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Self-Care Requires Care

(Content warning, talking about weight loss and diet.) A few years ago, I lost…I think it was eighty-eight pounds? I saw Onederland for one brief shining moment. Then everything went kablooey, but anyway. That took me about a year, and it wasn’t all that hard. I just followed the routine. Every(ish) Sunday I would prep five breakfasts of overnight oatmeal, and five salads for work lunches. Dinner would be a chicken breast prepared some way, and vegetables. Easy, no thinking, but as variable as I want–you can cook chicken so many ways, and vegetables…yeah. And I’d generally come in well under on the calorie goal, so if I decided to have that donut someone offered me at work, it didn’t set me back far. I’d go for walks. I had a gym membership, and I went to the gym! What’s the point of all this? What the title says. Self-care requires care. It takes time, and it takes energy. Everything went kablooey last time because I suddenly didn’t have the time or the energy to devote to the meal prep and the long walks or even the shopping. I’ve been trying for years to get my mojo back, but Stuff Kept Happening. And I’ve figured out (I’m a bit slow) that Stuff and brain chemicals had pushed me into an actual real depression. But finally I got help. Will it take this time? I don’t know. But I know that I’m trying. I’ve lost a few pounds already. I’ll take…

A Dream Come True

This past Saturday, something very cool happened. 🙂 I got to see my favorite band, Queensryche, up close and personal, from THE FRONT ROW. But let me back up just a bit. Anyone who’s spent any time with me knows that these guys are my passion, my life, my happy. I’ve been a fan since the 90s (as a teenager — I’m totally dating myself here, oops!) and I’ve hung in there, mostly, through their “dark ages” album phase and their lead singer change (for the better!) — I mean, Todd La Torre saved them from oblivion in 2012, but that’s another story. They respect and love their fans, and make a point of connecting with them on social media. They care. Not just because we’re paying for albums, merch, or to see them live, but because we are real people and we matter to them. How often do you find a band like that? Or a lead singer who randomly tweets you (and he isn’t following you) on Twitter/X three minutes after you tweet that you are devastated about having to (TW: pet death) euthanize your elderly cat in an hour and he’s giving you his condolences? Yeah. Okay, so I love these guys, and every time they tour and come to my state, I literally drop everything and move heaven and Earth to go. Seriously. I missed a few of Todd’s first tours with the band, due to some unavoidable circumstances, and I will forever never forgive myself…

Deep and Blue Coming May 1!

Good evening, friends! I’ve been hard at work getting my former serial Deep and Blue ready to be released into the world! The book has been edited, streamlined, and made pretty (with fish, because yay fish), and we’ll be releasing it in ebook form come May 1. Here’s the cover: And here’s the description: When the surface became unlivable, humanity retreated under the waves. In the underwater city of Haven, oceanographer Kaeri has been given her first assignment: a coveted spot on the team working to return the people of Haven to the surface. No friends. No family. An opportunity to earn her place. Not quite ostracized but never welcomed, Kaeri has never belonged. Something about her parents, though no one has ever explained what. And though she has become a respected scientist, people still shy away from her in the corridors, their conversations dying away. The new job is a chance to change all that. But before she can begin, strange things start happening. Shadows flit across the security cameras. Doors to airlocks and power generators unlock themselves. And people, across the city, are being attacked by something invisible. If Kaeri can save Haven from these mysteries, people will have to accept her. But digging into Haven’s secrets may bring answers that were better left alone. ~*~*~*~ I hope you guys enjoy the new and improved version of Deep and Blue! It’s been a lot of fun revisiting the story.

TV Shows That Are Giving Me Life

I’ve blogged before about how my spouse and I are having trouble enjoying film and TV these days — we’ve just seen too many stories, or something. But once in a while, something makes it past the analytical parts of our minds and hits us right in the feels, as they say. Right in the uncritical part of our hearts that is still 10 years old. (My inner 10-year-old loves a story about girls coming into their power, like Moana and Encanto. His loves an action story about girls who kick butt.) So it’s not surprising that our shared viewing right now is She-Ra and the Princesses of Power, the reboot series developed by ND Stevenson (Nimona, Lumberjanes). It hits many of the same things we liked about Trollhunters (him) and Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts (me). The writing is sharp, the dialogue on point. When any new trope is introduced, it’s not belaboured, because the show knows its viewers are genre-savvy, so the story can move on quickly — making it feel fresh. The characters and their struggles are relatable, at least one is neurodivergent (I love Entrapta so much), AND THEY’RE ALL QUEER. The worldbuilding is kinda thin if you look at too hard, but that’s not what the story focuses on, so it’s fairly easy to ignore. We’re about halfway through and looking forward to the rest. I also like a very specific type of comedy — whatever it is that The Good Place and Schitt’s…

Planting the Rain, Among Other Things

Recently I signed my declaration of independence. Well, okay–I just posted in the family server that i was tired of doing any housework that got done, and I wasn’t going to worry about it anymore. My declaration didn’t result in a war! Everyone was very supportive. Especially the cat, whose counter-cruising is a lot more productive now that I’m no longer emptying the sink every night. >_> So anyway. Now I have more time to do what I want to do. Like blog a day late. (sorry! brain just wasn’t willing yesterday.) Lately what I want to do is poke at turning my front yard and my mostly concrete backyard into a wildlife habitat slash productive bit of dirt. At some point I may put in some raised beds and try vegetable gardening again, but that’s not what I’m working on right now. I’ve moved a little on it–clearing some junk out of the shed, pulling a weed here and there, buying and planting two more citrus trees… Yes, me! I planted two trees! By myself! So far they are still alive. It’s been more than a week. While I’m pretty good with houseplants, I’ve had less luck with outside plants. Of course, it is generally something of the six-or-so legged variety that takes out my poor outside plants. But anyway. Not much luck. So we’ll see. I bought a book. This author lives not far from me, and what he’s been able to do is just fantastic. Of course…

Forty-eight

Age is just a number. You’re as old as you feel. I’m going to be forty-eight years old on March 27th. Two years shy of fifty; two years before I am a half a century old. In all honesty, I’m not really sure how I feel about that. I don’t really feel almost a half century, although I do have my share of health challenges. But I do notice a difference from when I was twenty and now. I was recently waiting to speak to one of my doctors, one who is still doing telehealth, in fact — and it’s a video call. So while in the “waiting room,” I could see a small video window of myself. And wow. Boy, did I see a difference. I did see many years on my face. It helped that I had a picture of myself at nineteen (one of those Glamour ShotsTM, if you remember them from the 90s) right in front of me on my husband’s dresser. The differences were remarkable. I don’t have a lot of wrinkles, thanks to my family’s slow aging. But I could see a bit of a difference in my face and eyes. I looked, well, older. Of course, I’ve put on a bit of weight, too, as most of us do. (Also? Around that time I was actually underweight due to illness, if you can believe that one!) so my face and body are a bit more filled out. My hair is a bit thinner,…

Et tu, Muse?

Hello friends. Have you ever gotten near to the end of a project, and all of a sudden every other project is super interesting? Or, in the case of my current brain, all of a sudden, there are new ideas everywhere. I’ve written more new things into my idea file in the last week than probably the last six months combined. Why do we do this? (Or maybe it’s just me?) While I’m close to the end of my revision (we’re firmly in Act 3 now) I still probably have at least a month more, maybe two. And that’s only going to get longer if I get distracted by every shiny thing my brain finds for me. And, holy cow, my brain is actively searching for shiny things. They’re everywhere. And you know that if I gave in and actually switched to one of these new projects, my brain would also give up on that one, or try to redirect me to something else, or decide now is an excellent time for a fanfiction hyperfixation. (oh no, I’m giving myself ideas.) Is this normal? I know other writing friends have this happen, but arguably no writer is normal, so this is a terrible litmus. If you too get distracted in the home stretch or find that you’re actively sabotaging yourself, what do you do to counteract it? My current technique is to tell myself that as soon as I finish my revision I’ll dedicate a month to chaos, where we…

Not So SAD

It’s March, friends! Not only that, the first Tuesday of the month (my blogging day) went sailing by when I wasn’t looking…whoops. Somehow, somewhen, we’re already into the third month of the year and almost up to the time change (except for those lucky folks who live in places like Arizona…ahem). I’m generally surprised by how fast Time is going these days. It doesn’t help that Toronto has been experiencing our warmest winter on record, which also bodes poorly for the planet. But…I kind of hate our “normal” winters, all grey and slush and cutting, damp winds. Without those last two, the grey is much easier to bear. I tend to struggle with SAD at this time of year, between January and March. This year…I’ve been waiting for it, and for the most part, it just hasn’t turned up. Why? Well, the weather could be a major contributing factor, of course. Or the Vitamin D that I’ve been mostly remembering to take for a change. It could be the ongoing culinary experiments — I’ve been making a point of trying new recipes and ingredients. Most recently, I’ve done ratatouille, stir-fry with broccolini, butternut squash & white bean chili, and tonight, Spanish lima bean stew (I’m on a bean kick). It could even be the (shhh) writing — I spent February doing writing prompts, a few hundred words a day, and rereading one of my favourite writing craft books, Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg. (Bird by Bird by Anne…

A Day Late and…You Know

It is 8:30 p.m. and I am already posting a day late. I don’t know what to tell you–sometimes the brain it just won’t work. Last week I enjoyed a glorious five days in a row off work. One of the things I did was to take off to Sedona. I love Sedona. So much. Oh, hey! you’re probably thinking. Is this going to be another blog post full of rambling and pretty pictures? Yup. Though probably not a lot of rambling, as it’s already 9:45. What can I say? The brain. It don’t work. Here’s the cabin we called home for the weekend. It’s one room with a full bed and a pair of bunk beds, but also the very important heater as it got down to freezing both nights. No, seriously. I don’t plan to talk much at all. Check this out. My child told me I caught a UFO! I told them that must be lens flare somehow–it wasn’t there when I took the picture. They told me then it’s an orb (think ghost.) It’s just a tree, but I like it. It’s a gnarly tree! All of these were taken on my phone, by the way. It’s a Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra, and I love the camera so much I put up with the dang huge phone in my tiny hands. Full moon! I was trying for a nice edgy shot with the branches against the moon. Works a lot better without the branches. GEEZ I…

Email Inbox Woes

So, why is this post being written at 2:15am on Wednesday instead of on Tuesday like it’s supposed to be? Well, I could tell you about a few things: a work emergency, a dental emergency that’s caused me to have an even more erratic sleep schedule for the past few days, but…actually, I just spent the past hour going through my email inbox. Trying to get things cleared out and ready for my night. Because anxiety. Because it’s the first (or second) thing I do. Because I have toooooo many things coming through, and it’s just getting out of hand. A Facebook post in a group I’m in actually inspired this post. People were comparing notes on how many unread emails were in their email inboxes and giving and receiving advice on how to clear them out…if at all. I saw some pretty huge numbers there, which honestly gave me heart palpitations, so I felt just a tiny bit better. But only a bit. See, I just went through a massive unsubscribe purge recently, which helped the situation a lot. But…there’s still a lot of business emails, and emails coming from people that I follow and want to read, but when these emails pour in, I just want to hide. Seriously. An hour a day, folks. I’ve joked that I need an assistant just to manage my email. I also routinely get those all-important business emails in spam despite whitelisting numerous times, so there’s always a spam email sweep added…

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Category: Bloggish Things