Drunken Owls and Other Delights

Things completed over the last few days:
--Flu shot received
--4th Covid booster received (side effects minimal, maybe a few aches and that's it)
--Food shopping done
--New releases listened to/downloaded
--Fee/donation to adoption agency for two (!!) cats (more on this in a few) paid
--Cat toys, litter box, food dishes, and other fun things purchased
--Cat tree purchased and built
--New cat carriers bought and original purchase returned
--VOTED! Will mail the ballots tomorrow before work!


Things fallen by the wayside:
--Writing. WELP, I figured it would happen anyway considering I just had ALL THE THINGS to do and I'm a bit distracted by the preparation of the arrival of not one but two kitties. Yes, two! After having the face-to-face-online interview with the agency, we both thought that considering the original cat we wanted (Jules) was from a litter of four, we'd be fine with taking on one of her sisters (temporarily named California). But anyway...yeah, I've had a few distractions lately so I'm fine with that. I kind of needed it as I'm feeling a little worried about where I am in Theadia. I don't think it's bad, but I'm having one of those "I'm too close to it and probably need to back away before I fuck it up" waves and should probably take a mental break from it for a tiny bit. And amusingly enough, Althea has mentioned in the book itself how a cat is the perfect distraction. Heh.
--750Words and Inktober. Again, same distraction, but I'm not letting it bother me. For the former, I'm not taking it too seriously and just working on a sort-of-new story idea and playing with the outline. For the latter, I've already done it twice already and caught up quickly. I'm not doing ginormous detailed art here, of course, but doodles. Essentially my outlook for both has been "it doesn't have to be consistent, as long as I get back to it." A few days off in between is fine.


Things to come:
--Awaiting word from the agency as to when said kitties will arrive or be brought home.
--Dropping car off at a garage after work tomorrow to have some work done on it.
--One of A's friends is coming to visit next weekend and there may be some transportation hiccups, but we shall see.
--Getting back to writing work.

This is my least favorite shift at work. Thankfully I usually only get one of them a week, normally on Wednesdays. We call them the 'Front End Manager shift' because basically that's what it is. It covers our two busiest times (the lunch crowd and the dinner/coming home from work crowd) and said FEM is a glorified babysitter for both the customer flow and the youngsters (and the oldsters) working the registers. Some days it can be uneventful and glacially slow, but other times it can be frustratingly stressful. I've used the phrase 'herding cats' at work more than once.

Unofficially I get to play my bookkeeper role on this shift as well (a position I hold on Fridays and Saturdays at present). I get to do till pickups of large bills and loans of needed bills, which is easy and often a welcome distraction. And thanks to being part of a union, I'm not pressured or guilted into staying any longer than I have to, busy or not. Can't complain.

The only real downside, to be honest, is that the shift often leaves me exhausted at the end of the night. Between herding the cats and experiencing two busy waves in one day, punching out at 8pm is a wonderful thing. I've been known to take the bus eight blocks home at the end of it all rather than walk. Still, it's not as life-draining as past jobs, so I make do.

As always, the new month brings in newly refreshed plans. The whiteboard has been revived, and things have been started. Day 2 of Inktober has just been drawn. I even wrote a 750Words entry yesterday! I still need to properly balance it all, but I'll get it soon enough. Today's going to be a bit tricky as we're heading to the opera today and I'll probably only have an hour or so for working once we get back home, but I'm getting in what I can.

I'm still annoyed at that unknown idiot who tapped my car in the lot at my job yesterday and left a dent and a scrape but no note, but not overly angry. I've already set up a claim with my car insurance, and if needed I can get footage from work (I confirmed that our store saves footage for a good long time). It's not a huge ding, but enough that it needs fixing and touchup paint. And it's high enough that I'm sure that it's either a minivan or a truck, and someone who can't drive for shit. But the point here is that I'm not letting it ruin my day unnecessarily. It is what it is, the car is still drivable, and nothing's broken. And as I've said before: this is annoyance. You'd know if I was actually angry or pissed off.

Other than that, all is well here. Hope everyone has a good week!

 I admit I've been a bit lazy these last few months, even despite saying I was going on a blogging hiatus to give them all a bit of a rethink. In retrospect I think it was less of a rethink than it was making a conscious retreat from the high self-demand approach I'd thrown at myself for years. I've been trying to adjust that for years and now I'm finally, actively doing so. It's never been a healthy habit and I constantly have to remind myself that there are other ways to approach creative processes that aren't Pour Your Every Emotion Into It And Turn It Up To Eleven.

What does that have to do with blogging? Well, I think for me it has to do with being okay with just talking about stuff here without constantly trying to turn it into a 'human interest piece', as my dad used to call them. It doesn't always have to have a beginning, middle and end, or even a point. This blog certainly isn't my professional site like Welcome to Bridgetown or Walk in Silence are, but then again, they don't always need to be Writing Life articles or Music News and Reviews. What am I trying to prove with them, anyway? Sometimes I feel like I'm trying to imitate the writing magazines and the music blogs I read, and that's fine, but it's not always me, if you know what I mean.

Anyway. I'd like to post here more as well. It's always been my personal site, and it's going to remain that way, and that's fine. Talk about my music and writing obsessions, things going on in the hood, day jobbery, and whatnot. Just thinking about making it a bit more frequent is all.

It's Friday and I'm enjoying the second of two days off from work. That was a LONG slog...seven straight days, six of which were opening shifts (5:45am to 2ish) and one midday shift (2-8pm). I spend most of yesterday just being lazy and conserving energy, doing not much except laundry and a walk to the bank to get more quarters. My boss posts the schedule on Thursday evenings but I think I'll be lazy and check tomorrow when I go in again. I still adhere to the strict 'out of sight, out of mind' rule when it comes to the Day Job, heh.

In writing news, I finally managed to finish that one passage that had been bothering me for a week and a half. I wanted to give this character some closure that had been bothering him earlier in the novel, but I didn't want to spend too much time rehashing everything that had already gone on. So how to do that? Well, economically, it turns out: the scene ends up being more about putting him at ease than giving him more conflict or drama, which made more sense. And it also balances out the latter half of that chapter where he finds himself in new and infinitely more annoying drama! Go me! Heh.

In personal news...I've realized that maybe I should revive the daily stretches and exercises, either before or after work and definitely on my days off. I think I'm in better shape now that I'm more active (thanks, Day Job), but I still feel a bit achey here and there. I know, I know...it's partly age, but I don't think it's tissue or bone degradation just yet....it's more like bad posture and habits. I still need to work on back stretches and knee bends. If after a while I realize that maybe it is age, I'll go see the doc about it. Either way, I can get in better shape.

On that note...hope everyone has a lovely weekend! 

It's been a busy week here...starting with the Motion City Strk show on Sunday, working five days and ending Saturday night with The Airborne Toxic Event playing with the SF Symphony! Thankfully all those work days were opens or short midshifts so it was never really all that exhausting.

I am, however, embarrassed to admit that I haven't been up on my Theadia revision as of late. It's another chapter that needs a lot of TLC to make it work -- in this case, I had to ramp up the conflict a LOT more than what was originally there in order for everything else after it to work properly. I'm hoping I'll be back to normal quick(er) revision later this week. What will I work on after this novel is up to question, though I have at least one sort-of-almost-complete novel and maybe two or three ideas to play around with. But that's further in the future, so I'm not going to worry about that just yet!

Oh! And if I forgot to let those few of you know who follow me here, I've been posting chapters of Diwa & Kaffi over at Welcome to Bridgetown! I'm up to Chapter 20 as of last Friday, so if you want to start from the beginning, go here. I've decided after all that I'm going to self-publish this one, so I need to find an artist to commission. I've got a few in mind that I'd like to ask, and I'm totally fine with whatever I have to pay. This one's worth it.

Anyhoo. Not much else to report, so I'll let you return to your relaxing Sunday afternoon!

Yeah. So.

Been kind of quiet these last few days for the obvious reasons. Yes, I am pissed off. But I've gotten so sick of using my own social media to bleed out that rage because while it might help in the short term, it doesn't really help the situation and I'm more than likely annoying the fuck out of the few readers I have here and elsewhere. I'm there in solidarity, I promise. I've just grown weary of saying the same things and having my voice lost behind those who say it so much better than I ever could. I'd rather defer to them, raise their platform rather than shouting over it.

If I'm good at anything, I'm good at making people feel calm during turbulent times. I've learned to be a good listener. So that's the strength I want to work on. I want to be there for y'all when you need to take a break from all this fucking nonsense.

Today's weather has been very weird. It started off extremely foggy and 100% humidity -- you could feel the condensation in the air as we walked over to the bank and then to get lunch -- but now it's a relatively nice 65% and a slightly cloudy sky. Such is the way with living in the Richmond District. And it's been pretty much the same over the last couple of days: wet and damp in the morning and clearish by afternoon. Which is actually quite nice when I'm doing a morning shift at the job.

Speaking of the day job: yes, I've been there for a few months now and I'm still enjoying it! I suppose once I realized this job is about complementing our income instead of propping it up, a lot of that stress went away. (And yes, I am still QUITE aware at that bit of economical privilege.) The job does have its facepalming moments, but it also has quite a lot of enjoyable ones as well. I's actually quite nice to see some of our regulars pop in every other day or so to chat! I very much prefer this over the office atmosphere, to be honest.

The bookkeeping duties continue apace, and I even got a "you're doing an awesome job" from the store's assistant manager the other day! Funny how that means a lot more to me than getting the occasional 'attaboy' pat on the back at the FDJ...I think because I know they really mean it here and aren't merely quoting Talking To Your Minions for Dummies. It's not the hardest of jobs and I'm definitely using my past experience to show that I can do it with very little monitoring, and I think they really appreciate that.

Meanwhile on the writing front...I think I'm sliding into that 'Oh gods when will this revision process end' mindset and I really must chase it away. I'm still working on some important scenes in Theadia, and it occurs to me that I still need to insert a few more new things here and there to make it work better.

I've also had a bit of fun recently rereading some of my trunked and backburner projects, and coming to the conclusion that maybe I can in fact resurrect some of them. Not in an 'I miss this project, maybe it'll be fun' but in a 'wow yeah I know exactly how to fix this now' way, which is definitely a good thing. It's definitely a mix of personal and professional maturity as well as gaining a bit of experience (and maybe a bit of reading a lot more in related genres over the years). There's also the fact that I did not get that "drop everything and work on THIS now" feeling (which I sometimes get in this situation), instead thinking that maybe this could be my next project once I'm caught up. Worth looking into, at any rate.

One last thing: I finally remembered why I'd switched from the keyboard that came with this PC with the Logitech one I bought a year or so later: it has some serious system-side sticky key issues. I'm thinking it's because I have so many other things plugged into USB ports here that the keyboard and mouse are fighting for importance, and the old keyboard just noped out of that argument. The Logitech duo is plugged back in and working just fine.


...and that's what's been going on here in Spare Oom the last few weeks! Hope everyone has a nice week ahead!

 So in the midst of doing All the Grocery Shopping today, I stopped at my place of work to pick up a few minor things and check next week's schedule (it wasn't up when I left yesterday)...and it so happens that I'm about to enjoy a four-day weekend!! WOOOT! Also a plus: I've got all opening shifts next week, which is what I've been wanting since starting there, and this is due to bookkeeping training, which I mentioned previously. Said trainer is now back and in better health, and has been showing me the ropes.

The systems being used are a bit old, but thankfully the major one is Windows-based software. The downside is that two others are DOS-based so there's a bit of Former Day Job flashback. The GOOD thing is that unlike the FDJ, I won't be digging into files looking for problems, just doing a bit of data entry and simple processing.

So how do I feel about starting at 5:45am? Well, I know A is a bit annoyed that I'm waking up so stupid early (4:30 so I can shower/have breakfast/etc) but it's a small price to pay. I'm not sure if this is going to be permanent or just until further notice, but I'd rather be opening than all mid-shift (the busiest) or closing (the most exhausting). Slowly but surely we're hiring more people here and there, so once things have solidified a bit I think it might work out for the best.

That said...I've been woefully lazy these last few days with the writing, so I'd better start kicking my own ass to get back into the groove.

I fear I'm lagging ever behind with my writing, and it's nobody's fault but my own, really. Just me giving into a lot of distraction. So with it being the first of the month once more, I'm going to try again to reel it all in and Get Things Done. Follow the whiteboard schedule again and figure out a way to make it work around my odd Day Job schedule.

Was also thinking that I haven't used the 750Words site in a while. I purposely stopped using it when I got to the sort-of finish lines of the two novels I was working on, just to take a break. I'd like to pick it up again, though. Even if it's just random incomplete ideas or incoherent rambling. Something that I can zip out in a half hour that won't interfere with the revision work I'm currently doing.

Other than that...? Not much to report! Hope everyone has a wonderful new month! :)