Look Away, Ye Of Modest Taste!

I'mma mention the word "bra" here... which means I'm remotely talking about boobies... sorry Mom.

So I have this weird, few month old, shoulder... thing.  (Gonna see someone tomorrow to hopefully get some answers, no one has had any so far!)  And it means my right arm has some restricted movements.  One of which is the motion it takes to fasten up a bra.

It's fine with my regular bra, but I have a sports bra that is extra, I dunno.. sportily reinforced?  So it has more hooks and takes more pressure to fasten.  Which, sometimes I can't quite get my arm to do.

The other day, I was struggling to get it done up and got frustrated and remembered I had another sports bra somewhere in my gym bag... like my backup one.  I'd forgotten that I'd already taken the backup one out, so kept digging through and not finding it.  But then... at the bottom of my bag, I discovered a sports bra I didn't even remember I had!  FREE BRA!

Well, I mean, it wasn't free when I bought it but since I totally forgot about it it was like getting a bra for free!  I just won a free bra, yay!!!

Plus, I was able to do that one up so yay for that!

Like A Tree!

I figure I *must* be growing.  Taller.

Because that's the only way the field of my vision can be getting worse and worse, right?

I know I mentioned it before, but after a fix from a manufacturer recall, my driver's seat is higher than it used to be and it restricts my vision.

Well, probably because I'm paying attention to it now, I realize I have a lot of blind spots out my front window!  Not even the "side" blind spots we're used to thinking of, but like... forward ones!

The side airbag window thingies are a blindspot, the rear view mirror is now a blind spot on certain streets/situations and it's like I said, I must just be getting taller, right?

So I'm probably a little more cautious at stops and around corners and that's ok, maybe we all could be a little more cautious... I know the lady who nearly drove into pedestrian me could be.  Ahem!

Whoops. Double Whoops!

I have an (older) Apple laptop, and some of you who do as well, may know the frustration of the charger cords.  They are absolutely the weak point of these devices and constantly fray and break.  Especially, it seems, for me, probably due to the angle of my cord compared to where it has to plug in and where I spend most of my time.

So because this part breaks so much, I get tired of paying the $100 for the replacement I know isn't going to live all that long.  Last time I got a replacement I tried to fortify the break point, but it still went.  And then I ordered a slightly cheaper one off of Amazon.  It didn't come from apple, but arrived with all apple branding, so... I figured it was real enough.  *shrug*

It frayed as well, and this time the protective coating was only slightly split so I left it for a while, intending to get some electrical tape to seal it up for a while.

Which is why I was not so happy to hear and see it spark when I went to plug it in the other night.

ZAP ZAP! is not a sound I really like to hear around electricity... so after seeing the spark happen again, I went and directly unplugged it from the outlet and shut off the laptop for the night.

I went in to London Drugs (closest store that sells them, same price as apple, but faster, since no need to wait for delivery) and brought my old, fire-worthy charger and they got me the replacement.

I took it home and it didn't quite fit properly, ugh.  I looked it up and I had a higher wattage than my computer needed, but the internet said that wasn't a problem.  But the not fitting was... I figured, so I went back the next day and explained the issue... it didn't quite fit AND was the wrong wattage (power... amperage?  I dunno) So the guy said he figured it was the wrong style and gave me the different style of charger.

Which... I got home and?  Didn't fit at all.  Le sigh.  Back I went.  With the page from apple on my phone saying precisely which one matched my computer.

And it wobbled too.  Ugh!  What on earth was going on here?

And then I thought that maybe just maybe I should check the port itself... and, sure enough, there was a little blob of... who knows, gunk of some kind that was meaning the charger wasn't sitting flush.  Whoops, my bad!

So not only did I come close to possibly starting an electrical fire, I also thought something wasn't working when it was, it was just gooped up.  So yeah... cleaned out that charger port, didn't I?

Jacob Two-Two

For some reason using this photo is making me laugh.  We'll not analyze it too much..... it's literally nothing to do with anything!

Except... I am technically talking about two things.  Two of the same thing.... like these crows!  CAW, CAW!  (ahem)

So for whatever reason, I decided to try growing a couple of avocado seeds.  Again, not particularly sure of why other than "I kind of want to see if I can do this" I guess?

I googled the thing and so now I have two avodaco seeds stuck with toothpicks sitting half in water.  Doing.. nothing yet!

It's kind of funny when I think about it though because what I read said it'll take weeks to show any signs, if at all, and that then it'll take years to grow and even then they might never bear fruit.  And here was I hoping for free avodacos! (pretty much joking there)

I figured other than taking up a couple of glasses for a while, it'll do no harm and I get to have my own little attempt at growing.  I'm still enjoying my baby spider plants and watching them grow so thought I'd try something different.  No harm if they don't do anything, but I'll give them a while yet!

I Knew What I Meant!

Me, to the waiter, letting him know it's my Dad's birthday:  Oh and someone got another day older today!

Waiter:  Well, I think we all did?

Me:  (thinking... crap... right...)  Ha ha yes!  (sigh)

Don't worry, he knew what I meant too, but happy day older day to all of you too!  (sigh)

Confession

"Hate" is a very strong word so I try not to use it, at least not out loud like this so.... I will say something else instead.

I strongly un-like yoga.

I dislike the doing of it a great deal.  I think I always have.  It's possible I always will?

At some point in my life, before I ever tried yoga, I thought it looked like this wonderful, and I'm embarrassed to say, easy thing.  I always saw yoga videos or photos of people in poses by the ocean, or on grass on a hilltop.  Or, smiling serenely on a mountain or something.  So, unlike shots of athletes competing, sweating and grimacing away, I figure I came to the conclusion that yoga was... you know, relaxed/relaxing and you just needed to learn to be bendy and twisty and stretchy!

Sigh.

See, I, for health reasons... and "health reasons" has a long-legged story behind it (yes, I made that term up, thanks) so we'll leave it for now, but for health reasons I'm trying to do yoga quite regularly for a time.

I've done yoga before.  A class or two here and there... a video here and there.  Another video.  A youtube video.  Another class...  I even had a 10 class punch card for a while.  I think I recycled it a couple of years ago with four punches left to go.... but yoga has always been a bit of a "should do that again" for me.

C-Dawg and I had some time off together a couple of years back and leading up to it we said we'd do yoga together every day!  But we didn't.  Because, you know, life.  And.... effort.

But in the last couple of weeks I've done a handful of yoga classes and a video at home (I'd forgotten about that as I didn't count it in my tracking ha!) and I do.  not.  like.

I find the classes extremely challenging.  Difficult.  Hard hard work!

Which, all exercise is really, I figure... but maybe especially because I'm not as bendy and twisty as I'd like to be right now, and because of a shoulder/arm.. weirdness right now, I'm finding myself asking "is it over yet?" when the class is pretty much a couple of minutes in.

"So why on earth are you doing this then?!" I hear some of you ask.

Well, because I genuinely feel a whole lot better and calmer and more relaxed after.

Damnit.

So I'm telling myself it's just like any other form of exercise... I don't enjoy it while doing it.  Cardio I very much un-like, doing the exercises a trainer would put me through I generally un-like.  And so yoga?  It's not all that different from the other things I un-like.

I do feel good after most exercise, but it's also the mind-body connection and the perhaps even potentially spiritual side of yoga, or at least the "care for yourself and your body" side that I'm wanting to have more of in my life.

It was suggested to me that I try yoga for 30 days and that it was highly likely I'd see positive benefits in a number of different ways from that.  So that's close to what I'm, in theory, working up to.

I say "close" because I don't want to put pressure on myself to do it every day.  Life happens, and perfection is not all that healthy of a thing to pursue.  And right now I'm not able to do every day.  My body isn't up to it and I really really don't want an injury of any sort, so I'm taking it easy.  And I don't do ALL the things.  I rest when I need to, and I don't do the poses that my shoulder/arm can't quite do.  So I'm taking care of my body.. while doing this thing I un-like that is going to take care of my body.  (that makes sense, I swear!)

But yes.... I confess.  I find yoga extremely hard work and do not enjoy the doing of it.  Yet.

I suppose I hold out hope that at some point that might change.  But I believe, like with most exercise, it'll be the "after" yoga effects I start to crave rather than the during.












Oh, and PS  I'm in to see a physio next week about the arm thing... hoping for some healing there for sure!

The Internet Age

One of the things I've always been aware of, and tried to manage in what may only be a token way, is not revealing too much information about myself online.

Like some of you, I've been online, or using the internet, or whatever we say, for far longer than FB has, or even google.  I've been online since the days of BBSes and chat rooms and dial up.  (I know, some youngster just gasped, right?)  And in all that time, I've always wanted to keep my *self* self as private as possible. 

Perhaps it stems from starting out all those years ago (decades???) when it was new to all of us and it was half expected you were lying.  (ASL?  Female, 22, Los Angeles cuz doesn't that sound way cooler than whatever else?)  There also wasn't much in terms of photo sharing back then... too much bandwidth involved... or something like that, it wasn't really a thing. 

I know when Facebook gained traction and popularity people were all excited to find their friends from highschool they'd lost contact with, or something like that.  I?  Wasn't.  I was happy to be in a different town and away from that.  And I had addresses and emails for the few I did want to keep up with.

When I started a blog, I didn't feel like having people from highschool, or work, or family reading whatever stupid, or private thoughts I wanted to share, so I made an anonymous blog, just like all of my other online ventures.  I've talked about it a fair amount here, but I always made an effort to write AS IF everyone in my life would or was reading, and that meant there was a lot I kept to myself.  Most notably work, I suppose.  Because, yeah, I was also online for the start of the blog explosion.  And I watched people get fired from their jobs because of what they said on their blog.  We still see that with blogs and FB posts, but when I saw it happen "way back when", I made a mental note to be mindful.  I think more people should be really.  I mean, so your boss sucks and is a jerk.  Do you complain about them in the breakroom?  Probably.  Might that get back to your boss and get you in hot water?  Possibly.  But, to me, to post publicly "my boss is a jerk" when your profile lets everyone know you work at the McDonalds in Hovertown, well, that's going to get back to your boss, and you'd better hope you're ok with having that conversation.  "Yeah, Steve, you're a jerk of a boss and I've already talked to HR/corporate about it, I should have told you to your face first, but then I'd not have gotten those sweet, sweet internet karma points, you know?"

Anyway, I digress...  I've had a hard and fast rule about not talking about work.  To give myself another layer of supposed anonymity, but also to protect said work as much as possible.  Because yeah, I've had bosses who were jerk-like, etc etc but I don't think airing that publicly will change anything, and would just make matters harder and uglier.  But, man oh man, work has been such an integral part of what's to talk about in my world I kind of backed myself into a corner.  And then things in my life got weirdly worse and harder and I kept feeling backed into that corner... even Jason clearly said "don't blog about this, it'd be a bad bad idea."

Jason, I have to hope, may have been overly cautious, but nevertheless, it's been a long while since I've written openly about my life, which means not much writing at all.  (As I've mentioned repeatedly, hi!)  And as I've mentioned a few times over the last while, I'm still trying to find a way to open up and talk about .... things.  But it's more of a big deal in my head than I'd like it to be.

But I also know there's a freedom in being honest about being human.  And that being honest also allows for connection, and I've discovered over the years, can also lead to helping others feel a little less alone.  Which is such a lovely, unexpected feeling.

But for me, unless there is a financial need for it (ie, I become a published author and so need to have my face/name out there, etc) I won't be starting a website blasting my name/photo... ASL, you know?  And if I do, at some point, choose, or am "forced" to put myself out there, I imagine I'll hate it and will cringe and wait for the sky to fall and then after a while, notice that no one really cares.  (I figure)

Still... the internet age is weird.  I'm not thrilled to be living in it, although I *am* thrilled to have existed before it.  It's confusing to me how many people are seemingly surprised and shocked by the revelations of this "data breach" or that "information loss" and are horrified at just how much we are tracked.  And how much about our lives is known.. in databases all over the world.  Sure, it's cute to see photos of your puppy and for us to connect over a band we both love, but... well, anyway, this is more of a discussion than I feel like getting into on a Monday morning, you know?

Not sure what the point was of this post, I think I got carried away on a train of thought or two somewhere in there.

Have a good week, y'all.  I hope to talk to you sooner rather than not, but no promises!

GAH!!!

Okokokok so I really don't want to talk about this because I might vomit but I'm going to talk about it because, well, I just. GAH!

It's not actually really a big deal, I'm just currently in the aftermath but I bought some raspberries Saturday and when I went to rinse them off there was a bug!  A long like.. meal worm, caterpillar legs bug!

I didn't eat it, I didn't even take them out of the container and I'm all like yay, no pesticides or something but still.  I WANNA PRETEND ALL FRUIT IS PURE AND CLEAN AAAAAAH!

I think it might be worse for my brain because raspberries have that hole in the middle and you know, maybe... things... hide, but I always wash mine but now maybe I should just never eat fruit again!

No, no, it's ok... it's ok... and um, yeah, I just... there probably were pesticides but now all I can think of is bugs and bug germs and little bug feet and I know it's just nature but I just wanted some fruit man!

So now that I've talked about it, we're not talking about it ok?  K.  Cuz I don't wanna vomit and the more I think about it the weirder my stomach feels... LALALALALALALALAAAAAA

Pay No Attention To The Man Behind The Curtain

Look, it's a blog!  See!  And this here is a post!  (ooooh)  With a photo! (aaaaahhhh)  And, you're reading words right now.... that were typed out just so you could read them!  WOW!  I know, right?

(Also, I'm totally trying to figure out what it is that's reflected in this puddle... streetlight?  Pant leg?  I think I see a wheel?)

(Double also, I sneezed so hard and out of nowhere that it actually knocked me into a wall, so that's a thing apparently)

(Happy May!)

(Updated to add:  I went and blew up the photo... it's the edge of a sidewalk and a telephone type pole with a white wire of some kind.  Ta da!)