It’s back catio season! And my unemployed status means the back catio can appear many more days of the week.
I enjoy working at my desk and watching the cats lounge in the sun.
This picture doesn’t show the area where Sentinel had his surgery, but it’s healing nicely.
May 2022. This is a post from the beginning of the pandemic. It’s been sitting in my draft folder for more than two years now. I am publishing it without revising, so please excuse its first-draft form.
I’m pretty tired. 9 hours of work today. I might have a midday break and do some gardening and/or short bike ride.
I’ve also decided to block out an hour weekly to make phone calls. You know, the kind where you have to follow up on some boring personal thing. I hate making phone calls and at least there will be a regular time.
Also today I applied for a full-time remote copyediting position with very clear instructions about what the subject line should be: first name last name – position you are applying for.
The second after I applied, I got an auto responder that asked me to record a Zoom video, again following an explicit script. And also to answer 9 questions. So I recorded that video (I had to change my shirt) and set it off.
I then immediately received an auto responder with a link to a YouTube video explaining their recruiting process.
It was kind of cool. I’m still in the mood to jump through hoops.
And it was better than the copyediting job I applied for yesterday that had an “overwhelming response” and had us fill out a Google Survey. The last question was what was my score on an assessment I did not take. Poor form!
Sara took a little break from her workday to send me this punny postcard. As a fan of puns, this was a delight to receive.
May 2022. This is a post from the beginning of the pandemic. It’s been sitting in my draft folder for more than two years now. I am publishing it without revising, so please excuse its first-draft form.
I’ve been busy! Working, for one. I upped my unemployment work schedule and that means 8–9 hours per day. Which I’m happy to do. Those hours are spread between five things and I can switch them up. Plus, I’m not commuting to get to this work.
My five things:
Last night after work there was happy hour (via Zoom) and then I dropped off a mask for my Aunt. By the time I was done with that it was after seven and I was hungry.
Tonight is Wednesday, which means it’s my movie watching night. I’m looking forward to that. But first! Digging two rows for the potatoes.
Edmund Goulding provides a great canvas to show off Bette Davis’s range in Dark Victory.* Davis, aside from cycling through the stages of grief, makes a wealthy socialite a sympathetic character while wooing George Brent, a reserved and quiet doctor who knows he doesn’t know enough about brain tumors to be of any help.** This is a solid capsule of its time from the lack of information given to the patient, to the copious amounts of cigarette smoking.
Cost: Free via TV Land Feature Films (which didn’t have ads for the first film I watched, but now does. Tricky!)
Where watched: at home.
*It’s a weepie, though removed enough from its time and place that I did not weep.
**This is the first time I’ve seen Ronald Reagan in a movie. I didn’t recognize him when he faced the camera, he was only identifiable in profile. Also of note. Humphrey Bogart is hardly in this .
The scene in Dr. Steele’s office where Judith can’t light her cigarette, and then a few minutes later she can’t light Dr. Steele’s, was devised by Edmund Goulding. He explained, “When Bette Davis can’t light her own cigarette, you know something is seriously wrong with her.”
When the band is packing up and Judith tips them to play a song, she gives the singer a $50 bill and they immediately jump to it. Adjusting for inflation, this is the equivalent of about $900.
Sara sent this postcard to commemorate the next phase in my life. She’s been sending postcards to all her students and I’m glad I’m in the mix even though I’m not a student.
May 2022. This is a post from the beginning of the pandemic. It’s been sitting in my draft folder for more than two years now. I am publishing it without revising, so please excuse its first-draft form.
I looked at my list of things to do for 3SMReviews and for Keen Eye and decided two hours per day each wasn’t going to cut it and I switched to three hours per day. This, plus the hour a day looking for work and the hour each a day working on two different books means I have a long work day.
I’m okay with it, I think? I do better with time being structured, rather than free-form. We shall see what this week brings.
Right now it’s 6:00 and I’m hungry and want to eat. Interestingly, the cats haven’t started bugging me for food.
Aside from a shirt destined for Goodwill, I also cut up a bandanna for this great black mask. I’ve got an orange bandanna to cut up for my own mask.
May 2022. This is a post from the beginning of the pandemic. It’s been sitting in my draft folder for more than two years now. I am publishing it without revising, so please excuse its first-draft form.
I got bored last night. I didn’t want to watch a movie, because I was going to watch one (and maybe two) on Sunday. I wasn’t in the mood to read. I had already gardened and cooked and watched some TV.
I haven’t been bored in a very long time. It was kind of a nice feeling. Aside from being, well, bored.
But today, I did not watch one or two movies because I sewed face masks instead. The CDC is now recommending people wear face masks when they go grocery shopping, etc. I find a cowel I use for biking when it was cold and called it good, but my mom asked if I would sew her a face mask and sent me some links.
I had material (somewhat) but I didn’t have elastic. But the tutorials my mom sent used hair ties! And I did have hair ties. 10 of them, unused, bought who knows when.
So after writers group, digging another row for potatoes, and cooking, I printed out the pattern and made two face masks. They turned out pretty cool, and I got started on a project I’ve been meaning to do for years: cutting down the dish towels I use for napkins into napkin sizes.
My Aunt Carol wants a face mask too, so I’ll make one for her. My Aunt Pat found some face masks from when Mount Saint Helens exploded, (!) so she’s good. I’ll see if dad and Barb want any. And then I will probably be out of hair ties.
