I use divination for self-examination and planning how I can take action to reach goals. I've posted a reading today that might help you make some decisions about healthy change in 2024.

https://diydiv.substack.com/p/a-reading-for-the-new-year

"Roots have been overexposed to dihydrogen monoxide" just sounds better than "she's been overwatered and root rot started".

My rosemary has to be grown in a pot and move in for the winter. It grows great most of the year, but just won't survive an outdoor winter. And I fear her roots have been overexposed to dihydrogen monoxide while she's been inside. I might be able to save her, but the chances don't look good.

I didn't find my YoYo Man yoyo (yet), but I did find my old Duncan Butterfly YoYo! So, in honor of Tommy Smothers, I found out it's been waaay too long since I last "walked the dog". But I can do a basic catch and release.

Gatsby, the Grey Catsby, had never seen a yoyo before! She's not amused that she can't chase it like a ball.

When I was a kid, the Smothers Brothers taught me through their show that you get to decide who will be on your stage. If everybody else won't let people on their stage because of the color of their skin, their gender, the country their name comes from...you give them your stage.

I still have my Smothers Brothers YoYo Man yoyo. I need to go find it.

I'm the only person in the house Santa brought a gift for this year. There are no kids here anymore, so it's just adults exchanging gifts. (I got some great scarves for headwraps from my mother-in-law!)

But there was one present from Santa. This book! It was my first favorite book. When I couldn't actually read yet, I could recite the story and turn the pages at the right times because it had been read to me so often.

Santa found a copy and brought it to me all these years later.

When words and names escape me, I'm so thankful to be married to a fellow nerd! I can ask him how many k's are in Warhammer and he'll tell me it's 40. If I can't find Ed Greenwood's name in my mind in the moment, I just say "Elminster's dad", and he knows I mean the author, not the fictional father of the character.

It was finally a Bill and Ted poster!

Now she always says, "You already did that," when I tell her that's what she's getting. I still haven't reminded her yet that there was a sequel.

The poster was in a poster frame. Big, flat, and the right size and weight for a movie poster. I wrapped it, so no one could see what it was. Still, I thought they'd be at least a little suspicious. Nope! Right up to the last second it was, "Well, whatever it is, I know it's NOT a Bill and Ted poster!"

That might have been my best Christmas! The shock on her face! The way my parents cracked up laughing!

I remember how old she was because several Big Things that year anchored it in my mind. One of the Big Things was her getting engaged. December came, she asked what I was giving her, I said it would be a Bill and Ted poster, and everyone had to explain the really long running joke to her fiance.

But nobody thought about the store at the mall that sold movie posters. Of course they didn't! I had spent over 10 years training them to believe this would never happen.

She was shocked! She squealed with delight! And when Christmas came...

Sister: What are you giving me for Christmas?
Me: Bill and Ted poster.
Mom: Not this again!

Eventually, after a few years, it became, "What are you giving me? And don't say 'Bill and Ted' poster!"

I think I stopped doing this for every birthday and Christmas around the time she started middle school. But I'd say it now and then. It wasn't completely forgotten.

Then there was Christmas when she was 20 years old.

I'm 8 years older. No other siblings. I had no one else to play these things out on. Her party was All Little Mermaid, but I had spent weeks telling her I was giving her a Bill & Ted poster for her birthday. She's opening Little Mermaid present after Little Mermaid present, our mom hands her a box and tells her it's from me, and the kid looks at me and smiles like we have a shared secret and says, "I know what this is!"

It was a Little Mermaid t-shirt and watch.

It's holiday season, I'm feeling generous... I shall bless you all with the story of the Bill & Ted poster!

"Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure" and Disney's original "The Little Mermaid" both came out in 1989. By the next year, my sister was All Little Mermaid All The Time. I'm not good with remembering ages, when people were born, or sometimes my own birthday. So I just know her next birthday was somewhere between 5 and 7 years old.

Sometimes the problem with talking about trauma isn't having someone to talk to. Sometimes it's the actual talking about it. The brain starts shutting doors because NOPE! We're just not even going to look in there! But I still know what's on the other side of the door. That's why I draw and play instruments. I can tell my story without words. #CoSoMentalHealth

It's December. My outdoor plants had to come in before the end of October. We've been running heat and wearing jackets and long sleeves for a while now. We've had light snow twice.

I took this picture in my yard today.

Shai-Hulud is feeling social today. Resting with his head out isn't as rare as it used to be, but still pretty uncommon. He flicks his tongue at me if I sit and talk to him.