I had vacation this week. I have to live with my vicious covert narcissist ex right now because of money and our dogs, one of whom is pretty close to the end of his life, and honestly my day to day life with him is very nasty as he’s extremely manipulative and vicious. I can’t change this right now.

But he went away by himself this week, so I took it off; I have tons of vacation time, and it’s been SO NICE even doing basically nothing to just not really think about his horseshit for a week. He has been giving me the silent treatment for over 6 months now for reasons that I don’t know and don’t have the energy to find out, other than a few really vicious attacks and basic communication about day to day stuff we have to notify each other of (like appointments or dog things or whatever). It’s SO nice to just do what I want and detach from all this for a week. I’ve been going swimming at the community pool almost every day, and just floating around on a pool noodle for an hour is just nice to escape. Can’t wait to have him out of my life for good.

People on here say there are bad parts of Lemmy, but other than the dork who threatened to sic the FBI on me for Luigi Mangione memes, I haven’t had anything but pleasant experiences.

No they’re just regular human bartenders there.

I’ve recently taken up swimming. I’m much more inspired to do it if it’s an indoor facility, so the city rec center pass is inexpensive and then I’m inspired to go. Even if all I do is fart around on a pool noodle for an hour, I’m still moving, and the water makes the impact on my bad knee go away.

Vampires are from Staten Island and Noo Yawk Citttttaaaaaay.

I hate giving up my seat on the bus. So I will pretend not to notice someone standing there until I absolutely have to, and then feign ignorance. Fuck off, I wanna sit down.

Because of Nick Cave.

I did not have grandparents like this at all; my paternal grandparents were overwhelmed simply by interacting with us at all, and maternal grandparents were only concerned with themselves, and while they didn’t actively dislike us per se, it was like they were all very elderly from my birth onwards. Just sort of an afterthought. It’s not like grandparents today who seem very involved in the lives of their grandkids. I didn’t dislike them save for my maternal grandmother who pitted her children against one another and liked triangulating people, and when she died left her two older daughters 25K each and left all of the rest to the youngest, which was heaps more, but none of them were particularly involved. They never would have gotten me orange juice or paid any attention to something I mentioned. So if you have these grandparents, you’re lucky!

My aunt who is just as fair has had many skin cancers removed, and her dermatologist says she has the thinnest skin in the world. It’s not something to fool around with.

I was just so cold yesterday I didn’t feel like getting out, so I kept rinsing. It’s been a cold spring here!

Summer savory!

I am the whitest of white Anglo Saxon mutts, so very easily. In summer I wear a giant hat and sunglasses and loose light shawl everywhere or featherweight sweater. I went on a resort vacation a couple of years ago, and within an hour the one day I was burned even with sunblock. Never again.

Even Satie. Who collected umbrellas.

The great opera singer Enrico Caruso was the 18th of 21 children, only 3 of whom survived infancy.

Johann Sebastian Bach wrote an opera about coffee addiction.

The Russian composer Tchaikovsky was afraid his head would come off while conducting, so he would hold his chin with one hand while doing so.

The girlfriend of composer Erik Satie wore a corsage made of carrots, and she was a painter and liked to feed the paintings she made. Satie once threw her out the window but she survived.

I can’t answer as to frequency, but I can say that recently a woman I know slightly cheated on her husband of 20 plus years, and the reason I know this is because he hired a private investigator and put the video of her kissing the other dude on Facebook. Apparently he did not include the video of them having sex but it exists. That seems like a really heinous thing for him to do, but if you know this family they’re actually really well raised good members of the community, and he’s clearly extremely hurt, stating that the depth of her lies to him was unreal. This woman’s mother is a saint walking upon the earth, without a shadow of a doubt, and her daughter was what seemed to be a very ethical well brought up mother herself raised in the Christian faith (not the conservative kind but the really decent person kind), so this was all a big shock. Apparently she was just lying to everyone, including her saint of a mother, all along. Her husband asked her to stop the affair (which was with some guy she had known for years) until they separated houses, but she kept on and kept on lying about it until she was caught on tape.

So until someone’s mask slips, you just really never know what someone will do.

I’m 50. If a terrorist put a gun to my head and ordered me to get on my knees, my head would end up blown off.

Tokkie claims he was sexually and physically abused by them and made into a slave. None of the sources seem very well sourced, it’s just based on a video he made, and they state that he’s an addict and trying to extort them for drug money. Capetown child welfare workers went to their house to see if their daughter Sixteen is ok, and apparently had no problems with them. I take abuse seriously but what he’s saying seems super farfetched and made up. I don’t think they’re great people exactly, but their characters are obviously an act and they’re middle aged parents under it all.

Apparently South Africans are NOT fans of the band despite their success. I think what Tokkie claims about them sounds made up, apparently he’s an addict and trying to extort them is their take on it. It just doesn’t sound truthful at all.

I’m leery of most romantic gestures now because it turns out some of them are just self-serving narcissism so they feel good about themselves for performing them, but honestly trying to cheer someone up with a nice dinner and a peaceful evening is really heartfelt and says, I can’t fix this for you but I can do this much and try to help you have a better day and show you I care about you.

I listen to Die Antwoord still and read the poetry of Anne Sexton. The former is because I think some of the accusations against them are exaggerated, and part of their whole act IS being jerks. The latter is because what she did was clearly in the throes of her severe bipolar disorder which was long before they had any good medications.