You probably don’t remember this, but a week ago, I shot your bear and punched you.

Sooooooo back in November I pre-ordered a Baby Yoda/The Child from the Disney shop the second it became available to pre-order. I did not receive it until May,* by which point I had more or less forgotten that I pre-ordered Baby Yoda to begin with.  

He arrived hidden amongst the other boxes of office supplies that were dropped outside the office that day. When I opened that box and found THE CHILD, both Bossman and I lost approximately 45 minutes of productive work time. Mostly posing Baby Yoda in various spots in our new office. 

Because I am a normal grown ass adult, I naturally have turned my instagram account into a Baby Yoda mommy blog. It started out as a funny idea a friend and I had to troll all the so-called influencers. But

Y'ALL

I'm pretty sure every single person who now has their Baby Yoda has started up an instagram account. It's absurd. I love it. 

Here's a photo of Baby the day he came home.

Also my hair is now purple

I can colour my hair no problem, but I'm waaaayyyyy too nervous to lighten it on my own. So with no more salon appointments, the only other option was to dye my hair purple. 

Follow @caelesto on insta to see just how much of my mind I have lost. 




















*The fact that Disney could not foresee the global phenomenon of a Baby Yoda blows my mind.

lovely ball

Something to be grateful for this holiday season--Gyr (my car) MIGHT be fixable. I'm going on my third week with the rented Ford Fusion (I hate it), so praying that they can actually fix Gyr.

My hip, however, remains a different story. The physical therapist believes that the impact of the car accident caused me to dislocate and then badly relocate my left hip. As a result, said hip does not want to stay properly located. I will probably be in pain forever, until the hip eventually gets so fecked up that it will need replacing. Yippee. On the bright side, I'll probably be able to get some extra money via lawsuit. 

But let's not dwell on that. Let's change the subject. 


Sometimes circumstances force you to lose access to something you really REALLY love. Like your satellite cable carrier deciding that you can no longer subscribe to just the one specific sports channel you want, now you must purchase a package that includes like 6 channels you'll never watch. 

And thus when I was about 15, I could no longer watch my football and rugby. 
(Proper football, not the pansified American version.)

We had no internet then, and even if we did, I doubt I would have found a way to keep up with watching my sports live. 

I was mental about football from like age 8 or 9. My team was always Tottenham Hotspur, because that was Dad's team, but to keep from being an outcast amongst my cousins, I accepted Manchester United as my alternate team. 

(Mum's side of the family was divided firmly between Man U and Liverpool.)

After starting to watch football and rugby with Dad about 2 years ago, I forgot how much I love it. He always found the games live on the internet, and we would occasionally watch matches on his laptop.

So then a few months ago I looked into finding an app or something I could get on the telly to watch Premier League games live, good quality live videos as opposed to the fuzzy and slow matches dad got on the laptop. 

NBC will allow you to purchase a "channel", without having to subscribe to the entire sports network. So I shelled out for a full year of access to English Premier League football. 

It took only a few weeks for me to get right back into the level of sports obsession I had in middle school. 

If I'm with dad, the conversation inevitably ends up with extensive discussions about football. As much as I value my weekend sleep (typically sleeping until 4PM), if there is a Tottenham match on at 7.30 AM, I will sleep on the sofa and set my alarm for 7. And you better believe I'll wake up to watch the match live. 

For Christmas, Santa* got me a Spurs jersey

with my fav player's number on it.

(I feel like I'm absurdly fat at the moment. Consumption of sedatives is at an all time high.)

All of this happened so quickly that the rest of the family is equal parts confused and annoyed. Dad is at the point where he has realized that the child of his dreams (previously a son who would become as enthusiastic about footie as he is) has been in front of him for years. Out of 5 children, only I ended up obsessed with football. 


The Premier League is taking over my life. 

Again.

(Except now I can't cover my walls in posters of football players because most of them are 10+ years younger than I am.)

My friends are equally confused by this sudden re-discovering of one of my favourite things. Except M, he remembers the days before I lost the foreign sports channel. 

Even at work--if there happens to be a weekday match, the office more or less comes to a standstill because YOU BETTER FECKING BELIEVE I'm watching that Tottenham match at noon on Tuesday. Bossman can't fire me, because he knows full well he cannot replace me with just one person.

I hope you all had wonderful holidays, no matter how or what you celebrate. <3 
































*Mum

Horror Movie Hoedown Episode 3, plus general nonsense

 [EDIT: because of some idiot shitposting a load of comments about A MINOR'S boobs, anonymous comments have been disabled. Sorry for any annoyance this causes.]


In continuing my journey thru all the movies of that Buzzfeed post, the remaining unwatched films were either not readily available to watch, or were not free to watch, so I shan't be offering any opinion on them. Thus concludes my half arsed film review series.

Some general updates since my "hey y'all I'm not dead post" a while back:

The Bros and I went to see Wovenhand in Brooklyn.

Y'all should know at this point of my obsession with the music of Wovenhand. 

I got to say hey to DEE, and naturally acted like a bumbling buffoon. 

My friend Cyn and I went to Paducah, Kentucky at the end of September for the BBQ on the River Festival and basically did nothing but eat ribs and brisket and biscuits and gravy for a week. We also got to spend a couple days with Tempest, which was beyond amazing. A morning of Geocaching occurred, good times all round. 

Some highlights:

We drove to Kentucky, taking 2 driving days each way. Our halfway point is and will always be in West Virginia, because TUDOR'S BISCUIT WORLD.

I usually don't take photos of my food, but this is the best breakfast of biscuits and gravy you will ever have. 

We ate our way through the Festival in Paducah, KY with great enthusiasm.

one BBQ vendor of many

At our halfway stop on the way home, we made friends with this cat at the Super 8.

For Cyn's birthday, she received her very own 18th century gown. She's been wearing mine for years on Halloween, and when I saw this one gown with a peacock colour paisley design, it was just screaming her name too loudly for me not to get it for her. 

I've made some alterations to an older gown for my costume this year. Harleyquinn has discovered that panniers (the rigid underskirt necessary for Baroque fashion) make very nice beds.

I have to imagine that women in the 1700s also discovered this, and wandered about their homes with cats sleeping on their dresses. 


In other fun news, this past Saturday night, apparently my drunk ass ordered an entire pizza from the take out place next door to my apartment building, and I ate half of it. I have no memory of doing this. And it's doubly perplexing because, as most of you know, I HATE cheese. 

300 mg of seroquel in action, my friends. Pretty sure my liver is the 8th natural wonder of the world. 

Mich's New Music Discoveries, episode whatever

First, here is a picture of my cats. I can't get them to sit still long enough to get a photo of all of them together, so I made one.

In other news, 2 weeks ago, my friend C and I drove 9 hours to Ohio on Sunday to see a super duper totally fecking amazing band Monday (and then had to get up at the crack of dawn Tuesday so I could make it back home in time for band practice).

We had THE BEST time. There weren't a lot of people in the brewery where 20 Watt Tombstone was playing, so we actually got to hang out with the band.

The singer/guitarist came to sit at the bar with us during their "smoke break" and bought me and C a glass of bourbon. We were supposed to have breakfast with them, though I doubted that would actually happen since we had to get on the road by 9.00 AM and they were probably up drinking all night.

Tom never answered his phone Tuesday morning, so I presumed they had in fact partied all night. I got a text a few hours later. Apparently they HAD gotten up in time, but Tom never realized his phone was dead.

Very sad altogether, but just seeing them play and hanging out with them Monday night was totally worth the driving.


C and I dressed up in ridiculous dresses for Halloween at Big Sis#'2's house.

One of the parents of the many trick-or-treaters we saw just bought and re-opened Baird's Tavern in Warwick. It was originally opened in 1766, and the owner offered us a possible job dressing up in 18th century fashion and hanging out in the pub on weekends. Getting paid to play dress up would make me deliriously happy.


And now on to the music.

Black Spirit Crown



Naturally, because I adore their music so much, they have thus far only released 4 songs.


Holy Grove



Yet another band with so few songs they can barely call their album an album and not an EP. But I love them.


Truckfighters



These guys are from Sweden. Proof that I need to move to Scandinavia immediately because their music scene is apparently off the charts awesome.


We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions.
LET ME PREFACE THIS ONE by stating that I very much dislike Bruce Springsteen. However



This album was playing in one of the antique shops we visited while in Lake George a couple months ago. I made the guy at the register stop the CD player and tell me what was playing, because I loved it. At first I thought there MUST be a mistake, because no way I liked a song by Bruce Springsteen. But no, it was definitely Bruce.

The guy at the register seemed nervous when I said I wanted to buy the CD, as he is not the owner of the shop and wasn't sure the album was on sale. I convinced him it was fine and got the CD for $5.00.


Also this cover band from Spain because holy crap.




Have a good weekend, kiddos.

It's like the N word and the C word had a baby and it was raised by all the bad words for Jews.

As y'all know, I have something of a spending problem when it comes to period costumes.

HOWEVER, this year, four of the giant dresses will be getting a night out on Halloween, as myself, 2 friends, and Lil Bro#2* have decided to wear them to Big Sis#2's house to give candy to the millions** of trick-or-treaters she gets.

I really enjoyed dressing up as Elsa a couple years ago, so this year I decided to mix it up and dress up as Baroque Elsa, hence justifying*** my purchasing a new giant dress.

The new dress arrived last week, and I raced home after work to try it on.

This is the first one-piece period costume I have ever purchased. You'd think that would make it easier to put on. Think again, my friends.

I ran into serious trouble when I finally managed to get both arms into the sleeves.

At which point I realized I was stuck.

Why was I stuck, you may ask? Wellllllllll it's because of a problem I frequently have with clothing.

BUT I DID NOT GIVE UP

The dress is bigger than my apartment, so it's impossible to get a decent photo of it. This is the best I could get:

In other news....

I've been doing some decorating and now I'm going to show off.

I think I'm most proud of the mini curio cabinet.

That's on the wall right outside the bedroom.

And in that photo you can see my fantastic new table.

My owl collection has some new additions.

I've decorated the windows for autumn.

And here's a picture of my fridge just because.

*yes, really

**this may be an exaggeration

***not at all

****it was taking way too long to draw that

Comfort Films

I stole this from Wandering Through the Shelves because I love this week's theme.

Comfort Films. 

I have lots of comfort films--movies I could watch over and over and over and over without ever getting tired of them. Some are just general comfort films, and some are watched for specific reasons. I'll start with the general all-purpose comfort films.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens

I LOVE Star Wars*. And this episode is definitely my fav, followed closely by A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back (I tend to get bored halfway through Return of the Jedi; The Phantom Menace is ok I guess; The Clone Wars is a f**king mess; and the first half of Revenge of the Sith is garbage, but the second half is alright I guess).

We recently ordered a voice-controlled BB8 for the office. Videos shall be posted forthwith. BB8 is the best in the world ever.

impulsive purchases from M.'s birthday trip to Walmart

......anyway, moving on...

Stardust

Everything about this movie is perfect.


The Princess Bride

I can actually recite this entire movie from start to finish.


O Brother, Where Art Thou?

All the Coen Brothers films are amazing (except Burn After Reading, which is trash), but this one is my fav.


Now some comfort movies for specific occasions:

Christmas - Harry Potter Number 1

I'm not sure when or why this became our family's Christmas movie, but for some years now we always watch it after Christmas dinner.



Sick Days

If I am super duper sick and bed-ridden (which does not occur often), I am probably watching one of two films.

She Devil

 (if you've never seen this, you need to immediately)

or

Death Becomes Her

Worth watching for Isabella Rossellini alone.


What about the rest of y'all? What are your comfort movies?






















*For some reason, most people are extremely surprised by this.

Being part of a family means committing forgery for the ones you love.

 Emails and facebook messages with regard to my wellbeing are starting to pile up, so I figured I'd try to post something....

I had a nice week away in the beginning of the month staying with Tempest, who is beyond lovely. We did one of those Escape the Room things (twice--success in the art gallery heist, near success at the bank robbery), and wore period costumes on both Halloween and two days later for trivia night at the local brewery.

We ended up skipping trivia and playing Nintendo instead. We all mostly failed at Super Mario on NES, and then we broke Mortal Kombat on the Sega Genesis. 

I made friends with Tempest's cat, Pippin.

 I love him. He cuddled with me nearly every night I was there. (Presumably because the Simple Cat has trained me to keep up the petting and scratching even after I've fallen asleep.)

We also did lots of walking at various parks, as I successfully got Tempest into geocaching. I got super excited at one park when we saw a red squirrel,

  

and then we found a praying mantis.

 I moved him from the danger of the parking lot to the safety of the trees. Hopefully he did not wander back into the parking lot.

I made some clay thingies

Simple Cat/Ivy and Harley

self portrait

but they are nowhere hear as amazing as Tempest's creations.

I returned from my road trip on Saturday, Vienn Peridot in tow. Peri made friends with both cats immediately. I was amazed, as Simple Cat NEVER comes out of hiding when new people come over. Ivy loved Peri, and she spent most of Monday evening and Tuesday looking for her after she left.

I took Peri to Smokey's for dinner for her birthday. On Sunday we wandered the farmer's market with Lil Bro2 (and of course visited the Pesto Man), went to A.C. Moore and Michaels to spend far too much money on art supplies,* and then headed over to Dadum's for dinner, as Stepmom had cooked a nice chicken and rice dish in honor of the foreign visitor. After dinner, we all watched Babe and I totally forgot that Elrond did the voice of the sheepdog.

The following Tuesday night, we as a nation somehow elected Donald Trump as the next president. I did not get to vote, as Bossman made me stay at the office until after 6.00 PM, and then I had to go get groceries and petrol and visit the bank, and after sitting in like 2 hours of traffic on the way home, I was so aggravated and tired I really didn't feel like waiting around in the cold when it was so late I might not even have made it to the front of the line at the voting place (which would have been another 45 minutes in the car from my house).

Honestly though I had no idea who I planned on voting for. I had actually considered just flipping a coin because I don't even give a f**k anymore. I've had enough of the lesser-of-two-evils elections. I've lost all patience with the circus that is the United States government.

Last Friday, I made an appearance at my friend's daughter's 13th birthday party. Emma (the daughter) is a treasure., and possibly the only real fan of my books. I made her a art for her birfday.

I think it might be the best mushroom cottage yet.

I also hauled ass outta there after only an hour because small house filled with a large group of squealing shrieking 12 and 13 year old girls = HARD NO.

In other news..........

The week-long road trip was a wonderful distraction, but once I settled back into normal life, all the ick came right back. Emotional turmoil, extreme depression, general despair and hopelessness. The Doc has upped my meds, but I know that more antidepressants and mood stabilizers and sedatives will not fix the real problem. I do not know how to fix the real problem, so I've fallen back on unhealthy coping mechanisms.

I do not eat anything more than the cream in my coffee and a spoonful of peanut butter or a leftover piece of chicken, except for when I have to eat in front of people. This has actually been a pattern for some time, though I have not blogged about it because I had done so well with recovery and to slip back into the eating disorder seems like such a colossal failure I couldn't bring myself to admit it.

It came to a head a few days ago, when one of my friends posted an old photo on facebook, and then sent me a recent one of us hanging out.

I hate photos of me. I hate my reflection. I tend to avoid mirrors except when doing my makeup, so seeing photos of me is generally never a pleasant experience, but I can ignore them, brush it off, and move on.

Except the other day, when I saw M's recent photo of us, I kind of lost it. I feel huge. Unbearably huge.

Last night, I had an extremely vivid dream in which I got struck by lightning and died. It wasn't a quick death, but I was unbothered by the pain and the shock and instead my thoughts were more like FINALLY. When I woke up, I was so disappointed it took me like ten minutes to drag myself out of bed.

It's like Hyperbole and a Half put it in her post about depression--I don't necessarily want to kill myself, I just don't want to be alive anymore. If I didn't have the cats, things might be different, but for the moment I cannot bring myself to abandon them.

*Everyone is getting art for Christmas now because I'm poor.

When I asked you to build me a wall I was rather hoping that instead of just dumping the bricks in a pile you might have found time to cement them together... you know, one on top of another, in the traditional fashion.

I need one of those interlock things attached to my computer because

.......it's for Halloween.*

How such things went out of fashion I'll never know. Yes I realize they are somewhat complicated to assemble and a bit suffocating and bodily movement is very limited while wearing it, BUT IT'S SO PURRTY.

I dropped my upright bass on my foot this week.

Owning that instrument is fraught with dangers. Just moving it from one room to another poses significant risks to my physical health.

One time I had a dream that I could fly around on it, like a witch's broom.

#goals

My Day of Oldering** fast approaches, and already Mumsy and Lil Sis are stressing me out by trying to make a fuss.

I hate fuss. Every year is exactly the same--I insist I want no fuss, no party, nothing extravagant whatsoever, maybe just dinner out somewhere quiet and inexpensive and that's it.

So far, TWO dinners out are planned (one at an absurdly expensive steak house), and Mummers has been calling and texting non-stop demanding I send her a wish list for presents.

I don't want to seem ungrateful. Quite the opposite. I am very grateful that I'm getting two nice dinners and that I have a mother who wants to get me lots of presents. But I hate that she's spending so much money. I feel guilty.

So instead I tried to come up with a few things that I actually need, like these super sweet boots:

(I need another pair of boots to wear to work.)

and a used laptop with Windows (I need a computer with Windows*** to do freelancing transcription work to make some extra $$).

Mumsy responded to this with, "FINE I'll just give you money then!"

Righto.

Adventure to Weyerbacher should be [hopefully] happening this weekend. I am super excited.

*I shall use Halloween as an excuse to wear it out in public. I really just love period costumes and will probably keep buying more until the day I die.

**I stole that word from Tempest.

***I would never normally endorse the use of Microsoft Windows.