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Please contact me if you have any questions. Thanks. I FOUND OUT NANOWRIMO IS GONE.
Found out in early Nov '25 and I'm kind of devastated, TBH. Health issues and all the craziness of settling in to a totally new environment really kept me in the dark. I feel like an old friend has passed away. đ˘
I was reading a book featuring vampires - as you do - and there was a plot line where a person was particularly compatible with vampires, as in allowing them to take a nibble, so to speak. So, I got to thinking while doing something else, would there be a reverse? Like, someone who'd be either allergic to vampire... body fluids... or, stay with me, who'd be an allergen to that vampire. Their blood giving the vampire a mild to possibly severe histamine reaction, maybe even anaphylactic shock, or whatever the vampire equivalent would be. Okay, so, interesting 'problem' to think on, right?
But, it made me think of ordinary, mundane human allergic reactions; like peanut allergies, fish allergies, etcetera. Right?
My question is: using the peanut allergy as an example, could you have a reaction if you had a peanut allergy and received a transfusion of blood from someone who'd recently, or just regularly, ate peanuts? Is that a possibility?
Peeps knowledgeable about such things, please tell me if you know(?)
hi there is no normal way to say this, however i did accidentally become obsessed with the tragedy of the minotaur being stuck in a dark maze his whole life and got so sad i looked up fix-it fics for it and came across your fanfic from 2012. i know im 13 years late, but i just wanted to say how glad i am to see a happy reteliing of the story. thank you very much for writing it! :D
đ Time means nothing where positive feedback is concerned! đ
Thank you so much for letting me know what you thought, and in such a kind manner. Iâd be delighted if you could leave your comment on the fic, itself, but regardless, Iâm so happy to know it helped you in the aftermath of what is, yes, a kind of depressing ending to a historical tale. Take care and be well. đđđź
It Seems We've Survived - Random Moving Experiences
Well, as it says on the tin, we have apparently survived the move. We are in our new apartment and in the slow, steady process of unpacking boxes and shuffling our metric ton of crap into about a quarter ton of space. There will be lots of donations made to local charities, that's for sure. But, the main thrust is that we're here, we're alive, and it looks like we're set for a while.
More under the cut, if you're you're interested. If not, don't stress it and move on.
I think the worst part of being here is that we came from a place that was barely a few hundred feet above sea level and now we're in a place that is a little over 5,000 ft - you can see the dilemma coming, can't you? The altitude is kicking a couple of us right in the booty and others are dealing better, but still feeling the fatigue of it. I'm one of the ones getting her butt kicked from the inside out - I have nocturnal asthma - because my lungs are convinced we're suffocating most of the time, especially if I exert myself enough to pick up ANYTHING or try to do anything that involves more than walking across a room at a sedate pace. I am Dr Seuss's moss covered three handled family credenza, I swear. Leave me in a corner, give me lots of water, and occasional food, as well as my asthma medicine. Yeesh!
Luckily, most of what I have been doing throughout the move, besides directing traffic and packing a few boxes, has been logistics; which I am pretty good at, when you get down to it. I've been the one who arranged the rental trucks, the moving assistance - and hokey shmokes am I glad we did! - as well as all the paperwork and such for the apartment, changing addresses, updating bank accounts, updating online shopping delivery addresses, updating stores where certain benefit cards can be used, and all that whatnottery.
What's worse, given how much of a spoiled little PC user I am, I had to do the first week's worth of stuff here on my phone. My phone has a tiny screen and tiny buttons and tiny sound and is, did I mention, tiny?! I'm used to using a computer, a desktop, call me a dinosaur, I don't care; I would love to have velociraptor claws sometimes, come to think of it. So, I spent days hunched over my phone, sitting on the edge of our bed mattress, which was on its box spring, and no legs. Yes, I was lucky to have a bed at all, I am aware. However, I have to give myself a few bits of credit for getting everything that needed to be done, well, done. On that tiny phone, with that tiny keyboard, and a lot of customer service calls. Still, it got done. So, yay me! \o/
I think I mentioned it before, but if I didn't, it's important to know that we are moving from a four bedroom, two bath, house to a two bedroom, two bath, apartment. We have 60 some-odd years of crap, each of us, and although we threw away and donated a lot of stuff before the move, we still have a lot of stuff left that we are realizing we can't really use. Some redundancies, of course, but some things just don't translate from a house to an apartment. Those of you who've had to make that move, know what I mean, I'm sure.
Despite all the jiggery pokery, we're here and we're getting it done, integrating a box or two a day into our new living space. On the positive side, the air here is much cleaner than where we left, and I have encountered a surprising number of nice, friendly, helpful people - both casually as well as professionally at businesses. I get a good vibe from this apartment complex and this city, though I'm not real thrilled with the state for various reasons. Political crap aside, because that is a can of infested, fascist worms I don't want to open at this time. I really would just like to bury myself in a hole or put myself somehow in cryo freeze until 4 years have passed. Ugh.
Aaaaanyway... I just thought it was worth an update to those who expressed such wonderful support and kindness at my last few posts about the move. Things should get better as we go, and I am optimistic that we will have a little more RL social life with our extended family, who were a large part of why we moved here. They have been so helpful and generous with their time and with helping us financially, as well, which was so amazing of them and so amazingly necessary for us. I feel blessed and lucky to have such people in my/our life.
Still going to be more expense coming, though, to get the things we need in order to replace some of the stuff that had to be left, mostly due to lack of space in the truck; things like chairs and nightstands and common stuff that you don't think about much until you don't have them at hand. Still, I have to say, these are small problems in comparison to the move as a whole. We'll cope.
Thanks, again, to all those who have expressed support previously, you guys do help, I promise you. Still open to any financial aid anyone can offer, but I am quite aware that most of us are struggling and few will have any extra to share; however, I'm saying it just in case, not to guilt trip or pressure anybody. That's the last thing I want to do.
I'll post more when there's more to know, and I hope to gradually get back into my social media stuff, as well as writing, now that the whole move business and everything attached to it is mostly done.
Well, here it is, a minute from the turnover to October 31st, and we are so not done with this move. BTW, Happy Halloween, everyone; regardless of my kvetching, I hope it's a fun/spooky/spiritual/etc time for everyone - whatever their preference is for a 'good time'.
More behind the cut, if you're interested...
I know I mentioned it before, but we really, really could've used some minions. My pirate and my BFF have taken on so much with this move, mainly due to it being October. All our young, healthy, willing acquaintances and friends are pretty much all working a haunt that runs all month. Otherwise, they have said many times over the months we were working towards this move that they would be happy to help pitch stuff into a moving truck. Of course the bulk of the move would end up being in October. Of course.
So, now, the pirate is unloading the moving truck into our storage space at our destination city, after a 15 hour drive - California has a law that people towing anything have to stick to 55 miles an hour; this drive is a 12 to 13 hour drive at regular freeway speeds. After he's unloaded the truck, he's going to have to turn around and drive that same route again, perhaps faster now that he won't be towing anything, and hope he can get by on naps at the rest stops here and there. I am so worried that something may happen, that he might nod off, that someone else might do the same and this whole endeavor and in tragedy. I try not to stress him by telling him anything I've been worried about in detail, but you know the thoughts come, whether you want them to or not. Anytime we love someone, one of the greatest fears is losing that someone. Still, he's a great driver and driving in the wee hours is probably safer - other than him maybe getting sleepy - due to reduced traffic, at least.
Enough of the stress fears. So tomorrow, well, today, he's going to call the owner's son and find out if they can do the walk-through on November 2nd, to give us until midnight on the 31st to finish loading up. And, if so, he'll also have to call the managers at the apartments we're moving into and find out if us moving in on the 1st of November is acceptable. Pretty sure it will be, because then they don't have to factor in prorating any time from October, and they already have all the deposits in their hands. I can't see any logical reason for them to say no. It's the owner's son(s?) I'm worried about. I highly doubt they're going to dive in and get started doing stuff with the house bang on November 1st - it being a Friday, and all. Certainly I could see it being on the following Monday, but I bet you they will not start anything till after the holidays, other than doing a walk-through and seeing what's what. That doesn't mean they will want to cut us any slack beyond the end of October, though.
Sure, I know at some point in time this will be behind us and we can sleep for a week or two (I may or may not be joking on that). I also know that moving is a stressful thing for many reasons and it's not just me being a wussy pants; it's that way for pretty much anyone going through it. Still, I can't help feeling like I should be stronger. I know I definitely feel like I should be able to do more, but my body seems to think otherwise and isn't listening to me. I still say I need minions, so many minions.
Anyway, I'm just offloading the current stress into some words going out into the void of the internet via Tumblr. For those of you with the patience to read all this nonsense, I hope you will send positive vibes and supportive thoughts into the aether for us.
Thanks to those who have already sent words of support, they have been appreciated and appropriately snuggled and smooched on the head. đ
Alrighty then, back to work! Who needs sleep, anyhow, right?
I've been talking on and off for a few years now about wanting to move. Well, we got the boot in the butt that we didn't want, but probably needed. The owner of our house is getting on in years and she's decided she doesn't want the stress of being a property owner - properties like the house we've been renting since 1995. Yes, that long. More life updating after the cut...
Although she said she would have been quite happy with us continuing as tenants, she's getting on in years and just can't do it anymore. I respect that, even if having to move is stressful, because she's being upfront with us, which I really appreciate.
The problem, for us, has been the high rent prices - due to all the greedy covid BS, we all know about it, so I don't think I need to explain - even though prices have come down a bit lately, they are still not low enough for some of us. By 'some of us' I mean 'us poor folks'. I know there are some who are doing worse than we are, people who don't even have a home to move from, let alone to. Still, I can only speak to my own experiences, though I do want to make it clear I appreciate that we are not on the street or anything like that.
So we've got down to about a week and a half left till we have to be out. Luckily, we finally found a place to move into, which is a small apartment - it's going to be tight to move from a four bedroom house with a two-car garage to a two bedroom / two bath apartment with no garage at all. Again, I have to say, at least we found something we could afford, barely. We also found something close enough to our extended family, which was our goal. So visiting and sharing events and holidays will be reasonably easy. We're going from 13 hours away from them to just under an hour away. Much better. Also, the climate where we're going is about 5 to 10 degrees cooler overall than where we are now. It gets hellishly hot here in the summer, which we have been getting less tolerant of every year. Two of the three in the household that are left - time has been unkind, and not just to us - are physically incapable of doing very much to help with the moving beyond sorting things. My pirate and my BFF (who has been so generously donating her time and effort to help us, even though she doesn't want me to move away) are doing the bulk of all the work and it breaks my heart not to be able to do more. If this had been 10 years ago, even, I would have been able to do so much more and felt a lot less like a glorified door stop. However, it is what it is and we have to deal with it, as it is. The universe may be amazing, but sometimes it can be really cruel; even so, I have it better than many people in the world, and I know it.
So, now you know a little of why I haven't been around the Tumblr community much lately and why now I've been almost completely a ghost. Body and age issues, and now frantically trying to get everything we own out of this house that we've been living in since the mid-90s. I need minions, dammit. Lots of minions!
If anyone wants to help us out monetarily, I'll be happy to accept anything that anyone can spare. Although, knowing how the world is, I'm pretty sure folks don't have a whole lot to spare lately. Don't feel bad if you haven't any to spare, and I mean that, because I have had some of you donate to me in the past most generously, so I know many Tumblrites have big hearts.
So, even if this Tumblr has been pretty empty lately, just know that I will be touching base as I can and I could really use some good vibes thrown my way. Luckily, Good vibes and best wishes are still free. đđ
Those of you who had a mailing address for me, DM me to get the new one, which I know now, if you're still interested. Again, if not, no harm/no foul.
If this post has an aura of melancholy or bitterness or anything like that, it's not intentional and I'm not doing the passive aggressive thing, either; I'm sad to be moving, even though I'm trying to have a hopeful attitude for where we're going, but I've lived in this town since I was 3 years old. It's hard to leave.
Send me any questions you have in an ask and I'll try to get to them as I'm able. Thanks, m'friends.
So, I live in the Central Valley in California. It is astonishingly hot in the summertime here, though we get quite mild winters, of course. I know this is very much a 'first world problem', but I am one of those people who does not do well in the heat - my DNA is about 80% Irish and the rest is a hodgepodge of native American and African. I pretty much look like all of that Irish: super pale skin, which burns easily, and just loves cool and stormy weather, as well as potatoes. Stereotypical Irish chick.
The rest of the whinging is under the cut, so skip on by if you like, it's fine.
So, because it's California, the power company charges an arm and a leg, as well as several first born children, for electricity and gas - mostly electricity. So it's nearly impossible, unless you're well off, to run your air conditioning enough to counter the heat fully in the summer.
Which means, we're already running it at the bare minimum with the thermostat set for 86. Not great, but better than over 100, right?
Now, this house is not new; we've lived here for about 30 years and it was not new when we moved in, either. The air conditioning was replaced about 15-ish years ago and the last time it was maintenance was 2018. You can sense the foreshadowing, can't you?
Yesterday morning, after we'd been experiencing cloud cover that made our 107° high even nastier with all the humidity, our struggling AC stopped working. We had to call the owner, then call someone to come out and figure it out, and now we're looking at it having to be replaced - there's a chance of a temporary repair, but it would lead to more money being paid in the long run. Now we're waiting for the owner to make up her mind what she wants to do
FYI, yesterday was 107 and today apparently peaked at 102, and at almost 6:00 p.m. it is still 101. Also, it's not the dry heat we usually get, of course. Oh, no.
Did you ever have to peel a bathing suit off after you've been swimming? Where are you were pretty sure you might need several people's help and possibly some lube? Yeah, that's where I have been the last two days every time I want to change my clothes or go to the loo. This is livable, technically, but it is also hellish evil that ought to be perpetrated on evil people - no, truly evil people, I'm only runner-up, apprentice evil, I swear.
And since everyone here in the house is facing the same evil, it's not like I can whinge at them. So it looks like I'm here to make your day that much more... I can't really say better... different? Maybe this will make you glad that you aren't in this kind of heat without AC? (Assuming you're not in the same boat, of course.)
However you or I rationalize it, here I am, bitching and moaning, and sharing it with you, because you are special. Yes, you are. Totally. Would this sweaty face lie?
I'mma go sit in the tub and dribble cold water over myself. Take it easy, m'friends.
This is a common misconception because theyâre such similar environments, but you should be aware that dads are native to Home Depot, while lesbians are actually native to Loweâs. At this point, however, both dads and lesbians have made themselves at home in both Home Depot and Loweâs to the point that trying to separate them back into their original ranges would probably do more harm than good to the delicate ecosystem of large chain hardware stores.
A properly raised and socialized Dad will be perfectly comfortable cohabiting with Lesbians. Its not really âencroaching on anotherâs territoryâ. You wouldnât say that about foxes in a forest that also homes bobcats, would you? No. Itâs just two different species that have both evolved to live in similar/the same environment. As long as they recognize each other as equals, Dads and Lesbians are more than capable of cohabitation.
Now, if you were to release a pack of Lumberjacks into a Lowes or Home Depot, thatâs where chaos will reign. Being adapted to a far harsher and more demanding environment, the Lumberjacks would simply push Dads and Lesbians both out and also consume far more than a sustainable amount of resources. It would be like releasing bears at a country club.
As a former timber-harvester⌠I feel this is potentially accurate in theory. But highly improbable in actuality.
Lumberjacks, like most megafauna species generally require more space than the average hardware store, even a big box store could provide. The misconception is that Lumberjacks are a social species because of how they often work and live together.
This is a matter of necessity, not preference, and a survival technique for thriving under the LogBoss.
A âpackâ of Lumberjacks, if not under the environmental pressure of a LogBoss will naturally disperse until they each have a wide territory.
Lumberjacks rarely fight for territory.
One on one, a Lumberjack could drive out a Dad or Lesbian, however the latter tend to travel in social packs.
Lumberjacks will passively retreat on the presence of large numbers of people. Kind of like Sasquatch.
Getting a âpackâ of Lumberjacks assembled would be hard enough unless they were forced into a Hardware Store by a LogBoss. In that case, they would already be in a heightened and potentially agitated state far above their natural behavior. This artificial scenario can be likened to a circus animal running amok. If it had been in the wild, the incident would not have occurred.
Free-roaming Lumberjacks are the cryptids of the Hardware ecosystem. They are surprisingly quiet and unobtrusive.
Please stop labeling Lumberjacks as dangerous roving social predators. They are intermediate level omnivores and remarkably peaceful unless threatened.
question where does the âart studentâ or âDIYerâ âcrafterâ or âsoap makerâ or âminiaturistâ etc. who has ventured into the store for supplies fall into the ecosystem/what is their impact of said ecosystem?
Most of the above are native to craft and hobby stores (art students, historically, are native to museums, but having been introduced to hobby stores, have found a niche for themselves and thrived), but all can be seen in hardware stores on occasion due to territorial overlap. They are generally low-impact, as they tend to stick to specific small areas and primarily utilize different resources. While a large group of any of them can be disruptive (art students, in particular, are known to travel in packs), in general, they are more likely to have territorial disputes with one another than with the local fauna.Â
A point of clarity -âcrafterâ is a bit misleading; while it conjures a specific image, much like âfishâ or âreptileâ it actually covers a broad array of wildly disparate species, and in general, more descriptive nomenclature is preferred. Fiber artists in particular are a genus to watch out for, particularly in groups. Beware a roving pack of domesticated quilters. They fear nothing, will go anywhere, and due to their social nature, will often seek interaction from other species that thrive best in solitude. They are quite friendly, and will happily adopt members of other species; the concern is that their adoptees do not always wish to be adopted.Â
I can say as a former craft store worker that if you wish to see true fear, look into the eyes of a Dad who must venture into a craft store. Despite the overlap of familiar beings known to him from his native hardware store habitat, Dads are instinctively aware that craft stores are not for them; they contain unfamiliar perils and even the seemingly familiar may have strange variances and unnerving secrets. (âWhy is this airbrush so small? What do you mean nails, why would you⌠WUT!!â)
Only experienced silverbacks or the boldest young Dads dare venture into a craft store for long without his mate or offspring to keep roving Craft Ladies at bay and guide him in this strange ecosystem. If a Dad enters with his mate and is separated from her, he will often scuttle for the seeming familiarity of Woodcrafts, Models, or Paints (the latter not to be confused with Fine Arts, unquestioned territory of art students), but he eyes Scrapbooking and Jewelry with trepidation and will usually venture into those exotic areas only in the company of females of his pack.
Lumberjacks are rarely spotted entering craft stores of their own volition, for while they do not fear it as Dads do, they know it is an environment unsuited for megafauna such as themselves.
Hardware store Lesbians generally adapt more easily to craft stores, although they may enlist another Lesbian of a subspecies more adapted to that environment to guide them until they find their niche. Lesbians have even been known to seek the aid of a Craft Lady, a native fauna that share similarities with Lesbians but are usually smaller and nimbler to suit their chosen habitat. Dads who witness this are often awed by the Lesbiansâ temerity, for although larger, Dads are generally wary of the cunning and dexterous Craft Ladies and may mistake their enthusiastic pack greetings as predatory swarming.
Craft Ladies, secure in their ecological niche, have no fear of interlopers and take the presence of non-native beings in stride, although they may become territorial about scarcer resources.
The only truly invasive species that threaten craft stores are Brides-to-Be, who are mere annoyances individually, but like locusts may descend in hordes and lay waste, leaving swathes of destruction in their wake. Fortunately for the Craft Ladies, Brides-to-Be are seasonal and usually only a threat in the spring and early summer.
Is anybody going to address the newly invasive species of BuJo enthusiasts into the craft store/art supply store environment? Why arenât we talking about the dangerous proliferation of Leuchtturm 1917s and the growing threat of Dotted Moleskins? I had to liberate a Dad from a tangle of washi tape in the art supply store the other day and it wasnât pretty.
The natural habitat of journalers was stationary stores, which have been replaced by office supplies stores, not the same. Journalers invade the craft stores and art supplies stores to get the markers and washi tape and Sakura pens they require for survival.
I had a dream based on the movie High Spirits (1988), with Peter O'Toole, Steve Gutenberg, and Daryl Hannah - I think Liam Neeson was also in it. (Spellings suspect)
Look past the read more if you're interested; no harm/no foul if you're not. đ
As you may or may not know, or care, at the end of that movie Jack - Gutenberg's character - had ended up in a happily ever after with former ghost Mary - Hannah's character. In my dream, Jack had been rudely let go from The firm he was working for, because his wife was dead (despite her spirit galavanting around the castle with the spirit of Mary Plunkett's husband and murderer) and the company was owned by her grieving father who had never liked Jack in the first place. However, because Mary had lived her original life a couple hundred years ago, she had knowledge of that era, of course; she also had knowledge of where some of the family fortune had been stashed by her Father/Uncle/not sure. So Jack was able to go excavate it from under wherever it was - in the dream I think it was in a secret room under her family's mausoleum. Upon finding it, filled with antique gold coins and assorted other things of value, Jack and Mary were able to acquire a boatload of money for themselves and to help renovate/ repair Castle Plunkett.
So, kind of a happy ending after the happy ending, I guess. Haven't watched the movie in like a year or more, which only makes me wonder what my mind was doing there in my sleep. Dunno, but there you are.
