#salty pirates
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Salty Pirates month hasn't gone as I'd hoped. I've been just barely keeping on top of the regular daily chores (feeding myself, doing dishes, and getting garbage, recycling and green waste out to the bins on time, as well as doing laundry and getting that mostly folded and put away), but I haven't tackled many of the deep clean and organize things I was hoping to accomplish.
I have been knitting, though, so even though I didn't cast on for the big project I thought would be my Knitvember project, I did start and finish two pairs of socks (posted previously), and I finished a hat that was in time out since August, and I started a new pair of fingerless mitts, and have completed the first one.
Going to CO the second mitt tonight, and tomorrow I want to go buy yarn to make a pair of socks or slippers for my late husband's mum for Christmas.
Hat pattern is Metallic Magnetism, mitts are Second Skin, both available on Rav
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Today in the penultimate Salty Pirate Adventure of the year, I went four rounds against the oven.
I think it's a tie.
UFyH style, let's do Before and After photos!
Before:
This oven is less than a year old. Its interior ought to be blue. Also, whichever among us three sometimes cooks directly on the grate, we all need to stop that.
(This is going to make my occasional Eggo Lunch more tedious. Worth it to have no more battles like today.)
I followed the directions to do a Steam Clean cycle. It loosened up some of the crud, but nowhere near enough. And I was doing myself an injury as I attempted to use a wet washcloth to wipe away the grease. No matter what I did, some grease continue to be on the wall and the cloth that I was using showed signs of needing to be cleaned.
I therefore made baking soda paste with which I coated all areas that were not heating elements. I left that to think about what it was doing for a quarter of an hour or more while I cleaned one of the oven grates.
I spent an hour and a half trying to wipe away all of the residue. Mostly the baking soda succeeded in breaking up the grease and pulling it away from the oven walls. But now I had a problem of a white film on everything it took repeated runs of completely cleaning out my washcloth and then wiping the entire up and down -- starting at the top rear.
This hurts like the dickens. I don't really bend the ways that I need to bend in order to do this job.
I now understand why it would have occurred to people long ago that an older woman living alone might decide to take a small child and put them inside of the oven. However it would have been a cold oven with cleaning supplies; and the child would have been instructed to reach all the places Auntie or Baba is too old or too disabled to properly scrub.
After:
I am not delighted.
I put in more water and ran the Steam Clean cycle an extra time. Even though I got a clean damp towel to wipe everything down as soon as the half hour cycle had finished, I still have some stains. And I still have this white film on the glass.
Unfortunately at this point I am too physically uncomfortable to try anything further.
At least it's safe to use?
I'll give it another go in two days.
#salty pirates#naclyoho#national clean your home month#ufyh#ufyh before and after#oven cleaning#yuck
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Let us end on cats!
First off, high five to everyone who participated in NaClYoHo, regardless of how much you got done or how quickly. Everything you did made your life better! (At least I hope. If it didn’t, you should spend December investigating whether or not you are cursed.) Thanks for playing along with me like always -- and let’s raise a silent toast to the inventer of Barkeeper’s Friend.
Normally I would spend the last day of NaClYoHo trimming the Christmas tree and decorating, but I’m going to be gone for a couple of days beginning tomorrow afternoon and I don’t want to leave the cats alone for days on end with a brand new Shiny Thing To Explore. So I’ll get out the holiday decoration boxes when I get home on Sunday, and instead today I did the traditional Cleaning For The Catsitter. Which was in its own way a good way to end the month, because it was a general tidying-up and taking-stock.
The place looks good! There’s a new electric blanket on the sofa and a new end-table at the end of it. All of my baking supplies now have their own home in the kitchen, which has been reorganized (somewhat) and scrubbed down (already filthy again but that’s kitchens for you). The craft supplies are all organized and stored. The bathroom is clean and has shiny new rugs and mats on the floor, the bedroom closet has been Kondo’d, and all the storage bins in the bedroom have been sorted through. All of the stuff to donate is in boxes in stacks next to the printer so that I can print labels and mail them off, one by one. The front hallway is almost completely clear of junk that’s been there for a year, and the hall closet has new storage bags in it to hold seasonal clothes, so they aren’t inaccessibly shoved under the bed anymore. There’s still a corner of the condo that’s just full of stuff to sort through but the corner is out of the way, and the stuff is not time-sensitive, I’ll get to it soon. Everything the moths got into has either been thrown out or washed thoroughly, and the moths have not been in evidence for at least two weeks.
I have run the dishwasher every single day this month. If I don’t have food to last through the winter at this point it’s not my fault.
And my fancy Christmas present from my folks, a new. compact, not-smelly and very quiet dehydrator, arrived today and has been cleaned and put away. Next farm share box arrives next Wednesday and I am gonna dehydrate the fuck out of at least some of what’s in it, whatever that may be.
[ID: A photograph of my cats, Polk the tabby and Dearborn the tortie, lying on my duvet; for once they do not look super purple. Polk is stretched out in a sphinx-like position, front paws out in front of her, gazing suspiciously at the camera. Next to her, Dearborn is curled up in a ball, back to the camera, but her legs are also stretched out in front of her as if she just flopped down into a curl.]
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Day 1 NaClYoHo
Today's goal is to un-decorate from Halloween!
This is going to involve:
Washing Halloween dishware Done!
Washing Halloween laundry--in progress, also found a load of laundry I forgot was already in the washer, whoops!
Finding/wrapping/packing decor items--in progress
Fitting everything back in the storage tote--in progress
A bonus for this item, since it's closely related, is putting out the last of the Thanksgiving decorations.
I plan to combine this with watching Life Below Zero (my dad and I watched the show as a bonding activity; he died last year). I forgot that I had set the series to record and a bunch of new episodes are sitting in my DVR. So during commercial breaks or between episodes or generally when I feel like pausing, I get up and work on un-decorating. And when I start feeling tired or overwhelmed, I sit down and start watching again. I'm hoping there will be enough "natural" reasons to want to get up or pause the show that I won't get sucked down into inertia again.
Here's a picture of one of my Halloween items! I collect these nutcrackers and get a new one each year. Gonna have to get a new shoe box for them soon.
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I have spent my entire weekend off being a homebody and I almost feel like a human being again
That's not entirely true ig, Friday after work I went to the coworker I actually likes' house, they gave me a haircut and we hung out for a bit. Counting the haircut as my "cleaning/selfcare" thing for the day.
Yesterday I was gonna do the dishes... but then I spent almost 300 bucks at fleet farm instead. (My nice sorel winter boots have both developed cracks in the rubber that makes them waterproof... no good for work :( so I bought new, equally expensive, winter boots. Hopefully the carhartt boots are as trustworthy as their jackets.) I also did a ton of random organizing shit in my living room, put together a feather frame to cut down on that collection, etc.
Today I did the dishes! (And basically fuck all else! But dishes suck so I don't care.) I've been working on one of my twine rugs this evening to maybe start chipping away at that backlog, we'll see how far it gets.
Tomorrow I might prime some of my warhammer stuff after I get home from work, it should be nice enough the paint will behave and then I can not worry about it for the winter lol. I'd also like to hang a poster, I stopped at a cute art museum the last time I went home and got a poster of a pelican that's super pretty. Not sure where I'll put it though.... my living room is Animal Art but most of it is of animals I specifically worked with. Then again I do work with pelicans. Idk.
I'm pretty sure TB tests are this week at work too but that's pretty painless.
#national clean your home month#naclyoho#salty pirates#anyway thanks for coming to my ted talk#about how im not good at being a functional adult#but oh well
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NaClYoHo vs. ADHD
I'm even more of a mess than my apartment, and I haven't done much about either me or the apartment in ages. But I made some cleaning progress today:
dirty dishes that were in the bedroom are soaking in hot, soapy water
dirty laundry collected and sorted into hampers and moved out of the bedroom
clean laundry put away (some stuffed into drawers, some neatly folded)
some trash and recycling taken to the kitchen bins
giant wheeled container with supplies for church into the living room so I can sort and donate the stuff inside (I'm not doing that job any more! Hooray!)
giant green+spinach salad with turkey, tomatoes, olives, mozzarella, and Italian dressing for dinner
It isn't much, and Dad expressed his regret that my motivation took a nosedive (he said he wasn't criticizing me, but his tone of voice told a different story), but the housework took me three 20-minute sessions. My room is still a mess, and I have a few things to move off my bed so I can sleep. But it was something, it didn't exhaust me, and my room looks a little less awful.
I got one of those tomato-shaped timers to use for UFYH/Pomodoro Method time management, but even 20 minutes seems to be too long. My first 20-minute session ended with me yelping in fear because I'd forgot about the damn thing. I'd got distracted so many times in the first fifteen minutes that I ended up standing in the living room, watching the pie fight in "The Great Race." (Dad was watching it.) I got back to my room just in time for the tomato timer to reach zero and clang shrilly. I'm looking into how to stay focused better while cleaning.
ADHD: 1
Me: 0
I've got into the Beatles recently, and my current favorite playlist on TIDAL is a few dozen of their happy-sounding songs. I've been sick with bronchitis for two weeks, but I am getting better. It was nice to sing (hoarsely) and dance (a very little) while I worked.
P.S. I don't drink alcohol. At all. How the hell did I end up with a bottle of wine on my bedroom floor?
#naclyoho#salty pirates#i haven't forgot#just overwhelmed most of the time#pomodoro method#unfuck your habitat#ufyh#real life#me and my limp lungs
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Ok three days of not being able to get myself to do the things I actually wanted to, I'm taking today off even trying.
I did get things done, I did a load of laundry and a load of dishes, but i feel like they don't count. They're "normal" things, not worthy of #naclyoho you know? ho?
That also means a night off from Bastards. Probably a good time - last night was a 3-part series about the worst racist in American history, and next up is a 3-parter on Zuckerberg.
So. Tonight, it's dying hair, drinking coffee, fighting clanks and...spiders with cutlery.
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i did not accomplish much for naclyoho yesterday or the day before, just folded some laundry before going to bed each night (though i did finally catch up on a lot of work work on wednesday which was such a relief for my brain and my work life balance, so totally worth not getting a lot of cleaning done)
however being fully caught up on my laundry meant finally having to accept the fact that i do not have enough room for my clothes and i will not be able to weed out enough clothing to make it fit. so new task added to my list to buy a wardrobe or something because i straight up can't put all my laundry away
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So today I woke up and it was pouring down rain. Not like a normal "Oregon November" rain, but "Build thee an ark!" My desire to crawl under the house an do plumbing was...low. Bottom of the Marianas Trench low.
So today was a low-sodium Salty Pirate day. I finished off a second pair of wool pants for the winter--I'm wearing them right now, actually--and I assembled and hanged an OMG!bright light over the sewing machine, as I persist in wanting to sew dark colors at times other than high noon on cloudless days in the summer.
The rest of the day was working on a fun little quilting project, petting cats, drinking hot chocolate, and otherwise treating a rainy day with the disdain it deserves. Though it did clear up in the afternoon.
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NaClYoHo Days 1 and 2
I’ve been sick for a few days (just a cold, but it’s kicking my ass), so I haven’t gotten as much done as I would like, but I’ve made headway in some things I’ve been putting off.
Yesterday I got started on cleaning/sorting/tossing a pile of stuff from my parents’ house that I needed to go through. It will take longer, but I spent about an hour on it.
Today I’m feeling rather nasty so I only spent about 10 minutes cleaning some stains on the carpet, but it’s something I’ve been meaning to do for months, so it feels like an accomplishment!
Next goals are to finish the pile from the parents’ house, re-pot some plants, and deep clean the upstairs bathroom. We’ll see if I’m feeling up to any of those tomorrow. If not, I can do a load or two of laundry.
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Salty Pirate month has gotten off to a slow start. On the first, I only managed to do the usual dishwashing/kitchen tidying, and nothing extra.
The second and third were a write off, as I went to see Jagged Little Pill on the Thursday, leaving directly after work,, and not getting home until 11:45PM. My alarm for work goes off at 5:30AM, so needless to say I was dragging ass on Friday, and went to bed early that night.
When I got home from work yesterday, Saturday the 4th, I did some preliminary organizing in the glass foyer-- took down the old string lights that were half dead, and recycled some packaging and other cardboard, then tested the timer/solar light sensor to make sure it was still working properly.
Today's Salty Pirate chores were cleaning the windows in the foyer before hanging the new string lights, sweeping out the stairwell to my apartment, and re-sticking the floor mat at the top of the stairs with double sided tape (which necessitated removing the old tape with a scraper) in preparation for snowy weather.
I've also decided to attempt a knitvember challenge, and will try to finish the sock I'm working on, graft the toes of the two pairs I will have completed then, and knit the "Le Square" shawl this month.
The socks are no problem, I'm an inch and a half from starting the gusset increases on the second sock of the second pair, but the shawl will be the bigger challenge.
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Photo descriptions in Alt text.
I decided to enrich my ttrpg enclosure by upgrading some organizational stuff.
I have owned these wooden boxes for years. They are great for tidying away minis or handout props, but within two weeks I stop seeing the boxes. That means I forget about their contents.
Maybe I can make the boxes stand out from the bookshelf a bit? Adorn with metaphors for the plot devices they should contain?
My first step on the little crate is to sand it down, at least around the edges. It's going back inside for tonight, because I cannot deal with the noise and smell of sawdust. Anyway, I want to install hinges on the lid so I can get rid of the nails.
Everything else needs at least a couple coats of this sparkly metallic blue stain. Except the coffee and lid -- those are for keeping me going.
I'm painting exclusively inside the cardboard box. Also they will stay in the box while they dry. I know that I will have spray, drips, and spills; I want to clean up easily, without damaging my home or the front garden.
.
Later:
I thought a single coat to most surfaces would take me about fifteen minutes. I stopped here for the evening because I had been standing for over an hour.
The little cube takes the stain well! I continue to roll low on my minimal Mechanical Skills stat. Cube looks surprisingly even. I can see my haphazard brush stroke technique on the rectangular box. That one may require three coats to get a pleasing result.
I used the old smartphone box to wipe excess paint off of the paintbrush because I have no idea if it could look nice. What the hey, I don't have that phone anyhow.
#weird furniture project#paint#wood stain#art#i have the sandpaper but not the patience this week#long post#salty pirates#naclyoho#national clean your home month
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The cleaning I did today was not exactly new or visually impressive, so again I simply offer you my cat.
[ID: A photograph of Dearborn the tortie, sitting smugly on the second-best blanket, front legs propped up against my ankle under the blanket. She has enormous cute eyes and looks like she probably belongs in a witch’s shack in an anime adaptation of a beloved children’s novel.]
I was going to do some digital cleaning but I realized I hadn’t finished sorting the craft stuff, so I did that instead. It’s about 90% organized at this point; there is one bin that’s just “shit I don’t know what to do with” but it’s genuinely stuff I don’t know what to do with, not stuff that isn’t where it belongs. I’ll work through some of my current projects and then see about sorting that out. In any case everything else is in a specific place in a specific bin, and I have one bin of “projects to complete” that is looking less like a heap and more like an orderly queue. Some of it I can complete fairly quickly so I might set up December as a “crafting in the evening” kind of a month.
But not the rest of November because I am tired. Feeling very productive, but ready to rest for a bit.
I did manage to get all the various patches I own (but don’t currently have on a bag) into one place, and rummaging in the craft supplies produced a number of stickers that I’m using to decorate the faux-wood end table with, to make it feel less like an Aspirational Living Decor Piece and more vintagey and in keeping with my home design aesthetic. Said aesthetic is best described as “Now that I know I have ADHD I’m doing this on purpose.”
Most of my shortform podcasts are still on break after Thanksgiving, so I listened to the latest episode of Criminal, summarizing the Tylenol Murders -- pretty much review for me, but I like listening to Phoebe Judge talk. Also did a little bit of sorting of projects while watching Cristiano Ronaldo try to take credit for Bruno Fernandez’s goal in the Portugal-Uruguay match. (The amount of shit that footie tumblr is heaping on CR7 is amazing, don’t stop ever.)
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Day 29 NaClYoHo
'Twas another tiring day at work, so my cleaning accomplishments are fairly modest:
Took out trash
Had Roomba vacuum the kitchen
Picked up a package
Did a little digital cleaning (tidied up my inbox, updated some account info)
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Fuck it, we'll try NaClYoHo this year. Mostly bc I'm moving in a couple days anyway. I suspect after the initial burst of Things That Must Be Done Now my ADHD ass is gonna need some help finding motivation to exist. Luckily, the first few days I will have the motivation of "you are moving Saturday and therefore things need to be done."
Yesterday's accomplishments included signing forms at the doctor's to get my medical records transferred, ordering a desk, and seeing my grandmother before I leave (not an inherently stressful thing, but moreso it was stressful by being Something That Needs Doing).
Today's goals include buying Another desk (I'm going to have my workspace in one bedroom and a Fun Stuff space in the other room. I hesitate to call it a gamer space but if the shoe fits.) And also I need to Pack More. Hoping today I'll get the vast majority of the rest of my stuff packed, so tomorrow and Saturday I can just worry about the things I use daily.
Good luck to everyone else trying this for the first time!
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~ Black | White | Yellow ~
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