KD Sarge

Articles posted by KD Sarge (Page 7)

Breaking the DOOM Loop

I don’t have to tell you that the world is looking pretty grim lately. I’m sure I’m not the only one who keeps getting caught in a doom loop. So apparently the way out of a personal doom loop is to do something small. Something good for you, or good for someone else. Make your bed. Love on your dog. Buy a friend coffee. Post a blog of good news. First, please enjoy these baby goats in pajamas. Feeling better? Now you can read about Europe’s wind farm capacity. Here’s a video of sixteen things that are going to help make the world a cleaner place. Twenty-one African countries are working together to plant the Great Green Wall. It is already increasing resources and decreasing poverty, and they’re only 15% of the way done. (15% of that is a LOT, though!) Plants may save the world. Again. Plants are awesome, but how about the animals? Well, we’re working on that too. Women in prison are saving endangered butterflies. Bald eagles, sea otters, grizzlies and others are recovering. I utterly adore whales, so the fact that humpbacks are also recovering is great news to me. Check out this friendship for some serious warm fuzzy. And the kakapo are getting a lot of help, thank goodness. They are ridiculously cute. I watch a lot of nature documentaries, and I never heard of a pumice raft before. But this one might help repopulate the Great Barrier Reef after a bleaching event! We’re working…

Curiosity Killed the Cat — Part 4

By KD Sarge Read previous installments: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Jhi Bo slipped through the door and flung herself back, adding her weight to Gerda’s to slam the door. A tentacle thudded against the other side. Maybe two. The door shuddered but held. A few more thuds, then silence. Jhi Bo thumped her head lightly on the door behind her. Idiot! Srivasi wouldn’t have forgotten the proper order for solving an equation. “Inda brofid na?” the girl said, waving at Jhi Bo’s sword. She mimed drawing it and swinging mightily. Jhi Bo scowled at her. Why would she fight the squid if they could escape it? The animal had only defended its lair. Right. So. Solve the equation in the correct order this time, and the door was… Jhi Bo noticed as she stepped forward that the girl stepped back. *** Srivasi hadn’t argued, but Dasid said it again, louder. “It’s a death trap. It’s a stupid lousy—you know what? Sod this.” He plunked down on folded legs, folded his arms in front of his chest. “I’m done. I’m not giving some madman his jollies, watching me run in circles like some trained chicken.” “I thought you wanted to find the gold?” “There is no gold,” Dasid snarled. “There are circles. There are doors, and questions. Answer wrong, and there’s a monster. Answer right, and there’s more doors. Sooner or later you’ll blow it again, and then what if we can’t outrun whatever we find?” “Not saying you’re…

That Time of Year

It’s that time of year for me. When friends text “hey, haven’t seen you!” and follow up a minute later with “right. End of July. See you in September!” When parents bump into me in the grocery store and suddenly I’m holding an impromptu “know your rights” discussion in the frozen section (next to the Haagen-Dasz “Spirits” ice cream, if you must know, and thankfully I don’t have any “Rum Tres Leches” in my cart yet to sit there melting and possibly drawing raised eyebrows.) The time of year when I’m having my friend in the passenger seat text cryptic messages like “FOSS kits” to my work email because I’m driving and can’t write it down but I really need to poke someone about that tomorrow. When I’m cruising all the back-to-school sales looking for the BEST deals because the more money I can save now, the more we can help out a parent in a bind later. When I’m at work emailing IT, checking on desks that should have arrived by now, and calling Facilities because the AC in the gym is still down–all at the same time. When I’m tracking down seemingly-random pieces of paper for HR and giving the copier a swift kick on the way past (I don’t actually kick it, but I am pretty quick at righting its wrongs.) We try, every year, to be ready. We do inventory and figure out what we need. We do research, and figure out where to buy it.…

If You Feed Them, They Will Come

Friends, I am tired. I was up late and also up early, dealing with teenager crises. Today after a (false alarm) freakout the roomie had over a potentially pet-harming bug in the kitchen, I promised her we didn’t have an infestation of cat-eating centipedes. I also jokingly apologized for the recent infestation of teenagers, but promised they fell into the mostly-harmless household pest category. The more I think about it, the more I think I was only a little off. They do have some similarities to many household pests. Where there’s one, there’s more. The kid’s room is like a clown car–just when you think there can’t possibly be one more human being in there, out pops another. And that one is probably a young’un you’ve never seen before. They’re nocturnal. Turn the light on late at night and they scurry for dark corners. They leave messes everywhere. Sometimes you only know they exist in your space because of the mess. If you feed them, they will come. They eat like–well, like a plague of locusts. Grocery budgets cower before them! But while I sometimes want to knock some sense into them, I never want to step on them. So…more like puppies. I’ve been known to swat them with rolled up newspapers (teenagers, not puppies, I’m aware we have better ways to train dogs now.) Yes. Like puppies. So cute when they’re asleep in little piles of adorable (how do teenagers sleep 3-5 to a bed? How?) So destructive when…

Settling In, Dreaming of a Green Garden

Before we go any further, I should point out that Siri is the gardener around here. I’m just a dabbler, and will likely remain so–especially since most of my backyard is concrete, and the only water in the backyark is a faucet with a hose so rusted I can’t remove it, that runs to not-good irrigation for two citrus trees, a place a citrus tree was, and leaves out two citrus trees. My kid is certain the concrete is covering up a pool someone didn’t want to bother taking out properly. I don’t know, but it’s one more reason (the other being weeding) to just leave the concrete where it is instead of pulling it up to put in a garden. So yeah. Container garden. The roomie and I have long entertained wistful thoughts of a container garden. Or just growing a few herbs, the ones we love the most. We can’t grow herbs in the house, you see. The cat eats plants, and all the places (presumed to be) safe from the cat are already taken up with my beloved houseplants. Also the kitchen is a cave with no windows, so goodbye pleasant dream of a windowsill herb garden. We’re probably going to put a skylight in the kitchen eventually, but not yet. And there still won’t be a windowsill. So a container garden, out on the concrete. Where the faucet can’t be used. Excuse me a moment while I run and put “penetrating oil” on the join to…

Chasing Productivity

Life is much easier if you plan ahead, I’ve discovered on any number of occasions. I’m trying to do it more consistently, so I did make a plan for this blog post. My idea was to blog about an app, Productivity Challenge Timer. I’ve had it on my phone for–probably years? I’d never used it. For one, I was amused by my title of “Unrepentant Slacker” when I opened it. For two, I didn’t know how to use it. For three, I didn’t want to get yelled at by a big guy with a hammer. On Saturday, though, I went looking for a Pomodoro timer bc my phone timer is loud and I can’t change the sound to something less jarring. Since some of the stuff I need to time requires me to move around, online ones just aren’t as useful as I’d like. So I bounced around a bit looking at reviews, searched “productivity” in the Play Store, and wandered across “already installed!” Oh. Right. That thing. While I love to find new useful things (and imagine that FINALLY I have found the magic spell to Fix All!), I also dislike putting apps on my phone. I don’t want it to be so full it doesn’t work well, and I begrudge granting one more set of permissions because lork knows who’ll be looking at my stuff next…and I needed to figure something out and get to work, before I spent the whole day looking at productivity apps and then…

Curiosity Killed the Cat – Part 3

Curiosity Killed the Cat A free fantasy serial by KD Sarge Part 3: Many Doors (Read part 1 here. Part 2 is here.) Srivasi reached for the door and hesitated. He had the right answer now, but there was no guarantee that the correct door led to safety. He looked back, and it was still dark around the corner they’d come from. He could go check, but probably the door was still closed, still hidden by the skill of its builder. Maybe he could find it and force it open, find a way to get back to the surface—and maybe he couldn’t. He wasn’t particularly eager to have the boy see him fail. If— “Oh, fine.” The boy bounced forward and yanked the door open. Leaped back, leaving Srivasi standing before the doorway alone. Only darkness flowed out. Metaphorical flowing, not real, thankfully. “Are you going to make more light?” Dasid demanded. “Or should we just stand here a while first?” Oh. He’d let his wand go out, distracted by running for his life. Srivasi thought of shoving the child through the door and holding it closed, but the boy would make noise and bring anything that might be nearby to attack. Though on the other side of the door… No. If something attacked the child, Srivasi would have to help him. Better to avoid it if he could. Srivasi sighed and lit the tip of his wand. “Huh,” Dasid said. “It looks just like where we are,” Srivasi said. “Yeah,…

Marie Kondo, Queer Eye, and Rejuvenation

Sometimes, things just come together. I love Marie Kondo’s Tidying Up. I’ve watched every episode. She’s so cute! And she helps people enjoy their lives more! What’s not to love? And Queer Eye–I’ve loved Queer Eye since the first episode I saw, way back when. I love the new one maybe more–no, I can’t say that. I love them both, and every single one of the guys in both shows. But I did watch the new one more recently than any of the old ones (all of season 3 on Netflix in approximately four days after it was released ahem) Rejuvenation–well, roomie was avoiding something, and I commented on how I wanted time to paint my room, and she painted my room! This color. It’s called Rejuvenation. Naturally, to get the walls painted, nearly everything had to be moved out of the room. My bed and my desk stayed, pushed into the middle of the room, but everything else outside my closet was removed. Did I mention this was spring break? This was spring break. Roomie’s school doesn’t have the office staff work over break, but my school does. So my room got painted and it’s BEAUTIFUL and I LOVE IT, and the tape got removed, and I just kept not finding time to move all my stuff back in. Because I was tired. Because I was busy. Because my room was so nice without all the crap in it! Reader, I don’t actually have a lot of crap. My…

Love Shines Through: A Fractured World Anthology

The world was whole before the war. But war is a terrible thing, and terrible things are done in the name of defense and protection. And this war tore the world apart, fractured it, separated families and lives and dreams. The reasons why no longer matter, but the effects still linger. They cause pain, though the war is over. But despite the monsters and the poisons and the despair, there is a glimmer of light. And hope and love are not gone from the world. These four stories, set in the Fractured World, explore how light can make it through the darkness. How hope can conquer fear. And most of all, how love can still flourish, even when the world is bleak. A young woman braves monsters to see the sky. A reluctant man chooses forgiveness over suffering. Lovers reunite to save a child and their community. Best friends risk everything for each other. Come see the light for yourselves.

Kitchen Adventures Continued

Last month I talked about another attempt to get organized. Like a wave washing up the shore as the tide comes in, each time I try I get a little better. Unlike the tide, eventually I hope to get there and stay. (although I guess with erosion and rising sea levels, it could–ahem.) Last year (gulp) I talked about learning to cook more. It’s another wave thing, but these waves come slightly more frequently than the get-organized ones. Probably because eating out is expensive and bad for me. (pretty certain it’s the expensive part that keeps me coming back.) Since last year, I’ve given up my Jamie Oliver cookbooks. I still like to watch him cook, but I don’t make the recipes in the cookbooks, and I’ve been watching Marie Kondo, so… Turns out the recipes were a little…odd…for me. Unfamiliar measurements, unfamiliar ingredients, and results that made the whole family go “…umm?” When you’re just not sure if it’s supposed to be like that, it’s hard to figure out if/where you went wrong. Also I’ve discovered that I really enjoy hunting recipes across the internet. So. Meal planning is a major step for me. I’ll do it the way I like best, to encourage further exploration. I’ve found it’s actually easier when there are limitations. Roomie can usually cook two nights a week, but she won’t use the Instant Pot. Kid can cook another night, but it has to be an easy recipe and I have to be available…

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