20231014\Sat
Around 11:30 in the AM today I began to pray to the sweet, pink baby Lord that my brain wasn't swelling up inside my skull.

Because my brainz were interpreting the light as somehow just a little bit different. Just a shade darker. Maybe subdued is the word. Desaturated? I eyeballed all the flourescent ballasts in the ceiling, and they were all working. It's almost never a Good Thing when a person begins experiencing subtle perceptual anomalies.

So, rather than get myself all worked up guessing, I asked those around me, "Um, does the light in here seem strange?"

(We live in a glass box.)

Most of the people responded with versions of 'Not really' or 'What do you mean' or 'No'. Except for the owner who said enthusiastically: "Yes! I was just thinking the same thing!"

"The light in here feels like an old department store, like a circa '90s Sears or something — " I said.

That was met with a chorus of 'Yeahs!' and 'Yessses' and 'That is was it feels like's.

But one young woman said, "It's probably just the eclipse."

Bingo.

Someone came up with thickish, black plastic packaging from a box somewhere and we all piled outside to look at the "Ring of Fire" 2023 Annular Solar Eclipse.

It was still early and we didn't get to see the "Ring of Fire" but we did get to see our Sun's mighty horns sucking on the head of Moon. We tried to take pictures through the black plastic, but the images only looked like smeary fire. (In my experience, trying to get a photo of Moon using a geniusPhone always results in a big, fat FAIL.)

But you know what?

We had a good deal of fun passing around the plastic and taking turns going Ooooohh and Ahhhhh and Look at that!

It was OK.

I thought the best part of it all was again experiencing the peculiar lighting of a windowless Sears Home Whatever Department. Far from being wonky, my brainz recognized the energy patterns instantly.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Later when I inquired about a dish that the server had forgotten to bring to my table with my soup, she thought I was buying and when I told her I was only asking about what I'd already bought, she had to VOID. She brought me the missed item quickly, but for the rest of my meal people kept showing up at the table with a duplicate OR asking if I wanted another one. Seems the VOID didn't remove it from other queues visible to The Kitchen, etc.

I saw the Manager walk up and sweat her about the duplicates, and I heard the server say, "But I VOIDED it!" When I was able to catch her eye, I mouthed, "SORRY!" But she only flopped her hand my way and shook her head and mouthed back, "Not your fault."