Monday, June 24, 2013

Rhythm of the Blues

Coming in a little late.  I had intended to post on Saturday, then Sunday, and now, well, I'm just late, so I'll get 'er done!

The Good Stuff:
  • All the cats are back home.  So is Mr. L. Rossie ventured to join Mr. L in bed their first night back, and Lady beat her up. He says he didn't see Rossie last night.  
  • After disappearing for two days somewhere in the house, Ruby reappeared last night and spent part of the night wrestling with my feet. She has a hiding place in the house that we can't find. It's as if she teleports, because we can't find her anywhere, and then she's here. I'm thinking there are kitty secret passageways in this house.
  • Got the dusting and vacuuming done. Knocked off several long time to do list items I'd been procrastinating on.
  • Adjusted the blades on the riding mower yesterday.  They still aren't quite right.
  • After being fooled into letting Mr. L rub her ears on Saturday evening, Sneaky has been more circumspect about him since then.  He's working with her.  The ear rub queen will soon figure out he rubs good ear and will fall to his charms.
  • While this isn't really good news, I received some insight from a friend this week on why I may be stalling with writing.  If I can't figure it out, it pretty much kills my aspirations of being an effective writer,  but I can figure it out, I should be able to move forward.  I'd been suspecting something similar, but my friend put my thoughts to words and confirmed from personal experience the potential consequences and why it can be an issue. 
  • We are packed for Grand Tour 2013 (East).  We have one large bag to check.  We decided to pack a bag within a bag in case we find any goodies we want to bring home on the trip.  We've managed to do that before and had to buy a suitcase.  This time, we're bringing the extra suitcase just in case.  If we don't need it, no big deal. If we do, we're ready. We have two small carry on bags and the electronics (Mr. L's laptop, tablet, and printer and my MacBook Air and iPad).  My CPAP fits inside my carry on, so that means one less bag to lug (but it can also come out if we need more space, because it's medical equipment and doesn't count against carry on).
  • Everything arrived for my class reunion "ensemble," so that's ready to go.
The Not So Good Stuff:
  • I, too, am ten pounds from my highest weight, and am not particularly pleased with my direction.  Unsurprisingly, this coincides with feeling really crummy physically.
  • I have not managed to throw anything out over the last week.  I've rearranged some boxes, but I must get better at actively getting rid of stuff.
  • No writing progress unless you count the insight gained above.
The Week Ahead:
  • Keep chipping away at stuff to declutter.  The efforts can't completely be equivalent to rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic.
  • Yes, I'm doing all the yada, yada stuff.  It, thankfully, has become like making the bed.  I do that everyday and don't report on it here.  I guess that's the good news.  
  • Getting the yards ready for us to be on vacation for a couple of weeks.  Mowing, trimming, watering.

4 comments:

SBB said...

I'm extremely curious about what's keeping you from writing. If you can share, I'll try to help. If you can't -- which I understand -- then know that I'm rooting for you. I wish you were in my writing group. It would be so awesome to have someone else in there who actually wants to write as opposed to have written, if you can follow that.

I'm trying to tackle my weight problem with eating more greens and veggies. So far, I've dropped 13 pounds. I can still make improvements, though. I'm trying to eat a salad twice a day. One or two tablespoons of low carb dressing. So far, so good. Oh, adding more beans to my diet, too. Slowly, of course, but they do fill me up.

Decluttering is hard. I try to throw stuff away and sometimes succeed, but then I turn around and I have more.

Wendy said...

I'm willing to help with the writing issue, too, if it would be useful.

I find I'm decluttering into my kids' houses. I give them right of first refusal before I take stuff to Good Will, but sometimes I wonder if they're just taking stuff to humor me like I did with my mom for so many years. That's how I ended up with too much crap in my house and I need to break that cycle.

Jean said...

Make sure you make it clear they don't have to take it. You do want to avoid the "Hey! I wanted that!" that comes after you've taken something to Good Will, but you don't want them to feel pressured to take something.

Another way to handle it is ask them if there's anything in the house they want if you're going to get rid of it, then, if you aren't ready to get rid of it, put a label on the back with their name, or, if you are give it to them. If they don't identify something, you're free to declutter at will. Let them know they have the right to change their mind later if something's been reserved for them (because, as you know, needs and desires change over time). My grandmother did this for years, and we (as long as we spoke up) generally got what we wanted from her before she cleared out her house.

I appreciate the offers of help with the writing issue. For now, I'm processing it. It's kind of along the lines of what Tammy wound up dealing with as she wrote her awesome fiction and the issues it released from the bottle of emotions. I have to decide if or how I'm going to handle that if I decide to go there. To my knowledge, it's nothing horrible, but it has the potential to affect relationships. My challenge is to figure out how to affect them to the good.

I picked up the ingredients to make the Vegetable Tian recipe making the rounds on Facebook. The zucchini pizzas are yummy. Holly, with her migraine-enforced need to avoid sodium (as in, if she consumes sodium, she endures a three day migraine), is shifting to one meal per day augmented with fresh fruit and vegetables throughout the day. How could you go wrong with that diet? And, it's something I could probably do here, because Mr. L and I generally eat one meal per day together (except when we go to breakfast on weekends), so what I eat other than dinner is fully within my control.

Tammy Jones said...

{{hugs}} on the writing and I'm glad the cats are all coming around, even if slowly.

For me, tracking and water are the key.

You can't have too much water. {{hugs}}

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