Tag: ADHD

Hither, Dither, and Dot

I finally got around to buying superglue and Adam put my sconces up above the shower. They are so cute! They used to be in the living room on either side of the fireplace mantel, but since the bathroom is so dark now because it’s black, I wanted something near the shower. Truth be told, I wanted this dragon head or this dragon for each side, but those are expensive. I think I would use the heck out of a 3D printer if they were affordable for me and I knew how to use one.

I’m a big Amazon shopper because our physical address isn’t valid according to most companies, and our items never show up when I try ordering from somewhere else. Amazon knows what’s up, but that does limit my options. The best part about these sconces is I bought six battery-operated puck lights that came with two remotes, so I just point the remote at each light to turn them on, which is great since I can’t reach them and it would be a pain climbing up there and removing the globes and flipping each light on each time I showered. I am now irrationally excited to take a shower 😂.

The uneven look from the ceiling slant is driving me bonkers…

I really want something like this hand for holding my hair things and other small stuff that I tend to lose otherwise. It’d be cool as a towel holder as well, but it doesn’t look all that capable and doesn’t have the greatest reviews. We talked about getting one of those mold kit things and resin and some press-on witchy nails and using Adam’s hands to make our own, but I don’t know how that would go, and it could be a waste of money.

I’m a collector of…things, I guess you could say. My darling mother really tried to keep up, which resulted in me having so many different things. I have collected unicorns, pandas, tigers, bears, (e)books, rocks, movies, and stuffed animals. Some unconventional things are underwear, socks, and music. It’s weird how much I love cute socks because I’m barefoot 99% of the time. Diabetic socks are awesome because there are no seams, but they stretch out after one time of wearing. I’m currently collecting ebooks again. I will never read all of them but there’s that niggling “just in case” in the back of my mind. Just in case of what? The apocalypse? Massive author strike? I don’t know. I won’t tell me. It sounds hoarderish but I actually get rid of stuff all the time and, unfortunately, I wind up needing stuff I’ve gotten rid of and have to buy it again. I’ve gotten rid of almost all my stuffed animals. I love them and hated getting rid of them but they just take up so much space. I keep worrying about the mess I’ll leave behind when Adam and I die. I don’t want family to have to figure out what to do with so much stuff. Since we don’t have kids, a lot of my items won’t be passed down.

How about that Titanic stuff!!? The Titanic is a special interest of mine, and I have mentioned how I would love to see it for real, but come on! There were so many warnings and safety issues, and the guy(s) just totally ignored them. Money can buy you nearly everything, but brains isn’t one of them. I saw a video on Reddit of an enactment of what it would look like when the Titan imploded, and it is so crazy. People in the know were saying how it would be milliseconds and the bodies would pretty much liquefy, and I just can’t wrap my head around that. Their deaths would have been quick and painless, at least. I’ve been glued to the Titanic subreddit for the past week. I bombarded Adam with a few texts before he was awake since I always forget what I want to tell him when he wakes up. That way, we can discuss what I sent him 😊.

People are really showing their true colors (they never disappoint) and have chosen to mock and meme the five passengers of the Titan. They either forget or don’t care that a 19-year-old boy was in there and he allegedly was terrified and did not want to go in the first place. From what I’ve seen, mostly on Reddit, which is a dumpster fire in itself 24/7, they all deserved to die because they had/came from money. These sentiments were laid bare before information about the glaring unsafety of the vessel and the blatant negligence ever came out, so it’s not all a case of “fox around and find out.” People are just so filled with hate over what they don’t have, whether it be money, wealth, privilege, talent, etc. The thing they don’t get, or completely ignore altogether, is that they would be the same way. If all they knew in their life were wealth and privilege, they would not be concerning themselves with those who have neither of those. They would throw money at some charities as tax write-offs and go about their lives.

Of course, I would not mind being wealthy, and I think I would be more charitable if I became wealthy at my age (mainly because I’m charitable now with what I do have or when I have something to give), but I would be a completely different person if I was born or grew up wanting for nothing. Wealth and poverty skew one’s view of the world. I certainly changed going from poverty to middle-class living with Mom after she switched careers. My food choices changed – I don’t know how I ever ate fried bologna and fake ketchup. I can’t handle being without central air conditioning at all. Obviously, I’m broke again since Mom died, but I am incredibly lucky that I inherited her house and paid it off with what she worked so hard to leave me. I could be homeless at any given moment, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to laugh and celebrate that five people who had it better than me financially are dead.

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Smoothie Criminal

I made the world’s-according-to-me worst smoothie ever and drank two 16-ounce glasses of it. It sounded good in theory; a berry smoothie with a splash of yummy sugar-free fruit juices. I started out with a keto berry smoothie recipe as a guide for measurements. First, were a frozen triple-berry mix of blueberries, raspberries, and blackberries from Sam’s; unsweetened vanilla almond milk; chia seeds; and unflavored collagen powder. I bought some new Tropicana Zero Sugar Summer Splash Punch and Zero Sugar Mango Passion juices and threw those in there as well, hoping for a concoction as tasty as Outback Steakhouse’s Huckleberry Hooch (which is uh-mazing!).

Adam gave me a taste before adding sweetener, which I realized after tasting it. It was horrid and bitter! How in the world are berries and other naturally sugary fruits so bitter in drinks?? I added the Splenda Monk Fruit sweetener, which doesn’t have sucralose (not good for you), and tasted it again and it was still a big NO. Out of pure desperation, I added a splash of lemon juice and vanilla extract. My “recipe” started out making 16 ounces and was now 64 ounces 😒. The same thing happens when I make loaded baked potato soup, so I wasn’t terribly surprised. I grudgingly claimed it drinkable out of sheer frustration and poured myself a tumblerful.

It wasn’t too bad. I could taste the fruit juices and berries. I got way too many chia seeds, which didn’t absorb and expand, so I was spitting seeds out all over the place all evening and accidentally spit one on Adam’s arm (oops). There was something I didn’t like, and it became more and more apparent with each drink. The next day, I poured another glass because I didn’t want to waste all the ingredients. I drank the whole glassful (16 ounces!!), but it made me nauseated, so I finally admitted defeat and dumped the rest. Adam and I concluded it must have been the almond milk, which I’ve been using since early April, but only in chocolate shake-type drinks.

I hate milk; it’s just too milky tasting. I eat cereal with a slotted spoon. I hate yogurt and cottage cheese. Like, I really hate it. Unfortunately, most keto smoothie recipes call for some type of milk or bananas (don’t like those, either), but it’s cool as long as I can’t taste it. I don’t like avocados, either, but have had success with making smoothies with them and not tasting them. I won’t try bananas because they are way too sugary, and I detest them. I pretty much hate everything that is keto-friendly, like broccoli, cauliflower, coconut, brussels sprout, okra, fish, etc. Anything healthy, I guess 😂.

How about some healthy fruits and vegetables?

Today, I tried smoothie-making again, determined to use my new blender for good and not evil, and I had success! I stuck to a simpler recipe consisting of frozen sliced strawberries, unsweetened vanilla almond milk, avocado, vanilla extract, and collagen powder. Just an FYI, vanilla extract smells so good, but don’t try it by itself! This time, I wanted to add more “zero” things to reach 64 ounces to lower the carbs and calories for each serving, so I topped the blender off with water, around 14 ounces, maybe?, and added a dram of LorAnn Oil’s Super Strength Strawberry flavoring. Drams are the cutest little bottles I’ve ever seen and I want to hug them all; kind of like Funko Pop! It needed a little oomph, so I poured in some Torani sugar-free French vanilla syrup. It was so yummy, and only 1 net carb! I’ll save the chia seeds for when my grinder gets here. I’m definitely buying some chia seeds to put in my sensory room because they are so calming for me, which I didn’t even know until after I bought them and stuck my hand in the bag 😳😊.

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What’s the Name of the Game?

Daily writing prompt
If you had to change your name, what would your new name be?
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I have actually thought about changing my name. My dad chose my first name, the title of a popular country song, and he was a loser. I was in the same grade as 6 other girls with my name, with my graduating class being just over 55 students. If I had to change my name, I would choose Cari Esta. My mom wanted to name me Samantha or Carrie Esta, and I like the latter (with a small spelling change). If I ever wrote a book, that would be my pseudonym. My name’s not bad; I’ve just never cared for it, personally. Better than Hashtag, though.

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Bookworm, Dood-Li-Doo

List three books that have had an impact on you. Why?

I’m sure I can think of three, most likely more, but I wanted to do this prompt because of one in particular. I’m an avid reader with severe ADHD, so I don’t remember much about a book upon finishing it, sadly. The good side of that is most books are always new to me! Speaking of books, feel free to follow or friend me on Goodreads! I’m an active logger and rater, but not big on reviews because of my terrible memory.

Because I want to, I’ll be listing my three picks counting down.

The Kite Runner – Khaled Hosseini

I read The Kite Runner years and years ago, probably around the time it came out, and I still think of it often. It and A Thousand Splendid Suns, another book by the same author, really jolted me out of my young adult and mystery/thriller/horror genres rut and introduced me to the terribly-named (assigned?), general “fiction” genre. I mean, all fiction is fiction, so why not give wonderful reads a worthy subgenre? That vague categorization makes it hard for me to find books similar to Hosseini’s. “Contemporary” is just as confusing because, after time, those books are no longer considered to be contemporary. But I digress.

Hosseini is a phenomenal writer and sure knows how to evoke feelings. I cried, I gasped, I laughed, I cried some more, and actually took a few days off reading after finishing this book, which is something I never do. This book made me think of how others live in other parts of the world and how different we all are, which is a great thing but can also be so disheartening and feel so unfair. Since reading The Kite Runner, I’ve not thought of theft in the same way.

My favorite quote (paraphrased) from The Kite Runner is:

“…there is only one sin, only one. And that is theft. Every other sin is a variation of theft.

“Do you understand that?”

“No, Baba jan,” I said, desperately wishing I did. I didn’t want to disappoint him again.

. . .

“When you kill a man, you steal a life,” Baba said. “You steal his wife’s right to a husband, rob his children of a father. When you tell a lie, you steal someone’s right to the truth. When you cheat, you steal the right to fairness. Do you see?”

Hosseini, K. (2003). The kite runner. Bloomsbury Publishing PLC.

The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas – John Boyne

Another book that stays rent-free in my mind is The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas. This story takes place in Nazi Germany and is about a young German boy who befriends a frail Polish boy who is always in striped pajamas. The two strike up a friendship while on opposite sides of a fence. I flew through this book and was ugly crying by the end. When the movie came out, I immediately rented it and watched it with my mom and Adam, though I must say the book made a bigger impact on me than the movie, which is almost always the case. The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas is a wonderful read but it is a hard one.

My favorite quotes from The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas are:

“And then the room went very dark and somehow, despite the chaos that followed, Bruno found that he was still holding Shmuel’s hand in his own and nothing in the world would have persuaded him to let it go.”

“And who decided which people wore the striped pajamas and which people wore the uniforms?”

Boyne, J. (2006). The boy in the striped pyjamas.

Lastly, or firstly, I guess, the book that has made the biggest impact on me.

A Monster Calls – Patrick Ness

I watched A Monster Calls before knowing it was based on a book. I went in blind, merely choosing it because it sounded like a horror movie and because Liam Neeson was in it. (If this reads familiar, I’ve mentioned it before in another post.) Whenever I find out a book or movie I like has a book or movie, I must read or watch it, depending on if I saw the movie first or read the book first, obviously. I don’t want to say too much about these books so I won’t spoil anything, but sometimes that is difficult.

A Monster Calls is considered a children’s/young adult book but I was in my early 30s when I saw the movie and then read the book. The story, which was inspired by Siobhan Dowd, is about a young boy, Conor, whose mother is dying from cancer and he keeps having a recurring dream involving a tree “monster.” I quite enjoyed Patrick Ness’ storytelling and could very much relate to Conor and his situation. Like the movie, the book had me crying my eyes out and finally feeling heard and seen. I own the book and the movie but I don’t think I could reread or rewatch for a very, very long time, if ever.

My favorite quotes from A Monster Calls are:

“You really aren’t afraid, are you?”

“No,” Conor said. “Not of you, anyway.”

. . .

“I’ve known forever she wasn’t going to make it, almost from the beginning. She said she was getting better because that’s what I wanted to hear. And I believed her. Except I didn’t.”

Ness, Patrick (2011). A Monster Calls.

With that, I’m done 😭😭.

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“My Soul is in the Sky”

Daily writing prompt
What personal belongings do you hold most dear?
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There are a few things I would be devastated to no longer have. There’s my last birthday card from Mom; my cross necklace; my wedding dress; my Pillow People, Suzie, that I got when I was 5. One item that reminds me of one of my grandmas, Mom, and Bub is a painting that belonged to Dad’s mom. Grandma and I were the only two who liked the painting. Everyone else thought it was ugly, but I loved it. I would stand there and look up at it every time I was there. It was titled “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” It was painted by a German guy whose name I have long since forgotten. I told Grandma more than once that I wanted that painting left to me, and she told me it was mine. Bub and I were her only grandchildren, after all. Neither grandparent had a will, so it was on their word, and my worthless dad, to fulfill verbally-made promises.

Dad’s second wife was hateful, jealous, and petty, and she successfully pushed me out of Dad’s life, but I doubt he put up any kind of fight, as he never wanted me. She wore the pants in that relationship, and since she is a complete trash person, she emptied Grandma’s house after she died (Papa died about a year prior) and got rid of everything over a short period of time. I wasn’t told about it. My brother wasn’t told about it, but he found out somehow. There was so much I wanted from there, and her actions made me sick, and that is something I still haven’t gotten over (obviously). I was supposed to get the painting, Dad’s children’s books, my rock collection that was under Grandma’s bed, Grandma’s costume jewelry, Papa’s handmade Native American beaded belt from when he was young, handmade mocassins that I wore wear when I was there. Nothing worth monetary value, which makes it worse to me.

In total Bub fashion, my brother decided to break into the house one night on his way home so he could get a keepsake, and he wanted to know if I wanted anything. I asked him to get the painting. A lot of the stuff was gone but he was able to get one of Papa’s shirts (which is all he wanted), and my painting was still there. In the end, my grandparents’ belongings were taken to Goodwill. Some of my family tried to track some of it down to no avail. I love that they tried. I do have Dad’s baby blanket because I asked Grandma if I could take it home, which I’m glad I did. I’m sure Dad’s wife would be livid to know I have it. She got super mad at me because I went to see Papa the day he died and she had thought she was the last person to see him. Yeah, she is that childish and spiteful.

After receiving the incredibly heavy painting, I repainted the frame a light blue, and the painting hung on my bedroom wall for years, until one day it didn’t. Without provocation, it fell off the wall, and we found out the back was some sort of wooden sign advertising some German place. Papa was in the Navy and had been all over the world, so that didn’t surprise me. I put the painting, flat, under the bed to keep it safe until I could get it re-framed. It was there for years, and when I pulled it out, I discovered my cat had torn a hole in it with his foot and had ripped the edge. I guess he liked lying on it. I was very upset, but still couldn’t do anything about it. What would be the point in reframing it when it’s torn and has a hole in it? It was very old and already had a taped-up rip on the bottom edge.

More years pass, and Adam enters the picture. On my birthday (I forget which one), I’m ushered into the living room by Mom, and there, over the fireplace, is my painting 🥰🥹😭. Mom had it restored and reframed, and it was beautiful. Because of its age and fragility, a lot of it had to be trimmed, including the title and artist, and the guy added a dark matte border. Of course, I cried, which Mom made sure to get a picture of. She and Adam had cooked up a plan to get it out from under my bed and into Mom’s car, then get it back in the house after it was fixed. Not an easy task.

A Midsummer Night’s Dream

So, that is my extremely long answer to a simple question.

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It’s Not Syrup, It’s Motor Oil

Like with all of my hyperfixations, I dove into keto whole hog, and Adam’s complete willingness to try it with me has made the transition so much easier, although he got over the sugar cravings faster than I did, and lost 30 pounds in the first week. Getting rid of carbs is no small feat, and the price gouging is infuriating. I know this isn’t a new thing, but it is new to me, and extreme inflation and sole financial responsibility just exacerbate the fact. Here, all-purpose white flour is $2.24 for a 5-pound bag. Everyone knows how versatile flour is. Almond flour, which is recommended for a lot of recipes, is $9.84 for a 2-pound bag. It doesn’t taste very good since it tastes overwhelmingly like almonds, at least in keto bread, so I found Carbquik (like Bisquick. Get it?), which is $12.38 for a 2-pound bag. The price difference between “real” cane sugar and sugar substitutes is just as bad, if not worse. All pantry essentials go the same way. Then, everyone wonders why the US is so obese. When you can buy 1 or 2 pounds of pasta for $1 or a 14-ounce can of “fake” pasta made from hearts of palm for $9.84, which item are you going to choose? For the record, hearts of palm is edible but not the greatest, and I much prefer zoodles (spiralized zucchini). Right now, zucchini is over $1 each, and spaghetti squash is $7+.

I bought Recipe Keeper a while back to transfer Mom’s handwritten recipes, church and work cookbooks into, and I absolutely love it, even though I think there should be a pink option. It has the neatest features, including one where you copy an online recipe’s site address and paste it into the app’s address bar and it imports all the information automatically in the correct sections and includes the address so you can revisit the site. It can also scan pictures of recipes in cookbooks and is just an awesome app, aside from not being pink. I think I had a point with this but I can’t remember what it was. Stick with me and it may come back.

Oh, yeah…While searching for recipes online, I started thinking how everyday food influencers (yeah? no?) are getting just as bad as large companies and social media influencers in terms of aesthetics. You don’t get a list of ingredients and directions like recipes of old. Now, there are pictures with more color than Gone with the Wind, pristine backdrops, Mason jars with ribbons, and more stage presence than Elton John.

My food pictures include the time I made 10 quarts of loaded baked potato soup and tipped it all over my new stove, and the other time I made ranch dressing and turned the mixer on without holding onto the bowl, spirographing dressing over half of the kitchen. The ranch was cleanupable, but my poor souped stove never fully recovered 😒. I shall demonstrate below because I just made some beef jerky today and took a picture.

Above is my freshly made beef jerky in a Rubbermaid bowl that has seen better days and seems to have some rough edges around the top, probably from being put in the microwave for too long and too many times. It’s sitting on my desk, which is still part wood color and part black because I got tired of painting it and moved on to the bathroom an embarrassing amount of weeks ago. To top it off, I took the picture in terrible lighting and it’s all grainy. The jerky, however, looks good and tastes great.

Click on the picture for the recipe.

Then, there is this dude with the smooth-looking jerky, and they literally tied it all up in a neat little bow on a table that is one intended color. Extra points for knowing how to do that focus thing for the object closest to the lens while everything behind it is pleasantly blurred.

Of course, it’s not just food, but beverages, too! Most impressive are the smoothies with multiple pictures including fruit that never saw the inside of a Walmart. The gorgeous royal purple smoothie below is the expectation, with the reality (at least my reality) coming out more of a muddy eggplant, and a sink full of dirty measuring containers and mixing utensils.

Click on the picture for more pictures and the recipe.

To go one further, the madness extends past food and drink and into family member territory. Feast your eyes on the Angelina Jolie of cats below. Coby comes complete with permanent eyeliner (and noseliner!) and eyes so blue that one wouldn’t believe them to be real if they didn’t belong to a feline. His photos are exquisitely flawless with him always the focus, and deservedly so. Even the “candids” are shots you wouldn’t think twice about making into a calendar! I admit, I’m a little (lot) bit in love with Coby, but what cat lover wouldn’t be?

Click for Coby’s Instagram account.

And then we have my very own Theodore Corduroy. I mean, what more can I say?

I mainly jest, but, honestly, who has the patience, skill, time, and money to churn out commercial-worthy pictures and videos of food during/after spending the time actually making the food and ensuring it’s Getty-ready? More importantly, why do these sites, pictures, and videos make me feel so inadequate?

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I’m a Hooker with a Heart of Gold

My mom used to crochet. My aunt was the arts and crafts gal, but Mom dabbled. Like any kid, I wanted to do what she was doing and, boy, did she try to teach me! Having a right-hander teach a left-hander something isn’t the easiest!

First, Mom had the brilliant idea to have me watch her crochet in the mirror. That didn’t work. Then, she had me watch her crochet for a few minutes and told me to do what she did backward. Nah, that didn’t work, either. So I said screw it and dug through her yarn books until I found a crochet book with a (very short) chapter on left-handed crocheting, with pictures!

My “project” was a pale yellow tie. It wasn’t meant to be a tie; it was supposed to be a scarf, but dropping and adding stitches is something I’m really good at without even trying. I quickly lost interest in crocheting. Knitting went the same way.

Now, in my 30s, I find crocheting to be very relaxing. I picked it up again after a Bob’s Burgers episode, along with knitting, but knitting takes too much of my focus and is aggravating for me. I had all kinds of ideas in mind for crocheting!

I was going to make hats, gloves, scarves, mittens, cardigans, animals, Baby Yoda, couches for the cats, and so much more! Then I looked up some patterns. Did you know knitters and crocheters have their own language?! It’s true, and it’s super confusing, especially for someone like me.

My dream was to make a too-big cardigan like the one Demi Moore’s character in Ghost made. It looks so comfy and warm! But that wasn’t happening since I couldn’t read and understand the patterns. Of course, something as menial as instructions and directions has never deterred me, so I came up with my own “pattern.”

My wonderful husband came home with 6 crochet hooks (I totally want these!) because he didn’t know what size I needed or wanted, and I set to work. I made the back of the cardigan, then most of the front using a slightly bigger hook, then bell sleeves with the biggest hook. My plan was to “sew” it together when I was done. Then I ran out of yarn with about three inches to go on the last front panel. It was very upsetting because my bell sleeves were awesome! *Sigh*

To make a very long story short, I have crocheted and unraveled about ten cardigans. As I said, crocheting is very relaxing for me, and I have anxiety, so I don’t mind all the undoing. I have about six balls of pink yarn of various sizes around the house and a completed cardigan. Until I unravel it and start over again.

Maybe I’ll wait until winter comes and goes before undoing it. Maybe I’ll buy more yarn. Who knows? Amazon has great deals on their yarn (my favorite brand is Red Heart Super Saver, like this one in Cherry Red) and there are so many available colors.  Hobii has some super cute yarn for cheap, too. I love the Space Walk and Outer Space yarn they have.

Update

I ended up buying four skeins of Outer Space Hobii yarn. It’s gorgeous, but as thin as thread! I guess I need to pay more attention to weights and such. Now I’m stuck with yarn I can’t work with because it’s too thin. It’s ideal for knitting socks; however, I don’t know how to knit socks. It may come in handy someday. Hobii sent a piece of cherry candy with their order and it was SO good! If I ever figure out the Magic Circle, I may even attempt to make a turtle someday, or a hot pad.

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The Costly Shenanigans of Wally World

I seriously despise Walmart (I feel they are monopolizing), and I hate that my financial situation forces me to shop there. I’m all for supporting small businesses, and I can find things I like at Target and Kroger, but Walmart is almost always cheaper than any competitor, big or small. Unfortunately, they are a soulless corporation and can afford to screw their customers over. Since we don’t have a car, I use Instacart, DoorDash, or Walmart to get groceries. Walmart is the cheapest, of course, as we have Walmart+, and there are no added fees like with Instacart+. A week or two ago, I was doing my thing and getting groceries and when I placed the order, it didn’t go through for some reason. I tried again and it told me I had insufficient funds to place the order, which would have been true if the order had actually gone through the first time but it hadn’t. I checked the bank, and there was my Walmart order amount pending, holding the only money I had for groceries.

I contact Walmart through the chat and tell them the problem. They tell me that the pre-auth (pending) amount will drop off in 7-10 days and I just need to reorder, but I don’t have the funds to do that. So, Adam gets involved because I’m flipping out, per usual, and he calls them. They tell him there was a glitch which is why my order didn’t go through, then tell him the same thing about reordering. He tells them we don’t have the money to reorder, and they tell him it’s on my bank’s end, not theirs, blah, blah, blah. He calls the bank, and they tell him it’s on the merchant’s side, not theirs. They even do a 3-way conference with Adam, Walmart, and the bank, and there’s nothing anyone can do. I read my bank’s policy on pre-authorizations, then contacted Walmart through chat again and asked them to remove the pre-auth, and the dude just leaves the chat!

Walmart can remove/cancel the pre-auth charges at their discretion, and I know this because Instacart and DoorDash do it all the time with my bank without issue. They authorize a certain amount in case substitutions cost more, a product is out of stock, or if something is weight-based. The final cost is reflected in the bank before the order even gets here on most occasions and if not then, always on the same day. Walmart is just a lying liar.

So, I’m shopping at Walmart yesterday, which is a chore in itself because I submit my order, then start thinking about finances and go back and remove stuff that we don’t really need. Then, I add stuff. Then, I remove stuff again. With Walmart’s crap policy and money handling, they tack on any additions as separate purchases and stack them up without subtracting the cost of items I remove (which I wasn’t aware of at the time). At the end of it all, I had around a $100 order and the pending charges/temporary hold were over $400. That is important information for my story. One item that I needed was a certain acid reducer, but it’s $23-something, so I chose the equate brand, which is $14-something (thus, why I shop at Walmart). Even the name-brand medicine was $5 to $7 cheaper at Walmart than the other stores around here. Order placed. No issue. Yay!

I go about my business and eventually get an email stating the equate acid reducer is unavailable, so they replaced it with the name brand, per my instructions. When I go to the site to approve these changes, I see they replaced my one 42-count box of equate with four 42-count boxes of the name brand, for a total of $96 for medicine! This does not raise any flags on their end because of that temporary hold being over $400, as mentioned above. I’m flipping out again because I’m very well versed in their policy by now and Gandi has a doctor’s appointment tomorrow and I have no intention of spending $96 on medicine at the moment. Adam does his thing and talks to several people, one of whom says that they will fix it and we can keep “or donate” the three extra boxes that are going to be delivered for no charge. Obviously, I don’t believe them at all and know they will say anything to get the customer off the phone. There is no way Walmart would agree to doing what the customer service rep said would happen. That’s just losing them money.

I have a light bulb moment and go in the app and start a return so I can get refunded, hoping that would be quicker and more reliable than customer service’s word. I do the whole return process, choose that 3/4 items were missing since there is no choice that matches my circumstance, and that just brings up the message that I need to call Customer Care. I cancel, go through the process again and choose 3/4 items were damaged, and lo and behold, a $76 refund is issued and shows up as such in my bank app before I even close the Walmart app. I was pretty proud of myself for getting this taken care of, although I must admit I was shaking from anger and frustration while Adam was on the phone with different reps giving him the run-around.

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Worry About Yourself; I’ve Got Everything Else Covered

Nitpicky. Controlling. OCD. Fussy. Particular. Unreasonable. High maintenance. These are some of the words that have been used to describe me. That’s fair, for the most part. I don’t have OCD. I’m not high maintenance, unless one counts the limitations from my disorders and illnesses. All the other descriptors are the result of being undiagnosed well into adulthood and trying to cope and maintain some semblance of control in my life and situations.

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If I get too stressed over something, I immediately start cleaning and straightening items. Adam usually tries to stop me so he can comfort me, but the comfort comes from organizing. Order is something I can physically control and, frankly, keeps me from dealing with overwhelming emotions, which is something I don’t know how to do or even if I’m capable, especially pertaining to sadness, anger, and stress. Keeping things just so helps keep my world calmer, and if I neglect that, it causes stress, which has been affecting me physically more and more.

My current hyperfixation is books. Logic dictates, in my opinion, since hyperfixation (“special interests”) is an autism thing, being AuDHD mucks that up into fixating on something for a length of time, then switching to something else with the same passion and intensity. Mom tried to keep up with my fixations, so I’ve acquired books, pandas, unicorns, and tigers, to name a few, over the years. I have a pink dancing turtle and a talking Squirt from Finding Nemo from my cute turtles phase. With Adam, I’ve obsessed over Bob’s Burgers, Taylor Swift, Pon & Zi, music, crypto, magic mushrooms, and on.

For reasons unknown to me, I decided to try Apple Books/iBooks instead of the Kindle app and discovered I like Apple Books better, so I was going to transfer my 500+ books from Amazon to Apple. Well, I couldn’t. When you buy an e-book on Amazon, you don’t own that book, unlike buying paper- and hardback books. Amazon is essentially a paid library for digital media, like Vudu and other digital goods companies. If Amazon got a bug up their butt and deleted my account, like they have in the recent past, my books would be gone and I certainly wouldn’t be reimbursed. This didn’t sit well with me, and being told I could not do something, specifically that I could not own something I paid for, only fueled my little AuDHD PDA self.

For the past few days, I have spent hours downloading my books onto the computer, converting them into .epub files, backing them up on my external hard drive, and transferring copies to my phone via iTunes. This went well for most of the books, but a few were totally messed up, and of course those are the ones my brain focuses on and bothers me incessantly about. I remove all of them from the phone, fix the metadata and covers for each one on Calibre, and send them back to my phone. A few more are corrected, but there are still some problems. I Yahoogle for help, as does Adam since this is really upsetting me, and I try everything we find.

The same thing happens. All the authors are listed first name, last name in the app, but alphabetically sorted by the last name, which is correct. Except for two authors. One is listed last name, first name and his 23 books are split somehow. For the other, her initials are MZ and she is sorted under M instead of Z, although her name is in the correct order (FN, LN).

Very funny, Apple.

After being miserable for the past week and not getting the results that I wanted, I’m standing at the bed hugging Adam and venting about the apps, and my sweet, amazing, well-meaning husband tells me I should not worry about it because it’s just a small thing. Now, I love this man to pieces, and I know I shouldn’t stress and fret over something so small, but it’s not by choice. I don’t do this because I’m bored or want attention or I’m desperate for some internal drama and turmoil in my life. I can’t help it. I tried to “deal” with Hurricane MIL and nearly had a mental break from that.

On top of my ever-changing, fleeting interests, my lifelong solid obsession is English/language. I’m average in every other subject and above-average in language, which was included in my psych/autism assessment, but I’ve known that since I was little. I was always in gifted reading/English classes, and that was my highest-scoring subject on my ACTs. I had this terrible-paying general transcription job once, and the company’s policy was to type what was said, of course, but that included spelling words how the dictator spelled them if they happened to spell them out, including medications. Most people don’t know how to spell medications correctly because the spelling and formatting can get pretty crazy. I always spelled the drugs correctly and was ready to defend my choice to the death if necessary. I was with one company where this doctor would always say “gamipectin” and proceed to spell it: G-A-B-A-P-E-N-T-I-N. Gabapentin was the correct medication, so I don’t know where in the heck she came up with gamipectin. I correct emails when replying to them. I correct FB posts if I’m reposting. I quickly stopped reading No Country for Old Men because Cormac McCarthy refuses to use quotations when people are speaking, which could very well be a sign of the devil. That really stinks because I loved that movie and figure his books are pretty good.

I have no idea where I’ve been or am going with any of this post. I applaud your dedication (boredom?) if you have made it this far 😊👍.

Adam made me modified tequila (what we called it growing up). Eh, maybe “barebones tequila” would be more accurate; zucchini, meat sauce, and lots of mozzarella cheese 😋. I think ground chuck is more expensive than ground beef because the farmers and butchers have a hard time finding boy cows who are named Chuck. Adam said that’s a possibility but never gave a definitive answer.

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P!nk is My Favorite Color

Daily writing prompt
What was the last live performance you saw?
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The last live performance I saw was in 2018 or 2019. My aunt took me to see P!nk on her Beautiful Trauma World Tour in Cleveland, Ohio. Prior to that, she had taken me to see Rihanna on her ANTI tour, and Lady Gaga on her Jolene tour, both of which were awesome. Then, I saw P!nk. To say I’m a P!nk fan is an understatement. One of my first CDs was Can’t Take me Home, and I listened to that album so much growing up. Before streaming, if you wanted to own a specific song, you had to buy the entire album. Honestly, that was the best thing ever. I discovered so many great songs because I would get an entire album just for one song and fell in love with the album. With most of my CDs, I know them by heart and that includes the track numbers. Listening to an album on shuffle will drive my anxiety up to the point of me crying and becoming very irritable.

Back to the concert. The people were absolutely overwhelming, as was the stress of filing into the building, going through the metal detectors, and trying to find our seats among hordes of others doing the same. Since it was just my aunt and me, I didn’t have the comfort of one of my “people.” Mom was gone, and my husband was at home. I felt a little calmer when we finally made it to our seats, but the noise of those around me talking and laughing and milling about was pretty nerve-wracking. I cried tears of joy from the excitement of finally getting to see one of my favorite singers.

The show was crazy good. P!nk isn’t just a singer, but also a performer and very funny. I knew most of the songs by heart, and the stage set was fun and colorful. Her outfits were, too! Revenge is one of my favorite songs (huge Eminem fan), and for Em’s part, this huge, inflatable Eminem doll “walked” down the stage and P!nk gets suspended up in the air near its face to deliver a big ol’ kick. It was quite hilarious.

Found a clip from the show I attended! Not my recording. Eminem shows up around 4:15 or so.

I have my pictures from both Lady Gaga and Rihanna, but I can’t find my P!nk pictures to save my life. I know I took plenty and recorded some videos, but they aren’t in my Concerts folder, which is very upsetting.

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