Monday

Had to venture out to the grocery store to pick up the herbal blend I use for my bone-building ACV drink. The store where I buy it (health food co-op) has a minimum $100 pick-up order that you have to schedule in advance, so I just went as soon as they opened to avoid as many customers as I could. I got enough for three month's worth. Wondering if I should've gotten six. Also picked up some eggs that I didn't really need yet but why not and some more cabbage. I looked at the chocolate bars but nothing looked especially appealing. (says something about my mental state I guess)

But I got this picture of the moon before I left the house! Once I feel like walking around the block won't fuck up my back I'm gonna start going on early walks. I hope two months of my revised PT movements put me in safe enough shape for that. March weather can be dicey here, though, so I'm keeping my expectations reasonable.

This morning I have another conversation with someone about making podfic. She's got some experience doing erotica audiobooks so she's gonna give me some opinions and suggestions about reading porn aloud. Love that I get to read smut I wrote to a friend before noon on a Monday morning. Sometimes life isn't terrible.

I'll resume answering questions tomorrow, I hope. My wrist hurts already and it feels weirdly chillly, like I put menthol rub on it, which I did not. I wonder if all the hand-sewing yesterday aggravated it. It felt good to move it in a different directions, but perhaps 20 yo-yos (spaced out over the day) was too much for it.

Have I mentioned how very, very tired I am of being so fragile? The worst part is this is probably, uh, not gonna get better with age.

Briefly political

I'm putting this here because I'm seeing good takes and info on Twitter and Tumblr but I know not all of y'all are in those spaces.

If you're running up against people who aren't concerned about future attacks similar to January 6 because the insurrectionists all look like a bunch of clowns, here's some articles to source/cite. I'm increasingly worried that this is going to get glossed over, just like the continuing "joke" of Trump's entire presidency and then we're gonna be fucked.

The men who carried zip ties as they stormed the Capitol weren’t clowning around.
The guys were carrying flex cuffs, the plastic double restraints often used by police in mass arrest situations. They walked through the Senate chamber with a sense of purpose. They were not dressed in silly costumes but kitted out in full paramilitary regalia: helmets, armor, camo, holsters with sidearms. At least one had a semi-automatic rifle and 11 Molotov cocktails. At least one, unlike nearly every other right-wing rioter photographed that day, wore a mask that obscured his face.

These are the same guys who, when the windows of the Capitol were broken and entry secured, went in first with what I’d call military-ish precision. They moved with purpose, to the offices of major figures like Nancy Pelosi and then to the Senate floor. What was that purpose? It wasn’t to pose for photos. It was to use those flex cuffs on someone.

Two Black officers say their chief and other upper management left them totally unprepared and were nowhere to be found on the day.
Management’s inaction left Black police officers especially vulnerable to a mob that had been whipped up by President Donald Trump, a man who has a record of inspiring racist vigilantes to action. One of the most defining videos of that day was of one of their colleagues, another Black officer, trying in vain to hold back the tide of rioters who had broken into the building and were hunting for Congressional members.

Thanks totinny for the link to this informative Twitter account.

Personal stories:
Pramila Jayapal:
The lack of security at the Capitol is not an accident. It is very clear to me that there were breaches of our law-enforcement agencies. The fact that there were no barriers, that they were essentially allowed in. And again, the discrepancy of what would have happened if these had been peaceful Black Lives Matter protesters … Believe me, they would not have been anywhere near that building. And there would have been a lot of arrests.

Susan Wild:
How were so many signs ignored? Why did the people charged with securing our country not do something in advance? Were Capitol police adequately staffed? Did someone on the inside know beforehand? I’m not making an accusation, but that’s part of what needs to be fleshed out. There is a sense that the intruders got in way too quickly and knew the layout very well. Many of us still have trouble finding Speaker Pelosi’s office, yet they managed to find it without difficulty.

Maxine Waters spoke on the day of:
I suspected that something like this would take place, and I talked with the chief of police here at the Capitol about what the security plans were. And the chief of police assured me that they would not even get on the plaza, let alone get in the Capitol. And I must have asked him 30 or 40 questions about how he was going to secure the Capitol and how would he know which of these organizations would be here. I mentioned to him that the Proud Boys were in town and the Oath Keepers were in town and white supremacists were in town, and he assured me that not only did they have it under control they were working in cooperation with the Metropolitan police of DC. And all of that has turned out to be untrue that they really had it taken care of.

Waters's words were echoed in a tweet by AOC that I can't find but here is a screenshot.

Please don't allow people around you to remain under the misapprehension that this was a joke or not really a coup. Frankly, we're very, very lucky that we can even call it an "attempted" coup. We won't be so lucky next time.