So, got paid for the scutwork last week. I forget which day but basically I messaged Neighbor to ask about going to the dump because he hadn’t said anything about the weekly trash haul but I thought there probably wasn’t enough for him to want to bother with. I was right, but me asking jogged his memory and he sent the $40. So I got my phone bill paid and also laid in some supplies and got a tub of spreadable cream cheese. Nice to have something a little bit different.
Neighbor only got part of the meat haul last night. He’s going back to Oregon tonight to snag the rest of it. I got lucky, though. If I don’t get any more food tonight, I got enough last night that I’ll be okay for the week. And we already got two scutwork items, so that’s $20 I know I’m getting, and that’ll see me through to next week. At this point I’m hoping for more frozen items. I was really running on fumes with the food supply but then realized I’d forgotten about a couple packs of boneless pork chops in the freezer, which for a while I had thought were L’s. But I get a sense she’s not that crazy about pork if it’s not bacon. Seems to prefer lamb. I also like lamb, but I can take it or leave it. So she gets hers and I get mine. It’s cool. I want to branch out a bit with seasoning — I’m thinking that if I can get about $20 ahead some week soon, I may order Roastmary for the first time in thirty fucking years (just about). Because it’s still available! This stuff is incredible. I’ve done up pork chops with it before and they were just [chef’s kiss]. Sooooo we’ll see.
I am thinking I’m going to wean off caffeine. L told me weeks ago that she generally avoids it because something had dried up for her — saliva? tear production? both? — and her doctor told her that can happen in menopausal women on caffeine. Apparently in her case, quitting it helped. I know I can still produce tears because my eyes are not constantly red, and I still produce saliva, but everything feels drier in my face than it used to. Plus, me being this dependent on caffeine es no bueno. I don’t seem to get serious headaches anymore — my brain’s few attempts to kick up a migraine since I got here have been feeble at best — but caffeine withdrawal used to be a trigger for them and I don’t want to find out the hard way if that’s still true. But anyway, I found an affordable way to do the weaning without investing in jars of instant for the withdrawal process. I will likely still do morning coffee after that, but just the three cups like I’m doing now, and with cinnamon. I love that shit.
Aunt Flo’s still trying to make up her literally bloody mind whether she’s going to drop in. Hope either she gets the fuck on with it later this week (after I get paid again, PLEASE, though I think I could manage with what’s in the account plus SpotMe if I had to) or goes the fuck away for another two or three months, because there will be a hot tub on premises for the meeting later this month and I’ll be fucked if I have to opt out. Yes, yes, I know what they say about hot tubs and diabetics. That’s people with neuropathy at risk of burns. I don’t have neuropathy, so fuck you. But I have rotten luck with tampons, even the super ones, so if Aunt Flo is harassing me that week then I’ll have to find something else to do when everyone’s in there. Knitting, probably. Why the hell not.
Speaking of which. I have been debating with myself for months on what to do with my remaining yarn. God — for years, I had both an impressive book collection AND an impressive yarn collection. Both all gone now. Handful of books left, my favorite yarns left, not a lot in either case. I need to make things from the yarn and get it gone. Probably will make them for sale. Mentioning this out loud on Facebook may have landed me some work making hats for a specific person, but we’ll see if she ever gets back to me about it. I’m not getting my hopes up. And this is one of many reasons I don’t normally open myself to commissions. People flake, even with the best of intentions. Sometimes they wait til you’re done to flake. That’s the absolute fucking worst. I got lucky once in that I was able to sell a requested pair of socks I knitted (thanks so fucking much, LaRay… fuck off) to a different person via Etsy when the original customer didn’t follow through. Won’t always be able to do that. Or, I dunno, I guess we’ll see.
But ANYWAY, so I’m finally knitting that damned llama yarn. Hats. Alpaca felts really easily, and llama wool is close enough to alpaca that I didn’t want to chance it as mittens or something. Hats involve less friction in the first place. I figure I can probably get about three hats out of my llama supply, and then I can go on to the alpaca. I have four colors of the alpaca, so I’m hoping to do some striping or some other kind of color change. I may not even use all the llama by itself because one of the alpaca colors is brown (the others are two shades of gray and a black), and I may add in a llama stripe to a brown alpaca hat or something. We’ll see.
Lots of brouhaha going on because they’re letting men compete in women’s sports in the Olympics this year. Worst of all, they allowed them into women’s boxing. I had some choice words about that on my Substack, and this is the most popular post I’ve published there yet. I should point out I’ve got about 115 subscribers right now and, last I looked, there are 57 likes on that post. I doubt everyone who liked the post is a subscriber, but since I put it up I’ve been getting daily emails about new free subscribers. So something is going on. I’m a little weirded out, but it’s pretty cool, too. I just wish I’d get that kind of engagement for other things I write. This is just where we are right now. People are sick of being lied to. It’s not even about being anti-gay. The concept of trans, at least as currently applied, is homophobic as hell and a lot of gay men and lesbians are pissed the fuck off about it, and lots of straight people are pissed off on their behalf as well. Lesbians being overrepresented in women’s sports, this is becoming twice as harmful to them. The “Pride” crowd does not give one single sweet shit. This will not end well.
I need to get on the ball with my two women-related projects. I’m dragging feet because I fear putting in effort only for it to go nowhere. Like everything else in my life. If anyone ever wonders why it seems like I don’t do anything, it’s because every time I do something it gets fucking ignored, UNLESS it is a negative or bad thing, and then that’s what I become known for. Fucking bullshit. I know this happens to women a lot, but there’s no fucking excuse. If Charles fucking Manson could get married in prison to a woman he never met outside of it, y’all can start noticing when I do good and/or useful things. I don’t need a prize or any fucking thing like that. I just need to not exist in a vacuum. It has really done a number on my mental health over the course of my life. My parents never should have built me up as The Smart Kid. No one gives two fucks whether a woman is smart. Ever. At best, they notice our work and fucking steal it. But usually, we just don’t exist.
But I should do it anyway. In case it turns out that THIS TIME I’m wrong.
Still pleased as hell that S referred readers to me. That was amazing. Once in a very great while a woman will call attention to whatever I’m doing but normally, dudes don’t bother. And you know what? I’m going to go thank him. I don’t think I did that explicitly enough and directly enough before. Time to fix it.