Tina's Walking Journal 🌳🚶🏻♀️🏡
Archive
February & March 2025.
March 2025
March 31 2025
Temperature: 37°F
Condition: Clear
Wind: none
Listening to: Zero Dark '80s: Pop Hits for Nighttime
3rd day in a row, gamers! Fortunately, the unseasonably warm temperatures from a few days ago were just because of a warm front passing through. It's back to seasonal, if a bit chilly. You can almost fool yourself into thinking that this state is still in a Koeppen Dfa climate zone on mornings like this.
"Break Free" by Queen playing now. My footsteps down the stairs subdivide the tempo. Same speed as sprinting. I can't sprint if you held me at gunpoint.
It smells warm around here. I'm not sure why, but it smells like someone has heated iron to glowing.
Kicked a rock. What was a rock doing there? Oh well, it ended up in a pit with other rocks. The frost heave around here got worse after they removed that tree.
What is "frost heave"? That's when the ground underneath a slab of pavement changes shape when exposed to temperature extremes. In summer, the ground gets soft and people walk on the pavement. In winter, the ground gets hard and the pavement fractures. In this case, it's been like this probably since the '70s (this is OLD pavement right here) and nobody's done anything. The cracks in this slab are so bad that it's slowly being subsumed by grass and weeds.
Crossing the road at this driveway here. Jaywalking is a made-up crime so police can meet their ticket quotas.
Got a mini heart-attack from that open charcoal grill. In my peripheral vision, it looked like someone in a hood sitting on the bench.
Something in my shoe. Lots of cars driving by on Numerical. Not enough activity will begin on the university in the next 45 minutes to justify taking the short way. Doing the long way.
I wish I could drive all the way down Numerical to State-Name Highway again. It's been years. Where's that new used car mum promised me?
Still have something in my shoe. It smells like breakfast. Probably the smell is coming from the dining hall. I'm quite a bit nearer to it here than I would be over there.
"The Great Ones Remember" by Men Without Hats playing now. I'm not going to listen to Rhythm of Youth again until I can get back to the nature-preserve park. Every morning for about 2 years, I would drive down to the park and listen to an odd-numbered Devo record, take a stroll and listen to Rhythm of Youth, and drive back home listening to an even-numbered Devo record. Result: Rhythm of Youth is the soundtrack for that park. In October 2020, I listened to Freedom of Choice by Devo en route down to the park, Rhythm of Youth of course as I walked, and Oh, No! It's Devo en route home without realising that was the last time I would ever make that trip.
If Elon has his way, the nature preserve park will be converted into high-end real estate. I don't want to think about that because there's a staircase coming up that I could easily throw myself down.
Devo, at last! Do you know how many weeks it's been since I've heard a Devo song in any of my playlists? This one is kind of ersatz, you can tell the band was in a shambles at the time. It's the only one of their songs that relies entirely upon sample CD loops (unless you count the E-Z Listening version of "Beautiful World", which uses an Optigan program). The main rhythm loop sounds an awful lot like "Walking in My Shoes" by Depeche Mode. Merits further study.
The sky back toward the athletic field is starting to look light. The sun will come up shortly after I get back home.
This school would look a lot different to me if I'd gotten in here in 2011. Or even in 2014. Hardly anything has changed in that amount of time, plus I would be familiar with how the inside of certain buildings would look. As it is right now, it's decorative. The buildings are merely cardboard cutouts. Nothing happens inside, and a lot of random people mill about here during the day. When they go through the doors of a building, they unload from memory like characters in a videogame that leave the player's field of vision. None of these buildings are real, none of these cars belong to anybody, none of the people who I occasionally see around here actually exist.
It no longer smells like hot metal. Now it smells like a gas-fired stove.
March 30 2025
Temperature: 38°F (wind chill of 28°? That's gotta be a mistake)
Condition: Overcast
Wind: Moderate from a variable northerly direction
Listening to: "She Bop" (Cyndi Lauper, from SHE'S SO UNUSUAL, 1983)
I seem to be averaging every other day. I didn't do anything yesterday, mostly because I didn't get to sleep until 5 in the morning. Between worry, writing, and attempting to reset my regular-people hours by force (and failing), I slept through my morning walking time. I thought I could take my morning stroll at 9 when I took my morning E, but i fell asleep again when I sat down to put my socks on.
The clouds are a fun orange colour over Absurdly Influential State Football University's media studies campus. I don't doubt it's bright from light pollution over there; the last time I was down there at night, it was like daytime it was so bright. No LED's over there, either. That's why the clouds are orange. This is in direct contrast to the almost white clouds over Alphabetical Street, where it's almost nothing but LED's (there's a few holdouts that haven't changed much from the '90s, probably since before my time, but mostly it's LED lighting down there).
Scared a fox. Sorry, darling, I won't be here long. In fact, I'll just turn here so you won't have to worry about me potentially threatening your family.
Again, walking at an unusually fast pace for no apparent reason. I guess it's just chilly out here and there's some wind from the north. I'm sure I'll slow down during the summer. It's just, my heart isn't liking this sudden burst of activity after doing nothing for 36 hours. Well, we've reached the "downhill" portion of the route.
It looks lonely around here without any decorative lights. I'm giving serious consideration to ordering some white christmas lights from a website someplace so I can string them up around the crown moulding again. The thumbtacks I used are mostly still up there.
There's actually a light on in that house I accused several months ago of being abandoned. It's in the basement, but it's still a light. I know plenty of people who lived in a basement. I wouldn't do it personally, especially with the unfinished basements around here. If you've looked at my real-estate shots of Cheap As Free from ModTheSims, that's what our basements look like in this state, only with more cracks, rising damp, and random spiderwebs all over the place.
Noisy engine on Earliest Dead President Street. Getting closer. Possibly on the sidewalk. Not going to look back for some reason. On the street, a motorised bicycle. Not an e-Bike but an old-style mo-ped. Cutting across the campus by driving on the sidewalk in front of the science hall. It smells like lawnmower exhaust. Coughed so hard I farted.
Today, I'm actually going to take a picture down Catholic Street. Like I said once, it reminds me of those romantic pictures of nighttime I used to draw when I was a kid and any activity at night was forbidden.
Since I'm down here, I might as well go all the way around the university campus.
There's a weird twinkling light somewhere on that flat over there.
Something in my shoe. Hold onto that lamppost up there. Car coming the second I reach it. Coincidence? Or will I die now?
Coincidence. They're driving away.
There's actually people parked in this carpark up here. Usually whenever I come this way it's empty. Many cars in carpark, no lights on in flats. "Who up readin' they bible?" (random line from a film I saw part of on cable TV in the mid-'90s)
"Caveman Head" by Eurythmics playing now. Making metronome sounds with my tongue to see if it's the ideal speed for sex climax. It's a little too fast, by about 35 BPM. Divide the tempo and you might be onto something.
Not many people on High-Number Numerical Street today. Why should there be anyone out here? It's Sunday. Observant Christians are all either still asleep or making coffee and watching a sermon podcast, depending on how fanatical they are.
None of the cars passing me on the road were built any later than 2016. No Teslas, no EV's of any kind. This sedan smells like it was built in the '80s. I can't tell because I can't see, it's still dark out. Even if it were light out, I couldn't tell because I don't care. I do not run identifyingcarsinposts.tumblr.com.
There's a really bright light over there by that house all of a sudden. I was considering carrying on down to Dead President Street from here, but not with that light there. I'll just turn here.
Looks like all the toys scattered around the front lawn here have been picked up at last.
I don't see Generic Boy's car. Doesn't mean he doesn't live here, he's just not here right now.
I often wonder what causes that colour-cycling light in the flat across from me.
March 28 2025
Temperature: 71°F
Condition: Partly cloudy
Wind: Moderate from the south
Listening to: "Down Under" (Men At Work, from BUSINESS AS USUAL, 1981)
What a difference a couple days make! There's a warm front moving through the area, which caused an 81°F high yesterday and will cause an 85°F high today. Can't turn on the air conditioning though, because my cooling assistance hasn't been approved and, with Elon and the Funny Bunch in charge, it most likely will not be. Assume I've died of heat prostration if I suddenly stop making updates in May. Anyway, the cooling assistance wouldn't have started yet anyway, since the state welfare office is still operating on the 1949 Koeppen climate survey estimate, so summer air-con season doesn't begin until most of the way through June and ends approximately the first week in September. As you can probably imagine, I can't afford any kind of climate control without assistance.
At least getting out this morning puts me into a stiff southerly wind. All of my windows face north, so sitting here at my computer, I'm not getting anything, even with the fan on.
I'm playing my '80s morning mix out of my MP3 player/dictaphone today because my mobile phone has a 7% charge. I don't normally like being outside without my phone for emergency purposes, but today was not optional. This also means I don't have a torch with me, so I guess I'll have to remember where all the frost heave is.
There is now a pair of broken liquor bottles on the pedestrian walkway in front of Broken Security Floodlight Flat. Those were not here last time. I imagine they will still be here tomorrow.
I think the porch light on Marty's place was installed for no reason but to enhance the light pollution this city gives off. That's as predictable a behaviour in America as swilling beer and watching football; someone says "pollution" and people immediately become Eric Cartman. It doesn't do anything for security except blind anyone who walks by and turn all the shadows RGB perfect black.
I'm walking pretty quickly for some reason. I mean, I'm dressed sort of androgynously? I'm not actually worried about my outfit, though... I guess I just wanted to walk fast.
The only disadvantage to playing music on my dictaphone is no shuffle. The track order is the track order I gave it initially. Plus, if I want to have other playlists that contain the same songs, I need to have copies of the same songs in all those different folders. Still, I have to keep reminding myself that this is what we had back in elementary school, and we made do just fine.
What is it, with me, and all these, totally, unnecessary, commas, today?
Since it's windy, the windmill-shaped weathervane in this front garden here is spinning so hard it might spin off and slice my head open. That might be fun. It sure would solve a lot of problems. Well, it didn't happen.
Once upon a time, I was going to walk all the way down to Numerical and walk back up Catholic Street. But, it's so dark. Maybe during the summer holiday, I'll do that on a day where it'll be fairly dry (I hate humidity with a vengeance), carry on up Catholic Street, go right through the university campus, and return home on Higher-Number Street. No one around, no one's gonna care.
Walking downhill like this, it's hard to tell there's sidewalk chalk drawings. It just looks like shadows from the tree here.
There's a scarf or something on the ground here. It looks like it came off accidentally, but it's been driven over quite a few times. It's still in one piece, but it's dirty and damaged beyond repair. It's kind of sad actually.
March 26 2025
Temperature: 33°F
Condition: Partly cloudy
Wind: none
Listening to: "Africa" (Toto, from TOTO IV, 1982)
Sick of the stairs and trying to reset my regular-people hours AGAIN, I happened to be awake at ideal walking time! So, why the heck not?
There's sidewalk chalk drawings on the ground in front of this house here, but it's kind of hard to make out what any of it is. I'm pretty sure there's hopscotch here, but it's dark. I can't tell. Last year, the hopscotch was in a well-lit area. I'm trying not to walk on anyone's magnum opus here, but a lot of the drawings go all the way to the edges of the pavement.
Unfortunately, the tree under which the hopscotch was drawn last summer still has smashed liquor bottles at its base. This lawn is now unsuitable for children to play in, and that's really sad. Whoever owns this building cares so little that he won't even do the bare-ass minimum and clean up the broken glass.
So, you can imagine the floodlight is still blinking and flashing. Of course it is. The glass will stay on the ground until someone cuts themselves on it, gets an infection, and sues the landlord. The light will continue flashing until it develops a short-circuit and burns the building down.
I seem to recall a school bus always stopping here under the Spider Tree during the early fall. It always seemed like it was playing mind games with me, how it would suddenly show up after I decided to walk in the road to avoid the Bug Bush. One time, it startled me back onto the grass and then vanished without a trace. I guess I keep coming out here too early in the morning anymore. Of course, where are there kids around here? I've been out here during weekend afternoons and holidays and I've yet to see or hear a single child.
At least the Halloween house still has decorative lights up... it seems occasionally like the people in this neighbourhood hate fun.
I stepped on the only stick on the entire pedestrian walkway and it snapped loudly. Great job, Han Solo; now every speeder pilot in all of Endor knows you're here.
There's a green light on top of the science building that I've never noticed before. I assume it's been there the whole time, I just never... bothered to look up there, I guess?
Bin van. Something in my shoe.
The LED floodlight illuminating the sorority house's Greek lettering has gone pink a bit. I know it's hokey— pink for girls— but I like it. Besides, I don't have to live there, so who cares even.
"Safety Dance" by Men Without Hats. Somebody coming.
Midterm campaign signs on that lawn. I can't read them from here. I don't even know when election day is. I hope I don't miss it.
"Africa" is playing again. I scared a rabbit. I can barely see her it's so dark around here. I wouldn't have seen her at all if she hadn't moved. Quirk of being human.
From the cars parked on the road, #3's brother's boyfriend spent the night. God, he's cute... too bad he's taken. I'm not real interested in starting a polycule. Oh wait, I'm a woman now though, I forgot. He wouldn't be interested anyway.
March 21 2025
Temperature: 47°F (wind chill of 42°F)
Condition: Clear
Wind: Light from the north
Listening to: nothing
I haven't logged a walk journal since the 13th because I hadn't been walking. I've done the stairs a dozen or so times, but I really need to get back into walking, even if it's at a high-traffic time like... all day. Spring break already happened, so the next university-emptying holiday isn't until the spring semester ends in May. Anyway, I'm just doing the stairs again today. At least it's something.
Considering recent events, I'm becoming afraid to leave my flat. I run the risk of shutting myself in and driving myself mad. So, yeah. Stairs at the very least.
Of course, nothing is going on. The laundry machines have been going consistently for the past 2 trips. I need to do my own washing while I still have the chance, especially since #1's dirty washing output is set to increase tenfold by August. Between 1 and 2, I won't be able to get a load in edgeways.
March 13 2025
Temperature: 32°F (wind chill of 25°F)
Condition: Clear
Wind: Light from the north
Listening to: SO-LO (Danny Elfman, 1984)
It's Danny's name on the cover, but it's an Oingo Boingo album.
Should I walk around the university? Maybe I'll walk around the university. Yeah, I'll walk around the university. Haven't done that in a couple of days.
I should have eaten something before coming out here... oh well.
Luna's not quite full, but it's near enough for werewolves. Walking the direction I'm going means I get to look at her for an extended period of time!
My mum's old boss got a job as an extended learning counsellor in this building here when the Catholic women's college in the stripmall shut down in 2011. She was sort of controlling and my mum had to have me help her work on being obsequious, or at least putting on an obsequious façade. Her son sort of reminded me of how I used to be when I was in pre-school. Anyway, that was a long time ago. She's probably retired or on a board somewhere, while her son is probably out of college and playing house right now. Sometimes I wonder how they're doing. Better than I am, no doubt.
Even though I'll probably walk this way again before then, I'm not going to have the campus all to myself again until summer holiday. I have no idea what I'm going to do about my summer clothes. All of my graphic tees are men's cut and I never want to wear another pair of baggy cargo jeans again as long as I live. I'm just taking it as a foregone conclusion that I won't be able to wear any of my women's clothes in public, most likely forever.
Of course, by summertime, I hope to have that much-talked-about new used car, at which point I can start going to the nature preserve again. An interesting thing about my transition: I stopped being afraid of bugs and spiders. I started to realise that they're just doing the best they can and they only bite humans and woodland mammals if they invade their personal space. I started really paying attention to the barn spiders that often build webs on my porch; last year I noticed that she had to get something out of her teeth, just like I do after eating corn, and it was the cutest thing ever. So, I think I can do nature trails in summer now.
I also hope to be working at the nature preserve's gift shop by then, too; so I'll have to go down there every single day. It'll make up for my not having been there in 5 years.
I sure am piling a lot of hopes and dreams on the new car, huh?
March 12 2025
Temperature: 25°F (wind chill of 21°F)
Condition: Partly cloudy
Wind: Light from the north
Listening to: Women and Children First (Van Halen, 1980)
Rather than a playlist, we're doing an album. Besides, VLC is gonna shuffle "Fools" to the top of the random sort again anyway, so why not just listen to the record? Anyway, Luna is beautiful again this morning, I'm dressed on the fem side of androgynous, and it's still wintertime chilly out here. I foresee nothing particularly interesting happening today, so we'll just leave it at that.
March 11 2025
Temperature: 32°F
Condition: Partly cloudy
Wind: Light from the north
Listening to: "Misfit Kid" (The Cars, from PANORAMA, 1980)
I reset my regular people hours yesterday at the cost of my evening meds. So, I figure exercise is the best way to cushion the impact of unbalanced hormones. Apart from strolling, I plan to do stair runs today as well.
Luna is beautiful this morning! She's almost full and, since I came out here so late, she's just getting ready to set, so she's casting some lovely colour on the bank of clouds that's coming in from the west.
Talking of our moon; whenever a wealthy corporation drops something and doesn't pick it up, no one cares. Whenever I drop something and don't pick it up, it's littering. Quite honestly, Luna's surface is basically being used as a landfill for large, expensive machines. Mars, too. At least the Mars rovers were doing something useful, but Intuitive Machines just wants to help billionaires establish company towns on the moon. Fuck all that. NASA used to get federal funding to do science for the sake of science, but then Dubya the Decider decided all that money would be better spent on the eradication of Islam.
I'm going to try taking a picture of Luna this morning. It'll take a couple more seconds monkeying around with settings in Pro mode, but it can be done! It won't be social-media quality, of course, but it doesn't have to. I just want to remember how it felt to stand here in the chilly morning air and see the moon.
VLC once again decided to shuffle Jan Hammer's "Miami Vice Theme" to the top of the playlist. Next!
If this is "Fools", I'm finding a different playlist.
"Smuggler's Blues" by Glenn Frey. Eh, good enough. Not great; I was hoping for Devo.
I'm here so early, the lights in the dining hall are still off. Not the soda fountains, though. I can still see the blue glow of the "Ice Cold Refreshment" sign.
I'm going the same route I went yesterday, so there's not much to say. Except that this boxwood hedge next to Marty's place is going to be full of garden spiders in a couple months, so I'll have to stop coming this way until probably September or October.
I always sweat a lot by the time I get back home, but... well... TMI. I'll save that for my unlinked diary page.
March 10 2025
Temperature: 32°F
Condition: Clear
Wind: none
Listening to: "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" (Cyndi Lauper, from SHE'S SO UNUSUAL, 1983)
Happy Mario Day! It's gonna get to 80°F today, amongst other weird things. Anyway, if you were waiting for a sign to stop giving Greedy Corporate Videogaming your money and start emulating old games on your computer, this is it. I suggest starting with playing Super Mario All-Stars+Super Mario World on Snes9x.
I decided to dress on the femme side of androgynous today: black sweatshirt and heather-grey jogging pants. I think if there's one thing we as trans girls can be grateful for in this political climate, it's how unisex certain clothing is. We can simultaneously dress masc and femme.
[A Message from the Future!] Now that I'm back at home, writing this entry in the privacy of my own flat, I'm dressed super femme. The same jogging pants, but with my red headband and secondhand Shein top I accidentally got from Goodwill last year. (Probably the reason for its longevity is I hardly ever wear it.)
The interesting bit about this song in particular is how much of a 180° turn it took in Cyndi Lauper's hands. It was originally a makeout song by Robert Hazard, where he was probably singing about how girls want his dick. But then, Cyndi turned that same song into the women's lib/lesbian/transgender anthem of the 1980s. "Wait, it's a transgender anthem?" Some boys take a beautiful girl and hide her away from the rest of the world, I want to be the one to walk in the sun, 'cos girls just want to have fun.
I left late enough this morning that the sun is just starting to think about coming up. There's a pronounced blue-to-black gradient in the sky at the moment.
Okay, seriously, what is it about Van Halen's "Fools" and Jan Hammer's "Miami Vice Theme" that makes VLC continuously serve those 2 songs in that order after the first selection every single day for 3 days? Next!
"Take On Me". Whatever. I'll take it.
Not that I anticipate having any trouble in this area, but I've worked out a pretty solid cover-story in case anyone decides I might be a trans woman and takes offence. I'm not telling you what it is. It's not that I don't trust you, it's just that Elon has been one of the biggest AI investors and I can't take the risk.
March 9 2025
Temperature: 23°F
Condition: Clear
Wind: none
Listening to: "Take It from the Boys" (Black Rose, from BLACK ROSE, 1980)
Somehow, the weather conditions this morning are exactly the same as yesterday morning; as though someone just copied the settings and pasted them into a new file. I'm going to go the opposite direction from yesterday for variety.
Incidentally, in the US, we skipped 02:00 this morning and went straight to 03:00, but no one informed the sun or the birds of this change, so this entire stroll will be conducted in the early morning darkness.
I should point out, Black Rose is not a Cher record. Black Rose is a Black Rose record; the only one they ever cut. "Take It from the Boys" is really the only standout track on that record, and fortunately it serves. The lyrics are a little dated (eg. calling weed "Maui wowie") but it paints a vivid picture.
...As vivid a picture as "Fools" by Van Halen, which is playing now. Interesting, this was the "randomised" 2nd track yesterday as well.
What do you want here? There's nothing going on. I do, however, have a grievance to air about the lighting they used on the new science building. Its "new age light-pollution resistant" design not only manages to avoid preventing any light pollution, it also avoids lighting up the pathway. It would only be marginally darker to have no lights here at all.
I'm not sure how, but going anticlockwise around the university has an unfairly high amount of "up". There doesn't seem to be enough "down". Sort of like when I went to get my bus pass for jury duty last September: it felt like I had to go uphill both ways, even though there's a very pronounced hill going down to the bus terminal. I still can't figure that one out.
March 8 2025
Temperature: 23°F
Condition: Clear
Wind: none
Listening to: "Beat It" (Michael Jackson, from THRILLER, 1983)
I haven't been out this way since February 1st. It's been cold, snowy, rainy, icy, snowy again, and I've had some personal problems that have affected my ability to come out here lately. But now, the cold snap is over, the snow is really gone, and all the ice melted. I can't resolve my personal problems if I can't go outside, so here we go outside.
I'm dressed more on the masc side of androgynous today because I only have 1 pair of khaki slacks left and I don't want to completely blend in with the shadows this early in the morning. Everything else you can see in the dark is brightly coloured and feminine, and... well... we've been over that.
For future reference (like, when I'm reading this entry in August), 23°F is cold. I've been out here in lower temperatures, and this is perfectly cold enough to be called "cold" and mean it. I'm pretty sure my exposed skin on my face and hands will be red when I get back indoors. And these khakis are more windpants than anything else. Real actual slacks would be protecting me from the slight breeze more than these are.
There's the bin van. Whenever anyone talks down about "garbage collectors", I always think of that Tumblr meme with Tony Soprano yelling "In this house, sanitation workers are heroes!" Just think of how bad it would be just on this one university campus if the bin van didn't come round regularly. I think the custodians have an incinerator, but there's no way you can incinerate 12 skips' worth of rubbish in a timely-enough manner to do anyone any good. Plus, it would generate so much ash and smoke (and possibly noxious fumes, depending on what's being burned) that it would thickly coat this part of town in an impenetrable drawing fog. Come to our university and live like you're in Superman 64!
It must be spring break; the frats are empty again.
Well, here's the science building and "She Blinded Me With Science" is just ending. Oh wait, here comes "Dr. Heckyll & Mr. Jive", that's good enough.
March 4 2025
Temperature: 53°F
Condition: Fog
Wind: nearly undetectable from the east
Listening to: "Cash In Your Face" (Stevie Wonder, from HOTTER THAN JULY, 1980)
I really had to push myself out the door this morning. This happens a lot as I recall. Anyway, if the forecast is to be believed, it'll be blizzarding conditions this same time tomorrow. And yesterday I said the snow was gone for good. It was raining a while ago so it's still incredibly humid; plus the temperature and the dew point agree with each other. You know what that means, right? Fog.
I'll just go the opposite direction from yesterday. I'm not feeling very imaginative right now.
The athletic fields' floodlights are on, so it looks kinda pretty in the fog like that. At least it would if I hadn't spent half the evening reading about the PAVE Phased Array Warning System
and other megalithic Cold War-era stuff. Technological constructs the size of office buildings that contain nothing but a singular computerised object detection system, and if you get too close to it, you die of cancer. PAVE PAWS is almost spookier than Chernobyl. How do the athletic field lights have any bearing on this? Well, they don't, I guess.
Apropos of nothing, "Pave Paws" would be a great name for a riot grrl synthpop band, like Devo only with 5 trans girls.
I can actually see into the dining hall today. Not very well, because it's 150 feet away, but I can. The way I can tell is the soda fountains. I can kind of make out the generic "ice cold refreshment" advertising placards on them.
Now playing: "Everybody Needs" from SO-LO by Danny Elfman/Oingo Boingo, 1984. The boy he speaks of was on Wheel of Fortune last night. I remember going to high school and college with guys like that.
It looks like there's some sort of police activity going on down the block. Fortunately, I'm not planning on going down that far.
Taking it for granted that this relic of the '50s is not, in fact, a sorority, that would mean that there's only one sorority left on this university campus. Because the one down there where I battled Team Rocket Grunts in Pokémon Go back in November 2020 closed sometime thereafter, so there's only the one on Numerical and Dead President now. You don't suppose the board of regents would be stupid enough to try and make this an all-male university, do you?
March 3 2025
Temperature: 44°F (wind chill of 38°)
Condition: Clear
Wind: light from the south
Listening to: "Where Do All My Friends Go" (Oingo Boingo, BOI-NGO, 1987)
If walking in feminine outfits makes me feel vulnerable all of a sudden, then go back to dressing androgynously already, huh? The snow's gone for good, the temperature probably isn't going to go below freezing again until late December, it's not hot and humid yet, I NEED TO GET OUT! I'm eschewing the purple hoodie in favour of the sweater with the zipper, but I'm still wearing my hair to the side and I have my zipper pulled down far enough to expose a little cleavage (if I had any). Rather than the baggy cargo jeans, I'm wearing some slacks that I quit wearing in '20 because they didn't fit with my "boring man" baggy generic look. I don't use cargo pockets anymore anyway, not since the backpack.
It's going to rain tomorrow. The forecast says 11% chance later today, but I don't believe it. I don't smell imminent rain, I smell eventual rain. That's a fun skill you develop after you grow up in Nebraska, you get to tell what kind of weather is coming by how it smells and how it feels on your skin. Of course, I'm still a slut for base Doppler reflectivity.
The block of flats with the "Red Alert" security floodlight also has broken bottles galore strewn about the lawn, the standing lamp hasn't worked since before Halloween, and the door looks like someone pried it open with a crowbar sometime in the past couple of months. I'm getting the distinct impression this is actually a slum, disguised as a working-class flat from the '50s. Clearly it's more of a burden and a tax shelter than an investment.
The house that did all that decorating still has some very limited festive multicoloured lights, quite possibly for Mardi Gras.
It sort of reminds me of that gentrified sublet house down in the art district where someone had multicoloured lights strung up on their porch for no reason other than they liked it. I noticed it one day in August or September when I was driving down to the park several years ago. It inspired me to buy 4 strands of white christmas lights that year and string them up along the crown moulding; it was surprising how avant-garde and actually practical that turned out to be. The lights lasted about a year before they gave out. The thumbtacks I used are still up there.
It's nice to see that, despite not having come out here for the better part of 3 months, some things don't change. Like the frost heave.
Thinking back to yesterday, it occurs to me that not once have I seen a single emblem of queer allyship on this university campus. For various reasons, I've been to the residential portion of Absurdly Influential State Football University several times and there's always at least a rainbow flag somewhere. The most radical emblem was the transgender pride banner in front of— of all places— the Unitarian church the last time I went down that way for jury duty. But not here. Not from Pride of the '50s University. However, I have seen a "Trump/Vance" sign in the window of the frat house. Until otherwise notified, I'm going to assume that this place is as far to the right as Liberty University and twice as fascist.
One of these days, I just have to go down that delivery ramp and see what is stuck to that bulletin board in the breezeway. It's interesting how academic bulletin boards haven't changed since I was in school. Border segments with clouds, balloons, or pencils; stick-up lettering in Cooper Black; that kind of thing.
March 2 2025
Temperature: whatever, cold-ish
Condition: still here
Wind: who cares
Listening to: nothing of consequence
I took a morning stroll for the first time since forever. I rushed through it. There's nothing to say.
February 2025
February 16 2025
Temperature: 12°F (wind chill of -5°)
Condition: Clear
Wind: Nearly undetectable from the north
Listening to: #8 playing New Super Mario Bros.
The reason I haven't been writing in my walking journal is because I've been doing the stairs this whole time because of a combination of an embarrassing personal problem and frigidly cold temperatures. As I type this, there's about 4 inches of snow on the ground and more on the way, so that's been an obstacle, too. I know I said I would walk as long as I could see the pavement, but I said that back when the overnight low temperature was 68°F.
The stairs aren't particularly interesting. Certainly there's not enough to write about regularly, so I just haven't been writing at all.
February 4 2025
Temperature: 12°F (wind chill of -5°)
Condition: Clear
Wind: Light from the north
Listening to: "Once in a Lifetime", Talking Heads
I'm not bothering to check the temperature before I go out. It's cold, frigid even, so I'm wearing 2 pairs of trousers, a teeshirt, and 2 sweaters. Why am I going out now? In the past, I would have just stayed in and done the stairs. I guess I'm compelled to go by the thought that this might be the last really cold day of the year, possibly forever. We had no appreciable snowfall since last February. The question isn't "is human-caused climate change real?", the question now is, "now that the climate has changed, what are we going to do about it?". The answer seems to be a resounding, "pretend like nothing is happening and blame everything on the gays and the immigrants."
I guess I'm feeling a little too political to make any objective commentary this morning. I went out, that is all.
February 1 2025
Temperature: 35°F (wind chill of 27°)
Condition: Mostly cloudy
Wind: Moderate from the south
Listening to: Ed Edd n Eddy Character Anthems Playlist
["Everybody's Broke", Herbie Hancock (Eddy's Anthem)] I didn't walk much during January. I'm not sure what changed, but I've really let my strolls go! That's not good for someone who wants to spend the whole day hiking from one end of the nature-preserve park to the other when her new used car gets here. Anyway, I've got my Nintendo 3DS with me so I can get more Play Coins. Would you believe that I spent 200 Play Coins on fortune cookies and design lessons alone? Last January, I never thought I'd be able to do anything with those.
I saw the weather conditions said "35F" and went, "Oh, I don't need to wear long sleeves." Wrong! It turns out a 27-degree wind chill is pretty chilly actually. Oh well, I'll just keep my hands in my pockets.
["Flying North", Thomas Dolby (Double Dee's Anthem)] I always have a low-level anxiety about being stopped by the police when I'm out here before dawn. I don't know why. Police in this town never stop white people and, with my sleeves short like this, you can tell how blindingly white I am at a glance. Plus, it's not like I'm making a big secret out of being here; I have my phone torch on and I'm whistling along with my playlist. I'm not so worried about this that I can't function, it's just, like I said, a low-level anxiety.
["Monsters", Blue Oyster Cult (Ed's Anthem)] This song talks a fair bit about "good ol' Joe". Back in 1980, when this album was new, Joe was the quintessential American name. Now, it's Joe Biden. I always imagine this Pasha chick scoring with Joe Biden and it cracks me up.
["Johnny on the Monorail", The Buggles (Jimmy's Anthem)] There's a hole in the grass here that looks like it was dug by a creature. Maybe a dog? But the dirt spread pattern is wrong. It's a small hole, so whatever it was couldn't have been very large.
I always like looking down Catholic Street here, because you can see all the way down to where the road jogs north a bit in about a mile. I like looking at the streetlights from this angle, it reminds me of the romantic pictures of nighttime that I used to draw when I was a little kid and any activity at night was strictly forbidden.
Even though it's Saturday, there's still quite a lot of traffic on Earlier Dead President Street. The bus won't start running until 8, though. You know, if the city council decreased funding for the police department by only 1%, they could afford to run the busses every day of the week for free. And this is a "liberal" city council, even. But no. Spending $30,000,000 on police helicopters was more important than actually helping anyone live a better life.
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