Monday evening things

 * Well, I guess it's happening: ALL the JoAnn's fabrics stores are closing. Stupid private equity again, slaughtering the goose to get all the golden eggs NOW. That means there really aren't any chains left that sell true dressmaker fabric. And small businesses that do are few and far between. I haven't sewn clothing in years, but I'd like to have the option to.

I guess one can still mail order, but.......I need reasons to leave the house and places that feel safe and welcoming and JoAnn's was one of those. I don't like gambling, so I will never go to the casino. And I don't drink., And I don't do "shooting sports," and I don't have kids, so I'm closed out of a lot of places here. 

For now I have the small yarn shop (which I will support for as long as we have them) and Michael's. 

*In fact, I was at Michael's this weekend; I had gotten an ad noting that they had a framing sale and I decided that I wanted to get my painting  framed. Not so much because I think it's so wonderful, but to me it represents me doing something I'd never done before and a step out of my comfort zone.

I chose a rustic wood (slightly gray toned) frame. It's supposed to be done on or before March 8th. Then I'll have to figure out where to put it up. 

I did also earn a generous "voucher" (because of what I spent) so I might take that when I go down there on my birthday and use it on something, if I can find something I want. 

* I was working on the (seemingly endless) blanket this evening; I'm almost up to the point of another color shift (light to darker pink) so that feels like a bit of progress on that

But I also got to thinking - this is yarn I bought at JoAnn's. I bought lots of those "color shifting" cake yarns from there (I have a couple more blankets' worth...) but now that won't happen any more. And I was sad again. 

And yeah, sometimes I do wonder if everything that matters to me is going away. I know I'm weird and have weird interests and so it's not "profitable" to cater to me, but darn it, it would be NICE to get to keep a few stores that sell the things I like. 

* I was also thinking about the tempest in a teacup of right now: the "justify your job in five bullet point" email thing, and I find the existence of the whole thing upsetting on several levels:

- I am a rule follower, who wants to do things "right." I probably would have been one of the fools who set myself up by doing the response right away (even though several agencies basically told their employees "don't do it, this isn't legal, we are looking into what's going on"

- realizing that if I were someone that "leadership" wanted gone, I'd be gone. There's really no fairness or loyalty any more and you can't trust anyone. We're all really "at will" employees now (meaning at the will of our employer). So taking a lower paying job with the promise of job security is probably a foolish gamble.

- Once again, the things that I value are not things the world values; and the things I am good at are not things that have value in this world. And that's a very isolating and terrible feeling. All of what's going on makes me feel small and sand and reminds me I don't matter, and this world could squash me like a bug and I'd be gone and few people would even care. Not a good think the week of your birthday, but here we are.

* And yeah. I guess I'm still gonna try to go do something Thursday, even though I know going places By Yourself on your birthday is kind of odd and probably looks loserish to normal people, but I don't have anyone to go with me. So I'm going to go out to lunch and to the yarn shop and Michael's and perhaps the used book store that used to be in my town but moved to the greener pastures of Denison. And beyond that, I don't know. We have a job candidate in Friday and I volunteered to make one of the dishes for the potluck lunch, though I might make something that could pass a day in the fridge (doing it Wednesday evening) and then heat it up Friday morning)

I do wish I had more to look forward to on my birthday but adult birthdays are a cheat.