Hopefully, I can post more often on here in the future. It was way too hot to turn my desktop computer on earlier this month. There isn't really a good Blogger app, and it's difficult to type from my phone to the regular site. Kind of sucks. Otherwise, I would have been posting.
Hopefully, this blog can keep going for many more years. It's been going longer than any of my previous blogs. I've never written in a diary/offline journal for this long, either. I wasn't into keeping a diary, but I did have one as a kid. It was off and on, and then I forgot about it within about a year or 2 of getting it. Even had a little lock on it.
If something happens to Blogger, hopefully I can move everything to another host. Blogger hasn't exactly been the best the last couple of years. It's been worse since their latest big update. Although, I'm grateful to have a place to post to. There are a lot of pros to it still.
The Pusheen calendar has her as a mermaid. Or, would that be mercat? She has a head ornament that's a yellow star coming from her ear and 3 pearls coming off of it. It's weird to see her as half fish with the tail and fins. She looks happy, though. There are 2 different shells near her, and another one in the actual calender part.
The month-long holidays for August are: National Panini Month, National Peach 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. Not much this time, but interesting mix.
I started this post on my desktop computer a couple of days ago. The internet connection was pretty strong that day. However, ever since then it has been having issues with it. It recognizes the 'options', but usually doesn't connect. When it does, it's only for a few minutes. It's frustrating. So, I bit the bullet and am trying a blogging app on my iPhone. I'm not sure how good it'll be yet. The problem is Blogger itself doesn't actually have an app. So, it's a little iffy. We'll see how this goes. So far, so good, I guess. If this works out, I might post more often. (More likely to have much shorter posts this way.)
I noticed that my desktop computer is actually 12 years old. It was Dad's before it was mine. I think I've had it for about 9 of those years. It uses Windows XP, which Microsoft doesn't support anymore. This also means there are no security updates. That's risky. No matter how much I dust it, it still seems to 'overwork' itself. It becomes really noisy, fan sounds like it has issues, etc. Even writing with it using Word has been frustrating. It has been slowing down a lot lately. It's been a really good computer, though.
In the future, I think it'd be nice to have in all-in-one desktop computer. It has everything packed into the monitor. Complete with USB ports, disk drive, headphone jack, speakers, etc. on the outside. They seem to have a wireless adaptor inside, some have Cortana, most have a webcam built in, and more. They've come a long way since this computer came out. Plus, it seems they're cheaper, too. I think I'd want another Windows one. I like and am more used to Windows for PC. Plus, Amazon and Smashwords (if I ever go back to that) only want Word docs for submitting manuscripts. So, in that way it makes sense. The only Apple product I'm familiar with is my iPhone. That's not the same to me. Although, right now it feels like it's turned into my main computer...
For the first week of it being hot out, I wrote more of the sequel to Alliance and the memoir in Notes on my phone. Got quite a lot of it done. Even wrote down a lot of ideas for later on in those books. I'm not sure if I'll just write everything from Notes to Word on my PC, or somehow get the connection to work long enough to copy and paste from it in my email. (Notes can be saved to my gmail account.) I always save the Word docs to a flash drive, so when I'm finally done writing/editing these, I can probably use another computer to submit it or something. It's still frustrating, though.
Some people/articles on fb have been talking about teachers teaching kids about gender. Often, the articles exaggerate it. I wrote out my take on it on fb. It really comes down to: why would people have a problem with their kids learning about gender? What is so wrong or too 'mature' about it? I think many people get it confused with sex. That also needs to be taught, but that's a whole 'nother can of worms. Are people worried their kids will turn trans or something? The teachers aren't going to tell them how to think or feel. It's not like brainwashing. Kids, *gasp*, might realize they are trans or don't want to conform to their strict gender's rules. This could also greatly help with acceptance from other kids. What's so wrong about kids being educated about another aspect of the world around them? It's kind of like parents being up in arms about kids learning about Russia, and thinking they'll turn Russian or something. That's how ridiculous it sounds. The argument that it's the parents' job is very problematic. Some parents will beat up their kids just for asking, some won't know how to explain it (even if they're well-meaning), and some kids will be scared to even ask about it.
I've been thinking about joing a closed non-binary group on fb. They don't allow people who aren't enby. Basically, a completely enby space. Not used to a group that excludes allies. However, it might help with finding others like me, hearing people's stories, and learning more about myself. I know that a lot of enby pages and groups on there are being attacked by haters lately. So, it's understandable. They want people to fill out a form before they approve you to join. Feels kind of weird. It would especially be nice to meet other agender people through it.
I'm unsure if I have gender dysphoria or not. It's a bit different than people who have a gender. I hate seeing myself naked. I get dressed and undressed as quickly as I can. Been like that for most of my life. In the past, I never liked undressing in front of people in locker rooms, so I'd either change under a towel or in a bathroom stall. The only reason I wanted bigger breasts at some point was because the girls in the locker room made fun of them. (They somehow saw them.) Saying I had mosquito bites instead. I also didn't fill up tops/dresses too well. Then, my breasts suddenly grew big during college. I thought I'd like it, but I didn't. It's never felt 'right'. I'm seriously thinking about getting a reduction or a complete mastectomy. A reduction would be for things to still fit ok, because I do like to wear 'feminine' things. However, there's a history of breast cancer in my family. My mom being the closest relative that had it; but my grandma on that side had it, and I think an aunt did, too. So, there's a high probability I might develop it, as well. If they're taken out, that risk goes way down. So, multiple reasons for it. Again, I'm not sure if this stuff is gender dysphoria or maybe just body dysphoria...There are other elements to it, too. I suppose talking with other enbies would help.
I recently got a newsletter from the enby group in Seattle. They apparently have been meeting at each other's houses, but now have an actual meeting place. I've been there before. It's a nice and quiet conference room at a cafe. Those regular meetings are only for enbies (no allies), and people who are 16+. They do have other get togethers during the month. Most of those are for all ages and genders. They have a camping trip coming up. That sounds fun. Very interesting group. Oh, they're getting big enough that they're thinking of splitting off into groups during their regular meetings. I wonder if that means there might be enough for an agender subgroup? That'd be cool.
Since I wasn't interested in too many of this season's new anime, I've been watching mostly One Piece. Even Boruto has kind of bored me. Re:Creator is interesting, but seems to be really stretching it out. The others I was watching are somewhat old. I do want to go back to those, but I did get a bit tired of them. One Piece on the other hand, has only gotten better.
I'm close to the 400th episode mark now. About halfway to where it's at currently. They now have Franky, who's a cyborg, and Brook, who's a skeleton. I like them both. Brook a bit more, though. His story is one of the most tragic ones so far. He ate a fruit that brings you back to life. He didn't know how that would work until after he died. I think he said his soul couldn't find him for 5 years, and he had already became a skeleton by then. He didn't see anyone for decades, and someone stole his shadow at some point. He mostly 'lived' on the same ship his fellow crew members died in, during that entire time. He's a musician. Apparently, can play almost any instrument, but prefers the violin and piano. In fact, the last thing he did before dying was sing and play the piano. Right now, they're trying to get to Fishman Island. It's underwater. There's apparently a way to take a ship down there.
When it was so hot out, there was also a lot of smoke from the Canadian wildfires. So, 2 unhealthy things happening at the same time. I felt sick to my stomach every morning and afternoon. I think my gut issues got worse during this time. They actually had warnings about going outside in that weather. It was crazy. Luckily, we did go to other places during this time. Like the movies, eating out, going to Port Townsend, and more.
We got a new clock yesterday! Yay! It's a big analog clock, on a brick wall, hanging over the fireplace in the family room. It's got an old looking map of the world, a separate seconds face, and interesting hands. Kind of reminds me of a ship or something. It's cool looking.
Also, a couple of months ago I got some new towels and a bathmat. The previous towels were falling apart. These ones are nice, but the ridges/bumps to them take a bit of getting used to. I didn't have a real bathmat before. It was just a green towel. This is nice, though. Really fluffy, there's memory foam, and the backing sticks the floor. Just putting my feet on it feels nice. The cats are scared of it, for some reason. Especially Rosie. Like, it's some new creature or something to her. There's evidence that Tasha sleeps or lays on it, because of the fur she leaves behind. I would have thought both of them would love it.
I went to services for the 4th time in a row. I might actually be getting back into it. This time our Rabbi led it, and he had a huge problem with his stuttering. I know it's not his fault, and he has a book coming out that he's nervous about, but it's hard to listen to it sometimes. This portion was about the Israelites complaining about not getting foods like meat, garlic, onions, etc. Even though they had manna given to them everyday. 
I like the part where they kept asking for the meat, and the next thing they knew there's pheasants on the ground 3 feet deep. 
Far more than they needed. I have to say it probably would get boring just eating manna 24/7, but on the other hand, at least you're getting food. 
One of the regulars came up to me and gave me a bone-crushing bear hug. It was nice, but I'm not used to it. He always says Mom's name when we say the Misheberach. (A healing prayer. Before we say it, we say the names of people we know that need healing.) Very nice guy. 
Maybe I'll turn off the download function too. Also, after getting my story copyrighted through this site, I see that on dA, part of it's already there. I don't know, I'll figure it out later. 