Good things

After feeling rather depressed yesterday, and starting off today in pretty much the same mood, I wanted to make a list of things that made me feel good today. Some of them are pretty simple.

• Cooking bacon
• Finding more jobs than usual to apply for
• Reading Terminator: Judgment Day by Randall Frakes
• Fixing the ring I messed up earlier this week -- I took silver polish to it, and even though the engravings still need to be blackened it's wearable again!
• My boyfriend

And now, a photo I just happen to like. It intrigues me, and this makes it another good thing today. I found it a while ago when I was looking for flowery spring photos, and even though it's a spring it wasn't relevant to the season I was writing about.

If you take a good look you'll see that it also looks like a shrine, with some practical camping/hiking equipment close at hand and mugs for travelers to use. There's definitely a story behind this spring, and I want to know it.

Spring by Jana Illnerová

Grief

I'm not sure how to cope with my grandma being in hospice.

I'll think I'm doing fine, then suddenly realized that I'm completely out of it. Maybe I have no clue what day of the week it is, or else I've overlooked important details that would normally be high priority. And yeah, I would occasionally get confused about the days of the week before all this...but not like how I'm screwing it up now.

This really throws me since I was never close to my grandma. I don't know if I'm mourning her, or if I'm mourning what I never had with her.

How am I supposed to cope when I don't know what it really is that I'm mourning?

Also, I seem to be transferring my grief/frustration/anger/I-don't-know-what to other things in my life. For example, my favorite ring.

My favorite ring was messed up big time yesterday when I exposed it to bleach. I hadn't realized what the consequences would be, and...well, I didn't take it well. I would have been upset at the best of times, because it's been my favorite piece of jewelry for so long, and I am really attached to it. But my reaction was a bit out of proportion to the damage done.

Luckily, I realized I was overreacting. Even as I was on the verge of tears I was able to tell myself that the situation with grandma was probably making me blow it out of proportion. Also, I realized that maybe I was trying to fix something that could be fixed, when I can't do anything for my grandma.

(Yeah, I sometimes manage to coolly examine myself as I'm falling apart. It's the weirdest thing. Wish I could always do it.)

I'm not sure how to cope with what's happening to grandma. And I'm not sure if transferring my grief/frustration/etc. to other things is healthy.

Singing Demolition Derby

Recently I've gotten into the habit of listening to music while driving. Specifically, Hank Green's music. I didn't think anything much about this, until last week I suddenly realized one of the songs in the playlist: Demolition Derby.

I'm not sure if I should be concerned about the fact that I've been singing along with a song that's about drivers intentionally smashing their cars up. Especially since I'm singing it while driving down the road myself. I mean, shouldn't I be singing about safe driving, not about totaling cars?

Then again, a song about driving safely doesn't sound very exciting.

I've found two YouTubes of the song. If you only want to listen to one, I'd suggest the first since one because of the visuals.



...that being said, this second one is what's on the CD, and it's a much better recording.



Do you listen to music while driving? Audio books? Something else? Or do you drive in silence?

Birthdays

Yesterday was Tall One's birthday. He decided to get presents the evening before, though, because of his too busy schedule that is sort of crazy on Thursdays.

Creeper plushy

I got him a plushy Minecraft Creeper. It's actually something I've been eying since Christmas since I thought it was really adorable, and I've been waiting for the price to go down on it. (Is it bad that I confessed this to Tall One?) Happily, he likes it even more than I'd hoped he would.

For those who don't know, Minecraft is an online game, and Creepers are...well, they're creepy. They'll creep up behind you, then go BOOM. This tends to be very unfortunate for the player.

And you want to know the really awesome thing about this plushy? If you squeeze it, it goes boom. Well, it makes the sound, anyways. It wouldn't work out too well if it really did go boom.

Unfortunately Tall One wound up sick yesterday. He spent pretty much his whole birthday in bed, but was able to eat chocolate cake when he got up in the evening. Of all the days to be sick...

In other news, tomorrow is The Belly Dancer's birthday. Since she moved away we seem to have become the sort of friends who barely talk, but who still send each other presents. I found a pair of silver dangle earrings that I hoped she would like, and which she got in the mail a couple of days ago. She seemed to like them, judging from the photo she put on Facebok, so I think I made a good choice of present this year.

It was definitely a much better than a couple years ago when I sent her something with a pretty leaf on it...which she later pointed out was a marijuana leaf...oops...hey, I had a sheltered childhood.

So I guess my brother's birthday sucked, though the cake and presents were good. And I hope that The Belly Dancer has lots of fun on her birthday tomorrow. :)

Supporting your community

If you're part of a minority group that needs to present a united front, and which needs to show support for its members, is it a reasonable expectation that you should attend every get together?

And if you get ticked off at someone for not showing up to view your brief bisexual film at an LGBT event, should you take it up with them privately or wait months before suddenly making your grievance public?

As you may have guessed, these questions have been prompted by a drama that I have been watching unfold. I can't give you links to both sides of the story (at least not yet), so I'll spare you the details. But it basically goes back to my original question: is it reasonable to expect a person to attend every event possible within their community?

Let's face it, going to every screening/talk/party/whatever just isn't possible. Sometimes, there are multiple events going on at the same time, and you can only be in one place at once. (Unless you're Hermione Granger and have a time turner.) For myself, I have to wonder what these people would say if there were a Pagan event and an LGBT event that conflicted with each other...would choosing one over the other suggest to them that I value one community more than the other? And sometimes a person's schedule is just so full that they have to take time off to relax at home, or to have a quiet dinner with friends.

...to name just a very few legit reasons for why someone might miss an event.

Whatever someone's reasons, I don't see why failing to show up to a screening should be termed "boycotting," or why it's worth turning it into a giant public fight on Facebook months after the fact. Unless someone is just trying to stir up controversy...interesting thought, that.

As for whether it's better to discuss such a grievance in private or scream about it publicly, I won't even touch that in this post.

I'm just glad that I'm jaded enough by now to not be disappointed at finding proof that the bisexual community isn't one big happy family. And if I find that I can share links to both sides of this argument, I'll share them in case anyone's interested in the details.

Adventures with coffee

Coffee!!!

My taste in coffee is changing. I mentioned this back in March, at the same time that I wrote about my new found appreciation for Guinness. I doubted that I would ever be able to drink it black, though.

Well, guess what? I'm drinking my coffee black now.

Or anyways, I am when I get decent coffee. (Sorry mom, I don't really like your favorite coffee.)

I was already a fan of Seattle's Best Coffee, so I latched on to their stuff. And I like it just as much black as I do when they make it into a mocha for me. In particular, I like their Level 5 coffee, which seems to be their strongest.

Perhaps the most remarkable part of my change in taste is that it finally allows me to understand the differences between different coffees better. Before, I learned to taste the difference between how various places made their lattes. But I don't think I properly understood that part of the taste has to do with the raw coffee...that there was more to it than what milk and syrups are used.

My changing taste is definitely an adventure, and is helping me to better appreciate (and understand) coffee. I'll spend some time appreciating the Seattle's Best Level 5, but look forward to exploring other types eventually.

What's your favorite coffee? Any suggestions on where to take my coffee adventures?

Having a bi moment

There was a funny thing that happened when The Hobbit came out on DVD. I was going to post about at the time, but didn't for some reason. Maybe because I'm not finding it the easiest post to write...it's not uncomfortable, just difficult to explain. Which is funny, because what I'm trying to say is simple.

My family hadn't seen the movie yet, and were asking me questions. Of course I told them about how it had been changed from the book, told them where it ended, and speculated where the second movie might end. Eventually mom randomly asked if there's anyone hot in it.

Galadriel

I had to stop and think about this question. Normally I'd expect the hero to be the hot one, but I'm sorry. Bilbo Baggins simply is not hot. And I hadn't really latched onto anyone as being particularly hot. (Unlike in Lord of the Rings. *cough* Legolas... *cough*) After a little bit of pondering I finally said "Well, I guess Galadriel is sort of hot..."

But here's the thing: I'd forgotten I was talking to someone that isn't into women.

It was sort of a jolt to me when mom pointed out she's only interested in men, maybe because this incident proved how much I had changed from the previous year.

A year ago I was still self conscious about being bisexual, and was a little uncomfortable with myself. I certainly wouldn't have casually suggested a female character as "the hot one" without being very aware that I was doing.

So even though this post is titled "Having a bi moment," and the incident I'm describing was only one brief moment in my life...it's really about more than that. I guess it shows that after so many years of denying my attraction to women, and having insisted to myself that I was only interested in men...I'm comfortable with myself now.

Adorable rats

Sabine is still separated from the younger rats, but they do get to spend some (supervised) time together. For example, when I'm cleaning the younger girls' cage I'll sometimes put them with Sabine. After all, I'm near enough to hear any disagreements and interfere if necessary. And they need to go somewhere while I'm taking their cage apart.

Usually when the three rats are all crammed into one small cage together they get feisty. They climb the walls (literally) and jump all over each other. Then last night, here's what happened as soon as I finished chores and decided to take them all out for playtime.

Hiding

I didn't even know they would all fit in that tiny igloo. And really, they don't. Which is why I had to get a photo.

Aren't they so cute with their tails sticking out of the igloo, and one of them checking out the entrance to see if it's safe?

Still hiding

Notice that the igloo isn't even sitting on the floor of the cage anymore.

I'm not sure why they were hiding. It couldn't have been because I carried the cage back to my bedroom with all of them in it, could it...? But they're used to me carrying the smaller cages with them inside.

Drooling

Once playtime was over I put Sabine back in her cage before carrying Kora and Aniki to their own bigger cage. When I returned to my bedroom to retrieve Sabine's cage I was met with the above scene: Kokopelle drooling, and Sabine trying to say hi to him.

I'm glad that Sabine is fearless of the cats. So long as cage walls stay between them when they greet each other, all will remain well.

Grandma in hospice

Ok, I figure I'll share the info that I stuck up on Facebook yesterday about grandma. The only bit that I didn't share in the note (I added it as a comment) is that the hospice nurse said people in grandma's condition usually have six more months. But that's just usually. Not always. A six months estimate could be wildly off.

... ... ...

First, a key point.

Grandma is happy, and isn't in any pain.

The rest of the news isn't good, but at least there's that.

Grandma has just gone on hospice. (Our hope is that she'll come out of hospice. Unlikely, but not impossible.) This is because she had a minor surgical procedure a couple days ago, and has barely been eating since then. Which isn't a good sign.

We do know that she has a mass on her pancreas. We don't know what it is. It's probably malignant.

After grandma received treatment for colon cancer a couple years ago she said no more surgeries if the cancer returned. My mom is respecting this decision, and so our focus is on making the rest of her time as comfortable as possible. (And as I said, she's pain free.) This means that finding out if it's pancreatic cancer (I think that's pretty likely) won't change treatment, so we aren't doing a biopsy. Particularly since the procedure to do a boispy is invasive, and there's no point of doing that to her if we aren't going to treat it anyways.

Again, this is us respecting grandma's wishes from a couple years ago, espeically since she is still vocal about not wanting surgery. And she's weak enough that we don't think she would handle surgery very well anyways.

Grandma is finally being released from the hospital today, and we're hoping that she'll start eating again (and improve) once she's back with the people she's been living with and who she knows.

Sleep paraylsis

Long tentacles reaching indoors. I somehow knew that it was Cthulhu come to destroy humanity, and responded accordingly: fighting back. It didn't occur to me how useless that would be.

Then somehow the dream shifted to me in my own bed. You know how dreams usually mess up places you know? Your furniture is arranged wrong, or else it isn't really your house at all. Or anyways, that's how it is for me. But not this time. This time, the dream got everything correct.

Some of Cthulhu's monsters were outside, and I could hear a stranger inside. I tried to move, to call out, to scare the intruder away. Then I realized that everything below my neck felt strange -- somewhere between numb and the pins and needles you feel when your foot is asleep.

I couldn't move. I couldn't make a sound. And that terrified me.

... ... ...

Thankfully, I woke up fairly quickly after that. And surprisingly, I was calm after the horror of being unable to move.

If I'm having a nightmare I can usually wake myself up by calling out. It might come out as a moan, but I'll sit up and make some noise. And, most importantly, wake myself up. I don't even have to realize I'm asleep to do this, and this is what should have happened last night.

Once I woke up I didn't bother to move at first. I didn't feel the need anymore. After another minute I started speculating that I'd just experienced my first night terror (no I hadn't, I was remembering the wrong name for something I'd read about before), and a minute after that I finally moved to check the time.

It was just after 1am, and I'd gone to bed at about 11:30pm. So I hadn't been asleep for very long.

This morning I did a little research (ok, I read a bit on Wikipedia), and realized that night terror was the wrong term. What I experienced was my first bout with sleep paralysis. It also turns out that dreaming about intruders during sleep paralysis is common.

I really hope this doesn't happen again. I prefer vanilla nightmares, even if they do leave me terrified.

I'm still surprised at how calm I felt once I woke up.

Maybe this was brought on by stress with what's going on with grandma. She just went into hospice yesterday.

Drawing the line

Tuesday, at a job fair

"I'm sorry to tell all of you, but you just aren't what we want." The Interviewer gathered together our applications, and set them aside. "If you want to know why you aren't under consideration, you can stay and I'll tell you. I've got time. It's up to you."

All of us stayed. I don't know why the others did. But I figured that knowledge is power, and that if I knew why I wasn't under consideration in this case, that it might help me do better next time.

Then...

"Actually, I'm interested in all of you. I'm inviting you back Wednesday through Friday. We'll discuss more about the job descriptions and pay then, and I'll figure out who's the best fit. I just said I wasn't interested to test you, and see how you respond in adverse conditions."

Maybe that isn't word for word, but you get the jest.

That evening I told my family that I might have a job opportunity at a car dealership, and my brother teased me about becoming a used car salesman.

Wednesday, 5:30pm

"I have plane tickets here, two way for two people." The Interviewer waved them around. "Who's interested?"

Virtually everyone responded immediately. I guess I was a bit slow, and was one of maybe two or three people who didn't have a hand raised high in the air.

"Why didn't you raise your hand? Why didn't you raise your hand?"

When The Interviewer demanded this I felt a little silly for not jumping at the opportunity. But I didn't want to get too upset about missing out on free plane tickets, and was mainly happy for the person who was the fastest to claim them. I'll admit this isn't always my attitude about missed opportunities, but it was this time.

Then just as The Interviewer was about to hand the prized tickets over to the lucky guy who beat everyone else to the prize, he pulled back.

"No, did you really think I was going to just hand them out? Did you really?" The Interviewer had a good laugh, and I think everyone who jumped at the chance for free plane tickets felt like idiots. Even I felt like one, for believing it was happening.

"But...everyone who comes back tomorrow, will get tickets. You'll have to arrive promptly by 10:30am, not a minute later."

Again, this isn't word for word. But you get it.

Today

I wasn't there. I don't care that as a car salesman I could earn a ton of money. I don't care that I would have had a $6,000 training, guaranteed. I don't care that women tend to sell more cars than men. (Apparently we appear more trustworthy and approachable.) I don't care that I might have gotten free plane tickets today.

Yep, that's right, I might have gotten the tickets. Notice that little important little keyword there. Might. And that's why I don't care about the rest of it.

Because I'm not convinced. The mind game The Interviewer played on Tuesday was one thing. That, I could laugh off. I came back the next day, after all. But there were other games he played on Wednesday, of which the plane tickets was just one. And they left me unable to trust what he said.

Maybe some will say this decision proves I'm not really serious about finding work. I suppose The Interviewer might say that. But I can wait a little longer to find employment with someone whose word I can trust. I'll probably make less than I would have if I'd followed through on this job opportunity with The Interviewer. But that's ok. Because I'm not nearly desperate enough to take a job with someone who will play games until I question every little thing he says.

Time to move on.

I have three interviews lined up, which is a first for me. It turns out that putting my resume online means that employers will actually call me about job opportunities, instead of me having to go to them. How easy is that? And why didn't I figure it out before? Of course I'm still actively looking, but this makes life so much easier.

Cthulhu Prayer Breakfast

First, I've got to point out that this was held at Columbia River Brewing Company. This is a restaurant that is also a brewery. And, things were set up so that you could see some of the equipment. Just, oh, wow.

Brewing!

 I wonder if people working there ever feel like animals on display.

Same thing, slightly different angle

So, you may be asking what the Cthulhu Prayer Breakfast is. Well, I'm sorry to tell you this, but that is a closely guarded secret. So closely guarded, in fact, that those of us who attended are sworn to secrecy.

...no, just joking. It's not any sort of secret.

It's a breakfast for people to hang out, talk about the con, just generally be geeks...and of course, there are also special prayers. And stories. If you want a taste of what those prayers and stories were like, below is a video I happened across from the breakfast.



By the way, I wrote about some interesting films and authors from the con over at my book blog, here.

Cthulhu Con: Loot

After getting distracted by recent events in my life, I would like to resume posting about Cthulhu Con. And specifically in this post, about the loot I brought home.

I spent a bit more money than I meant to, but less than I might have. I think that I was pretty responsible with my money. Mostly. Overall. I think...

Book!

First, I got a book. I haven't gotten a chance to read it yet, but it's definitely eye catching, and was pleading with me to liberate it from the book seller. It's Screaming Science Fiction: Horrors From Out of Space by Brian Lumley. Between its covers is a collection of short stories that look pretty neat.

A ring...

Yes, I know the info thingy says Nenya. But if you'll look at the photo, you'll see it's not really Nenya.

The vendor was really selling Nenya, though, and the ring I got was from Lord of the Rings as well. So I guess they decided to give me the info for Nenya. Anyways, I liked the three leaves on the ring I got, and kept going back to drool over it until I finally gave in and bought it.

Stickers

Someone was handing out stickers. An awesome one that simply says "Word Horde" and shows some angry vikings ready for a fight. (Seems like a good sticker for any writer to have.) The other seems to be an advertisement for a website.

Another book!

Someone actually just gave this to me, because he had too many books to take home already. It's A Cthulhu Mythos by Chris Jarocha-Ernst. It's basically a good cross reference for someone who is learning about, or wants to looks up details about, Lovecraft's world.

Artsy business card

And finally, the last (non food) thing I bought was a piece of art. Due to copyright I don't know that it's ok for me to share a photo of it here without the artist's permission, but I can certainly share her business card. I can also share a link to what I bought, as well as another link to what I really wanted to buy, and couldn't because it was too darned expensive.

Don't ask me to explain why I want the second one, since I'm scared of spiders. I just like it. And it would have cost a bit more than all the souvenirs I did buy added together. *sigh*

One thing's for sure. The artist Liv Rainey-Smith picked up at least one new fan at the Con. Her stuff is amazing.

It All Makes Sense At The End

I doubt that I'll actually get a chance to write a proper post today, since I'll be spending most of the rest of the day at the hospital. Yeah, it looks like I'll spend mother's day with my grandma. Which might be only fair since mom was with her yesterday. I guess I'll write an actual update about grandma another time...probably tomorrow.

In the meantime, here's a song instead of an actual thought out nice piece of writing. It's my favorite one by the amazing Hank Green.



I spent pretty much all of yesterday with my boyfriend. I felt bad at first for not being with grandma, but eventually realized that I would have been worse than useless to her. I was so out of it (stress, I guess) that I had trouble talking sense to Murray when he picked me up. Luckily, he's good at making me feel better, and I am in a much better frame of mind now. I'm still tired (probably stress) but finally ok.

Prayers for grandma

Yesterday was somewhat eventful. Mom and I took grandma to urgent care because she was looking a bit yellow, and eventually they sent grandma off to a hospital. She got to ride in an ambulance with a couple of cute paramedics, and I came along for the ride while mom took the car.

We don't know what's going on yet. We know grandma has a cyst or tumor, and her liver is messed up. So are a few of the organs around her liver. And with her history of colon cancer, it's easy to jump to conclusions. Even grandma, despite her dementia, was asking if it was the cancer coming back. I had been hoping she wouldn't think to ask that question.

Thoughts and prayers for grandma would be greatly appreciated. It doesn't look good, though I keep reminding myself that it might be something easily fixed that just looks bad at first.

At least she's comfortable, and feels fine. That's one thing to be thankful for.

Nurses Uniform by Karen Arnold

There is one thing, unrelated to grandma, that I want to discuss. It is, however, related to last night, which is why I'm not writing it in a separate post.

It took us hours of waiting at urgent care before grandma was sent on to the hospital. They took some time to move her even after it was obvious where she would need to go.

The cause of the long wait was probably (at least partially) the ultra sound. The one before grandma's took ages, for whatever reason. The nurse who worked with us, Sallye, seemed to be of the opinion that grandma should be able to get the ultra sound at the hospital. I agreed with her on that, but the head doctor wanted the ultra sound done at urgent care. No idea why this was important to him, but that's how he wanted it, so that's how it was. Incidentally, we never met the doctor. And although Sallye seemed perfectly competent, she still had to go along with what he said.

Despite the long wait, the people there took care of grandma (and mom and myself) as best they could. They offered to bring a second chair for mom or me to sit in, and did their best to make grandma comfortable. Someone even brought her a warmed blanket, though she didn't want it. And when Sallye showed me where the food was, she gave a snack to a kid wandering by who said she was hungry. That seemed pretty sweet to me.

They took care of us.

Sometime after the ultra sound, after they had told us their findings and finally called the ambulance to come get grandma, Sallye apologized for how long everything was taking. She seemed tired and stressed, and kept apologizing even after mom told her it was ok. She seemed to expect us to be angry. So I told her, "We know it can take a while. So long as you're trying, and are sympathetic about the wait, we're not going to yell at you."

"Why not? Everyone else has."

Everyone else has.

Just, wow.

I might have been yelling if circumstances were different. For example, if grandma had been in pain and they were ignoring her. I would have been furious then. If I had met the head doctor who delayed things for an ultra sound that could have easily been done at the hospital, I might have asked him why. And who knows, he might have had a good reason.

But the people I met were doing the best they could, and made sure we were comfortable. Heck, they even fed mom and me. (Not grandma, though. Grandma wasn't supposed to eat anything.) There would be no point in yelling at these people when they were already doing their best. Besides which, it just seems mean to take your anger out on those who are helping you.

That nurse -- and probably everyone else there -- needs a hug and a medal for putting up with crap from people they're taking care of.

...and maybe I'm trying to distract myself from what's going on with grandma by writing Part II of this post. But I do think it's something that needs to be said.

Cthulhu Wars

Info...or rather, advertisement

It was at Cthulhu Con that I had my first real brush with people playing RPGs face to face. Yeah, I guess the D&D I've played is technically an RPG, but I've only played it online. Not with someone else who was actually sitting across the table from me.

The game was Cthulhu Wars, and its creator Sandy Petersen was test running it. The game pieces were even prototypes, apparently, and Sandy was telling people not to pick them up by their tentacles or wings. Apparently he had to glue Cthulhu's head back on at one point, because it came off...

I didn't follow the game very well. I missed the beginning, and I left to attend a reading before I could catch the end. But I did pick up a few little details, such as the fact that the players are playing the Old Ones themselves, which is apparently unusual in Lovecraft inspired RPGs. I can also tell you that it looked like a lot of fun.

Maybe I'll get a chance to play Cthulhu Wars sometime. Or perhaps another RPG with people who are sitting across a table from me. I would like that.

Nerdy gamers having fun -- Sandy is bottom right

I also attended a panel about keeping fear alive in games, which was pretty interesting. I shared the notes from that on my book blog, which you can read here.

Cthulhu Con

On my first "date" with my Murray -- back when I was insisting things would remain strictly platonic -- he decided to introduce me to horror movies. I wasn't too keen on the idea of watching horror movies, and tried to insist that we not watch any horror.

I'm afraid that I lost that argument, but I really can't complain. I discovered that the older horror movies aren't really scary after all. There are some of the newer ones I won't watch, and Murray knows that. But for the most part they're ok, and I really like some of them.

And last weekend, my boyfriend took me to a horror film festival: Cthulhu Con.

What really shocked me about it was that I felt like I belonged. I mean, I've hardly read any H.P. Lovecraft, and his works are at the center of what it's all about. Many of the jokes went over my head. And yet, I was just so comfortable there.

I also got to step outside of my comfort zone a little, and learned a few things. At my boyfriends encouragement, I tried some almost black lip stick. I learned a little bit more about the horror genre, and was introduced to the bizarro genre. I actually got to see an RPG in action. I may have gotten slightly drunk for the first time at an after party (someone fed me two drinks, and I get tipsy on just one). I also determined that I'm not a huge fan of noisy bars, but that the quiet(er) ones are ok. Also, there's a different between middle aged people being noisy versus people my own age being noisy. And the latter is harder to handle.

There will be one or two more posts about Cthulhu Con this week. For now, I'll leave you with a photo from the pre-party, which had very interesting entertainment.

What to say...?

One of Us

I had a long (fun) weekend which, even on Monday evening, I'm still recovering from. It was that tiring. Though I guess that getting up early this morning, and drinking two cups of coffee, didn't help. Yeah, the caffeine didn't do much other than prevent me from napping when I needed it.

Even though I'm too tired to really write about my days at the H.P. Lovecraft Film Festival (also known as Cthulhu Con) properly right now, I do want to share something on here. I don't like going several days without a blog post. So I decided to share one of Heather Dale's songs, and while I was wandering around YouTube trying to decide which one I made an amazing discovery: she's got a new CD out, and it finally finally FINALLY contains one of my favorite songs of hers. So, here it is!



If you like this, you may be very happy to learn that the album is free. That certainly made me very happy.

Furry friends

Today's post will come in two parts.

The visiting puppy

It's been said before that, the way Kokopelle torments Saphira, it might be nice for him to get a bit of his own medicine. Well, he hasn't gotten it in the form of another animal body slamming him...but he has met someone who he's very uncertain of.

Zoe is an adorable basset hound who loves everyone, and she definitely loves cats. My boyfriend occasionally brings her on dates, and she's met Kokopelle exactly twice. Both times she's tried to make friends with my kitty.

Kokopelle isn't entirely certain what to make of this.

The only times I've ever seen him hiss, arch his back, or have his fur on end, have been in Zoe's company. And below is photographic evidence of his opinion on dogs. All she wanted to do was play...

However, Kokopelle did eventually go nose to nose with Zoe of his own accord. So he must not have been too traumatized by her presence.

Zoe wanting to play with Kokopelle

Sabine and surgery

Not a fun detail, but if I'm sharing about my furry friends anyways, I'll go ahead write about it.

Two nights ago I noticed that Sabine has a small lump under her skin. Yesterday I called to make an appointment with the vet, and today the vet said that surgery is the best option.

I still have no idea if it's a tumor or a cyst. Either way, it's coming out on Monday.

Sabine doesn't like the vet. She's better about it than she used to be, but after the visit I gave her a little bit of chocolate chip cookie. Definitely not recommended as regular treats for rats, but I thought it might be nice to give her a little extra something nice.

Beltane

Beltane. The day when people dance the May Pole and have fun sexy times. Basically, a giant fertility festival.

But I was also taught that it can be more than what immediate comes to mind when you hear the word "fertility." That it can also mean abundance. Or, that it's a good time to celebrate having the means to support yourself comfortably...or that it's a good time to do some work to get to where you have enough to live quite comfortably.

Hmm, not sure if that makes sense...?

Anyways, because I just have to, here is a song. I was trying to find a particular Omnia piece when I happened across this interesting band called Beltaine. I took an instant liking to them, and decided that they might be appropriate to share today given the day and their name.


In other news, I got a call today about a possible job. Interview is tomorrow. Wish me luck. :)