Thurs. Jan. 23, 2025: Up and Down

image courtesy of Clker-Free-Vector-Images via pixabay.com

Thursday, January 23, 2025

Waning Moon

Uranus, Jupiter, Mars Retrograde

Cloudy and cold

You can read about the latest on the garden over on Gratitude and Growth.

Windows11/Microsoft Office has forced Copilot into Word. The steps people have posted to turn it off do not show up in the options or settings. I hate it. It’s very distracting to have it show up at the beginning of each paragraph. I want it gone. I’ve uninstalled the app, which has done exactly nothing.

Hard to get going yesterday. Got the blog up, did my daily rounds, did the rounds of the social media on which I’m still posting, did some follow up emails on a few things. Considered starting up the marketing from the content calendar for the month, ignoring the sites on which I’m not posting anymore and just posting per calendar on the ones I am. But I’d have to rejuggle the whole thing. So I’m not sure what I will do. I might just post everywhere next week, and then reconfigure the calendar for February. Posting marketing consistently on social media translated into sales for November and December. Let’s see what only posting where I want to stay will do in February.

I checked in on Counter Social and people were having hissies about others promoting work, so I guess that’s just a check in every few months. If I can’t do both – be social and promote my work – I very literally can’t afford to spend time there.

I wondered why I was faffing around. I mean, it was all stuff I needed to do, but why was I having trouble concentrating creatively during my best creative hours? Then I remembered, through sense memory, that this was how I felt from January 2017 – January 2021. Almost all the time, even though I pushed through as often as possible. Okay, then. I know the root cause. Now I can work on solutions. They won’t be instant, but I’ll get there.

I suited up and went out on my errands on foot. I had an escort from my murder of crows, even though it was only a few blocks. It was kind of cold, but not bad as long as I stayed in the sun. Got everything done, got home, unwrapped. Still had trouble concentrating.

I did, however, get a slew of contracts from the ghostwriting client for the next round of paid testing. I have a Big Deadline on February 12th, which is doable. There are multiple pieces to this next round, each with its own contract. The contracts are simple and straightforward, so I went through them, signed them, and returned them. Looking forward to it. I’ll set up the project folders today and get to work on Monday.

I turned around 4 small coverages. 2 more coverages, hitting somewhere between small and medium came in. I’ll work on them today and tomorrow, depending how the rest of the day shakes out. I’m hoping I don’t have to work for that client over the weekend. I’m at about half of where I should be for this pay period, which makes sense with another week in it.

A few things about the administration firing all nonwhite, non-cis, non-males in the coming months: this is part of their bigger plan. Fire anyone who’s not a cis white male. Eliminate the Department of Labor and then unemployment benefits. There’s already a stoppage on any health information distributed by government sites. This is intentional to drive up poverty and disease. Then, when people protest, turn the military and the domestic terrorist militias on us. This is what the Democratic cycle of posture, cave, fundraise has gotten us. They had four years to eliminate this threat; instead, they enabled it to fundraise, and then wonder why they lost. This is also on anyone who voted for the Sociopath or didn’t vote.

Also a note on this “forced reportage” – aka snitching. No such thing. Each individual can refuse to snitch. You’re going to be fired anyway; at least slow everything down as long as possible and be fired for doing the right thing.

Remember how vital the first 100 days are. Slow it all the fuck down. That’s why there’s so much aggression right out of the gate, in addition to wanting to overwhelm and disorient us. Pick you battles and take a stand.

There’s a Venus Retrograde coming from March 1 – April 12, in the same signs as it was 8 years ago. I went back to re-read blog posts from that time. We had many of the same people in power, and a lot of the same chaos. Do what you can where you can.

Speaking of Venus Retrograde, I have a very strong desire to radically change my look. Which is the absolute wrong thing to do near or in a Venus Retrograde, because it is bound to end in tears. I need to ride it out, and make changes when things are on a more even keel. I may get a fairly safe haircut between now and March 1, if I can get in with the stylist I like. I’m almost back to pandemic hair. But I’ll keep reminding myself to hold off on the bigger changes that are tempting me.

I got disappointing news on the second big project on which I was waiting to hear. They went with someone else. I’m very sad about that. At the same time, it opens up the possibilities of some other opportunities I thought I would probably have to pass by and not even try to land. Some of those deadlines may have passed, but others have not. I need to recalibrate and think where I want to put my attention, in and around the ghostwriting, and hoping to land a couple of other part-time clients. And hope I pull off the ghostwriting in a way that they want to keep working with me!

Meditation this morning, then some writing, then a library run, then some client work. I haven’t made much progress on the anthology story, ANGEL HUNT, or VICIOUS CRITIC, so I hope I can get back on track with those in the next few days.

Peace, my friends.