Miracle of miracles, fun was had! My request for my birthday--oh, shit, I’m 40 now...

Huh.

Anyway!

My birthday activity request was to take a trip to Solvang--technically Danish, but still thematically appropriate for me Swedish language pursuits and general Scandinavian interests. There is a bookstore there (and Hans Christian Andersen museum) that had a chance of having Moomin books, maybe even in the original Swedish. (Spoiler: no Swedish versions currently in stock, but I bought up their stock of English versions.) So we made a day of it, with Pepper in tow.

The timing of everything was perfection. We had precisely enough time to do all the things I wanted to, plus one extra unplanned stop, and got home exactly in time to feed the horses at the usual hour. Utterly stress-free. I obtained books and stickers and a truly alarming quantity of baked goods. The place was simply overrun with grackles, a bird that was intermittently present when we first moved to our new place but have since left, so it was like seeing an old friend (or a few hundred). It was a very, very good day.

In a lovely surprise, the next day, our neighbor let mum know he was done working on her tractor. He’s been attempting to fix it for a few months now. What started as one known problem became a whole cluster of uncovered issues, a few things he broke accidentally in the repair process, and some improvements. It’s a 1955 Massey Ferguson, and while my dad had sort of kept up with maintenance on it, it was really showing its age and the need for significant part replacements. I wrecked my back trying to get the brush hog hooked up to it again, but such is life. Mum got to twirl around, doing battle with the grass armies that have overtaken everything, and the tractor didn’t have the slightest problem. Considering it previously could only run for about 20 minutes before needing to be hosed down to deal with its overheating problems, this is stunning. She’s very happy.

I’m sad to be going back to work tomorrow. My work phone was blowing up during the week with team chats that I resolutely ignored. So I’m sure I’m going to come back to A Situation. But that is still officially not my problem for a few more hours.

Lewisia: still on break

Day job: none hours with left beef

Cleaning: attempted to fix the weed whacker but it’s still having problems of a mysterious nature

Crafting: finished attaching the “antici...pation” patches to the battle jacket and reattached the one I took off to make room for them, finished the dorky little cotton washcloth I’ve been crocheting for three thousand years

Gardening: watered all the succulents for the first time in *mumblety* months, first pass of weed whacking the castle garden

Reading: Mislaid in Parts Half-Known by Seanan McGuire (a bit of a transitional book, trying to do a bunch in multiple threads of the series, and the charm of all the characters makes that work just fine, a bit of a road trip story)

Watching: Revolutionary Girl Utena episodes 30 to 34

Listening: Dan Avidan and Super Guitar Bros volume 1 (yep, that sure is what it says on the tin, I have now finished the process of living backwards through this particular series), the self-titled album from bbno$ (he guested on the Game Grumps, I wanted to know what his music was like, the answer is “frantic ADHD swagger,” which is apparently something I like [see sbassbear’s album], and he’s also vocally pro trans and queer people, earworms the whole way through)

Playing: Animal Crossing still, la la la, creating island decorating projects for myself, thinking about redesigning a massive area, living my best, most pointless life

Clock Mouse: 125 minutes of planning work

At last, I am not on any extra medication. I’ve gone a whole two days and haven’t exploded yet, so that’s promising. I’m only intermittently and lightly coughing. I’m pretty sure I can mostly hear out of both ears. My sinuses no longer periodically attempt to assassinate me. Yaaaay... *tiniest, groggiest pompoms*

I am particularly grateful to be feeling marginally less sick, because work did everything it could to kill me off ahead of my vacation time. Friday, in particular, threw everything it could at me. On the plus side, I programmed a robot. I also wired a temporary three-phase power supply drop. That one was a bit harrowing, but I guess I can’t say I was in over my head, because I sure did supply power without setting anything on fire.

Also, the only rain we got all week occurred in the half hour in which I was up on the roof, trying to replace air filters. Because sure, obviously, why not?

Speaking of vacation, I am now on a week of it. By the gods, I better have some fun this week. I’ve had about as much petty unpleasantness as I can take for the month.

Lewisia: still on break

Day job: 46.25 hours, with early starts and late ends

Cooking: decided to wing it on my usual curry recipe and managed to brain crisis my way through it nearly to inedibility, chocolate-chocolate chip edible cookie dough

Reading: The Wonder Engine by T. Kingfisher (gnole cultural studies! fantasy industrial infrastructure! some other rather upsetting stuff! ...I really liked it), The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy: Quintessential Phase (continuing the BBC Radio productions, I found this one a bit frustrating to follow along with, though I found the whole sandwich shop bit oddly touching)

Watching: Revolutionary Girl Utena episodes 27 to 29 and halfway into 30, Sinners (spectacular, holy shit?!)

Listening: Midnight Signals by Starcadian (synthwave, with a surprising thread of disco, found by way of Dan on Game Grumps noting his death last year :/)

Playing: continuing to enjoy renewed interest in Animal Crossing, the gift that keeps on giving

Clock Mouse: 117 minutes of planning work

Even in a generally friendly forest, not all trees are pleased to have visitors, however polite, and he had managed to choose poorly on every possible level when he decided to carve his initials somewhere. The strategically dropped seed pods and small sticks failed to deter him, and even a wind-whipped branch across the backside only made him fumble the pocket knife for a moment. Even cranky trees may have friends of their own, though, and the creature that padded up behind him on silent paws was quite happy to leave some marks of its own in retribution for its arboreal associate.

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LL#1360