Dragons

Today’s photo:

I came across these stickers while hunting for something else. They are TOTALLY going to be used for the Rex’s letters when she gets to writing those in February. It’s a sticker pack for educators, so I have a couple of sheets, so I have PLENTY to use. ::grins::

Other than that…today has been....interesting. So many things planned, and almost nothing went according to plan. But not in a bad way. Just not what I had planned.

I dropped off the books I had to donate to one of the after school programs that I’m still in contact with. I feel bad because it was only 4 or 5 books, but man, Darlene was SO grateful. I just wish I could do more. And that pisses me off. Because the after school program has FIVE supervisors – THEY should be doing better. ::shakes her head:: But man, I’m so glad I got out.

I’ve been helping Jayden, a coworker, find a new home for her bearded dragon. Turns out, Lauren, my cousin, is over the moon excited about getting her. So that turned into a long phone conversation with my mom to get all the information squared away (Mom was the go-between for me and Lauren, while I was the go-between for me and Jayden…just how it worked out). Which then turned into me going and picking up the bearded dragon and bringing her home. Which is NOT AT ALL what I had even remotely planned. But hey. I’ve got a dragon chillin’ in my room now. So yeah.

Now I’m seeing about setting up a time with Lauren to give her the dragon. If that doesn’t work out quickly, Mom and I may get together on Sunday and then Mom can take the dragon to Lauren. So yeah, lots of things in the works. And I’m rocking a headache. Not a major one. Just one that makes thinking and whatnot a bit slower for me.

But I did get all caught up on my daily art journaling. Quite a few of those, I’m rather pleased with how they’ve turned out.

Geese

We’ll start this off with my daily photo:

MY GEESE CAME BACK TODAY!!!!!!

Ok, so hold onto your butts as today was quite the roller coaster ride.
Today was the first day this WEEK that there were ZERO jackhammers being used at our Library. Do you know how straight up blissful that is? Yeah, the Library is undergoing some MAJOR renovations, so it’s just a quiet lull for now. Soon the construction will begin INSIDE. But for now. I am enjoying NOT having jackhammers going.

Our new story time, in which Rexie the dinosaur puppet actually TALKS (that would be me), went quite well. I actually had quite a bit of fun with it.

Then, I got an email from the HR lady, saying she’d be having her talk with quasi-boss at 2 pm. So yeah, anxiety spiked up to a 15 on a scale of 1 to 10. He already knew something was up and was rather pissy most of the morning. I just focused on deep breathing, rote counting, and making sure I did everything that I needed to do for my job requirements…and then some.

Yeah, he was in a right foul mood after that meeting. BUT, my Archer & Olive notebook for work arrived, so that was a massive plus. And then I took a late lunch to see that my geese, who have been MIA for over a week due to all the construction noise, were out waiting in the parking lot. So I rushed back in to get food for them and spent time out with my geesie friends.

And apparently now, our little idea of having the Rexie write a postcard to another plush mascot at another library has TAKEN OFF. Like MASSIVELY. I think we now have close to 20 libraries that want to join in on this. ::laughs:: So, Emily, Clarissa, and I are all totally geeking out over it and just all around giddy about the whole thing.

I talked with the HR lady after her talk with quasi-supervisor to go over how that went. She asked, and stressed that I was under ZERO pressure here to agree to it, if I would be open to having an open discussion between Me, Quasi-Supervisor, Director, and HR, to clear the air and the lay out the new work relationship and see if that can still work. I’m sure as shit not looking forward to it, but it needs to be done. And honestly, why put it off. So I agreed, and she said that Director would set up the time for that.

So while we Three Amigas were geeking out about the Rexie thing, Director came through. We have our meeting on Monday at 3 pm. She also talked to Dustin about it as well.

Then Dustin comes out of his office and says we need to keep him in the loop on the whole Rexie thing. But just yesterday he was calling it “girlie” IN A STAFF MEETING. So like, which is it? So I updated him on what we currently had going on.

And then he just left without saying anything to us, and slammed the door so hard on the way out. We just looked at each other. I didn’t want to say anything about the HR thing, but I did mention that I wasn’t sure what to tell him about the Dinosaur thing and what not to. Like I’m not trying to purposely exclude him, but he’s made it very clear he isn’t interested in it. Clarissa straight up said “Well, since he said it was girlie in the supervisor meeting yesterday, I don’t feel like we should have to update him on much of anything. He’s kind of decided that for himself.”

But yeah. He can continue being a fucking stick in the mud all he wants. I’m not going to let him rain on my parade. I am enjoying the FUCK out of my job right now and I’m not going to let him steal that from me.

Petty? Me? Naw

Photo from Tuesday:

Why, yes, I DID do a cute page on the Rexie puppet’s outfits in my journal. Why you may ask? Because my quasi-supervisor said the Rexie was “girlie” in one of the supervisor meetings. So yeah, I’m embracing the fuck out of this now. I’m going balls to the walls on this. If he wants to be a fucking stick in the mud, then he can be a stick in the mud. I don’t have to join him there.

I also had a meeting with HR about filing a formal complaint against him. So that is said and done now. Needless to say the HR lady was BLOWN away by what I had to say. And I was seriously pulling my punches and being extremely diplomatic. So now, it’s just the fun waiting game. Waiting for her to have a talk with my quasi-supervisor and then seeing what, if any, the fallout will be for me. She’s given me her cell phone number in case there is any fallout. She wants to know immediately.

I’m not sharing today’s photo. It has too much personal information and by the time I blot out of that out, you wouldn’t be able to tell what it was. ::chuckles:: But I got my first official business cards for the library today. My director was so embarrassed that it’s been this long to get them. She could have sworn they had ordered me some when they first hired me (ya know, a year ago), but apparently, they just MADE the order, never PLACED the order. And what know what a shitshow 2020 was. So yeah, that all just kind of got swept to the side. Oh well. Doesn’t matter, as I have them now. ::smiles:: And I’m rather pleased. Tomorrow, I’ll find one of the acrylic displays we have and put it out on the Youth Desk, so my business cards can be out there as well as quasi-supervisor’s.

Journals

Almost missed my photo for today! But I just snapped it, so we are good to go.

It’s my 5 “New Year’s Resolutions”. Very loose definition of resolutions there. More like affirmations. I read these out loud to myself every day because I really want these mind sets to stick.

I spent most of my lunch break working in my art journal. I forgot my lunch AND my prescription antihistamine, so there wasn’t a whole lot else for me to do. Thank god I still had my bottle of Benadryl in my bag, or I would have been so miserable.

But it was nice to print out some photos I wanted to put in my journal. Plus I got to show off the 8x8 Archer & Olive journal to Clarissa and Abby up at work. AND Abby told me that she went ahead and ordered the Archer & Olive journals for us at work. Woohoo! I can’t wait. So excited! So yeah, when that one gets here, that will bring my collection up to FOUR Archer & Olive journals.

Mini Sun

I guess I’m unofficially doing the 365 Photo challenge again this year. ::smiles:: So here’s today’s photo. A mini sun:

I really like dandelions. They are just such…happy flowers.

I called my Mom, just to get another perspective on the situation with my quasi-supervisor. She’s always a wealth of information. Me, I’m a dog with a bone. Once you’ve managed to piss me off, I just don’t let things go. And I’m bitten down and won’t let go…so it’s hard for me to see a different perspective.

My Mom is good at playing to my strengths while also helping me to find a less…nuclear…tacit with dealing with things. Seriously, I am truly blessed to have her in my corner. Because without her....I would be a friggin’ loose cannon 80% of the time.

She did point out that honestly, he’s just a big man-baby who’s also probably super threatened by me. He’s probably feeling really shitty about using the cleaning product that caused my major allergic reaction and he’s joking about it as a way to diffuse the tension – because he doesn’t know how to deal with the tension any healthy way. Plus, while he does have more experience working in a library, I have WORLDS more experience working with actual children than he does. Hell, I have twice as many years just in the after school program I just left than he does at the library. And I’ve been a co-director of a private school before that, and a Montessori teacher, and worked for a few other day care places as well. So yeah, he should feel threatened. ::chuckles:: Plus, my Mom pointed out that I have a rather “strong female personality” which could also rub him the wrong way as well.

So, for now, I am going to be the Serpent. I’m going to sit back, and watch. Mom suggested I just keep note of any shit he does or says that pushes my buttons. Then, if it continues, I can bring that to my Director’s attention. Plus, I’ll also tell quasi-supervisor that his comments are not ok. But yeah, other than that, I’m going to sit back, and let this little boy run himself ragged. I don’t have to chase him down. He’ll hang himself soon enough.

And, hilarious enough, my Mom suggested I “do what I do” to help quasi-boss find a “better job”. I had to chuckle out loud at that. Yeah, I can do that. This way I can keep the director I like, the coworkers I like, AND my Canada geese hoard.

Art and Tome

FINALLY able to deposit D’s check for half of the bills AND pick up my prescriptions today. I’ll need to talk to my bank at some point to see what’s up with the ATM about depositing checks.

I did a small video for two of my groups, showing off the Archer & Olive notebooks. I have a B5 (that I use as a grimoire), an A5 (that is my current Bullet Journal), and now an 8x8 Square (that is my art journal for 2021). The video turned out kind of crappy because of Facebook being shitty. I’ll probably just end up doing some photos to compare the sizes better since that was distorted the most in the video. But, I’m still proud of myself for at least trying to do it.

I painted my cover page for the art journal. It’s a blue sun with 2021 also written in blue. I’m happy that my paints, that haven’t been touched in ages, still work. The page doesn’t feel done yet. Once it’s done, I’ll share a photo of it then.

For now, here’s a photo of what I’m currently reading:

It’s The Devil’s Tome: A Book of Modern Satanic Ritual, by Shiva Honey. It’s even autographed. I should do a spread in one of my journals, listing all the books that I have, that are autographed by their authors. I don’t have a huge collection, but I have a nice beginning.

Anyways, The Devil’s Tome is seriously stretching my brain. It’s about non-theistic ritual use in Satanism. I love that the author uses scientific papers to back up the positive impacts of rituals, regardless of “religious intents”, on participants. She makes a great case for the fact that ritual does not require supernatural or deity belief to still have a powerful and positive impact on the participant’s life/psyche.

I strongly suspect some of this is going to find its way into my personal practice. Plus, some might find its way into any Coven rituals I’m put in charge of writing and leading. ::rubs her paws together:: Could prove to be quite fun.

Day 01

Well, I ended up taking my angry lil ass to bed last night at 11 pm. I was still extremely pissed about work stuff and felt it wasn’t right to continue to inflict my grumpiness on my husband.

And then I slept until 1 pm today. Apparently fighting off this allergy attack is EXHAUSTING my body. Which is probably compounding my grumpiness. ::chuckles::

Instead, I am taking a page from one of my dear, long-time friends, and wrote a few things on my FaceBook account that I’m grateful for. Jennifer K. has been doing that daily for a few years now, and honestly, I look forward to reading those every day. So I think it might be a good thing for me to add to my own writings.

It’s been a lovely, quiet day here at home. I did get around to finally making my Van Van Oil today. All that’s left is to shake it and empower it daily for the next 31 days.

Here’s what it looks like right now:

I can’t wait to see what it looks like on day 31.

In the course of gathering up all the supplies I needed, I have come to realize that I have GOT to organize my witch supplies better. I came across all sorts of things that I had completely forgotten I had!

Hopefully, tomorrow, while I’m out and about running various errands, I can run by the Dollar Tree, and pick up some cheap baskets and bins. I can use those to begin getting some sort of grip on organizing my herbs, oils, and essential oils. I also need to create some tracker spreads in my grimoire and most likely my bullet journal as well, as to what supplies I do have.

And to finish off this entry, a photo of me and Josey pup. ::smiles::

I hope 2021 is a kinder year to us all.