Life in the Great Plains is different. Let me tell you about it.
Wildfire
Yesterday, we had several “Red Flag” warnings from the National Weather Service. Due to the high winds, this means that there was an elevated chance of wildfire! People who have lived this far out and further west are probably no doubt used to such warnings, but this isn’t something I recall ever having seen issued to us back in Indy. Furthermore, areas of the countryside were actually already burning. My family that lived here prior to us assured us this happens every year and that we shouldn’t worry too much, but being on alert to something as potentially serious as FIRE felt pretty serious. In the end, though, we were honestly lucky. The town we used to live in back in Indiana got hit with tornadoes and sustained quite a bit of damage. I’ve been scrolling through Facebook this morning, hoping nobody lost their lives. It was definitely a scary weather day all around.
Since the move, Rufus and Cinnamon have both had some minor health problems. Their eyes have shown signs of conjunctivitis, which is essentially pink eye for cats. Cinnamon’s cleared up pretty quickly because we were able to get medicine into his eyes without too much trouble, but Rufus is a much more timid kitty and isn’t the type to hold still for something like that. This meant a trip to the vet for Rufus and $160 later, his eyes look much clearer now, too. The vet advised that the eye trouble could be flaring up due to stress from the move. Cats are animals that prefer routine and consistency, so a change as big as our move was isn’t ideal for them. Hopefully, now that their eyes are looking better though, it’s a sign that they’re feeling more comfortable in their new surroundings.
For the past four weeks of work, I’ve been in training, learning more about the company and the main technology platform that we use. It’s been stressful trying to balance my job and training at the same time, but hopefully, once the training program is complete, things will go back to relative normal. Frankly, all I’ve wanted to do lately is just sleep, but it’s hard because part of my resolution in moving out here was to make it more of an adventure and to start living my life again and stop feeling like I’m just in “survival mode.” I’m beginning to wonder if I know anything but survival mode at this point, though.
If you follow me on Twitter, you may have noticed my ongoing issue with Instagram. I believe that my account may have been hacked because I was informed that my account didn’t follow Community Guidelines and I’m not sure what I could have personally been doing that was against said Guidelines. My account was suspended as a result of this and I was asked to provide additional information, as well as a selfie and some other stuff, for Instagram to review to see if I could have my account back. They apparently decided in their review that I still wasn’t following their Guidelines and permanently deactivated my account. So unfortunately I will no longer be on Instagram. With everything going on with Twitter turning into Elon Musk’s personal hellscape as well, it’s probably a good thing that I decided to start this personal blog since who knows where these platforms will all end up in the future? Please be mindful though that you can always find me at jiggyflyjoe.com.
Twitch streams will be returning on Saturday, April 8th. It’ll be the first time I’ll be streaming from my digs here in Kansas as well, so make sure you tune in and don’t miss it! Follow me on Twitch if you aren’t already and we’ll have some fun gaming together!
Until next time…