Since I have a habit of naming all my cats after Star Trek characters, I give you my pit bull raised cat, Spot. The smallest animal in my house, pushes around all of the rest.

I've got a wasps's nest in my deck post, possibly under the vinyl as well. I've got guests coming in a week and a half, specifically to hang on my deck.

Terminix wants $199 to remove it and a hard push of endless requests for yearlong service (it was $299 originally, but if you pause for a beat, it suddenly drops to $199, which is still too rich for my sensibilities, damnit!) I've dealt with all my own bugs in the past, and also I like my money, so we are attempting to kill it ourselves. The first attempt will be a foaming spray from 20 feet away.

I can't possibly see anything going wrong with this.

We couldn't find it at Blue Box Store last night so Rog is going to get it from Orange Box Store today. In the meantime I put out a trap bag for wasps last night. I looked at this morning: nothing. Crap.

[EDITED, Friday, Aug 31]

I did it! Actually, Rog did it before I even woke up this morning. A $2.49 can of foaming spray from Dries (thank you small local business) did it in one shot. Damn Terminix for upping my stress level. I was just concerned about the distance this time, and my inability to really run. Yellowjackets are f*%ing vicious. Though I've killed small paper wasp nests several times already, for some reason this nest seemed so much more active and harder to spray and get away from safely!

The day the HVAC contractors were coming over to quote out a new heat pump I put my dogs and my foster dog in my back yard so I could finish cleaning around the heat pump. This takes about an hour, but I'm finished in plenty of time for the first contractor's appointment time. I open the back door and let the dogs in. My pair comes inside. 

No sign of Mr. Pickles.

Crappity crap crap crap crap. He's done flew the coop. Squirmed his little body out through a loose picket and run away. I go outside and start knocking on my neighbor's doors to see if he's in their yard. Get a negative from one neighbor and I'm on my way to the other when my contact from the rescue calls. 

"Is Mr. Pickles missing?" I feel about 3 inches tall when I reply "Yes." Fortunately neighbors in my development who know the rescue found him, called them for the number for animal control. Then my contact made the connection with their description of a little one-eyed dog. Hmm, Ray lives in that neighborhood...

So I recover Mr. Pickles in minutes of that phone call. Then I use some tree trimmings to temporarily block the escape path. AND the other one he shows me that evening.

Now, I'd planned to replace the fence anyway. But it just got bumped up to ASAP. Fortunately, neither the heat pump nor the fence have conflicting dependencies. So, I'm going to run two projects at the same time. Not the way I'd prefer to run things, but needs must when the Devil drives.

Hi, all!

It's been forever since I've posted here, though I have about 98734 drafts just none of them finished.  I'll summarize the last month with a listo:

• Beatlefest (wow, a month ago) was one of the most musically satisfying things I've ever done, tribute-wise.  The band Joe hired was full of some of the best musicians I've had the pleasure to work with here. Everyone has extensive musical training and reads music like a motherfucker... you needed those skills if you were gonna get through 215 songs... yet they also had rock chops so we knew how to feel an ending that just fades out on the record.  There were times we had 40 musicians on stage which includes string a section, a horn section... we also had musicians who specialized in Indian instruments.  There was one instrument that pretty much nobody in north America plays called a Dilruba, so we flew my dear friend Stefan in from Arizona to approximate the part using a hurdy gurdy.  Stefan was the real MVP.  We have dates for Beatlefest 2019 already, and FINALLY the City of Wilmingon sees this as the lucrative, exciting thing that it is and will be putting their marketing hype behind it next year, making Beatlefest a destination with hotel deals and stuff.  It was nice that we sold out the last 3 nights of the six-night run, and we all made a really nice chunk of change. (This is unusual for these tribute shows... usually we make a few hundred bucks, but this was quite nice, especially considering that we'd been rehearsing since January.)
• Through the hype of Beatlefest, I didn't really notice how anemic I was getting... adrenaline is a hell of a chemical.  The following week we had Hot Breakfast's 8th Annnual Summer Blowout at the Bellefonte Cafe (which was sold out 3 days before the event-- yay!) and I kinda noticed I was having a hard time singing medium-length phrases, but again, I just pushed it aside because adrenaline.
• The thing with anemia (or at least my anemia-- my hematologists insists I'm weird for this) is that I'm able to hit "snooze" on the Iron Alarm when there are more pressing things in front of me... so Beatlefest, Hot Breakfast show... caring for my Mom for a week... being in NJ for Sunnyvale rehearsals... and then BAM, I was almost dead. 
• So yeah... I put myself in the hospital for 5 days because I got too damn anemic.  That was last week.  I was gonna go for iron anyway because I would never go to Burning Man without being freshly ironed-up... but still.  Damn.   It also turns out that there's a manufacturer's shortage of my usual iron preparation, Iron Dextran, which is normally a 6-hour infusion when I'm not so low I'm a fuckface, so I had to do a 5-day infusion of this other formulation anyway.  
• SO!  BURNING MAN!  After a 7-year hiatus, we are headed back to The Thing In The Desert. We leave for the airport in a few hours, and we'll be in Reno getting supplies tomorrow (Friday), and then Saturday we will head out to the playa.  We have Early Access Passes which normally I don't really care about, but with the city having 70,000 people in it, I'm happy to get out a day early so we can beat some of the line at the gate.  We will be there (assuming all goes well) until Labor Day Monday. We'll head back to Reno on Labor Day, clean the car on Tuesday, and then fly home early on Wednesday the 5th.  So we will be totally incommunicado from Saturday August 25 - Monday September 3rd.  Yes, I know that Katy Perry updates her Instagram from the playa and that there is scant wifi if you look hard enough, but I am not going to do that. The phone stays in the car, which stays locked for a week.
• Matt is very excited to be heading back out there, too... this will be his 2nd burn, and my 8th.  I'm a little worried about his anxiety, but we have a nice, newish trailer, so if he gets squoodgy, we can just hang there where it's comfy.
• We were in NJ for a week (before my iron infusion) and my dad was out to breakfast and my mom fell.  It was a huge deal, and Matt and I managed to get her back up after her being on the floor for 90-ish minutes.  I wrote a long OPW post about it, but haven't posted it yet because I didn't finish it. But she was trapped on the floor and it was awful, and she was basically suffocating because she didn't have her oxygen.  More on this later.
• My mom's mobility is seriously hindered and her body has basically told her to fuck off.  Her biggest pain is her knee, and she's not allowed to take any pain medication (not even Advil or other NSAIDS) because of all the other medications she's on.  My mom was supposed to have her knee fixed on Monday at a surgicenter, but once she got there, the anesthesiologist was like "Um, your heart is A-Fib, your lungs don't work from emphysema, you need supplemental oxygen... I can't believe anyone thought we could accomodate your surgery here.  We can't.  Go home, and we'll do it at the hospital where I have more ways of keeping you alive, yo."  So she was VERY disappointed... but I admit I was kinda relieved because she would have been recovering while we were at Burning Man and unable to give my dad a hand.  We want to be up there with her during and after the surgery... my dad can't handle it all.
• Life continues to be happy. I'm in a much better place mentally than I was 2 weeks ago-- I was feeling really dark and angry and sad and frustrated and overwhelmed and unable to cope... and in retrospect this was probably because my iron was so low.  
• Please don't give me crap about ignoring my iron. I know. I know. It won't happen again, Mom. :-)

OK, that's all I can think of for now.  There's more to write, but no time... I need to get in the shower... our ride to the airport comes in less than 3 hours and I still have to throw together a few more things. 

I love you all, and I hope you have a spiffy few weeks!

xoxo,

Jill-o

On OPW, it's tough to get in the game. Newcomers make public posts, hoping to connect; the rest of us might see them if we're already connected to that person, but otherwise not. There's a "Network" button, which shows public posts from second-degree connections... but nothing calls attention to new posts there. Or did, anyway.

So I've taken a stab at improving on this: there is now a separate new-posts counter for the "Network" page. You probably see it right now, singing its siren song.

Since we didn't keep track of the "last read" post in the "network" feed until just now, that counter is probably showing you a big number at the moment. And hey, that might be right, if like me you weren't in the habit of checking it out.

In the future, though, it'll know when you last read the "network" page, and limit itself accordingly. So I think this will be much more useful as a way of discovering new folks.

While I was at it, I also changed the other "Network" button to "People." Hopefully emphasizing its separate role as a place to edit your connections. Because yeah, confusing. Little things matter.

And speaking of little things: kitten!

Yup, that’s me. 

I'm looking for people to participate in a huge book exchange! You can be anywhere in the world. All you have to do is buy your favorite book (just one) and send it to a stranger (I'll send their details through in a private message).

You'll receive up to 36 books in return, to keep. They'll be favorite books from strangers around the world!

If you're interested in taking part, please comment "IN" below and I'll send you the details.

(The above is boilerplate from the organizer. I'm sending out my book today - let me know if you want to play! I am happy for the people who come after me to do used books and if the wording shifts to "all you have to do is send your favorite book to a stranger, new or used" I can get behind that.)

I recently received an e-mail from the folks planning my latest high school reunion. As in reunions of the past, I am completely torn about attending.

When I first learned of this year's reunion, the plan was that I would extend the trip to show my partner around my old stomping grounds. There was also the aspect of feeling somewhat more secure because he would be with me and be so excited about everything. He is from the US Pacific Northwest, and has never been to the New York City area, where I grew up. There were informal plans of various things to do - visit my sister at the Jersey Shore, take in a Broadway show, etc. But he can't go, so I would be going alone.

That isn't a big deal on the face of it - he and I will make that sightseeing, memory-exploring trip at some point.

But as the years have gone by, I have become increasingly introverted - like, beyond what anyone realizes. Socializing is exhausting for me. It literally takes me days to recover. There was a social event in which I participated several years ago, when a friend came to town with her longtime playwright partner to see a performance of a play he had written. And I goofed that up. I doubt he even thinks about it, but it sticks with me. I was wiped out for the better part of a week.

The most recent socializing was performing a wedding. There was no way to back out once I was committed - I was the center of the storm as the officiant, and I could not change my mind. I really didn't want to, and I didn't - but man, was it difficult. It was my affection for those marrying that kept me from reversing course. It was all great - lovely day, lovely company - but I think the major plus was that the wedding was super small: two people getting married, two witnesses, and me. I mean, I was all in black and polyester and it was 100 degrees, but I would not have traded that day for any in the last five years.

When social events come along, my initial response to any invitation is to be flattered and have a sincere desire to attend. As the date draws closer, there is an increasing sense of dread and panic. If I power through and commit to attending, I spend days preparing mentally and organizing to be able to go through with it. It is about storing the mental energy as well as psychological defenses. It was a bit easier to do this when I was on certain medications, but it is always a challenge.

The energy store is somewhat critical, but the psychological part is often just as important. I don't look in the mirror and see what others see. Every social insecurity I've ever had is right in my face. Don't talk too much. Don't overshare. No loud colors. Accept how you look, and don't think about it. Watch your voice. Watch your hands. Watch your posture. Be unremarkable, inoffensive, and as normal as you can. All of this can easily become Just don't do it and save everyone a lot of grief.​​​​​​​

In April 2018, I participated in the NoH8 campaign by having my picture taken by photographer Adam Bouska. I have not modeled in 30 years, and there is a picture taken of me perhaps once a decade, not counting official photos for licenses or other IDs, so doing this was HUGE. It is a cause I believe in, and once I told my partner about it, there was no backing out. He was so frickin' excited. And he knew it was a major thing for me to do, and it is now his favorite picture of me, largely because I didn't back out, and I did push through and violate my comfort zone. Only a very small handful of my friends commented to me privately about this, because they knew what a difficult and momentous thing for me to do.

So now I am thinking about this reunion, and I don't really know what to do. We, in my graduating class, lose more classmates every year. One of the more recent hit me particularly hard. His death was sad, but the saddest part for me was his fear. I wish I could have saved him from that. Having been dead myself, I am no longer afraid of it. The losses still sting when another passes, but I also know from my own experience the peace that comes, and it isn't something easy or even appropriate to communicate.

I digress. The point is, with each passing year, the opportunity to see any of the people that I might see at such a reunion diminishes. We're all getting older, it's just a fact of life. And with age also comes ever-expanding families and perhaps reduced ability to participate. In short, this may be one of my last chances to be a part of something like this, or see many of these people.

But there is that ability to mentally prepare - I may not have that luxury. Traveling is stressful, and I can't afford to be there for many days before the event trying to prep. A Friday night reunion might mean traveling Thursday, at best, after working the first half of the week. I'd probably fly back Sunday. 

And then I have to quiet the internal insecurities - with the added bonus of revisiting every misstep, every self-image, every memory of high school. For the greater part, I enjoyed high school - I had great friends, great experiences, and I have amazing memories - but there were also negative influences, both within school and without. I lived in the town for seven years leading up to my graduation, so there are a lot of memories and experiences to comb through.

As a logical, thinking adult, I don't care what others think about most things, but there will always be opinions that I value among people who meant so much to me for so many years. Introverts select their friends very, very carefully, and for me, it really is that methodical. A lot of people I admired in high school will be there, and their impressions remain important. I mean, that's ridiculous on its face, and I know that. None of them have any impact on my daily life now, and I shouldn't be a prisoner to the impressions of my teenage self.

And then there are those who were... we'll say abusive. I am not confrontational, but the adult me is not the teenage me, and I don't tolerate bullies now. It is the one situation that triggers me, and it startles people how I react, usually on behalf of others. My partner is protective and has a much shorter fuse, and it is probably a good thing that he wouldn't be with me if the wrong person said something that he thought was disrespectful. I really don't want to be on the news.

I don't know which population will be more present, and I don't know if I want to go through all this to be around the wrong group. I can't decide if it would be positive or healthy. I know there are people I would see that would likely overshadow any negativity. I really do miss a lot of them sometimes, but thanks to Facebook and other social media, I have stayed in touch with anyone even remotely of interest. Social media interaction is not the same as the real world, however, even if it is so much easier for an introverted, shy, social anxious personality.

So I have four weeks to the deadline to make a decision. We'll see how it goes.

I've been working on a project that is bringing plastic talking lightup ridable sheep to Burning Man.

I got drafted into making the corral. I designed a barn too, but it got nixed. We made signage for the corral. I spent july asking and asking for people to draw me sheep, robot sheep, sheep robots.  . . and then turned the submissions into signs. I'm still working on ones that says "Baa means Baa" and "Sheep consent to photos, but ya gotta check if the attending humans do". Here are some of the signs art:

With some other sheepsters, I spent yesterday making 5 flags for the corral.  I am very proud of these sheepy flags <3 <3 <3

Also, since I have a glowforge laser cutter in my basement, I offered to make swag. Sheep coaster sets: 

And Sheep pendants (matchbox for scale):

This project has been a lot of fun. I'm looking forward to seeing it all come together out in the desert at the end of the month! It's about flocking time!

PS: The sheep themselves look like this. And they talk, each of the dozen sheep have different voices/personalities :-)

The title is dogs, but it's really one particular dog that is consuming my throught cycles at the moment. Gna, my boxer/greyhound mix, she's the one on the left in my profile pic.

She had a tumor removed earlier in the year. It was an aggressive cancer. The only option was an exploratory surgery, open up her abdomen and see if they could find the root and take all of it. And hope it wasn't growing from an organ. Really, that was not an option, due to her age and general un-well state of being.

So, we've gone through the balance of spring and most of the summer and she's been a couch potato's couch potato. Sleeping away the days. Within the last couple of weeks she's been digging and chewing on herself. A sure sign that a dog is stressed. I made a vet appointment for an assessment.

But last night she started denning up in her crate and wouldn't come out to go to bed. I let her sleep in her crate downstairs. This morning she wouldn't go out. I let her sleep. She did come out for breakfast and went out in the afternoon. She's spent the rest of the day in bed.

Now, my once in a lifetime dog, Gage, lingered with cancer. I really feel that I was keeping him alive for my comfort, not his. So tonight I'm staring down the barrel of having to let her go in the morning.

In general I don't shy away from anything. But there's a part of me that is hoping that tomorrow never comes.