Life's been odd lately.  Deaths, mourning, relationship problems among those around us, and the leaving of our interim pastor.  "Everything changes, nothing changes back." 

Public thanks to incandescens , stark_black , bellumina  and shadowgirl1605  for helping me out when I wasn't nearly at my best.  *laughter*  I've been moody, cranky, unable to sleep.  The medication side effects I've alleviated by taking it earlier in the evening.  I get the full 12 hours on either side, and I can always do it when Jet goes to sleep, so by the time I go to sleep I can now sleep.  So that's to the good, and I'm breathing and thankful for all the breaths I'm now aware of.  I'm picking up tai chi again just to enjoy the depth of breath, and it's helping me with the other things, again.  Probably a bit like yoga for others.

There's two quotes for this week.  "Disciples know themselves as distinctive, peculiar people bearing the inner mark of character and the outer mark of compassion." -- from my Disciples Biblical study workbook.  And "Compassion is the secret name of God." -- from The Saving Jesus workshop.

We spent the morning eating cinnamon rolls and then Jet and I ran off to Hobby Lobby to get more book materials. *laughter*

We're mildly obsessed.

We bought some elastic for closing the books, thin ribbon for a bookmark if we want to add them, multicolored thread for sewing the books together, and some candles for the beeswax for waxing the thread. I bought a few more needles for the class, so that everyone who wanted to sew could.

Then we found out that the scrapbooking section of the store was having a 50% off sale on *all* decorative paper. Oops.

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I had a really full day today, and I'm not getting around to another chapter. I'm MAKING the time tomorrow, come hell or high water or even the Kings of Israel...

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I'm just kind of cranky... tired from that time of the month and lots of things happening and the dying time is upon us again. The summer end and fall seems to be the time when not only the leaves die, but it's been kind of prominent this year for those I know. No one close to me, but lots of friends and acquaintances and other folks in the church as well who are having people die and/or getting injured or otherwise hospitalized.

So I'm kind of depressed and tired. But I try to do what I can and sometimes that seems kind of weird, too. The dreams class ends next week, but the Christian Education Board asked me to ask the folks if we could just keep it going until the end of the year, and so I talked with folks. They'd like to, but we need to talk with one of the members that couldn't make it today, so we'll just wait a bit, but it's likely we'll continue.

The funny thing is that I'm reading Exodus and watching Moses repeatedly say, "You can't mean me... you should really get someone else..." and equating that to the likelihood that I'm likely to own the class, so far as being responsible for keeping it going and NOT responsible for all the content thereof. You can't mean me... *laughter*. Or maybe you can. We'll see.

I've been so tired even when I have had a good inkling about my dreams in the morning I haven't had the energy to pick up the pen and write them down, so, of course, they melt off even as the butter melts on the waffles John made for us. So, at least, I got waffles for breakfast. *laughter*.

Baseball has provided me some relief. The Rockies, this year, have been pretty incredible to watch for nearly all of September and October as well. I can't say I'm a fan, as I really didn't follow them much when they weren't on this streak. But I can say that I've been enjoying watching them play, especially with Arizona. I still have very fond memories of Randy Johnson, and having him out on the injuries has made it even easier to enjoy the games.

Having the Red Sox trying for AL slot again is fun, too.

It's interesting to realize that I love the slow pace of baseball. I think I always have ever since I started keeping score cards for my sister's softball teams. The coach asked if anyone could keep score for him, and I started doing it to help him out, but I kept doing it. I did it for four years at Caltech for the baseball team there, and whenever I really want to get into a game, I get out the old scorekeeping book and start marking balls, strikes, and where hits were hit and get back into the rhythm of the game, seeing the defensive setups.

The odd part is that I love soccer and hockey, too, with their give and go flow. I can get lost into those, too. I'm not actually sure I care who wins or loses, though it would be fun to see the Rockies and/or the Red Sox in the World Series. I am likely to watch the World Series no matter who is playing.

Church was a mad house this morning, a guest preacher that is a returning pastor for this church from in the 70's! My. Lots of treats and kids and general chaos. Then Jet got invited to someone's house for most of the afternoon, and John ran off to do the Crop Walk with his mentor in the confirmation classes, so I had the house to myself for a chunk of the afternoon.

The rain helped. It rained all day today and most of the evening yesterday and that's helped my energy levels in a lot of ways. That felt very good, and has helped clean the air so I'm hoping my allergies will be better for a bit. We'll see...

I watched the last three episodes of Fruits Basket again and the rain was helpful in that as well. Storm states. I especially love, in the last episode, where Shigure, the older guy in charge of their part of the family, explains carefully to Tohru, the girl, why she should not do what she has asked to do and she says, "Hai" quite cheerfully. And in the very next scene, they're all doing what it was that she wanted to do and was warned from doing. I think that is my favorite thing of all. *laughter*

I think Tohru is also the kind of leader I'd want to be, too. She says she doesn't deserve it, either... and maybe I get her worries and thoughts and, eventually, her actions more than I get Moses. *laughter*...

Three down, a few more to go...

( And homemade ice cream to boot! )

Pain is a weird thing. Especially pain that I feel helpless to avoid or fix. It's definitely making me feel more depressed and unhappy with everything.

I had a great day for most of yesterday. Nothing hurt when I got up. I had a really fun morning with Jet.

Jet started by wanting an Ant Farm. He'd seen a friend with an ant farm from the Discovery Channel Stores, and really wanted one for himself. So we went to the local toy store and peered around at all their bug paraphenelia, but there was nothing cheap enough that he really wanted. He had $20 he'd saved from saving all his allowances for the last month and from picking raspberries for Granny, but that wasn't quite enough for the really good ant farm he saw. Plus that farm didn't have the transparent ant ladders on the sides, so he wasn't sure he wanted that, either.

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We've been having a rough time the last couple of days with schedules and other things, and my newly crowned tooth isn't showing any appreciation for it's new brand of royalty. At all. It's been hurting a lot the last couple of days. Not a lot more than when I first got it, but enough that I'm having to really use a lot of coping skills with it that I would rather not have.

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After a night on ibuprofen, my mouth is back to at least a semblance of normality, though chewing is still something of a chore.

That, plus the fact that we had nearly a quart of ice cream mix from last Friday prompted me to go to Target. I'd been thinking of the Krups Le Glacier, but it's been discontinued, and John did a little research and found out that there was a Hamilton Beach machine that looked compact and solid enough to be useful for ice cream. It has an electric motor on it, so Jet could just turn it on and watch it work, so I decided to go and get it for myself, since I was feeling badly. Yeah, so I do shopping therapy, too.

I got it. Jet made ice cream the next day and he was so happy to watch it churn and freeze solid and then get Puffy! The thing beat enough air into it to double the volume, easily. And John thinks and I agree, that the barrel hadn't gotten cold enough, as it didn't freeze hard enough to stop the motor. So we had very, very airy ice cream.

The local dairy (no hormones, no antibiotics unless the animal is actually sick, and they say the milk was collected within 24 hours of delivery and it's been so fresh it lasts forever in those reused and reused glass bottles) will now deliver pints of half and half!! I think we're going to have quite a bit more ice cream this summer. *grin*

Oddly enough, even with my aches and pains and stuff, I am actually happy today. The temporary crown seems to be working okay. The *gums* are sore back there, but then that's where the dentist put a BIG HOLE with his novecain needle, so I'm not that surprised. The temp crown is working okay with careful chewing, but I'm trying, mostly, to stay off it until the gum is back up to snuff. But I've done what I can. And there isn't anything left to really worry about. So I'm good, on the most part, and, just maybe, the pain was a good recalibrater of what's now "good".

I finished spinning 8 ounces of wool in something close to fingering weight. But it might be a bit too fine, all in all, sigh, but so it is. I may just have to double it back on itself to get a good sock weight, but I should try it before deciding. I still hate being *too* fine for sock yarn, but maybe I should just to a lace leg and upper with it and just do a double strand across the bottom of the foot each time? I'll have to think about it. Lots of work that last.

I also finished the dark rainbow yarn. I need to take pictures.

I'm also into the third color of yarn on the phoenix, still six more to go, but I'm actually doing the feet of the bird! Soon the wing tips! Woohoo! I bought more red from Shuttles, Spindles, and Skeins, and the needles that didn't work out I returned and bought some really expensive Mountain Colors sock yarn. I really wanted to do socks, somehow, and my sock needles are in Seattle. It's all on the packing table, so that's to the good.

Jet and I found the first two Avatar DVDs that I'd bought a long time ago. We watched them and Jet now wants to see a lot more. "Not as bloody as Rave Master," was the first thing he said about it, but then followed up,"I *love* the Avatar." So I'll follow this more closely for him, and I know that RightStuf has sales on the DVDs once in a while. I'm just afraid that I can only get ALL the Season 1 DVDs and can't just pick up the ones I need... I'll have to look more.

I think I'm a bit lost at the moment. Since we've lost Jet's school schedule and structure (school ended at the end of May), there is very, very little structure anymore to our days. I've been losing track of the days since I stopped working, but now there isn't even any real reason to figure out which day it *is* anymore... and it's a bit wacky.

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I love my husband, and it's a very good thing, too.

On Tuesday, I broke out the worst I have in my memory, I got six pimples all at the SAME TIME...

... and John says, "Ooohhh... under a little stress, hm?"

Grrrr...

I hate these things. I clean like a maniac, I try to avoid chocolate around PMS time, and ONLY when I'm under stress anyway, there it goes... and I'm trying everything under the sun from Lush's herbalism to Origin's Spot Remover to contemplating those damned medicated pad thingy's again. I'm NOT a teenager, damnit.

Ahem.

Yes. It is actually an excellent indicator of when I'm under stress. Only a spouse can get away with pointing that out, though. *grin*

Yeah... I can finally admit that the whole transition thing has been really, really stressful and I have to give myself some time and room and pampering to recover. Jaw aches, back aches, and I'm not getting the sleep I really need. I'll deal...

It's been kind of insane the last few days. A Goodbye lunch on Monday, meetings every minute on Tuesday, and then on Wednesday it was all meetings and then a release party for lunch and bowling after, and then meetings every minute until 5pm.

I got a moment of calm in the evening when John gently shoo'ed me off to the knitting group. I knit and talked with the lady a lot. It was good. At one point she said, "Wow, you must have a lot of conflicting emotions now."

Wow. Yeah.

Ending and beginnings, figuring out what I am if I'm not working. Seeing more of how people value me along with seeing how I get replaced so completely. It's weird. Not good or bad, it all just is and there's a lot of stuff just happening, and lots of emotions getting triggered from it all, which are not all good or bad, they mostly just are. Some regret, some joy, some laughter, some sadness, some glee, some anger, some frustration, and some feeling of having failed by not doing everything I'd *wanted* to do and seeing some of those things really being taken over by others that do it in ways I wouldn't have. Which isn't a bad thing, as some of the other approaches are better than what I would have attempted.

At the moment it's 1.2° F (-17° C). The highs around here have been in the teens and lows have been a bit below zero without wind chill, with wind chill it's down around -16° F (-27° C).

It's not Minnesota or the East Coast. They're actually having warmer weather there than we are. Hmph. We usually have warmer weather than they do and it's just a bit weird to have snow so fine and dry that the only way to get it off the sidewalks is to use either a squeegie or a push broom. It's powder fine and even after a few days on the ground it still crunches under the feet.

It definitely is cold enough that my body *knows* it'll die if I stay out there much. But Jet seems to ignore it cheerfully in order to kick and push every single bit of snow he can find. Boys. *laughter*

It's been about this cold since Thursday afternoon, on Thursday you could watch the thermometer just start to drop down and down and down. Wednesday was in the 50's and we were thawed enough we could actually see a bit of ground between the white and a bit of black top right in front of the house. But about an inch or so fell on Friday, half an inch the night before Saturday, and then another two or three inches today. Powdery fine stuff. Excellent if we were a ski resort, but we're not!! Hmph.

It is beautiful, though.

( And for something completely different... )

My God. It was actually out and out and completely sunny today. Unexpectedly, gloriously, completely sunny today. Hot and amazing and beautifully sunny.

It even started that way after a pretty cuttingly cold night, the humidity in the air made it far colder than I thought it would be, but the blankets were enough to get by. But when I finally awakened, after ignoring my bladder for longer than I thought I could, I got dressed and put together and Waltr was out making cinnamon rolls for everyone. Wow. I trotted off on the long trip to the bathroom and then came back to orange flavored cinnamon rolls out of the Dutch oven and coffee. Coffee that John had made in the vacuum flask with our drip maker. Hee. Yay!

That was a fantastic way to start the day. I'll admit that the hard cushions of our van bed really made their impression on my hips and back, it wasn't that great, but with a bit of food and plenty of stretching I was okay for the day, which involved, mostly, going out to the beach and digging in the sand. :-)

Cathie had had to leave in the early pre-dawn morning to go to work. She wouldn't be back until Tuesday and we missed her.

Jet and John and I mostly just went out on the beach and dug all day. I built a bunch of stuff.

Jet found brine shrimp in the sand, thousands of them. There was a section of sand at the right depth or something, and when the waves came in the brine shrimp would leap up from the sand, swim around in the water while it lasted. Jet could see them all in the water and catch them on his hand and gently show them to me. When he or the waves deposited them high and dry on the sand, they would burrow in under the surface.

I found that if I stepped on the sand they were buried under, the sand would wiggle under my feet, and my feet would sink into the sand. When I lifted my foot, there would be a brief puddle, and the shrimp would come up into the water for the brief moment it was there, and then bury themselves back into the sand as the water drained away. It was odd to see them flash up like that and then down again. Jet loved seeing them and digging for them and picking them up only to put them back into the surf.

We stopped for lunch for a while and put lots of sunscreen on as half our crew was sunburnt from just the morning. Jet said he wasn't hungry but then devoured the food we put in front of him. Then we all went out again, picked a different spot and dug in deep.

I'd gotten braver and thought a bit about what I wanted to do and build a high tower with curved walls to either side circling in from the arched entry way. It was fun to see it happen. Then I remembered something in the book and wondered if it would work.

I swirled the sand and water until it was all flowing, got a double handful and started passing it from hand to hand. When it had drained a little, I added half handfuls of dry sand at a time to the outside of the handful and, eventually, I had a sand ball. It was dense, heavy and solid, and Jet yelled, "CANNONBALL!" when I handed him one and he launched it in the direction of the waves. I made several more, set some of them on the sand to dry and harden and drain a bit from its contact with the sand, and eventually I topped the tower with a series of sandballs that looked unnatural. :-) One doesn't think of sand staying in the shape of a snowball the way snow does.

A family with three girls came up to look at the castle and admire it, and Jet said it was the ice cream castle. I liked that name. I asked them if they wanted a sand ball and they nodded shyly. So I handed them one. John made another one and Jet another for them, so they had a set. Jet took to shaping them so naturally it surprised me, but he got good ones, too.

Jet happily put a bunch of balls into the sea, too. Ones that were set aside for him. He felt that he could knock over the castle too, but John did his level best to persuade him to not to while I went to get a camera before Hurricane Jet did it's destructive best.

I got pictures. But by then Jet was uninterested in knocking it down, he was far more interested in flinging handfuls of sand into the sea.

Eventually, I took Jet to the showers and got him cleaned up and all the uncomfortable sand washed away. That was very useful indeed. :-) He cleaned up nice and warm from the hot water, and I dried him off, dressed him and when we got back there was a taco dinner underway. Jet ate four shells with cream cheese and furikake. The rest of us had, essentially, taco salad in shells. There was lots of good salad and some refried beans and taco seasoned beef.

While dinner was being served, I thought I'd try out my Visor for journal entries, and when it complained about low batteries, I took out the old batteries and put in new and the darn thing spazzed on me. This new one keeps spazzing out whenever I replace the batteries, unlike my old, faithful, original Visor which never complained about a voltage change of any kind. So I may well just go back to my rubber baby buggy of a Visor and at least HAVE all my data when I need it.

I now have no contact data other than what was in my cellphone. I am unhappy about that.

When dinner was done and the hot chocolate came out the mosquitos came out, too. John slathered Jet while I slathered myself with the non-DEET stuff that's now out. But by the time Jet wanted to go to bed the stuff had decayed enough that it wasn't working anymore. So the mosquitoes, after the warm day, swarmed us. Jet got five big bites on his face, neck, behind the ears, and in the van one landed on his cheek while he was whimpering at it, and got him there. Thank goodness West Nile hasn't made it this far. Sigh. I was upset. Jet was upset. John tried to calm us down without making us more upset. We finally cleared the van of all the bugs and John read to Jet.

Then I nursed him and he fell asleep, but when we tried to put him up, even as tired as he was, he cried and cried. This time I explained to him that he had to help us put him into the sleeping bag when he was done, and that worked well enough in his near term memory that when he realized we were putting him in again, he tried to help and he fell deeply asleep in his sack.

This night was unbelievably cold for me, and I ended up on John's half of the van, nearly on top of him as he was actually a heat source. I was amazed that it got that cold even in our insulated space, and Jet didn't notice a thing and said that he slept really well, woke up once, turned over and went back to sleep. He said that the sleeping bag made it so that he could sleep all night long. Yay for all night!!

Last night, Jet suddenly came up to me and said, "Mom, I really want the breakfast that we had on Christmas morning."

"You want cinnamon rolls?"

"Yeah. Cinnamon rolls. Can I help make them?"

So we spent a chunk of the evening throwing things into the mixer, kneading, and rising. He had to go to bed before the dough had done the first rise, and I shaped as John read Jet his stories.

This morning I had the 7:30 radiology appointment, so I was up at 6:15, showered, and John happened to wake up then anyway, so he put the rolls into the oven. I had enough time to get myself a latte, but then I was off to the hospital.

They did another shot of the left side, and then an ultrasound to be thorough. There's a cyst and a lymph node in an odd place, both are entirely benign, but both made the mammogram denser in that area than they'd expected. So no problems. Yay! Thanks, rmd, you were entirely correct. I'm glad my radiologists are that thorough.

By the time I was done with all that, I had ten minutes until the beginning of my boss's offsite. So I called John to bring me a couple of cinnamon rolls to work, and then headed right to work instead of home.

It's been interesting. The cinnamon rolls are very comforting, in the midst of this.

I'm hurting.

My left big toe got smashed when I tried playing indoor soccer in my walking sneaker and I didn't tighten the laces before going out on the field. My first plant and turn and kapow, my left big toe had a smashed and bent nail. This is the same toe that got smashed over and over again up on Bromley in Vermont, and it was just starting to grow out. It swelled up that night so that all the layers of it were way too obvious, and the toe has remained swollen for a few days. This morning was the first morning I could put a sock on, and given that it was 12° F (-9° C) out this morning, it was a good thing, too.

We went to the Rec. Center last night, too, and the water was okay on my toe; but in the midst of riding the current of the Lazy River and doing the big tube slide (I had fun singing a *loud* note of "COoooooooooold!" in the part of the tube that went outside the building) I pulled something in my right shoulder, and it is now killing me.

Luckily I have a massage tonight.

Jet was the one that asked to go to the Rec. Center. We haven't been for a few months between a lot of different reasons, but John's been riding the bike every night and he's lost a good deal of weight. All to the good.

Loved it. Lots. Quirky, crazy humor and "action fantasy" galore. And, wow, about the Depp character. More than I had hoped it would be with the inclusion, on the DVD of Robert Rodriguez talking about how film is dead, showing off his home studio for digital movies, and the whole ten minute lesson on how to shoot flicks. It's pretty amazing. Made me think, a lot of "Six String Samuri" and how much easier and cheaper it would be to do now.

Now I want to make movies of games I've been in. Not star in 'em, but just make 'em, plot 'em, shoot 'em, score and chop chop chop with my viewpoint and sense of what's beautiful.

Technology's the easy part for me, the pumping back up of the artistic side of me is the hard thing, especially while I'm burning out about people. There's a really respected technical writer that was in one of my classes in the last week, and my mug came back from Crack Pots and she peered at it, "Hmm... artistic and technical. You should be very, very scary..."

But I'm not. I am, however, burning out. When I have four scarves to make for Jet's teachers and I'm dreaming of burning scarves being rescued by Harry's friends it's kind of funny. But when I'm doing a 'simple' six-step chocolate torte and don't even LOOK for the eggs until I realize I'm missing some, that's bad. This is a torte I've made several times and it's drop dead simple, melt chocolate and butter together, add some flavorings, separate four eggs (I messed up one white/yolk yeesh I never do that), beat the yolks with sugar and the chocolate and a few tablespoons of flour and nut meal, whip the whites with acid and sugar, and then fold together and bake. I was ready to throw the whole thing out by step three, and I'm never that way with chocolate.

Okay, so John has the kitchen sink out and I can not use a kitchen sink, just the laundry room tub. Okay, my arms and shoulders hurt from all the scarves (the teachers loved the scarves, and Jet loved handing them out to everyone). Okay, it's already nearly 9:30 and Jet's supposed to be going to bed. Okay...

But I don't think that would have afffected me without the work burnout, too. I did just do it. I am now done with the cake and it looks pretty good. Two pumpkin pies in the morning, and another day without the sink, but that does mean we get to go out to eat. Not a terrible deal.

What is terrible, though, is realizing that if I keep my job the way it is I'm going to be so burnt out on people that I won't be able to go to Cons. I've been making excuses that involve Jet the last few years, but I'm realizing, now, that I've hit a hard line where it's just HARD for me to go out on a limb and meet new people and be pleasant and try and accomidate their expectations of me. It's really hard to even be as friendly and energetic as I usually am, and harder yet to stay away from cynacism and real depression about people. It's weird.

But I'm pretty sure that so long as I'm working the way I've been working my introverted bits are being so darn starved I'm not going to be good for much other than meeting up with people I know and whom I know I am not going to disappoint. That was good on my trip to Carl's, as that fulfilled that in spades. I loved that, but Cons are going to be harder for me.

Okay, okay, so doing movies would involve people, too. But I can dream, can't I?

We spent most of today just staying at home. Jet and I, at least. John went out to Home Depot and bought a new kitchen sink. Hee. I admire him.

Last night John and I had an evening out without Jet. Jet and I had done a few errands during the day and he was pretty tired, but he went to Mikayla's for the evening, as we'd had Mikayla on Wednesday and Dean was great about payback. So Jet went over there to play with the kids while John and I went to Hanna Sushi, the new Japanese restaurant in town up on Main street. It was quite good. I think it's an expansion branch of the same place in Boulder. High prices for Japanese food seems the norm around here. Teriyaki for $12 a plate. Yeesh. But the tonkatsu was delicately crisp and still had tender meat. The soft-shell crab appetizer had two crabs on the plate and they were delicately seasoned and lovely and crisp. The sushi was good and fresh and the salads were small. The miso soup was good and hot. The vegetables, even at the beginning of winter, was lovely and ripe. So it was a good experience. We'll likely go back there again and drag the lunch-bunch with us.

After dinner, we hit the Snowy Mountain Creamery for ice cream and then went to Luna's for drinks. The lady there told us that they'd stopped doing the frequent buyer cards, which is sad.

Today Jet and I did a lot of negotiation about eating, and he refused to eat just about anything. He was also a little sad, last night, about us not being there, and Dean said that some of it was because Jet was so tired. I could believe that. Still... I am getting a stronger connection for the theory and Jet's eating habits might go spare whenever he's uncertain about things.

He spent most of today in the basement, playing with toys, watching video games while John and I played, and doing some cartoons in the afternoon. John and I got a few things done around the house, and I read Going Postal by Pratchett. It is good. Pratchett just seems to be getting better and better all the time. I loved the protagonist's "people skills" as they're surprisingly like what I now do. Management through knowing too much about human nature. But the plot is sweet, the solution non-obvious, and the characters are, as usual, amazingly fun. Good stuff to think about and chase the other things out of my brain.

I am... depressed, mildly. PMS plus the crash after a big class and learning a lot and panicking about applying it. So it is. I'll get over it.

Jet needed someone with him for most of the day, then around 3:30 he climbed into the rocking chair and fell fast asleep. He really seemed to need it. He woke up enough when I came over to demand that I pick him UP, and so I did and rocked him back to sleep and tried to lay him down three times before I was finally successful.

Dinner was teriyaki short ribs plus the haigamai I'd bought when in San Jose. It's just short grained rice with the germ still attached, no bran. A little more nutritious then just white rice, but not by too much more. It was enough to bring Jet out of his nap, and he ate half a bowl of rice. Not nearly as much as he usually does, but it was something. He'd also had a really loose stool today, so I suspect he has a gut bug and he doesn't want to eat much for a reason beyond my mental models.

I got to sleep in until 8:30, which was very nice, but I'd been up with work scenarios buzzing through my head, which isn't good. So I'm still at a standstill so far as sleep. I should get more... I'll have the week, that will be nice.

John did make Scottish oat cakes tonight, and they're delicious. Crisp and buttery with just a bit of oat chew to them from the Scottish cut oats. Pretty delicious way to get your whole grain, I guess. Yum. I need to concentrate on things like that.

The Katrina news is wiping me out. Safe and sound at home, it's still too much for me, in ways I hadn't expected. I'm responding with old reflexes, old ways of dealing, old ways of hiding, and mostly reading, reading, reading fiction and playing a lot with Jet. I'm just reading and knitting and avoiding the stupid sensationalist media. It's making it hard to deal with my real life in many ways. Though it now makes my way of dealing with stress something less funny.

There was a time when I often said, "Well, no one I know died today, that makes it a good day." A way to keep my perspective. Now, eventhough I don't know the folks that are dying, it doesn't make it a good day, at all. I wonder if Bush will ever ask folks to fly flags at half mast for all those anonymous deaths?

I'll follow a couple of blogs, now, and that's enough for me. The metroblogging in N.O. has been anything other than sensationalist, trying to just spell out what they can, including an "I'm okay" site. I get plenty of sensation from interdictor who just refuses to leave. But that's more than enough for me.

( My more soothing details of the day. )

Around April, I made myself an allowance for each month. Like an old-fashioned kid allowance it's the money I get to spend on the things that I, alone, wish to have. Health items (including massage therapy), food for home meals (excluding my coffee bean and tea leaf addictions), etc. don't count. Scrapbooking ate up nearly all of my August allowance, and it's been worth it. The allowance has been good because it's money I can spend without feeling guilty about it and it's a low enough allowance I have no business feeling guilty about giving it to myself each month. I've even had some folks peer at me for limiting myself this way, but, before this I was spending things either guiltily or through being angry that nothing we were getting was for me. I much prefer knowing and having complete control over something I can't be guilty about.

Two major projects have been stressing me a lot this month. One was a series of interviews that most folks didn't want to do, but agreed should be done. The other was a presentation I had to give today to my boss' boss's staff.

I have figured out that I don't want to get promoted again if it means working, politically, at that level. What's really scary is that after I did the presentation, my boss offered to let me manage Yet Another Group. Aieee...

Folks seemed to appreciate it even at that level. My boss has said that I did a great job, even under fire I kept my cool and was helpful and knowledgeable and did what was next. I still feel wrung out, though. Enough so that I might just add another $25 to my allowance for the month, simply for getting it done and it was "harder than the average bear" things I do. Yes, $25 is a significant enough increase I'd feel good about it. It's nice to have a way to reward myself for hard stuff, and I can get a lot of my digital photos printed with that. :-)