Inane Chatter

Today was not a bad day.  It was just like every other day this week, though, with a breakneck pace and no actual work that got done.  By me, anyway.  Other people might be having better luck.  And I get it, kind of.  I’m managing a process now, and I have other people (will someday have other people – that’s part of what we’ve been having meetings about this week) who have to do the stuff that needs to get done, so I’m not as hands on as I’m used to being, but deadlines are looming and I feel like I need to say I’ve accomplished something!  I’m a little worn out.  A little frazzled.  A little (a lot) in need of extra hours in the day with no meetings.  Except who wants more hours at work?  Also, who wants to keep talking about work once they’re at home?  Not me.

John called to tell me he was  just leaving the office and to apologize for how late it is.  I’m feeling weak-willed because I have no energy and my head is pounding (and not just the part that’s still tender from my encounter with the window yesterday), so I asked him to be the voice of reason and say “No, we can’t order Chinese food.  We’re having ravioli or stir fry or something that’s already in the house and is relatively good for us.”  But since it’s so late, and neither of us wants to deal with cooking and cleaning up, he failed in his duty (as the voice of reason) and told me that if Chinese food is the only thing that will make me feel better, then that’s what we should have for dinner.  And I gave in.  Because I’m weak.  Our local Chinese place should hang our picture on the wall.  (This hasn’t been a good week for healthy dinners.)

I do want to tell some stories about this vacation, but that would involve adding pictures, and have I mentioned how draining it is to upload pictures to this site?  I don’t have that kind of energy.  Some people at work were giving me a hard time for coming back from vacation on a Thursday (why not take the rest of the week off and come back on Monday?), and while I see their point, it’s totally awesome to go back to work on a Thursday.  Two-day work week!  The weekend is right around the corner.  And as fun as that vacation was (it was totally fun), I’m very glad to be home.  I love my bed.  And my dogs.  And my kitchen.  Well, I don’t love my kitchen, but it’s bigger than what we were working with in Georgia.  Not that I spent much time in it.

Okay, maybe this is going to be a little bit of a vacation post.  I was reading The Bloggess just now, and of course I’m laughing hysterically at today’s post (that should totally go without saying), and I had a similar experience over the weekend, and then I started writing the story in my head, so here it is.

Background: My family (Mom, Dad, brother, sister, me, assorted spouses, and one almost 5-year-old) decided to stay in a cabin in the mountains in northwest Georgia for a few days.  In the mountains.  In the woods.  Not in a clearing in the woods.  In the woods.  With me?  Okay.  ‘Cause this will become important.  John and I were supposed to arrive just before midnight Friday night (fly into Atlanta, rent a car, drive an hour and a half), but our flight was delayed (a lot) and then, only about 7 miles from the place, the road was blocked by a police cruiser because the power company was removing a tree from the power lines.  After about 20 minutes of sitting there (no map, no Internet connection to find a map), I finally asked the cop if there was another way to get where we were going.  There was, of course, and we finally got to the house.  In the woods.  At about 2:30 in the morning.  Oh, after we pulled into the wrong driveway.  ‘Cause it was a gravel road that was more of a track up the mountain.  In the very deepest dark.  Because it was in the woods!  And the power was out.  Dad met us at the right driveway with a flashlight and helped us get inside (where there were no lights, because the power was out) and find our bedroom.  With a flashlight.  Because there was no power.  Being up the mountain meant we were using well water, which gets into the house via pump.  Which totally doesn’t work when there’s no power.  So, you know, no flushing.  And bottled water for brushing teeth and washing faces and hands.  NO POWER!  But we were ready to collapse into bed (a bed we never collapsed into again after that night – I promise I’m getting to the point) when the power came back on, and so did every light in the house.  Anyway, most of that background was not really necessary, but let’s just say it illustrates how tired and ready for bed we were the next night, having only gotten about 5 hours of sleep the night before.

I was washing my face in the bathroom when I heard a very loud, somewhat shocked “JESUS CHRIST!” from the bedroom.  I came running and found John standing about three feet away from the foot of the bed, kinda pointing towards the pillow.  “There’s a scorpion.  IN the bed.”  “Can’t be.  Scorpions don’t live in Georgia, they live in Texas and New Mexico and deserts and stuff.”  “Zannah, it was a scorpion.  Go look.”  “Um, no.”  He twitched the covers a little and I saw something scurry under his pillow.  I got a little closer and saw it come out from under the pillow and go upside down under the mattress.  Kinda looked like a scorpion to me, but I wasn’t about to get close enough to really look.  Besides, it couldn’t be.  Either way, though, I didn’t want it in the bed.  John was pretty freaked out, and I wasn’t brave enough to get it, so I ran upstairs and grabbed Corey before he disappeared into his room.  Normally, I’m the one who finds the big ugly bug, and I’m the one who completely freaks out.  John walks into the situation knowing what to expect (I’ve already shrieked about the bug), so he’s usually able to handle it fairly calmly.  This time,  he was the one who found it after nearly LAYING DOWN ON TOP OF IT, so I think he was well within his rights to be a little less than rational.  Anyway, big brother came down, we both grabbed shoes, and I helped him lift up the mattress so he could WHACK the damn thing dead.  And then he put it in a plastic bag to show every person who came to the house over the next few days.  ‘Cause he’s a boy.  Thanks, Cor, for killing the scorpion!  After Corey left (with the scorpion, which he left on the table for everyone to find at breakfast), John and I discussed whether or not we’d be able to sleep in that bed.  I was actually fairly okay with it, I think because I’m not the one who found it, whereas all those other times I have been the one surprised by the spider or the centipede, I can’t sleep because of all the creepy-crawly nightmares.  According to John, that kind of inconsistency is one of my most endearing (or is that infuriating?) qualities.  Anyway, we did a thorough search of the room and the bed, checked all of the blankets, all of the sheets, took the pillows out of the pillowcases so we could shake them out, lifted up the mattress again, looked under the bed with the flashlight, then checked the drooping fabric underneath the box spring just in case they were nesting (isn’t that something you’ve heard of?  A nest of scorpions?  Maybe that’s vipers…), and when we didn’t find anything, we decided it was time to go to bed.  Gingerly.  And without much sleep.  Every night after that, we did the same bed check.

After the scorpion IN THE BED, the spiderwebs that apparently only took 10 minutes to string up across every doorway and sidewalk, and the millipede on the wall over our bed the last night (I called Dad to rescue us from that one), John and I have decided that although we like the idea of having a house in the woods, the woods will totally have to keep their distance.  Nature (the buggy part, at least) is not for me.

(I counted six, which I totally (seven) put in on purpose.  For reals.  Think I can go higher next time?)

My brain is starting to shut down.  Work was hard today, and tomorrow I’m going to be mostly useless.  You know why?  I’m going on vacation!  Woo!  Not a long one, but it should be nice and relaxing.  The worst part (and I’m telling you this in advance to try and prepare you for this traumatic experience) is that there is NO INTERNET CONNECTION where I’m going.  I will have to skip updating this here blog for several days IN A ROW.  Blog aside, what am I going to do without the Internet?  Here’s where I realize I may have a problem.  Do I really think I’m going to be scarred for life if I can’t google the lyrics to that song on the radio or find out what weather.com says the temperature is rightnow for a couple of days?  I think I’ll manage somehow.  And when I come back, I’ll have lots of pictures.

But hey, the withdrawal doesn’t have to start just yet.  My vacation doesn’t start until the weekend.  According to my brain, however, it started around lunchtime today.  Ooh, that reminds me of breakfast today.  A guy on my project won breakfast for the office from Chick-fil-A!  That place might have the best fast food breakfast in the world.  They certainly have the best fast food chicken sandwiches in the world.  And since that’s basically what goes on their breakfast menu, I think they’ve got the breakfast trophy all sewn up.  Which reminds me…I used the phrase “hungry as all get out” the other day, and that made me wonder where “as all get out” came from.  I was driving just then, so I couldn’t google it, and I’ve only just remembered.

[Pause for googling]

Okay, according to one forum, the OED says it was first used in Huckleberry Finn in 1884.  I couldn’t find any other references to the origin of that phrase, and I don’t have access to an OED myself (and I don’t subscribe to OED Online, although maybe I should – mm, no, $30 a month), so I can’t check.  That’s not very helpful.  Maybe I’ll be just fine after a few days without Google.  (Look!  I can tie things together!  (Oh, is it not cool to point that kind of thing out?  Better to be subtle and let others notice on their own?  Oops.  Guess I’m not cool.))

I bought wasp killer (and crabgrass killer – we’re don’t believe in nature in this house) and after rehearsal, John humored me by putting on long pants, a sweatshirt, safety glasses, and leather gloves, and then he went out in the dark, sprayed the hell out of the wasp nest, and sprinted around the side of the house when he saw something drop to the ground.  I think I freaked him out with my speculations about swarms of angry flying venomous insects.  But they’re dead!  He went back out after a couple of minutes with a flashlight to check out the carnage.  I’m thrilled they’re dead.  He feels kinda bad.

Today was the first day of my new job.  Same company, new boss, loads of new (and higher) responsibilities, and I think I’m in a little over my head.  It’s a good thing (right?), and I certainly won’t be bored.  The best part is the complete and utter lack of anything resembling travel.  Or even a commute.  I’ll have the occasional meeting in DC, and there may be a time in the fall when I have to spend a few days in a row down there, but the majority of my time will be spent in the office that’s only 20 minutes (max) from my house.  SO much better.

Enough about work.  I performed my adjunct-to-the-band duties tonight and put their set list together for them.  They’ve got a 4th of July gig nearby, and tonight was their last rehearsal before the big day.

Ricky Gervais is doing stand-up in the other room and I can’t concentrate anymore, so I’m off.

I am not in the mood to appreciate Duluth.  I got to my hotel last night right around midnight (central time, so it felt like 1am).  I was a little lucky getting in, though.  The rental car counter closes at 11:30, and that’s when my flight was supposed to land, so I thought I was going to have to take a cab to the hotel, then a cab to work (since the rental car counter doesn’t open again until 7:30 in the morning, which was when I was supposed to be at work), then a cab to the airport to pick up the car after work.  I wasn’t looking forward to that.  Fortunately, my flight landed ten minutes early and the rental car counter is less than 10 feet from the baggage carousel.  The one baggage carousel.  Duluth is tiny.  So, lucky me, I got my rental car.  Small yay.  Anyway, midnight at the check-in desk and thankfully, no one else was in the lobby, ’cause the check-in guy took it upon himself to bellow my room number to the space at large rather than just point to where he wrote it down for me like most hotels.  It was 1am before I could turn off my light, and all I wanted to do was sleep for hours and hours, but 1) it wasn’t dark in my room, and 2) I had to get up 5:45 to get to work on time.  Why wasn’t it dark in my room?  Because the Holiday Inn in downtown Duluth doesn’t believe in blackout curtains.  All I had were sheers, and my room faced the bright green Holiday Inn sign.  Still, I was tired, so I didn’t notice as much as I might have on a normal night.  5:45 came too early, but I made it to work okay and then through the day without falling over.  The day itself could have been better (I forgot to buy candy to bribe my students, so they were less enthusiastic than I was used to, and the lights in the room we were in were either too bright to see the projector screen or too dark to keep anyone awake), but it went well enough.  I headed back to my room thinking I might take a walk down the lakefront to find dinner, but it was raining, so that idea went out the window.  Speaking of the window, I was going to change clothes, but I saw a rope dangling from an upper floor.  I took a closer look and found a guy on one of those window-washing platforms about three feet down and three feet to the right of my window.  I could see him, and if he looked to his right, he could see into my room.  Not okay when I only have sheers on my windows.  On top of that, about 30 seconds after I noticed him, he started drilling into the wall outside my room.  SO loud.  I was on the phone with John, and he could hear it, too.  That eventually stopped (around six), but when I called the front desk to ask about it, they said it’ll be going on all week.  Shortly after that, the fire alarm went off.  The front desk made an announcement asking us to stay in our rooms while they investigate to find out if it’s a false alarm.  The alarm went off again, and then I heard the announcement of the false alarm.  Except that then the alarm went off again.  And again.  And again.  All in all, it went off about six times before I gave up and found a new hotel.  So now I’m somewhere else, in a hotel that has a really nice lobby and really nice employees (the check-in guy was great – upgraded my room while keeping me on the rate I’m supposed to be on for work) and HEAVY CURTAINS ON THE WINDOWS.  I never knew how important that was to me until the last few weeks.  In NC, the hotel only had sheers, but it wasn’t downtown or anything, so it got fairly dark at night.  In RI, the B&B had shutters that didn’t completely block out the light, but they were so cute and I was so relaxed that, while I would have preferred a darker room, it didn’t really bother me.  When I don’t have to wake up to an alarm clock, I enjoy waking up to sunlight streaming in my window.  But for work?  While traveling?  I want a dark room and real curtains.  Especially when there are men working outside my window.

Anyway, Duluth is not winning me over.  I’m sure it’s fine, and maybe I’ll like it better when the sun is shining and I’ve had a good night’s sleep, but I’m not seeing its charm at the moment.

We got up early this morning (5-ish) to run in the fog (which was really cool), and then John drove me to work on his way to spend the day visiting houses he used to live in and old high school haunts.  Work was not bad, and the day didn’t go nearly as slow as expected, mainly because I had a very lively class.  Lots of good-natured heckling.  I’ll take that over a zombie class any day.

Once we got back to Newport (work was in Narragansett – and I’m done for the week! Yay!), we went for a walk, planning on going to the Redwood Library to look around.  Got distracted by the giant stone tower thing in Touro Park, and John said he remembered a plaque or sign or something saying it was built by vikings or something, but we couldn’t find the sign.  On our way back up to the library, we passed the Newport Tower Museum.  We were looking at the pictures and posters in the window, and I noticed a guy on the inside coming towards that window.  Before I knew it, he’d bounced outside to come talk to us.  It’s his museum, and he’s done research and written books on that tower, all while trying to figure out who really built it.  Apparently, there are a bunch of theories, but most don’t hold water (according to him).  Anyway, he took us back over to it and pointed out all kinds of interesting things about it.  Long story short: he got us interested in it and we’re going to visit his museum tomorrow and let him tell us all the stuff he found out.  And probably end up buying his book (or books).  It really was cool, and the guy was SO enthusiastic.

After that, though, we decided to put off the Redwood Library until tomorrow, and we headed down to Thames Street to the Brick Alley Pub for dinner.  Very good, just like we remembered, and then we walked.  And walked.  And walked.  Just because.  It felt like forever, and we both wanted to turn around and head back to our inn, but for some reason we kept going.  And when we finally turned around, it felt like we’d never get back.  Of course, we did, eventually, and I just mapped it.  It was only 2.5 miles.  So we’re wimps.  It’s not even that late, but we’re both really tired.  John says that’s because it’s been 40 hours since we got up this morning.  He’s probably right.

Go check out Curiosity.  She’s hilarious on the subject of her hearing loss (which I’m very sorry to hear about, but am delighted to read a post about).  (Does that make me insensitive?)

It should go without saying, since I link to practically all of her posts, but The Bloggess is one of the funniest people on the Internet.  Truly and consistently funny.  She made me laugh at almost every sentence of her post today, so, you know, go read.  And laugh.  I’m going to put my walked-out feet up and go to bed.

Today didn’t start as planned.  For one thing, my alarm didn’t go off.  This wasn’t the disaster it could have been.  I’d set it absurdly early because I planned to run.  I woke up when the sun came up, about an hour later.  No time to run, but I still had plenty of time to get ready.  Ate breakfast, showered, dressed, and I was out the door about 8 minutes before I was supposed to be there to meet the guy who would let me in the building.  My hotel is only about three minutes from the place, so I got there with plenty of time.  Except it didn’t look like the right place.  The building had the right address on it, and it had a sign for the right agency, but it looked more like a warehouse than an office building.  And nobody was there.  I called my boss to make sure I had the right address.  I had the same one she did.  I called the guy who was supposed to meet me to let him know I was outside, but I only got his voicemail.  After about ten minutes, a couple of guys showed up, and I asked them if they knew anything about a training class.  One of them remembered the books being delivered and told me the class was being held at another site.  He was going there anyway, so I followed him.  Turns out the warehouse is where everything is shipped, which explains why we had that address, but all the office, all the classes, all the nice pretty landscaped grounds are a couple of miles away.  I still don’t know where I am (by address, anyway), but I’m pretty sure I can find my way here tomorrow morning.  It was about 8am when I got here (I was supposed to meet the guy at 7:30), but class didn’t start until 8:30, so everything turned out fine.  Except for my exceptionally slow internet connection.  That was a little annoying.  It’s hard to demonstrate things when your screen won’t load. 

Anyway, it’s lunch time and I’m hungry.  I need fuel to get me through an afternoon full of unhappy users.  (The types of users in this next session are notorious for hating this system.)

Or Durham.  Or Chapel Hill.  Or wherever the hell I am.  It’s not any better where I live, but I know my way around there.  I found dinner, I found Kroger, and I found my way back to my hotel.  I haven’t yet found where I can run around here, but that can wait until tomorrow.  I’ll start out in the hotel fitness center and then ask people who live around here.  When I meet them.  Which will happen in class tomorrow.

It’s entirely too quiet here, so I’m going to turn on the radio, read my book, and try to settle down and sleep.  The class I’m teaching tomorrow has a focus I haven’t really taught yet, so I’m not as comfortable with it.  Meaning I’m not as relaxed as I’d like to be.  A bath may be in my future.  Once I find a radio station I like.

The traveling part of this trip was totally uneventful (aside from some turbulence during the flight), no talkative seatmates, and it was surprisingly easy to find my hotel, so I’ve got nothing good to share tonight.  But I’m wireless!  Yay!  Here’s to posting from bed!  Maybe tomorrow. 

My neighborhood was Grand Central Station for bunnies this morning.  I’d forgotten about that aspect of spring, so when I took the dogs for a run this morning (for the first time in more than two months, I think), I wasn’t prepared for their reaction.  Nearly got my arms yanked off.  Over and over and over again.

I am looking forward to tomorrow.  Very much.  I asked for the day off a couple of weeks ago, just because (and also because I thought I’d need the escape since I was convinced I would be less than a month from unemployment by this week), and earlier this week I thought about not taking the day off and just going to work anyway, but then my boss reminded me that this was meant to be an easy week for us trainers (to give us a break from all the stressful traveling) and I don’t have anything to do, so why not take it?  I saw her point.  So now I have plans for tomorrow.  Plans to run, to get a mani/pedi, to get my very first ever massage, and to buy a new suitcase.  Almost in that order.  I need a new suitcase…do I?  Well, yeah, I do.  The one I’ve been using (big, rectangular, purple, on wheels) is coming apart at the seams.  I have another rolling bag, but it’s more of a rolling duffel and I have to travel with some stuff for work that wouldn’t fit very well in that.  I could borrow John’s (and I will if I don’t find something pretty easily tomorrow), but eventually, I’ll need one of my own.  I’m putting too much thought into this.

Hamburgers tonight!

Will it be all sunshine and flowers from now on?  Let’s go with yes.  Why be realistic when I can be optimistic? Seriously, that weight on my shoulders?  Gone.  I’m not saying I love my job or anything now, but holy hand grenade of Antioch, do I feel better.

I don’t ever want to go here.  I had nightmares after Jurassic Park and I was half-convinced raptors were going to leap through my bedroom window and kill me, so a forest full of dinosaurs and GIANT SNAKES is not the place for me.

Curiosity blames her absence on Nicholas Cage.  Lots of things can be blamed on him.  I’m just glad she’s back.

One last thing: the last paragraph of this review of the new Robin Hood movie made me laugh.  Twice.

Now I’m going to bed.  Sorry for the choppy post.  (I tried to call it a chippy post.  Not sure what that means, exactly, but my spellcheck thinks it’s a word.)

For real.  It might work.  Wait – bad title.  That’s not what I did.  Well, kinda…never mind.  Starting over.

I had an emotional day.  I saw my doctor and sobbed incoherently while I tried to explain what’s been going on (with the help of my notes – yes, I brought notes).  She basically told me that this anxiety is situational (and all related to work) and I should feel better once I can get myself out of that situation.  That’s pretty much what I thought, too, but it was good to hear it from someone who should know.  So that was Emotional Event #1.

Emotional Event #2 happened this afternoon at three when I met with my boss.  I managed not to cry, but I was close, and she could tell.  I explained how the travel and the commute were causing problems for me, promised to stay through June, and suggested we work together to figure out the best way for me to leave after June without causing any big problems for them.  Her response?  To figure out how to keep me.  (And, of course, to sympathize, ’cause she’s gone through similar situations in the past.)  She asked me if leaving the company was what I wanted and I said no, but I was prepared to do that if necessary.  She said she’d find out if there was anything else I could do, and then she sent me home for the rest of the afternoon (which almost made me cry again).  And then, less than two hours later, she called me at home to suggest another position for me, same project, no commute, no travel, that will get me at least through the end of the summer, and after that, something else at the company.

Moral of the story?  Ask for what you want.  I feel better already.

Because my boss can be pretty cool sometimes, I didn’t have to go to work today.  I had a long long list of things I could/should do, and I had great plans to do them.  And then I didn’t.  Well, I did a few of them.  Actually, I did nine out of nineteen, and to be fair to me, some of those things were meant for later in the weekend.  Okay, I did plenty today.  But I didn’t run and I didn’t go to the grocery store and I kept my out-of-the-house errands to a minimum because Roxy had a “welcome home” seizure last night before midnight and another one this morning, shortly before noon.  She’s fine now, but somewhat groggy (we’re under instructions to give her extra medicine after seizures to help prevent clusters – clearly didn’t work last night – and that makes her woozy), so I thought it would be best if I stayed close to home.

One of the few errands I did run today took me to Home Depot.  John needed grass seed, and while I was there, I bought a rosemary plant and an oregano plant ’cause MY FACE POTS WERE DELIVERED!  Yay!  And I already have a basil plant, so I’ll put all three into my new pots and put them…somewhere…to grow.  The deck, maybe?  I could put them on a plant stand on the front porch (if I had a plant stand.  I think I just added that to my shopping list for the weekend.).  I definitely can’t put them anywhere in the yard.  The rabbits will get them.  Like they’ve already eaten the three (maybe it was four) black-eyed susan plants that came back this year.  I need plants rabbits don’t like.

I bought a donut today.  The woman asked me if I wanted a receipt.  I said yes, and I think you know why.

I’m in the airport now, waiting for the plane to arrive.  It’s a day early (me going home, not the plane – I’m sure the plane will be right on time (Okay, no, it won’t, but it won’t be a day early.)), and because it’s work-related, I don’t think it’s a good idea if I go into why I get to go home early.  But it’s not bad news or anything.  So, you know, nothing to worry about.

I had the BEST airport food when I got here.  I know, crazy, right?  Well, it’s not really airport food any more than any other restaurant in an airport is airport food, but still.  UFood Grill.  I’ve never heard of it, but there’s one near my gate and I got my lunch there.  It was GOOD.  (I just checked locations and they do seem to be mostly located in airports, so I guess I was right to characterize it as airport food.)  I had the Chopstick Chicken Bowl, which is chicken, broccoli, and carrots in a teriyaki thai chili sauce, all over steamed brown rice.  Spicy.  And good.  And healthy!  (Not greasy, for real.  I watched them make it.)  What a surprise.

I’ll be home in less than three hours, and I get to stay home for a whole week.  More than that!  Yay!

A few links to keep you entertained while I fly home:

The dishwasher was cold.  She cracks me up.

Jess found a baby chicken cam (similar to the puppy cam from a few years ago).  Go!  Look!  Melt into a puddle from all the cutesy cuteness!  (And while you’re there, steal her recipes for homemade strawberry ice cream and arugula pesto.)

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!

I would still call DisneyWorld the happiest place on earth (me and fifteen trillion of my closest friends), but I think the Coke museum in Atlanta (now The World of Coca-Cola) is the happiest place in Georgia.  (Ask me again after I go to the aquarium.)  I love Coke.  Me and Coke are buddies.  We like to hang out.

My class got out a little earlier than expected, so I headed out of the windowless training room on the 9th floor (windowless, yes, but NOT in a basement – big improvement) hoping to go for a run.  I got off the elevator to cloudy skies, but I was still hopeful.  Cloudy just means it’ll be cooler without the sun beating down on me.   Then I got outside.  Raining.  Hard.  Annoyed.  (Me, not the rain, although who knows?)  Then I had a brilliant idea.  I’m in Atlanta, it’s only 4pm, it’s raining, and I’m mere blocks away from a shrine to the only soft drink worthy of the name.  So I went – by myself – and joined a tour group and spent a very enjoyable couple of hours looking at all the Coke stuff, watching the videos, watching a ton of Coke commercials, and tasting many (not nearly all) of the really disgusting Coke products they manage to sell around the world.  On my way out (funneled, of course, through the gift shop, where I showed admirable restraint and did NOT buy myself a t-shirt), they handed me a Coke. 

In sadder news, Roxy had a seizure this morning.  John said it was a cluster seizure, and she was in the middle of it when he came back in from his morning run.  Riley had done his holding her down thing, there was hair everywhere, and he’d slobbered all over her neck.  (No blood.)  John talked to our vet this afternoon, and she apparently jumped to the conclusion that the new medicine isn’t working and that Roxy needs an MRI (costs at least $1000 according to her (the vet, not Roxy)).  I’m not sure why she (the vet) went there so quickly, though.  Roxy’s only been on the new meds for a month and off the old meds for only three weeks, and in that time she’s had basically two episodes.  That sounds pretty promising to me.  So we’re going to ignore the vet for the time being.  (That’s a strange phrase.  Time being.  I’m sure I’ve said it before, but I don’t think I’ve ever written it down.  Looks too weird.)

It got late before I realized it, and I haven’t eaten dinner yet, so I’m out of here.

Updated to add Roxy’s second set of seizures for the day.  Three this time.  John may be leaving her with the vet for observation tomorrow, since he can’t stay home with her.

Caprese salad, steak, and asparagus.  Fresh (except for the steak – it’s been in the freezer for….a while), healthy, and delicious.  John is grilling (both the steak and the asparagus), and I’m getting hungrier by the second.  I’m also back in planning mode.  Trip-planning mode.  I managed to avoid this phase last weekend.  The trip to Pittsburgh snuck up on me, and when I thought about it, I wasn’t remotely stressed, so I never really planned, aside from packing the day of and setting up the pet sitter a few days before.  This time, though, I’m about to travel for work.  I have to have work clothes, after-work clothes, all the stuff (papers, training guide, copy of my contract, tax-exempt form, etc) I need for work, and who knows what else.  What does John need while I’m gone?  What will I have to do next weekend, when I’m home for about 48 hours before I leave again?  Can I plan ahead for that now?  Wait – stop.  I can do this later.  (Like tomorrow, when I might have the morning to myself at work.)  Now is for dinner.  Only dinner.

Clearly, the stress is getting to me, and today (at least right now), the ups and downs seem pretty funny.  This morning I started out generally tired and not quite awake.  Middle of the road, emotionally.  I got to the part of my commute where I always need additional waking up, so I turned off my book and switched to music.  Some song I really like (I don’t remember which one right now) came on just as the sun came out from behind the clouds.  Combine that with the fact that I was on the GW Parkway (beautiful drive), and the sunlight was being filtered through all the trees, and all of a sudden, I was happy.  It was a beautiful day, I was up in the early morning sunshine, and I was singing along to a song I like.  Unfortunately, the next song was “Everything I Do” by Bryan Adams.  I like it, and I can sing along to it, but instead I got all sappy and cried.  In the car.  On Constitution Avenue.  Tears streaming down my face and everything. For no good reason.

(Just after I wrote that, Roxy puked on the floor, and I can’t identify what she threw up.  Seriously, what was that?)

Anyway, I got over the tears easily enough and quickly moved on to annoyance.  My class got moved to a new room starting this morning.  The new room has a keypad, and the people in charge of the room won’t give me the code.  No big deal as long as they’re around to let me in every day.  The agreement (or so I thought) was to meet me at 7:45 to let me in so I could set up.  I was there by 7:45.  They did not show up until 8:40.  Class is supposed to start at 8:30.  So I spent almost an hour parked outside the door to that room, determined to be there when this person showed up, trying to reach anyone I can think of who might be able to get me in.  Since they refuse to give me the code to the room, someone has to be there to open the door for the class every day this week at 8:30 (they refuse to come in any earlier, so my class will start late every day) and at 1pm so we can get in after lunch.  You know, I’m still annoyed by that.

At lunchtime, I left the building.  I ate my lunch on a bench in the shade in the plaza outside the building.  Perfect weather, wonderfully pleasant, and I finished lunch feeling MUCH better.  The good feelings continued during my drive home, with more perfect weather and a beautiful drive, and then I took the dogs on a walk.  All is well.  As long as I get to bed on time tonight.

I’m on my way, but first, watch this.  I know it’s a little late (not last Saturday, the week before), but we just watched it tonight, and I think it’s hilarious.  The guy is one of the SNL writers, and he’s adorable in this clip.  Little boy adorable.  Makes you wanna put him in your pocket and take him home.

Check out this adorable picture.  Roxy used to ask to be picked up when she was a puppy, and I miss that a little.  It’s probably just as well she got too big (and grew out of it – thank goodness.  I don’t need a 55-pound dog asking to be picked up.), or I’d carry her everywhere and she’d be fatter than ever.

Today is the last day of class (for this week).  It sort of feels like summer’s coming, like it’s the end of the school year.  Everyone’s getting a little antsy, but more relaxed at the same time, so it’s kinda fun.  And yet, it’s only the end for them.  Not so much for me.  I’m here again tomorrow, and then I start a new class next week.  Same thing, different day.  They go back to work, so I guess it’s not really all that great for them, either.  I’m trying to enjoy the day, and mostly I’m able to, but then I remember how many more times I have do it.

And then I look at adorable pictures of puppies, and I’m ready to pick back up after lunch.    (Too cutesy?  Too bad.)

I mentioned last night that I felt vaguely anxious about today.  I didn’t have any reason to be worried, and there was nothing about today that was any different than any of the last two Mondays.  Maybe I shouldn’t have talked about it, ’cause this morning was weird. I didn’t have any trouble falling asleep or staying asleep, and I got close to seven hours, I think.  Not too bad.  I needed to leave a little early to fill up the car, but that wasn’t a problem, and I didn’t eat as much breakfast as usual.  Maybe a third of my tea, and just a small bowl of cereal instead of my usual piece of toast with peanut butter (out of peanut butter).  I had a hard time staying alert on the drive, so I resorted to yelling at myself and making loud noises.  Strange, I know, but effective.  You’re not going to fall asleep at the wheel mid-yell.  I was starving after I set up for the morning, so I went to the coffee place in the food court and got a small chai latte and a bagel.  I had time to eat the whole bagel before class, but I only drank maybe a third (probably less) of the chai.  I’m mentioning this in such detail to point out that I don’t think I was either over-caffeinated or under-nourished when I started class.

Anyway.

In the minutes before class and up to about mid-morning (so…more than two hours, closer to three), my heart was not exactly racing, but beating faster than normal, my hands were shaking, and I had to fight to keep my voice from sounding scared.  I have NO IDEA what was going on.  I’m fine now, and I was fine by lunch, but what?  What was that?  I didn’t even feel particularly anxious while all that was going on.  I had all the physical symptoms of anxiety without any of the unease.

I mentioned it to John when he called me on his way from work, and he thought maybe it was lack of sleep catching up with me.  Could be.  Whatever it was, I’ve resolved not to worry about it unless it happens again.

Tonight, ravioli with Wegman’s delicious vodka blush sauce (the one in the bag.  John’s mom is totally right.  The one in the bag is SO much better than the one in the jar.).

We’ve been watching the weather all day, looking forward to the thunderstorms, but the forecast kept pushing them later and later.  It would have been nice to stay in while thunder boomed today.  Now they’re not supposed to start until after ten.  And since that’s past my bedtime, it looks like I’ll miss them.

All of a sudden, I’m nervous about tomorrow.  I don’t know why; tomorrow shouldn’t be any different than the last two Mondays.  I have everything I need, and in fact, most of it is already in the car, so I’m not even in danger of leaving anything crucial at home.  I don’t like this sense of general anxiety.  Makes me nervous.  ( )  I might try some sort of meditation to get to sleep.