Ooh La La - Guster's Newest release

No secret, I love me some Guster. Everyone on earth knows this. This is a banner day/week/month/season/era for Guster and fans.

Yesterday they announced their ninth studio album release, Ooh La La. Their last album was released in 2019 before the world kind of fell off its axis a little bit. I've been waiting for this for a long time. 

Over the past year(s) they've been playing two songs, Wishing Tree and Black Balloon. Neither of which I've really liked, except when they were with the Pittsburgh Symphony, and the intro and outro by the orchestra was just next level beautiful and brought a real depth to the song. 

With the album release announcement, they put two more songs out into the world. Keep Going, and All Day, as well as an official music video for Keep Going.  

Now. I love me some Guster all day every day. The last album, Look Alive, took me a long time to like. I needed to hear acoustic versions of the synthy slick highly produced songs to really start to love the tunes. It happened. I did get there. 

I think the same thing is going to happen with this album. It's going to take me some time. 

This particular song has some really good "Gustery" lyrics, such as: 

Well the world brought us here
If we let it now all good things reappear 
It's ok I'm alright It's ok I'm alright
Keep going
Keep going
To the light...

Keep going, indeed. 

One of my fellow facebook group friends posted that this song is helping her deal with the grief of her father's very recent death. Until someone said that, I just kind of felt "meh" about this tune but I started really thinking about how all songs have meaning to different people when they come out, and they are met in that place by the music. I hadn't thought of it that way. 

And I thought of people who need to be encouraged to Keep Going. 

It feels like another Guster church hymn to me in some ways, like Hang On has always felt to me. I just got chills thinking about it. 

An additional ponder: With my first listen or two, this song and others recently released are "Ryan Miller" songs, and not Guster songs. 

I don't hate it, I'm not mad, but I do feel like there is a lot missing from the presentation. 

I miss Adam's voice being in the forefront of things, it has been a very long time since they put out a song where he's singing lead. It feels too overproduced, noisy. I felt that way about so much of Look Alive, so I feel like we're all going along with them in this "era." The synthpop era. We've moved far far away from the bibbity bobbity bongos and two guitars, three part in the round harmony things.

Every band moves through their changes and growth, this I know. They're even calling this tour "We Also Have Eras," a nod to the lovely Taylor Swift there. 

But I do kind of feel like my ears are being left behind, my heart is not being spoken to. Not like Easy Wonderful or Ganging Up On The Sun did for me and those were kind of the last overall "everything on this album is awesome" releases for me.

But like I said, I do not hate it. I just need to sit with it for a while. I need to analyze this era. I need to just, you know. Be with it. 

It's okay, I'm alright. It's okay, I'm alright. 

The official album release date isn't until May 17th, but at the March 30th show, that's the CD release party. It'll be my second Guster CD Release Party - I went to the Ganging Up On The Sun one at a Boston Harbor Cruise a bajillion years ago. 

I'll probably buy a copy of the CD because I do want to hear the other tracks. There are not that many. It's not a hugely packed album. 

And I am for sure looking forward to hearing what these songs sound like live on stage. 

Here's me and the aforementioned Mr. Ryan Miller on the Boston harbor Booze Cruise CD Release boat. June 2006. 

Geoff wanted to go with me on this excursion, but it was 21+ because, you know, booze cruise. So Doug came with. I told Ryan that Geoff wanted to be there, and he waved to the camera and said "oh hi Geoff" and other nice things. I think he wished him a good day. Sorry you couldn't be here, kind of messaging. 

Digits, below. 

digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps.  15 min. indoor walk (dedicated 10+5) 5500+steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

9:15am: 181
5pm: 171
9:45pm: 195

food:
coffee/water
11:30am: 2 egg omelet w/goat cheese, wilted spinach, red onion. Metformin
1pm: tuna sandwich on 15 grain bread
2pm: the rest of the tuna salad
6:30pm: tater tots (Doug made fish sandwiches but feh, I didn't like them so I took a bite and didn't finish)
8pm: large bowl of greek yogurt w/blueberries
red wine+diet ginger ale

Just the digits

No real entry today, I'm off to bed. Better more fun entry tomorrow, I promise.
Here's a picture of Toffee Beans. Her toe beans are 90x as big as anyone else's She's a beast. 

digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps. no dedicated 10 indoors or out. 5k+ steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

8:30am: 157
4:30pm: 156
10pm: 182

food:
coffee/water
10:30am: 15 grain bread w/peanut butter
12:30pm: Metformin, left over fajita chicken mixed with cream cheese for chicken salad
6:30pm: mushroom tortellini, sauce, homemade chicken nuggets, piece of garlic bread
7:30pm: metformin+jardiance
shiraz

Trash Panda

First, a moment of silence. A long time ago Doug bought a little 4 piece set of cheese spready knife dealies of these wee hula girls. We have two left but today, we have one. 

I encourage my family to not put utensils in the right side of the sink, because that's where the dish disposal is. Well. Today I broke my own rule and ended up destroying one. 

RIP cute hula girl spready knife dealie. You were good with my peanut butter and apple snacks. 

On my walk last night, I passed a trash barrel with an interesting feature. There was a tall wooden carved raccoon sticking out of the top. 

Huh. 

Interesting?

An actual Trash Panda. 

I pulled it out and carried its heavy ass home. 

Now, I'm not usually the one in our family picking stuff out of other people's trash barrels. Doug is. Doug is the king of side of the road trash discoveries. We have bookcases, and a Stickley Chair (we think it is real, not a fake/copy) so maybe Stickley style. There are no stickers on it so we don't know if it is authentic but it looks it. 

Anyway, Doug finds stuff, Doug brings stuff home. We decide if it is decent. We either keep it or trash it after second thoughts. 

But this time, I couldn't walk past a tall raccoon statue and not bring him home. 

He has pants on, yo. And his tail is super cute. 

In order to take some pictures of him this morning, Iput him on the back patio table. This scared my dog out of her fucking MIND when she came around the corner. I knew she'd be a little astonished but did NOT expect an outright panic. 

And of course, I laughed.

So he needs an identity and a permanent spot. I want to get the back patio fun-ready after spending a little time out there with the fire pit the other day. 

The Raccoon will be a welcome buddy. Here are some pictures. 

digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps. Dedicated 10 in the house while cooking dinner/Doug went to pick up the car. Extra 15 min pokemon walk. 7300+steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

8:30am: 136
4:30pm: 164
10pm: 150

food:

coffee, water
11:30: grilled swiss, roast beef, red pepper hummus on the 15 grain bread. Metformin
1:30: apple w/pb
3pm: celery stick w/pb
6:30pm: chicken fajita mess & topings, in a bowl, no fajita wrap, avocado. Metformin+jardiance
8pm: pretzels. red wine

Even though I did not want it

Doug didn't buy any low carb bread ("they didn't have it, sorry") or lettuce and tomatoes for salads ("oops, I forgot"). So right now without a working car, we are a little bit stuck. 

I stood in front of a very full refrigerator, and just languished. What the hell can I eat in here? Hardly anything. There was a stack of leftovers, and my family is not good at eating leftovers so I looked them over and they were no good, so out they went. 

Sigh.

I had toast. He has a loaf of 15 grain bread and a beautiful loaf of sourdough. He made a grilled havarti and roast beef sandwich for himself, and it looked and smelled beautiful. 

But I wasn't going to do that.

Lately, the past several days, my blood sugar has been a lot lower than usual. I had several zero carb days and was super proud of that. Last night I forgot to record that I had some pretzels (22 pretzels, 20 grams of carbs) with pub cheese, and got up this morning to a much higher than wanted reading. 

Booo. 

So no. Those two pieces of 15 grain bread were super nice but I'm not going to try and have more. 

I found some bacon in the fridge, thin bacon that will crisp up very nicely. Lamented the no lettuce no tomatoes situation, and no BLT salad. 

Decided that just eating 5 slices of bacon my themselves wasn't like, a good culinary decision I should make for myself. That seems lazy. So I opted to make an omelet. Out of fresh mushrooms, out of spinach, no shredded cheese. But we had a block of Monterrey Jack and I sliced it up so it would be melty sizes. Not in the mood to get out the cheese grater for such a small task. 

I found some avocado dip in the fridge. Oh this will help. 

And I built a hell of an omelet that I didn't even want. 

Doug took Toffee for a ride up to the garage to drop our car off and walk back with her. The walk is about a mile and a half, so after I finished my last meeting, I put salmon in the oven and took myself for an almost mile walk. Not quite. Still a good one, and met them on the way back. 

Dinner was much better than trying to come up with something for lunch. 

Anyway, that's about it for today. Tomorrow I have a fun surprise! No picture today though.

Digits below.

 

digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps. Dedicated 27 minutes, almost 1 mile. about 7k+steps by dinner

blood glucose:

8am: 197
5:30pm: 177
10pm: 154

food:

coffee, water
10am: 2 slices of 15 grain bread w/peanut butter
11am: Metformin
1pm: 2 egg omelet w/Monterrey jack cheese, 4 slices of bacon, avocado salsa
6:30pm: salmon w/mixed veggies
7pm: metformin+jardiance

Shoulda been a brewery day

 Yesterday when we were plotting out what we were going to do, Doug noted that one of our favorite breweries near where we were going was doing a "Mean Girls" themed drag show/brunch. "That's just not what I have in mind for fun. It won't be fun," says he. 

Feeling a little like, huh. This is interesting. Is Doug showing a side of intolerance I didn't know he had (I know he has some, trust me, he does). 

That's a touch closed minded, thought I. So I said "or, it could be the most fun you've ever had." 

"Not if it is "Mean Girls" themed," he replied. "I'll take one without the other, thank you." 

Alrighty then. There we go. That's what I would hope for and expect. Open to seeing a thing that you've never seen, and then later you can develop opinions on it. But I absolutely understand the "no thanks, Mean Girls" stance. 

With one car dead and the other possibly on the verge of overheating, we're not doing anything venture-wise today. But it would be a very good day to go to a brewery. Even with outdoor seating. It is chilly but no wind. Several good breweries we know and love have nice fire pit setups. One is closed "for the season" but today would be a nice day to be open, Landmade. But Lone Oak, Babycat, and Waredaca are sweet spots for outside even this time of year. I'm thankful for them being there. Especially want to get a yurt rental some one of these fine days at Lone Oak.

And today would have been super nice for such a fete. But. Ya know. 

With it being Sunday and we can't really make progress on getting things fixed up car-wise until morning. Hence, there is puttering around happening. I've got the dishwasher humming. The laundry is rolling, the bathroom is in progress. 

The bathmats are in the dryer, the shower mat is soaking in bleach and I'll scrub the tub next. Sink is scrubbed. Toilet and floor around the toilet - scrubbed. Lord help me, I think I need to start yelling at the boys about aim. This is ridiculous. When they aren't around, the toilet area is spotless and perfect. I sit to pee, after all. So c'mon guys. like, clean up after yourselves??? Jesesh.

I'm not sure what is up with this shower mat. I threw the last one out that we bought when we moved here and got this one and it gets gross FAST. And it leaves black circles and an outline in the shower in no time. The other one, never. I'm sorely disappointed. 

And I don't like these bath mats either. They're thin and stupid. I like the old one we had but after, oh, 6 years or more it started to fall apart. It was thick and fluffy and I washed it often. Probably what wore it out. 

I think I'll end up back at Target getting the same other ones we had. Lesson learned!

I played D&D at 3pm with my buddy Matt as game master and a bunch of other new people, and one I've played with before. I agreed to this time and thought "crap, what if we wanna go somewhere..." and here we are. Unable! So this is good. Good for me. We've played three times together and it is always a riot. Two hours went so fast.

Doug started a fire in the fire pit, and we went and sat out for a while, but it didn't want to stay going. The fire pit needs to be fully emptied and we need some good, dry kindling. But he didn't start it that way so a lot of newspaper met its death. It was nice while it lasted! 

So a low-key homebody kind of day. Could have done more but glad I did not do less. It's like that sometime. 

Here's the fire. Digits below.

digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps.  15 min 1/2 mile walk before dinner (pokemon, etc) 6200+ steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

9am: 180
4:45pm: 174
10:30pm: 195

food:

coffee, water
11:30: metformin; Big bowl of greek yogurt w/blueberries and a smidge of splenda.
2:15pm: Apple w/peanut butter
7pm: Metformin+jardiance; 2 frozen beef and bean burritos in a cheese/salsa/sour cream sauce that Doug whipped up.
Red wine
9pm: pretzels and pub cheese

Pasadena and the Swimmy Dog

I feel like we so rarely do a fun thing anymore. I ask Doug every weekend "do you want to so something today?" and a lot of times he says "you're looking at it." Then we do nothing, he takes a nap, I putter around the house and when he wakes up I am ready for a nap and he is ready for a walk. That is most every weekend.

Today I asked him the question, again. But this time he had a plan. "Let's go to a part of the state we've never been to." And he picked Fort Smallwood, up in Pasadena, MD.  Indeed, we've never been!

You might laugh at a place being called Pasadena and it not being California. I know I did when I found out one of my co-workers lived there (and I thought that must be a hell of a daily commute) But it is south of Baltimore, over on the Patapsco River, North of Annapolis and where the Chesapeake Bay comes together. Maybe it isn't so bad? 

There's another river there where everything is named after it - the Magothy, which our GPS pronounced "Maggoty" and that made it sound very unappealing. Maggoty Beach. ugh. No thanks? 

But no, the area is fantastic. I bet in the summertime this place is absolutely packed, and this park must be too. Doug wanted to go to the Fort and walk the entire area but more than half of it is closed for renovations - including the part where the fort is. You can't even just park in one of the open areas and walk in. Completely closed off. Thanks, website, for letting us know this. We may have gone someplace else. 

And we had to pay six bucks to get in. I actually was surprised Doug paid it, because he is usually super cheap. We bemoaned being charged to pay to go into a place we couldn't fully enjoy, but, we were not the only people there. Dozens of folks were enjoying the February day. Cold but no wind. We had a beautiful view from the pier and beaches to Baltimore. All the way to Baltimore beyond the Key Bridge. 

We enjoyed a wonderful long walk, and Toffee was extremely interested in the water. It's brackish, so I dissuaded her from drinking it, but she splashed and played and was overjoyed. She wanted to jump off the boat launch, and I thought if it was just a little warmer and we had towels, well heck. I'd let her. 

Phineas didn't enjoy swimming, and while Brodie sure did, we never really found a good good swimmy place for her but we didn't look too hard. She went several times in the Potomac River, off the C&O canal, when the water was not very swift and there were rocky outcroppings and places for her to wade and swim without getting swept to DC. We'll have to do some research.  

After our visit to the park, we went to another park to see if we could get a good and closer view of the water but they wanted another $6 and Doug said if he knew the parks were all charging admission, he would have come here first. Where nothing was closed. We drove for a while to see if we could just follow a road to a beach and everything is a gated community. We discovered that when we moved here and went on a little trip to the water. In Maryland, there are literally no open, public right of way accesses to the water. None. Everything is privately owned or a park that you pay admission for. Dummies.

So we decided we'd go to a brewery, like ya do. 

Hysteria Brewing has a taphouse in Pasadena, so we went there. We'd been to the location in Columbia, MD in the past, with Phineas. Dog friendly space, but no food. You can order from any of the restaurants in the plaza and that was our plan. Chill, have a beer, some wings, and Chill some more.

Toffee wasn't having it. There was another dog in the building and she wanted to go be with them, but we didn't want there to be a scene of any sort. So they were at one end of the taproom, we were at the other, and she was just acting a fool. Doug put her in the car so we could drink our beers, in peace. She sat in the front seat patiently. But we didn't want to stick around. We wanted to get home in the daylight.

See, on the way up there, our car started to overheat which was weird, what with it being February. 

Doug stopped at a gas station on "Maggoty Beach Road," and we got the machine filled with fresh coolant (it was very low) and a couple thingies of oil (it was low). Things were looking good, much better! Until we headed home, and it started again. We pulled over to let it cool down and hit the road again - hoping that the overheating wouldn't turn into complete overboiling. I held my breath and prayed. Breaking down is one thing. Breaking down with 3 large adults and a Pibbie is no fun. We'd never get a ride with a tow truck driver to a garage. So that would suck. So bad.

We made it home safe with the alert turning on and off. We couldn't really figure out why it would do that unless the water pump is on its way out. 

So now both cars have to go in. Fun. 

The car temp is behaving right now but we are not risking anything. Doug ran to the market when we got home, I made dinner. We'll deal with things Monday morning.

But here's Toffee enjoying getting her feet wet for the first time in the Patapsco. Looking forward to what will come for her in the future. I love having a potential swimmy dog! 

digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps. Dedicated 30+, over a mile and a half total. Good walk today! 7700+ steps by bedtime 

blood glucose:

9am: 174
5pm: 140
10pm: 167

food:

coffee, water
11am: metformin
12:30: 2 big celery sticks w/peanut butter
3pm: 1 beer at hysteria brewing
5:15pm: 2 left over Popeye's biscuits with butter
7:15pm: metformin+jardiance; 1 long piece of french bread pizza w/pepperoni (was only going to have half but I was super hungry!) 
vodka tonics

Oh Friday I love seeing you

 No real entry today just doing this to record the digits. I stacked myself in meeting after meeting today. And yesterday. I tried to knock off around 4:30 but then it was 5:30. I laid down and took a rest, but someone else also took a rest and his turned into a giant nap. 

So instead of schlepping to the grocery store to buy food that would take an hour to cook, I just went to Popeyes. Everyone else in the county had the same idea. But they were fast, and the food was hot and decent. No complaints. 

But wow, is take out expensive anymore. Jeeesh. 

This afternoon I talked to my former boss for about a half hour, she started her own company and she is a busy lady, doing all the things she does best. It was lovely to talk to her. She didn't try to recruit me for her company. 

I was partly sad about that but also relieved. Not sure she can pay me what I get where I am, but it sure would be fun working with her again. 

Anyway. The other highlight of today was watching Toffee play with a ball in her mouth, and two balls she was trying to pick up, but she was kicking them, and it was the height of ridiculousness. She dropped one of the balls in between the guest bed and the wall so we have to help her get that tomorrow. She's very sad about it being where it is. 

I warned her. I told her it would happen. But. The house hippo never listens.

Right then, publish then sleep. Tomorrow will hopefully be a little more fun and interesting. Digits down there 

digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps. No dedicated 10 - raining out. 5200+steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

8:30am: 145
6pm: 117
10:30pm: 160

food:

coffee, water
1pm: Metformin; tuna salad w/celery and butter lettuce
7:30pm: Metformin+jardiance, 4 pieces of popeye's chicken, some coleslaw, scoop of mashed potatoes
no alcohol, just water.

Mini Troubles

This morning Doug and I got up, dressed, and ready to take the Mini over to the garage for a front end alignment. It was in deep need. 

Only, it wouldn't start. Heck. 

I drove it a couple days ago, everything was fine. Didn't leave the lights on or anything silly. I always double/triple check that when I drive. Geoff drove the Dodge yesterday so he didn't do it. 

Bummer. 

For not-front end alignment stuff for the Mini we were going to a garage that now seems to be only tires. Tires only. All 4 bays filled with tires. I called this morning and no one is answering the phone. I called our usual place that does not work on Minis but does every other car we've ever had, and was on hold for a long time so I gave up. The two garages are owned by the same guy so I wanted to see if I could get the low down on what's up, and maybe find out if they have another recommendation. 

Not a lot of folks 'round here do Mini work, so we are disappointed if we've lost the one good joint in town. 

Doug said he thinks it is the alternator. I agree. We don't want to jump start it to have it not start tomorrow. Getting it fixed is important. 

The front end alignment and an overall overlook were on our list of things since this is the car I'll be taking up north in one month. 

I like the Mini. Handles like a go-cart and rattles like one too, but has a kick ass engine and gets me up to speed fast on the highway. A good little bean on the road. So it needs to be 100% happy for the 2 week trip north. I still would have rather gotten a Subaru. The happiest I've been with a car is the Wasabi Mobile that died a horrible death in Buffalo NY quite some time ago. 

Anyway. We've had some good car karma lately. I like it. I like not having to worry about 2 cars that both suck. 

I worked hard today, and Toffee came to me at 6pm and gave me the "get off the computer Mom," moves and I obeyed. Took a fast pokemon walk late, way after dinner. Because I've been on a roll lately and didn't want to let today slide. 

Here's Toffee's nose.

digits 

exercise: 11/12 hours of 250 steps.  Somehow missed 7pm goofing off on my phone. Dedicated 10. 7k steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

8:15am: 140
4:30pm: 123
11pm: 134

food:

coffee, water
11:00am - Big Salad w/spinach, bacon, tomatoes, goat cheese, feta, cucumber, mayo; metformin
6:45pm: chicken parm sub which was unsatisfactory so I gave Doug the other half.
7pm: metformin+jardiance
8pm: mixed nuts
vodka tonic

On Call

Everyone on my team has to do an on call shift for a week. There are six of us, and one of us is leaving. It isn't bad being on call but I sometimes forget I am on call. And I go out in the world and get an emergency page from a station. 

Without my laptop on hand. Unable to look at anything to help. Once we were at a cidery in the middle of nowhere, shocked that my phone rang and I called the guy back to find out "the problem went away by itself." 

Awesome. Wonderful. And thank goodness because wow. I'm 90 minutes from my house and literally cannae help ye, brother. 

I was on call last week and got an emergency page during business hours, which always cracks me up. Like, dude. Submit a ticket and also the thing you are having a hard time with is not an actual Emergency as defined. Is your website down? No? Not an emergency. etc. 

I helped the guy, educated him, and at the end of the call I just had to laugh. It monkey wrenched my afternoon. I was in the middle of house walking and got interrupted. 

With one person leaving, we'll drop a week and have a 5 week cycle. At one point there were eight of us so we'd be on call once a week for every other month, which was super nice. We also cover for each other. So if you're going on vacation, someone will swap coverage for a day or the whole shift if needed. Our team is very kind to each other. I appreciate that. 

I went off call this morning at 8am. And even though we do not get nearly the amount of Emergency Pages we used to get, back in 2014-2019.... when we hosted streaming services and our content management system was failing regularly, it still brings to me a sigh of joy when I get the text letting me know I'm off call. 

I need to go look at the schedule for when I'm seeing Guster at the end of March, and when my dad's cemetery service is at the end of April.

Not much else going on. 

Here's a picture of Toffee being a weirdo. She drags herself around on her belly, legs stretched out behind her, tail wagging. She looks like a bear rug or a spatchcocked chicken or turkey. She arches her back like a yoga pose, and you can see her tail is wagging and she is just ready for fun. silly beast. 

Digits below.

digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps.  dedicated 10+2, walk to the Pokegym; 6k+steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

8:30am: 140
4:20pm: 121 (tested 2x just to make sure it was actually that good...)
10pm: 123

food:

coffee, water
9:15am: 2 oatmeal cookies (the last of them!)
1pm: metformin; large salad, bacon, cucumber, tomatoes, spinach, mayo (blt plus)
6:30pm: baked chicken breast stuffed with spinach & feta, marinated in olive oil, lemon, yogurt
vodka tonic

It could be worse, in fact

Something happened at work that has me irrationally angry. Maybe not irrational. My feelings are based on valid emotions and observations. But should I be as mad as I am? 

Yes, I'm big mad about the thing. I can't really write or talk about it because I don't know who reads this. But it ruined my otherwise really good day. 

At about 5 Doug was getting ready to take Toffee for a walk and I was just in the kitchen banging shit around in the guise of making dinner. 

Like. that is going to help right? 

Doug asked me what my deal was, I told him what happened, and he sided with me. A lot of times he'll dismiss my feelings or point out the other side of the situation being right more than I'm right. But tonight, his "what gives [that person] the right to make [that shitty decision to do something]. There should be a committee or consensus on the thing." 

When my husband who usually shrugs the shit out of things or says I'm not really valid in my feels has the "who do they think they are?" stance. Well. 

Anyway. 

He went to walk the dog, and I got dinner in the oven. I took a quick walk in down to the pokemon gym and back. Colder than it looks outside. 

I had cooled down emotionally too. 

My sister called me on the phone, she never calls. We use Facebook to talk to each other on video calls. So I was surprised to get an actual call. I ate dinner and got right back to her. 

Our uncle Jim passed away and she was calling to let me know. 

Our cousins get to go through the buttoning up of life since his wife, their mom, Carole passed away quite a bit ago. 

We chatted for a while and she showed me her crazy out of control new puppy. I showed her mine, sleeping beautifully at my feet. They'll get there. But right now, their puppy is a velociraptor.

I ended up not being mad anymore about work. Or anything. But I am still mad. Just not that mad. 

Anyway, I started a dedicated 10 walk in the house while Doug was out, and got to 5 minutes and got bored. When Doug got back, I ended up going down to the pokegym and didn't linger too long out there, it was cold. 

Oh, and the daffodils are popping up in our yard. In February. Digits below. 

digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps. Dedicated 10+ to the pokegym. 6k steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

9am: 177
4:30pm: 128
10pm: 131

food:

coffee, water
12:30: bowl of chicken salad; metformin
1pm: another bowl of chicken salad
6:30: bowl of rotini w/sausage and mushrooms and sauce, melted mozzarella
vodka tonic
7:45pm: ramekin of mixed nuts; metformin+jardiance

Good Omelet Day

I was in such a hurry last night that I published my blog post with a place holder title. Blogger lets you fix the title but not the Permalink. Which seems like a deficit to me. But whatever. Note to self, don't be so fast next time and check your work. 

So unprofessional of me. 

Today was a non-holiday for us. We don't get Presidents' day off, and so I did not take it. Some of my colleagues have kids so it is the start of February school vacation week for them. I usually always work holidays so people with kids can have zero qualms about time off. 

I got a lot done, it was a good day, and not too stressful. I had a long back and forth with a client who is talking circles around me, and I can't make him happy. That was a little frustrating. And I think I gave someone the answer to something and they won't like what I told them, but I ran it past a colleague here and she told me that my response was understanding, caring, and loving. I offered my advice and told her that honestly she is doing something the wrong way and asking for a tech solution for a people communications solution. But I told her in a very kind way in the end. Still, I feel I'm not going to win this one and she's going to dredge it up in the future. 

I made one hell of an omelet today and loved it. So much. Like, I'm going to do it again tomorrow. Bacon and Goat Cheese make everything better. 

Geoff went to the market and we have food for dinners through Thursday, which is good. He had Friday and today off because he worked over the weekend. So having him free on a weekday was like old times. Here's my bank card, please go buy everything on this list and then also wine. Please buy your mom wine. 

I didn't even shower today, I had no in person on camera meetings lined up today so it was fine, but I felt slimy all day. Looking forward to showering tomorrow. 

Doug came up at 4:30 and I asked him if he was going to take Toffee for a walk. He said yes, "Why, do you want to come?" 

Yes I do. 

Geoff had started making dinner and the last of my emails could wait. Let's go. 

We did a little over a mile in 29 minutes, according to my fitbit. Got some pokemon caught. He asked if I wanted to turn right and lengthen the walk by a block or two and I did not. It was colder than I expected, I was feeling hungry, it was after 5, and Geoff's chili would be ready by the time we got back. All the right excuses. And I knew our route was a mile, what I would have done on the treadmill if I managed to get myself to the gym. So this was enough.

And I was right about dinner. Perfect timing. 

Geoff picked up more corn syrup and food coloring so I can keep decorating cookies. But I realized I didn't have the muffin tins that I usually use for doing the frosting. So I guess I do need to connect to pick them up. But I think I have muffin tin liners that'll do the job. I have a few small ramekins, and some tupperware. But it can wait. 

I just ordered a bunch of sprinkles and sugars which will arrive by Wednesday. Gold, Silver, Purple... things that I didn't see at the market and that I wanted. I figure some cool black iced cookies with silver sparkles are going to be so fun. 

Upping my decorating game, yo. 

Anyway, no picture today. Just a good day that started out with a good omelet. Sometimes that's the best way to kick off a Monday. 

Digits below.

digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps. 1 mile walk, 29 min. w/Doug 7k+ steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

9am: 193
4:30pm: 175
10pm: 177

food:

coffee, water
10:30am: 2 egg omelet w/sauteed onion, wilted spinach, goat cheese, bacon. (so good)
11am: Metformin
2:30pm: apple w/peanut butter
6pm: chili w/shredded cheddar and fritos
7pm: metformin+jardiance
a few more fritos while loading the dishwasher
red wine

The Sunday Funday blog post

I fell asleep last night an finish the cookie day entry. You can read that here. If so inclined.

Doug and I watched a really dumb movie after I got home called Spaghettiman. It was awful, but had its moments, and could have been so much better with some snappier dialog and a better ending. At about 11 I realized I didn't blog, and didn't have the energy to do anything outside of brush the teeth and hit the sheets. 

Did the same sleep in thing this morning as yesterday and woke up after 10am. 

Toffee initially woke me up at 7:30 and Doug had gone into the guest room sometime in the night and closed the door so she wouldn't follow him. 

After waking me up, she heard him and went to get him rustling about and went to find him. He took care of her morning needs. I went back to sleep and didn't even hear Geoff leave to go to work. Deep sleep for another couple hours.

When I did get up, super exciting. We sat quietly together, drank coffee and I had a couple of my oatmeal cookies with the giant pecan center.

I thought the cookies looked like eyes and made myself giggle.

Toffee sat here obsessed with the Roku screensaver so I got her picture. 

Please do ignore the past-their-prime poinsettias and my lap desk akimbo on the table. 

Last night Doug moved it because it was wilding hour with the dog after she had dinner so he didn't want the dog to whack my laptop and send it absolutely airborne.

Very glad we do not have downstairs neighbors as the noise and energy would make people batty.

I chatted with Linda a bit about spring travel plans and shenanigans. I still have to book the Brooklyn hotel and we have to figure out Linda's home trip after the Boston Guster show since I'll have the car, she won't.  

Doug took a big nap and then while I was cleaning up the kitchen and doing yet another load of dishes he asked if I wanted to go for a walk. I passed and continued to do some cleaning. 

I started to put Christmas away, finally, by bringing things down to the storage room. I have a couple boxes I want to sort and repackage, but didn't get to it. 

For dinner I didn't have a lot of ideas but he suggested we get takeout from the Greek Cafe in downtown. So I went with him, he double parked while I ran in. Easy peasy. 

And yeah. That was the excitement for sunday. 

Digits below. 

Sunday digits 

exercise: 11/12 hours of 250 steps. Missed 9am - slept in. Dedicated 20. 5100 steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

10:15am: 173
5pm: 156
10pm: 197

food:

coffee, water
10:30am: 2 oatmeal cookies
11:30am: turkey and havarti on 647 bread w/mayo
6pm: gyro and spanikopita. Metformin+jardiance
red wine+gingerale
7-8pm: 4 more oatmeal cookies

Cookie Day Fun A Day Late

(Saturday's blog a day late)
This morning, I anticipated being up early. Geoff is working this weekend, full time shifts both days, 9am to 5pm. Since I knew it was going to snow overnight I told him to wake me up around 8:15, I'd drink a cup of coffee, and drive him over. Then, I could bake more cookies. 

Well, I heard him bumping around, 6am ish, too early to actually be up. So I went to the bathroom and back to bed. Fast asleep. Out cold. I didn't hear Doug and Toffee get up. And Doug drove the boy to work. I heard some talking about feeding the dog breakfast, but I rolled over and into my usual between 6 and 9am wild dream events. This morning was no different. But at least nothing so horrible that I am shook. Doug got murdered in this morning's dream. At least I think he did. He went missing on a forced haunted trail event after we had gone to a musical/play in a beat up shitty run down building where mice ran over your feet. Jess and Molly were with us, and after Doug disappeared we ended up talking about Taylor Swift songs at one of the "scary" houses, which wasn't scary at all. 

Well, unless you are afraid of Taylor Swift. Which I am not. I just don't know a lot about her music. 

Anyway. Up at 10:30, Doug was on the couch with the dog, so I just slept through it all. Didn't hear a thing. 

I had my first cup of coffee and set to baking. Regretted not making the dough last night but this went fast. I kind of screwed up though, you aren't supposed to heat the butter, but, my room temperature butter is always too hard and it never creams nicely with the sugar and egg. So I nuke it. Usually 10-15 seconds but I did it for a minute. I think that had an impact on the quality of the dough. It was very cracked and dumb looking and didn't roll out nicely. I needed a second (technically fourth) batch so I didn't make that mistake again. 

Two giant batches of dough ready, I had already made hearts and stars yesterday so we got flowers, some large mickey mouse ones, and lots of cats.

Lots of cats. 

And I realized I skipped all the birthday shapes after I was done with both batches. ugh. 

I thought about making Sara a batch of dough, so she and the boys can do it this weekend, but, I ran out of butter enough to make another batch or two. 

Instead, I asked Doug if he wanted cookies and he said "you don't have to do that," with all honesty.  But. I have enough butter for one batch for us for home. "Do you want toll house, oatmeal, or peanut butter?"

 He asked for oatmeal, with pecans. 

I checked the bag of pecans and noticed they were whole pecans. So I told him I was cheating. I didn't really have time to smash the pecans, so, each cookie gets one big ass pecan. What I should have done was wet the pecans and roll them in some brown sugar, or sprinkle a little on top of the cookies when the pecans were pressed in, but, I was just in a hurry and didn't think of it until everyone was in the oven. 

They look cute. I'm proud of them. Even if they aren't what I set out to really make. Doug told me he doesn't like the craisins or raisins in the oatmeal cookies and I do, so, since I'm not necessarily supposed to eat them, I mad them to his liking. 

Apologies for the wonky lighting. but 3pm brings a delightful angle into my kitchen through the window. 

I got to Sara at about 3:30. We set to covering the table, as the boys set to mixing colors. Hen is a little obsessed right now with colors. At the end of the month he's going to have a blast as they take him to a Crayola museum in Pennsylvania. I think you get to mix your own colors and then get crayons off of them! 

His cousin Grant is here for the weekend. He lives in Ohio, and they are two months apart. 

They are super cute together and worked closely (physically and in agreement) on color mixes. Grant's attention to the task was short lived - eventually he was kind of done. He didn't want to put sprinkles on anything, or eyes, he did a couple cats in a purple grey to match his cat at home. And we had to encourage him to stay at the table and not want to go play X-box. 

Sara's mom lives with them, and she also came to decorate cookies and I honestly feel like she had a blast. 

The cat butt cookies were hilarious. I brought chocolate chips and while he didn't bust a gut laughing at them, Grant gave a smile and guffaw, which is big. He's not a big laugher. So I know I scored with that when I showed him. 

Some of the cookies were cracked and weird because probably of how I made the dough, and it wouldn't roll out without breaking. I showed the boys how everything is imperfect. But sometimes all you need is a coating of sugar and color and it's like nothing is wrong. Perfection. 

Then I thought about it. Grant's going through some things with his mom (Sara's sister) and I realized the message I might be sending was a little warped so I stopped. 

I was thinking of Kintsugi, where you fix broken things with gold, so that the frosting was like fixing the brokenness of the cookie. But in Kintsugi, the gold is always visible, becomes part of the broken pottery, as a reminder of the brokenness. Not to mask the brokenness and hide it. 

I realized my metaphor was coming off as "put on a fake sugary coating and hide your flaws, your sadness, your weakness, and the world won't know what's happening underneath. That's perfection!" 

Frosting fixes everything. 

Ugh. no. It's just a cookie, Chris. Please don't say things that a 9 year old can take with him for life and be even more hurt by it when you're just trying to be a cool philosopher. 

Sara's husband said "I didn't know cookies had such deep philosophy." 

They don't really. I am just talking out of my ass.

Henry noticed that we didn't have m&ms and he was disappointed. I realized yeah, I didn't bring them because I am used to needing those for Christmas tree ornaments and red noses for reindeer. They used a bunch of chocolate chips on the flower shaped ones, 

At about 5:45pm we let the boys go, lots of cookies decorated without them while they played in the yard in the snow. We got a lot less snow at my house, 3 miles south. They had enough for a snowball fight but not enough for a snowman. 

The cat butts were funny but the shape could also be a dinosaur looking over its shoulder. We made a bunch and painted shoes and pants on them when the first coat dried. 

I now want to go get this cookie cutter shape from Sara and make a million more colorful dinosaurs. 

I didn't take as many pictures as I thought, I guess we were just having fun. 

We cleaned up, went to the pub for dinner. It was packed. A horrible band was playing and my meal was not so good. Feh. 

But. I brought home a mess of cookies that we didn't get to decorate and I have those to entertain myself with. I forgot my food coloring and half my sprinkles, so if I want to decorate these as a gift of a moment of peace to myself next week, I can. Digits below because I put the pictures inline. 

digits 

exercise: 11/12 hours of 250 steps. Missed 9am - slept in. No dedicated 10 but a lot of movement. 5500+steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

10:30am: 160
n/apm: did not take an afternoon reading
10pm: 227

food:

coffee, water
1pm: turkey sandwich w/Mayo on 647 bread
2pm: metformin
7:30pm: 2 pieces of pub pizza, 2 small pieces of southwest egg roll, fajita steak wrap - flavorless and horrible. ate the meat because i felt bad an animal gave its life and it didn't belong in the trash but the rest of it did (sorry, lettuce). 
3 truly seltzers
9pm: metformin+jardiance

Baking the Cookies

This morning I had a dream that was incredibly disturbing, so much so that I can't even write it down but I can't stop thinking about it. I woke up at 8am before the alarm and just said "alright I'm not going back to sleep to see that shit again. voof." 

A weird and awkward way to start the damn day.

There was a digital media webinar this morning, so I mixed cookie dough while listening. I had procrastinated so long and had to do it. Great way to spend 90 minutes. I cut and baked the first batch and mixed a second. I baked those around 5pm, and realized I needed to make another batch. Maybe a double batch. I only have hearts and stars. I need to make the cats and the flowers. So I'll end up with 90000 cookies by the time I'm done I think. But that's no problem. The more, the better.

We're meeting up at 3pm tomorrow so my plan is to whip a couple batches up early and we're good. No worries.  I may just even bring some dough with me, so Sara and Henry can cut and bake their own cookies too, I think that'll be fun for Hen.

There was a team retreat this afternoon to sit and close helpdesk tickets. Together. That's how I missed the 2pm steps I think. I thought for sure I got up and moved and met the goal but ... missed, probably by a couple steps. 

I'm super drained today. Training meeting, doing all these old tickets, cookies! And a chef quality meal for the fam. I'm bushed! 

Saving the pictures for tomorrow so we have something to look forward to! 

We're supposed to get 3-5 inches of snow overnight tonight so I could very well wake up to a sweet winter wonderland. We'll see. 

Digits below. 

digits 

exercise: 11/12 hours of 250 steps. Somehow missed 2pm?! No dedicated 10. 5400 steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

8:30am: 183
5pm: 151
9:30pm: 182

food:

coffee, water
9:45am: chicken salad (sorry Doug)
11am: Metformin
1pm: Apple w/Peanut Butter
7pm: chicken in creamy mushroom sauce (using this recipe, but expanding on it to make more sauce, thicken it) with chinese rice and peas
8pm: metformin+jardiance
vodka tonic

Water Water Water

Doug had a 7am meeting this morning, and I was awake with him at 6 but went back to sleep. Full of regrets on that. I had a 9am meeting, woke up at 8:45, brushed my hair, got coffee,  found my laptop, read email, and started the meeting. It was nothing but a hassle. The woman I was meeting with had a problem with her computer, her mic wasn't working, but she could hear me. She rebooted her computer and started again but still no mic. So she called in on the phone. Our half hour meeting turned into 80 minutes. 

After I was done with her I had to go to a team meeting to talk about Goals and Objectives. I felt like I had no time to prepare for anything but luckily I didn't have to contribute anything, just listen.

Several more meetings and some sudden jump in and do this what's the update on that kinds of stuff. I was supposed to have a check in with a teammate and asked her if we could bump it to later in the day. 4:30. Okay. (no gym for me, I guess). 

Doug came up at 4 and asked if I was done for the day, nope. He invited me to go for a walk and I told him that I'd be on a call until at least 5. So he took Toffee. She loves to go for walks. I had my meeting with my co-worker until 5:30. it went great. And I got dinner in the oven and Toffee's dish filled in time for her to come tearing into the house to eat. Toffee Time! 

We had dinner, Geoff went to the gym, and I schlepped a basket of laundry down to wash. When I went to move the laundry into the dryer, I stepped right into a big ass pile of water, in front of the washing machine. What the hell. What the living hell. 

I looked at the utility sink, and it was almost full, slowly draining. 

Ah. Okay. There's the problem. 

I thought maybe the washer was leaking or something, but alright. This maybe I can handle. Plunger, plunge plunge plunge!! meh? Sort of helping, not really helping. But it was going down. Slowly. I had no Drano or anything, so the plunger was my only weapon.

The laundry still needed to spin so I put the water setting on the super small setting where it had been on the super large setting.  This prevented too much water from going in. I stood there and watched.

After all the water finally drained out of the sink, I noticed there was a lot of schmutz in the sink, so it needs to be scrubbed. That's probably what's clogging the drain. I think we should get a nice snakey dealie in there, but I had Geoff grab some Drano from the store on his way home from the gym. I'll tackle it in the morning.

Tonight, I was supposed to bake cookies for Saturday. I have a decorating date with Henry for his birthday. I guess it'll have to wait until tomorrow. I work better under pressure and at a deadline. 

Super excited for tomorrow to be Friday and then the weekend. And cookies. There will be cookies. 

No picture. I thought about taking a picture of the sink, but. meh. 

digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps.   No dedicated 10. 5500+ steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

9am: 169
5pm: 153
10pm: 165

food:

coffee, water
noon: chicken salad. Metformin
5pm: some triscuits and sliced havarti and pepperoni
6pm: porkloin and 3 pierogi; metformin+jardiance

Bad Habits Developing

I realized this morning that we quietly let Doug's dad's passing go by without thinking of it, mentioning it. It's funny how some of my friends have really powerful hard times around yahrzeits (jahrzeit as an alternat spelling).  They get depressed leading up to the memory, they go to the cemetery, they mourn over and over again. 

But we just kind of, go on. And we think of birthdays and we smile. But we don't dwell necessarily on the death day. It's not just another day really, but it is. There's nothing you can do, and you can't change a thing, but. I'm somewhat ashamed I didn't necessarily stop for a beat and think on him.

As I got ready for work this morning it crossed my mind where we were in 2018. Right about now.

 Thankfully I have a blog, and I record things, and talk about things, and I know on February 5th I was house cleaning and then called to rescue Doug and Geoff after the car broke down on the way up there to be with the family. 

And then how Geoff and I came home knowing we'd go back up soon. And we did. 

We did. 

I was going to write today about how I need to change some habits. 

Lately, I can't fall asleep at night, and then in the morning I can't wake up. I've been sleeping until about 8:50. My alarm goes off, and I basically hit snooze 5 times. 10 minute increments. But that's stupid, I should just get up. 

Even more so, I've been resetting the 8am alarm to 9am. I never have meetings in the 9am hour, I just basically read things, catch up on slack, and then go to scrum at 10. Then after scrum, we work. And we work long past 5pm, 6pm, we work until we are kind of just done. 

I haven't been making time for me to go to the gym in the afternoons. I was going to do it today, honest I was. Then my colleague messaged me to say "is there a problem with making [content] in [product] that you know of?" Oh they did a code push yesterday afternoon and nooooooo. No one has reported a problem to us yet. 

"You are going to hate this," he says. And yeah. I did hate it. But by 6pm it was all resolved and I had really no excuse, I could go to the gym. But. I didn't. This basically exhausted me. I didn't even hit my goal of 5k steps for the day. 

I got some very extra toffee cuddle time though and that makes life better. 

digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps.  no dedicated 10. meh

blood glucose:

9am: 202
4:30pm: 182
10pm: 192

food:

coffee, water
10am: protein shake
12:30: large bowl of chicken salad; metformin
6:30pm: mix of ravioli & tortellini in sauce (cheese only) 
7pm: metformin+jardiance

Of snow and no snow

There was a weather report calling for 12 inches of snow across Massachusetts and I guess it turned into a nothingburger. Last night I asked Doug if we were going to get any snow, and he said "have you seen anyone freaking out about it on TV or online?" 

I acknowledged that no, I'd seen nothing. And I went to bed. 

Upon waking this morning to find all the schools in the area closed and our office operating on a level 2 defcon closure. 

It flurried for about an hour, and then stopped. The sun came out and it was 47 degrees. 

I kind of think it is hilarious that weathermen all get to keep their jobs when they are so incredibly wrong. So wrong. 

I gave Geoff a ride today and then picked him up. I went to Aldi for groceries, we were out of paper towel and coffee. They didn't have any of the trash bags I like, and I completely forgot to get dish soap. 

Real exciting kind of day, eh? 

Anyway. After dinner, I ended up eating a lot of oreo cookies, regrettably. And I didn't get to the gym. Because groceries. I want to try and go right after my 3pm meeting is over, and maybe Doug or Geoff can be the dinner makers. And I'll do better tomorrow. 

No photo, just digits. 

digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps. No dedicated 10. 5300+steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

9am: 161
4:45pm: 151
10pm: 197

food:

coffee, water
12:30pm: bowl of hot&sour soup w/red curry beef
1pm: metformin
1:15: another bowl of hot&sour soup w/red curry beef
6:30pm: nachos with meat, cheese, sour cream
7pm: metformin+jardiance
8pm: a lot of oreo cookies
vodka tonic

Arnold Movies

Watching the game last night, we saw a State Farm commercial with Arnold Schwarzenegger in it. He has a pretty distinct accent and drops the "R" off the end of any words like "Get in the choppah!" and "like a good neighbah, state fahm is thaih." The crew is trying to get him to pronounce things correc

It reminded me of the Simpsons and Rainer Wolfcastle, who annunciates "Up and At Them" instead of saying "Up and Atom" when he is playing Radioactive Man. 

Wolfcastle as a Schwarzenegger rip-off, and Schwarzenegger doing a Radioactive man nod. Truly meta, in all circles all around, and very funny to all of us. 

Then, Geoff says "Is that guy from New England, is that why this is funny?" And Doug and I were pulled up shocked on this.

"No, honey, that's Arnold Schwarzenegger. He is from Austria. He was a body builder, is an actor, and was the Governor of California of all things." 

I took a beat. "Do you not know who Arnold Schwarzenegger is? Like, legit not know who that man is?" 

"Well," says Geoff, "I know the name but I have never seen any of his movies."

Whoa. 

How did we fail this child? We've never shown him any of these movies? Terminator? Conan the Barbarian? True Lies? Running Man? Kindergarten Cop? Total Recall? Twins! Wow. 

We may have to have a fest. Doug will go on binges, he's in the middle of a Walter Matthau one. Lots of Jack Lemmon and Billy Wilder classics. 

Anyway. Busy work day and at 6pm I hadn't run to the market, Doug was napping, so I basically just ordered a mess of chinese food and we had at it. Will do better tomorrow. 

digits below. 

digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps. No dedicated 10. no real exercise. 5k+ steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

9am: 180
5pm: 160
11pm: 201

food:

coffee, water
11:45am: salad, started out as BLT with butter lettuce, cherry tomatoes, 3 pieces of bacon but I blew that away by adding a tiny bit of goat cheese crumbles, avocado, red onion.
noon: metformin
7pm: chinese food fest. lots of bad things. Metformin+jardiance

The Basement

Oh today I thought a lot about doing things, but I didn't even get a shower. Doug went and took a nap around 3 and I just basically sucked it up and went downstairs and started moving things around. It was time.

I unpacked some boxes, I repacked things, I threw a bunch of cardboard out. I made a dent. A heck of a dent. Two solid non stop hours, getting there. Getting there. 

We watched the superb owl. I almost went to bed because the game was so boring. But then, overtime? What? Great ending. My friend Sara asked me what the most fun superb owl experience we'd ever had was and I was awash in memories of going up to Maine to see Marcia and Wayne and the kids, and all the food, and all the fun. I think the year U2 did the halftime show, and the Pats won, that was probably my very favorite festivus. 

And on that note, I didn't take before, during, after pictures of downstairs but I personally feel like I am winning the Lombardi Trophy myself. And I enjoyed the halftime show with Mr. Usher... fun stuff.

Happy for Taylor's boyfriend, I guess. They're living their best lives. Good for them. 

Digits below. 

digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps. Lots and lots of steps but not really a dedicated 10. 7200+ steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

9am: 208
5pm: 202
11pm: 162

food:

coffee, water
11am: metformin
1pm: bowl of mac&cheese with bacon
6pm: sausage, peppers, onions, sauce, cheese & a little bit of pasta
beers
shrimp
fritos & queso

The day was taken (The Friday and Saturday post)

Per the last post: The day was taken. And I took a break from touching a computer, so no blog post... 

After 2pm, me and this laptop were not on speaking terms. I almost kept working yesterday afternoon, even though I put in 4 hours vacation time on my time card. It's not that big a problem. I got done what I needed to get done, sent out a bunch of emails that had to go before I disappeared and then, I went. It's all good. I know I make up for slacking off when I give myself permission.

List of things I set out to do, not necessarily in this order: 

• Bloodwork
• Home Depot for rubbermaid containers
• Gym
• Target
• Grocery Store
• Liquor store
• haircut 
• Start thinking about getting ready for basement reshuffle (see bullet 2)

Blood draw was particularly uneventful. There were only 10 people before me, so, it moved quickly. Quite a merciful thing.

I didn't make it to target, but that's okay. I got a few bags of coffee at Lidl after the gym and that was the primary reason (that and paper towels) I would have gone to Target. And we can go any time this weekend. Geoff went and bought beer and we didn't need anything else really, we've got everything but wine. That can be obtained any time this weekend. Haircut is still something that needs done. Someday. 

I had fun at Home Depot. I love walking up and down the aisles. I got medium sized storage containers, and Geoff brought them all downstairs for me. 

All I need to do is motivate myself to go do it, go do the thing. There are some things that can be placed in the storage room immediately,without getting repacked. I think I'll start with those. Get them out of the way so I can look over the other stuff, the ripped boxes, the boxes that were partially unpacked and not put back together. 

Pour myself a cocktail or mimosa and get to work. Do it.

Today Doug got some things done. He changed the filter in our furnace after me nagging him to do so. I bought filters, so he had no excuse. Ha. 

He put air in the front passengers side tire of the mini. I only had to nag him a little on that one. He made an appointment for the mini to get an alignment, very needed. I'm probably taking that to Massachusetts in April, so, it needs to be in tip top happy order. We'll get an oil change before I go and that'll be the only thing it needs. 

He has been incredibly unmotivated to do anything lately, so seeing him get things done warmed my cold dead heart. And I'm getting things done. 

He took a nap this afternoon and I pondered going to the gym but the laundry needed folded, so, I did that. And here's a picture of Toffee, not really helping me. But trying. 

Digits for both Friday and Saturday below. 

Friday digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps. 1 mile on treadmill, 25 min. 30min circuit, only half the machines since people were camping out on them (jerks). 9200+steps by bedtime (shoulda pushed to 10k but. meh).

blood glucose:

8am: 163
afternoon reading n/a due to being out
11pm: 160

food:

coffee, water
9:30am: 2 eggs w/ sausage links and Monterey Jack cheese
10am: Handful of red grapes
11am: metformin
6pm: french bread pizza with mushrooms and pepperoni; metformin+jardiance
3 beers

Saturday digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps. Dedicated 10+5. Walk in the house while dinner was marinating before putting on the grill. 7k+ steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

10am: 160
5pm: 158
10pm: 189

food:

coffee, water
11am: metformin
1pm: english muffin w/pb and low sugar strawberry preserves
6pm: salmon, green beans, pierogies. And I ate seconds of the salmon and the greenbeans. 
7pm: metformin+jardiance
11pm: some pita chips and hummus (and heartburn)

Take a Day

 Tomorrow, I'm going to take the afternoon off and do things. I have decided. I noticed I had absolutely no meetings after the 11am one for our weekly team check in, and just .... don't want to. I don't feel like working. So I'm not going to. I feel like I have done a total lot lately and I have me things I want to do.

I'm taking a day, well, half a day. I'll check out at 1. My list of things to do includes that bloodwork thing, the gym, some groceries, maybe a haircut. 

No real entry tonight, Doug and I have been watching old episodes of Kids in the Hall and I just basically want to be Canadian at this point. Maybe. 

I thought about no entry tonight and save anything for tomorrow, but. I already tracked all the things so. Here's today. Digits below. 

digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps. No gym, no dedicated 10. 5400+steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

8:30am: 150
5pm: 180 (in one finger, 151 in another finger. I'm finding I distrust these readings and their accuracy most of the time)
10pm: 160

food:

coffee, water
9:30am: english muffin w/pb
12 noon: metformin
12:30pm: bowl of Doug's leftover chicken stew
6pm: metformin+jardiance; roasted chicken thighs, stuffing, green beans
no wine/anything

When The Big Dog Sicks

ooof. I keep forgetting that Big Dogs come with Big Impact. 

Toffee got super sick in our bed last night. She tried to wake Doug up for help, super smart girl that she is. But he rolled over thinking she was just looking for a cuddle. She was up between our shoulders, not where she usually is. She tends to sleep by our feet, behind our legs, getting closer and closer until it's like she's gonna crawl into my underpants. She likes closeness.

I heard her making kind of a licking swallowing sound, you know before you throw up you may have a lot of saliva starting to build up in your mouth and you start to try to keep it down? That's what she was doing. 

Then we heard the first wave. 

I snapped upright and hit the light and called her out of the room but it was too late. She hit the bed by Doug's pillow (didn't hit the pillow), the twin comforter he is using, so I got her out of the room to the front door where she puked again before going out. He got the bed cleaned up, I got the floor cleaned up. She came back in and Doug headed to the guest room. 

All I have to say is I'm so happy we put the mattress protectors on this bed. Well, these beds. It is a split king mattress and I'm not happy with the over all split king-ness of it, but. That's another story. 

I couldn't quite fall back asleep but eventually did. Since it was around 6am by the time we got settled back in, I actually entertained the idea of going to the gym. I made a deal with myself. If you're asleep by 7, good. And I somehow did fall asleep before 7. Next thing I knew my alarm was going off at 8. I reset it for 8:45, 

Wild dreams involving relocating Jess to a new living place but she was MUCH younger than she is now. Like middle school Jess. It was very interesting and I woke up kind of sad. 

Work went well today. I had a good check in with a co-worker and we had a team meeting to try to solve a problem by creating more chaos. Nothing can be simple sometimes. 

I need bloodwork done, so I checked out of work around 3:45pm. I got to the lab and there were like 50 people there and I decided to screw it. 

I was dressed for the gym so. Why not. I've been threatening to go for weeks, yeah? Let's go.

The gym was not crowded, which was nice. I got a treadmill and did a mile in 26.26 minutes. The guy two machines away from me had a speaker and was playing music very loudly while running at an 8mph setting and I could hear all his music over my headphones. Rude. 

The 30 minute circuit room had 1 person in it. One guy working on the same machine over and over. I started next to him and skipped over where he was. I don't understand people who do weird things like that. There is the same machine out on the floor and no one is on it. What are you doing? 

I haven't made use of the 30 minute circuit yet, or ever, but I guess you should do it fast? You can't wipe down your machine, move to the next one, and then get things positioned right in 30 seconds to do the 60 second machine dealie. So I just paced myself and it took a lot longer. I got to every machine except the one that the dude had taken up residence on. I'll hit that one another time. 

My shoulders hurt. 

I hit Lidl again for supplies, just because it was next door. I found just what I needed for ingredients for a baked stuffed chicken breast, but it took me forever to get home. There was some sort of horrible accident, and a 3 mile ride took over 40 minutes. So it was nearly 6:30 when I got back, and what I was planning would take about an hour. Ugh. 

Doug saved the day by making a wonderful chicken stew with the two chicken breasts, a can of stewed tomatoes, some cheese, sour cream, chicken stock, green chiles, and a thing of reconstituted chinese white rice. Kinda glad I shove these unwanted lil'guys in the freezer when we get them. It was delicious but now I need chicken breasts again. And sour cream. 

I will need to head out to try the blood work again tomorrow. And maybe, the gym too? ha. That'll be nice.

No picture. Gotta finish the laundry and dress the bed for Doug and load the dishwasher. Busy day, kids. Digits below.

digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps.  1mile/26 min. on the treadmill; 10k+steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

8:45am: 171
n/apm: missed the 4-5pm reading due to being out
10pm: 151

food:

coffee, water
10am: pbj on 647 bread, low sugar jelly
11am: metformin
12:30pm: tuna salad on 647 bread; 2 kosher dill pickles
7pm: metformin+jardiance; 2 bowls of Doug's chicken stew
red wine

Spreadsheets

Had a little time between meetings today so I started a spreadsheet to track the things that need to get done. I made a hotel reservation by Linda for 3/28. I need a Brooklyn reservation for 3/29. We have Boston on 3/30. 

We're planning an easter egg hunt for 3/31 for the kids. Then, is Linda going home that night or are we going to spend a couple days down at mom's. Will she fly home Monday or Tuesday. 

I talked to Doug and we decided I'll stay up there. We have a lawyer appointment on April 4th that she needs someone to bring her to, so that'll be me. 

And rather than come home, and turn around and come back for David Sedaris in Boston on the 12th, I'll just stay. 

Then I have my car, I'll have freedom of mobility. And I can leave on Saturday or on Sunday, or on Monday or... 

whew. 

I like spreadsheets. It helps me think and plot and plan. I can track what needs done and what is in place. 

I'm going to miss my dog for two whole weeks though. 

Here's a picture of a dog. You know her. You love her. She's guarding. Works great.

digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps. no dedicated 10, 6k+ by bedtime

blood glucose:

8:30am: 153
5pm: 236
11pm: 141

food:

coffee, water
11:30am: bowl of mac & cheese with bacon; metformin
2pm: low carb wrap w/roast beef and 3 slices of muenster
6pm: pulled pork bbq w/ some french fries
7:30pm: metformin+jardiance
vodka tonic

Boredom Munching Desire

Oh was it ever a busy day. I had several chats with people about backroom discussions, I had a client want to set something up but he didn't have permission from the sharing partners so that turned into a thing. That turned into a whole thing. I'm glad I ask the right questions sometimes.

I planned breakfast but we have our team meeting at 11 on Mondays, and by the time I showered and realized how late it was there was no chance to make what I wanted. And then I wanted the tuna

I made a wonderful chicken parm for dinner, and even though it was filling and good I had serious munchies and nothing to eat. I drank wine. I wanted snacks! But we had no snacks. Well, nothing I could eat. I could have a bag of popcorn but that's not a good choice. Geoff ate the last two apples so I couldn't have apples and PB. 

Too late for a pbj sandwich really. Sadness. 

I didn't go for a walk because I was still working when Doug and Toffee left. And I wanted to make dinner. I need to not think about my family and only think about me. After I got the chicken parm in the oven I really could have gone for a walk but I'd already had two big glasses of wine so no. Not a good plan to drive to the gym. Who wants to work out after two big glasses of wine, eh? not me. 

So I continued to work on something very mindless and repetitive, something that needs to be automated but has not yet been set up to run that way. It kept my mind off of wanting to eat something. 

I figure if I can be distracted time will go by and I won't be tempted to eat something carby. 

We don't have any crackers or anything in the house, and I didn't want mixed nuts, I'm sick of them. Baby bel cheeses are okay but I was feeling meh about it. 

Next thing to do is I have to remember to reach back out to the Air bnb guy now that dad's 2nd funeral is back on track. I have to plan my travel for Guster in NY and Boston. I have to figure out what I'm doing between Guster 3/30 and David Sedaris on 4/12 in Boston. I feel like I can almost plan things, maybe clear enough head and willing enough heart. Sigh. Getting a clear head. 

But first, more steps, more wine! Naaah. Bedtime.

Anyway. Not a very exciting entry but one. Just to track the digits. 

Digits! Below! 

digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps. no dedicated 10; 5k+ by bedtime

blood glucose:

8:30am: 173
5pm: 153
9:45pm: 128

food:

coffee, water
11am: metformin
12:15pm: left over white rice, peanut sauce, peas & chicken thighs
5pm: Handful of mixed nuts
6pm: chicken parm; metformin+jardiance
red wine

Plant Swap Day at the Brewery

First Sunday of each month is plant swap day at one of our favorite breweries. The front of house manager/beer keeper has gotten to know us and cheered when we came in. It's been a few months since we've gone, probably in the fall so longer than I think. Actually it was probably right before we lost Phineas. She and I are instagram pals so she's kept up with the dog news and the new dog and wanted to know why we didn't bring her. 

We left her home so we didn't have to think about managing her and beer. Managing Phin and beer was sometimes a challenge and he was only 35 pounds. She's about 60. And big and enthusiastic. So we'll wait until it is nicer and warmer and we can hang out on the patio, where the dogs hang out, and make dog friends. 

Plant swap was hopping, tons and tons of people, and plants, and I went there empty handed with nothing to swap but I like the free table because there are sweet finds and sometimes some pottery. I met a guy named Chris who was willing to part with some of his pottery because he didn't want to schlep it home. 

We had a nice visit with my beertender pal and it was a fun nice time. We headed home with a stop over at a fried chicken joint that I'd heard was good. They have fried chicken, it is true, but it was not good. Sadly, Popeyes is better. I felt let down by the recommendation from a coworker on this one. 

Doug got a Cubano panini and it was much better, very tasty. We got one for Geoff to bring home to him. And it appears that they have possibly actual good pizza. So being a fried chicken place with crummy fried chicken, well that was disappointing. I came home hungry. I doubt we'll go back there. 

Home and happy to be welcomed by Toffee with enthusiasm and joy. I chatted with Linda for quite a while and enjoyed her puppy (even though she thinks he is a little monster). And all told, not a good carbs day and a no exercise day, but, a good day. And that's a nice way to end the working week. 

Back to the working week tomorrow. sigh. 

Here's a picture of beer. Digits below.

digits 

exercise: 12/12 hours of 250 steps. No dedicated 10. Lots of basic steps but nothing sustained or exercisey. 5k+steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

8:30am: 183
n/apm: ate dinner early right after beers and messed up timing 
10:30pm: 192

food:

coffee, water
11am: bowl of mac & cheese w/hamburger; metformin
beers at Atlas, bag of potato chips at about 3pm
4:30pm: 1/4 fried chicken (meh) cole slaw, 2 small rolls
5:30pm: metformin+jardiance
7:30pm: pbj on 647 bread
2 beers