random thoughts – Day 1,874 – (Sunday) – bare minimum

The weekend was shot. Destroyed, due to an illness that had the same effect on plans as a firing squad.

This was supposed to be the weekend where I bought the paint for the porch walls and floor, and painted the walls. The handyman coming at the end of the week is handling the floor. Friday night, before I was suddenly and fully overcome with illness, I decided to wait until Saturday morning to get the paint.

The view from the couch.

Instead, I have been incapacitated since Friday night at 10:00. The overnight was spent being ill from all directions. Most of Saturday day was spent sleeping. Saturday night was spent sleeping. Sunday was spent laid out on the couch watching most of an entire season of Wear Whatever the F You Want with Clinton Kelly and Stacy London. Prime cut out three times during the marathon, which was annoying. 

Though I hadn’t eaten anything since supper at around 6:00 on Friday, I wasn’t hungry. The thirst was strong and I was finally able to keep down water, so that was an improvement. My stomach was making lots of noises and I finally mustered the strength to make and eat a piece of challah toast. It was exhausting.

Later in the day, I still wasn’t hungry, but eating seemed important. I dragged myself to the kitchen to make scrambled eggs, the comfort food Mom always made for me when I was sick as a kid. Unfortunately, mine never come out as geed as hers. Barely one-third of the two eggs was eaten. Somehow, the trash was gathered and the litter box cleaned.

It’s been a day of dragging myself through the bare minimum level of activity. Let’s hope tomorrow is better.

random thoughts – Day 1,873 – (Saturday) – under attack

Mysteries abound. In addition to the missing sunglass clip, suddenly draining cell battery, and misplaced dance belt, Friday night delivered a mysterious health situation.

While sitting in the living room half-watching TV, messing around on my cell, and drinking ice water my stomach started feeling “wrong.” I wasn’t a stomach ache, it just felt like the ice water, which I drink nightly, was causing a weird reaction and things were churning. At 10:00, there began a full-on assault of vomiting every 20 to 40 minutes.

I remembered Mom giving me ginger ale when I was kid with a messy stomach, but I don't have any. There is ginger root in the freezer, but I wasn't in any shape to be trying to cut some of that.

Eventually, it felt safe to go upstairs to bed, plastic trash can with a liner bag at the ready. Kiki laid on the floor near the door, her new nighttime spot. Things were calmer with my stomach and then suddenly they weren’t when the mystery ailment took a turn and the expulsion from the other end of the digestive tract kicked in. I was also sweating, then freezing. My body was angry and I don't know why. 

This went on all night. It was brutal. I returned to the couch because it’s significantly closer to the bathroom than the bedroom is. Then it felt safe to return to the bedroom. Things finally eased up around 6:00 am. Not gone, just less frequent, and I was able to sleep for longer increments in bed. At 2:00 pm, I left the bed and went back downstairs to the couch. 

I was thirsty and feeling parched, but the first sip of water kicked the cycle off again. Eventually, I was able to keep water down. I have a headache and feel very weak, but I’m afraid to take anything on what I’m certain is a completely empty stomach and I don't feel like eating.

The expressions “sick as a dog” and “weak as a kitten” kept running through my head, along with lots of exclamations of whiskey-tango-foxtrot.  And why are the dogs sick and the kittens weak? Aren’t cats the ones known for yakking on the rug? I actually feel more like another expression I used to hear – “death on toast.” No, I don’t know where that one originates from either. Maybe when I’m not dealing with a headache and feeling as weak as a kitten I’ll have the energy to look into it.

random thoughts – Day 1,872 – (Friday) – energy drain and missing stuff

Yesterday, despite my not using it all day except for stupid work-related multi-factor authentications, my cell phone drained itself empty. Not long after work ended, it was suddenly at 1% and then dead. It charged quickly once I was home at the charger. I decided it needed to be monitored.

This morning, it drained quickly again. And recharged quickly. And was dead again in the afternoon. And recharged. Now, a few hours later, it’s back down to 26% without even being used for games or watching videos or anything. It’s shockingly similar to my own energy level lately.

This can mean only one thing. The phone must be about five seconds away from being fully paid off, it’s time for it to blow up, and by next weekend, I’ll be forced to shop for a new phone. This was how it went down with my previous phone, and maybe the one before that. Hooray.

The day was shrouded in the mystery of the phone as well as the earlier mystery of “where the h*ll is the sunglass clip to my brown tortoise browline glasses? I had it on Tuesday. The car, work bag, dance bag, pockets of the fleece jacket I wore and the denim jacket I didn’t wear, and two purses I didn’t use this week. Multiple times. No sunglass clip. First the dance belt, now the sunglass clip. Mysteries sure do make things interesting.

random thoughts – Day 1,871 – (Thursday) –kitties and tassels

Kitties in the window
with reflections 5-1-25.

We had a guest scheduled to be in the office today, so it became an onsite day for me. On the way into the office, I got to check out the Lazy Cat Lounge windows and saw the white kitty and the black and white kitty together in one window. So cute. Still so hard to photograph the black kitty with all the window glare and reflections.

We were hosting a high school student who is a co-op in another department and who wanted to learn about marketing. Four of us were onsite for the occasion, each with scheduled time with the student.

In preparation, I spent time gathering samples of types of projects I work on because I find it easier to show the finished product and talk about the strategy and work behind it. I had a gajillion PDF tabs on the screen with sponsorship ads, business banking ads, bi-lingual ads, billboards, and other stuff. Then I accidentally hit the X in the corner instead of the minimize screen button and blew it all away. Then I got to reconstruct it all. After 45 minutes at my desk, he met with the others, and then after that it was just a mostly regular day.

At lunchtime, there was a walk to the Dollar Central store where I browsed the aisles and chuckled. There is an entire wall of products that includes sewing scissors, elastic, needles, pins, and other various tools and notions for sewing recognizable and not, and every single package bore the same product name of “Sewing Kit.” And none of them was actually a sewing kit, which is usually a set of thread, needles, a needle threader, and maybe a couple buttons. I wanted to take a picture of the wall of not sewing kits, but the guy working there was following me around like he thought I was going to rob the place. 

Curtain ties now,
belt tassels later?

My mission was tassels and trim for a tribal style dance belt, and as hoped, they had some curtain tie backs with tassels and corded balls which I bought instead of playing the ridiculous game of “I’ll come back” and then not and getting all stressed out because I forget. Theoretically, the curtain tie backs will magically be transformed into a dance accessory. Or not. We’ll see. 

I still have hope I'll find the tassel belt I already own, in which case, the new tassels and parts will become another layer for it. This stuff was all so much easier when there were fabric stores, and I totally missed the boat with the JoAnn fabric store closing sale. Timing is not always my strong suit. 

random thoughts – Day 1,870 – (Wednesday) –pretty and fluffy

Backyard lilacs.

Spring is popping everywhere. The sun was out today, and the temperature was in the 60s (give or take, I didn’t go outside to verify). 

The lilac in the back yard has some flowers, but not very many, which may or may not be due to the big trim I gave it last year. Last year I cut big bunches of lilac to put in vases, but this year may not be as plentiful. Time will tell in a few weeks.  

The bleeding hearts that were transplanted last year are loaded with little heart flowers. Daffodils waved in the breeze Tuesday outside dance class.

The lily of the valley has spread and sent up an abundance of green shoots. They will eventually take over the back yard, which is okay with me and was an unofficial plan. For the past few years, I “expanded” the flower bed by moving the edging out further.

This morning, while parking downtown, I took a moment to look beyond the concrete wall at the world outside. I noticed that solar panels have sprung up on the roof of one of the converted mill buildings across the street, which isn’t exactly a sign of spring, just something I noticed this morning and didn’t remember seeing before.

Fluffy kitty in a window.

Over on Merrimack Street, I saw kitties lounging in the windows of Lazy Cat Lounge. Finally! A fluffy white beauty posed for me, then a couple windows away, a black one was curled up napping. 

The Lazy Cat Lounge opened months ago and I still haven’t been inside. It’s not open when I pass in the morning, I’m failing miserably at the afternoon take a walk thing, and at 5:00 it’s the last thing on my mind.

At home, my own kitty was seeking face rubs and pats. Her coat is smooth and silky and she let me touch it. Today had a pleasing amount of soft, pretty, fluffy things. Five stars. Highly recommend.

random thoughts – Day 1,869 – (Tuesday) – surprises

It’s another week where the workday routine is out the window. Monday had the visit to the surgeon’s office to shake things up. Today, there was a resume review session with MassHire in the HR suite, which led me to be downtown for the morning. The first challenge was getting out of the neighborhood after I discovered that the short street that lets me leave my neighborhood in an efficient route to work, was closed. A large, orange “Road Closed” sign informed me as I prepared to turn onto the street.

Instead, it was the longer route to work, which planted me in a lengthy line of traffic. There was another surprise at the parking garage, where only one entrance was open, with an orange traffic cone blocking access to the other one. Traffic was blocked up with people from two directions waiting to enter the garage through the one entrance lane blocking the two lanes of people trying to exit the garage.

The Idea Lounge.

The resume review that brought me downtown was in the HR suite. The schedule was running a few minutes late, and I had arrived a few minutes early, so I had a chance to sit quietly in the Idea Lounge in the HR suite overlooking Palmer Street. It’s decorated with 26 square paintings depicting the letters of the alphabet. 

The lounge is the same space where, nine years and a few weeks ago, I had my interview for my current job. This morning, I was receiving help with merger-induced outplacement. It’s funny how things work. As Mummu used to say, “not funny ha ha, funny peculiar.”

The result of the resume review was another surprise. The recommendation is that I should completely revise mine from a chronological format to skills based (aka “functional”). Like, right away, because the onsite job fair with reps from 25 companies in attendance is next week. Oy.

Wednesday will be a regular state of things with being downtown, but Thursday will be topsy turvy all over again with another day in office for a visit from a co-op student from another department. The co-op is studying marketing and will be shadowing our team for part of the day. These visits are better on person.

It’s only Tuesday, I’m already tired, and I’m looking forward to sleeping late on Saturday. It’s nice to have something to look forward to.

random thoughts – Day 1,868 – (Monday) – plate and bump and x-ray vision

There was a doctor’s appointment this afternoon, scheduled last Friday after I finally remembered to call. For a couple weeks, the surgery scar had been doing crazy stuff. It looks like it's glowing red and weird, and sometimes is sensitive and needs to be covered with a bandaid when wearing long sleeves to keep the fabric from rubbing on it. The real kick was when there was pain in three fingers and down the top of my hand and forearm when grasping and pulling leaves from the flower beds. Every time. While leaves won’t need to be pulled forever, the action of grasping and pulling may be required on an ongoing basis.

X-ray visions.

There were more x-rays, which seem to be the warm up act at every appointment. The assistant, followed by the doctor, were not especially concerned about the scar and the pain, but I did learn new nuggets of info concerning my wrist. The first was that the plate may need to be removed eventually because my wrists are all small-boned and dainty and the plate “sits proud” as the assistant said. Basically, it’s not flush with the bone and makes a bump in my wrist, and a tendon rubs and clicks over it, but only when I move my hand, so no real worries, right? 

I figured the plate is what caused the bump, but this was the first mention of removing said plate after the bone is fully healed, and if my scar hadn’t started randomly glowing and feeling all Harry Potter weird and my fingers hadn't screamed at me when I pulled some dead leaves, I might not have known this any time soon.

The second nugget was that there is a small bone chip near my outer wrist bone. What, what? The assistant pointed it out on the x-ray, then said it’s too small to be dealt with, but it can rub on the soft bits in the wrist, which explains the ongoing tenderness and swelling in that area.

The instructions before I left the doctor’s office were “take Motrin” and “come back in three weeks.” Um, okay. See you then, I guess. And until then, I’ll be hyper-fixated on the wrist, the plate that sits proud, the bump, the bone chip, and the tendon. Things I was blissfully unaware of until this afternoon.