Getting better all the ti-i-ime (can I be depressing and say that’s unlikely to last?)

I feel so much better today.  For now.  I went to bed early and set my alarm for 4:50.  I slept mostly okay (weird dream that turned into a horrible nightmare (with people chasing me and trying to kill me) around 4am) and wasn’t too shocked when the alarm went off that early.  I took my time getting up, reading a little to wake my eyes up, and then I got dressed to go for a run.  I already knew I was heading to the fitness center (it was still dark out, and I’m not running in a strange place in the dark), but when I opened the door, I found out it was raining.  Pretty steadily.  I dashed across the courtyard area to get to the little fitness room.  I don’t really like treadmills, but that’s what I had to work with, so I set it up to go for 30 minutes and I turned on the little TV that was attached to it.  I had headphones, but I couldn’t find a jack on the stupid thing, so I watched TV (an episode of Married With Children) and tried to read lips for half an hour. 

About halfway through my workout, the thunder and lightning started, and the rain switched from steady to POURING.  Like the clouds were hurling all that rain down as hard as they could.  I was soaked after my dash back to the room.  Rain like that doesn’t usually stick around for long, but it was still raining as hard or harder when I splashed through the parking lot to my car to get to work.  I have to park about a block away from the building (at work, not at the hotel), so I stopped at my friendly neighborhood Kroger and bought a tiny little red umbrella.  You know what that means.  By the time I parked in the lot downtown, the rain had slowed to a sprinkle and I hardly needed the umbrella.  If I hadn’t bought it, though, it would have been pouring still. 

My point, if I had one, is that despite the soaking wet hem of my pants, and despite knowing that I don’t get to go home until NEXT Friday, I feel a little better because I RAN this morning.  (“SO much better” from the first paragraph has already been downgraded.)  Also, I get to see Mom, Dad, and Gaby tonight.  They’re stopping here to see me on their way back to KY.  AND (see? lots of good things today) my first couple of hours at work this morning have already been a vast improvement over the rest of this week ’cause I’m sitting down and I’ve only had to talk to two people.  Sitting down is crucial. 

Make that five people.  Still better than the rest of the week, and I have a built-in, supervisor-approved excuse so I don’t have to stay here all day.  Yay!