If you’d like to join me in helping Lakota families and/or rural libraries this year, please read this post. Over 6 weeks in 2019, we raised $2669.94 for the Lakota families, touching 27 lives. What can we do in 2020?
Current total: Lakota, $1,816.35; Rural libraries, $346.69.
Week 29 of COVID in the Bay Area.
Week 29, Day 199: Between JB and Seamus, and now TBD nickname Smol Human, I am not getting anything like enough sleep.
I was teetering on the very edge of the cliff of No Patience, and nearly bit off PiC’s head for asking me any questions.
I had to take several deep breaths and a giant step back, and stop working for a little while. I did a spot of organizing. Stress cleaning usually evens out my mood and stress organizing was close. It took the edge off at least but it was enough for me to realize just how tired I was. I never snap at PiC.
After I realized that I’d been woken up or disturbed no less than a dozen times over the night, I gave up trying to fight and went to lay down for a short 30 minute rest. I really needed a couple hours but I did not have that luxury on a Monday. We made it through but not without a lot more bumps and bruises along the way.
After hours, I discovered Seamus, fresh off one round of medications yesterday, has developed yet another problem! That poor pup cannot get a break. I gave him some medication and monitored it but he neither improved nor seemed in distress so we left it til morning to talk to the vet. (more…)
If you’d like to join me in helping Lakota families and/or rural libraries this year, please read this post. Over 6 weeks in 2019, we raised $2669.94 for the Lakota families, touching 27 lives. What can we do in 2020?
Current total: Lakota, $1,732.74; Rural libraries, $321.62.
If you’d like to join me in helping Lakota families and/or rural libraries this year, please read this post. Over 6 weeks in 2019, we raised $2669.94 for the Lakota families, touching 27 lives. What can we do in 2020?
Current total: Lakota, $1,732.74; Rural libraries, $321.62.
‘I Have Stage Four Cancer, But I Will Not Live Like I’m Dying.’ I can’t help but think that JB’s morbid streak comes from me because when I read articles like this, I think harder about all the ways I have to figure out how to replace all the things that I do in our family should I be out of the picture. But that’s a rather transparently desperate attempt to impose control over something you can’t control. I couldn’t replace PiC with systems and preparation if our roles were reversed. Not by a long shot.
If you’d like to join me in helping Lakota families and/or rural libraries this year, please read this post. Over 6 weeks in 2019, we raised $2669.94 for the Lakota families, touching 27 lives. What can we do in 2020?
Current total: Lakota, $1589.82; Rural libraries, $321.62.
Our long term goal is to replace our day job income with passive income before my health prevents me from working. I know from my Mom’s experience that qualifying for or relying on disability is incredibly tough or near impossible here in CA. Aside from that, I aim to do my best to make the most of what we can do while we can.
I redeemed a $10 reward from Achievement early this month but they still haven’t paid or replied to my emails. Not sure what’s going on with that. *update: I’ve contacted them four times via ticket and email, AND tweeted them twice. They just like the tweets and do not answer them. What is going on??
If you’d like to join me in helping Lakota families and/or rural libraries this year, please read this post. Over 6 weeks in 2019, we raised $2669.94 for the Lakota families, touching 27 lives. What can we do in 2020?
Current total: Lakota, $1589.82; Rural libraries, $321.62.
While I’m still not yet optimistic that we’ll see true and lasting changes in society after just two weeks of outrage and protests, I do feel like this time feels different and this article talking about protests in small towns across America is exactly why I sensed a difference. I don’t know if it’ll last, I truly hope it does, but I was startled by the number of people from small places I was familiar with coming out to protest. Even my predominantly middle class white suburban hometown turned out.
The ‘3.5% rule’: How a small minority can change the world – “Overall, nonviolent campaigns were twice as likely to succeed as violent campaigns: they led to political change 53% of the time compared to 26% for the violent protests.
Music’s week during the protests: “It’s hard to walk into a store knowing I may not get service because of the color of my skin, it’s tiring to remember to get a receipt because I don’t want to get stopped for shoplifting. It’s painful to think about my brother getting pulled over for a traffic stop and having guns pulled on him (which actually happened, in front of our house, when we were in high school). In my particular corner of the world, it’s hard to be many of my friends’ only black friend. It’s hard to ignore the Trump-supporting crap my in-laws post. It’s hard to surf social media (which I have to do for my job) and see the awful racist stuff people post, the whataboutism, the well-meaning but tone-deaf stuff from “allies.””
If you’d like to join me in helping Lakota families and/or rural libraries this year, please read this post. Over 6 weeks in 2019, we raised $2669.94 for the Lakota families, touching 27 lives. What can we do in 2020?
Current total: Lakota, $1,021.58; Rural libraries, $321.62.
Weeks 7 and 8 of shutdown in the Bay Area.
We have a bit of a routine now. Mornings: Walk dogs, feed dogs, breakfast. JB has a lesson online, PiC and I work during that period (I oversee the lesson just as a behavior monitor.) Usually they are released to go hang out with PiC for a snack and games after the lesson unless he has conference calls. Afternoon: Lunch, I wander out after I’ve cleared the critical parts of my work (if I’m lucky). I’m juggling my work, training new staff, giving feedback, overseeing policy issues and questions plus the usual household stuff: ordering supplies, watching our spending, thinking about how to organize our lives a little bit better.
Week 7, Day 1: I had to run an important errand today and it threw my entire work groove out of whack. It took hours to get focused on work again, and before I knew it, I was derailed again by fatigue. Rude.
I did get lucky with the weather though! The sun was shining fiercely enough to be warm even with the usual gusty wintry winds we get through our neighborhood, so I set up camp in the garage for a couple hours to get “beach weather” while working. Ahhhh….. The change of scenery really did my mind and body good. I still felt ill and tired, but it did boost my spirits for a good hour and I’m grateful for it.
Week 7, Day 2:
I had to get checked out today and that was really weird. My second solo outing in two days, after 40 days of being home and around the neighborhood only on short walks, and I was feeling such strangeness of being out and about when the world is so altered. Seeing and talking to people at the doctor’s office was also incredibly strange. Some people were reassuring, some people were brusque and off-putting. Some people were slightly hysterical about the medical building’s policies.
One enormous sigh of relief: The possible crisis with PiC’s job blew over. We will be seeing some changes in May, details still unknown, but I’m so many kinds of grateful that it’s not the layoff that we were concerned about.
I’m thinking about how my mentor used to tease me about my 12 month cash emergency fund. She considered it excessive. It could be excessive for her with her very very stable job but I remember the Great Recession far too clearly not to want an 18-24 month cash fund. THAT was probably too much, though, considering how behind I have been with investing for the future. On the one hand, yes it was important to get off my caboose and invest. The habit was the important thing. On the other hand, considering last year’s high prices, I may have been better served if I had held on to the 18-24 month cash and invested a portion of it this year. Wait. No. That’s not true. In a pandemic, I wouldn’t have been able to let go of the cash and I still wouldn’t have made any inroads into our investing goals. Never mind. Hindsight fails to account for the behavioral changes I needed to make.
Anyway. The point is, if we hadn’t had a year of cash in hand, that concern over PiC’s job earlier this month would have been full blown panic. Facing one income when we need 2 to cover our expenses, less than a year of cash, the stock market down, and being stuck at home during a pandemic? Nope. No way. Eliminating one of those four factors as an issue made a big difference. Going down to one job with 12 months cash would let us hold out for about 18 months before having to sell stocks. If facing a recession and a down market, the longer we can wait to tap those stocks, the better.
Of course I don’t know what the heck the market is doing now or why.
If you’d like to join me in helping Lakota families and/or rural libraries this year, please read this post. Over 6 weeks in 2019, we raised $2669.94 for the Lakota families, touching 27 lives. What can we do in 2020?
Current total: Lakota, $640.74; Rural libraries, $321.62.
Seamus
This pupper continues to be our beloved buddy of many veterinary woes. He’s suffering from moderate arthritis, chronic eye problems, incontinence, and his usual dietary and/or environmental allergies. He’s on a mini-pharmacy of medications to keep him as comfortable as we can: 6 medications.
We’re washing his bedding 2-3 times a week some weeks because his bladder is so unpredictable, so we have to add yet another medication to his pharmacy.
His attitude has backslid quite a bit. He’s so grouchy when he doesn’t get his way now! He’s also restless randomly at night sometimes, waking us up at 2 or 3 am to go out for a pee. I’m constantly watching him like a hawk for any stumbles, he has taken us by surprise a few times falling on his face or falling over sideways without warning.
Sera
Training her has been a roller coaster of many stomach-twisting drops.
It took us several months just to find a treat that she gave half a hoot about (Beggin Strips of all things) after several months of trying to find anything that she cared enough about to even notice when she saw other dogs. I thought we were on the upswing and then she had an incident where she totally misread the situation thinking a dog was a threat and freaked out.
From that point, she was so reactive, so upset at the mere sight or sound of other dogs that I was straining with my entire body and soul to keep her restrained on our walks. I was a walking stress case, constantly worrying. It didn’t matter if they were barking at her or just running past, she was fearful and that made her aggressive. Her manners were all shot to hell again, too. She’d meet small humans and leap at them in her excitement. (more…)
Week 29 of COVID in the Bay Area.
