Welcome to Chaos !!

Hello January First! What is there to say at the end of yet another year and the beginning of a new? Does it even matter? Three weeks into January it will not matter any more anyways. Things will roll on and unfold, good and bad. Disasters have already taken place and people are sad this first day of the year.
Portlander of The Year 2025 was The Frog, or Toad as they prefer to be called. I am pretty sure that I met Toad a few months ago. In Portland. Go Toad!

To stay on the political page, today Zohran Mamdani was sworn in as the new Mayor of New York City. Bernie (Sanders) did the honors and swore Zohran in. To me Bernie is THE human of every year, I love him in many ways. I am happy to see Zohran as the Mayor of one of my favorite cities. I hope it goes well for him he seems like a nice person and has accomplished a lot. It will not be an easy task to rule over NYC, so may people. The world is overpopulated and it is a problem.
The President of the US, Donald Trump's New Year's Resolution was "Peace on Earth". We should all strive towards at least a more peaceful earth, starting with ourselves locally. It is easy to forget when you feel tired and cranky and had a shitty day, sitting in traffic and everybody is super annoying. Sometimes all it takes to change somebody's day from bad to a bit better is a simple gesture of kindness. The state of the world is scary. Not a good situation at all. I feel really bad for people. And of course, animals. 
I do not have any New Year's resolutions. Last night I did nothing besides stay inside. I ate, watched TV and cuddled with Kaya. Today was a repeat of yesterday. Called friends. Reflected on life.
Here is a pic from about 10 days ago and one of Kaya on Christmas. I am glad Christmas is over. And with that......you be safe and healthy in 2026. I hope nothing terrible happens and that the year is mostly good. 

As far at the blog goes.....it will continue on as usual (I think) through 2026 with the help of my kind and patient KISA. 

I went to Portland on the 26th to hopefully have a fun birthday weekend. And I did (!!!). I got a room at the Crystal Hotel and checked in with Kaya and my friend Siren. The Crystal Hotel has a heated saltwater pool that is open until 1 am, so after we settled into the room we went down to the pool to relax.

And after a nice soak we headed to the Crystal Ballroom for an 80s dance party. It was my first time at the famous Crystal Ballroom and as soon as I walked in I knew it was going to be a great evening, the energy was just right. Good music, music videos (I love that) and lots of people dancing and having fun. 

And here is Siren.

One of the two chandeliers. I really liked the venue and I need to go back for some more dancing there soon.

Ready for a wild night on the streets of Portland, you know the burning hellhole.

Down the stairs behind me is Al's Den and we went there the following night.

We took Kaya for a walk to Pioneer Square. Yes you can walk in downtown Portland after midnight and be safe.  Surrounded by the lunatic creatures of the night I felt at ease. 

Me and Kaya shared a vanilla latte from Stumptown the next day.

In the evening we went to dinner at the Portland City Grill, I highly recommend it. The view is great.

There was a beautiful Christmas tree downstairs in the building.

And after dinner we went to a comedy show inside Al's Den at the Crystal Hotel. And then we went for another soak in the pool.
Sunday I went to IKEA for lunch. Plantballs for me and a few meatballs for Kaya. I wanted to get a princess cake but it got taken out of rotation, I hope it will be back at some point.

I also met two individuals with dogs during my couple of days in Portland and I told them about Pet Pack and at least one of them made it there on Sunday with his dog. That made me happy. I really just wish that nobody was homeless unless absolutely by choice and I wish that all pets had warm safe homes as they so deserve.

It looks like Santa has arrived to my little corner of the world......Do you ever ponder that you are one out of eight billion plus people existing on this planet right now, each individual has a voice, needs and wants. Kind of scary. And before you know it your life will be over, all your belongings whether it is a little or a lot will be scattered and thrown away and you will become a memory and eventually fade away. Hopefully we all go somewhere else after this earthly existence.  Even a forever sleep sometimes seems like bliss.
I am not feeling Christmassy whatsoever. Not a single decoration up this year. I am spending Christmas alone. Well with Kaya, so I am not completely alone.
Today we went for a walk in the forest as we do on a regular. Here are some pretty amanitas that I took pictures of recently.
Did you know that Santa's reindeer fly because they ate the Fly Agaric (Amanita muscaria) mushroom right? I love the mushrooms in the forest and the forest too, it is very peaceful.

And then we went for an evening walk as well through town,. There is a tree outside the Liberty Theatre. I am happy to say that it is a plastic tree, not a live tree had to get cut down.

And now I am sitting at home, eating food, candy and sumo mandarins (yeay they are in season now!) and watching Dateline and murder mysteries. Kaya is sleeping. And earlier I watched the new Guillermo del Toro movie Frankenstein. And I also finished Tidstjuven, the Swedish Christmas tv calendar (Julkalendern) and opened door 24 on the advent calendar that I got from IKEA and that was that.

Wednesday was another slow night. Nothing going on, so I could just occupy myself with other stuff. I made this little ad for free pool to be put on the club's social media page (Instagram) and then I wrote the Swedish word of the week......stjärna which means star.

And I put on a cute holiday appropriate dress and took this picture for the IG as well.

Then it was Friday and Saturday. Friday two guys came by and they were being friendly and chatty but did not contribute to much more than trying to have conversations and buying us drinks. One of them come up to me twice to tell me he thought that I was very pretty but standoffish. Oh no, you don't say!? Standoffish? Yes absolutely I can be, depending on how annoyed I feel with people. And the other one was telling us about a drink he had invented while on vacation, that he had named a ridiculous name that I don't even want to mention here.....(I do not know if he really came up with the drink but anyhow), here is the receipe in case you want to make it for yourself - 2 shots (or parts) of gin, some pineapple juice, a bit of grenadine and shake that concoction well, pour over ice and top off with Sprite. I did not want anything to drink besides cranberry juice but a couple of girls tried the gin drink and said it was good. He tried to get me to drink something besides juice four times but I declined. And then he started asking intrusive questions and I quickly became "standoffish" and he reacted by turning into a pouty manchild.
Saturday all I can recall is that we were having fun and entertaining conversations.

Tried these two dairy free plant based frozen desserts by So Delicious instead of having ice cream made with dairy.
I will not eat the mint chip again, that was a no for me. Not bad, just did not please my tastebuds.
But the cold brew coffe was a yes, actually yummy and I will have it again. What else is new on the food front? I have been drinking a lot of my morning coffee at home actually instead of going to the coffee shop. But one of my fave baristas here in town is moving at the end of the month, so I will make sure to go and get my oatmilk lattes from her before she leaves.
I ordered pizza from Papa Murphy's for the first time the other day. The pizza was ok BUT the place (I picked up the pizza myself I never get delivery) smelled like yucky bleach and the food containers where the toppings for the pizza are stored looked kind of mucky. So I am not sure if I will get pizza from there again, well maybe one more time and if the place still smells and looks mucky then that will be the last time.

A while back I got some more Aveda products for my hair. Sap Moss shampoo. I like it. And Nutriplenish conditioner, the light moisture hydration one.  I like that one too.

And a current picture of my hair. I get a lot of comments and questions about my hair, due to the lenght. Is your hair real?
Are those extensions? How long have you been growing your hair? Do you ever cut your hair?
I like to say that it is a wig. Or that yes, I have extensions and I get them for cheap at Sally's Beauty Supply. My hair has been about this lenght, give or take some inches, for a long time. I am used to it. And yes, I get a trim, usually three to five inches once or twice/year. I go to low cost salons, since all I am doing is getting a trim. I wash my hair twice/week, it air dries (I never blow dry), no hair spray or anything too complicated, no styling. I finger comb it and use a wide tooth comb for detangling.
I am way too lazy to spend a lot of time on my hair. It used to be in much better condition.
I sometimes get comments that my hair is luxurious, yes years ago it actually was. Now it is more on the dry side and not as thick and healthy as it once was. It is getting thinner but it doesn't look scary thin yet.