Miscellany of a Cheshire Cat

Despite all my best attempts to thwart it, I caught a cold about 2 weeks ago. I’m still sick. This is annoying to say the least. Miss Winter caught my cold over the weekend. So did the Fop. The whole house is officially sick. I took Miss Winter to the pediatrician today. I hadn’t fully intended to but I called them to say, “Hey, I’ve got a sick infant. She’s not running a fever but she’s pretty congested. I’m pretty sure it’s a cold. At what point do you want to see her?” The answer to that was, “Can you get here in 20 minutes?” (The answer to that was “no” but we did take the appointment an hour later.) The pediatrician confirmed that yes, it’s a cold and no, her ears aren’t involved yet. No, she’s not running a fever. Yes, congestion sucks and it lingers in babies sometimes. I’m trying to keep a happy medium between my own laid back attitude towards going to the doctor for little stuff (like colds) and the ridiculous over-monitoring (and over-medicating) prevalent in the medical world these days. Sometimes I wonder if the medical profession is populated by hypochondriacs. (More likely, they’re just afraid of litigation… I know.)

By the by… Miss Winter is 11 weeks old today. I can hardly believe it. And she gained 9 ounces in the six days between appointments. Rock on, kiddo!

In other news, I’ve left the house one other time since this cold started. I needed to go to the grocery store and such for much-needed supplies on Monday. I was looking for something specific in a certain department store when I innocently rounded the corner to come face to … er … face with this microwave. I think I took these photos because I wanted to make sure I wasn’t hallucinating.

Well, apparently, I wasn’t hallucinating the Hello Kitty microwave. As such, I wish to share my non-hallucination (which is totally in stock if you want one) with you. Because what are friends for, right? No, seriously, what are friends for? It’s not like I gave you my cold!

I totally resisted buying these adorable (and ethnically diverse) ghost marshmallows. Resistance is getting harder and harder. It’s not that I’m having cravings… more that I’m highly suggestible. Very rarely do I desperately need something. However, start talking about something tasty and I will start to want it. Watching the Food Network is pure torture. Damn you, Guy Fieri and Diners, Drive-ins & Dives! Shopping alone is not advisable either. I’m highly suggestible in the grocery store… “Oh, tortilla chips sound good.” “That’ll be a good, easy snack.” That kind of thing. The result is often a bunch of stuff that only has fleeting appeal once it’s actually home in the cupboard.

If you didn’t already know, I’m almost 38 weeks pregnant. The last preparations for the arrival of the squalling infant are falling into place. I ordered cloth diapers this week and picked up disposables today as well. Tiny, adorable clothes (OMG I LOVE ONESIES) are being washed and organized by size. The crib is built and even has a sheet on it now. I’m looking forward to taking Advil again. A lot. The next couple months will be interesting because I really can’t imagine being MORE tired. This week, 3 of 5 days were saturated with exhaustion in a rather extreme way, despite getting decent sleep.

I am driving the Fop crazy with my variable pronunciation of “diaper”. I happen to partake of both of the acceptable, documented pronunciations: [dahy-per] and [dahy-uh-per]. As a standalone noun, like “No, we are not going to put a diaper on the cat”, I use the 3 syllable pronunciation. In a compound, such as “Please keep the cat out of the diaper pail”, I tend towards the 2 syllable pronunciation. I have no explanation for this. Well, the 3 syllable pronunciation almost assuredly is a vestigial northern New England accent. And I could make up some stuff that sounds like legitimate linguistics for the variation (and I suspect there probably is a legitimate reason), but we’ll just leave it at: it’s fun to make the Fop crazy.

Perhaps I should offer to switch to “nappy” to soothe his offended ears. Nappies are for babies, not for cats!

At any rate, I’m optimistic for a good next couple weeks, an easy infant who sleeps through the night early and often, and a delightful transition into parenthood for us. Because what’s the point of being pessimistic now?

I hope Monster Cat will still love me after we bring home a mini-thumb-monkey…

I’m making a feeble attempt to post more than just Monster Cat. Which means you get pictures of light up flamingos and ramblings about silliness.

Friday I visited the chiropractor. After some serious adjustment to my neck, I think we’ve resolved my headache problems. My hip problems have at least another 6 weeks to wait, but he did do some manipulation that appears to have helped a lot. I also got a home blood pressure cuff. My blood pressure is pleasantly low at home (like 100/70) so it really is the traffic and the parking garage at the hospital that are driving up my pressure before I see my doctor. I’ll take my little machine tomorrow to compare it to the in-office reading. Should be entertaining. And reassuring. Low blood pressure means fewer tests… or at least a lower risk of various interventions. So hurray for 2 major annoyances being mitigated!

Why, yes, I do feel taller now that my neck isn’t so jammed that it took 2 really good cracks to get back into shape.

Saturday, I did NOT buy the flamingo pictured here. Note the lovely scarf! And the Halloween decor on the wall behind it. That’s right, the real horror is that xmas crap is available so early they haven’t taken down the Halloween stuff yet. Soon the seasonal backdrop for xmas crap will be stars, stripes and fireworks.

Of course, I have already “decorated” for Halloween… which is to say that my terracotta jack-o-lanterns are hanging out around the house. There are apples in the kitchen which will soon be pies and sauce. Last night, there was hot and spicy sausage pasta sauce. Tonight there will be the attempting of pre-made turkey and beef pot pies. Even though it’s 80° F (27° C) outside, I can effectively pretend that it’s Autumn.

And… I’m learning just how horrible the stink bug infestation is in the new area. I just vacuumed up a ton of them (and emptied the canister outside into a bag, sealed the bag and tossed it in the outside trash) and I already feel like my efforts are in vain.

Spring is definitely trying down here. The daffodils, crocus and a couple tulips appear to be ready already. I blame the super-warm weather last week confusing their little green brains. They will persevere, I’m sure… or at least I’m reassured by my mother that they’ll be fine. Given how fast the snow is melting, I really shouldn’t worry at all, right?

I spent 40 minutes on the elliptical machine at the gym today. It felt great. I’m pleased to discover that the iPad is perfect for reading on the elliptical too – bright, high contrast and adjustable letter sizes. I’m sure another eReader would probably work too, but the iPad is what I’ve got and I like it. Of course, spending 40 minutes reading about Starbucks’ business and marketing approach makes it really tempting to stop for coffee on the way home. (I resisted, not because my usual plain latte is bad but because I’d already caffeinated for the day.)

I have a new trainer I’m starting with next week. His name is Steve and I didn’t giggle at the name.* For those keeping score at home, that’s Trainer #6 in the year I’ve been working out at this gym. All previous trainers have left the gym. Needless to say, I’ve canceled my training contract and don’t expect to renew even after I’ve used up my surplus sessions. Which is a pity… if they’d been able to keep my original trainer around (he left for a better job at a better gym), I’d probably be gung-ho to continue with this gym until the end of time. Seriously, he rocked that hard. I’ve considered going into his new gym, but it’s in the city which will only serve as an excuse not to go. I may need to reevaluate that sometime in the near future.

*”Steve” has long been my default name when I need an example. I tend to forget sometimes that Steves actually exist.

exercise, gardening, snow, spring, training

This morning in the gym, when I looked up during my toe touches, there was a fat gray squirrel staring at me from the ledge over the door to the aerobics room. He might have been snickering.

New Trainer Guy continues to earn points. Varied and challenging workouts that happen to also be fun? Yes, please! Let’s keep doing them!

Pennsic exploded in the living room… and it’s still there. Laundry is on-going.

I’m not a big romantic, but the optimism and perseverance shown by the Chilean miner who proposed while trapped underground is really touching.

Today’s Penny Arcade is irreverent and made me laugh so hard I nearly choked.

It’s a Great Big Sea kind of day.

I don’t even know where to begin. Things have been busy, the world has been a little out of control and chaos has been a close companion. In the interest of being more amusing though, here’s the progress report without any of the causes, goals or even context in some cases.

Health and exercise:
- I still love the gym and see my trainer a lot.
- I’m still feeling better than ever and still shrinking.
- It’s entirely possible I’ll miss working out when we are at Pennsic. Handily there’s a big hill and a lot of walking.

House and home:
- The ceiling in my office and many of the cracks in the plaster walls have been fixed. My office is a different shade of green and my desk is setup again after a week and a half of working from less desk-like areas.
- The ceilings in the living room and porch are also repaired and repainted multiple times and the archway has had its plaster repaired.
- The house has been cleaned thoroughly to try to mitigate the mess the workmen made.
- Many of the broken windows have been fixed. (The windows were broken by hail, not the workmen. The workmen only broke a door to my stereo cabinet as far as I can tell.)
- There are roofing supplies (albeit the incorrect ones) in the driveway to replace the roof post-hailstorm. There will also be siding.

The Mini Clubman and cars:
- The Clubman is in the shop getting $4000 of damage fixed, also post-hailstorm. Paintless dent removal is an amazing thing but there are still dents to be removed with body work.
- The Mercury Grand Marquis has been returned to Enterprise because, despite how novel I found the feeling of driving my living room, it smelled pungently of cheap air fresheners over cheap cigarettes.
- The HHR is sitting in the driveway pretending to have the allure of the Clubman but without the appealing gas mileage or zip of the Clubman.

Pennsic prep:
- We are not certain where all the garb is but we do have hunches.
- Cute Project: supplies achieved. Construction likely.
- Fun Project: may bring supplies to Pennsic and do it there.
- Sewing: HAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA!
- Packing: Do we even need to go there? I bought a new basket in Media as well as some toiletries that landed in that basket, does that count?

Work stuff:
- Work has eaten my life lately.
- I’m going on vacation in a week.

Miscellaneous:
- I have wonderful, awesome, greatest of the greats friends and I love them dearly because they really are just that superlative.
- I want to spend more time reading.
- I bought Bejewled for my iPad which means time I would spend reading is actually spent playing Bejeweled. This was an error.
- If I owe you responses to email, voicemail or snail mail, I apologize. I’ve been terrible with that stuff this summer due to work eating my life.

cars, clubman, exercise, health, home, pennsic, work

Ceiling collapse part one: wee hours of Saturday morning.

Ceiling collapse part two: noonish today.

My office is cleaner than it’s been in ages (except the inescapable gritty dust which is driving me nuts) and about 2/3s empty.
Plaster’s a bitch to clean up. I now have a large space of missing plaster in my ceiling that is vaguely reminiscent of a Peep.
I’d say I love my old house but today it was aiming for me. Monster Cat may have been hit with some of the bits too… poor cat. Tasha and Tenny were in my office at the time of the collapse… neither has been back since. Can’t say I blame them…

I did have a great customer service experience with my old-old insurance company. As the rep put it, there was a “goofy enrollment termination problem” that I confirmed to be resolved with multiple phone calls in June 09. After spending easily 15-20 hours playing phone tag with half the planet.

Hahahahaa… it’s apparently not resolved and no one contacted me after that. Bill was helpful, made all the phone calls that I made a year ago, and generally left me feeling like this issue might actually get resolved without me having to take a cricket bat to any computer systems. (Actually the problem was human incompetence at the insurance company and a dermatologist’s office, but anyway…) It’s a good thing Bill was so helpful, or this could have been a very different post… from jail.

My Mini Clubman’s speaker was fixed 3 weeks ago and looks like it might stay fixed. Fingers are crossed.

Work is busy, despite my hopes that it would slow down this week with my developer on vacation, and resembles a full-time job more and more each day. I have mixed feelings about losing my free time but I’m generally enthusiastic about the flexibility and paycheck.

It’s hot. It’s really hot. I have popsicles. Pomegranate popsicles. I win.

house, lath, plaster, summer,heat, work

The project had a problematic bug over the weekend but is going pretty smoothly otherwise.
“How to Train your Dragon” was cute and entertaining. IMAX 3d works better than little-screen 3d, I think. Where do I get my dragon?
The seeds are seedlings.
The daffodils exploded.
The mini-cats continue to be mini, at least next to Tenny.
The gym continues to be good for me despite a malaise last week that cut down my number of visits.
And the laundry is still going… ugh.

Yes, this is a post about laundry. A cranky, annoyed, pissy post about laundry.

I understand why laundry is an on-going thing… but I’m really tired of it. I thought working from home would make it easier. I thought I could fit in moving laundry between meetings or around other tasks. Yeah, right. Just like with every other job, my day gets away from me and that load I put in the washer when I was making coffee first thing in the morning is still sitting there when I’m pondering dinner. Ultimately, it’s a matter of how I work. I probably wouldn’t be as successful at the working part of working from home if I were better at getting laundry done. So I take heart in that at least.

However… In my next house, I want fewer than 2 flights of stairs between where I work and where the washer and dryer live. I’d be quite content with the laundry closet or room being on the same level as the bedroom… you know, because it would be convenient to where the laundry lives when it’s not sitting in the basement waiting to be washed. Logic: it’s what laundry needs. Getting the laundry downstairs is easy enough as we have a laundry chute. However, getting it back upstairs is a pain and the commute to do it? Annoying. It’s not even the physical effort that’s the problem… it’s that mental avoidance of the whole task is totally enabled by the closed cellar door and the stairs that lie behind it.

And, like many basements, my basement is subject to the whims of the weather. If there’s a flood warning, there’s water in the basement. Maybe it’s just me, but I feel more accomplished if I first spread the 3-5 (or more) loads of laundry all over the floor and make the washer plow through them. Each pile that disappears into the hungry maw of the front-loader makes me feel like I’m making progress. During wet seasons, I shove everything into plastic bins and it’s just not the same nor as motivating. Currently there are 4 loads sitting on the floor as I’ve carefully checked the forecast and think I can get through them before it rains Wednesday.

“The only thing I can’t figure out is how to keep the change in my pockets. I’ve got it . . . nudity!”
I think Chris Knight may have something there.

house, laundry, random, rant

In the land of random open tabs I’ve been meaning to share, we have have the following:

• Yodeling Pickle: I never knew I needed a yodeling pickle (toy)… I still don’t know. But I’m sure there’s someone out there who will love the yodeling pickle.
• Truckers knitting and quilting: a cute story. Installing a sewing machine in a sleeper cab is brilliant! (link from Laura)
• Margaret Thatcher in a tank: actually linked from a larger story about the Top 10 Careers damaged by Photographs. Ms. Thatcher’s photo was provided as an example of one not damaged by a photo.
• Bunny party after roof collapses: Swedish rabbits “make special friends” after the roof over the country’s biggest rabbit exhibition collapses under heavy snow. Paternity suits increase 72%.
• Convicts in sheep’s clothing: quite literally. Apparently it’s an effective disguise for avoiding recapture.

As an public service announcement, I feel it is necessary to point out that I haven’t had any coffee or other caffeine since Sunday.

That’s okay though, I’ve been taking cold medicine and trying to stay hydrated like a good little sick person. And cold medicine itself has certain stimulating qualities.

(I’m reallyreallyreallyreallyreally looking forward to having coffee tomorrow morning though! I think I’m well enough that I can risk a little dehydration, right?)

caffeine, coffee, cold medicine