#dailyfoo

So it looks like at least part of the reason I'm abruptly feeling rather like crap is because I'm coming down with a summer cold.

Now, this is more complicated than it looks, because when I'm in a place or situation where I don't feel safe, I don't get sick. I simply ... don't get colds. When I moved in with my friends in Knoxville a couple years ago, getting away from a rather crappy situation back in Colorado (the people I was living with were okay, but my brain REALLY was not), I got a cold within three days of getting there ... after not having had a cold for probably two years. And I got colds probably two more times in the six months I was living with them.

Once I moved out on my own -- into a neighborhood with a meth lab in the apartment building next to mine and occasional knife fights out on the street -- I didn't get sick at all, and the only thing that's happened to me in the year and a half I've been living with my mom is a stomach bug (which, alas, this defense mechanism does nothing about).

So I guess it should come to no surprise that after feeling really pretty good for two weeks straight, my body has decided that I'm safe, and WHAM UGH here I am with a cold.

I really, really apologize for that subject, but I apparently can't help it.

Mostly things have been better than in my last post (what, a month ago)? Although it's been sort of a rough road. The antibiotics from the sebaceous cyst messed with my Depo and I basically had PMS for about a week and a half straight. Since PMS makes me feel a 'my cat just died' level of 'things are BAD and WRONG' this was...pretty shitty.

But I finally leveled back out, and I never actually got my period, which is GOOD, because I realized a year or two ago that...

...okay, backing up here to say that I've been vaguely wondering if I am transgendered since I was twenty or so, and eventually decided that I probably wasn't because: no body dysphoria. There are things about my body that _annoy_ me (boobs, the possession of, being a LOT of it), but none of it rose to the level of dysphoria.

Of course the whole time I was doing this thinking I'd already been on Depo for a couple years and hadn't had a period in quite some time, so it wasn't until a year or two ago that I realized that yes, holy shit there WAS dysphoria, and it was all about having my period. I thought that hating the whole process and wanting to rip out the entire system once a month was pretty normal, but apparently it's not!

So thank $deity of choice for Depo, because euch. (Since then I've decided that my gender identity is 'somewhat both but mostly neither', but since I don't mind she/her as pronouns and have near-total passing privilege I don't really say much about it.)

So ANYWAYS that was a shitty week and a half but eventually I guess my hormones balanced back out, because then I had about two weeks of feeling really pretty good, and getting a LOT done for the business, and feeling REALLY good about getting stuff done, and enjoying what I was doing, and...just yeah, a lot of good. I've been posting about some of that over at my business blog (http://thevagabondtabby.com/blog/), which is somehow where the actual 'things are going well' posts go. I guess because I can't really post 'my life is shitty and augh' in the business blog. Anyway, there are Loiosh pictures, might be worth a look.

Plus Chocolate's icky spots randomly healed up (I'm filing it under 'Yet Another Chocolate Miracle), I found out that my car is _not_ actually on the verge of falling into tiny pieces, and AND and I'm learning how to fix card from a new friend. I learned how to regap my spark plugs a week ago and it was AWESOME.

(Told my mother this, and she looked nervous. Told her that I really like working with my hands, and sometimes wish I'd gone to tech school instead of taking all those useless AP courses, and she looked politely horrified. It was amusing.)

Feeling...randomly, remarkably crappy today.

It's been an ugh-tastic couple weeks. Chocolate (my grumpy old man cat with the food allergies) has been having a reaction to...something, I don't know, I didn't change his diet at all, so that was worrying, especially since I'd just bought a new bag of his kibble and might have to buy him something else instead. Which, money, and...

...I also bounced two checks last week, due to paying insufficient attention to things. Yes, my bad, but that doesn't make me any less stressed about it.

There's also the almost-bought-a-truck-but-damn stress from last week -- yes, at the same time I was bouncing checks, different accounts, okay? Trying to figure out a way other than Paypal to make it so I can easily transfer money from one account to the other. I don't want to connect both accounts to Paypal because I don't want Paypal to be able to randomly drain money from both of them; the risk is unpleasant enough with just one.

Plus (ick warning) the sebaceous cyst that's been on my upper back for, I dunno, years, but small and no worse than mildly annoying, suddenly got HUGE in the last week or two and it felt like someone had shoved a dinner plate between my shoulderblades. I couldn't move my arms or shoulders really at all without it hurting like crap, and I wasn't sleeping well, and I didn't feel like I could go to a doctor because money.

Finally Monday morning I was like screw it, I can't even with this, called a dermatologist and made an appointment. I was at the point where I was willing to spend RV Fund money on it and...yeah. It's straight-up self-care, and I need to be feeling okay if I'm going to actually get my business to the point where I can survive on it. But it's still hard to spend money when it feels like it's just pushing the time when I can finally get the fuck out of my mother's house further away.

Anyway, I went in yesterday and they did unpleasant things to my back and it was pretty ucky but the NP was really nice and did what she could to make it less not-fun. Even kept talking to me and telling me what she was doing and stuff when I asked her if it was okay, because I'm always curious about this sort of thing.

And then -- because they knew I didn't have insurance, and I wasn't going to be able to pay with Care Credit like I'd thought -- they didn't charge me near as much as they normally would have. I actually could pay the whole bill right then, instead of hoping they'd let me pay in installments (which it turns out they would have, if I'd had to).

...and I got home and just had nothing. I wound up eating lunch and going back to bed for like four hours, and felt ... just tired and a little dissociated last night, and today I don't want to do _anything_ and I just almost started crying listening to Galileo by the Indigos and maybe I'll just go back to bed again.

...not actually happening, due to a report from the mechanic which included phrases like 'I didn't accelerate too hard on the test drive because I was concerned that the transmission would fall out, and that'd be embarrassing'.

SO. This has been a test of the Emergency Kate's Not Actually Buying A Truck System. If Kate had actually been buying a truck...well, the COMPLETELY TERRIFIED would have kept going for a couple days, I have little doubt.

Possibly I am buying a truck this week. I am of course terrified by this.

It's sort of perfect, though. It's got a tow package and a big enough engine to be more than enough for the size travel trailer I'm going to want. It's big enough that even before I get the travel trailer I'll be able to carry everything I need for Battlemoor _and_ sleep in it, which means no more hotel stays EVER. It is _possibly_ big enough that I'll be able to bring Chocolate as well as Loiosh with me on long trips, and that's huge, part of the reason for all this has always been that I am DONE with leaving Chocolate home while I travel.

It's also going to cost just about all of my saved-up money, once I'm done with taxes and insurance and registration, and this terrifies me. Because my RV fund is also my what-if-a-cat-gets-sick fund and my what-if-the-car-dies fund and my what-if-augh-thing fund and then I'mm have SQUAT-ALL NOTHING AGAIN and this is TERRIFYING.

I mean, rationally? I have a CareCredit card I can use to pay up to $500 in vet fees, and I even get six months to pay it back before I start paying interest. Once I have the truck it won't _matter_ if my car dies because I'll have, well, a _truck_. And there's always the option of a holy-crap-I-need-money sale.

But I'm still terrified.

So I drew a tarot card because, well, terrified. This isn't something I do often but it seemed the moment for it? And I got the Two of Wands:

The Two of Wands takes the spark of inspiration from the Ace of Wands and matures it into an actual path forward. Thus, the Two of Wands is all about planning and progressing. You have been able to take your idea and turn it into a feasible plan that you know will lead to your success. It is no longer just an idea but you now have a plan in place to ensure that your idea is carried out as you had intended.

...

The Twos in Tarot often represent decisions of some sort. In the case of the Two of Wands, you are making a decision between sticking with what you know, or expanding your horizons and taking a risk. You know that the world has to offer you something ‘bigger’ or more meaningful, yet you are also aware that in order to maximise on this opportunity, you must leave your familiar grounds. Even though you have already invested a lot into your current circumstances, for you to be able to grow and to maximise your potential, it is imperative that you step out into a new world and explore your options.

This card shows the patience and focus of your intent. You have got the ball rolling and have started out on your journey, so now it is time to patiently wait for your rewards and watch as your ideas begin to materialise.

In other words, this is the ABSOLUTE PERFECT RIGHT THING to be doing right now.

I'm _also_ being terrified about the gas mileage -- it's going to be far crappier than the 35-40 MPG I get in my car, which was going to happen ANYWAY, I don't know why I'm being all shocked about this now, but still AUGH.

So yeah I'm having a flail. It'll all be fine, I'm just terrified.

I'd hoped to take time for myself weekend before last, and I totally succeeded there. Saturday I went to a local historical farm for the annual sheep shearing -- along with demonstrations of spinning, woodworking, rug-making, and making brooms. It was pretty awesome, I talked to people who are geeks about their chosen thing and that always makes me happy, and I learned a bunch about brooms and the making and history thereof. Sat and watched the guy for a while -- not long enough to actually make an entire broom, but I could turn my hand to parts of the project, I think.

Sunday I went down to Philly to watch a vintage base ball game (yes, that's how it's spelled). Civil War era rules, uniforms, and moustaches. No gloves (ow). Just a bunch of guys who play because they love the game, and isn't that what it's supposed to be about?

Plus I brought Loiosh, because he's my sanity. He got petted by the Deputy Mayor of Philadelphia (and lots of other people), caught a cricket, and got to scare the crap out of someone's puppy who'd never met a cat before.

Also the game went on forever, so I was out of the house for hours and hours. BEST.

Last week I finally got caught up on making soap and got ready for the event this weekend, which was...small, and I only added $40 to the RV fund, and that's less than $200 this month, and at this rate I'm gonna be living with my mother forever.

Sunday I'd thought to go to a local stitch & bitch, but I never heard back from the host and was also feeling _very_ antisocial after the event, so I wound up cleaning my entire 'apartment'. Which was kinda nice, especially as my sister didn't visit so it was just me and Mom. And cleaning is definitely an 'approved activity', so it was all right.

Yesterday I had a LOT of energy and opened a store on Zibbet. They made it pretty easy -- I could import most of the information right from Etsy and just edit a little. I don't plan to advertise it at all (any advertising gets pointed at the main site) but I might pick up some sales from people who regularly shop Zibbet, so I figured what the heck.

Today I...feel like crap and want to go back to bed. I feel like the business is getting nowhere, that I'll be stuck here forever. I'm basically unemployable by anyone other than like Target or something, so it's not like going and getting a job is any sort of option. I'd make slightly more at a retail job than I am now, but I'd lose my weekends, so I wouldn't be able to do shows, and I wouldn't have the spare energy to dedicate much to the business. I guess theoretically I could work retail until I've saved up enough for an RV _and_ to support me while I built the business _back_ up to where it'd be enough to live on, but it just seems like so many steps backwards.

Painfully tired today -- and the 'painful' is literal; no surprise after how stressful yesterday was. Emotional things tend to cause me much more physical pain than physical things, unless the physical thing was _really_ dumb.

So it's been a 'half a thing at a time' sort of day, though I did manage to get out to Office Depot and get more of the paper I wrap soap in -- necessary both for getting ready for EK Coronation this weekend and for shipping out the Soap of the Month soaps tomorrow. I also figured out how I'm going to get more durable booth signs done; that'll just need to wait until I get around to doing higher-quality versions of what I have and saving up about ten bucks.

I have a whole list of things to do to make the booth better. Unfortunately nearly all of them require money, so they'll get done a little at a time. It's a balance between 'save money for RV, thence to getting OUT' and 'spend a little money on making life more bearable in the meantime' and I've been leaning more towards the latter the last month or so. Not in any drastic way -- it's been more like 'five bucks for a PS2 game' and 'four bucks for buttons to finish that dress', no 'forty bucks for dinner' or 'twenty bucks for this week's lattes' for me. But it's time to buckle down again.

I'm pretty sure my car isn't going to make it out to Colorado again without a bunch of (expensive) work, so either I'm going to have something drivable and RV-esque by the middle of August, or I'm going to be spending money on my car. I'd really prefer the former, but we'll see how it goes.

I have a little over two thousand saved. I know, I was at a thousand nine months ago, but then there were hospital bills and vet bills and...yeah. But I haven't touched the RV fund since October or so, and it's slowly-but-steadily growing. Just hope it keeps at it, and grows fast enough.

Anyway, state of the me: Tired. Too tired to be really anxious; today I'm keeping an eye on the depression more than the anxiety. Still short on fun things to do at the end of the day, so I'm likely to keep working into the evening for lack of anything better to do, the other option being 'go and watch TV with my mom until I start wanting to kill someone'.