I really should've done this sooner. Date stamping this way the fuck up there so I can keep track of it.

"Censorship is telling a man he can't have a steak just because a baby can't chew it."
-- Mark Twain

( Fox's Banned Book Checklist )

How the hell do you deter a cat who actually *likes* the taste of adhesive? I swear to [insert deity here, if applicable] Zoe can smell adhesive three miles away in the dark. She doesn't care if she steps on it. She doesn't care if it get stuck to her face. It's like fucking cat crack.

***

So my character for D&D 101 is effectively a wolfmanwoman. Her name is Cedar and she's an Earth Warden. She can partially turn into a tree. And she refuses to eat plants. And she carries a rock tied to a stick and calls it a mace. Which fits in quite well with everyone else...the entire party is pretty special. It's a campaign run and played by Cepheids, so there was little doubt of that.

Lol, I got called "sir" today. I've been told I look "far too feminine" in the face to pull off androgyny, but apparently just a change in hairstyle is really all it takes.

Which just goes to show that humans are not as sexually dimorphic as we like to think we are.

And Falc, "Good Hair" is showing in Bryan. We could theoretically go tomorrow, (I didn't really feel up for pizza rolls last week, and may not be this week either, but I do want to make the meeting so I know where D&D 101 is being held). Thursday is also open, Wednesday is the aforementioned D&D, and I close Friday and Saturday.

Hair is gone. Most of it, anyway. Once I get photos I'll post some. I am, however, terribly exhausted.


This week on the Tiny Ouroboros:

The Lazy Fox's guide to cleaning
The forest for the trees I really liked this post.
There was no Friday post this week as I was busy and did not get a chance to write it.

EDIT: Posts by others you might find interesting:
You vs. the Cubicle
It's only life or death
On owning nothing

Ugh. Ughughugh.

I was hoping to get Zo spayed at her usual vet, but they want 125 to do it. I normally wouldn't begrudge them this, but I don't have 125. TAMU wants 150-200. Student discount is 10%. This isn't because TAMU has high-quality vets working on your pet, it's because they have a forth-year student AND a vet working on your pet. WTF, last time I checked, having your pet be a guinea pig for a student's training was supposed to be cheap. Or maybe that was just twelve or fifteen years ago when your whole family's broke as shit and the next door neighbor is a vet. "Hey, we've got students who need practice, want to get the cats done?"

Supposedly I close next Saturday, so I'll probably pack her up and drag her to Bellville for most of the day. If I don't spend too much this weekend, I may be able to afford to get her retested for FIV as well, but it may just be the spay. I want to do both, but my financial forecast shows a record level of broke followed by brief periods of "buy the toilet paper now while you still have the money to do it." I blame it on my love affair with having a savings account.

I've gotten to the point where, unless said child is old enough to hold an intelligent conversation, I simply think of and view children as very expensive pets with privileges.

I don't know when this happened, or why. I only realized it last Tuesday when a man came in with a toddler and insisted that they both get free tacos when it was clear the man was intending on eating both of them himself.

I'm not sure if this says something about me, about them, or about pets. Maybe all three.

This week:

Carbon offsets are bullshit
"Ecological Footprint" (this one started a "wtf" tag...as in "wtf is wrong with you")
"Consuming Kids"
Angry, young, and broke, that's me

I'm quitting Dr Pepper. For the third time.

This time, instead of quitting soda cold turkey, I'm quitting DP and other caffeinated sodas first. Tea is acceptable, as long as it's TEA and not tea-flavored bullshit.

I'm in the process of switching from DP to Sprite. Once I can drive by a DP ad without wanting one, I think I can start quitting the soda altogether. I'm expecting this process to take between one and three years. Long term, shit, yo. First time I quit, I relapsed after six months.

I got a caffeine headache about two today. A bottle of Sweet Leaf and an ibuprofen later and there's still a twinge back there. Tomorrow I'll have one of the last DP with breakfast. I have five cans left, so I'm drinking one for breakfast every other day to try and wean myself off the caffeine.

I'll be holding myself accountable on LJ, and hopefully that'll help.

Rules:
After the last cans of DP are gone, that's it. No mas. Not even as a "treat." That's how I relapsed last time. Slippery slope is not always a fallacy.
No caffeinated sodas. Until I quit having caffeine headaches, I may have a small cup of one (NOT DP) at work. That's all.
IBC Root Beer is an exception. I can't remember if it's caffeinated or not, but I don't get it very often, so I'm not really concerned with that brand.
I'll drink Sprite or other clear sodas when possible. At work I usually get the non-caffeinated root beer (Sprite lookalike tastes like shit), but I'm trying to avoid brown soda if I can help it.

***

I maybe shouldn't have gone for the bike ride. Gravity and the wind were all "you go backward!" and I was all "nooooooo!" and now I'm fucking exhausted. I suck at the bike riding.

So stainedfeathers and I managed to fix my bicycle (and mostly fix hers). The back brakes still need some work, and all the brake pads should probably be replaced soon, but the bike is now rideable. The back brakes are off at the moment, I need to fiddle with them so they don't rub quite so much...it was causing me untold amounts of strain with them on. They definitely need to go back on, though, the front brakes can't stop the whole bike very well.

So now I get to take the bike out a couple times a week for exercise. My legs don't ache quite so much with the back brakes off, but I'm still horribly out of shape when it comes to bikes. Especially since D-raid is up a hill...and a fairly steep one for someone who doesn't do bicycles much.

I'm taking a much needed break from everything this weekend...except I have to drop a book off at the library. Oh well. Had a bad case of burnout at work late Friday and Saturday morning. Monday's my only day off, so I'm taking both today and tomorrow off and fully intend on playing video games, reading books, walking, and fiddling with the bicycle.

Friday is payday, which means I can finally make an appointment for Zoe to have her final FIV test and get spayed. It also signals the start of me cramming as much money into my savings as possible before I crash and burn from working fourteen hour days. The goal is to hit a thousand...that way if something happens I have somewhat of a cushion. I'd like to keep working two jobs and pay off my student loan this year, but I doubt I can keep it up past building up the savings.

Exhausted Fox is taking a break.

***

This week:
Money does not equal caring
Book Review - The Omnivore's Dilemma (a poor review for a good book.)
20 green things no one ever seems to mention