26th of Cheshvan

My nurse plans to discharge me from palliative care (pc) this week. My home aide did my last bed bath today. She might come on Friday, we don’t know. Most likely won’t. It’s usually on Monday and Thursday. She had off this Monday, and Thursday’s a holiday. At least I’ll be somewhat clean for the holiday. I have a plan for doing it myself. I might even get cleaner. My shower brush will come in handy. As my home aide was leaving, she said that I can friend her on facebook. She said she doesn’t normally say it, but that would be nice to keep in touch. I don’t know if I will or not. I searched for her, just to see. (I was surprised I found her.) She’s right, she doesn’t do much on there. She might react to things though. She was nice, but it might be a little strange.

My social worker said she’ll call me sometime this week. It’ll be about being in touch with another social worker who deals with cancer patients on Medicaid, I think.

They told me I can still stay in touch and call the pc doctor, even when I’m discharged from it. He never was very good at communicating. He keeps saying he’ll call me but never does. I don’t really trust him anymore. My primary doctor and oncologist would do a better job.

We didn’t get to go grocery shopping for the week during the weekend. We went to Central yesterday. On Sunday, my parent spent much of the day making a kosher Ukrainian borscht. All the meat in it was beef. There was quite a bit of vegetables, too. I think that was the first time I’ve had borscht. It seemed earthy. That might have been the beets. The only thing I didn’t like were the pieces of beef. They were a little too fatty for me. The sausage was good with it. Despite it being skimmed, it also left an oily film on my lips. That’s not a bad thing. It was pretty good.

I thought I was finally getting all my royalties from kdp/Amazon, but apparently some of it already went to the ‘state’ as unclaimed property. This is all on kdp or Amazon. I did what they asked me to do. I feel like they almost stole it from me. Luckily, there’s a claim you can file with the Department of Revenue to see if you have unclaimed ‘property’ or money. I shouldn’t have to give them the document that kdp gave me. The link will apparently disappear in 2 business days. I’ll download it to my computer just in case beforehand. They said I’ll get $33 from the US market. I’m not sure where they got the $33 from, if all of it went to the ‘state’. I got the royalty from the UK today. The $33 they say will be paid on 11/29. This is so weird. The Unclaimed Property Division emailed me back. They had a document of things that were unclaimed to me. Nothing on kdp. (Surprised they had anything.) I’ll try to upload the document kdp gave me to them and see what happens. I’m starting to feel like it’s not worth it… Maybe if I don’t get anywhere with the Unclaimed Division, I can email kdp back. They said I could use the email to reply back, if I needed to.

For Thanksgiving we were told to bring pie. We might get apple and pumpkin pies. They’ll probably be good. I don’t know what else will be there. Hopefully foods I can have. There will be 10 people, 8 adults and 2 children. That’s not too bad. Maybe it’ll be a new tradition to go to this friend’s place for Thanksgiving. The only downside would be how far away it is from home. (I think she said it's in Lacey, which would be about a 1.5-hour drive.) We’ll see how it goes. It’s nice to be with people for it, though. It’s a different experience when it’s just my parent and I and Rosie. Nice but different. I hope the friends we used to visit for Thanksgiving have a good one too.

I managed to do an outside walk today. The weather was good. No rain or wind. A little cold and cloudy, but nice walking weather. A little kid in a van yelled hello as they went past me. That was odd, and looked like the kid was going to fall out of the window.

Rosie’s been good today, but she’s been peeing and pooping outside the box lately. I looked up, with Google’s AI, how to clean up after a cat's mess in the bathroom. It came up with some pretty good suggestions. We’ll see how that goes. My parent might get in touch with Rosie’s vet to see what more we can do about it.

Went to Diablo’s tonight. I got their Diablo’s fries without onions, guacamole, and sour cream. It was like nachos but with fries. It was huge! (Fries themselves were huge!) Very good, though. The fries seemed to have a slightly spicy seasoning. I think I ate around a 1/3 of it. It’ll be a lot for tomorrow’s lunch. Got churros for dessert. Those were good too. 

Pinterest (again, I did not make these, I'm just sharing them):

(The next 2 are from the same house plan. One's the main floor, the other 2nd floor):

Youtube: 

27th of Tevet

For Duolingo's Scottish Gaelic course, I finished all levels of the Colours unit, and started the 2nd level of the Home one. This is the last unit before the 2nd checkpoint. There are only 2 more sections. Ended up at 9th place in the Obsidian League today. Hopefully, I can stay in the top ten by Sunday. 

Yesterday, I updated the description for Alliance's facebook page, made a post about it being on Smashwords again, completely revised, and being free on there. (Here's its facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/alliancebooks/) I changed the name of it today, and posted about Alliance: Dawn, too. It was a page just for Alliance (first book), but I'm turning it into one page for the whole series. Good to have everything in one place. 

I'm trying to do a little of promoting/getting the word out every day. I have a lot of ideas, which seems like it'll be overwhelming. If I do little chunks every day, it won't feel like that as much.  

Today, I also republished, updated, and posted to both Sweet Endless Terror and My Mother's Treasure Trove of Recipes' facebook pages. Here's Sweet Endless Terror, and here's My Mother's Treasure Trove of Recipes. I think I might create a new author page, considering I don't like my current one, and I want to start 'fresh' with that. I still need to make one for More Than Meets the Eye. I also read that another way to get pages noticed is by having your page 'like' another page. That actually sounds fun. I could base it on what the books are about. For example, the cookbook page can like food, cookbook, cooking, etc. related pages. Sweet Endless Terror could like horror stuff. Seems like they can take on their own personalities, which is an interesting concept. 

After I get through all that, I'll make an author account on Instagram, and another on Twitter. Not sure if I'll make separate ones for the books on there. Seems like a hassle. However, I can see making one for the cookbook on those. Maybe one on Pinterest for that, too. I plan to make and share some of the dishes from it. I think a good way to promote that is to let people know what some of it will look like. 

After doing those things on fb, I checked the pageviews on Smashwords. A couple of them really got a boost right away. Very interesting. The more people that see it, the more likely they might buy it. 

My memoir's free promo on Amazon started yesterday. 4 people 'bought' it. That's more than I thought I'd get the first day. None today so far. It's ranked as #12 in the Gay & Lesbian Biographies & Memoirs section. Odd that they don't have an LGBTQ+ one, and cram everyone into that. I'm not gay or lesbian...Pretty cool they ranked that high, though. It's #158 in the Kindle Store's (ebook) Memoirs. That's interesting. Might be interesting to see what happens after I make a page for it on fb.

I just realized, this morning, that many of the symptoms I've been experiencing since February may be side effects of the Lialda. No one has been monitoring me with that. I have a feeling it's changed, my body's rejected it, or something. The side effects I found online line up with a lot of my mystery symptoms. Myalgia (muscle pain), joint pain, hair loss, malaise, sneezing a lot, feeling weak, swelling in hands, severe back pain, and more. It makes too much sense, and I'm wondering why no one (doctors) suggested that some of this could be the Lialda, and looked into it. I've been taking a half dose since Tuesday. The back and muscle pain seem to be getting a little better. I'm wondering if I should just taper off, like I'm doing, and then stop taking it. Not get the next refill. I'd rather have the possibility of having a flare (not sure if I'm in one or not), than feel those other symptoms. Those symptoms combined have been hell. I still suspect a couple of my symptoms are actually related to another autoimmune disease. (I did test positive for that.) Having the other symptoms cleared up might help with pinpointing it in the future. 

Youtube: 

Fairy Tail:

Boku no (My) Hero Academia:



Dr. Stone:

One Piece:




Kimetsu no Yaiba (Demon Slayer):

Tsuritama (lit. Fishing Ball. Kind of miss this anime. It was so trippy. Not sure if I like the ending song/part of this amv, but the rest of it's good):

Magi (this makes me want to watch more of the series. I think I only watched the 1st season a while ago, and one or two episodes of the 2nd season.):

National Pecan Pie Day!

This is one of my fave pies! One of my fave nuts, too. For some reason, it's hard to find a good slice of it locally. Usually it's too dry, too many pecans, too sweet, or runny. It's like heaven when it's just right, though. 

I posted on my personal fb and in an enby fb support group about my analogy for gender. I came up with it a while ago, but it popped in my head again when someone was telling me about a muffin one. That one wasn't very good. It's hard to find good analogies for it. 

Mine is gender as pizza toppings. Men are handed sausage pizza, and women are handed pepperoni pizza. Society encourages them to love their toppings (only those) and to never change anything like the sauce or dough. A trans woman is handed a sausage pizza, but hates it and loves pepperoni. She doesn't hate people who love what they were given, but it's not for her. If she picks off the sausage and trades toppings with someone else, suddenly society at large is in an uproar. How dare you eat pepperoni instead of sausage! This goes the other way with trans men. 

Gender non-conforming people, who still like the topping they were given, might add other sauces and dough. Non-binary people, as a whole, would have different and/or multiple toppings. Agender people specifically might not have any toppings, except for extra cheese. Genderfluid people might have different toppings depending on which gender they are at the time. Bigender gender people could have 2 toppings of any of then. 3 for trigender people. Or, some might have one totally separate gender, and they'd get a different topping entirely. Demigender people might have their pizza partially covered with a certain topping associated with a gender, and maybe another topping for the rest of it. The possibilities are endless, but society will only focus on the sausage and pepperoni pizzas. They have to be the standard for those pizzas, too. They don't want people to switch with each other. Or, even to ask for another one. 

I think this is the best one that I know. It's got many layers to it. Plus, gender expression can be mixed in there with the sauces, dough, or different types of cheese. Really, there are many ways to look at this one. I went with pizza, because it's one of the most popular foods around the world. Sausage and pepperoni are some of the most popular toppings, and considered 'classics'. Funny thing about this is I can't have those toppings in real life. So maybe that was another added subconscious thing. Also, with genders that aren't connected at all with the binary they could have things like fruit or veggies. The concept is flexible. I'm extra cheese in this. It's not boring, especially considering you could have something like a 4-cheese pizza for it. For a cheese lover, like me, that's amazing stuff. Plus, we can have any sauce, dough, etc. that we're comfortable with. 

I had a couple of loves and a share on my personal page. I'm still getting lots of likes, loves, and comments in the enby group. People really seem to like it. Someone suggested we should list what type of pizza we are, which was cool. Very interesting to see what people are in that one. This could be a 'thing' now. It'd be cool to see illustrations of the pizzas. Not sure if I'd do it. Someone recently commented in the group that it's perfect. 

It's been really warm lately. A lot of the time when this happens I feel like not doing much. I end up trying to stay in the coolest area of the house downstairs. It'll be a little warmer the next few days. Oh joy! At a certain point, I can't have my desktop on. Unless I want to heat up the house, particularly my room, even more. My room usually is the hottest, even when my desktop's off. Makes it difficult to go to sleep. Even with my new window fan. 

This means I can't write more of Alliance 3 until it cools off again. Not sure when that will be. I did brainstorm a bit on what will happen next, today. That's something. 

Yesterday, I decided to lower the prices of all my paperbacks. I thought since my ebooks will start their promos soon, I might as well do something with their paperback counterparts. I made it so I get at or close to $2.57 in royalties for all of them. They also just started giving authors the option of Expanded Distribution for their kdp paperbacks. So, it sounds a lot like it'll be similar to Smashwords ebook distribution system. It'll be available to bookstores, libraries, etc. Unlike how it was only available on Amazon before. This will be immensely handy. If I get 3 ebooks on Smashwords' Premium Catalog, and check the box for Expanded Distribution, all 3 of those books (both versions) will be distributed to different places. Smashwords only deals with ebooks, although I think you can provide a link to other versions of them. I'll have all my bases covered for those 3. 2 of them would just have their paperbacks distributed to other retailers. (I'm keeping those 2 ebook versions on Select for now.) This sounds like it'd really work out. 

I managed to check all but 1 for Expanded Distribution. That one didn't meet their requirements. It has to be a certain trim, at least. I think it's has the largest trim for my books, so it makes sense. 4 isn't bad. The prices are required to be a little more for this option, too. I still kept the royalties at the amount I planned. 

Alliance's paperback is now $11.70. Alliance: Dawn's paperback is now $10.40. Sweet Endless Terror is now $10.80. More Than Meets the Eye is now $9.80. My Mother's Treasure Trove of Recipes is now $8.99. For some, I've lowered the prices by quite a bit. Like I planned, I'll get at or close to $2.57 royalty for them all. I think MTMtE was the one I couldn't check off for ED. Oh well. This all might help. After my ebooks are finished with their promos, I'll either set the prices back to where they were or set it to somewhere in the middle. It all depends on how they'll do. I'm pretty optimistic about this working out more. Some people (some of whom I know) who bought the paperback version of the cookbook already might get angry at me for lowering the price now. However, self-published authors mess with prices all the time. They need to find that 'sweet spot' with all their books. Maybe they'd be happy they got it either way? Hopefully. Or, they might be happy they helped me? I should look at it like that. 

Today, I went through the Colors unit for Chinese. Interesting that for colors they lit. say things like 'blue color', 'brown color', and so on. I'm doing even better with the pronunciation. Still a few mistakes here and there, but not bad. The next unit is The Attributive. 

Started the live-action version of Mob Psycho 100. It's probably the best way they could have adapted it. It's just not the same 'feel' as the anime. The anime made it seem so much more epic. They really tried to make the characters look as similar as possible. They did a pretty good job with that. Even the eyes are similar. The mangaka (creator) has a unique design for the characters, so again that makes it difficult to translate it to live-action. Ekubo, an 'evil' green spirit with red 'dimples' (also nicknamed Dimple) turned Mob's pet, was a little hokey looking. He looks better in the anime version. Not sure how different the anime is to the manga, but it's following the anime's story closely. They just left out the cool tunnel scene from the beginning, and I think when he fought Teru subconsciously it was in a different type of building. I like that in the story the 'jocks' of the weight training club are really kind and against using violence unless it's absolutely necessary. So much media has the jock high schooler stereotype of being rude or like a bully. It's refreshing to see again. Mob joined that club to become better physically and possibly get the girl he likes to notice him. He's not very good at it, but then again he just joined. The other members really care about him. When he falls down from exhaustion, they congratulate him on trying his best and encourage him to keep at it. When he faints they haul him back to the club's room to let him sleep it off. Usually alone. It's interesting that Mob is strong with his psychic abilities, but very weak physically. Saitama, the main character of One Punch Man, is superior physically. Both are 'overpowered' characters in different ways. ONE is the pen name of the mangaka for both series. 

National Graham Cracker Day!

I used to really like graham crackers. I grew tired of them after having them as a snack for a while. They're especially good stale, or crumbled up and used as a topping or crust. They're ok with s'mores. I'm more into the chocolate and marshmallow part of that, though. I'm not going to do the usual monthly thing on here. Might in the future soon.

Yesterday, I marched in a local 4th of July parade with the local Pride group. I thought this year's float was cool. It was a ferry boat. There were inflatable orcas tied to the sides. A bubble machine was poking out on top. A speaker for the music was at the other end poking out. I was one of the people in the float. There were 2 people in rainbow captain costumes, and 2 who were in rainbow skipper costumes. There had to be someone at each 'window'. I waved my genderqueer flag out of one of them and tried to wave at the same time. The only problem was the music wouldn't play. The generator ran out of gas as soon as we started moving. Hard to do it without power. So, we ended up just smiling and waving, instead of dancing and looking more excited. Also, there were some sudden stops. With me trying to wave both a hand and my flag, I wasn't holding onto anything most of the time. So, I came close to falling with each stop. I was also wearing my aro ace pride shirt. Saw a few people I knew. At least one person booed us. I tried to think that it was just another type of cheer at the time. Most people were excited to see us and supportive. I should remember that more. Some people seemed a little confused about what my shirt said and the flag. That's ok. They can look it up. I tried to be cheerful as we went through. I'm glad that they drove us back to where most of the cars were at the end. It's a shelp to walk all the way back. Also helped that I wasn't walking during the parade. It was cooler than last time and there was a breeze. Made it nicer. There was one other ace there. I think they were also enby. Yay! 

A week ago, I badly strained my shoulder. It somehow started during a very painful bowel movement. (Sorry...It's a bit gross.) I don't how that happened...After the pain persisted for 4 days (Monday at this point), I decided I really needed to go to Urgent Care. It wasn't getting better on its own. 

I have a high pain tolerance now, and tend to just remember the worst of it. Going through the symptoms with the staff there, made me realize there was more to it. There was the shoulder pain that covered my entire left shoulder, left half of my chest, and left upper arm. A huge area. The pain was like scalding hot water was ebbing off and on. It wasn't (still isn't) necessarily sharp. My left hip had barely there type of pain. My abdominal pain was close to being as bad as my shoulder. That has been intensifying the last few weeks. My blood pressure was oddly high. I'm usually low. Even when I go to UC or the hospital, it's usually on the low end. They brushed it off as just nerves, but I don't think that was the case. I'll just have to watch it next time. I've been much more nauseous than usual, too. Came close to throwing up several times before going to UC.

I had blood and urine tests done. Of what I got back at the time, everything was 'normal'. My sodium was the lowest it's been, and was verging on breaking through the lowest normal range value. It usually is low, but this was surprisingly by a lot. It's not like I don't have enough sodium in my diet. I have plenty. I'm a little worried about this. Even if it's still technically within normal range, it's not my normal. Could be a sign I'm not absorbing it well. My chloride seemed better, but also on the low end. I can't stand food that's too salty, so it's not like just adding saltier food will help. Wouldn't be able to keep it up, at least. Salt helps with the nervous system, so it's important to get enough. Most people (at least Americans) get too much of it. There was something with one of my blood counts, too. Like, it was just slightly higher than my norm. Still within normal range, though. There were some white blood cells found in my urine, which they flagged. The doctor didn't talk about that. That's usually a sign that there's inflammation. It could be a sign of a UTI or inflammation from somewhere else. They found and flagged that there was bacteria in it, too. Since peeing doesn't hurt, it most likely means the inflammation is somewhere else and my body is fighting something. 

The doctor said I most likely strained my shoulder badly. She wanted me to put a heating pad on it and take Vicodin for the pain. As well as, resting it. She also strongly suspects that my colitis is flaring again. Just mainly going by the symptoms. So, she said I should have a follow-up soon with a gastroenterologist. Both my primary and GI (she's really just a PA, not an MD which is what I need) are awful, so I think I'll get new ones soon. She also suggested that I eat more of my 'safe' foods for the time being. She gave me some tips on a printout for easing colitis symptoms, too. She told me she also has a chronic illness and understood a lot of what I said about it. That was nice. Not good that she has one too, but good that she 'gets it' more. I liked that she really tried to help me as much as she could. 

I've been taking the Vicodin since late Monday afternoon. 2 pills a day, since I'm still in pain. She prescribed 15 pills, taken every 4-6 hours when in pain. I've decided to take one with lunch and one with my late night snack. (Usually lunch is 11am or 12pm; late snack is around 8:30pm.) I have to have food with it. I figure in order to get some sleep with this pain, I should take one close to when I go to bed. To have some relief during the day, after lunch might be best. This way I also can check on my pain more between doses. It makes very drowsy, time is weird, like there's something heavy on my chest, a little wobbly on my feet, navigating through cloudy jelly, etc. It's a good and slightly bad experience. Sometimes I feel like I'm going to throw up more while on it, too. I've noticed this happens about 3 or 4 hours after taking it. It's weird. This was all lovely while I was in the parade, too. Very strange experience. 

I think the heating pad has been slowly working, too. I had less time with it yesterday, though. I know it takes a while even for muscular 'injuries' to heal, but it's still annoying. I want the pain to stop and be able to move it around more. I'm tired of it already. I can't even wash my hair at the moment. Can't move my shoulder enough for it. Not only is there the actual washing with shampoo/conditioner part, but I also have to comb it (first with my hands, then with an actual comb), use a smoothing spray and comb that through, work in a styling mousse and comb that through, shape the curls with my fingers, and finally take care of the hair that fell out. That's a lot of moving in painful positions for my shoulder. I feel too embarrassed to ask for help with it. Getting dressed hurts, too. I keep getting dressed anyways. Mainly to feel some semblance of normalcy with it. It is getting better at least. 

I decided last night to have Benefiber while I'm on Vicodin, too. One of the side effects is constipation, and I think I've started to get that. Dad had a really bad bout with it when she was on Vicodin last. So bad she went to the hospital. I don't need that sort of thing. Benefiber might help with it. I'm taking it with breakfast, lunch, and my late night snack. They say to take it 3 times a day to get the full effect. I'm lucky I still had a big thing of it, although it's pretty old. The best by date is in January. That's not an expiration date, though. It should be good for now. 

I did get my aro ace pride shirt around the 29th or 30th. It's really nice. Feels soft, it's long, stretchy and clingy, fits me well, and the print design is cool. I shared a pic of me wearing it in the ace groups I'm in on fb. I specifically mentioned how so many shirts for ace and/or aros were cutesy, and how I felt this perpetuates people infantilizing us. (It's a big problem.) I wanted something badass instead. One of the first comments I got was that I looked adorable...Oh, and adding an 'omg' to it made it a little worse. The point went right over their head. The rest of the comments were better. 

Many people liked it on my personal page. One of my aunts noticed I looked like I lost a lot of weight. I noticed that as soon as I posted the pic, but wasn't sure if it was just me or something. Good to know someone saw it, too. Maybe it's another sign that I'm flaring. I didn't look at my weight at UC, but the doctor might have factored that in (with my weight history) when she said that I'm flaring. Last time I knew I was flaring, I did lose a lot of weight. 

I set a schedule for promos for all my ebooks on Amazon. I thought it would be good to do, especially since 3 of them will be taken out of Select soon. Alliance will have a free book promo July 14th-18th. My Mother's Treasure Trove of Recipes will have a Countdown Deal July 19th-26th. Alliance: Dawn will have a Countdown Deal July 24th-31st. It'll be the same dates with a UK version. More Than Meets the Eye will have a free book promo August 6th-10th. The cookbook will have another Countdown Deal through Amazon UK August 11th-18th. Sweet Endless Terror will have a free book promo August 13th-17th. So, there will be 7 promos from July 14th to August 18th. I've never taken advantage of the UK marketplace, and having all of the books up at once. I had to think about when all of the books' terms will be up. Even if they're going to be renewed, you can only schedule them within the term that they're already in. Plus, I wanted A2's promo later than A1's. Their terms end at roughly the same time, so it was a little more difficult to figure. A1 will be free, so I can hook people first. A2 will basically be discounted so they'd have to pay something for that next book. Since the cookbook is the newest, it'll be a countdown one. I could hook people in with the others being free, too. We'll see how this goes. Those 3 books could leave Select with a little bang. (Again, they'll still be on Amazon afterwards.) Interestingly, the cookbook's ranking is steadily going up. It has shown some sells. My author ranking reached the highest it's been yesterday. Slowly something's happening. I'm still going to take those 3 off Select and add them to Smashwords. 

Finished watching Bad Guys on Netflix. It was pretty good. They added a little too much drama to the ending, though. I feel really bad for what Lee Jung-Moon aka Psycho (that was his nickname) went through. He's a psychopath, and he was used just because of it. He walked in on burglars killing his parents, and killed them in self defense. Ever since then, the police have been trying to pin a serial murder case on him. If he's a psychopath, of course he did it, right? They caught him getting a certain type of oil for his girlfriend. She was a painter and needed it for the paint. That oil was found on all the victims. He also was found at every crime scene the nights of the murders. He had no memory of it. The detective set him up and tried to kill him. Part of his purpose for creating the team was to eventually kill him himself. He assaulted Psycho a few times, too. He blamed him for his daughter's murder, which was apart of the serial killings. Psycho never wanted to kill anyone, and was hoping it wasn't true. What actually happened was a really twisted prosecutor killed them all. He believed the only way to punish killers was to kill someone close to them. He killed the detective's daughter as a diversion. That was the only difference. That prosecutor found out that Lee was a psychopath, and took him to a psychiatrist. That psychiatrist then drugged him, tried to tell him to kill people that the prosecutor wanted to kill through hypnotism, they gave him a knife, and drove him to every victim's place. He still subconsciously refused to kill them. So, the prosecutor did it and framed him. The drugs made him forget everything. The mob went after him when they thought he killed their main boss. His girlfriend was forced by the detective to lie and say she was the only victim that got away. It devastated him. She still felt guilty once he was working cases with the team. They had to act like they didn't know each other. He went through hell. The detective asked for forgiveness when he was told the truth. Lee refused, and even came close to shooting him. He felt he couldn't trust anyone again after all that. After they got the prosecutor, Lee's sentence was erased. He was completely innocent, and technically the only one who wasn't a true criminal. I'm glad he was able to be freed. He looked younger than he was. In their present time, he was around my age. However, he looked like he was in his early 20s to me. 

Went back to watching Samurai Gourmet on Netflix. It's a Japanese drama centered on food. It's a lighthearted feel-good type show. Each episode is about 20 minutes, so it's not long. It's about a guy who just went into retirement. He likes food, and goes out somewhere different every time. He imagines how a samurai would do things in certain situations that arise there. I like that it's centered on someone older than the norm, which is usually in their 20s or 30s. It's from a different perspective that way. And, they didn't make him act old, either. The food they feature looks amazing. The last one I saw was he decided to try a run-down old izakaya. Izakaya are traditional Japanese bars/pubs. He had beer, fried chicken, a tofu and tripe stew, salad, and a few other snack like things. At one point, it started downpouring, and the rain leaked through the roof and onto the patrons. It was apparently normal to them (except the retiree), and the hostess gave them all umbrellas. It was interesting to watch that one. It didn't dampen their spirits, instead they became more lively. With the one before that, he went to a quiet cafe. He hadn't felt like he had time to sit at one with a book since he was in his 20s. That in itself was a treat for him. He got coffee that was 'traditionally' made the Japanese way and eventually had spaghetti for lunch. Again, everything looked amazing. It makes me hungry just watching what he eats. He did have one bad experience, but his wife's cooking made up for it later. I like that she's been doing her own thing, too. She just retired as well. Although, her outings aren't centered on food, and she often doesn't go with him. 

I'm really close to catching up in One Piece. Only 3 more left, which I'll probably get to today. This arc has been really twisted and disturbing. More so than the Dressrosa one. It seems all light and childish at first, but it really isn't. Linlin or Big Mom has issues. That's putting it mildly. She's been unstable mentally since she was very little. Her parents left her on an island full of giants at 5 years old. She was taken in by an orphanage there that was ran by a corrupt nun. She was into child trafficking with the Marines. When Linlin ate something she really liked for her birthday, she ended up eating all the children and the nun. She didn't know she did it and figured they just vanished. She also killed a 300 year old giant before this without realizing what she was doing. A chef that ate the cooking devil fruit found her, witnessed what happened to the nun and children, and decided to join forces with her. They became pirates. He was perfect for her since he could turn anything into food. She's always been huge, too. Never knows her true strength. She wanted to create a utopia full of different types of people, because that's what the nun wanted. She also wanted everything sweets related, since she has an awful sweet tooth. She'll abandon her children like toys if they disobey or are too 'ugly' to her. She uses her citizens souls in food and to create animorphic trees/flowers/etc. Makes for a surreal world. Everyone's about to escape from her at the moment. They keep referring to the treasure box that the Fishmen gave up. I remember the Fishmen actually gave her a dummy one full of explosives. I keep thinking she's going to open it and blow herself up. That would be oddly satisfying to watch, and it would benefit everyone. 

15th of Tammuz

I decided I'll try something a little different with my books. I'm taking 3 of the ebook versions out of Amazon's Select program. It's a program only for the ebooks that helps promote them. You get 2 different promo 'tools' to use on them for each 3-month term. It also puts them in their 'library', which people can borrow and with each page read the author gets something from it. (Not much, though.) They also suggest them more. The thing is...if you enroll them in that it has to be exclusive to Amazon. You can't have it at any other retailer. It cuts the audience down. I also don't think it's working much. Although, I think they're keeping me from seeing how much I'm selling because I haven't switched to direct deposit into a bank account. It's set to checks, but they don't use checks in the US anymore. I probably should change that soon to make sure. 

Anyways, those 3 will be: Alliance, Alliance: Dawn, and Sweet Endless Terror. They're the oldest. I'm keeping them on Amazon (just not with Select). Both versions will be there. I'll publish them to Smashwords. They'll most likely be approved for their Premium Catalog, so it can be distributed to a lot of other retailers. Retailers like Apple, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, etc. They have a lot more than when I published last through them. They also will promote a series more. I'll have both the first book and sequel to Alliance on there this way. That'll help. Some retailers have higher royalties, too. I can't put them up on Smashwords until their terms are up. That'll be in August. 

I'll keep the memoir and cookbook in Select for now. When I'm done with Alliance 3 and it's published, I'll take the memoir off of Select. Eventually, that'll go to Smashwords, too. I think with every new book, I'll take an old one off of Select and publish it to Smashwords as well. It could be a nice little system this way. I could still use Amazon's promo tools this way. I could technically only do this after writing so many books. I'm going to take advantage of them. I just have to keep track of what's in Select and how long their terms are. 

Wrote more of Alliance 3 today. I would have gotten more done, but I was blanking a lot. The weird thing is I have so many more ideas for later in the story. Word wasn't acting up, either. Yay!

Went through the Measure unit for Chinese. They use different measure words for things like people, animals, food, drinks, etc. Also, they seem to not use digits like 1, 2, 3. Instead, they use the characters for those: 一 (yī), 二 (èr), 三 (sān). They use liang for 2 people instead of er. Kind of like we use 'couple' sometimes. It looks a bit weird with phone numbers just in those characters. Interesting, though. Next, it's the Money unit. I was ok with pronunciation this time. Had a few perfect sentences, and the rest were very close. They've added speaking back what you've heard without it written out. As well as answering a question with saying the correct choice given. A little more difficult, but seems like a good way to learn it, too. 

Yesterday I started reading the manga, Choujin Gakuen or Supernatural Academy. It's been interesting so far. I might go into it more next time. Read more of Helck today. Not much went on other than quite a bit of dialog. Asuta's fine, at least. She's still imprisoned. 

Managed to get to cleaning my bathroom today. Yay! Finished cleaning the toilet. Next will be the tub/shower area. 

I've kept up grooming Rosie with the mitt. Her lumps are all slowly coming to the surface. I clipped off one of the biggest clumps a couple of weeks ago with scissors, because it was so close to just falling off. Some of the others are getting to that point now. Her fur is so nice, soft, and shiny. It's really helped her, and I think she knows it. I think she thinks of it like some humans might think of going to the spa for a massage. She loves it and becomes very relaxed afterwards. I also inked Doina's head from Alliance. I'll edit the 3 newest heads in Photoshop and post them soon.

I've been keeping up with being strict with my calories and such. (Started going back to this Monday.) I've set my daily calorie range to 1200-1600. I'm trying to shoot for the middle of it (1400) most of the time. Of course, during the weekend I'll allow myself to eat as much as I want, since they're my treat days. It's interesting to figure this stuff out beforehand through MyFitnessPal. I still can have quite a decent amount of food throughout the day. I'm always surprised by how much I can eat of certain things this way. Like, the carrot cake slice I got recently is supposed to be a single serving. It's about 800 calories, though. So, I've been having a quarter of it each time. (4 servings for something that's supposed to be one...It just amazes me.) Down to the last one, and it might be a little stale. Many things are going to make more servings than what's listed, while eating this way. I'm doing slightly better with protein lately, too. Still trying to watch the other nutrients and keep it more balanced. I'm 'documenting' a lot of this on Instagram. I've done it before in the past. I keep thinking people will think it's annoying and stop following. I've found the opposite to be true. I've been getting a lot more likes and follows. I guess people like this sort of thing. 

28th of Sivan

Went to our local Pride's picnic yesterday. It was raining heavily most of the time, so we mostly stayed in the lodge. They had a buffet area in the back. There were fruit, veggie trays with ranch, huge foot-long hot dogs, BBQ brisket, bagged single serving chips, baked beans, and more for the lunch part. There were Irish cream bars, cappucino bars, and sugar cookies for dessert. The brisket was really good, as well as the desserts. Dad got a hot dog, and it was so big it couldn't fit in the bun. The chairs were really comfy. I knew a lot of people there. It was nice to talk to some of them. Especially about trans, aro ace, and IBD stuff. (IBD doesn't have to do with the community, except for the fact that some of us have it.) 

Occasionally, there were breaks in the rain, and they had set up campfires with the fixings for s'mores on the side. I just grabbed a cold marshmallow and chocolate. They were out, so...they probably didn't mind. There were a lot of people there. We filled up most of the lodge. It's rather big. They had a live band, but also music coming from the speakers. 

Put out a status on fb yesterday announcing that both versions of the cookbook are out. The main link was to the paperback, since I think most people would want a 'hard' copy of a cookbook. An ebook cookbook might be a bit cumbersome, and you don't want it to get dirty, either...A cousin said she bought it and can't wait to get it. Yay! The paperback's not completely 'connected' to me yet, and people aren't charged until they get it. So, I don't know how many copies I've sold yet. 

However, today I did notice that the paperback does have a ranking. It's not ranked until it sells. So, it's happening. I also don't know if they're keeping sells from me, because I haven't switched to direct deposit into a bank account yet. It's still set to checks. They've stopped supporting checks in the US. I probably should switch soon. Just to see, at the very least. 

I also posted the cover on Instagram. 19 likes for it so far. That's quite a lot for me. Submitted it to dA, too. Posted it to a few groups on there. There were a few faves/collects, and one person commented asking what was on the cover. I mentioned it in the description... 

I embedded the ebook version of it on the left side of this blog. (You can see it in the desktop version.) They don't let you embed the paperback version. Soon the ebook and paperback will be linked together, and you can choose which format on there. So it won't matter much soon. I need to finish Alliance 3 to even out what's on here. It's weird for me to think I've put out 5 books already. I have a lot more ideas for books, besides the Alliance series. Also, the more I put out, the more I'll get noticed. 

Social Security accepted that I am who I said I was today. With that, I applied for the income-based repayment plan through the government. They said I was eligible. If I can't pay it within 25 years, it'll be completely forgiven. That's awesome! Better plan than I thought it was. Won't have to pay a thing unless my income reaches a certain point. I just have to recertify annually. Now, Navient has to ok it. Once they do, it'll take effect soon. 

I'll try to get to more things tomorrow. The application took a little longer than expected, and my computer slowed down/froze a lot. At least I got a little promoting done, as well as doing the cat stuff for cleaning. 

By the way, they both seem to be guarding me lately. Rosie's letting Tasha sleep against my room's door jam during the day. Tasha's looking happier because of it. I think she wants to get closer to me, too. Rosie's still very possessive of me, so it'll be interesting to see how that plays out. 

25th of Sivan

Head-wise, I'm feeling slightly better. Gut-wise, worse. It's like I'm being stabbed by knives in my abdomen on top of everything else. Maybe whatever I have has travelled. I hope it's just that I'm sick and not something more. 

The cookbook's paperback is live now. However, things aren't settled quite yet. It isn't connected to the ebook at the moment, for one thing. Read that it might take up to 48 hours to get everything 'set' after it went live. The ebook isn't quite there yet, either. Might be ready for me to tell/share the link with people tomorrow. That should be interesting. 

Figured out a better way to deal with my student loans. I think I was out of forbearances, or at least couldn't apply for another one for a while. Navient has been hounding me through emails the last couple of months. Anyways, through seeing what plans I'm eligible for, I found an income-based plan. As long as my 'income' is below a certain amount I won't have to pay. Once a year I'll have to 'recertify' for it and they'll give me a reminder. That sounds like it'll be a load off my mind for a while. I just have to wait for Social Security to check that I am who I say I am, then apply for it. I think it's actually a government-based plan. So, it's through both them and Navient. Good that there's something like this.

On Sunday, there's the local Pride picnic. That was nice last year. It's at a retreat and camping center in the middle of the woods. There's a lake nearby. They have a labyrinth meditation area near it, too. I haven't seen that yet, but might this time. The local Pride organization has a huge rainbow flag they hang from the main cabin area. I think it was originally a piece of a much bigger flag. It's impressive. There are usually things like hot dogs and hamburgers, outdoor games, speakers, and music. I'm thinking of going to another local Pride picnic in a couple of weeks. That one I haven't been to, and it seems it's only its 2nd year. It'd be great to go to Seattle Trans Pride, too. It was cool to see the amount of people marching, flags, people out in support watching, and going through the booths after the march. I can wave my little genderqueer flag this time. I'm not sure about marching in the Seattle Pride and July 4th parades. It's usually hot out for both of them. It's tiring, too. The Seattle Aces are marching this year, though. It's their first year doing it. So, both them and our local Pride org have spots in it. The Seattle Non-Binary Collective might, too. Might be interesting to watch instead. 

I've realized that most ace activists focus mainly on erasure. That's a big thing, but it isn't the only thing we face. There tends to be an attitude that our issues should be downplayed, because there are other groups that have it worse. Probably the mentality that comes from people playing the Oppression Olympics on Tumblr. It stifles our voices, I think. Another really big issue is 'corrective' rape. Not many people want to talk about it. Aces (as well as aros) go through conversion therapy along with the other parts of the greater LGBTQ+ community. There was a recent study that aces are less likely to be offered housing than gay people. (Gay people were less likely than straight people. That should be noted, too.) That might stem from erasure and being 'invisible', but it seems like an added layer to it. This stuff needs to be talked about more. I'm all for visibility, too. 

Finished watching Glitch. It had way too much drama. I never finished the first season, because it was being drawn out and slow. I apparently didn't miss much after starting this season. They must have realized that they were drawing it out too much, and thought adding more drama would help. There were too many side things, too. I don't think I'll watch another season if they have it. I'm going to watch The Break next. According to Netflix, I've only seen the first episode. I thought I saw more...

Hopefully next week will be much better. The cookbook might catch on. I know people who knew her would be interested (that'd be a lot), and maybe they'll tell their friends and family. 

24th of Sivan

Went to the local trans meeting last night. There weren't very many people this time. One person told me she realized that she's demisexual recently. That was cool. Demisexuals or demis are on the ace spectrum, aka ace-spec. Sometimes written as a-spec, but aros use that too, and can get confusing that way. Not all ace-spec people are aro-spec...Anyways, they're the grey area between asexuals and sexuals. (Sexuals are also referred to as allosexuals or allos.) Essentially anyone in that area has very little sexual attraction, or has it under certain conditions. Demis only have it once an emotional bond has formed. Before that, they're basically ace. Fraysexuals are basically the opposite. They have sexual attraction, but it fades away as soon as that emotional bond is formed. I think one of the new people said they were demi, too. Awesome! 

We also talked about squishes and qpr's. Squishes are like platonic crushes, and a qpr is a queerplatonic relationship. Many aro aces want qpr's and have strong squishes, like me. Especially if you're aro ace, many of us go by our platonic attraction for a qpr. I'm pan this way. I can be attracted to anyone platonically. It's not really the same as being 'just' friends with someone. It's much deeper. It's like having the urge to be super close best friends with certain people. It's a bit hard to explain...Some are attracted to the same gender, some by another gender, some to 2 or more, some to all, etc. this way. There's even aplatonic. Some people will say who they're attracted to that way by saying they're queerpanplatonic, using myself as an example. It might be a bit weird for people who aren't both aro and ace or on those spectrums. On the other hand, I think it might be an interesting thing for people to think about. I think these sort of things should be taught in schools to introduce different types of relationships, and let people learn more about themselves. 

All this had nothing to do with trans stuff, but we had ran out of things to talk about with that...I think the new person that was there this time and last week, likes me. (More like a friend not romantically.) We're both enby, and upon hearing that his (last night that was his pronoun, he's genderfluid) ears seemed to perk up. Sat next to me this time, too. That's cool. I was happy there was another enby, too. I wish there were more agender people, though...I think he thought I was much younger than I am. He's 19. He asked me if I was about to start college. (The meetings are held at a college.) I said I haven't been attending college for about 10 years. He looked a little disappointed. I find it odd that people still think I look that young. By people of that age group, even. 

Tried to get the carrot cake at Shari's afterwards. They were out of it for the 3rd time in a row...It must either be there to take up space on the menu or it's extremely popular. I got the banana cream pie instead. I like that they put actual banana slices towards the bottom. Feels more 'real' that way. 

Started feeling really awful just before going to group last night. It was worse today. I've been feeling really lethargic, a tension headache that covers my entire head, like I'm going through clouds, walking through mud, throat's itchy and swollen, my temp's low (normally it's pretty low, but this is by quite a bit from my norm), more nauseous than usual, and like I'm talking slower and softer. It might have seemed weird last night. It was so bad today, I had to take a nap. I'm not a napping person. I usually only nap when I'm sick, and it has to be pretty bad. Had a hard time sleeping, but I think I got some in. My head was in even more pain when I woke up. I'm wondering if it might be signs of anemia. I've been anemic before, but this seems a little different. 

Rosie wanted me to eat a lot all day. Every time I was downstairs and moved, she ran to her bowl, made like she was going to eat, then looked at me, then at the refrigerator, etc. Even if I had just eaten. She even tried to get me to eat while I was upstairs. I think she thinks the answer to all ailments is to eat. It wasn't like she didn't have food. When I did eat, she seemed happy, hugged me a lot, purred, and watched the backyard. It was also like she was guarding me while I ate, which was also a little unusual. She knows something is up with me. 

Submitted the paperback version of the cookbook. When I saw the preview, I noticed that they had it as 158 pages, when Word's version (sized to what the paperback would be) is 160 pages. I approved it, and clicked save and publish before that really sunk in. What if it's missing those 2 pages? What if things like the table of contents are off because of it? It seemed fine when I saw the other stuff and before I realized the page thing. I just didn't look at the last page. I guess I'll find out after they approve it. Maybe it was just an approximation of the page count or something. It's under review at the moment, and I can't change or check things until it's live. I'll get more of a royalty from the paperback than I realized. 60% of the $14.99. I'll earn roughly $2 more than the ebook. The ebook became live within 12 hours, but isn't completely 'connected' to me yet. (Can't even see sales, if there are any, yet.) All the details aren't up yet either. At least both versions will be out very soon. I'll tell everyone once that's all settled. 

23rd of Sivan

Figured out the pricing for both versions of the cookbook. The ebook cookbooks seemed so much more expensive than most 'regular' ones. I know that you get more out of cookbooks than regular books, but it was surprising. I don't think I'll ever set my ebook prices in the mid-teens, and that was about average. It's insane, considering we can get up to 70% in royalties with those. If you want it to be in the 'select' program, you have to set it to that. Otherwise, there's the option of setting it to 35%. Different than what it is for paperback. I decided the ebook would be $5.99. Not too bad, considering. I didn't want to cheapen myself. It's the most expensive ebook of the ones I've published so far. I was surprised by the fact that the majority of cookbooks on there seem diet related. Very few 'regular' ones. Maybe it gives mine more of a chance. There were very few cookbooks in general on there compared to other categories. 

Decided that the paperback will be $14.99. Same price as my memoir's paperback, and much cheaper than most paperback versions of the cookbooks on there. There's a smaller percentage of author royalties for paperbacks. Most of the price goes to Amazon for the labor of printing, putting it together, and sending it out. Understandable that they'd need a larger share for that stuff. There's also a set minimum calculated by them for how much they'll need to make it happen. The amount of pages, size, page color (white or cream), cover, type of cover (glossy or matte), etc. are factored in. I think it'll be over that minimum. It's not like it's a huge book. 

Filled out the publishing forms and submitted the ebook version. Apparently, they found no spelling/formatting errors. I thought they would find at least one thing. That's great! It was cool to preview it. Especially seeing the cover there. I think it turned out well. They say that it'll take up to 72 hours to approve and fully publish it. I think it took a lot less time than that last time. Should be interesting to see how it does. I'll fill out the publishing forms and submit the paperback next time. That one has a few more things to it. 

For German, I finished the Abstract Objects 4 lesson. It was another long one. About 10 parts. A bit more difficult than usual, too. I only missed 3 questions. I think the next one is on more pronouns. The one after that is classical music. That's interesting to throw in there. There are only 3 more after that. 

Tried the Italian 5-cheese blend sandwich slices. I'm not sure if I like it. It's smellier and more intense than I expected. I don't usually like when it's like that. Each cheese by itself doesn't seem all that smelly or intense, but I guess if you put them together it's different? Tried it first in a chicken sandwich with mustard yesterday. Today it was the same except with tartar sauce instead of mustard. It was better. Maybe creamy sauces are best with it?