This week's annoying lesson in medical stuff: elbow splints are all one size fits none. (I need night braces that keep me from tucking in my arms and making my sore elbows worse.) Never fear, crafting supplies & Amazon to the rescue! The DIY-adapted splints are already helping, and I now have stabilizing exercises to do too.
Nothing attracts a cat more than dirty laundry...except clean laundry.
Another component in my love of autumn: it's the trickster season. Not only Halloween, but fall in general. Expected a nice day when you left for work on a sunny, sticky hot morning? HAHAHANOPE. Big, muscular clouds roll in like linebackers, and it's hot cider weather by dinner hour. (YAY, CIDER!) Days of gloom and wet chill resign you to winter's arrival, and then HAHAHA you wake to endless deep blue skies, trees dressed in party clothes, and air as warm and soft as a towel fresh from the dryer. I love me the antics of the trickster gods, so of course I adore fall.
I just realized I compulsively check the news every few hours to find out what fresh hellspawn has been hatched by my own government. In one of my writing worlds I've been looking forward in time toward a post-chaos future for 30 years now, and that makes reality a very weird place to be living in today.
What's up with ridiculous corporate name changes? I haven't seen this many questionable "re-branding" ideas since the heyday of the early 90's. Weight Watchers, Papa John's, Dunkin Donuts...I swear, it seems like decisionmakers are being pranked bigtime by their marketing teams.
The latest in fun internet searches:
potato chip packaging
thermoplastic shaping elbow armor cosplay
lyrics purple people eater
octopus seal kayak video
marching band helmets
rank US cities metro population
An phrase I saw keeps popping into my brain: "TOXIC POSITIVITY.Yes, it's toxic. It's a villain's most effective tool. Dolores Umbridge was all about positivity. ANYway. Turns out, "positive attitude" management is worse than ineffective. It damages morale (oh, the irony) stifles creativity & leads to rebellion and/or employee flight. Cites? Nope. This is my personal blog. The internet is right there. Search for yourself.
Because I was back on campus for an alumni event this weekends, I was thinking recently of all the creepy times in college when people told me in hushed, sentimental tones, "Your years here are the best in your life, and the memories will stay with you forever. Don't waste a single minute." I know it was meant as encouragement, but it always felt more like an threat. The idea of life being all downhill after college still appalls me. It hasn't been true, either. They were formative years, certainly, and I do remember them well, but rosy nostalgia just isn't my gig. And the most important year in my life is always next year.
It must be fall. I'm moving furniture. Carefully, because elbows, but I'm moving it. I didn't move anything around last year, so this year the living room and my writing den are getting rearranged. Maybe this year will be the one when I finally buy plant lights and a stand for my herbs & things. No promises.
This weekend marked a major life shift. When people ask what I do, I said, "I'm an author. I write science fiction and fantasy." So, there's that to celebrate. I even had a card in my wallet. Small steps, but BIG small steps, ya know? I didn't make much progress on the WIP while I was away, but I did keep my hand in, and I'm not going to kick myself for taking a rest day today. I needed the decompression after four days of Major Social time. I wish that wasn't true, but it is. So I'm dealing.