Promiseland

[Fetian]

So dad texted me this morning to say he wasn't feeling well, so we rainchecked again to Thursday, which is unfortunately after Christmas but what can you do. Let ash know the new plan and then I went back to sleep until 1 or 2. It was very hard to wake up! But I did eventually manage it, ate some breakfast and watched some youtube, and then I went out on the bike again since I won't have another opportunity for a few days. It definitely needs a professional lookover, get everything touched up and in good condition, but it continues to be rideable. I was out for maybe an hour this time? Still getting used to the motor, but I'm getting there. I'm currently most comfortable going around 13 MPH on most roads in the neighbourhood, and I can in theory make that one of the PAS settings, but I want to wait until I'm more used to riding it before I do that. At that point I might want to be riding a little faster.

I have not yet needed to change gears at all, but our neighbourhood in particular is pretty flat, so we'll see what happens when I'm riding it around dad's house on Thursday.

When I got home I changed out the litter in both my cats' litterboxes and now I'm sitting down for a while. Later I'll want to take the trash out and also I need to work on Christmas presents again, and ideally get them done or close to done tonight.

[Fetian]

Cargo basket got here and has been installed! Unfortunately the screws it came with are too short for the bike frame so I've just zip-tied it very thoroughly in place. When I'm able to get some longer screws of the right size I'll try putting the brackets in place but for now this should be fine, feels very secure. I'll make sure to keep an eye on the ties for any signs they're getting weak

The basket is a bit smaller than I'd hoped, but is probably as big as I can reasonably attach to the bike, so. I'm unsure if I'll be able to transport soda in it, but I'll definitely be able to transport a couple bags' worth of groceries. The next time it isn't raining and also I don't have other plans that day and also it's not Christmas Day (so some time next week, probably), I will ride up to the store and test it out.

[Fetian]

I did in fact forget to get pictures before I boxed them up. I'll try to remember when they're opened

Merry Christmas! Happy holidays! Yesterday, ash and I watched Muppet Christmas Carol and the Rankin/Bass 1974 'Twas the Night Before Christmas, and then we searched up free-to-play games on steam with 'Christmas' as a search term, and ended up playing Peek-a-Mimic: Christmas Mansion, Adolescent Santa Claus, and we tried to play What is Snowman Made Of but it wouldn't run on the deck. Then ash went to bed and I went to my room to work on presents!

I ended up starting them over three times and I am as ever not wholly happy with how they came out, but I hope ash and Erik like them.

Now I just chill out until 11 when we're going to open presents

[Fetian]

Happy boxing day! So at 10-something yesterday ash went out to start baking a lemon custard pie and I put on a yule log with jazzy christmas instrumentals, and we hung out until it was time for presents. ash and Erik liked mine to them, which were a couple of little statuettes:

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But they can fit together like:

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1225242004.jpg

 
The original intent was a couple of little shibas but that is just not how the art happened. I guess they're cats now? The sunglasses are a last-minute addition. As I said I started over on them three times -- I kept trying to make the heads and the bodies separately but that just wasn't working, so these are a couple of sheets of foil shaped into basically what you see here and then with sculpey added on and refined. They're painted with watered-down acrylics, for which I would do a layer, wait for them to dry, add more paints to the pallet to adjust the hue, paint on another layer in sort of rough shading and highlights, and repeat. So they've got a bunch of shades on them, and I think that turned out pretty nice.

Anyway! Erik got me the Lateral book based on Tom Scott's Lateral podcast, which I didn't know there was a book for that! It's full of puzzles and I will look at it more closely soon. ash got me a few weird candies and a beginner matcha tea set, which I have now used several times. It's very nice!

We watched Hot Frosty for our traditional christmas movie movie, and then ash started making dinner while we watched a couple of youtubes and then some more of the Jet Lag season I'd been showing him. I think we just kept at youtube all evening until he went to bed, including the secret santa Game Changer that just got uploaded to dropout's youtube for christmas, I think.

I was planning on holding out until 10:30 and then going to bed, but what ended up happening was I went to bed at 9:30 with the intent of getting up when Cael came to get his dinner, which happened at around 1 AM. So I got him dinner, opened up the gate for ash's and Erik's animals, and shut mine in my room for the night, and then I listened to a podcast and played some video games. First some more Dark Souls but then I got frustrated again and switched to Heaven's Vault, which might be coming out with a sequel or prequel next year. Then I went to sleep for real at about four o'clock, and set an alarm for noon.

In the morning-ish I'd sent out 'merry christmas' texts to the family, including a couple of family members I haven't talked to in a long while, one of them in specific being my cousin who I haven't seen in decades, and the last time we talked she had gotten my phone number from somewhere and tried reaching out coincidentally during a time when I was having trouble paying my phone bill, so a lot of texts to and from me were just vanishing into the ether. But this is a cousin with whom I was super close when I was younger -- her mom babysat me a bunch and I would spend a lot a lot of time at her house. Last I had heard said cousin was doing something school related in Egypt, I think? I'm not sure. Anyway! Despite not talking in forever and in fact having potentially ghosted her by accident during that last attempt, she jumped right into talking with me as though nothing had happened! An immediate 'Merry Christmas! Look what my coworker got me:' and a picture of a souvenir mug from a place we'd gone a bunch on summer vacations. It was nice, and we chatted a little through the day with large breaks during which I assume we were both spending time with people in person for the holidays. She has not responded to the last text I sent yesterday evening -- but also she is one of the only people to have heard that I am taking college classes and to actually ask me about them.

It was nice to catch up a little, I hope she and her mom are doing well.

Today! After having breakfast and caffeine, and also after hitting snooze a few times, I got ready to head to dad's house. This was my first time really out with the bike and it went pretty well! Awkward getting it on and off the train and bus, but it worked out fine and then I was able to ride it to the bank and to dad's without much issue, even with the hills. There was some weirdness with a guy on the bus who kind of seemed to have some kind of issue with me having a bike on the bus? I did my absolute best to keep out of everyone's way but when he got on the bus I had my bike pulled as close to myself as possible for people to get by, but when he had to pass me with his walker he just stood there until I moved even more to make room, and then every time someone was getting onto the bus he would like move his walker up against my bike to block them from getting on? And while the bus was moving he would let it just slide around all over the place, including banging into my bike, until finally the driver got up and was like, you can't have your cart like that, you can't be blocking the aisle. At first he tried to switch the seats the guy was on the wheelchair-accessible configuration but for whatever reason he couldn't get that done, so asked me if I would switch seats because my seats also could fold up to allow wheelchair access, and I was like absolutely. So the driver got the guy into those seats and his walker into the gap for the wheelchair but then when we were in motion again the guy continued to just let his walker slide around all over the place.

Meanwhile I had overheard where the guy was going, but when I got off about two miles before where he had said he intended to get off, he got off at my stop instead and then just stood there a few feet away from me while I unfolded my bike and got ready to take off. He finally walked away just before I was finished. Very weird! I definitely got the impression he was trying to get the bus driver to also be mad at me and my bike, or something? That's probably just paranoid thinking but certainly he was kind of obnoxious.

At dad's we went through some more stuff, mostly some old letters and pictures. Then ash picked me up and we went to the store, where I found a backpack-cooler on clearance that I think might fit in the cargo basket for the bike. I'd love to have something I can sling onto my back when I need to get the bike folded up, instead of having to juggle the bike and the bag and probably my transit fare. It's also less spaceous on the inside than I'd have liked, so I may end up wanting to replace it with a more traditionally backpacky backpack at some point. Hopefully it works for now! Backpacks are expensive :(

We came home! We had dinner! We watched more youtube -- a drawfee, a jacksfilms, a 'we ran the lyrics through google translate a bunch of times and sang the result' for Baby It's Cold Outside and then 'Twas the Night Before Christmas -- and ate some ice cream, and ash went to bed. It's a chilly night, so I made some matcha to warm up a bit and now I'm eating more dinner and writing this post. And watching youtube.

It started raining when I was around the block from dad's house and it's been raining since. I therefore left the bike in ash's trunk, so hopefully it's drier tomorrow when I go to remove it. Also a thing fell out of my bag in the backseat, so I need to look for that tomorrow as well.

Alright! Going to be another early night, catch up a little more on that sleep debt. Probably the usual in the meantime.

[Fetian]

TIL there's a thing insecure fanboys will do where they will propose an 'X vs Y' debate where they pit their fave against Sailor Moon, expecting it to be a funny 'of COURSE Sailor Moon is fucked' "curbstomp"

Except that unbeknownst to them, Sailor Moon is unfathomably OP and every time it goes the opposite of what they wanted

Also TIL Sailor Moon is unfathomably OP

(Just read one of these in particular that put Sailor Moon of Sailor Moon against the God Emperor of Warhammer 40k. Sailor Moon won.)

[erikavonkaiser]

omg can you link me the Sailor Moon vs God Emperor one I need it for science

[Fetian]

Here you go!

[Fetian]

Stop putting important information in the lower sixth of your videos!! That's where the captions go! I can't fnucking see it!!

[Fetian]

Cael hiding under the covers from the fireworks

[Fetian]

I've learned that it's not enough for him to just be under the covers, he also needs something like a pillow or a cushion on top of him, so now he's also sandwiched between the giant alligator and my computer pillow, while under a blanket.