Nonsequitur Life

We had a record breaking four days straight of eighty-some degree weather. Today it’s forty degrees colder with rain and tomorrow we’re supposed to get anywhere between two and six inches of snow.

We’ve been under a Red Flag fire weather watch for most of the week, but I think that has been negated for the time being with this rain. Every river in the area is under a flood warning as they are rapidly meeting and exceeding flood stage. There is also a wind advisory and a winter weather advisory. I have never seen so many warnings out at once in the weather app.

Yes. Hello. This is now exclusively a Minnesota Weather blog.

Anyroad.

… This sloth inside my kombucha bottle cap has a point.

… We took Bob’s car in for some service yesterday and had to deal with so damn many detours because road construction is everywhere. Also the signage for those detours is staggeringly unhelpful. We are going to learn so many back-road-alternate-routes around this city before the mess is finally done. The crews were working on our access road all day yesterday while shaking the whole house. If what we saw when we were out is any indication, our new temporary exit is going to be a rather steep ramp up to the main road. If that is the case, thankfully winter is on its way out, because that would not be a fun incline on ice let me tell you. Hopefully the [temporary] finished product will be less of a climb. (The original road is medium-ly steep with a sharp curve right at the top, but this is like…45 degree angle straight up the slope of a triangle steep.) We can only hope they’ll be done with the new road by the time winter comes back around in six months. I can’t imagine another winter like this with a road like that. Woof. Maybe I’ll rebrand to a Road Construction Exclusive to My Neighborhood blog.

… I’ve had several dreams lately that almost feel like Basil is trying to What-if his way into my sleep. I don’t remember any useful details other than several instances of someone from high school suddenly resurfaces and turns into a prospective love interest. Only none of these people showing up in the dreams are people I actually know in real life. And while that is right up the alley of ideas I tend to keep throwing at the wall, it’s not helping the complete lack of writing that has been dragging on for…a long time now. Yammering blog posts notwithstanding.

… It has been…eight? nine? years since we bought and built our office furniture. The file cabinet has had stuff in it, but we weren’t getting real proper usage out of it as far as, you know, files were concerned. The bulk of papers that should have been in the file cabinet have been sitting in plastic storage bins stacked in a pile waiting to be sorted. I went through it all last summer when I was on the hunt for a lien release for Joel the Obstinate and Cursed Jetta(TM) that did not exist and eliminated a heap of papers that didn’t need to be saved anymore. (And by eliminated I mean, thrown in a plastic bin to be dealt with later.) And I thought I would have the motivation to continue the work sometime soon, but that didn’t happen. I’ve dragged my feet in going through it all because ech. I used to get paid to do exactly that kind of work, but doing it for my own fire hazard is just…mech. I decided to start small and just sort things into three basic categories and then whittle each of those into more specific piles and I figured it would get done eventually, but it only took three or four days (in small doses) total. I eliminated more papers (by adding them to the other pile) and I know there’s probably a lot more that could be ditched, and finally filled up the hanging files that have been sitting empty all this time. I still need to label said folders and now I have a massive pile of papers to get rid of. I’ll go through it again to make sure I didn’t toss something I actually need to keep and then sort it into things that need to be shredded and things that can just get tossed. I can feel the paper cuts just thinking about it.

… A few weeks ago we were in Target for our usual necessity trip and we happened by a display of critter themed beanbag chairs. One was a fuzzy unicorn and had a big stuffed unicorn lounging in it to match. I stopped—because critters—to inspect the unicorn thinking it was cute, and when I went to pick it up, I discovered it was weighted for a sensory-type benefit. It suddenly went from cute to I NEED THIS in about seven seconds. Bob mentioned we really need to make space if we’re going to bring more critters into the house—because our house is a disaster, he has a point—and I left the critter behind, scheming what I could do to earn it instead of just buying it on the spot. (Self-medicating by buying shit I don’t need takes some wrangling that I am not often good at, so I’m glad Bob is skilled at talking me down off that ledge.) But that snuggly, horned horse was firmly rooted in my brain and I kept going to Target’s website looking at the product listing, fighting the urge to just order it. Suddenly I had the motivation to tackle the file cabinet mess. And when I finished that project (more or less) Bob said, “I guess now I have to buy you a unicorn.”

So he bought me a unicorn.

She’s a little over a foot tall, weighs about three pounds, is velvety soft, squishy, and has a sandbag butt that creates a satisfying thud when you set her down. The weight would be far more beneficial (ala a weighted blanket) to a small child versus an adult, but it’s still a therapeutic cuddle for unrelenting anxiety. We’re still deciding on a name, but I love her little t-rex arms, her rumply, pudgy belly, and stumpy legs.

I also like that her snoot is a smiley face all on its own.

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The Rising Tide The Killers