3644 Drying up

Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Mouths lie; hearts don’t.

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I took a 12-hour pill this morning.  It should be wearing off about now.  I feel great!  My temp has been 97.5  all day, and although I still have to blow my nose occasionally and I've been sneezing a bit, it's a clear discharge.

Wow. 

I hope it holds.

And if Romney doesn't stop exaggerating, interrupting, and going over time, I may have to sue him for a broken TV set.
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3643 More schnork, and an oof.

Monday, October 15, 2012

People have a way of getting away with exactly what you let them get away with.

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So, I got dressed and went out to buy some decongestants, and discovered another symptom.  My legs are weak.  I was walking like I was drunk.

Speaking of drunk, I think I've had two hangovers in my entire life, and in both cases I wasn't even inebriated.  Both hangovers were from drinking home-brewed mead.  Man, that stuff is EVIL!  Tastes good, but evil evil evil.

This headache I have feels just like a mead hangover.  It was overcast today, but every once in a while a beam of sun would break through, and when it did, it split my head.  Somebody two houses away was running a wood chipper, and every time a branch went through it felt like my head was going through the chipper.  (Yeah, I saw "Fargo".  Just like that.)

So, I bought a box of pills for runny nose to take now, and a box of pills for breaking up nose and sinus congestion (I figure that's where this is headed next) and some menthol lozenges for zinging the old membranes.  In each case I got the smallest packages.  It came to $27!  Not counting the lozenges, that's almost $.75 per pill!  I about fell over.

When did that stuff get so expensive?

I'll be sleeping in Vicks Vaporub tonight.  I love that stuff.  I like the way it smells and the warm glow on my chest.  (No expiration date on vaporub, so it's one of the few things spared from Daughter's purges.)

-------------------------------

The other nickname for the Nugget is Monster Truck - acquired in utero when she ran all over her mother's insides, and that's her geocaching "handle".  The teachers at her nursery school call her Muscles.  She's almost 18 months old, 32" tall, and weighs maybe 27 lbs.  Powerful chubby short legs.

She really is incredibly strong for her size.

When I got back from the grocery store yesterday, I put away the refrigerator and freezer stuff, but left everything else in the bags in the hall near the front door.  Daughter and Nugget came over this evening.  Daughter picked up all the bags and carried them into the kitchen, but left the laundry detergent in the hall because it goes in the laundry room under the stairs.

When Daughter brought the bags to the kitchen, I looked up and then past her, and here comes Nugget trotting around the corner carrying the laundry detergent jug by the handle, high against her chest.  The jug weighs just under 8 lbs.  That's almost 1/3 of her own weight.  It was as big as her chest and belly.  I need two hands to lift it comfortably.

She's amazing. 

[Photo at the nursery school.  Interesting the way her shirt matches the floor, wall, and door.]
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3642 Schnork

Monday, October 15, 2012

Identifying a problem is more important than solving it.

---------------------------------------------

Sick.

I was fine yesterday late afternoon.  I went across the street to visit the Nugget for a few minutes.  Hercules, her father, was sniffing and snuffling and complaining of a slight fever.

I left them and went to the grocery store, and my nose started running in the bread aisle.  Yeah, that suddenly.  Naturally, I had no tissues.  I was licking it off my upper lip and hoping nobody'd notice. 

Also naturally, I walked right past the colds aisle and didn't buy any decongestants.  I've got nothing in the house, mostly because Daughter goes through my kitchen pantry and medicine chest when I'm not looking and throws out anything past the expiration date, and I'm not asking her if she has anything I can take because she uses herbal remedies and that stuff, I forget what it's called, where there might be one molecule of active ingredient in the whole bottle.  You know, that stuff.

She doesn't like chemicals.

Last night I was working logic puzzles in bed and dripping all over the pages.

Today I am miserable.  I can breathe through my nose, but I don't because that sets off sneezes that scare Jasper and aggravate this pounding headache I have.  It seems to be all sinus and nose at this point.  Temp 99.5 (normal for me is a bit over 97).

I've got to get up off my tail and go get something.  But I guess that's the other symptom.  I don't have enough energy to get dressed, let alone go out.
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3247 Cold pressed

Monday, January 31, 2011

“While you may be very careful about what you pay for with your money, you are probably less careful about what you pay for with your attention. In the long run, how you spend your attention affects your life far more profoundly than how you spend your money.
Attention is energy. Whatever you feed it to will grow.”
-- Alan Cohen (Why Your Life Sucks, Page 70) --

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Jasper plays a lot, but I don't get to watch him play unless I happen to be on the other end of the toy. I hear balls rolling, or catnip pillows being "killed", or hanging bells being jingled, but if I look over at him, he stops, leaves the toy, and comes over to me. I hear him chasing something from one end of the house to the other upstairs, but no matter how quietly I sneak to the stairs, when I get to the bottom, he's sitting on the top step looking down at me. I don't know what's going on up there.

He sits on the window sills when I'm not in a room. I see him in the living room window watching me when I'm on the front porch, and I've seen tiny paw prints on almost all the sills. But I've never seen him get up there. I don't know how he gets past/around/under/through the curtains.

The only way I can watch him do anything, including eating, is to cover my face with my hands and peek through my fingers, so he can't see my eyes. Even then I have to turn my face aside and look sideways, or he's not fooled.

I've never seen him drink water.

I don't know why he keeps all these secrets. It's not like he's afraid he's doing something wrong. About the only times he's ever had to be told "No!" is about getting on the kitchen counters or getting too close to an outside door. Otherwise we've never had any arguments.

I've never even seen him use the litter box.

Hmmmm. Jasper and The Man have a lot in common.

--------------------------------

I'm beginning to think that maybe I'm not sensitive to temperature - that's just what it feels like. Evening to evening in this house, as long as it's not windy, the temperature is fairly steady. Most evenings I'm fine. But some evenings, I freeze.

I am freezing this evening. I'm sitting here wrapped in a knit cape topped by a new rust red tan brown crochet shawl with only my fingers and head exposed, and I'm freezing. I'm thinking about going to bed, just to get warm.

And then I realized that every evening that snow or precipitation was predicted overnight, I've gone to bed especially early.

I wonder if I'm actually sensitive to drops in atmospheric pressure, and it registers as feeling cold.

Is that possible?

-------------------------------------

Know how you can't buy wintery stuff in the winter? I had a telescoping snow-pusher-offer thingy. Brand new in December. Last week, after the last snow, Daughter turned the pusher-thingy head without pressing the release button, and it broke. So now I need a new snow-pusher-offer thingy, and it needs to be telescoping because I'm so short and the roof of the minivan is so high and wide.

I went to three stores this evening, and none of them - including a huge auto parts store - had any, and none expect to get any more.

Yeah, I have one at the old house, and also a push broom that works if one doesn't mind marks on the edge of the roof, but Fred the van and I are here, not there. And if I bring them here, that leaves nothing to use there.

Why do they stop stocking winter stuff when there's two more months of winter to go? Do they really think nothing ever breaks or gets lost? Doesn't the fact that what they had sold out quickly, and people are still asking, tell them anything? Is anyone really buying lawn mowers right now?
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3216 It's all me

Wednesday, December 29, 2010

"Computers make it easier to do a lot of things,
but most of the things they make it easier to do
don't need to be done."
-- Andy Rooney --

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When I was in therapy in my 30's, Dr. K. said I had (among other things) an omnipotence problem - that I thought that when anything went wrong, anywhere, it was entirely my fault. It was difficult for him to convince me otherwise, because I had so much evidence. There was too much connection for it to all be coincidence. Besides, everyone always blamed me.

I moved down here, hoping for less snow.

Sunday was the first snow of the winter. It was the worst snowstorm in this area in decades.

I am sitting here feeling that it's all my fault.

--------------------------------

I have the antenna booster, one upstairs and one down, and I'm getting about 40 over-the-air TV channels out of NYC, but there's next to nothing worth watching in the evenings now that this season of "Survivor" and "The Amazing Race" are finished. There's nothing but chintzy talk shows, celebrity gossip shows, and ancient reruns of once-decent shows. It's way worse than the Schenectady schedule that I got at the old house.

That, plus the house getting colder in the evenings, has been sending me to bed by 9 every night, where I've been watching "My Name is Earl" DVDs. I'm working my way through the whole four sets. I love that show! It's 180 degrees off "Big Bang Theory", which I also loved. (Loved, because like all situation comedies, it's starting to repeat itself.)

"Jude the Obscure" is on the night table next to the bed, and I have promised myself I won't get into any other book until I finish that, but I just can't stay awake reading it. I pick it up, read a page and a half, and either fall asleep or think of something else to do, like tape another room for painting. I think I'm avoiding it.
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3206 Thermostat lies

Monday, December 20, 2010

“If a cluttered desk is the sign of a cluttered mind, what is the significance of a clean desk?"
-- Laurence J. Peter --

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I keep saying I'm freezing in this house. The insulation is crap. They didn't insulate around the heat runs that go through exterior walls, so when the heat isn't on, cold air blows out the vents. There's a steady cold draft coming out of every electrical whatchmacallit on an external wall. The walls themselves are cold. The downstairs floor (the slab) is icy.

The thermostat says it's 72 in here.

Today I remembered that I have a Brookstone clock that shows temperature, time, GMT time, and has a timer, depending on which side of the cube is up. I had it sitting on "date & time". I turned it over to temperature. It said 63.

The freakin' thermostat lies!

Some people would be comfortable at 63. I'm not. Keep in mind that I'm also comfortable at 95 degrees, as long as it's not too humid to breathe. Different people have different comfort ranges.

I'm sitting here in a sweater over a turtle neck, with a knit shawl over that, knit pants over lycra pants, socks, and plush-lined ankle boots, and I'm FREEZING! My body is actually shivering, and I've got that heavy feverish feeling. I just can't do cold, especially cold drafts.

My nose and hands are freezing. It's silly to wear a ski mask and gloves in the house. This is like when I visited Ex#2's parents' farmhouse, and got chilblains on my cheeks and shins that cracked open and bled. This is ridiculous. I'm going to have to get someone in to figure out what to do, and do it.

When I'm so cold, I'm not interested in doing any work. I have to work hard to not climb back in bed. I'm almost out of food and cat food, but I have no interest in going out into that cold to get any.
.

2746 Sick?

Saturday, January 16, 2010

Flip Wilson, as Geraldine: "You don't have to be a thing of beauty to be a joy forever."

----------------------------------------------

I was not very sparkling at dinner last night. Anyone looking at me would have thought I was either tired or sad.

When I got home, I had a heaviness in my upper abdomen; I wondered if something I had eaten was getting nasty at me.

I got to bed about 2 am, and slept very badly, waking at about 8 am and unable to get back to sleep. Do you ever get that feeling of foreboding? I had it.

I feel icky today. I have boosted the thermostat to 78 and put on a long robe over my clothes, but I'm still freezing. The skin in the center of my body feels hot and dry, but the battery thermometer says 98.2, and the old mercury thermometer (which I trust more) says 98.55, so I don't have a fever.

I have pain across the small of my back, above my hips, more on the right than the left. I have a rock of pain under and behind my left ear, from the point of the jawbone to the center of the back of my head. There's pain across my eyebrows. My upper back feels very tired - I can't hold my shoulders back; my shoulders ache, feel like they've been beaten. They curl forward. I slump. My feet smell very salty.

No snuffly nose, though.

I was so cold and miserable that I climbed into bed, fully dressed and under the blankets, at 1 pm, and slept until after 5. There goes the dinner and movie that was scheduled for this evening. I'm not too distressed about missing that. This group is run by guys, and they planned dinner in the food court at the mall, and the movie is "The Lovely Bones". I read the book long ago, and couldn't understand why it was so popular, and then I read a review that didn't make the movie sound any better, so, eh.

I hate feeling like this with no explanation.

---------------------------------

Another blogger has written about An Innocent looking to buy a car in New Jersey. The kid was likely to be eaten by sharks.

It reminded me of my shopping for a car for Jay. He had slid on ice and wracked up his Subaru, and we needed a small cheap car ASAP for his commute. We had just received a check from his father for Christmas, so we decided to use that. $X,000 was the absolute limit (I forget what the number was).

I did exactly what what the Innocent above did, but with one slight difference. In the end, I was the shark.

I called every dealer, new and used, in the phone book. I said "I'm calling every dealer in the book, looking for a car. I have exactly $X,000, which must cover all costs. I need a car immediately. What do you have?" I just wanted to find out what was available at that price.

Most offered huge gas-guzzling 10+year-old junkers with high mileage, until a salesman at the Chevy dealership offered a little red three-year-old Chevy Cavalier with less than 60,000 miles on it, that they had just taken in on trade. It was just in, not yet "detailed". Wow.

I reiterated the limit, which would have to include taxes and registration, and the salesman assured me that was the price. I accepted his offer ("I accept your offer of ...") contingent on examination and test drive that afternoon - and then I told him that having called so many dealers and not trusting my notes, I had recorded the conversation (NY requires that only one party be aware of recording), so is there any part of his offer he wanted to amend or rescind? He said no.

We went, we looked, we tapped, tweaked, and prodded, we test-drove, and when it came to the paper-signing part, the manager came over and said that the price of the car was --- a whole bunch more, but "we might be able to bring that down a bit. "

I said, "Is this man (the salesman) authorized to strike a deal?"
Manager, "Yes. You can talk with him."
Me, "Then there's nothing to talk about. We have already agreed on $X,000 total."
Manager, shaking head, "No, we can't possibly sell this car for that."
Me, "You already did. I'm sure you know the legal definition of offer and acceptance. Your man offered it for $X,000, and I accepted, and I have the offer and acceptance on tape. We have already agreed on the price. There is nothing more to discuss."

The look on the manager's face was priceless. The salesman slumped in his seat. We signed the papers, and drove the car off the lot right then, just to make sure we got the whole car, if you know what I mean.

It was an absolutely fantastic deal, seasoned by the knowledge that the salesman had tried to trick us in to see it, and didn't know who he was tricking.

Several years later I sold the car to The Hairless Hunk. It's probably almost 16 years old now, and still running fine.

I wish I was running as well.

--------------------------------

Update, 9:00 pm. 99.8. Shivering. Yeah, sick.
.

2400 Annoyed

Monday, May 18, 2009

Frost warnings for tonight. High twenties low thirties predicted. It might get all the way up to a high of 50 F tomorrow.

I don't understand.

-----------------------

I got annoyed at the morning news. They did a piece on a woman with a "pea-sized" brain tumor who had a new, immediate, non-invasive treatment "by robot! whoop whoop" which required very little recovery time.

Of course that drew my attention.

They then showed a focused narrow beam radiation doohicky swinging around her head, shooting beams from multiple directions, all of which converged on the tumor.

Thud.

That's fractionated radiosurgery. It's not new! It's been around for more than a decade. Jay had it in 2000. The improvement is not the "robot" or the converged radiation. It's the preparation that's improved enormously.

Back when Jay had it, the radiologist had to map the beam directions by hand, so that they could enter and exit from as many directions as possible, all crossing at the tumor, without hitting certain areas of the brain, the eyes, the optic nerves, throat, and so on. He then fed the coordinates to the machine.

The big news is not the "robot". It's that now that CAT and MRI scans are digital, a computer can do the mapping, and feed the coordinates directly to the machine. That's faster, but not a great leap in "robotics".

But I guess that's not as sexy a story.

It also annoyed me that they presented it as a cure. Like, just snap your fingers, ten minutes with the machine instead of 10 hours in surgery, and voilà, all fixed. Yes, they actually said something like that.

Sorry folks, but if her tumor was malignant (which, without biopsy, they don't really know), this probably bought her six to nine months, and it can't be repeated. So she is likely to end up in surgery anyway. If it's operable. Otherwise, she's SOL.

------------------------

The Man and I were supposed to get together again this week, but a work emergency has come up, and it may be another two weeks. Hearing this, I of course got annoyed and depressed.

Thinking about it, I realized that over the past two years, almost all my interests have died one by one, and my life has devolved to The Man, Daughter, and the internet. I don't do much of anything else any more.

• The only bar in the village has closed, so there's been no afternoons of throwing the bull with the guys for a long time now.
• Since the market dip, Piper has been too busy for our walks, and manages lunch only about once a month now instead of the old once a week.
• Friends have gradually moved away, or have become much less active (I'm surprised at how many people my age have aged so quickly).
  
• I've gradually wandered away from the dance community. I find I've lost interest in shows and haflas. I went to Rakkasah Spring Caravan only because the Gypsy needed someone to work her sales booth while she rehearsed and danced. Otherwise, I wouldn't have gone.
  
• I haven't been to a Mensa activity since February, when I realized that of the ten people I'm most likely to see at functions, I enjoy only three of them. The other seven are major stressors, and I don't need that. So I see Roman, Angie, and Nate occasionally outside Mensa, and since Roman has realized that, after two years, The Man is not a flash in the pan, his phone calls and invitations to lunch have tapered off. I guess we weren't friends after all. He was just waiting for another chance at reconciliation. ('Taint gonna happen!)
• Last month I resigned as Mensa Ombudsman when I realized that there were some conflicts brewing, friends would call or email and tell me about shouting matches in restaurants, and it looked like FW would be at the middle of all of them. I don't care to mediate a conflict involving FW (whom The Man teasingly calls my psycho ex-girlfriend).
• And so on.
  

I didn't replace those activities with anything else. Some days lately I don't even bother to get dressed. When I don't see The Man, I go into hibernation. I've gained 12 pounds in the past eighteen months (that's like 20 on a regular-sized woman).

That has to stop.

Over the weekend I went looking for activities.

I have signed up for two dinner groups, two movie/discussion groups, got on the mailing list for a science cafe, and joined a group in Woodstock that takes dogs for easy hikes. Their flyer said they welcomed people without dogs, and I miss my dogs. I'm hoping I can enjoy theirs. A friend has been trying to talk me into a line dancing thingy she goes to, but I'm not sure I'd like that. It's "called", sort of like square dancing, and I can never remember what name goes with what pattern. I also joined an over-50s singles group, but only because they have interesting activities - like a dinner cruise down the Hudson next month. I'm not looking for pairing up, and I may not last long with that, anyway. I remember those groups as being more than a bit vicious (but maybe I won't get into trouble if it's obvious that I'm not competing. "I don't want your man, lady. I have a perfectly good one of my own.")

So, we'll see. I have a feeling I may have some problem getting off my butt - sometimes it seems like too much trouble to get up, dressed, and out - but at least I've found some directions I can go.
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1614 Thank You, Plow Man

Wednesday, December 26, 2007

I was up late last night, so I slept late this morning. Usually the cats let me sleep, but this morning Jasper was bouncing all over my legs by 10:30, and Miss Thunderfoot was complaining loudly. Very unusual for her. I was having a nice dream, and held out until 11, but finally gave up and got up.

Their complaint was that it was 60 degrees (F) in the house.

I have a programmed thermostat, so the temperature does drop during the night, but never lower than 63, and it should be above 70 by 9 am. Something was wrong, and the cats didn't like it. Not one bit.

Neither did I.

The furnace fan was blowing, but it was blowing cold air. The outside temperature was 32. Freezing. We had power. I went to the basement, and the furnace was "running", but it was cold. The fuel tank gauge said "empty". I knocked on it with a knuckle, and it was hollow all the way down. I have a 250 gallon tank. I got a delivery only two months ago. Ouch!

Remember my chief concern about getting the top of my drive cleared? So the fuel oil truck could get up and turned around?

I called the oil company and told them I was out and needed an emergency delivery, then moved the Aerio to the street to make sure the truck could turn around. Within the hour, I heard the "beep beep" of a truck backing up the drive.

Backing up?

It was a new guy, and he didn't know that Ms. Silk always makes sure he can turn around (although the dispatcher knew, and had made sure to send a small truck). I met him at the top of the driveway, and scolded him, "Sheesh! I did all this work (waving at the cleared top) to make sure you'd be able to turn around, and you BACK up the drive? But I've gotta admire your courage!"

I guess it was a scary trip. This complete stranger walked up to me and hugged me, with a relieved laugh.

It took 253.1 gallons, at $2.449/gal. $619.84 total. It would have cost a lot more, but I had prepaid in September, with a discount on the September price. I've got one more delivery's worth of credit, then I'll have to pay the real price.

Let's hope it's a short winter.
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1170 Financial Decisions

Monday, March 19, 2007

Talked with Daughter yesterday. Her father has agreed to retire, has signed the papers, and will be moving back east. His elderly mother's home has her old beauty parlor attached, and his sister has begun converting it into an apartment for him. The ball's rolling. I guess the main impetus was when his blood sugar got low enough that he was able to look around and realize all the things he had let go, like the taxes, car registration, and so on. Daughter was supposed to return last Saturday, but her flight had been canceled because of the snow, so she's returning Tuesday, late. I asked her what the weather was like there, and she said it's in the 70s. I was surprised. It's in the low 20s here, and near Boulder it's 70s?

According to both the thermostat and the thermometer on the desk, it's 74 in my house right now, and I'm still freezing. My hands and nose and legs are so cold. Maybe it's because there's no sun today. Maybe I'm not eating enough fats or something. I am literally shivering.

Piper told me last Wednesday that he wants me to sell all my odd lots of stock, and about half the large oil company blocks "by the end of the week", so we can transfer more into bonds and mutual funds. By the end of last week. He said that the recent severe drops in the market wouldn't affect the odd lots much (like, 3 shares of this cheap stock, 14 shares of that moribund albatross, most acquired through spinoffs), and that the oil stocks have held their value, so they'd be ok. Well, I got busy with other stuff, and it didn't happen.

I spent much of today gathering transfer agent contact information, and researching recent market activity on the stocks, intending to make the sell order calls this afternoon. And now I'm glad I didn't sell last week, and I think it'll be a while before I unload the oil stocks.

Yeah, the oil stocks didn't drop much in the "market correction", relative to the share price, not like other industries that got hit harder, but it still averages out to $7 per share. Considering that I was about to sell more than 2,000 shares, a drop of $7 is $14,000 !!! The drop in oil stocks is a temporary "ouch" reaction, and it's going to go back up, faster probably than the rest of the market. So, uh uh, I'm not going to sell right now. Piper will just have to wait.

Yeah, ok, why do I have a financial adviser if I won't listen to his advice?

He's not just looking at the stock sale prices - he's also looking at tax issues and the prices of the tax-free bonds and mutual funds he wants to buy. That's what he does. But I have a feeling that the oil stock will rise before the bonds and funds. Oil will be ahead of the average. If it takes two months (and I don't think it'll take that long), that's only two months of taxes. That's not so bad. I have this weird idea that I can take a $14,000 "loss" to buy less expensive bonds, and bonds don't grow, or I can "grow" $14,000 then buy $14,000 more bonds, which retain value. The latter makes more sense to me.

Piper's job is to recommend a conservative and cautious path. I'm willing to take a chance. We get along because he doesn't fuss at me when I do it.
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#562 Trivia

Snow is coming, probably Saturday night, somewhere between 7 and 12 inches, depending on whom you believe. Which really means we'll get either none or more than 18 inches.
[Later update - Channel 6 says the storm will be passing off the coast, and it probably won't affect us at all. Channel 10 says 6 inches. Channel 13 says 4 to 8+ inches, maybe. Channel 23 says 12 inches or more.]

It's cold outside now (23 degrees). Even though the air is still and the thermostat says it's 74 in the house (it lies!!!!) my nose, shins, and hands are cold. Times like this is when I want to go to bed in the middle of the day. I hate cold.

Something I noticed - since I've lost a little weight, I feel the cold more.

Of all the Mensans who were so interested in Trivia last night, Tom and I were the only ones who showed up. We were joined a little later by two nonmember friends of Tom. We played under separate ids, but collaborated on the questions. Out of a few thousand players nationally, I came in individually at something like 125th, and we managed to bring our bar total in at 24th (and there were only the four of us playing! That's pretty good). Tom regularly scores in the top 10 or so individually. I still need to improve my time. When I'd be the first to say the correct answer, and the guys and I would all hit the buttons as soon as I said it, over and over they got the full 1000 points, and I got 875 (the points drop as time passes), even when I said the correct answer when the question first came up, before we were offered the multiple choices. I'm slow finding the right number to go with the answer, and then I'm slow on the button. And I was using BOTH HANDS!

I ate too much. I got the pulled pork quesedia, and Tom ate 1/4 of it, and it was so good I got another (of which Tom ate another quarter). Then Tom got a chicken platter and I ate half his baked potato. Then the other guys got a sampler platter, and I ate some wings, and sausage, and onion rings, and cheese sticks. Not to mention the wine.

I was afraid to step on the scale this morning.

#480 Good, Middlin', and Bad

Busy day today. Good - A few things accomplished. Middlin' - A lot of hurry up and wait. Bad - A lot of pain.

I was awakened this morning by a call from Piper. We'll meet Thursday, early afternoon, to finalize the plans for balancing the portfolio. He wanted to make it lunch, but I have too much other stuff to do that day. Puttered around, washed hair, etc.

Then across the river to the mall to the computer expert to get the scholarship application printed. He also made 30 copies of the 2-page document, and didn't charge me a cent for anything.

That all went so quickly that I was left with an hour before the appointment with the lawyer about the easement, not enough time to go home. So I ate a late lunch/early dinner at what happens to be Piper's favorite restaurant. They have things like $9 appetizers that turn out to be a whole meal. The full entrees there are simply too big for me. I don't understand why they charge $18 for a huge loaded plate. Why can't I get half the food for half that price? Frankly, I think it's a secret way to increase profits. It's like two people eating in one seat, requiring half the waitstaff.

Even with just a shrimp, spinach, and cheese roll appetizer, I ended up doggying half of it.

Then to the lawyer. My appointment was for 4 pm, but I got there at 3:45, and he took me right in. He filled out the tax forms for me (the state apparently considers the granting of an easement to be a sale). I had found a serious error in the survey of the easement - the way they had it written, instead of going up the edge of the lot, the line went across the middle of my front yard and into the neighbor's yard. They had an "E" where it should have been a "W", so the line veered. A little whiteout and a black pen fixed that. He also added a paragraph that maintenance was to be done at no expense to me, and answered my concerns about how the easement contract specified compensation of $1, and there was a separate contract for the brush clearing, which was to be the REAL compensation (if I had to hire someone for that, it would be at least $2,000.) I was out of there by 4 pm, and he didn't charge me a cent.

I'm beginning to wonder why I didn't get a free lunch.

I was left with an hour before I had to go to class, not enough time to go home. So I went to the classroom (an hour+ drive, at rush hour no less) early and spent the time collating and folding the scholarship forms.

The class was 4 hours long. I wasn't sure I was going to make it through it. For some reason, after a few years of hurting in only two or three places at a time, today I hurt all over. It seems to have started last Friday, with pain in my left foot and ankle, left hip, back of my neck, and temples. I've been taking glucosamine condroitin (spelling? I'm not about to look it up!) on May's recommendation. She says it did wonders for her joints, but it takes a very long time to kick in. I also recently increased my calcium supplements on the advice of my doctor. I'm thinking maybe neither of those are good for me with my problems.

I don't metabolize calcium very well, and it can build up in deposits in my joints, and as "gravel" in my muscles. I think that's what's going on in my foot, ankle, and neck. (Yeah, I'm limping on BOTH feet today.) Oddly enough, the deposits usually eventually dissolve themselves. Ultrasound seems to break up the stubborn patches.

Today, in addition to the foot, ankle, and neck, I had screws twisting into my temples and between my eyebrows, my breastbone was on fire, the middle of my back kept biting me, my lower back ached, the left hip burned, lower right abdomen was cramping, and ... whatever. It was so bad I had to do the relaxation breathing several times during class.

There are only three of us in this class, and when the pain got bad I had to keep forcing my eyes to stay open. Didn't want Roman to think I was falling asleep. I kept slumping, and that would set the back off. I forgot there was a guy sitting next to me, and several times I slipped my hands under my sweater and inside the back of my pants to massage my lower back. I wonder if he got a show. After class, Roman said I seemed to "be out of it tonight." Little does he know....

The temple stuff frightens me. I've heard that tic doloreaux can come back, and I never ever want to see that again. I had it on both sides, 4 to 8 20-minute episodes a day, for 18 months. Mine was so severe the doctors at first refused to believe that's what it was. (It was so severe because it was due to a stretched and twisted brainstem - not the usual cause.) And I can't take pain pills stronger than plain aspirin.

When I got out to the van, a little after 10, the van thermometer said 9 degrees. Driving up route 9, I started shivering so badly I couldn't hold my head still (and I was wearing the warmest of my fox jackets!) and it was messing up my neck even more, not to mention that the head shaking was so violent I couldn't see to drive, so I stopped in Barnes & Noble, and bought some books on HTML and web site design. I keep registering for the web site design class, but apparently I'm the only one who wants it, and they keep canceling it, so I'm giving up. I'll figure it out myself, thank you.

Like I said - a good, middlin', and bad day.

I'd like to sleep in tomorrow, but I also want to take more paper to recycle, which has to be done by noon. Compromise - I won't set the alarm.

~~Silk