Sunday Coffee – Hail the Graduate

Posted on May 31, 2020 by Thistle

Fun little family history: My mom was born in 1957, and she graduated high school in 1975. I was born in 1979, and graduated high school in 1997. My middle son, Ambrose, was born in 2002, and he’s graduating in 2020. Ironically, there’s a good chance that he won’t carry on the tradition. He’s aromantic and uninterested in any kind of relationship, and definitely doesn’t want to have children. But I still think it’s a fun little accidental “tradition” in my family!

Class of 2020, though, eh? What a year to graduate! But all things considered, if one of my three children had to graduate in a year where they didn’t get to see their friends to say goodbye, they had no graduation ceremony, and the last few months of the school year were chaotic, Ambrose is definitely the best option. He has good relationships with his in-person friends online (Discord! Minecraft servers! Tik Tok! Text chat groups!) and doesn’t feel the need to be in personal contact with them. Prom, summa awards, senior awards, etc didn’t matter to him. He was never interested in the graduation ceremony and wanted to skip it anyway. In fact, the only thing that has bothered him about any of this was missing the last few months of the ping pong club he accidentally started** and having to do online school (which he hates).

These last few months of lackadaisical learning and not-really-turning-in-assignments notwithstanding, Ambrose is graduating as a summa student and is planning to go to one of the local community colleges that have a baking associates degree. As parents, Jason and I are trying to adapt to the lack of finality that usually comes with a graduating senior’s various ceremonies. Today we’re hosting a Zoom graduation party for him, where Jason insists we play too-many-repetitions of Pomp and Circumstance while Ambrose is forced to wear the horrid graduation gown for the camera. Ha! Last weekend, we took him down to the school to get a few grad-photos. We let him choose how quirky they would be, so in addition to his cap and gown and summa cord, he’s wearing flip-flops and his gold cloak. Because Ambrose.

It’s been a weird year. But regardless, we’re very proud of Ambrose and all he’s done in his school career – especially outside the traditional academic achievements. He’s saved all his earned and gifted money for years instead of spending it, learning how to budget for the future and items he particularly wants. He started clubs and gathered groups of friends who would be considered unpopular outsiders in most schools, and made them notorious and popular in unconventional ways. He has become a district-wide legend as “that kid who wears the cloaks,” and people spot him and point him out at UIL, sports events, etc. Ambrose has participated in UIL for various math and science categories for most of high school, and he was nominated this last year for homecoming and prom king. He’s kind to his classmates, has kept a sense of individuality that often gets dulled in a public school setting, reports bullies (of him or others) without hesitation, and been part of many clubs/groups from National Art Honor Society to German Club. And of course, he probably knows more about Star Wars than anyone I’ve never known, down to minutia of individual TV series and books, and editing Wookipedia articles. Heh.

Ambrose is an awesome kid. He’s got the best sense of humor of anyone I know, often in subtle ways that take a moment to register. He’s confident, willing to take risks, and ready to be out in the world on his own, in his own weird way. He’s awesome.

Congrats to you, Ambrose. Class of 2020 has a really good one in you.

**At the beginning of his senior year, Ambrose texted a code to Remind to join one of his classes, but got one number wrong in the code. He accidentally joined a ping pong club at some other school, and he thought it was so funny, he started telling people that he was in the ping pong club. It was a joke at first, but it turned out that his physics teacher loved ping pong. Ambrose, his close friends (known as the “sauce squad”), and this teacher began the club, shoving together science lab tables as ping pong tables. Over the months, the ping pong club grew to have dozens of members, and would often go on until after 7pm on Wednesdays as they had tournaments. By the time spring break came around and quarantine ended, they were talking about having to split tournaments due to too many participants. Ping pong became one of Ambrose’s favorite things in the world, and in typical Ambrose fashion, it didn’t matter how good he was. He just enjoyed it for the fun.

*****
Note: This post was pre-drafted before the current protests began. My heart is so heavy right now, and I know that it’s not even the slightest fraction of what someone without my privileges goes through on a daily basis. Nothing in our country is okay right now. I don’t talk very often about politics on this blog, but I couldn’t not address this. I stand as an ally in every way I can – vocally, financially, and with a determination to learn more so that I can root out any blindness or bias in myself. My heart is heavy for the families of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, and the countless others who have been attacked and/or lost their lives due to the color of their skin.

Posted in Personal | Tagged | 2 Comments

Quarantine Diaries – Week 11

Posted on May 29, 2020 by Thistle

It has been a whirlwind week, with the end of school, Morrigan applying for summer jobs (in this environment – eek), lots of virtual parties, and tons of insane weather. Summer is here, whether we like it or not (not, in the case of south Texas – 100+ degrees is NOT FUN, and we’ve already had those days earlier than normal). And people are pretending that the virus is gone. We’re about to enter some very dark times. You know this tarot card that says everything is fine? Everything is not fine. Not in the world, not in the country, not with this virus, not at home. Everything is not fine.

Note:  If your mental health is at a point where you cannot bear to hear more about quarantine stuff, skip to the bottom of this post for a list of positives and highlights and Nice Things. We all need some of that right now!

This Week in Numbers
We ended last week with 2371 cases and 64 deaths. This week continued not only with another large jump in our numbers, but a continuation of the steady increase in hospitalizations we’ve had all month. Hospitalization numbers can’t be attributed to more testing or asymptomatic folks, so the steady increase all month is a worrisome sign (one that the city officials also agree is worrisome). By Wednesday, we had the highest number of hospitalized folks we’ve had so far, and that went even higher yesterday. Sigh.

  • Friday, May 22nd: 2392, 66 deaths
  • Saturday, May 23rd: 2418, 66 deaths
  • Sunday, May 24th: 2442, 69 deaths
  • Monday, May 25th: no data – holiday for city officials
  • Tuesday, May 26th: 2480, 69 deaths
  • Wednesday, May 27th: 2525, 70 deaths
  • Thursday, May 28th: 2583, 71 deaths

So that puts us at a total of 212 cases this week, and a total of 7 deaths. It’s a slight drop in case numbers, but a peak in hospital cases, and the largest weekly death total we’ve had except for that first nursing home outbreak.

This Week in San Antonio
In the same trend that’s been happening for all of May, the state governor decided that we don’t need to wait on real data to continue opening things up. He removed all air travel quarantine restrictions that have been in place for months. He also announced reopening of water parks (indoor and outdoor), driver’s ed programs, and food-court dining areas. Some of those reopened businesses – like driver’s ed programs – make social distancing impossible, and there’s still no mask requirement, just a “suggestion.” Basically, there is very little that isn’t openable here in Texas – pretty much arts concert halls and arcades and maybe thrift stores? I’m not even sure about the last one. And this comes amid giant outbreaks in certain parts of Texas (like the meat-packing plants in the panhandle) and the steady rise over the last month of hospitalizations in metro areas across the state, not just San Antonio.

(my meagre attempt to help the economy)

Unfortunately, the situation is being compounded by the high levels of unemployment – reports indicated that we went from 4% in March to 14% in April – and by the state blocking efforts by our local officials to continue to provide housing guarantee to renters (evictions can resume in June, the state says). Things are becoming overtly politicized here, as far as an idiotic county politician announcing this week that COVID19 is a democratic hoax to discredit Trump, and telling people that to be republican is to take off your masks and refuse to use social distancing. Sigh. She’s not the first person to say all this of course, but it still makes me so angry.

Can I just take a moment here to address the rational side of human beings, regardless of your political leanings? Please, stop listening to politicians of all parties. Please, stop listening to the media regardless of whether you lean left or right. Find someone you know and trust who works in the medical industry: a doctor, a nurse, a janitor, a secretary in a clinic, a security guard in a nursing home; it doesn’t matter – just a person in close contact to medical facilities that are dealing with COVID19 on a daily basis. Talk to that person, talk to several people, and learn the truth of the seriousness of this virus. Get their recommendations and follow them, NOT politicians or media pundits. Let’s take the politics out of this discussion. Please.

Other noteworthy news from this week: We’re starting to see MIS-C show up in kids who have been exposed to COVID19, regardless of whether or not they actually contracted COVID19. // There have been reports of changes in rat behavior in urban areas due to limitations on the amount of garbage restaurants can throw out – the rats have taken to cannibalism and eating their young, as well as aggressive behavior toward humans, in their search for food. // Local restaurants have begun putting meat surcharges on meals due to virus-related meat shortages, and the cost of beef has tripled in stores.

On a personal note, I wanted to have a little rant against our country judge, who participates in the daily news briefs regarding COVID. The man is old and a bit out of date with modern data, and keeps saying stupid stuff like we don’t know how asymptomatic folks spread the virus (we do!). At least once a week he goes on a rant where he fat-shames people and blames those with underlying metabolic health conditions for their situation. He genuinely believes that overweight and obese people are just lazy and negligent of their health, and says this virus – and the fact that it’s worse for people with underlying conditions – should be a wake-up call for those of us who “refuse” to take care of our health. It makes me want to punch someone (aka him), especially when he also discusses where he eats out every single day as his contribution to the economy. How is THAT taking care of his health? The man is lucky enough to have good genes, while some of us work our butts off at eating right and exercising a lot and STILL suffer from obesity and metabolic disorders. Ugh.

This Week at Home
School officially ended yesterday, though my boys finished last week with the last of their AP tests. Thankfully, neither of them had items at the school to get from lockers and such. They did have to do a book drop-off for textbooks and library books, and Laurence needed to pick up his yearbook. Some other student who clearly wasn’t paying attention got in line right behind us at the school, not observing the six-foot rule. Laurence turned around, surprised to see her right behind him, and stared at her until she realized and backed away. He wasn’t intending this, he was just surprised, but it made me laugh. We also took solo graduation photos of Ambrose this week, and will be having a Zoom grad party for him on Sunday.

Speaking of Zoom parties, we had quite a few of them this week. My sister-in-law’s boyfriend just got his bachelor’s degree, and we had a Zoom party for him. On the weekend, Jason and I attended a live-streamed wedding for one of his co-workers. In a couple days, we’ll have a Zoom birthday party for my nephew’s first birthday.

Not all has been virtual, though – I got to meet up with my dad, stepmom, and sister this week at their house (yard!) over the weekend, and then my mom and stepdad came over on Wednesday to have a yard hangout here. It’s the first time I’ve seen my mom since January! I’m glad there were enough breaks in the storms we had this week (hail, tornado over our house…) that we could arrange that meetup!

(my awful attempt to get a pic of all of us at once!)

Sadly, my mom did relay a bit of news that I find disturbing. First: My aunt is re-opening her private daycare/school in June, and even though the state has mandated that school employees wear masks, she’s already told the parents enrolling their kids that she and my mom (her other teacher) will not be wearing them under any circumstances. OMFG I want to scream. Second, my mom declared this week that she and my stepdad would not be getting a COVID vaccine for a few years. They’ll let “other people” be guinea pigs for it. Shouldn’t surprise me – she’s anti flu vaccine too. Oh, my family…

Positives and Highlights and Nice Things
Many of my happy things this week were already discussed above (Zoom parties, yard hang-outs, grad photos, etc). Here are some other nice things from the week:

  • given that my hiking group is setting up tiny hikes again in June, I ordered two more Buff face masks because they are so much better than traditional masks for exercise!
  • making fun sketch/drawn goals for the summer break
  • awesome deals at Torrid! (Even better, discovering that the dress I bought has POCKETS!!)
  • getting my boxing area set up (thank you Jason!) and feeling like a badass when I throw punches
  • having safe spaces to shelter –> when the tornado rolled over us, plus not getting any damage to the house/yard during the tornado or hail storms
  • playing Scattergories with the boys using all-new-made-up categories
  • live-streamed yoga practice (Yoga With Adriene)
  • uptick in Wowbrary items through the library system

How are the rest of y’all holding up? It’s been a bad week throughout the US (both with the virus and beyond it), and I hope people are okay. Sending y’all love and hugs.

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Wellness Wednesday – Processing Stored Trauma

Posted on May 27, 2020 by Thistle

Last week, I posted this on Instagram and Facebook. It’s long, so I’ve just included a screenshot. I know that might be difficult to read, but I’ve linked out to the public post on Instagram if you wanted to see the original. I apologize for the length, but this post leads me in to the discussion I wanted to have today about trauma stored in the body.

Last year, I read Burnout by Emily and Amelia Nagoski. It changed my understanding of trauma response, specifically in terms of fight, flight, or freeze. In the past, I’ve considered these all as stress responses. Jason, for instance, has an unconscious fight response when confronted by extreme stress. (Example: Once my former brother-in-law thought it would be a funny joke to sneak up on us at a mall and grab Ambrose – then aged 9 – and run, as if he were a kidnapper. Before Jason even registered what was happening, he’d turned and nearly punched him, despite Jason being the most passive, non-fighting kind of person around.) Others have a flight response. When Ambrose sees a spider, for instance, he immediately runs regardless of whether “fight” is a more rational instinct. My stress response has been “freeze” ever since I can remember (maybe aged seven? eight?) and that has only gotten worse over time.

In Burnout, the Nagoski sisters explain that “freeze” isn’t a trauma response, an action, but is instead the opposite, a helpless lack-of-response. If an animal is confronted by a predator, they either run or fight that predator, but if neither fighting nor fleeing is an option, you play dead. This is “freeze.” As an animal, if the ruse works and you don’t end up as a meal, you can later run away safe and essentially complete the trauma cycle. All kinds of trauma can get stuck in your body if the cycle isn’t completed, and a freeze response to stress that could warrant a flight/flight reaction is an indication of deeply- and long-held trauma in your body.

As I said in the post above and in previous blog entries, I have an automatic freeze response and a lot of stored trauma (something I knew even before I learned that “freeze” wasn’t the same physical process as fight/flight). And I want to get rid of it. I don’t like having years-old trauma haunting me with random feelings of grief and anxiety and fear that don’t match my current-day situation. Burnout talked about different ways to complete the trauma cycle and release old stored emotions. The one that struck me at the time of reading was running. (Hence my screenshot post above.) It makes sense – an animal confronted by a predator will run. It’s a physical reaction, and when you complete a run, your body goes through a whole series of physical and hormonal changes. When I took up running again, I didn’t know if it really would help excise old trauma stored in my body, but I also knew it wouldn’t hurt.

I’ve gone out running roughly 25-30 times in 2020 (I’ve never been terribly consistent!). Additionally, I’ve gone on a lot of walks and hikes (especially pre-quarantine), as well as other exercise (yoga, dancing, strength training, whatever – I’m kind of an eclectic exerciser). What I’ve found is that during/after certain workouts, I’m flooded afterwards with rolling waves of some kind of hormone (I won’t pretend to have a clue which kind) that makes me feel lighter and happier, as if I’ve sloughed something off. This has always happened after some workouts, but I’ve become more in tune with the reaction since reading Burnout, and I hope that this is helping me to release stored trauma.

And I wonder if perhaps now is the time to get out my boxing gloves and add a fight-based exercise to the mix, too. It couldn’t hurt, right?

Posted in Book Talk, Wellness | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

Summer Break Quarantine Goals

Posted on May 25, 2020 by Thistle

I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t take any excuse to make goals, would I? Ha!

Well, the boys are out for the summer, even though officially the school year doesn’t end until Thursday afternoon. Their AP tests are done, their finals – if they even had finals – are over, and all graded work had to be in last week. Everyone is out for the summer! Not that it makes much difference, given that they’ve all been home since mid-March, but we’re officially into summer break now, and that means GOALS.

A few years ago, I bought a sketchbook and began a new way of doing things. I drew out a title page – Cultivate a Life I Love – and began to draw out mini-sketches of things I wanted to do or experience in life. It was like a sketchbook bucket list and planner wrapped into one, and included everything from places I wanted to travel, to short-term plans, to house renovations and loose sketches of my happy place. See the link above for pictures of many of my little sketches.

Life has changed a lot over the last two years. Some of the short-term goals I made in May 2018 are no longer applicable (like “I want to do these by my cruise in September 2018”), and of course I’ve moved houses so all the renovation stuff has changed. I’ve also entered a very different place mentally, which is a really huge step forward. This weekend, I decided to revamp the sketchbook, as a rolling “new start.” Instead of “Cultivate a Life I Love,” I called this “The Impossible Dream,” as a tribute to What Alice Forgot, which helped me so much through my ghost-trauma last year in May.

Many of my goals are the same, and instead of re-sketching, I simply referred back to the old pages and left blank space for new sketched goals in the same categories. And because I tend to get really excited about things like “new starts” and “new goals” and “new plans,” I made myself a sketch-page for goals over this summer break through quarantine. Because of course.

Goals for this summer break (5/23 through 8/17) include:

  • Finish the Real Life Ghost Stories Patreon backlog
  • Finish Couch to 5K (three runs to go!)
  • Finish my Yoga With Adriene backlog (~45 sessions, going back to April 2019 eek!)
  • Complete at 100% my 20-20 in 2020 Goals in June and July
  • Finish the next phase of xeriscaping the front yard (which includes digging, leveling, and paving a path and seating area)
  • Build a cat wall (for scratching!)
  • Print photos for frames and birthday coasters
  • Apply to SNHU for the fall semester
  • Go on four (or more!) dates with Jason
  • Go swimming (if possible – this can be nixed depending on covid)
  • Finish my running board (for bibs, medals, motivation, etc)
  • Play Just Dance with the boys
  • Go to a new-to-me location
  • Try a new-to-me fitness or workout
  • Support a local small business (or more than one!)
  • Throw a virtual graduation party for Ambrose
  • Start learning Spanish again
  • Crochet a bag for my Modern Witch Tarot Deck (not pictured)

These include a bit of everything – some fun, some career-oriented, some fitness-related, some creative, some for mental health. They may not all get finished, and I might add more sketches to the blank space at the bottom, but I’ll check in after August 17th (the supposed start date for next semester) to let y’all know how I did (or if I completely forget to pay attention to this at all…)

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Sunday Coffee – Life Without the Library

Posted on May 24, 2020 by Thistle

Every Saturday, I log into my feed-reader to find hundreds of new entries. My library system uses Wowbrary, an RSS feed for newly-ordered books, which updates weekly. I don’t subscribe to the whole of the SAPL system’s new books – that would be thousands and thousands, and I’m not insane! Instead, I subscribe to specific subcategories: Fiction, Audiobooks, DVDs, Young Adult, and Science Fiction/Fantasy. With Wowbrary, I discover when the library has ordered books I’ve been looking forward to, and get myself on the Hold list ASAP. I also discover books I’ve never heard of before, regardless of whether or not I’m interested in reading them. The first year I spent away from San Antonio, I removed my SAPL Wowbrary feeds, and the local library system didn’t use Wowbrary. A few months after the move, I was in a book store and didn’t recognize most of the books on the shelves. That’s when I realized just how valuable the SAPL Wowbrary feed was for me, even if I couldn’t take advantage of the particular library system.

(library landscape)

Y’all know I’m a HUGE fan of libraries and the library system here in San Antonio. I’ve talked about it for years. I don’t buy books I haven’t read except in very special circumstances, and the library is how I fill that gap. Library first is my book motto. Which means the last few months have been hard! In more ways than I anticipated.

So, yes, the library is closed. This means the regular stuff you’d imagine: I can’t pick up my holds that have been there since mid-March. None of the books I ordered before then are moving up in the Hold queue, since no one else can pick up and read their books, either. I have a book on my desk that has been sitting here for months even though I decided it’s not for me, because the drop boxes are closed. I’ve had to order more ebooks, which I’m not generally a fan of reading. I miss the librarians and the folks at the checkout counter of my local branch, who all know me by name. There are no walking events, no Harry Potter Wizards Unite community gatherings, no book clubs, no teen game time, no picking up local newsletters or resources, etc. Just the simple act of walking through rows of books to browse, or checking out the Express shelf for recent items, is highly missed!

But there was one thing I hadn’t really anticipated, though I should have. There’s been almost no Wowbrary activity in months.

It makes sense. I’ve recently found out that many book release dates are being delayed for multiple reasons. Plus, the library isn’t open to receive purchases, so they aren’t ordering very much. I don’t know all the ins and outs of what employees are doing right now – how many are working from home or furloughed etc. Either way, most weeks there’s been maybe five to ten books come through Wowbrary, sometimes only in a single category, and there hasn’t been a single week where books have come through in all five categories that I follow. It’s been a little sad and makes me feel a bit like I’m in a book desert. (Actually, it reminds me of the year I lived in rural Wisconsin, when it took weeks to get books from the library once requested, and when I was so happy and grateful that my library’s branch manager here in San Antonio updated my account so that I could still get ebooks and e-audiobooks from SAPL while I lived there!! They’re the best librarians ever!!)

Yesterday, about a hundred books came through Wowbrary in three of my five RSS feeds. Several were releases from April that I’d been looking forward to, that my library was finally able to order. It’s a good sign! But a better sign is that some of the books weren’t new at all. I saw orders for ebook copies of Germinal, and The World According to Garp, and Cold Comfort Farm. The San Antonio library system is preparing to begin reopening sometime in the near future, and the upswing in orders indicates to me that the action is underway. More orders – and more ebook orders – speak to changes and adaptation.

(my book club at the library, 2012)

I’m excited. The world isn’t as wonderful without libraries. Don’t misunderstand – I want the employees to be safe and I don’t want to open up rashly or too soon. I’m perfectly happy to have digital books or curbside service or whatever we have to do to keep folks safe. But I’m also not going to lie and say that walking into my local branch of the library isn’t going to be similar to moving back to San Antonio after our year in Boston or Wisconsin. The library is my second home, and I’ve missed it.

Posted in Book Talk | Tagged | 6 Comments

Quarantine Diaries – Week 10

Posted on May 22, 2020 by Thistle

I’m changing around the format of this as we’ve passed the two-month mark under quarantine and less is changing on a day-by-day basis. It’s still important to me to track all this, especially as the state government forces us all to open everything up and (I predict) then cause a major spike in illnesses, but I’m going to split it up into categories rather than days.

Same caveat applies, though: If your mental health is at a point where you cannot bear to hear more about quarantine stuff, skip to the bottom of this post for a list of positives and highlights and Nice Things. We all need some of that right now!

This Week in Numbers
Our local health team took a much needed break over the weekend – literally their first break since mid-March – so there was a bit of catch-up in the numbers on Monday and beyond. The city also changed its website, supposedly to make it more user-friendly, but really they just succeeded in putting all the info onto multiple pages instead of one. Ah well. It just means I have a few “no data” days. Also, with asymptomatic testing happening now, there’s been no recovery data since the 15th. It makes sense, as it would be really difficult to count “recoveries” for people who never had any symptoms.

  • Friday, May 15th: 2120, 62 deaths, 1071 recoveries
  • Saturday, May 16th: No data
  • Sunday, May 17th: No data
  • Monday, May 18th: 2213, 62 deaths
  • Tuesday, May 19th: 2278, 62 deaths
  • Wednesday, May 20th: 2322, 63 deaths
  • Thursday, May 21st: 2371, 64 deaths

Totals for the week unfortunately are quite high – 330 new cases and another 5 deaths. I don’t know how much of this can be attributed to asymptomatic testing and how much is due to the early reopening and willful ignorance of people refusing to use masks.

This Week in San Antonio
On Monday, the governor announced his next phase of opening the state, which included specific opening dates and limitations on child care facilities, gyms, massage parlors, bars, bowling alleys, zoos, youth sports, etc. Pretty much the only businesses that can’t open in some capacity now are amusement parks and concert halls (the latter of which has pointed out that they fit fewer patrons than megachurches, so should qualify for opening under these same terms). I still think this is all too soon, especially as the state is up to record numbers of daily cases and deaths. At least the state is still prohibiting gatherings outside of members of your household. That’s one thing to hold on to. Not that most people are paying attention, sigh.

Locally, we’re trying to figure out how things are going to move forward. School districts are starting to make plans for potential hybrid models of learning. There’s legal action in both state and federal courts regarding mail-in ballots for our elections, which have already been moved back several months. Our jail system is becoming massively overcrowded because the state prison system and mental health system haven’t been taking the inmates they’re supposed to for the last few months (not a great thing, given our COVID19 outbreak at the jail). Our libraries, which were originally set to open up again after the 19th, have extended their closure for the foreseeable future, though they’ve announced that a reopening plan is in process. San Antonio extended our shelter-at-home order through June 4th.

Other noteworthy happenings this week:

  • A legal firm here will be offering free wills and estate planning for 600 hospital workers, which is really kind.
  • Vaccine testing is apparently going faster than expected/normal and there’s a possibility that a vaccine will be approved and available by the end of 2020. I hope that’s not just wishful thinking!
  • Carbon emissions worldwide have dropped majorly during quarantine with the shelter-in-place orders.

This Week at Home
I finished the first stage of xeriscaping the yard this week, buying the rest of our plants (mostly mediterranean herbs that will thrive over our insane summers) and planting them. Jason got the mulch down, and it feels great to have one little part of the yard DONE. It only took a few days and cost less than expected, plus I’m really excited to see how all the baby plants are already thriving. I always expect plants to freak out and wither a bit before their roots recover from transplanting, but every single one out there – a total of ~35 – has not only weathered the transplant, but is fuller and putting off new growth already. Some that we didn’t even know should flower have done so! I love this so much. Our little herb garden is going to be such a beautiful jumbled mix! Can’t wait to get to the next phase.

It’s lovely to get the yard prettier, because I’m starting to have more lawn visits. We finally met the neighbors – it’s funny how people view you more kindly if you do something nice to your yard, I’ve noticed – who came to talk about our gardening. We’ve also seen our former neighbors out walking a couple more times. And my friend Stephanie came over to hang out on Sunday. We sat in the shade about eight feet apart; drank coffee and chatted and pointed out all the lizards and mini-dragonflies around us. I forgot to get a picture, sadly!

(ready for covid-safe visits!)

I’ve been struggling a lot this week with mental health issues. May is my heavy PTSD-triggered month, and between that, the heat, the isolation, and the inability to get outside to exercise as often as I’d like, I’m really not doing all that well. But I’m trying, and I’m really looking forward to next month when my hiking group will start having some small (5-person-max) gatherings!

Other notable happenings this week: I donated blood! So happy I was able to do so this time. Jason found hand sanitizer at the store for the first time since quarantine began. Heh. My brother-in-law has been sick for a few weeks and while all the symptoms have been GI, he’s now getting free COVID19 testing through his employer. Fingers crossed! My sister tells us that he still leaves the house far more often than he should.

Positives and Highlights and Nice Things
It was a tough week, so I don’t have a lot to share here, but a few positive things happened (sorry for the repeats from above):

  • finishing the first phase of our xeriscaped garden and the lovely unexpected flowers
  • I was actually able to donate blood! And while Jason still couldn’t donate, he found out that the restrictions barring him should be lifted by August!
  • that awesome video of the Scottish woman who tried to make a mask from socks
  • more pictures and videos of my sister’s foster kittens, who are now six weeks old
  • videos of my mom’s new baby chickens!
  • safe yard meetup with my friend Stephanie
  • Laurence finished his AP test and Ambrose finished his third of four (last one to be done today)
  • my sister (not the same one from above) sent me a digital copy of her wedding video from eight years ago (it was their anniversary this week), which made me very happy because I love that video and it was removed from youtube sometime in the last year

I’ve watched a few very sad things happen for some of you this week and I’m sending all my love. I hope the rest of you are well. Please stay safe as our country tries to John Wayne its way through this virus.

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WW – For Better Sleep: Weighted Blankets

Posted on May 20, 2020 by Thistle

Last week, I discussed my battle with pillows in the war on insomnia. Today, I’m going to discuss weighted blankets and my experiences with those over the years.

First, I adore the idea of weighted blankets. I wanted one for ages after first hearing about them. While it’s easier to find and purchase weighted blankets now, a few years ago this was much more difficult. Back in 2015, Jason contacted a local maker and ordered a custom weighted blanket for my Christmas gift. It was a lovely gift and I absolutely adore this blanket, but sadly, I found I couldn’t use it at night. The beads would spill to one side or another on the large squares, leaving lots of gaps, and the blanket itself wasn’t big enough to cover my entire body as I slept. Additionally, it was heavy enough (20 lbs) that it put too much pressure on my arms and feet. The few times I was able to keep it draped across me properly, I slept much better, but most of the time it wasn’t worth the trouble. I find it better as a lap blanket when I’m feeling anxious.

For a few years, I gave up the idea of a weighted blanket after this experience. Then back in the fall, I saw that Walmart was selling cheap-o weighted blankets. This put them back on my radar. When I began looking for a decent pillow a few weeks ago, I decided to take the plunge and get a weighted blanket as well. I did a little research, and found a 15-lb blanket from Simple Being that seemed right. It had multiple layers to keep glass beads from bunching up, was available in a 60 x 80 inch size (large enough to easily cover me), and made from a cooling fabric (necessary for summer here!). It cost $70, which was on the lower range for weighted blankets but I figured would still be okay.

Unfortunately, the product arrived defected. The materials were cheap, and the stitching was awful and coming apart in places. After one night of using, I noticed a fine sand-like grit all over my bed, and parts of my skin were irritated. However, I slept much better that first night, so I decided to give it a second try. After the second night, several seams ripped open completely on the edges (see pic below), and most of the beads from the middle of the blanket had rolled toward the outside edges. The sandy feel of my bed got worse, and the grit caught in my hair, fingernails, etc. Not good. Returned as defective, do not recommend, would not get another blanket from this company despite its normally good reviews!

More research, because oh my between the pillow and the weighted blanket, my sleep was much deeper even if insomnia-interrupted. The second blanket I bought was a Baloo quilted weighted blanket, 15 lbs, 60 x 80 inches, cooling fabric, $169. More than I wanted to spend, but worth it if it helped me sleep. The blanket arrived on Mother’s Day, actually! I pulled it out of the box and immediately draped it over my body short-ways to feel the weight and how it draped across me. The fabric was wonderful, cool, and smooth, the heaviness even throughout, and my body had an immediate reaction.

Let me say this first: While I love weighted blankets and they’ve helped me to sleep deeper in the past, I’ve never felt a systematic physical/hormonal reaction to them. When I put the Baloo blanket on, my heart rate physically and immediately slowed. The muscles in my legs, torso, and arms relaxed perceptibly, and I began to get chills all up and down the skin of my legs (the same as I get if someone scrubs my back or plays with my hair). It’s the same reaction I have with a really good massage or with touch-therapy, and it didn’t stop after a few minutes. I sat there with that blanket draped across me for over an hour, and the chills just moved to new locations while my body melted into bliss. It was amazing!

Then there was the sleeping. The first night I put this blanket on, I was asleep in under two minutes. While I don’t suffer from can’t-fall-asleep insomnia, I still normally take 20-30 mins to fall asleep. But I was just out. Could have been a coincidence, but there’s literally only been one night I haven’t fallen to sleep quickly since I got this blanket. Better than that, though, the first couple nights I used it, I woke up around 5am and then fell right back to sleep for another few hours.  This doesn’t happen to me. I can sometimes manage to go back to sleep (after tossing and turning an hour or so) if I wake up between 2 and 4am. At 5am, though, I’m toast. I’m just up for the day. I definitely don’t sleep in until 7:30 or 8am. But with this blanket, I just change positions, and the touch pressure moves to a new location and glides me right back into sleep. On the third night, I actually woke up at 5:45 and still managed to fall back to sleep until 7:20! For someone with my kind of insomnia, this is astonishing and feels a bit like a miracle.

My goal in getting a new weighted blanket was to not to end my insomnia (an impossible task), but to prevent outside factors from making the insomnia worse. I never expected that the blanket would actually help me to fall back asleep when I woke in the night. It has exceeded my expectations, however. It’s not a miracle-worker: There was one night when I was sore from manual labor, forgot my sleeping pill, and kept my phone on until almost 11pm, and consequently woke up every hour or so all night. But at the same time, during that awful night of sleep I still managed to go back to sleep after each interruption. Which is really, really impressive.

I ordered a slip-cover from Baloo a few days after I decided to keep the blanket, to prevent my cats from making accidental tears in the fabric and destroying the weight distribution. The cover arrived on Monday. Unfortunately, while it is soft and breathable and doesn’t detract from the blanket’s interesting chills-effect, it is too hot for Texas summers. I’ll save it up for the winter, where it’ll probably make that lovely cool weighted blanket just perfect for the colder nights!

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The Broken Girls, by Simone St. James

Posted on May 18, 2020 by Thistle

Idlewild Hall was once a boarding school for wayward girls. Haunted by the ghost of Mary Hand, the school is plagued with troubles and eventually closes for good. Now, however, someone has bought the property with the intent to restore the Hall and reopen the school, and the ghosts begin to reemerge. Fiona Sheridan, whose sister was murdered and left on the grounds of the school two decades back, intends to get to the bottom of the new owner’s intentions. She ends up uncovering 65-year-old murder in the process.

I enjoyed The Sun Down Motel so much that I decided to try out one of the author’s other books. I’ve been told this one was good and also contained the haunted/ghost story elements, so I checked it out from the library’s digital catalog. Let me start by saying that The Broken Girls, while having a paranormal element, is very different from The Sun Down Motel. The latter is faster-paced, with a lot of creeping chills and terrifying moments. It has less character development and more emphasis on atmospheric setting. The Broken Girls is a thicker, deeper, slower book with fewer chills and less emphasis on the ghost aspect. Neither are necessarily better than the other – they are both good, just very different books that use the paranormal in very different ways.

Personally, I preferred The Sun Down Motel simply because that’s the mood I’m currently in. However, I can say that The Broken Girls feels like a better-written novel. The characters are far more fleshed out and believable (except one, whose personality twist seemed to come out of nowhere). Everything except the ghost aspect is richer. It felt more permanent and less transient as a story. Most of the time, I think it would be the story I’d prefer. It was a really great book, beautifully written, with very few flaws (the only one I saw being that the twist relied on that one character with the undeveloped personality). I highly recommend it. Just don’t go into it expecting it to be more like a campfire ghost story. It’s far more literary than that.

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Sunday Coffee – Adapting to a New World

Posted on May 17, 2020 by Thistle

This week, I looked at the worldwide COVID19 stats for the first time in ages. It’s incredible that some folks think we’re doing okay and that it’s okay to open up the economy right now. The US has a third of the world’s confirmed cases (when we have less than 5% of the world’s population!), and six times the next-highest country’s level of confirmed cases (Spain). If you break those numbers into “per million people,” to take population into account, the worldwide figure is 531, whereas the US’s figure is 4144. Only Spain’s number, 4829, is higher. As for deaths, we have 28% of the world’s deaths as well, and 2.5x higher total deaths than the next in line (UK). This is just plain nuts. The US has done the very worst job in the world at taking care of its populations during this pandemic. How are there some people who don’t see this?

This has all gotten me thinking, particularly because COVID19 isn’t going away any time soon. It’ll be at least 12-18 months until a vaccine can be created, tested, verified, approved, and rolled out, and that’s best-case scenario. We still don’t know if people can catch the disease twice, or how its mutations will thwart vaccine-creation. We have to start thinking of this as a longterm situation and consider how to handle our lives beyond the immediate. Because no, of course we can’t shut down the country for the next year or two. We already know we can’t rely on the federal or state governments to help those in the most need. And we know that the people most affected here are the people we need crucially – essential workers like health care folks. Things can’t stay frozen, but they also aren’t going to go back to the way they were. They need to move forward into a new way of living that takes into account this virus.

That has been my focus this week. I picked up coffee from a coffee shop even though I could have gotten it from home, because I wanted to support that particular business, and they have been doing a good job with social distancing, and it was a fundraiser for the Battered Women’s Shelter. I went to my dad’s house and had an in-person conversation with my extended family for the first time in two months, sitting ten feet apart to stay safe. My husband and kids set up our fire pit on the driveway so we could roast hot dogs and s’mores, and generally hang out outside, saying hello to people who walked by and watching all the other neighbors out in their yards and driveways. I invited my mom and another friend to set up a yard hang-out time as well, which will hopefully happen soon. I began digging up my yard to xeriscape, knowing that I can get curbside pickup at my local nursery. Jason cut his own hair, because this may just be what we have to do to stay safe for the next few years. I donated blood in another community drive yesterday (pic below), and was pleased at how safe everything has been set up.

Jason and I have identified businesses that are doing a really good job to keep people safe, and which are flaunting the rules, and have removed all of our business from the latter. For example, in the past it has been easy for Jason and me to get most of our groceries and household goods from our local grocery store, HEB. Some items, though, weren’t available, and it was easy to pop down to Walmart for them. Walmart, however, has done a HORRIBLE job taking care of its employees. It’s never been good to them, of course, but we never changed our habits before. Now, we’ve removed our business from them altogether and gone to better stores, both local and national. We plan to continue to boycott them even after all this is through, plus any other businesses that are saying f-you to the safety of their employees and customers.

It feels like a good time to be very deliberate in our choices. Not only are we shopping more at local/small businesses and supporting only companies that are taking this seriously, but we’ve been changing our habits. For instance, we’ve been making more vegetarian meals to ease the pressure on the meat industry after they were required to stay open. And we’ve watched other people make similar personal choices as quarantine enters into our third month or longer. Not everyone can be deliberate, I know – unemployment and health and other factors will interfere – but it seems a good time to use whatever privileges we have (be that money, or sewing skills, or time, etc) to reach out and/or help others.

These are the things we can do – adapt to the technology available to us (ebooks, online ordering, curbside pickup, contactless delivery, VPN, Zoom, etc), pick up some new skills like cutting hair or cooking, get better at budgeting and meal planning and consolidating errands and time management. Find ways to socialize and attend to physical/mental health, while continuing to keep the community safe. It can be done. We just have to stop looking backward and start considering the longterm instead.

Some of my favorite new-world innovations:

  • mini greenhouse dining space in Amsterdam
  • Marco Polo, an app for text video chats with people
  • streaming movie releases at home (higher cost for earlier release in lieu of theatres)
  • tele-medicine availability (both Morrigan and Jason have had these over the last two months)
  • adaptations to more work-from-home choices, as a positive impact toward the environment and work/life balance without commutes
  • yard hangouts with family and friends (I know that doesn’t seem like innovation, but it certainly feels like it is!)
  • the Knight Bus feature and spell energy put on the map for Harry Potter Wizards Unite, to make play easier from home
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Quarantine Diaries – Week 9

Posted on May 15, 2020 by Thistle

This week, I began to focus on what life will be like moving forward in a pandemic, which I’ll discuss a bit more on Sunday. It reminds me of when I first began to KonMari my house in 2015 – the first step is to envision what you want life to be like. This quarantine sucks, but it also gives us the opportunity to live life a bit more deliberately, which is both terrifying and exhilarating. We won’t be returning to our normal habits – not soon, because SAFETY, and not ever, because we have the chance to find Better Things right now. The world is a scary place right now, but I can also envision it being more beautiful on the other side as long as we stop pretending things will ever be the same again.

Same as before: If your mental health is at a point where you cannot bear to hear more about quarantine stuff, skip to the bottom of this post for a list of positives and highlights and Nice Things. We all need some of that right now!

Friday, May 8th
Local count: 1835, 56 deaths, 927 recovered. Some interesting data has come out this week about our last few months of quarantine. Apparently, 1 in 5 positive tests have come from health care workers, which just shows how much of the burden is being put on them and why we shouldn’t endanger them further with going out early and without masks! Conversely, so far none of our cases have been from the homeless population despite proactive screening and tests in addition to providing extra resources and housing to as much of the population as we’ve been able to. There’s speculation that their immune systems have become more resistant because of their living conditions. I’m curious what the numbers show in other metropolitan areas with large homeless populations.

Saturday, May 9th
Local count: 1887, 56 deaths, 970 recovered. Jason and I went to the park on Saturday for our early Mother’s Day hike and found so many people there. Jason and I hiked 3.6 miles, and we were almost never alone on the path. We didn’t bring masks because we were out to exercise, but I wished almost at once that we had. Very few people were wearing them – it’s difficult to exercise in them! – but some of those trails were only three feet wide and it’s impossible to maintain 100% social distancing in that situation. I think I’ll avoid that particular park for the rest of this pandemic! Glad the local parks I normally visit aren’t like that.

Sunday, May 10th
Local count: 1901, 56 deaths, 976 recovered. Mother’s Day, including our awesome outing to Mildfire (with masks, social distancing; great business and cause!) and our safe family gathering. Our county judge keeps talking about how it’s great that we’re spending more time with family, out in our yards and neighborhoods, and I agree. Of course, he also keeps saying that we’re spending less time on technology, which is absolutely ridiculous and not in the slightest true…

(hanging out with family outside, and all three are STILL on their phones)

Monday, May 11th
Local count: 1920, 57 deaths, 978 recovered. Asymptomatic tests were finally approved today. Pretty soon our count numbers will skyrocket and I’m not sure how accurate my graphs will be given that a certain percentage of new cases will be symptomless. I’m not even sure how they’ll be counting “recoveries” in asymptomatic cases. We also have caught a few more outbreaks in nursing homes and assisted living facilities. We were already testing everyone in congregate settings – a policy that the state adopted this week based on our success – so we’ve been able to catch these cases early, hopefully preventing too much spread. Lastly, we had several public protests in town today against the hate-speech ordinance the city passed last week. Our mayor calls this “anti-anti-hate speech” which cracked me up. Some people are morons.

Tuesday, May 12th
Local count: 1942, 57 deaths, 1048 recovered. Speaking of morons, our attorney general fired off political letters to San Antonio and several other metropolitan counties, claiming that our local orders are in conflict with the governor’s (they’re not) and citizens’ rights are being violated (also not). He threatened to jail certain local officials, and our county judge lambasted the AG publicly. Go Judge! The politicians (and businesses, to be honest) capitalizing on this pandemic are really pissing me off right now, and I’m sure they’re pissing a lot of you off, too, so here’s a kitty photo to make us all smile just a little.

Wednesday, May 13th
Local count: 1972, 58 deaths, 1050 recovered. We had a bit of mask-related violence in SA today. A man who refused to wear a mask was not allowed onto a city bus, then he got into an argument with a person wearing a mask and shot him. Another man got belligerent when a store refused to let him in without a mask, and assaulted someone. WTF, guys? Stop it!! Also, notice that all the violence is being done by folks who refuse to wear masks? We’re dealing with that population of idiots. // Tough day today at home as Laurence came down with a mild case of food poisoning. Poor kid. I also got a wild itch to start xeriscaping my yard, so Jason and I dug out the first section. I probably went a bit too hard on my body, and additionally ended up covered in mosquito bites. Oy.

Thursday, May 14th
Local count: 2041, 59 deaths, 1051 recovered. A lot of the new cases are coming from even more nursing home outbreaks. // Spent a lot of time in the garden today, digging and churning dirt, lining the border, mixing in manure and moss, and finally, planting the first of the border plants. They’re small now, but within a year these will be large and beautiful! The blisters on my hands are large and awful now, haha!

Totals for the week: 236 cases, 5 deaths. This is down from the giant spike last week, but still higher than it had been prior to the jail outbreak. Again, not sure how helpful these graphs/numbers will be going forward purely because asymptomatic folks are now getting tested.

Positives and Highlights and Nice Things
This has probably been my most social week since quarantine began. I was out at quite a number of places I haven’t been in months, and I saw half a dozen friends and family (all from a safe distance, of course!). I always feel so much more energized when I’m engaging with the community, so it was a good week for me. Highlights include:

  • My friend Stephanie needed someone (last minute) to help her out during the inspection of the home she’s trying to buy, so I got to help. Plus see her and hang out for a few hours at a socially-safe distance!
  • Jason, Laurence, and I walked/hiked 2.23 miles for Ahmaud Arbury
  • woke up to discover Jason had signed me up for the Real Life Ghost Stories Patreon as a Mother’s Day gift!
  • a continued wonderful early Mother’s Day celebration, plus the rest of the fun Mother’s Day weekend
  • lemon mascarpone, mmmmm…
  • my new weighted blanket, which is AMAZING
  • Ambrose finished two of his four AP tests, and Morrigan is nearly done with finals week.
  • Jason finally cut his overgrown hair. (At home. Using our own clippers. Because SAFETY.)
  • first phase of the new yard project started and almost done!

We’re approaching two full months under quarantine conditions now. Oy. How are the rest of you faring?

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