It doesn’t look like I ever shared my very first collage of open-source flower/spring images. SO there it is!!! Felt seasonally appropriate.
I had considered leaving earlier so I could walk around, and/or stop at the library. But it was raining I think from about the time I woke up, until about 6 PM or so.
And I had Lost Souls, and a very cozy bed piled with TWO blankets, because even though it’s spring already, the nights are still VERY cold at times. I used two blankets AND wore velour pants to bed, along with my comfy top. So, it was a good morning to have some leftover pizza, get ready for work, then retreat back into bed until I had to leave, to spend some quality time with Nothing, and Ghost and Steve, and all the rest of them.
When I did finally leave, I think the cat decided to stay in my room, on top of the outermost blanket. That particular blanket has some fun history. I ordered it from USC during my freshman year of college, in preparation for dorm room life, in Los Angeles. That’s how long I’ve had it. Since I was 17.
Since then, it’s been the “emergency blanket” in the trunk of the car, deployed when we needed something to spread underneath us, like when we stopped at a beach to watch a kite event or hot air balloon event or lantern event or something– I forget which. And that time we met an adorable husky, and got a photo of the two of us posing with the pup.
Yay I found it, in my photos, on my phone.
A brief moment in time when we both had black hair, when kiddo was in her emo phase, but it looks like this is before she experimented with, I believe, green emo bangs, and a snake bite piercing.
That was a good day.
Looks like she’s got a tablet there, as well. Not sure what she was using it for in the moment. She was never much of a reader? Unless it was there for me?
I tried, impressing on her the beauty of imagination, and the written word, from a young age. But her creativity manifested differently. She spent many hours teaching herself sketching techniques, and the blending of alcohol markers.
There’s a pencil sketch she made of a character from Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure, which she left behind when she moved. I framed it and keep it in her room, above the overflow of books I store there, in a shelving system on wheels that originally housed some bins full of her clothing.
So, how did I spend today, given its festive nature?
As I said, I did have to work. On the way home, I had debated just heating up a pizza, putting off the use of the various produce items and fresh meat and such, for another day. Figured perhaps I would make dinner in the morning, then eat it tomorrow night.
HOWEVER, without even putting on Spotify on my phone, for bolstering, I managed to heat up the shaved steak I’d bought yesterday, season it, and chop up a lime, an onion, some tomatoes, an avocado, and some Cilantro. Not an earth-shattering amount of effort, but it’s a damn sight more than I have done IN A VERY LONG-ASS TIME. At least for dinner.
It’s been cans of Campbell’s Chunky Soup and toast, or frozen pizza with spinach and Balsamic vinegar, for dinner. My elaborate breakfasts of eggs with spinach, buttered toast with jam, bacon, and some kind of fruit, were about all I could handle. And breakfast is relatively easy to put together.
Honestly, I suppose this was, too. The steak just needed cooking, and spreading apart into bites, and seasoning, with a pre-mixed packet, and some water. Still, mentally, it felt like I had a hurdle to overcome to do that, AND chop all the extras.
We’ll see if I am able to build off of this, and start cooking again. I’ll try my best to be kind to myself, however that turns out.
Perhaps a controversial move to throw all the veggie fixins and cilantro and lime juice, directly into the pan. My thought was that I wouldn’t want to have to chop up more fixins every time I ate tacos, until the meat was gone. Also, the flavors will meld even more, as everything sits in the fridge, and is later reheated.
I had picked up just generic taco seasoning, and cheese and sour cream, the salsa that was on sale, and some zero-net-carb, soft-shell street taco tortillas that were also discounted.
But I also treated myself to some honey mangoes, and red plums. Have since tried both fruits. Plums, I have had many times. We used to get them from a fruit and vegetable stand in my hometown, that sold pumpkins in the fall.
I’m not sure what the stand was ACTUALLY named; we called it Charlie Brown’s, because there were always painted wooden Peanuts cutouts in the pumpkin patch, when the pumpkins were in season.
Never had a honey mango, though. SO so delicious!
Yes, I did, in fact, make it to the store yesterday. Kind of late, but I did it. I had already prepped a list full of discounted items to pick up, many of them quasi-Cinco-de-Mayo-related. Taco supplies, and the honey mangoes, and so on. They had a special running on all of that, in preparation for the holiday.
I also got a taco pizza, which I heated up yesterday, for lunch and a late dinner (which became today’s breakfast). Added some salsa and taco cheese and sour cream to the slices. Very, very good!
That particular brand of pizza was on sale, too. Got that one, and a bacon cheeseburger pizza, frozen for another night. And I got a tiny supreme personal pizza, by a different brand. Those were on sale, too. Only like $4 or so. Maybe I should’ve gotten more than one? Mainly, I needed tide-me-over groceries and breakfast staples, to carry me up until payday, tomorrow.
I did, however, discover, as I took the above delicious taco filling and added the aforementioned cheese, and sour cream, and salsa, that the particular mix of things I had put together would likely have tasted better closer to Mexican style, rather than combining bits of that, with American style tacos. Next time, I’ll leave the filling be, and just add a dash of hot sauce.
My grocery store sells every variety of Taco Bell hot sauce, which is awesome, because I’m not sure if I will actually be heading through their drive-thru any time soon. My sauce drawer supplies are lookin’ pretty sad.
Didn’t get any yesterday, but I told the Diablo sauce (out loud) that I would be back for it some other time. I ADORE Diablo and a bit of Hot or Fire on my morning eggs. Combining them both creates the perfect balance of heat and flavor. Diablo is so fantastically smoky, but an extra hot sauce not quite as spicy complements it well.
Until then, the salsa will suffice. I can even use the taco cheese and sour cream on my eggs, and, if I scramble them, add some fresh spinach.
Saved a bit over $20 on my groceries. Pretty pleased with that. Got free peanut butter, too, with a paper coupon, that I think had just come yesterday, or the day before, in the mail. Used a careful combination of paper and digital coupons, and in-store specials. Honestly, the generic taco seasoning and sour cream were much better than I thought they might be.
Not sure if I ever mentioned this, but one of my transactions at that store was accidentally rung up under the wrong phone number, and I had to get prices adjusted at the service desk since my digital coupons didn’t load. Maybe I did vent about that.
Anyway, because of that, not all the money I have saved so far this year shows up in my year-to-date savings on receipts. But even without that one trip counting, I’m up to almost $300 in savings, for 2025.
Very cool!
I also have a plan for what I’m going to get my mom for Mother’s Day. They have these adorable brown paper bags at a local fancy chocolatier, with flowers on them, that say “You’re A-May-Zing.” Full of treats. Only like $12.
I had wanted one for myself, because you get such a great variety of things, for such an excellent price. Thought she’d appreciate one, too. Some of the chocolate may be milk vs. her preferred dark, but I think she’ll like it, regardless. We stopped there today, because I had some time to spare, and I used some quarters from my coin purse to pick up a big pretzel, covered in peanut butter and milk chocolate. Yum!
Will I dabble with Mystery Train a bit before bed? I left my characters in a rough place, the last I added to the story. Two of them are at odds again. At least, one is irrationally resenting the other, for circumstances he had nothing to do with. It’s a very tumultuous relationship.
I caught up a coworker on what happened last in the story. She was stunned at how difficult I had just made life, for my primary characters.
She also said Dorian is a very old, immature man-child LOL.
Did I mention that she’d seen a TikTok (which she showed me later), stating that Dorian is THE hottest name for a male romantic lead?
I since heard the name Dorian dropped in someone else’s conversation, to which someone else had replied, “Is he gray?” Oscar Wilde reference, FTW.
(Also, HA! Morally gray, maybe.)
My coworker said she, too, has been running into the name Dorian a lot recently.
Well, I’m gonna fill up my fave bottle with plenty of ice topped off with water, and at least look over what I’ve got down so far, in their ongoing adventures. We’ll see if the characters have anything new to tell me tonight.
May follow that up with a quick Tarot or Oracle Deck draw. Haven’t done that in a bit. And a teensy bit more reading.
Merry, merry! Na-nites!
All the Bright and Sparkly Things 
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