the girly who shall end all girls

we only had one camping trip scheduled for this summer, and the NPS just shut down the campground. i'm feeling crushed. i needed that time in the woods. (we're making alternate plans with the camping group, but it's just not enough.)

there's a completely uncontrolled forest fire.* highway 20 is closed. even if they did magically manage to contain the fire before our reservation was to start, it still would be too hazardous.

this is an annual trip, and one of the things i've enjoyed over the years is that Colonial Creek reworks the landscape a bit every winter as storms send rocks and trees down the mountain. well, the landscape will definitely be different next year. i love the water, and i can always see the beauty in the signs of destruction and disruption from the creek. burnt landscapes just make me feel sick. i'm trying not to think too hard about it, but the last update i read said that they may not have the fire contained until October.

the area isn't just a beautiful park, it's also the home of about 30% of Seattle's electric power generation. i'm worried about the workers at the hydro plants, and i'm also worried about what happens to us in the city if it becomes too dangerous to keep them operating or the fire destroys transmission infrastructure. good times, good times






*permalink to today's version of the wiki page on it.

i spoke too soon. C is covid positive again, one of the ~15% who have a rebound after completing their Paxlovid course. i am glad that he kept testing and we didn't accidentally spread germs at Thanksgiving. we've both had a good cry about it. at least my work trip next week was already cancelled? my fancy birthday massage i was able to reschedule for a couple weeks out. C is currently doing okay, his symptoms are still relatively mild.

this means that i did surprise Thanksgiving shopping blitz last night. i'm delighted that for a small meal the grocery options have evolved from pressed turkey loaf to an actual brined breast (and its seasoning and gravy makings are GF, which feels like the real miracle). otherwise i got sides to reheat because damn it i wasn't supposed to be cooking today; the turkey is in the crockpot. i'm leaning pretty strongly towards just making a failure pile in a sadness bowl out of it all.

there's GF cake for C and leftover birthday cake for me, and ice cream. i also got a few cans of flavored Liquid Death and a selection of munchy snacks for eating while we watch soccer and play video games...i suppose it would be a nice weekend if we had planned for it.

dirtbag fedex stopped by at noon yesterday and claimed that they couldn't deliver the package. no, even if somehow they didn't have a passcode (and all the services do) they couldn't be arsed to ring the call box. don't pretend you thought we weren't home, we're all fucking home.

best part? this service doesn't deliver weekends so I was never getting it on the promised Saturday delivery date.

i took a kayak rescue and recovery class last night (in a pool, anything else would be insane this time of year).

i'm very glad to have done it. it didn't go as well as i would have liked, but i now feel like i could definitely assist someone else, and re-enter with an assist probably 8/10 times. theory pretty well understood, more practice required.

self-rescue? nope. i almost got it once, but capsized while shifting into the cockpit even with the paddle-float as an outrigger. the method they were teaching (which, if i understand correctly is the ACA standard) involves heaving your body perpendicularly across the stern of the kayak far enough that your hips are on the deck. you can't successfully pull over with your arms, you have to kick your legs and flop up like a seal. i guess that's fine if you're a dude, or flat-chested like the instructors. i mostly got caught up on the hatches and rigging badly enough that it nearly tore off my PFD. (it was very well fitted and didn't ride up before we started, but it had a center zip that peeled open from all the pulling. i don't own my own yet, but it certainly put a side closure at the top of my buy list.)

learnings:

• your PFD isn't tight enough. no really, tighter. again. cinch that fucker. also, easy removal is not a good thing.


• swimming while wearing my usual paddling clothes is not a problem.


• i always wondered why i saw more inflatable than foam paddle floats. (inflation being a pain and puncture being a fear.) i assumed portability and cost, but it turns out the foam ones don't have as much buoyancy as a two-chamber inflatable.


• when i buy a paddle it will be the strongest fucking paddle. there were points where i had my full weight balanced on the shaft.


• lean toward the float.


• Eddyline kayaks are pretty sweet.

i did not weep when we ran out of pool time and i still hadn't self-rescued, but it was a close thing. i was quivering with exhaustion, and my dreams of solo winter paddling in Lake Union and the ship canal were crashing down.

* * *
it was great to go with philotera and Sailor J. J was the real hero of the revolution, doing extra stints on the boat side of assisted rescue and driving us home when we were all thoroughly exhausted.

i am now the new owner of philotera's neoprene paddling shoes. apparently they were always too large for her, but they fit me perfectly. they're very nice. beats the heck out of my heavy sandals.

today we've been swapping videos of alternate self-rescue techniques. i think i would have more success with the heel-hook method, or maybe a stirrup assist.

i think i need to get serious about doing the kayak routine from Conditioning for Outdoor Fitness. and maybe look into what synchronized swimmers do to lift their bodies out of the water. (doing more swimming wouldn't hurt. my muscle memory is strong but my conditioning is gone.)

my inner teenager is always just under the surface.

i had two separate people warn me about fatigue and pain from knitting with tiny circular needles; you stay in the same position for a long time and it's easy to overdo. well, that wouldn't happen to me because i am a special snowflake.

of course i charged ahead and completely wrecked my hands. as in it hurt to pet the dog.

yes, i have sought treatment. basically i need to rest and listen to my body. if i'm still in pain at the two-week mark i have real trouble.

i've been not-knitting for a week, and it is driving me bonkers because it turns out everything i like to do (and my job) requires my hands.

these are the offending socks.





i'm quite proud of them since i learned multiple new techniques in the process: sock blank dying, magic loop, toe-up construction, and two-at-a-time knitting. and to put my work down more often.

the meanest town in America story is preying on me. knowing she has a ticket out of that place doesn't make it better.

i returned an unfinished book to the library today.

we have a wonderfully large library and a great holds system here, so with a bit of planning i can have a nearly unbroken stream of reading material that takes no money from my budget or space on my bookshelves. the nature of the holds system means that the books must flow - many of the things i read aren't eligible for renewal because there is a line behind me.

so sometimes i have to give up. when i purchase a book and it doesn't grab me on the first try, it goes to slumber on the shelf, to be revisited at a better time. often the right moment is all i need. sometimes the better time never comes, and it heads out to a used bookstore to find a happier home. unfinished library books fill me with guilt, because i know that the book and the right moment are unlikely to have a chance to meet after that initial pass.

i feel like i am letting that book down. in January, it was Treason's Shore. it's book four (i think the last) of a fat fantasy series that is very good. (martial arts! egalitarian society! pirates! complex well-defined characters! really.) if you start to read Inda and are enjoying it, just get the rest of them because they read as one very long continuous book. which i normally applaud, because i hate recaps. but put a year between the reading of book three and book four, and all of the complexity that was so pleasurable in the first three volumes makes picking up the fourth without a reread of the prior three nearly impossible. i carried a 700 page hardcover around for three weeks, knowing how much i enjoyed the beginning of the story, seeing the potential, barely able to pick at it - knowing that if i let it go i may not ever read it.

today i admitted that Finch wasn't doing it for me. i don't know why, when i find a description of Finch so enticing, that the book itself does not beg to be read. it's not about being depressing - i tore through The Windup Girl and immediately ordered up and read Bacigalupi's short story collection, which are all post-apocalyptic and hopeless.

it's so much easier when i definitely don't like the book, it doesn't feel like my failure. when my failures belong to the library i'm not filling my shelves with their spines, spines that reproach me for failing to unleash their potential - i can just turn my head as the door on the return bin slams shut.

think about it.

the unfortunate side effect of getting the 360 back is C watching bad (but not so-bad-they're-good) fantasy movies.

i would like to un-experience every glimpse i have had of The Scorpion King: Rise of a Warrior.

today, UPS left the standard passive-aggressive sticky note and no package.

but hey, if you contact them by seven, you can drive yourself to their warehouse in SODO between the railroad tracks, and then stand around and wait through most of the one-hour window they give you until the package is produced.

and lo, M$ gave us a new 360 with a warranty instead of repairing our busted old one, and a month of Live for our troubles.

they did not, however, send along a power block or a/v cord.




*headdesk*




if you call the service number on the website, you go through a series of recordings that never lead you to a human. if you exhaust the automated menu, it actually says "then i can't help you".

i used their email form. they make you choose a problem from a drop-down menu. "Console will not power on" it is.