A Promise of Better Things

I have been noticeably absent this space since early April. It's been a combination of things. I have not felt well. The warm spring days were followed by chilly and damp days. I don't do chilly and damp very well anymore. It settled into my joints and I found myself aching much more than usual. My rheumatologist agreed that this spring has been hard on people with joint problems.

Then, our work load quadrupled, which sounds like an exaggeration, but is not. I found myself doing day trips two, three and four days out of a week. I appreciate that fate or God or karma decided last year I needed a newer car because the drives to all these places was ever so much nicer when it was done in a car with adequate heat and windshield wipers, as well as cruise control and the ability to sip, not guzzle, gas.

This became something of a bad circle. I ached because of the wild swings in weather. I ached because of all the driving and walking. I couldn't get comfortable at night to fall asleep and stay asleep because I ached, which made me tired. Weekends have been something of a fog. I didn't have the stamina to complete a project so my house is littered with unfinished things. This made me sad and, let's face it, depressed, which contributes to the uneven sleeping. Everything accumulated making writing a chore. I just felt overwhelmed and unable to put thoughts to paper.

That being said, I've been working on a short story based on a writing prompt a friend gave me. She "double-dip dared" me to write a story around a silly Internet photo; a photo I had made an off-hand comment about. I know how the story ends. I just have to write the lines to that point. Now that the weather has moderated, it's inspiring to sit outside with my pen and write. I bought a journal to use for book quotes, but picked it up to use to tell this tale. It's probably a pedantic sort of tale, but I haven't done anything like this in years so it feels fresh and exciting.

I probably have 8 more hours of writing left to do. In true "Sagittarius mode", however, there are more shinies calling for my attention. That's what can overwhelm me and leave me feeling depressed. I love having projects to do, but completing them has always been a problem. The simple act of setting up the project is exhilarating to me. What do I want to do and what supplies will I need to accomplish this? But I get into the thing and have to set it aside because something else crops up, like the need to have clean underwear, and then I lose the drive to finish. It was extremely acute during April and, now, May. Then, I feel like I can't do anything and you see where this track goes. I'm ever so good at beating myself up.

The weather seems to have moderated now. I had a doctor visit last week where I poured out my frustrations and my rheumatologist was so understanding. She reminded me that living with RA means doing small tasks. "Just finish one thing and celebrate that; dishes, a load of laundry, pick up the living room so you don't see lots of piles." I got the oil changed and tires rotated. I spent 3 hours writing on the story; advancing the plot by leaps and bounds. I did a load of laundry and swept half of the floors. Just those things made me feel as if I could accomplish more.

Memorial Day weekend was a series of small victories which I'll detail below. Each step leads to another step which leads to a feeling of accomplishment. The business of business is still astonishingly hectic, but it appears, like the Tetris game, things are falling into place so I am not quite so overwhelmed. I still have to travel, but it's not in a rushing sort of way.

And then, as if to rubber stamp my sense of worth, I managed, for the first time in 3 months, to carve out time to go to cross-stitch club at the Wheaton Public Library. I haven't felt any inclination to do any stitching on the project since January because I've been coming back from somewhere on the day of the club. I stepped out of the house and headed to the car. There was a small rain shower going on. It wasn't much; more like the last bit of water was being shaken from the watering can. I got to the car and turned to slide in and saw this.

I do not remember when the last time was I saw a rainbow this brilliant. Look at the colors. You can see all of them; red, orange, yellow, green, indigo and violet. Excited, I quickly drove to the end of the drive, got out and aimed my ancient cell phone skyward.

Yes, please. I'll have a double helping of rainbow.

If you've followed me for some time you know I'm not a very God-y person anymore. I believe in an almighty, but I don't feel he pays too much attention to me; checking in on occasion, to see that I'm still hanging in there. Sometimes, he takes pity on me and things align, but most of the time, he smiles and moves on to someone with way more cares than I have. I don't want to make too much of a scientific occurrence, but I think this was nature's, karma's, "God's" way of telling me the storm has passed and, while things won't be smooth sailing, because, after all, it is raining, it won't be quite as bad as it has been these past 2 months. I've come through a choppy time and now there will be quieter seas ahead.

(On a strictly scientific note, I was quite surprised the rainbow was so vivid. We didn't get enough rain to wet the deck all over. It really was simply a sprinkle. Yet look at the colors, how clear and dramatic they are. Everything was at the right juncture to create this scene. Science is fascinating.)

So, dear reader, if you've progressed to the bottom of this post, I can't promise I will be as dedicated to this space as I was at the beginning of the year, but I have hundreds of photos I should blog about. It appears life is on the upswing. Things are, indeed, better. I have a double rainbow to prove it.

Beverage:  Earl Grey tea

Deb

The Myth of Time

The photos pile up as do the books and magazines on the ottoman. There are dishes waiting to be done, waiting and waiting again. I walk across the living room floor and feel the grit of an unswept floor. Pilchard yells at me because, rightly, the litter boxes haven't been cleaned in 4 days. I look across the detritus of my life and think, "If only I had more time."

Time. Elusive. Fleeting. Never enough, especially when the great and exciting and the horrible and nasty events wander through our lives.

I've been feeling pulled in so many, many directions lately. Since February of 2013, my office has been working double time, triple time, in some cases. According to the boss, our office contributed 52% of total company revenues; 52%. I come home from a full day of work so very tired. With that weariness, the things which I enjoy doing get shunted aside. On the plus side, there's a lot of overtime which translates into a padding of the paycheck.

Add to this, the weather. The heavy rains had water seep into the basement. Step 1 is to wait for the rain to stop so the water stops coming in. Step 2 is to run a fan to dry the floor out. This whole month has been about survival. I knew I needed to clean the basement, sort and move things around so I can deal with the dying washing machine. But when the basement floor is wet, it's hard to clean. Finally, tonight, I was able to move everything that needed to be moved. Then the floor was swept and I'm ready.

Problem. The washer I want seems to be out of stock through the 7th. I have endured, thanks to Pam and Patt, without much in the way of washing clothes with my sorry machine. But, this is another week and I'm slowly running out of clothing. I suppose it's a fallacy to expect a reasonably priced washer to be in stock for next day delivery, but I'm going to the store after work tomorrow to see if my choice of machines, either #1 or #2, is available faster through the store. This is frustrating. It takes time to do all of this. It's more to do, on top of the things that I want or need to do.

I'm frustrated. I feel as if I'm spending way, way more time not getting things done. I feel as if I can't do things, like blogging, which are important to me, because there's too much other stuff going on. Mowing the lawn leads to trimming back the branches which have been bent by the wind and rain. It needs to quit raining so I can weed.

This is the mess in front of the air conditioner. I mow and I see this and I know it's not good for the unit to be so surrounded. It's like every weed seed in the ground germinated with the rains. I cleaned for an hour in the basement and then pulled weeds for an hour. This is as far as I got.

I need to spend more time; there's that word again; working through this mess to liberate the unit. I need to put down landscape fabric and cover it with rocks. That would effectively remove 90% of the weeds around the unit.

The cross-stitch isn't going to be done unless I can devote a full day to just stitching. Do I have the time to do that? I thoroughly cleaned the litter boxes and that area yesterday after mowing the lawn. Mowing is going faster now. I was able to mow the back, the side and half of the front before feeling tired. I did have to sit down with my feet up for an hour in order to finish the rest of the front. This is a victory. I'm looking toward the day this summer, when I can mow the whole lawn without stopping. I can feel this coming. It feels good.

But there are piles to go through and I just don't feel that I have time to devote to them. Clear away a block of time and something else pops up needing my attention. Overtime is coming, simply to get through all the reports I have stacking up. I'm on the road again tomorrow. There is a giant job looming. As much as my boss wants that job, the indecision of the general contractor and the confusion of the owner over what they actually want could mean we don't get any of it. I cannot say that I would be unhappy.

Friends have told me to let things go. It's terribly hard to do that. I am not, in any way, shape, or form, asking for you to pity me. I reiterate what I've said before with regards to pity. I don't have a use for it. I'm merely telling you how frustrated I am that all these things I find I cannot share because the muse parks herself over in a corner and refuses to play with me when I'm tired and I am so very, very tired.

I want to promise that I'll blog more but that would be a hollow promise. I can only promise that I'll turn up, every so often, to show you things I've found. I hope you'll check back every now and then. Maybe you'll find something interesting on these pages.

Beverage:  Dr Pepper

Deb

Clean Up in Aisle 1

The thing about my traveling is the effect it has on the girls. It's stressful for them, no matter what I do to make it calm. For a big trip, like the wedding, I haul the suitcase up a week in advance and leave it out, tossing in things a bit every day. I read that this provides visual cues that change is coming, that I'm going to be going some place and won't be home. For overnight or a couple of days away stay, I pack the night before. It's probably as much stress when it's an overnight as it is when it's a week as cats really don't have a concept of time. "I'll be back on Sunday," means I'm gone as long as "I'll be back next Tuesday". Add to this the need to have someone look in on them. Although they love Pam, now that they know her, she couldn't stop in on the last trip and I had to hire a service. Rob is great and I have no worries, but the girls don't know him yet and are scared. He never sees them when he stops by to fill dishes.

So there were back-to-back trips last month. And there were day trips for work which necessitated my leaving the house by 6:45 and not returning before 6:45 p.m. Even if I was home, I wasn't "home". I was tired and not able to relate to them as I usually did.

I came home from my mother's birthday celebration and unpacked the car. I started to look through the mail on the table in the living room and Mija went to jump up onto that table to command my attention. Also on the table is my sewing box. She hit the box and both her and the box tumbled to the floor.

She was terrified and took off. It was a good 2 hours before she came out from under the cedar chest in the office to see if I was furious with her. I was worried it had fallen on her but she was okay.

It's a mess. And you know what, it's still on the floor. I look at it and think, "When I clean this up, I need to really clean it. I probably have stuff that I don't need anymore (like 3 pair of sewing scissors)." Plus, I don't know if the box top just popped off or if it broke at the hinges. If it broke, then the box is no good. I'm pretty sure my parents gave me this some 45 years ago, back when I was sewing up a storm at home. I did scrape the stuff that rolled under the recliner over to the pile.

I don't have the desire to clean it up. This weekend, I tackled the papers in my home office. How could I underpay the Internet bill by 4 cents? Seriously. I did wash. I stripped the bed. All the dishes are done. I read another chapter in, of all things, the book I'm reading about tidying. When I go out the front door, I have to step over the mess, but clean it up? I just don't feel like it.

I'm chalking it up the the general tiredness I'm working through. Pieces of life are getting sorted out and I just haven't, mentally, reached this point in the journey. The girls aren't chasing spools of thread under the recliner so there's not a reason to clear the pile. Check back next weekend. Maybe I'll have done it then.

Beverage:  English Breakfast tea

Deb

Relaxation, Thy Name is Cross-Stitch

To say I have been busy is an understatement. There has been a lot of personal travel in the past month but it's paled compared to the travel for work. Pilchard, in particular, has been vocal about my leaving early and coming home late. I can't do much about that schedule, however, as work has been very busy.

When I come home, there are really only a few things I want. One is quiet. I've found that even playing jazz, which I love, is too much for the addled mind. So, I've not had music or TV on. The second thing is a lap cat.

She has decided that sleeping next to me is preferable to sleeping in the lap. I guess that's okay. She's within petting distance.

The third thing I want is something to help me relax. That's been cross-stitch. I have found that the concentration needed to make sure the stitches are where they need to be drives all the frustration of having spent yet another day in the car right out of my mind. That's what needs to happen.

It's nice to have a project to look forward to.

The big butterfly is coming along nicely. I have the main color done. I need to add the complementary colors. Pilchard hasn't been interested in my lap when I've been stitching so I'm able to work without the demand to stop and scratch ears.

The bad part is that stitching will relieve the tension of the day to the point that I forget what time it is. Going to bed at midnight when you have to get up at 6 is not good whether you're watching TV, playing on the computer or cross-stitching butterflies.

Beverage:  English Breakfast tea

Deb

I Resolve...Bah Humbug

Another year. Another New Year's Day to reflect on the old year passed and what I didn't get accomplished. Another New Year's Day to reflect on what I would like to accomplish in the upcoming year.

We all do this. It's kind of a default setting for New Year's. "I resolve to lose weight." "I resolve to get my financial house in order." "I resolve to give more to charity." [insert topical resolution here] You do it. I do it. And long about now, we discover whether our resolutions actually stick. Generally, they don't and you give yourself 40 mental lashes for failing. (Strike overly dramatic pose of defeat.)

When you've got a disease in which chronic fatigue is a major part, resolving to "be more active" or "lose weight" or even "get one project done at night after work" is wholly tied to whether you even have the energy to eat when you get home. Making resolutions is almost surely guaranteed to lead to self-bashing because you can't do what you've resolved to do. Even breaking a resolution, such as "exercise every day", down to simply adding 20 more steps and going in the front door instead of the back, can be fatal to keep if I am exhausted because of an RA flare. I knew I was setting myself up for failure. I know me. Calling them "resolutions" doesn't make these ideas better than any other idea I've ever cooked up. Give them a title and I'll feel that much worse when I can't keep them.

So, I'm trying something different this year. I looked over the span of last year and picked something I really want to improve on, eating better. I spent the last week of 2014 thinking about my diet. How can I improve it? Well, I could be cooking dinner when I get home. What is the reality of that? I'm often too tired to cook. That leads to skipping dinner altogether or eating something just because it's fast. I spent a week in December eating a peanut butter sandwich for dinner. That was it because I was too tired to cook. I spend way too much money on eating lunch out because I'm too tired to cook to make left overs of things that I enjoy eating. It's faster to just run over to Subway. What can I, realistically, do to eat better?

Step 1 was to go over the budget. Gad I hate this. I hate going backwards through the previous year and seeing, in black and yellow (since I was doing the tallying on a legal pad), what I already knew but had refused to acknowledge. Too much of my meager funds went into eating lunch out because I was too tired to cook. I decided that had to change. There are a lot of things I can't change in my budget, but that's one thing that could.

Step 2 was to decide what to add or take away from my diet. I decided to simplify lunch and add a fruit to every day's meals.

Step 3 was to divide the month in half. My company pays monthly. I realize some of you will go, "How can you live like that?" After 3-4 months, you get used to it. I, generally, buy all my groceries at the beginning of the month. The problem is that fresh fruits and vegetables don't keep for a month. You're lucky if you can keep them 2 weeks. We always joked that we don't have vegetable and fruit bins in the fridge. We have compost bins. I can, twice a month, go to the store for fresh produce and frozen dinners. I have wrapped meats and frozen veggies in the freezer. If I get ambitious and have the energy, I can make meals from scratch. But, lunches would be frozen dinners. The cost is the same, less, actually, than going out. Plus, I'm shouldn't be tossing as much moldy produce into the compost bins which equates to dollars thrown away.

Step 4. Stop calling them "resolutions" and call them "goals".

Step 5 Tic off, on the kitchen calendar, the days I don't eat lunch out and the days I add a fruit to what I eat.

How am I doing? So far, so good. Only one lunch out, so far, this month and that was because I was going to be out in the field at lunch without the opportunity to eat home prepared. Breakfast is a thornier issue as I can spring out of bed one day, full of vim and vigor and then next day sleep completely through the alarm and wake up with an hour to dress, feed the cats, eat breakfast and get to the office. I'm giving myself permission to not worry about breakfast so long as I eat it. No skipping. I am making a Dunkin' run only once per week and Panera every other week, circling the dates I visit each on the calendar so I am not tempted to go more than I can.

I'm told it takes a month of work to make something a habit or to change a behavior. This is all I'm doing right now, trying to change eating habits. I've tried some new to me frozen dinners, things I probably wouldn't have tried had I not set the goal of reducing money outlays for lunch. Some are clear winners. Some are, "Well, not eating that ever again." Today, I have the last banana and the last yogurt in addition to a shrimp alfredo that looked good on the box. Monday will be a new fruit, maybe apples, and there are still a week's worth of frozen dinners behind the bread.

I'll revisit this on February 1st and see how I've done.

Beverage:  Water

Deb

The Cost of Tired

I have been missing here for almost a month. The girls know where I've been and have spent a lot of time with me there. Bed. Struggling to sleep and get rested.

Since coming back from a quick trip to Virginia at the end of October, I've felt myself slide. It's not that I'm in pain. There isn't "pain" associated with my RA. It's more a case of a dull ache here and there, but a dull ache every day. Maybe it's the left thumb or the right wrist or my right shoulder or my left pinkie finger. It's never enough to say, "Oh wow. Does that hurt." I can work through it, but it's there. And please understand that I'm not trying to pull pity out of you. I'm merely recounting what's going on so you know where I've been for the last nearly a month.

One of the markers for RA is fatigue. It figures. Your body is fighting yourself, attacking your joints and your joints are trying to fight back. That internal war just wears out your body, making sleep attractive. RA sufferers are a tired lot and when it gets into the severe area, where mine is, fatigue is as common as sunshine.

Also, we have been extraordinarily busy at work. Since Labor Day weekend, we have received two projects requiring weeks of work in the city. Now, I love the city. I enjoy driving in. You've seen my photos of sunrise over Lake Michigan and over Chicago. I've had a lot of overtime and more is needed as I do the reports for the field time. But, when you suffer from RA, getting up early, working late, being on your feet as much as I have been, comes with a price. That price is added fatigue on top of what you already experience just in fighting the disease. I come home after 12 hours on the job, get the mail, sit in the recliner, add a cat and boom, it's 2 hours later and nothing's been accomplished. I pick one thing to do, say a load of laundry, do that and then I have to sit, which leads to dozing, which leads to, "I should just go to bed". It becomes a sorry cycle.

This can also lead to depression because you just don't have the energy to do anything other than what absolutely has to be done. I'm out of pants. I have to do laundry. Dishes pile up in the sink until something smells. Then, it takes 3 days to do them because I only have the energy for a couple loads. At least they are stacked on the stove. That's good, right? Not really. I come in the back door and have to walk right by the pile which reminds me that I need to do another couple of loads which I don't have the energy to do.

So, I make a conscious choice NOT to eat at night or eat something which doesn't need much in the way of prep time or dishes. Peanut butter  or turkey and cheese sandwiches have been my meal of choice. Frankly, I don't want to fix anything and I've gone to bed without supper many, many times in the last month because I'm too tired to even unscrew the lid off a jar of peanut butter, let alone cook the hamburger I took out of the freezer so I could make meatball vegetable soup. It's a great cold weather soup and it's reasonably easy to make, but not as easy as peanut butter on bread which is harder than just having a cup of tea and calling it a night. Yes, my doctor is not pleased.

I find that I spend much more money eating out. As you know, Dunkin' Donuts is a favorite place and it's been frequently a lot in the last month. Just this week, I've gone there 3 times. A couple of donuts and a large hot tea and I'm set for hours. I also frequent Panera but breakfast there is more expensive as their pastries are more expensive. Still, going to both frequently means I've earned free drinks both places, which does cushion the cost. I also have another person almost "trained" at Dunkin' as to what I get when I walk in. Let's not talk about the healthiness of this breakfast choice.

Lunch is also a conundrum. If I'm out in the field, I can justify having lunch expensed to the client. It's built into the cost of the work. But if I'm sitting at my desk working on reports or processing data, I have to foot the bill for lunch. Recognizing my tendency to take an "easy" way out of procuring food, I bought a bunch of frozen dinners and yogurt which could be grabbing in the morning and eaten for lunch. The operative word in that sentence is "could". When I get up with less than an hour to be at the office, even grabbing a frozen dinner and yogurt doesn't happen. So, when it gets to be 12:45 and I realize I need to eat lunch, it's off to Panera or Subway. There are a lot of choices near the office, but those are my go-to places and are far more healthy than a lot of the other places. With a hearty lunch, I can go the rest of the day without feeling the need to eat, not that that's a good thing, mind you.

All of this leads to feelings of inadequacy. I can't care for myself adequately. I look at the girls. Am I doing right by them? I have Christmas gifts I want to sew yet looking at the patterns stacked neatly on the table in the living room leaves me feeling exhausted and I haven't done anything with them. My house is dirty. I need to clean. The best I can do is sweep a room with a glance and try not to write my name in the dust. All these things I want to do get tossed aside because I have no energy. And let's not consider the cost of breakfasts and lunches out. Uh oh. That's a very real effect of not feeling that I can adequately care for myself.

There was a doctor's visit on November 14th. We went over all of this. You know how, sometimes, you don't feel you can tell your doctor everything you're going through. You're afraid that you'll be labeled a scaredy-cat or obstinate or who knows what else. I don't want to be thought of as a hypochondriac. I know people who fit this description and that's not what I want to be. But I've come to see that telling Dr. Francis everything, all the aches, pains, bumps, non-eating, bad sleeping, falling asleep at my desk at 10 a.m. leads to frank discussions of what's going on and what can be done to help me. She put her hand on my arm and said, "You have to stop trying to tough it out. That's not working well, is it?" No, it's not. I think I'm more tired when I try to simply push on than when I admit that it's not working. I find it so hard to ask for help, so hard to say, "I can't do this".

There was, at the end of November, an article in an online RA newsletter I receive which talks about the tired. That appears to be the number one issue people with RA report. Exercise can give you more energy, but you need a certain pool of energy to begin with to even attempt the thought of walking or running or swimming or, man, that makes me tired just thinking about it. The author of the article said we know we are tired so we, wisely, scale back our expectations. So instead of, "I'm going to clean the house", we decide, "I'm going to clean the bathroom". But, when we are fatigued, cleaning the entire bathroom becomes an exercise in futility which leads to a cycle of mental shaming and sadness. She said that you need to pare a project down even further. Instead of "I'll clean the bathroom", it needs to be, "I'll clean off the mirror", "I'll clean off the sink", "I'll wash the floor". Yes, this may mean the project goes from what you could do in 2 hours to what I need a week to accomplish, but this is what I have to do.

I also need to give myself permission to nap. I can't do it at work, unless no one is here and both the post office and UPS have made their deliveries. Then I can turn off the lights and snooze. But on weekends, I need to give myself permission to say, "I'm tired. I'm taking a nap" and to sleep however long my body tells me I need to.

I also need to give myself permission to admit that this is a struggle and that some days I will win and some days I will "lose". I need to stop seeing those days as losses and see them as adjustments in the road I have to travel. Not blogging has weighed heavily on my mind. I have hundreds of photos to share and have written thousands of posts in my mind as I drift off to sleep. I sometimes think that, perhaps, an iPad would be a good investment because I could write a blog post while I am in the recliner, with my feet up. But I don't want the cost of an additional item on my Internet service.

There has been a change in medications in response to this. I'll detail that in another blog post as this one is getting long. I don't know if the medication has made any sort of difference in my quality of life. Dr. Francis said it could take 2-3 months to see a change. She says this heavy fatigue will lift. You know, the recent end of November cold was rather energizing. I didn't mind it at all.

I also added back into my medications a nightly sleeping pill Dr. Francis prescribed. I thought I was tired enough that I could fall asleep without it, but that's not the kind of fatigue which promotes sound sleep. I found myself waking up two or three times at night. Fractured sleep is not good sleep. Since adding that back into my regimen, I notice that I'm not falling asleep during the day, nor do I need a nap when I come home after work. The brain fog one gets when one is overtired is lifting.

So, if you've stuck with this post this far, this is what's been going on in my life. I can't promise I will be better. I need to carve out time to actively post and my days and nights have been akin to mashed potatoes. Bear with me. Life is a journey and I seem to have hit a slightly bumpy stretch of road.

Beverage:  Dunkin' Donuts tea

Deb

Bubble Bubble Toil and Bah Humbug

It's that day again, the one day out of the year when I am certifiably cool because I am owned by a black cat. I used to be excited for today but, as I sit here, looking out my office window at precipitation-laden clouds, I'm about as amused as Pilchard is.

It could be because I was gone at the end of last week to be with my daughter. The original intent of the weekend was to be at the Central Virginia Celtic Festival and Highland Games. Since it was held in Richmond, that gave me an excuse to see her again. But I was weirdly affected by this trip.

My knees, on Saturday, were painful. Ironically, I got the most relief from standing. As long as I stood and could take my time to move about, it wasn't bad. But I can't stand for long periods of time so I had to sit and sitting without elevating my knees caused pain. I'm assuming it was related to my RA, but I don't completely know. I haven't had that kind of pain in years. Later, as I was getting ready for bed, I noticed my right knee was swollen and slightly discolored. It was gone in the morning, however. We wound up leaving the event early because I simply couldn't tolerate it.

My allergies acted up, big time. I got out of the car at my daughter's on Thursday night and my head instantly filled up. She said the weather had been cool and damp prior to my arrival. The weekend was impossibly beautiful with a wind on Saturday and a breeze on Sunday and highs in the upper 70's. The sky was clear and although the trees were just beyond their peak color, it was so pretty out. But, there wasn't enough allergy medication on the planet to keep my sinuses open. I have a cough now that can wrack my body and make my chest hurt. I know that this will pass but, man, it's not what you want to happen when you go visiting.

So, I don't want to be getting up and down all the time to answer the door. I don't want to open the door and dissolve into a coughing fit. Parents have no idea if it's allergies or the flu or a cold. Why scare them? And this allergy reaction has me tired. Being over tired leads to RA flare ups. I want to get better, not prolong this.

But perhaps my deeper reason is that it's not fun anymore. It feels like there is a great deal of pressure to pass out candy. It feels as if it's required. If you give something else, as I used to do, you run the risk of being called something unprintable to your face as you close the door. Why can't I give out pencils or stickers? I don't feel like contributing to nutritional deficits by giving mini-Mounds bars. I also don't feel like having left over bags in my house where I will eat them. If I'm going to have candy in the house, it will be 50% off holiday M&Ms. I have standards, low ones, but I have them.

I don't like that kids lean on the doorbell if you don't open the door within 3 seconds of the initial ring. I don't like that if I don't have my front light on, which has always been the standard for knowing which houses were participating, kids still stomp up on the porch and ring the doorbell. Then they stand there and ring it three or four more times. If there are more than one child in the group, over the age of 8, they all ring the bell. Would it be bad of me to disconnect the bell tonight?

This holiday terrifies the girls. It's always terrified all my cats, except Shakespeare. For some reason, he was never scared. Everyone else hid. I've got Pilchard, right now, asserting her irritation with me for being gone by peeing at the edge of the litter box. This is a known habit. I'll be switching this litter box out for a clean one and the availability of my lap will cause this behavior to go away over the weekend. Not having additional stress in her life would be very welcome for both of us.

Maybe it's because I'm older now and I'm not taking a little one around. Maybe I'd feel differently if I had an under age 8 who wanted to go out. I didn't drag out my minion costume from last year. The cat pumpkin I made still sits on the table in the living room. I love it, but I never did put it on the front steps with the spiders from 3 years ago, as I envisioned I would. I was too tired to decorate when I came home. Maybe if I simply felt physically better.

Whatever the root cause of this, I just don't feel Halloween this year. I have this big "back off" vibe going on. I just want to go home, make myself some hot cocoa and be all nice and quiet in my house, without stomps on the front steps and ringing doorbells.

Beverage:  Dunkin Donuts Tea

Deb

On the Road

I'll be on the road for the next few days. Trying to get ready for this trip has been a stressor. I also did not know how much I would be physically wiped out by falling. I have been working some long hours, too, in preparation for what I'll be doing. Add all this up and when I come home, I'm exhausted. I fall asleep in the recliner for an hour or 90 minutes and then, of course, I cannot sleep at a decent hour.

I'm sorry if you have come here expecting some random thoughts or lots of photos and the same few posts and photos have been up for weeks. Things are slowly going to change. I'm making more "me" time in the next couple of weeks and that will help with feeling energized and wanting to write. I haven't wanted to write since I fell.

If you are a loyal visitor, please watch this space. There will be things coming soon. For now, I will leave you with one of my favorite things, Pilchard in the box of flowers Carole and Larry sent me for Mother's Day.

The Pro-Flowers box is perfectly Pilchard-size.

Beverage:  Water

Deb

Really, Officer. It's My Jeep, Photo 18

On Friday, it was travel again, this time back into the city to be on a job I was at a week ago. This was to finish things up. I was talking with the co-worker who went with me to service equipment we have on the site. We feel like zombies, although we do have brains. "Braaaaaiiiinnnssss" It's more in the idea that we are pointed in a direction and we just go. We aren't even completely thinking. We have things memorized of what we need for any job, but we're all so tired because of the work load that, sometimes, little things on the periphery of a job are missed. This is a story about that.

I finished what I had to do on Friday. The job is east of the University of Chicago. It's a multi-cultural neighborhood with old homes, new homes, old apartment buildings, new apartment buildings, stores, shops, night clubs and pretty much any amenity you'd like in an urban environment. As a "safe" location in the city, it's pretty good. I still wouldn't leave valuables in my car and I'd lock it, but the old rusty Jeeps (*cough) fit right in with the Volvos and the Mercedes and the Audis.

As I was walking down the alley toward the street where I'd parked the Jeep, I couldn't find my car keys. I have a squeezeable flashlight on the key chain, (Love it! Just love it!), home and office keys. That's it.

I was carrying a camera bag so I stopped and searched all the pockets in the bag. No keys. I searched my jacket and pants pockets. No keys. I tried to remember where I had been. I wouldn't have left the keys inside the building. I didn't remember even having them in my hand when I entered the building. Did I leave them in the Jeep?

There was a twinge of panic. I strode down the alley and crossed the street to the Jeep. What you see above is what I saw. Not only did I leave them in the Jeep, I left them in the ignition. But I did lock the doors. That, you see, is very important. Now, how was I going to get in?

Well, not to tell you how to break into a soft top Jeep, but this is what I did. I took off the rear passenger window. I now could just reach around and unzip the passenger window. That only works if the zipper for the window is on the passenger side of the window not, as mine was, up by the engine. I couldn't reach the lock. It was a good 6 inches too far from my reach. This is the part where not cleaning out the Jeep came in handy.

I grabbed the long-handled snow brush and tried to find an angle to push the lock to unlock the door. I couldn't get a good angle. I looked around. There was no way I was going to climb into the back seat. I'm not limber enough to do that. On the floor in the back, I spotted a long-handled ice scraper. The scraping part had broken off a few years ago. I think about tossing it because it's really not useful, but I never got around to it. Where the scraper part had attached to the handle and had broken off, there were these "wings", for lack of a better word. I was able to get one of the wings in the string tab of the zipper and pull it to open the window. Once it was open enough, I could get my hand in and unlock the door to get the keys. Then the window went back on and I could head back to the office.

It was only as I was driving out of the city that I realized one major point. My Jeep was still in the spot where I left it. If ever there was an invitation to a car theft, it was right there; keys in the ignition of a soft top Jeep. Never mind that this is 10:30 in the morning on a Friday. Hello? You want a car? It's right here. To say I was "lucky" is a huge understatement. Of course, there's rust and a cracked windshield and you need to know how to drive a stick, but the only thing missing was a neon sign with an arrow pointing to the Jeep.

Yet, when I was standing there removing the window, the only thing I thought of was how fitting it would be to have one of Chicago's finest, on patrol, drive by about now. He'd see this woman unzipping the back window of a Jeep. Would he stop and ask what I was doing? Would he believe me when I explained the dilemma? My one worry is that he'd look at me and say, "Riiiight, lady. Why don't you come with me to the station." It never crossed my mind that I could come back to an empty parking spot.

I was incredibly lucky. You can bet that I will check, 2, 3, 4 times now when I have to park the car and go to a job, to see that I have my keys. Murphy and his laws were kind to me yesterday. I shouldn't press my luck.

Beverage:  Scottish Breakfast Tea

Deb

It Can Be Lunch, Photo 11

It feels like I'm meeting myself coming through the door. While some aspects of what I do have changed in the 14 years I've done it, some things, such as hands on customer service have not changed.

This year, starting in January, there's been more hands on required. My boss said it's like there's this pent up demand for all things building. The recession hit Chicagoland, but not as badly as it did other places. I don't know why, but we managed to weather the downturn decently. It wasn't easy, but we did it.

Now, we find ourselves with phone call after phone call asking for our hands on services. It's meant a lot of time in the car for everyone, even me. Last month I went to Iowa and Wisconsin. This month, it's so far just been around Chicagoland, but there is the potential for another trip overnight somewhere to provide services.

I tend to eat better if I am forced to find lunch rather than scrounge the inner shelves of the fridge. I've been so tired at night that supper tends toward cereal or a peanut butter sandwich, neither of which produce leftovers. Yet, I know where there are really good salads and I rarely eat hamburgers on the road. The offerings around the office are very good and lunch can be the best meal of the day for me, unless it's 11:45 and I'm in the city and heading back to the office.

Such was my dilemma on Friday. I was in the city. It was a gorgeous day to be in the city, even if I was working.

The 98% ice on Lake Michigan is gone, thankfully. The sky was clear and there was a wind out of the south, carrying the warmth from the Gulf of Mexico all the way to the shores of the Great Lakes. I had hoped to stop and take photos of this spring beauty but I had to get back to the office. There was no time to gawk, no time to marvel, no time to sit and be.

I needed gas, but in the city, there is no such thing as "cheap" gas. In the last two days, I've seen prices climb 20 cents and I'm not sure why. I probably could have made it back to the office, but why chance it. There was a station next to the job I was at so I put a bit in the car and got myself a soda and a candy bar. There would be no time for lunch today. I had work to finish on deadline. I had to be back. And, as tired as I was, the caffeine and sugar in these products would keep me going just enough to get home and a ham and cheese sandwich and sliced fruit.

Actually, I just needed a bit to take the edge off, so to speak. It was so wonderful out that I didn't notice I was hungry until I got home and collapsed in a heap in the recliner. Some days, soda and a candy bar are it. That can be all you have time for. Yesterday, I probably could have gone without and just lived off the day.

Beverage:  Water

Deb

Quite Unexpected

This is the happiest monster I've seen in some time. He also made me incredibly happy.

Two weeks ago, exhausted and looking forward to a weekend, I came home at the start of yet another snow storm. I bring in the mail and there is a flyer for services I'll never use and a plain white envelope. The handwriting looked sort of familiar, as if it was my friend, Patt's, but the postmark was suburban Chicago. It felt as if there was a credit card in the envelope.

My mind started racing. "Oh my lord," I thought. "Did I leave my debit card somewhere and it was turned in at a Chase bank and they mailed it to me? Where could I have left it?" In case you don't know, I have a tendency to make things worse, in my mind, than they actually are. I tell myself it prepares me for the absolute worst thing and then I can feel relieved when things really aren't as bad as I extrapolated them to be. In these few minutes, I ignored the fact that Chase would have called me had I left the debit card somewhere and it was turned in, or, at the very least, I'd have received calls from their fraud protection division, the nice people who found the problems last September. I hadn't heard from Chase since they sent me a replacement debit card for the one I had used at Target during the time data was compromised.

I also ignored the fact that I had seen nothing on my bank accounts to indicate the card was missing AND I had just used the thing not 2 days prior to the receipt of this envelope. That should have told me this was not my debit card. That I thought of my debit card first should give you an understanding of how often I'm using my credit card, which is, very little. This is good. All of these things should have been clues that this was not a bad envelope, but my worries jumped through the roof because it felt like a credit-sized card.

So, I ripped open the envelope and, wrapped in a plain white sheet of paper was this monster. I had to actually sit down, I was so flabbergasted.

To whomever sends me these, thank you. You have made a very gloomy, very tiring, very wearing winter a whole lot better. I am humbled by this.

Beverage:  Yorkshire Gold Tea

Deb

And Now For Maintenance

With the RA stabilized, it's time to handle all the other things that fit into this. I've had almost as many tests as I remember having during finals week in college. These are the kind I can't study for. I checked in with my general practitioner and everything was ordered.

Blood tests. One of the side effects of RA is an increased risk of heart disease. The best I'm given to understand, doctors don't know why RA sufferers have this increased risk but my cholesterol has to be monitored yearly, every 6 months if there is a concern.

Now, I have genetically low cholesterol. Heart disease does not run in my family. For that, I am eternally grateful. But the results showed a high triglyceride level. Sustained high triglycerides can be precursors of heart disease.

The other, perhaps more bothersome, result was high glucose levels. Sustained high glucose number are one of the markers for diabetes. Again, this does not run in my family, but diabetes doesn't seem to be a genetic thing unless your mother had gestational diabetes.

Still, I'm worried, to be honest. I think this is a diet thing. I have to admit that my diet is crap, not to put too fine a point on it. When I come home from work, I have an agenda, tasks I want to accomplish. Many times, those tasks don't include cooking something for myself. Hence, I'll grab the quickest, easiest thing to eat or, believe it or not, skip supper altogether. I always, always eat breakfast. I cannot imagine a day starting without some form of breakfast. Cereal. Waffles. Pancakes. Fruit and yogurt. Peanut butter toast and milk. Oatmeal with raisins and walnuts. I don't eat those all in one sitting, but those are my preferred items for breakfast. The day always goes well when I have breakfast.

After that, it's a crap shoot. I've been known to skip lunch or skip dinner. Then I get really hungry about 9 p.m. and I'll grab a bowl of cereal or crackers or half a bag of M&Ms. This greatly influences what shows up in the grocery cart. I look around the kitchen and have nothing to grab and eat. So, while shopping, I add 3 boxes of granola bars to the cartand then eat half a box at 8:30 p.m. some night because I was too tired to cook at 6.

I love fresh fruit and vegetables. But buying them and then preparing them to be eaten during the week are two different things. What looks so inviting in the grocery on a Saturday morning looks quite a bit different after I've dragged it home and shoved it in the fridge.

Moving on to other health items. I have nodules on my thyroid. These were seen last year in a CT Scan. I had an ultrasound of the thyroid and they are still there. One of them is large enough to have the potential for a biopsy. Now, so as to not frighten me more than I already am about this, I was told that if you pull 10 people off the street and ultrasound their thyroid, 8 of them will have nodules. It's part of the aging process. I'm told that I shouldn't worry.

Unfortunately, these nodules have to be checked and I have the name and number of an ear, nose and throat specialist to call. I just don't like the idea of having to take off work time to do things. I feel as if I'm inconveniencing the office when I can't get an appointment except at 1:30 p.m. I'm awaiting the results of the mammogram which should be normal and not require any further follow-up.

The next steps are to call the ENT and check into an appointment. Wait for word on the mammogram.  I have a follow-up appointment with my regular doctor to discuss the high glucose and triglyceride levels. The more I read into these, the more I realize that my diet is probably wholly responsible for the skewed numbers. I've done a lot of things just because I've had to, but this diet thing...I just don't know. Convenience and familiarity seem to win out, more often than not, over what I should be eating. If I were cooking for more than just me, I can guarantee that my numbers wouldn't be as askew as they are.

This doesn't feel like a set back. I have felt so much better than in the last two years. There are bad days, to be sure. I kind of overdid it over the holiday weekend and am paying the price in stiffness and soreness for that overindulgence. I'm looking at all of these things as shoring up my ship which has become leaky over the last few years. We fix these leaks and I'll be as close to good as new as I can be. At the very worst, I'll get to know some people at the hospital by name.

Beverage:  Blackberry tea

Deb

Zoom Zoom

It's nearly 1 a.m. on Labor Day. My sleep schedule is more than a little wonky this weekend. I have allowed myself to just be during these days off. That sometimes means that I fall asleep in the recliner with a purring cat in my lap and I don't awaken for an hour. Hence, going to bed when I "should" isn't possible as I'm wide awake.

I've come to the end of an alphabet theme that I kind of fell into early in August. The month went by and, although I tried to keep up, I just couldn't. Last month was the first month since I started blogging that I have not had a post a day. Believe me when I tell you this bothered me, greatly and truly bothered me.

The thing is, I just couldn't. I'd log on and sit here, looking through Flickr for an illustrative photo that would match with the next letter up. I don't know how many times I said to myself, "I can't come up with 'L' or 'P' or 'T'. I've got nothing." Something would pop up. I can usually come up with several posts at a time. You know, if you're a long-time reader, that my posts come in batches. I limit myself to 4 a day when they explode in my head like that. Why 4? That's how many I have on a page. Other bloggers just post one or maybe 2 a day, but when I write, I write so you might as well see all of the ideas that bounced around on this particular date.

During the month of zooming thither and yon, the well nearly ran dry. I was so tired at night, posting was something of a joke. I will often post at work because I have time or post when the inspiration strikes and schedule the post to pop up on the site on a certain day. But having a great deal to do at the office, feeling overwhelmed at home, being tired and worn out from driving was like, to use an overdone cliché, the perfect storm to staunch blogging ideas.

And speaking of storms, August was full of the kind that lend themselves to puddle stomping. I mentioned this blog post at the end of July. I wanted to reciprocate with puddle stomping photos of my own. But, because it's just me, I had to take my photos looking down, me standing in puddles. I took the photo above with the umbrella and then ditched that to just stand in the driveway and get soaked. There is something wonderfully cleansing about a summer rain, particularly one that does not come with percussion and fireworks.

Last weekend, as I was feeling the effects of the RA flare up, it rained. It wasn't a very long rain, maybe 20 minutes, but it was just rain. I went outside and sat in one of the chairs on the deck, just sat, in the rain, on a Saturday afternoon. Yes, you will get wet if you just sit on your deck in the rain, but the "zoom zoom" of the title washed itself away. All the "wouldda", "couldda" and "shouldda" of the past month washed away as well. I let it go. I didn't fight it.

"Zoom zoom" can be really hard to turn off. The obligations of life call for you to be in x place at y time. You must work to provide. Follow these rules. Get this done. Stand here. Don't spit and keep your arms and legs inside the ride at all times. I just wanted off the blinkin' ride by the end of August.

This weekend has been a forced "off". The remnants of Hurricane Isaac wandered through Chicagoland on Saturday. Where I live, we got spotty rain as if it couldn't make up its mind. Only once was the rain strong enough to be interesting to stand in and, at that time, I was checking football scores. By the time I was done, it was over. There was no standing in this for it wasn't there.

Tomorrow is the last day of vacation and then I go back to the office. I go back refreshed and with a better attitude and in a better frame of mind. I thought I'd do all this "stuff" while I was out and what I've wound up doing mostly is sleep. I've done a great deal of self-care, something I struggle with doing when "zoom zoom" is turned on. It's vital and necessary that I have that need to push through things. Life can be a meander but there are times when you have to move it a long a bit. Bills have to be paid and clothes have to be washed so "zoom zoom" is necessary. I just need to figure out how to turn it off and when to turn it off so it's most beneficial.

Yours, at 1:20 a.m. on Labor Day.

Beverage:  Water

Deb

Thursday Stitching

I haven't been sleeping well of late. I wake up every couple of hours. Hence, I find myself nodding off during the day, going home and being wired at night so the cycle begins again. Last night, I came home, sat down in the recliner, had Pilchard sit down in my lap and, the next thing I know, it's an hour later. I start to get down on myself.

But that small voice inside me that is trying to help me remember gratitude pipes up that now, when I'm feeling badly about nodding off, would be a good time to stitch. Now, when the voice of failure and how I 'shoudda' done something can be drowned out by the small voice of gratitude for having something I like to do in front of me.

So the dishes and the wash and the 'shouddas' were set aside and I stitched for an hour before making myself supper and trotting off to play WoW. It still doesn't look like much, does it? Technically, I have finished the lighter mauve pink and the light blue but I'll keep those colors in the bag in case I didn't read the chart right.

I'm getting there, both in remembering to listen to the voice advocating gratitude and in finishing another project.

Beverage:  Dr Pepper

Deb

Only a couple more hours

and the sun will be up. The above photo was taken in 2007 in Columbus, Indiana where I was attending a Highland Games for my clan.

It's just after 2 a.m. and I'm finally feeling tired enough to sleep. I didn't get up until 8:30 but I've been going all day without feeling tired enough to take the body to sleep. I don't have to go anywhere when I finally do get up except the cats will want me to feed them in roughly 4 hours.

I love sunrises and sunsets. I knew this guy from Florida, Bradenton, to be exact. As part of the pseudo-romantic talk some guys indulge in, he promised that "some day", we'd start our morning with croissants, juice and strawberries on the beach watching the sun come up and then drive across the state to have hamburgers, french fries and beer while watching the sun set. Nope, never happened.

My dad was an early riser. He would wake me up in the summer to go for walks into the fields. I remember following him as he plowed through the alfalfa drenched with morning dew. Spittle bugs made their homes in the alfalfa and dad would catch them and the dew, getting his pants soaked but making it sort of easy for me to walk.

Often times, we'd stumble into a deer rut, where the deer were either just leaving or had just left. The deer would come into the alfalfa field at night to sleep instead of sleeping in the woods. It would smash down the alfalfa but the stuff would spring back fairly quickly in a summer day.

What I remember most is the intense musky smell of deer. That is definately an animal smell which could be compounded by dew-laden grass. If we had a ground fog, that would trap the smell. It's not like anything I can describe for you. You know it if you've smelled it.

So what am I doing up blogging at now 2:20 a.m. I don't really know other than I wasn't tired earlier. I miss having someone to wake up with and go to watch the sun rise or set. It's quiet outside tonight and I know I will sleep soundly. I also know, there are days when I'd give my eye teeth to have someone poke me and whisper, "Come on. The sun isn't going to wait for you to get there to watch."

Beverage: Coca-Cola

Deb

Needed something stronger

I know you're wondering how the date went. I have considered just how much to reveal and almost didn't post anything. But I mentioned this event so I need to visit it and, if you know me, I do have an opinion.
I stayed up too late on Tuesday evening talking via my computer with my daughter and with a WoW friend I had not seen in several weeks. Brian is, like my WoW friend Bill, a confidante. Both are pragmatic and have very good insights into the human condition. I have often leaned on them for advice in dealing with the humans who manipulate the pixels that form the characters that congregate in my World of Warcraft guild. Brian's been very busy at work and just has not had time to play. So, when he logged onto the game, one of the first things he did was ask if we could chat later.
And with my daughter playing a character in my guild, I have the chance to stay more connected with her and her life. This situation doesn't lend itself to going to bed at 11:30 p.m.
I called the date to say I was leaving my house. He inquired about my day and I yawned. I admitted I was tired. He suggested we just get together for dinner. I heartily agreed. Although seeing a movie is a nice idea, I prefer to talk to the guy first and decide if he's worth seeing again. We met at the Outback Steak House in Wheaton.
I've never been to Outback, anywhere. It's good food, cooked well, nice selection, very attentive service. They had Key Lime Pie and were happy to give me a side of hot fudge to drizzle over it. (Pam is laughing.) They have a huge warm pecan brownie dessert that's topped with ice cream, whipped cream and hot fudge, but I wanted Key Lime Pie so I didn't get the brownie.
He's made it clear in all our phone conversations that he's a recovering alcoholic and I felt ordering a drink would be in poor taste, so I had tea, lots and lots of tea. He talked and he talked. I finished my appetizer, my meal and my dessert a full 15 minutes before him. I'm sure the steak he ordered was cold by the time he finished it.
My perception? Well, if it goes anywhere, it's merely a friendship. I know I have excess baggage accumulated from a life of hard knocks. He's got trunks. For every comment, there was one a step grander. As a for instance, I mentioned my liking Highland Games. He proceeded to tell me about them. Incredulous doesn't quite cover it.
He appears to be a gregarious person. He knows so many people and has relatives and friends in all sorts of places. For every place that I've been in my life, he's been two or three more places. For every incident I would relate, he had one that was more. There was never a lack for conversation but the conversation didn't seem to include me.
Some of the people in my World of Warcraft guild, who knew I had a date last night, said he might be nervous and so talks over much to hide that nervousness. I think he just likes to talk. He's overly confident that his opinions are correct. I never expressed an opinion in the course of the evening because it seemed certain he either wouldn't hear it or wouldn't allow it to stand.
We left the evening that I will call him. Next week is shaping up to be quite a week for me and, with his work schedule being nights and weekends, any getting together is only going to involve dinner and a movie.
A year ago, I was friends with a guy (met via the service) and that was all we did. He called pretty much every 2 weeks from Mother's Day to Labor Day and we got together for dinner. He did come to the Highland Games last year and we spent an hour listening to the music in the entertainment tent. He made some suggestions about other things we could do. In the Chicagoland area, you can find free entertainment, via local band concerts or festivals, every weekend and we were going to do some of those things. I was excited. I couldn't see a romance with the guy, but I could see a friendship. But we never did anything he suggested other than dinner and he drifted away around Labor Day. Going out to eat or going out to a movie for every date is just not my cuppa.
I came home, poured myself a small glass of wine, and logged onto the computer. A few guild mates and my daughter were online so we talked. While I did enjoy the man's company, I found myself rehashing the things this guy said that bothered me. I should be thinking about the things that are right, not the things that are wrong.
The service has already sent me another name. Maybe they knew they did not make a good match. I need to call this new guy and make arrangements to meet for lunch. I'm not optimistic but I take the tact that these kinds of things get me out of the house. That's not necessarily a bad thing.

Beverage: Huckleberry tea

Deb