In the event, printing from the web at the library (open now on Sunday: thank you Mayor Chow) is a piece of cake. They give you a slip of paper with the instructions all printed out for the aged techno-illiterates like myself. I was even able to do it from my phone, go me. Only possible glitch is when you're told your order is in queue and the paper says Come back within 24 hours to pick it up. It's in queue with nothing ahead of it, so go ahead and swipe your library card and press print. I only got two copies and perhaps should have made three. Blood requisitions have a six month expiry from date ordered and I go every three months, so I'd have to get blood taken before January 8. Then again, if we have another winter like the last one, I will be going to neither the library nor the lab until spring.
Pleased with myself, I had my one restaurant meal/ alcoholic drink of the week at Pour Boy, which was pleasant. The day was mid-20s/ high 70s dry so I was OK wearing a tshirt, not something I normally do in July. A thin tshirt, but still. Another heat wave starts tomorrow so getting to the lab will remain on my I Would Prefer Not list, but will anyway.
Drinking lots of water to kill the allergy cough and flush the water weight is all very well, but I'm going to have to time it better. The flushing tends to happen overnight and I am unlimber first thing in the morning so the dash down the hall is not always successful. Thus: no water after 8 pm, and we will see how that goes.
Slept in to noon and dreamed about my room in !not the real Heiwadai residence,more like my parents' room at Bedford, where I was packing to go home and despairing about the drawers full to bursting with clothes, how will I ever get them into a suitcase. And then suddenly I had a roommate that I had never noticed in the three years I'd been living there but she introduced herself and said don't mind me I'll be away for the weekend. And wondering where someone else was, and being told Oh she's gone to Halifax, which was only a couple of provinces over even though we were also in Japan.
I could have hone to the library but settled instead on no.2 on my Bartleby 'I would prefer not' list of To Dos, and went to the laundromat instead. So am well-stocked with towels and sheets and face cloths and two pairs of sleep pants. Place was mostly empty but young guy came to get his stuff from the dryer, took it out, then came over to me sheepishly to ask if I had an extra quarter because some of it was still not dry. I looked over at his bedding and gave him fifty cents because quilts need that much time.
The Dear Bell subscriber scam calls are never ending. In an attempt to make them stop I started pressing one to speak to a representative. The robocall says they'll replace your router with a fast fibre optic one, but when you talk to a scammer, they immediately start on 'we have noticed suspicious activity on your router' in an attempt to get you to DL something onto your computer. I insist that there's nothing wrong with my current router but I want, no I insist, that they come to my house as promised to install the fibre optic whatever. The men will hang up at once but the women keep trying to reason with me, and I get to talk over them demanding they bring me the router they promised me. If nothing else it at least keeps one agent busy not scamming someone else for a few minutes.
For the second time this year I knocked my waterpik off the sink onto the floor and broke it, and for the second time the broken piece disappeared into a black hole so I couldn't see if it was fixable so for the second time I went up to Loblaws and bought a new one for close to $100. That thing now stays in the corner and if I'm cleaning it goes on the hall table.
Two young raccoons were climbing my cherry tree the other evening and, I assume, nibbling on the desiccated fruit that remains. Fine: means I can start using the washline again. Not that I care to have raccoons and their toxic poo in my garden but I suppose it's better than the coyotes that have the neighbouring FBs in a tizzy. At least one pair has been denning beside an empty house and the frequent sightings have some people losing their minds, because the adults keep warning dogwalkers, and more to the point their tiny dogs, away, sometimes viciously. The most anti-coyote voice ('Remove them! Put them in an enclosure!') is the woman who was delighted when KFC closed because she was so concerned about people eating unhealthy food. People keep telling her to be quiet but of course she won't be.
Walking up the street this evening I counted three doggie bags left on the sidewalk at various points, something of a record. They're from irresponsible dog walkers who dropped them in other people's green bins after the garbage guys came through, and the owners of the green bins removed them when they came home because who wants someone else's dog poo in your bin in this weather? Being scratchy myself from allergies and humidity (am certain there's mould in my basement coming up the vents) I might wish coyotes on the dogs of said walkers, but it's not the dogs' fault that people are, well, shit.
The forecast widely scattered thunderstorms morphed into a severe thunderstorm warning and considerable rain, scotching any idea I might have had about going out or ordering in. The thunder itself considerately remained distant but the accompanying pressure changes plus allergies brought on enough of a headache that I stayed doped for most of the afternoon on sinutabs and Pepsi.
Sent Witch King back to the waiting readers and consoled myself with the Kakuriyo manga which of course segues nicely into 100 Demons land. Last night I hacked through that first story in vol. 28 and now sort of have an idea what happened. But I have no notion what it was Uncle Kai took from the cult house and equally no idea what his semi-psychic coworker took from that other house-- he said it was a cat but Kai says You realize now it's not a cat? Oh no, he actually says 'You realize it's not something you can raise in an apartment'. But guy is seen feeding it cat food. No idea what's up with the bell that the coworker buys for his ?cat? for his girlfriend? that disperses ghosts when they come knocking on the door. Only a vague idea what's up with coworker's mother who was supposed to have run off but who may be a ghost herself. This is Ima-sensei at her most obscure. And memory says 28 is an obscure volume all round. Argh.
Hot again but drier than forecast and breezy as well, so I was fine getting up to physio and shopping. Because I stayed in yesterday and didn't wwar a backpack, my shoulder was perfectly well-behaved. And then I put it on today and ouch. Physio acupunctured and taped shoulder so I trust it will go back to being quiet. Especially since tomorrow is supposed to be rain and thunderstorms off and on all day, so will be back to couch potatodom.
Finally got the form for my quarterly blood draw from my doctor's secretary-- who suddenly seems not to remember who I am: clearly out of sight, out of mind-- and now must get to the library to print it out and then get to the lab. I do hate the whole thing but needs must.
Finished only 100 Demons 27 last week. Had Witch King come through on an ebook library loan and am wading through that. Definitely wish I had it in paper, definitely wish there were not two narratives, find it oddly a downer for no good reason. Continue only because Kai has moments of sounding like Murderbot. And then there's the Ada Palmer that I'd like to concentrate on and can't. Perhaps I should let Witch King go to the 'two people waiting' and, well, concentrate on the nonfiction Renaissance, since nonfiction goes down so much easier in the hot weather we're forecast to have well into August.
My nursing friend texted me this morning, did I want to meet up for coffee? But I was in one of my 'let's stay in bed all day' moods and had to decline. Eventually I did get up and found myself not quite as achy as yesterday: but once I was out of the bedroom and its air purifier, my sinuses filled and I sneezed mightily and coughed spasmodically and had all the symptoms of a really bad allergy day. Which may have been why I hadn't wanted to get out of bed. Nonetheless I intended to sweep up the carpet of seedlings out front, but my back at once had conniptions. So I heated up the beanbag wrap and took a bunch of muscle relaxants, not thinking how those might interact with the histamines in my system. Yeah, so I was a zombie the rest of the day and didn't go out at all. At least managed to swifter the kitchen floor but that was it. Stayed on the couch and read. Or doomscrolled, whichever.
DW tells me that the Kai story in vol.28 defeated me completely back in 2020, but with the help of my tablet and the Internet I've wrangled a bunch of vocabulary into comprehensibility. You'd think the wordtank might have the words for real estate (宅健) or lock (施錠) or come in handy (重宝する). I mean, they do, but not those phrases. We won't start on the slang meaning of float. It's still hack hack hack through some very ambiguous language and events. Oh, and カルト is a cult, not a cart, which explains how there could be a number of bodies found in a place: but why didn't the wordtank have that? Sheesh.
Yeah, so it's supposedly cooler for certain values of cool which are not my values. Keep reminding myself that I wasn't out last week to observe what a really deadly humidex can do. But today was an 'ache in every joint' day, plus I somehow racked up my right shoulder that panged at me all through my erranding. BoM for small bills, libray for hold, Palmerston grocer for avocadoes (their avocados have the virtue of always being ripe, unlike either supermarket) and raspberries and Quebec strawberries and hell why not sliced mangoes. Better than a whole mango that I will eat in one sitting thereby doing awful things to my blood sugar, no doubt. I think my unsettled digestion is owing to magnesium which I've had to up because suddenly the dose that got me through the winter no longer stops the morning leg cramps, but it could as easily be due to eating more fruit than I'm used to.
By then I ached so atrociously I could see no way of getting home, so good intentions notwithstanding I went to Pour Boy for a Cosmopolitan and some grilled salmon and veg. And rice, alas again, but at least followed by a ten minute walk home. And lots of water, of course.
Bro came by to see me later to talk about this and that and had I called Waddingtons about selling the Franck. Not yet, but will. Find I will have to pay capital gains if I do, which may be considerable given that it's the difference between the assessed value in 1985 and its present valuation. However, a problem for a later, cooler time. Bro also was in 'ache in every sinew' mode-- glutes and hip for him-- but my s-i-l wanted rollmops-- that's herring by any other name-- and only Fiesta has them.
Did a laundry which is hanging in front of the downstairs fan and to my mind/ nose smelling strongly perfumey. This is a side effect of allergies since it's the same detergent I've used all year. Swept the linden seedlings from the sidewalk and front path, which my shoulder hated. And cancelled my dentist appointment this month both because the allergies are so bad that I don't want to be supine at all, and because my July dentist appointments always call in monsoon downpours and I'm just not up for it.
Have started Hyakki Yakki 28 and despair. Neither the wordtank nor the paper dictionary have half the vocabulary there, and it's compounded by the pov character speaking a demotic Japanese I don't know. I mean, he's in Tokyo and I can make out male Tokyo-ben well enough usually, but this defeats me. And as it has Uncle Kai just beginning work at the company he was already very happily employed at in the end of vol 26, I have no idea why we've gone back in time. Maybe when it's cooler...
In spite of heat-induced couch potatodom these last four days, drinking water and not drinking alcohol and I suppose not having cream-heavy iced coffee continues to lose me weight, though with all deliberate speed. Today was slightly cooler and a lot dryer than it has been so I went up to Farm Boy for the sourdough seedy bread which my touchy summer tum insists on, also bananas and soy and like that. Spoke to another human being for the first time in days. I would make a good eremite, I think. But oh dear god I want sugar so badly. Passed up FB's cookies and cakes and pies, but had a cake pop at Starbucks because cake! Sugar! Frosting! such happiness, such bien-être! and that was lunch. If I could go low carb my weight would drop like a lead balloon, as I know from experience, but in summer that's not possible. Fiber will have to substitute instead. Another two kilos and *maybe* my ankles will unswell. Or maybe not. My physio's acupuncture is good for many things like unhappy knees (as I can tell from not seeing her for ten days) but she's not a patch on my old acupuncturist for debloating the body.
And though it's cooler this week, it's still not going to be cool enough at night to use the window fan. 20C/ 68F at 6 a.m. is too warm, so AC it will be, probably for the rest of this month. Also I continue to have the mild dizziness that goes with hot weather, caused no doubt by tree pollen that is currently coating the front steps and walkway. Do not want to garden with the world gently turning round, but garden I must.
Couldn't get to sleep Thursday night. Too hot, too cold, fan blowing air on my tender feet but if I pull up the quilt I sweat etc etc even with the AC set to 18C. Got up and looked for something in English I could read one-eyed and so started in on Master and Commander. Which doesn't hold me as it did 20 years ago. But after a chapter went back to bedroom, turned on air purifier, turned fan from high to medium, bumped AC to 20C and fell happily asleep to wake in unexpected coolness. May say this didn't work last night: AC needed to be at 17C before I was comfortable. Today it was 23 with a steady rain, but a suffocating humid 23 so still didn't go out even after the rain stopped, because sidewalks didn't dry and catkins are forming paste everywhere, green or brown according to species, and filling up my sinuses. Supposed to be drier tomorrow, which shall see.
Don't think I'll continue on with M&C, though I'd intended to reread the series sometime. Non-tablet reading is The Last Continent because someone in a Pratchett FB group mentioned a passage I had no recollection of-- no surprise since I've only read it once that I can recall: the wizards do not do it for me-- and then a hefty ebook came in from the library, once again long before I'd expected it. 100 Demons reached Ritsu's three month coma rather earlier than I'd thought. He has no memory of having consented to be a marrow donor (if that's what he's donating: the Wordtank is not good with medical terminology) so of course neither do we. And I don't believe he gets his memory back. And the Ada Palmer is still waiting for me, all 700 pages of it.
I don't listen to songs much because songs are too much Give me the beat, boys, and free my soul ie just a way for me to get into a mental elsewhere. Very useful for writing fic back in the day, only I don't do that anymore hence don't need music. But somebody's video had the ten top banging songs of all time and I made the mistake of listening to it. Knew some of them: Total Eclipse of the Heart, It's All Coming Back To Me Now, My Heart Will Go On, and no, it wasn't a list of only Steinman songs, those were just the ones I'd heard of. But continuing in the Steinman tradition was I Would Do Anything For Love. My acquaintance with Meatloaf starts and ends with a couple of tracks from Bat Out of Hell because I'm choosy about what rock and roll I get lost in but this one was indeed banging, and the video was marvellous in its shoutouts, and the upshot is that I'm completely earwormed by the thing now. Ah well. Maybe I should put some Mozart on the CD player, except that the fan drowns out everything else.
Oh, and the mystery 509 was the Aged Impoverished Homeowners' Supplement (or rebate, I forget which) is why I don't always get it, not always being sufficiently impoverished to qualify.
Some gov't payment or other is due to come in tomorrow. I think it's just the regular quarterly HST/GST credit by another name, so fine. But my account says something with the same name paid in last week, to the tune of $500, which is much appreciated of course, but puzzling. I would dearly like to know what it is because this isn't the first time it's happened, and I had no idea what it was then. Presumably the government will get around to informing me by snail mail eventually, as is their wonted way.
Otherwise a nothing day. If not as hot as yesterday it was still hot, and I am certainly not going out in any 35C/95F humidex. Maybe by the weekend things will ge cool enough that I can get to the library for a hold I'd expected to take much longer. Must be picked up by Wednesday or face a fine but I'm tempted to put it off as long as possible because it's Inventing the Renaissance that I want to reread, but not while I have 100 Demons on the go. Though a reread might be faster than the first time through and may not take me the full three weeks as the first time did.
