Some memes for life at home…
…and life in America
(by Popcorn Punk)
Author: Karen
House Adventure 2.0
I think I mentioned we’re starting to look for another house–one where we could maybe live without stairs if we got too decrepit, and one where we could definitely live without an HOA. We haven’t looked at a lot in person but it all made me go back to a home inspector’s account on TikTok and watch pretty much all of his videos.
Is this encouraging? No, not really. But is it cathartic in a sort of terrible way? Yeah.
@everyones.junk.drawer PART 1 2.5 Milly! what a steal! upkeep? maintenance? never heard of her! #thatoldhouse #expensive #fail #homeinspection #inspection #mansion #troubling #disrepair #rough #shape #notgreat #woodrot #rot #everywhere #uhoh ♬ original sound – 🇵🇸 Inspector Guy
@everyones.junk.drawer come with me on a tour of a house Zillow bought and renovated 3 months ago for 330k and is trying to sell for half a million dollars. #fail #flippedhouse #flip #flips #inspection #zillow #corporate #slumlords #flippers #craftsmanshit #lazy #dangerous #greedy #bastards #thishastostop #unsustainable #latestagecapitalism #thatoldhouse #bummer #homeinspection #nightmares ♬ original sound – 🇵🇸 Inspector Guy
@everyones.junk.drawer hell yeah flipping #flip #design #fail #songwriter #justinspectorthings #craftsmans #quality #custom #opendoor #realty #corporate #realestate #thatoldhouse #unfortunate #details #yourewelcome ♬ Chill out BGM (simple) – Hollywood Labo
New builds aren’t available in our price range and/or without an HOA in the areas we’re looking, so that’s off the table…. but I’m not that upset:
@everyones.junk.drawer another day, another new house that had a new set of problems. #newconstruction #house #inspection #singinginspector #thatnewhouse #construction #quality #craftsmanship #attention #to #details #well #thought #out #movingalong #downwardspiral #joy #live #laugh #love ♬ original sound – 🇵🇸 Inspector Guy
Someday These Will Be Jeans
I’ve had a pair of the lightest blue summer jeans cut out since May, then I tabled them to make a couple of pairs of gym pants that didn’t fit. I finally started them right before B-Day (the day of the discovery of bedbugs) and now I want to abandon them again to make a waterproof beach tote.
I know I will love them and wear them a lot, but I guess the jeans sewjo just isn’t there yet. Oh well! ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Weekend Of Extremes
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was 100 degrees and then it was 65 degrees, it was a time of exultation (so clean, yay chemicals) and of despair (saw another bedbug and it was ALIVE)…
It’s a good thing I had four days off because that’s about how long it took to tear the house apart, look for bedbugs, and put it back together. Every single fabric thing in the bedroom and linen closet got bagged and put in the hot car for a day, all the closets and dressers got emptied out and vacuumed and sprayed, every baseboard got vacuumed and dusted… I guess if I was worried about the amount of work involved in moving, this was a good trial run. (It’s SO much work. I was right to be concerned.)
We did go to the lake for our solstice sunset but that was right when a front was coming through and the 40mph winds were dropping the temp to the 50s. It felt kind of fitting, though–stormy times!
Moods & Links
I have tomorrow off for Juneteenth and took Friday off as well for a long weekend. When I was thinking about this week, I wanted to go to the pool in the afternoon and get some sewing in and organize a little bit in the basement and generally just chill.
Well, WE ARE NOT CHILL over here this week (but I haven’t gotten any new bed bug bites after two nights on the air mattress, hooray!) and I’m going to be pulling everything out of every closet and letting it bake in the car and vacuuming every baseboard and laser-focusing on any speck that MIGHT be a bug and generally Cleaning Through It.
Which is all a long way of saying, here are some links for the weekend!
1. This is the sound and face I make when I think about BUGS crawling over my FACE and feeding on my FLESH in the NIGHT:
View this post on Instagram
2. Yep. 
3. There is a band on TikTok that is doing covers of songs but changing the lyrics to be about discount crab legs. I’ve had “You bought crab legs! Cheap crustaceans!” in my head for days now.
@crabsmackband “Smells Like Steamed Crablegs” Live from the WhiteHart Cafe #smellsliketeenspirit #nirvana #livemusic ♬ original sound – CrabSmack
Even More Desperate Times
That fresh bite on my shoulder yesterday? It turned into a cluster of three bites and itched like hell all day. I realized I have seen ONE mosquito all month. On a whim, I googled, “Mosquito bite vs. bed bug bite,” and reader: OH FUCK.
Bed bugs bite in a line or cluster (all of my bites) and itch and swell for even longer than mosquito bites (all of my bites) and can leave a dark mark after they finally stop being active (all of my bites). So I tore the bed apart yesterday afternoon into evening and OOOH FUUUUCK: 
My brother is on his way over right now with commercial spray and all of my clothes and every piece of fabric that can’t get boiled are going to bake in my car in the sun all day (120 degrees for 30 minutes kills bed bugs and eggs. Learning!).
BUT OH MY GOD. I would be more eloquent about it all but I spent the night on an air mattress having a low-grade panic attack, so I am not at my best.
Good lord. So much nope.
Desperate Times
When you keep getting bitten by Mystery Mosquitoes on your face and neck every night for a month, you break down and order something from Amazon: 
Is this ridiculous? Maybe. But does it work? YES. I still got a bite on my shoulder at some point last night when I got up with Toby so I need to remember to cover up when I get out of bed (and also find where these little fuckers are living, omg I am going crazy).
But I have slept under my head tent for two nights and I have NO new face bites! Now I just need the 4 on my forehead to stop itching and get the 2 on my eyelids to fade and hope the 6 on my neck don’t leave too much of a mark, either…
Friday Links
1. Poe should have written a horror story about mosquitos in a house where you can’t see them and don’t know where they’re coming from yet you keep getting fresh bites regardless of whether the house is closed up or not and every bite itches for at least a week and it slowly drives you mad…
2. Ahem. I’m pretty sure I have a mosquito bite allergy, but the name of said allergy enrages me almost as much as the mystery and the itching: skeeter syndrome.
3. Mysteries I can get behind: List of unexplained sounds.
How To Write Insults
Hamilton Nolan’s newsletter this week is a masterclass in insults. Of course, it’s easy when the target is ICE “I’d rather destroy the lives of entire families than have the fellas make fun of me” agents, aka “twitchy, puffed up, goofy ass cops.”
Please, enjoy:
It can be difficult to laugh at riot cops. But we should all try. Because they’re so fucking ridiculous. Hey, nice huge helmet and body armor and fake ass gun and shield to oppose a bunch of skater kids waving around flags. You all are the most terrified group of human beings in the United States of America. You all are the types of people who open carry handguns to go to Buffalo Wild Wings. You all need to stop getting your news from idiots on idiot websites. You all need to read some fucking books and gain a minimal sense of perspective. You all need to embrace the crushing realization that for your whole lives you have been afraid and confused and have embraced a misguided set of macho enticements that have seduced you into believing that manhood depends on looking like some sort of cartoon action figure when in fact it is this look that reveals to the world the deep inadequacy that haunts you every day.
As he concludes, “Fuck off, losers.”
Wednesday Poem
Well this is appropriate. Because I had to look it up: “dios del chisme,” the god of gossip.
poem where no one is deported
by José Olivarez
now i like to imagine la migra running
into the sock factory where my mom
& her friends worked. it was all women
who worked there. women who braided
each other’s hair during breaks.
women who wore rosaries, & never
had a hair out of place. women who were ready
for cameras or for God, who ended all their sentences
with si dios quiere. as in: the day before
the immigration raid when the rumor
of a raid was passed around like bread
& the women made plans, si dios quiere.
so when the immigration officers arrived
they found boxes of socks & all the women absent.
safe at home. those officers thought
no one was working. they were wrong.
the women would say it was god working.
& it was god, but the god
my mom taught us to fear
was vengeful. he might have wet his thumb
& wiped la migra out of this world like a smudge
on a mirror. this god was the god that woke me up
at 7am every day for school to let me know
there was food in the fridge for me & my brothers.
i never asked my mom where the food came from,
but she told me anyway: gracias a dios.
gracias a dios del chisme, who heard all la migra’s plans
& whispered them into the right ears
to keep our families safe.