Welcome to Chaos !!

There are strip clubs scattered all over Oregon and since Portland is the largest city in the state you can find most of the clubs here. There are about 30 or so clubs in Portland.....of various sizes.
Every year dancers compete in the Miss Oregon Exotic competition and I went to check out the finale last night.
I think 18 girls performed (I missed the first one) and at the end the dancer that won last year, Phoenix did her thing.
Some of the dancers were meh but some were freakin' AMAZING. Just wooooow. Upon entering Dantes, where the competition was held you got handed a plastic bead necklace to give to your fave dancer.
I had like four or five favorites, my beads went to Nia that is a dancer at the Golden Dragon. I loved her energy and her smile.
Of course she was super pretty too and a really good dancer.
Towards the end she climbed up high on the pole and she lit the ends of her heels on fire, the lights got dimmed and all you saw were sparkles flying.
In order to place in this competition you should work on a theme/presentation besides just doing the normal two songs on stage with some pole tricks. I personally look at posture, how well the girls move and pole technique. I do not like jerky fast movements, I prefer slower and seamless.
Last year's winner Phoenix put on a whole rock show last night with singing and like 20 back up dancers.
One of the presenters was 2020s winner Axel (she won doing a Clockwork Orange theme) and the other presenter was a guy that puts on all the dancer competitions around town (there are several), they referred to all the competitors as dancers which I love. All the girls were appreciated verbally. I feel that stripper is somewhat derogatory and sometimes used by people that feel they are better than "some stripper". Newsflash bitch - you ain't better. You just sorry so sit down.
Anyhow.....great evening!

It is one in the afternoon here on a Thursday in November which also happens to be Thanksgiving. My friend Ann spent the night and left a couple of hours ago. I am going to slowly go about my day.
No stress. No cooking anything from scratch except peeling potatoes (I leave most of the skin on the potatoes anyways), boiling them and making mashed potatoes. I am looking forward to eating the apple tart, the brussels sprouts and the red cabbage. Trader Joe's apple tart is AMAZING.



Need to feed the birds and the squirrels too.



Thankful every day for the comforts that I have. Water at the turn of a knob, a warm place to call home. Food to eat. Family and friends. Health. I wish everybody at least had the necessities like food and shelter. Everything else is extra.

As you know I cannot stand people that litter and I am a fierce animal lover. Of course I am NOT the only one feeling strongly about littering and animals. I am glad that other do too.
This is what people mentioned when asked what they do not like about others.





That is the TRUTH spelled out right there. "Littering is the biggest sign that you have no respect for 1) the earth 2) the animals 3) your fellow human being. There's is no fucking excuse for littering."
I am AMAZED over how many people in the US litter. Americans are very quick to loudly declare how proud they are to be Americans but at the same time have NO problem to leave their trash behind all over the place in the beautiful country they supposedly love so much. That is hypocrisy right there!

And I like this one too. This is often what I hear after people ask me where I am from and I tell them......and then they proceed to tell me that they are Swedish or German or whatever country it might be. I'm like....ok so you were born there? No my great grandma was Swedish......well yea ok. So you speak Swedish then? No? Ok.
By the way, I like Robert's last name there. Not really his last name but if you know Polish then you know that the word "kurwa" is used A LOT. You need to be Polish to truly understand how to use it.
I have the luxury of being Polish and Swedish.....so I understand these things.



Favorite movie anyone? Look.....my FAVE movie made number one! I love this movie! It is BEAUTIFUL and SAD.
Other movies high on my list.....Breakfast Club and Lost Boys. Besides those three I like movies in general. There are so many good ones.
Favorite color? All colors are beautiful. Favorite food? I love food too much to have a favorite dish but I am partial to Polish food (pierogies and barszcz czerwony), also ice cream, Princess Cake and pies, especially the fruit pies you find in Sweden served with vaniljsås. And I love Indian food. I love food in general. No diets for me.

I did not want to get out of bed today......but I had to because of my commitment to Pet Pack. Sundays means Pet Pack for me, not every Sunday but most. Today I had to pick up a donation from Mud Bay. This is a chain of amazing pet stores. And they are very generous, they donate weekly to us. Today Mud Bay donated several bags of kibble for dogs and cats. Canned food. Toys. And a large brand new crate on wheels. I loaded up my car with everything and headed for Stumptown to get a latte.



At Stumptown they clipped my coffee card with nine stamps because I brought in my own mug. That means I will get a free latte next Sunday! Generous! Stumptown is my fave coffee shop in Portland.

The art theme for Burning Man 2023 was announced a few weeks ago - Animalia.
The first time I went to Burning Man was in 2013 after years of wanting to go. That first time I decided that I was going to try to go 10 years in a row as a start.....if I am lucky enough to be there next year that will be my 10 year in a row at Black Rock City in Nevada.
In 2020 I went to Baker Beach in San Francisco for the gathering there (Baker Beach is the place where the first Burning Man happened). In 2021 I went to Renegade Burn/Free Burn which was held at the regular location in Nevada. So if I do not count 2020 Baker Beach, then next year will be my 10th year.
And Animalia is so far my FAVORITE art theme so I am feeling EXTRA excited over it. I love animals and I hope with this this theme, which will be interpreted in many different ways of course because it is Burning Man after all, but I am hoping that it will bring more understanding and compassion for our fellow friends here on this planet -the animals. I think the future is vegetarian/vegan. In the future I think majority of the human population will look back at history and be disgusted with our treatment of animals.

Well I tested positive for COVID, I tested at home with one of those test kits that got sent out to every household a while back. This might be the second time I have COVID, the first time was almost two years ago, mid November 2020. So sit back and relax and I will tell you about all my COVID ailments just like your older auntie in Queens would do.
The first time (in 2020) I was sick for about three days. I did not get tested. I was basically sleeping, slurping soup and drinking tea the whole time I was sick. It's been two years after all and I don't really remember all the symptoms. But it was similar to this time around. Just like your older Auntie in Queens, I am now older and have started to develop some age related memory loss.
But here I am on day four, still alive and kicking and I can tell you ALLLLLL about my COVID symptoms.
Monday I started feeling a tickle in my throat which developed into a full on body ache, my eye sockets even ached, chills, all the hair follicles on my legs and arms ached throughout the night, the muscles in my back ached and I did not sleep well. I probably had a fever too but my thermometer is broken so I do not know for sure but my body felt hot. I took two headache pills the first full day/night with COVID.
Somebody please send Tati a thermometer!
Tuesday it all continued but instead of chills at night I was sweating. Another night of poor sleep. Oh and LOTS of peeing throughout this whole ordeal. Wednesday I woke up feeling OK, still felt sick but not that sick but later towards the evening I started sneezing and coughing.
And today is Thursday, the coughing and sneezing is accompanied by a runny nose. It actually hurts in my throat to sneeze. And my cough is deep. My nose feels hot inside, the right nostril feels sore. My hair follicles on my scalp are achy. My lips are chapped on the inside of the mouth somehow.
Have I been sick like this before? Yes I have. As far as I can remember. It feels like a full on cold/flu.
And in case you do not know yet.....I belong to the minority of unvaccinated people.



I might entertain you with some more sick stories one day. I have noticed that some people love to talk about their sicknesses and ailments. I don't really relate to them but to each their own.
I will continue this evening with blowing my nose and hopefully tomorrow I will be almost back to normal.