In which I’m blogging because I’m not scrolling Twitter.

TWITTER:

I waste a remarkable amount of time on Twitter. Used to enjoy it, but now it’s more a habit than a pleasure. Sometimes it’s fun, still, and there are quasi-meaningful interactions with other users, but most of it’s just crap: the absurdity that is the White House, the bad performance art that is Fox news, international news of wars, crimes against humanity, the occasional interesting tidbit about an old word or some science. But most of it is really just unadulterated crap: recycled jokes, married women saying mildly clever coquettish things for male attention, pet pics, ads, and vitriol.

Now it’s been “improved” into a site that does not show you content chronologically; you see others’ Likes in addition to their Retweets; and the mobile app some months ago started refreshing to the top on its own, hiding older content and re-displaying seen content.

That was annoying, so I’d switch to the site in a mobile browser. But now the browser version has started doing that, too. You’ll be reading a tweet, and the thing will just reset to the top on its own.

Too annoying. Tab closed.

GERMS:

It’s been, oh, around 72 hours or so since a co-worker showed up visibly ill and breathed all over everything, and I now feel what may be the beginnings of Coming Down With Something.

Am I irritated as fuck? Why yes, yes, I am! Stay home when you’re actively shedding goddamned germs, people, especially if you work in public!

There are people out there, like me, who JUST DON’T LIKE BEING SICK, thank you, and worse, there are those who will FUCKING DIE FROM THE COMMON COLD, and you might be breathing on their caregivers in your public job, so do your best to stop it from spreading. It’s your civic goddamned duty. If you can afford to work in Uptown, you can afford a couple days off when you’re contagious. Working while sick is not a praiseworthy sacrifice indicative of a good worth ethic, it’s rude and, at a stretch, quite possibly involuntary homicide.

BIRTHDAY:

My birthday is Saturday. I’ll be 50. No friends or family in the area, so no party. At least I won’t have to put up with macabre black bunting and balloons and over the hill jokes, but also, nobody’s planning shit, so, yeah? Not gonna say I’m not disappointed about not celebrating my big five-oh with a proper party. Nobody cares about 38 or 47, but 50?

It’s looking most likely at this point that I’ll be snot-filled and bed-ridden for the day, but if not, I’m considering requiring I be taken on a date to a jazz supper club about twenty minutes away. Wear a dress, some makeup, a cocktail ring, eat a $25 plate of food, come home. Sounds fun!

DISHES:

I have to do dishes at work now, so doing them at home is making me mad. I grumble about it under my breath.

It’s sorta like my internal monologue when I was married and infuriated, except my current partner actually, you know, supports me, so mostly I just want a professional sink and sprayer setup because domestic dishes are stupid.

CHILI:

I made three bean vegetarian chili today in the Instant Pot. Came out yummy!

WEIGHT:

Having a job that requires me to move around has not only destroyed my feet (ye gods they hurt!) but I think might be helping me lose a little weight. I haven’t taken my measurements or anything, but my gut seems slightly less gigantic.

At the very least, my Google Fit app pings me each shift to congratulate me for taking my 10k steps for the day! I mean, it’s not like I’ve become sporty, but compared to the nothing I’ve been doing the past three years, it’s an improvement. A painful one for my feet, sure (ye gods they hurt!), but hey.

WEATHER:

It cooled down from the 90’s! Wore a hoodie and a scarf the past two times I walked to and from work; tonight it’s rainy and cool and I have the window open and it smells nice!

PHONE:

My phone, which works excellently, is doing that things all phones do after a couple of years: it’s telling me its full.

I have a massive SD card in it, but apps bloat endlessly. Apps also flat-out refuse to work if they get old enough, so you have to let them update in order to even use them, and then one day your phone’s full.

App bloat pisses me off. I remember when devs would try to keep code small and efficient, but the expectation now is of endless hardware and processor improvements, so nobody cares. In a few months, my phone will start telling me it can’t update installed apps, and then I’ll spend half a year deleting things until I’m down to a quarter of what I’d actually like to have installed, and then I’ll need to buy a new phone.

Cell phones are marvels of technology, they truly are, but the expectation of endless hardware upgrades is just humanity being fucking wasteful and dumb.

CLINGS:

I cannot wait until next Monday because I’m going to put THESE up!

I adore me some holiday window clings, I truly do!

HOBBY:

My traveler’s notebook/fountain pen thing is still going strong. I have a dozen (cheap Chinese) fountain pens now (anybody who’d drop $700 on a pen is a weirdo), and a half dozen bottles of ink.

Look at this precious little lipstick-sized swirled teal mini fountain pen!

Occasionally I go over to the Java Hut and practice calligraphy over a latte, though only for fun; I have no intention or expectation of actually mastering it.

It’s pleasant and distracting; much better than scrolling Twitter!