My Week in Instagram Pictures

Last week has been uneventful, much as my entire life. Thanks the universe for that. I hate everything but eventfulness especially. I have captured each non-event of each uneventful day in one non-picture.

5 Feb: My cactus colony is dying on me. It’s a minor miracle that I’m managing to keep the cat, a life form superior to plants, alive. 

6 Feb: I went out. To get smokes. It was very exciting because there are new pictures on cigarette packets! This ad for clogged arteries is particularly attractive. The imagery is supposed to discourage me from smoking, but sadly, I enjoy the art, so not happening.

7 Feb: When you think the bloody winter is about to be over and the snow thinks otherwise. 

8 Feb: That’s my balcony chair. Clearly, I never clean it. I converted it into an art installation.

9 Feb: The day when a radiator burst and flooded the building. This was taken when I was pressurising the boiler, unaware that it’s sending all the water down into the cellar, creating an impromptu swimming opportunity.

10 Feb: Freezing as per usual. No amount of thermal wear helps. Please notice, however, that my fleece shirt is colour-coordinated with my knitted socks. And my nails are colour-coordinated with my outdoor thermal pants. Which I wear indoors. 

11 Feb: I did my nails! What an event! And I did them wonderfully. I love the jaundiced yellow, the bloody red and the deathly black. 

More Instagram Crap

I do crap. Because I can. I mean, because I can’t. Can’t do better, that is. Since you appear not to hate my Instagram-to-WordPress reposts enough, you have condemned yourselves to another week’s worth of instant snaps. One day, one snap. Each snap is crap with an even crappier story to go with it. Here’s proof.

29 Jan: I went on an adventure. To Tesco. I met this lost and lonely hairpin, symbolical of my dead and discarded dreams and hopes, and it was so moving. So moving that I snapped this and moved on. 

30 Jan: There was an actual sunset, which means that there was an actual sun out during the day. Whew. It gave me a fright. I already forgot what sun was and mistook it for fire.

31 Jan: You wouldn’t fucking believe it. I know I didn’t. A month later, I actually unpacked my new yoga mat and started using it. Once I hopped on it, I started to hate myself for having waited so long to break it in. It’s all kinds of awesome. 

1 Feb: Today, nothing happened. Except I ventured in front of the building to take the dust bin out for the dustmen. Dustpeople. Let’s be gender correct. Or dustentities. In case the council employs not-people too. 

Feb 2: I painted my nails. I thought the colours would stand out best in monochrome. Duh. They’re black anyway, with one nail tentatively yellow. I’m a wasp. 

3 Feb: The cat is shedding like her survival depended on it. I can’t even drink coffee these days without swallowing and then coughing up a furball. Cat hair everyfuckingwhere.

4 Feb: I got up. Got dressed. Painted my face. Did my hair. It was so awesome. I mean, it was a bloody bother, but I was surprised to find myself comparatively pretty after like a two-hour prettifying procedure. And I didn’t even go on a date.

 

A Snap a Day Non-challenge

My reblogs of my own Instagram snaps seem to be among the posts which you hate the least, so I’m continuing with this non-challenge and presenting another week’s worth of crappy snappy shit (I know that this dubious phrase makes no sense, but that’s suitable for a non-challenge).

Jan 22: Went to Tesco. Was colour-coordinated. That’s how exciting my life is.

Jan 23: It’s fucking freezing and I don’t understand how the water hasn’t turned into ice. The world is not what it used to be. 

Jan 24: My old yoga mat is disintegrating and disgusting. I bought a new one. I haven’t used it yet. I have this curious mental block which doesn’t prevent me from buying new things but does prevent me from using them. What the actual fuck. Sorry for the swearing but it’s spot on here.

Jan 25: I’ve been waiting in vain for my ballots for presidential elections. Nothing arrived and then I was told that this time I’d be getting ballots on the spot. Which I did. I could’ve spared myself the trip, the wrong candidate won. 

Jan 26: Proof that I bothered to go voting. Never again. See above. A nice walk though. 

Jan 27: My anxiety levels are breaking records and I’m unsuccessfully trying to counter with meditation. Nice try.

Jan 28: I had this obsessive thought that there was a gas or water leak, so I descended in the cellar of the building to examine. Thanks for the trip, anxiety. Nothing is leaking anywhere. So, good news, I guess. I need to go check again though.

 

My Perfectly Average Silhouette

WordPress’s Daily Post is being clairvoyant today. The prompt of the day is silhouette, which I noticed just after posting a snap of my own meagre silhouette on Instagram.

Relating to this photo and at other occasions, I’ve had curious discussions with people about my height. It’s no huge surprise that different parts of the world are populated with people of different heights, but I was a bit surprised that North Americans tend to regard me as tall. What the heck? It must be my slight built that’s misleading.

https://www.instagram.com/p/Beap69HhwAN/?taken-by=maraeastern

I checked some rough stats and confirmed that my height is perfectly average for my part of the world. And by perfectly, I mean perfectly, I’m right at the average (okay, so almost right there, I’m 0.78 mm/0.03 in off). You can check out the stats on Wikipedia, if you’re interested, but what I’m trying to point out is that an average US woman is 161.8 cm (5 ft 3 1⁄2 in), while an average Czech female, me, is 167.22 cm (5 ft 6 in).

I’m right where I’m supposed to be, height-wise, and I’m not only not tall, but even sufficiently short to be perceived by the average Czech male (180.31 cm / 5 ft 11 in) as tiny.  That much to statistics.

My Week on Instagram

Hey, I have some crappy photos on my Instagram, so why not slap them here? (That was a rhetorical question.) Each photo represents one day in the last week. (Be advised that I have no life, hence my photos are no photos.) For explanations, even duller than the photos, see captions.

15 Jan: A business trip. A photo that says more than thousand words nothing but proves that I rose to the occasion, got up and got dressed. Also, see my nails. I didn’t #wakeuplikedis, I had to paint them. Extra effort.

16 Jan: The first proper snow of this winter came in the week when it was my turn on the building’s chore wheel. Convenient. Not. I probably should’ve shovelled the shit but, instead, I waited a few days for it to thaw. Problem solved.

17 Jan: I found neither peace nor anything else during my meditation, however, I still have painted nails and these cute yoga pants on top of it. 

18 Jan: Breaking in a new candle. It smells vaguely of mulled wine. Give me a candle anytime and I’ll burn the world down (the same when you give me mulled wine). I wonder if candle lovers are closeted pyromaniacs. 

19 Jan: I must’ve been watching too much Breaking Bad because whenever I see a powdered substance, I want to snort it. Also, this is magnesium and I swear it’s the best placebo I’ve ever had because it helps me shake less when I’m anxious. Which is all the time, duh.

20 Jan: The ultimate cat box. A perfect fit for your cat. Order a yoga mat now and receive your gratis cat box! A fun note: I haven’t tried my new yoga mat yet and am still using the old one because I believe I don’t deserve nice things. Yeah, I know.  

21 Jan: The fucking chore wheel has been haunting me all week. Sunday looked like the deadline for cleaning the building. So I was sweeping cigarette butts (not my own), stray tinsel (not my own) and dead tree needles (not my own). It’s not like I have to dispose of dead bodies, I don’t know why I hate doing this so intensely. 

The (Dis)contents of My Body

Don’t be afraid, I’m not going to talk about my bowels. At least, not specifically and not in graphic detail. However, I had the chance for the first time to step on a smart bathroom scale which, besides your weight, displays the percentages of water, fat and muscle in your body. I was pretty surprised by the results and I should probably do something about it. Like, I don’t know, eat something.

Now, I’m aware I’m underweight and I try not to make too much fuss, except keeping tabs on my weight to make sure it doesn’t drop below the pretty random limit of 47 kg (103 lb). That was my weight when I was getting married. (Why, yes, I was a very insubstantial bride.) Now I’m slightly below 50 kg (110 lbs), including a cat sitting on my shoulder. I would probably benefit from weighting more, but I quite enjoy people giving me free food just by the look of me.

Apparently, yoga causes weight loss and muscle growth

What the smart scale told me though was that I had 45.5% of muscle in the body and 14.2% fat. That’s ridiculous. That’s a lot of muscle for a woman of my age and build, and it must be wrong. I look anything but muscular. (Though there is a mini-muscle forming on my shoulders from my yoga planks and downdogs.) Also, my fat percentage is basically health-threateningly low. WTF. This must be wrong too, unless it’s right because I don’t have boobs and hips, where most women have fat stored.

The scale scared the shit out of me. It suggested that my proportions were that of a top athlete, which isn’t a good thing when you’re not a top athlete. Top athletes are doing nothing but ruining their health. I’m already ruining my health with smoking, so I should consider getting fat for my health’s sake. This is a confusing concept. I’ve been on a vegan-like health-focused diet (plus Oreos) for long enough to completely lose appetite for anything else (except Oreos). It’s awkward when you actually start liking healthy food. And it’s super awkward that I should change my diet for something less healthy. I wonder how this happened.

Wot I Shot Wednesday: Emulating My Cat

It’s probably late for Michael’s Wot I Shot challenge. Or maybe not. To my utmost confusion, I always see Michael’s Wednesday posts on Tuesday. So why not join the Wednesday challenge on Thursday? Time zones clearly elude me.

I took and ruined Michael’s challenge by deciding to participate with the worst of my bad Instagram snaps. I mean to go on like this until Michael bans me. This time, however, I’ve noticed something curious on my Instagram.

I posted two photos after each other, one a portrait of my cat and another a portrait of myself, and we happen to be posing in the same way! The cat has her paw over her face after an exhausting day. I have my own paw over my face because I prefer not to show my face. Literally.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BasHQ2DhvR7/?taken-by=maraeastern

https://www.instagram.com/p/BasPlFTBX7V/?taken-by=maraeastern

Wot I Saw Wednesday: Be Careful What You Wish For

Michael has tentatively started a new regular feature. I decided to interpret his Wot I Saw Wednesday as a forum for the worst of bad pictures. Unlike other photography forums, this is one where I can contribute a lot of quality material. Continuing in the mode of my first response to this challenge, here is another shitty snap of myself when I was feeling shitty.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BaU0EcABRL4/?taken-by=maraeastern

Yesterday I had an identity crisis, which is my euphemism for a bout of depression. I wished I rather had a bout of anxiety. Well, now I know I should be more careful with what I wish for because I indeed woke up in an anxious fit today. Nothing half a Lexaurin wouldn’t fix, but nothing too enjoyable either. To make it fair, since I wasn’t enjoying myself, here is another crappy picture for you not to enjoy.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BaWmt4BhMSR/?taken-by=maraeastern

Grungy Textures

Here are some gritty city snaps from my latest business trip adventure. Spending about four hours on trains and buses to get somewhere and another four hours to get back is only bearable when I spend time snapping everything.

Shot with my iPhone 8 and edited in Adobe Photoshop. Kidding. I don’t do Apples and I’m not a fan of Adobe either. Shoot me. Actually, shot with my Android-running Lenovo mobile, which is as badass as any Apple, and edited in Snapseed, which is, hands down, the best phone photo editing app around.

One of the many trains I’ve been

My favourite local graffiti

I’m bizarrely attracted to abandoned cigarette packages

(Not) historically valuable tile floor

Bad boys

Classic boot selfie

What I Was Doing When I Couldn’t Sleep

I have bouts of insomnia alternated by bouts of sleepomania. I don’t sleep when I’m too stressed out and I sleep all the time when I’m too stressed out. Yes, I’m aware it’s the same thing, it depends on what kind of stressed out exactly I am at the moment. Right now, I’m the kind of stressed out when I never sleep because my brain never shuts down (and never shuts up).

When I was attempting to sleep last night, I found myself engaging in various kinds of bizarre activities not only not related to but even outright counterproductive to sleeping. They say that if you don’t fall asleep within half an hour, you should get up. Alright, so I got up and did the following:

• In lieu of a hot bath, I went to shave my legs because I don’t have a bathtub and it doesn’t really matter what kind of ritual involving hot water and foam you do.
• In lieu of hot milk, I opened the fridge and watched it for a while like a TV. There was soy milk but I didn’t dare to heat it up lest it should explode. You never know what they put in these things.
• In lieu of a relaxing meditation, I put a coat over my nightie and sat at the balcony to smoke. Smoking before bed is even worse than smoking at other times because it apparently pumps you up.

A reverse Live Long and Prosper sign

Then I crawled back in bed and was freezing, either because it was cold outside or due to the loss of my fur by shaving. I lay flat on my back and was waiting, impatiently. Nothing happened. So I rolled on to my side and called the cat. Three times. She was too busy licking her butt on my yoga mat to come to me. I’ll remember that the next time she meows for wet food.

I remembered to close my eyes to facilitate sleep. Then I remembered what I haven’t done today, what I should’ve done the day before and what I should do the next day, provided I fall asleep and wake up. Then I remembered what I have done throughout my life and what I shouldn’t have done. I grew increasingly terrified. Then I managed to cry myself to sleep.