chickentimeschickenways

I am disappointed but not surprised, alas.  

Thinking about the woman on Twitter who told me I'd ruin my liver by drinking diet Coke and taking Advil. Joke's on you, random concern troll lady! My liver's already ruined! (Surely it must be!)

I spent this morning finishing Nurk, Ursula Vernon's first novel, a children's book about a (somewhat) brave shrew. I would describe it as a gently creepy modern interpretation of The Wind in the Willows.

Yesterday I went through all of the Hamster Princess books that were available in the children's section of the Cambridge Public Library (which is its own floor and has a foreboding little sign on the door to the staircase leading up to it, FOR THE ENJOYMENT OF CHILDREN AND THEIR CARETAKERS. I rushed in and out as quickly as possible), and I expect that I'll shortly be blowing through the Dragonbreath books as well.

Everything is a bit overwhelming right now, and I don't much feel like I've got the emotional energy to cope with books where people are thoughtlessly cruel or complex or difficult. I can hear the screaming now -- that's not real life! -- but that's the point, isn't it? I can barely deal with my real real life.

In light of that, I've also been watching Lords and Ladles, a show during which all things, with the singular exception of calf's foot jelly, can be made tasty, with enough spices and butter and cream. It's probably that which got me started thinking about planning my Ireland trip again -- not, which would be more sensible, the fact that we're supposed to submit our requests for vacation in January.

It suddenly came to me yesterday that -- if the idea of figuring out how to get to Worldcon is stressing me out -- I could just not go. I have a dreadful habit of making a plan and then -- because I've told people about the plan and I feel embarrassed about backing out of it when there are witnesses to my optimism -- forcing myself to go through with things, even if I'm too tired or short on time to make it really work. And while it is, of course, possible that I won't feel as brittle as I do right now come next August -- currently I have far more nightmares than daydreams available to me about how said convention might go. Spending a lot of time looking at the authors and panels that might occur makes me feel sick and inadequate; spending a lot of time looking at hiking trails that I can easily get to with Bus Eireann is pleasant. So there we are. 

So perhaps I will try to make Wellington 2020. That would be terribly exciting, wouldn't it?

Reality these days is (mostly): wake up, somewhere between six and seven thirty. Lie in bed until eight or nine, thinking vigorous thoughts about getting up. Spend the hours between nine and one doing various sorts of things -- laundry, dishes, fucking around the Internet, journaling (eh?), working on art, writing. (I was going to a coffee shop every day, but last month my finances got a bit out of control, so we're back to domestic amusements for the time being.) Occasionally I go out for walks; right now being away from even the possibility of doing productive work prompts a huge surge of anxiety, and it's also cold, so that's not happening as much.

At one o'clock I go into a little flurry of all the things I was supposed to have already done -- brushing my teeth, changing into a shirt that wouldn't shame my ancestors, etc. -- and initiate my commute. On Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, that means getting on my bike and cycling to [large box store], which is between four and five miles away from my apartment. On Sunday and Monday, I power walk to the coffee shop, which is about three blocks away.

Saturday is a clusterfuck and I work a total of ten hours between the two jobs, so there's nothing doing.

At [large box store], I work in the back, so unless a customer runs me down while I'm getting more packing tape or something, I don't ever have to answer questions. My job is sorting things that have been returned or damaged, boxing up the ones that could reasonably be purchased in a salvage auction and stacking them on a pallet and throwing away the rest. The store has a somewhat complicated system of garbage bins, compactors, and recycling schemes that have to be adhered to. I passed my ninety-day probation on November 20th, so it seems somewhat less likely that I will be randomly fired. So far none of my mistakes have been painfully expensive -- so far as I know, I put a $40 phone case in the wrong shipment, and I had to spend several hours cleaning up a series of spills which I engineered through taking the store software instructions too literally. I put an electronic thing in the dumpster that should have gone in the recycling. Yesterday I wasted roughly an hour trying to disassemble a table which refused to be disassembled. No one has yelled at me so far.

The coffee shop is probably where my heart would be if the owner didn't sporadically become convinced that whoever is in front of her is the stupidest person alive. It's not about me -- of course -- and yet, when you're on the butt end, that's hard to recall. The coffee always smells good. The chai always smells better. I have started remembering some people's orders (Tom: large chai in a to-go cup, though this weekend he got a hot chocolate. Dave: large mocha and a large green iced tea. Guy with the long gray pony tail: one or two cups of half-caf to go.) I am less afraid that I will forget things.

I've mostly stopped counting weeks, though I've been at the coffeeshop for eighteen weeks and [large box store] for sixteen. I've never stayed at one job for longer than fourteen months, a milestone which seems like it is a very long way away (TEN MONTHS, October 2019). I've also never gone longer than two years being self-supporting and living away from my parents, and I'll hit that mark around the same time (ELEVEN MONTHS, November 2019). This is terrifying, and also, in some odd way, calming: I have time. I have time. I don't have to move just yet.