Thoughtbytes
* Mercury retrograde in Aquarius. Hohyeah, it's rollin, all right. I've already seen a sharp uptick in posts about race anger, political anger, and gender anger on my flist and news sites, in just the two days. So this is me, watching my feet and fingers for the next three weeks, because dayum. Everybody feeling defensive combined with Mercury's tendency to make folks lear in a different language while it kicks all the closeted fears and frustrations out into the light at suppertime? Not a good way to improve anybody's quality of life, that. While there's something to be said for clearing the air, it's best done when the air can be cleared, instead of just filled up with toxicity, y'know?
* By way of being as explicit as I can, I am not suggesting that anyone other than me avoid topics of race, politics, gender, or their anger toward them. I'm just reminding myself not to get drawn in, because now is not a time when people will hear anything aside from what they already want to believe, no matter how carefully I may put it. I'm not trying to muzzle anyone but me.
* Mithril waited for the coldest day of the winter thusfar to decide he wanted to go out. It's 13 degrees today, and the silly widget still hasn't come to the door when called. I suspect he's found an open cellar door somewhere, and is exploiting some nice old lady's sympathies like the pirate he is. Last night he got into my lap for scritches, and then actually laid down and settled. No, really, for Mithril, this is a fecking milestone! He's always had a fear of being confined in any way -- caged, held, hugged, even pet in the wrong way seems like confinement to him, and makes him freak out a little. Sitting in a human's lap has NEVER been on his menu. But last night he did it. Moreover, he dozed and purred WHILE he was doing it. As Dominus said at the time, "Austin has left the building."
* Now that I've accepted Tiger's presence, she's giving me a much more solid impression of her purview, and making it easier to see in retrospect the tracks through the long arc of my adult life. Tiger's gifts were always a bit opaque to me before, being a bit hard to interpret whenever a tiger would appear in a juju bag, or a dream interpretation. This was because I was trying to see them from inside without the acknowledgement of my personal perspective. Now though, the first thing that springs to mind is Territory. Tiger is incredibly territorial, but not in the tyrannical way of humans. Tiger lays claim to things and to people, conditionally to their relationship with her, not in absolute. A Tiger is incredibly territorial about her friends, but that doesn't mean she's jealous or possessive of them, what it means is that she expects the friendship to be respected on both sides, and to be valued equally on both sides. She isn't going to run off the competing friends, or to piss in a circle around those whom she considers her own, but she is going to expect that the friend, and other people the friend may know respect the relationship between the Tiger and her friend. It also means that if someone hurts, insults, or harms a friend whom the Tiger considers her own, they are in for a whole facefull of wrath over it, even if it has nothing to do with the Tiger herself. It threatens the Tiger's territory, therefore the Tiger will react to it. Territoriality, again. Territory, not dominion, though it's easy for people to mistake the two. The Tiger doesn't want to control the people she claims as her territory, she just wants to know where she stands with them.
* Someone is disrespecting a couple of people I consider my own right now. It's hard for me to keep the stripey wonder under wraps, and stop her wading into the middle and snarling and slashing about, but I'm making the effort. Mercury retrograde, as I said -- now is not the time. Actually, in this case, never is the time. That situation and resolution must rest in other hands... but in the meantime, I predict much treadmill time for me, to try and walk off the aggro.
* Dominus and I have decided to rent a car for the drive to Arisia this year. Silmaroth is not legal to drive, the repair shop is so backlogged they can't get him in until a week after we get back from the convention, and Cobalt, Dominus' dear old coupe, is beginning to give signs of warning. Tyres leaking, clutch pedal squealing, ferocious shaking and grinding at startup, electrical problems, and so on. Nothing immediate or overwhelming, but plenty that could go really wrong on a three hour drive in the bitter cold. And also, there's every possibility of storms that weekend, and that just puts the odds over the edge into ugly land. If we could afford to take on the payment right now, we'd be selling Cobalt off, and putting the money toward a new Outback for him. As it stands, once Silmaroth is fixed, we're considering selling Cobalt anyway, and going it as a one-car family, to ascertain just how feasible it would be for us. Silmaroth is a more useful vehicle for us, with the passenger capacity, hauling room, and ground clearance, than Cobalt is, and we could use the gas, repair, and insurance money that's currently going into Cobalt to pay down our debt load that much quicker. Still, the bus system out here is dodgy enough that we'll need to give the experiment a try before we decide anything. Waiting at a bus stop in the dead of winter up here is not anyone's definition of fun.
* I really need to pick which poems I'm going to take out for the reading at Arisia. I haven't seriously even looked at them to try and decide. Been too busy with other things. But if I leave it till last minute, just watch -- I'll show up with only my laptop, and then find that I've got NOTHING on that hard drive, and have to bang out something that day and just HOPE it's good enough not to garner ridicule.
* Ah. Mail's here. *Goes to check it*
* Goolawd, it's friggin COLD out there! And all for crap, too; nothing but bills, pleading magazine and credit card offers, and unwanted magazines to be chucked straight in the recycle bin. Makes me want to curl up with a heating pad, just like the snakes are doing right now.
* And with that, I'm going to turn this off, and go sit downstairs with the laptop. The heating down there is more efficient, and the laptop will vent nice and warm on my cold knees. *Brrrrrr!*
* By way of being as explicit as I can, I am not suggesting that anyone other than me avoid topics of race, politics, gender, or their anger toward them. I'm just reminding myself not to get drawn in, because now is not a time when people will hear anything aside from what they already want to believe, no matter how carefully I may put it. I'm not trying to muzzle anyone but me.
* Mithril waited for the coldest day of the winter thusfar to decide he wanted to go out. It's 13 degrees today, and the silly widget still hasn't come to the door when called. I suspect he's found an open cellar door somewhere, and is exploiting some nice old lady's sympathies like the pirate he is. Last night he got into my lap for scritches, and then actually laid down and settled. No, really, for Mithril, this is a fecking milestone! He's always had a fear of being confined in any way -- caged, held, hugged, even pet in the wrong way seems like confinement to him, and makes him freak out a little. Sitting in a human's lap has NEVER been on his menu. But last night he did it. Moreover, he dozed and purred WHILE he was doing it. As Dominus said at the time, "Austin has left the building."
* Now that I've accepted Tiger's presence, she's giving me a much more solid impression of her purview, and making it easier to see in retrospect the tracks through the long arc of my adult life. Tiger's gifts were always a bit opaque to me before, being a bit hard to interpret whenever a tiger would appear in a juju bag, or a dream interpretation. This was because I was trying to see them from inside without the acknowledgement of my personal perspective. Now though, the first thing that springs to mind is Territory. Tiger is incredibly territorial, but not in the tyrannical way of humans. Tiger lays claim to things and to people, conditionally to their relationship with her, not in absolute. A Tiger is incredibly territorial about her friends, but that doesn't mean she's jealous or possessive of them, what it means is that she expects the friendship to be respected on both sides, and to be valued equally on both sides. She isn't going to run off the competing friends, or to piss in a circle around those whom she considers her own, but she is going to expect that the friend, and other people the friend may know respect the relationship between the Tiger and her friend. It also means that if someone hurts, insults, or harms a friend whom the Tiger considers her own, they are in for a whole facefull of wrath over it, even if it has nothing to do with the Tiger herself. It threatens the Tiger's territory, therefore the Tiger will react to it. Territoriality, again. Territory, not dominion, though it's easy for people to mistake the two. The Tiger doesn't want to control the people she claims as her territory, she just wants to know where she stands with them.
* Someone is disrespecting a couple of people I consider my own right now. It's hard for me to keep the stripey wonder under wraps, and stop her wading into the middle and snarling and slashing about, but I'm making the effort. Mercury retrograde, as I said -- now is not the time. Actually, in this case, never is the time. That situation and resolution must rest in other hands... but in the meantime, I predict much treadmill time for me, to try and walk off the aggro.
* Dominus and I have decided to rent a car for the drive to Arisia this year. Silmaroth is not legal to drive, the repair shop is so backlogged they can't get him in until a week after we get back from the convention, and Cobalt, Dominus' dear old coupe, is beginning to give signs of warning. Tyres leaking, clutch pedal squealing, ferocious shaking and grinding at startup, electrical problems, and so on. Nothing immediate or overwhelming, but plenty that could go really wrong on a three hour drive in the bitter cold. And also, there's every possibility of storms that weekend, and that just puts the odds over the edge into ugly land. If we could afford to take on the payment right now, we'd be selling Cobalt off, and putting the money toward a new Outback for him. As it stands, once Silmaroth is fixed, we're considering selling Cobalt anyway, and going it as a one-car family, to ascertain just how feasible it would be for us. Silmaroth is a more useful vehicle for us, with the passenger capacity, hauling room, and ground clearance, than Cobalt is, and we could use the gas, repair, and insurance money that's currently going into Cobalt to pay down our debt load that much quicker. Still, the bus system out here is dodgy enough that we'll need to give the experiment a try before we decide anything. Waiting at a bus stop in the dead of winter up here is not anyone's definition of fun.
* I really need to pick which poems I'm going to take out for the reading at Arisia. I haven't seriously even looked at them to try and decide. Been too busy with other things. But if I leave it till last minute, just watch -- I'll show up with only my laptop, and then find that I've got NOTHING on that hard drive, and have to bang out something that day and just HOPE it's good enough not to garner ridicule.
* Ah. Mail's here. *Goes to check it*
* Goolawd, it's friggin COLD out there! And all for crap, too; nothing but bills, pleading magazine and credit card offers, and unwanted magazines to be chucked straight in the recycle bin. Makes me want to curl up with a heating pad, just like the snakes are doing right now.
* And with that, I'm going to turn this off, and go sit downstairs with the laptop. The heating down there is more efficient, and the laptop will vent nice and warm on my cold knees. *Brrrrrr!*