It’s my WordPress anniversary today, as I registered my WP account three years ago. My actual blogiversary is in three days though, when I posted my first post. It was an almost hilariously bad snap of coffee. The picture was taken with a compact camera because I didn’t even have a smartphone back then. The post received the astonishing amount of two likes.
Since then, I’ve actually established coffee as my favourite blogging subject and introduced a frequently used coffee tag. I’ve also meanwhile completed two 365 projects, posting a photo a day. I’m on my third 365 project, which might take me more than 365 days to complete, but who says I need to post my 365 posts on 365 consecutive days, right?
Since I’ve been living at my cat’s place, I’ve learned a few interesting things about cats in general and my cat in particular. Such as the following.
The cat wants attention. She acts like she doesn’t, but she does. She’s quieter, calmer and better-behaved when I cuddle her anytime I chance to walk by and she happens to be awake.
The cat gets depressed when I’m depressed. She also gets calmer when I’m calm. Either my cat is psychic, or depression is infectious. The only difference is that when I’m depressed, I’m paralysed; but when the cat is depressed, she’s wild.
The cat likes routines. I like routines too, so we’re good. The one thing the cat doesn’t get routine-wise is the concept of every other day. I give her wet food every other day, but she demands it daily at the usual time.
When you’re in doubt what to blog about, blog about the cat. That’s self-explanatory.
I’ve been learning HTML on and off for the last half a year. I’ve now thoroughly covered the basic tutorial at W3Schools, but there’s more. There’s always more. My original idea(l) of encompassing all of HTML, as in moving all there is to know about it in my head, proved to be rather naive.
I’m also finding that there are overlaps in the HTML tutorial with other coding / programming / scripting languages. There are always overlaps, of course. For now I’m skipping anything that involves functions, but I am trying some very primitive scripts. If I knew a word meaning more primitive than primitive, I’d use it now to describe my attempts.
I’m a rather good typist and I rarely make typos, but I made one that amused me when I was trying to write a more primitive than primitive button. I told the button what to do on lick. Well, the canonical idea is to tell the button what to do on click. The lick button didn’t work, and I didn’t try licking it to see if that would work out.
I take my own posts as prompts: when I blogged about chronic pain, I went to see the doctor the next day; when I blogged about tattoo ideas, I made an appointment at a tattoo studio immediately. While the results of my doctors’ appointments are still being determined, the outcome of my other appointment is now finished—see picture above.
Quick answers to the obvious questions:
Yes, it’s permanent.
No, it didn’t hurt.
It’s a cat-shaped semicolon enclosed in CSS curly brackets.
As to long answers, I wanted a tattoo as part of my dealing with my midlife crisis. I borrowed the catty semicolon idea from the internet (I didn’t suspect I’d actually get it when I was saving it on Pinterest) and I added the brackets as my own idea. I didn’t intend to share my design, however primitive, but I’m too pleased with myself not to share it (insert smug emoticon here).
The tattooing part lasted under ten minutes and hurt less than having blood taken for lab tests. I got it with an extra bonus of glamour feel – it felt superstar-ish to sit with a strong halogen light in your face and the air from a fan in your hair. Of course, in combination with the slacks and the lace top in the picture, it doesn’t look too badass. I guess I need more leather. And more tattoos.
I have an insurance card and I’m not afraid to use it
I have a health insurance card. That in itself isn’t particularly surprising, as where I live, health insurance is obligatory. My card is special though because I made it so – I had my academic titles added on it because I could. Where I live, academic titles are a decorative property – it won’t earn you a living, but it will earn you a better approach from people. I’d almost venture to say that my PhD secures me a humane treatment, but I don’t want to push my luck too far.
Since you present your insurance card to staff before you are granted any treatment at all, the staff that will attend to you will know that you’re a fellow doctor. It’s seriously working wonders. Some of the doctors and nurses I dealt with were not only polite, they were positively friendly. I know this to be not the default behaviour. As all of them took vivid interest in my titles and inquired how to enter them in the correct order in my medical files, I’m sure that it was a smart move to adorn my insurance card with the little extras that make people treat me nicer.
I received a package from overseas from a mysterious admirer. The package was better travelled than me, which itself inspired awe in me for it. There were more awes and aws as I opened it and kittens started spilling out of it.
It seems that I live on the kindness of strangers and friends who are so awesome as to supply me with gifts of iPads and cat themed stationery. So this is a thank you. Now, will you excuse me, I need to go and cuddle the kitty on my new mouse pad.
A most unnatural thing has happened. I now own an Apple device. I came into possession of it by the most unnatural means too. A colleague won it, had it lying around for a while and then gave it to me, seeing that I could make a sensible use of it for website testing. Installing the Safari browser on Windows isn’t entirely the same as being able to check how a site displays on an actual Apple.
My feelings about my iPad mini 4 are wildly mixed. My ownership of it is disputable to start with. I wouldn’t be surprised if the donor wanted the device back so as to sell it instead. I also shouldn’t own the device at all, as it’s above my class. I don’t particularly like getting a taste of something that I won’t be buying—like trying on clothes you can’t afford, which is a self-flagellating device that some people apparently enjoy.
When I switched the thingy on, I was thrilled by the quality of the display. I was also thrilled by how fast it runs. That’s a lot of thrills going on, considering I’m hardly ever excited, not to mention thrilled. Fortunately, it manifested some kinks—searching on iTunes didn’t work properly in some instances—and I soon discovered that iTunes is a poorly stocked shop, when compared with what’s available for Android. Ultimately, I’m relieved that I don’t like the tablet without reservations, though I like it well enough.
So far I’ve used the iPad as a rather expensive mirror. The display displays so perfectly that I propped the thing with the camera on against the fridge so I could see myself when practising yoga. It was very subversive and very first-world of me, and I’m likely to do it again. One issue remains unresolved and I’m tired of Googling, so if you know, do tell me: what’s wrong with there being practically no antivirus for iOS? Does Apple think they do their thing so well that their devices don’t need an antivirus? What am I missing?
I know, I’m weird with my diminutives. I have socksies, shoesies, panties and whatnotsies. On my defence, it’s perfectly normal in my mother tongue to diminutivise what you hate the least. Today I hate my toeless sockies the least of everything that I hate the least, with the exception of the catsie (aka the cat), whom I always hate the least by default. (I have it all figured out.)
I use the toeless socksies for my yogsie practice on cold days. (Yoga is belittled here as yogsie because my limited take on yoga doesn’t deserve its full name.) My feet are as cold as my heart (that is, if I had any heart at all, it would be as cold as my feet) and regular socks are pretty much impossible to exercise in, given that the poses (posies) one strikes in yoga require a firm grasp of the ground with your soles and toes. Now, wait for it, my sockies are also equipped with rubber anti-slip soles. Cool, right? Or rather, warm.
I’ve been configuring my work station. I added new software in the form of a soft kitty cushion. Given that I’m pretty much in permanent full body pain these days, I’m trying out some limited options I have to set up my work place so as to make it less conductive to the usual aches one gets from sitting at the desk.
The cushion is alright to lean on, rest the back and get the arms in an easier position. It doesn’t work wonders. But it contains cats. It’s not great that it features three cats—odd numbers feel odd to me—but my live cat makes for a fourth, which is good enough for my OCD to rest in peace.
(Not) sorry that this post is much less fun than its suggestive title suggests. Everything is much less fun than publicity suggests. Including the bed. I crippled myself in bed yesterday. While climbing in it, as per usual, in order to sleep. I have myself (and the bed) to blame.
I always climb in bed over the headboard so as not to crease the bedspread placed on the half of the double bed that I don’t use (well, I put my phone on it for the night). The safe way would be to avoid climbing and get in the bed like a normal person, from the long side. But there’s the bedspread in the way, so no way. The opposing long side of the bed is flush with a wall, so no way either.
I frequently hit the corner of the headboard with one bodily part or another as I’m climbing in, but this time I had the exceptional pleasure of banging it with my knee. It was rather painful but I found it hilarious. I mean, how funny is it that rather than messing up my bedspread, I bruise my legs, regularly and repeatedly?
Mara Eastern 