#florida beauty labs

[nahimjustfeelingit-writes]

HBCU CONFESSIONS.

Erik x Valencia

Smut

Part One.

What am I going to do? I’m pregnant and it’s my freshman year. I don’t know if I should keep the baby or not. Any advice?

-Florida A&M

My stupid boyfriend cheated on me so I fucked his homeboy. Now both of them are fighting over me 🤭

-Hampton

I think my roommate has a thing for me. I’m not gay, but I’ve caught myself staring at his dick a few times. This shit is confusing me. I don’t like dick I like pussy!

-Morehouse College

My girlfriend wants me to eat her butt. She keeps begging me to do it. Who on here ever ate ass before? I need some advice because gahdamn she won’t leave a nigga alone.

-Morgan State

I already know what yall gonna say but I don’t give a fuck. My homegirl keep telling me about how her man is cheating on her. He’s cheating with me. I’m the side chick. The D is just too good. At this point I’m already too far gone. Judge me if you want I don’t care 🤷🏿‍♀️

-Clark Atlanta University

I had a train ran on me the other night. No, they didn’t fuck me. They ate me 😩 and it was a bunch of Omegas! Since they like to show their tongue so much I wanted to see which one of them could make me cum the hardest 😘

-Howard University

-I wish to remain anonymous. I’m not as experienced in the sex department and I am 21 years old. I want to hook up with someone here. Maybe I have unrealistic expectations, but I want it to be with someone I’ve been eyeing around campus. He doesn’t know I exist, but he’s so beautiful. If I could just have one chance with him…

-Texas Southern

“I did it.”

Valencia shut her MacBook Pro and fell back against her bed within her dorm room. Across from her sat her roommate, Brielle. They’d been roommates since freshman year.

“It was an anonymous submission, right? Nothing to worry about.” Brielle replied while looking over her notes for her A&P lab practical.

“I know, but what if someone figures it out?—

Her phone buzzed next to her thigh again.

“Jesus…he keeps fucking calling me.”

Brielle chuckles, “His ego is bruised. He probably wants to make sure you don’t say anything about it.”

“It’s been a week. He needs to let the shit go.”

Valencia ends the call for the eighth time that rainy evening. She’s already angry with herself for even allowing that man to have his way with her body. It was the worst experience. Worse than her first time.

“Head was trash, dick was trash…”

“So, I guess it isn’t all true that Que’s are great in bed, huh?” Brielle jokes.

“It’s definitely not true. I just wish it was with him.”

Valencia grabbed a pillow and screamed into it. Brielle simply laughed at her antics.

“Isn’t he a Que too?” Brielle questions.

“He is. Maybe he’ll be the exception.”

Valencia slowly removed the pillow from her face and blinked her eyes up at the ceiling. Butterflies formed in her belly just thinking about him.

“He’s so damn fine, Brie. Like, why couldn’t it be him that had all of this instead of Isaiah?!”

“Who is this again? Girl, you know my attention span is fucked up.” Brielle replied with a laugh.

“His name is Erik. He’s getting his doctorate.”

“Hm,” Brielle highlighted a section in her textbook orange, “How old is he?”

“I don’t know, like…thirties maybe?”

“Since when do you like them older?” Brielle asked with a shocked tone of voice.

“Since now! He’s too fine, Brie. And he’s really smart. Like a genius. He has so many accomplishments. A sexy nerd.”

“He sounds like he’s out of your league—”

“He’s also a TA—”

Brielle’s eyes went wide.

“A TA? Girl…don’t do it.”

Valencia had to admit that Brielle was right.

“It’ll never happen anyway. That man walks past me everyday like he doesn’t see me. I’ll just crush from afar at this point I don’t even know why I sent that fucking message.”

Valencia pouted in bed. Silence filled the room as she laid there staring at the television. Brielle was completely absorbed into her notes to care. Valencia could be doing some schoolwork herself, but the thought of her anonymous ask kept circulating in her mind.

Valencia sat up on her elbow and reached for her laptop again. Brielle cut her brown eyes at her and smirked playfully. Valencia checked the blog and noticed one note. Clicking on it, it was just a like. Her submission is nothing compared to the other wild confessions.

“There he goes again,” Brielle motioned with her eyes at Valencia’s phone, “Do you want me to cuss his ass out? Block that nigga!”

Valencia grabbed her phone and proceeded to block him.

“You know I have Chemistry with that limp dick fucker, right?” Brielle said.

“Just ignore him, Brie. He’ll be alright.”

“He keeps harassing you!”

Valencia sat her laptop on their shared desk. She shut off her lamp light snd slipped beneath the sheets. She had an early class tomorrow and needed to ease her mind into slumber.

“Goodnight, Brie. Don’t stay up too late.” Valencia said.

“I’ll try. You know I’m a night owl.” Brielle grumbled.

The rain seemed to flow into the following afternoon. Valencia ran as fast as she could back to her dorm after the boring lecture she had to endure. A fellow student held the door for her and she made it inside although she was drenched from head to toe. She smoothed wet braids from her face and adjusted her cropped T-shirt. The brisk air of the building caused goosebumps to form along her sepia skin. She could even feel her teeth chattering.

Removing her heavy school bag from her shoulder, Valencia took long strides towards the elevators. She waited impatiently while rubbing her wet arms to try and warm up. She silently cursed herself for not bringing her umbrella. The sunny morning and clear sky deceived her. She stared down at her black and white Adidas Campus 00s for two seconds before the elevator doors opened. Valencia took a step forward and just then a deep timbre sent a shiver up her spine.

“Going up?”

Valencia was halfway into the elevator when her chocolate orbs fell upon the one person she wasn’t expecting to see in her dorm building.

Valencia may have met her match with Erik Stevens.

“Yes,” She stepped to the side so that he could enter.

“Thank you.”

Valencia scooted towards the corner of the elevator.

“Which floor?”

“Six.”

“Bet, that’s where I’m going.”

He has a dorm on the sixth floor? She thought.

She focused on him like she was studying a passage out of one of her textbooks. First, her eyes took in the style of his hair. He kept the sides and back tapered but the rest was beautifully loc’d and braided back. His eyes were shielded with gold-rimmed glasses that complimented his face and made him like artsy. She trailed her gaze down his neck to his broad shoulders. He wore a cream-colored hoodie and khaki cargo pants. On his feet were a pair of boots and in his firm grip was a dripping wet umbrella.

“After you.”

Valencia picked herself up and slipped past him since he was holding the door for her. She could smell his cologne and it was her new favorite smell.

“Thank you.” She said.

She instantly felt warm and fuzzy. He had this effect on her she hadn’t felt in a long while truly. Not even for that lackluster lay she had a week ago. Isaiah who?

Valencia walked into a crowded lounge area with a confused look on her face. She spotted Brielle near the window sitting on a lounger. She was chatting with a few of their mutual girl friends. The grey clouds outside began to allow the sun to peek through. She walked over to them and dropped her bag to the floor.

“Cindy, Skai…”

Cindy jutted out her petite hip and smiled with her braces in greeting. Skai raised her hand and fluttered her fingers covered in various gold rings. Skai was playing in Brielle’s ginger-colored coily hair as she typed away on her tablet.

“Why is everybody sitting here in the lounge?” Valencia questioned.

“Rumor has it, Rochelle isn’t our RA anymore.” Skai revealed.

Valencia furrowed her brows and squinted her eyes.

“Really?—”

“CAN I HAVE YOUR ATTENTION PLEASE!”

The chatter amongst everyone died down to a pregnant pause. Everyone looked towards Erik. Valencia caught his eye briefly and she could feel herself squirming from that small interaction alone.

“My name is Erik. I’m sure some of you have seen your emails, and for those that haven’t, I’m here to fill you in. Rochelle had a personal emergency and she will not continue as your RA for the final months of this semester. I will take over that position from here on out.”

Whispers circulated around the room. Erik stood there with his back straight, arms folded, and poker-faced.

Elusive nature.

Mellow.

“Uh-oh…”

Valencia turned her gaze towards Brielle. Her friend gave her a mischievous smirk. Valencia suppressed a laugh and threw her hands in the air dismissively.

“I will be staying on this floor for the remainder of the semester to keep an eye on things and act as a guide. I know a lot about TSU and I’m more than happy to help. Does anyone have any questions for me?”

Erik scanned the room through his glasses intently, similar to a drill sergeant. For some reason, his presence evoked a feeling of obedience.

A quiet Alpha.

“Well, that’s all I have to say for now,” Erik clapped his hands together in finality, “You can resume studying or whatever it is you were doing. Matt, right?”

Erik pointed to a freshman sitting at a desk. Matt was tall and lanky with designer braids in his hair and dressed like he was ready for a runway. A lot of designer. Definitely attention seeking.

“Yeah. How you know me?”

“I’m a Que Dog. You still interested, right?”

Something in Matt shifted. He stood taller and raised his chin with confidence.

“Absolutely.” Matt replied with excitement.

“Your probationary period starts tonight. You got a lot of work to do.”

Valencia could sense the nervousness in Matt.

“I’m ready.” Matt replied.

“We’ll see.”

Erik walked past Matt and towards the elevators. Valencia watched him leave and when he’d finally gone she let out a shaky breath.

“I don’t think I’m going to enjoy a man being our RA,” Cindy said with obvious disdain.

“Same,” Skai stood up and pulled her tight denim skirt down over her rotund backside and generous thighs.

“Valencia is going to keep me up playing DJ hero every night since her crush is our new RA.”

Valencia glared at Brielle.

“You have a crush on him?!” Cindy questioned with a surprised expression.

“What happened to Isaiah?” Skai asked.

“Isaiah was a disappointment. He talked a big game after that party and when we went back to his room he pretty much did the opposite of what he said he was gonna do.” Valencia recalled with frustration.

“I’M GoNnA MAke YoU CuM,” Brielle mocked.

“I’Mma GiVe YoU THIs DiCk AnD HaVE YOu BeGGiNG FoR MorE.” Valencia said

“oh my fucking GOD,” Cindy giggled, “It was that horrible?”

“Cindy, horrible isn’t even the word. If I could find a word to describe how awful it was I would. Can’t eat pussy for shit, constantly tried to stick it in my ass because he couldn’t find my pussy, has a big dick but can’t fuck, kept asking me if I liked it, it was terrible.”

“I’m so sorry for you, sis,” Skai shook her head, “I really thought he was going to knock the Sonic rings out that coochie.”

“Maybe he was drunk?” Cindy said

“He wasn’t. He had a little bit of weed, that’s it.”

Valencia reached for her bag and stood up to leave.

“Let me go study, I’ll catch up with ya’ll later.”

“Sure you don’t wanna come out with us for drinks tonight?” Brielle asked with a smile.

“I have to train. I have a swim meet coming up.”

“Fine! Maybe Saturday!”

Valencia put a thumb up as she walked away towards her dorm room.

Thirty notes.

Girl if you don’t approach this man!

Who is it? I wanna know 👀

If he hasn’t taken the hint by now he don’t want you.

Valencia’s heart sank to the pit of her stomach. Most of the replies were nothing but discouraging. She wished she could take back her anonymous submission. Sitting at their shared desk in an oversized yellow Nike hoodie and her braided hair in a messy bun, she clicked on a tab on her MacBook to continue reading about Erik’s accomplishments at TSU. He’s an alumni receiving his doctorate in Computer Hardware Engineering. Summa cum laude. Pledge President. Star Football player. Leading place in various academic clubs and competitions. Tutor in multiple complex subjects such as quantum physics, chemistry, mathematics, and philosophy. Fluent in languages such as French, Spanish, Chinese, Latin, and signing.

Overly intellectual.

Valencia could go on and on about how perfect Erik seemed to be. She was infatuated past the point of no return. Far gone. The sexist fucking nerd she’d ever known. But still, it was just a reminder that he wouldn’t be concerned with a twenty-one-year-old chick with no experience and nowhere near as much maturity as him. He probably wanted a sophisticated woman. confident, in charge, and calm. A lot of experience and knowledge about the world and about culture, art, and literature. Someone who can quote Aristotle.

Studious.

Oh? He was in the Military? That explains a lot.

Valencia clicked out of the tab and back to the HBCU Confessions blog. As she scrolled the page, she wondered to herself who could have created it? She’d heard whispers around campus about how the infamous blog became active again after some years.

As she scrolled, an instant message icon popped up. She shifted her hips in her seat and leaned in to click on the message. It was probably some old man asking if she wanted to be their sugar baby or a bot. Valencia’s dark brown eyes scanned the message.

-Hi:)

It was the blog. HBCU Confessions. The owner.

-Hello ❤️

Why would they message her?

-I read your submission. Probably the most innocent out of them all.

Valencia didn’t know how to take that. Was it an issue?

-Unfortunately for you, I don’t have THAT MUCH excitement in my life lol

-Nothing wrong with that. It prompted me to message you personally.

-It was that interesting? Lol

-I’d like to understand and see if I could give you some advice.

-Thank you! I’d actually love some advice. 🥰

-Perfect. What makes it an unrealistic expectation? Because I can tell you now, I doubt it is.

-He’s on a different level than me. He’s also older than me. Idk I just get this vibe that he wouldn’t be interested.

Valencia grabbed her hot pink Stanley cup to take a sip of water.

-How much older? I know you’re 21.

-All I know is that he’s in his 30s.

-I’m still not seeing where it’s unrealistic. Have you tried anything at all? A smile? Anything?

-No. I’ve been too shy to.

-Shy or afraid of rejection?

-BOTH.

-You gotta break out of that.

-Do you know for sure if he’s single?

-I’ve seen him around campus with this professor sometimes for lunch but that’s it. I’m not sure if they are dating or just friends lol

-What school are you attending again?

-Texas Southern

-Really? 👀

-👀👀👀

Valencia made a face at her laptop screen. Did they know something she didn’t?

-Is there something I should know?

-I think I may know who you’re talking about. He’s not available from what I know…

So, this person attended TSU as well? Makes sense now why they singled out her confession.

-Who am I talking about then? 😌

-He’s 33 by the way.

Valencia’s shoulders slumped.

-This still doesn’t confirm that we’re talking about the same person.

-He’s a Nupe, right?

-No. he’s a Que. lol

-You sure? He’s about 6’0, teaches chemistry, spends time with that one English Literature professor…

Valencia considered their description of Erik but she was sure he said that he was a Que Dog earlier. And he’s a TA for quantum physics not chemistry. The only similarity is the English Lit teacher. Professor Boyd.

-I don’t think we’re talking about the same person. Send me a picture.

Valencia waited two minutes before a picture popped up in their chat.

-His name is James Parham.

-He’s cute but that’s not my crush 😂

-Well then I have no idea who you’re talking about lol.

-wait!

Valencia waited. She stood up from her seat at the desk to grab her phone from the charger. Checking her notifications, she received a text from Brielle an hour ago. Valencia opened the text thread and there was a video. She pressed play and it was a lot of motion to keep the phone steady until the video zoomed into a table far off in the corner. Valencia squinted her eyes and recognition washed over her face.

Erik.

He was sitting alone in a booth with a drink in his hand, bobbing his head to the music.

Ping.

-Is it him?

-Yes!

-😌 ohhh so Erik?

-He’s definitely single.

-Make a move before it’s too late.

-what do you suggest I do? Can you give me some advice please?

-Erik is introverted and often mistaken for being timid. He is indeed an Omega and takes pride in that. You can find him around campus reading a book or working out. He’s a homebody for sure. Sometimes you may catch him out and about. He’s a chill dude with this mysterious aura about him. That’s what I’ve gathered from just seeing him around campus.

-I would start off by playing into his interests. He likes to read so find out what books he likes. From what I know he’s big on poetry. He likes to run around campus at 6 am. Need help tutoring? See if he’s offering some study hours for that. Start there and see where it goes.

-This is really good advice! It’s very subtle and a perfect way to get his attention without being too obvious. Thank you! ❤️

-You’re welcome love 💗 I’m here if you need anything. Feel free to chat with me.

Intent listener…

“I really don’t know what to do about it, Erik…”

Andrea, Erik’s friend from college and English Literature professor at TSU walked alongside him in the early afternoon the following day.

“He’s so confusing half the damn time, I can’t even tell if he’s into me or not.”

Erik had both hands in the pockets of his slacks. Today was his day to assistant teach quantum physics. He really wasn’t up for it because he’d been up so late in the dorms trying to settle a sneaky party. Apparently, Rochelle allowed them to party and have drinks which is against the rules and grounds for expulsion. He just walked and listened. Out of his friend group, he’s the one they go to to vent because he doesn’t disrupt them, and he gives great advice.

“How long have we known James, Drea? That nigga can’t express himself for shit. Just know, he’s feelin’ you. He’s always had a thing for you.” Erik replied.

Andrea took a sip of her super green smoothie.

“Well, I’m not gonna wait around for him to speak up. What is he so afraid of?”

Erik turned his gaze onto Andrea through his gold-rimmed glasses.

“We’ve been friends for about ten years, Drea. Maybe he’s afraid that if things don’t work out with you two romantically, it’ll mess up the bond you both had as friends.”

Andrea mulled over Erik’s words. They settled in front of the school fountain and sat down on a bench facing it.

“You have a point. We’re going to a spoken word tonight. We’ll see how it goes.”

“Spoken word, huh? Wow…I haven’t done one of those in forever.” Erik replied with a smirk.

“Coming back to Texas is nostalgic, ain’t it?” Andrea said with a giggle.

“It is—”

“Oh! Guess what?”

Andrea leaned into Erik with a playful look in her eyes. Erik narrowed his eyes at her in response.

“Are you gonna guess?” Andrea pestered.

“Aight, You’re finally gonna write that book you’ve been talking about all these years.”

“No! I changed my mind about the book,” Andrea rolls her eyes, “the blog…”

Erik’s eyebrows shot up.

“Yep. It’s been so long I had to see what was going on with it.”

Erik chuckled, “Nah. You’re back on there? Drea,” Erik shook his head, “You’re a professor now! What if somebody finds out?”

“Who’s gonna find out, Erik? We never revealed ourselves when we used it. Nobody knows what school we went to or who we were. Well…I think I may have slipped up last night…”

“What the hell did you do, Drea?”

Erik surveyed his surroundings to make sure they were safe to talk about this.

“I got the sweetest confession from a student here and I just had to message them.” Andrea said.

“Okay, what did they say?”

“So, they pretty much confessed to having a crush on someone here and being afraid to approach them…”

“Who?” Erik said impatiently.

“You.”

Andrea laughed at Erik’s expression. He furrowed his brows and looked at her like she was talking gibberish.

“…Did they say who they were?” Erik asked.

His interest was peeked.

“No. All I know is she’s twenty-one, very shy, feels as if she has no chance in hell with you.”

“Why are you telling me this?” Erik fussed.

“Because I thought you’d want to know! You need some action in your life, Erik. When was the last time you had sex?”

“Aye, don’t worry about it, girl,” Erik playfully shoved Andrea, “I’m just saying, what am I supposed to do with this information? Like…I don’t even know how the girl looks.”

“You will eventually. I gave her some advice. She may pop up today…”

Erik couldn’t deny that he was intrigued. Could be fun to see how things play out.

“Okay, okay…the log in still the same?”

Andrea smirked, “Still the same. You remember?”

“Yeah…it was my idea, wasn’t it?” Erik smart-mouthed.

“Alright, smart ass.”

Andrea checked the time on her Apple Watch.

“Let me head back to my office. When does your class start?”

“In an hour. I’m gonna head over to the library and do a bit of grading to kill some time.”

Andrea and Erik stood up at the same time. Andrea opened her arms to accept a hug from Erik. She squeezed her old friend and then kissed his cheek.

“Aight, Daka, I’ll catch you later.”

“Have a good class, Drea.”

They parted ways and headed in opposite directions.

Valencia felt cute today.

She did her makeup for once. She dressed in a body con black dress that enhanced her curves. She wore her favorite Carolina Herrera perfume. Anything to get his attention.

On her way to the library after her philosophy class, Valencia entered the library with a grace that turned heads. She took the elevators to the third level of the library, her stomach doing flips because of how nervous she was. She exited onto the third level and walked further into the silent area until she was near the windows that overlooked the campus.

Valencia took a seat and proceeded to retrieve her MacBook, and textbook. She wanted to format her notes with bullet points and colors while the information was still fresh on her mind. It was Friday evening and she didn’t want to spend her weekend catching up on school work. Her cafe noir eyes would look up to see if her crush had shown up yet.

After some time, her attention veered back to the HBCU Confessions blog. She was excited to see that there was a new message from the blog.

-Any luck today?

Valencia typed.

-No 😪

Erik strolled over to a desk diagonal to Valencia. He quickly took his laptop and other work out of his bag. It was the last thing on his mind after what Andrea told him. He opened his laptop and found his way back to Tumblr. Being back sparked memories of mischief and lust. Erik started this blog for laughs and he honestly didn’t expect it to transform into what it is today. What started out as a blog strictly for TSU, expanded to other colleges unexpectedly. So many scandalous things go down at college and it sucked that our people didn’t really have their own way of connecting across HBCUs. So, Erik started the blog for fun, and it quickly evolved.

He’d known secrets about people across colleges. It didn’t matter if you were the dean, a professor, a student, or a coach, your deepest darkest thoughts and feelings were exposed for everyone to see with the option of remaining anonymous. Erik witnessed breakups and hookups. It was a guilty pleasure of his, like watching hentai. Erik had many guilty pleasures. Who didn’t?

He successfully logged back in and found himself staring at hundreds of notifications. The only thing he was concerned with was whoever this anonymous person was that had a crush on him. It’s been a while since he’d been with a woman. Being in the military as an engineer was a busy job. He worked a lot and on top of that he moved around from state to state. Hardly any time to settle down or date. He did date a few women, but it was all a dead end.

Erik found what he was looking for.

ebonygoddess1990s_-No 😪

Erik read the entire thread and couldn’t help but chuckle quietly. He was tickled by Andrea’s advice to his secret admirer. She knew him like she knew her classic literature. He was indeed laidback, quiet, nerdy, and ambitious. The more he read the messages, the more he wanted to find out who this woman was. He decided to respond to their message. Why not? It would be fun to play along. Just like the old days.

-Where are you right now?

Meanwhile, Valencia’s head shot up at her MacBook when she heard the ping of a new message. She read the message.

-Where are you right now?

-Library ☺️

-Usually he’s there around this time.

Valencia looked up and she was staring at him sitting at a table diagonally from her table. He didn’t know that she was eyeing him down since he was focused on his laptop. He wore a pair of slim fit paisley and gray pants with a white button down shirt and brown loafers.

-He’s here now 😳

Erik sat up straighter and his eyes locked with Valencia’s. She quickly averted her gaze to her laptop, tucking her braids behind her left ear. Erik took his time admiring Valencia. His eyes started at her feet. She wore a pair of black gladiator sandals with silver spikes on them. She had red painted toes and smooth, brown legs. His onyx eyes ascended further up her body, over the curve of her hip, the hourglass shape of her waist, her toned arms, ample cleavage, neatly braided hair, and then finally her beautiful face.

He really really liked the shape of her lips. Large and wide set with a plump, pouty appearance and equally full on the top and bottom. He’d seen plenty of beautiful women every day, but whoever this girl was, she was the most beautiful. It was her rich, brown skin. Her pretty doe eyes. That body. Erik was certain that she’s his secret admirer, but he needed to be sure. Excitement brewed in him as he typed a response.

-You should say hi. Get his attention.

-I’m nervous 😭

-Don’t be. Just go for it. How else will you know if he’s interested?

-I dare you to give him a flirty wave with a seductive smile. 😏

Valencia’s eyes went round with surprise. That was bold. Bolder than she initially planned to be. She cleared her throat and turned in her seat. Crossing one leg over the other, Valencia flipped her braids so that it gave her a messy look and then she made her eyes look sleepy and hypnotic like Dorothy Dandridge. She took a deep breath in and focused her gaze on Erik steadily. After five seconds, he looked up and did a double take. Valencia raised a small hand and waved at him slowly while her lips were formed in a smile.

Erik simply smirked at her and raked his eyes up and down her frame. That’s all. He just smirked at her and then he dropped his gaze back to his laptop. Valencia gripped the back of her chair to try and calm her racing heart. That slight interaction had her bewitched. He smirked at her and he checked her out. She wanted to jump up and down.

Ping.

-How did it go?

-He smiled at me and then he looked me up and down. 😭 clearly he likes what he sees!

Erik nibbled on his bottom lip to control the urge to smile with all of his teeth. This was so much fun. The most fun he’d had an a long time. It was good to be back.

Erik packed his things so that he could be on his way to the class he needed to assist. As he was getting ready to leave, he felt his phone vibrating with an incoming call. He plucked his cell from his pocket and brought it to his ear. His eyes connected with Valencia’s briefly before turning away.

“Hello? Hey…I was headed there now—really? You sure? Okay…no, no…it’s all good. Uh…I’ll just finish grading everything and drop it off later? Perfect. Alright…see you next Friday…”

Erik ended the call. Fuck it. He didn’t want to assist that class today anyway now that something and someone had his attention more. He stole a glance at her and she was reading from a philosophy textbook. He knew philosophy well. So well that he tutored for it. Erik had an idea. He took his seat again and brought his laptop back out. He opened it to the messages and began typing away.

-That’s a good thing 😌 What’s he doing now?

-He was going to leave but changed his mind. I wonder why. Hmmm…maybe he can’t get enough of me lol

-maybe 🤔 lol. What are you doing now? Are you studying?

-I am. It’s philosophy. It’s so boring but I have to do it.

-Philosophy, huh? He actually tutors philosophy.

Valencia giggled to herself and shook her head.

-Why am I not surprised. He’s so smart 😍

Erik licked his lips. She was infatuated with his intellect. He liked that.

-You want another dare?

Valencia looked heavenward. Erik peeked over at her.

-Okay. What do you dare?

Valencia’s eyes veered from her laptop to Erik again.

Ping.

-I dare you to ask him to be your tutor.

Valencia exhaled louder than she’d expected to. She brought a hand to her belly to calm the butterflies. That actually wouldn’t be a bad idea. She just needed to calm her nerves. Valencia counted down from ten in her head and stood up from her seat. She paused with her fingertips against her philosophy textbook before lifting it from the table. She pressed it against her, beneath her cleavage, hugging it with both arms like those school girls from teen dramas.

She started making her way towards him slowly. Erik didn’t look away from his laptop until she was standing next to him. Being that close to him, his features more prominent, Valencia couldn’t find the words to speak. Erik looked up at her through his glasses and gave her a friendly smile before recognition washed over his face.

“Hi.” Erik said.

“Hi…”

Valencia shifted her focus on the empty seat at the table. She took a moment to gather herself before scooting out the chair and making herself comfortable.

“Weren’t you in the elevator the other day?” Erik said.

“Yeah…yeah that was me,” Valencia smiles.

Erik nodded his head, “You look different.”

She wasn’t as dolled up and she was soaked from head to toe.

“I didn’t look very flattering,” Valencia released a dry chuckle, growing more bashful the more his eyes were on her.

“No, what I mean is…you’re not all wet.”

Valencia blinked at Erik. Heat crept up her face. The way he said wet…

Erik’s eyes fell to the book that pushed her titties up.

“Philosophy. What’s your major?”

“Psychology.” Valencia replied.

“It doesn’t matter how slowly you go, as long as you don’t stop…”

He sounded those words out so smooth like he was serenading her. Valencia furrowed her brows at Erik’s response. Her full lips parted invitingly.

“…What?” She questions.

“Confucius. Confucianism? the importance of having a good moral character?”

“Oh—oh!”

Valencia sat her textbook down and giggled.

“Right, right…I had a brain fart.”

Erik laughed.

“Uhm…do you tutor?”

Valencia leaned in, unknowingly exposing her cleavage more. Erik fought the urge to look, focusing his penetrating gaze on her face.

He adjusted his glasses very studiously, “I do actually.”

“That’s perfect actually,” Valencia folds her arms against the table, “I could use a tutor. You seem to be well versed in the subject.”

Valencia looked at Erik expectantly with those doe eyes and honestly she could have whatever she wanted if she kept staring at him like that.

“Are you asking me?” Erik quirked a brow.

“…Please?”

Valencia folded her hands and pouted her bottom lip. It was adorable.

“Are you free after five?” Erik inquired.

“I am, actually. Tonight I have plans with friends but I can meet at five.”

“Alright,” Erik shut his laptop, “We can study in the lounge at the dorms. Wait…”

Erik touched Valencia’s arm, stopping her from standing. The hairs on her arm stood up like a jolt of electricity coursed through her.

“I didn’t catch your name…”

“Oh…sorry. Valencia.”

“Nice to formally meet you, Miss Valencia. I’m Erik.”

“I remember.”

They smiled at each other. Erik stood up, placing his laptop in his bag. Valencia took her time retrieving her textbook, unsure of what else to say.

“Well, I guess this is goodbye for now—”

“Valencia?”

Isaiah.

The last person she’d hope to run into. He looked irritated with her as he approached them. Valencia fixed her face into a look of frustration and Erik noticed straight away. The tension between them was palpable.

“What it do, shawty? You avoiding me?”

Valencia looked between Erik and Isaiah. Isaiah loomed closer, draping his arm around her shoulder. Valencia rolled her eyes.

“What can I do for you, Isaiah?” Valencia quipped.

“Did you block me?”

“I did—”

“For what? Didn’t we have a good time?”

Valencia pursed her lips and shut her eyes.

“Isaiah, don’t make me embarrass you…”

Truthfully, she was the one embarrassed at the moment. Erik’s eyebrows ticked up and the corner of his mouth twitched. Isaiah cut his eyes at Erik, sizing him up initially before he recognized him.

“Oh, shit what’s poppin’, Poet?”

Isaiah raised his hand to dab Erik. Erik slowly brought his hand forward and their palms collided with a loud smack and a firm grip. Erik released his hand and watched as Isaiah discreetly flexed his fingers.

“Don’t mind us, just tryna see why my girl mad at me.”

Isaiah clearly couldn’t read the room.

“I’m not your girl, Isaiah.”

Valencia lifted his arm from around her and turned to leave. She threw Erik a furtive glance before retreating quickly.

“Valencia!”

Shhhhhhhhhh!

He was in a library after all.

Isaiah was ready to chase her down but Erik yoked him up by his backpack to stop him.

“Gahdamn, Bro,” Isaiah fixed his bag.

“She’s not interested, One Pump Chump.”

“Fuck you and that nickname. That was one fucking time. I was drunk.”

“Yeahhhh and I’m sure the same happened with Valencia?”

Isaiah glared dangerously at Erik.

“If it didn’t happen that way, it shouldn’t matter, right?”

Erik slapped Isaiah on the back and proceeded to walk away.

“I’ll catch you later, little bruh.”

Erik threw up a hook and twisted his tongue before descending the stairs with a laugh.

[controlledarrhythmia]

Tell me more abt Lepidopterologist Hux can’t stop thinking about it since you mentioned it 🫀

OH, ABSOLUTELY. As mentioned in the concept post, I love the idea of him as a moth breeder, but I think that’d be more of a hobby thing— like his taxidermy —so I’ll get back to it in a bit. Career wise, I’m definitely imagining him as a laboratory entomologist. Or perhaps a disgruntled children’s museum worker who may or may not have been fired from his previous job as a laboratory entomologist.

Irregardless, he loves capturing new specimens for his personal collection. Be it wandering through the woods at night in search or waiting for them to come to the moth sheet he has set up in his yard, it’s a time that must not be intruded upon.

Which is why when it comes time to clock in he leaves the field work up to his coworkers. He’ll be damned if he lets the presence of Other People taint his favorite activity. (And if a coworker happens to send a specimen to the lab that he then identifies as a new genus and he takes the credit for it… so be it.)

As for the breeding, he dreams of one day having his own sanctuary, but as of now most of his breeding is contained to an area of his office where he raises caterpillars and hangs chrysalises/cocoons before he brings the adult moths to a local sanctuary to breed.

When it comes to what he breeds, I think he’d adore the faithful beauties I mentioned in a previous post, but those are native to the area around Florida and he’d never subject himself to living there. So I think he’d love to breed meadow rue owlet moths. Though not being one themselves they belong to the same genus as vampire moths, being the only moths from the genus (Calyptra) to inhabit North America. He’d be a big fan of that. For the record I imagine him living somewhere like Virginia or Maryland.

I hope this satisfied some of your curiosities!! I’ll probably have more to say on this later and ofc my fics are still coming eventually, but I’m a little out of it right now.

[dailyanarchistposts]

"Ecologist" means different things to different people. Strictly speaking, an ecologist is a scientist (usually a biologist) who studies the interrelationships between organisms and their environments. "Deep ecologists," on the other hand, may or may not be scientifically trained, and their topic is not ecology per se but rather developing a harmonious relationship with Nature, and defending the Earth against human-generated threats. Scientific ecologists, to the extent that they want to appear respectable, may be quite anthropocentric in their day to day behavior; deep ecologists, on the other hand, are explicitly biocentric (or at least they try to be). To many people, an "ecologist" is simply an environmentalist, or someone who (unlike Hayduke) picks up bottles and cans along roadsides (I've seen garbage trucks labeled "Ecology Dept."). Some self-labeled environmentalists have added to the confusion by misinterpreting what ecology fundamentally means, and using it as a buzzword for various political goals.

More distributing to me, as a professional ecologist sensitive to people's lack of appreciation of ecology, is that environmentalists are often antagonistic toward science and scientists in general, not just toward manipulative science and technology. Some openly suggest that scientists are the enemy, and have nothing positive to offer the environmental movement. For example, in planning a recent Green Conference in Florida, organizers went out of their way to assure that no scientific ecologists were involved. When I criticized the program of the conference (which featured anti-deep ecologist Ynestra King as a keynote speaker) and asked why no ecologists had been invited to speak, the conference organizer responded that if I meant, by "ecologist," the "progressional, biological scientist type," then he saw no need for that kind of person to speak at a conference for activists.

I admit I feel a little uneasy about being called a scientists...somehow that label conjures up images of little men in white lab coats playing with test tubes and DNA. But a woman or man crouched in the forest, keying-out (and admiring) a fungus or recording details of bird behavior, is every bit as much of a scientist as the experimenter in the laboratory. And the lab scientists, too, may contribute invaluable information toward our understanding of how Nature works. I suggest that science phobia is often misguided, and that ecological science is a constructive approach to knowing Nature. By itself, science may be neither necessary not sufficient to understand Nature, but it is one fo the best tools we have. Deep ecologists and other environmentalists would do well to consider more thoughtfully what the Way of Ecology offers, both as a science and as a worldview.

The science of ecology developed from natural history, the lore of Nature. Since Charles Darwin, this lore has been unfused with concepts of interdependence, interrelationship, and co-adaptation—indeed, it was Darwin's thoroughly scientific theory of evolution that made ecology possible. Evolution made sense out of natural history; facts heretofore disconnected became interacting components of general patterns that should be explained in a rational and convincing way. Furthermore, elements in Darwin's theory were empirically testable—the hall-mark of science.

Unlike religious beliefs, scientific hypotheses are designed to be discarded if they no longer accord with observations. Much hogwash persists in science, but honest scientists do their best to weed it out. The subject of ecology is Nature, which has developed in all its beauty through organic evolution and is a vast web of interactions more complex than humans can ever fully comprehend. As ecologist Frank Egler has pointed out, "Nature is not only more complex than we think, but more complex than we can ever think." It is one intricate system composed of a hierarchy of nested subsystems, with structure flowing upward and constraints flowing downward. Although ecological complexity can never (and some would add, should never) be fully quantified, the study of complex interactions—ecology—produces overwhelming respect for the whole in all who approach it sensitively.

In becoming scientific, natural history does not denigrate into mechanism, but rather matured into holism while retaining the proven techniques of mechanistic science. Establishing facts through observation, experiment, and other reductionist methods, ecology unites them and integrates them into broad, general theories, into wholes greater than the sum of their parts. The wholes (theories) are there all along, of course, guiding the collection of data and providing context for facts. As Stephen Jay Gould has pointed out, facts do not speak for themselves, but are read in the light of theory. Perhaps most important to deep ecologists, ecology and evolutionary biology demonstrate unequivocally that humans are just one ephemeral component of an interrelated and interdependent biota. Ecology and evolutionary biology place us firmly within nature, not on top of it.

Natural science is explicitly non-anthropocentric, even though many of its practitioners are still stuck in anthropocentric modes of thought. Scientists, such as Jared Diamond, who have become familiar with taxonomies developed by indigenous cultures (i.e., the way they separate and classify wild organisms into types) are generally impressed by the similarity of indigenous taxonomy to scientific taxonomy. "Primitive" people recognize mostly the same species in Nature as do modern scientists. The differences usually involve those plants and animals that are not used directly for food, clothing, ornamentation, drugs, and other human purposes. These "useless" species tend to be "lumped"; thus, fewer distinctions and fewer species may be recognized by indigenous cultures than by scientific taxonomists. Indigenous people, like everyone else, have a utilitarian bias that has been naturally selected to foster their survival. For this reason, they have developed a taxonomy that is anthropocentric compared to that of biology, which seeks to classify all organisms with equivalent precision, regardless of their utility to humans. This is not to deny that most research money in biology is channeled into anthropocentric research (e.g., medical science and genetic engineering), and that vertebrates and vascular plants have received more attention than "lower" forms.

Ecologists, as scientists, devote their lives to studying, and hopefully understanding, how Nature works. These people love the Earth. As the British entomologist Miriam Rothschild remarked, "For someone studying natural history, life can never be long enough." Other approaches to this same end (or to no particular "end") are also valid, and are not mutually exclusive. Direct experience, contemplation, meditation, and simply the ecstasy of being immersed in wilderness are equally viable approaches and, in fact, provide many ecologists with the inspiration they need to carry on. These spontaneous or mystical experiences are accessible to scientist and non-scientist alike. Nothing in my professional code of conduct as an ecologist says that I cannot run naked and whooping with joy through the desert, or sit all day and stare at a rock. When I am actively engaged in research, of course, these particular activities may not be appropriate, but only because they may bias my results (for example, by scaring away all the fauna). A whole human being is one who is equally comfortable with rational and intuitive-spontaneous explorations of Nature---one who can deal with "hard facts" at one moment and be a wild animal the next. These two approaches, complementary and intertwined as yin and yang, are both essential to holistic understanding.

Aldo Leopold, my favorite deep ecologist, was able to carry his message so powerfully because he had the sensitivity of a poet and the objectivity of a scientist. He communicated in the hard, factual language of science, sprinkled with brilliant, experiential metaphors in the finest tradition of Nature essays. Virtually every faction within the environmental, ecosophical, and resource management fields claims old Aldo for its own, yet few people seem to comprehend the more radical, biocentric notions he developed gradually through his life, and articulated late in his career. Because he could write so damn well and is appreciated by so many people of such divergent worldviews, Leopold provides deep ecologists with an avenue along which to lead others toward biocentric understanding.

If yin and yang, intuition and rationality, emotion and thought, right brain and left brain are complementary, then so too are deep ecology and scientific ecology. It may be that their relationship is mutualistic: they need each other. Don't judge scientific ecology from your experience that most ecologists (or scientists, generally) are anthropocentric jerks. Most philosophers, accountants, lawyers, farmers, and television repairmen are anthropocentric jerks, too. At least ecology, "the subversive science," has a biocentric, holistic underpinning, which cannot be said for most other disciplines. If most scientific ecologists are not deep ecologists, it is because they have yet to grasp the radical implications of their science. If most deep ecologists are not scientific ecologists, then perhaps it would behoove them to explore natural history, evolution, and ecology. You don't need a college degree to be a good ecologist, though it helps, because it compels exposure to the cumulative knowledge of others through textbooks, journals, and symposia. But the best ecology is learned in the field from observation and reflection on why Nature works the way it does; and from just being there, out of doors and away from the human-dominated world.

It is no accident that many ecologists and field biologists are somewhat crude, wild-eyes, and uncivilized, or to put it simply—"earthy." As John Steinbeck, who was trained in zoology, noted in Log from the Sea of Cortez, "What good men most biologists are, the tenors of the scientific world---temperamental, moody, lecherous, loud-laughing, and healthy...The true biologists deals with life, with teeming, boisterous life, and learns something from it." The message of the ecological worldview, in its fullest expression, is this: Get out into the woods, the mountains, the deserts, the swamps. Feel it, explore it, examine it, think about it, understand it. Rational analysis and direct intuition do not conflict—you need both and your brain is built by natural selection to do both. It is your Nature.

If science, in the form of the "new sciences" or ecology, evolutionary biology, and quantum mechanics, is capable of reinserting humans into Nature by enlarging the self to include the whole biosphere—"the world is my body" (Alan Watts)—then perhaps we have come full circle. We began as primitives, relatively un-self-conscious and inseparable from the ecosystem; we evolved into calculating, rational beings, becoming more and more alienated from our real home; we developed other-wordly religions to place us above other life-forms, and dualist reductionist science to ascribe mechanism to all of Nature; but then we developed new forms of science that put us, surprisingly but objectively, right back where we began and where we belong: as Earth-animals.

Most scientists don't want to think (or, at least, talk openly) about such things or feel they cannot do so without jeopardizing their scientific credibility and, therefore, their careers. Jobs and money are scarce for ecologists, and appearing radical or unscientific is usually a one-way ticket to poverty and obscurity. This does not excuse ecologists from active involvement in defending the Earth, but their hesitation is understandable. Deep ecologists must encourage scientific ecologists to get involved in saving that which they study. The battle to defend the Earth needs warriors who specialize in determining what the war is being fought over, what it takes to save what we have, and how we might be able to put it all back together again.

[rockislandadultreads]

Libby Spotlight: Newly-Added Science & Nature eBooks

Fire Weather by John Vaillant

In May 2016, Fort McMurray, the hub of Canada’s oil industry and America’s biggest foreign supplier, was overrun by wildfire. The multi-billion-dollar disaster melted vehicles, turned entire neighborhoods into firebombs, and drove 88,000 people from their homes in a single afternoon. Through the lens of this apocalyptic conflagration—the wildfire equivalent of Hurricane Katrina—John Vaillant warns that this was not a unique event, but a shocking preview of what we must prepare for in a hotter, more flammable world.

Fire has been a partner in our evolution for hundreds of millennia, shaping culture, civilization, and, very likely, our brains. Fire has enabled us to cook our food, defend and heat our homes, and power the machines that drive our titanic economy. Yet this volatile energy source has always threatened to elude our control, and in our new age of intensifying climate change, we are seeing its destructive power unleashed in previously unimaginable ways.

With masterly prose and a cinematic eye, Vaillanttakes us on a riveting journey through the intertwined histories of North America’s oil industry and the birth of climate science, to the unprecedented devastation wrought by modern forest fires, and into lives forever changed by these disasters. John Vaillant’s urgent work is a book for—and from—our new century of fire, which has only just begun.

Slow Birding by Joan E. Strassmann

Many birders travel far and wide to popular birding destinations to catch sight of rare or “exotic” birds. In Slow Birding, evolutionary biologist Joan E. Strassmann introduces readers to the joys of birding right where they are.

In this inspiring guide to the art of slow birding, Strassmann tells colorful stories of the most common birds to be found in the United States—birds we often see but might not have considered deeply before. For example, northern cardinals thrive in the city, where they are free from predators. White brows on a male white-throated sparrow indicate that he is likely to be a philanderer. This essential guide to the fascinating world of common, everyday birds features: detailed portraits of individual bird species and the scientists who have discovered and observed them; advice and guidance on what to look for when slow birding, so that you can uncover clues to the reasons behind specific bird behaviors; and bird-focused activities that will open your eyes more to the fascinating world of birds.

Slow Birding is the perfect guide for the birder looking to appreciate the beauty of the birds right in their own backyard, observing keenly how their behaviors change from day to day and season to season.

Universe: 50 Ideas You Really Need to Know by Joanne Baker

From dwarf planets to dark energy; and from the Big Bang to the death of stars, this book is the perfect introduction to the cutting-edge science that is shaping our understanding of our place in the Universe and that could lead to the next great discovery -- the detection of life beyond Earth.

The Devil's Element by Dan Egan

Phosphorus has played a critical role in some of the most lethal substances on earth: firebombs, rat poison, nerve gas. But it's also the key component of one of the most vital: fertilizer, which has sustained life for billions of people. In this major work of explanatory science and environmental journalism, Pulitzer Prize finalist Dan Egan investigates the past, present, and future of what has been called "the oil of our time."

The story of phosphorus spans the globe and vast tracts of human history. First discovered in a seventeenth-century alchemy lab in Hamburg, it soon became a highly sought-after resource. The race to mine phosphorus took people from the battlefields of Waterloo, which were looted for the bones of fallen soldiers, to the fabled guano islands off Peru, the Bone Valley of Florida, and the sand dunes of the Western Sahara. Over the past century, phosphorus has made farming vastly more productive, feeding the enormous increase in the human population. Yet, as Egan harrowingly reports, our overreliance on this vital crop nutrient is today causing toxic algae blooms and "dead zones" in waterways from the coasts of Florida to the Mississippi River basin to the Great Lakes and beyond. Egan also explores the alarming reality that diminishing access to phosphorus poses a threat to the food system worldwide—which risks rising conflict and even war.

[nancypullen]

MIA

Yep, I've let too many days pass without posting. I've missed the opportunity to crow about how much fun Halloween was, we're already more than a week into November! We did have a grand time though. Trick-or-treating with our little miss in her fun neighborhood ticks all of the boxes on my perfect Halloween check list. I popped on my witch hat and my sweatshirt and had as much fun as the kids.

I'm trying to be better about sharing pictures of myself (ugh!) so that when I'm dead my kids can have something to prove I was here.

Yes indeed, we gave October a fantastic send off and November arrived with chillier weather and even more color in the trees. Absolutely beautiful.

I've been busy filling a big earring order, and keeping appointments. My in-person interview at the library went well ( I thought) but I haven't heard a peep. I can't worry about that. I know I'm qualified and would be helpful and cheerful to the patrons, but I still may not be what they're looking for - who knows? If not there, I'll find something else. I had a follow up appointment after my yearly physical/ lab work because my blood pressure was up. That's really unusual for me, so I had to track it for a month and then bring my monitor in and all that. Turns out I'm normal, I just don't like going to the doctor. I'm really glad that I don't have to take meds. I'm too forgetful for that.

Then, I received a call that my mammogram results were abnormal and showed a "developing asymmetry" in the left breast. Tomorrow I have to go to Easton for a diagnostic mammogram and an ultrasound. I'm 99% sure that it's nothing, probably just normal changes, but for someone who doesn't like going to doctors and/or having procedures, enough already! If this is what getting older is like, I'm not a fan. I told a friend that it's probably a lump of cookie dough that didn't make it all the way to my hips - much ado about nothing.

When I'm not kneading clay and baking earrings, or getting poked and prodded by medical personnel, I'm trying to prepare for the upcoming holidays. I love an October vacation, and Ireland was sublime, but it tends to dump me right at the doorstep of Thanksgiving and Christmas and I'm not ready for either one! I confess to playing some Christmas tunes already, just to get in the mood. I feel like I'm way behind. I've been trying to come up with our card for this year and the creative well is running dry. They just get thrown away by the recipients, why not just pick up a couple boxes of cards at Target? That would be smarter and I could cross it off my list. I know that I'm one of the dinosaurs still sending out holiday cards, but I love getting them in my mailbox and one must give in order to receive, right? So that's my quick check in, and my apology for being tardy with this post. Tomorrow I'll ship those earrings off to Florida and go get my boob smashed again, and then my schedule will be nothing but holiday madness. I'm looking forward to it. It's time to get my jingle on!

The Edgewater gang will come over this weekend and I'll have to make sure that I have a grasp on the grandgirl's list for Santa. I have a toy catalog here that should inspire her. Everyone else is getting socks and a toothbrush. Just kidding, but that sure would be easy. When am I old enough to start doing that? They'll head to Tennessee for Thanksgiving, but will be with us for Christmas. Matt is flying in for Thanksgiving, then in December he jets off to Brugge, Belgium and Amsterdam for the Christmas markets. He'll be here for Christmas week full of stories to share. I can't wait. On that happy note, I'll head of to soak in a bubble bath and then snuggle under the covers with a book. I'm pooped. Until tomorrow, stay safe, stay well...and

You better watch out You better not cry You better not pout I'm telling you why

… Santa Claus is comin' to town! 47 days!!! XOXO, Nancy

[strigops]

beautiful little a. vulgare from my florida pods culture, sadly infected with rickettsiella. they’ve apparently been slow cooking the infection for over a year and a half and it’s taken until now for them to start showing noticeable symptoms (thanks again @crevicedwelling for the help in diagnosing it!!). not surprising considering these guys were scooped out of a backyard in sarasota and lived on a diet of soil and leaves indiscriminately dug up from the front of the lab building they originally lived in, but still a bummer as they’re my fav culture :(

i have salvaged quite a few (currently) healthy individuals, hopefully the new subculture will do well and i can eventually eliminate it over subsequent generations!

[scribblesartcollective]

Augusta Savage was a black American sculptor. She was born in Florida, and though she had always made art, small figures made of the clay she found near her home, her Methodist father disapproved and tried to dissuade her from her work, even resorting to corporal punishment.

She married at age 15 and had a daughter, though her first husband, John T Moore, passed away soon after. She later married James Savage, and though she later divorced and remarried, she would keep the name Savage all her life. In 1919, she was given a booth at the Palm Beach County Fair to display her clay work. She won a $25. In 1921, she left Florida for New York with a letter of recommendation from an official from the fair with the intent to study at the School of American Sculpture. But, could not afford the tuition. Encouraged by scylptore Solon Borglum, she applied to the Cooper Union, a scholarship based school, and was admitted. She studied under sculptor George Brewster and completed her degree. Though highly trained and incredibly skilled, she worked as a laundress in Manhattan in order to support herself and her family, including her parents who's home was destroyed by a hurricane. Despite these difficulties, she received her first commission from the New York Public Library for a bust of W.E.B. Du Bois. her work, so impressed, she began to receive more commissions.

But this success was not without problems. In 1923, she applied for a program in France at a school for the fine arts and while initially accepted, upon finding out she was black, her acceptance was withdrawn. So began her outspoken criticism of prejudice, low standards and stereotypes. She had left to study in France in 1929 but returned to the US just in time for the height of the Great Depression in 1931. In 1934 she opened the Savage Studio of Arts and Crafts, opening it to anyone that wished to create artwork. Some of the artist who came to work under her would go onto be titans of the artworld themselves.

The success would not last. And while her art would always be viewed and well received, the sales dried up. In 1945 she moved to a farmhouse in rural New York She gardened, raised chickens and pigeons and was employed as a lab assistant.

She still made art and taught children at summer camps. Eventually however, her health declined and she moved in with her daughter. She would die in 1962 of cancer. Augusta's work is realistic, sensitive, with a delicate touch. She endowed her figures with incredible humanity and life. Augusta's life was full of trials and fights, and beautiful art and uplifting her students and encouraging progress. If you'd like to learn more about her: Smithsonian American Art Museum - Augusta Savage Augusta Savage: the extraordinary story of the trailblazing artist Augusta Savage: Sculptor, teacher, and warrior for civil rights Augusta Savage: Female Sculptor and Educator who fought against Racism

[vintage1981]

Swamp Think Comes to UHD and Blu-Ray from the MVD Laservision  & Rewind Collections!

THE DC COMICS SUPERHERO COMES TO LIFE IN WES CRAVEN'S CULT CLASSIC FILM, MAKING ITS DEBUT ON 4K ULTRA HD AND FINALLY, INCLUDING BOTH THE PG THEATRICAL VERSION AND THE UNRATED INTERNATIONAL VERSION!

Releases  7/25/2023

MVD LaserVision Collection #1 TITLE: Swamp Thing (2-Disc Collector’s Edition) [4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray] SKU: MVD12567UHD UPC / Barcode: 760137125679 YSRP: 49.95 SCIENCE TRANSFORMED HIM INTO A MONSTER. LOVE CHANGED HIM EVEN MORE!

Deep in Florida's darkest everglades, a brilliant scientist, Dr. Alec Holland (Ray Wise, Robocop) and a sexy government agent, Alice Cable (Adrienne Barbeau, John Carpenter’s The Fog) have developed a secret formula that could end world hunger and change civilization forever. Little do they know, however, that their arch nemesis, Arcane (Louis Jourdan, Octopussy) is plotting to steal the serum for his own selfish schemes. Looting the lab and kidnapping Cable, Arcane douses Holland with the chemicals and leaves him for dead in the swamp. Mutated by his own formula, Holland becomes “Swamp Thing” - a half human/half plant superhero who will stop at nothing to rescue the beautiful Cable and defeat the evil Arcane... even if it costs him his life.

DISC 1: SWAMP THING 4K LASERVISION COLLECTION – SPECIAL FEATURES:

• 2023 4K Restoration (16-Bit Scan of the Original Camera Negative) of both the US Theatrical PG Version and Unrated International Version of the film presented in its original 1.85:1 Aspect Ratio in Dolby Vision / HDR • Audio: DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 Mono, Spanish Mono • Optional English Subtitles • Audio Commentary with Writer/Director Wes Craven moderated by Sean Clark (Theatrical / PG Version) • Audio Commentary with Makeup Effects Artist William Munns moderated by Michael Felsher (Theatrical / PG Version) • Collectible “4K LaserVision” Mini-Poster of cover art • Limited Edition “4K Laservision” Slipcover (First Pressing Only) DISC 2: SWAMP THING REWIND COLLECTION BLU-RAY – SPECIAL FEATURES: • 2023 HD Restoration of both the US Theatrical PG Version and Unrated International Version of the film presented in its original 1.85:1 Aspect Ratio • Audio Commentary with Writer/Director Wes Craven moderated by Sean Clark (Theatrical / PG Version) • Audio Commentary with Makeup Effects Artist William Munns moderated by Michael Felsher (Theatrical / PG Version) • DTS-HD Audio 2.0 Mono, Spanish Mono Audio • Optional English Subtitles • "Tales From the Swamp" (Remastered) with Actress Adrienne Barbeau (HD, 16:56) • "Hey Jude" with Actor Reggie Batts (HD, 14:30) • "That Swamp Thing" with Len Wein, Creator of Swamp Thing (HD, 13:19) • "Swamp Screen: Designing DC's Main Monster" featurette (HD, 20:32) • "From Krug to Comics: How the Mainstream Shaped a Radical Genre Voice" featurette (HD, 17:34) • Posters & Lobby Cards - Photo Gallery • Photos from the Film - Photo Gallery • William Munns’ Behind the Scenes Pictures - Photo Gallery • Behind the Scenes Photos by Geoffrey Rayle – Photo Gallery • Theatrical Trailer (HD, 1:31) • "REGION A" LOCKED * Special Features May Not Be Rated, Closed Captioned Or In High Definition. MVD Rewind Collection #51 TITLE: Swamp Thing (Collector’s Edition) [Blu-ray] SKU: MVD8554BR UPC /Barcode: 760137855484 SRP: $39.95

SWAMP THING REWIND COLLECTION BLU-RAY – SPECIAL FEATURES: • 2023 HD Restoration of both the US Theatrical PG Version and Unrated International Version of the film presented in its original 1.85:1 Aspect Ratio • Audio Commentary with Writer/Director Wes Craven moderated by Sean Clark (Theatrical / PG Version) • Audio Commentary with Makeup Effects Artist William Munns moderated by Michael Felsher (Theatrical / PG Version) • DTS-HD Audio 2.0 Mono, Spanish Mono Audio • Optional English Subtitles • "Tales From the Swamp" (Remastered) with Actress Adrienne Barbeau (HD, 16:56) • "Hey Jude" with Actor Reggie Batts (HD, 14:30) • "That Swamp Thing" with Len Wein, Creator of Swamp Thing (HD, 13:19) • "Swamp Screen: Designing DC's Main Monster" featurette (HD, 20:32) • "From Krug to Comics: How the Mainstream Shaped a Radical Genre Voice" featurette (HD, 17:34) • Posters & Lobby Cards - Photo Gallery • Photos from the Film - Photo Gallery • William Munns’ Behind the Scenes Pictures - Photo Gallery • Behind the Scenes Photos by Geoffrey Rayle – Photo Gallery • Theatrical Trailer (HD, 1:31) • Two-Sided Artwork • Collectible MVD Rewind Collection Mini-Poster • Limited Edition Slipcover (First Pressing Only) • "REGION A" LOCKED * Special Features May Not Be Rated, Closed Captioned Or In High Definition.

[floridabeautylabs]

Achieve Salon-Style Skin Care at Home with Florida Beauty Labs’ D-Tan Facial Kit

Who doesn’t dream of flawless, radiant skin? But between our hectic schedules and environmental aggressors like UV rays and pollution, maintaining a natural glow can feel overwhelming. Enter Florida Beauty Labs’ D-Tan Facial Kit—the perfect solution for salon-style skincare right at home!

Whether you have dry skin, oily skin, or a combination type, this kit is crafted to suit all skin types. If you’ve been on the lookout for the best D-Tan facial kit, we’re here to tell you why Florida Beauty Labs’ Cocowalk D-Tan Facial Kit should be your go-to choice.

Why Choose a D-Tan Facial Kit?

A D-Tan Facial Kit isn’t just a beauty product—it’s a powerful tool that reverses the damaging effects of tanning, pollution, and stress. Unlike regular facials, these kits are specially formulated to target sun-tan and dullness, leaving your skin rejuvenated and glowing.

Florida Beauty Labs’ Cocowalk D-Tan Facial Kit is a carefully curated, easy-to-use 5-step solution for healthy, radiant skin, helping you achieve salon-like results from the comfort of your home.

Benefits of Florida Beauty Labs’ D-Tan Facial Kit

1. Effective Tan Removal

The primary purpose of a D-Tan kit is to reverse tanning caused by excessive sun exposure. The Cocowalk D-Tan Facial Kit effectively removes tan and evens out your skin tone, bringing back your natural glow.

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If you struggle with excessive oil and breakouts, this kit is your savior. As the best D-Tan facial kit for oily skin, it balances oil production, unclogs pores, and prevents acne, leaving your skin refreshed and radiant.

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Cocowalk D-Tan Facial Kit: Your 5-Step Skincare Routine

Florida Beauty Labs’ Cocowalk D-Tan Facial Kit is designed to give you professional results in five simple steps. Let’s take a closer look:

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Apply the D-Tan mask evenly across your face and leave it on for the recommended duration. Enriched with natural tan-removal agents, this mask lightens pigmentation, reduces tanning, and brightens the skin.

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This luxurious cream hydrates and nourishes your skin, leaving it smooth, plump, and glowing. The massage cream also enhances blood circulation for a youthful appearance.

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Complete the routine with the finishing product to lock in moisture and ensure long-lasting results. Your skin will feel rejuvenated, radiant, and salon-ready!

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Conclusion

Achieving salon-style skin care at home is now easier than ever with Florida Beauty Labs’ Cocowalk D-Tan Facial Kit. Whether you have dry, oily, or combination skin, this kit is your ultimate weapon against tanning and dullness.

Don’t wait to give your skin the pampering it deserves. Visit Florida Beauty Labs today to buy the best D-Tan facial kit online and take the first step toward flawless, radiant skin.

[writerprincess]

My Favorite Flower:

White Magnolias

Have you ever seen a white magnolia flower? I did, but in the most unexpected way. On my way to a college chemistry lab, I happened to look up at a tree—one I must have passed every day for three years. This tree, along with many others like it, adorned the parking lot of the school. The flowers were white, yet I had never noticed them before. Instead, what always caught my eye was the underside of the leaves. These leaves, with their brown, leathery texture, resembled the color of dead fall leaves and seemed to obscure the beauty of the flowers they encased.

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When I looked at the tree again, it felt like I had stumbled upon a sacred plant, its white flowers almost magical in their presence. Living in Florida, I don’t often see flowers like these, as the extreme heat and humidity can be unforgiving. But when the magnolia flowers began to bloom, their elegance took my breath away. Like orchids, their beauty is fully revealed once they open, and their size and southern charm have always captivated me.

I couldn’t help but think of artists painting these stunning blossoms, their intricate details celebrated on canvas—and yet, here they were, right under my nose all along. At that time in my life, I was going through so much that simply moving forward was all I knew. I didn’t have the luxury to admire the scenery or stop to smell the flowers.

Now, I see the brown, leathery leaves as something symbolic—a protective design, shielding the delicate beauty within. Perhaps I’m rambling, but this flower holds a special meaning for me. I hope to incorporate magnolias into a bouquet someday or even into my future home. They will always remind me of resilience and grace.

I am the flower that blooms.

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The art

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Now my favorite flower

Took a quiz on buzzfeed : 😂Validating my love for this flower

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#magnolia#favorite flower#self awareness#bloom#white magnolia

Blaze

0 notes

[jodilin65]

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 29, 2020 I see a worktable with wood/saws set up in Dahl’s driveway. It’s amazing how many people don’t give a shit about those around them. Even in a retirement community. Given that this has gone on since they’ve been there, I think it’s pretty safe to say it’s going to be a regular thing I’ll have to put up with until one of us moves. He could be prepping to sell since he lost his wife, but it seems like it started before she died. I don’t know for sure since I don’t know exactly when she died. This is likely just the way he is, though I don’t know that it’s him making the racket. It’s whoever visits in the navy SUV. They definitely didn’t stay overnight, whoever they were. I could see the little workshop they had set up clearly when I looked out front early this morning as there was no vehicle in the way at the time. That’s the problem with people with money; they’re always having things done to their place.

I almost wish things would fall apart enough to give us a good enough reason to head to Florida, but I know it won’t. I still believe there are at least some quieter places left out there but nothing is going to be eager and let us move to one. Where he has a pay curse on him, I have the noise curse.

Speaking of pay, this has been a real eye-opener for him and what he discovered makes him wish he quit 5 years ago to look for something else. He compared recent paychecks to ones from 7 years ago and found he really isn’t taking home much more money. The more he makes, the more they take for insurance. Now that he knows this fantastic insurance plan exists, thanks to the federal government and the state, it would actually be more beneficial to us if he made less money. Why have to spend 12 hours out of the house to make more money for them to take out? And all for nothing when the insurance doesn’t cover shit and we have to lose even more money to pay for our health care. So basically, he was slaving his ass away for nothing. Yes, we could pay for the essentials and even more, but we both agree we’d rather have just enough to pay for essentials, even if there wasn’t much leftover, for him to be gone 8 hours instead of 12 and for us to get better insurance. We’re going to have to buy a TSH and T4 test for $49 and my PCP is going to cost $180. With this plan, the yearly full panel of lab testing would be free, and the doctor’s visit would be $65. And instead of costing us hundreds a month, it would cost us $2.

He could practically kick himself for staying with Teleplan as long as he did. He was determined to stick with what was safe and what he knew rather than take a chance with something new and he regrets it, not that he had much time for interviews with the way they were running him ragged. If he’d only known then what he knows now.

If he got another permanent job, there are no guarantees the employer would offer a plan that’s as good. Therefore, he’s hoping to basically go temp-hopping till he retires. Or maybe get two part-time jobs. My first thought was that it should be easy enough, remembering the temp craze that I would think still exists since it’s a clever and sneaky way for employers to legally get out of having to insure their employees. But then when do we ever get to choose what we want?

These titties have finally been relieved of their soreness, but the bad news is that I’m spotting more. Feeling crampy here and there but not enough to need to reach for the Ibuprofen. Still don’t know if this is going to turn into a full period or not, but just in case, I grabbed some pads from Rite Aid. sighs with frustration Why am I still going through this shit?

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 28, 2020 Another noisy but beautiful day. Got both doors open and enjoying a nice cross breeze and fresh air. Just wish I didn’t have loud vehicles on one side and circular saws on the other. What is it with this park’s obsession with circular saws? It’s definitely coming from Dahl’s place, as suspected. I’ve heard more of these fucking things in the years I’ve been here than in my entire life and it really gets old. How much fucking wood could they possibly have to cut and for what? This is like the tenth time I’ve heard this shit from that place in just the few months he’s been there. Amazing how just one person can make so much noise, but I doubt it’s him doing the sawing. He’s still having multiple visitors and I wonder if any of them may be staying there.

Yesterday I was dismayed to find faint spotting and had light cramps as well. Today my boobies are less sore and I haven’t spotted so I’m hoping that’s it for once and for all and that my body will quit trying to kick off a period every so often.

He and I were talking about how we wish this country would finally wake the fuck up and go with universal health care, even though I highly doubt it will happen in our lifetime. In response to me saying how people are obsessed with being independent and selfish, Tom said, “People say that and want to believe that, but we’re not as independent as people think.” After all, the money taken out of people’s paychecks each week or month for insurance does go to pay for others and not just themselves. I get his point, but people in general still suck.

For $4 I found a lovely Pocahontas doll at Goodwill yesterday. She’s about 18” tall, all-vinyl, and has a lovely face and nice long sleek black hair. I washed and conditioned her knee-length hair because it was a little dirty and frazzled. Not nearly in as bad a condition as the BFF dolls were, though. It definitely looks better now, and I’ll also have to touch up a part of one eyebrow where the paint has chipped off. I didn’t like her original outfit because it was boring and so was her painted armband. She’s wearing one of the 14-inch dolls’ three-quarter-sleeve crop tops and matching skirt. Bold pink looks good on her with her skin tone, black hair and dark brown eyes. I guess Pocahontas was a real Indian woman who lived in the late 1500s. She only made it to age 21, though

I was thinking that I might take my acrylic paints to polish some of the vinyl dolls’ nails since regular polish chips off too easily.

Haven’t heard from Dixie and I don’t know if that’s because something’s wrong or she’s ghosting me, and personally, I don’t care if it’s the latter. It may very well be too, because I’m not always available when she needs me. I have absolutely no problem with helping her out, but I can’t be available every time she may need a helping hand. Not saying that’s the case, but it wouldn’t surprise me if it was.

I dyed my hair and I’ll get it cut on Monday when it’s less crowded and less likely that damn church band next door to the salon will be playing. Yeah, I’m so cursed with noise that even my salon is noisy. I don’t understand how the hell anybody could stand to work to that ferociously pounding bass. I first thought some kind of construction was going on over there.

Tom loaded an app on his phone so that we could find things we were looking for in Walmart that we don’t usually get. It tells you what aisle to go to, but sometimes it would still take time to find things on the proper aisle.

My low-carb diet starts today at 157.8 lb. As I said, I doubt it will do me any good, but this is my final attempt to lose a little weight. As I said, not going to play the let’s try to be what I’m not meant to be game forever. Not so sure going low-carb is going to leave me any less hungry as they claim this type of diet does. Hopefully, I can get used to it.

For breakfast, I made my first cheese and veggie omelet and it came out great. Made it with real butter and olive oil instead of margarine. Lunch was plain yogurt in which I threw in some blueberries, nuts and seeds with a dollop of honey, and coconut flakes. Dinner will be a bunless cheeseburger with veggies.

Tom has begun working out on the Bowflex to get in better shape and says I should lose my muscle in less than a decade. He says he noticed he lost strength in his late 50s. Well, nothing lasts forever, that’s for sure. The older we get, the more we lose pieces of ourselves.

He’s hoping to start a new job in about a month. He doesn’t want to have to start something soon and then take March 16th off for my doctor’s appointment which wouldn’t look good, especially if he got first shift. For now, he’s sprucing up his resume and doing his research as far as what’s available. He’ll apply for Unemployment next week since you can’t get it the first week anyway.

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 27, 2020 It finally happened yesterday. What I thought would happen within a year or two after he started with Teleplan 8.5 years ago happened yesterday. He got laid off. The company is struggling tremendously and closing two of its five buildings and laying off hundreds of employees. Eventually, more will be laid off than kept on.

How do I feel about it? Well, I’m as shocked as I am not shocked. Although I sensed change on the horizon (especially now that I’ve beaten the worst of the peri/anxiety) I’ve had no dreams or vibes suggesting a layoff, so I was blindsided. Yet at the same time, we knew it was coming. I knew the job and the money wouldn’t last forever. I’m just surprised it lasted this long. Most jobs eventually do lay you off.

But why no nightmares or bad vibes? I’m hoping that even though no psychic sees it all, it’s because there’s simply nothing to worry about. Yes, he’s older, but the economy isn’t doing bad now. There are tons of jobs that will start you at $15 or $16 an hour that he could probably get started with next week. But our savings and unemployment which I guess we’ll be getting in a week or two will give him time to look for something better. Where I have always had a noise curse on me, this man has definitely had a pay curse on him. He never seems to get paid fairly. Not even when he’s making decent money for our personal expenses at the time. As he said, this could actually be a good thing that will lead him to a better job with better pay and better insurance. He was making shitty money and our insurance was shitty because it cost us hundreds a month and didn’t cover shit. We were paying out-of-pocket for virtually everything. He should be making 55K or more in most of the country, but especially CA. Instead, he was making 40K.

Things don’t usually go well for us or turn out for the better so it’s hard to be optimistic and wonder if we could now be on the path to a slow descent into disaster like we were in 2004 and 2008. However, we’re not in the situation we were in back then. In Arizona, there was no way to get more than a few grand for the house, so we had no money. Then there was the recession. Well, if worst comes to absolute worst, we could get about 40K for this place, put in for early retirement, and go to a cheaper state. If he’s destined to make shitty money from here on out, though I’m not saying that will be the case, it’s better to make shitty money in Florida than Cali. Our golden years would be a lot tougher, but it would likely be enough to get by on. Still hoping he’ll work till he’s 66.5 so we can get more retirement money. My countdown on Up to the Sky says he’s 1403 days away from that.

I personally can’t see him ever making the nearly $19 an hour he was making ever again, but as I’ve learned, money isn’t everything. It won’t kill us to have to forget about going to Hawaii, give up Hulu, and do without the extras if need be. It’s not like we’ve never had them before. We know the most important things are good health and being able to pay for the essentials.

I’m not the least bit worried about losing the house because of the noise curse on me. Believe me, nothing’s going to be eager to kick me out of a flight path.

As much as I hate Cali for many reasons, it also has some good in it that other states don’t have. Most states don’t have Death with Dignity, for example, and will treat a dying animal better than a person. Also, Cali has its own insurance for those who are uninsured, and you pay what you can afford. It’s the law in Cali that everyone has to be insured. But the horrible catch to that is that employers that are struggling like at Teleplan can offer the worst insurance possible in order to save themselves money.

We’ve heard many say that Kaiser is the best medical group and that they have the best doctors. Well, he looked at a plan that is WAY cheaper than what we’ve got. The MRI he had that costed 2K would cost $350. The $180 we’re going to have to pay to see my PCP would be $65. A visit to the ER would be $500. Urgent Care would be $65 like a regular doctor’s appointment. It doesn’t cover dental, though, or eyes.

He would only be able to get it if he couldn’t get insurance through an employer. It looks so good, unless you have major expenses like if you’re hospitalized or something, that he almost hopes for a temp job. Oh, yes, the temp job craze. I remember that well. A great way for employers to get out of having to offer insurance. I wouldn’t be surprised if he started off as a temp. We’re hoping he can get something on graves so that at least some of the daytime during the week when things are less crowded can be used for shopping and appointments since he’s likely to get hired by an American company that doesn’t give nearly as much time off as European companies do.

Anyway, he’s going to file for unemployment today and rework his resume. His age and color aren’t good things, especially his age. He’s also partially deaf and has to wear his Hearphones and I don’t know if that could be used against him or not.

Like I said, though, no fears of losing the place. Just being trapped here by financial or medical issues. Anytime the economy is good, we can sell out once he’s at the right age, so that leaves medical issues to worry about and hope that nothing new arises in that department to hold us back.

For now, I’m going to try to look at the positives in this. He’ll be home more for a while. We don’t have to restrict our shopping to the busy weekend. In fact, he suggested we go out to Goodwill today to do some treasure hunting.

“Are you sure we should be spending the money?” I asked him. He said sure, why not, since half the time we don’t get anything, and on a “big” day at Goodwill we spend maybe twelve bucks.

I’m even going to get my hair trimmed sometime soon because I’m not ready to go long again yet and that’s not much more than 12 bucks.

Thank God we don’t have gas, oil, tune-ups, and emissions to deal with! Because we’ll have more time for a while, we might take a drive out to my old dentist and talk to them about transferring records and all that while we cancel my appointment. It’s a little tricky with dentists, but a law was passed where medical records have to be transferred electronically.

I’ll have to let my PCP know that I may not see her again, depending on what happens with us. I would have preferred to stay with her, funky Ecuadorian accent or not, but saved money, better insurance, and better doctors are more important. You know, the kind that doesn’t write off levothyroxine side effects as simply “being anxious.” An HMO would probably be better than a PPO like we had, but we don’t know yet what we’ll have.

Wow, Miss EMDR just squeezed out a couple of tears. I never miss my mom, but every once in a while, I miss dad. My parents were like night and day, and Dad was definitely more like me. I can’t imagine a single person in the world getting along better with her than with him. It would be nice to be able to call and talk with him now.

So grateful for my bestie who is always there for me. Even though I’m the older one (and bigger), in some ways I see her as wiser, mature and stronger. In fact, when he first broke the news to me, one of my first thoughts was I want Aly! I want Aly! I want Aly! But even if I was oblivious to her horrible climate, it may be cheaper to live there, but they don’t have mandated insurance which they supplement a lot.

I mentioned his layoff on Facebook. That way the Twenties will know why he’s around more all of a sudden, and if they know anyone personally or have any suggestions, they can tell me. I blocked it from Norma’s view, though, because I didn’t want her mentioning it to the drama queen so she could get a good laugh.

In other news, it’s going to be 77 degrees today. So glad I’m not in peri anymore! The house got up to 76 degrees as I was going to bed, but I was fine with the fan on. I would’ve been on fire if I were back in peri.

Boobs are still sore but I’m down a couple of pounds. Not sure if I lost fat or water but my diet doesn’t have to wait until Monday to start. We’re going grocery shopping tomorrow, so I’ll probably start the day after.

Below is a sample menu of the low-carb/healthy fats/protein diet I’m doing. There’s no way in hell I’ll touch that salsa sauce, though! Also, salmon is boring to me so I’m going to substitute it for another fatty fish which will be mackerel. I also don’t have a grill, so I’ll roast my chicken wings instead. Because I’m listed as a cardiac risk, I doubt my doctor would be too pleased with this idea, but what she doesn’t know won’t hurt her. :-)

Monday Breakfast: Omelet with various vegetables, fried in butter or coconut oil. Lunch: Grass-fed yogurt with blueberries and a handful of almonds. Dinner: Bunless cheeseburger, served with vegetables and salsa sauce.

Tuesday Breakfast: Bacon and eggs. Lunch: Leftover burgers and veggies from the previous night. Dinner: Salmon with butter and vegetables.

Wednesday Breakfast: Eggs and vegetables, fried in butter or coconut oil. Lunch: Shrimp salad with some olive oil. Dinner: Grilled chicken with vegetables.

Thursday Breakfast: Omelet with various vegetables, fried in butter or coconut oil. Lunch: Smoothie with coconut milk, berries, almonds, and protein powder. Dinner: Steak and veggies.

Friday Breakfast: Bacon and eggs. Lunch: Chicken salad with some olive oil. Dinner: Pork chops with vegetables.

Saturday Breakfast: Omelet with various veggies. Lunch: Grass-fed yogurt with berries, coconut flakes and a handful of walnuts. Dinner: Meatballs with vegetables.

Sunday Breakfast: Bacon and eggs. Lunch: Smoothie with coconut milk, a dash of heavy cream, chocolate-flavored protein powder and berries. Dinner: Grilled chicken wings with veggies.

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 2020 I went for a walk yesterday and it was a very cold walk at 45°. It’s a little warmer this morning so it will probably be around 50° when I go out walking.

I’m not sure which is worse… What’s going on in the sky or on the ground. On the ground are the usual traffic and landscaping sounds, plus the park was banging on something just beyond Bob & Virginia’s place yesterday. They’ve torn up the cobblestone in the center island down the street by Dixie’s place, but you know how it is here…they’re always doing something. I’m dreading the next project that’s really loud. This is the time of year when they go on tree-cutting frenzies. I just hope when Lawrence gets to trimming the trees in front of his place that it’s done when I’m awake since it’s only about 20 feet from the bedroom.

I’ve decided to make one last-ditch effort to lose a little weight by going low-carb. I doubt it will work because I still have a bum thyroid and I’m older. If it doesn’t, it’s definitely time to give it up and hope I don’t end up gaining too much more or become diabetic. I don’t want to waste time struggling for what is it meant to be and fighting some losing battle for the rest of my life. If I play all my cards right and I don’t lose the weight, then I guess I just wasn’t meant to. But for the sake of my health, I’m going to give it one last try.

I’ll be following a menu that mostly consists of meats, veggies and some berries. A little yogurt as well. There are some foods that are bad for hypothyroidism like broccoli, so even though it’s one of my favorite vegetables, I’ll have to cut back on it. I’m not giving up my morning coffee, but I need to drop the wine and severely limit things like spinach, peanuts, soy, and strawberries.

I read up on the dos and don’ts of going low-carb and it basically says don’t overdo the protein, add some sodium if you start to feel lightheaded, fatigued or get constipation, and be patient. It takes a few days for your body to get used to burning fat instead of carbs. I still have my doubts because being hypo means your body can’t burn much of anything. But it certainly can’t hurt me to try it for a week or so. I’m going to weigh myself when I get up on Monday, the day I start the diet. Then I’m not going to weigh myself again until the following Monday. If I’m not down a pound or two, then it’s time to move on. Moving on doesn’t mean stuffing myself, eating unhealthily, and becoming inactive. It just means I no longer try to lose weight. There really does come a point in time with many things where it’s okay to throw in the towel and give up. With all the years I’ve been trying, if this fails, I won’t feel guilty or bad for giving up because I know I tried my best.

I have a strong feeling that Elton John is going to die soon but I don’t know how or why. I was never a fan of his, but I don’t hate his music either.

MONDAY, FEBRUARY 24, 2020 I hate control freaks. The kind that tries to cram their ways down your throat and make you be like them. The kind that prefers terms like African-American or Native American and then condemns those who are used to or prefer black and American Indian. Furthermore, referring to oneself as fat doesn’t mean they’re “mean” to oneself or hate oneself. It just means they’re honest and telling it like it is without any fancy words or labels. Why do so many people seem to think there’s a right and a wrong way to describe things? Whether you describe something positive as fabulous, fantastic, awesome or great doesn’t make you wrong if the guy down the street prefers sensational and the woman across town prefers incredible. Just saying, you know. No, this doesn’t have anything to do with me personally now. Just things I’ve observed in daily human interaction.

Really getting worried about my weight as I continue to have a harder and harder time controlling it. I think that before I know it, the 150s will be a thing of the past, and sadly, I’m only able to keep losing and gaining the same few pounds no matter where I am. So if I ever hit 165, I’ll never see 160 again.

Did some research and found that it doesn’t always have to do with willpower, as I’ve heard. There are so many reasons why a person can’t control their weight and it doesn’t always have to do with them being lazy or underactive. Read a little bit about genetics, the habits of parents and grandparents affecting future generations, and leptin resistance.

The question is what to do so I don’t eventually end up diabetic? There is so much information and misinformation out there that I don’t know what to believe. Obviously, sugar isn’t good, and fish is healthier than red meat. But then there are diets that encourage not only low carbs but not going low fat or overly restrictive of calories. Some things get kind of confusing. I’m torn between whether or not I should keep on trying to find a solution or totally giving up and just letting my body gain whatever it wants even if I’m eventually 200 pounds or more. Sometimes the best way to deal with a problem really is to not deal with it at all, not that I expect everyone to agree with that, of course. If I decide to give up, though, that doesn’t mean I won’t still eat healthy most of the time and keep active. It just means I’m not going to try to go really low-cal or worry if I keep gaining. I’ll just try to eat sensibly most days, keep active, and leave the rest to fate.

My GYN’s case is very discouraging. She told me she’s struggled with her weight all her life and she’s got to be close to 300 lbs. If a trained medical doctor can’t help herself, how can I? Well, if I only had a decade left to live, I wouldn’t want to. I would indulge to my heart’s content. But I don’t have just a decade. I realize that some of my weight is muscle but still… This has gotten really frustrating. So much so that yeah, I’m thinking perhaps it’s time to give up and accept myself as I am.

Damn these fucking pigs this morning! I put them in a plastic bin while I’m changing their liner and they just had to get into it. Rockefeller started it, as always. Kudos to Blitz for fighting back, though, as I’m guessing he did, based on the wad of fur in his mouth. I told Tom I really want to get rid of Rockefeller next weekend because I’ve had it with his shit. That way Blitz has more space, we don’t have to change liners as often, and the rats can have their freedom again. I’ve had to limit their freedom because of Rockefeller. But he doesn’t want to, saying he’s an animal and he is who he is.

So a woman or a man should stay with their abusive partner because they are how they are?

It got a little cute when they were finally back in the pen and separated and then I let Fuzzy visit Blitz. Blitz has never minded and he was all the more grateful for the company because Rockefeller’s such a mean, hateful asshole. He was popcorning happily as if to say, “Yay, somebody else that walks on four legs that doesn’t want to kill me!”

Fuzzy visits him regularly for a few minutes but they can’t live together as Blitz wouldn’t get much rest because Fuzzy would always want to climb all over him and clean him and all that. Plus, he would steal his food, making sure to drag it out of reach. Rats are hoarders, they’re thieves, and they’re smart.

The pigs are proof that bigger isn’t always tougher since Rockefeller isn’t quite as big as Blitz, yet he’s the one who starts the fights. But there are definitely limits. I saw a woman and a man at the store yesterday that were huge. They were taller rather than wide and I knew I could never take them in a fight no matter how pissed and determined I was.

Yesterday sucked in that I heard the woodpecker for the first time in a while and someone’s motorcycle woke me up just as I was falling asleep. Probably the guy’s son who lives across from Dixie. His name is Tom. I told Dixie she ought to tell him that this isn’t the place for that shit and that it’s loud, rude, obnoxious and unnecessary. There are plenty of other quieter means of transportation.

She said she wouldn’t tell him that because the sons live far away, motorcycles are cheaper for them, and they find it fun. That may be so but that’s the problem with this world; people always have to have fun at other people’s expense. Do they think it’s “fun” to me when I get woken up?

Then as I was falling back asleep, what goes by but a tremendously loud car stereo. I was so pissed but finally fell asleep and the son left a few hours later without waking me up. I can’t swear that was him but right now he’s the only one that I know of on the circle that visits on a motorcycle. He can’t live too far because I’m pretty sure he visits every weekend unless it’s another son of his. I guess the guy has more than one. UPS and fire trucks are one thing, but other loud vehicles should be banned from retirement communities.

She gave me a good idea, though, when she asked if we had heavy drapes. She said she first thought it was the new windows that were keeping her place quiet/warm/cool, but discovered it was the drapes because when she would pull them apart was when she would notice the weather and all that, not that her place is totally quiet. I’ve heard stuff in her place as well, though the drapes were open when I was there. It’s just not as loud, and as she said, we are on the corner. This may explain why getting new windows in the bedroom didn’t help much. Heavy drapes are something I’ll keep in mind for the next place. Until then, maybe if I get a new mattress, instead of getting rid of this one, I’ll lean it against the back window. Don’t know that it would do me much good, though. I’m simply too close to such loud sounds.

As I was saying to Tom, I don’t know if it’s wise to go to another park when we move after I thought about all the years I dreamt of being old enough to finally be able to move to one just to find that it’s the noisiest place I’ve ever lived. But where were the two quietest places I’ve ever lived even if they too, sometimes had their share of noise? Out in the country. We had some sonic booms, distant hunters, and barking in Maricopa, and then there were Jesse’s mutts in Auburn, but there’s no comparison.

It’s tough because I’m torn between a tropical place in Florida or maybe getting some land up in the Carolinas where it would be colder, but cheaper and quieter. We’re going to keep all our options open and check out everything when the time comes, but sadly, I’ve got quite a wait. Four years may not be forever but it’s long enough to make me want to beat my head in the wall if I think about just how much longer I have to deal with the traffic, planes, landscaping, and random projects sprinkled into the mix, including road work.

I was also thinking about how happy we are with our electric car, even though I only ride in it and I can honestly say that’s one more reason I’m glad Andy isn’t in my life. I would have had to hear all the negative comments and reasons why that was such a bad thing to get as I excitedly told him about it rather than him simply being happy for us. Of course, it’s always good to be looked out for and warned of potential problems, but it was just so overkill with him. He rarely had anything positive to say about much of anything and was always so pushy about things, too. He always focused on the negative aspects of things. It’s easy to do at times like when this place really gets to me, but then I remind myself that at least I’m not in Nairobi or Dharavi.

Added a smart lock to my phone so I don’t have to do the thumbprint thing every time I want to use it which should reach all the way down as far as the end of the circle. So it should still be unlocked at Dixie’s place.

I’m keeping track of how many books I’ve read this year, but the counter is kind of deceptive. It says I’ve read 6 books, but I’ve actually read 11 since one of them was a box set.

SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 23, 2020 Now Aly has protected her tweets, as I saw from my other Twitter accounts that she hasn’t blocked me on. Can’t help but wonder what it is she’s hiding. If she isn’t hacking my account, then I was likely suggested to her after I peeked in on her and she probably blocked me then so her account wouldn’t be suggested to me.

Based on Molly’s side of their communications, Aly is whining once again about people not being there for her and Molly, who is glad she’s finally back, insists she does try to be there for her.

Just in case she’s hacked into my Prosebox account, I’ve changed the password to something really strong even though she may have encryption software that can crack it, which is how she would have hacked me in the first place if she ever really did. Do I think she has? I just don’t know, but this in conjunction with Ask and MyOpera definitely makes me wonder. No one’s that smart or intuitive, are they?

I read that something like 82% of those who try to get pregnant conceive within 6 months and again I can’t help but wonder…would I have been one of those statistics if I’d had a husband who could perform normally and wasn't exposed in utero to DES? And if I had conceived, would I have carried to full term? I guess I’ll never know, even though things worked out for the best in the end.

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 22, 2020 I’ve noticed that when I’m lying down, I sometimes feel this burning-tingling sensation in my outer right thigh. I Googled that symptom and came up with something called meralgia paresthetica. The top reasons for this are being obese, pregnant or diabetic. Well, I’m none of these things, but if I had to guess, it’s probably because I’m slightly heavy.

I was pretty light-headed earlier. More light-headed than I have been in a while. I’m guessing it’s due to going back to full doses. Again I wonder if the doctors might have a point about other things causing the anxiety. I’ve had some days where I was more anxious on partial doses. Yet now I’m taking full doses and I’m fine. I think it could be tied into why I’m getting PMS symptoms. My boobs aren’t as bad as they were before but they’re still somewhat sore.

As far as whether or not I have any nodules growing on the left side of my thyroid, I don’t know. I know for a fact that when they did the ultrasound in 2014, they did find a couple of small nodules there. The question is have they grown? I don’t think they’re cancerous since most of them aren’t. Thyroid nodules are actually pretty common, from what I read, and most people have at least one by age 60.

Unfortunately, it looks like our betta fish is dying. He hasn’t even made a bubble nest in a while now, and he is getting old. He doesn’t seem to have as much energy and has been lying sort of on his side, which isn’t usually a good sign.

The water was off while I slept. Damn bidet spit some air at me when I got up, so that’s how I could tell.

Doing the laundry now and tomorrow we’ll change the rats’ cage and the pigpen. Going to be too tired by the time he goes to Sam’s, but we’ll go out somewhere later. Sunday morning, I should be good to go to Walmart.

The metallic nail polish set is absolutely fantastic. Very vibrant colors and very heavily pigmented where I only need one coat. They have a set of neon colors I’m going to get as well and then I’ll be set on polish for years.

It kind of bothers me that Aly never commented or asked me about the sickos in Arizona but I bet I can guess why. What bothers me more is that she always, always seems to know things she shouldn’t know like the fact that I found her “secret” Twitter account which she has now blocked me from. How the fuck could she possibly know that??? It’s got me wondering… Have I been tracked or hacked? Was it something I said in my blog? Have I shown up as a suggested account for her to follow due to my nosing around? Has she got a tracker I don’t know about? Or could she be hacking in and reading copies of my journal on sites that don’t have two-factor authentication? I hope not, but I gotta admit it’s kind of funny to think of her reading things she would want to let me have it for yet she would be forced to keep her mouth shut. Of course, if she is hacking me, then she’ll know that because she’ll read this entry.

She’ll also know that I threw in some tests in the entry I just sent her to see if she’ll point them out. I left in an order I gave Alexa that got printed in because I forgot to disable voice typing, plus an unfinished sentence.

Just thinking back on how she always knew it was me who would ask her anonymous questions as well as anonymous questions I once asked Molly on Ask makes me wonder. Plus, there was MyOpera. When I was fucking with Molly there along with Kathy, she told Molly (as Karly or something like that) that there were two people harassing her and then she offered to message her and tell her what was going on. Well, those two sites have/had shitty security.

In the book I’m reading, a character describes people as being opportunists and pests. This is so true not to mention liars as well. Despite her admitting in the past that she knows she has a problem with lying, she doesn’t seem to have done much to change, and I know the smart thing to do would be to walk away. But unless she dumps me again, it’s not that easy. Unlike Andy, Tammy and others, there’s so much good in her that it’s hard not to see that and focus on the good points while doing my best to ignore the bad. Perhaps I shouldn’t have gone looking for her, knowing all along she didn’t simply ghost Molly, but if anything, it just confirms that she’s continuing to lie about her connection to the whack job. If she can lie about things like that, couldn’t she lie about anything?

Last night I thought of how I miss checking book reports for sales and decided that rather than republishing my old books in my real name, I would go with a pen name that only Tom and I know about. That is unless Aly really is reading my journals, of course.

At first I wanted to be Camille C, which was suggested to me by one of those random name generators. But sure enough, someone’s already going by that name, real or not. So Lexi L it is! I kind of like names where both the first and last names start with the same letter.

I’m excited! Even though I know I’m not going to make shit, I’m looking forward to getting back in the publishing game just as soon as We’ll Meet Again Someday is properly edited.

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 20, 2020 Hmm…what do I want tonight, planes or the air cleaner? Kind of sick of having the air cleaner running so I think I’ll turn it off and just listen to the planes, helicopters and freeway. The commercial planes should be done in a few hours. Oh, to give my ears a break from all sound for just a few hours! At least the small planes were quieter than I thought they would be last night. All I heard after midnight was the freeway, but it was only for a couple of hours.

Not all the small planes are from McClellan Airport. There’s another one called Mather.

Time to start sleeping with the fan on and setting the AC when I’m going to be sleeping during the daytime. We’re going to hit 75 degrees tomorrow. We’ve got several days coming up in the mid-70s. I’m starting to wonder if it’s going to rain again before next fall.

Nahji, my new Indian doll, arrived today and is quite lovely. She’s from the Heart for Hearts collection and was on sale at $34. There was one as low as $27 but not one I wanted.

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 19, 2020 Why does society still feel the need to point out single mothers despite becoming so commonplace? Half the moms out there are single, yet you still hear, “Single mom, so and so, blah blah blah…” Married moms are less common and yet you never hear, “Married mom, so-and-so, blah blah blah…” Just wondering why that is.

Anyway, if it weren’t for my headphones, I don’t know that I would enjoy my walk very much. I could hear some of the commercial planes, small planes, vintage planes and helicopters over the music blasting in my ears as it was. The small planes were flying so low I could see the propellers. Knowing I have to live with this for another four years and that I still may not be able to escape it even then makes me want to scream. I almost always do something to the tune of something flying over my head. I cook to the sound of helicopters. I pee to the sound of commercial planes. I clean to the sound of Cessnas. There is rarely any break from them, even in the middle of the night.

Other than the annoying sounds from above and on the ground, the only thing I’m going to miss about this place is that it’s great for walking most of the time. It’s a dry, temperate climate without many bugs and even less humidity.

Tom is now suspecting that there may be a bunch of layoffs this summer but doesn’t know if he’ll be one of the ones to be laid off.

I’ve been eating very little and very healthy and my blood pressure is almost normal! Even my HR is amazingly and comfortably low at 74. That was when I was just sitting around, though.

I realize I can’t make every single journal entry I ever wrote perfect and that people can understand what I’m saying well enough as it is, but I’m still going through them and fixing little things. I do a month a day. I’m in mid-1993 right now. The way I was so deprived of sex and had to fight like hell just to get a decent piece of ass was ridiculous. Yeah, because nothing up there might have had it in for me sexually and there was never any sex curse on me, right?

I’m so glad I got Aly, who is now home from the hospital, to switch to Skype. Not only is it so much more reliable but I love how I can sneak a peek at her messages and then mark them as unread if I’m not in the mood to reply right away, since one of her pet peeves is people reading her messages without replying right away.

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2020 Slept a little better last time, but still woke up a few times along the way. I don’t think anyone woke me up, though. The only problem is that where my boobs seemed like they were getting less sore, now they feel sorer. I dropped another pound but that could be from not eating as much and not that I’m losing water. Tom said I looked less watery, though, so maybe it is.

Had a dream I was stuck in some hotel but couldn’t afford a room for that night. I approached a group in one room that consisted of a woman and two guys. They were somewhere in their thirties. I asked if I could crash in their room and they surprised me by saying I could.

Later, I was walking through the hallway and looked out a window and down into the parking lot where I saw Tom’s car parked and realized he was able to get a room somewhere. I found that room and entered it. As he began talking about whatever, I interrupted and said, “Why sleep in a room full of strangers when I can sleep right here?”

He seemed annoyed that I interrupted him.

I later caught the group in the hallway as they were exiting their room and told them I didn’t need to stay with them and asked to get my stuff. I wondered if they went through my purse and ran my name online trying to look me up or anything like that when I wasn’t around.

Next, I was in a public bathroom and couldn’t bring myself to go because I felt awkward and exposed since the gaps in the doors were a bit wide. There were even gaps in the side panels.

I also had a dream that Tom had a daughter with someone he knew before we met whom he broke up with when the kid was born. It was decided at that time that he wouldn’t be a part of its life because they believed it was better that way. I wondered if he would have the same attitude had it been a boy and if it had anything to do with him not wanting kids with me.

MONDAY, FEBRUARY 17, 2020 I was surprised to learn that a healthy BMI for a typical woman in the US is between 25-31. Well, I’m 31. As I was telling Aly, I’m not that big but could stand to lose a little even though I never do. I guess I’m just a typical middle-aged person. Although I certainly wouldn’t discourage anyone who wanted to lose weight, I feel like I would be lying to them if I told them things like, “You got this” or “You can do this!”

The reality is that they’re unlikely to lose the weight and keep it off for very long if they do. So, I wouldn’t want to tell them they could do something they’re unlikely to succeed with unless they’re around 20 years old perhaps and don’t have any medical problems or food addictions.

Lawrence really has project addictions, that’s for sure. I don’t think he’s the bastard that woke me up, but I was woken up twice by something loud going by. It came in at 9 and then left 20 minutes later, whatever it was. At first I thought it was Diane’s Pride bus, but they pick her up at 8:30 and don’t take 20 minutes to do it. Either way, I’ve been tired all day…again.

When we went out to Safeway to grab some things, that restoration truck was and back again. So, I guess this is yet another project that will take who knows how many days or weeks.

So glad Google did away with inserting punctuation when using speech-to-text, presumably because they got a lot of complaints. I thought it was cool at first but then I quickly came to hate it because it was breaking up sentences and causing too many errors.

Anyway, we ran out to Safeway where I got some vegetable oil and was amazed to find not raw peanuts but unsalted ones in the shell.

I made up the rest of the tempura with mushrooms which ended up making quite a mess and isn’t worth it in the end. It would work best with the strainer I thought we had but can’t find, and a deep fryer as opposed to frying it in a skillet. Very hard to drain and very greasy even if you try to soak up the grease with paper towels. I’m paying for it now with a queasy stomach. We could easily get a deep fryer, but we have very limited space in the kitchen and it’s definitely not healthy either.

We ordered a frying screen splatter guard and I got a set of a dozen full-size bottles of metallic nail polish each in a different color that has better reviews than the last set I got which is a bit dry and streaky.

Still have sore boobs and still don’t know if it’s going to amount to a period or not. I swear I had cramps at some point in my sleep, too. I’ve lost some of my water having Oolong tea and went down a pound. I’d like to drop 4-5 lb before my appointment so I don’t go breaking records there but that would take a shitload of hunger. I’m trying to convince myself that the hunger is totally worth it for all kinds of health reasons. If I don’t eat much, I help prevent debilitating weight gain which fucks with my mobility, diabetes, high blood pressure, such a high LDL score, and a whole host of other potential problems. There is an endless number of possible negatives if I continue eating. If I go hungry most of the time, there is only one negative and one negative only… hunger. That’s it. Just being hungry. Really wish it was as simple as it sounds! But I did quit smoking after trying for many years by telling myself the same thing and that was all the negatives of smoking versus the benefits of quitting.

I got the idea to search for Molly on Twitter by adding the name of the group home she lives in, and sure enough, she does have a new account… And so does Aly. Knew she was lying about ghosting her. The question is why she wants to keep their friendship a secret. I’ve already made it more than clear to her that I support her right to be friends with whoever she wants to be friends with, whether I think it’s a good idea or not.

She really is such a fucking liar in general. I don’t get it. Is it some sort of addiction she can’t help? Or is it just fun for her? Really dampens my trust in her in some ways.

She definitely doesn’t tweet much more from that account than she does from the one we’re connected on. She supposedly created it to keep track of her weight and health but only has 6 tweets, the last one being a month ago. Even Molly tweets not being sure if Aly uses Twitter anymore.

So they’re not doing Skype or WhatsApp together like I thought they were then? Maybe not because she hasn’t been on WhatsApp in almost a month. She did say she used to be in touch with some people there who stopped using it. Yeah, probably because messages going through were hit or miss.

Aly has been contradicting about her weight. She mentioned a while back about gaining weight even though she’s been walking more, then there’s this account where she expresses a desire to lose weight. Yet a few days ago she was telling me that they devised a menu for her to add a few hundred more calories. I asked her about it earlier and she said she gained back some of what she lost and isn’t under or overweight.

I don’t know, I’ve always gotten the feeling that like with Andy, she likes being the opposite of me. Maybe she’s heavier than she lets on but doesn’t say so in order to have one less thing in common with me.

Not that it matters in the end, but I can’t begin to really guess what her weight really is. I’ve learned that being hypo doesn’t always mean you’re fat just like being hyper doesn’t always mean you’re skinny. I’m sure being sick messed with her appetite for a while, though.

I’ve seen pictures of her taken when she was around 30 and she looked a lot like me, maybe even bigger. She had to have been in the 140s, possibly even the 150s or higher. If her weight was that high that young, she could be pretty heavy now and maybe more likely to end up even heavier than I am. Anyway, as long as she’s healthy and happy. She’s looking at being discharged Wednesday and I wonder if this is finally the end of her health problems for a while other than some tummy issues. Doubt it, though, unfortunately.

SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 16, 2020 I feel horrible for Aly. She was supposed to get out of the hospital today or tomorrow but now her IBS is acting up and she’s got another partial blockage. This girl just can’t get a break! I would feel so cursed if I was her, but believe me, I already do when it comes to my anxiety. I wonder if she’s ever going to feel better more often and have fewer doctor’s appointments. I hope so for her sake!

My boobs are still sore and I felt anxious today and yesterday, even though I cut today’s pill. Now I’m back to thinking there’s something more going on besides just the medication. I wonder if it’s tied into these PMS symptoms. Either way, it’s very discouraging and frustrating. The longer I have these feelings, even if they’re intermittent and not consistent, the more I lose hope of them ever going away for good. Tom still feels sure they will. Well, if there was ever one thing and one thing only that I hope he gets right out of all the things he feels will and won’t happen, it’s that. Really hope this doesn’t turn into an actual period, but if it does, I’m looking at about a month of PMS since PMS gets longer and longer with age.

He was telling me he was reading about one of Holland America’s cruise ships being delayed in Asia due to the coronavirus thing and then he read that it was the Westerdam and was like, wow, I was on that ship. Yep, we were on it in 2006 when I won my first trip.

Speaking of firsts, I made my first tempura-battered mushrooms. It was SO good even though I didn’t make much because I was learning and ran out of oil. Had to use olive oil even though they recommend vegetable oil. I’ll make more some other time. It was delicious! I’m also going to get a screen splatter guard for when I’m frying things on the stove that make a mess.

We walked for 1.9 miles in 35 minutes. We would have hit the 2-mile marker had we gone all the way to the back of the park.

I was watching yet another Jodi Arias special on Hulu and was surprised that she’s got an appeal going that’s successfully gotten the prosecutor in her case, Juan Martinez, suspended on paid leave. I’m just surprised she was able to get it that far even though I don’t doubt there was at least some misconduct on his part. Those in law enforcement and those connected to the courts always think they’re invincible. I still think she’ll lose and that all that will happen to the guy in the end is that he gets a paid vacation of sorts. As twisted as our legal system often is, he’s been a prosecutor for decades, the courts protect their own, and they’re not going to side with him over a murderer. At least I can’t imagine they would.

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 15, 2020 I spent all of yesterday tired because I didn’t sleep well, though I managed to get done what I wanted to do. He planned to pick me up to go out to eat when he got out of work yesterday. Instead of having him come all the way to the house, I walked down Astro and met him just past Tandy. This made it easier for him because then he could just loop back around to the front gate without doing U-turns or anything.

We ended up going to KFC for our V-Day meal since we didn’t want to deal with crowds by dining anywhere. Got chicken and fries, now that I know they sell them and not just potato wedges. They were cold and not the least bit crispy but good taste-wise.

I’m retaining water which is reflecting nicely on the scale along with how sore my boobs are. Please tell me I’m not going to get a period! I should be done with this shit by now! I know it’s possible for some women to get periods into their late 50s, but with my last one being 16 months ago, shouldn’t I not be feeling PMSy ever again? I just would have thought I’d be over that shit by now. Read that the harder your PMS is, the rougher the perimenopause phase will likely be for you. No wonder I suffered so damn much.

We went to Kohl’s earlier to make an Amazon return and it was almost warm out. I wished I hadn’t gone out in long sleeves. Of course, the warmer weather is bringing out the car stereos. We have to sit and listen to that shit at just about every single light.

Bees and other bugs are back in full swing as well, but I still like the nicer weather. I’m smelling skunks more and more and I really wish the city, Animal Control or whoever would start trapping some of these smelly bastards. There are way too many of them. I wasn’t kidding when I said everything is so excessive in this state from loud vehicles to constant landscaping to airplanes and even to skunks. Never experienced anything like it before but I’m guessing it’s due to being in a temperate climate that doesn’t get overly cold or hot.

We shopped a little bit at Kohl’s, and true to California style, they blasted music as well. They were having a big sale and then we got a discount for returning what we returned and that way I was able to get $70 worth of stuff for half the cost. I got a new pair of slippers in light blue which I’ve been wanting since my leopard slippers were starting to tear up. I still have my furry boot slippers, but I also like a pair that I can jump in and out of quickly.

I also got a turquoise long-sleeve dress that’s very simple and comfortable yet stylish. Believe it or not, it’s a size S and fits perfectly. It has a crisscross design at the chest with gold accents. Before I tried it on I had to ask the woman to repeat herself twice after asking where the fitting room was since I couldn’t understand whatever foreign accent she was speaking in.

Then it was off to Carl’s for fake burgers where the Mexican girl that fulfilled our order had to go and fuck up part of the order.

Hey, if you’re going to come to this country and burden our schools, hospitals and housing and take our jobs, why don’t you at least learn our fucking language?

The filter we got for the fish sucks in that the water current is too fierce with no way to adjust it. I wanted to return it but then he printed out a plastic diffuser for it and it seems to be working well so far. Love how this one has a washable filter.

A couple of other things I love is that Diane will no longer be picked up on that insanely loud Pride bus. Dixie said it had something to do with her falling. Guess they don’t like their people falling on them. She’s on a waiting list for other programs that don’t mind if you fall, as funny as I know that sounds.

Dahl is still having quite a bit of company. Every day there are two or three cars over there and I wonder if he’s as capable of being as independent as we thought. By now I would have expected the company to start dwindling a bit. At least they’re quiet.

I also love how my-diary now has the option of making some entries private within the same account. Decided to discontinue using my private account since there are over 8K entries in it and do a mix of public and private stuff on my other account.

I don’t understand why everyone’s so freaked out over the coronavirus thing going on. Think of the odds. First of all, it’s not as deadly as Ebola. Secondly, there are over 7 billion people in the world. Even if it ends up taking out a million people, which I highly doubt, that hardly puts a dent in the population and therefore I wouldn’t think I was at much risk of being one of the ones to get it.

A possible layoff is still looming over our heads, but he doesn’t know for sure what’s going on at work. All he knows is that they were talking about moving everything into one building which would mean laying off a lot of people. I’ve lived in many places, and experience has taught me that the more I dislike a place, the harder it is to get out of. Therefore, I don’t think we have a chance of losing what’s been the noisiest place I’ve ever lived in. I think the worst-case scenario may be that they lay him off, he gets a minimum-wage job, and we’re broke till he retires and we move to a cheaper state.

I had a dream I looked in the mirror and saw a square black patch of skin at my temple. At first, I thought I got something on me but then I realized it may be melanoma.

That’s the second melanoma dream I’ve had. In the first one, I had black stripes on my nails. I have a couple of spots on my scalp that are raised and sometimes itch, but I can’t tell if it’s anything worrisome or not through my hair.

I also had another dream that made me wonder if we were in my home state. We had our own house and it was big. There were at least two floors. I said to Tom, “I can’t believe we own this house. I’ve wanted it since I was 8 years old and now we may lose it.”

Yet while I seemed worried, he seemed pretty confident.

Then I had some dream that I was starting my morning routine off with some kind of special drink that seemed to be causing me to lose weight. I wasn’t starting my day off with coffee like usual and a part of me was thinking I may not bother with coffee for a while since I was awake enough by the time I was ready for it.

In the last dream, I was in some house with several kids of different ages who were known as “screen kids” because they always had their eyes on the screens of tablets, laptops or phones.

I’ve always loved Law & Order SVU, but now I’m getting sick of it. It’s all about race and politics.

Having two procedures in a row, Aly hasn’t been able to eat as much due to experiencing some nausea. She says one of the nurses accused her of faking it and would change her menu around. Because she’s got to pay out of pocket for so much of this shit, she wasn’t going to put up with her, so she complained and she hasn’t seen her since. Why can’t I get results like that when I complain instead of getting either nowhere or retaliated against? The car still rarely comes around, but I don’t think it’s because of anything the park did due to people’s complaints. I also still don’t think it’s forever either.

Her body is now starting to respond well to the transplant and she’ll be moved out of ICU today and probably discharged Monday. Hopefully, this will finally be the end of her health problems.

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 2020 Enjoyed a half-hour walk this morning. Spring has definitely arrived. The flowering trees are starting to bloom, and it was warm in the sun. I was even a little sweaty by the time I got back to the house.

Today I said goodbye to mail.com, something I’ve been wanting to do for a while. Hated that email service! Worst one ever. Login issues galore, being pestered about logging out if I happened to close the window without logging out, and just an overall shitty service. I changed the email on the few important accounts that were using the address I had connected to that account and then I deleted the account. I have six email addresses and I only use half of them. If I were starting over, I would only ever need three. One for personal use, one for joining sites like the health portal, Amazon and social media, and then one for sweepstakes.

Definitely need to get our betta a filter. Noticed the water was pretty filthy yesterday. It looks like there’s tons of dust in the tank. Didn’t realize the filter was also sucking up debris as well as filtering pee.

Even though I’ve been feeling great and surprisingly energetic, I’m going back to full doses of medication starting tomorrow and hopefully, I’ll make it to lab day.

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 12, 2020 I decided to say hello to Nottelmann and see what I could find out about Johnson. I didn’t expect a reply, but I was surprised by one saying that she not only remembers me but that sadly, Johnson wasn’t one of the ones she kept in touch with over the years. She has kept in touch with others, though, like Palma.

Nottelmann is German and thanks to my shitty memory I looked up the wrong names first. I was surprised to see posts and comments in German. I just didn’t think she knew German. Able to read it, I realized she was getting a little too old to be knocked up, LOL. Then I jumped to her wall through Palma where I was reminded that her first name is actually S.

Anyway, Nottelmann, as I’ve always known her by (I don’t think I could get used to the S/J thing), said she hoped I was doing well. I thanked her for getting back to me, let her know I was doing well and living in Cali and said I hope she’s well, too.

We all have our pet peeves, but silly peeve or not, it bugs me that I have no online privacy. All the while I was telling Kim I deactivated on Facebook, she was reading my public comments for God knows how long and for God knows what reason. Am I just that interesting or something? Maybe I should take it as a sign. One saying to just say fuck it and be more open without worrying so much about who sees what. I’ll be doing that on Blogger. I keep forgetting to copy my PB posts the Facebook, but since Blogger has a built-in share, I’ll use that one and hopefully remember to share from there. It will be the same stuff going on PB and MD. I don’t want anything public on PB but the book with entries pertaining to the termites so that’s the first thing they see when they come looking for me.

I don’t usually allow comments on PB for 3 reasons. One is that there are a lot of spammers on the site lately. Two is that I don’t want to hear from anyone that’s permanently in my past. Three is that I’m not there to argue with anyone who doesn’t like something I may say. That was part of why I was a little dismayed to learn a flagging option is going to be added. I can see flagging spam, but when it comes to things like hate speech, for example, that’s a subjective thing. We’re living in a time where practically everything is seen as racist or hateful. It also goes against the supposed right to free speech and freedom of expression. I think if we get comments (when we allow them) that we don’t like, we should simply ignore or block the person. Also, if you start reading something of someone’s and you find it hateful or offensive, don’t read it. It should be that simple. No one’s forced to read anything. I’ve come across all kinds of things I don’t like to read, and you know what I do? Yeah, I simply move on. I may bitch about some of it in my journal, but I don’t go trying to control and change others to conform to what I believe they should be saying and writing. So that’s part of the third reason I don’t allow comments much lately. If I write that I believe a woman should have full reproductive rights, I’m not going to get into a heated debate with someone who believes otherwise. You’re not going to change my mind simply by telling me you disagree with me just like I’m not going to change your mind. Your views, opinions, and beliefs are on you just like mine are on me.

Had to laugh when Josh said that perhaps a better term was “reporting.” LOL, yeah, and I’m not fat. I’m just curvy, heavy and overweight.

I’m sure it’s considered offensive to some people if I say that Jussie Smollett is another wonderful example of the fact that yes, reverse discrimination and false claims of racism/bigotry really do exist. Yes, it can happen, and yes, it does happen. It’s happened to me and it can happen to you. I’m glad the media has spotlighted the Smollett case, but I really wish they would also give attention to cases that don’t involve famous people.

The wind shifted last night and I got a break from the planes for a few hours. They were back to being annoying this morning but not as loud as they have been. Went out walking for about a half-hour. I really wish I'd gotton the headphones I use when I’m out there when we first moved in here.

Might have to get a new Kindle or just go back to using my old one because I’m having too many syncing issues between the app and Alexa. My old one works. It’s just slow.

When I got back, I slaved over the animals for about an hour, changing both the rats’ cage and the pigpen. Then I swept and mopped under the pen. Some days, like today, I don’t mind the work. On other days I wish I hadn’t gotten such high-maintenance animals.

Been having fun fucking with spammers when I voice message Kim. Her messages will play right through one after another if I play them on the phone. If I reply by phone, I have to hold the button down while I speak but that way, I can watch speech-to-text replying to them on my computer, LOL.

I’ve now got just over 19K pins on Pinterest.

The only bad news is that Aly’s rejecting the transplant. They moved her to the ICU and put her on steroids. I’m waiting to hear back from her on what happens next. I’m guessing she may need an outside donor, but I don’t know for sure.

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 11, 2020 Aly’s transplant was this morning. She’ll be paying $325 a month for 18 months which means no apartment for her or visit to us. :( At least she’ll feel better.

The planes continue to really suck, and based on the 10-cast, I don’t see any relief in sight from their shit anytime soon because the winds are going to be remaining Northerly. The fucking things are terrible. Just one after another, and I have to have the sound machine pretty loud in order to drown them out. It sucks that my ears can rarely get any kind of a break around here. It’s either outside noise or my own in order to drown the fuckers out.

I was telling Aly how we name our devices. Right now our living room isn’t “smart.” We actually spend the least time in that room. The kitchen is “Kitchen.” “Coloring” is the area between the kitchen and living room because that’s where I usually color.

In the master bedroom, “Monitor” is actually my rainbow lamp and “Rainbow” is the lamp that sits on the dresser. The room itself was supposed to be called Rainbow and I used to have a smart plug called Monitor to turn on my old monitor. Not wanting to get confused by changing the names, I left them as they were. Even “Air Cleaner” kept that name even though I eventually plugged the air cleaner in elsewhere and now use that particular smart plug to control my fan or portable heater when I want to warm up the bedroom without warming up the whole house.

The bathrooms, laundry room, hallway, and back door lights aren’t smart right now. The front light is just “Front,” and then there’s “Dining” over the dining area.

The small bedroom was supposed to be “Tom,” but Alexa had trouble with that one at times, so she chose the random name of Mavis. It’s an ugly name but it’s what it is. Roomba was Rosie and now RoboRock is Annie.

Annie can always be Annie no matter where we are, but when we move I’m sure I will reassign new names to the smart plugs based on the setup of the new place.

Annie vacuums differently than Rosie did. Rosie went along the walls and then she vacuumed in a crisscross pattern. This one does lines back and forth much in the way one would mow their lawn.

Today I’m slightly tired because I didn’t sleep as well last night. Kept waking up a lot. I remember bits and pieces of a few dreams. One of them was sad because a rat I really loved was killed by someone, but I don’t know how it was killed, by who or why.

Then I went to attack some guy that I and several others were pissed at. Don’t know why or who he was but it’s like I became incredibly weak as I threw each punch that may as well have been delivered by the fists of a one-year-old. Instead of bleeding and bruising, the guy acted like he didn’t feel a thing and went about his business as usual.

In the next dream, I was chatting with a young guy who was holding a baby. Lastly, I was with a small group of people telling a small child that only those I was close to knew of a particular secret of mine, whatever that was.

MONDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2020 I was reading someone’s journal on Prosebox complaining about their trip to an aquarium. They said kids of all ages were totally obnoxious and that she normally has pity for parents having to deal with toddlers having meltdowns which she understands is normal. But this was different. This was yelling, screaming, banging on the glass of the exhibits and having no regard for anyone around them. They were getting in people’s way, running into people, and multiple times one kid or another plowed into her or stepped on her feet, she said. What bothered her more, which is totally understandable, was that the parents and chaperones of groups ignored it and let them carry on like little monsters.

This is so, so typical too. And frightening. These little brats are going to be running the world tomorrow. If parents don’t teach them manners, respect and consideration young, what kinds of people are we going to have running things in another decade or two? It’s ridiculous the way kids are allowed to carry on with no regard for those around them. Every fucking time I go to a store when the brats are out, they’re screaming, and throwing fits, and no one gives a shit.

Alexa gives random names if you ask her to. So Annie, as we’ve named our new robot vac/mop since we like to name our devices to keep track of them, is absolutely fabulous! It really blows my mind to walk into the bathroom after a while and find it perfectly mopped. Not just vacuumed but mopped as well. The app is cool because with this one I can see the battery life and things like that.

Used the laundry bag for the pigs’ beds and that should cut down some of the hairs in the washer. I take them out of the bag before tossing them in the dryer since the dryer has a filter to catch any fur.

The planes have been absolutely horrible. This isn’t just in the morning and at night either, but from 5:30 in the morning until after midnight. It’s utterly fucking ridiculous. I hope people are complaining up a storm, not that it will do anyone any good.

I love that we’re getting up to 72 degrees today, but dreading the onslaught of motorcycles and loud projects that the approaching spring will bring.

My new panties fit great, but I hate the shapewear. It fits and isn’t uncomfortable, but I don’t think it makes me look any different, so I’m going to be returning it.

Got a visitor from West Palm Beach yesterday with a Mac computer. Naturally, my first thought is the drama queen since I know it can sometimes think you’re in a different town and occasionally even a different state. But if it was her, I would think she would hit more than one page. Unfortunately, I couldn’t see the one page she did view because it doesn’t always tell me that for some reason.

Aly is to have her bone marrow surgery tomorrow morning and is worried about how much it’s going to cost her. She may not only be unable to come out here this year but to afford her own apartment anytime soon.

SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2020 It occurred to me after my last entry that Fran’s old friend didn’t have MD, she had CP. Andy and I used to refer to her as the CP lady. I wonder if Kim might have that.

I am so sick of so many stores discontinuing so many things! Just when I get to like something, they stop selling it. Raw peanuts are getting harder to find and even unsalted peanuts in the shell are hard to find. Everything is salted that’s in a shell. For now, I can still get unsalted pistachio nuts, but we’ll see how long that lasts.

Had a bunch of Chinese food delivered yesterday and it is SO damn good! I found them on GrubHub. It’s the New Shanghai Restaurant. I ordered egg fried rice and the best egg drop soup I’ve ever had. Plus, I got crab cheese wontons and BBQ pork. Lastly, beef and scallops with a mix of veggies that are fantastic. We got free delivery and a $12 discount for being newbies.

I ate so damn much yesterday that I expected to be up a couple of pounds, but I wasn’t. It’s been gentle on my stomach too. Chinese never gives me heartburn, gas or anything. It’s not greasy or fatty.

I got some tempura batter and I’m going to make my first battered mushrooms, but not until next week. Figured the mushrooms would be going bad by the time I finished all the Chinese.

We went to Sam’s and Walmart and then treasure hunting at Goodwill but didn’t find anything there. Stopped at Rite Aid as well. It was cold and windy this morning, but we’re getting back into the 60s in the afternoons.

Good and bad news from Aly. She’s been in pain and tired but is just starting to perk up. Because she’s having blood issues, she might have to get her bone marrow operation done now and just go on a payment plan. This may mean she might not make it out this year but we both agree that she’s had enough of being cold, dizzy and getting bruises from this blood disease and needs to get it taken care of properly once and for all so she no longer has to have transfusions and immunosuppressive drugs.

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 7, 2020 Aly, who should be in the middle of surgery right now, doesn’t think Kim has MD, otherwise she wouldn’t be able to do her Taekwondo. She’s got a point there, but Kim definitely has some kind of disability affecting her speech that it’s a wonder she can sing in the choir she sings in. As mean as we were, oh what fun Andy and I would have had with that voice 30 years ago!

Aly says that now she’s being bombarded with planes too, and doesn’t know if it’s connected to the coronavirus thing where incoming patients are being brought to a place called Camp Ashland and quarantined for two weeks. She also says drones have been a nuisance at night. I think that until everything is electric, planes, helicopters and drones are going to become more and more of a problem.

Something just hit me about Abby and that’s her dark eyes. I can clearly see a resemblance to Stacey, though her hair and eyes are darker. I can’t swear to it, but I thought her husband James had light eyes just like she does. Well, I’m pretty sure it’s genetically impossible for light-eyed parents to produce a brown-eyed child. Or maybe not from what I just looked up.

I had a dream I lost a lot of weight and was rocking out but it’s just a dream. My weight will reset itself on its own within a few days because it’s where it feels it needs to be. In fact, it’s already starting to even though I’m not eating any more than I have been. Started off today a little hungrier than I have been in the last several days but then it went away. In the end, my calories are similar to what they have been. If I were unfortunate enough to be in a modern-day concentration camp like Auschwitz, assuming typhoid fever didn’t kill me and I wasn’t thrown in an oven or killed by some other means before the camp was liberated, I can just imagine the sheer shock people would feel when they saw that I was still the exact same size I went in at. They would certainly be wondering how the hell that happened.

Yeah, how the hell does that happen? I still don’t get it but if my body feels comfortable keeping its weight, I say let it have it. I don’t want to try to make it something it’s not, not that I’ve been trying to. I simply haven’t been as hungry and therefore not eating as much. Tom is the opposite. He never gets hungry. He just likes to eat.

Since he got home with the chicken before I got up, he put it in the oven on warm. Apparently, it doesn’t stay warm indefinitely because I woke up to beeping sounds. At first I thought it was the microwave until I went into the kitchen and found it was the oven.

I did both laundry and dishes as soon as he got out of the shower in case 9 hours without water turns into 5 days like last time.

I don’t know the particulars and I haven’t heard of all the people involved, but supposedly, a woman named Kesha is being sued for daring to confide in other celebrities about some doctor who’s a rapist. Because of it, she’s being sued for “defamation.”

I feel for her not just because of what she’s going through but because it reminds me of my own case. I was harassed for years without provocation, first not intentionally and then very intentionally and deliberately. I spoke out about it, the people involved and the system couldn’t handle it and had to add their own damning “evidence,” and then I became what they accused me of being…the hater they made me through their behavior and not their color.

Just did a huge Amazon order with our tax return and got necessities and fun stuff. They include:

A body shaper

15 mini bottles of nail polish

6 pairs of lacy boy shorts, mostly in dark colors

Hair dye

White Shoulders perfume

Jovan Musk perfume

Actuator

Robot vac/mop

A laundry bag for small pet stuff to help keep hairs from clogging washing machines

I don’t think the pigs’ liner will fit in it, but their beds will.

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 2020 It’s great that I didn’t have to deal with anxiety last night or the night before, but I am so not listening to planes today! They’ve been back to being totally annoying at night and in the morning. Got an earbud in hissing brown noise since the first one flew by at 5:33, not even six hours after the last one.

I changed the chat theme colors in Messenger just for fun and Facebook just had to let everyone know it too. Can we do any fucking thing online without the whole world having to know about it?

I’m making one of those Brit-style jacket potatoes now. Noticed my appetite has been down for a few days now. I can still eat. I’m just not as hungry. I read that for reasons no one knows, it’s common for many older people to lose their appetites. Well, maybe because we don’t have PMS or perimenopause hunger to deal with anymore, although I would have thought “older” meant those in their 70s and up. I may not be as hungry but I’m not expecting my energy to last much longer since I’ve had to lower my medication.

My weight is down a few pounds and if this trend keeps going I shouldn’t have to worry nearly as much about gaining weight. All I had yesterday was a potato, fish and salad, a plate of broccoli, a banana, a kiddy smoothie, and not much else other than blueberries and pistachio nuts mixed in throughout the day. Today I’ve had the same except in place of fish I had a beef patty.

Tom will be stopping at the store on his way home since he has to pick up his blood pressure medication and will grab me some chicken and hopefully some unsalted peanuts if they don’t have raw. Due to the mercury in fish, I try not to have it every day. Besides, I like variety.

Then at Rite Aid, which is practically outside the entrance to our place, he’ll pick up treats for himself as well as some wine and lentil chips for me, which are surprisingly good. I’ve cut way back on my sugar.

Oh, great. Tom just got a text saying the water will be off tomorrow from 9 to 6. Yeah, I knew it was just about time for the next game of shut-offs. Filling the tub now for extra water.

Muscular dystrophy. I’m listening to some of Kim’s many voice messages now and it just hit me that she almost certainly has MD. She reminds me of that girl Fran was friends with that people thought was drunk when we’d make prank calls via 3-way calling. She had MD. The way Kim has trouble controlling her voice and forming words totally smacks of MD.

When looking at my On This Day sidebar on PB, I saw an entry about a fake account likely created by Kim several years ago that Kathy alerted me to. This was on Facebook. She was calling herself Maya and was supposedly knocked up with triplets and had Tourette’s syndrome. I suppose that might be another possibility as far as what Kim has but I’m thinking MD. I wonder if she would remember that account, if she really created it, and be shocked if I told her I got a friend request from someone with that name and description and all that, hee-hee.

Not like I am with Stacey, though. The one in Arizona. I’m starting to post chapters of the story she “stars” in little by little on my blog. Her daughter Abby allows anyone to comment on her posts, so I gave her a heads-up. I don’t know how active she is on Facebook or how long it will be before she sees it.

Looks like Stacey’s kids turned out to do pretty well for themselves, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they were total bigots when it came to gays. Abby seems to be somewhat religious. Maybe not like Palma, but enough to tell me she’s probably pretty conservative and that usually means narrow-minded as well. If there is a God, I still don’t get why people would think that God would want them to hate those who are different.

I would have thought Stacey would be similar to my mother…very negative, domineering and even abusive. But maybe not. Not so sure her kids would turn out the way they seem to have turned out if she had. The whole family seems to be pretty active, sociable and well-off. The kids don’t just seem successful career-wise and relationship-wise, but they seem to be pretty talented as well. When I peeked in on them several years ago, I found that Abby was into dance. There was a shot of her leaping for joy as she graduated from Business School. I can tell just by the way she’s posed in midair that she can dance.

There was a clip of Hanna, the oldest, singing on Spotify and she’s surprisingly good. Not great and a little flat on some notes but overall pretty good.

Anyway, I’m sure Abby will delete my post and block me as well. I don’t expect any of them to read the story, but we’ll see. Maybe they’ll be curious.

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 2020 Oh great. Now I can’t email my husband because it thinks I’m spamming him. I like to share my thoughts with him throughout my day when he’s asleep or at work. Pictures too. Guess I’ll have to send him stuff to Gmail instead of Outlook.

So Germany won’t remove their anti-Semitic sculpture. That doesn’t surprise me. If it was anti-black, they would remove it in a heartbeat.

I kind of like how speech-to-text is inserting punctuation for me. The only time I don’t appreciate it is when I stop to think of what I want to say next. Usually, I’ll speak a sentence straight through but not always. I don’t like how it’s capping more words than it should.

Kim left me 44 messages while I slept and OMG! She leaves voice clips much like she tweets. She breaks them up into tons of them with just a single word or two. Only a few of them went for 10 seconds. I can understand most of what she says but every now and then there’s something I don’t catch. I don’t mean this to be mean or anything like that since we can’t help the way we sound but her voice is weird as hell. Not funny, but weird. Voices never sound “funny” to me. Not even when people stutter. To me, a stutter is no different than if someone sneezes or coughs. It’s just a sound.

Kim sounds almost robotic and like she’s on the verge of crying and I realize it’s likely linked to her disability and whatever is wrong with her that got her qualified for Special Olympics. Some form of retardation, I guess. I don’t know what the so-called politically correct word for that is today and I really don’t care. Especially since it’s only going to become a no-no in a decade or so and then there will be some new and proper word until that too, suddenly becomes offensive. So I may as well stick with what I know and was originally taught.

My best buddy may be a little hard to understand at times because she has a bit of a nasally sound and her voice is a little higher pitched than I’m used to, but I have the same problem. Not the higher pitch, but the nasally sound. It comes out when I talk. It comes out when I sing. I’ve had this all my life and I’ve never been able to get rid of it, not that it’s necessarily a bad thing any more than the pitch of one’s voice is. I think it’s easier to change accents than it is for things that are simply a part of our nature that we’re born with. Either way, at least she and I sound human. LOL, Kim sounds anything but normal but I realize it’s beyond her control.

I like exchanging voice clips with her because it’s easier. I don’t do it very often with Aly and other Facebook friends because most of them prefer to read rather than listen.

I was a little anxious yesterday, but not like the day before. The key is not to skip full doses like Tom pointed out. I’m just cutting the dose until a few weeks before labs. But if I have any trouble then and I have to come back down again before labs, fine. It just sucks that there’s a good chance I’m always going to have to choose between fatigue and anxiety, but I still have pretty good energy.

I did a little reading and found that I’m not actually postmenopausal. There are three stages. Perimenopause, menopause, and postmenopausal. Well, I’m not officially postmenopausal until it’s been 24 to 36 months after my last period. I’d like to think he’s right about the anxiety going away someday and that my hormones are still changing and settling in, but I still think it’s most likely on the meds. That’s when all this shit began to happen. And as I read, frequent or severe anxiety or thoughts of suicide and panic attacks aren’t a normal part of the process.

If it isn’t on the meds, maybe I really did acquire some kind of anxiety disorder, even if that seems unlikely. Bodies change over time and the mind can too. But my gut has always been on the meds.

Tom still thinks they’re on the verge of going out of business. He hopes they lay him off rather than simply go out of business because then he’d get a severance package. I really hope they do neither. I still don’t see any good coming out of it. I want to get out of here like yesterday, but it really is smart and safer if he just stays there until he retires.

The weather has been horribly cold. We’ve had a few mornings where we hit freezing.

I feel bad for Aly because Friday she has to have an emergency hysterectomy and will have to put her bone marrow operation on hold because she can only have two major procedures a year covered. At least hysterectomies aren’t the big deal they used to be. It’s minimally invasive laparoscopic surgery where they insert a camera into the belly button and take the uterus out from there. It may be minimally invasive but it sure is a gross thought!

MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2020 Yesterday I was up 19 hours and only slept for 5. I ended up taking a 90-minute nap. Not sure it refreshed me, though. That’s another thing I don’t get; I hear so many people say that naps refresh them, but I actually feel groggy afterward. It was still nice. Even the planes have been quieter than expected.

I still can’t find a pattern for them (commercials). Hearing the freeway doesn’t always mean I hear the planes and not hearing it doesn’t always mean I’m not going to hear the planes. The winds aren’t N now but NW instead. They are going to be just N in the morning which is their other prime time so they may be a problem then. It won’t matter if they are, though, because I’m going to be reading myself to sleep around that time.

Carolyn said it was getting too hard for Tricia (or Trisha?) to do things around her place so she’s moving close to where she has friends to help her. Naturally, this gets me worried about our own future for the millionth time. Who helps us when things get tough for us to manage? And then there’s knowing that unless I’m surprised with a stroke or heart attack or God forbid cancer killing me before he dies, I’ll have to kill myself when he dies because I simply won’t be able to go on alone. Even if the loneliness and depression wouldn’t be as off the charts as it no doubt would be, this isn’t the 80s anymore when life was simpler and all I had to manage was the rent and three simple bills… the phone, gas, and electricity. Even then I would fuck up my checkbook because my math is that bad. So there’s no way I could manage as complex as life is today with all its technology and gadgets. I don’t know how to take care of setting up computers and internet-related things and I certainly couldn’t take care of a house by myself. Then there’s the fact that I don’t drive. So with no way to survive and things being way more than I could ever handle on my own, I would have no choice but to go, which brings a whole new set of worries right there… What if I fuck up killing myself? What if I simply don’t have the guts to go through with it? What would I do then? Commit a crime so I could go to jail and at least get some care as half-assed and as shitty as it would be? No way!

I just have to tell myself yet again that the end isn’t here yet and when it does come there’s nothing I can do about it, so just try to enjoy life until then. So far, though, just because I can tell myself something doesn’t mean I can always believe it or at least find comfort in it. He’ll die first and I’ll either take my life right afterward if his death takes us by surprise, or we’ll know his death is imminent and we’ll go together. End of story. Until then I just gotta do my best to not worry and enjoy life while we’re healthy and able-bodied. This is the kind of personal shit I won’t share publicly, of course. People are just too stupid to get most things. I’ve done my time hoping they would catch on, but the truth is they likely never will.

I don’t know that we would be able to afford it but after he retires, I still think it would be nice to travel somewhere every other year or so just for variety. Yes, traveling is a pain in the ass but just like one may get tired of having a room decorated the same way after so long, one sometimes needs an entire change of pace and scenery altogether even if it’s only for a few days.

I thought about it and asked myself could Florida really trigger my asthma as Simone did? I sure hope not, but when I think about it, I don’t think so. I think my usual snot spray would keep the sneezing fits away and I don’t think my asthma would be to the point that I’d need inhalers every day as long as I didn’t spend too much time outdoors when it was really humid. Hopefully, we’ll still get to test Florida out. I want to see what it does to my lungs and my ear, and how often the storms wake me up. We have the desert as a backup, but I can’t see us having as much to do there. The only thing I think we could do more there than in Florida would be bike riding. If we ever have any land around us, which I don’t see, I want to grow lettuce, tomatoes and an avocado tree.

I just want him retired and us having lots of fun, active, productive and happy times together before the end comes, whenever it comes, however it comes! I want to be at the beach and on the ocean and in the warm sunshine!

Right now, I have similar fears that my friend has. One of the many things that makes her such a wonderful person and great friend is that we have enough differences to learn from each other and keep things interesting but enough common ground to really relate and understand each other. Like the fear of brand-new health issues springing up as soon as we get over one. Sadly, though, I’m still not completely over the anxiety. If anything, this year hasn’t been off to a good start and I still worry because of my age.

I’m back to worrying about my meds and labs all over again, even if it’s not to the degree that I once did. Yesterday I felt too wound up to take full doses all the way till March 6th. Fuck the numbers. I’m not going to make myself feel miserable just to get good numbers in the lab any more than I would let myself be hungry to get good numbers on the scale. So I’m only going to take full doses a couple of times a week until the middle of the month. I think what I might have done wrong was the ramp-up. Even though it means having to deal with fatigue in order to be calm, I think I should have kept my dose down until 5 weeks before labs. I noticed that I’m able to go at least 5 straight weeks on full doses if I let my thyroid levels fall enough first. I’m just glad that if I have to have this shit it’s Hashimoto’s and not simply low thyroid because from what Tom told me about a couple of his co-workers, you’re more likely to acquire a goiter and gain weight if you don’t have Hashimoto’s.

Tom still thinks he’ll eventually be able to take full doses every day without issues as my hormones continue to settle into their postmenopausal stage, and I still hope to hell he’s right, and that it’s not just on the medication alone or I possibly acquiring some strange chemical imbalance. If that’s the case, I could struggle with this for the rest of my life. His retiring will definitely make a difference as we both believe. I would definitely be braver to try to stick it out until the 6th if he was home every day and see if it would go away on its own. If I remember correctly when I went back to 75s after the Lio experiment proved to be a bust, I was anxious but then it fizzled out.

It would just suck to always have to choose between anxiety and fatigue. The only reason I’m tired now is that I was up so long and didn’t sleep as long. They say nothing lasts forever. Hell, I can’t even find raw peanuts in the Sacramento area anymore. So, all I can do is hope for the best, even though the things that don’t last are usually the things you wish would last.

Carolyn also said that she thinks Dahl will keep the place because she’s pretty sure he’s still working.

The betta’s filter started having problems, so we’ve decided that since he’s in a 3-gallon tank which is 2 extra gallons than they recommend for one fish his size, we’ll just let him be without a filter. I’ve heard they actually prefer still water anyway. I have test strips to test for the amount of ammonia in his water which I’ll do regularly

Finally found and installed a program that weeds out duplicate photos. Now I just have to find a universal text reader.

Later…

I wish I had the amazing patience and tolerance Aly has for those with mental/emotional issues, but I just don’t. seriously, if she ever gets sick of working with kids, I hope she considers working somewhere in the medical field like doing home care or something because I know she would be great at it. Me? I just want to throttle the Kims and Loris of this world at times.

Anyway, my main complaint today is Facebook. I’ve told her numerous times I don’t do Facebook anymore which is mostly true. I’m hardly active there anymore. Every now and then I’ll change my profile or cover pics and react to something someone posted so they know I’m still alive, but it’s mostly Messenger that I use along with Skype, and I’ve told her this numerous times. I’ve never known anyone before in my life with such memory issues! She makes Andy and I seem like we never really had much in the way of memory issues after all. It is said to be common and those with certain mental illnesses. Anyway, despite insisting I’d rather keep in touch on Skype or Messenger and that I’m not very active on Facebook, what does she do? She goes and sends me a fucking friend request. So, I’m sure that despite all I’ve said, all this time she’s been creating and deleting accounts and systematically blocking me from each one as if I go looking for her and want to be connected to every goddamn account of hers. I don’t care anymore if she’s putting my account at risk, though. It’s only Facebook.

But just because I can occasionally forgive doesn’t mean I forget. Every lie I catch someone in, every time they betrayed my trust, every time they go ballistic on me, that’s a mark that forever remains on my view of you as far as I’m concerned, and you will never again regain the complete and total trust of me. That’s why I’m going to ignore the friend request. We’ve been on good terms for a while now, but I never forgot the times she so viciously and relentlessly stalked and harassed the shit out of me and involved others as well. Knowing she could flip on me should I dare say the wrong thing and piss her off, I’m not going to connect with her on Facebook and give her a chance to post God only knows what on my wall or in response to comments or in messages to friends before I might get a chance to block her. Like I said, total trust can never be regained once you use and abuse it, even though I realize that people don’t always react the same way the second time around. I know I wouldn’t react the same as I have in the past if those who are presently in my life chose not to be, but I still can’t see myself adding her. Why now, anyway? Why would she suddenly want to be added now? She unfriended and blocked me on one of her accounts a couple of years ago. Then I said hello to her on another account that showed up in the ‘people you may know’ section and she replied and then blocked me. So now she wants to reconnect? It makes me suspicious and think she has some kind of ulterior motive. But then those who are crazy or insane don’t always function rationally and sensibly, so I don’t know for sure. I just know I’m going to ignore the request. If she asks me about it, I’ll just tell her I never got a request.

Lori pesters me with tons of back-and-forth messages and sending me shit I have no interest in or like some of the shitloads of videos of her singing and playing the guitar. She’s not the greatest guitarist and her singing is way off-key. I realize that she too isn’t all there. I guess she’s autistic. I tried to avoid those with things like Asperger’s, autism, bipolar and multiple personality disorders because they usually end up being quite a problem in the end and I don’t need any toxic drama in my life when I’ve already had more than enough. These people just get way too emotional, too repetitious, unreliable, contradictory, aren’t usually very bright, and can turn on you in an instant, usually for things they’ve either imagined or misunderstood. Her cousin Cindy has the same thing and when I declined her offer the swap texts, she went ballistic on me.

I hate to sound overly picky and judgmental as I know that I’m far from perfect myself. It’s just that I’ve gotten to be very selective with whom I associate. Just looking out for myself. :-)

Last night turned out to be pretty shitty. I was more anxious than I have been in a while and it eventually turned into depression as my mind took me to dark places. No, I’m not suicidal or anything like that. Just the usual worries about growing old, things that could go wrong, dying, death, wondering if there is an afterlife… That sort of thing. Many who believe in the afterlife seem to think we spend it with our families. But what if that’s the last thing we want? What if we’d rather spend it with our spouse and our friends?

Then I saw a short rat animation and that made me more depressed even though the sad video which depicts rats trying to survive in New York was totally made up. I know it sounds silly. Hell, I’m not usually that impressionable. But yeah, it’s sad.

I felt like I just wanted to cry toward the end of my day which was early in the morning. I only managed to squeeze out a tear or two. It was more that my eyes stung and watered than that I actually cried. I’m just not much of a crier these days.

Why am I struggling with these emotions all over again? I’m 4 months postmenopausal, for fuck’s sake! Tom says he thinks I shouldn’t worry about the lab numbers and that I should just let them show who I am and not worry about upping my dose before labs and lowering my cholesterol intake. Yeah, I think he’s right. I just don’t want my doctor getting on my ass about it, but hey, this isn’t me as a child or on probation or anything like that, right? No one can tell me what to do. Just because she may suggest statins doesn’t mean I have to take them. Sometimes I have to remind myself that while we don’t have much control over our bodies, we do at least have a little control over our lives.

I know I’ve mentioned this before and that it’s gone on for a while now, but sometimes I still feel like there’s some kind of growth at the very base of my neck on my left side where it connects to the chest. That’s a little low for my thyroid, so I wonder if it’s some kind of growth stemming from my thyroid, a swollen lymph node, something else or nothing at all. Whatever it is can’t be serious if I’ve had it for this long. I don’t notice it when my body is in an upright position. Only when I’m lying down and only if my head is turned toward my left side. When I place my hands at the sides of the base of my neck when my body is upright, I don’t feel anything unusual. But I sort of think I can if I lie on my back and put my head back. I’m just not sure. Maybe it’s just my imagination, but if it isn’t, it’s got to be benign.

Tom said he wants me to be aware of the fact that he could very well be laid off because the company isn’t doing well, and they’ve been laying off people like crazy. I haven’t had any dreams suggesting any real trouble or change is ahead, but if he gets laid off, it could be a good thing or it could be a bad thing. At his age and in a country where most businesses favor minorities unless you’re in the Midwest perhaps, I don’t see how his being laid off could lead to anything better. I think it could lead to financial struggles and throw a definite kink in our plans. We may not be trapped here forever but we could probably kiss Hawaii goodbye. There are worse things than being broke, though, as the last half a decade has taught me. I always felt the money wouldn’t last forever. I’m just surprised it’s lasted this long. Worst case scenario he retires early, and this state also is pretty good with supplementing income. They have a lot of different programs, unlike most states. I don’t see him getting a job that pays the same or us getting out of here before he’s 66-67, but then I don’t see him getting laid off either. Really hope he doesn’t since it’s more likely that bad would come of it rather than good. I said that now that I’d beaten the anxiety that something new would go down, but obviously I haven’t beaten it like I thought I did.

Still no pattern with the planes. The first one rocketed overhead at 5:40 yesterday morning as I was about to start unwinding and the winds were heading north. Well, they’ve been northerly all night but all I’ve heard are small planes, helicopters, and the freeway.

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 1, 2020 It was almost 70° today. Fortunately, I was able to get caught up on my sleep before the motorcycles hit the scene. They’ll be a problem until November.

Patricia’s house is for sale, which kind of sucks. She’s only been there for a few years. Carolyn said she’d been planning to sell for a while, had a couple of surgeries and wants to be closer to friends. Either way, it’s another place going on the market that’s close to ours that I worry may eventually include a motorcycle, some other loud vehicle, lots of company, or dogs that do nothing but bark when they’re out being walked. :-(

Also, the fact that there are still 2-3 vehicles at Dahl’s place every day makes me think he can’t live on his own. Tom got the feeling he could, though, even if he isn’t healthy.

I hate it when unpleasant memories from the past spring to mind when I least expect them to. You want to talk race, race-obsessed, America? Okay, well, how about being tricked into confessing to something I wasn’t even charged with by a black cop who hated whites and was personal friends with the others involved, also black. How about being tricked, deceived and manipulated in ways that the person knew you couldn’t prove? How about confessing to sending journal excerpts you never denied sending, unaware of other “evidence” that may have been fabricated by this pig or sent by someone else? How about continuing to be pissed at yourself for how you handled it 20 years after the fact in a place that automatically believes non-whites over whites? At least they sure did in Phoenix, Arizona from 1999-2004.

I know it’s totally pointless to wish I’d done things differently when what’s done is done and can never be undone, but if only the only thing I said was, “Charge me or let me go and I’ll talk to you when I have a lawyer.” Oh, I would have been charged out of spite, no doubt, but in the end, I could laugh at how they took the time to drive all the way out to my place for nothing and maybe, just maybe, it might have helped my case in the end. Not so sure about that last one, though. Evidence had already been fabricated against me and I was still white.

Lesson learned too late… Keep your mouth shut whether you’re guilty or not and no matter what colors are involved.

But how did this pig end up being booted from the force? I mean it’s great that he did, but somehow I doubt my vindication had anything to do with it. I think it was only a part of it. I think I was just one of many complaints the pig had against him. Corrupt officials don’t usually pick on just one person. I remember how worried I was when I was vindicated, knowing how much it would piss off the welfare bums, but had I known at the time that he was kicked off the force too, that would have really turned my concern up a notch. It probably didn’t happen right away, though, but after we left the state when he lost his job at the bank, something we were very right to do. After perhaps biding their time for a bit so as not to look obvious, who knows what the hell they may have done to our property or to us in time?

Bing reminded me why I hate February so much with its current wallpaper picture. And of course, every other article is on racism, most of which I could bet you just about anything is exaggerated if not completely made up. Man, I’m sick of this fucking bullshit. I’ve seen fads and obsessions last for years, but decades? It’s been this way since the L.A. riots and I’m wondering when people are finally going to move on to something else to obsess over.

It’s just after 7 p.m. so in a little while I should know whether or not the planes are going to be a nuisance tonight. When they’re bad at night it’s usually from just after 7 to just after midnight.

Tom’s asleep now having crashed early and not long after getting home. We’re going to go to Walgreens when he gets up.

Had a detailed dream about being on vacation during the long 10 hours I slept. It started off with the baby termites. Tom and I were outside somewhere. There seemed to be a lot of snow on the ground. Becky and Sarah were a short distance away talking to someone. At one point I started jogging in place to warm up, saying I didn’t understand how people could sit still for so long. This seemed to annoy the termites. So the termites stomped off to wherever and then the snow was nearly to my chest. I “swam” through it just as I saw them heading back in our direction.

Then we were in a hotel room by ourselves. We were at the end of the hall and our door was open. Just outside the door was a small cabinet where we had some stuff. I told Tom I was going to get all the stuff that was outside the room and he said that was a smart idea.

I headed toward the end of the room with my shaver. The room had two beds. Tom was lying on the one closest to the room’s large windows watching TV.

“Wow,” I suddenly said after trimming some leg hair stubble that was way thicker than anyone really has, pointing to a mechanical fish floating outside our window. I told Tom, who didn’t see it from his angle, that it looked cool even though its head fell off when it hit the window.

Then he said something about checking email and I said, “Oh, email. I probably have a ton of it.”

Then I went into a separate room within the room. Instead of it being just a bathroom, there was also another bed and a table in it. I told Tom I would clear the table so I could move it out of the doorway which was partially blocking it. The glasses on it were left by the previous guests.

I looked at the bed and thought, why should I sleep in the main room and have to deal with his snoring when I could sleep in there?

Then I glanced at the open door to the adjoining room and thought to close and lock it. But since I had the other door closed and was ready to pee, I figured I would use the light spilling in from it to see what I was doing before locking it.

[yourreddancer]

HEY RED STATES!!! - Huffpost - Miles Mogulescu

HEY RED STATES!!! - Huffpost - Miles Mogulescu

So some of you patriotic Americans in Red States are so mad that a Kenyan, Muslim, socialist black man got elected President of the USA for a second time that you want to demonstrate your patriotism by seceding from the United States of American? Go ahead. Make our day.

But be careful what you wish for. Here's how it could go down, and it might not be so pretty for you after all is said and done.

We would get the West Coast, all of the Northeast and the upper Midwest.

You would get Texas, Oklahoma and all the former slave states.

We would keep Hawaii too, the foreign country with warm water and beautiful beaches where Barack Hussein Obama was born without a birth certificate.

You can have Alaska and stare at Russia from your front porches.

To be fair, we may have to split up some states.

You get North Florida. We get South Florida. After all, what would you want with all those gay people in South Beach and old Jews in Miami?

We get North Virginia. You get South Virginia. To be fair, we'll let you keep the University of Virginia. Go Cavaliers! Plus you need at least one place to educate some leaders who believe in science.

But Austin, Atlanta and New Orleans get to be their own Blue city/states, sort of like West Berlin before the Wall came down. We'll even pay to move the capital of Texas from Austin to W's hometown of Midland, where as one native recently put it, "There used to be one Democrat in town, but I think she died".

We might even merge with Canada. That way we get single-payer healthcare, solvent banks, the Royal Canadian Mounties, and Ryan Gosling (eat your hearts our Red-nation women).

To sum up briefly:

We get Bruce Springsteen, Jay Z and Beyonce. You get Ted Nugent and Meatloaf.

Plus Willie Nelson gets to park his bus anywhere he likes in the Blue America.

We get Elizabeth Warren. You get Todd Aiken. (Hey, we'll even keep Chris Christie. He's too large to move, anyway.)

We get the Statue of Liberty. You get OpryLand.

We get the New York Philharmonic. You get the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.

We get Oprah. You get Paula Deen.

And Blue America will have an easy repatriation policy for the ancestors of slaves still stuck in the former Confederate states, as well as a path to citizenship for undocumented workers and their children from both Red and Blue America who have worked hard/studied hard and put down roots. We'll even have a 21st century version of "40 acres and a mule" with education, job training and work at a fair wage for those who need it. (But here's a warning: good luck getting your crops picked, your kids asses wiped, and your pools cleaned without a bunch of low-paid undocumented workers.)

Any Red-nation NBA team that wants to gets to move to a Blue state city without its own team. Hey, how about them World Champion Pittsburgh Thunder?

And the New York Jets will send you back Tim Tebow for a player to be named later.

We get 85 percent of America's venture capital and entrepreneurs.

You get backwoods crystal meth labs.

We get Intel, Microsoft and Apple. You get WorldCom.

We get Harvard. You get Ole' Miss.

We get two-thirds of the tax revenue. You get to pay your fair share for once.

Speaking of all those federal taxes you love to hate. Most of it comes from us and goes to you. So stop talking nonsense about how "It's our money, not the government's money". Of the 19 states that send more money to Washington than they get back in benefits, 14 are Blue. And of 31 states that get more money back from the Feds than they pay in taxes, 23 are Red. It's not your money. It's our f**cking money. So from here on out, you can pay for your own damn roads and bridges.

Which state do you think has the lowest divorce rate? It's Taxachusetts, the first state to recognize gay marriage. Think that's some aberration? How about this? 9 of the 10 lowest divorce rates are in the Blue states. And where are the highest divorce rates? 10 of the top 10 are Red.

But gay people getting married is going to ruin the family for you? Seems like you're ruining it pretty well on your own.

So we get a bunch of happy families, straight and gay. You get a bunch of single moms and deadbeat dads.

With the Blue States in hand we will have firm control of 80 percent of the country's fresh water, more than 90 percent of the pineapple and lettuce, 92 percent of the nation's fresh fruit, 95 percent of America's quality wines (you can serve Texas wines at state dinners) 90 percent of all cheese, 90 percent of the high tech industry, all living redwoods, sequoias and condors, all the Ivy and Seven Sister schools plus Stanford, Cal Tech, UC Berkeley, and MIT.

With the Red States you will have to cope with 88 percent of all obese Americans and their projected health care costs, 92 percent of all US mosquitoes, nearly 100 percent of the tornadoes, 90 percent of the hurricanes, 99 percent of all Southern Baptists, virtually 100% of all televangelists, Rush Limbaugh, and Bob Jones University.

So, as we said at the start. You want to secede? Go ahead. Make our Day. But be careful what you wish for. You might not be so happy if you actually got it. If you ask nicely, we might even take you back.

[uniquejellyfishqueen]

11/24/1835 The Texas Rangers, a horse-mounted police force were authorized by the Texas Provincial Government

*Didn’t she have horses wearing friendship bracelets?

11/24/1877 - Black Beauty, by English Author Anna Sewell is published. It became an immediate best seller and eventually sold over 50 million copies

11/24/1932 - In Washington, D.C., the FBI Crime Lab opens (officially known as the FBI Scientific Crime Detection Laboratory

11/24/1943 - During World War II, at the battle of Makin, the USS Liscome Bay is torpedoed by the Japanese near Taraw and sinks killing 53 officers and 591 enlisted men

11/24/1963 - The assassin of U.S. President John F. Kennedy, Lee Harvey Oswald is killed by Jack Ruby

11/24/1969 - The Apollo 12 command module splashes down safely in the Pacific Ocean, after it completed the second manned mission to land on the Moon

11/24/1971 - Dan Cooper, aka D.B. Cooper parachutes from a Northwest Orient Airlines plane during a thunderstorm over Washington state with $200,000 in ransom money. He was never found.

*same initials as Down Bad

11/24/1973 - Photography by Ringo Starr hits #1

11/24/1994 - At the first annual MTV European Music Awards, Oasis is named the Best UK Band 

11/24/1998 - Garage, Inc., is released as the Metallica compilation of cover songs

11/24/2014 - Shady XV is a two-disc compilation album released by Eminem

The Panthers host the Chiefs on 11/24 at 1pm.

Bank of America Stadium is 33 acres.

Broke ground on 4/22/1994 and opened on 8/3/1996

The Carolina Panthers have never won a Super Bowl, losing both of their appearances:

2004: In Super Bowl XXXVIII, the Panthers lost to the New England Patriots 32-29.

2016: In Super Bowl 50, the Panthers lost to the Denver Broncos 24-10. The panthers were the favorite by 5.5. The network it was on was Westwood One…(Woodvale?….I forgot how the west was won….)

*They are 1 out of 12 teams that have not made it to a Super Bowl.

Owned by David Alan Tepper 9/11/1975 hedge fund manager of Appaloosa Management (specializing in distressed debt) founded in 1993 based in Miami Beach, FL (their logo is a horse.)

TS was wearing a Panther necklace on 11/19

The Panther on her 1989 set

The “Big cat” on her blind for love shirt in the bank vault

“Range Rovers and Jaguars…”

“Karma is a Cat”

Her 2 cat is Olivia Benson… Named after Mariska Hargitay who can speak 4 languages.

In SVU History:

* Clarence Williams III 
In the 2000 Law & Order episode "Burn Baby Burn" (aired on 11/22/2010), a former Black Panther named Clarence Williams III shoots and kills two cops on the warrant squad. The episode explores the idea that police can never know what they might encounter when they knock on a door. 

* Former Black Panther accused of murder 
In season 11, episode 6 of SVU(aired on 10/28/2009), a former Black Panther is accused of murdering a Caucasian police officer. The episode features a politically charged trial and the accused questioning Detective Green's integrity. 

PANTHER SYMBOLISM:

* Protection and guidance: In medieval bestiaries, the panther was seen as an embodiment of Christ, and was said to bring unity and harmony to the animal kingdom, while also protecting from evil. 

* Leadership and unity: In modern times, the panther has become a symbol of leadership and unity, especially in comics, civil rights activism, and cinema. 

* Power, protection, and ferocity: In Greek mythology, the panther was associated with Dionysus, the god of wine and pleasure. 

* Grace, beauty, and mystery: For many tattoo enthusiasts, the panther represents these qualities. 

* Justice, morality, and money: In The Visit, the black panther symbolizes these concepts

Or we have the Florida Panthers

They do not have a game on the 24th.. but they do play on the 23rd and 25th of this month…. Bookends of sorts. And they are all home matches for the kitties.

11/23 Colorado Avalanche W 7 vs Florida Panthers 4

11/24 KC Chiefs vs Carolina Panthers

11/25 Capitals vs Florida Panthers

The day before Thanksgiving 11/27 the Florida Panthers host The Toronto Maple Leafs (TS current stop on the ET)

11/27/1942 is Jimi Hendrix birthday (electric lady..)

11/27/1957 Caroline Kennedy Birthday (US Ambassador to Australia since 2022)

11/27/1727 - The foundation stone of the Jerusalem Church in Berlin i laid

11/27/1870 - Baseball is called "The National Game" by The New York Times

11/27/1901 - The U.S. Army War College is established

11/27/1924 - The first Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade is held in New York City

11/27/1960 - Gordie Howe becomes the 1st NHLer to score 1,000 points

11/27/1961 - Gordie Howe becomes the 1st to play in 1,000 NHL games

11/27/1965 - The Pentagon tells U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson that if they are to succeed in the Vietnam War that the number of American troops has to be increased from 120,000 to 400,000

11/27/1973 - The U.S. Senates votes 92-3 to confirm Gerald Ford as Vice President of the United States

11/27/1983 - Avianca Flight 011 (Boeing 747) crashes near Madrid's Barajas Airport, killing 181 people on board

11/27/1989 - Avianca Flight 203 (Boeing 727) explodes over Columbia, killing all 107 people on board and three people on the ground - The Medellin Cartel claim responsibility

11/27/2009 - The Nevsky Express train between Moscow and Saint Peterburg derails after a bomb explodes causing 28 deaths with 96 people injured

11/27/2015 - A shooter in a Planned Parenthood facility in Colorado Springs, Colorado shoots four police officer, one police officer and two civilians die and six are injured

11/27/2017 - Country singer Blake Shelton is named People Magazine's Sexiest Man Alive

11/27/2020 - Days after the discovery is announced, the Utah monolith is removed

11/27/2021 - All Too Well, the extended version by Taylor Swift with a time of 10:13, hits #1 on the Hot 100

But also because Pittsburgh has been relevant The Penguins host the Florida Panthers on 12/3/24. 1..2..3..?

*5 days before the last day of tour.

12/3/1818 - Illinois becomes the 21st U.S. State

12/3/1910 - Modern neon lights are demonstrated for the first time by Georges Claude at the Paris Motor Show

12/3/1960 - The musical Camelot debuts at the Majestic Theatre on Broadway in New York City

12/3/1968 - NBC airs a TV special called Elvis

12/3/2014 Actor Taye Diggs (Private Practice) divorces Broadway actress Idina Menzel after 11 years of marriage

12/3/2015 - Scott Weiland American singer and songwriter who was the lead singer of the Stone Temple Pilots and made six albums with them

12/3/2015 - Based on the book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, a live adaptation of The Wiz airs on NBC

12/3/2016 - Following his death, Leonard Cohen's original version of Hallelujah enters the Hot 100 at #59

TS HISTORY IN NC (15 shows):

1/20/2007 @ Greensboro Coliseum, Greensboro, NC

5 song set list

8/2/2008 @ Time Warner Cable Music Pavilion, Raleigh

7 song set list

8/3/2008 @ Verizon Wireless Amphitheater - Charlotte

8 song set list

Fearless Tour:

6/12/2009 Greensboro

9/5/2009 Charlotte

5/1/2010 Raleigh

Speak Now Tour:

6/30/2011 Greensboro

11/16/2011 Charlotte

11/17/2011 Raleigh

Red Tour: Charlotte

3/22/2013 Charlotte: “Tim McGraw”

9/12/2013 Greensboro: “Change” acoustic tour debut, “Everything Has Changed” with Ed Sheeran

9/13/2013 Raleigh: “Everything Has Changed” with Ed Sheeran

1989 World Tour:

6/8/2015 Charlotte:“You Are In Love Acoustic”

6/9/2015 Raleigh:

10/21/2015 Greensboro: “Little Red Wagon” with Miranda Lambert

[isabelwcna]

Discover Top-Rated CNA Classes in Fort Myers, Florida: Your Path to a Rewarding Healthcare Career Starts Here!

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### Top-Rated CNA Classes in Fort Myers, Florida

1. **Fort Myers Technical​ College**: ⁣ – Location: 3800 Michigan Ave, Fort Myers, FL ​33916 – Phone: (239) 334-4544 – Website: [Fort Myers Technical College](https://fortmyerstech.edu/) – Description: Fort ⁣Myers ⁤Technical College offers a comprehensive CNA program that covers essential topics ⁤such as⁣ patient care, medical terminology, and infection control. With experienced instructors and hands-on training opportunities, students ​can gain the skills and knowledge they need to excel in their CNA careers.

2. **Southwest Florida Technical College**: ⁤ ‌- Location: 5264 US-19, Palmetto, FL ‌34221 – Phone: (941) 723-2211 – Website: [Southwest Florida Technical College](https://southtech.edu/) – Description: Southwest Florida Technical College’s CNA program ⁢provides students with a ⁤combination of classroom instruction ⁢and clinical experience to prepare‌ them for‍ the ⁣challenges of working as a CNA.⁤ The⁢ program ⁢covers a wide range of topics, including ⁣medical ethics, patient⁢ safety, and communication skills.

3. **Lee ​Health**: – Location: 2776 Cleveland Ave, Fort Myers, FL 33901 – Phone: (239) 343-4120 ⁣ ⁢- Website: [Lee Health](https://www.leehealth.org/) ⁢ ⁣- Description: Lee Health offers a CNA ⁣training program for individuals looking to pursue a ⁤career in healthcare. The program includes classroom instruction, skills labs, and clinical rotations to provide students with a well-rounded education in patient care ⁣and medical assistance.

### Benefits of Enrolling in Top-Rated CNA Classes

– **Hands-On Training**: Top-rated CNA classes‍ offer hands-on training opportunities that allow students to practice their skills in a real-world healthcare setting. – **Career Advancement**: Becoming⁢ a CNA can ⁤open‍ up⁢ doors to further ‌career ​advancement⁣ in the healthcare field, such as becoming a Licensed Practical Nurse⁣ (LPN) ​or Registered Nurse⁣ (RN). – ​**Job ⁢Security**: With an ⁤aging population and​ a growing need for healthcare services, CNAs have excellent job prospects and job security in the healthcare industry.

### Practical Tips ‌for Success in CNA Classes

– **Stay ⁤Organized**: Keep track of assignments, deadlines, and clinical rotations to​ ensure⁣ you ⁢stay on top of your coursework. – **Seek Help When Needed**: Don’t hesitate to ask questions or seek help from instructors or classmates if you’re struggling⁤ with a particular topic. – **Practice Self-Care**: Taking ⁤care of yourself both‍ physically and mentally is‌ essential to ‌succeeding in CNA classes and in your future healthcare career.

enrolling in⁤ top-rated⁢ CNA​ classes in‌ Fort Myers, Florida, is ⁤the first step‍ towards⁣ a ⁣rewarding career in healthcare. By choosing a⁣ reputable‌ institution that offers quality education and hands-on​ training, you’ll be well-prepared to embark on your journey as​ a ⁤Certified Nursing Assistant. With the​ right⁤ skills,⁣ knowledge, and dedication, you can look forward to⁢ a fulfilling​ career providing care and support to those in⁢ need. Start your path to ‌a ‌rewarding healthcare ​career today ​with top-rated CNA classes in Fort Myers, Florida.

https://coursescna.com/discover-top-rated-cna-classes-in-fort-myers-florida-your-path-to-a-rewarding-healthcare-career-starts-here/

[maddasherxxbeautyroom]

Check out this listing I just added to my Poshmark closet: Teami: Detox Mask Green Tea Blend 🍵 | BRAND NEW, STILL SEALED!!.

[hanimma]

Tallahassee, October 9, 2024

Excuse me, are you…, aurora? lol

Florida is the home of hurricanes. And this time, Milton was going to hit Florida. It was not even two weeks after Helene, another powerful hurricane came and made me and my friends evacuating to another state.

According to the weather forecast, Milton’s landfall will be happening tonight. Though Tallahassee will not get impacted, the day here felt gloomy. From sunrise to dusk, the dark clouds clung to the sky, holding back the rain, as if Milton's presence was already casting a shadow over us.

As my class was called off, I rushed out of the doctoral lab, heading to the Tradition Garage, when I saw a beautiful ray of light stretching across the sky. "Are you, the aurora?"

This year, the natural disasters and also wonder have come back-to-back, from tornadoes to hurricanes, from tropical to geomagnetic storms. A few days ago, I saw people on X brimming with awe, sharing their joyful moments seeing the northern lights—Aurora Borealis—in northern states like Illinois, Minnesota, Wisconsin. “Could it be?” I thought auroras were only Alaska’s blessing”. But, no!

Apparently, (thanks to--mashaAllah) powerful magnetic storms could also happen and bring colorful lights to the southern areas, even adorning the sky of Alabama and Florida!

Tonight, October 10, they say the aurora will be at its peak. I hope for other obvious rays of light, to come down and paint the earth with its bright and beautiful colors, once and many more times again.