Impatient Idealist

...not to let French-press coffee sit on the grounds an extra minute. Oh my dear sweet ghods, people.

Well, it finally reached our house: Rob is COVID+. (On home PCR, well before any rapid antigen test showed anything. Be careful out there, folks.)

For two and a half years I've guessed this is how I was going to get COVID. Rob was going to go do something fun and he'd bring it home. This is the pattern he and I have followed for decades. (He travels. I usually have a job.) In any case, here we are. I do not always love being right.

Rob says it feels like having the flu, which at our age is pretty darn fortunate, frankly.

It feels weird to be masking in my own house. But if I can skip this, I sure do want to skip this. So far so good. My biggest exposure probably would have been Tuesday/Wednesday kind of time frame. I worked pretty late Thursday, the day he started to feel bad, and we began solid precautions by Friday. If I'm still in the clear by Monday my odds go way up.

Tick... tick... tick... tick...

Several months ago we had a mimosa tree cut down. I learned at that time that mimosas have roots that go out to the sides and stay very close to the surface. I'm really not sure why the people who used to live here let it grow this big. Maybe, like me, they didn't know? Anyway, this one was destroying a fence and threatening multiple larger structures, one of which I can't afford to replace (the house I live in) and one of which we don't even own (the house my neighbors live in).

Wellll... apparently mimosa roots live for a while and keep trying to generate new trees. Keeping up with those is a real chore!

The next most challenging weed is oxalis (wood sorrel type), which is absolutely relentless and difficult to pluck. I may let some of it go. It doesn't tend to choke out other plants really. It just wasn't quite what I was hoping for, aesthetically, is all.

I'm finding the most difficult weed to control is a thing I don't yet know the name of. It puts down a tap root and sends a handful of runners out horizontally just a little below the surface of the soil. Every inch or two, those runners put down roots; every inch or so, it puts up a flat smooth-edged leaf shaped like a cardioid. (Sort of like creeping charlie but with smooth edges to the leaves. Like bindweed but the leaves are smaller and the runners are white instead of pinkish. Almost like dichondra?) In any case, it is not easy to get that stuff up without hurting the ground cover I'm trying to nurture (daimondia in one spot, a relative of thyme in another spot). I'm hoping not to do any herbicides. The thyme is super sensitive to those. So this one is a lot of gentle poking and lifting and tracing the lines, and my back starts to hurt after not too long.

That said, I got a lot of stuff out this morning. Tomorrow morning, more of the same. Wheee! It feels productive to get it done.

(edit: ooo, we get a lot of spurge, too! That one's easy. And a bit of bindii weed, also easy. Plus the usual dandelions and such.)

How do you get out of doing all those supremely annoying not-a-robot puzzles on this site? The user experience is hideous now. If this keeps up I don't think it'll be long before I won't be back.

I tried a hot dog that had been hermetically sealed since before its best-by date and so far, no ill effects.

Reached out to four people for low-key social and already have two zoom dinners yay!

Landscaping efforts are... in progress. We are past the "the place looks like a landfill", past "there are trenches everywhere", past "there is a Stonehenge attempt all over the driveway", and into "there is now a forest in the driveway" (plants go in next week and the week after).

I broke one of the flagstones, oops. (To be fair, I had a chisel and mallet in my hand at the time. Do not trust me with a chisel. Scissors yes, wire cutters yes, scalpels yes, chisels no.) But the crew has forgiven me, or at least claims they've forgiven me, and they'll grout it.

Yay good things.

Haven't had anything to say for a while.

Probably won't, for a while.

I hate asking people for things beyond the basic “hey could you hand me that” kind of thing. I knew this. I’m reminded it’s still true. I’m almost pathologically … no. I am absolutely, pathologically resistant to asking anyone to change a behavior in order to make my life easier or happier.

It has come to my attention that this can actually damage relationships.

Sigh.

This Twitter post, and the replies, hit me hard this morning.

https://twitter.com/EmmettComix/status/1458534462522859526?s=20

I have never seen this side of cis masculinity. (Affirmation and inclusion are not stereotypically offered by cis dudes to persons who look like me, no matter the topic.)

I am realizing that if a friend is someone who would be supportive and welcoming about something that's that deeply important to me, then I currently have zero cis dude friends among the people I hang out with.

Knowing why doesn’t make it sting less.

My right shoulder is earnestly (though slowly) trying to disassemble itself. The medial end of the collarbone is on walkabout, and out at the actual shoulder, what I suspect is the biceps tendon keeps jumping the groove. I put that back with a weird hand-on-hip, back-up-to-a-wall maneuver, which if successful generates a mildly painful and audible pop before things feel a little better. The arm is weak in certain directions. There's a very low grade ache all the time. When things clank around in there, either near the sternum or at the shoulder, it effing hurts.

I am so over it. It's been ages. I'm ready to get this dealt with. So despite COVID, I'm seeking some elective medical care.

X rays showed nothing. I didn't think they'd show the soft tissue injury, but I'm surprised they didn't notice where the collar bone had got to! But at least going in for that nearly-useless diagnostic has purchased me the right to an orthopedic appointment. That'll be Tuesday.

Bodies. sigh