masquerading as a man with a reason

Happy pi day! (US version, anyway. And non-military-time.)

Lots of updates! Because I suck at posting here. Ahem.

I forgot to post here when Loki came back (my last post was him being missing) but he was only gone a week. Very long week, and I have no idea where he was, but he seems unscathed by his adventures.

My new chair, *finally* (after only a year and a half of trying), is usable. They managed to get it to tilt back more than the manufacturer's specs indicated, but I needed the extra tilt for repositioning and for pressure relief. It's still not as comfortable as the old chair but at least it doesn't randomly crap out.

My niecelet is still the cutest. Went down to visit her weekend before last (and gave her a hat which she *loved*), andthen my sister had a work-team trip to Tahoe last week so I got to have dinner with them when they came back through. I need to do a picspam one of these days, because cuuuute. Also she is a total chatterbox, and loves to sing, especially the alphabet song.

This last week was Rehearsal Hell Week -- five hours of rehearsal Tuesday, five Thursday, five Saturday, two Sunday, and then performing Sunday night. I actually skipped the Saturday morning rehearsal so I wouldn't be too fatigued for the concert -- there was no way I could get up in time for a 9:30 start, rehearse until 4 (with a lunch break), and still be able to think straight by Sunday night. I felt a bit guilty, but RHW always wiped me out even when I didn't have underlying fatigue issues.

Speaking of which, I ... er ... still have fatigue issues. I'm starting to suspect/worry it's the new normal; it's quite possible that the fact that I can't move means I'm just physically not generating energy. I've been trying to find alternative explanations, thyroid or vitamin or whatever, but all that is testing more or less normal. Though I'm not convinced my D is high enough; my doctor isn't concerned, but eh what does she know ;)

Crafting stuff: I made a hat for my niecelet, and currently have three active projects: a crochet shawl made with a rainbow gradient (it's so fun watching the color change as I go!), a knitted lace shawl, and a hat I'm using to re-figure out knitting in the round and also to teach myself Portuguese knitting. (PK involves having the yarn tensioned in front, rather than from behind; purling is ridiculously easy, and knitting is a bit more awkward but doable, and for the most part it's mechanically easier given my physical limitations. My tension is shit, but I'm not stressing about that too much.). Did I mention I like playing with yarn? Cause I do. Yay yarn!

Okay that's enough updates for now. If you read all this, have a cookie 🍪

Cross-posted between DW (here) and LJ. Comments welcome in either place; DW has comments

... so I've been kind of quiet here lately. This is largely due to a lot of freaking the fuck out.

So -- roommate and I realized about a week ago that neither of us had seen Loki for a few days; by itself that doesn't necessarily mean anything, because cat, but his food was untouched and his litter box was untouched. (Yes he sometimes eats Monkey's food, but in addition, not instead, of his own, and rattling his food dish usually brings him running.) And he is not a quiet cat -- if he were trapped somewhere he would be howling his head off -- so it was increasingly clear he wasn't in the apartment. And of course he doesn't have a collar.

Cue the litany of lost-cat tasks: calling vets, calling the shelter, talking to neighbors in case one of them brought him inside, making up fliers, etc. Also cue my brain being an asshole and constantly returning to worst case scenarios.

To add to the stress, my roommate had a scheduled trip for a grad school interview, leaving Tuesday and getting back this weekend. Having her gone is stressful even normally because there isn't backup if my aides flake and because I don't have the stress relief option of venting to her and because my mom is the one driving me home from rehearsals argh. Having my roommate gone *and* Loki missing meant I've been a gigantic ball of anxiety and stress.

Then yesterday I went to go to rehearsal, and Loki goes scooting out from under my van to under another car. Tea deer versonnen: My aide scoops him up and brings hm inside, I sulk about going to rehearsal because I want to be at home with a Loki making sure he's okay, but I do the responsible thing of going.

I don't know where the fuck he was all week or what he was doing; he seemed scared while hiding under the car, but was back to his usual self, including jumping on shoulders (and my mom's back, when she made the mistake of bending over to try to pet him). Possibly slimmer, but he had some pudge. We will probably take him in for a checkup but I'm waiting until next week so roommate can help with that. But he seems okay.

( Collapse )

Meanwhile, today I was pretty much a complete mess -- you know how you can hold it together (at least sort of) *during* a highly stressful event, but then crash afterward? Yeah. Some amount of paranoia (which I predicted yesterday would happen) that when I haven't seen him in a few hours it's because he's gone again, rather than hiding somewhere sleeping; a lot of crying, both random and not. (And I ducked up scheduling a ride -- Yahtzee had to go to the vet for yearly vaccination stuff today at 3, and I had someone lined up to drive, but told her 3:40 for a pickup time rather than 2:40, and didn't realize until 3:03 -- and even though I was able to have my aide, who was there, drive instead, and call the vet to give a heads up that Y would be a few minutes late but was coming, I then just burst into tears because ~clearly~ (that's sarcasm font) I'm a horrible failure. )

Oh, and my chair has wonked out again -- lateral tilt not working, stuck in turtle mode, though st least not super tilted -- and I *still* don't have the new chair working. (Well, it works in general, but there's a comfort issue and if doesn't tilt back as much as i need.)

So ... yeah. I'm having ~fun~.

Cross-posted between DW (here) and LJ. Comments welcome in either place; DW has comments

I was talking elsesite about Duolingo, and lingots. And how I have too many. (I'm 88 short of 4k. That's a lot of lingots.)

In the process, I was calculating how long I've been doing Duo, as a way of explaining why I had so many. And um.

My streak is currently at 166 days; I had a 625 day streak that ended in Sept 2016 (not my fault, the app didn't send info to the main servers) and a 455 day streak before that (forgot two days in a row); and I started in August 2013. Now, streak freeze has saved my bacwn a number of times, but still. It's been 1268 days since I started. I've done 1246 days of duo.

That's a fucking 98% success rate. For a daily task over three and s half years.

I'm kinda boggling.

(And no I have no idea how. I don't stick with things that well. Hell, I don't brush my teeth with that level of consistency...

In other news, it's good to know Duo is trans-friendly ;)

( Collapse )

Cross-posted between DW (here) and LJ. Comments welcome in either place; DW has comments

If you ever find yourself needing a text to speech app on your phone -- like, for example, if you are on the fourth day of a sore throat that feels like you're swallowing razor blades but is not strep and is probably viral and can't be treated but you really shouldn't be speaking -- there is a free, ad-free text to speech app called Speak that is actually pretty decent. Pacing/cadence is off sometimes, and I have to use ungrammatical commas in places to make it more understandable, but it's a lot better than trying to whisper.

Also, if you find yourself having a sore throat etc, numbing lozenges are your best friend. Sadly the effect doesn't last, and you can only do one every two hours, but it's lovely for dulling the razor blades. Ginger candies are good too.

Cross-posted between DW (here) and LJ. Comments welcome in either place; DW has comments

This has been bugging me for a while:

"Das Objekt, aufgefunden in den Keller gewurden der Oper, funktioniert noch"

Why is gewurden smack in the middle of den Keller der Oper? (It feels wrong to me -- why isn't gewurden last?

...or oh oh oh is gewurden part of the noun phrase? I was thinking it was part of the verb phrase (aufgefunden gewurden) but if it's the noun phrase -- is that, like, "the cellar that used to be (but isn't any more) part of the opera house ?

Hilfe bitte! (Is there a German equivalent of halp? Halfe? Lol)

Cross-posted between DW (here) and LJ. Comments welcome in either place; DW has comments

Okay, https://www.nytimes.com/interactiv… is fucking awesome -- women's marches on every continent, including Antarctica.

Sometimes the world sucks, but sometimes there's stuff like this.

Cross-posted between DW (here) and LJ. Comments welcome in either place; DW has comments

a) been kinda off-grid lately -- mostly health stuff (migraines, random heart palpitations that have no apparent cause at least yet but yes I do have a doctor appointment because this is a new thing, and stuff like pain keeping me awake last night until after 6am so I only got three hours sleep and the next day or two are going to suck) -- if I've missed anything important in your lives please link / summarize / tell me where to look?

2) I had a dream the other night where I got to meet Lin-Manuel Miranda. He was very tolerant of me glomp-hugging him. idek.

iii) I "lost" all of Wednesday to writing up my newest knitting pattern, Freedom of Hattitude -- knitting drama seems to inspire me.

( Collapse )

D) I also made a hat for a friend. Loom knit, a smidge too small because I couldn't find the right loom, so worked in twisted rib (e-wrap+purl) for stretch.

V) ...and once my brain recovers from last night's painsomnia, I want to play with brioche loom knitting. Fear me. Or don't; whatever

Cross-posted between DW (here) and LJ. Comments welcome in either place; DW has comments

I can't find the code to embed it directly -- YouTube isn't giving me anything codelike to share, just the link itself -- but this video is freaking amazing. It's a place in Mexico that makes thread for knitting/crocheting out of the leaves of a particular plant (and I was vastly amused at their using a big cactus to card the fibers before spinning). The video shows the whole process: harvest, prep, fiber extraction, prep, spinning, and knitting/crocheting. Audio is in Spanish with English subtitles.

ETA embed:



Cross-posted between DW (here) and LJ. Comments welcome in either place; DW has comments

I want to write up a series of recommendation / information posts about some of the mobile games I am currently playing. What I've thought of so far is something like this:

- premise: a sentence or two of what the game is about or what the purpose is
- mechanics: what you do and how you do it
- ads: do they exist, are they forced or optional, how annoying
- in-game purchases: what, how necessary
- accessibility: (see below)
- braining required: how much do you have to think
- speed or timed levels
- internet connectivity required?
- summary of why I like it

What else would be useful to know?

And in terms of accessibility -- I can't really judge visual accessibility, though I will do my best. I can do auditory accessibility (whether sound is required / useful). I can definitely do physical accessibility of my own needs (which include "if I am playing on the iPad, do I have to be able to reach the entire screen or just parts" and "horizontal, vertical, or both" (admittedly both is a rare thing), but what else is good? Precision required? Reaction time, maybe. What else?

The posts will be written with the intent of being shareable, so I want them to be as useful as possible without being cluttered.

Cross-posted between DW (here) and LJ. Comments welcome in either place; DW has comments

( Collapse )

Cross-posted between DW (here) and LJ. Comments welcome in either place; DW has comments