The past few months have been pretty intense. I downgraded my WordPress hosting, because I found that I wasn’t using many of the benefits of my upgraded package. This sounds simple, but, in reality, required a lot of back-and-forth between three chat bots, some emails, and a discussion forum. Either way! It’s all sorted now and, if anything breaks in the near future, it’s entirely because I’m messing with themes and colors again.
Now, as for the rest… I vended at my first in-person event this year! It was a great experience, I sold a ton of artwork and sculptures, and I’m very happy.
Then, shortly afterward, my house caught on fire some. I was sitting in the bath when I smelled something like melting plastic. I checked the bathroom window, but it definitely wasn’t coming from outside. When the smell intensified, I asked my Handsome Assistant to see if he could track it down. He came running back with a fire extinguisher, there was smoke everywhere, cats were evacuated, fire department was called, and I sat in the driveway for a while chatting with friends on Discord because I’m pretty sure that was the one thing tethering my sanity in the midst of all of the chaos at that particular moment.
Anyhow! Everyone’s fine and the house is habitable. However, as a public service announcement: Do not leave your bathroom vent fans on when you’re not around, they are absolutely capable of subterfuge. As it turns out, our basement bathroom vent fan’s wiring blew out in a rather spectacular fashion. Like, flames. Melted insulation. A scorched gas line. If we hadn’t been home, or I hadn’t smelled it when I did, it would’ve been a catastrophe. As it is, it’s just been a very stressful series of inconveniences – including having no heat for several weeks.
Also, yellowjackets live in the walls now. This is totally unrelated to the fire. They just saw some gaps around the powerlines and decided it was free real estate, and now they live there. Sometimes they get into our bedroom. I woke up gently spooning one this morning.
If circumstances were different, these guys would’ve died off with the first frost as they usually do. Since they’re living in the walls, they’re here to stay. Or at least for way longer than my Handsome Assistant and I are comfortable with sharing a space with them. I don’t mind stinging insects, but as far as housemates go… I mean, they’re not great.
Lastly, we have ducks! We did not initially intend to get ducks. My Handsome Assistant likes the idea of having egg-producing pets, despite the fact that neither of us eat eggs. (It is his latent Ohio prepper sensibilities.) These are not egg-laying ducks.
What happened is a friend of ours rescued some ducklings from Tractor Supply. It was the end of the season, the store can’t return them to the breeder, so they just… had these unsexed ducklings. Friend took them, since friend already has necessary ducky infrastructure, and the ducklings grew into three handsome Rouen drakes and one lovely hen.
(Pause for sounds of dread from people who have kept drakes and hens before.)
Duck mating is… Let’s call it “hardcore.” It’s dangerous for the hens at the best of times, and that’s even with a good ratio of drakes to hens. Which is about 1:3-4 at minimum, not 3:1. So, friend needed to find a home for these drakes before the spring breeding season rolls around. If no one took them, they’d have to make the difficult decision to cull the drakes for the safety of the hen, which they really didn’t want to have to do.
So, bleeding heart that I am, I decided we were going to keep ducks.
And honestly? It’s been great. We built them a run and a coop, set up a pool, gave them a separate water source, and feed them a variety of fresh foods alongside a healthful prepared diet. They’re three handsome Rouens, and they’re also a lot of fun. They get excited when I walk outside or talk to them through the window. They wag their tails and bob their heads. They’ll eat treats from my hand and listen very well when I tell them it’s time for bed.
Left to right, Marcus, Eddie, and Robert.
… Alright, they listen well when I walk in and say, “Alright handsome boys, it’s time to go eepy-sleepy’! Ready? Let’s go!” In high-pitched parentese like a demented Disney princess.
We’ve only had them for a little while, and I already love them. There’s Marcus, the crested one and the smallest of the three. There’s Robert, the second largest and boldest. And there’s Eddie, the largest and the unwitting target of Marcus’… affections.
Ducks, like many other animals, will mount each other in a display of dominance. So, much like a high school transfer student, Marcus has apparently decided that since he’s in a new place, it is time to try to be the Cool Important Duck. A strategy that would make more sense if he weren’t shy and less than half the size of Eddie. Eddie’s mostly just confused by the tiny hat-wearing maniac trying to climb on his back.
So, my time a way has mostly been dealing with housefire remediation logistics, rebuilding, setting up duck infrastructure, and finding a way to get the wasps out of the walls.
Remember when I was brewing water kefir and accidentally almost made my Handsome Assistant lose an eye? As much as I loved the process (and the product), I also found that water kefir required a lot more attention than I am accustomed to from my colonies of semi-feral microorganisms. So, I’d been considering going back to making kombucha.
And remember those PSAs about video piracy from back in the day?
Joke’s on them. I would 100% download a car.
(Also, hello again! I apologize for my unannounced hiatus last week. It was my Handsome Assistant’s birthday, the world is on fire, and I was not feeling my best. I am better now and 100% back on my bullshit again.)
Anyhow, I was originally introduced to kombucha by a very sweet lady from Russia that I used to work with back when I still did Laboratory Stuff. (Predominantly a series of small, purposeful, semi-controlled explosions.) She brought me part of her SCOBY, and I used that for ages. Eventually, I fell out of the practice when my then-partner and I moved.
The trouble is, getting back into making kombucha hasn’t been super easy. Tracking down a live SCOBY isn’t always the simplest process and having them shipped through the mail can be tricky. (Of course, this is true of anything living that has to go through the mail. Bugs. Plants. Small children.)
Fortunately, there is a solution: Just kind of make your own, with a little help from the bottled stuff.
The majority of bottled kombucha on the market is raw. It has to be, in order to do the whole “probiotic” thing. This means that, even without a SCOBY, it contains what you need in order to brew more kombucha.
I’ve read posts that claim that bottled kombucha has been somehow “weakened,” and isn’t as strong as the starter culture used to produce commercial kombucha. I have my doubts about this because this would mean that it also wouldn’t be very effective as a probiotic. I’m also not sure of what kind of process would selectively weaken a probiotic culture in order to… install some kind of microbial DRM, I guess?
Even if this were the case, it doesn’t actually matter. As anyone who’s started a sourdough culture or accidentally left a bottle of juice out for a few days can tell you, the bacteria and yeasts responsible for fermentation are all around us. The trick is to select for those, and not pathogenic bacteria or toxic fungi. If you start with bottled raw kombucha, you’re already starting with something that has the low pH and natural compounds needed to keep down populations of unwanted microorganisms. It might take a couple of rounds for a SCOBY to get to full strength, but it’ll get there. I mean, the first kombucha ever made didn’t have a SCOBY to start with. Even if all you have is a bottle of kombucha, you’re ahead of the game.
The process is easy:
If you look at the surface of the tea, you can see a thin SCOBY formed from the bottled kombucha.
Get a bottle of kombucha. Make sure it’s raw. Flavor doesn’t really matter. Drink about half to two thirds of it. Leave the goopy stuff at the bottom.
Clean a nice, wide mouth jar. Rinse it thoroughly.
Brew up some nice, strong tea in your jar. I prefer green. (While you technically can make kombucha from herbal tea, this isn’t really recommended. If you do want to do so, you’re advised to cycle between a batch of herbal kombucha and a batch of the regular kind. To start with, you’re better off working with actual tea — the stuff made from Camellia sinensis, without any other additives.)
Add a bunch of sugar. It should be very sweet, albeit not syrupy. Don’t worry about the sweetness, because the kombucha will eat most of the sugar anyway.
Allow the tea to cool to room temperature, or just slightly above. Too much heat will kill off the culture.
Swirl the bottled kombucha thoroughly to incorporate the goopy stuff into the liquid. Pour the bottled kombucha into your tea and sugar mixture.
Cover the jar with a bit of cloth, a sturdy paper towel, or a coffee filter. Secure it with a rubber band.
Put it someplace clean, warm, and dry, out of direct sunlight.
Ignore it for a while. You’ll eventually begin to see a thin, translucent “skin” forming on the top. This is a baby SCOBY! With time, it’ll get thicker.
After a week or so, your SCOBY should be a bit more substantial. Brew up more tea and sugar and transfer it to a new jar to allow it to continue to grow. The old SCOBY will break down, and a new one will form on the top. If conditions are right, it’ll gain some strength with each successive iteration. It’s a good idea to cut the SCOBY into halves so you can have two separate batches running at once — that way, if one goes weird, you’ll still have a backup.
So far, this process has been working out well for me. The SCOBY is SCOBYing, and I’m coming up with ideas for flavoring a second ferment. I’m thinking a ginger peach or raspberry and rose.
Last Friday, my Handsome Assistant and I went to Baltimore Soundstage to see Folkfest of the North, featuring Nini, TrollfesT, Ensiferum, and Korpiklaani. We were both only familiar with the latter two, but hey, I’m always up to hear some unfamiliar stuff in genres I’m into.
And it was a fantastic idea.
We came in at the end of Nini’s set because we were running late, despite our best efforts. It doesn’t help that I was wearing cargo pants (they’re men’s pants, so they have the good pockets) and had forgotten the amount of random life flotsam that I had accumulated throughout the day. So I had to fully unload some weird little art projects, about eleven lipbalms, my keys, a handkerchief, and a pocket full of lobelia seeds I had foraged on a walk while I was looking for skulls. (“Those are… emotional support seeds.”)
Anyway. We came in just as NiNi was halfway through a cover of Baby One More Time. I was glad we didn’t miss them entirely, but I would’ve liked to hear more. Fortunately, she has a pretty extensive YouTube channel with her other work — folk metal played with traditional Chinese instruments (Nini herself is Taiwanese).
Next was TrollfesT, from Norway. They came out in full flamingo costumes for Flamingo Overlord, a concept album about the rise of a world-dominating flamingo dictator. Their opening song was Dance Like a Pink Flamingo, which is loads of fun, very catchy, and an absolutely scathing indictment of remaining apolitical and distracting yourself while the world burns around you.
Their songs were great. There was a bubble machine. There was a massive venue-spanning conga line. It was a fantastic time and I’ve been listening to them on repeat ever since. I hate that it took me this long to hear them.
After that was Ensiferum, who probably needs no introduction. I used to listen to them a lot years ago, but kind of fell out of it (and I’m sorry I did). They were also very good, and it was immediately obvious that a ton of the crowd was there for them. I didn’t recognize their newer stuff, but that’s fine with me — I was 100% here for it regardless.
Last up was Korpiklaani, the band that originally got me to get tickets in the first place. They’re always a lot of fun — there’s never a lot of between-songs banter, so it’s just back-to-back bangers. Jonne Jarvela’s mic was also better than last time, so the vocals were much more balanced and not as drowned out.
Also, I’ve read the stereotypes of folk metal fans: We’re not as hard as other metalheads. We dig the silliness. We’re here to party. We drink room-temperature dark beer and are more likely to form kick lines and dance in a circle than mosh. And honestly? I get it. Hell, I embrace it.
(I have, however, never met a racist folk metal fan. That’s not to say that they don’t exist, of course — lift up any subculture and you’re bound to find all sorts of weird things crawling underneath — but the bands I enjoy don’t espouse those ideas, and the folk metalheads I’ve interacted with don’t either. Honestly, most of them have stories about bouncing dickheads from shows.)
Also:
Shamlessly stolen from the r/MetalMemes subreddit.
Both my Handsome Assistant and I had a great time. All of the bands were delightful. I went home a sweaty mess from dancing (and honestly, you should come home with sweaty hair and streaky makeup from a show. At maximum, a minor concussion and maybe some loose teeth but your mileage may vary). I can’t wait until any of them are back in the area again. 🖤
This weekend, my Handsome Assistant and I attended an educational picnic to save Rock Creek, which is currently at risk from the continued expansion of a golf course. Construction has already begun, parts of the forest are being turned into mulch as we speak. Over 1,200 trees are slated to be cut down, including some that would otherwise be considered special or heritage trees under DC law.
This deforestation is part of an effort to expand multiple golf courses throughout the DC area.
Yeah, I know.
Even without further examination, I mean — who is building golf courses right now, of all things? The answer is the National Links Trust. While people worry about paying rent and getting their next meal, the National Links Trust apparently thinks that the public yearns for more golf courses. It’s something that sounds almost moustache-twirlingly villainous. Like the plot of an after school special where the heroes are a band of plucky cartoon kittens. Unfortunately, this is actually happening.
What’s the deal with the National Links Trust?
The NLT’s stated intention is “positively impacting our community and changing lives through affordable and accessible municipal golf.”
This is something that doesn’t sound… terrible, barring the whole “people-can’t-afford-food-right-now-you-rich-weirdoes” aspect. However, here’s what the NLT isn’t saying:
Lem Smith, NLT board member, International & Federal Government Affairs Manager for Chevron, and Former VP, Federal Government Relations for the American Petroleum Institute.
While they claim that they’re attempting to mitigate the harm done by the deforestation of Rock Creek (harm that is, once again, completely unnecessary and unasked for), they are not adhering to the best practices for doing so. There are multiple ways to mitigate the damage of both removing old growth trees and the presence of invasive plants, but their policy seems to be to mulch everything and call it good.
They’re not actually accountable to anyone. They can make half-hearted promises to plant meadows and maintain the forest all they want, but there is no incentive for them to keep them and nothing to stop them from doing whatever they want.
They claim that they’re willing to dedicate unused golf courses to being replanted as meadows. This is not a suitable compromise for multiple reasons:
For two, if there are already unused golf courses, they don’t need to cut down old growth trees in Rock Creek in order to make new ones. WT-actual-F?
There’s also the fact that it doesn’t seem like anybody actually asked for this. When asked, local golfers appear to be ambivalent at best. The NLT was able to scrape together some who are in favor of it to make a public appearance, but these don’t appear to reflect the opinion of the majority of the new course’s ostensible user base. They are absolutely not reflective of the larger population of DC and the adjacent area.
Here’s why it matters (no matter where or who you are).
So the NLT is attempting to build a golf course. Like I said, this is a huge deal and will have far-reaching effects even if you don’t live anywhere near DC. Here’s why:
Old growth areas are carbon sinks.
It is generally thought that old forests cease to accumulate carbon, but this isn’t the case. Research shows that in forests between 15-800 years of age, “net ecosystem productivity (the net carbon balance of the forest including soils) is usually positive.” What’s more, carbon doesn’t cease to exist once it’s taken up. When these areas are disturbed, that carbon is liberated as plant matter decays or is burned. Rather than trees dying naturally over time, breaking down, and having their nutrients (including carbon) absorbed into the mature forest, deforestation disrupts this natural cycle.
Rock Creek is part of the Potomac watershed.
Trees support healthy watersheds. Rock Creek itself connects to the Potomac River, and eventually drains into the Atlantic Ocean via the Chesapeake Bay. Trees contribute to healthy waterways by anchoring soil in place, preventing erosion. Their root systems (including the mycorrhizae within the soil that surrounds their roots) help capture nutrients. Without these systems in place, they would otherwise flow into the water to encourage algal blooms and fish kills, a process known as eutrophication. Removing these trees and replacing them with grass that requires a regimen of fertilizers and treatments to maintain is a terrible idea.
The last thing anyone needs is golf course runoff oozing into our local waterways.
Golf courses need a lot of water.
I already mentioned supplemental irrigation, but I’ll say it again: Golf courses need a lot of water. They are generally watered with sprinkler systems that lead to a lot of waste and loss through evaporation. This also puts strain on existing systems, reducing the availability of water for other uses and increasing scarcity issues. Only about 12% of golf courses surveyed use recycled water, and even with more efficient irrigation methods, turf grass remains a very wasteful use of land and water.
We’ve already had droughts here. We’re already told not to use any more water than necessary during the summer because of scarcity issues. Why are they building a golf course?
This could increase the transmission of avian flu.
I’m not being hyperbolic when I say this. Destruction of wildlife habitats drive populations of wild animals into greater contact with humans. If old growth trees are destroyed, the thousands of birds that they house and feed get pushed elsewhere. That “elsewhere” is going to be people’s back yards.
How does that relate to the H5N1 virus? More displaced birds mean more contact between wild birds and flocks of backyard fowl. It means more indoor-outdoor cats that come in contact with potentially infected birds. It means more bird feces on cars, decks, and feeders. A higher overall population of birds congregating in the same feeding and shelter areas means a higher risk of potentially zoonotic H5N1 moving through that population.
Birds aren’t the only ones that’re going to be displaced, either. Look for more conflicts with foxes, raccoons, rodents, and coyotes, too.
If it was living in that part of Rock Creek, it’s gonna need a new place to go. In an area as densely populated as DC and the surrounding suburbs, there aren’t many other options.
This further undermines Washington, DC, as a political entity.
Washington, DC, has been pushing for statehood for some time now. (A significant part of the reason why it keeps getting struck down is that DC would be a majority blue state, so it benefits the Conservative party to avoid allowing it to have any more representation than it already does.) While it isn’t a state, DC does still have home rule in some aspects. For example, DC’s tree law provides numerous protections specifically for heritage trees. Removal of a tree that qualifies as a “special tree” requires a permit. Healthy heritage trees cannot be removed, period.
Rock Creek is part of the National Park System. As such, even though a significant portion is within DC, DC isn’t able to enforce its tree laws to protect it. This inability to protect trees within its area further undermines DC as a legal and political entity.
The National Park Service is part of the problem.
Rock Creek is a national park, but it hasn’t been maintained as one. Invasive plants are a significant issue, and one that the National Park Service hasn’t adequately remedied. There are local people who are trained as Weed Warriors, who are able to legally remove invasive plants. However, there’s only so much they can do.
Part of the inception of the National Park Service was to push Indigenous Americans off of their ancestral land, with the claim that the land must be “preserved.” (Madison Grant helped launch the national parks movement — he also wrote The Passing of the Great Race, which gave a very detailed account of his negative views of Indigenous people, Black people, and immigrants.) In reality, the land in the National Park System was being preserved just fine while its original stewards were living there.
The neglect of Rock Creek shows that this land is not being protected or preserved. Furthermore, its current state has incentivized the NPS to sell part of Rock Creek in order to have it cut down and turned into a golf course. The idea is, I guess, that the National Links Trust would do the preserving instead, by… cutting the trees down and turning the land into a putting green.
It’s all so, so ridiculous, and it’s a terrible omen of things to come. Nothing good will come of the NPS being allowed to neglect public lands, then sell them off.
Light pollution is going to be a problem, too.
In addition to the loss of exceptionally old trees, biodiversity, and wildlife habitat, the presence of a golf course will increase light pollution in the area. The plans call for a driving range that will be lit through the night hours. This will disrupt nocturnal animals, including (especially) insects. We’re already experiencing a dramatic drop in insect populations. We don’t need a @#$%ing driving rangethat nobody asked for to begin with.
The land is removed from public use.
Right now, you can just go to Rock Creek. You can walk around. Picnic. Bird watch. Have a grand old time.
Already, the area of the forest that is earmarked for cutting has been removed from public use. You can’t just go there — people who have have been told to leave.
Meadows aren’t forests.
Even if the NTL carries out their plan to turn unused golf courses into meadows, meadows do not provide the same benefits as forests. I’ve been very vocal here about my efforts to remediate the immature, hard clay soil and turn it into mature soil. Cultivating turf grass is terrible for soil and doesn’t allow it to mature.
So here’s a bunch of immature soil that’ll be used to grow some (one can hope, but certainly not assume) native flowers and grasses. This will take over a hundred years become anything like the area that’s currently being cut down, in a process known as forest succession. While meadows are certainly better than the sterile monoculture of a putting green, they do not play the same role or have the same benefits as a century old forest.
This effort to turn part of Rock Creek into a golf course is just a continuation of Chevron’s ongoing pattern of land acquisition and destruction. They are promoting this destruction via the National Links Trust. If you are interested in helping to put a stop to this, please visit Defend Rock Creek’s Linktree for further steps that you can take.
As I write this, it’s the first day of spring. There’s an Ostara celebration this weekend, things are coming up in the garden, and the crows have returned from their winter perambulations. Happy spring equinox!
Sadly, I probably won’t be able to make it to the big ritual and feast this weekend — it’s a bit of a hike for my Handsome Assistant and me, and it’s been a rough week. (He’s had stress from his not-being-my-assistant-job, I started my meds for my seasonal allergic asthma again, and we’re both tired of the constant stress of the news cycle. We’re pretty much wiped out and a long drive, sadly, probably isn’t in the cards.)
All that aside, I’m excited about the changes I’m seeing in the garden. I’m going to go through and do a bit of a bigger inventory soon, but, for now, I’ve been noticing buds on the persimmon, apple, and plum trees, the return of the raspberries, buds on the roses and blueberries, and new growth in the yarrow and sage plants. The tulips and daffodils I planted are also returning, and they’re looking really good so far.
Unfortunately, there’s some bad news. The big maple tree seems to be infested with a native species of oak borer. It’s dropping more limbs at an accelerated rate, and there are tons of larvae under the bark. (The woodpeckers, on the other hand, think this is a wonderful development.) The trouble is, even assuming the tree isn’t too far gone to be saved, the treatment of choice is injection with a neonicotinoid pesticide. Neonicotinoids are controversial, and for good reason — while they’re very effective, they’re also nonspecific and terrible for non-target species. They’re notorious for killing bees, but bees aren’t the only ones that they harm. As much as I want to save this tree, I can’t do it at the expense of the insects that I’ve been working so hard to attract, feed, and shelter here. We’re losing too many bugs as it is.
Since this is a native species of borer, the fact that an infestation has progressed like this so quickly means that there’s an underlying problem. Treatment with pesticide would, therefore, be a bandaid solution at best. I don’t know how old this tree is, just that it’s mature. I know that the yard is (still, mostly) immature, hard, heavy clay soil, stemming from years of cultivating turf grass. We haven’t lived here that long, and I don’t know all of the stressors that the tree has experienced. I only know what it’s told me and what I’ve witnessed in the brief period of its rapid decline. I really, really don’t want to lose it, but I don’t know what to do that wouldn’t just be a temporary solution that would end up making so many other things worse. It’s a sucky situation to be in for everyone — and everything — involved.
Plus… As annoyed with them as I am, the native borers belong here, too. Unlike invasive borer species, they evolved to have a place in the local environment and are a food source for several important species of parasitoid insects and insect-eating birds. They wouldn’t even be a problem if there weren’t something else already wrong.
The spring equinox is a balance point. The word “equinox” means “equal night,” and stems from the fact that this is the time when the length of daylight and night hours is equal. From now until the autumnal equinox, the daylight hours will continue to lengthen.
Balance means taking the good with the bad. It’s life and death. It’s the decay of autumn’s leaves that feed the soil and make way for new growth. As much as I don’t want to lose this tree, I know the end might be coming and I’m grateful for all it’s done in its life.
Things leave, things return, and new things arise. The important thing is not to dwell on the loss, but to build on it and sow the seeds of things to come.
This past Saturday, my Handsome Assistant, some friends, and I went on a bone walk. This was organized by a friend in the Druidry group of which I’m a part, and it’s pretty much exactly what it sounds like — a walk through an area where it’s common to find bones.
Late winter/early spring is the best time for this, because winter is harsh on wild things and this is when the snow melts and uncovers the earth again. It’s a meditation on mortality and privilege; we are fortunate to have access to the things we need to easily survive winter, but this isn’t universally true. And, regardless of how true it is, none of us will live forever. It’s kind of an antidote to modern western society’s extreme refusal to acknowledge the more visceral aspects of our own mortality.
(I’ll give you an example. When my grandmother passed away, she was sleeping in bed beside my grandfather. Her body was picked up, cleaned, preserved, and covered in makeup and a wig. Her cheeks were stuffed with cotton to hide the way cancer had eaten her away. Her eyelids were pulled over barbed plastic forms to make her look like she was sleeping. We filed in during the wake to see her, and she was carted off to her grave by unseen hands. Only, it wasn’t her grave exactly — she was brought to a kind of staging area, with her coffin set atop a white rectangular platform. There was a eulogy, the press of a button, and a mechanical whirr as the coffin descended into the platform. It was all very neat and methodical, with as little involvement from the bereaved as possible. Just lots of preservatives, makeup, and little tricks to maintain the illusion of life, and a closed casket gently lowering into a sterile, white box.
If this is the closest we come to experiencing mortality before going through our own, no wonder we’re so fucking weird about it.)
The bone walk itself was a lot of fun. We didn’t find many bones, mostly some vacant snail shells. The area we walked was a very diverse meadow, with horse nettle, lobelia (I even snuck some leftover lobelia seeds), native grasses, and more plants than I could possibly identify, so there were signs from an abundance of wild things. Shed feathers. Coyote scat, packed with rodent and rabbit fur until it looked almost like owl pellets. Tufts of winter coat from horses, where they’d rubbed against a fence. The stumps of trees, whittled to a pencil point by beaver teeth. Droppings from rabbits, deer, and horses. It was the traces of a healthy, vibrant population.
We chatted about all kinds of things, mortality-adjacent and non. Books. Music. The population of crows that visits here. The plants we saw. I haven’t been able to see anyone since late autumn, so it was nice to just catch up and spend time together.
We also talked about the idea of a burial forest, where everyone could be buried beneath a tree. One friend said they wanted to be buried beneath an apple tree, which would continue to feed people in a somewhat macabre fashion. I said I wanted to be buried under a bald cypress, so it’d grow cypress knees. Then I could continue to be a pain in the ass in death as I am in life.
(Alternatively, I want to go to a body farm. Then I want my picked-clean skeleton recovered, well-scrubbed, and adorned with thrift store junk jewelry. Then I want to be propped up on a marble throne in a mausoleum to confuse the shit out of anthropologists far into the future.)
Once we’d finished the bone walk, my Handsome Assistant and I had to go. (We had a rather long drive back, and I was in a hurry to get to my favorite stationery store before it closed because it would probably be my only opportunity to pick up Colorverse’s exceeding gorgeous 2025 ink, Blue Green Snake, without having to order it online.)
(I got the one with blue purple shimmer.)
We stopped at a placed called Kelley Farm Kitchen on the way back. We’d never been — didn’t know anything about it, really, but it said it was “100% Vegan.” I had some doubts when I looked at the creamy sauces and cheesy dishes on their menu, but they were not kidding.
My Handsome Assistant got a seitan cheesesteak and a little bit of macaroni and cheese (well, “cheese”), which were both delicious. I was debating getting the same, but I went with the pinto bean and avocado tacos instead, and you guys.
They were amazing. Just a little heat. Flavorful. Satisfying. The tortillas were soft, but with just a bit of crispiness on the outside. The grated carrots were a cool, sweet counterpoint to the salt and heat of the other ingredients. And the sauce!
For serious, I’d gladly make the trip just to get more tacos.
This was a small adventure, but delightful. I’m glad that the thought of mortality doesn’t strike the same fear in me that it did years ago. I’m grateful that I got to see and socialize with my friends. I’m happy to spend time in a beautiful, biodiverse place. I’m glad for delicious food, good conversation, and beautiful ink.
I will never cease to be simultaneously baffled, amused, and horrified by the sheer number of tiny, pointless ways that the human body can go wrong.
I don’t mean cancer or anything that serious. Just tiny things, like hitting your late twenties and discovering that your brain is no longer able to regulate its own cerebrospinal fluid. Or going to sleep and waking up with a ruptured disc in your spine. Or, as I recently discovered, calmly crocheting on your couch and having part of your eyeball fall apart.
It’s fine. (Really.) It sounds much worse than it is. It seemed much worse than it is when it happened — a sudden flashing of light around the edges of my vision, and the appearance of a blobby, dark-bordered circle in the middle. No pain. No blindness. Not even blurriness. Just something quite a bit stranger than the usual slate of pseudotumor-related optical batshittery to which I’ve become accustomed.
It’s a posterior vitreous detachment, and it’s what happens when your ocular jellies kind of pull away from their attendant structures. The flashes of light happen because the retina has no receptors for pain, and the sagging vitreous jelly pulls on stuff it shouldn’t. The little blobby circle is a shadow cast on the retina from the detached bit. It’s gross, it’s weird, and it’s also bizarrely… harmless?
I mean, it isn’t ideal, but it’s also something that just kind of happens to people. I’ve read that it’s more common in older people, but not exactly uncommon in younger people. My history of papilledema may make me more susceptible, since nothing inside my eye it shaped the way it ought to be anymore to begin with. It isn’t even caused by in injury, the way a detached retina can be. It’s just one of many ways your body can decide to be uncooperative.
And, as with so many other small, horrifying annoyances, there’s not really much to be done. It’s just kind of like that now and will remain so for the next few months until a) my brain retrains itself to ignore it, and/or b) the stringier bits settle to the bottom of my eye. There’s a pretty high likelihood that I’ll develop a retina tear or detachment at some point, but, until that happens… eh.
I can’t say I’m happy about it, but it could be a lot worse.
Eyes were a terrible idea. Mortal existence is a scam.
Years ago, people wrote about the “dead internet theory.” It’s the idea that humans on the internet are a bit like habitable exoplanets — tiny islands in a vast ocean of mostly nothing, where that “mostly nothing” is made up of bots. Now, it’s half conspiracy theory and half grim joke on the continued enshittification of content creation. Whether it’s the coordinated effort of state actors or the natural consequence of the drive for automation and engagement, it seems like we’re hurtling toward a dead internet on a rocket cycle.
So, I’m here to tell you that this blog is entirely human-generated. I come up with the ideas myself, I outline them myself, I research them myself, and I write them myself. I either use my own photos or seek out those by human photographers. When I’m researching, I avoid sources that appear to come from generative AI. The only parts of this process that’re automated are basic grammar, spelling, and SEO compliance checks.
Photos like this vignette of a pen and journal with *squints* crystals and a dried orange slice, I guess. Photo by Alina Vilchenko on Pexels.com
I don’t know who to attribute it to, but I read a great comment not long ago: “How could I be bothered to read something that nobody could be bothered to write?” It’s simple, but it stuck with me. If I can’t be bothered to write something, why should I assume that anyone would bother reading it?
There’s also the fact that I genuinely enjoy making stuff. I like writing. I like making art. I like learning new skills and using them to create things. I can’t imagine automating any aspect of this, because I don’t understand what the point would be. I’m also disabled in a way that makes creating things legitimately difficult. If someone can lose the use of their arms and re-learn to paint using only their teeth, I can sort myself out.
In my experience, arguments in favor of content creation using generative AI seem to come largely from a desire to be someone who has created something, not the desire to create something. This isn’t a strange belief, either — not everyone enjoys the messy, ugly phase that every creative project goes through in the beginning, when the words are unedited, the colors are flat, the melody hasn’t come together, and the bread hasn’t proofed yet. I just think the answer lies in finding a different means of self-expression, not in getting an algorithm to do the hard part.
Every weird turn of phrase and wack idea present here is entirely organic. They’re products of my experiences filtered through my sideshow-quality mind.
(This also means I’m sometimes slow to respond to comments, soz.)
Kiko has always been a “daddy’s girl.” The kind of cat who’s content — nay, delighted — to sit on my Handsome Assistant’s lap for hours at a time, gazing up at him with an expression that could only be called “worshipful.”
Don’t get me wrong, she loves taking small naps on me. But if he’s available, it becomes much more, “This is my daddy’s house. That idiot lives here too.”
So on Thursday, when she ignored him to come snooze on my stomach and gently headbutt my face, I was surprised.
“Am I dying?” I joked. “Don’t say that. You know she loves you,” he replied.
Anyhow, 10:00 Friday morning. I woke up with a nagging backache of a kind I have uneasily come to associate with pyelonephritis. Even though I hadn’t had any urinary symptoms beyond the “maybe I should have a glass of cranberry juice about this, just in case,” kind, I was somehow progressing into the worst pain of my life. I tried taking a hot bath, just in case it was a muscle or joint thing. When I was in danger of passing out and drowning, I crawled to my Handsome Assistant’s office door and pounded on it.
“Is everything o-“ “help“
No position was comfortable, or even marginally less agonizing, so I kind of did the worm on the floor for a while as he looked things up, asked me questions, and decided it was time for a ride in the Wee-woo Wagon.
Ten minutes after that, I was loaded in the back of an ambulance and shot full of fentanyl and Zofran.
“Is it helping?” One of the paramedics asked. “It’s… I still feel pain. But in a way that’s hard to care about,” I replied. “Yeah, it does that. I have some other stuff that’s more dissociative.”
I don’t remember what I said after that. I’m pretty sure it was something akin to that everyone in the ambulance was now my friend except for this one light that was kind of strobing in a way that I Did Not Appreciate.
It being early January, every ER was swamped. (Also, contrary to popular belief, arriving in an ambulance does not get you seen faster than if you walk in the door. You get triaged just like everyone else no matter how you get there.) Fortunately, the ambulance guys had started an IV so I was able to get some more medication for nausea and pain while I had to wait. Also, because I compulsively apologize when I’m afraid or in pain, I did that to pretty much everyone I came in contact with. If my mind couldn’t find a reason to apologize, I just said “Thank you” over and over instead.
At one point, my Handsome Assistant inspected the various doors, closets, and cubbies in the room. He found this closet/wardrobe type of arrangement and decided it was a good time to go to Narnia. (Also that black box is an Xbox mounted to the wall, because this room used to be/occasionally still is used for pediatrics. No games or controllers, though. I think you have to ask for those.)
Everyone was very nice and extremely helpful. I briefly talked to a teledoc when they were initially triaging me, so they could order some pain meds and initial testing (a CT scan, some bloodwork, and a urinalysis) while I had to wait for a room. My Handsome Assistant handsomely assisted me by occasionally asking how things were progressing, if I could have some water or ice chips, and so on. One of the nurses noticed he called me “they,” so she asked what my pronouns were just to make sure.
“Honestly, I do prefer ‘them.’ But I’m in the ER, you could call me Donald Duck and I’m really not gonna worry about it,” I explained, around a mouthful of ice chips.
There were ultrasounds. An offer of morphine. Ultimately, it looks like it’s a urinary thing of some kind, and my immediate future looks like a whole lotta antibiotics, phenazopyridine, and heating pad time.
Hat tip to everyone in the ER, though. The doctors were thorough, the nurses were very chill and understanding, and the imaging technicians/various -ologists did a lot to help put me at ease. I feel like I’ve been dragged over several miles of gravel road, but I’m probably going to be fine.
But anyway, the point I’m trying to make is that, should you feel a deep, continuous ache in your lower back, and stretching, massage, etc. don’t seem to help, get thee to a doctor instanter. Don’t wait. Not only can it be very dangerous, but it also hurts super badly the entire time.
Hello, I haven’t forgotten about you (collectively) or gotten bored with writing here or anything. Mainly I’ve just been massively preoccupied with carving little guys out of wood to the point that most of my fingers aren’t working as they should and typing has become somewhat of a challenge.
I resonate strongly with this. In fact, I become intractable if I’m made to go too long without creating weird little guys.
The actual day of the solstice passed uneventfully for us, as it often does. It’s the shortest day and darkest night of the year, and, since it isn’t widely observed in the US, my Handsome Assistant (who has been assisting me handsomely by doing things like opening jars and turning doorknobs until my hands work again) didn’t have time off.
We did exchange gifts this holiday season — a kilt, a book he’d wanted, and a small sculpture for him, and a fancy new lyre and a small sculpture for me. We also followed our annual tradition of eating pie and watching horror movies.
Theoretically, Yule should be about anticipation. About hope. The shortest day and coldest night give way to gradually lengthening days as the sun makes its gradual return. It’s been kind of hard to feel hopeful, though, for reasons I probably don’t need to enumerate here. If there is, it’s in the form of a brewing tension before a crisis point.
Shit feels a bit fucked, really. If you haven’t exactly been filled with Yuletide wonder and hope, you aren’t alone. But that’s okay. In the words of a friend of mine, “hope is poison. Spit it out and fight.”
If you don’t have the energy for all the “new year, new me” stuff, you’re not alone either. Save it. There are enough other battles to fight. Sow an edible plant. Reskill. Learn to make one inexpensive, shareable meal really well. I know I kind of harp on it, but these are very small things that contribute to the resilience of you, your family, and your community.
Here’s hoping for a return of strength and light to all of us, as the days grow warmer and brighter. I’ll return with a much more fun post about finding weird little mushrooms tomorrow.
Marble Crow 