Friday 5: What Ails Ya

Photo by Abbie Bernet on Unsplash

How do you treat a bad case of the Mondays?

When you're a freelance tutor, you don't really get "the Mondays." People often have the most forgiving schedules on weekends, so that's when the bulk of your tutoring happens. Couple that with spending the work week on editing and other work-related tasks, the answer is that I don't get "the Mondays" because I don't have Mondays or weekends. My downtime comes in small chunks throughout the week and then periodically in longer breaks for vacations.


How do you fight off a case of the blahs?

I check in with what I'm doing. Usually I feel the most "blah" when I'm sitting at the computer and compulsively checking social media just for the sake of checking it. If I can stop that cycle and do something else (write, read, listen to a podcast while I play Diablo III), I usually feel better. I also recognize that I'm more prone to the blahs during the winter months, which I try to counter by lighting the apartment with full-spectrum bulbs and making sure to take a multivitamin with plenty of vitamin D.

The other thing I do is clean. Stuff tends to accumulate around me: papers get piled up, jewelry projects I intend to finish "soon, really soon" float around on my desk, things like that. Sometimes I feel "blah" because I'm surrounded by a mountain of unfinished things; when that happens, I take a day to clean up and organize. (The last time I did this, I found a year-old piece of unopened mail from Skatteverket.)


How do you deal with a bad hair day?

Ponytails and dry shampoo.


What’s your strategy for FOMO?

I don't know if I suffer from a "fear of missing out," specifically. On bad days I can be a fairly compulsive smartphone user (check Facebook! check Twitter! check your emails!), but for me it isn't an anxiety about missing out on something cool or exciting. It's about not knowing: not being able to answer that head-scratcher right away, not knowing what that email from a friend says, etc. I'd say that I have FONK (Fear Of Not Knowing) more than FOMO.

My strategy for FONK is non-existent. I can get sucked up into it really easily. If I notice what I'm doing, I'll switch out of email or Facebook and read something on the Kindle app instead, but I don't always notice.


How prone are you to Instagram envy?

Not at all, since I don't use Instagram!

Trek Thursday: Discovery

On Friday, JV and I sat down with our weekly pizza to watch the first episode of the new Star Trek series. I went in with cautious optimism: it had received a lot of good reviews (when they finally lifted the ban on reviews?), but all of my friends who are actual Trek fans (including Diana of Redskirts) were ambivalent at best about it.

Despite the caution in my optimism, I left the episode DISAPPOINTED.

I say this as someone who liked the J. J. Abrams reboot—initially. Rewatching it after mainlining TOS over the course of a few months, though, it loses a lot of the shine. (Or maybe I just paid better attention to the plot the second time around.) I didn't even bother with the second one. We've hit peak Cabbagepatch.

Discovery takes its cue from the Abrams' reboot more than something like TOS or Next Generation, both in terms of aesthetics and also in story style. It's a lot of whiz-bang visual effects, Dutch angles, lens flare, etc. The story is more about what will look good on screen and not what would be interesting to think about.

Also, minor point, but when you make a prequel fifty-odd years after the original material, first of all: why? (Do they want that Klingon–Federation war backdrop?) Second of all: if you're going to do that, why are you blowing the budget on these fantastic hyper-future sets that are so clearly more advanced than the tech that's supposed to be, in-story, ten? fifteen? years later? Say what you will about the Star Wars prequels, but the visual continuity between the prequels and the original trilogy (I can't speak for the new movies, haven't seen them and have no interest in there) is pretty solid.

There are also plenty of Star Trek episodes where the conflict is based on someone in Starfleet making a terrible decision that errs on the side of optimism and naivete. But the point always seemed to be that even if it ends up being a mistake once in a while, that's the Starfleet standard operating procedure and it's based on (what I think is) a pretty noble ideal. (Like, we just watched the Next Generation episode "The Samaritan Snare," where La Forge gets kidnapped when they stop to repair a broken-down ship right after we watched the first episode of Discovery.)

A Starfleet where striking first—and violently—is framed as "the thing that should be done" and the officer who promotes it is being framed as being unjustly punished is not a Star Trek I find particularly inspiring or entertaining. I don't have hopes for future stories: Kurtzman's previous writing is much more in the action-oriented line (Transformers, Cowboys vs Aliens) and one random, stilted-sounding drama (People Like Us). Of course, Fuller has worked on other Star Trek incarnations: he's also written stuff that's more nuanced than giant fighting robot cars (Pushing Daisies, American Gods, Dead Like Me).

Good thing I have so many more episodes of Next Generation left to go!

Talky Tuesday: What I Did on My Summer Vacation: Austin, TX, Day 4

It's my last full day in Austin and I try really hard not to be sad about it. Fortunately that's easy, because today's the day we go to Natural Bridge Caverns in San Antonio and see the bats!

Everyone sleeps in and I'm the first up, again. I've finished Stories of Your Life and Others by now (I finished it while I was waiting for the bus to/at Book People yesterday); my eye catches a James Tiptree, Jr. collection and picks that up.

"Take that with you," Elizabeth says when they wake up. "I'm basically holding on to those books to give away to people."

Noah and Elizabeth decide to take advantage of the rental car and do the grocery shopping for all of the heavy things (read as: kitty litter). I follow along, because I really do genuinely like wandering around grocery stores, even if (like my trip with Elizabeth yesterday) there's no giddy quality of planning and anticipation involved.

After we bring the groceries back (and make a quick run to the store to find a misplaced "bag of bags"), we decide to try to get lunch in town before the drive out to San Antonio. The places we check have incredibly long waits, though, so instead we get some macarons and a turkey and cheese sandwich (for me and Noah to split) and head straight to San Antonio and decide to eat there. Noah consults with a friend via text about the best tacos in San Antonio, and he responds: "Rolando's Super Tacos, Jesus is Lord."

A podcast interview with Eddie Izzard fills the silence on the long drive; a Texas state lawmaker (who both Noah and Elizabeth recognize, since they both work in the Capitol) drives very aggressively, ultimately passing us on the right, and Elizabeth and Noah both shriek in inchoate rage. (Apparently she's a garbage politician in addition to a garbage driver.)

We get to Rolando's Super Taco without incident. We took the "Jesus is Lord" part of the text to mean that really, they're awesome tacos, but then when we arrive we see it: bold text, professionally painted on the side of the building.



The tacos are, indeed, super. And the water glasses are comically oversized. ("Welcome back to America," either Elizabeth or Noah says when a "Jesus, this is huge" reflexively escapes my lips.)

Stuffed to the gills, we continue to the cave, which is a jaw-dropping tourist trap of truly American proportions. I suppose when your cave is in the middle of uninhabited ranch land, you can spread out as much as you like; there are two different gift shops, some kind of zip line attraction, a maze, gem panning, and even a cafeteria.

The next tour leaves in about five minutes, giving us enough time to stroll over to the tour holding pen. This cave opts for the "tour guide at every station" model, which I like less than the "have a new friend and personal cave psychopomp for an hour" model, but given some of the hairpin turns in the path, I see why it's run the way it is. I don't fall, thankfully, though Noah almost does.

They have an obligatory photo spot, which Noah and Elizabeth resent—"even if they don't sell your picture to you, they can use it in promotional material"—and so they strive to look as awful as possible when the flash goes off.

I shrug. "Joke's on them. I'm not photogenic at all!"

The cave itself is spectacular and miracle of miracles, my camera phone manages to capture some of the magic. I lose my mind repeatedly on the tour.

"Thank you for indulging my weirdo nerdy interests," I say as we follow the walkway back to the main tourist campus of shops and food. I still have OMG CAVE HIGH thrumming through my veins.

"You'd do the same for me," Noah replies.

"What would be the equivalent? That Eugene O'Neill play, I guess."

"Oh, yeah. Which one was that?" He stops to think and we both say, together, "'The Hairy Ape.'"

We wait in the cafeteria for the bat tour to begin. There's some short paperwork to sign, a waiver for something or other, and then we're out on the patio for a short lecture on bats. The bat colony here are Mexican free tail bats; they don't hibernate, so they haven't been devastated by White Nose Syndrome like the little brown bats in PA. But the BCI volunteer touches on WNS, and other kinds of bats as well. She brings up the flying fox: "Do I have anyone here who's six foot?"

"This guy is," Elizabeth says, pointing at Noah. The BCI volunteer asks him to stand and hold his arms to demonstrate the wingspan of a flying fox. Elizabeth and I both crack up, and she snaps a picture of his demonstration. The volunteer moves on to other bat species and Noah sits down.

As we're caravaning out to the cave where the bats will emerge, Elizabeth tells Noah, "I volunteered you to stand up because I knew you would love it. Everyone watching you? Perfect."

The drive to the cave is surprisingly long, though we can't be driving more than 20 mph, so that's part of it.

"They could just be really efficient serial killers," Elizabeth wonders as we drive. The rental car isn't exactly made for off-roading; I think we all are fervently hoping that we don't get a flat or suffer any other road maladies. The survives, and right away you can smell the presence of bat. Woof. It's a short walk through the Texan scrub and then we're at the mouth of a cave. Or not at, not entirely; we're a few hundred feet back, separated by a gentle slope full of rocks and debris.

At ground level a few benches have been built to seat bat observers, and some artificial terraces. We make our way to the front-most ledge and sit and wait, while the BCI volunteer continues to inform us about the nearby wildlife and other bat facts.



We see a few flutters of individual bats here and there, and then eventually they're out, like a bat vortex. They stream out and into some fields we can't see to feed on assorted pests. After a few minutes of watching, the BCI volunteer announces that she'll be leading people to the other side, right over the cave, so we can be right under the bats as they fly.

It's a pretty amazing sight, though I'm mindful of the fact that we're under animals and try to remember to not stand and gape with my mouth wide open. Don't want to be a bat toilet!

"They look like an aurora borealis," I say.

"There is a river-like quality to their flight," Noah agrees.

Again, I think of Vonnegut: If this isn't nice, what is? "Not everything is a total garbage fire," I comment, and Noah just laughs.

On our way out, we can still see bats silhouetted against the clouds in the vanishing daylight. According to the BCI volunteer, they can hit bursts of speed up to 100 mph. With the right wind and atmospheric conditions, I guess.

We pull back on the highway and listen to a podcast Elizabeth wanted to try out, The Babysitter's Club Club. It's two guys reading The Babysitter's Club books, one for the first time and one for the first time since childhood. It suffers the usual podcast problem: desperately needs more editing and/or more scripting, and much of the episode is full of only moderately funny banter. We all pick it apart a little, and then Noah puts on another podcast for the second half of the trip home: Pop Culture Happy Hour.

As we wind in to Austin, food comes up. Noah is hungry; Elizabeth isn't. (She had a huge platter at Rolando's Super Tacos, Jesus is Lord.) Elizabeth drops us off at the all-purpose eatery Noah and I had patronized for breakfast on Friday and goes home herself. Noah gets loaded vegetarian nachos (tofu instead of bacon!) and I get a cider. We sit and talk about everything important and nothing in particular: friendships, relationships, anxieties, veganism. There's no postponing the inevitable, though: we finish the nachos and my cider runs out and it's definitely time to go home.



"Should we wake you up, or do you have an alarm?"

"I'll set an alarm. Have I checked in?" Weird to phrase it like that, but since Noah bought the ticket, he's the one who keeps getting the email reminders from Southwest.

"Yes, I did that this morning."

"Okay, great."

A few minutes into me last-minute packing and double-checking everything, Noah drifts out of the bedroom. "Okay, so I didn't actually check you in. I had the window open to take care of the airport cab, but I never hit the button. Should I send it to you, or...?"

I wave him way. "You can just do it yourself, it's fine." If my flight back is overbooked and I get bumped to a later one, I don't really care so much.

"Okay. Night!"

"Night!"

My things are packed as best as they can be with me still in pajamas. I double-check my alarm (poor form to miss a flight someone else has paid for), and then drift off to sleep.

Friday 5: Consumption

What is your paper towel consumption like?

Not awful, but not ideal. I try to use sponges and tea towels as often as possible in the kitchen, but paper towels have also become our default paper product in the house. No napkins, no tissues: just paper towels.

What condiment do you use most often?

Hm, what counts as a condiment? Do the variety of sauces in squeeze bottles in our fridge count as condiments? Because if we're talking about just ketchup and mustard, I don't use either.

What is your sticky note consumption like?

Nonexistent. I never use them.

What’s your coin jar setup?

Sweden is much closer to going cashless than the US, and I go for long stretches without having any cash on me at all. Needless to say, spare change doesn't really accumulate. When I have some, I usually give it away.

What’s something you’ve purchased recently that was lower in price than usual?

I don't know about recently, but I picked up some home decor items from Myrorna's for ultra cheap. I also visited a couple of vintage stores while I was in the US, but the keyword there is "vintage" (i.e. not "thrift"). They didn't break the bank, but they weren't a steal, either.

Talky Tuesday: What I Did on My Summer Vacation, Part 3: Austin, TX (Day 2)

My favorite part of visiting friends, particularly friends I only see every so often, is borrowing books from their personal libraries. It keeps me from having to pack books myself, and I like to see the ways that friends have branched out and developed in my absence. So it's not a problem that Noah is still sleeping and Elizabeth has already left for work when I wake up a little after 7:00, alert and refreshed. I use the time to sit with a collection of Ted Chiang's short stories, Stories of Your Life and Others.

I start with "The Story of Your Life," since I had recently seen and enjoyed Arrival,  and have just begun another before Noah wakes up and brews some of the Söder tea I brought to go with the mugs. We talk while we finish our drinks, sleepy and meandering.Making new friends in a new country can be challenging, especially for introverts (and maybe even especially in a culture that's very introverted); I relish the chance to spend time with someone who has a history with me and who knows me well, and vice versa. The conversation continues through starting a load of laundry, walking to (and then eating at, and then walking home from) a breakfast joint, and a visit to a store that has a proper name but that Noah and Elizabeth simply call "The Magic Rock Shop."

My reputation precedes me, I guess; anytime I visit friends somewhere, they point me towards a nearby rock and gem shop, if one exists. I worked at a cave (a literal, hole-in-the-ground cave) with a pretty hardcore mineral and lapidary selection throughout college and afterwards. As a result, I have a soft spot in my heart for rocks, even today, and I guess it's obvious to anyone who's known me for any length of time. This one tilts more New Age than rockhound, but there's still plenty to enjoy (and, of course, the pallets out back with the bulk, rough-cut slabs).

I'll never understand the appeal of amazonite.

One of my priorities in Austin was seeing the Art.Science.Gallery. in person, but they're closed while I'm in town. Oops!

What awful timing!

It's quite close to Zhi Tea, though: across the street, basically. I know about Zhi Tea because of another friend, originally from Austin but now based in Sacramento. Noah is also a fan and it was already on his agenda for us that long weekend without me even asking, so it works out perfectly. We jaywalk across the street (I had forgotten how much the American landscape hates pedestrians) and I make a beeline for the black tea selection to find four I want to try in the little four-cup sampler. Noah orders an iced tea and we go and sit in the garden in the back.

Please pardon the unintentional photobomb behind (hah, hah) me.

All of my day job runs on bottomless cups of black tea. I love a good Söder, but I'm always curious about new varieties. My Sacramento friend had sent me some other Zhi Tea, and it was good enough that I was keen to try their other blends. None of those four in front of me disappointed, either.

I remember to (mis)quote Vonnegut at one point in between sips: "If this isn't nice, what is?" Even with on-going life anxieties, I recognize that at least in that moment I'm happy. I like to think it comes out well in that photo; as someone with chronic Resting Bitch Face my smiles come out rather forced in most photos unless I'm genuinely and really happy.

After finishing our tea, we go back into the tea shop so I can make the difficult choice about which tea to buy. I eventually settle on Fredericksburg Peach, and we head out for Korean-Mexican fusion food next because all of the caffeine has put me in hummingbird mode; I need some food to take the edge off. Miraculously, I have a huge bowl of rice for lunch without lapsing into a food coma right after.

We bus over to the Capitol building for a tour. It's much shorter than usual, since both the state senate and the state congress are in special sessions, so we just wander around the halls a bit, with our bald, eyepatch-wearing guide. I stop in the gift shop and pick up some postcards for mailing later.

We check out the state Senate and Congress from the gallery, Noah narrating in low tones about current legislation they're trying to pass and assorted factions within the state government and within the state-level GOP. We don't stay long (maybe the prospect of politics is too depressing?), though, and eventually head for the library, where Elizabeth works. Her day is almost over at this point, so we just wait at a table for her. Our conversation here, influenced by the library atmosphere, is slower and hushed. I encourage him to write more.

Then it's back home, and everyone reads for an hour or two. I sit with Elizabeth in the living room and read more from Stories of Your Life and Others while Noah retires to the bedroom, eventually falling asleep in his book. Once in a while Elizabeth and I talk about the cats, or the graphic novel she's reading for a book club.

We stay like that until it's time for Master Pancake, a local riff show in the spirit of Mystery Science Theater 3000, my all-time favorite TV show. Before we get to the Alamo Drafthouse, it's pizzas, Chicago style, in a dark and dingy bar. Three different TVs have three different things on, all muted with closed captioning: there's Young Guns, a sports game, and something else.

"They have all the Austin bases covered," Elizabeth notes. "People nostalgic for the 80s and people who want to watch sports."

The food is a completely opposite experience for me from yesterday with the veggie sandwich and Subtraction Soup.  I thought I was hungry when I ordered, but after the first bite of pizza I realize This is way too much. Even with Noah mooching a slice off of mine, there's still a last slice of my personal pie left over. I would have left it, truthfully, but Elizabeth wraps it in foil and bravely carries it in her purse for the rest of the night; Noah will have it for breakfast in the morning.

Eventually it's time to the theater for Master Pancake. We stop at another, closer bar first, in order to meet up with everyone. I get my first and only Long Island for the trip, and we go up to the roof to people watch, which quickly turns into "sitting in the air-conditioned part of the roof bar and watching the arcade."

More of Noah's Austin friends find us at the bar, and we all have a good time at Master Pancake. We hang around the lobby of the Alamo Drafthouse, tired but also reluctant to brave the horde of loud, drunk people. It has to happen sooner or later, though, and we squeeze into someone's car for a ride home. When we get back, it's late but I'm not as tired as my hosts, so I make use of their wifi and check my email and gchat and things before bed.

Friday 5 on Saturday: Sandwich or Nah?

Why is or isn’t a hot dog a sandwich?

Oh, this controversy! This is one that I actually watched unfold, to an extent, because even Merriam-Webster weighed in on it.

I don't even care about hot dogs and their status as a sandwich; I just want to say that Merriam-Webster is a ray of light in these dark, confusing times. I'm glad I follow them on Twitter.


Why is or isn’t a hamburger a sandwich?

I would say so. Maybe it's a question of the orientation of the bread that throws people off.  Hamburgers have proper bread orientation to be a sandwich; hot dogs don't.


Why is or isn’t a wrap a sandwich?

I say it is, for the same bread orientation reasons outlined above.


Why are or aren’t Oreos and ice cream sandwiches sandwiches?

They're sandwich cookies, but they're not sandwiches. There's no bread! They could never be a reasonably filling and healthy meal!


Why does or doesn’t listening to an audio book count as reading the book?

Now here's the really juicy question. What is the point of reading a book? Is it to consume the story, or is it to consume the story in a particular way? Is there an advantage to reading? (Like how some studies suggest that readers retain more from paper copies than from ebooks.)

After all, reading or listening doesn't change the story or the language, for that matter. Not to mention that audiobooks are a godsend for people with visual impairments or dyslexia. Isn't it better that they hear a story instead of not being able to consume it at all? Didn't all language and literature start out as oral traditions of storytelling?

And yet, I would still feel like I was cheating, somehow, to say that I had read the audiobook I listened to.

All of this is a moot point anyway, though. I don't care for audiobooks for reasons unrelated to snobbery. I have a hard time paying attention to purely audio information (same problem I have with a lot of podcasts)  and am incredibly likely to zone out and miss huge chunks of the story without even realizing it. It doesn't matter how good the narrator is.

Friday 5: Five of Whatever

How tidy are your kitchen cabinets?

I realize now that we don't really have proper cabinets in our kitchen. We have mostly open shelving and then a few closets. They're clean, definitely, but tidy? Well, we know where to find everything, and that's enough, I think.

What’s an art project you did in school that you remember fondly?

The big project in third? fourth? fifth? grade was weaving. That was my favorite out of anything else we ever did, and over twenty years later I still have that project. Weaving is a handicraft I'd like to get back into at some point. I remember it as being very relaxing.

What’s the best thing you ate on your most recent trip?

Oh man! I had so much good food: upscale Italian with my parents and best friend, deep-fried Nutella and fluff, greasy spoon diner breakfasts and lunches, a Rolando's Super Taco, pirogi, Thai curry...it's really hard to pick.

What’s the dumbest non-political thing you’ve seen lately?

Photobucket charging its users $40 US per month for the privilege of third-party linking. Um, what?? I never used Photobucket as an image hosting service (or at least, not seriously) so I'm not really angry about it (my images aren't being held hostage), just confused. How out of touch can you be?

What’s something in your home that’s lasted longer than you expected?

We had a microwave that was definitely older than some of my students. It's gone now, and we have a replacement, but RIP noble microwave. You served us well.