If Daleks were tortoises. HI-BER-NATE! HI-BER-NATE!

I have been regretting that the local homewares/paint/garden etc shop closed, then Homebase, and now it's B&Q which is 30 minutes walk away. But Screwfix is only 6 minutes walk, and my goodness it has so many Things! Full of almost all the things I could want. Bought 3, made a wish list of 14 :-)

Question 4: Paint! I have several tins/tubs in the garage (which is next to the garden), left over from the house painting 2 years ago. How long does opened paint last? Is it useful to hang on to some for touchups, or should I get it to the recycling centre for reuse?

Question 3: Tools! Forks, secateurs, the like. Do they generally wear out or become too rusty after 2-3 years, or am I shockingly lacking in a maintenance plan? Should I just get new ones and learn to look after them this time? I don't have spoons to take them to a sharpener's.

Question 2: I always write my plant labels, but they never stay! What are your tips for permanent labelling? I've tried Sharpie on plastic labels (sold as plant labels), Sharpie on masking tape on plastic labels...

Question 1: why does the soil level in pots go down? Is it watering and compacting, is it leaving through the bottom, is it turning into plant? I fill the fresh pots right up, and a year or so later they're 5-7 cm down.

I was going to ask the gardener some questions on Monday, but he was ill so I'm asking you instead.

September books: Books in: 6 (all ebooks) Books read: 9 (4 physical, 5 ebooks) Books unread: 435 (329 physical, 106 ebooks) Last month Books unread: 438 (333 physical, 105 ebooks) Making my way through that physical bookcase.

I also had my flu jab today (at a different surgery). "Do you have an egg allergy?" "No" "There isn't any egg in this vaccine but there are in some, so we always ask" Safer to have the habit of always asking, than forget when it's important.

Garden/Garage sorting update. Gardener was ill, Shona came to collect rocks (2 panniers full but I seem to have the same number of rocks) and did some moving of things, so I could do some slow easy things to prepare for Tuesday's garage sorting visit.

Sep 26: 1 month since Covid2, 3 weeks of Long Covid relapse. Days still variable and it's easy to crash. Worst days are a lot better than the worst of LC1 in 2020 but nowhere near as good as the worst days of 3-6 months ago. Same pattern for Best days. Baseline feels bit better this week than last.

I thought clearing those things would leave me less stressed, but I'm weirdly feeling ravenous. But tomorrow morning is weekly blood sugar test so a motivation to not go crazy on the cornflakes.

If I could get non-autistic people to understand one thing, it wouldn't be that I have support needs. It would be that YOU have support needs.

Just discovered years of digital bank statements, in the online inbox I never used to use. You can filter the messages by account. Current account [5389] Savings account [6731] Oh crikey! That doesn't make sense. thinks... thinks... Oh it's the last 4 digits of the account number.

Compressed timescale! Folded ladder is in the kitchen for now, machine will go on Thursday, gardener will come on Monday, Penny will come on Tuesday for the sorting. Everyone understands that I can't do much and mostly have to sit quietly and think slowly.

Garage yay: mum is bringing back the loft ladder, man who's been storing a large woodworking machine "temporarily" since 2021 is coming to dismantle and remove it, gardener is coming in three weeks to put garden to bed and bring some things in to store for the winter.

Pikachu in a capoeira ring in the anti-Bolsonarista demos in Salvador, Brazil

On the same afternoon, I plunged back into a Long Covid relapse in which I am still (Day 16 of that). Didn't post immediately, to see how it settled, hen it got too long to compose as a thread. Here's a big brain dump you should be able to read for a week: bugshaw.dreamwidth.org/876749.html

August books: Books in: 24 (6 physical (gifts), 18 ebooks) Books read: 10 (8 physical, 2 ebooks) Books unread: 438 (333 physical, 105 ebooks) Last month Books unread: 428 (340 physical, 88 ebooks) Lots in from birthday and Martha Wells HumbleBundle, and I've just read my 100th this year.

Boosting this again because clinically vulnerable people do not stop being vulnerable when the Government wants to save money. petition.parliament.uk/petitions/73...

If the legacy media had reported honestly the scale of the Trans Pride demonstration, they would not now be able to represent the Far Right demonstration as a sign of imminent democratic collapse and civil war.

You could make a transfer with SKILLS on and it would be transferable skills.

Before I try to do a thread, how does it work? First post Reply to first post Then do you reply to the first post again and again, or do you reply to the first reply then the second reply? I am very low brain energy today and don't have any spare to experiment or stuff it up...

Last of the One Mile Telescope. Having a proper scan of the pinhole photo means it’s easier to blend over iPhone images I took at the same time - images through a glass decanter lid, which shatter the dish into a Queen like harmony of interstellar eavesdropping. Blended using the Photoleap app

I accidentally recorded this on slow-mo, but I'm glad I did. Love how it makes the most innocuous soundscape instantly ominous. The death knell chime of that child's triangle...

The weirdest thing I was doing was thinking this was a cauliflower, when in hindsight it's obviously a kohlrabi. It said cauli on the label at the church fair plant stall!

@panchoballard.bsky.social hello.. My partner, @bugshaw.bsky.social bought me your painting for my birthday and I near fell into tears. I am genuinely overjoyed to own one of your album covers. And this is one of my favourites from the exhibition.

These are superlative. Click to feel love. (Teaser: they would also beautifully illustrate The End of Everything, Serpents Tail, June 2026.)

I am so bold that I wanted a cup of coffee but it was 3pm but I still started pouring the kettle.

Hurrah, negative LFT on the morning of Day 12. Glad to be out of that part of it, now to very carefully reintroduce activity.

Gaussfest, and an electrical day in London Next Sunday High voltage, tesla coils, electrostatic machine demonstrations and a Victorian/Edwardian pumping station to look around, plus a chance of seeing a working mercury rectifier(s) More Details: www.extremeelectronics.co.uk/the-gaussfest/ #science

I placed a grocery delivery order when the sun was out and now it's suddenly tipping down with rain and I'll look like the kind of git who makes deliverers come out in this weather.

I'm always interested in events which have both "Cambridge" and "Festival" in their name, so here's the Cambridge Rivers of Film festival, which seeks to bring rivers, aquatic ecosystems and their guardians into public view in twelve days of events. cambridgeppf.org/riversoffilm/

This huge book of stories/ essays on far futures and end of Earth/humanity lays a heavy burden of history and a taste of bleakness and futility that is not the sweetest fit for reading when isolating, ill, and concerned about one's long term future health. Let us meditate on the end times, for fun.

Stupid web form on phone where the majority "Subject" field only allows numeric keypad entry.

Day 7, still positive. Feeling well enough to try some sitting-at-computer admin, but it's so stuffy in the study with the door closed and window that can't open; I'm wearing a mask so I don't emit clouds into the shared hallway when I come and go, but it's also stuffy and pokes me in the eyes.

The weirdest thing I'm doing at the moment is growing a cauliflower.

Texting across each other, I'm on the far far futures SF book and Toby is stuck at Bishop's Stortford on a delayed train. How can you contemplate the mind boggling ends of space and time if the engineering work hasn't been completed yet? The authors didn't think of that. But Bob Shaw would have.

Autocorrect just changed website to endive and that's not a bad shout.

It is the time when my "Things to do in August" list becomes "Things to do tomorrow" ah ha ha ha no.

The curry delivery man was in a hurry, so we said "Hello Here's your food Thank you" "Hello Thank you Ta ta" in run on gabbles over each other but it seemed to work.

Today I am starting this great thick book, later I'm ordering curry.

Day 5 and a positive LFT again (early doors I know) but feeling a lot less ill. Toby cycled up yesterday with ibuprofen. Another day of rest and isolation, my thoughts veer between no reason I should get Long Covid again, and but what if I do. Didn't want to lose 2-3 weeks to this.

The first week of being 55 was hectic and crammed full. Wednesday: birthday with Toby, find someone selling a FrightFest ticket and hotel for the next day, get it! Hectic reschedule. Thur-Mon: FrightFest, good fun, 17 films. Tue: positive LFT, hectic reschedule. Week 2: rest and sniff.

Rationally I'm not worried about travelling home later this morning. My subconscious has woken me after 3 hours sleep so that I can start to get ready. This is the way of things.

Sometimes at FrightFest you're in the queue for the loo and you see someone who was murdered 20 minutes earlier.

Today's necklace for FrightFest film festival. I'm alternating my outfits between black genre t-shirt, and terrifyingly benign-seeming lady in Seasalt clothes.

FrightFest jump scare in the toilet when the automatic flush went off unexpectedly

Even better, they found a seat upstairs which wasn't booked for any of the films so I can just show my pass and go straight to the seat for the next 20 films.

Yay, the answer is that they let me try the seats upstairs which are fine and good and normal, I've gone to rest up now but in the morning they'll try to find me a bunch of single tickets upstairs and if someone wants to swap for my luxurious seat that's fine.