Monday, February 12
Feb. 13th, 2024 01:17 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gottawonderToday I am grateful for:
Beautiful weather today. Bright and sunny. I am aware of being "over the hump" now in terms of the short days of deepest winter. The longer days are noticeable.
I went to town today.
I went to Winner's and found an absolutely stunning pair of loose, palazzo style SILK pants for a very reasonable price! They are a rich, jewel-toned green.
I went to pottery, and saw a few people I haven't seen in ages (they always leave before I get there). It was nice to catch up with them, super nice not to have any heavy emotional stuff to deal with this week too.
I worked on a tea pot, putting sunflower decoration on it by hand using underglaze, then glazing it. Now it will have to be fired again to vitrify the glaze. I hope all the decoration shows through nicely, I tried to choose a fairly transparent glaze.
I only worked on one thing, the decorating/glazing, so that I could go grocery shopping and not be in a rush.
It felt positively luxurious to go grocery shopping knowing this wasn't a "big" week, and that I also had lots of time.
Mostly we needed fresh vegetables.
My Sweetie did go rock climbing, and from all accounts had a very good day. I'm glad he's enjoying himself so much doing this; his job can be tedious and a person needs to do something to feel alive.
I think he's got more energy since a while ago I yelled at him to stop donating plasma, as I could tell it was half killing him. He has this savior complex about donating blood/plasma that he can't seem to be moderate. He gets hooked on the numbers (how often he donates) and the feeling of doing something good. He was also doing it as often as they would let him, to the point that I could tell he was really run down. All I ever heard him say was how tired he was.
I think it's also why he wasn't getting anything done on the house.
He seems a lot healthier since he hasn't donated in about two months now. To me, there is a marked difference in his energy levels.
He's not a spring chicken anymore, so I wouldn't mind if he just stopped donating, or limited it to maybe once or twice a year. He was donating every couple of weeks, because supposedly plasma doesn't drain your body the way whole blood donation does, except I think it is just as bad.
Of course all the information about donating blood or plasma says "there's absolutely nothing to worry about", I can only say what I have seen first hand. I don't think frequent donation is for everyone.
We've been looking into trucks more, and my husband thinks he found something that might work for us. Apparently Dodge still makes a fairly basic truck meant for trades persons and such that is simpler (fewer bells and whistles that you really don't need in a truck anyhow), and he feels a little better about the sticker shock.
We both got home a little late to watch anything, but that's okay.
Taiwan is officially "The Republic of China". China is officially "The People's Republic of China".
Okay.
The Republic of China controls 168 islands, the largest being the island of Taiwan. The island of Taiwan has been inhabited for about 25,000 years, with the indigenous people of Taiwan settling there about 6000 years ago.
I am going to skip right along to more modern political stuff, as 25,000 years is a long time to have dynasties and wars.
The Dutch and the Spanish established trading posts there, and were granted some lands, but never governed Taiwan.
Then there was a long stretch where control went back and forth between mainland China and Japan. I'm not going to pretend to understand that. It was a LOT OF FIGHTING.
Then Taiwan formed it's own government, after all the civil unrest and trying to free itself from China/Japan, that was more or less just martial law from 1949 to 1987. Lots of people (over 140,000) were thrown in prison, tortured, or executed on suspicion of communist sympathy.
Civil war went on for some time, the U.S. got involved there during the invasion of Vietnam (because it was the perfect place for the U.S. to have a military base, and use the natural resources as well) and stabilized the economy of Taiwan and helped develop the agricultural sector, leading to the current age of industrial growth.
The United States continues to have a military presence there, as it is basically a good place to have troops that could be mobilized against mainland China, BUT, there is no treaty that exists between the U.S. and Taiwan that states the the U.S. would do anything to defend Taiwan in the event of mainland China invading it.
Taiwan legalized same-sex union in 2019, making it the first Asian country to do so. It has a great education system, decent health care, so over all it's doing fairly well as far as quality of life and human rights.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwan
An interesting video about daily life in Taiwan: https://youtu.be/OiFP183PtXU?si=0-cfH-O8vZh-gu_q
The current "Republic of China" that now resides on Taiwan is the remnants of the regime that WAS in control on mainland China, but was driven out by "The People's Republic of China" that now controls mainland China.
We are all aware of Taiwan's great growth in manufacturing, which has led to modernization and a rise in the quality of life there. The Republic of China went from being a single party state under martial law to the current multi-party system of Democracy with elected officials that is the current system.
There is still confusion still with regards to U.N. representation, as to whether or not Taiwan is representing China in any way since the Republic of China was the last recognized government of mainland China.
There is some talk of reunification of the territory controlled by Taiwan/ROC and the People's Republic of China (mainland China). Not really sure why Taiwan would want to do that.
There is also other talk about clarifying the identity of Taiwan/ROC as a separate nation.
The main island of Taiwan is actually a giant chunk of ancient bedrock that has been thrust upwards from tectonic activity, unlike all the islands I've discussed in Oceania that were volcanic or atolls. So, it is a solid block of very hard bedrock.
It also has an interesting ecosystem of evergreen forest on part of it.
Beautiful weather today. Bright and sunny. I am aware of being "over the hump" now in terms of the short days of deepest winter. The longer days are noticeable.
I went to town today.
I went to Winner's and found an absolutely stunning pair of loose, palazzo style SILK pants for a very reasonable price! They are a rich, jewel-toned green.
I went to pottery, and saw a few people I haven't seen in ages (they always leave before I get there). It was nice to catch up with them, super nice not to have any heavy emotional stuff to deal with this week too.
I worked on a tea pot, putting sunflower decoration on it by hand using underglaze, then glazing it. Now it will have to be fired again to vitrify the glaze. I hope all the decoration shows through nicely, I tried to choose a fairly transparent glaze.
I only worked on one thing, the decorating/glazing, so that I could go grocery shopping and not be in a rush.
It felt positively luxurious to go grocery shopping knowing this wasn't a "big" week, and that I also had lots of time.
Mostly we needed fresh vegetables.
My Sweetie did go rock climbing, and from all accounts had a very good day. I'm glad he's enjoying himself so much doing this; his job can be tedious and a person needs to do something to feel alive.
I think he's got more energy since a while ago I yelled at him to stop donating plasma, as I could tell it was half killing him. He has this savior complex about donating blood/plasma that he can't seem to be moderate. He gets hooked on the numbers (how often he donates) and the feeling of doing something good. He was also doing it as often as they would let him, to the point that I could tell he was really run down. All I ever heard him say was how tired he was.
I think it's also why he wasn't getting anything done on the house.
He seems a lot healthier since he hasn't donated in about two months now. To me, there is a marked difference in his energy levels.
He's not a spring chicken anymore, so I wouldn't mind if he just stopped donating, or limited it to maybe once or twice a year. He was donating every couple of weeks, because supposedly plasma doesn't drain your body the way whole blood donation does, except I think it is just as bad.
Of course all the information about donating blood or plasma says "there's absolutely nothing to worry about", I can only say what I have seen first hand. I don't think frequent donation is for everyone.
We've been looking into trucks more, and my husband thinks he found something that might work for us. Apparently Dodge still makes a fairly basic truck meant for trades persons and such that is simpler (fewer bells and whistles that you really don't need in a truck anyhow), and he feels a little better about the sticker shock.
We both got home a little late to watch anything, but that's okay.
Taiwan is officially "The Republic of China". China is officially "The People's Republic of China".
Okay.
The Republic of China controls 168 islands, the largest being the island of Taiwan. The island of Taiwan has been inhabited for about 25,000 years, with the indigenous people of Taiwan settling there about 6000 years ago.
I am going to skip right along to more modern political stuff, as 25,000 years is a long time to have dynasties and wars.
The Dutch and the Spanish established trading posts there, and were granted some lands, but never governed Taiwan.
Then there was a long stretch where control went back and forth between mainland China and Japan. I'm not going to pretend to understand that. It was a LOT OF FIGHTING.
Then Taiwan formed it's own government, after all the civil unrest and trying to free itself from China/Japan, that was more or less just martial law from 1949 to 1987. Lots of people (over 140,000) were thrown in prison, tortured, or executed on suspicion of communist sympathy.
Civil war went on for some time, the U.S. got involved there during the invasion of Vietnam (because it was the perfect place for the U.S. to have a military base, and use the natural resources as well) and stabilized the economy of Taiwan and helped develop the agricultural sector, leading to the current age of industrial growth.
The United States continues to have a military presence there, as it is basically a good place to have troops that could be mobilized against mainland China, BUT, there is no treaty that exists between the U.S. and Taiwan that states the the U.S. would do anything to defend Taiwan in the event of mainland China invading it.
Taiwan legalized same-sex union in 2019, making it the first Asian country to do so. It has a great education system, decent health care, so over all it's doing fairly well as far as quality of life and human rights.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwan
An interesting video about daily life in Taiwan: https://youtu.be/OiFP183PtXU?si=0-cfH-O8vZh-gu_q
The current "Republic of China" that now resides on Taiwan is the remnants of the regime that WAS in control on mainland China, but was driven out by "The People's Republic of China" that now controls mainland China.
We are all aware of Taiwan's great growth in manufacturing, which has led to modernization and a rise in the quality of life there. The Republic of China went from being a single party state under martial law to the current multi-party system of Democracy with elected officials that is the current system.
There is still confusion still with regards to U.N. representation, as to whether or not Taiwan is representing China in any way since the Republic of China was the last recognized government of mainland China.
There is some talk of reunification of the territory controlled by Taiwan/ROC and the People's Republic of China (mainland China). Not really sure why Taiwan would want to do that.
There is also other talk about clarifying the identity of Taiwan/ROC as a separate nation.
The main island of Taiwan is actually a giant chunk of ancient bedrock that has been thrust upwards from tectonic activity, unlike all the islands I've discussed in Oceania that were volcanic or atolls. So, it is a solid block of very hard bedrock.
It also has an interesting ecosystem of evergreen forest on part of it.
