RatCreature's Reading List

It's been about three weeks since I've had the oomph to update.

• study: I now have a literal basket of books to read, ahead of giving a presentation in the academic stream at Swancon (coming up at the end of the month, for those planning to attend who haven't got that on their radar)
• study: response to reviewers for ethics got submitted. It has been discovered that the project agreement went missing somewhere in the system, and my primary supervisor followed up from an email from February. (I do not pretend to understand what is going on, but the uni with the primary ethics approval is not the one I'm enrolled at/not the node I'm allocated to, and thus there is Paperwork)
• body: i thought all the healing was done, but there is still some swelling in the right armpit, which is very slightly tender. Also, I keep bruising, so I'm going to throw vitamin C at things, and if that doesn't help I'll go see a doctor.
• health: I still have not got the 'get a cardiology appointment' sorted, because I put the paperworks somewhere sensible the last time I tried (and got lost in the phone transfer).
• body/health: I took today off to get my covid and flu vaccines.
• health: I nearly managed a 30h week last week! I actually feel like I'm making progress!
• body: yet again - injured a 'shoulder' muscle (down the back, near the shoulder blade). Same place as December. Diagnosis is 'probably sprained'. Took ages to be able to sit for half a day, so I did a lot of study from bed.
• oops: Youngest lost a fight with gravity / the barrier / the ice very early Sunday morning and we were called to take them to emergency. There was a very fretful coach asking if we didn't just want an ambulance called; I'm glad we didn't need it. 6am is a dreadful time to be woken by the phone, but all good. Half a dozen staples, mild concussion (lowest diagnosable level, is always concussion if the head hits hard enough to bleed is my new understanding), a week off exercise
• appliances: the washing machine has been broken for ?2 weeks. Solenoid that controls the spinning failed. Part is back ordered. We are relying on the kindness of chaosmanor and of Middlest for getting our washing done.
• swancon: the convention is getting close, we are now at weekly meetings, and it has reached the point where it feels like the wheels are coming off (this does not mean the wheels are coming off, just my ability to perceive the tasks to time ratio has failed).
• scheduling: i apparently had a radiation oncologist appointment this week, but I hadn't been notified well enough to have it in my diary, and the reminder message came through just before 9am the following day, so I called and explained and now I have an appointment in June.
• music: I made it to rehearsal Monday, but I'm not going tonight - I had hoped to, but I'm too tired to drive. This is an improvement on last week, when I was too tired to be safe to drive both Monday and Wednesday.
• medication: the new hormone suppressing medication isn't doing anything I'm noticing, which I'm counting as a win. The first couple of weeks of screaming insomnia (not actually the worst insomnia I've had, but it has been a little while and I'd let the memories fade some) seem to have settled into 'no point trying to sleep before 11pm', except on nights when I literally can't keep my eyes open.
• garden: we have harvested some of the prickly pear (tasty) but it doesn't seem to get loose the way I was informed, so I didn't get as many off and they are getting quite ripe. Next pass I'm going to take a very sharp knife to cut rather than tear (along with a different get of tongs, because the last time the tongs cut the fruit).
• weather: it has turned cold. By which I mean we have had days where the temp doesn't get above 20°C. I have pulled out my slippers. The heavy quilt is out, and i've put my extras back on the bed. *craft: I had a week and a bit where I made progress on Eldest's quilt. I have 10 incomplete blocks. I pulled out chaosmanor's pillow (although that might have been long enough ago that I've already blogged it) and if i could work out why I'm blocked on doing something, I'd have made progress (sorry hon, it will happen).

(this is dated 2025-10-05; I suspect I had plans to write more or edit it down, but I no longer care)

Today I got to completely baffle another non-binary individual (I'll call them Q). Because I have a simplified explanation for gender that I trot out as a 101 explanation when I'm not in a situation to actually do the proper couple of hours Ally Training spiel.

In this explanation, I get my new ally to think of a graph (in person there is a lot of hand waving around), where across the bottom is how much someone considers them self to be a woman - at the left, 0%, at the right, 100%. And likewise, up the side is male, where at the bottom is 0% and the top 100%. And I said that lots of women might put themselves right at the bottom right. But that say, someone who is a tomboy might still think of themself as 100% woman, but maybe 10% man. And yes, I get that I'm doing some dodgy things about defining femininity here; the person I was talking to is in their late 70s or early 80s, and while they absolutely are an ally, they haven't ever had to think about this.

But my explanation kept being interrupted as Q kept going 'what'? They truly were expecting me to explain using a line, with man on one end and woman on the other. They had a moment of 'are you treating these as independent variables'? And I was yes. yes I am. Because how much 'man' I feel on any given day appears to be completely independent of how much 'woman' I feel on any given day. And yes, actually, I agree that it is more accurately an n-dimensional whatsit (Q is doing a PhD in mathematics, they understand so much more math than I). But this is what works when I only have a little bit of time to explain.