Veni Vidi Vivi

I'm having trouble with eczema as the air gets colder and dryer. It's making me itchy and grumpy. I've got some eczema "settling" lotion, but it hasn't settled too much. There are spots on my hands, the back of my neck is itchy, there are other random sritchy scratchy places. My feet also hurt - a fun combo on the bottom of the heel from plantar fasciitis and on the outside if the heels from my shoes because of new pressure from the inserts I'm wearing for the plantar fasciitis. I swear to Pete. Flesh prisons are never happy.

Oh, and I deleted my Tumblr by accident the other night. 2007-2023 RIP! I'm not too upset, as it wasn't a memory collector place, per se. But I was bummed. So much fannish history!

I aten't dead.

It was a little touch and go there in August, but thanks to intensive group therapy and a medication change, I'm actually doing better than I have in... years. Many years. Possibly ever. I've always had a gloomy corner of doom in brain, but sunlight is shining into it now. It is bizarre. Is this how normal people feel? Like doom and dread is not imminent? Like you can enjoy life instead of fear it? WACKY.

Sounds fake, but I am experiencing it, so...

I have a new job, too, which I started in June, and I like it. Like, actually enjoy it. It is, omg, it's fun. Not all the time - it's still work - but I like what I'm doing.

As 2023 bleakened earlier in the year, I lost the thread of my witchy exploration. I'm going to pick up following the wheel of the year again with Yule. I'm determined to get past Imbolc this time. 2023 was super rough, y'all. I focus on the changes of nature and the rhythm of life in my emerging practice, and not magic, but with the gloomy corner of doom lighter in my brain banished, maybe there's more magic possible than I originally thought.

Today was a Monday, but it was a Monday in which I got some things done! I made a delicious chicken pot pie, put away what I washed in the dishwasher yesterday, and didn't hate work as much as usual (just the normal amount). Thus the post.

I'm having fun with my witchy journey. I think I mentioned that I don't believe in deities, and that was the thing kind of keeping me from embracing anything for reals. Now that I've discovered secular witchcraft, I'm finding that it is really just intentional mindfulness with pretty smelling things that connect you to the earth and nature better. Fun! I haven't done much aside from some gentle intention setting and lots of reading, but it's good. I'm going to low key celebrate Imbolc, which is something new.

I reject a lot of the "woo woo" stuff I just can't get behind. Like I get a big fat nothing from any rock or crystal, for example, and this has always been the case, so that part is right out. I'm not, like, imagining there will be  *~*~magical*~*~ happenings at any time. I really really like the discipline of having patterns to follow with neat props to help sustain my brain. I've been a lot less full of despair this month in some important ways. So that is super cool!

I think this year for my patio, I will do an herb garden, because why the hell not? I love rosemary when it's not being used as a prop for some witchy workings.

Joy/Miss Mouse/Chaos Mouse is doing great. She outgrew her kitten climbing tree, so there is a new sturdier one for her now. Her health remains good, and her appetite prolific - this cat will eat pieces of lettuce, squash, peas, anything that falls on the kitchen floor and anything I'll share with her. Ridiculous baby. She's keeping me on my toes. She is also the reason why I keep all of my witchy materials in the hearth that is shut off to her by a screen I keep tied together with bread ties. 

I think I spent most of my first years on LJ not filling them out, and I think I was okay with that.

I took today off and I spent it on Thanksgiving tasks. My refrigerator rolls are not as sweet as they should be because DUH I didn't put in the amount of sugar called for in the recipe. I think they'll be okay, though? I hate it when my baking doesn't turn out. Some years they turn out so well. But they are made from scratch and full o' butter, so it ought to be fine for friendsgiving tomorrow.

I made sausage balls, too, but they don't taste like they did when Mom made them.

I spent a lot of today vanquishing creeping despair. I looked at Twitter with no filters, and WOW, that bruises my soul. I do not want what it has. I have two lists that show just DoDo videos and Untamed recs. Actually I should just cut down who I follow to the bone. I still haven't checked out Mastodon because it is more complex than I have brain for right now. Anyway, so I went back and forth from the despair of the world being awful and me getting older in it and not really liking either at all to kicking the blues in the head and just looking forward to this nice long weekend.

My kitty is a chaos mouse, but I sure am enjoying having her around. She is so silly. She does help with kicking the blues in the head.

It's the end of the week! It's the end of a long and frustrating week!!! I took a nap and now I'm just sitting here kind of meh, needing to make dinner and kick off my Halloween long weekend. I'm taking Monday and Tuesday off, mostly because of Halloween but partly because of my job interview Monday morning, in which I will dress as the interview candidate who gets the job.

I'm also strangely, hmm. Let down? Is that the word? I don't know. I'm feeling weird about Halloween weekend. I think it's because it's Christmas in the stores, and I've had my fill of activities and buying fun holiday stuff. It feels like the actual holiday should have been last weekend. Not that I don't have plans to enjoy myself and do some final spooky things this weekend and Monday.

I think I'm mostly just pretty damn tired, and that's kind of bleeding into everything.

Today was a fun day under a wide brimmed hat at this festival. I splurged on VIP tickets because they came with parking (the street parking is INSANE), a pumpkin from the pumpkin patch, and axe throwing! I threw axes! Three stuck!

This park is a former farm and one time stage stop (four miles from Denver), and it's now a restored working homestead with farm animals, blacksmith, root cellar, original house, bees and honey - all pretty cool. I'm not sure how a fall day with a high in the low 70s can feel hotter than a summer day, but it was one of those days with a bright blue sky.

I had pie with ice cream as my treat, and I got a great, warty little pumpkin (plus some rosemary bundles for periodic house cleansing). I left when I started feeling tired, which was just right. I'll be going again in a couple of weeks for a 21+ Spirits and Sprites evening. I'm planning my costume now. It gets chilly at night now.

That I would do a Halloween countdown every year. I had a whole Halloween Tumblr account that went from August to November.  But I haven't done that in a good long while, even pre-pandemic.

I do not have the brain for a for real countdown, but I am Doing Things this spooky season, and I will talk about them. Maybe post pics of my decorations.

If I can remember how...

Dear Yuletide Writer,

Thank you so much for writing for me. I'll enjoy what you write for me because you took the time and effort in a difficult time to write it for me. Seriously, I'm easygoing.

Things I Love:
Redemption arcs
Villains (I love villains. They can be grey, all bad, or on their way to better, but I love flawed, angry people who lash out in complex ways.)
Hurt/comfort
Enemies to lovers
Canonical characterization (you can do an AU if you need to, so long as the characters are very in character, if that makes sense)
Two people finding out that despite their seemingly huge differences, they slot together to make each other whole
Two people who are "it's you and me against the world".

Things I Dislike:
Super graphic violence (a little bit of blood is fine)
Animals getting hurt
Not a fan of extreme kink, but mild exploration is a-okay, especially if it is in character/canon

From the sign up:

End of the F*cking World
I was sucked quickly in by the first season of this show, and I really enjoyed the second season, too. One of my favorite tropes is "two damaged people finding each other and figuring out how to be more or less whole", and James and Alyssa are just so freaking damaged. I really love them, and I'd love any exploration of their relationship. If you chose to explore it, I'd be interested to see what they figure out for intimacy, due to James' injuries. I feel this is one are in which he still assumes himself to be very broken, and I would like it if Alyssa could help see that he isn't even if he has physical limitations.

The Craft
I love this hot mess of a movie, and I adore Nancy. I don't mind what you write, so long as she is the focal point. I love a good redemption arc and a well-earned happy (or happier) ending - future fic is fine, as well as through canon fic.

Birds of Prey (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn)
I love, love, love Helena Bertinelli with great love;. I love all of the other characters, too, to be clear! But I really want a story with Helena, because she's my awkward kick ass movie girlfriend.

YIKES, sorry, creator. I had a rough week and didn't get to updating this before assignments. Uh, obviously.

I'm excited to participate this year! I'm not Jewish, but I've been reading and learning a great deal about Judaism in the past year or so. So if that Jewish lore and legend or modern Jewish life styles are something you'd enjoy writing about, please weave it into your work(s)!

In general, I enjoy character explorations, and while I adore canon, I also enjoy a well-thought out AU, especially one where canon divergence occurs. I love history, but I also love urban fantasy, plain fantasy, and some sci fi. I'm a romantic, and fanfic tropes I enjoy are hurt/comfort, enemies to lovers, equal partnerships, redemption, and disparate characters finding out they're more alike than they thought (and evil characters finding out they're not as evil as they thought).

Here are specific

• Star Wars Original, sequel - hmm, I hope I picked the right tag for this. I love The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi, but the originals are great, too. Please know that I like the character of Kylo Ren very much (but I don't care for Hux, unless he's playing the evil vizier role). I love love love Rey. If you don't want to write Reylo, that is cool, but if you do? Amazing. That is my favorite. I'd also love anything Leia and Han related, family-wise
• Chilling Adventures of Sabrina - I really like Ambrose and Hilda and Zelda. I'd love to see how Judaism fits into the universe where Satan is real and hailed all the time. 
• Good Omens - This is a perennial favorite. Aziraphale/Crowley makes me happy. And I'm sure they dealt with more than one evil vizier.
• Jewish Lore and Legend - I don't know what to ask for yet! I would say that I'd like Jewish content to not revolve around the Holocaust. I want to know more about the lore and legend beyond just that one time period.
• Neverwhere - If you know Neverwhere, you know that the Underside could hold many, many forgotten remnants of London Above's Jewish history.
• World War Z - I enjoy a little dystopia. I love World War Z. Oral history is one of my very favorite things.
• Parks and Recreation, Brooklyn Nine Nine, Schitt's Creek - I love these three shows, because they are about kind (well, sort of, with the Schitts) people who genuinely like each other and are funny while accomplishing large and small things that matter. Ben is my favorite from P&R, everyone on B99 makes me happy, and Johnny and David Rose are adorbs (as are Moira's wigs).

Most of all, have fun creating these works! I appreciate the effort you're making for my Purim fun!