Author: zenzalei

Into birds, music, nature, science, hockey, movies, fitness, books, chocolate, wine, and spooky things.

It Sounds Like a Whisper

Ha! I can’t wait to see what the third day brings.

Oh, bad form? Yeah. No. Dude made $10 million a year from a company notorious for rejecting claims and letting people die. I had problems with UnitedHealthCare, myself, in which they botched my payment processing through the health exchange and canceled my insurance even though it was their fault. Then I later came home with an $8,000 emergency department bill for a partial small bowel obstruction because I could no longer get insurance for that plan year, so pardon me while I sing “Cry Me a River.” And believe it or not, there’s nothing abnormal about that. There is no “right” way to respond to someone’s death, so whatever you might be feeling about it is fine and don’t let anyone try to make you feel bad if you can’t muster up any sympathy or empathy for it. Patients die because of greedy people like him and these other ghouls.

As for Nick Fuentes, he is the raging misogynist who started the whole “your body, my choice” thing. Well, I guess he’s about to find out that the law doesn’t agree with him. I hope they lock him up and throw away the key.

But on to happier news, shall we?

I’m really digging the Finch app. Just finished my first week and I worked out four times since Monday, ate all of my fruits and veggies every day, and stayed fully hydrated. I can’t remember the first time I did all of that in one week. Usually there are a days short on fruits and veggies, or when I don’t drink enough water, or I only work out a couple of times in a week. Finch works for me, so I’m keeping it–which is probably a good thing being that I paid for a full year in advance for $40 on a Black Friday deal. I think it’s 10 bucks a month otherwise.

Right now my Finch, Sherbet, is in Iceland and she has a pet cow. I’ve earned enough points to give her that fancy outfit, including her Cosmic Crown.

Looks like I took the screenie while she was mid-blink. Normally she’s not scowling.

Never thought I’d have a toddler, but here we are.

I’ve been working on a snowflake this evening but won’t finish it by midnight, so I’ll post it tomorrow. In the meantime, have a seat at the revolution, folks.

Lots of Red

Long day with lots of writing for work, so I’m pulling out one of my little emergency tricks for an entry. Here’s my laptop wallpaper for the season, by Toni Cuenca on Unsplash. I love all the red.

Faux holly on a red background.

Apparently DesktopNexus has imploded, which bums me out. I’ve been a member there since 2012 or so and enjoyed so many of the pictures there. Granted, that site was one giant copyright violation, as a lot of people uploaded any image they found on the internet that would make a good wallpaper, as evidenced by the number of duplicates. I used them mainly for their intended purpose, as wallpaper for my laptop, as well as for my Facebook cover photo and header images for a private journal on an old diary site. Call me selfish, but I hope it’s just a server migration or something. I have probably 200 bird photos saved on there.

Ah, well, things change, and I don’t mind going to Unsplash. At least there I know who took the photo and can credit them properly.

That’s all for tonight. I’ll be back with a real entry tomorrow. And probably a snowflake. Maybe. Doing one a day might have been too ambitious a goal for me.

It’s Beginning to Smell A Lot Like Not This

It’s late and I’m beat, so this is a quickie.

Today Holidailies would like to know the top three scents or flavors that always evoke holidays for you. I believe I answered this one last year (pine, peppermint, and allspice–I think) so I’ll tell you what does NOT evoke holidays for me. This stuff:

A candle called Woodland Path designed to smell like cedar and fresh pine.

It smelled so nice in the grocery store, cedar and fresh pine, just like the label says. When I bought it I couldn’t wait to go home and light it. I got out the lighter and was just about to take it to the wicks and then I smelled it. Something was off. Way off. As in it reminded me of something I didn’t want to be reminded of. I couldn’t place it at first, probably out of denial, but with each sinus-cramping sniff, it emerged from the depths of my scent memory.

It smelled like a million bad dates from my late teens and early 20s, a time in life when the males of the species are so used to the olfactory assault of the sweaty gym clothes piled up on their floors and doing the sniff test to see if a shirt they already wore twice can go a third round that they become nose-blind and end up practically bathing in every young guy’s go-to cologne once he outgrows Paco Rabanne and Polo. It smelled like cars borrowed from fathers and older brothers, dorm room sex, and hangovers. It smelled like…

Drakkar Noir men's fragrance.

Now, see, I’m sure there are a lot of guys out there who love this stuff. But for the love of all that is holy, don’t spray it directly onto your skin, fellas. Spray it up into the air and then walk through the mist like you’re going under a limbo stick. ONCE.

As for me, it’s a “no.” Too many horny dudes who doused themselves in it tried to get into my pants back in the late 80s and 90s and it triggers an automatic rejection from my lizard brain.

This is not to say Tuscany candles are bad. Here’s one of my favorites:

A candle called Peony Blossom.

That’s my spring candle, though. I have one for each season. My summer one is Yankee Candle’s Iced Berry Lemonade, which is below half and a little too sooty for me to show you. It’s juicy, though. Makes me wish it was a slushy so I could drink it.

I guess I’ll have to go with my fall candle this holiday season. I haven’t used it yet, but it does remind me of the holidays.

A candle designed to smell like apples.

One of my favorite rock stars has a thing for apples, so I’ll have to put on his band’s music when I light it. Too bad they don’t have a holiday album. Get on that, Poets of the Fall, would ya?

And now to post this and hit the hay. No snowflake tonight again. Tuesdays and Wednesdays are my in-office days and by the time I get home, work out, shower up, and have dinner, I have almost no time left before it’s lights out. I’ll finish one on my lunch break tomorrow.

Oh, and I’ll be seeing the state trees on Friday the 13th. Just too much work to do, and I love to tempt fate.