Today I went to look at Ole Bolle Troll at Nordia House, a beautiful place in SW Portland. The troll has been there for a couple of months now and there are five more trolls to be found around here in the Pacific Northwest. All made from recycled material by Danish artist Thomas Dambo. Very impressive.....Ole Bolle looks great. I have read many troll tales in my days.
"There’s something in the air that something makes my belly rumble
Something smells so strong it hits me almost makes me stumble
Could it be the little people cooking something smelly
In their cooking jar, so I can put them in my belly"
From thomasdambo.com
Today as we know.....is Halloween. It is a bit past 10 pm and I am in bed. Doing nothing tonight. Besides eating and laying in bed. Which makes for a close to perfect evening if you ask me. Add a two hour massage and it would be a perfect evening.
But Happy Halloween! I love Halloween. Anything spooky, haunted houses, fairy tales, ghost stories.....that is what I like.
Let me show you some pictures from this last week. October is coming to an end.....the nights are cold now. Yesterday's full moon - the Hunter's Moon.
I keep spreading BRC Weekly around. By the way, the art theme for Burning Man 2024 is Curiouser & Curiouser.
Feeling curious about what this might mean? Read about it here......
https://journal.burningman.org/2023/10/philosophical-center/the-theme/2024-curiouser-curiouser/
I have been sharing my morning lattes with Kaya. She is so pretty. It is sweater time in the mornings.
I brought this growing avocado plant inside today. It somehow grew this tall......from an avocado pit that I planted in my backyard.
Sunday evening.....I am underneath my electric blanket (like the best thing ever). My plans for this evening......quiet time and reading.
There are some things on my Barf List. Littering is one. Another is how people handle their trash. In the rather small apartment complex I live it seems like majority of the tenants have zero clue about how to throw away their trash and how to recycle, this is very difficult for them to comprehend. Even though there are instructions posted on what goes where and how to bag and dispose of the trash in the garbage and recycle area, clearly written in English. As far as I know I am the only non American living here and I can read and understand the instructions. Bagging the trash in the appropriate trash bag and tying the bag? That is too much to ask. Just throw away half turkeys (?) not in a bag, put trash in the recycling bins, recyclables in the trash bins, plastic in the glass only bin, glass bottles and glass jars in the bins where the glass should not go, chunks of meat in the yard debris bins......whatever.
Food waste. Like WTF is this? Did you just buy a whole salad only to throw it away? Packages of unopened salad dressing just put there to be discarded. Lots of left overs here. I very rarely throw away food. Food scraps in the form of potato peels or apple cores, bell pepper cores etc go back into nature. Is is frightening how much good food is thrown away daily. It is disrespectful to the animals that died in order to end up at someone's plate. I feel the same way about fruits and vegetables. Something grew and I decided to eat it, so I will do my best to honor that. And then of course.....some people would be extremely grateful if they did not have to go hungry. And some people just don't give a fuck.
Public laundromats........yikey. One of the laundromats I used to go to (I do not have a washer and dryer in my apartment) had warm water, like a bit warmer than lukewarm half of the time even when I selected and paid for hot water. Yes, hot water costs more. I pointed that out but these places are not always staffed so there is like nobody to talk to about an issue most of the time. Plus they told me that they never clean the washers on the inside. They considered the washers to be clean enough due to laundry being done. Whaaaaaat? So I found another laundromat, in a "nice" area. They supposedly clean the washers here on the inside once a month. Wow. Progress I guess.
There are often some colorful individuals there......doing their thing. The super wash with hot water is $4.25 for 22 minutes. At least three of those minutes go to the washer filling up with water, draining the water and then the spin cycle. Do clothes get clean in 19 minutes or less? I don't think so.
This is not how Swedish tvättstuga worked when I lived in Sweden. The hot water is always HOT and I don't know if 22 minutes is even an option. That is like a pre-soak.
Since a while now I have been doing my laundry at a friend's house, she has a very nice full size washer with no agitator and a nice dryer. THANK YOU dear friend, my life has improved because of this. My laundry comes out clean and fresh. It really does make a difference where and how you do laudry. I like my stuff a certain kind of clean when I do laundry and laundromats can be very gross.......apparently I am not the only one that think so.
I love reading on Reddit, so many topics to dive into. Anyhow.....I had to copy one of the responses. It could had been me writing this except I would had added that the guy took his clothes off, everything and briefly stood around nekkid before he found a pair of pants to step into. Later he needed help to zip up his back pack so I helped him of course. Good thing I am not a pearl clutcher. I mean, I get it......You had to wash the pants you were wearing so you took them off, after all we are all naked underneath our clothes. Perhaps I should get naked at the laundromat as well but charge $, then I can use whatever I make to do my laundry. $4.25 is kind of a lot.
"When I lived in Portland I was doing my laundry at a local laundry mat and this homeless guy who was well known in the area with hair so dirty it formed thick disgusting dreads that his his skin infected, hairy face. You could literally smell this man coming from at least six blocks away if the wind shifted. I’m not kidding or trying to be rude I do feel for his situation in such a damp area. Even having access to clean clothes out there feels like they are always damp even out the dryer. Anyway I watched him come into the laundry mat and load his sleeping bag and other clothes all reeking with filth into a dryer and dry them so he could be warm…. These places are unintended and homeless people will take advantage of whatever they can and I’m not judging them for that, it’s really not their fault but it’s a reality. I made sure not to use the same dryer but I left Oregon with a skin infection regardless and I’d never had that issue in my life. I knew I couldn’t be sure he hadn’t already used every dryer in the place over time without them being cleaned I mean it was a crapshoot."
I do NOT use the dryers at laundromats for this very reason. Prior to using my friend's washer and dryer that is. I take all the clothes home, hang dry most. IKEA has good drying racks. Anything that needs to go in the dryer I take back home and put in the two dryers the tenants in my complex have access to. I am fairly certain that the tenants here put their laundry through the wash before putting it in one of the dryers.
Today Britney's story came out in book form - The Woman In Me. This is a memoir and a ghostwriter was used. A lot of the content is all over the internet so I did not get the book, yet at least. But I did go to the bookstore today to look at the book.
I love Britney. Have you seen her early performances? She was so amazing! I saw her in Vegas in 2015......yes pictures from the concert are in the blog of course. Here......
https://fargosisters.com/styx/archives/2436-Its-Britney,-Bitch.html
Lots of writings about Britney almost daily in the media. All I can say is that nobody knows what she went through......so I don't have anything bad to say about her. It seems to me like she has been mistreated by many. Besides....I REALLY like Britney, there is something about her. I hope she will live her best life and be happy.
Fall (or Autumn) has arrived. Leaves are covering the streets and evenings and nights are chilly.
I saw this beautiful waterfall the other day. And other colorful things in the forest.
And this is Kaya. The other day it was her birthday (October 20). She is six now. She has been with me for a while, I have not written about her much, if any. I did not name her Kaya, she already had that name when she came into my life. It is pronounced the same as my other Chhaya but a different spelling. My Chhaya passed, I think about her every day and I miss her. It is very hard to lose a pet, she was my everything. I loved her so much, I should say I love her so much. I feel that she is there somewhere waiting for me, I hope that she is.
My "new" Kaya is amazing. She has big round eyes, her face has the softest fur, she is extremely agile and athletic. She sleeps close to me at night and she loves to cuddle. I kiss her over and over and inhale her scent, I love her. I love Kaya and I love Chhaya. My girls. ❤️❤️
Once in a while I do something wholesome......like bake.
Fun Tati fact, when I still lived at home with my Mom in Sweden she wanted me to bake once a week. I usually baked an apple pie or something we call sockerkaka (sponge cake) or a tiger cake (like a sponge cake with chocolate). I don't recall if I actually did bake once a week year round but I did bake on a regular. And I made waffles too, I love waffles.
Well last night I baked cupcakes for puppies - pupcakes. Very simple, just add an egg and water and mix together.
Then some frosting on top. TAAAADAAA!
The cupcakes spent the night in the refrigerator and today I brought them downtown Portland to PetPack.
I help feed and clothe plus equip with leashes, harnesses, collars, beds, blankets, bowls etc the pets that "belong" to humans that have limited monetary funds and resources. I love doing this. I wish I could do more.
That is Senna checking out all the goods.
This is Behr.
And here is pretty Princess.
My dream is to help animals more. I love them so much. Please do NOT breed your pets. EDUCATE yourself on that subject.
I had so many offers to breed Chhaya, she was so gorgeous and she had papers and I could had sold her puppies for a nice sum. But what is more important? The profit or the welfare of the dogs? The welfare of the dogs of course. I do not trust that people can provide good homes for animals, some do but many do not.
If you are reading this and have millions of dollars (or some other strong currency like KWD, GPD, CHF to give a few examples) and are not sure what to do with your money......let me help you put some of that money to good use and save some animals.
