a day off

 according to dr google i'm at risk of developing a stroke because i used a massager on my neck. i'm not sure that's true, but i'm definitely scared off doing that again as the back of my head's been feeling a bit numb since i did it.

...

i got a relatively good night's sleep last night, minus waking up in the middle of the night with my neck / shoulder locking up and needing more than half an hour of work to be able to return to bed, but little-to-no lower back or hip discomfort.

mr smear, however, did not have a good night. he's clearly properly sick, regardless of yesterday's RAT outcome.

the three of us left him home alone as my mother and i dropped gd off at her physio appointment, then walked about florentin looking for blinds. we eventually found a place, but were rather put off by their charging approximately NIS 500 per small window, and double that per door. we have quite a few windows and doors.

as it is, i'm feeling decidedly financially unstable lately...

we met up with gd and went to meshek barzilay for a really nice lunch. speaking of financially unstable :P

we then returned home for a while - disturbing mr smear's full day of screen time - and a bit later my mom and i paid a visit to the library, where i checked out a better (though not pristine) copy of my name is asher lev. we meandered all over the place until catching a bus home, then meandered between the shops to find vegan marshmallows, then returned home for a relaxed evening.

i mean, it was relaxing for my mother and i, for gd and mr smear not so much. him because he's sick, her because in spite of a good physio session her shoulder's been locking up the whole afternoon.

my mother made - and taught gd to make - her pea soup for dinner, which was delicious ^_^

i've just put mr smear to bed, reading between his coughs, and i'm amazed to see it's 11pm already (O_o)

...

aside from contesting my parking fine, and opening an investigation into our bean bag purchase (after holding for half an hour to be told they'll call me back, after more than a week of trying to get hold of them to find out where our bean bags are), and holding for half an hour with social security to be told that i should just ignore the last message i got from them, i've been made very uncomfortable by the idea that there are authors warning other authors not to so much as quote a lyric of a song - even if it's clear that it's a quote - because that's not considered fair use. i cannot believe that's true, but if it's true, then the state of copyright law is even more awful and even less aligned with its spirit than i thought.

...

i saw a couple of disturbing things today: even "educational" tech is interfering with our kids learning, and this guy's quote is heartbreakingly powerful: "do you know how hard you have to abuse a mammal to make them not have children?"

we're in serious shit as a species right now.