Journal

▓ Saturday 2nd November

    Got woken up early by Neko who decided to act up for the whole length of her morning walk (Neko was acting weird for the whole day, in the morning she pottied in the house which she hadn't done in a while and did it like 3 more times throughout the day ://). Then I came home and finally made my coffee, I sat down to write the journal entries for the past 2 days because I was late and then I tried to code a little app using Tauri but I mostly spent my time struggling with the window transparency on macos.
Eventually, I decided it was time for me to be productive and I went to wash the dishes, then fold the laundy and then I started vacuuming the appartment (Go me!) while Alyssa was making the meals for the week.

    For midday, I had some gnocchis with vegan nuggets and no sauce whatsowhever. It's one of my favourite meals for some reason despite it tasting like salt and chewy potatoes. After eating, we finished all our chores then started watching the last episode of 'Nouvelle Ecole' (They're not all out yet, so the last would be the fourth at the time of writing). The two teams made 2 separate cypher style musics and I think both sounded great and I couldn't have really picked a winner myself (Though I had my preferences for team SCH but barely and I could find reasons why team SDM would be better, a tough battle).

    After that, we waited for Alyssa's half sister to pass by with her son cause we had a birthday gift for him that we hadn't been able to give for months! (We were meant to see them a couple times throughout the past year but timing was never right). The kid was super pleased with the gift (a 'Paw Patrol x Dinos' set) and we chit-chatted a bit before I went to walk Neko.
The walk was cut short again because she simply wouldn't walk, she would just sit on the curb and wait for something to happen I guess, because I tried walking in all possible directions and she wouldn't follow me in any.

    Then I came home and we watched today's 'Star Academy' as always. Monday and Tuesday are the episodes with the debrief from Marlène and I really like that part, she's my favourite coach <3.
After that, we ate some 'Pommes Pin' while watching the first episode of 'The Greatest Teatcher', a Japanese series about a teacher who gets killed by one of her students and goes back 1 year in the past to try to figure out who killed her. So far, it's been a very moving series, the screenplay is really creative though I think that the cuts between the scenes are sometimes a bit harsh.
After that we went to bed to read till 10PM, I walked Neko once more and went to sleep.

▓ Saturday 1st November

    Woke up at 10AM, after a too short night (read previous day for more infos). The morning was a little rough but overall alright, I took Neko for a walk but she was acting up, not wanting to go anywhere appart from where there was food on the pavement. So we cut it very short and came home quick.
After that, I made my coffee and we debriefed yesterday's night with Alyssa's cousin who had spent the night home. We looked at the pictures we had taken and there were some really funny ones (that you can find on my memories page).

    At some point, after taking a long shower, we got our nick nacks together and thought of meals for the week as wel as how we are going to organise because next week is Alyssa's first week of work and they gave her a schedule that we didn't expect at all!
I went to the shops (that were thankfully open despite today being a holyday) to get all the groceries for the week and I think we managed to not pay too much, so that's cool :)) I came home at around 16:30 and stared crafting at a new idea on my computer, but it led nowhere, eventually I had to walk Neko and she was still acting up. I hate that there is food in so many places on the street like, come on a dog can't eat old french fries with andalouse!

    We came back in time for watching today's Start Academy and after that I called the chineese restaurant (We have a vegan one in town which is insane and so cool!) to order some takeout. I played brawl stars while waiting to go pick up my order and I was particularly lucky as I won most of the games I played!
Then I went to get the food and it wasn't raining (which is a little miracle these days). I hate how it has already started to be super dark outside early, November is really the worst month, it doesn't have any fun day to look forward to and it's gloomy and dark and grey and yuck!
But anyways, I came home with the food which we ate while watching some more of 'Nouvelle Ecole', we still have one episode to watch and then we'll need to wait till friday for new episodes. The participants are really good and they seem to be super nice and fair play to each other which is something I highly value and like, so that's a pleasure to watch. The two people I was waiting for the most had to battle and they wee both so good that they couldn't say who won, which I agreed on (In fact, the jury made almost the same choices as I would have done which is always super satisfying x)).

    Then it was time for this week's Star Academy Priiiiiiime! OMG I was so excited (and tired cause of the lack of sleep), the show was insane, they were all so great and I'm so mad that Lenny got left out. I really liked the dude and think he deserved to stay in the competition. I was especially impressed by Ambre and Sarah who put up exceptional performances (like come on, dancing with Katseye ain't nothing). 

▓ Friday 31th October
    
    This was a special day because Halloween!! But the morning was quiet (if only I had known). Walked Neko, made coffee, wrote my journal, the usual stuff.
Then, when my SO woke up, we started watching the new season of 'Nouvelle Ecole' and we were so stoked, plus there were two dudes from our city participating. (Unfortunately they didn't make it past the auditions). But the show is nice anyways and some candidates show a lot of promise and were impressive (I'm on team SCH but my fav is 2L from team SDM).

    After that it was time to actually start the day cause we had stuff to prepare for our little Halloween party later that day. So I walked Neko again and went grocery shopping. I first went to Delhaize to get the bulk of what we needed and when I came home I made myself gnocchi with pumkin sauce but it wasn't really tasty (there are still some leftover in the fridge and it disgusts me).
Then I wen to two other shops to get whatever else we needed and by the time I came home it was already 17:20 (people are coming at 19).
So I quickly started preparing the stuff that was missing (Alyssa (my SO who I'm gonna start calling by her actual name) had prepared all the food and decors during the day already so there wasn't much left to do), and then the two friends we were waiting for came up at practically the same time. (It was quite fun to hear them go up the stairs with like 1 flight of lag between them).

    The party got underway quite quickly and there was almost none of that "beggining of party cringe" where noone knows what to say, doesn't have drinks yet etc. Neko was pretty nice, she barked at the guests a bunch because it's like the third time we have guests over since getting her and she's not used to it yet, but she quickly let her guard down and accepted pets from everyone.
For the occasion, we had bought a 'crime/investigation' game where you have a box with a story, a bunch of documents and a website with more infos. To progress in the story you have to unlock enveloppes and for that you have to answer questions on the website that is themed around the specific story you are playing.
It was incredibly fun and everyone was super invested. Neko let us play quietly as she was snoring away in the sofa, that was a big concern of ours when we bought the game cause we thought she was gonna try to jump on the table and steal things all the time!
It took us about 3 hours to finish the game and we got every answer extra right so it was super satisfying to discover the 'actual' plot that confirmed all the suspicions we had ^^
Here's a link to the game for those interested: https://www.dossierscriminels.com/products/dossiers-criminels-les-fantomes-de-brandonsbury

    After that, we started playing gartic phone (if you've never played that game before, call your friends rn, assemble an online party and have fun). I feel that 4 people is a perfect number to play this game because you don't have to wait too long on everyone and you don't have to draw for too long either, so we had so so so much fun and we played the game till like 3AM.
After that, we played some random 'would you rather' or 'never have I ever' and a little bit of 'What do you meme', but at some point I was nackered and had to go to sleep.
By that point, Neko who had slept through the whole night wasn't taking being in her crate quite well and she was barking at me to let her out. But I was too tired and powered throught the barking waiting for Alyssa to come join me for sleep (Neko generally stops barking when we are both there, like she understands that it's time to sleep or smth).

    Surprisingly and luckily, Neko let us sleep till like 10 without barking or crying or peeing herself (I'm proud of all the progress she's made, she's a great dog) and the rest of the story is for tomorrow.

▓ Thursday 30th October

    Started the day by walking the dog, then writing my journal entry for the previous day (Like I'm doing now, I think this is gonna become a recuring thing in my morning routine. Might be a good way to reflect on the previous day before starting a new one) while drinking my coffee.
The rest of the morning was spent reading and drinking more coffee ^^, I really like the book "Le Vivant comme modèle", the way it's written gets me to want to keep going and it has had me reflect a bunch on my opinions on degrowth and I think that I'm leaning more into it now than ever. Like I realised that whatever we called sustainable/green energies is still kinda fucked cause we will not have what it takes to build enough solar pannels or wind turbines anyways. So instead of trying to keep our way of life by using so called sustainable things, we should strive for a completely different way of life more connected to nature and with less comfort. (But that's definetly a topic for my notes and not my journal).

    By 2PM, it was time for us to leave because we had to take a bus to go to the place where my SO gets her nails done. This was the first time taking the bus with Neko and it all went very fine! Then we spent a couple hours walking in the nearby woods while waiting for my SO. It was really fun has it had been a long while since neither Neko nor me had gone into the woods and I think we were both very happy to be walking in the muddy cracking leaves, listening to the birds and the insects going around us.
Some notable things that happened during this walk in the woods is that we met 2 cats, Neko found bread that she wouldn't want to leave behind (I needed so many kibbles to get her to move away from it), we took some path that weren't quite path and since she's a dog she had not problems going but I, with my old nikes, was slipping everywhere and mostly getting dragged in the mud.
I noticed that in places like the one we were in, aka not the city center, since there are less people, they are much much more friendly. They actually say hi and happily go for a little chat about the dog, it's great! I think I want to live in a place like that some day, but like not in Belgium, I need more sun.

    We then went to get my SO who then had nicely paintend nails and went back to the bus stop. But for some reason, it never came (or was very late), and all the buses we were seeing go in front of us were PACKED with people. 
So we decided that it would be too hard to take the dog in a fully packed bus and started walking home. It's about a 40min walk away but since Neko and I had been walking since 2PM (it was now 6PM), we were quite exhausted, my legs were killing.
We eventually came home and I started to prepare dinner, it was "Pommes Pin" with spinach and cream and some vegan "not-meatballs" for me. That took a while to cook but I didn't have much to do, it was mostly just mixing the spinach so that was easy.
It was all really delicious and we ate the meal while watching todays Star Academy as always. Then we went in our bedroom to read until about 10PM and it was time to sleep.

▓ Wednesday 29th October
    
    Morning was chill, walked the dog, made my coffee, and then worked on this website. I finished writing a note about the fact that it's hard to prioritize things in the time we are given, moved all my snippets from the old branch on the github repo to the current website, fixed a few typos or missing metas here and there.
This blog has really been a blast to work on. The "manual" nature of it where everything is basically html makes it feel so simple! I have nothing to think about appart from writing the actual things I want to write and that's lovely.
    
    I also watered my plants which I hadn't done in way too long! I used to have so many of them, but my cats killed a bunch and thrips killed another bunch. I must say that this has really discouradged me from taking care of the ones left but I do it still cause they are living things you know. 
After that, I went to get a package for my SO, a signed copy of the vynil of Miki's latest album. It's a good album and the vinyl comes with a keychain in the shape of a computer with a SD card inside which I think is a nice touch! We are going to see her live in December and I'm sure that it's going to be a fire concert :))
On my way there I crossed path with Taïaut, a cute and kinda crazy dog that I often encouter when walking Neko. His dude is a nice dude, he sometimes gives kibbles to Neko though she's super affraid as always.
At the library (where the package was dropped), I found a book that seemed nice, it's about a doctor who doesn't prescribe medicine but rather cats! So I took the book home with me.
Before midday, we watched the latest "Qui est l'imposteur" video by Squeezie with Kyan Khojandi and Alexandre Astier and I almost got them all wrong. It's soon going to be Halloween and I can't wait to see what video all the youtubers are gonna upload! Generally Halloween videos are some of the best :))

    The afternoon went by rather quick, I went to get some groceries, mostly spinach and "Pommes Pin" for tonight's dinner. I went to Aldi, and for some reason, the people in the queue there alays smell so bad OMG. I don't get how it's possible, but it is always the case. That said, maybe I smell bad as well and I simply don't notice... I wonder. 
After that I came home and went for a quick walk with Neko, then washed the dishes while my SO was doing some shopping. She brought back a book for me which is a really nice gesture of her, she's good with gifts (A talent I wish I could steal sometimes). It's a book about cats that run a mobile cafe and the side of the pages is all deep blue, I love it!
We then proceeded to wash Neko, which she hates, and it was at the same time hard and cute. She was slipping around in the shower and was shaking cause of the cold. So we made it quick and after that she was going all crazy running everywhere in the house, mostly trying to grab her tail that keeps getting away from her face as she turns around for some reason!

    It was then time for another walk, a long one this time, so we went in the Laveu, which I think has some of the most beautiful houses in Liège and I also like the ambiance. Neko was pretty nice and accepted to walk most of the way there, she only stopped at some point while climbing a street (she really doesn't like going uphill it seems) but we crossed path with a tiny chihuahua and were good to go again ^^.
We were supposed to be home by 17:30, so naturally, at 17:20 we were at the furthest point away from home of the whole walk. Fortunatelly, it was the downhill time and Neko loves to run downhill, so we ran all the way home and were able to be back late by only 7 minutes! We were both really tired but it has always been a dream of mine to go for a run with a dog by my side so hey, thanks for that Neko :))
The reason why we had to be back by that time was to watch today's Start Academy!! (You are going to be hearing about that for the next 3 month, I warned you). Nothing much to say except that it's impressive the amount of stuff they are able to learn in such a short span of time. Like come on, one day to learn a song, how to sing it and a little staging to go along is not enough in my opinion.
I'm really shocked by the amount of ads there are in a TV program. We don't have the cable so we never usually watch TV and rather watch videos on youtube or movies/series on Netflix. I also am so sad about how uncreative the ads are, it's hella lame and I hate it!

   Then I went to get some fries!!! I had been dreaming about them since midday and couldn't wait any longer. I took the tram and when I got there was greeted by an empty line, which very rarely happens because they are situated in the city center and almost always have people. 
But when I got in, all my dreams fell appart. The dude behind the counter tells me that they don't have veggie poulycroc anymore... Disaster, sadness and dread fill every part of my body. Maybe I'm being a little dramatic, but that meant that all I was gonna eat for dinner were some fries! Which don't get me wrong, is fantastic, but the poulycroc really ties it all together usually.
After me, a girl came to order just a single cheese croquette, which I thought was a funny order (A good order though, cheese croquettes are great). Then she went back with it in a little paper and I imagined her eating it like a little rodent. Holding it with both hands and taking tiny tiny bites.
Finally I came home and we ate the fries while watching GILMORE GIIIIIIIIIRLS! OMG it had been so long, what a perfect evening. I love that show so so so so much, Luke is my favourite and I wish to be like a 1/1000000% like him. We are at season two still and going through it way too slowly for my taste, but what a great series!

    After that we did our evening routine then went to bed and read a book for an hour or so. My SO has a tiny lamp you can attach to the book that makes a perfectly cosy orange light, the dog was laying at our feet snoring away, it was perfect.
The book I'm reading currently is "Le Vivant comme modèle" by Gauthier Chapelle. I'm enjoying it but have only gone through 50 or so pages so far. It has some interesting ideas and you can really tell that the dude is passionate about the subject, I like it.

▓ Tuesday 28th October

    This is the begining of my journal! So hi to whoever is reading this ^^
I'm currently on holiday so I'm taking things easy. This morning after walking Neko and making my coffee, I finished and published this website!
Then we went to get another coffee at Kawa, this coffee shop is only open during the week when I work so I was happy to go there. But since they changed location, they stopped making filter coffee. So I was dissapointed and didn't take anything there.

    Instead, we went to this other coffee I had meant to try for years, Grand Maison. The place is super cool and I love their website, it's simple but really cute. Also, they accept dogs, and that's a great plus!!! There, they do make filter coffee, and it was great. Chocolatey and not bitter at all, a bit too watery for my taste but nothing too bad.
I hope to go there again soon and maybe we can sit inside this time, the place looks super nice and the staff was lovely.

    After that, we got caught in the rain while coming home. But it was like you know, this super wet rain, the kind of thin, cold, hard hitting, spitty rain. I know it might seem dumb to call rain wet, but I swear that some rain is wetter than some other rain. Come to Belgium for a year, you'll see.
Neko hates the rain and being wet, but she was brave and kept walking and being nice even when we took the tram. I'm really happy about the way she's growing and I feel like most of the worries I had in the first few weeks are now behind me :))

    For dinner, I had gnocchi with bell pepper, tomato paste, cream and a plentifull amount of garlic. It was great, the texture was perfect. After that I finished house cleaning, went to get groceries for tonight's dinner and a carrot cake.
Then there was more walking with Neko but this time she was awful because she'd found some food and wouldn't accept to go anywhere else than where the food was. So we cut it short and went home with loads of pulling and kibble throwing.

    By the time I came home, it was basically time to watch today's Star Academy summary. I'm almost ashamed to say it, but I'm starting to like this show more and more. There is still some hate watching, like, I still critique everything like I know better and it's a lot of fun. My favourite rn is Victor but tbh it's not like a real real favourite, I wouldn't care who wins, I'm not that invested (yet).

    Tonight we are eating fried rice with kimchi (I'm making it as I write these lines), I love this meal, it tastes super good, the vinegary taste of it is on point and yayyy more garlic!!

    Now (Yeah time moved between the previous sentence and this one) we are watching the animated series "Haunted Hotel". I've only seen the first episode so far but I quite like it. I've always enjoyed these kind of dark but fun but adult but childish series, and I'm a big fan of cartoon stuff. I might try my hand at drawing some of the characters later, I haven't really drawn in a while and a little refreshing would do me great I'm sure.