Queer by Choice

From seaivy

1. Bagels or donuts? Bagels are more satisfying but donuts are delicious. (I'm going to miss the bagels from the New York Bagels place near my old house.)

2. Bar soap or body wash? Bar soap. I use it very sparingly.

3. Being afraid or being embarrassed? Neither is any fun.

4. Big bash or intimate gathering? Intimate gathering


5. Board games or video games? Board games.

6. Bridgerton or The Crown? The Crown. I've never watched Bridgerton and somehow it's never appealed to me.

7. Cardio or weights? Cardio

8. Carpet or hardwood? Hardwood with area rungs.

9. Clue/Cluedo or Monopoly? Cluedo. Monopoly goes on for too long.

10. Cook or do the dishes? Do the dishes.

11. Damp socks or a pebble in your shoe? Damp socks.

12. Dragons or unicorns? Neither

13. Family vacation or solo trip? Both have their place.

14. Fork or spoon? Both are necessary at different times. Try eating soup with a fork!

15. General admission or assigned seats? Assigned seats.

16. Give or receive? Both.

17. Hot cocoa or hot cider? Hot cocoa

18. Iced tea or hot tea? Hot tea

19. Italian food or Mexican food? Italian

20. Long car ride or short plane trip? Long car rides can be a lot of fun with the right companions. Short plane trips are for when you're in a hurry.

21. Mountains or beach? Mountain, but beaches can be beautiful.

22. Movie candy or popcorn? Neither, but I'd always choose candy over popcorn.

23. Musical theater or concert? Neither.

24. Nightlight or no light? No light.

25. Ninja attack or pirate attack? I don't want to be attacked by anyone or anything.

26. Outer space or bottom of the ocean? There are some absolutely incredible things at the bottom of the ocean which I'd rather see than go to outer space.

27. Painful truth or comforting lie? Sometimes you need one, sometimes you need the other.

28. Pancakes or waffles? Pancakes.

29. Passion or friendship? Both.

30. Phone call or text? Text

31. Pizza or tacos? Pizza (isn't this basically the same as question 19?)

32. Play or concert? Neither.

33. Playlists or podcasts? PLaylists

34. Puzzles or coloring books? Puzzles

35. Rain or snow? Snow.

36. Ramen or pho? Ramen

37. River or lake? A river flowing into a lake

38. Roller coaster or Ferris wheel? Ferris wheel. I love those things.

39. Roller skates or ice skates? Ice skates

40. Salt or pepper? Just a tiny pinch of salt.

41. Singing in the shower or singing in the car? Singing in the car.

42. Skinny fries or thick cut? Thick cut

43. Sneezing or coughing? Sneezing. It's usually over quickly, wheras coughing can go on for a long time.

44. Snowboarding or skateboarding? Neither. I'm too old.

45. Snowmen or sandcastles? Snowmen

46. Spicy or mild? Mild

47. Street food or fine dining? Street food.

48. Subtitles or dubbed? Subtitles, but I'll take dubbed if I have to - with subtitles as well.

49. Wine or beer? Neither.

50. Zoo or aquarium? Aquarium

I decided I would go for an early walk this morning (just after 6 am) even though it was barely above freezing, because I really like being out at that time of morning now that it's already light around 6. It's quiet and peaceful outside and there's something special about the light that early in the morning. (As the mornings get lighter and the weather gets hotter I'll probably go out earlier.) Anyway, I discovered that it didn't feel horribly cold, and I really enjoyed the walk.

Just before lunch I walked over to Stop&Shop to get a Covid shot, which went without a hitch. I was feeling slightly nervous since so many of what used to be solid health policies have been overturned by the current stupid administration, but as an older person it's apparently still unproblematic to get vaccinations so I needn't have worried.

A couple of days ago I started crocheting Aria's purple cow, but it wasn't looking very cow-like when I had done the head; in fact, it looked much more like an octopus, so Aria said I should just make an octopus instead, so that's what I'm doing and it's turning out to be much easier than I expected to make the tentacles. I've still got a granny square chicken in process, but that got held up because I didn't have any eyes. Now I've got eyes (which I'm also using on the octopus), but I have to work out how to fix them in the corners where there's a hole in the pattern. Right now I'm just focussing on the octopus because it's easier.

It's cold and rainy today so I decided not to go out for a walk even though I had challenged myself to walk or run outside every day this month. I did use the rebounder, so I'm satisfied.

Aria has been wanting to make an omelette for her father for a while now (because she loves breaking and beating eggs) but the recipe the family uses calls for eggs, butter, cheese, and milk, but we didn't have any cheese. We also didn't really have enough eggs (five) but we made do. So yesterday whoever did the grocery shopping bought some sharp cheese and today was omelette-making day. We made these "omelettes" in muffin pans, so they don't look like omelettes, but I'm sure they will taste fine. The weird thing was they puffed up a lot until they were more than half-way out of the muffin cups, which looked very odd. I'm sure they'll taste just fine though. Aria has made a very nice place setting for her father, with cutlery on a napkin plus a hand-written menu (Dinr menu omlet, a glas of watr, spindrift (spindrift is flavoured sparkling water).) She has also put a little fake flower in a tiny vase in front of the place-setting. She has put a lot of thought into this.

The Silent Book Club last night was fine, but I learnt a couple of things. First, and most important, I need to do something about my hearing aids, because we were sitting around a fairly long table and I couldn't hear the people who were furthest away from me, or even those who were a bit closer. It felt very much like when I was a student at George Washington University (15 years ago!), and found I couldn't participate in class discussions if we were in a bigger space because I couldn't clearly hear what other students were saying. I had my hearing aids checked and the audiologist told me I needed new ones (I'd already had that pair several years by then). After I got the new ones it was a revelation to find that I could now hear clearly in class.

Second, there was no discussion during the reading hour, but after the hour finished the leader (library staff member I guess) asked if anyone would like to share something about their book, and then we went around the table and everyone contributed something so then I felt pressured to say something about my book as well. That wasn't really a problem, but I felt unprepared. And because of the hearing issue, I couldn't contribute to the short discussions after other people talked about their books. There were only 7 people present, so the discussion portion of the evening only lasted about ten minutes.

I had been expecting a group of older people for some reason, but everybody was much younger than me; the youngest people looked to be maybe in their 30s.

Today it's quite a bit cooler than the last few days, and apparently we are supposed to have nights down to freezing next week. Just as well I didn't put away all my warm clothes.

Because I'm going to the silent book club this evening, last night I had a dream about being at a silent book club, but people were ignoring the silent part and talking about the books. Strangely, the main people in the dream were a couple of women from my old neighbourhood who used to go to the local knitting/craft group I sometimes attended. In the middle of the dream I went looking for a toilet, but the bathroom I found didn't seem to have any doors or even many walls.

This morning, out of the blue, Violet asked me if I could knit or crochet a purple cow for her. We went looking for patterns and found one she thinks is cute, and both she and Aria want one, so I guess that's what I'll be working on for a while. I have yet to finish the crochet chicken, but I now have stuffing so I can get that done fairly quickly.

Apparently there was a very dramatic thunderstorm last night which I completely failed to hear. When my daughter was telling me about it I wondered why I didn't hear anything, but I might have already been asleep, plus for the last few days the dehumidifier has been running non-stop as the humidity has risen, so that blocks out a lot of other noise since it's right on the other side of a partition from where I sleep. (A wall that doesn't reach the ceiling.) It actually works well as a white noise machine.

I was out walking early this morning (just after sunrise) when I had a moment of perfection - the atmosphere was clear, the temperature was perfectly mild, and the view was pretty with many signs of early spring. My words can't do the feeling justice, and it didn't last because I turned a corner and some of the elements changed, but I loved it while it lasted. The whole walk was very pleasant but those few moments were way beyond pleasant.

I'm starting to think more about the details of my apartment, like kitchen finishes and colour schemes. The kitchen will be along one side of the living room so whatever colours I use in one will have to be the same as or complement the other. It's kind of exciting and scary at the same time because I will have to live with whatever I choose.

I was sleeping soundly around 2:30 am when I was abruptly woken by something falling loudly onto the floor upstairs. Ugh. I guess my son in law was up and doing something in the kitchen. I did go back to sleep after that but I kept feeling restless and waking up.

I was thinking of going for a run before breakfast this morning, around 6:30 or 7 am (it's just barely light at 6:30 but at least not still dark), but when it came to the point I just couldn't make myself go out that early while it was still not much above freezing. So then I planned to go around 9, but at that time my son in law had gone out grocery shopping and I was the only adult in the house with Violet and Eden, so I couldn't go out then. Now it's after lunch and I'm thinking I'll go for a walk soon just to get out of the house; I've lost the urge to run at this point and I'm putting it off until tomorrow.

I pulled out the blanket blocks yesterday and managed to join four more; now that I'm familiar with the method it goes much more quickly than when I was doing the first seam.

When I was out walking this morning I passed a house with a warning video surveillance sign out front; next to the sign was parked a big, tough, mean-looking Jeep truck or something similar (a late model super-chunky vehicle) with a row of stuffed toys lined up across the dashboard. (When I mentioned this to the girls they said there's a custom of having rubber duckies lined up across your dashboard and maybe that's what I saw.)

My plan for the morning was to go for a shortish walk to the post office to post a letter and then come home, change into running clothes, and go for a longer run, but as soon as I stepped outside I discovered there was a cold wind blowing so I decided I would just make my walk longer because I didn't fancy running in that wind. The forecast for tomorrow says "calm wind" (a phrase that always makes me laugh) so I plan to run then instead.

With my daughter and Aria gone, everybody has spent the morning lying around doing nothing much (with screens involved), but now my son in law is trying to motivate the girls to go outside and do something active with him. I think they decided to go to a local park and then to Aldi.

Speaking of parks, I really miss all the parks and walking trails around my old house, not to mention the footpaths on almost every street. In spite of being in a major metropolitan area, that was a far more walkable area than this. There were also public toilets in various directions from home within walking distance (2 to 3 km), including porta potties on the hiker/biker trail for 9 months of the year. Here there are bathrooms at the library and the Stop&Shop supermarket (across the road from each other just over a mile from home) but none in any other direction closer than about 5 km/3 miles away, and all in areas hard to get to on foot.

A couple of weeks ago I started knitting a hat because I was in between crochet projects and I had this one random ball of yarn lying around. The yarn happens to be purple, so as soon as Violet saw it and found out I was making a hat, she claimed said hat, as purple is her favourite colour. I finished the hat a couple of days ago and Violet wore it to school yesterday. When she first discovered I was making it she was lamenting the fact that spring is coming and she won't get much chance to wear it until later in the year, so I'm happy that the mornings are still cool enough for a hat.

We've had a few cold days with a biting wind keeping the temperature down, but although we had a cold start today, it's not so windy so it feels more pleasant outside, so I went for a run to enjoy the sun. We're starting to see more signs of spring, especially all the low-to-the-ground flowers popping up along with forsythia glowing brightly all over the place. I've also seen one or two trees covered in white blossom, but in general things are still more muted here than they would be back in Maryland by this time of year.