The improv show was fun! We met up for dinner at a restaurant downtown and then walked to the Sky Stage, which was where the show was last night. It’s a building that caught on fire 15 years ago, and just the walls are still standing - they use it for live performances of all types. It was my first time there and it was great.
We saw a Baltimore improv group followed by our local D&D improv team, O Crit! I really enjoyed myself and so did the guys, I think.
This morning though I woke up to the news that my longest friend had died. We met back in middle school in math class, and remained friends forever. She was maid of honor when I married my first husband, and I was her maid of honor in her wedding a short time after. We texted frequently, sometimes infrequently. Our lives would separate and then come back together. When her mom passed several years ago, I took it hard, as her mother had a place in my heart after I spent so many sleepovers at their house during our teenage years.
Anyway, she had been failing in health for a long while. She was constantly online asking for help, asking for money. I paid for Christmas gifts for her family once, another time I sent gas money. I helped where I could but her husband worked only sometimes and she physically couldn’t work and was failing in her health.
Her mental health deteriorated and she drank a lot. She damaged her liver really, really bad and that is eventually what did her in, I guess. It allowed toxins to build up and her blood sugar wouldn’t come below 285 no matter what. Her last hospital stay was her last. Apparently sometime last month she unfriended me and almost everyone she knew on Facebook in a fit of anger. I didn’t even realize because her first grandchild had been born, and I spoke to her about it in comments and it didn’t even register that I wasn’t seeing posts from her on her page.
I’m not even sure if she realized it, tbh.
Anyway, this is someone I have known longer than anyone else outside of my family. I knew her so well in a lot of ways, and then as the years between us grew, I knew other parts of her not at all, except through brief discussions & posts. We were different people but I grew up with her and on her parents’ boat, fishing on the Indian River in Florida. They aren’t having any sort of goodbye, though when I talked to her daughter today, she said that her ashes were going to be spread in that same river. That seems really right to me. I hope she happier, wherever her soul is. Her life was not on easy mode.
I had woken up this morning at 6:30 am, as I had set an alarm to get up to prep early for Key City Steampunk. Unfortunately, my Dexcom had alerted every single hour last night and I literally got no sleep. (It was saying my sugar was at 60 but I pricked my finger each time and was really at 90-100.) So I was in bed, found out about my friend and then had zero motivation to get ready. Suddenly it was 7:30 and I realized I was pretty fucked for time.
Thankfully I had showered before bed, so I just had to put on my outfit. This usually takes about an hour. But I had forgotten that I needed to make an owl headpiece. Gah! So from 7:30-8:00 I glued like crazy! I made this, with two pinecones as the base for the feathery tufts.
Then I had 30 minutes to get ready. DarkKnight made me breakfast in a bento box (hard boiled egg with everything seasoning and some blueberries and strawberries, and a hot chai) and drove while I ate. Thank goodness! My Dexcom alerted again while on the way, which was bullshit again.
We made it to the event right at 10 am, which was in time for the first panel that DarkKnight really wanted to participate in, so I was glad of that! (The entire event opened at 10, so we were on time!) Overall it was a fun experience, and I was so happy to have a date that was just the two of us!
He ended up buying himself a cross body leather holster, and I got him an owl pin to wear to match me more (he had an owl belt pouch). I also bought myself an impractical ring, a cross stitch and a Bigfoot Christmas ornament. Then he bought some hot sauce and he got me the ABSOLUTE SOFTEST plushie - a little owlbear! Squeee!
When we came home, he took a nap but I went to the craft store with MisterMoonbeam before it closed to pick up some little mushrooms. We grabbed Taco Bell for dinner and then the three of us watched the next-to-last episode of Andor together. Then I went downstairs to my studio and made more Blossom crowns while DarkKnight helped with pricing tasks.
I’m in bed with DarkKnight tonight and he’s snoring. So far my Dexcom seems to be working after all the nonsense yesterday. I must have calibrated this stupid thing half a dozen times! Anyway, I’m really exhausted and I want to just pass out. Hopefully I get a good sleep tonight!
Today I went to my youngest daughter’s new house. It’s very spacious and I spent a few hundred dollars ordering her things they needed. TheEngineer went with me to troubleshoot getting their furnace and central air units running, and he figured out the issues. Parts are needed - I will be ordering those tonight.
