Ishte Rants and Rambles

I've been a bad girl and haven't been checking my email. lol. Your birthday is 2 days after my daughter's. This is the only time she and I get to be double digits together, and only for a few more days.  She just turned 33 and I'm 55, but only for a few more days.  I'll be glad to start a new year. This year can go to hell. It's been nothing but crap and crap and crap. Thankfully, I see the light at the end of the tunnel now. Finally. lol

Since I have DreamWidth now, and my Semagic is set up to post there, I will probably just post a notice that I posted to DreamWidth most of the time from now on.  My most recent post: https://ishte.dreamwidth.org/285265.html

BTW, I was eventually able to export my entire journal over to DW. That was in March, so I don't know how easy that still is. It wasn't working for a few days after the invasion, and then when I'd given up, I suddenly decided to try ONE MORE TIME, and lo... it worked.  Good luck!

Finally.  Holy cow though. That was hard.  I'm glad I spent some time reading through and checking everything over again though.  I had left some notes in it, and didn't remember to put in a small but important part of a conversation.  And missed a time/date stamp too... But it's posted now.

Here's the linkies.

An Archive Of Our Own (original)

Fanfiction.net (dumbed down for childish rulez here.)

Oh my sweet Goddess! I think this thing is finally finished.  It's past bedtime an I don't have time to post it tonight. Expect it tomorrow. Holy cow that was hard to write. lol.  I knew exactly what was supposed to happen and in the right order too, but link all together really did not want to happen easily

(This is a manually crossposted entry from my Dreamworks account.  If you haven't found me there already, look for me under the same username.)

Guys... I don't believe it, but I decided to try one more time to import, and my LiveJournal imported.  All the way back to my very first LJ post in 2003 "I am Broccoli of Borg". Holy COW!  I didn't think it was going to work.  Even my comments imported.  When it said it was successful SO QUICKLY I was sure it was some kind of mistake, but it continued to process the comments and the almost as quickly that was ALSO imported.  HOLY WOW COW! I'm so happy that it worked.  I was sure it was going to be blocked forever. The few days where I was posting to both places, it actually just slotted the LJ entries in the right place on DW like they'd always been there.

I wonder if there's a way to use my custom mood themes here.  I'm really delighted and if I can just figure out the CSS to make my Journal layout right, it'll be perfect.  It looks and feels just like LJ without the weird stuff they added over the last few years, and without the R*****n O*******y owning it.

YAY!

Freaking YAY!!!

(If you've been trying. I suggest you try again.  If you aren't on DW and want to leave because concerns, seems like a good time to do so.  You'll find me there. Same username.)

I guess it's needless to say that given LiveJournal is now a Russian owned and Russian run company, many of us in the west are concerned given the current situation, that we may very well find ourselves unable to access our LiveJournals. I HOPE it doesn't come to that, but it's something that is on our minds.

Given that concern, I made a DreamWidth account and thought I could use it as a backup since Semagic is supposed to work with both and it's supposed to be possible to cross-post from DW to LJ (It's not anymore btw. at least not at present.)  It's also supposed to be possible to import your entire LJ into DW. This was working for some as of posts I saw on Feb 2 (I think). So yesterday I started trying to do that. 


Well given that LJ my journal import into DW as a safety measure has failed (though I was able to import my tags and userpix and other things... just not entries.  I have used the tool provided to download all of the CSV files.  I copied them into another folder and converted them to HTML files. (done by changing the extension to html... go figure.)

The CSV file opens with Excel.
The HTML file opens with a browser into a more or less readable format. There's a little bit of formatting weirdos that act as the headers of the entry. No comments included though, alas, but at least the entries are preserved in some way.  Maybe DW will figure out a way to import from CSV or HTML.

It seems that you can also get an XML file, I downloaded one... and it seems like I was able to look at it in the browser, but it's coded. It's still readable.  I feel like the first time I opened it with Firefox it followed the code and somewhat formatted it into a readable... well I don't remember. Maybe it wasn't. It's bedtime though, so I'll fiddle with it after work tomorrow.

It's kind of been a pain in the behind, but at least I have the files and they're reasonably organized and file coded by date. If anyone else is looking at this problem and feeling this way.  I hope this is helpful.

My name is the same on DreamWidth if you want to add me to your circle when you get there or if you're already there.  It's pretty nice. The platform has the feel of LJ back in the days before they started adding stupid 'features' to try to make it more like FxcxBook and less like a blog.  So there's that. I haven't dug into the code of the layouts yet. I need to find a clean CSS of something so I can plug things into it.  So at present, though I loaded the CSS from my Spring Argyle layout, it's not displaying correctly. Sorry. but I'm visible. That's what's important.

Now it's really and truly bedtime.  Nighty night.

Seems like he's accepted his new box as he has pretty much been sitting in it nonstop since I brought it up here and showed it to him. lol.  The important thing is that at present, he is staying OUT of my scrap fabric box.

Cats! lol. You know, people think they are dumb animals, but they are not. When I got a pair of computer glasses from Zenni, they sent a special blue laser pointer to demonstrate their special brand of anti-blue light coating. So Goblin is the only cat who comes up here to the attic with any regularity. So he has got to experience the fun of chasing a dot on the floor. At first he didn't quite make the connection of the dot with me. But he very quickly figured out that I somehow created it for him to play with. Now he comes up here and BEGS me to make it appear.  I just did a quick test to see if he also made the connection with the actual laser cylinder by picking it up and fiddling with it (but not turning it on).  He totally understands that this is where the blue dot comes from and that I control it. lol. He was in my face immediately upon seeing me pick it up.  I showed it to him and he rubbed his face on it and begged me to play with him. 

Of course, he really pounds his murder mittens down on the dot  trying to catch it, so it sounds like a herd of elephants up here when he's chasing it.  So I only played for about 30 seconds because marynachaotica is in bed as she is not the night owl that I am. This cat though. He's such a character. So now he knows I put the device away, but he's pretending to hunt anyway.  Here he is at my side again asking for the dot.  He's not going to get the dot any more tonight. Sorry Goblin!

So... as the title implies, our power went out just before 6 am. I know this because it blinked back on twice. The first time, my phone came on (at a point where I was turned towards it and my face was probably only a foot and a half away from it because of how I was lying, and the screen was facing me) and the light woke me up... then because I was asleep, I was confused about what was happening and after a few seconds of not being touched my phone turned off again. So at that point I was awake enough to realize that my phone had come on. I sat up, and picked it up to figure out why it would have done that. Of course it's dark again in the room, right? So just as I start to activate my phone screen the my main room light flashes on SUPER BRIGHT (because it was dark and it was sudden. I'm sure it was just the normal amount. lol.) for about half a second and then goes out again. So if anyone in California heard me yell "WHAT THE HELL??" in the middle of the night. I appologize for waking you.

It was at this point that I realized that not only was it dark. it was UNUSUALLY dark, so I peered out the window and realised that all the neighbor's lights were out and all the street lights and the whole block... and then realized that it looked like the whole neighborhood was out. So I went to the power company's website and sure enough. They were aware of a power outage. I reported for my area and decided to go back to sleep since it was estimated that it would be restored within the hour. Just at that moment EVERY SMART LIGHT IN THE HOUSE turned on. Power was restored, but the Alexas were rebooting. Then they couldn't connect to the Internet because the router wasn't finished booting yet. So because they couldn't connect to the Internet, apparently they also couldn't turn off light bulbs? Inside the house? Makes no sense. So I had to load the app and turn them off myself, after which I went to bed with no apparent wear and tear, other than that I slept only intermittently the rest of my sleep cycle, which was annoying.

And that's my story for today.

So... I scheduled a week of vacation because honestly I need an F-ing break. lol. But I expected to be finished with the spring reset before I went, and it's NOT DONE after a WHOLE MONTH. Why? because a) it's HUGE, and b) right after we started working on it 5 people were out with freaking COVID (or in a couple of cases a couple of people were out pretending they didn't have Covid and refusing to test to prove it), one of those 5 was my primary help with the reset. The other person helping had a mini-vacation for her birthday over the long weekend and then was so behind on her regular duties that she has never been able to get back to the reset she was supposed to be helping with.

( Some more words under here.Collapse )

So YAY! Things!

This was way longer than I expected

Today would have been my dad's 92nd birthday. He's already long since gone now. He died 10 days after his 78th birthday. Hard to believe it's been almost 14 years now. I hope Roger is hanging out with him now. Dad served in Munich during the Korean War. His platoon had been slated to go to Korea as well, but at the last minute a runner came aboard their ship with new orders and they all went to Germany instead. I told him once that I felt lucky that he'd gone to Germany instead of Korea because otherwise, I might not have had the opportunity to have him as a father. He told me that it wasn't that lucky as the guys in Germany during the restoration didn't get promoted as fast as the guys fighting in Korea, and the lower officers and enlisted men ended up doing more of the higher officers' work. Dad was enlisted, but he was the one doing all of the Lieutenant's actual work, including scheduling teams and such things, because the Lieutenant couldn't do it competently apparently. I still consider it lucky in my case, and I'm sure my brother would have agreed with me. I couldn't have asked for a better pair of parents.

He and Mom kept up a correspondence the whole time he was away, during which they came to an understanding that when he returned from his tour of duty, they would marry, which they did and were married for nearly 55 years. After Dad passed through the veil, mom compiled all their letters that she could find and gave copies to both of us kids. They are very sweet. When Roger passed through, Lexxie kept his copy of those letters. I hadn't known that she didn't get a copy. Somehow I thought she had. Mom told her she could make her a copy of her own, because Roger's copy was 14 years old, but she wanted Roger's copy, and honestly it was pristine. He took very good care of it.

Dad retired from Kroger as a store manager, and then went back to school and started a whole different career, which he also retired from. So when they both retired, Mom and Dad each had 2 full retirements saved, as well as their IRA's, so they were able to travel and have a vacation home in Arizona which they enjoyed a lot until Dad got sick. They both had such an amazing work ethic, and lived frugally so they could save for the future, and still managed to plan fun vacations and and weekend camping trips for us. My brother wrote the most beautiful eulogy for our Dad and he talked about the work ethic we learned, and the vacations, and the camping trips we went on, and hunting with Dad (I didn't get to do that, but Roger continued to be and avid hunter the rest of his life.

I miss that old man. 14 years later, I still hear him in my head when I'm weighing a decision, or see him driving by in a car or a pickup truck and have to do a double take. Lol. Now, I see my brother sometimes too. I hope he and Dad are hanging out together right now, remembering the good times. I wish Dad had lived long enough to meet Jameson.

Happy Birthday, Dad

So if you HAPPENED to be on my page in the last hour or so, you may have noticed that it looked pretty chaotic, if you HAPPENED to refresh it multiple times you might have noticed that it was gradually reconstructing itself. Well now it's all finished. I was working on reclaiming another of my favorite layouts. Spring Argyle and now it's perfect again.

These have been a little bit of a struggle for me because LJ apparently eliminated the Bloggish theme on which I based tons of my layouts. Also PhotoFuckit said it was done existing for it's intended purpose, so I transferred all my images to Imgur and had to go through the CSS and fix every single graphic link, some of which I had not properly labeled in my code so I had to guess and try different ones until I had the right thing. I have a bunch of images that were IN my folder for this layout but which were NOT in the actual layout. So I guess I'll remove them to save myself confusion another 20 years in the future. lol

Also, I've already grown a small 3rd boob under my arm from my jab. Took a couple of days to grow it last time. Just thought you'd like to know. lol

Dude. I finally got my third jab yesterday. The first two I barely felt. This one holy crap, I watched her put the needle in and it was like "NO I'M NOT GOING IN!" The pharmacist saw it too. She said something like "Man... I need to order some different needles, these are not very sharp," and it wasn't! It stopped three times, once at the skin JAB, once I assume at the outside of the first muscle, JAB and then what? Freaking BONE? lol. She had to really use some force. Thankfully I'm not a baby. But my arm is pretty sore today, where previously I really didn't have much pain at the injection site. On my second jab, I grew a small extra boob in my armpit for a couple of days, which is a pretty common occurrence. It wasn't sore, just felt weird. For the record, I always intended to have the booster, I was just having trouble scheduling it as I wanted to schedule it the day before my day off in case of discomfort. So I was talking to my boss about how I could never find an appointment available on the day I needed it at the time I needed it (right after work) and she says to me "YOU don't need an appointment. YOU work here. Just go back there and ask Annie to give it to you." So now I know that and now it's done, and in two weeks my immunity will be boosted back up into a better wall.

My glasses came in. The ones from Zenni came to my house, so I have them on. I can see better and without feeling like I'm straining to stay focussed. My weaker scrip is actually more comfortable and I can see JUST FINE far away. I'm hoping that the ones I ordered from Stanton specifically for computer will be better though. I can wear these and use the computer, but I need the screen pretty far away. I think I might not mind that, but after complaining about having to have my glasses off and my screen RIGHT IN MY FRAKIN FACE to read it for several weeks, I'm still adjusting. HOWEVER, given that I now have a weaker distance prescription, and thus a weaker reading lense, I feel like my progressives may finally be back to being ALL USE instead of "Have to take them off to do this or that. and I may not need a specialized pair of glasses. I'm about to leave to go get my glasses. I'm just waiting for my advil to kick in because SORE ARM and driving is less desirable than not quite as sore arm and driving. I'm glad my scrip appears to be better. I can definitely tell that the tweak to my left eye astigmatism has improved my clarity, but I still need to see an ophthalmologist about the cataract I'm pretty sure I have in my left eye, and I don't know if anything can even be done about the floaters. Last I read there was nothing to do about them. They look like big particles of dust and sometimes interfere with my ability to focus that eye. Ugh.

So that's my report for today.

ETA: Back from picking up my glasses from Stanton.  Yeah... So I can actually use the computer PRETTY well with my daily wear glasses on.  It's going to take some time to retrain myself to LEAVE MY GLASSES on when I'm reading. Because every single time I go to read something (other than on the screen) I keep shoving my glasses up on my head because I'm SO many years of used to having to do that if I want to see anything. I can focus very well close up now through my lenses even on fine print. I feel at computer distance I can see just a LITTLE better reading the screen in the computer glasses, but I don't actually feel like I NEED a different pair of glasses for that. My mid distance is pretty darn good with my progressive in a way that my old glasses were not.  AND I can see some pretty fine details on the top branches of that tree over there in the back yard of the house a street over from mine (at least) which I COULD do with my old glasses, but not without feeling like my eyes were being sucked out of my head.  I can't tell you the number of times over the last ten years I have told eye doctors over and over and over "My new glasses make me feel like my eye is being sucked out." and being told "You'll get used to it".  No... that is not the right answer.  The right answer was "Let me recheck your prescription and see what went wrong to make you so uncomfortable.  Now I wish I'd been fitted with contacts too, because with this scrip, I could have multi focal lenses and actually READ through them. I needed a +300 before to counter the strength of the prescription, and the highest they went was +250 and now my Add is only +200. Wow.

I don't want to rant about this on Facebook, because I'm still mad about it, and I yet I don't want to offend anyone that might be a coworker. But yesterday a thing happened that really upset me. It upset me a surprising amount and I'm still not over it... So I need to rant about it and get it off my chest.

So I work in a pharmacy store. No need to say which one. Generally speaking I love my job, love my customers, love my coworkers, and feel like the company takes pretty decent care of us. Now since the CDC changed their guidance, to a ludicrous 5 days (corporate pressure anyone?) for people to be out, when they test positive for CoViD-19... What is it? 5 days from the time you test positive? or 5 days after you develop symptoms yourself? I don't know the answer, and when I asked about this at work, they didn't know either. This is the same crap I dealt with in 2020, when NOBODY KNEW ANYTHING, or what to do or how to handle people being out or anything, SO I missed 100% of a month because I MIGHT HAVE had CoViD. We'll never know, because at that time, nobody could get tested unless they were sick enough to be in the ER and I wasn't, and my symptoms at the time were not what they were calling typical (but now they say that a lot of people experience it that way. So when I felt well enough to come back to work, suddenly someone exposed my daughter, who in turn exposed US, so that's another 2 weeks quarantined in 2020 before I ever got to go back to work.

Now we've had CoViD-19 running through our staff. Here is how it goes:

One of our people is out long term. We don't know when they will be well enough to come back if ever.

One is suspected to have CoViD-19, but has shopped for a doctor who won't test them for CoViD-19 but was willing to write a note saying that they have symptoms consistent with 'an upper respiratory infection'. This one refuses to wear a mask, claiming a medical exemption that I can tell you 100% is based in false science. Instead this person wears a face shield which does nothing to protect him or the people around him. This person is also not vaccinated, claiming that because they have already had CoVid-19 that they don't need to be vaccinated. (again, at the very least misleading science.) I like that person but generally speaking avoid being in any kind of contact with them for any period of time. I guess the doctor cleared them to come back to work today (my day off)

Now the third one was out because their parent tested positive for CoViD-19 and they and my coworker both developed symptoms. My coworker did not test and it's been implied that they did not test IN CASE they did not develop symptoms, so they didn't have to miss 5 days of work. Well they DID develop symptoms, and were out for 5 days PER the CDC guidelines. But at that point, I hadn't been told that I'd been told they didn't test positive (and wasn't told it was because they didn't test at all.) HOWEVER, shortly after arriving they asked me if I could cover for them for a few minutes on front registers (NOT MY JOB... NOT SUPPOSED TO DO THAT) So I thought they just needed to go to there rest room, and agreed anyway since we're so short handed right now. Turns out, after I've already brushed past them that this person DID have symptoms of CoViD and did not test... and they want to be relieved because they feel hot and want to go and stand in the cooler for a few minutes. WHAT??? I ask "What? Why do you feel hot?" and the answer "Because I had COVID... Still have it really..." ... no... What THE ACTUAL FUCKERY IS THIS? I'm really flabbergasted at this point. If I had known this was the case, I would have not been any where near this person. and would have covered in the other register... but I was stuck now. In this unclean place with a giant line... UPSET and STUCK there unable to escape.

Because I am shouting, In my TYPERY I can see that this is still pretty upsetting. The thing that upsets me the most is that this person is my friend. My work friend. and they KNOW how careful I have been, and how careful I continue to be. THEY KNOW that I just lost my brother, that I have a 91 year old mother who tries to do everything herself, and that I DID NOT SEE my mother for an entire year because we were TERRIFIED to bring CoViD-19 to her door if we visited her. So now, I don't care HOW slight the chance is that I've been exposed. There is no way I'm going to go see my mom during the next two weeks until I"m 100% sure I'm not carrying. SO MAD about this. I explained to my manager why I was so upset. I'm sure my coworker things I'm being ridiculous and maybe I am... but I'm not putting my mom at risk and I feel VIOLATED that I wasn't told the truth and put myself in ONE SCRAP of risk of infecting my mom when I have been so gods damned careful.

Why do I feel so violated? Because I wasn't given honest information. Because I ended up standing in the fug of a COVID patient UNNECESSARILY because I was not given enough information until it was too late to do anything about it for 15 minutes. and because now, if my mom calls because she NEEDS something. I either have to put her at risk until I know 100% that I'm not, or I have to try to find someone I trust to have been as careful as I've tried to be to go to do the thing for her. Especially since locally now, there are only ME and her 88 year old SISTER to call.

That's why I feel VIOLATED and I'm STILL MAD... But I'm done ranting about it I think. I have to go back to work tomorrow, and hopefully act like nothing happened. I will avoid being in close contact with my coworker (and my other coworker too) until the requisite time *I* feel is safe has passed. Someone (several someones) hasn't been careful, and it wasn't me.

One a lighter note, I've pounded on my keyboard so much that my batteries died. Probably the amount of backspacing I've done because I couldn't see what I was doing.

So frustrating.

So as you may have read, I broke my glasses about a month ago. I got out my backup pair, but man... I can barely tolerate them. I spend most of my day without glasses, and at work I wear them to drive to work and then spend most of the day with them sitting on top of my head (also caught in my hair 90% of the time which the ones I broke really didn't do too often.) So I can't see very well with the old ones. I can't see very well without them. I can see ok to drive, and at a distance, but I can't see up close because the progressive lens has too small of a sweet spot for reading.

Now after 2 or 3 weeks trying to get in where I normally do, I decided I'd had it and went somewhere else. But my glasses won't be ready for at least another week (again... whatever happened to 1 hour or same day glasses. Ugh... SO today I was thinking, well, what if I roll up a ball of tape to where my nose pad would normally sit and just tape it on there for a few days. Hmm? No... I put those glasses on and HOLY SHITE! They are WAY too strong. I don't know how I didn't notice how strong they were. No wonder I've been feeling like I had eye strain all the time. I was REALLY concerned that the new scrip was quite a bit weaker than my current one. But I don't think I am any more. Holy COW... How did I not notice that.

So... Yah... Next Wednesday at the soonest. Writing is nearly impossible. I can't stand having my face right up in the screen all evening. I've been writing a LITTLE bit working on CTT... but it's distracting and a little disorienting not being able to see properly, so I'm generally exhausted by the end of the day and all I do is sit here on my warm blanket and waste time. I only have one scene to write, one to finish the beginning of it, and then a little tweaking and proofreading. I just can't keep my brain on it because the distortion of my left eye (astigmatism) is too much without my glasses even if I have the type set distractingly large.

So there it is. One excuse after another.

My thoughts on Maus by Art Spiegelman being banned from schools in McMinn County Tennessee?  Ok. see I do get it.  We're talking about 8th graders.  13 and 14 year old kids.  I get that. I also feel like some of the reporting is a little disingenuous.  Some are just presenting a boogieman of a book being banned and really glossing over the things the school board members had to say about the decision making process.

( Long discussion with many words here.Collapse )
I bought the complete book with both graphic novels in it.

You know.. so a couple of weeks ago, I broke my glasses. So I went to the same eye doctor i went to the last time I needed glasses. They were old anyway, and I needed new ones before they broke. This was just the stick that broke the camels b... glasses. lol. So when I walked in there, the doctor was out sick, so I scheduled for a week later since I'm only off one weekday a week.  Went to my appointment... Doctor was out sick STILL, (they say they tried to call, but they didn't, and they didn't leave a message or send a text or anything.) So I RESCHEDULED.

Now... Today was my fault, I went a week early, because I forgot my appointment was next week.  Doctor is still out sick, so I can't do a walk in (which is how it's supposed to work anyway.) So I'm  thinking... At this point, I've been two weeks without my glasses, wearing 8 year old glasses that I can't really see that well at varying distances. (but I can see well enough to drive, so I can get to work and wear them on my head the majority of the rest of my day at work.)

Anyway, given he's been out this long, I think I'll be pretty po'd if I waste ANOTHER only weekday off going to an appointment that is cancelled, so I decided to see if I could get in somewhere else. So I did. and I could.  Long story short. I could have already had my glasses by now if I'd gone to Stanton in the first place.  I had a great experience.  I was able to schedule my appointment online at the red light waiting to turn into the parking lot. (Don't worry kids. It's a very long light, which I knew, and I would have put my phone down immediately if it had changed before I was finished.) 2 minutes before the appointment time. lol. 

They were SUPER efficient getting me through all the little machines that do various testing including the "puff of air" machine (That's literally what the technicians were calling it.  I know it's to test for glaucoma), and  then back to the waiting room for I kid you not, long enough to go to the ladies room and sit down.  Then they had me in the doctor room, and my doctor visit was very different.  My eye doctor was on a video screen in a remote location, and he worked all the controls on the device from there. You know the machine you look through and read stuff and then the doctor flips the lenses back and for the "This one? or this one?" flip flap.. ."Number one? Or number two? Are they about the same?". So that was an interesting experience.  Then the same thing for my reading lens, only he DID have to wait for a technician to come in and swing the reading card down, and that did take about 2 minutes while the bell was ringing for her. Either way, it was all really efficient. The doctor didn't get impatient with me when I asked him to flip the lenses a little slower because I do need a second or two to acclimate each time it's flipped. In fact at one point, he stopped and asked me to just close my eyes for a moment and then blink them for a few times before continuing.  I gotta say that was refreshing.

The optician was also really good.  He was an older gentleman.  He was really good example of a good salesman without coming off as pushy at all.  He listened to my preferences, and noted the couple I pointed out and one that I tried on, and then let me browse while he browsed for me as well based on my tastes.  And I have to say he really did come back with some winners.  For my daily wear glasses I picked the first one he picked for me over the top pick I had found myself.  For my computer glasses (this will be a first for me) I picked my top pick over his.  So we both won. lol. He took the time to explain each charge, and how the insurance did or did not effect that. My second pair was 60% off anyway (which is common around here.  Most places have buy one get one anywhere from 50% to 100% off.)

I made sure my pupilary distance was on my prescription and the optician pointed out that it was already there as part of the script (as it should be). Used to be you had to ask for it to get it, and often they would argue with you about whether you needed it, and some places would even try to charge you for it, saying it meant they had to measure as if like they didn't normally do that. Um.. NO... You do normally have to do it and if you DIDN'T measured it for my glasses in the first place, then I'm certainly not buying glasses from you!  Do I buy glasses online? Yes. Yes I do. I have for nearly 20 years now.  But I also generally buy them from the place I got my eyes checked if if they have an optician, and my insurance covers frames, and if I can find frames I like that ARE covered by enough that I can still afford them. But I like options, and my last pair of glasses from Zenni lasted me 4 years before *I* broke them.  They were really good. I could see well up until maybe the last year or so.  So yes, I'll be ordering glasses from them as well so I will have choices.  I'm probably going to order a new pair of sunglasses, as my sunglasses are *6* years old. I can still see fine to drive with them, but it's time to update them.

So that's my little experience with the eye doctor today. lol New glasses in one to two weeks.  (Man whatever happened to same day service on glasses?)

I did not write at all tonight.  NOT ONE WORD. And I'm not going to start now. I wasted way too much time with TurboTax trying to get the free service that my bank links to, but which they claim to have discontinued.  But then they have a DIFFERENT free service for simple taxes (like mine). Only it's NOT... because they will find SOME excuse to try to charge you.  It took an HOUR to go through the questionaire, did not give me the option on not doing state which I have done though I-file for years (also free) until the end, so it wanted me to pay not just the $34 for enhanced plan so they could stick on a schedule which I did not need for a credit which will not make any difference in how much I get back. They also now want to charge me $40 for Ohio filing. LOL! HAHAHAH!

No.

So took went back and started over.  Declined the upgrade everytime they said I should upgrade (for no reason) and then after going through the whole thing again, went back and TOOK OHIO OFF...  and I come up against a paywall again.  No back button, no way forward other than to upgrade, no way to downgrade again unless you clear it and start over.

So, I got on with their useless chatbot and wasted another 20 minutes shouting at it in ALL CAPS about my unpleasant experience. I went back to my banks site and left negative feedback (more politely) about the "service" that I'd experienced at TurboTax that was $80 of "free". I was desperately poor for WAY too many years to let a company nickel and dime me to $80 just because they want to add one more sheet of non-physical digital paper to my return that I don't need.  Just because I CAN pay it doesn't mean I should, and I didn't.

I went back to IRS.gov and followed the link from Free File back to ezTaxReturns.com which is the FIRST PLACE I ever did my taxes online, when free file first became a thing.  I'd only been using TurboTax because of the deal my bank was supposed to be getting for us.  In 20 minutes I had done what it took an hour to do the first time on TurboTax, and my Federal taxes are filed. DONE. January 21.  Oh and the biggest laugh? TurboTax likes to brag "The biggest return guaranteed" well, not if you bite a big $80 chunk off it it's not.  I got the exact same return for free... with no bite missing out of it.

Ohio I-File opens on January 24, and I'll get that done too.

I ain't playing.

So Chapter 18 - What If?  It's finally taking shape.  It's 4 scenes (really 3, but the first one has a shift in PoV and a small amount of napping, that I split into two scenes. 


I finished Scene 1 last night. (Just barely) It's a lot of conversation. lol. It's not really much of anything in the way of consequential conversation. I think I'm just trying to give a feel of the comfort these two have with each other when there are no outside mitigating factors to interfere with their interactions. The idea that they can poke fun at each other, laugh and joke in a very casual way appeals to me on many levels.  So that took severals days of kind of mapping it out, acting it out in my head to get a feel for it... Funny thing is, I found that once I could get myself settled to actually write it, It came along pretty easily.  So last night I finished it. Adjusted the passage of time, and figured out the lead in to scene two.

Tonight, I finished Scene 2.  That was supposed to be about a 10 minute scene, and I think it was. Ed gets a couple of minutes to spend in his head space by himself and mull over a couple of things that he already knew about his feelings, and also something he is just discovering, and maybe something Audey said to him earlier just sank in pretty thoroughly.  I kind of picture it like a bead of water sitting on top of some dry soil, it's surface tension as yet holding it together and keeping it sitting on the surface. That's the seed Audey planted, and Ed's brain is the soil.  So something crossed his mind, and the surface tension on that water broke and it sank into the soil.

So Scene 3 is mapped out... sketched.  But I haven't written much of it. The sketch has a few snatches of conversation.  It's intent is mostly to introduce Al's girlfriend, Molly.  Now... Al says Molly looks like a movie star. lol... and in my head, she has a certain hairstyle and look, and so the other night while allegedly writing in my head, I searched the web for someone with that hairstyle. When  finally started zeroing in on it, a girl with that exact style and curling in that exact way, I realized that a lot of the photos I was clipping looked like the same girl... and that not only her hairstyle resembled Molly's, but her face too.  so I dug a little deeper into the photo that had first caught my eye, and it turns out she WAS a movie star back in the 1920s. So  it turns out that Molly looks like Marion Davies did when she was Molly's age.  But I'm told by both of them that Molly's brows are styled more naturally, that she is a dark brunette (and Mx. Davies was often a blonde) and that she doesn't wear her lipstick quite that pointed. lol.


Scene 4 has been sketched out for a while. (really they have all been sketched out) and has been mostly written for a week or two. This is the scene with the most meat in it. lol. You'll see.  I just need to decide how exactly to square it off and finish it to my satisfaction. It's been a long time coming. It also has some implied tie backs to One Kiss: Goodbye, which My!Ed and My!Winry both agree happened, and Ed probably thinks that's why he's feeling so awkward now.

Now it's bedtime. Time to go to bed.

My planned activity for today was as follows,

1) Go to the eye doctor and get my eyes checked and order new glasses to replace my broken ones. 12:30 pm

2) Sit around a little while and maybe have a nice nap.

3) Have some supper

4) Go up to the Creation Room and goof off some more.

5) Finish Chapter 18 of CTT and post it (hopefully)

6) Maybe have some time to waste down some rabbit hole on Ancestry before bedtime

How my day actually went?

1) Go to work, because I forgot that I had a basket of stuff I meant to buy on my way out yesterday. Buy stuff:

2) Go to the eye doctor and reschedule my appointment in person because the doctor is STILL out sick. Next available appointment on my day off two weeks hence.  Minimum time before having new glasses now? 3 weeks.

3) Sit around a short while... No nap.

4) Spend 2 or 3 hours putting the window insert in the dining room window (this is the last big 105 year old sash window downstairs that hasn't been replaced with a new double tilt sash window.  Cleaning thoroughly under the big cube unit (which I moved out from in front of the window put the insert into it.) vacuuming and scrubbing all the floors in the dining room because they are just GROSS. Switching the big cube unit with the buffet table because the big buffet table is actually EASIER to move from in front of the window than the cube. Polish all the wood flooring in the dining room because it looks worn and dull.  Tighten up the legs of the table and chairs Put the rest of the furniture back where it belongs.  I did enlist help from marynachaotica in the furniture moving and tightening part.

5) Have supper. (ok. I got to do that an hour later than intended.)

6) Try to figure out why Outlook is getting duplicates of some (most) of my emails from Gmail Pop3. (Don't know if this was successful yet or not.) Set up 3 more filters, and unsubscribe from another 10 mailing lists I don't need and probably didn't sign up for.

7) Complain on LJ about how I didn't follow my own guidelines for my day off, because the first thing on the list ended up messed up and threw off everything else.

8) Start thinking about Chapter 18 of CTT at 20:42 hours... Bedtime?  01:30

I'm probably not going to finish it today either. I also want to eat cookies.

Oh. Sorry guys! lol. I'm not going to get it posted today as expected.  I have just wasted too much time looking at cool things like ceramic fire balls and now it's 23:25, and I'm NOT going to finish this in 35 minutes and post it.  I had the outline. The outline is done. It's already mapped into yWriter (which I also wasted a fair amount of time fiddling around with the last few days too, because it's an upgraded version that works a little different from what I'm used to, and certainly more to play with on yW7 than on yW2, which was what I was using earlier.  So I decided to get used to it by setting up a project for this story, with character charts and so on too. Sketched out the scenes, thought a little more about what Molly looks like.  I've got a good picture in my mind now.  I wish I could draw people. lol. Someone draw me a Molly and I'll draw you a house

Anyway, tomorrow is my day off, and I have intentionally planned very little. We're expecting snow anyway, and frankly, I'm still suffering from exhaustion. I have a bazillion loads of laundry to do, and I need to tape the winter window frame into the dining room window if I'm up to it. 

Otherwise, I'll be concentrating on Chasing the Trail - Chapter 18: What If...

I've mentioned that in October my brother passed away unexpectedly.  It's been a rough few months since then. Helping to deal with his estate as much as I can while working full time in retail. lol.  His house was listed before (in my opinion) we were really ready to do that, and surprise, it sold the same day it was listed.  So tomorrow is the closing, and I don't know if arrangements have been made between Mom, the Lawyer and the Buyer about my brother's truck and his camper.  I can go get the truck if Mom wants me too, but I don't know about driving it with a big heavy camper attached to it though. I'm pretty sure I don't know how to park it even if I can manage driving an unfamiliar truck with a giant haul attached to it. I guess she would have mentioned it if she needed me to do that.  With the closing, that's one big stress that will be off my mind.

Ugh... I need this stress to totally ramp down.  My injured ankle, my brother just dropping dead like that. Me getting sick and still feeling like I haven't fully recovered from that.  A doctor who is unreachable and whose assistant won't return calls (That office doesn't know they're fired. As soon as I find another GI doctor). His house, WINTER, The holidays (work), exit from the holidays (work) and spring resets (work). I had planned to take a vacation right before all this happened and the world started running so fast, I didn't get my request in and then it was too late. I was sick all last week with whatever stupid stomach bug going around. Then this morning I wake up dizzy because Migraine sometimes works that way for me.  So I need less stress. I wish I could retire already. lol. I love my job, but that would be one less stress. I need a 30 hour day and only have 24 to squeeze everything into.

So here's a little bit of a funny story. Roger had a big jug of pennies in his living room, and mom mentioned it several times, so I mentioned it to the person who helped me pick up the flatbed trailer and he put it in my car for me, (but I didn't actually realize he'd done it until later). So I told my mom about it today and said that I didn't know what to do with it, or how to get it out of the car unless my daughter can lift it. (Of course I guess we could dump a bunch of the pennies out of it, move it and then put the pennies back in.) so I asked if she though we could coinstar the pennies.  She kind of laughed and told me she didn't really want to do anything with it. She just thought she would set it next to her TV stand like he had it at his house.  Here, I thought she was worried about the money in it, because she kept mentioning it.  Turns out she didn't care about the money. She just wanted it for sentimental reasons as a memento.  So at least I did get it. Now it's just a matter of getting it out of the car.

At work, we have the big cosmetics wall spring reset coming up in a few days. So I hopefully will get some vacation time in. You can laugh about me putting WINTER as a stressor, but it definitely is for me. It's a HUGE stressor for me and every year it's more difficult for me to get through Winter.  I don't know if I should be taking a D3 boost or what. I feel like I never see the sun any more, or if I do it's while I'm inside at work. I can go outside for 1 minute, but it's not like I can just stand outside in the cold half the day if the sun is out. lol.  I'll be okay. I just need to get past the big stress points of WINTER. and get some vacation.  The upshot is that I do earn my paid time off at the maximum amount now.  So I can take a week now, and by summer I'll have 2 more weeks and another week by fall to get into the right mindset to face WINTER again.

cornerofmadness and evil_little_dog I retrieved edward_elric's LiveJournal lol.  It wasn't easy. I couldn't remember any of his info, but I managed to figure it out enough to send a password link back to my secondary email and reset his. So in response to gateways_2_dawn question circa 2008, Ed is in if anyone else wants to play, or restart.  It probably needs to move a little slower, but I updated Edward's email as well.

So... I got this big monitor and now it's possible to watch stuff on one side and do stuff on the other.  So I was watching FMA 2003 Episode 38 a little while ago. The episode is mostly filler even to the alternate story that was told in 2003 to be honest. Only a few references of any importance occur. So in this episode Ed and Al arrive in some rando town after their vehicle breaks down, and the two of them get into a fight.  Eventually, towards the end of the episode at sundown, Ed goes looking for Al. Al is sitting down by the river just like he would do in Resembool when they were little kids.  Next to him are three small toys he has transmuted out of the riverbank clay.  1) a horse (initially shown to be fancy and detailed in full tack) 2) a simple touring style car of the time period.  3) (I assume this is the first one he made) looks to me like a poop emoji. Lol

Now I'm wondering if I ever noticed that before, and if not, why didn't I? and if I did, why didn't I remember it?

Well, I've mostly got my new computer set up. Of course I get to come down with some annoying bug this week and feel like crap all week... (Not CoViD-19... just stupid guts made super delicate and susceptible to the slightest little thing by a lengthy period of very high stress allowing me to get some stupid bug.  I'm not feeling well enough to go to work, but mostly not sick enough to stay in bed all day.  So in the interim of the time I don't feel to crappy to do ANYTHING at ALL, I sit here and work on setting up my computer or writing.

So... For the most part, the computer is set up the way I want it.  It's now been a matter of finally transferring data from different places.  Now my office computer Aka Silver Drake becomes the secondary computer.  So files from there are copied here. It never had all my files in the first place. That was done weeks ago, and the thumb drive used for that transfer was all moved onto the Vaio aka The Dragonette.

The Dragonette, I only moved a limited number of files to in the first place since I only intended to continue using it for writing, so the writing files of which were the most up to date are moved to the Dragonfly. The music files I found on the Dragonette are also moved to Dragonfly now, and I sorted them as well. So now the Vaio is finished.

Last I guess is going to be moving things that have remained on the Fire Drake computer (predecessor to the Silver Drake) which I never moved all of completely.  Mostly this is Photos, Music, Artwork, and Manga. lol... SO much that It's going to take several trips back and forth with the thumb drive.  Right now... Loading Manga, Writing I did not transfer in the first place, and my other eBooks.  Music is probably going to be the biggest. I'm 100% sure that the music I moved from the Vaio was minimal, because it's only what I found on my backup CD's and put on to listen to.  I mean, I have to wonder how much of The Crüxshadows I'm going to be able to listen to on Amazon Music! Lol And I have quite a lot of it. So the transfer goes on. The trick here is that the FireDrake (aptly named) Overheats EASILY, so I have to be careful to make sure it doesn't get overloaded while copying.  It's on the fan, and it's fairly chilly up here (I have a heated blankey. But I have to really watch what it's doing. It already went to sleep once on me.

Meanwhile, I am working on Chapter 18 - What If...  I set a soft deadline for January 15 and I intend to try to meet it. I decided to start using yWriter7 to work on this. I already use it when I'm working on Gaia's Song, but I had never really thought to use it for something more 'trivial'. lol.  But I think it's going to be helpful to stay organized too. 

I hope so, because I've spent a good part of my evening researching stuff. lol