National Gyro Day!

This holiday was actually on Saturday. I love Gyros! The meat is usually beef, a mix of beef and lamb, or chicken. It’s makes for a great pita sandwich.

This is my wallpaper for September. It's Hibari Kyoya from Hitman Reborn. I did use it a few years ago around this time of year. I think it fits the theme of the High Holy Days the most out of all my wallpapers. With a lit. reflection of himself (it's a time of reflecting on the previous year), seeing himself (a time of introspection and thinking about how to better ourselves for the coming year), and somber expression (it's both a happy and somber/serious time). Although, that's pretty much his normal expression. 

On the regular calendar, this year the HHD start the night of September 9th and go until sunset on the 19th. They're on the same dates every year on the Jewish calendar. 1st of Tishri until the 10th. It's just that the Jewish calendar is lunar. With this coming Rosh Hashanah, the year will be 5779 on our calendar. HHD begins with Rosh Hashanah or our New Year, and ends with Yom Kippur or the Day of Atonement. 

The month-long holidays for September are: National Biscuit Month, National Chicken Month, National Honey Month, National Potato Month, National Rice Month, National Cheese Month, National Piano Month. Some are for important causes, some are to make you appreciate things you may take for granted, and some are just for fun. I love all those food related ones! Interesting that it's National Honey Month, considering we have quite a bit of it for Rosh Hashanah. It symbolizes a sweet new year, along with apples and other sweets. 

I upgraded my phone to an iPhone X on Sunday. I wasn’t sure if it was doable yet. I had (still have, but not using now) an iPhone 5c. The 4th anniversary of it was several days ago. (According to facebook.) Doesn’t seem like that long. It was my first smart phone ever. I had a flip-phone before that. I can’t imagine life without a smart phone now. It’s amazing! Like a mini powerful computer. 

My old iPhone had just 16 gb of storage. They don’t make them that small anymore. The new one has 64 gb. So much! Nice, but not sure if I’ll ever fill it up. That’s probably a good thing. The screen on the new one takes up most of the phone, which is quite different compared to the other one. It’s a much bigger phone, too. The keyboard seems bigger and more spread out, which is better. It doesn’t have that lag if I type quickly, as well. It runs faster in general. It also has a much better and fancier camera. I can tinker more with that. I love taking pics, so that’s nice. 

There are few downsides that I’m noticing. If you don’t have wireless earbuds/headphones, you can’t plug the earbuds (it comes with) in and charge it at the same time. They share a port (I think that’s the right word..). However, the battery life is much better than my previous phone. That one wasn’t too bad until just a few months ago. 

Going out of home and looking at apps that are open, closing them out, and going back to home is not as intuitive to me on the new one. Before, you just pressed the home button. Pressing it 2 times for going to the open apps, and one for going back to home. If you wanted to close apps you just flicked them away with your finger. In this one, you drag things up a little and pause with your finger to get to apps that are open. Drag your finger straight up, and you go back to home if in an app or from the lock screen. For closing out apps, you have to press the ‘cards’ for a bit, then you tap the minuses that show up. Maybe I’m just not used to that. I liked the home button. 

Some of my old apps aren’t working well on the new phone. MyColitis won’t even open. They’re all up to date, but I know some of them aren’t compatible with newer phones. So, I’ll have to replace some of them like the MyColitis app. Sad. 

I'm still really amazed by it. It has augmented reality, so that will be fun in the future. The visuals and sound are much better, too. Opening it by just showing my face is interesting. It was annoying at first, but I am getting used to it. 

I was recently harassed by another guy. I mentioned this on fb, but not here. He was rather tall, and it seemed like he was with his wife and kids. This was at the same Safeway as the last 'incident'. The first one was roughly a month ago. Two guys went up to me and hassled me in the parking garage. This time the guy stopped me in the store and was really loud about it. With both incidents they talked about how much they loved my hair, wanted it, and liked how bouncy it was. The most recent one added that it was so 'wild'. I stopped listening to him at one point, smiled, murmured a thank you, and quickly walked to where I was going. First, no one should be treated like this. It was kind of implied that they thought I was a woman, which adds a special layer to it when you're not. Second, why are they so fixated on my hair? Do they want to rip it off my scalp? What's the point? It's not a normal thing for me. So, it's also got me thinking that they're picking up on something that I changed recently. With the first incident, my hair was the same state it's been for a while. With this second one, I have been taking much better care of my hair. That shouldn't mean that I should be subjected to that, though. Why was I harassed by 2 guys before that? Weird vibes I'm sending out maybe? 

I have been trying to be healthier overall lately. I've been showering more often, too. Unless I want my skin issues to act up, I can't take one everyday or go without for a while. The perfect amount of time is every other day. My skin is much more healthy looking and feeling this way. I think my eczema was starting to really come back with a vengeance before I went back to doing it more often. I also have a weird genetic 'disease' that acts up, and my skin's super sensitive. Wahoo! In order to have healthy skin, I have to be balanced and do it on a more regular basis. The best time to wash my hair is once every 3 days. That's a while in between. Most of the time, it's not in sync with my regular showers. If I wait for longer in between, like I was doing, it gets severely damaged, increases in volume, there's a lot more dandruff, and it becomes frizzy. It develops a layer of lighter hair on top that's brittle and dry, too. If it's every day (or every other), it gets super dry and frizzy, as well. With doing it as often as I'm supposed to, it keeps its style, is nice and soft, tamer, smells nice, and more.

I've also been trying to keep track of my exercise throughout the day on MyFitnessPal lately. I'm amazed by how many calories I burn just on big laundry days. Yesterday, I burned 1228 calories. Most of my calorie intake for the day. Only about 300 left. This was taking into account how often I went up/down stairs, minutes cooking, taking in the garbage bin, what's involved with my big laundry days (moving clothes around, running up/down stairs with them, taking my bed linens apart and putting them back on, etc.), playing my clarinet for an hour, doing my other cleaning, etc. It adds up. 

I've started doing sit-ups again. Haven't done them in a few years. It was pretty much as soon as I first felt the colitis symptoms. I'm starting with 5 in the morning and 5 at night. I'll add 5 to both each week, like before. The most I had gotten to before was 95 each. It was kind of disappointing that I wasn't able to make it to 100 each. It'll be interesting to beat that. I think it's best to start small with it, like last time. That way I can ease into doing a lot more. 

I also want to get back into walking regularly. Haven't gotten to it yet this week, since I've been distracted every time. I'm determined to get to it tomorrow. I hope to increase those walks over time, too. Right now, I'll do one 2-mile walk after dinner. Maybe if I can keep it up for a month (every single day), I'll add another 2-mile walk after breakfast. There was a brief time that I managed to do 3 of those. One in the morning, one after snack, one after dinner. Each time there was a different atmosphere outside. The night one is supposed to be around sunset to motivate me. At least, it was at first. The morning one was close to the sun rising. Maybe I'll work my way up to more than 3 of them. However, that might take up too big of a chunk of the day. I might add in running up/down stairs in consecutive sets, as well. Starting with 3 sets of 3. (Go up/down 3 times, rest, 3 times again, etc.) I didn't do that before. All this might make me lose weight even quicker. That's ok. I'm most likely not at the norm weight range yet. Might be close. I'll be physically more fit, which would be good. I won't be caring about how much I'm losing, unless I clearly am skinnier than I should be. It's not about weight loss for me. 

Finished the HelloChinese course. Started Duolingo's Russian course yesterday. I took Russian in college and loved it. Some of it is coming back to me. I don't like that Duolingo doesn't really go over the alphabet. I guess they just expect people to pick it up from the exercises. I looked at a wiki article on the alphabet, and that alone brought back memories. It's overwhelming to see when you haven't gone over it for so long. I now have a Russian keyboard on my phone so I could write out the sentences on Duolingo. That's been interesting to look at. Some of the letters are borrowed from Greek, however most seem to be unique. I remember feeling like Russian as a whole was truly more like a puzzle than the other languages I've studied. Should be interesting to go through their course.

Finished Anjaan on Netflix recently. They ended it on too much of a cliffhanger. I hope Netflix gets the rest of it. Went back to watching Hinterland. It's a Welsh detective series. I remember watching a couple of episodes in the past, but when I went back to it Netflix said that I only watched the first episode. Watched half of the 2nd one yesterday, and it looked familiar. That's ok. It'll get me oriented again with it. Each episode is roughly 90 minutes long. Longer than most shows I watch. There are only 13 episodes in total, though. 

Finished watching Isekai Shokudou or Restaurant to Another World. It was pretty good. The food looked amazing! Better than food in real life. The animation was high quality, too. The fantasy side to it was quite interesting. Their dragons seemed different than most. It was interesting how much they focused on them. Essentially, 2 dragons guard the restaurant in the other world as if it were one of their treasures. The darkness-based dragon became a waitress in order to watch over it directly. (The fire one tries to watch over it from afar, although she does order a lot of curry for takeout.) She was curious at first, since she lives in space. Humans would die when she was around, hence the reason she decided to isolate herself. Like the other dragons, she can transform and appear elf-like. When the dragons normally do this, they prefer to be naked. They can make clothes seemingly out of thin air. She was forced to do this during her first visit right away. She tends to speak telepathically, but was working on physically speaking through her mouth. This scared the customers at first. They seem more like aliens than dragons. Apparently, the chef's great grandmother was a warrior elf in the other world. She suddenly was trapped in our world, and decided to make it her own. She opened a restaurant to welcome people from the other side. Not sure how or why she didn't go back to that world after that. So, the chef has some connection to it. He doesn't have any special powers. He seems to only know that his grandfather and father were the previous chefs. He's just kept it going. After his father passed away, it was mainly just him keeping it going. Then, a demon and that dragon showed up to help and became waitresses. Still don't know how that door to the restaurant from the other world came about. It'd be interesting if there was another season.

National Cheese Day!

I love cheese! Just a day devoted to it isn't enough...I guess I celebrated with having garlic and herb Jack cheese spread on sourdough. Recently got Italian 5-cheese blend slices for sandwiches. That sounds really good. 

This is my wallpaper for June. It's another Hitman Reborn manga wallpaper I made a few months ago. I didn't create the art; just put 2 chapter pages together and resized them. The half-siblings (they have the same father), Bianchi and Gokudera, are on the left. Bianchi, aka Poison Scorpion Bianchi in the mafia, specializes in poison cooking. Gokudera is Tsuna's Guardian of the Storm Ring, and has sworn to become Tsuna's right hand man. He's aka Smokin' Bomb Hayato, and he specializes in explosives. Despite his looks and attitude (seemingly like a delinquent), he's a genius and excels at academics. His sister used to test out her cooking on him as a little kid, particularly right after piano recitals. She's immune to her own cooking. So, every time he sees her, he gets physically sick. It was so traumatic, he also swore off playing the piano. They eventually do make up (not entirely though...), but for most of the series there's that tension between them. Tsuna and Reborn are on the right. I thought the summer like one with Tsuna seemed appropriate for this month. 

The weather calendar's main pic's of a rainbow at sunset over cliffs at a Utah national park. The dark clouds around it look really ominous. It's a cool shot. The other 3 smaller pics are of tornadoes in Dodge City, Kansas. It seems like most of the pics are tornado themed...

The month-long holidays for June are: National Candy Month, National Dairy Month, National Iced Tea Month, Pride Month, National Camping Month, National Zoo and Aquarium Month. Some are for important causes, some are to make you appreciate things you may take for granted, and some are just for fun. Yay, for Pride Month! I haven't gone camping in a very long time, but I remember liking it. 

Apparently, there's a calendar going around where there are specific Pride days for different sexual orientations and genders every day for June. The whole month is supposed to be for everyone in the community, but it is interesting. I have 5 days on it. The 10th for ace pride, 15th for agender pride, 20th for genderqueer pride, 25th for non-binary pride, and 30th for aro pride. All my LGBTQ+ 'identities' seem to be represented. Not many of the lesser known ones were listed, but interesting they came up with 30 of them. I also found it interesting that my 'days' are every 5 days after the 10th. 

I started looking for Pride shirts yesterday. A little late, but I'd also like something to be 'out' with for the rest of the year. So far, there are 2 cool aro ace ones. Made me happy to see at least 2 that were for aro aces specifically. I'm leaning more towards one that has animal skulls, arrows, flowers in the ace flag colors, spades, says aro ace off to the side, and banners. Arrows are an aro symbol. It looks really badass, and like a tattoo design. The other one's of a spade splattered with the ace flag colors. The ace of spades in cards represents aro aces in the community. For that one, unless they know the flag and know about the spade, the meaning's more hidden. Haven't looked much for agender stuff. I'll narrow it down when I'm done looking around online. I wouldn't mind getting one shirt representing 1 or 2 identities, and some sort of accessory like wristbands or earrings for the others. That way I can be 'out' with everything at once, and that seems cheaper. 

I thought about a description for the cookbook. I'm not 100% happy with it yet. Seems too long. I want to mention some highlights so others can get a feel for it. I was going to start putting the print version's cover together, but can't really do that without a description for the back. I'll probably get to the cover tomorrow. Might even finish it. Then, it'll be figuring out pricing for both versions and filling out the publishing forms. That's all that's left. Not much.

For German, I finished the Present 4 lesson. There were 6 parts, and I completed them all in one sitting. It was a lot. Missed about 3 or 4. Not bad, considering. Next is their Fantasy lesson. That only has about 3 parts, so I'll probably at least start the next one after that, too. 

Managed to draw a little today. Haven't done it in a while. Finished drawing Antonio's (from Alliance) head, and I'll ink him next time. I think Antonio's head has a better shape than my previous ones. I'm slowly improving on it. He doesn't quite look like what's in my head, but he's not bad. The next head will be Doina's. She sounds like she'd be cool to draw.

Finished watching Chosen. It was intense and had a good ending, for the most part. I like how they got revenge against the people behind the game. Started watching the 2nd season of Glitch a couple of days ago. Saw most of the 1st season a while ago. I like the idea behind it and where they've taken it. 

Made a list about a week ago of the shows I have on my Netflix list. I put them in order of length. So, Chosen was only 3 episodes and that was the first on the 'list'. Glitch is 2nd since I'm just watching the 2nd season. It's good I made this new ordered list, because I can finally finish most of the ones I started previously this way. There will be a 'schedule' of sorts. I never went back to them because there were other new interesting shows. I decided that if I want to add more shows, I can add them to the list once I get to the really lengthy shows. Shows like Filinta are 100s of episodes long, and if I just watch that I'll never see anything new. Also, made a list for shows to watch during the weekend. Things like nature docs, food, comedy, travel, etc. That way I get to the 'extra' ones, too. Kind of fun to see what I'll see next on the list, as well.

22nd of Iyar

On May 3rd, or 18th of Iyar, it was Lag B'Omer. People usually have bonfires, do archery, and get haircuts. A fun one. I guess we celebrated Cinco de Mayo a day before. Went to Azteca, and got their burrito blanco. It had grilled chicken, white rice, beans, peas, carrots, and jalapeno cream cheese on the inside. There was a flour tortilla with cheddar, cojita, and a cream sauce on the outside. It was amazing! Humongous, though. It was also Herb Day on the 5th. Cooking with herbs is great! A lot of the time they make the dish. It was also National Astronaut Day. That's cool that there's a day devoted to them. They go through a lot.

This is my wallpaper for May. It's the first of the Hitman Reborn manga wallpapers I made recently. I obviously didn't make the art. I just placed two chapter pages together. I like how this one turned out. However, it would have been nice if I was able to make the one on the right big enough to be a standalone wallpaper. It would have stretched the image way too much. Oh well. Tsuna, the main character, is in his Dying Will mode on the left. Xanxus is on the right. I think, with the one on the left, Tsuna was in the middle of his big fight with Xanxus. Xanxus and his family, Varia (an offshoot of Tsuna's Vongola mafia family), were villains at first. They eventually sided with Tsuna and the Vongola. Xanxus thought he was the rightful next boss of the Vongola. He fought the previous head, which resulted in those scars. He was certainly not happy that Tsuna was next in line instead. He felt even more humiliated having an 'outsider' take over. I like Xanxus and even his character design is cool. He's a complex character. He's never truly 'good'. Just like some of the other people that eventually ally themselves with Tsuna. 

The weather calendar's main pic's of a storm cloud. They describe it as a big spaceship. It looks more like a giant mushroom to me. Still, it's impressive. The two smaller images are of a lightning storm in Texas. 

The month-long holidays for May are: National Asparagus Month, National BBQ Month, National Egg Month, National Hamburger Month, National Salad Month, National Salsa (the sauce) Month, National Strawberry Month, National Vinegar Month, Jewish American Heritage Month, Mental Health Month, National Inventors Month, National Pet Month. Some are for important causes, some are to make you appreciate things you may take for granted, and some are just for fun. So many this time. 

Yesterday, I decided to start keeping more of a schedule through my google calendar to be more on top of things. Things like blogging more often, if not every day. This blog was originally meant to be daily. There will be shorter posts that way. I usually make a to-do list every day, except for Shabbat. With my calendar, it seems easier to stick to. Before, sometimes I'd spend too much time on something, so it's a little nudge this way. Mainly the too much time was with my computer being too slow when I wrote, edited, with online stuff, etc. Now, I'll have set times to cut it off and move on. I might end up writing less, but at least I'll get to things. I've gotten everything from my list done so far today. Writing, editing, cleaning, etc.

Also, trying to get up and go to sleep at decent times again. I plan to get up at 8am most days, and go to sleep as close to 10pm as I can. That's really not bad. For a while I'd get hooked on my phone and stay up until about 1am, which isn't healthy. 

I'm also trying to not go through my fb feed during the week. Going through it mostly on the weekends, but with set times. That cuts quite a bit of time out. I plan to mainly look at notifications, share what I find through my google news alerts or other places I might stumble upon outside of fb, and write personal posts. Blog posts are counted as personal posts...So, in many ways I'll still be active on there, just not nearly as much as I used to be. I know a lot of my friends have gone through periods of totally swearing off fb. They'll even deactivate their accounts. They were just so addicted to it. I understand that. I'd like to still be in contact with people, get world news, see funny LGBTQ+ memes or stories, occasionally be active in the groups I'm apart of (the enby one has been helping me the most), etc. I'll just limit it more. Mainly for my sanity, trying to sleep a decent amount, time for other things, my eyes (I can tell my eyes are straining more lately), and more. 

Instagram is different to me. I mostly just post what I eat, my cats, drawings, landscapes, etc. It's not all the time. Also, I don't follow many people. I'm following 26 people currently. A much smaller percentage of those people seem to actually be active. I have a lot more people that follow me. Up to 82 right now. I'm rather surprised by that. With every few posts lately, I seem to gain at least one follower.

DeviantArt's different, too. I haven't actually been going through my deviation stack notifications. Those are the ones of art/journals of artists and groups I 'watch'. Those have been really stacking up. I mostly look at reactions to my own art/profile. When people fave, collect, give me llamas, and watch me. So, I don't spend that much time usually. At some point, it'd be great if I went through that other stuff that's just piling up...

I only managed to write a page of Alliance 3 today. My computer was super slow at the time. I gave it an hour...I normally type fast, especially when I don't have a block, so it was extremely annoying. Got a lot more editing done of the cookbook. My computer suddenly decided to speed back up to normal for that. Only have about 15 more pages to edit of that. Then, I'll make a source list. 

Today's German lesson was on language. That was interesting to go through. I only got one wrong on that. 

Finished the manga Animal Sense recently. It was much shorter than I expected. It's about a girl that can 'possess' any animal around her. She saved many people around her, including herself, with that ability. The end was interesting. She was so emotional, apparently all the animals from the forest she was in came out and helped. She didn't possess them. They just were drawn to her. They could have done more with that and continued the series...The only thing I didn't like was the main character's hair. It was bizarre. 

I'm a little disappointed that there was no update for the manga of Ao no Exorcist or Blue Exorcist today. It has been 2 months. Normally it's once a month. Maybe the next one will have an added special chapter or it'll be longer than usual? I read some of +Anima instead. That one has been pretty good so far. From where I stopped today, there's about 10 more chapters left. 

I finished drawing and inking Ravel's head today. I don't think it turned out as great as my previous designs of him. Not bad, though. I was hung up on his horns and hair for a while. Started drawing Nico, too. I'm slowly learning what my style is, what looks good, how to improve in general, etc. It's kind of fun getting back into it again. 

I hope to get a walk in after dinner. That way it's cool enough and it's still sunny out. Might do that for a while. Eventually, I'll add another walk in. I'm realizing I'll certainly have time for another one if I keep this up. If I recork my clarinet, I'll probably have some time to cram playing it in as well. 

I dropped Dances with the Dragons a couple of days ago. It was really boring. I gave it 4 episodes. It was way too into politics, dialog, and the story didn't progress much. I normally love complex shows that make you think. However, this one tried and failed horribly. They promised dragons, yet we only saw them a few times. There was Middle Eastern sounding music as a soundtrack, but it didn't seem to fit any of the scenes. The main characters had long names. I think their full names had 6 names each. None of them were catchy either, so they were hard to remember. They really tried to do something with this show, so it's sad. 

I started more food 'journeys'. I was and still am doing a cheese journey, where I try new (to me) cheeses. I'm adding journeys in bread, jams/preserves, teas, etc. I don't know why I didn't start those when I started the cheese one. I like trying new things. It takes me a while to get through stuff, especially if it's just me, but it's still fun. I started the bread one with sheepherder's bread. It's originally from the Basque region of Spain. It seems to be a mix of French and sourdough. Tough on the outside, very soft inside, and has a slightly sour aftertaste. The loaf is huge and round. Has an interesting design, too. It's good. I won't be able to try some of the really seedy breads, because they affect my gut. Should be interesting to see what I can have. Tried the lingonberry jam that my dad had. This one actually comes from Sweden. It tasted like cranberries, but stronger somehow? Very interesting. It was good with the bread.

International Cat Day!

Mood:

This was actually on Saturday, but every day should be Cat Day!Or, at least people should appreciate them each day. I've had a certain affinity for them probably since I was born. I've always been around cats. Most of them were rescues, and definitely deserve a lot of love.Yesterday was National Banana Split Day, and National S'mores Day. 2 of some of my fave desserts.I rarely have a banana split, and I usually feel like it's too decadent or something. S'mores can be fun. You can do them at home, too. I've roasted marshmallows over the stove, and put that between the normal stuff, chocolate squares and graham crackers. I like to roast the marshmallows to the point that they catch fire.Fun to blow it out afterwards. (I also use a fork to hold it over the stove.) I sometimes use Nutella in place of the chocolate squares. And, sometimes I don't roast the marshmallow I just microwave it all together. Have to be careful with that, though. The marshmallow can expand quite a bit if you heat it up for too long. Then, it becomes a gooey mess in the microwave that you'll have to clean up...

This is my wallpaper for August. It has Tsuna in his Hyper Dying Will mode and Reborn. Tsuna's doing one of his specific techniques. Only Primo or the 1st aka Giotto could do it before him. (Tsuna's considered the 10th or 'Decimo' generation boss of the Vongola.) And, Tsuna modified that version for himself. He named it Zero Point Breakthrough: Revised. He can absorb his opponents' flames, purify it, and add it to his own storage of flames. No one truly knows how much he can absorb and use afterwards. Simply because it increases the amount every time he uses it. He actually absorbed a character named Ghost, who was from a parallel universe and was a huge giant like being. (He almost seemed to be made entirely of flames.) I think he was a failed attempt Byakuran had when he tried to bring another version of himself to this world. He kind of mutated on the way. But, he was incredibly strong, a loose canon, and didn't speak. So, basically after absorbing him, Tsuna powered up quite a bit. Reborn was the one who trained him to get that technique perfected. 

My Paris calendar features Jardin du Luxembourg, or Luxembourg Park. It's a large park that tends to be crowded with students, neighbors, and tourists. Yet, it can be a relief from the busy Paris streets. There's a large octagonal pond, known as the Grand Bassin, that's in the middle of the park. You can rent small boats for children, there's a puppet theater, pony rides, a merry-go-round, and a large playground. Between 1615 and 1627, the Luxembourg Palace was constructed at the northern end of the park for Marie de Medici, who was nostalgic about growing up at the Pitti Palace in Florence.

My Jewish calendar's main pic features a Torah mantle made out of velvet, silk, metal thread, and chenille; Netherlands; after 1735-1737. Like it implies, a Torah mantle goes over the Torah like a cover. This one actually looks old.Some of the really old stuff they've featured, doesn't look all that old. But, this seems to look more its age. Interesting floral patterns. Odd that they didn't list who made it, or even have it as 'anonymous' or unknown. This probably has a story behind it.The 2nd pic features a dress, unknown maker, made out of cotton; Netherlands; 1930-1940. It looks like it's faded and has a floral pattern. I can pick out that it has pinks, reds, and tan colors. That's all that's visible. Looks like it's a little girl's dress, unless the perspective of it is skewed. The last pic features a tefilin bag, anonymous maker; made out of textile, thread, and wire; Netherlands; 1870-1890. This one doesn't look that old. Tefillin or phylacteries are a small set of black leather boxes (that have long black leather straps for putting/wrapping it on) containing scrolls of parchment inscribed with verses from the Torah. They're worn mainly by Orthodox men. Apparently, men are obligated to wear them, but women aren't. Many have discouraged women from wearing them in the past, but are slowly turning around on that stance. (Ever so slowly...I haven't felt the need to wear them, but think other Jewish women in general should be able to have that choice.) It's worn during morning prayers. One is worn on your left upper arm (corresponding to the heart), and the other on the forehead (corresponding with the mind). I've read some people like to have pretty ornate looking bags for them. This one seems simple, but nice. It has a small red plant-like pattern in middle, and the rest is mainly beige. The border of the bag is kind of dark green or grey. Hard to see in the pic. 

The month-long holidays are: National Panini Month, National Peach Month, National Sandwich Month, National Goat Cheese Month. Some are for important causes, some are to make you appreciate things you may take for granted, and some are just for fun.

Weather's been a bit weird lately.We'll have a day that's pretty cold, then a warm one, and back and forth. It finally rained yesterday, though. Hasn't really rained in this area for a long time, and we really needed it. Still, most of the rain happened during the morning, and by the time I went for my night walk, it was pretty dry again.The grass has turned yellow and straw-like. The blackberries are starting to come out at least. We have a lot of blackberry bushes in this area. On Friday it's supposed to be cool and rainy. That might be nice. 

Tried to do both my walks yesterday, but I didn't want to get stuck in the rain that morning. I pretty much have kept up with doing 1 walk a day for the last 2 weeks. I need to get my other one in soon. Hopefully, I'll get to it tomorrow.I started getting back into doing my sit-ups twice a day on Sunday. I'm starting out with 5 of them each time. Really basic, but I think it's good to start small with it. I might change it up in a week or 2, and do 10 twice a day. The most I had gotten to before was 90 twice a day.I don't think it'll be wise to work up to that again, but we'll see. 

I've been having more issues with eating lately.Things seem much bigger than they are. Half the time, I'm starting to forget or just want to skip meals. I've never felt like that before. I like to keep my calorie range to 1200-1600 each day, and break that up between 5 small meals. I don't think it's good to be at 1200 too often, but I use it as the least I'll do. If it's a touch above 1600, it's fine. It's just a reference point. I might need more calories in the future, with my IBD, but I'll do this until my doc or a nutritionist tells me otherwise. I made it to around 1400 yesterday, and I felt like I ate a lot more than I did. I'm writing down the calories as well as what I eat in a small notebook now. To stay on top of the calories, to see what I eat, and how it affects me. I've felt nauseous lately, too. So, it just adds to the feeling of not wanting to eat much. Even Rosie, my cat, is trying to get me to eat more. When I usually eat those meals, she finds me, acts like I should follow her, looks at her food bowl when I do, rubs against my legs, meows repeatedly, and then stares at the refrigerator. She has plenty of food. She just is trying to give me a hint that I should be eating. Sad when even Rosie is picking up on it.When I start preparing a meal, she gets really excited, happy looking, gives me long cat hugs, and starts eating her own food or sits calmly close to me on the hard floor. As I eat, she's been kneading her paws, lying down (on the carpet near my feet, not on the chair) next to me quietly, etc. It's weird. Not really the norm for her. 

Finally got the last lab test from the blood draw that was done at the end of last month, today. But, (before I got it) my gastro emailed me last Friday saying that it 'suggested' that I have Ulcerative Colitis instead of Crohn's. All the other tests, symptoms, etc. seem to point towards Crohn's.She said as a follow-up, I should get another blood draw that day. I also know that the other test results are good indicators to see how my system is taking the new med. This feels like some weird adventure I didn't sign up for. 

I met with my gastroenterologist on the 31st. She was pretty positive that I had Crohn's, and said that the final test result might make it more definite. It didn't really...Although, seeing the results today, yeah I might have UC instead. But, I've read that they may have to do more tests to truly determine it, if it's like this. I don't have the common characteristics of UC. Visible bleeding is the main one, and I don't have that...Even the guy who did my colonoscopy didn't see any signs of bleeding. At the appointment, she gave me some papers on Crohn's and some on IBD (Inflammatory Bowl Disease) in general. There were also some papers on the med she wanted me to start with right away. I'll probably have to get blood tests done at least every 3 months in the future. I mentioned my hair was falling out, and she told me to try and eat more protein. It's still coming out, but it doesn't seem like so much that it's visible to everyone else yet. Just looks 'thinner'. 

On our way back home, while heading to the ferry, a guy, who clearly had road rage, yelled at us (Dad and I) for about an hour. I thought he'd just verbally attack Dad (which was bad enough), but he eventually directed it towards me. It was half scary and half amusing, because he seemed to not know how to sound hurtful. Calling us Canadians, because he thought they were rude. The stereotype is that they're very polite. He didn't swear at us. Said there was a mob of 100 angry people around us. No one was out of their cars, and most just looked like they were scared of him than anything else. He gendered my dad correctly, and referred to her as 'miss'. He could have used better words/examples to be a lot more threatening. His voice just sounded scary, and he kept going on and on. We weren't sure if he was going to get out of his car and attack us.We didn't say a word to him. It added to the stress I felt for that appointment, and when I finally got on the ferry I fell into a deep sleep.

I started the new med the next day. It's called azathioprine. It's used both as a 'mild' chemo med and an immunosuppressant. Some use it for leukemia, some for organ transplants, and others use it to treat their IBD. The med itself sounds a bit scary. If you use it for a prolonged amount of time (like, for several years), you have a higher risk of getting lymphoma.Since it's an immunosuppressant, I have to be extra careful around people who are sick, cuts, hospitals, vaccinations, etc. Which is lovely, because I'm normally pretty healthy and don't think much of that stuff.I started having one of the smallest doses for a week first. After that, the doc told me to take 2 of those pills. That first week, I noticed I was feeling more sleepy after taking it. This second week has felt weird.I do feel sleepy right after taking it. But, I also feel weaker, semi-nauseous, noticed I have a bruise I don't remember getting, feeling like I'm much heavier than I am, etc. I've also read that it can have a side effect of anorexia (I didn't think a med could induce that...), making you not want to eat. I have to watch that closely, too. It's scary, because I don't know what's really going to happen in the future with this, if it's the right one for me, etc. More unknowns. It accidentally stuck to my tongue about a week ago, and it tasted and smelled like exhaust to me. It doesn't have a plastic-like coating like balsalazide does. So, now I'm nervous it'll stick every time I have it. I decided to space out those 2 pills in order to make it easier on my system. One with lunch and one with dinner. The other meds I've read about, aren't exactly easy on the system either. 

I just emailed my gastro about the test that suggested I have UC yesterday, other questions I had, and some of the new symptoms I have. The email from her on Friday asked me how I was, so I took that as a reminder to tell her what's been happening so far. Haven't gotten a response back yet. Although, I did notice that she seems to do a lot on Fridays, so she might respond this Friday. We'll see. Hope I didn't sound like an idiot, but they did keep telling me to use it for any questions or 'concerns'.

Along with trying to learn the most I can about IBD (it was more about Crohn's for a while), I've been trying to get back to my normal 'stuff'. It feels good to get back to some of it. Like I'm more 'human'.

Hopefully, I can figure out the title to my nightmare anthology soon, and get going with the rest of the stuff I have to do before I publish it. Can't wait to really get back to playing my clarinet!I only played a little on it when I got it back on the 1st, just to test it out. Getting back to drawing would be nice, too. Hopefully, I can finish editing that meme with Junko in it, put it together, and post it on dA soon, too. It's taking a while, and I'm not doing the editing on it too often. I can move on to other drawing memes afterwards. Plus, I have some writing memes that might be nice to do, too. Really getting back to learning my Japanese on a regular basis again would be good, too. I might have come up with a better 'schedule' in order to get to everything including the 'extra' things. 

Hoping to go through more of my closet soon. I stopped about a year ago. I think I got through about a third of it. Many of the stuff in there is unwearable (full of holes, tears, etc.), some I'll never want to wear, some are too big or too small for me (many of the things that are too small are from when I was 11 or 12), etc. I had to take a lot of it to the dump last time. Mom was the one that tried to encourage me to keep a lot of it. Some of the stuff in there, I think, were originally hers. I also have a mountain of beaten up ratty looking shoes that fill up the left side, along with things on the hangers above. It's a mess there. It'd be cool to see more of the floor on either side of the closet...

I'm putting together a list of easily digestible foods. Just for reference. I might try to eat more things from it. I won't change my entire diet, but it may make it easier on my digestive tract. Again, food doesn't cause the disease, but certain foods can make it feel worse during a 'flare up'. It's like treating a side effect rather than the disease, if you decide to drastically change your diet that way. Doesn't prevent flare ups or anything. Just might calm things a bit. Kind of like giving it a little break from having to digest complex things along with what the disease is doing to it. I already have bananas, leafy vegetables, oatmeal, yogurt, sauerkraut, kimchi, salmon, chicken breasts, eggs, porridge, and more on my list. I didn't think sauerkraut and kimchi would be easily digestible. But, I know they're both fermented. I used to like kimchi, but stopped eating it, thinking about how spicy it was. (After being in the hospital twice, most of my flora and fauna in my gut were wiped out. I was told to stay away from spicy food because of this. I love spicy food...Turns out, it's usually not good for IBD, either.) Might try it again? I love sauerkraut, too. So, that might be good to get back to.

National Milk Chocolate Day!

Mood:

This was yesterday. My favorite type of chocolate!I like dark chocolate in recipes, but not so much by itself. I can only take a little at a time if it's by itself. Milk chocolate isn't as bitter, and has a nice smooth sweeter taste. To me, at least. Not as rough a flavor. Parents' Day was this past Sunday. I didn't realize it until Monday...It became an official holiday in 1994. They should advertise it more or something. Especially with how I've felt about Mother's and Father's Days.Nice that there is a 'Parents' one. In South Korea, they've had a Parents' Day since the 1930s. Interesting. Video Games Day was this past Saturday. I still have my Sega Genesis and several games for it. They're still in pretty good condition. I should have played my first game on it this past weekend...Oh, well. My first game was Sonic the Hedgehog 2. Maybe I'll play it sometime soon. I have Fate (which I haven't played in a while) and the Sims 2 (I play this one a lot more often) for PC. In fact, I recently got the Seasons Expansion Pack for the Sims 2, as a present back at the end of January. It's made it even more enjoyable.2 of my other fave video games: Morrowind and Fable. I miss them.Last Friday was Cousins Day. I have so many cousins! I've lost track of how many.That's including the kids my first cousins have. I have around 20 first cousins. And, there's a wide range of ages. Oldest one is around 50. Old enough to be my uncle or something. I think the youngest first cousin might be in their late teens or early 20s. Of the first cousins' kids, there are several that are newborns right now. Not sure how old the oldest one of my cousins' kids is. But, I know that many of my first cousins have more than one kid. It's crazy! Would have been even more interesting if I had lived closer to them all. 

The weather's been nice and cool. It's rained a couple of times. Everything's been so dry, so it was a more than welcomed sight. Today and throughout the rest of the forecast, they're saying it'll be in the low 80s. Not too bad. Nothing like that long heatwave streak we recently had. 

I've been getting back to doing both my 2-mile walks this week. Monday morning's was really muggy. I was sweating like crazy halfway through.That night and yesterday's walks were a lot better. I'll probably only get to one walk today. But, at least it'll be one!

I'm also trying to get back to going to bed early and getting up early. Feels like I actually get my mornings back this way. Also, I'm more in tune with the natural rhythm of things during the day.Monday, I wanted to get up at 7am, but I was wide awake at 5am. Yesterday, I slept about a half hour longer than when I wanted to get up, but that's not bad. Today wasn't too bad either. I'm trying to go by 8 hours from when I go to bed. This way I get roughly the right amount of sleep, and still get up early. Before, I was always trying to get up at 6am no matter the time I went to bed at. Wasn't very bright.But, this way I can feel more rested and normal about it. Also, means my days might vary as to when I wake up. That might be fun. This new 'system' might be good.

Had my blood drawn Monday for the multiple blood tests my gastroenterologist wanted, and one my primary care doc wanted. Apparently, my gastro ordered so much that the lab tech had to draw several vials worth.Lots of labels for them, too. My primary just wanted to make sure one of the meds I've been taking for years isn't damaging anything. Haven't had that specifically checked on for a while, so it's probably a good thing to do. I was nervous and didn't want even the hint of passing out I got last time, a month ago. The person who was there this time was able to get me into chatterbox mode, and I barely noticed things were happening. She also kept asking me questions. Probably mostly to keep me distracted. It took a while to fill all of the vials up. Longer than what I'm used to. She bruised me pretty badly, too.

I got 5 of the tests back that night. One thing seemed unusually low for me, but within normal range. The rest of those were normal. Which is good, but I was a bit discouraged because I didn't/don't feel 'normal'.I got another test result back this morning. This time it was about my red blood cell sedimentation rate. (Or 'sed rate' for short.) It measures how fast the blood cells drop in a test tube. They drop faster if they're sticky and clumped together. It's one of the indicators for inflammation. Many who have inflammatory diseases use it to check on the progression of the disease and to see how well treatment's going. The high end of normal range is 20 mm/hr. Last time mine was 44mm/hr. This time wasn't much better with 40mm/hr. I'm oddly relieved it's still not normal.Probably because, like I mentioned before, I don't feel like I'm back to normal. This might also mean I'll have to go on more meds like my gastro started to talk about over the phone towards the beginning of the month. But, they may help me feel better. Other stuff I was really 'off' on last time were my eosinophil count (it was through the roof! Even PatientsLikeMe online kept warning me about how it was beyond their scale), vitamin B12 (it was very high too), sodium was a bit low, and a few other things. I have my appointment with the gastro early Friday morning. That should be interesting. I have quite a few things to ask her that I hope I don't blank on.Luckily, I did start a questions list.

The music store called recently saying they're done with looking at my clarinet, and I could pick it up at any time. I realized I won't be able to get there until the 1st. So, I called them back asking if they could hold onto it until then. The response was so quick, I almost didn't hear him.All he said in response was: "That's fine." So, just to be sure, I rephrased my question. He still said it was fine. I thought they would need to get my name at least, and make a note that I won't be there until the 1st. Just in case they would've thought I had abandoned it or something. Hopefully, they didn't have to do a lot, and it'll feel like new. I keep getting that 'itch' every so often to play. It'll be nice when I do get it back and start playing again. 

I've been getting more into Netflix's Instant Play. I can watch anything in that library on my phone, or project it onto the Apple TV. It's pretty cool. I've watched a couple on my phone before, but didn't actually look much into it until now. The ones they recommend for me are actually interesting. Some I would never watch, some I haven't heard of before, and some I've been hoping to watch but didn't think they'd have. I didn't use their 'My List' feature before. I would just search around for a while seeing what I felt like watching at the moment. A lot of the time that search was fruitless.But, now whenever I see something I want to watch, I can add it to my list. That way in the future, when I feel like watching something immediately, I can just look at that list. 

They have a surprising amount of Korean, Chinese, British, Spanish, and French stuff. Not too much in the way of Japanese movies/dramas. They seem to think that most Japanese movies/dramas are from the horror genre. That seems very lacking to me.I love watching international movies and shows, so it's still cool to see the ones I found from the countries I mentioned before. I saw The Host before I started the list. It was a surprisingly good Korean monster movie. A lot of the movies from Spain and France are food related. I might be hungry after watching those.Although, there's a French movie I heard about before called the Rabbi's Cat. I think one of the Jewish newsletters I'm on mentioned it when it came out. It won quite a few awards. It's an animated film about a rabbi's family from Algeria. His cat, after swallowing the family parrot, suddenly gains the ability to speak. He's skeptical of Judaism at first, and starts talking more to the rabbi. The more he learns, the more he wants to convert. Sounds...unique. There's an English detective show called Happy Valley that looks interesting, too. There's an Irish movie about a monster who only attacks sober people. I'd be in trouble, then.I can't drink alcohol because of my meds, and most of the time I have no interest in it anyways. Maybe for cooking, but not actually drinking it. (Looks funny, but in that sense, it might be scary to me...) Some of the Chinese ones I want to see look beautifully done or I like to say 'artsy'. Like the costumes, scenery, etc. Some of the ones I have seen in the past have a similar feel. Very interesting. All the ones I've found so far sound really interesting, have won at least one award, and have somewhat good reviews. So, that should be a fun adventure as I go through the list.

I managed to narrow down the possible titles for my nightmare anthology. Apparently, this sort of anthology is rare. There are few 'horror' anthologies out there, and not many of those are actually based on nightmares. I find that interesting, and slightly intimidating. But, I went through my long list of possibilities, and checked out if there were any novels that had those titles by doing a Google search. Surprisingly, I didn't eliminate too many this way...But, going over and over it, I finally narrowed it down to 2 possible titles. I'm still a bit stuck on which of those 2 I want to use. At least I narrowed it down by a lot.

Finished reading the manga version of Hitman Reborn. Didn't really like the last couple of chapters. They were kind of pointless. They left so many things hanging and unexplained. Maybe there'll be a sequel in the future? I really liked it, besides those last couple of chapters. It seemed to have a lot of unique characters and situations. Kind of wished Chrome was able to really show her own power more. They were just starting to towards the end of the last arc. I didn't like that Tsuna still, after all he's gone through, denies that he's rightfully the 10th boss of the Vongola. Even the previous generations have accepted him. He basically already is, whether he likes it or not. He's even won trials that are specifically about determining who will be the next Vongola boss. Reborn even suggested changing the title to Neo Primo of the Vongola, which actually makes a bit more sense in more ways than one. I think Tsuna's just kidding himself, and doesn't really get it. I liked that they were able to lift the curse at the end. Lal was able to turn back into her adult self, because her curse was the weakest of the group. The others have to physically age over time from their baby forms. Which kind of sucks, if you have an adult mind still. But, at least they'll live and eventually be who they once were. Hopefully, they won't die once they hit the age they were before they were cursed. That'd be horrible. But, then again, we'll never know if there isn't a sequel.