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Flash: Calm

Photo by Hisu lee on Unsplash

Hear the sounds. The drip of the evening dew off the leaves. The chirps of the listen-ins. The hiss of the steams in the surrounding hot springs. Let your mind drift.

Your arms have disconnected from your body. Your legs float in the cosmos. You are one with the stars.

Smell the scents. The light salt of the water. The sweet of the cherry-bite trees along the edge of the spring. The sharp of the gathering ozone of morning. Clear your mind of everything.

Breath in slowly. Inhale space. Fill your lungs with nothing.

Hold, let the worries and cares cross into the vacuum.

Breath out slowly. Release your old life. Forget.

All there is left in the waters is who you should be.

The mantra continued to be vibrated directly into Fhergus’ inner ear. Some people swore by this nonsense, he just needed to bring his brain cycles into a calm enough state to pass the psych-evals. Come on, calm faster!

(words 162 – first published 10/3/2022 – from a picture prompt for a Facebook writing group. Aim is about 50 words)

Geeking Science: Decision-Making Fatigue and Mental Load

Photo by Niklas Hamann on Unsplash

New year. Same energy levels.

A lot of it has to do, not with work and effort, but making decisions, especially for women. If both partners are working full-time, and come home and only one is making all the decisions there, someone has two full-time jobs even if the other partner is helping out when asked. Often putting together enough energy to ask for help takes as much energy as doing it yourself.

Sit down with your partner and split the decision-making and the task work. When I had a partner, I figured out making meals (making the meal plan, creating the grocery list, shopping and stocking the food, cleaning the cooking area, cooking to schedule so all the dishes come out at the same time, setting the table, clearing the meal dishes and cooking pans, doing the dishes, and putting everything away) took as much decision-making and task energy as THE REST OF THE HOUSE COMBINED (yard work, laundry, and clearing & cleaning).

If you have a partner, find time to sit down and state how to help with various tasks. Like “I’ll do the laundry and put things in baskets by the door, and you take them and put them away when you see them out.” If cues can be set up to let the other person know when and how to help, the decision maker doesn’t need to make another decision of asking each and every time (becoming a nag). “After the last kid leaves the table, can you get it cleared immediately while I work on the kitchen, then jump in with the kids and get their homework started.”

And both sides need to say thank you.

Emma’s “You Should have Asked” – https://english.emmaclit.com/2017/05/20/you-shouldve-asked/ – is such a shout out to how women are buried under the combination of full-time work AND house work. And, no, it isn’t the case in every house – I know two homes where the male partner is the stay-at-home parent – but in the vast majority, it is the case and that needs to be changed. And as we know change comes only two ways – preparation (talking and planning) or disaster. Don’t wait for the person doing double-load on the decision making to collapse. Have the conversation and find out what are the hidden tasks and decisions you might not be noticing.

Men outsourcing mundane decision making to women and causing decision fatigue – meanwhile they get to preserve their brains for work. (Anne 2022)

If both are working outside the home, it doesn’t matter how “high-powered” the job is, both are constantly making decisions for work. Stocking shelves depends on which needs to be stocked when (say morning coffee needs to be out first, but school supplies by three, and dinner makings by six), how much, and where. In a partnership (marriage or living arrangement), one of the couple is not the home manager.

Okay, now to focus on the GEEKING SCIENCE part of this.

decision fatigue … is a state of mental overload that can impede a person’s ability to continue making decisions (Berg 2021)

The pandemic has made this worse for everyone. A simple run to a store now has four or five additional decisions, especially when COVID-19 started in impacting life in 2020 – mask or not mask, which store, what has the least risk, do we really need this, who is the house is best suited to go. People were exhausted learning how to zoom, work from home, deal with the home stuff – heck, how to dress for the day! Nothing was the same anymore. That first year everyone was in a haze. Most thought “shock”, but a lot of the exhausted-haze was being buried under decision-making from the lost of routines.

It used to be a joke of a woman “can’t decide what to eat.” That was because she was buried under the house-management and the day-job together and used up all her decision-making ability. During COVID, even the previously protected privileged from double-decision-management, started “binge-watching” Netflix at night … not so much from “I want to see this entire show in one sitting” as “I sat on the couch and stared at the black screen and pushed a button out of habit. I couldn’t get the energy to make the decision to turn it off and go to bed.” People started skipping meals, not because they weren’t hungry, but because they couldn’t decide TO EAT, let alone WHAT to eat, or HOW to make something to eat.

As the brain exhausts its decision-making through the day, it starts doing shortcuts – impulse, avoid, procrastinate, and just don’t decide at all. One of the reasons expensive decisions should be made early in the day; shopping for food at night rather than in the morning will have a lot more impulse buys. Fast food buys happen more at night. The shopping channel sells more at night.

Doctors recommend making lists before shopping to reduce decision-making in the store. You cut out entire aisles of choices with a list in hand. (Berg 2021)

Become aware of mental load and decision fatigue. Maybe some of the New Year resolutions should focus on reducing decisions. Things like “I will create a routine of setting out my clothes at night.” and “Me and my partner will make meal decisions for the week on Saturday and post it on the fridge.”

Take care of yourselves y’all. Work together and support each other.

(Interesting side-note – Anne is Kenya and Emma is France. This is not just an American or European thing.)

Bibliography

Anne (AuDHD Electrical Engineer. @W_Asherah). “Someone has asked me what else I’ve observed. And oh boy – there’s another really messed up one. Men outsourcing mundane decision making to women and causing decision fatigue – meanwhile they get to preserve their brains for work.” twitter.com. 6/14/2022. – last viewed 12/13/2022. (see below for extra)

Berg, Sara. “What doctors wish patients knew about decision fatigue.” AMA (American Medical Association). 11/19/2021. https://www.ama-assn.org/delivering-care/public-health/what-doctors-wish-patients-knew-about-decision-fatigue – last viewed 12/13/2022.

Brusie, Chaunie. “Moms’ Decision-Making Fatigue is More Real Than Ever.” healthline.com. 7/8/2020. https://www.healthline.com/health/parenting/moms-decision-making-fatigue-is-more – last viewed 12/13/2022.

Chandler & Alexis. “Your wife is your partner not your mom!!!” youtube.com 9/22/2022. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X2XVCr6l50g&t=7s – last viewed 12/13/2022.

Emma. “You should’ve asked.” 5/20/2017. https://english.emmaclit.com/2017/05/20/you-shouldve-asked/ – last viewed 12/13/2022.

Twitter post

Since Twitter is having a meltdown, I’ve retyped the screen shots for (Anne 2022) below. (Bolding is my emphasis.)

  1. Someone has asked me what else I’ve observed. And oh boy – there’s another really messed up one. Men outsourcing mundane decision making to women and causing decision fatigue – meanwhile they get to preserve their brains for work. Let me look for the thread (June 14, 2022)
  2. Autism and gender. Do you have a woman in your life who knows everything, plans everything, thinks for everyone, helps solve all problems? Does everyone depend on that woman so much they would be lost without her? Her friends, family, colleagues?
  3. Then joking about “how women can’t decide what to eat” like it’s a cutesy thing. Sir, your (insert) has been making so many decisions that her brain has shut down and won’t let her make any more. She’s literally struggling with comprehending the stuff on the menu. Help her!
  4. The human brain doesn’t have limitless decision-making capacity – it has a bandwidth which when exhausted, someone struggles to think even the most basic thoughts. It’s why you’ll get shouted at for asking “where can I find the spoon.” That “I don’t know” is honest.
  5. The brain, at that moment, doesn’t have the bandwidth to figure out where the spoon is – even when it’s something they put somewhere ever day. It’s super easy for Autistics to realize this in themselves because our social bandwidth is near non existent – we guard the little we have.
  6. (next several tweets are links to articles about decision-making fatigue – some are behind paywalls, but (Berg 2021) is part of the bibliography)
  7. If you relate with both threads – you need a mental health regroup. It’s bad bad. You need to collect yourself before you’re on several sets of antipsychotics for people reasons. If you’re already on them, see if you’re medicating the symptom and try dealing with the source.
  8. It’s 1 pm in Kenya. Off I go.
  9. (thread date changes to June 15)
  10. I don’t know why anyone thinks I’m interested in debating things that impact women’s mental health. Like okay, your sensibilities have been offended and you’re emotionally hurt – learn emotional regulation, sir. I’m here talking to people who are literally breaking down healthwise
  11. And do you know what happens when women show up sick in hospital? They are told they are anxious. They are told “it’s all in your head“. Then when we talk about things that make women anxious and affect their mental health, there’s clowns who want to center themselves.
  12. This isn’t about me. Repeat that to yourself enough times. It’s about people who should start caring for themselves as much as they care for others. Because few people ask “how is the person caring for me doing?”. They just take and drain. And that causes health problems.
  13. We are anxious. We are fatigued. Some are burned out. Some are severely burned out. Someone decides to tweet likely explanations to other women. You get offended because “that’s not the case in my life as a man”. Well, great. Clap for your exceptional self and keep moving.
  14. (Retweet from OziomaOnukogue.eth: Another name for this is: Mental Load. This book by Emma explains it all. We end up making <so many> small tiny decisions that’s there’s barely space to focus on big ones. Yes, the brain freezes from overwork, just like a computer. That’s why it’s not helpful to call women multitaskers.)

Some responses (not copying the twitter tags on these)

  1. On the verge of tears because my God all of this! I’m so tired that by the end of the day I’m literally only capable of staring at the wall.
  2. Yes and once I get the baby to bed I just want to sit and relax but get flak from my SO for not showing interest in him. I’m so tired.
  3. Funny, I still had to make all the decisions in my house even when I ALSO had a full time job.
  4. I’m a single mom now and still make all the decisions. But at least no one criticizes me for them now. Somehow it’s easier. (RESPONSE: Makes sense. If he wasn’t a partner in making decisions, then without him you have one less mental/emotional dependent.)
  5. The number of men I know who “don’t know where things go” in their own drawers/kitchen/refrigerator/house. (RESPONSE: And if you ask them to put it away anyway, they will choose the single most ridiculous, obviously wrong place for it and then do the “but you wouldn’t tell me where to put it.”
  6. I started answering the “whatever you want” with “I want not to have to decide”

Book Review (SERIES): Mason Dixon Monster Hunter

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Mason Dixon Monster Hunter Season One by Eric R. Asher

  1. Mason Dixon, Monster Hunter
  2. Mason Dixon & the Wampus of Reed Springs
  3. Mason Dixon & the Ghost Dinosaur
  4. Mason Dixon & the Gowrow’s Last Stand

BOOK BLURB ON AMAZON for SEASON ONE

He’s a YouTube sensation, making hilarious videos about hunting down monsters in the wilds of Missouri that are too outlandish to be real. Besides, everybody knows things like gowrows, Momo, and jimplicutes are just tall tales told to scare children.

Aren’t they?

Follow Mason Dixon, his sidekick Emma, and their tech guru Himari as they wander the woods of the Midwest looking for the monster that killed Mason’s brother, and working hard to protect the other cryptids from encroaching humans. And sometimes protecting the encroaching humans from the cryptids, too! This hilarious horror comedy series is part of the expanded Bubba the Monster Hunter Universe created by John G. Hartness and populated by Hunters like Mark Wojcik, Jess Friedman, and Caitlin Kelley.

MY REVIEW for SEASON ONE

Mason Dixon Monster Hunter: Season One combines four previously published novellas – Mason Dixon; Mason Dixon and the Wampus of Reeds Spring; Mason Dixon and the Ghost Dinosaur; and Mason Dixon and the Gowrow’s Last Stand.

Mason Dixon is my second favorite Monster Hunter of the Bubbaverse, right behind the Monster Hunter Mom. His gimmick to pay the bills is run a video channel of Monster Hunting cryptics – only do the video so bad, it is all clearly fake. He and his team have to work really hard to make their very real monster investigation and relocation (they don’t kill the monsters, but move the creatures to a better place where they don’t harm the environment or humans) look fake.

And moving monsters around is NOT easy or safe, but they try and save lives of all kinds whenever they can. From Wampus to Invisible Dinosaurs.

I find the series (or collection – depending on which way you are reading it) charming, delightful, action-packed, and funny.

(Read through Kindle Unlimited)

 

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BOOK BLURB ON AMAZON for MASON DIXON MONSTER HUNTER (Novella One)

The best-selling author of The Vesik series flexes his comedy muscles in a hilarious new comedy urban fantasy series!

They are the first line of defense against the things that go bump in the night. They are the keepers of a centuries-old legacy of The Church defending the world against the forces of darkness. They are a bunch of highly armed rednecks, internet video celebrities, soccer moms, and assorted broken nutjobs. They are the new Templars, and things are about to get weird. From the pages of Bubba the Monster Hunter comes a new series featuring the Hunters from around the United States hunting down monsters, fighting off supernatural baddies, and making life really, really bad for the things that hunt people.

He’s Mason Dixon, and he’s a bona fide internet celebrity. He has his own video series, a pistol that deserves its own area code, and a high definition video camera, and he’s not afraid to use any of them.

In this introductory urban fantasy novella, we meet Mason, his right hand Emma, his “handler” Noah, his anime-styled hacker friend Himari, and more monsters than you can shake a stick at. Unless it’s a really big stick.

With Mason, it’s always a big stick. This first novella in the series follows Mason through the wilds of Missouri as he hunts down monsters that hunt men, monsters that eat chewing tobacco, and monsters that make pancakes. And there’s moonshine.

And then Bubba the Monster Hunter shows up.

MY REVIEW for MASON DIXON MONSTER HUNTER (Novella One)

Mason Dixon is the perfect addition to the Bubba world.

Don’t get me wrong, I love me some Bubba the Monster Hunter by John Hartness. But I’m more of a subtle humor kind-of gal instead of Bubba’s overt funny, and Eric Asher’s take on the Bubba sandbox with a crypo-hunter creating a faux youtube show about real hunts he goes on is LOL funny to me.

The new Monster Hunter series by Falstaff is still comedic, and monsters, and rural-sassiness. But subtler, smoother. Like finely aged apple shine. One left in the barn the entire winter before drinking.

The first part of the book introduces us to Mason Dixon and the second part of the book, after the major action is done, ties the series into the larger Bubba world.

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BOOK BLURB ON AMAZON for MASON DIXON: THE WAMPUS OF REEDS SPRING (Novella Two)
Your newest favorite monster hunter is back, and this time there are squids!

Mason Dixon, the internet superstar and cryptid hunter from the woods of Missouri, is back with a new adventure, new monsters to hunt, new video to shoot, and new mysteries to unravel! Mason and his much more sensible sidekick Emma are investigating a series of monster attacks when, as usual, they find much more than they bargained for.

Can Mason figure out how to build the easy-up tree stand?
Can they survive the fearsome Wampus?
Will they get enough cool footage to keep Himari happy?
How much gear can they destroy on one expense account?
The answer to all these questions and at least one more are hidden with The Wampus of Reeds Springs!

MY REVIEW for MASON DIXON: THE WAMPUS OF REEDS SPRING (Novella Two)
Mason Dixon is back, and he is still hunting monsters with a camera and knock-out darts whenever possible. In the process, he gets his ATV stepped on by a bingduffer and his arm swallowed by a gally-wampus. He is so diligently earnest with multi-ton water-mammals and big cats with razor claws, you just want to bundle him up in his endangered-species-protection-centric world and hug him.

He brings new meaning to tree-hugging eco-warrior: hugging on the tree and hoping not to fall out on top of the rock-throwing bingduffer, while still getting good footage for his webshow.

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BOOK BLURB ON AMAZON for MASON DIXON & THE GHOST DINOSAUR (Novella Three)
Now Mason Dixon is back, and this time his problems are bigger than ever!

Like, dino-sized!

The sasquatch is on his side, the zigmals are cute, and the gowrows are downright adorable, but when Mason Dixon and his sidekick Emma run afoul of not only a dinosaur, but also MoMo the Missouri Monster, he’s in for the fight of his life!

MY REVIEW for MASON DIXON & THE GHOST DINOSAUR (Novella Three)
Another fast read from Eric Asher. I love Mason Dixon’s approach to being a Templar in the Harkness’ Bubba-verse – instead of hiding the fact monsters exist, become an internet cryptid-hunter. One of the few monster hunters who hunts with a zoom lens and a dart gun, for when push comes to shove.

And when Mason runs across GHOST DINOSAURS, push really comes to shove.

Awesome book. I mean – Dinosaurs!

With Sasquatches, and side-hill hoofers, and zigmals, …. everything a cryptid lover can love!

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BOOK BLURB ON AMAZON for MASON DIXON: THE GOWROW’S LAST STAND (Novella Four)
He’s fought ghost dinosaurs, wrangled gowrows, drank moonshine with Sasquatch, and chased miniature flying squirrels all over a movie theatre, but nothing could have prepared Mason Dixon for what he’s about to deal with in the thrilling conclusion to Mason Dixon, Monster Hunter Season One!

If it had just been the jackalope, that would have been simple. But nothing’s ever simple for Mason, and when super-secret government agency DEMON finds out that he’s created a cryptid sanctuary in the wilds of Missouri, things go from sideways to downright corkscrewed. Now Mason has to navigate an uneasy truce between multiple species of monsters that are typically…not friendly, evacuate a crowd of unruly cryptids before the government shows up and kidnaps them or worse, and negotiate with MoMo, the Missouri Monster himself, to create a new safe haven for the creatures he’s spent years trying to save.

It’s a lot to ask of a YouTube star that most of the world thinks is a complete hoax. But it’s safer to pretend to be a fake than to let the world know the truth. Because monsters are real, and this time it’s Mason’s job to save them.

MY REVIEW for MASON DIXON: THE GOWROW’S LAST STAND (Novella Four)
Another in the Mason Dixon (New Templars Novella) series. Mason comes against the biggest cryptid ever – the American Government – who in the department of DEMON has decided to collect the cryptid contents of Larry’s sanctuary for themselves. What them mean to do with them is anyone’s guess (*cough* weaponize them *cough*), but Mason and his extended circle aren’t going to take the invasion laying down.

Not a wrong note in this conclusion of the first season of Mason Dixon. Action packed and environmentally sound, the mix of humor, horror, hope, and have-at perfects this read. Highly recommend.

If you can, read the first three volumes first. The whole series builds nicely. If you want to purchase it as one item, I expect the Season will be collected soon (it is 2/20/2021 when this review was written). In the meantime, check it out through Kindle Unlimited (I did).

Flash: Meadowbrook

Photo by Eddie Kopp on Unsplash

Walking hurt, but her tattered wings weren’t up to supporting her weight, so on she trudged. Meadowbrook winced, promising herself she could rest when she reached the end of the blight. There had to be somewhere, anywhere, green still lived. Her eyes too dry to cry and water the endless dirt which used to be the grass of her meadow.

(words 60; first published 3/4/2023, from a FB visual prompt for a writing group I belong to – aiming for 50 words)