Rosalia Rambles

Tag: ikea

  • Redundancy Review: Day 77, “Not Quite There Yet”

    (for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia’s Rambles)

    Good morning knights and bards, welcome to Day 77 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.

    So despite a good day yesterday, my mental state is still in a severe amount of flux over cosplay shenanigans, which led to me having a bit of a breakdown over lunch due to cosplay stress compounding with work stress which shattered the thin veneer of mental stability I usually present with leading me into a bit of a spiral until I had some ice cream.

    In the midst of the breakdown though, my mind started having a thought about what my problem is, and, I think I found something I need to change.

    I am… extremely bad at giving myself time to properly process things, usually due to the pace my life moves out, and this lack of time means that I often rush past any attempt at healing, instead trying to find solutions or working on something else to distract myself from what hurt me initially.

    Again, this can be seen as an admirable trait in some instances, but a common running theme in what people admire me for is that it comes at a great cost to my personal sanity and comfort.

    Losing my job back in June hurt, and it still hurts today. I am working towards building myself up as a writer, a freelance software tester, and whatever titles any of the other hobbies I am exploring right now could bestow upon me… but the sense of self and belonging that came from that job is still gone. 

    And with this cosplay, I am working towards getting a backup plan sorted, and even when it comes to stumbles within that backup plan I need to be kinder to myself, because whilst I consider cosplay a big part of my identity; the actual act of putting together cosplays is something I am still inexperienced on even coming up to almost a decade since my first time cosplaying.

    In general, the idea of “being kinder to myself” is something I struggle with a lot anyway – in both my career and personal life. I often fall into this trap of needing to make myself perfect in all I do, finding my stride within the first try or else I consider myself a failure, all the while preaching a gospel about how mistakes and imperfections make things interesting.

    Hypocrisy is fun, especially when it comes to needless self flagellation… getting in all my big words today too.

    Anyway, I want to go play Helldivers after dinner, so, I am going to try wrap up this Redundancy Review with a quick Hololive Tuesday segment, which today is going to cover a rapid fire review of all of the items inside my mini Ninomae Ina’nis display on my big Kallax configuration.

    For a brief bit of context, Ninomae Ina’nis (or Ina for short because god that is a mouthful) is a VTuber within Hololive English 1st Generation “Myth”, and is one of my main oshis. I absolutely love Ina, her streams always give comfy & cozy vibes with delightfully fun tangents, and her sleepiness speaks to me on a personal level.

    As such, I have a fair bit of Ina merch, which I can happily say was all bought directly from Hololive via Geekjack without the need to go to scalpers on eBay like an admittedly-not-insignificant portion of the Hololive collectibles I own are.

    Up front on the left we have “SmolMyth” Ina Plushie, one of the first pieces of Hololive merch I ever bought because it was right around the time I had discovered Geekjack was an option for shipping to the UK. She has stuck with me ever since and now forms the cornerstone of my little display.

    On her right we have “Friends With U” Ina Plushie. Friends With U is a series of plushies that tend to be in stock more regularly for fans who might not be able to buy plushies as part of limited-time made-to-order milestone drops that talents usually do. Admittedly I am not the biggest fan of the halo on this plushie, it feels a little too flimsy and hard to position correctly.

    Sitting in the lap of both of these plushies is a Connect the World Penlight. When it comes to the headline Hololive English concerts, I am unable to attend due to the fact they are A. in the USA which I do not massively feel safe going to right now due to being trans and B. The travel costs are prohibitively expensive for my current situation. 

    So in lieu of attendance, I make an effort to buy the made-to-order/leftover merch from the concerts themselves, having done so for Connect the World, Breaking Dimensions, and the incredibly recent All For One. The penlight from Connect the World is actually the only penlight I own as well, something I hope to change given my upcoming convention but this one will definitely get mileage there as well in both the opening and premium concert.

    And finally, looming behind all of them, is the large Takodachi Plushie, specifically being the rerun version from Myth’s third anniversary merch in 2023… I absolutely love this thing. Whilst a lot of Hololive plushies are made more for display than cuddling, the Takodachi plush is absolutely one you can cuddle and it feels amazing to do so. 

    The outside is incredibly soft but the stuffing holds up to being squeezed amazingly, making it perfect to hold tight on lazy days where all you want to do is lie in bed, relax, and watch silly videos on Youtube.

    For someone having a bad day, the fact I managed to write almost a thousand words makes me happy, especially as it was quite easy to find my flow for this. Thank you for reading today’s Redundancy Review, I hope you are able to find relaxation and happiness wherever you are. Myself though?

    I am diving feet first into hell once more.

  • Redundancy Review: Day 36, “Neuroplasticity”

    (for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia’s Rambles)

    Good morning geniuses and boffins, welcome to Day 36 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.

    Yesterday was a little difficult honestly, ended up needing to have a bit of a cry away from my desk cause of having some intense emotions spring up as I was trying to get through my work. The afternoon was a bit more settled with me actually being able to get some stuff done, even if I did not feel too great with it.

    Part of my contracting work involves topics I am somewhat familiar with due to my degree, but considering I graduated in 2020 and abandoned what my specialist subject was, it does not feel entirely fantastic to be working with it again – even for the day rate I am receiving. 

    I have booked an appointment with my therapist to discuss how my life is going. I last saw her in April when I started to pick up the writing on the wall for my old company and talked about wanting to make a change in my career before the shit approached the fan at a great velocity, and part of my main plan moving forward has her advice ringing in my ears once more.

    Whenever a challenge comes my way and I told her about it she would always emphasise one thing:

    “Neuroplasticity states that the brain needs twenty one days to start adapting to a change”

    Catastrophising is something I fall into often, especially when it comes to trying to maintain my professional identity. Even when I know the people I am working with I can often develop feelings of inadequacy about my output.

    But today is only my third day, and whilst I have struggles I do have wins as well, with me being certain that new stuff will appear soon enough that takes my interest a lot more.

    For now, I will try take each day at a time, take pride in when they go well and seek comfort on times they are harder.

    Comfort is going to be the theme of today’s review, with me talking about one of the most important aspects of being transgender. 

    Is it a good bra? Not today, although having been eaten alive by underwire that is definitely something to properly invest in.

    Good shoes? Shoes are important to everyone, I just wish finding comfy goth stompers was not so difficult for my massive feet.

    Nope, what I want to talk about today is an essential aspect of comfort to trans people and one of our most recognisable stereotypes.

    Yup, it is time for me to talk about the lovable IKEA shark: BLÅHAJ.

    Pronounced either as spelled or as “blue-hi” for those wanting to conform to the Swedes, this shark plushie comes in two sizes as a 55cm variant for £5 or as a 100cm variant for £22, both are incredible plushies even outside of the meme. They are extremely soft and squishable, making them perfect to hug tight on hard days. 

    I have had my own personal BLÅHAJ since 2022 when I moved out of my parent’s place which enabled me to start living my truth, and “Sharky” as my main one is called has provided me a massive amount of comfort on my harder days, to the point he is very flat now with the stuffing deflated from multiple cuddle sessions.

    To be loved is to be changed though, and whilst I would not mind getting him professionally cleaned, I do not think I would want to get him restuffed for a while yet… especially as I do have a fresh BLÅHAJ who lives on the sofa for that exact reason… and two smaller ones who live on my giant plushie shelf.

    Even as my nephew was born the first gift I sent to him was a 55cm BLÅHAJ, both as a perfect soft toy for a newborn but also to serve as a reminder of who his Auntie Rosa is – a badass trans woman who will cry a lot, but still get the job done.

    And I definitely cry a lot still, especially over these last few months, but I am still here, and I am still getting the job done.

    That will be all for today, I hope you are enjoying the cooler weather wherever you are and that hitting hump day is not too hard for you.

    For more information on BLÅHAJ, visit the IKEA website here: BLÅHAJ soft toy, shark, 100 cm – IKEA UK

  • Redundancy Review: Day 26, “Relaxed”

    (for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia’s Rambles)

    Good morning dancers and jivers, welcome to Day 26 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.

    It is a beautifully quiet Sunday morning right now. The day started with rain outside which has now developed into it being cool and cloudy as I wait for an IKEA delivery to arrive, with not much planned beyond that.

    Building on the theme of yesterday being the odd feeling of my redundancy feeling “liberating”, Sunday would always be tinged with sadness slash anxiety due to my burnout feelings – enjoying the day but dreading dragging myself back to my desk on Monday, an emotion that has been replaced with a similar but different one.

    There is still some amount of dread I feel on a Monday, as I mentally gear myself up to go delving on LinkedIn again and look at job postings but in a way it is less oppressive than what my burnout felt like. In a way I have more freedom to structure my day around different periods of job searching and working on different bits of writing work.

    But with freedom comes responsibility, with one of the main things I am definitely struggling with is discipline. I write these reviews every day but I find it hard to keep up with my mind flitting between different personal projects, wanting to tell all the stories at once without finishing any.

    It is something I will improve on as time goes on, although for now I am going to continue to enjoy my sleepy Sunday.

    For the weekdays though, I am still available for writing work and both money & getting experience on professional projects again are insanely good motivators.

    Going to be a straightforward review today as well, talking about my favourite piece of IKEA furniture: the Kallax.

    Whatever purpose you need storage space for, the Kallax can handle it. Easy to build, infinitely versatile, and available in a range of attractive designs, it can fit into any room and any style with ease.

    My favourite feature of the Kallax is how many inserts are available for it, both from IKEA and independent sellers. On my one specifically I have these laser cut stands that are supposed to be used for books, but as you can see from the image, I use them to support a copious amount of plushies.

    Board/card games are also ideal for the Kallax, with many standard sized boardgame boxes fitting perfectly into a Kallax square for a tidy and presentable solution.

    I am not sponsored by IKEA in any way, shape, or form, but considering how much I shill for the Kallax in my everyday life, there would be no greater honour if the opportunity ever arose.

    Short, sweet, and to the point. Thank you for reading today’s shorter review, I am going to go back to snoozing. Enjoy some relaxation yourself.

    For more information on Kallax styles and variants, visit the IKEA link here: https://www.ikea.com/gb/en/cat/kallax-series-27534/