Ben came on the 27th. As always that’s hard. It went somewhat better than I expected in person. It went as well as I remember afterward. He doesn’t like the way I know him, and doesn’t want to imagine the disabilities he had before his body stopped working. When I notice he smells an attack and kicks and shoves to get away from me. It’s sad that this is a thing I have to protect myself from. It’s sad that we were pushed into this place to start with. So that disrupted my weekend a bit. He sleeps even more poorly than I do, and came for a 26 hour…

I started one of these that could have gone out on Christmas, but it was full of extra sad story so I’ll save that one for my birthday. It was also hard to finish because I was exhausted from supporting Shanda’s central-time early morning punishment session with your family of origin, and then felt supervised instead of connected when you were done. Christmas went fine, after we gave up on those morning plans. I advanced the plot on the boots and coats heist, I delivered a birthday present in recognition of the way Christmas erases birthdays, and I got Shanda on board with the idea that maybe our Christmas is…

Dog got a Christmas present today. He wasn’t really up for waiting. Someone sent a dog toy and he sniffed it out of the pile of wrapped presents and couldn’t leave it alone. It didn’t even have food in it, but it clearly had something Dog assumed was for him. I had discouraged him from it last night but today he dug it out while we were away. Didn’t rip it open but did move things to get at it. So he’s got a new faux animal to murder, which he seems to like. Went out to lunch today with Shanda, and got bits to prep for the week. It’s…

These have seemed hard to do. Lots of things have. There’s lots getting done too, but it’s been a busy time, and I stepped out to WI in the middle of it. Then I came back, pushed hard to catch up, and needed 2 days of staring at nothing to get back to normal. Tried to organize a grand heist but couldn’t provide the necessary security on short notice, which is a disappointment. But it was nice to see you imagine it for a minute – imagine doing something big and unproductive and spontaneous – even if it’s ultimately not what you wanted. I hope someday there’s a version that…

Back to Seattle today. You know how I feel about being physically trapped and interacting with authorities. But otherwise it was a real good day. I had some Potato Oles, which I can’t get here. I got to meet DerbyK’s youngest 1Technically we rode together in a car once but I don’t think it counts unless we actually interact. and provide emergency gravy and spin and build a house. It was lots of fun. I am always the last one to sleep. Under stressful circumstance I’m also the first one up. There are lots of reasons for this. One is trauma and related feels about being physically vulnerable while asleep.…

Went to a divorce this week. It’s like a wedding, wherein there’s paperwork and promises and then a party. The guest mingling works in reverse though, where you start out on seperate sides of the aisle and then go to seperate parties. I know both the participants from back in the day, though now that sides are drawn up I find myself opposite my former partner. I broke up with Nick back in the oughts. I’m sorry your flight from him took so much longer. But I’m really exited about where you came out. Went to civil court super early, which is always exciting. Watched Nick not be able to…

I was out too late at noisy places to write, but I did do this [fig 1]. Divorce arts achieved. Heist successful. ZiB

It’s been a while, and longer still at low rates. I still need a plan to deal with writing when I’m in an official busy state – the low rate version is probably okay but the none isn’t ideal. I use this to plan my life. But I have some excuse. I’m in Wisconsin, traveled Thursday to get here, and wanted it to be a surprise until last night. I had travel bits to write but I didn’t want to be restricted so not talking about it was easier. Plus there’s the fleeing feels I have tied up in travel, which are hard enough to pick apart even when I’m…

Got many things done. Clean Dog, white hair, trash, dishes, laundry, sheets, floating costume, soldering, LEGO labels, robot competition. Lots of feels about working together. The broken toe makes many things intense, even if we weren’t on a deadline and anticipating travel. Major OS updates on the home automation controller. Not planned. The DMX interface died due to upstream maintenance rot, and to make fixing it less terrible I pulled the OS up to date under it. Lots of security tweaks and updates required to get it going, during which none of the lights or garage door work at all. I would have liked to pick the time for it…

Weird day at robots. There was a very specific goal that T wanted to meet, much more specific than was required for success at robotting. In persuit of it they did many useful things, but they also let it consume them, as they made perfect the enemy of good. I’m not stressed about it, but I’m sad to see it happening. I would change it if I knew how. Talked to DerbyK about their party, and the reasons for it. Good times, but hard ones too. It will be good for things to be different though, and nice to start in earnest to build a new thing in place of…