Its funny to me, how my mind works – how the spiderwebs connect from thought to thought.

P watches alot of youtube videos – or rather, he has a plethora of subscriptions to alot of tubers that are varied. One of the ones he has subjected me to – mostly because I’m kinda ambivalent about these things….. is called “Goonzsquad” – its a couple of brothers that do a variety of things – most recently alot of “land” things… At first, watching these boys it made my eyes roll – “oh another redneck channel? Really bah” – but after 4 or 5 of their videos I found a creeping sense of them growing on me like a fungus… and I started to evaluate what I didn’t like about them…. Only to realize that its their perpetual optimism that was annoying to me. They are always happy. Always finding positive things, and praising each other. Both brothers take time in front and behind the camera – and in the scenes both bust their arses doing insane things, and learning insane things with relation to alot of varied activities – if they don’t know how to do it, they learn. As a viewer, you get to be in the backseat with their learning.

It was very telling and interesting to me that it was their hopeful optimism I found grating, which of course immediately changed my course and I’ve now learned to find them endearing. Its also one of the videos that I look forward to….

Most recently they were building a “wellhouse” – Now I did not know what a wellhouse is… so my good friend google, was quick to educate me (https://acornabbey.com/blog/?p=316#:~:text=The%20pumphouse%20is%20a%20small,in%20the%20days%20before%20electricity.) …. its basically a building to keep the “things needed when you have a well” from freezing when you live somewhere where it gets below freezing for a good bit of the year.

So I got to watch these young men, who had no knowledge of what this was… but had the internet, and resourcefulness, and able hands and bodies — build this thing, after researching, and finding out what was required. They poured the concrete – as the person they had originally hired to do this, suddenly became unavailable, and they had a deadline – they learned how to do this, what they needed, they went and picked it up, and did the job.

Something about this is just well damn inspiring.

There are many tubers P watches, many of them I enjoy for similiar reasons. They are normal humans – not famous or wealthy – doing normal human things – in a way that I get to lean over their shoulder and watch and be there with them. Something about this brings me hope – particularly when things don’t always go exactly as they had originally hoped or planned – and I get to see them react, and move thru the obsticle.

There is some sort of connection to humanity in this….. Something that lets me feel like I’m not alone – that others are having these types of struggles, and we can all get thru — its like the Andy Griffin of this generation. Lessons being taught and received.

Not all tubers are this way – there are … well much like not all TV was that way either. P has a knack for finding the good ones.

In the course of him enjoying his new toy – he was showing me the “many” — lets just call them “recipes” for stuff that you can make – where someone has already done the “requires alot of knowledge and time to do the like-an-architect on a computer software things” — they call these a “mesh” thats a jargon term to describe the “downloaded item” that tells the printer where and how to print. So P showed me a website with a ton of mesh – most available for free.

There were so many things – I started searching for “practical” things – like soap dispensers, or hooks, or laundry clothes hanger clips – all of these and more available here…… And then I started thinking about the upcoming holiday….

We started searching for “christmas villages” — and we found a ton of things — but basically it led us to Railroad/train buildings – where its sort of a “these are all in this scale” type of thing … but a “design and build your own” — a DIY christmas village – I think we might endeavor to try this — depending on how long the models take to print.

D came over yesterday, and we got a chance – after much running around – to sit and chat for a bit. Something about having her here was incredible activation energy for me. I managed to get so many of my “I wanna” list done. Felt good. Plus I now have tasty soup and fresh chai to enjoy.

Its always enjoyable to me to sit with my sister, because we are able to verbally spar, without it becoming emotional confrontational. She is one of the few people in my sphere I’m able to do this with — where its not taxing for either of us, and we can just banter and pro/con both sides of issues. Its very liberating, because while we don’t always agree – or even eventually come to consensus — its always always learning. Its my version of being in the goon squad 🙂 — Plus I got to see kitties.

I don’t know what the rest of the year will hold, or how 2021 will start out, but I do feel tremendous hope and promise. I feel there is a world of positive possibilities just bubbling up to overwhelm us with happiness. I’m very grateful and feel blessed to be here to share that world with rest of humanity; the people I love.