Well, then. We’ve come to the portion of the program where I turn on the news, listen for a few minutes, and turn it off again in a fit of rage and despair. Fun! I am so tired of old white men making all the rules. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I love and adore quite a few old white men, individually, but as a collective, I’m still waiting for anything good to come out of their scheming. I will not be holding my breath.

In the meantime, the banalities of life continue, and I am trying to do my best impression of a Functional Adult Who Still Cares. This is a testament to my acting skills, as my level of functioning is questionable at best, plus I’ve been dead on the inside for a very long time, but… eh. We all have our issues. Mine is that I’m a delicate flower and I hate everything, but what are you gonna do? I still have to pretend like I’m a willing member of the human race, or something. I guess.

So let us consider the Life Matters Of Which We Can Speak™—that is, nothing of true importance or which overlaps with other people who did not agree to ye olde Internet confessional—which are, ever so precariously, keeping me busy/somewhat sane/from hurling myself into traffic these days, shall we? Yes? Yes!

The State of the Barkitude
When I last left you, Foster Dog Grok had just left the building, and Foster Dog Barkley had arrived. The rescue I work with footed the bill for his neurology appointment so that we could learn that… yep, he has a brain malformation and poor balance. Which we already knew. But now we knew from fancy, expensive people! We found a company to build Barkley a custom stabilizing wheelchair and sent off the specs (and the cash) to have him outfitted.

Do we have the wheelchair yet? Nope. It is being built by magical fairies all the way up in Canada, and I’m sure it will be perfect (dear God, please let it be perfect), if they ever finish it. Hopefully I’ll live to see it finished. (As each week ticks down, I am less sure of that happening.) We’ve had Barkley for over two months, now, and he’s still not available for adoption, because we want to get his chair and get him trained on it before we release him.

In the meantime, Barkley has come right out of his shell. He loves us! So much! Hooray! But also he hates… everything else. And while I can sympathize with this position, I hate everything mostly quietly, whereas Barkley feels it necessary to bark VERY LOUDLY to communicate his displeasure. Here is a short list of things Barkley hates: Being in his crate, not being in his crate, not being in your lap, the vacuum, people at the door, people on the street, people existing anywhere at any time for any reason, cars, riding in cars, and being groomed.

When Barkley arrived, I had shaved him down and bathed him without much trouble. Of course, he was freaked out and matted and uncomfortable, and maybe he understood I was helping, maybe he was in shock, who knows. It’s worth noting I didn’t make much progress on his face, but he was fine for the rest of it. But it’s been a couple of months, so I put him up on the grooming table last week to tidy him up, and he flipped out. He wouldn’t let me do anything. I tried breaks, I tried treats. I tried showing him the clippers. I tried muzzling him. He screamed and flailed on the table and I gave up; I arranged with the rescue to have a real groomer take care of him, because surely that would work, or we could arrange for sedation.

The groomer had a cancellation, and I was able to bring him in the very next day. They were able to work with him over the course of the day and get most of his body done, but—as I’d experienced—he was not allowing anyone near his face or feet with any equipment. They suggested I get some oral sedatives from his vet and bring him back, doped up, the following week. So I did that, running the gauntlet of 1) getting this authorized by the rescue, 2) getting the drugs, 3) actually drugging him, and 4) bringing him back to the groomer.

They kept him all day. And when I picked him up? He looked exactly the same. Yeah, that didn’t work. Have I mentioned that Barkley is an asshole?

“But I’m an adorable asshole.”

The State of the Poshitude
I am still attempting to sell stuff on Poshmark, because I am a glutton for punishment, and I love it when people offer me $5 for a an item that retailed for $300. It’s my very favorite!

Listen, it’s not a bad little side income stream, and most people are reasonable, so it’s fine. Usually. I thrift, I find good stuff that you can’t be bothered to go thrifting for, yourself, and then I sell it to you for somewhere between 75%-90% off retail, and we’re both happy.

And then there’s… people who don’t quite get it.

Example 1: I have a designer purse in my shop listed at $50. It’s practically new, and retails for close to $250, so I feel like this is already a good deal. Someone comes along and offers me $25. Which: no. So I counteroffered $45—another 10% off my already low price—and here’s where it gets silly. I actually have something on my page about how I don’t fool around with pricing; I price where I think is fair, and I will either accept an offer or counteroffer with my best price. But this person came back at $32, and I (again) counteroffered $45, and she declined. That’s fine. A little later, she came back and offered $40. I—tell me if you already guessed this—counteroffered $45. She declined. AND THEN SHE OFFERED ME $10. I guess that’s the Poshmark equivalent of a tantrum? I have no idea. She was SHOWING ME? Who knows. I remain confused.

Example 2: I had another, cheaper, little clutch purse in my shop listed at $16, which I sold to someone for $14. She received it and then proceeded to give me a 1-star rating. In the space where she was asked to clarify, she put “It was smaller than I expected.” After I finished rolling my eyes, I contacted her, and explained that the rating process is designed to let other buyers know what the buying experience is like with various sellers, and what she SHOULD be rating is whether the item was as described, with accurate photos, whether I shipped it quickly, whether it was nicely packaged, etc. And then I pointed out that in addition to a COPIOUS collection of pictures of said bag, the item description included the measurements. “So I’m sorry it’s not entirely what you expected,” I concluded, “but giving me a terrible rating because you weren’t paying attention is kind of unfair.” I did not expect anything to happen, but she changed her rating. So. Winning? I guess?

The State of the Offspring
The semester is juuuuust about over, and that means (hold on to your hats if you’ve been reading here forever) Chickadee is wrapping up her first year of grad school and Monkey is finally, officially, a senior (although aiming for a December graduation, meaning still about a year and a half to go). Chickadee still lives too far away and Monkey arguably still lives a little too close (I kid! Mostly!), but they are both amazing and making us proud.

(I recently found out that Sunny’s mother is appalled that my blog exists, so, um, Sunny’s great, too, not that I would ever talk about her here.) (But, she’s the greatest bonus kid ever. That’s all.)

Moving on….

The State of the Groceries
I ordered groceries for pickup all through the pandemic, and have only returned to the store sort of recently. Like, maybe the last few months. I still wear a mask, and people look at me like I’m nuts, but that’s fine.

Last week I didn’t get groceries at all, and this week was shaping up to be similarly overwhelming, so I remembered that online ordering existed and decided to just do a pickup order to simplify my life.

Now: while supply chains were struggling and eeeeeeveryone was ordering groceries, I grew accustomed to various items being unavailable, and appreciated the humor in what Kroger would offer as a substitute (hint: it didn’t often make a lot of sense), but we managed. Nowadays I figure ordering volume is probably down, most shortages have ended, and it would be no biggie.

So I ordered for pickup yesterday morning. I did receive the “Some items in your order are unavailable” text and went online to review my substitutions. There were four items I was asked to review, and I ended up not taking the substitutions for any of them, because every single one was stupid. (Dear Kroger, if I am ordering “low carb sandwich wraps,” “extra fluffy white corn tortillas” is not a good sub.) But that was fine! Still, I was getting (most of my) groceries.

I picked up. I went home. I unpacked. I looked around. I checked my online receipt.

I had been informed that 4 items were unavailable and that there were substitutions I could accept or reject. But I had NOT been informed that there were 5 other items they weren’t giving me, and they weren’t offering me any sort of substitution at all. This happens, sometimes, if it’s a really specific item that they only carry one variety of. Would you like to know what HIGHLY SPECIFIC AND RARE items they could neither fulfill nor substitute for me?

1) Sliced turkey. Yep, the one I ordered was out of stock, and NOWHERE IN THE WHOLE STORE was there any other deli meat. Such a shame.
2) Sliced roast beef. Ditto above.
3) The hamburgers that were on sale. NO HAMBURGERS IN THE WHOLE STORE. Definitely give me the buns I ordered, but no hamburgers, and no substitutions. That’s totally normal. Thanks!
4) Sardines (I buy these for Goose). The entire store is out of sardines, folks! I mean, they carry five different brands, but nope! ALL GONE!!
5) Oreos (for Monkey). There’s not a single cookie in the whole store. Kroger is on a diet, evidently.

Anyway, I had been planning on hamburgers for dinner (nope!), and the lunch meat was so the school-going members of the household can make themselves sandwiches to take for lunches, so that was… aggravating. I guess next week I’ll go TO the store.

The State of the Weathering
We are alternately covered in pollen or withstanding massive thunderstorms (of which Goose is absolutely terrified). A few weeks ago it was still freezing and now it’s entirely too hot. In other words: it’s May in Georgia.

The State of my Murderousness
I’d heard tell of it happening to other people, but it finally happened to me.

Earlier this week, I got in trouble on Facebook for “violating community standards.” My comment was hidden and I was given a warning.

The comment in question? A friend posted a picture of a gorgeous breakfast sandwich on an everything bagel, and I mused that mostly I don’t miss gluten anymore, but I would cheerfully cut a bitch for that bagel.

Facebook told me my comment promoted violence.

I appealed. And I said in my appeal that my comment is not important, but not being able to tell the difference between an actual incitement to violence and jealousy of someone’s breakfast sandwich is. We’ll see what happens.

That’s it. That’s all the news. I hope you are well, and (just a reminder) I hope you vote.