Hello, world. Welcome to a new week. We’re up. Podrick did Podrick things really early, spurred on by the wind making the blackout curtains flap in the bedroom. I was too warm and had a miserable time, but reset the Sleep Daddy I was listening to and hoped to crash. Not even the kitty snuggles made it better.

We had a nice Sunday. Shawshank skipped brunch and made a simple lunch that would get us through the early afternoon. After lunch, I put on my boots and sunscreen, and we drove out to a rodeo. It was a gorgeous day for a day out, wicked sunny with a nice breeze to keep it from being too hot. We brought our own water bottles this year, which was smart. While I was still shit about hydrating, it was more than I probably would have had otherwise.

The rodeo is always entertaining. We sat at the top of the bleachers, which is nerve-wracking for me. I’m usually terrified getting up there – the steps are complete bullshit and the boards are bouncy – but I’m generally ok once I’m sat. The organizers run a very tight schedule and keep things moving, and intermission came before we knew it. Shawshank ran off to stretch his legs and returned with a spiral cut potato for us to share. We made it through 90% of the day’s offerings, heading out right before the last event. We’re old, and we can’t sit on shit without cushions and back support all day. Plus, we can avoid the traffic jam getting out.

Once we made it home, we fed the cats and chilled until we were hungry enough for dinner. I hopped into the tub for a hot bath and some gaming while Shawshank watched old episodes of Modern Marvels.

We’re working today: two days on, then two days off. I’m going to assume a human form and act up.

[Current Mood | happy ]

[Listening To | the house is surrounded by sparrows and I think they're plotting something ]

Hello, world. We managed to stay in bed until the standard waking time. I think the heat yesterday and overnight sapped Podrick‘s energy, because he wasn’t immediately harassing Shawshank for breakfast when we came out of the bedroom. He crawled out from behind the couch, bleary-eyed, while we lightly panicked.

Shawshank took us out to BiggerTown yesterday, just to get us out of the house for an extra day. My shopping list was made up of one thing: ribbon or shoelaces. I hit pay dirt in the craft bins, and went on to look in the rest of the shop’s rooms. I almost always find something in the basket of lingerie, because I swear to God there’s another chubby baddie in the region who donates a lot of her stuff. Sure enough, there’s a brand new corset with matching eye patch thong. It’s a little too big, even fully laced up, but since I’m not interested in tightlacing, I’ve sorted out a way to take it in a little and snug things up a bit.

Shawshank spotted some boots. Not so much boots, but BOOTS. He insisted I try them on, not just because of the novelty of wearing cowboy boots to the rodeo today, but because they’re really nice looking boots and didn’t feel like bullshit quality. I couldn’t get my bare foot into one when I tried it on in the shop, but since they’re half a size bigger than what I normally wear, we figured it was probably a matter of adjusting the laces. I was waffling, but he grabbed them. We left with treasures, snagged lunch to-go, and headed home.

The boots fit perfectly. PERFECTLY. Once I opened the lacing up a little and could make a better effort to put them on, they fit perfectly. Then, I looked them up to see if they’re decent. It turns out Shawshank snagged me some Freebird Coals for a whole $10.

Shawshank spent the rest of the afternoon playing Roller Coaster Tycoon while I sewed dreadlocks to some cord to make dread-falls. Then we made a pizza, and watched wrestling.

We’re going out again today. It’s a beautiful day for a rodeo. We’ve already found the sunscreen.

[Current Mood | unbothered era ]

[Listening To | BIRDSBIRDSBIRBSBIRDS ]

Hello, it’s morning. Saturday morning, to be precise. I woke up before I should have, but not early enough to be angry about it. Podrick didn’t come up to cuddle, allowing me a bit of extra sleep.

We both worked yesterday. Fridays are rough for me, I feel like no matter what I do, in the words of the prophet Skee-Lo, I’m always last to be picked,
And in some cases never picked at all. I stayed on for a little over 3 hours, with the hope that clearing that “milestone” would rank me above the models who didn’t stay on for 2+ hours. Once it was clear I wasn’t moving up, I moved on. I ate a cheese sandwich and a rice cake, fed the cats, and played my game.

My crow army dropped in for another visit last night. I heard one in the front yard when I was making my sandwich, and found him squawking and eating sunflower seeds on the front walk. Something spooked him, and he flew around to the back of the house.

When I heard more squawking, I found the whole gang in the yard, eating wheat puffs. Pippin watched from her little table. Another crow cawwed from somewhere nearby, one of the army screamed a reply, and a fifth bird dropped into the yard to join the unit shortly thereafter.

Since we have the day off, we’re going out. We have plans tomorrow, so we’ll putter around the house today, after a trip out to BiggerTown. And we have wrestling.

[Current Mood | okay ]

[Listening To | YOU TRUCK IS LOUD AND YOUR DICK IS SMALL ]

Thank fuck it’s Friday, eh? It’s a bright morning, with clear skies and sunshine. We’re not in the smoke zones, but my phone has already warned me that it’ll be a warmer day. This is perfect sleeping weather, in my opinion. As long as I don’t wear anything to bed, I can sleep under with just a comforter tossed over me, and not wake up drenched in sweat. Once the sun started to come up, Podrick periodically came up on the bed to cuddle on my chest.

My new mic came in yesterday, setting off a mini-meltdown (on the inside) when I opened it and discovered it had a plain ol’ USB connection, and I don’t have enough ports on the Dell. I was especially upset because I know I looked at the plug types of the mics I added to my cart, but when it came to actually buying one, I grabbed one that looked like one in the cart, $2 cheaper, and I didn’t look at the plug. Shawshank promised we could look in a dollar store when we leave town this weekend, and I begrudgingly went about setting up the bedroom after he left for work.

I pushed myself through the set up in defeat-mode, having been excited about something new, only to have curb stomped my enthusiasm with my own stupidity. Halfway through setting up, I went through every drawer and storage container in The Flat looking for a way to connect it to the Dell, finding about a dozen USB-C ➡ USB-A, but nothing going in the other direction. Eventually, in the bottom of a tote full of lingerie, I found a tiny-ass adapter. I’m pretty sure I bought it a couple of years back to go with one of those mini-mics.

Crisis averted, I worked on getting it connected. That was only slightly less annoying, as there are few things in this world I dislike more than configuring devices. After troubleshooting a bit – because why the fuck would it try to use my mic as a speaker? – I got it working. I tweaked some settings so I didn’t blow people’s eardrums out if I coughed, recorded some test clips in OBS, and logged in. My space is a little crowded now, the mic sits on the laptop in front of me and takes up about ⅓ of the non-keyboard space, but it’ll do. I made jokes about being a dirty true crime podcast. It was a quiet evening when Tammalynn¹ opened the storage container and found something…. amiss. Her golden buttplug, the most profitable of her toys, had vanished…. without a trace. Join us as we unravel the mystery of Tammalynn’s Missing Money Maker, my new 47 part series…..

This is the last night of work for us, and we have the whole weekend off. We have plans, and we’re going on a lil baby road trip, that no longer needs a detour to a dollar store.

1. Not my online name, apologies if it’s yours, I just pulled it out of my head, but I hope you find your plug. ↩︎

[Current Mood | blah ]

[Listening To | the world is burning. or flooding. take your pick, it's everywhere. ]

Morning. It’s not good. It’s not bad, but it’s not good. Without the high temps sapping his supply, Podrick has the energy to chase Pippin again, and it feels like he’s making up for the time off. He was fine right up until we got out of bed, so I guess I should count my blessings.

I survived another shift. It’s nicer to stream since the heat wave left the area, it’s nice to not be sweaty and feeling vaguely damp everywhere. I made some money for the second night in a row, which made me happy. I threatened my viewers last night, “I bought a mic, now you’ll hear all my random noises, it’ll be bad ASMR”. Someone told me he already uses me as ASMR background noise, which wasn’t what I expected to hear, but I’ll take it. The mic is sitting in the post office, and I’ll have to spend some time messing with the audio settings in OBS before I go online today.

My crow army has landed in the front yard to make their morning demands. We regularly have four crows who fly in for snacks of seed and puffed wheat. The two feeders are full of a seed mix. The small seed keeps the little birds fed, and the sunflower seeds keep the squirrels fat and the crows happy.

Two shifts left in the week.