TL;DR: This short week was dominated by Catsby feeling unwell (but with Miss Biscuits providing excellent nursing care), a deep dive into Home Assistant dashboard shenanigans to track dehumidifier power usage, discovering new games (Demonschool and Wanderstop), and revisiting whether Neil Peart was actually Canada's best rapper all along.

Catsby Updates

I kinda want to keep these weeknotes light, but we had a rough span of days with Catsby. Last Thursday, he stopped eating and we ended up hospitalizing him at the vet's overnight. We got him back Friday evening, pretty doped up and with a not-so-great diagnosis wherein we're not sure we have a long time left with him.

So, as a programming note: this blog will most likely be delivering elevated levels of Catsby photos for the foreseeable future. I love all our critters, but Catsby is my best friend, he's my pal, he's my homeboy, my rotten soldier, my sweet cheese, my good time boy. (That's a WWDITS reference, FWIW.)

But, Catsby's got good company. Miss Biscuits immediately got to work bathing the vet smell off him. Saturday night was a bit rough, but Cosmo hung out with us.

By Sunday, things turned around—Catsby had a better day, ate a bunch, and was even purring on a heating pad. That morning, he'd come to bed, so naturally I stayed put for another hour watching TikToks. Priorities.

By Sunday evening, things felt much better—Catsby was back on the couch with Miss Biscuits and me. And of course, every cat here loves a churu (including the campaign for unlimited churu treats).

And, of course, if Catsby wants to eat in weird places—say, atop a furnace vent—he gets to eat atop a furnace vent. Miss Biscuits remains confused by this arrangement.

Home Assistant Shenanigans

No, you spent a stupid amount of time puttering in Home Assistant to gin up some dashboard shenanigans to better see how much power the dehumidifiers are using.

I was really surprised to see how much power those things gobble up!

Context: We had a mold problem in the attic that we remediated over the summer, but it still needs fairly constant attention from a dehumidifier to keep at bay. The basement also benefits from some drying out. Overall, we want to see how much running this is costing us so we might tweak cost vs goal humidity.

Really though, this stuff just lets me roleplay as Geordi LaForge and pretend that I'm doing real starship engineering.

Games Worth Playing

Started playing Demonschool. Faye sure does want to punch some fightable faces! The game has this great tactical RPG vibe mixed with demon-hunting high school drama.

Then on Monday I started playing Wanderstop and, dang, does the idea of tea sound ever more appealing. It's from the same creative team behind A Psalm for the Wild-Built (as someone pointed out, they really should have used that in the marketing).

Both games hit different cozy vibes—one's all about punching demons, the other's about making tea and processing emotions. Perfect weekend balance.

Geddy Lee's Secret Rap Career

For the longest time, I thought it was Neil Peart rapping on Rush's "Roll the Bones". Thus, in my mind, at least, making him Canada's best rapper. (We don't talk about Drake.)

But, it turns out that was actually Geddy Lee with vocal effects. They were all sneaky about it during the tour 1991-1992 tour: I remembered they'd turn the lights down for that section and you couldn't really see who (if any of them) was doing the spoken word / rap part.

Miscellanea