Plumbing

 Blessings Darlings!

Yup, we have plumbing issues.  Spent lots of time figuring it out, two trips to the hardware store, etc.  When it became clear that fixing it would involve removing the kitchen sink ... and that the Chubby Hubby is really not at all good for fixing this stuff (I at least always know where the master water shutoff valve is, and use it before doing work) ... we're calling a plumber on Monday.

The sink and faucet work, but the sprayer is kaput.  I'll have to fill a plastic container with water to rinse dishes in, to reduce the amount of water I'd end up using to rinse them without the sprayer.  Not horrible, but wasteful and inefficient.  And ... we can afford to have it fixed right at this time.  Which will certainly be a better job than we would have done.

But THAT was my day today.

Frondly, Fern

Sun moves into Virgo, Fern spends day sleeping.

 Blessings Darlings!

I'm under the weather today.  Slept most of the day.  Had weird environmental and political dreams.

In totally mundane stuff, the sprayer on our kitchen sink isn't working.  The Chubby Hubby has twice tried to fix it and failed.  Today I ordered a replacement for pickup, which is supposed to be in stock at one of the two close by big box hardware stores.  They've acknowledged the order, but apparently not pulled it from the shelf and brought it to the desk yet.

I'm hoping that we'll get some blessed rain tonight.  It's been dry lately - not unusual, we're usually dry in August, but still ... dry.

Here's hoping that tomorrow I'll be more useful!

Frondly, Fern

Crab Rangoon Day.

 Blessings Darlings!

It was a grand night for stargazing last night.  Alas, I saw no meteors, but the temperature dropped down low for perfect sleeping weather.

Woke up refreshed today, AND before my husband came by to wake me up.  Laundry done and on clothes line.  Crab Rangoon mix made, and tested.  Will make more for dinner.  Had full shopping list ready for the Spawn when he went to the Big City to shop.  Cleaned out the fridge.  Did more of the eternal chore of dishwashing/putting away.  Did some reading ... and, yeah, some book buying.  Bad Fern, Bad!

Washed the kitchen floor.  Made more crab rangoons, and dinner.

Just busy lately.

Frondly, Fern

Busy busy busy

Blessings, Darlings!

Busy day today.  Defrosted the big freezer.  Organized shopping for the week.  Made salmon piccata.  Plan to make crab Rangoon tomorrow. Got propane delivery.  Lawn care done. Loudly done. Still going thru' the papers on my desk - maybe will be done by end of month?  Maybe by the next dark moon?

Spawn took his piece of salmon out of the pan before I added lemon and capers, and put pesto on his instead.  He approved of this taste.  So now he will eat one type of cooked fin fish happily.  Rah.

I stepped on the scale yesterday and today (multiple data points).  I've not gained weight during the pandemic/staying home.  OTOH, I've not lost any, either.  

Last night Katrina Messinger challenged us to go to bed 1 hour after dark.  That would have been, um, 10 minutes ago.  I'm running a little late.  I'm going to run off and do tonight's offerings and go to bed.

Frondly, Fern

Dark moon. Dark days. Dribble Dinner.

 Blessings Darlings!

I had planned to defrost the freezer today, but life intervened.  Had to go out to stores, had to cut the Spawn's hair before he goes back to in person college.  I'm seriously pissed that college will be in person. He'll be going out every day, getting exposed to Covid 19, and then have to decontaminate when he gets home.  Tomorrow he's scheduled for his pre-class Covid 19 test.  Today in my county we had a 1.12% increase in total cases, which is a 22% increase in active cases. 

Snarl.

Tonight is Dribble Dinner - BLT's, with fresh juicy home grown tomatoes.  So very messy, so very very good.  Avocados were on sale, so I might add that to mine, replacing the mayonaise with mashed ripe avocado.  And hot sauce.

Dark moon right now, new moon in a few hours.  

I'm going to end this here, and work on going thru' some of the pile of papers on my desk.  Because I fear a landslide.

Frondly, Fern

Pollinators by the cloud!

Blessings Darlings!

We have hit the time of year, where I can tell you the time of year by looking at the 'island' in my kitchen. Said island is covered with Too Many Tomatoes to Eat, and Too Few Tomatoes to Can.  And I only put in 2 tomato plants this year - and only let two of the dozen volunteer tomatoes keep growing.  So far I've only gotten tomatoes off of the volunteer plants.  One of the volunteers is a Cherokee Purple, one is a Brandywine, so I'm thrilled.  They are my favorite types, and it's not surprising that they volunteered since I did grow them last year.  But I threw seeds/etc from all the tomatoes we had over the year, store bought and home grown, into that compost pile, so there was no guarantee that they'd be my favs.

So I added a diced tomato to my leftovers for breakfast.  The Chubby Hubby is having a big salad with a full tomato in it for lunch.  Tomorrow we'll feast on BLTs.  Previous years I was able to give tomatoes and such away to coworkers.  This year, not having any coworkers, we're going to have to be on Tomato Eating Overdrive.  Which is replacing the Yellow Squash Eating Overdrive we had been on (and I still do have a few of them left to eat, too.)

Everything blooming here has a heavy cloud of Black Wasps around them, especially the spearmint.  The black wasps are great pollinators and feed their larva on bugs that would eat my garden, so they are win/win.   They don't get the great press that honeybees get, or even that bumble bees get, but they are every bit as helpful and easy to live with.

Frondly, Fern

Dreams and food talk.

 Blessings Darlings!

I had one of THOSE dreams last night.  I was working a job where the Upper Management had suddenly changed all sorts of things, but given me no training in the new stuff.  Including the new software.  Frustration ensued.  I tried to go to my supervisor for help, but even SHE was forced to work the cash register at this point and couldn't take time to get me to the point of being useful to her or customers or to myself.  Extremely frustrating.

Or, as they say, welcome to 2020.

Friday night we ordered from the better of the two local Chinese restaurants.  This will be the 3rd night we're eating the stuff.  Big portions, good (not great) flavor.  Way more meat in each of the main courses than needed.   So we've taken to adding their dishes to the vegggies and sauce stir fry leftovers from what I made earlier this week.  With garlic or hot sauce added for fun and variety.

One item did NOT have too much meat - in fact didn't have enough meat.  The Crab Rangoon.  That I'm going to make a batch of on Wednesday or Thursday, and do it RIGHT.

Really, that's all for today.

Frondly, Fern

Day of Dreams

 Blessings Darlings!

We're finally getting rain!  Of course it started while we were out at the BLM protest.  But just drizzle then -  later in the afternoon it was REAL rain.  

Other than that, I really took today off of everything and napped.  Weird dreams, even for me.  In the first set I was, sigh, back in college with high anxiety doing my old bad adaptive behaviors.  Second set of dreams, the anxiety theme continued after a short very interesting high-tech 'narrowing search area for stuff that is somewhere in this huge body of water' part.  

That's it.

Frondly, Fern

Detailed garden update.

 Blessings Darlings!

Today ... like most days this week ... the forecast has been 'today will be much cooler than yesterday was'.  Today ... like EVERY day this week ... the forecast LIED.  It's still hot and miserable out.

My plan in the garden this year was to try to match most of what the garden produced with the amount of veggies that we eat fresh, other than my experiments with growing potatoes and dry beans.  I'm doing okay at that goal!  Yay!  Not all of the success has been because I planned well, tho'.

We haven't gotten ANY tomatoes from the plants I purposely put in yet.  We're eating the ones off one of the volunteer tomato plants.  I have no idea what its genetics are, but it's putting out about 8 oz round fruit.  Hell, one of the plants I bought and planted (pink brandywine) hasn't even set fruit yet!

I've only planted two plots of green beans this year - we had WAY too many green beans for eating last year, and I didn't want to mess with canning them this year.  I only planted the second plot late, two weeks ago, so we've not gotten any from that plot.   But since I wasn't after beans-for-canning, I planted my favorite bush beans this year - Contender beans. Last year I planted my second favorite, Tendergreen beans.  Both produce for a longer period of time than green bean varieties for selling or canning, such as Jade.  Now every few days, altho' I expect that patch to be played out, I still harvest at least a pound of beans.  ALMOST too much for us.  The second plot has half the number of plants in it (and can be protected from frost, since I did plant them a little late.)

When we get a cool day, I'll harvest the potatoes, and evaluate that harvest.  I put in 15 seed potatoes of Yukon Gold.  I'd rather have put in some russet potatoes, but this was the only option at the store at the time.  Things got SERIOUSLY sold out due to folks suddenly gardening due to Coronavirus this year!  I didn't to a great job of making sure that the potatolings were covered by straw to protect them from the sun over the season, so I'm sure that I'm going to have a problem with some of them being too green to eat (the green produces toxins), but it's still going to be interesting.

I lost the one grey squash zucchini to bacterial wilt, but got 3 squash off of it before it died.  The ONE yellow crookneck heritage squash has been producing more than we've been able to eat.  This is with using it for stir-fries, raw slices for dips, zoodles in place of pasta, and just cooking and eating it as a 'regular' veggie.  The plant is now dying off, slowly but very surely, so we won't be getting much more from it.  My husband is grateful for that.

Turnip and beets were about perfect.  Put in 12 or 15 of each of them.  Rutabagas ... I don't do well with those.  They didn't survive transplanting.  The 'volunteer' dill - I had one scrawny plant last year, so I just let it go to seed, and it gave me 1 plant this year - is doing well, but I'm letting it seed itself again.  If I get enough plants next year, and put in some Jade or other canning beans, I'll use some for dilly beans.  And maybe for dill pickles - this year I've not gotten any cucs yet but do hope I'll get a few from my late planting.  I've gotten enough basil for fresh use (barely) and to dry some for the winter, but not enough for the Spawn to make and freeze pesto.  Parsley has stayed alive, but not grown enough to harvest and use.  I've harvested lots of spearmint, oregano, thyme, and sage.  Rosemary is ... limping.  I'll be happy if it survives the winter.

The one bell pepper is doing okay, but not great.  The hot peppers are producing tons of peppers - I might skip growing them next year, and just smoke or dry these.  Next year I want more sweet peppers and maybe some shishitos, I really loved those last year.

Postal Pearl Clutching - A Guest Post!

 Blessings Darlings!

I have a wonderful, intelligent, diverse, and interesting group of friends.  One of them spent years and years with the US Postal Service, spending her last years as a Postmaster of a post office in Illinois.  While I may have seen her delicately crochet a noose (she IS a delicate flower of womanhood), I've never seen her go postal and shoot anyone.  Yet.

Being of sound mind, I asked HER opinion of all the stuff going on at, and being posted about, the post office.  Here's her informed opinion:

"I'm getting really sick and tired of the fear mongers. Y'all know they've been doing this for years. Unused and underused machines have been removed and relocated all the time.  Collection boxes are routinely reviewed on volume of mail and removed if the volume doesn't justify having it.  Mail is still being processed and still meeting delivery standards  Folk just got use to having that package get there next day at no cost and that isn't happening. I don't remember folks clutching pearls and public outcry when they were closing facilities and removing machine in 2012 or any other year. I firmly believe this administration is trying to destroy the USPS.  But they are doing it by brewing distrust with the service   This is all being reported in a manner to cause the public to lose confidence in the USPS.   Mail early and buy a couple of books of stamps instead of clutching pearls."

 I'm going to add that a shit load of folks are ignoring the huge increase in package delivery that the USPS is doing right now, and how simple volume is slowing some delivery down.  It's JUST like how delivery times increase in December for Christmas and due to all the fucking Christmas and New Year cards, as well as shipping of packages.

All vote my mail ballots have to be postmarked the election date, of course.  Depending on your state, they might have to arrive by the day before the election, or up to 10 days or so after the election.  Here's a link so you can check the rules in your state.
https://www.vote.org/absentee-ballot-deadlines/

Frondly, Fern

PS - She adds "I've checked the union sites and nothing on them concerning collection boxes or machines being removed"

Really save the children

 Blessings Darlings!

In the past couple of weeks, my timeline, and groups that I am in, have been inundated with QAnon-based #savethechildren stuff, focused on 'stranger danger' and international conspiracies at the base of child sexual trafficking; with panic over books on good touch/bad touch or helping children identify grooming from family members being FOR grooming children for sexual abuse; with people who think that dolls and other toys that change color patterns when wet are ... somehow grooming kids for sexual abuse.

Yes, child sexual trafficking exists. But it is the smallest part of child sexual abuse.

Your children are at risk from your family members WAY the heck more than they are from strangers.

If you want to protect your children from sexual abuse, give them autonomy over their bodies. That they don't have to obey everything adults tell them to do. That if something makes them uncomfortable that it is safe to talk to you about it - AND that you'll stay calm during the talk. FFS, don't set them up so they feel they have to fucking protect YOU.

Want to help children who have been taken from their families, are being sexually exploited and tortured? Then work to help get the kids out of cages at our border reunited with their parents. ICE hasn't just taken them from their parents - they are holding them in inhumane conditions, they are being sexually abused by the workers AND ICE SAYS THEY HAVE NO POWER TO STOP THAT, at least 1500 of them have gone 'missing' ... ahem, etc.

Here's a list of groups to work with to help stop ICE and save those very real very exploited children

https://www.aclu-wa.org/pages/5-things-you-can-do-fight-immigrant-families And, of course, join the ACLU

https://www.nnirr.org/drupal/border-groups

https://www.bustle.com/p/7-organizations-fighting-human-trafficking-supporting-survivors-20117978 

Yes, this is not a list of EVERY good organization.

Focus. Do useful stuff. Save actual endangered children.

 

Frondly, Fern

Look! Up in the Sky! It's a Bird, it's a plane, it's ... the Perseids.

 Blessings Darlings!

Picture this:  The Interwebs, August 2020.  Someone spellbegs.  No one replies.  16 hours in I give her a LMGTFY.  She objects - googling is lazy. 

Baby girl, spell begging is lazy.  Asking folks to share their research, their sigils, the spells they've created/worked is lazy.  Googling is the beginning of doing research and NOT being lazy.  I point this out, and she blocks me.  Still having gotten not one single other reply.

Gods, people are stupid lately.

In other stuff ...

The land here is still abnormally dry, and the temperatures have been hot.  The lawn care folks are ignoring this, and mowed the barely grown lawn today, so it now looks like dead grass.   Most of the time I spent in the garden today was on removing dead baby squash, now rotting, from the yellow squash plant.  It's not as if that will remove all grey mold spores - not at ALL - but I feel better for having removed that slimy crap.

I have about 2 pounds of green beans from the garden in the fridge, and 3 yellow squash, and a lot of Swiss Cress, along with several home grown tomatoes, so the garden is serving us well.  I can harvest the potatoes anytime, too.  Which is handy since there is now a bloody potato recall due to lysteria or something.  It also affects some citrus.  I'm pissed about that aspect.  And this is why I keep those dry lemon and lime powders around - Simply Lemon, Simply Lime.  Because I love citrus, especially in iced tea.  And this is iced tea season here in the northern hemisphere.

Speaking of the seasons. the Perseid meteor showers are going on, right as I type.  But only visible on the other side of the planet right now, since it's daylight here.  They peaked here shortly before dawn this morning.  But if you watch the skies tonight you'll almost certainly see stragglers.  Or meteors not from that group - August is a peak time for visible meteors.  

 Two states have hit new highs in Covid 19 deaths yesterday.  Rah?  I had more masks as part of my Walmart order, but Walmart didn't fill that part - said they were out.  So Spawn went into the store and got them (because they were NOT out of them), and got the alcohol, bottle brush, and peroxide that Walmart had said they were 'out of' as well.

My car is in the shop.  I'm late in getting it its inspection, and it needed an oil change.  It failed the inspection, so I need to shell out money for front brakes and such. Work that we can afford because I saved what I could from that weekly $600 Covid 19 stimulus money I was getting with my unemployment.  So this helps keep the local economy moving.  Rah?

Tomorrow I hope to take all the comforters in to the laundromat and wash them.  Before the bulk of the students return to town.  I have saved quarters for a year to do this.  And watch - I've not been to the newly build laundromat yet, they probably don't use quarters and want you to put money on a card.  Stay tuned!  Such wild adventures I have.

Frondly, Fern

August Life in the US update.

 Blessings Darlings!

So, back to more mundane daily life-during-coronavirus.  I'm enjoying a bit of hypomania and the higher energy levels.  House is getting more deeply cleaned, two blog posts I'm really proud of, reading is being done without me falling asleep, etc.  Yes, folks - the pillows are in the wash even as I type.  Maybe it's not hypomania, maybe this is what 'normal' folks without anxiety and depression feel every day.  Whatever.  

I'm trying to incorporate a second daily offering in my life, an offering of some of my coffee to The Morrigan in the morning.  Been meaning to do that for a week.  Last night I put a sticky note on my coffee cup.  This might be just the thing I needed - I MIGHT now be able to do an offering before I actually have my daily coffee! 

But Coronavirus drags on, with more than 5 million infections in the US.  Schools are opening, masks aren't begin worn, infections spreading there, lots of students/staff getting quarantined.  The Spawn's college starts again 2 weeks from today.  We know that one class will be online.  The other 4 are all supposed to be In Person. I have invested in more masks.  Hospitals still full, respirators still fully utilized, deaths still up.

Sturgis is full of bikers going around mask-free, who will infect each other then spread out across the country.  There might be many a Harley on sale cheap in a few months.

Economy still fucked, because folks don't want to become ill or die.  My job is GONE.  The hotel is going to be a dorm for the local college, so the college can do only one student per room.  The dorms do not serve meals.  I worked in the kitchen.  My only job options right now are McDonalds and Dairy Queen, and maybe the Food Lion is hiring.  Both would require lots of exposure to, ya know, people.  For minimum wage.

Grocery prices are still way up, especially for meats. There are new episodes of contamination of lettuce every few months.  We're getting by on Swiss Cress from the garden instead of lettuce. This will be more of a problem come winter, of course.  I don't have quite enough veggies to not have to buy any, but maybe I'll do better next year.

The Chubby Hubby's birthday is coming, and there's really no where to take him for the day.  Museums?  Surely you jest.  If it was MY birthday, we'd hike.  But MY birthday is in December.  His is on the anniversary of the National Park Service, later this month.

While the Spawn and I were getting our Coronavirus stimulus money, we saved most of it.  The govt might start it up again, but Constitutionally money stuff has to start in the House.  Not as executive orders from POTUS.   At any rate, we could save a lot and did save a lot.  We'll be okay for a while, unlike lots of folks.  Most renters here in West Virginia are delinquent on their rent.  

Here in the US we haven't even had the national conventions leading to the election.  But this election has already dragged on for ever.  And the stupid push against voting by mail, especially during the pandemic is, well, stupid.  At least here in WV - a mostly Republican state, so POTUS is okay with it here - I can order my vote my mail ballot online TOMORROW.  And you can bet your ass that I'm going to.  But if I had to vote in person - I'd be there, with a chair, drinks, food, umbrella if needed, etc.  I . am . going . to . vote.

Frondly, Fern

To see or not to see, that is the question.

 Blessings Darlings!

I am not a visually-oriented person.  Ask me to 'visualize' something and I'm going to have a very hard time with it.  Or fail.  Ask me to describe something I saw, I'm likely to fail.  This extends to my use of makeup (I don't use it), my taste in museums (I focus on reading the information more than looking at the actual objects), the type of meditations I find the most 'to my tastes'.  As a result of this, while I'm old and have been doing all sorts of metaphysical stuff for a long long time now - 'visual' stuff is not something that is usually part of my practice.

Today while meditating, I kinda got a breakthru' of sorts.  I was sitting there, doing the mantra I learned 40+ years ago when I took a Transcendental Meditation class.  The mantra is the beginning of a prayer or invocation to a Hindu Goddess, but I don't know the prayer/invocation or recall who the Goddess is.  And I'm not going to claim that I'm consistent about meditation, or of even doing mantra meditation every time, or THIS mantra meditation when I do mantra meditation.

Yeah, I'm a Bad Witch.

Anyway, suddenly I realized I could 'send' and 'see' the energy from the mantra going thru' my body.  And I could change where they mantra was centered and sending that energy from - it DIDN'T have to be from my throat.  It could centered in any of the major chakras (It's not like I tried centering it on my thumb, or my shoulder, but I didn't think of centering it from my feet.)  Hey, , afor ME this is a breakthru', and one that I've gotten in my mid 60's.  I'm extremely chuffed!

I did a quick practice of doing it in all the levels of my auras, using Ivo Dominguez, Jr.'s  "Emerald Heart" exercise, which rocked.

The point here is less the 'technique' or 'visualization', and more that we all have things that we suck at, visualization being one of mine.  And that it's okay to not be good at some stuff.  Find your best ways of working, and rely on those for the most part.  BUT - keep practicing at the stuff you suck at, too.  Because you may or may not get better or get breakthru's, but then again you just might.  I'm here to give you hope that someday you might suck less at it, just like me.

Frondly, Fern

Picture attributions!

http://clipart-library.com/clip-art/body-silhouette-outline-18.htm

<a href="https://www.freepnglogos.com/images/sun-rays-31014.html">sun rays png image download pngm from freepnglogos.com</a>

 

Splunking thru' records and check stubs

Blessings, Darlings!

Tis hot, sunny, and humid out there today.  I've worked the garden, hung laundry, visited the farmers market.  Glad to be home.  

By necessity, by the end of Covid19 being a crisis I'm going to become adequate at cutting the Chubby Hubby's hair.  I did it for the second time today.   Rah.

Splunked thru' records and scant hints, and figured out where to take the Smart Car for it's required however many miles inspection.  CH didn't record the name of the place last year when we bought the car. I'll call them tomorrow and set things up.  Also need inspection - we're overdue on that by 9 days at this point.  Oooops.  We just don't drive much now, and almost NEVER use that car.

That's it for today, really.

Frondly, Fern

That time of year.

 Blessings Darlings!

I'm a bit antsy and disorganized today, so this blog post might be as well.  

Did the laundry thing, did the dishes thing, did more tomato bondage, did the coffee thing (mixed up a week's worth of the half-decaf mix we use regularly), added stuff to grocery pick up, etc.  Talked with spawn about masks for his school year, since at this point most college classes will be in person.  Decided to get more masks, even if not N95's, and add extra filters to them.  

I see an Official Sign of Fall Coming:  the cattle farmer is putting grain out for the cattle.  And, right now, she's stacking a bunch of bags of it in the shed for future use.  She moved a couple dozen head more into the pastures here, and even with the rain and more growth of the pasture grasses, they now need to also get round bales of hay and grain.

 I got about half way thru' my list today.  I'm chuffed - it was a long list.  Maybe I'll watch that video on cutting men's hair before I crash.  Tomorrow I cut the Chubby Hubby's hair again.  And in about 2 weeks, I cut the Spawn's.

Frondly, Fern

Witchcraft shouldn't be a sales funnel trapping stupid people.

 Blessings Darlings!

I'm not a nightmare person.  I virtually never get them anymore, since I'm old and I just face and deal with problems in my life.  That said, I certainly get dreams full of frustration, or things that anger me.  THAT is the type of dream I had last night.

The Chubby Hubby and I were at some big hotel.  I assume that we were there because he had a conference there, since we have a long history of staying at big hotels for that.  We spouses (almost all women, since these are high tech conferences, and women are still ... ahem ... sidelined as much as possible in tech) are encouraged to 'enjoy the amenities'.  So in the dream, I tried to.

What I discovered was that while their 'self care' center said that services came with your stay, the services were stupidly minimal.  Skin care!  Only of your hands.  Sitting thru' videos of what they offer ... for pay ... was one of their 'free services.'  

Fundamentally, all of the 'free amenities' were ads.  I walked out - so angry that I changed from my 'draping' for all the services (like in a spa) where everyone could see my fat pasty white ass, rather than in a dressing room.  Then thought about dinner.  I looked at the big posted menus, and got even more pissed that all the options for food there were over $50. 

Now, I totally know what triggered this dream.  Yesterday I watched the first 'educational unit' in the FB group of the woman who made the meme I trashed all last week.  It's a fucking sales video, not an 'educational unit', for her $900+ course.  On having a daily practice.  Bitch, I don't need a course on getting up, drinking some water, brushing my teeth, meditating, moving a little, and eating a healthy breakfast that costs over $900.  For that price, you'd best be here pouring me the water, cooking me the breakfast, and bringing the ingredients for that breakfast.  And she's calling this witchcraft.  I'm calling it a sales funnel aimed at stupid people.

Putting on my marketing hat (and I actually do have quite a lot of training and experience at marketing) it's really clear that this is yet another person who is working the Clickpages model.  If you ever get a chance to watch one of Mike Filsaime's rants about Clickpages (and I like Mike's stuff on marketing, but don't 'love' his stuff) check it out.   And for best digital marketing ... go with Ryan Diess and his DigitalMarketer.com (I get no $ from referrals, just from using the system).

Frondly, Fern

In the kitchen with lots of veggies.

 Blessings Darlings!

Welp, I HATE the new interface here at Blogspot.  It does less than the old one. It gives less info than the old one.  We hates it, we do.

Anyway, it's before 10 am.   Dishes done, garden done.  Will roast home grown veggies for a pasta dish to have with dinner soon.  Maybe I'll roast some beets, too.  Or at least some turnips.  The harvest is on, for sure.

 Yup. Spent the day cooking and cleaning.  More focused on the cooking than the cleaning.  Also paid the bills and ordered a fill for our propane tank.  

That's it.  Life just ... goes on.  

Frondly, Fern

Endless Unemployment Wednesday

Blessings Darlings!

Today has been a boring day.  Gardening/harvesting, first full meal salad based on the Swiss Chard, housework, husband spilling coffee ALL over a counter full of stuff, etc.   Spawn made dinner - breakfast burritos.  Tomorrow the left over enchilada sauce will go on the pasta/veggie mix we're having with dinner. 

Spawn did the pick up from Walmart, and the rest of the shopping.  We'll still need milk again this week, but that's no real problem.  Interacted with folks from work online, all hoping we hear that we'll be going back, and no one optimistic. 

Onward towards tomorrow!

Frondly, Fern

Today is for the birds.

Blessings Darlings!

Yesterday I did the "Juno Rite for Finances" from Jason Miller.  Things clicked really well while doing it - no candles blew out, the chanting came naturally, and within minutes of finishing rain started.  As I mentioned yesterday, we're on the Edge of Drought here.

After that rite, I cleaned the part of the patio that is protected by an overlay of roof.  I was given 'word' to put up a second altar out there, but I don't know why yet.  The area needed sweeping anyway, tho.  Today the back is full of swallows flying around, so I cleaned the bird poop (softened by the storm) from under the swallows nest there.  The babies are now living in the air just like grown birds.  The wasp nest is still in heavy use there, of course.  I'll knock that down around December.

While doing the preparation for yesterday's ritual, I realized that the wine in the kitchen had been open, but not used, since March.  Which means it was vinegar at best, and I don't need yet more wine vinegar in the house.  It was painful dumping it, but ... that's life.  I meant to use it for daily offerings, but have been using whiskey instead due to Reasons.  Obviously I've not been doing much cooking with wine for the last 5 months, and instead of wine I've used dry Sherry.

Today is being a Day With No Energy.  Did dishes, worked with the drying herbs, had conversations with Spawn and Chubby Hubby, cut up a lot of fruit, took lots of stuff to the compost bin, watched the swallows, listened to the wrens.  Will do more in the kitchen after dinner.  But not doing a whole lot of stuff today. 

Frondly, Fern

Lughnasadh, Pandemic, economy, garden - SSDD

Blessings Darlings!

Now, back to life during Coronavirus.  And now a rapidly weakening hurricane.  And protests continuing.  And the President talking about delaying elections.  

This is the Irish holiday of Lughnasadh.  Depending on your POV, it could be about the harvest.  I see it as the funeral games honoring Tailtiu, Lugh's foster mother.  She died from overwork, clearing the land for agriculture.  So for me - it's ALL ABOUT THE FARMWORKERS.  Of course, the farm workers are not being protected from Covid 19.  http://www.ncfh.org/msaws-and-covid-19.html

Speaking of Covid 19, since the US fucked up the last 6+ months, and didn't put any organized efforts into control, we're hitting new highs in cases and deaths daily.  According to Dr. Birx (the Coronavirus Response Coordinator for the White House Coronavirus Task Force since February 2020) it's too late to talk about 'hotspots', it's now widespread - it's everywhere.  There is no sign of when it will end.  It might well take years before it's under control.  And ... darn few of us are going to trust vaccines that are rushed on to market, especially since the govt is going to release them even if they are only 50% effective, and there haven't been long term studies on side effects. 

The 'Covid stimulus' money that had been given to those of us on unemployment - an extra $600 per week - has now ended.  Our congresscritters are at a stalemate on replacing it with anything, especially anything that helps people instead of corporations.

Agriculturally - my area is between 'abnormally dry' and 'moderate drought'.  This is likely to change tonight and tomorrow, as we're getting rain from the remains of hurricane/tropical storm/tropical depression Isaias.  We have flood warnings for tomorrow, then a day off, then more rain from it.

My first planting of green beans is almost played out.  The second planting was totally eaten, probably by returning voles.  Swiss Chard is doing well, I have beets, and today I picked the first two tomatoes.  The yellow squash plant is on a break, which is nice so we MIGHT catch up on eating the harvested ones.  I harvested the first of the potatoes today, too.  

That's the 'quick' summary.

Frondly, Fern

Witchy Wellness part LAST. Finally.

Blessings Darlings!

Here we are, at #25, Devotionals.  Welp, around there HERE parts - as I keep saying - Witchcraft isn't a religion.  It's a skill set.  Just . like . knitting .   You don't have any devotionals to do to be great at knitting.  You don't have to do any devotionals to be great at witchcraft.

And they ain't part of 'wellness', either.

#25 Skincare.  Look, bathing regularly IS a wellness issue.  Common sense says to wash what is dirty, and moisturize what is dry.  As pointed out a few days ago - ashiness is not 'spiritual'.  But FFS, you can witch just fine with dry skin or zits or whatever.  Being moisturized or not has no impact on your witchcraft.  Zero, zip, nada. 

We're skipping line items that we hit earlier, lumped in with other ones.  So ...

#28 - Trust intuition.   How about DEVELOPING your intuition before trusting it?  Like learning to drive before trusting your ability to drive?  And while this IS witchy - it's not Wellness.

#30 is Meditation,  which I did mention before.  But I want to give it a bit more time, especially since this is the last thing we're going to cover (the last list item I covered DAYS ago).  Focused mind meditation is wellness, and is witchy.  So focus on that candle, or your walking, or that mantra, or follow that sound, whatever.  Don't confuse this with guided journeys, or pathworkings, or 'meditating to stop abuse' or whatthefuckever. 

Whew.  Finally.  Done with this crap. 

Let's summarize my points:  Wellness has a definition.  Witchcraft ... has a lot of definitions, but most of them are at least in the same ballpark.  "Witchy Wellness" is a stupid concept.  Especially when you set too many goals for too short a time.

2 to 4 goals a month, some of them to add things, some to drop things, is a good monthly 'goal total'.  And quantify those goals, make them measurable, so you can tell how you are actually fucking doing.

That's it, my dears.

Frondly, Fern

Witchy Wellness, Part 8. The bullshit goes on and on.

Blessings Darlings!

Yes, this does feel like it's going on for ever.  The meme had you doing things every day for a 31 day month.  If you think that my commenting on it is overwhelming - holy fuck, what must it be like trying to DO this?  I'll tell you - it would be overwhelming and impossible, it is set up for failure.  Even with days thrown in to 'soak'.  Now - back to analysis!

#21 Connect with nature.  Oh, I'm sure that she means hang out with plants outside.  Maybe with a stream or river.  Barefoot, if possible.  And, yes, being out in open green spaces is related to actual wellness.  It could be argued that such acts are witchy.

Statements like this have some level of implication that you aren't already surrounded by nature.  Humans are totally a part of nature, after all, and I'm pretty sure she doesn't mean throw a pot luck party (in times of pandemic safety) and connect with other humans.

This isn't 'realize your role in nature', either, tho.  It seems unlikely that she's asking you to check your impact on the environment.  To stop eating as much meat (I live in a cattle grazing area, on a beef cattle farm. Ground too full of boulders to plow.  If the focus is to farm (and this is permanently protected farm land) beef is it's best use.   To use less electricity, AC, heat, buy less things, etc.   I could go on about this for days. Probably for a full book, mostly filled with how I fall short on this.

Back to 'connect with nature' ... if you're not doing it by joining Sierra Club and working to actually protect the land, and 'just' going for a walk somewhere green that you didn't have to drive TOO far to get to ... I'm going to suggest that you Give an Offering first, before you expect Nature to connect with you.  Humans are an animal that leave garbage everywhere, so bring a couple of garbage bags and pick up trash, THEN work on connecting.  Carry the trash out when you leave. 

Next up is Crystal healing.  Crystals are lovely, and can be witchy useful.  Alas, the vast majority of them are unethically and taken from the earth, rather in violation with the previous point.  Also - not only are you not going to learn about crystals in one day, or understand how to use them for healing in one day, you're unlikely to be able to buy them all in one day.  We're got yet another task that will take a whole bunch of time, added to a list of other tasks doing the same thing.

Seriously check if any crystals you buy are ethically sourced - no slave labor, no strip mines, etc. 

I'm certainly not saying that I have zero crystals.  Heck I have a gallon bucket filled with quartzites, from chips to ones bigger than my fist.  All 'gifts' for working my garden with hand tools - I dig, they are in the ground.  It's a quirk of this neighborhood.  But I'm not out buying crystals of unknown origin. 

Next us Love your body.  Okay.  Again, an ongoing challenge that might take oodles of time.  It's another thing that shouldn't be on a 'monthly challenge' to a internet full of folks in varying states of health and different stages of their lives.  Some of us are going to have to start with 'stop talking negatively about your body' or 'tolerate your body'.  Then go on to 'accept your body'.  And this shit is going to take lots of time for most folks. 

That's it for today.  There are only 3 or 4 items left (I'm not sure if I'm going to do Meditation again, since I touched on it in another post earlier).  I might get to finish this tomorrow!  Yay!

Frondly, Fern