Cam Larios @sculpin@mastodon.social

Why don't I have an apothecary jar brim-full of egg specimens? Major oversight.

Current cat song: "Lay me low / Where no one can paw me / Where no one can claw me / Where no one can gnaw on me" There's a reason this cat thinks his name is "Kitty No".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWs9R7ptbhQ

I'm seriously thinking about joining the stonecarving class this weekend. Like I need another thing on my list, right? But...

Today I wandered into NW Rockhounds just off Lake City. OMG, the place is a wonderland. Gorgeous rocks, fossils, and bones, and lots of geological and jewelry-making supplies. They have some interesting-looking classes, too. It's like Hardwick's but for bio/geo nerds. Some of the rocks are color-enhanced (e.g., almost all citrine on the market is heat treated) but I saw nothing that was outright dyed and they tell you the truth about the enhancement. I bought a tiny, perfect fluorite specimen.

I had a tasty cocktail last week at the Triple Door: a version of the "honey bee" made from chile-infused tequila, elderflower liqueur, lime, honey, and lavender bitters. Now I've got some blanco tequila infusing so I can make my own.

Walk report

Here's Hank, aka "Kitty No". He's considering whether he ought to be outraged by a squirrel outside. (On reflection, yes.)

A little late-night gentle solo fingerpicking from the guitarist from the fantastic band we saw tonight. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Du-sQXbWhog @rjl20

TIL that there's such a thing as a Pellegrini bean, developed up the street from me by the late, inimitable Angelo Pellegrini. http://theherbfarm.com/Items/Pellegrini_Bean/

This focaccia is brilliant, if I do say so myself. The only coarse salt I had in the house was pretzel salt, so it's something like a big flat pretzel glistening with olive oil.

Currently reading: Eva Illouz, "Saving the Modern Soul"
Currently making: some slightly dodgy focaccia. We'll see.
Current theme song: https://sverfolk.bandcamp.com/track/bootn-rally

"Blogging these days is like singing in the empty hallway of a deserted highschool, with feral animals peering at your from moss-hung lockers and wind whistling through broken windows. Bloggers are squatters in abandoned buildings. They can hear the apparently joyful hubbub of the feed, a few streets away, while they rub sticks together to work up a fire to heat up their old cans of beans." https://robertminto.com/2019/05/15/writing-against-loneliness/

I've swum with sharks, taken a few rides on a Hayabusa, and flirted with handsome young men in the streets of Istanbul and Paris. I've charmed my way through a line of bayonets in Athens. I've had a scuba tank fail me at 45 feet in a Kiribati lagoon. But nothing matches the dangerous thrill of the first bowl of plain white rice after a bout of gastroenteritis.

This Embittered AI cover of "In The Air Tonight" deserves more love. https://music.metafilter.com/8662/HWY-X-In-The-Air-Tonight

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On the mend and ready to boil and/or bleach everything I've touched in the last few days. I'll spare you the details. I will say that I got four pounds lighter over 48 hours. Not my most glamorous moment.

Today I'm all, "I can sit on a COUCH in my SWEATPANTS. I can slowly eat a small bowl of WHITE RICE. I am healed!" Nothing like gastroenteritis to lower one's standards about what it is to be just fine.

The cat is deeply committed to jumping on my stomach in this gastrointestinally delicate time.

Sick in bed for a couple of days and not feeling very gracious about it.

I can't usually read in dreams, but yesterday I dreamed a giant sign that read, "WHY EARS?" Indeed, why ears?