24th of Elul

Had a busy day Friday. Spent most of the day in Tacoma. Went to 2 different recycling places. Then, to the Tacoma Mall so my parent could recycle her old ipad and iphone. The line for the new iphone was long. Glad we weren't there for that. 

My parent found out that she had pink eye Thursday afternoon, and was told not to go back to work the next day. Since it's highly contagious. I hope I don't get it. Although, I think I would have had signs by now. This made it easier to make a full day of it. 

We went to Half Price Books after that. She gave them a huge collection of books. (Filled up 3 boxes.) They didn't see the value in it, sadly. They'll recycle them for her. I did find a cookbook there. It's called Traditional Swedish Cooking. It was only $7. Really good for a cookbook. It's interesting. There's a lot of fish recipes. More than I expected. Fish side dishes, salads, stews, etc. Even fish that I haven't heard of before. They have other salads that seem 'safe' for me, too. Lots of cooked vegetables. Other types of stews. Tons of desserts. There's a section for bread, and another for preserves. Sounds fun. It also has alcoholic drinks. I don't drink alcohol, but it was interesting. There are tips for certain ingredients. A lot of the recipes sound doable to me, even with the pain. 

After that, we went to my rheumatologist's appointment. He seemed to actually listen to me, was thorough, and tried to come up with things to help. He thought the muscle relaxant was a good idea. I think it might be helping, but I definitely feel it when it wears off. I might ask for a higher dose. 

He was worried about my hands. Brought up seeing a hand surgeon to figure out how to get rid of the lumps. There are so many. They're still somewhat small, but are growing and hardening. They're not painful, unless I mess with them for a while. They're annoying and sometimes move around. He was concerned about the weird sores on my hands, too. 

I brought up my mouth sores. Although, I think I only have one right now (like a thin line on the edge of the left corner of my lips). He still took a look at it. I forgot to tell him that one of the sores that disappeared was black with a little white on top and big. It scared me. Now that it's not there anymore, maybe it doesn't matter if I told him. 

I wasn't sure, but I thought the big lump on my neck might be a swollen lymph node. I thought it was too big for one. He said they can get much bigger, and it would make sense if it were. He wants me to see a dermatologist, since he's not an expert in what's going on with my skin. 

I brought up the possibility that I have scleroderma. He agreed it could be, but also brought up lupus. He ordered 2 blood tests, one for scleroderma, and the other is the ANCA Screen. I think the ANCA Screen is to help narrow down what autoimmune disease it is. If it's positive, it's a certain group. If negative, those are eliminated. I don't know much about that test. I had a strong urge to get imaging done on my hands and wrists, and he agreed and ordered x-rays. Those lumps could be calcium deposits, which would show up on x-rays. Plus, the structure of my hands seems to have changed. They're more twisted and bony looking. The positions the put my hands in were awkward to stay in, too. Apparently the results are all back, but I'm nervous to look at them. What if both blood tests are negative and the x-rays come back with nothing? I'm back to square one. However, what if all of them indicate what I think is going on? He said he'd make a phone appointment depending on the results. If he doesn't, I'll see him in 6 months. That's a long time, but maybe the dermatologist will come up with things. 

Went to the Cheesecake Factory after that. We don't go there very often, so it was a treat. So many things on their menu are calorie-laden. It's often hard to pick if I've eaten anything beforehand. I only had breakfast before that, so I could handle quite a bit. It was also the start of my treat days, but I didn't want to go overboard. I got their cheddar-stuffed burger. Most of the cheddar fell out and pooled on the plate as soon as I started eating it. Much more liquidy than I expected and kind of gross looking. The burger and sweet grilled onions were great. I ate all of the burger and onions, a little of the cheddar, roughly 1/4 of the bun, none of the fixings, and roughly half of the fries. I think I did pretty well with that. For dessert, I got their Cinnabon Cinnamon Swirl Cheesecake. It had layers of Cinnabon cinnamon cheesecake, vanilla crunch cake, cream cheese frosting, and caramel on top. There was cinnamon and sugar sprinkles on the back of the slice, too. It tasted and smelled like a cinnamon roll. Like 2 desserts in one. Got home pretty late.

For the last couple of days, Rosie has had an upset stomach. I woke up to her scratching on my closet door Sunday morning. She scratches near things she doesn't like. She does this almost every time she goes to the bathroom in the litter boxes. Seems that she's trying to flush it away or something. She never covers. Anyways, I ignored her until the 3rd time she came by to scratch. I lightly tapped her on the butt, and told her to stop. She walked a little towards the middle of my bedroom and proceeded to throw up. What a way to start the day! Turned out she had thrown up a lot near my closet. I took care of it all before I got ready for the day. Then, she seemed fine throughout the day. Monday morning, she threw up again in my room. Near my sneakers this time. Cleaned it up. Throughout the day she would throw up clear stuff. She seemed depressed and was very affectionate. I was angry Sunday morning, but that quickly turned into feeling bad for her. She must have eaten something she shouldn't have. She doesn't get sick that often. She hasn't thrown up today. At least, not that I know of.

I've decided to try to stick more closely with the daily calorie range limit I set for myself (1200-1600, 1400 being the 'sweet spot'), and to be close to what's recommended of other things like sugar, carbs, protein, etc. It's a balancing act. The calorie range is the easy part. I vary wildly day to day when it comes to many of the other things. Half the time I go a little over what's recommended for sugar, the other half I get maybe half of it. I'm usually well over for carbs. That's something I'm going to have to 'manipulate' a bit. Since I have a problem with absorbing protein, I need more than what's recommended for a healthy person. However, I have a hard time going over the halfway mark for that healthy person's recommended amount. I never make it to the full amount for that. So, it's an even more difficult thing for me. Interestingly, I usually am under the recommended amount for fat. I plan to still have Friday night to Sunday as my treat days, but I might try to be a bit more careful. Maybe my limit should be around 1800 calories a day for those. Not sure about the rest of the nutrients. I think I figured out today's stuff pretty well. Except for the protein. Seems like I'll just barely make it over the halfway mark for that. I'll end up being slightly under 1400 calories, which isn't bad. Only 4g over for carbs. (The recommended amount for carbs is 225g.) Right on for sugar. Yay! Better with potassium than usual, too. That's close to it's halfway mark. Only 4% under the recommended amount for calcium. 17% under for iron. Potassium, iron, and calcium can be tricky for me, too.

Studied Dutch on Duolingo both yesterday and today. I skipped it on Friday. Despite that, I'm still in the Ruby League. I'm 1/4 way through the Arts 2 unit now, and made it passed the 5th checkpoint. I think that's the last checkpoint. They did it a little differently with this one. It must be a new thing. In order to pass it, they quiz you on content you were taught after the 4th checkpoint. They don't let you see the translations of the words in sentences you may have forgotten, can't repeat what was said, a couple of different formats for the questions than the usual, etc. Supposedly it wasn't graded either. Maybe it's more of a review? Made it through quickly. 

Edited Alliance yesterday and today, as well. I'm well into chapter 10 now. Today I went through 7 pages of the ebook version, and 9 pages of the print. I only did it for 4 days last week, but I managed to go through 36 pages of the ebook, and 51 pages of the print all together. That's a lot! I'm still surprised at how quickly I'm moving through it this time. 

Practiced my clarinet yesterday. Finished playing through my klezmer book, and started the Mozart one. I wasn't feeling up to it today. Hopefully, I'll get to it tomorrow. 

Finished watching the new anime adaptation of Fruits Basket. There is going to be a 2nd season. It really did stick to the manga. The 1st anime didn't, and the mangaka (creator) was really upset by it. She hated the design, the music, the voice actors' portrayals, etc. That one also had a lighter more immature tone. The actual manga gets dark quick. There's still a lot of humor, though. The design with this new anime followed the one in the manga to a T, which was interesting to see. They made the art prettier and animation better. The voice actors were much better. I remember how much I hated the Japanese voice actors in the older anime. It's really rare, but the English dub was much better in that. This time the Japanese voice actors sounded pretty much how I'd imagine the characters to sound. The music was better with the new one, too. It wasn't so wishy-washy. With the old one, they veered off into a different direction than the manga halfway through because they caught up to it. The manga wasn't even halfway through. So, people only got a glimpse at the plot. I'm glad I read all of the manga. It gets complex. There were characters that I liked that weren't in the old anime, since they were introduced later. Got to see one of those in the last couple of minutes of the 2019 version's finale. That was Rin, the horse in the zodiac. I've also realized that there are quite a few queer themes in it, which might be why I liked it so much in the past. I didn't realize it at the time. It's hinted that a few characters may be trans and some are gender non-conforming. One character is clearly bi, but jokes about it sometimes. Their friendships are portrayed in a much deeper way than many series (manga/anime, and even in Western media). Some of them could easily be called queerplatonic. There's a big twist to the story in the manga. They have you thinking one of them is a certain gender throughout most of it, but isn't. They were forced to be a certain gender. I think they might actually be non-binary. (I'm trying to not spoil who that is.) The main protagonist, Tohru, is tougher than she seems also. Probably was a way to portray a strong female character girls and women could look up to or be inspired by. Rare in shoujo anime/manga, to me. She seems more...real. I think she sometimes slips out of gender roles, too. The series also touches on mental illness and some other deep topics. Hopefully, the 2nd season will be out soon. They just said sometime in 2020. I'm not sure how many seasons they'll make. I think if they want to do the whole thing it might be 3 or 4 seasons long? Not sure. That would be cool. I'll get to see more of the manga-only characters next season. Yay!

Also, finished Naka no Hito Genome or the Ones Within. I liked it a lot. It had a dark side to it, which is my sort of thing. The characters were unique and most were lovable. I think Anya is actually ace, possibly aro as well. He's never had a crush, and he's said he doesn't like anyone when he was asked about dating. Some of the others don't seem straight, either. They leave it ambiguous, which was a fascinating side to it. They hint at some of them possibly being gay, lesbian, or bi/pan. Again, it's put in such a way, except for Anya, that you can't really tell. Makino, who doesn't talk much and loves to sleep, seems to attract everyone. He also seems, at least, to be gender non-conforming. I think I share a lot of Akatsuki's traits, which was interesting. The only one I felt iffy about was Akatsuki's stalker, Yuzu. I think she was meant to make people feel that way. The games were interesting. They managed to get over half the amount of viewers they needed. It leaves it wide open for a 2nd season. I really hope it does have one. It seems highly underrated. 

International Cat Day!

This holiday was yesterday. I love cats! I love other animals as well, but cats hold a special place in my heart. Been around them since I was born. Our current cats are a Turkish Van, Natasha (Tasha for short), and a tortoiseshell (aka tortie), Rosie. Tortoiseshell isn't technically a breed. It's based on the color of their coat. They're similar to calicos this way. She's a tabby (short hair), which has stripes along with the different colors. We went through a lot of names for her, but Rosie seems to fit so well. She's glomped onto me almost since we got her. Tries to take care of me, too. She has an issue with matted fur. The vet clinic had to shave most of the mats off recently, and I've been using a grooming glove twice a day since. The mats haven't come back. Her fur is so much softer and shinier now. She seems happy about it and begs to be groomed now. She'll 'groom' me at the same time by licking my free hand. So cute! 

Turkish Vans have long fur, but it's in a single layer instead of multiple. Makes it very soft. They often have color on the head and tail and sometimes parts of their legs/feet (she has some in those areas), and white for the rest of the body. Tasha is black and white. They're prone to polydactyly, which is lit. many fingers/toes. Tasha has that. Her paws are huge because of it. Yet, she has a small slender head. A collar doesn't fit her. She'll just wiggle out of it, if you manage to get it on her. She also barks like a dog when startled. Loves water. This might be because the breed comes from near Lake Van in Turkey. Pretty unique cat. Since we got Rosie, they've fought each other. However, they seem to be mellowing out. Tasha has become braver in the last couple of years. Wanting to stick around me, sleeping on my bed during the day, going downstairs and hanging out with us, watching things out the back door, etc. Things she wouldn't do before. She's standing her ground more, too. I think this has made Rosie feel even more jealous, but she's not attacking as often. 

Tuesday marked the 10-year anniversary of this blog! Wahoo! Never thought I'd keep it up for as long as I have on here. This will be the 1,049th post. It'll be cool if I keep it up in some form for another 10 years, at least. Hopefully, I can get back to posting more often. The year I posted the most was in 2010. Did better than most years last year. I've also created 3 other blogs on here. The 2nd one was on what I'd say to my mom after she passed away. Similar to writing letters to her, I guess. I had that completely private where no one but me could see it. I deleted that one, because it was painful to see after a while. The 3rd one was supposed to be on various different topics and my point of view on them. That became inactive after a few posts. Maybe I'll get back to it in the future. It was an interesting concept. The final one was on practicing my Japanese. I even switched to the Blogger Japanese base where the comments, headings, etc. are all in the language. They even email you in Japanese if there's an alert of some sort. It was cool. Might go back to it in the future, and/or make another language learning one. As an example, since I'm studying it right now, I could make a Dutch one. I did have a few comments on the Japanese one from actual Japanese people. That was nice. I've read you can create 100 blogs through Blogger. That's way too many to keep up with. I also like the lists feature. I can keep up with things and see what I've finished at a glance. The links list is probably not completely up to date, but that's good to have as reference, too. There's a lot you can customize. I stuck with one background/configuration until just a few years ago. It looks quite different now. I think I was forced to, because they weren't able to support the old version. I like it, even if it's taken me a little while to get used to. It's pretty great to be able to link to my books (with the cover art) with a widget on here, too. Even if I'm a little embarrassed by my 1st book after editing it. I need to go over the beginning yet again. Then I'll go through the sequel, and finally resubmit both of them for publishing. Anyways, this is like my little home online. 

I've been using Pandora since college. It's really gotten to know my 'tastes' in music over the years. (Of what's in their database.) I've loved that it picks new music based on things you've liked already. I recently got Pandora Premium. I had been using the free version. They give you the 1st month free, and then start the subscription. There are no ads and I think their recommendations have been much better. I haven't looked at My Thumbprint radio yet. I've just kept listening to my Shuffle one. It shuffles the ones I've thumbed up and suggests new tunes. I'm not sure how different Thumbprint would be. I guess I can see in the future. 

Recently started watching Naka no Hito Genome [Jikkyouchuu] (The Ones Within- Genome [Now Streaming]). It's been very interesting so far. A very different twist on a currently popular genre, isekai. Isekai (different world) is when people from our world are transported, reincarnated, or trapped in a parallel universe. Sometimes this works in reverse. It's usually fantasy or horror based, and a lot of them are influenced by or actually in their own video games (mostly rpg's). I think it's a fun one, but there have been a lot of them in the last few anime seasons. Some people are sick of them. This one has a group of gaming 'streamers' or video uploaders from our world transported to a place called 13th Avenue. Each player specializes in a certain type of game, like cultivation games, fighting games, puzzle games, horror games, etc. A man in an alpaca mask, called Paca, gathers them together and explains that they have to clear all the stages and collect tokens. They must reach 100 million viewers at the same time in the 'livestream'. The viewers are watching everything they do. Even when they're not participating in a stage. There are a certain number of people allowed to do each one. If you go against Paca the punishment could be deadly. They can die or be injured in the stages, too. It's really dark at times, which is my kind of thing. 

It got a bit personal for me in one of the last episodes I saw (I'm not up to date on the series yet). The main character, Akatsuki, has a similar dominant handedness as me. We're both essentially cross-dominant. We tend to prefer a certain hand for certain tasks, and this can switch at times. For instance, I mostly write with my right hand, carry an umbrella in my left, might kick a ball with either foot or catch it with either hand (depends on which is closest), eat with a fork and knife similar to a left-handed person but a little different (I've been told it's weird, but it makes the most sense to me) etc. They say he's ambidextrous, but was forced to do things like write with his right instead of left. They do suspect a lot of cross-dominants are actually ambidextrous, and it wouldn't surprise me if I was. Left-handed people weren't treated very well even when I was in elementary school. Scared me enough I tried to make sure I used my right hand for at least writing. I'm surprised they had a character like that.  

He has a stalker that's one of the gamers. She has a wall covered in pics of him, and has been 'studying' him since they met. She knew about the cross-dominant thing. I've had 3 or 4 stalkers in the past. 1 woman and 2 or 3 men. A couple of them had done a similar thing with pics of me. The 1st one I found out at a Jewish youth group camping trip. I think I was 14 or 15? He had made a shrine with pics of me, the shoe I lost that day, and candles all around in his cabin room. I accidentally found it along with a friend. Kept blowing kisses at me the rest of the trip, and followed me all the way home. Another one, a roommate at a dorm in college, had made a huge collage of pics of me sleeping and other times without my knowledge. She also wrote a 5-page letter that she gave me when I moved out. Funnily enough, I had to move because of another stalker. That one was much scarier/violent, but he never made collages of me. That I know of, anyway. The anime did bring back those memories. It was creepy enough with what she did/was doing in it. I like Akatsuki even more so now.  

Watched Kuroshitsuji (Black Butler): Book of the Atlantic. It's an anime movie based on the manga's Luxury Liner or Campania arc. Campania was the name of the ship. It was one of the best arcs in the manga. The zombies were introduced, a lot was revealed about Undertaker, and Lizzie has some major character development. A lot of people hated her before that arc. The zombies in it aren't exactly like how most are portrayed. They crave souls, not brains, and you can't be zombified if you're bitten/injured by them. There's a special way to make a zombie that only the fugitive shinigami (lit. death g-d, like the grim reaper) can do. He really was experimenting to try and bring back the dead, not necessarily make zombies. Recently, in the manga, he still hasn't truly perfected the process of making a person come back to life with their soul intact, awareness, memories, same personality, without needing blood transfusions, etc. He's come very close, though. I thought it'd be great to see. It wasn't available for roughly 2 1/2 years. I thought it was pretty well done. A lot of the animation was stunning. Lizzie's fight with the zombies really looked like a ballet, which is like how it was portrayed in the manga. It was oddly beautiful. Sebastian's 1st fight with them was portrayed as a crazy violent demonic dance. They came close. Interesting to see both animated. There's only so much the manga can do. They followed almost everything exactly the way it was in the manga, like the other 'Books'. There's a season on the Circus arc, and another on the Detective arc. I hope they adapt the other story arcs in the future. There have been several since. 

Finished Ultraviolet on Netflix. It's a Polish detective show. Ultraviolet or UV is an online amateur detective forum. They often solve cases much faster than the actual detectives, so there's usually tension between them. The main character, Ola, becomes a member after witnessing a crime. A retired cop and a detective friend help her and UV. The last case was more intense than the others. It'd be cool if another season came out. The characters were very likable. 

Started watching Deadwind, but decided to drop it. It's a Finnish detective show. There's not much humor (even dark humor), everyone looks so depressed, and the acting isn't great. 

Tried out Memories of the Alhambra last night. It's a fantasy Korean drama mostly set in Spain. It sounded really interesting and is highly rated. Dropped it after that first episode, because I couldn't get passed how much of a jerk the male lead was, and weak the female lead was. Seemed sexist. The scenery and game stuff was impressive, though. I brought up what I thought about it in my feed on MyDramaList, and people really seem mixed on it. Some said you should just ignore the female lead. It's supposed to be only about the man. Focus more on the game. Others also hated the sexism and couldn't get passed 1 or 2 episodes. Everyone agreed that there was sexism in it, yet the ones that loved it thought it wasn't a big deal. I wonder if there's a lot of sexism amongst Asian drama fans or they just ignore it? I don't watch that many romance dramas, but it seems like a theme in most of them of that genre around the world. Particularly of non-LGBTQ+ romance shows. I've watched some other types of Korean shows, usually detective ones, that didn't really have that element. In fact, the women were kickass and strong both physically and personality-wise. So, it doesn't seem like just a cultural thing to me. I'll try Possessed next. It's a Korean supernatural detective show. 

Wednesday, we went to the dump and recycled a lot of styrofoam. Got rid of the old computers (Mom's, my parent's, and mine), printers, monitors, and keyboards. There was also a cat bed that neither cat really was into, a rope I got from my horse management class, and some of my really old bedding. Felt a little sentimental about the rope, but it was ragged, pricked me every time I touched it, really old, and there really isn't anything I'd use it for. I think it was one of the ropes I used with the horse assigned to me. He was one of the most abused horses and took a while to break. After that he was glued to me. He wouldn't let anyone else touch him, and was super jealous if I took care of another horse. Was super gentle with me, and if he thought he stepped on me he was beside himself and visibly looked hurt. There were a couple of times like that, but he just would graze my shoe. I hope he found a nice home after the stables were torn down. The new electronics made a lot of styrofoam. It was nice we could find a place to recycle it. 

While we were out around Tacoma, we decided to go to Half Price Books. I found a cookbook called the Joy of Chinese Cooking for about $6. Thought that was really good. It's from the early 80's, so might not be the best. There's a lot of fried dishes. (Like deep-fried, not referring to stir-fried.) I'm not sure if that's really the way authentic Chinese food is. It does indicate things like what's classic, what's festival/party food, what utensils/methods to use, time, and more. That's handy. They don't always list amount of servings, which makes it a little difficult. There's also info on how the Chinese view food, philosophy of it, etiquette, cookware, history of some ingredients, etc. That stuff's always interesting to read about. We went to another HPB, but I didn't find anything else. Last time I went to HPB I found a cheese encyclopedia for around $2. It wasn't thin and was in good shape. That's been interesting. Haven't looked at it often, but it's a wealth of info just sitting there. It features cheeses from around the world, even from places most people don't think about. It'd be cool to try out more cheeses and look them up beforehand. 

Went to Krispy Kreme after all that. Needed something with my 'dinner' pills, since I knew I'd have a late dinner and I need to stick to having my pills at certain times. Have to have food with them. I've only been there once or twice, and it's been a very long time. Got their cake batter donut and chocolate milk. I didn't know they had different fillings besides custard or lemon. This was cake batter flavored frosting. It was surprisingly light and tasty. Hadn't had chocolate milk in an even longer time, so that was an experience, too.

I did manage to mostly stay away from social media last Shabbos. (Friday night until Saturday night. Shabbos is Yiddish for Shabbat, and Shabbat is our day of rest.) It felt nice. Haven't done that in a while, and it felt more like a 'rest' this way. I also got to lighting the candles, saying the blessings, and attended online services for both Friday night and Saturday morning. Did quite a lot more than what I have been doing lately. I used to try to at least do the candles/blessings. Hopefully, I can do the same things as last time this Shabbos. I was kind of disappointed by last Saturday morning online services, because they had technical difficulties and just reuploaded the service from the week before instead. Didn't realize it until about halfway through. Felt a bit off. The night one was nice, though. They seem like a much more diverse congregation than some out there. Probably because they're in NYC. It was still cool to see.