Heat hell

The other weekend I went out to party, or rather, I tried to. Even though the bar was quite full of people, the main bar counter was still not open. Well, I saved money when I only bought one drink, and that saved me from a hangover. I used to go to that bar often in the summer, from the opening to the closing. But apparently there's no need to go there anymore, since they're not interested in selling alcohol.

And then the heat came, so I can't go out. I finally went out in the evening when they say it's cooler then, and now it's "only" 27 degrees. But they say you can't get vitamin D from the sun in the evening, so it's not good.

The funniest thing about the heat is of course that my feet complain that they're freezing. I've been wearing thin cotton socks instead of thermal socks and wool socks. Sick. I guess I have to buy pycnogenol since many people claim that it can help with blood circulation in the legs. I used it years ago for endometriosis.

 

 

One night I saw an alien in my bedroom by the wardrobe. I was terrified and my heart was racing. It's nice to know that according to a recent study nightmares shorten the lifespan.

Nothing will come of this anyway, since I've been stressed all summer. My jaw is in the wrong position all the time. What am I stressing about? At least about health issues and my writing. That's sick, too.

I realized that I don't get much vitamin C from food. Of course, I take a vitamin C supplement every day, but still. My diet is so one-sided these days. Of vegetables, I mostly eat carrots, and sometimes broccoli less often because it's more expensive. I've been eating kiwis now, but they're bad for my tooth enamel. I used to eat strawberries, open-field cucumbers and watermelon in the summer, but now I can't when I'm even poorer. I don't care about cooking, and I try to get by with as little as possible. I cook some frozen vegetables in a pot, and I prefer to cook meat in the oven. If I did it in a pan, I would have to watch over it, no thanks.

 

 

I've been trying to write and edit my second novel in July. It feels like an endless swamp, because only about half of the text is even somewhat in chronological order. It hasn't progressed as much or as well as I had hoped. And I've even cried when I got to a certain point in the editing process, and LibreOffice closed itself without saving. I usually save often, but not that time. And the closing wasn't caused by Libre itself, but by my mouse, which likes to do its own thing and act as it pleases. My nerves are just going 24/7.

As the anniversaries of the cats' deaths approach, I've been crying. A year ago, they were about to die, and I, an idiot, didn't realize anything. Even a year without cats is so terrible that I can't bear it. Luckily, there are no old and sick cats suffering from this heat.

Is there life after Dreamlight Valley? I've spent 175 hours of my summer on it, completely addicted. But I have to stop when I finish all the friendship quests and there's nothing left to do. I could get more things to do by buying the DLCs, but of course I won't do that since I've borrowed the base game from the library. I do dream of a capybara... a big guinea pig, which you get in one of the DLCs.

 

 

The trip to Lidl was a success because I got the clothes I wanted, namely cycling shorts and sleeveless tops. I was pretty sure they wouldn't be cotton, but luckily they were. The cycling shorts were an older batch though because they were on sale, only 3.23 euros. There were no linen tops in size S, so I didn't buy them. But I was very disappointed when there was no sugar-free milk chocolate at all, I'm afraid they've stopped making it altogether.

 

Summer without summer

13 degrees. I didn't go anywhere on my birthday. But I can't complain. I had champagne with strawberries, strawberry curd, strawberry cake, concerts to watch and games to play. I'll have to go party some other time, when the weather is better and I'm feeling better. If that ever happens.

 

 

I bought myself the game Squirrel with a gun as a birthday present, I've wanted it for a long time and it happened to be on sale.

Great summer. It's July and I haven't had to wear summer home clothes, such as dresses, skirts or shorts. I haven't had to take the fans out of storage. It's still better this way. I got traumatized last summer when I felt dizzy after a run, and it was "only" +22 at the time.

This summer I've mainly focused on growing pumpkins, and okra has also been a byproduct. So in the game Dreamlight Valley, that's my happy place.

There was a power outage on the evening of July 1st. Luckily I had time to shower and grease my feet, otherwise it would have been more difficult in the dark.

 

Writing

LibreOffice has strange ways. The last time I complained that I couldn't hyphenate in it. Well, the next day I just had to open the text file in question, and LibreOffice hyphenated it automatically. Of course, I had opened it quite a few times the day before.

And there are always new problems. They claim that it's worth using something like a line register. Using it just increases the number of pages in the book a lot (the first time the number of pages increased from 326 to over 400), and thus the price.

When I added page numbers, the style of the entire file was then some kind of Grid8. Then try changing the style settings.

It's an endless battle with LibreOffice. I save the file with certain settings, and it has 350 pages. When I open the same file again, it only has 325 pages. Did the line register get lost somewhere? Does LibreOffice hyphenate the file again every time it's opened? There are lot of mysteries, and nothing will ever be finished.

You can enable the line register in at least three different settings. And when you enable these, each one results in a completely different number of pages. And the question is, can LibreOffice even do line registers/baseline grids? At least with one of those settings, the lines are just randomly in some places.

I have set the page height to 21.50cm. But it always changes by itself to 21.52cm. The same thing every time I open the file: the line register has disappeared from use, and an extra two millimeters have appeared in the page size.

I forced myself to take several days off from fighting with LibreOffice, because it's nerve-wracking and eyes-wracking, and the stress is devastating.

I also don't understand why BoD's instructions tell you to save the fonts in that Word text file, if the book has to be sent to them as a PDF file.

And then I started playing with Books on Demand's cover editor. Luckily, there is one, so you don't have to do it yourself. I've had the cover image for my debut novel chosen for a long time. Although BoD suggested this.

 

 

 

ER

Carter has really started to annoy me this time watching ER.

Season 9: Tells Abby he's not going anywhere. Leaves for Africa soon.

October: "Dear Abby" letter from Africa.

January: Returns to Chicago with a new pregnant woman. Someone might say that's fast action?

There's a reason why some people hate Kem. And then you are supposed to cry when the child dies. I LAUGH.

And it's all Carter's actor's fault. He was said to be a pretty shitty person. He hated all the new actors who came to the series, especially Kellie Martin. He hated that the new guys got screen time. Didn't want Carter and Lucy together. Wanted Carter and Abby together. Wanted himself off the show. As a result, the plot of the series changed from what was intended.

 

 

47 years

I've been scared that I'll be sick for my birthday. In the last seven years, I've been sick twice on my birthday. When I turned 40, I had pneumothorax, and in 2022, I had coronavirus. And what's so great about this time? The endometriosis pain started a week ago. My birthday is now at a bad time, both in terms of health and weather. There's a thunderstorm and heavy rain expected today. And yet I'd like to go out to party.

 

 

I was a big F1 fan in my teens, and at that time the drivers used Moët & Chandon to spray champagne. Ever since then I've wanted to try that brand of champagne. I thought it wouldn't be possible for me because of the too high price and sugar content. But then I found out that the brand also sells smaller bottles, and even a low-sugar version. The smallest bottle isn't available here, but the second smallest (0.375 l) is. 33.58 euros. 

 

 

I didn't dare to go to buy alcohol until I got a valid passport. And then of course they didn't ask for any ID, outrageous.

I'm afraid that sparkling wine will make me feel sick (again). But I still have to drink it, from morning on.

 

In recent years, I've played my favorite game Friday the 13th: The Game for my birthday. That game is basically dead now, but in practice it's still possible to play it on PC and Playstation. Even though I've already downloaded the Resurrected mod for that game on my computer, it'll still have to wait.

I've been thinking about watching some concerts, like NKOTBSB's London concert in 2012, it's already been 13 years?!

 

 

So I want to go out to eat and drink. The last time I went out for my birthday was in the summer of 2020, when I was exceptionally able to eat at Wanha Satama when there was no Wine Festival. Now I can't.

Storm

I've been following the weather forecast diligently, it's been quite a roller coaster. Example: one day, according to the forecast, this day would have been the warmest in a 10-day period, and a couple of hours later the forecast had changed completely to the opposite, meaning this would be the coldest day of the week. So it was worth stressing about the weather forecast for 15 days. Then on Monday I was told that there would be a storm in Finland today! When I want to go somewhere for the first time in five years, this is what happens.

We'll see how badly I'll freeze. How badly my feet freeze. And I definitely want to put on my silk dress. And that's a problem if it rains because silk doesn't withstand water. Maybe it will melt off in the rain? Was that dress actually on me then in the summer of 2020? Anyway, the last time I used it, it had a stain that looked like a drop of water, but it didn't go away with time. Now that I've checked the dress many times, I just haven't been able to find the stain. I wonder if I'll find it when I put it on.

There are exactly two shoe options. I'd really like to wear peep-toes, but is it too cold? Of course, closed-toe heels warm the feet (calves) much more. If only the heels wouldn't affect me like they did last time. The prognosis is pretty bad because my feet have been affected by other things now, burning pains + joint pains.

 

 

 

The forecast is pretty bad if I go out partying in cold stormy weather while feeling unwell. The backup plan is of course to stay home, order some food, and play some game while drunk.