Empress of Mars: Undisputed @zebratron2084@awoo.space

Current mental location: somewhere on the road between "scaring myself shitless over the studies that even mild COVID causes brain damage, because I'm not 100% sure I did the home test right and I've ALREADY probably got some dain bramage from a post-viral syndrome I got when I was 19" and "absolutely livid at the Reddit hoi polloi for not reading the goddamned article-- which says it's equivalent to about a year of extra brain aging and mostly affects the goddamn olfactory system-- and screaming OH MY GOD IT'S GONNA BE IDIOCRACY NOW"

i hate hate hate hate hate brains

this is why i was a transhumanist -- i was never some dipshit libertarian who thought Moore's Law was gonna make us wise somehow -- i just absolutely fucking want us all off this shitty broken platform, made out of wet fat and engineered for self-delusion-- as soon as possible

You know, I think my whole Deal with Artie -- other than the fact she's an adorable and mostly-friendly kitty-- is that she reminds me so much of me.

I know she's not really stupid. She's... she's obsessed with chasing something she doesn't quite understand. And man, if that isn't me too, little sister. 🐯​❤️​

I've joked that Artie is Peg and my moms' revenge for having to raise us. We'll never be cursed with the obnoxious "gifted" (read: "just smart enough to be a problem") children we deserve. So the Fates found a way and gave us a very "gifted" cat...

It dawned on me today that if cats have any kind of culturally native magical system, it probably revolves heavily around poo.

Artie on ground for dinner.

COVID test negative, though there are very high odds I screwed up the test. I always do -- there's a reason I didn't become a scientist.

Fun day! Caught COVID, developed a massive (related?) lip sore out of nowhere, went frantic over a missing Artie, and ended up mapping out the whole of our exneighbor's (now completely abandoned) house (while sick!). At least rescuing Doofus Cat gets a lot easier now...

She's currently on the ground with us. Yeah, the board our neighbor kindly put up before he moved out did nothing. But he left enough doors unlocked that we now have full reign of the place, at least until the landlord cares this place exists again.

So we haven't finished the quest, we just got a new quest. It's harder in some ways, but we have more time to do it in -- and rescuing Artie from the attic is just a matter of climbing up some stairs and snatching her up.

Welp.

The Artie Situation might be resolved for good. There is now a large white board blocking access to the broken attic window. There's just enough of a gap at the top to concern me, but it would explain why Artie's been on the GROUND for three days! ^___^

On the other hand... yeah. Got a scratchy throat, severely runny nose, and a weird inflamed feeling all over. Three days after the largest public gathering in NOLA in two years.

Oh, well. I'm triple-boosted. I didn't really have any big plans that required being outdoors for a while. And it could still just be the result of Bong Misadventures. I'll stay at home a couple days just to make sure.

Also, Peebs may have had a sip or two of caffeine from my tea. I THINK I grabbed her in time, though, and it looks like a few sips won't hurt most healthy adult cats, so... *sigh* Whatever. She's inside with us and I'll keep an eye on her.

1) Poobers [3]
2) Shempley Shemp Shemperton [4]
3) Shadowbutt [2]
4) Foobow [5]
5) Sugarbutt [6]
6) Fartemis [1]

Congratulations, Peeblet!

i am a godling <3

'Cause you know it, Bast, you sweet cosmic thing. I have gone all-in on Team Cat and Artie was GONNA get rescued one way or the other. Thank you for possibly arranging it so that we might not have do any major demolition or commit any felonies. :>

Oh my god.

I dare not speak too soon. I dare not hope.

But we have FINALLY got a hold of our neighbor and might have an actual solution to the Cat Stuck In Attic saga.

Not two hours after I buy a cat mask for Mardi Gras. Praise Bast! #bestkitty

this is the closest i will ever come to knowing godhood

Did I mention Worldle ain't shit? *grooms massive forepaw*

https://worldle.teuteuf.fr/

So for any of you who have been worried about the conflict in the Ukraine turning into omnicidal nuclear war, here's a very cold comfort:

Putin's got a real good chance of getting his kindred spirit and toadie into office in 2024. His propaganda war on us is one of the most successful in human history*. Why would he destroy a bunch of perfectly good real estate he's already paid for?

* SOURCE: own arsehole

I also finally connected with our dealer and got a batch of something nice and dreamy. Between this and a few days of tolerance break, I ended up having a really nice introspective session on the trolley ride to the parades.

Mostly, it finally occurred to me that some of the stuff we were doing at Transliminal and its predecessors was the emotional equivalent of cave diving: exhiliarating, rare, stressful, dangerous as shit, and not really a hobby for people interested in getting old-- something I am intensely interested in most days, despite the world's best efforts.

It's amazing I ever went that deep with ANYONE. It was a precious and truly unique time. If there's one thing I learned from Ghost Dog, it's that you should never dwell in the Spirit of an Age longer than you have to. We were fools. We were right to try doing it, but what we were doing was not sustainable at the levels of merely human emotional savvy we were working with. Leave it to less wretched beings, like the gods and plushies.

It's amazing that it ever happened, but it's probably a great and protective mercy that it ended, and the alternate universe where it didn't is probably even sadder. I got a lot of comfort out of this realization. *zen tigress*

Parades were fun but physically and mentally exhausting. My inner changeling gets massive snack value off the crowds and their sense of anticipation, but the parades themselves are actually kinda low technical event count for an ADHD child of the Internet like me. Might let Peg do tomorrow solo and bide my energy for the bigguns Saturday -> Tuesday.

Gave Artie, who is back up in the fucking attic of course, some water. This was shaping up to be only modestly stressful... until Shadow got into the abandoned apartment and hid behind the (rather nice actually) massive old-school porcelain bathtub. She's out, things are fine, whatever. Peebs is around somewhere but I am very uncharacteristically not looking to pet her, because I am so low on energy, especially cat energy.

in a cafe uptown, hanging out waiting for parades to get rolling, and i'm overhearing two guys who are bonding over real estate and finance

but they're both very new orleans kinda guys so it's super informal and chummy

it's both creepy and heartwarming, like the Donald Sutherland scream from Invasion of the Body Snatchers ending up in a big chummy wailing podmonster pub crawl

Attic. *sigh*

I'm not too uptight about it. I knew this was gonna happen; one or two good nights wasn't proof we'd broken the cycle.

I got a look up in the attic myself for the first time. It's small and cozy. I see why she likes it. Doesn't look hazardous, either.

I've convinced myself she's mostly safe except for food and water risks. I HATE that we've got no other good plan right now, but I guess we leave her up there for a week with enough food and water to keep her going, and see how she feels about the attic afterwards.

It's gonna be a weird week.

ladies. gentlemen. enbies.

I will not be truly happy until a troupe of queer furry bandits has set up an impenetrable camp outside a major US city, shut down an entire interstate, taken at least one Republican legislator hostage, slit the throat of said hostage when they inevitably try to cut a fake deal with them, and mailed their body back to Washington, postage due.