"Kirk/Spock: What Are You Doing New Year's Eve"

I need to figure this out--can't embed a video here.
Here's the link to Marz's fanvid "Kirk/Spock - “What Are You Doing New Year’s Eve?”
I've posted it most New Year's Eves since she made it Dec. 31, 2010:
https://vimeo.com/18280590

Marz (Milkweedy) wrote this description:

"Spock wants to know what Jim's doing for New Years Eve but is - understandably - having trouble spitting it out.

The song is a Verve Remix of Ella Fitzgerald's "What Are You Doing New Year's Eve?"

Clips from Star Trek TOS.
I own nothing."

New Year's Eve Afternoon

 Last social-distancing-with-bink photo of 2020 to send to Auntie Vi--we're walking around the lake near me:

New Year's Eve Day: Be the Squirrel

This morning, I see a squirrel has squirreled its way into a squirrel-proof bird feeder across the street.
Bad news be damned, I'm taking that squirrel as my model for 2021.

                  [istock photo]

I bought a bottle of bubbly (prosecco, the champagne of the era) to welcome in 2021 tonight.  

My goals for the coming year are not only to strain spaghetti through a tennis racket like Jack Lemmon in The Apartment but, like him, to turn in my key to my boss.
"The old payola won't work any more. Good bye, Mr. Sheldrake."

I started the thrift store job with buckets of enthusiasm––I used to write up pages of ideas for improvements or fun changes at the store. They mostly sank in quicksand, and now I'm not only disheartened by the store's management, I'm a bit bored.

Sorting and displaying donated books is good work.
Though I've unpacked to every Cool Old Book a hundred copies of  The Literary Peelings of the Fisherman's Daughter; The 7 Effective Tips to Get Your Cheese While Losing Weight; and I'll Die Below: The Hunt for a Lawyer on a Red Submarine, I wouldn't be looking for another job if I could also work on writing a volunteer handbook (we don't have one);
investigate grants for a barcode pricing system (we write prices on stickers by hand, and the cashier enters taps them in); maybe exploring social media more...

Those ideas of mine have all been somehow subtly discouraged and while I could push ahead with them anyway, now I don't want to––
especially not since Big Boss turned store management over to Ass't Man.

I can do something else. Not sure what, but something.
I can raid bird feeders!

Children of Authoritarians

Books by my bed. I'm reading several of them at once, including Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst by neurologist Robert Sapolsky.

 

 

This quote from Behave, BELOW, helped me understand Ass't Man, whose father was an army man--all of it, but especially this bit is helpful--children of authoritarian parents tend to grow up to be adults
"often with an undercurrent of resentment that can explode."
After a few months of us getting along well, he has again slipped into saying,

"This is the way it is. There is nothing to be done. YOU are the problem."

I don't know what to do with such a person except play by his rules (ugh), manipulate them (ugh, again--already did that), or avoid them.
So I'm avoiding him.

I've posted these photos of my parents before--they say a lot about me as an adult.

My father was something of a [Sicilian male] authoritarian, but also a nonconformist---here he is addressing an anti-Vietnam War rally in the mid-1960s.

 

 

And my mother was a rather "permissive", low guidance/ high praise parent--and again, nonconformist---here (center, in jacket) at a gay pride parade in 1978:

 

I could have used some parenting help on how to "do the hardest thing when it is the better thing," as Sapolsky says, but I am proud of my parents' social-political selves.

And now, off to work!

How Many Pennies Is Penny Cooper?

 Tom figured Penny Cooper must be two and a half paper clips high.
I think she's taller than that---7.5" tall--but don't have paperclips at the moment.
"How many pennies am I?" she asked instead.

         .   .   .   Ten!

"The arrangement is delicate even under duress"

I just saw the snowplow going down the street this morning---this is a low-traffic street, so it's low priority and it hasn't been plowed since it snowed a couple days ago.
And this afternoon, more snow is due...

Biking in new snow is heavy work.
I'm proud of myself, arriving at work on my bike, but I'm a bit sore this morning, so I'm going to take the bus to work.
A bus serves the nearby high school, and since the students are distance-learning, I've been the only rider for most of the trip the couple times I've taken it.
It'll be a bit of a treat, taking public transportation, weird to say.

I'm in a pretty good mood lately, in general, thank goodness.
I'm trying to think of ways to make work better for me (and the people around me)--how to practive better self-care?

It helps if I go in prepared, instead of dashing off last minute.
I've taken my tinctures--CBD oil, an immune booster mix, and elderberry syrup, and I'm eating leftover beef this morning. I don't like to eat this early, but going to work without breakfast puts me in a bad mood by late morning.

Blogging before work helps me feel more like myself. I'm trying to avoid customers, and I think that's part of my unhappiness--I'm not mirrored by book people at work.

One of my only book-reading coworkers sent me this text before Christmas. I love it so much:

I had set up red & green books last week --no theme except color:

I took them down yesterday and left without setting up a display.
I'm going to put Cool Old Books on display, since their front covers are often a treat. You can't judge them by their spines.

Meanwhile, Penny Cooper suggests holding onto a talisman of who you are. I shall take a paperclip!

Play Grup

My favorite Christmas image this year (maybe ever!):
Three of The Addams Family (Morticia, Wednesday, and Pugsley) by my favorite Madeline doll photographer, W12LA, on Instagram:

 
This Monday morning I'm heading back to work after a four-day Christmas break.
It's 13º F ( -10 C) at 8 a.m. As long as the temps are in the double-digits and it's not windy, it's okay to bike. (I'm trying to avoid taking the bus during Covid.)

Screen cap from my workplace's fundraising video, taken on Dec. 23 (before it started snowing).
I'm on the far left, holding a yellow book:

I've been looking at job postings online. Nothing I want to or can apply for at the moment.
Not the best time of year for job hunting, or the best year!
It's not an emergency.
I turn sixty in March, I'm healthy (knock on wood!); I will keep looking.

1. Can I afford to keep living on a part-time, low-paying job, as I have most of my life?
It's one thing when you're young––why not?––but heading into old age? Especially, it limits where I can live. I've always rented from people I know, which is not always what I would want...

2. Do I WANT to stay?
Given the dysfunction, even if my job paid a lot more, would I want to stay?

That would help, but I don't know...
Anyway, it's a moot point:
my workplace doesn't and isn't going to pay me or anyone else more money.

I used to love the place. I started volunteering there almost three years ago--and working as Custodian of BOOK's two and a half years ago (June 2018).
Even in September, I felt I was in the right place and chose not to pursue another bookstore job.

The stress of Trump & Covid–times has revealed underlying, seemingly ineradicable (because unacknowledged) uglinesses.
I'm almost alone in seeing or caring about them.
I was especially disturbed that most everyone scoffed at the volunteer who quit because of sexism.
The gaslighting goes, If you're unhappy, you are the problem.

And yet, there's a lot I do love there.
If you're in a rough place, it's going to be rough.
How to stand it?
When is enough?

I don't know.

On my wall at work:
a coworker adapted the card to read "Neil diamond" (I'd said I like the very young ND);
I found "fun time! Play grup for Animals" in a donated book:

Behind the Scenes: How the Girlettes Balance

Linda Sue at Lady Margaret's Curlers was wondering how the girlettes hold their poses. I always like to see "The Making Of"s....
so this morning I pulled together some examples and wrote to her:

I love when movies and photography achieve their special effects "in camera" instead of on a computer.
(Did you see  the movie Be Kind, Rewind, with Jack Black and Mos Def? they are rank amateurs recreating special effects with tin foil, vacuum cleaner parts, and other junk--I love it!)

Some incredible toy photographers use Photoshop, but for my own fun and satisfaction, I almost never photoshop the girlettes. (I don't even own Photoshop.) I never studied photography or anything, but I do have an iPhone that is a breeze to use and takes pretty great photos.

To provide balance, I use whatever's at hand.

The dolls wedge their feet into snow or dirt, or they anchor them in tangled grass and weeds.
Mud is ideal:

A stick stuck in or on the ground behind them may prop them up.
You can just see a hint of a stick, circled in blue, behind Penny Cooper's right leg.

(I took this with the "portrait" option on iPhone ^. I don't like it---looks like a fakey Sears studio portrait.)

Often something they're doing or holding provides balance--like how Golda holds and is held up by her dreidel here:

A little something that's in the scene can serve as a foot rest to help a girlette balance too.
Even though it's in view, the eye often doesn't register the "little something" as a prop. Like the penny under Penny Cooper's foot here:

(But Golda in her hat ^ stands unaided. The girlettes can stand on their own, even a little off-balance.)

Eeble's foot is resting on a stick:

A hairband:

Occasionally the girlettes undertake a more ambitious scene, and I have to use a more elaborate aid.
Ivy here is hanging from Penny Cooper's hand on fishing line,
and Big Doll's arms are tied around Annie Evening--you can see the white string:

BELOW: Here's a rare "photoshop": my Christmas card in 2019 of Minnie Sutherland skating on the lake.
A clear-plastic doll stand held her upright.  Her body hid the stand's vertical pole, and I rubbed out the visible base in iPhoto's "edit".
It's a bit smeary, but again, I count on the eye to overlook such things, or on the viewer not to mind if they do register it.

I would just add, this was a challenging shoot:
the ice was too thin to hold me, so I crouched on the lakeshore and got damp and cold, and I moved Minnie on the doll stand into position with a stick.
I was worried I wouldn't get the shot before the sun set, but it came together in time.

I've never used it, but some swear by Blu-Tack--you know that stuff like silly putty for mounting posters on walls. Sarah uses it sometimes. LOL--I forgot, she even titled a post "Never Mind the Blu-Tack".
And that's the thing--mostly the viewer doesn't mind.
I myself even like to get a glimpse of what's going on.

Penny Cooper always says,

"A balanced approach is usually best."

2020 Hindsight: Year in Review

Yowzer... what a year, eh?

2020 started out with high hopes... 

I'd read in the Economist about a new virus in China, but even Penny Cooper thought the outlook was fine as she strolled through Hartley Park in Duluth. 

 
BELOW: In February, I lobbied to enter my workplace in the annual Best of the Cities contest. (I'm far right.) Look, no masks!

On March 17, the governor's Stay-at-Home order went into affect--to "flatten the curve" of the spread of Covid-19 (coronavirus disease 2019).
We began to practice "social distancing". (One day the idioms of 2020 will be a distant memory.)

Marz & Penny Cooper visit through the window:

Meet outside, wear masks, and keep 6 feet apart. In bink's backyard:

 

I sewed my first masks. L-R, below: me, Marz, Crow:

Marz was the first person at the food co-op where she worked to wear one voluntarily. Soon it became mandatory.

Social media booms and zooms.
Easter 2020, I text, "We have locusts":

Life in the Time of Corona is a drag (and tragically far worse for many), but Stay-at-Home sparks creativity in some folks. Inventive graffiti and chalk sidewalk messages, window displays:

 

bink & I send regular pix to Auntie Vi.

Warm weather makes it all easier.

 

Julia, who is in lock-down for a while, airlifts hummus I brought her:

Coworkers strip the floor, preparing to reopen as Stay-at-Home lifts.

And then, on Memorial Day...

"George Floyd was murdered here last night"
Police murder George Floyd (one mile from where I live and work).

People create a memorial, a sacred space at the site.
This is my favorite image from the time, before concrete barriers went in.

Protestors take to the streets for Black Lives, and marauders for reasons of their own.
The store is broken into. Twice. With a coworker, I paint the boarded up windows.

Rage from every direction has melted the steering wheel.

 

Back to work, cleaning up broken glass...

And goofing around...

 

We all get tested when BB gets a mild case of Covid. (This was before they started doing saliva testing. You got your  nose reamed with something like a bristle tea-spout brush.)

Luckily we all dodge the bullet. For now.

Life: it goes on.

It takes two months for the store's windows to be replaced. Finally, we reopen on July 31 . . .

. . . and win BEST THRIFT STORE.
The inclusion of my book section's "printed ephemera" is a high point in my life.

(OMG, there's more? Aren't we done yet?)

Masks. Most people wear them. Sort of.

RBG, r.ip.

Picnic with Julia before Marz goes to work a goat farm in NM for a couple months, "Thattaway":

 

In October, Frederic, the potato I'd planted in May (it had been found in the closed store) bears fruit: four spuds! 

 

George Floyd Memorial Square has a free library in a bus stop (until the weather gets bad).

November 3: We vote for US president.
As I kneel on the curb across the street to photograph the girlettes, it occurs to me I could look like a shooter. I just snap a couple quickies.

On Election Day, bink & I go to visit Auntie Vi. The pink sign reads
"WOMEN FOR TRUMP: Safety Family Freedom".
I try to prepare mentally for four more years.

But, . . . what's this? We won???

HONK YOUR HORN,
WE WON!!!

 

So, as we wait for to get vaccinated, many of us feel more hopeful.

Still social distancing of course.
On Xmas Eve, old friends gather on FaceTime to put on our paper crowns:

And on Xmas Day, the girlettes hold a choir concert, because they can.

The humans are going to have to wait till next year to sing together, because singing spreads the virus.