Catching Up: New Year’s Eve 2024 Edition

Hello to everyone except the IDIOTS to re-elect Donald Trump and the 20 million people who decided not to vote.

Yes… I just said that.

I’m astonished at the stupidity of our country in electing someone who cannot speak in complete sentences, who claimed that people were eating dogs and cats in Springfield even after THE FREAKING MAYOR OF SPRINGFIELD AND GOVERNOR OF OHIO TOLD HIM TO CUT THAT ISH OUT AND THE PROUD BOYS SHOWED UP, who claims that he’ll raise money for things by imposing tariffs on China… despite the fact that THE IMPORTER IS THE THE ONE PAYING THE TARIFF AND PASSING IT ONTO THE CONSUMER INSTEAD OF THE COUNTRY IN QUESTION (was I the only one paying attention in Economics in high school???), who is imposing tariffs on Canada and Mexico despite us getting a lot of our imports of food and other things from them, who doesn’t know the origin of the word “grocery” (Google is free, y’all!), who is claiming that there will be mass deportations even though he doesn’t actually have any clue of how to do that or how much he is going to hamstring agriculture or building in this country by doing that (because migrant workers are the ones who actually *DO* those jobs), who incited an insurrection which killed several people, and who, along with his derpy followers, has no idea how basic things in the economy work. His Cabinet choices are the dumbest people imaginable for each position (like they were in his first administration) to the point that even his followers are objecting to them. (Seriously? Matt Gaetz for Attorney General? Well, he is a pedophile like Trump…)

I’m positively dreading the next four years as a member of a church with members who could possibly deported because our immigration system is effed up in so many ways, I’m a member of the LGBTQIA+ community, someone who is neurodivergent with chronic conditions, and someone who had a pregnancy condition. I’m struggling to keep my head up already, and the Orange Idiot taking offices means that I’m going to have to fight twice as hard to keep things working for me and Daniel when I barely have the mental and emotionally energy to get out of bed.

And yes, you can absolutely unfollow me if you’re offended by anything that I’ve just said. I’ve never forced anyone to read this blog.

I guess I should go look on BestBuy.Com for a new laptop before the Mango Mussolini hostilely takes over the Oval Office again and prices jump 25% because he is incapable of understanding the purpose of tariffs…

Oh yeah, my saint for 2025 is St. Gianna and the word of the year is “hello”.

I’ll be putting my new bullet journal together if you need me…

Catching Up: April 11, 2024 Edition

So…

[+] I’ve been struggling with severe depression and COVID-related fatigue for the last 2 1/2 months. I didn’t know what was going on with the depression until I was supposed to have coffee with my former workwife Kim, and I was lying in bed trying to drag myself out. I didn’t know how seriously I needed that coffee date until she hugged me and I realized how much I missed seeing her and working with her. She and I get each other, and we bonded over our kids six years ago. I’m grateful that she had the time off from work and grad school for coffee.

[+] I just finished a prayer shawl on March 30th of which I’m really proud.

The whole shawl.

Segment 1.

Segment 2.

Segment 3.

I made it for Jay Bowen, a local artist and elder with the Upper Skagit Tribe, with whom my church has a relationship. He happened to be there the next morning on Easter when we blessed it, and I had the privilege of draping it across his shoulders. The idea was that each panel was an individual piece of stained glass.

[+] Daniel just turned 15 this past Sunday. Here’s a picture taken on Easter Sunday.

Daniel and me on Easter Sunday.

Why yes, he is quite a bit taller than I am. He passed me height-wise more than two years ago.

[+] I watch a lot of court cases on YouTube while I crochet, and a particularly maddening one was that of Rita Pangalangan who was convicted of murder along with her boyfriend of murder in the death of her daughter Cristina. Her boyfriend put Cristina in a hot car, where she sat for more than hours while he and Rita got high on meth. As the mom of a disabled child, I kinda want to slap her face repeatedly. I mean, how could she do something so selfish and stupid?!?!?!? I have a severely disabled kid, and my rear passenger doors have the child locks engaged so that Daniel can’t open them in traffic (which he hasn’t tried to do for years, but I have no trust). You better darn well believe that I know where Daniel is at all times, and I don’t leave him in the car, especially in the summer. Getting high on meth just adds a layer of horror to the situation. I can’t fathom putting myself knowingly in a position like that where I would lose the ability to care for myself, let alone my child, without another competent adult taking care of Daniel. As a single mom with sole custody, everything relating to Daniel falls on me.

Catching Up: Two and a Half Months Edition

Wow… two-and-a-half months of silence.

[+] Work. My contract with the college ended on June 30th. I knew it was coming, and I spent last quarter working on my LinkedIn profile as well as creating ones on Glassdoor and Indeed. I’ve got a couple of stop-gap temporary measures in place until I can find a a more permanent remote job, but I’m still living pretty modestly and I am getting a little frustrated with the amount of scammers out there posting positions. There are some days when I honestly feel like I’m playing “Scam or No Scam”, and I have other friends in similar situations.

[+] Health. My appointment with gastroenterology is next week, and it cannot come soon enough. My stomach is angry and eating is unpleasant. I’m willing to deal with an endoscopy and colonoscopy at this point if they can figure out what is happening.

[+] Daniel. Kiddo is at least five inches taller than me, and he is in the middle of puberty. The mood swings are epic. School starts again in a little more than a month, and I think both Daniel and I will be excited for that to happen.

Catching Up: December 9, 2022 Edition

Where do I begin…

[+] The depression fairy. I’ve been dealing with depression since menopause hit, and I’m at the point where pushing through is getting harder. I really want to just curl up in bed with the covers over my head, but there is so much that nobody is going to do if I don’t do it. Single motherhood, even living with family, is hard.

[+] Imposter Syndrome. I’m not going to lie. I suffer from this quite often. I graduated with TWO degrees and almost a 4.0 GPA in my late 30’s, and I still have a hard time believing that I’m good enough to be hired in my field. I need to start thinking about interviewing in six months, and I’m having to psych myself up to do it.

[+] End of the quarter. Finals are done, and I am exhausted. There are some boundary conversations I need to have with a student, and those are being left for next week.

Catching Up: July 29, 2022 Edition

TGIF…

[+] This week, I discovered Steel Magnificat, the blog of Mary Pezzulo. I had seen friends link up stories from her blog before, but I wish I had taken the time to read her blog before now. She is an amazing writer and an even more incredible person.

[+] We’re having a church picnic at a member’s farm on the 7th, and I spent this week arranging to *NOT* have to figure out how to put worship online that Sunday. I’ve been out there before and the part of the farm we’ll be at is kinda primitive. I would probably have to record worship and upload it later… and I don’t have the space on my phone to record a 90-minute service. Broadcasting it off of my laptop would require really dedicated Internet access, and I really don’t think they have it in that part of the property. Also… I haven’t had a service off from running things and doing Zoom (we’re talking Sundays, Holy Week, and funerals) since April 25, 2021. I think I (and everyone else on the committee who switches around from Sunday to Sunday) can use a Sunday off.

[+] Daniel had an ADHD appointment scheduled for Wednesday morning at 8. My alarm didn’t go off and Daniel woke me up at 8:22. I called them apologetically and rescheduled it. They were cold to me on the phone, and I don’t blame them one bit because I know how much of a headache it is from working in a clinic when people are no-shows.

[+] One of my new guilty pleasures is Code Blue Cam. It is videos from police body cams, and it’s interesting to see the job from that perspective. I am not an ACAB person by any stretch (as I have relatives in law enforcement), and I am absolutely in favor of police having body cams that are not allowed to be turned off. (A lot of jurisdictions have civil and criminal penalties for officers who do so.) The department that seems to have the majority of videos right now is the La Crosse Police Department, and one fo the things that surprised me is that they have to put their guns in a lockbox when they head into the station.

Catching Up: May 13, 2022 Edition

I’m usually triskaidekaphobic, but we’ll try this tonight…

[+] I met with DDA this week by Microsoft Teams. I hate this meeting every year because it’s incredibly draining, but it’s important so that Daniel can get services. All I have left is the home visit.

[+] I had to make the decision to sit out the rest of the spring from choir because of my asthma and my drippy throat. It’s not COVID (I have tested myself and I’m consistently negative), but my breathing is screwy. It’s a pain because I miss choir and singing, but I don’t want to have coughing fits the whole time.

[+] I had to give up on my bullet journal as life got away from me in March. I ordered another one, and I’m going to probably make it a June to December one as I will have enough pages to do it. I ordered a blank journal off of Amazon tonight, and I’ll be starting to put it together when I get it and trying to get all of the month’s pages done early so that I don’t have to worry about drawing/numbering a new page daily.

[+] I had to give up on Learning to Pray by James Martin, S.J. because my heart and brain just weren’t in it. I love Fr. Jim’s books, but I’m needing something lighter these days. I just started Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldree, and it’s not amazing but is keeping my attention. (I think it was a free Kindle book?)

[+] For those who enjoy Wordle and are map nerds, check out Globle.

[+] So, this happened on Monday morning. Thankfully, campus is still pretty quiet because many classes are still online and enrollment is down overall, but it was not fun having my phone explode with emergency notifications.

Catching Up: April 30. 2022 Edition

And it’s been six weeks since my last post. Go me.

[+] In my defense, I’ve been sick. I had a UTI over Spring Break that flattened me, my sleep schedule is completely knocked off kilter, my seasonal allergies have manifested as serious asthma so I spent Holy Week having serious asthma attacks, and I got hit with a respiratory infection the next week which spilled into this one. I’d like to be able to sleep without waking up coughing up a lung, and I’d like to not be taking Sudafed with a Robitussin DM chaser.

[+] We’re four weeks into the quarter, and I haven’t had a consistent schedule from week to week. Part of it has been having to cancel sessions due to asthma attacks and this stupid respiratory infection, but the other part of it is students being added and dropping tutoring or not showing up. I purposely scheduled my Fridays off this quarter to have a day where I could do doctor’s appointments or Daniel appointments, and I’ve also made it so that my students don’t send me work to look over on weekends. This is thanks to a student who completely burned me out during Summer Quarter and a student during Fall Quarter who made me ponder taking up rattlesnake cuddling. I can’t even begin to describe her shenanigans. Between the two of them, I could probably write an entire post of “tutoring don’ts” if it wouldn’t violate FERPA.

[+] Daniel turned 13 on April 7th. I’m still stunned that I now have a teenager.

[+] Doc is getting so much braver and friendlier. Mom is getting serious love time from him when she gives him his greenies. He’ll allow me to get closer to him, and I’m hoping I will eventually get to pet him. He is a very soft cat, and I would love to give him all the scritches that he could ever want.

[+] I spent a lot of time doing blogging/Facebook stuff for church during Holy Week. Five days of services was A LOT. The office of Tenebrae was a new one, and it was very dark. I’m kind of glad I was home doing church web stuff during that one because I wouldn’t have been doing a good job of focusing. By Easter Sunday, I couldn’t focus on anything, so I redid the header for Facebook and the church website. I still need to do the Facebook and church website posts for this weekend. I should probably get started on them…