“Remoted” – Workday 127 Day 185 (Thursday)

The past two weeks have felt brutal, like being beaten up by the class bully. In our team meeting today, I learned this sentiment is shared by others in my group, which made me feel a bit better. It’s easier to deal with feeling overwhelmed and buried knowing it’s not just me. 

Work has challenges and quirks, but at least the after-work hours feel more productive and less frustrating. There are a few recent things that have made me feel slightly better about life beyond work. 

Ever since the wild eviction of the mouse from the house last week, I have seen neither a mouse nor fresh evidence of any. It’s probably a long shot that there are no others, which is why I am still on the lookout for their tiny calling cards. In an odd quirk of visual prowess, while I may not be able to see the earrings or pen or scissors I’m seeking and which are plainly in open view, I can spot a mouse dropping from halfway across the room. It’s probably more paranoia than actual bird of prey visual acuity. At least for now, I feel like I can relax a bit. Even Winston is more relaxed, no longer sniffing the baseboards and closet doors and staring intently into other rooms.

In a testament to my amazing focus (which alternates with moments of complete and shocking flakiness), the puzzle was finished after supper. The part I thought would be difficult, when approached methodically, was quite easy. Last night, all the names of the quilt squares were assembled. Tonight, with a laser beam focus, I looked through the remaining pieces thinking, and sometimes muttering (which got the dogs all hyped up), search clues like, “H bottom, with purple on a nubbin,” and “pink leading to green,” and other cues to the pieces that stitched the rest of it together. 

H bottom with purple
on a nubbin.

Finishing the puzzle was much more satisfactory than walking. My shins still hurt from Monday and Tuesday, and I felt every single step taken while sweeping the kitchen floor and later, limping through the yard to harvest the dog poo and three dinner roll sized mushrooms. After staring at quilt squares in the puzzle for the past week, now I want to make one. Or return to the stained glass panels I used to make, which, when I first started, were based on quilt squares copied from books borrowed from the library. I have all the supplies, including most of a 35-pound reel of lead came, six-foot lengths of zinc rail, and dozens of sheets of glass and boxes of bevels. Soon. I think I feel the itch coming.