Elise Matthesen

So Monday the 28th was a day so full that I didn't get things written down, but I got a great many things done. All the outgoing items were packed and their labels run. Various tasks were completed. Biggest of all, though, was talking with an advisor.

Any kind of advisor is a big deal to me, for all sorts of reasons, some good, some painful. I'll leave out all the personal history and what it's like approaching the hectic bureaucracy of this capitalist hellscape from the starting point of being a third generation factory worker who navigates the world with numerous disabilities and chronic illnesses, who came from a little farm town and often feels overwhelmed with all that needs doing.

But Monday I talked with a financial advisor, and it was good. Tuesday, I talked in more depth with the financial advisor who is probably going to be my particular financial advisor. (I practiced up for this by getting some constructive related experience by talking with a Lutheran Social Services financial person-who-makes-sense-of-what-you're-in'the-midst-of about a year back, and they were tremendously informative even though I was terrified. I highly recommend them.)

It might not seem that big to anybody else, but it was huge for me, and I am now feeling a combination of victorious, stunned, and tentatively optimistic about the future. And I'm flat out exhausted. But smiling.

Perfume of the day on Monday was Nocturne Alchemy's Amber Sun (both kinds, the blue label and the red label), which don't actually work for me, so I shall let them go. Perfume of the day on Tuesday (I won't say "today" because we've slipped into Wednesday) was BPAL's Stimulating Sassafrass Strengthener, which is actually weirdly good on me.

I wish you so much good fortune in any of your askings-for-help and finding-advisors endeavours. How's that been going? Do you, like me, sometimes feel like you're such a tangle-maker that even the helpers wouldn't want to deal with you because you have undoubtedly Bollixed Things All Up in ways that Surpass Imagination? (Boy howdy, do I ever feel like that. So much, I feel like that, and so often. But not right now! Right now, I actually feel tentatively optimistic, and also kind of exhaustedly giddy.)

I woke at 7 something p.m. today. My sleep remains upside-down but I definitely got a lot of it, which is good.

Got up, washed some dishes, felt my balance and presence of mind reestablish itself over the course of dish washing.

There is workbench in my future, yay! I am partway through a necklace-crown I've been wanting to do for a while. We'll see if it works. For the moment, I am about to eat Raisin Bran, which oddly enough is also one of my comfort foods when I can eat it.

Mood is a thing. I'm behind on a whole bunch of tasks, including writing up a Kickstarter update, transferring some more video to an external drive, and finding a good email address for the neurologist who looked after me when I had a stroke. I want to send the latter the four essays I've written so far about art after the stroke. There are many more things than those on my list, and I'm trying not to be overwhelmed by how much there is to do. (Grief does not play nicely with that, alas.)

Today's perfume is JOOP. The scent brings me powerful memories of when I was with a particular girlfriend. Scents can be like opening an old journal. This one is probably extra-powerful because I rarely wear it.

Do you have scents, perfume or not, associated with powerful recollections?

Bagels with smoked salmon and cream cheese are my birthday treats this year. Om nom nom salmon on a bagel is so goooood. (Big thanks to Catherine Lundoff for making sure there was cream cheese when I had neglected to get some.)

Today got eaten by sleep again mostly, after a fruitless attempt at sleep last night, followed by work until I found enough sleepiness to try again. Well, work and a nice cold bath. It is too hot here, and my domicile is currently not air conditioned. I'm glad to have finally gotten some sleep. The good thing is that today I managed to get meds in me at the right times, so I have hopes that the rest of the week may go more smoothly. (The current format of my timing is that I sleep when I'm tired, and take meds when the schedule says I should, as much as I can manage that.)

And now I'm actually tired and also sleepy, so even though there are 7 small pendants already photographed and ready to go up, I am going to go to bed and see how that works. (I think it was the bagels and smoked salmon and cream cheese. They just make me feel good and safe and well-fed. Such a comfort food they are to me.)

Do you have comfort foods?

Edited to add: Oh, forgot to say, the perfume of the day was Leather Jacket from CB: I Hate Perfume. Like other CB:IHP scents, it does what it says on the tin, which is pretty cool for a water-based accord.

Last night at the workbench I finished the aquamarine necklace called "Will the Sea Remember Me?" It has a sterling silver lobster clasp which has a swivel, so the necklace can be untwisted without removing it. Useful little thing, a swivel clasp.

Here it is in the Etsy shop: https://www.etsy.com/listing/1550006235/will-the-sea-remember-me-short-necklace

I woke early today because it's a shipping day and I need to be near the door to hear when the USPS folks thump. (I have a note on the door asking them please to thump, because I am hard of hearing and cannot hear regular knocking very easily.) So with any luck I'll be able to get a good batch of new pieces up. There are a lot of them ready to go, and have been for a while. (See also "I need to have four of me to do everything on my task list.")

Today's perfume is Voodoo Queen from Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab, since it seems appropriate to wear a rare scent today.

I will almost certainly update this post again as my birthday proper continues. Whee!

What is your relationship to the sea? To other entities of water?

I am determined to make it to the workbench.

There will be an update after that.

Today's perfume: Strawberry Ginger Fizz from Haus of Gloi

UPDATE: I have had WORKBENCH YESSSS! Made an aquamarine necklace about the sea and memory, and with any luck I will get it into the shop soon. Should I put photos here too? Probably some people will like seeing it. These are very imperfect aquamarines and I am fascinated by them.

So. Workbench. There was workbench and it was good. And now I need a bath in order to be fit to sleep.

After I work at the workbench, I have a happy tiredness. (As distinct from various chronic tirednesses and so on.) Do you have something that gives you a happy tiredness?

There is only one durian custard cake left. Hmpf. Should have gotten more. Might need to do something about that.

I'm late posting this because I took a little time for reading, and fell into the story and forgot about time. Since it's beta reading, that's a very good sign that the writer's doing things that work. This is a story by Celia Lake. Have any of you read any of her things? I love them very much.

The first thing I did today was unsnarled a minor bureaucratic situation, which involved talking to people by phone twice, with a brief break in between in order to set up an account with FedEx, which I was told to do by the situation-unsnarlers. These things may sound like small things, but for a person with ADHD, fibromyalgia brainfog, anxiety, and also PTSD, stuff like this can loom over one enough to totally freeze a person. So getting through that fairly easily, first thing, is a huge wiktory.

Also I got a few new things photographed and into the Etsy shop, and other things have been marked down. (Still so much slower getting things into the shop that I hoped, but something is better than nothing.)

Now if my silly body would let up with the mildly ominous pain, I could go merrily on with the regular pain. the stuff I am used to. Oy, bodies.

Today's perfume is Nocturne Alchemy's Ra's Amber Sandalwood, which is good in a fairly straightforward "does what it says on the tin" way.

Have you fallen into a story lately and lost track of outside things? Are there authors whose work you are tremendously fond of these days?

Still letting my sleep cycle choose itself, but today I have gotten my Etsy boxes packed and labeled with postage on them, and have done so in time to schedule a pickup for tomorrow. Yay! As my vibrating alarm clock arrived today, I have the technology appropriate for a hard-of-hearing Lioness to be awakened in time to switch to the sofa near the door upon which the excellent USPS person-of-the-day will thump loudly, if they have read the sign beseeching them to do so. (I cannot hear a regular knock unless it's under exceptionally favorable conditions.)

After I have something cool and enjoyable to drink, I have a few eBay things to pack as well, but since there is a pickup already scheduled, I do not need to race the clock here. The metaphorical clock, I mean, rather than the thumping one that will go inside my pillowcase... or possibly in a bag hung round my neck. We shall see.

Yesterday I forgot to write that the perfume of the day was Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab's "Death" from the Tarot series. It is in a 10ml bottle, which will tell you how old this particular BPAL scent is. (Somewhere around here I have a couple of tarted imps, if there are any old-timers who remember those.) Today I'm wearing a Nocturne Alchemy scent: Ra's Vanilla Amber. The NA perfume oils do not age as well as Possets or BPAL.

And I got GLORIOUS WORKBENCH TIME today, and finished a thing, and have other things almost done, and I cannot wait to show you. Probably I will photograph a bunch and put them up in the Etsy shop while waiting for the USPS.

How do you interact with your mail and package pick-up/delivery people? Do you have favorites?

Two days vanished, there. Part of it is that my body insists on sleeping until 3 or 4 p.m., and part of it was that on the 13th, I got to the workbench and was too happy there to leave in time to post, and then I lost the notion of posting. Lost it in the fog. No, I don't have Long Covid; I have my own witch's brew of brain fog and related fun courtesy of fibromyalgia, ADHD, C-PTSD, and being a stroke survivor. Plus maybe the six decades of wear and tear on the organism has something to do with it too. In any case, I didn't write anything down here.

The time at the workbench on the 13th really was good. A piece that got inspired by a photograph of a flower got almost done, and I worked on selecting some opals for a Thing that Needs Doing.

Today, then, was a combo of silly body foolishness and continuing recuperation, plus repeatedly checking on whether a thing I need is going to work out. Plus more silly body foolishness. And now, which I am still counting as the 14th because I have not gone to bed yet, I am about to start an experiment.

For the rest of the month, I am going to sleep when I am sleepy and work when I am not sleepy. No more wrenching my sleep schedule around to try to get it to match some notion of ideal. I will have to set alarms for meetings and so forth. And I need to order that bedthumper alarm thing ASAP.
[fx: a cricket considers chirping. Time passes.]
OK, bedthumper alarm ordered. We shall see if it works on someone with my level of hearing. (I am moderately hearing impaired according to the audiology people who measured me. Haven't had it checked lately, but I mostly still can't hear the same stuff I usually can't hear.)

OK, where were we? So many things to do, and not enough good wake time and good sleep time, so we will see if this experiment is better or worse.

How's your sleep lately?

Silly body continues silly. Hurting back ate my day. And yet, I managed to get filters ordered finally, and some magnetic clasps for someone who needs them, so that's something. Also had zoom tea (or whichever the meeting method we found that finally worked) and passed along some tidbits of musing on historical things I had been watching/reading that turned out to be possibly very useful to the person to whom they were given. Being useful makes me happy.

No workbench, though. Silly body. Tomorrow I will try again. Now, though, gotta be sleep. I set out to go to sleep two hours ago, but then last minute thoughts distracted me (see above for things that got ordered) and so here we are, not yet snoozing. But I go, I go!

How's your sleep been?

My back pain was bad enough to keep me from sleeping last night, so I napped a lot today. This can leave a person feeling discombobulated and a little bit unstuck in time. Yet in my naps I think I got some good sleep, at least a little, and I managed to take care of a paperwork thing while awake, and also have a good e-visit with my mother-in-law (aka my mother outlaw), which is always good. I made her laugh with delight by describing some of the excellent model aircraft videos Juan has been showing me.

I should go figure out what today's perfume is. Be right back!
[fx: grasshopper sits on bent blade of grass; time passes]
Sacred Kyphi from Nocturne Alchemy's 3rd anniversary it is, bottle 26 of 69. (It originally came with a box of resins with which to make one's own kyphi. I believe the box has gone to kiya who seemed more likely to do something fun with it.)

My current ambition: breakfast. Which will show you how discombobulated my day is, time-wise.
My further ambition: workbench, please please please. Need workbench time, which improves everything almost always.