Oh, and the hospice service called to remind me that I have 20 free counseling sessions with a bereavement counselor.

I'm so glad to hear this.

I'm still in Georgia till Monday morning, but I've moved from the part where I roam around Blue Ridge Mountain backroads and scenic drives mostly by myself to the part where I'm attending Multiverse Con in Atlanta. The panels look great (events don't actually start for another hour or so) and the hotel has a more comfortable bed than my vacation rental did and allows me to set the thermostat down to my personal semi-arctic preference. But part of me wishes I was staying in the mountains until it's time to fly home--I haven't yet had my fill of waterfalls and mountains and just being ALONE.

(And yes, I do realize I live near a bunch of mountains, big spiky ones that are snowcapped for most of the year and are punctuated by volcanos. But the Appalachians speak to a different part of my soul.)

Thanks for the update, David. I worry about you. Having lots on the schedule isn't a bad thing as distraction can help. Nice song. Reminds me that I have to do the body check appointment when I return home. Part of life in the Sunshine State.

Another guilty plea in the Georgia case. Fani Willis keeps lining them up, and knocking them down.

Nilly and Shir thanks for keeping checking in!!

David that’s a good song. And glad you’ve got some counseling coming to you.

I keep having to do work and I don’t want to. But applying for a new job is like….EXTRA work. So that seems like too much too.

I hear you on that, meara. Although I am actually enjoying my job right now - it's more work than I really want to do but at least it is interesting.

Hooray counseling and therapy and checking in!

Another guilty plea in the Georgia case.

Is that all of them? I may have lost count

Chesebro and Powell have both pled guilty in exchange for testimony. Heh.

... though I hope they have security, or a safe place to hide. TFG is going to lose his shit.

It has been a long week and my work laptop has been acting up, so I was at home using a janky version of VPN to access the network, and I just gave up and took the rest of the afternoon off. It was too difficult to get much done.

I’m sitting at the doctors office and just received my second application of numbing cream to my face.

It’s a little scary to contemplate what they’re going to do to my face that requires this much numbing.

I have to wait another half hour before the procedure. Gah! This is not going to be fun.

Fraxel laser resurfacing. My skin should look younger when it’s recovered though.

Much~ma to you, David. May it be quick with an easy recovery.

Since that Saturday two weeks ago I had to convince myself to go to bed on Fridays. There is an anxiety of not knowing what will happen to the world when I wake up tomorrow. But whatever happens, if anything happens, I guess it's better to face it with more sleep than none.

I realized that only today I told a close friend how that Saturday looked from my perspective. How only around noon I started to understand that the glimpse of stories I caught about what happens in the south aren't franatic rumors and irresponsible media coverage but might be true (though I was also going in and out of the shelter from morning till noon). I got to the first cup of coffee between the third and forth siren, and took it with me during the forth siren, because hi, priorities. And after noon, I spent hours looking at the phone, trying and failing to make sense of the news, getting updates from people and updating them. And reading those who were still under fire or in danger to their lives, in real time. And being unable to help them.

I'm relatively safe, where I am. But I really miss the problems I thought I had before Oct. 7th.

May it be a quiet night. From Hamas, Hizballah, and also from my cat, which based on last night, may be a collaborator with the agenda of keeping me up at night.

May it be a quiet night, Shir.

Review of Frexel Laser Resurfacing: That fuckin' hurt.

But it's already calming down and doesn't look any worse than the kind of sunburn I used to get being out on the water all day growing up in Florida.

Which, not coincidentally, is why they need to tend to the precancerous cells and sun damage of my fair skinned Floridian youth.

As Emmett used to say with acute understatement: That was undelightful.

Worse, I have to get the same procedure done again in a month. Though she was kind enough to schedule it after Thanksgiving.

But I am going over to a friend's Oktoberfest for brats and beer tonight.

And tomorrow Jes and I will go see the Misfit Cabaret's Halloween show: [link]