A Bear of a Headache

I have been plagued with headaches for a while ~ not migraines, just bad "regular" headaches. We've had air quality alerts almost daily for weeks, so perhaps that is triggering them. Not that I go outside much, but I do breathe, every minute of every day, if not more. I don't feel much like it's a new year, as everything feels the same as it has for a while now, but I think that feeling will change on January 20 when the news won't be so much speculation as reality. Ugh. Maybe it won't be as bad as we think it will? Hah. It will be worse, imo.

This is why I focus on fiction. I watched Missing You on Netflix this week. It's a detective story told in seven episodes with two investigations dovetailing in a somewhat confusing though suspenseful way. Regardless, I thought it was well-acted and compelling enough to finish in two nights. I also read Bear by Julia Phillips and awarded it four stars. It fulfilled one of my 2025 Reading Challenge squares by having a map depicting a ferry route around San Juan Island off Washington State. The story is about two sisters, 28 and 29, told properly in third person past tense with one POV from younger sister Sam. They are living in poverty and working menial jobs as they await their mother's looming death from lung disease. A bear appears on the island, which creates suspense in both real and metaphorical ways. I don't want to give anything away, as I highly recommend the book and think you should read it. There were moments when I grew angry with the MC's behavior, but this didn't detract from the overall complexity of her personality or the suspense throughout the final chapters. However, since I thought the first part of the book was a little draggy with too much backstory, I kept one star back.

Today I am having a late lunch at the Cheesecake Factory with friends and then seeing the Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown. Should be some good music in there at least (I would make a literature joke, except none of the relevant parties are reading this blog). Tomorrow I'm having lunch at a delicious Mediterranean restaurant with a friend I haven't seen in a while. It's good to catch up with peeps. Speaking of, I owe my dear old high school friend a letter ~ we actually still use snail mail sometimes. Hard to believe how ancient we are now, but at least we're still keeping up with each other. 

In crafty news, I finished my last latch hook pillow (pic on IG) and am moving on/back to diamond art, this time for my bathroom. I have a seahorse picture and a sea turtle picture to go with my blue/beige theme in there. I had planned to paint during my time off, but I never got in the mood. Maybe soon, we shall see. I did write more poetry and have a collection almost ready to put on KDP where no one will read it, except I have one more poem to go. This one will be a sestina, so it's taking a while...