“Remoted” – Workday 144 / Day 211 (Tuesday)

The day was gray and rainy. Despite opening the mini-blinds in the kitchen office, the gloom required turning on the lights. With no distractions from things like sunshine and backyard critters, there was definitely no wishing to be outside. Focus and productivity were good, and it was actually a pretty good day for working from home.

The only reason to exit the house was to roll the trash bin to the street and roll it back up the driveway later. Both legs of the brief, rainy journey of the trash bin required an encounter with the puddle at the foot of the driveway. It’s a large puddle and sits a couple inches deep, and it’s been smaller since the street was repaved last year, but it still spans the width of my driveway and about a third of the way up. The dry summer meant it's been rare to have to deal with the puddle, but for today, there it was, the return to luxurious waterfront living. 

On the waterfront.

Despite the miniature lake out front and the day of alternating drizzle and rain, the basement was delightfully dry with no signs of waterpark features when I checked it late in the day. If the ceiling wasn’t so low down there, there might have been a little happy dance. Having already nearly concussed myself too many times on the ceiling beams which barely clear my head even when I’m wearing flat shoes, it was learned that expressions of joy over a dry basement are best delivered in constrained ways. At least until I get upstairs and regular height ceilings.

In addition to the dry basement, the day delivered other reasons to celebrate starting before work. It was day one of two Amazon Prime Days, and purchases were transacted. Last week’s Whole Foods order earned $10 off for Prime Days, and vinyl numerals for the fence ordered during the weekend's Support Small Business promotion earned another $10 off. Ordering the new mailbox (and a few other items)  using the discounts plus credit card rewards points meant the order cost exactly $0 out-of-pocket. Boo-yah!

An impulse Prime order of recent days arrived with chocolate chip cookies, a three pack of Pepperidge Farm Milano cookies, and 144 individual Caramel Macchiato coffee creamers (delicious in coffee, hot cocoa, and mocha), continuing the day's streak of good stuff. When the hot cocoa arrives in another day or so, stocking the cold weather hibernation pantry will be underway. Not that the cookies will last very long. One bag of Milano cookies is already two-thirds gone and rapidly dwindling. It is far less an issue of hunger and more the situation that they are just so fresh and tasty. It's amazing the level of contentment a $3 package of cookies can provide.