponge. The deck repairs have not been going well, and there's been a lot of upset on my parents' part as they work to make sure it's both sturdy and good-looking. It does look very nice, so at least all that hard work has been worthwhile! Still, that's been stressful for me by transference.

It's been raining a lot since I got back from the Ren-Faire, which makes it very frustrating to get around and do things, so I've been stuck inside.

And then Evie got sick again. It's a chronic infection, so we were given the same antibiotic as last time and we're pilling her at both 8 AM and 8 PM, so that's been fun.

The most recent demotivator has been the fact that pretty much every time I venture outside something goes poorly for me. My local fiber circle canceled this month's meetup and I didn't find out until I'd already crossed town. On some attempts I made at being social, I was chased by hornets. When I try to go outside and get some sun on the few days it's here, I'm buzzed by my neighbor's honeybees. Heck, I've even been hearing more people yelling rude stuff while I'm out walking! It's a residential neighborhood, you weirdos, don't yell at the preteen girls who are jogging past me that they'd better keep going or you'll kill them!

Seriously, don't do that. If you try that again, I'll unhinge my jaw and eat you. I'm getting grumpier in my middle age.

The weather has been nice and chilly, at least, which I prefer to hot and sticky. I just wish there had been more nice days that I could go down to Main Street and paint.

It's going to be too cold for that, soon, and I'll have to switch to sketchbooks. I really should get a soft-cover drawing pad with detachable sheets - it'd be fun to be able to sell sketches as I work.

But hey, enough morose nonsense - I do have good things to talk about!

I made iced tea this week! I've never made iced tea from teabags before! I dumped 7 Meyer Lemon teabags in a pitcher full of cold water and left it overnight in the fridge. The resulting tea was just a touch sweet, a touch bitter, a touch sour, and incredibly pinkish-orange. The Meyer Lemon tea I have is made with rosehips and hibiscus, so the pink was expected. What was unexpected was how freaking delicious it was with a splash of Cranberry & Elderberry juice to sweeten it. The color deepened to a regal purple-red and all of the sweet/bitter/sour notes soared. Just lovely!

I also got to have my first taste of cider for the season, which was also delightful. Early apple cider is better than winter apple cider and I will fight you on this. It has none of the mealy undertones of a winter cider.

And when I say cider, I mean the pressed apple kind, not the alcoholic variety.

I'm being needlessly pedantic sorry lol.

Oh! And today, after years of trying to fan-cast a new Kolchak series, my guy & I came up with the perfect new Kolchak - Bob Odenkirk. I dare you to disagree. You'll be wrong lol.

Anywho, I am still planning on catching up on my missing Cozytober pieces, despite having missed... a lot, so I'm going to need to get back to the drawing pad.

Go Enjoy Something, folks!

FC

Thursday Art Walk

 

In Which I Am Way More Tired Than I Thought

So I haven't really done a lot of art this week. I'm disappointed in that. In fact, I've only made one thing. I'm proud of it, but it's just one thing, and I wanted seven.

That's 14.2% of my goal met.

That's 85.7% of my goal remaining.

Oof.

Math is unkind sometimes.

Regardless, I still made one thing. Mostly I've just been tired. I am still having trouble sleeping - staying up til 5AM, crashing til 11AM... it's not good. I need to be more consistent.

Which is, of course, why I haven't had as much caffeine today as usual.

I drank more water today than yesterday, I'll be taking my Vitamin D later so I can metabolize the calcium from my coffee (I take it with cocoa mix made with powdered milk and cool it with half and half, so there's calcium in it, I swear lol). I had breakfast, even!

Maybe I'll feel better tomorrow.

Maybe I'll draw. Maybe I'll write.

The writing, at least, is largely consistent! I'm proud of that! I've only missed one day so far, I think, and I've gotten so much done!

But my art is suffering, and that, I don't like. So I'll try again tomorrow, which is all anyone can do.

Tomorrow is for trying.

For now, though, there is a cat in a silly hat sitting in the snow.

"Snowcat" digital art; 2023 [ANIMAL]

Is it lumpy? Yes. Is it wonky? Also yes. Is it FREAKING ADORABLE?!?!?! Absolutely, and so I am very proud of my Snowcat. Look at those derpy eyes, the lil teefers... So cute.

I hope to do some more and different art soon, but for now, my little snow cat is good, and I love him.

If you want to have a say in my art, feel free to buy me a coffee over on Ko-Fi with a message attached telling me which category (Animal, Vegetable, Mineral, Location, Dedbert, Geometric, or Word) you'd like to see!

For now, I'm going to watch silly videos and plan out more pictures. Maybe add more words to my story.

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Fiber Monday

 

In Which I Am Not Built for Yo Yo Weather...

This has been the weirdest fall, weather-wise. Yesterday was in the 40s (4,4℃), the day before was in the 60s (15,5℃), and today? I think our high was 38℉/3,33℃. And it's windy! We're talking gusts up to 25mph (40kph)!

Here's the problem.

My skull is a very sensitive barometer and everything that is going on with the weather has been wreaking havoc on my poor lil sinuses.

I have been coughing and sneezing all day.

Needless to say, I did not get a whole lot done today, crochet-wise. I tried to, but uh... I'm not a human being right now.

I'm a very sneezy potato.

Anywho, after about six and a half hours of crocheting and sewing and stuffing, here's the tree from last week!

It's a little under a foot tall!

I think if I was selling these, I'd charge about 30 bucks.

I also started work on a cat sweater!

I don't know if I can finish this...

I'm trying to make my cat a cute little sweater but....

I'm already out of sparkly green yarn.

Should I add that red & green yarn? It's lighter weight, so it could be trouble...

I could also just start over with the green yarn I used on the tree, of which there is a lot left...

I think I'll do that.

Maybe I'll also include some of the white metallic yarn I used for the flocking, too...

Crochet is hard, man.

Right, I think that'll about do it for me - I have sinus meds to take, water to drink, and thick blankets to cuddle down into...

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Talk About Tuesday

 

In Which I Am Le Tired

Yesterday was Quite A Day, let me tell you. It started normally enough - took a shower, drank some coffee, chatted with my guy, and started to get ready to finish the shrug I was working on...

And my mother told me to get ready for an adventure with the cat!

I'm always down for a kitty trip, so I threw on some Tromping Around Clothes (I'd changed back into pajamas after my shower, not anticipating the surprise adventure), and came down to find a paper bag on the counter.

The plan was thus:

• Grab the cat and the paper bag, get in the car.
• Head to the Wal-Mart for some forgotten bread and a box of tissues
• Head to the next town over to drop off some Vicks, cold medicine, and tissues for my guy, who has a chest cold (Feel Better, Love!)
• Find a beach that was open and not too crowded.

Now you may be thinking that's a lot of car time for a cat. Would she be okay? Especially with a trip to Wal-Mart?

Sure, she was fine. Annoyed at being stuck in her carrier while I tried to find the tissues (I was lied to by an endcap and looked in the wrong aisle for like 5 minutes before I could find them), but fine.

The first beach we tried was Birch Point State Park, but apparently the state decided that, despite our Septembers being anywhere from 55-75℉/12,8-23,9℃, and Mainers swimming in the ocean up until about January, the beach had to be closed. What a pain.

Well, we weren't going to let a little State Park Closure prevent our girl from having her first ever beach adventure, so we headed over to another beach - Crescent Beach. Poor Evie the Cat was chirping crankily from her carrier and reaching out with her cute little paws by now, so we made our way down and parked. By the time we got her out on her leash (which she was very curious and very nervous about), I realized we'd made a fatal error that my fellow Mainers will probably tease me for.

We forgot to check the tides.

We arrived just as the tide was at its highest, just starting to ebb.

On a beach where the beach head is 100% loose stones.

Yeah, there was no sand for her to walk on for the first half of our visit.

She enjoyed sniffing the dried seaweed and climbing the rocks (which, yeah, was against the rules, but she's a cat, so she can't read signs), and we figured that would be it.

And then another family pulled up and came hiking across the stones.

If you've never met my cat, you need to know this about her:

Evie LOVES people. She is obsessed. She desperately loves new people and wants to hang out with everyone on Earth.

So of course, she immediately had to go visit these people, dragging my mother and I with her. Thankfully the family thought our 3-Braincell Tabby was the bees' knees, and they put up with her crawling under their feet and begging for snacks (they had a banana). Eventually, the water receded enough for us to put her down on wet sand and...

She hated it.

So, Evie did not enjoy her beach trip as much as we'd hoped lol.

And she was also so squirmy and exploratory that it was very hard to take pictures between trying to dislodge her from crevices where she got herself stuck. I did manage two pictures, though!

Here's Evie sitting on a rock, about to go wrap her leash around a rugosa rose bush.
She's just noticed the family and wants to go say hi!

Here Evie has failed to retrieve banana from the other family
And has grumpily decided she'll go climb more rocks in protest.
Also seaweed smells fun to her I guess lol

After that, we scooped her up and took her home, where she sulked outside with my mom. I ran upstairs and worked on yesterday's blog.

I do have to admit, though...

It was incredibly hard, being surrounded by all those delightfully smooth beach rocks in so many interesting colors and shapes and knowing I couldn't keep any of them. It's illegal to take the beach rocks, and at Crescent Beach, they're absolutely necessary for preventing erosion, so it's just bad all around to take beach rocks from there. If I'd gone wading and grabbed one from the water, I'd have been pretty ok with it, but I wasn't going to get in the surf while the tide was receding as fast as it was (we went from no sand to 5 feet of sand in 10 minutes, it seemed).

So that was my adventure this week!

The rest of the week's plans are thus:

• If you want to send me a coffee donation through that light green button, you can leave a message telling me what theme I'm drawing from this week! Those themes are:
• Animal
• Vegetable
• Mineral
• Geometric
  
• Location
• Dedbert
• Word
• Art Blog on Thursday
• I forgot to post the tea last week so maybe I'll do it this weekend? We'll see
• More crochet for Monday!
• Blather next Tuesday!

I hope my feline misadventures have brought a smile to your face today!

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Talk About Tuesday

 

In Which It Is Warming Up!

I'm pretty sure it reached 58℉ (14,4℃) today during the short period where we got sun instead of sprinkles, and with the sun came a flock of wild turkeys! We had a very tall tom and six hens, all of whom converged on my mother's bird feeders. Thankfully, none of them tried to empty the feeders themselves, but they were certainly cleaning up the mess the squirrels and chipmunks left behind! That tom could've probably just stood all the way up and eaten from the feeders himself if he'd wanted, to be honest. He was truly enormous!

Sometimes, when we see wildlife in my back yard, they're not very healthy. It's the 21st century and I'm about a mile from the center of town. It can feel like we're in the middle of nowhere when my neighbors all seem to own poultry or livestock of their own (seriously, our newest neighbors have brought a pair of either lambs or kids onto their property, and I'm a bit baffled, to be honest), but I can see Domino's and the busiest street in town from my childhood bedroom. It's not a rural neighborhood. Anything wild does run the risk of mange or accidental poisoning - especially since the dump is close enough to smell on a bad day.

We've had sick coyotes, poisoned owls, tick-ridden deer, and possibly possessed squirrels.

But those turkeys were some of the healthiest animals I've ever seen!

The tom was completely relaxed, too - he just milled around under the feeders with his harem, utterly unbothered by my face plastered to the window quite obviously. Evie was enraptured with them, for a bit, but since she's a cat, she got bored pretty fast and went back to trying to convince one of us to take her out to hunt the poor chipmunk. She's got a vendetta on the poor lil guy...

Also I found a fly and a cellar spider in my room. These bugs combined with the abundance of healthy wildlife outside and the balmy-yet-damp weather tell me that it indeed spring is upon us. Fred, the cellar spider, has been relocated to the basement, where they will continue their duties as an exterminator in peace. No one will bother them in the bulkhead, so they'll get to keep chilling. The fly has vanished and I can only hope it found its way downstairs and possibly out of my dang house. Don't need any maggots up here, thanks. I'm good.

I may have to put my window fan in tonight. I'm pretty toasty and I have my lightest sheet on and the ceiling fan on. I would rather not put the window fan in before my folks turn off the heat, though.

Regardless, I've got work I am going to do this week!

Tomorrow I'll be sketching and figuring out what art to make.

Thursday I'll be posting an Art Blog!

Friday-Sunday I'll be working on my crochet

Monday I'll post the next part of the Mystery Project!

Next Tuesday I'll be back here blathering again lol.

I think that'll about do it for me tonight. My brain is pudding and I cannot think lol!

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Talk About Tuesday

 

In Which I Cooked Myself lol

Today was an incredibly beautiful day. The sky was practically Microsoft blue, no clouds, breezy but not cold, and so warm! It was only supposed to reach 50℉ (10℃) but it actually was about 58℉ (14,4℃)! I overdressed on my walk and cooked myself. You wouldn't think a tank top and a 30 year old fleece jacket would be too much on a day like this, but whoo boy, did I get a headache. My cheeks were like apple-shaped furnaces, and my palms are hot and dry. That's a right cooking right there.

Thankfully I'm feeling much better after a delicious BLT from the local co-op, some Chocolove with toffee bits, and about a gallon of water!

Unfortunately the cat is not feeling her best. She's been urpy all day, and she's the reason I just had to pop the table cloth in the washing machine. Don't worry, I used a cold, light setting, and I'm drying it on delicate with some other light-colored and lightweight clothes (some tees and over shirts), and I'll try to replace it on the table tomorrow.

I also did a bunch of dishes, and after those got done, it meant that I shouldn't need to do more than just a cup, a bowl, a spoon, and probably chopsticks for myself and 2-3 plates for my cat (yes, she eats off of dinner plates, she's people too). Why three plates for a tiny cat? Because sometimes she wants to join my mother & me for coffee and since the poor lil kitty cannot drink coffee, we give her a splash of the half & half.

My mother exclusively buys the kind that's only made of milk & cream, no fillers! It also means that my morning mocha is extremely good.

Hopefully she feels better tomorrow and I can give her some cream and a cuddle before she wants out.

My plans for the next several days mostly involve house cleaning and furniture rearrangement, but I also plan to make some art on Thursday - maybe something in a sketchbook.

It's supposed to be cloudy tomorrow and about 10 degrees cooler, but perhaps the breeze will still be sufficient to get the cat inside after less than 2 hours of desperately trying to climb things she shouldn't climb.

Like the utility pole.

Or the neighbor's spruce.

Or (and she hasn't tried this - yet) the house.

Cats, man. What can you do?! Right now she's conked out in my dad's recliner in a Patriots blanket nest. Hopefully she gets some rest and water and feels better tomorrow. I wonder if she's just stressed that my mom is off helping my grandmother out?

This kitty be sleepy

Alright, I'm feeling pretty sleepy now, so I'll let y'all go!

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Talk About Tuesday

 

In Which I Am A Bit Scattered

Since I'm starting this at about 10:30pm on Tuesday, it'll probably be a Talk About Wednesday, for most of you, but hey, I'm trying lol!

Today has been a day of chasing my cat around, experimenting with yarn (new project? Maybe after the Mystery Project is done...), chastising deer, and eating delicious leftover boiled dinner. Doesn't sound like a lot when I say it like that, but trust me, today was a long one.

Now, I usually love hanging out outdoors with my cat - especially when she's chasing leaves and stomping them into crispy submission - but today was a surprisingly cold one. It was one of those days where the sun feels warm, but the wind is whipping around so hard that you end up being sandblasted by road salt and gravel. It may have been about 40℉/4,44℃, but it probably felt like maybe 32℉/0℃. And it wasn't even that sunny. It was mostly cloudy with a few moments of warmer sun. And Evie was... uncooperative when it came to wanting to go back inside. My hands are still a little chilly, and that was around 1pm!

We have had a lot of critters in the back yard lately, too! The deer have been... awful. They're raiding the bird feeders and they have zero fear of me, which is probably not healthy for them. They're heckin chonkers now, too. We've seen the hawk a couple of times, and it has probably been feeding better closer to Main Street, since that's where the pigeons congregate when they're not in my yard or copulating on the roof above my bed. Please stop that, pigeons. Please.

The ducks have been by a few times, and we have had two confirmed sightings of a chipmunk! Unfortunately, the chipmunk may be wearing out their welcome, because I found some awfully suspicious holes next to my house's foundation today when I was walking Evie around. Chippy, please stay outside. Evie did tumble you last year and if she catches you indoors, you will end up battered.

My dinner tonight was a rehash (badum tss) of the corned beef dinner we had on Sunday. It was kind of a deconstructed bubble & squeak, since my mom stir-fried the cabbage & onions together, but she used three frying pans total! She had one for the cabbage & onions, one for the mixed veg (rutabaga because there were no turnips left, carrots, and potatoes), and one for the slices of corned beef. They were truly just as delightful for a Tuesday dinner as they were for Sunday's dinner.

I have some idea of what I'm going to do this week, but we'll see. I also need to start planning out how I want April to go, so there's that, too lol!

Tomorrow/Wednesday is gonna be a day of me just scrambling around like a squirrel on a pallet of Red Bull, figuring out what to draw for Thursday.

Thursday will be me drawing and doing art. I have ideas, though I don't know if they'll work yet, that's what Wednesday is about lol.

Friday - Sunday will be me working on the Mystery Project, getting it to a point where I can share a new section of the pattern! (We shall see if that red thread actually works - sometimes it looks right by lamplight and then I take a photo and it's suuuuuuper different!)

Next Monday I'll have more crochet to share!

Next Tuesday, hopefully, I'll remember to post the blog before midnight lol!

Anyway, that's it for me today. I should go brush my teeth and go to bed so I'm not useless tomorrow!

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Talk About Tuesday

 

In Which A Lot Continues To Happen

Man was I tired yesterday. I'm tired today, too, but I didn't sleep til noon again so there's that!

Instead, today started with me accidentally shrinking my mom's shirt in the wash (only a very little bit, but it's enough to be annoying... oops), then I went for a walk and picked up some chocolate to apologize, and as soon as I got back from my walk, my aunt showed up to drop off some crochet & cross stitch supplies that my great aunt was giving away. I now own my great great grandmother's crochet hooks, and you'd better believe I'll be making something for my aunt as a thank you using those hooks in particular.

And then there's the cat.

Bless her heart, she wanted love today. She was in everyone's faces, she's been meowing nonstop, and she desperately wanted to go out with my mom and aunt, so they took her outside. And then she got bored because it's warm (44℉/6,7℃) but there's no sun and no grass, so she begged to come back in.

No one noticed that I was back upstairs putting my new crochet stuff away.

Poor Evie decided she needed to pee and wasn't going to let a harness and leash stop her, so she dragged the plastic retractable leash across the kitchen floor and down the cellar stairs, and by the time I ran down to unhook her, she was already in her litter box, peeing. I let her finish, and she told me off for walking in on her while peeing (hypocrite) and let me take off her tackle so she could just relax.

What a goofy girl.

Also, good(ish) news about those watercolor markers I bought! By carefully pulling open the dark brown barrel and introducing water, I may have rehydrated the colors somewhat! It's... brownish again!

And! I shhhhhould have a blog up tomorrow about AEW Revolution! Though I will probably talk about the sad news of Scott Hall's passing, too.

And then there should be art on Thursday!

And next Monday I should have something to show you for art!

And then next Tuesday I'll be back to blather.

Update: The deer showed up again in my backyard and tried to empty the birdfeeders again! The cat was enraptured lol.

I think that should about do it for me today. I've got new/old crochet things to put away and a dinner plate to drag down to the kitchen.

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Talk About Tuesday

 

Yep. Still Tired lol.

Great news! I'm sleeping more than 2 hours a night again!

Bad news is, though, that even a full 8 hours a night isn't recharging me yet.

I'll be working on rectifying that by moving more tomorrow, since I think part of my tiredness is because I keep forgetting to exercise enough. I took a short walk yesterday (the uphill-both-ways one I do every week), but I couldn't go out much today because not only was it chilly, it's been raining off and on since the afternoon. Right now it's pouring and the wind is roaring.

My eyes constantly feel gritty, right now, which is a pain, but I've been through this before. I go through the eye-grime every time I start recovering from an insomniac bout. Best things for it are water, sleep, and face-washing. I'll be getting the first and last as soon as I post this blog, but the middle one will come when it comes, and no amount of relaxation techniques and soothing jazz will change that. It'll probably hit me around 2AM. That seems to be the magic hour for sleep lol.

I still haven't grabbed my red crochet thread, so I won't be able to finish the Secret Project for a while yet, but we'll get there.

I have ideas for Thursday - I might try to do more work on that silly Happiny idea from last week, or I might try to draw something else. Maybe a dinosaur. I have been thinking a lot about raptors this week lol.

Mostly I just keep getting distracted. I'm distracted a lot lately, mostly because I'm having SpeedyBrain, which is hard when I also have MolassesBrain at the same time. My thoughts are very very fast, but it's like having an auctioneer in my head. The thinky thinky goes fast, but the understandy goes very very slow. I'm fairly sure that's just because of the overabundance of coffee, so I'll try to have less caffeine tomorrow - easy since I plan to be using the treadmill and coffee + treadmill = disaster, so there will be less bean juice tomorrow than today lol.

Then again, I'm seeing that it'll be pretty nice out tomorrow. Still windy (the real feel will be about 10℉ lower than the ambient temperature), but sunny (in the afternoon). If I'm very sneaky I might be able to get all the way down to Main Street without too much trouble from the neighborhood dogs, and if it really is all that nice (I'm seeing temps of about 53℉/11,7℃!) I might find a spot downtown to sit in the sun with a sketchbook and a thermos of lemon tea.

We'll see how motivated I feel around noon.

Let's see, what else should I talk about...

• I saw a bald eagle on Sunday! It wheeled around the intersection I cross on my way downtown to the local bookstores and vanished behind some houses and trees. Very cool.
• My next door neighbors have somehow ended up with a rooster, which is fine - it's not a very loud boi. It was just driving me nuts trying to figure out where the rooster noises were actually coming from.
• The deer have been emptying my mom's bird feeders into their cute lil faces on a nightly basis and my mom is getting ready to sic the cat on them.
• The cat got a new heavy ceramic planter which my mother planted with cat grass. The cat thanked her by trying to dig in the damp soil, then smugly trotted away to use the freshly-cleaned litterbox, only to bound upstairs with inquiring noises as soon as my mother tried to replace the literally soiled table cloth with a new one. The cat then proceeded to sit in the very center of the table and refuse to move, which ended with my mother just draping the tablecloth over the cat, who happily sat there in her tablecloth tent for a good 10 minutes. During the smug tablecloth adventure, I punctured a piece of plastic wrap a bunch of times and covered the cat's ungrown grass with it, using some toothpicks to hold the plastic off of the dirt.
• My dad finally beat a hard level in Beat Saber. He's getting good at the base game, apparently, and he plays it before dinner.
• I tried faroh risotto tonight and it was very nice. 10/10 do recommend.

I think that about covers my news this week, guys. I'll do my best to post a drawing on Thursday!

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Talk About Tuesday

 

Tired Sounds

I am so incredibly sleepy lol.

There's no excuse for me not writing today's blog on time. Well, kind of, I was trying to be available online to my boyfriend who had his birthday today!

So I'll make today's blog brief!

Q: How is my finger doing after stabbing it yesterday?

A: If I didn't have written evidence, I'd never know it happened lol. Honestly, the scratches I have from my cat being indiscriminate with her claws while kneading are more painful than the jab is.

Q: What are my plans for the blog in the next 7 days?

A: Some kind of art for Thursday, hopefully more Mystery Project next Monday, hopefully coherent rambling next Tuesday. Anything else is gravy.

Q: How's the weather?

A: Cold. Sometimes. It got up to 50℉ (10℃) the other day, but right now it's about 8℉ (-13,3℃) and tomorrow it might be around 32℉ (0℃) but it'll feel like 22℉ (-5,6℃), so there's that.

Q: Cat update?

A: Poor Evie hasn't been feeling great and I'm pretty sure the antibiotics gave her a bad stomach ache until recently. We let her eat whatever she'll eat (as long as it's non-toxic) when she is off her feed, and she has yet to become overweight. Unfortunately, she doesn't like peas, hates to drink water, and will not touch eggs (unless they're cooked in bacon fat, which we have done exactly once because a coronary doesn't sound fun), so we just slipped her some oatmeal & water and she decided between that and her actual cat food, she'd take the cat food and like it lol. Also, she demanded to go out today. Again, it's cold, and she hates the wind, so I told her "you aren't gonna like it" and scooped her up. I stood on the deck with her in the cold wind until she threw a look at the kitchen door and started squirming. She pouted the rest of the night because we cruel humans have clearly turned the good weather off and stolen her grass.

And that's about it for burning questions on the blog.

I will say this, though.

My guy has an author friend whose book just came out. The author is Jonathan Evison, the book is Small World, and it's brilliant. If you're looking for a book to read right now, regardless of what your usual genre is, give it a try, because it almost certainly has something for you in it. I am too sleepy to do justice to what the book is and what it's about but think of this:

I am someone who almost exclusively read fantasy, horror, and Sherlock Holmes until fairly recently, and I fell in love with Evison's previous book, Lawn Boy. From what I've seen leafing through the gorgeous hardcover my guy bought on Sunday and from descriptions around the net, Small World blows Lawn Boy out of the water, and I am obsessed with Lawn Boy, so...

You're probably gonna love it.

Especially if you love history, trains, the American West, and rooting for the underdog.

So yeah, go check out Small World by Jonathan Evison.

That's my plug for the night!

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk

 

In Which Art Is Hard.

I've been working on a bunch of art ideas, none of which are coming to fruition, sadly, but hey, that's life. Sometimes your art goes smoothly & well, and sometimes you're hurling sketched-upon notecards around your room like shuriken in frustration.

Today has been a shuriken day.

It's not due to any sort of horrible nightmarish scenario that I'm struggling to make art. I'm just having an off month. Happens.

That being said, today was another nice warm day (I think it reached 50℉/10℃!) and we had a thick fog roll in, so the cat got to go out again. Yesterday, she came face to face with poor Skye-Kitty from next door, who she loves to flirt with and then attempt to batter (poor dude). He wisely didn't come back today when she went out, but she did settle on the grass and look out into the fog, wistfully, as though she wished he was there (presumably to punch in the face like she always tries...).

So I made a little homage to that!

"Trouble"; colored pencil sketch on notecard; 2021

The cat in the foreground is, of course, the disastrous Ms. Evie, and the indistinct blob in the background is Mr. Skye-Kitty.

I hope I can make a larger version of this some time, maybe in watercolors, using their actual colors, because I didn't have my hot pink colored pencil with me when I was drawing this, and that's what color Evie's harness is lol.

Sadly, that's the only art that's come out even close to acceptable lately. And I'm not talking just "oh, I don't like it because I'm the artist and we're not allowed to like our own art", I'm talking "is that an elbow or a chair?" bad.

Then again, I do still have a *lot* of Christmas presents to finish, so I think that's what I'll focus on!

I hope you're all doing alright!

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Talk About Tuesday

 

In Which I May Be A Night Owl
But Insomnia is Definitely A Bear.

I have mentioned my struggles with insomnia but boy howdy have I not had a bout like this in a while. I got up at 5:30AM with sore ribs (from sitting or standing upright for over 20 hours) and eyes so dry and tired that I was constantly dodging what I thought was my cat darting in front of me but uh... it was absolutely not my cat. It was nothing. There wasn't anything there.

Yeah, I finally stayed up so long I started hallucinating.

Don't panic! (I didn't I was more annoyed than anything else) I took care of it and now I'm seeing the world normally. My brain is only slightly molasses-like, too!

How, you may ask, did I resume functionality after nigh-destructive insomnia?

I tried this thing I never do because my body hates me and won't let me:

I took...

A nap.

Seriously. From about 10:45AM-2PM, conked and then dozed off & on for most of the day. Is that a replacement for sleep? NO. Will I get sleep tonight? Hopefully, yes.

But probably no, because again, my body hates me.

We've been at war for the entire century so far.

Such is life.

But what have I been up to besides sleeping?!

I've been drawing (a Big Piece for my guy, a few sketches for me as a treat), watching Red Dead Redemption 2 Lore Videos (I have not played RDR2 nor am I likely to lol), eating Cup Noodle (chicken flavor - I added fried garlic which I heartily recommend), and crashing my iPad for the first time because it hated the new update for Pokemon Masters EX (it's fine now, just was a pain).

Also my mom took the cat out for exactly ten minutes because it is cold and poor kitty hates having cold toes. She has been on a kleptomaniacal hot-streak ever since, stealing my mother's seat whenever my mom tries to sit down. As though my mother is responsible for the changing seasons...

We saw deer this week! A buck and a doe, separately. Both did the sensible thing and ran away from the road lol. I also saw a big hawk and I'm grateful that it hasn't committed birdicide (yet).

Next week, I'll be adding more to the mystery crochet project (hopefully a lot more, but we'll see!), and then I'll have more art to show off.

I didn't do NaNoWriMo, but I hope to do some really good work this coming month on my book!

So many ideas! So little time!

I also may be just as herky-jerky as in October/November when it comes to blog consistency - I've got a bunch of gifts to finish and only... 23 days to complete them in.

That's probably gonna do it for me tonight!

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Talk About Tuesday

 

In Which My Arms Itch

My cat has an infection. This doesn't surprise us - she's probably had URI's the whole time we've had her. Unfortunately, she has a 10 day course of antibiotics to take, and even more unfortunately, they're pills. She refuses to be pilled.

She knows when you hide it.

She knows when you're holding it.

She will not take it.

So one of us (me) has to hold her while the other person (my mom) tries to cram a quarter of a pill down her gullet.

She does not approve, of course, and since I have a minor cat allergy, her scratches on my arms and stomach itch a lot.

But thankfully my younger sibling came over and the cat was practically comatose in their lap during pill-time, so that went pretty well.

Still, we've got something like 8 days to go, so I'm hoping the rest go like tonight's. This morning was apparently a real mess, but she was pilled nonetheless.

I've been really tired lately. I've been having bizarre dreams and restless sleep, and I'd really like to just enjoy this fall. We dipped back into summer today, too, which isn't helping with my inattentiveness and sleepiness. I don't think well when I'm too warm - my eyes droop, my back tightens, and I just don't feel right.

The high today was, I think, around 76℉ (24.4℃), which was especially galling after a series of 56-63℉ (13.3 - 17.2℃) days. I hope tomorrow will be nicer so I can more comfortably walk around. I need to get out for more than a slow meander around the yard with a crazy kitty!

My plan for the rest of this week is to work on art and crochet, so I hope the weather cooperates (not too dry so my paintings evaporate too fast, good weather for random jaunts around town to work in fresh air, etc). I also hope my brain cooperates, but that's far less reliable than the weather lol!

I have something planned for Thursday, so hopefully that works out!

I think that'll do it for me for now though, I'm very tired and my Thursday project is taking a lot out of me through just the prep phase!

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Talk About Tuesday

 

In Which It's Been Quite The Week

So Facebook died for a bit yesterday and that was a Bit of Trouble for a lot of people. I know people sell handmade crafts and stuff on FB, and I really hope they're doing okay and that a day of tense waiting and hoping. Personally, I was mostly annoyed that it was harder to talk to my boyfriend and was completely cut off from my friends :(

I used that time to make my blog yesterday, but what about Friday-Sunday and also Today (the days I haven't blogged about)?

Well, on Friday my cat went in for her dental cleaning and health check. She has to be completely sedated for this, since they usually have to take teeth out (she has suffered from periodontal disease since before we got her). Now, she's had a lot of health issues since we got her. Polyps, perpetual cough, lack of appetite, bad teeth, she's kind of an adorable lil wreck. She's also eleven.

Which all combines to mean that for most of Friday, I was on pins & needles hoping she'd be okay. She hadn't eaten at all on Thursday night, after all. Thankfully, around noon, the vet called and said she was waking up fine.

But they'd had to take two teeth.

And they took a sample of the slime in her throat.

And they found another polyp, this one in her right ear, laying horizontally too far down to reach.

And she was a bit underweight.

And she's eleven.

She's more than 2/3 of the way through her lifespan, and she's spent the whole time sick.

So of course we've basically been her slaves since Friday.

She spent Saturday and most of Sunday asleep in her kennel (to prevent her from hurting herself), and while the door stayed open, she didn't like to leave. She did, however, eat all of her food for once in a long long time. She ate breakfast every morning, even taking her pain pill (those are gone now)! She slept 90% of the time, and she mostly wanted snuggles when she wasn't in her kennel, which we covered with a flannel blanket for privacy.

I should mention it was in the mid-50s here for temps (55℉ = 12.8℃) so to her it probably was very chilly. Today was a nice balmy 65℉ (18.3℃) and I took her for her first walk post-surgery. She... ate grass and rolled on the warm driveway and completely ignored the chipmunk two feet away from her face. Then she wanted to come in after an hour of lounging and rolling and nibbling, and I gave her a snack.

She ate her snack!

She has an appetite! She just needs people around her and for her food to be higher than it currently is.

Unfortunately for me, today was also a day beset with mold spores. Which I am very very allergic to.

I've been sneezing since I woke up, and I hate it because my nose feels heavy and my eyes itch like crazy.

The eyes are the giveaway. If I had a cold, it'd just be my nose, but with the eyes feeling like my eyelids are lined with Brillo? Definitely allergies.

I will take my meds before I sleep.

So basically the whole time I haven't been on here or crocheting I've been a cat slave!

That's been my week.

The rest of my week is looking pretty similar, tbh. And no, she didn't like the treat I bought her on Saturday (a tube of chicken flavored treat from Tiki Cat). Maybe she'd have liked it better from the tube and higher up? I don't know.

Probably not, she can be picky.

Anywho, the rest of the week is for Art Prompts and Falloween/Spooktober fabulousness!

I'm gonna curl up in my flannel shirt and my fluffy pants and read spooky stories until I conk out tonight.

That'll do it from me!

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Fiber Monday

 

In Which Today Has Been A Day, Has It Not

So... Facebook.

Amiright?!

That was fun.

Anyway, today was my crochet day, but most of the morning was actually spent looking for our hot glue gun so I could secure the eyes into Mystery Project #1, which... I FINISHED!!!

Sort of.

See, I ran out of yarn for the tail, so instead it has none. If I ever find a good deal on the yarn I'll pick a skein up to make the tail (and possibly a friend for this lil dude!)

The lil dude in question:

He's so cute!!!

This lil guy, believe it or not, is a "Dumpling Kitty" by Sarah Sloyer on Ravelry. It's an easy pattern, but I had to go and be creative (or something) and do one without 1) stripes and 2) a mouth, so that required a bit of thinking (pro-tip: the color changes count as a stitch!). Mine came out kinda looking like a rabbit, but that doesn't stop it from being hecking cute. It is so stinking cute! And I don't miss the tail (which, uh, is good because I'm 100% out of this yarn).

If you weren't here last week, you're maybe wondering why I can't just substitute in another worsted/heavy DK weight white acrylic yarn for this project. If you were, you probably want me to prove that this stuff does what I said it does...

Ladies & Gentlemen, we have GLOW!!!

Yes! The glow looks great even after only 15 seconds of close exposure to my bedside lamp! If I have any complaints about this yarn it's that:

1. The skeins are tiny (like, maybe 100 yards tiny)
2. The yarn itself seems to be polluted with sharp bits of plastic that can really hurt
3. Splitty, splitty, splitty yarn

I did a little more work on the other Mystery Project, though, and for that, we can either look next to the first pic of that lil critter or I can show you this:

Wow... Not a big difference from last week, huh...

And yet there is a significant difference.

There's at least 6 new rounds, and I'm taking it up to around 150 stitches around before next week, I hope. If not 180!

Okay, you may be thinking, but this is getting a little... big. You'd be right. I have plans for this bad boy and they don't involve it being microscopic... no matter what a 1.9mm hook might suggest :P

Anywho, that'll about do it for me today. I'll have a lot to blather about tomorrow involving my cat, the internet, and more, so stay tuned, folks!

And don't forget to

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Talk About Tuesday

 

In Which I Am Le Tired

I overcaffeinated last night, I think. I didn't sleep fantastically well, and what sleep I did get was constantly interrupted with suddenly waking up and grumbling "What the f?!" before going back to sleep. This happened five or six times.

Yup. Definitely switching to chamomile or lemon tea tonight. Probably chamomile. I like that for nighttime.

Coffee is delicious, especially mixed with cocoa, but apparently once you hit 32 you just can't slam back mug after mug of delicious brown goodness without consequences. Drat.

Anyway, several neat things have happened/are happening this week! First of all, we took the cat for walkies again on Sunday:

Evie really enjoyed hopping up on the lowest branch of the old smoke bush near our neighbor's fence. She was watching their chickens and ducks and hoping for a glimpse of Skye, the cat she has a crush on (despite slapping him in the face when they finally met).

My mother and I stood out there with her for a while, trying to tempt chickadees and cranky woodpeckers into my mother's outstretched, sunflower seed filled hands. They did not deign to fulfill her Disney Princess Dreams, sadly, or I'd have taken a picture.

Perhaps a certain someone parking her fluffbutt under the tree with the bird feeders in it had something to do with their reluctance...

If you look very carefully, you can see a very put-out chipmunk glaring down at me because I'm the moron holding the bright pink leash to my cat right where he wants to be!

After the walkies, my boyfriend came over and we hung out and it was great! We tried something called "panackelty" that my mom made from a "Pooh Bear Cooks British Food" video, and that was incredible. Sunday was, in short, a wonderful day.

However there was one thing on Sunday that bothered me.

For about a year, now, I've had a strand of purple LED lights strung around my window. In the last month or two, they've started to go bad (flickering, lights dying and coming back on, generally becoming obnoxious), and it's been driving me nuts. I like having some noticeable light in my room while I sleep, and the purple light was very soothing to me. The lights were practically vibrating at times on Sunday, so I decided to bite the bullet and replace them with something actually designed for nightly use:

A Mr Glo 6" glow ball

This thing is a USB-recharegable LED light with a bunch of colors and stuff. I was not paid by the company or anything, I just knew that my BF has the 4" cube and that thing is great! It didn't have free shipping though, so I went with the slightly more expensive sphere. There's a lil button on the bottom you can use to cycle through the colors and light patterns, but if you wanna adjust the brightness, you have to use the tiny lil remote it comes with.

I have it on right now, plugged in and charging. I might just leave it plugged in tonight lol. It's currently sitting in my yarn bowl so it doesn't roll around on the end table - it's hard to sit it down while it's charging (which is a few points in favor of the cube!). I'm looking forward to using it as a way to get more light down to me while I'm on the ol floor pillow, crocheting or sketching.

I also got another shipment in, but that's a tale for Thursday, which is when the next blog should be up ;)

That'll about do it for me today, folks!

Go Enjoy Something!

FC