Maranda Russell's Blog, page 49

Wordless Wednesday – Potty Mouth Pigs

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Depression Slump

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I’m going through a depression slump right now. I can tell because I am sleeping half the day away and not wanting to get out of bed even when I do finally wake up. I don’t feel like writing, creating art, talking to anyone, or simply functioning. I want to stay in bed and either sleep my life away or curl up under all my heavy blankets and leave reality behind.

I have some important appointments coming up soon (my Ehlers Danlos testing and my SSDI hearing top the list), but right now I don’t even care about those things. I don’t feel like doing them and the thought of dealing with them is overwhelming. I hope this slump passes soon.

Poetry – Malice

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This little poem was inspired by a middle grade book series called “Malice” by Chris Wooding. I liked the world that was created, and decided to capture just a bit of it in poetry (my favorite line is the “mushroom lamps” one):

Take the evening train

into the cavernous abyss.

Light up the darkness

with your mushroom lamps

and a fist full

of round trip tickets.

Out of Anxiety Meds & Body Dysmorphia

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I’ve had a rough few days. I think the main problem is that I’ve been out of my anxiety meds for a while because Buspirone is on national back-order for some reason, and my pharmacy doesn’t know when/if they will get it back in. I contacted my psychiatrist today to ask him to prescribe something else, hopefully he will do so soon. I was going to try to just hang on until my appointment with him at the end of the month, but I am having some real anxiety issues cropping up without my meds.

For one thing, I’ve been having some body dysmorphia issues, which happens now and then. I’ve heard that issues like these are common among high-functioning autistic people. I’m not trans or anything like that. I don’t want to be a man. But, for some reason, ever since I hit puberty, I’ve always felt kind of uncomfortable in my own body. I’m not sure why. I don’t think I’m extremely ugly or anything like that, but it is like there is some kind of disconnect in my brain when I look in the mirror. I feel like my body looks wrong somehow or like it isn’t the body I should have. It is hard to explain.

I think part of it has to do with always feeling unfeminine. Like I said, I don’t want to be a man, but I’ve always felt like I’m not very good at being a woman either lol. I feel like a tomboy, I always have, yet sometimes when I look in the mirror I look more like a woman than I feel. It is weird. I also have always wished I was thinner, more flat-chested, and athletic-looking overall, but my genes just don’t cooperate with me. It is funny to me when I hear women saying they want bigger boobs. I’m always like “why would anyone want that?”, but I know everyone has their own insecurities, and some people obviously have different ones than I do.

Poetry: A Bit of Lewis Carroll Nonsense

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A Bit of Lewis Carroll Nonsense

By: Maranda Russell

The serious ones

and the bonkers ones

are rare birds

telling tales of

biscuits and chewed pencils

served with curry

and elegance –

a feast

which you can chew on

for ten whole years.

Cupcake and Unicorn Collages

Here are a couple new ACEO artist trading card collages featuring some of the stickers I got for Christmas! Both of these were made with acrylic paint, scrapbook paper, and of course, the stickers!!! I like the fun, bright quality of both, and the cupcake one already sold, so I guess others like those qualities too!

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(You can find these and more for sale on my Ebay store!)

Hemp Seed Oil Side Effects? Medical Marijuana Scam?

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I didn’t post the last couple days because I’ve been sick. At first I thought I was having an adverse reaction to hemp seed oil, which I decided to try for the first time Friday. I was hoping it would help my chronic pain issues, but within a few hours of taking it, I developed a horrible headache (almost migraine level) and then became really nauseated and felt like throwing up all night.

However, yesterday I made sure not to take the oil again and I still had a rough day with nausea and other stomach issues, so I’m not sure if an adverse reaction could last that long or if maybe I just had a stomach bug or something. I hope it wasn’t the hemp seed oil, because if that makes me sick, I would worry that medical marijuana might do the same, which I am still hoping to try if I can get my Ohio prescription card.

The really sucky thing about Ohio’s medical marijuana program is that they only approve certain doctors to prescribe it and it sounds like you have to go through certain organizations to get approved….organizations that do NOT take any kind of insurance and charge a couple hundred bucks just for your first visit. Almost seems like a scam in some ways. I’m doubting you can use insurance on the prescriptions themselves with a system like that, but I’m not sure. So honestly, I don’t know if I can afford medical marijuana

Kindle Direct Publishing’s New Reporting System and Some Author Updates!

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Yesterday I logged into my Kindle Direct Publishing account on Amazon and while looking at the reports, noticed there is a new “beta” reporting program they are working on that I could test (the picture above shows the new graphing, with part of the book breakdown below). I checked it out and it is WAY better than their old reporting program! It uses color coded graphs to plainly show which books you are selling, when you are selling them, and also easily separates books sold from “free” promotions vs. paid sales.

I am thrilled they are updating their system, because what they have had the last few years sucks in my opinion. It was hard to even tell which books sold! In other good news, while checking out the new system, I looked at my overall numbers from the last quarter and was pleasantly surprised to see that all together I’ve sold more than 230 ebooks (including promotions) during the last 90 days! Not bad for an indie author!!! It makes my heart happy to know that many people are reading my books!

If you use KDP publishing, I would recommend checking out the new program if you are able to under your own reports! By the way, if you want to check out my Amazon Author Page and maybe give it a follow, that would be awesome! I also have a FREE ebook promotion running today through Monday for my art ebook, “Stories Behind My Art” (if you like it, please consider leaving a review on Amazon!)

Lastly, a few years back, I published a little short story/spiritual ebook called “Jesus, Mohammed, and Abraham – A Parable about Love and Peace” under the name M.N. Russell ($0.99, FREE for Kindle Unlimited) . I decided to add that to my Amazon author bibliography, so you can check that out if you think it sounds interesting!

Wordless Wednesday – Sloths in Space

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I Attended a Psychic Class – How Did I Do?

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Last month I attended a class developed to help you improve your “psychic abilities”. Partly, I decided to try it out just for fun and to see what would happen, and partly I have always been interested in the paranormal, whether it be ghosts, ufos, psychic abilities, time travel, near death experiences, cryptids, etc.

So, what happened? I will only share my personal experiences, nothing about anyone else at the meeting or any specific teaching. We did several kinds of exercises and a meditation period. I think the weirdest experience I had the entire class was when we did a practice where the leader would share a hidden word and we all tried to intuitively figure out how that hidden word made us feel.

We did this quite a few times, and only once did I have a strong physical reaction to the hidden word. For this particular word, my hair literally started standing on end on my arms and I got goosebumps. I thought it was weird and showed everyone else in the class. This didn’t happen for any of the other words. When the leader revealed that word, it was “evil”. Kind of interesting, huh?

For the other hidden words, I often was pretty accurate about the feeling I got from it, although none of the others gave me the visceral physical reaction “evil” did. We also did some practices where the leader tried to “create” colored balls of light energy and we tried to intuitively figure out what color the balls were. I was surprised how accurate I was on these too, even when I kept feeling it was white, though I didn’t think white was technically a color, so figured that couldn’t be right….however, turned out the instructor had chosen white lol. I even came up with purple and silver when the instructor decided to challenge us and pick two colors at once.

I’m not claiming to be super psychic or anything, although I have always felt I was rather empathic. I think I might keep going to these classes simply to see what happens and because it was rather fun.