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 Had a nice little birthday. Went to some museums I've been wanting to check out since we've moved up here, got the sweetest card ever and some lovely gifts to boot. It was so bitterly cold that I didn't really feel like doing several of the things we'd planned, but oh well. Birthdays are nice but not nearly as important when you've had nearly 40 of them, haha. 

And yes, I bought a book about tow barges so I can become better acquainted with the traffic around here. Spent nearly $75 in the lock and dam gift shop, because of course I did. 

 Sat indoors all day yesterday watching the ice accumulate. Clencing my cheeks. Fretting about electricity. It stayed on! And now a loooot of snow has popped up this morning, so it's sled day for us! Gotta be out extra long today to make up for being iced in yesterday, I figure. Don't come back til your toes are black. 

I hear lots of loud booms, no idea what or why. The plow fellas are out hitting the roads again, bless em. 

 Happy 2025, please enjoy your complimentary quarter inch sheet of solid ice all over everything. 

New town, hilly town, just uneasy about how we'll manage/how I'll get to work and back home/whether the power will stay on. I 'member 2008 (Or was it '09? I must not 'member that well after all!) It sucks being without heat and power. Cannot find my propane heater for the life of me, so I had to run a town over to secure a smaller, crappier one. Better than freezing to death, I reckon. At least slightly. Got water and food. Good to go! Come at me, Sunday!

It's done! I moved over a bunch of kitchen stuff, too. Is this real life?? One day soon I'll be writing about fun and engaging things I've been up to and life won't be "lay floor" punctuated with "work" and "staple up ceiling tiles".

I've been putting together a lot of Legos in the small amount of free time I've had. Kid loves them but he's not really there yet in terms of following instructions or precision with tiny pieces. My fingers are sore, but Sonic needs his weird launcher thing.

Need to start plotting the garden. I guess I'll throw down some cardboard so it'll kill the grass where I want it? Idk. Just kinda plotting out my butt here, I've not done much more than flowerbed gardening and helping my dad as a kid- and I don't have a tiller. Big confused shrug.

Been reading The Abominable. Simmons really shines when he's at least a couple of generations away from his subject matter. That or I just hate reading books that take place in modern times, it's jarring AF to read about some dink playing on his cell phone and asking Alexa to take the dogs out or whatever.

 No thinking. Only flooring. Put in floor. No sleeping. Only flooring.

 The staple gun is fixed, life is good. 1/3 of a dining room left to do, and a giant pocket door (I mean ridiculous, 8x8 maybe even wider, hundreds of pounds) that needs trimmed at the bottom and repocketed and like... we could move?? Into our house we've been working on for months?? Feels strange man. 

Nobody will tell you that the retinol you're using is making your face flake horribly. You'll just walk around, looking deranged and diseased, none the wiser til you go in front of a mirror hours into your workday. Oops!

I'm getting so much closer to having a garden and a clothesline again! It's happening! 

 Did nothing of value today. Either getting sick or burned out or just need a breather. Played a whole bunch, does anything else really matter anyways? 

I have one of those jobs where you can read a lot, and boy I've been on a kick. Probably read 15 books in October, all horror. That William Peter Blatty fella is a hell of a writer. The Exorcist and Legion wowed me, and I was never a fan of the movie or the subject matter, really. October also started up a frantic Dan Simmons marathon and I'm finally nearing the end. Two more (I only did the horror ones, apparently it's the only genre I can tolerate atm). Drood was brilliant and so much fun. The Terror was fantastic (I love old timey boat horror, put me on the Obra Dinn). Summer of Night. 🤌🤌 And the books are all 700+ pages long, which I need because I read too fast (not a blessing) and it's nice to get to linger in a story for more than a day. I have the first Southern Reach Trilogy book started right now, it's all of 200 pages and I chuckled when I opened the package... "What is this, a Goosebumps book?" But tbh it's been slow-going, interesting but not really pulling me in. After that, book one of The Familiar series by the House of Leaves guy. 

Our new dining room is going to double as a library. I'm pumped. My "civilian science" projects will have a battlestation, we'll have a proper desk for writing, I'm just str8 pumpt. Just need to get a little closer to ready and measure to figure out exactly how many bookcases I can cram in there. Built ins are like... phase 3. Way down the road. 

What's for supper? Bout to go find out!

This is gonna be so cool! 

Things have just felt off. Social media sucks. I have like four friends, moved away from all of them but the one I'm married to, and nobody is interested in my mundane, dooftacular musings. So, I'll post them publicly on the internet!  

I just came off of a short stint on night shift and my sleepometer is broken. Years of routine, waking up a few minutes before my 5am alarm, completely dashed by a month of working midnights. It's 2am and I'm a little slap happy but a lot awake. 

Been prepping to move into the house we bought. Maybe we are insane for taking it on, but the view! The history! The craftsmanship! The pet damage! The leaking basement! Ya just have to keep going, keep working on it, because if you stop and get contemplative, you'll hyperventilate. 

Besides dolling up the kid's room, which I think is super-gratifying in like a "spoiling him because life has been so hectic lately" kinda way, the best part of all of this will be having a full-sized kitchen with all of my stuff out of storage and in action. Miss baking bread. Miss instant pot. Miss deep freeze. ❤️ 

Gonna wrap Christmas presents tomorrow. Been a disappointing holiday season, what with the 60° weather, the surprise move to 3rd shift, and our tiny but temporary apartment stay getting stretched every time there's a house hiccup. All I want from Santa is for the staple gun to keep working so we can get these hardwood floors done. Next year, I'm gonna deck tf out of the halls for sure.

I can't wait to post some dumb observations! Not even being sarcastic, I just miss being open- and I guess I'm old enough to have figured out that nobody really cares about what's going on in my head but me. With age comes wisdom, unfortunately. 

I kinda want to do a regular post about the weird ass town I moved to. Weirdest vibes, probs from the high per-capita of serial killers and homicidal maniacs- like maybe it taints the town with a weird dark juju. Possibly might also have some sort of "pod people" type situation. Will continue to investigate (or at least observe). 

I think I could sleep. I'll try.