My condolences to you and your family, Karl.

lisah, Amy, so sorry about the bad news for your parents.

Yeah, what Matt said.

Hang in there, Sheryl. That is also tough.

And sorry for your mom's vacation, Steph!

Uggggggh I don't know if this is depression or burnout or a secret third thing my stupid brain made up special, but I miss you guys and I wish I had the spoons to remember to check in here more often.

Friends: Wish I had some local ones. Proximity matters so much. (There are a handful of people in my town if not neighborhood where every time we interact I'm like "this is great, why aren't we friends" but it's because I am unable to do any proactive peopling and so I just sit at home wishing people would invite me to things.)

Re Teams - we use Chime here because why license something that works if you can force people to use a proprietary knock-off they hate instead? (We have Slack too but not all teams use it, and Chime is the conferencing system that's built into Outlook and meeting rooms.)

Salesforce - being forced to work on launching an instance of Salesforce is what drove me away from Audible way back when. I used to literally spend my entire 2-hour commute crying in my car because of fucking Salesforce.

Dryers - We have an ANCIENT machine up at the cabin, and when it started leaking this summer the repair guy said flat out "never replace this" because the new machines are all garbage.

I am thinking about Shir and Nilly every day. Thank you both for letting us know what's going on.

So, legal abortions, legal weed, save our railroad.

This is the future liberals want! And congrats on the legal abortions! (My grandparents were Diamond-awarded supporters of Planned Parenthood in Cincinnati for over 50 years, if there is an afterlife, I hope they're celebrating this.)

yeah, wow, sheryl. hope he gets the help he needs.

The name of the company is literally "Appliance Wizards." I am DEEPLY disappointed that Cheerful Chaotic Neutral Guy isn't wearing a wizard hat or robe.

Room for a Wizard's Staff joke there

The name of the company is literally "Appliance Wizards." I am DEEPLY disappointed that Cheerful Chaotic Neutral Guy isn't wearing a wizard hat or robe.

Room for a Wizard's Staff joke there

I can't believe I missed that opportunity!

Appliance Wizards is a great name though! All of the appliances in my house are about 18 years old (the age of the house) so one of them is going to break sometime soon…

I’m on my way to my dance weekend! So of course the Reign, who I have season tickets for, are unexpected in the championships this weekend and I probably won’t even have time to watch the game. Ah well. Hopefully will be too busy dancing!!

I saw a video online of a person who does custom "action figures" - not necessarily a Marvel or DC character, but a figure of some sort. A recent, much enjoyed commission, had her creating a possum figure - type of character not important, just a possum. Well, she decided on a wizard possum - she put magnets in the possum's hands so it can hold a wand or staff or something else. It has a little wizard's hat, plus a fabric cape that she embroidered and made buttons, etc., to decorate. But ... a WIZARD possum.

Sheryl, Karl, Amy, lisah - I'm sorry and I'm keeping you in my thoughts.

Hi, friends. It's been a minute. This week was a lot. First, I'm reorganizing volunteer gigs. Found a place with a better fit, even though cooking really helps the soul.

I found the answer to "where do you get hugs and meet friends now". The answer is funerals and memorials. Hiding some triggering details in the next line - -

On Tuesday someone who was once a friend, then less than a friend, died by suicide. I'm also a friend of his ex wife. The funeral was yesterday. Not sure what to say about it other than it really, really, really sucks, and please promise me you'll ask for help. It's devastating.

In better news, I got my COVID shot this morning. I also manged to conduct 50% of the conversation about it, as well as buying Jerusalem Bagel and venting about bus schedules in Arabic (the clinic is on the border with East Jerusalem, so they're mostly serving Palestinian population. I prefered to go there and not to wait another two weeks for an appointment in a closer clinic to home). It also felt reassuring: the clinic is right next to the police headquarters that now get attacks every few days (a policewoman was stabbed there just 48 hours ago), so it was nice to do everyday stuff as if some stuff are still normal. And I guess they are. Or can be.

I also got today the key to a friends' house. I'll water the plants and take care of the cats while they're abroad - they dont want their kids to be here during all of this. The plus side is that they have a secured room in their place which I now can freely occupy if things will get worse (the sheltering options in my building are less secured).

That's the update from here. My current hope is that US government will step in even more and make all of the terrible governments here to play nice. It's not a good hope, but the other options are a military coup or a regional war, so this might be the most peaceful option of them all (I'm afraid Bibi is not going to step down on his own. Ever).

Anyhow, it's getting late. May the war be over soon. I'm hanging in there. And one day, this indeed will be over.

I'm sorry for your loss, Karl.

Thanks so much for your update, Shir