Rough Days.

It’s my last kid-free night until next week, so I thought I’d work late and maybe hit up Aldi for a few odds and ends. I did work late, but I skipped the store. There was nothing urgent on my list. I wanted to get ingredients to make more jar salads to take for lunch, but I have one left, so I can procrastinate a day. I was able to just come home and relax.

TEN HOURS

I was still really, really sick yesterday. I had a lot of achiness and general malaise. I felt ok for a couple hours first thing in the morning, but my energy plummeted by 10:30. I ended up leaving work earlier than planned and going to the grocery store to get a few things. Then the boyfriend and I had grilled reuben sandwiches for dinner, which he was supposed to cook, but I ended up making them. They were so good too.

But then! I went to bed at 8:30. That is unheard of! And I was so violently shivering that I decided to pull out my flannel winter jammies, AND I wore socks to bed, which I hate to do, but I felt so cold. And I slept pretty solidly. I only woke at 3am and went right back to sleep, and again at 5am, which required to trip to the bathroom, but I fell back to sleep again until my alarm went off at 6:30.

COLD CALLING

I have been procrastinating turning on my furnace. I wanted to wait until November, but then it occurred to me that my furnace is gas-powered. I pay a flat rate each month, no matter what, so I decided it needed to happen this morning, when the temp was 36F. It’s set very low now, but you know… I don’t need it to be 70F in here. I do need it to be NOT 36F.

I went out to my car wearing my warmest fleece jacket, and it was still really cold, so I told myself that I really need to get serious about clearing out the garage. I need to be able to park in there. I probably should be addressing that instead of sitting here writing this.

(DE) CONSTRUCTION ZONE

The boyfriend came over on Sunday to demo the kitchen. He actually only tore out the soffits, but it feels so much bigger in there now. Thanks to being sick, it’s still not completely cleaned up. I’m still finding construction dust in places I didn’t expect.

The ceiling in there is the only stippled one in the entire house, and we both hate stippled ceilings, so that has to be scraped. The question is: should we try to scrape the stipple off, or just tear out the entire ceiling and then install new drywall? He seems to think the latter will be easier, but cost more money. We have decided to try scraping the stipple off, and if that goes poorly, we’ll just tear it all out. (Actually, I told him I didn’t care which way we went, because realistically, he’s the one who will be doing the bulk of the work.)

YE FRIENDS OF OLDE

My posse and I went to the Renaissance Festival on Saturday. I had not been in probably 20 years at least. It has grown quite a bit since then. But it was funny that the one show I actually could not miss was the Mud Show, and it was <i>exactly</i> the same! Even one of the actors was the same ones we saw years ago, except now he has white hair!

We shopped, which is something I couldn’t afford to do there 20 years ago. All the others bought wind chimes, and some did a bit of Christmas shopping. I ended up leaving empty-handed, because nothing just really jumped out at me. Plus, I really have no business buying unnecessaries when I have house repairs and updates to pay for.

The food — UGH. It was tasty, but oh so salty. My fingers swelled up so much that I could not remove my rings! Even after 3 bottles of water!

I really enjoyed hanging out with my friends. We had a girls weekend at the end of May, but summer hang outs were few and far between. I was so distracted with house-buying stress and working so much to ensure I had enough money. This was a nice reminder of why these ladies are my go-to gals.

I found that I didn’t seem to cough much while we were there, and I thought I was just getting healthier. I later deduced that it was likely the humidity that kept my cough at bay, because once we got in the car with the a/c, the coughing was more frequent. It really sucked.

SHAKE THE DISEASE (NOT)

Then I got home, and my coughing continued. I felt altogether awful: my body was sore, especially my back, and I was pretty sure I was sunburned. I could not move from the couch for the longest time… until I had to. I had a coughing spell so bad that it inflamed all the nerves in my back and shoulders, and it radiated down my arms. I almost threw up, and I had to change my underwear.

The next day, it happened again twice, while my boyfriend and I were out to dinner. Except this time, the tingly nerves were tingling harder, which was actually painful. I had him rub pain cream on my shoulders later that night.

It felt disheartening that I felt up to the festival on Saturday, but on Sunday, I was down again. Way down. And Monday was even worse, but then… go back to the top where I wrote that I went to bed at 8:30! Today I am feeling much better. Still having some infrequent coughing spells, but nothing like over the weekend, and I had enough energy to power through work until 7pm, which is a 10 hour work day.

COMMUTING A SENTENCE

That’s 10 hours at work. It doesn’t include my commute. I get up about 6:30 each morning to get myself and sometimes my son ready to go. I drive him 30 minutes or so — sometimes more if traffic is being a dick — to school. Then I drive to work from there, which is another 25-30 minutes. I drive a minimum of 90 minutes each work/school day.

Kiddo is off school this Friday — I feel like he just had a day off… oh wait, he did on the 9th! — so he’s staying with his dad that day. I will get up and take him there instead of school, and then head to work.

END OF THE ROAD

That’s all I’ve got tonight.