Averygoodun's Personal File

So, I spent a good hour of this morning looking in my archives for the actual year of Page's last birthday party (Geoff thought it was pre-Meningitis, I thought it was last year; it turns out it was 2 years ago), and came across a few posts that make me so, SO glad that things are better now. Page really was Demon!Boy for a while there, and, with my 20/20 hindsight, I can see now that he was really not well. His moods have evened out so much, his meltdowns are so much less severe, he's happy more often than not, and he's not nearly (not even close) as obstinate as he was at five. OMG, how did I survive those years? (Oh, right, I nearly didn't.)

So, yeah. Grateful for progress. And a diet that seems to work (there was a lot more attitude this morning after a sugar-full party yesterday. Kid has been reminded of the correlation (which is almost certainly causation in this case)).

Speaking of diet, I've been looking over the Autoimmune Protocol (AIP), and I actually don't think it's going to be that big a problem for us. Still not starting it until the new year, but with coconut still available to us, we'll definitely be able to make do! Snacks will be tough, but there are tons of ways to make it work. Actually, the hardest part will be getting the organ meats into me and Geoff. Page actually likes liver, and while I like pâté, Geoff doesn't like either. But, well... (And this is assuming that the chicken guts in the gravy doesn't amount to enough organ meats for our needs.)

Well, that and getting Page to eat enough bone broth... Kid hates soup.

But I am positive we'll see a difference in all of us on this diet. I am scared of finding out who reacts to what (because I am pretty sure each of us will be reacting to different foods, making the cooking job that much more difficult), but it will be worth it.

Despite the copious amounts of honeyed tea, coconut-milk ice cream, and other borderline (or outright) naughty foods, I am detoxing like mad here. I think it's the (copious amounts of) milk thistle I've been having. And the vegetable extravaganza. Oh, and the truly clean sea air. (That would be a check mark for applying to Harvard next year - Cambridge is damned close to the shoreline, though not nearly as clean a shoreline.)

One of these days I'm going to start working on the (everlasting) mural, though I have to do some studies on the lady's mantle beforehand. Hopefully it'll be sunny on Friday. We'll be car-less and nephew-less that day, so it's possible I'll be able to find the time and energy.

(Page must be enjoying not being the nagged one. His cousin is an order of magnitude louder and more active, which directs all the attention (deliberately, I think) to him. My god, I do not envy my brother. Granted, both my brother and SIL have an order of magnitude more energy than Geoff and I do, so it all evens out, doesn't it?

Fortunately, as long as the boys are rested and fed, they play extraordinarily well together, considering they're both wannabe alphas. Their mutual obsession with all things explody helps, of course.)

Right. Should go wash my feet. Then I can lie around and read some more. Or solve another crossword.

I love vacations.

I think I'm fighting a cold. I ache that special cold ache, feel hopeless about ever having energy again, and have my sinuses bitching at me.

Geoff is fighting a cold as well. His ears hurt. He even took yesterday off because of it, though mostly because he knew going in was going to make it a thousand times worse than because he was feeling so ill.

Page, meanwhile, is a chipper little monkey, talking a mile a minute and begging for attention at every turn.

On the plus side, I had an unexpected day off from school yesterday due to the snowstorm that went by this past week. New Englanders are so wimpy cautious. But I'm grateful for their wimpiness caution, for once.

(It's kinda funny - I posted on FB about NEers being wimpy and one of my friends pointed out all the reasons for the cancellation (to which I rebutted that a delay was all that was necessary). The conversation evolved into my brother and I reminiscing (more or less) about how stupid Coloradans are about NOT canceling school for snowstorms. We both remember the blizzard of '86, him because he had to walk to school in it (some city bus drivers gave free rides that afternoon when they finally decided that canceling school was a good idea after all... after 2 feet had already fallen), and me because he was my hero and picked me up on his way home, freeing me from my powerless school earlier than everyone else. Good times.)

I slept in till 10. Probably would have slept even longer had Geoff not started talking... ;-)

And this coming week is spring break. Finally. I so desperately need it. Unfortunately, I already have a fairly substantial to do list going for what NEEDS to be done in that time frame. Fortunately, two of the items are "rest".

But still. Exhausted just thinking about it. I don't think my mitochondria are happy at all. Worn out, is what they are.

Anyhoo. I should go enjoy this alone time I've been given wrangled. The boys are out on errands; they are not to come back until they've finished watching a movie at the library ("Wreck It Ralph") and gotten their hairs chopped to reasonable lengths.

I think some reading is in order. Fun reading. And maybe napping. All in glorious silence.

*nods*

Right. Lots to do today. I've even done a portion of what's needed... The portion that can be done in front of the computer.

However, I WILL get out today, because I am not missing my appointment with my fabulous hair snipper. I would call her a stylist, as that's truly a more apt title for her and her magic hands, but it would imply that she's giving me style, and well, I'm still stuck in pragmatic dowd mode. For now. But at least after my haircut, my head will appear less uncared-for. Even if the reality is otherwise.

And while, after the haircut, I should probably work on Christmas presents, I will probably choose something completely unrelated to gift-making from my list of chores. Even though time is really running out.

Though all I want to do right now is sleep.

I wonder... Why is it that the gravy Geoff makes goes bad far faster than the gravy I make? I just had to toss a couple cups of his gravy as it was smelling vinegary and had a suspiciously colored spot in one cranny. It's been out of the freezer (where it was put immediately after making) for all of five days. My gravy usually lasts a good ten days (at least) before it starts to smell funky. Of course, there's also the fact that my gravy tends to get eaten up far faster than his... It usually doesn't last a week. (I make "gravy" by the quart, which is how it can last as long as a week. Usually I get two quarts out of a batch. Also, my "gravy" isn't real gravy, but roasted veggies (usually carrots and onions, though adding celery for proper mirepoix is quite nice, too) pureed to smoothness with organ-meats and drippings. It's goooooooood stuff.)

Ah well. At least I have to make a roast today, so I'll have enough veggies to go with the giblets I fried up yesterday.

What else...

Huh. Tomorrow is my sister's birthday. I'll have to remember to (actually) call her. Or at least (actually) email her. That's the problem with me, is that while I do think of and remember birthdays and anniversaries, I rarely remember them for long enough, and at the right time, to wish happy tidings on the day. Bad me. And then, once the day is past, well... It gets harder.

And, now I should go. My out-of-house errands need doing right now, if I'm to make it to my hair stylist on time.

Happy Thursday!

So, I'm a whole mess of conflicting things lately.

Yesterday, I was an emotional wreck because we got news that Geoff's aunt (the one who was recently diagnoses with breast cancer) and her husband had to be evacuated from their house because of the Waldo Canyon fire on Tuesday night. And, of course, it was yesterday, Wednesday, that she went in for her surgery. (Prayers for her safe and speedy recovery would be appreciated.) Perfect timing, wouldn't you say? We think that their home is still standing, but her recovery will take place at their son's place for the foreseeable future. Hopefully that will be a good thing. I suspect it will.

It also bothers me, perhaps more than it should, that my childhood home, in a different part of Colorado, is under an evacuation alert due to a different fire. On the plus side, my in-laws' home (and my sisters' places, too) is probably safe from any of the wildfires raging, because its city is surrounded by sand.

Today, SCOTUS ruled that the individual mandate is legal. I am personally relieved about what this means for my family, although I do think the ruling is slightly... skeezy. No, this is not a tax as it is currently set up. If it were a single payer system, then yes, it would be a tax, but as it is... Falling under the federal imperative of interstate regulation is closer to the mark, but it's still rather unsettling to let the government tell us we have to buy insurance from a private business without a public option available to all. That said, HOORAY FOR UPHOLDING THE SOCIAL CONTRACT!!!!!!!

Meanwhile, I have basically been a slug of slothiness this week. I have been reading like mad when I haven't been under the spell of a ninja nap. I think Page has a cold, and I've been fighting it. (That's my story and I'm sticking with it!)

Yesterday's visit to the library found me carrying out "The Hunger Games." And, yes, I see why everyone's been raving about it. I'm torn between wanting to rush to the library to see if they have "Catching Fire" on hand today or just chilling and reading the other five books I've got out. Especially as "The Hunger Games" interrupted another book I started, "Mr g" by Alan Lightman.

I don't know if any of you have even heard of Alan Lightman, but he wrote "Einstein's Dreams" and "Good Benito" (among other things). He's a theoretical physicist, and most of his book revolve around science, and the interplay of science, philosophy and humanity. I really like his writing.

"Mr g" is his take on Creation seen through the eyes of God. I am loving it. It's a very meditative book, demanding to be sipped and savored rather than gulped down greedily (as "The Hunger Games" did), but it's an easy read nonetheless. It resonates at the same frequency of my daydreams and inner dialogues (yes, dialogues; I don't converse to myself, but with myself), and is... interesting. It's basically looking at the philosophy behind astronomy and evolution.

I'm probably going to get it for Geoff's birthday or Christmas (should I remember it). He would really enjoy it as well (and just doesn't have the time to read it right now).

What else... I have finally given in and ordered a bug suit from Amazon since I'm tired of either subsisting off of benadryl or avoiding the back yard. I would like to garden, but I refuse to slather myself in poison to do so (although I will be slathering my bug suit with poison... But that's once a season, and I'm not going to put it on until the poison has dried).

Meanwhile, I need to mow the front yard again already. This time, on a slightly lower setting, I think. Hopefully I'll be able to do that today after acupuncture (which has finally been scaled back to once a week).

Overall, life is going pretty well, really. I'm waking up cheerful, my leg is starting to ease off (loads of magnesium helps with that), and my body is even starting to cut back on its need for milk thistle and vitamin D. Yay! Now to just be able to work for 8 hours a day without crashing for a week, and I'll be healthy, right?

:-)

As in the mood. There's not much actual content here.

( Mostly good things. )

Hope you all have a marvelous weekend.

So, we just got back from a weekend on the Cape. One of our friends invited us to stay at his funky old house again. Once again, it was just the four of us, though more were invited, and that was fine by all of us.

Geoff and I did nothing. N-O-T-H-I-N-G. It was marvelous.

(And by nothing, I mean that Saturday morning (at a reasonable hour, as we got to sleep in!) I cracked open a 1000 piece puzzle and worked on that till it got aggravating and then did something else, like eat. With Geoff's help, we got the puzzle finished before we went to bed, somehow managing to complete the *&$%ing horrible Grecian blue sky by trial and error, because there were almost no clues otherwise.)

Anyway, I feel a bit less prone to panic now, and Geoff feels almost human. Page suffered for it a bit, as the house is very old (came into D's family's possession in 1892) and on the water, so a bit dusty and mildewy at the best of times, so his cough is still present, but he loved it as much as we did. Well, almost as much. He was far more freaked out about the house this time than he was last time, refusing to go anywhere alone. This time, he said it was the motion detectors that spooked him.

*shrugs*

The only downside to the weekend was coming home to find that running the dishwasher and leaving it unopened without having activated the heated dry function resulted in mold. Ew. Washer is going again with the sanitizing function on. (ew.)

I got no writing done. I feel only one small iota of guilt over that. Maybe only a quarter of an iota. Much less than a smidge, anyway.


Tomorrow will be busy as it will be the third to last day of school for Page, though I will be happy to not have to worry about setting the alarm clock for a few months. That said, I am very glad it will only be three weeks till we leave for my parents', where Page will have all his cousins from my side of the family to play with. My brother's son (who is closest to Page in age) might even be staying for the entire trip.

Day 14 – Where you live

I live in southern New Hampshire. Picturesque scenes abound all over the place once you get out of the big mill centers and coastal towns. Not that there are many coastal towns, seeing as New Hampshire has only thirteen miles of coastline.

While I'm still less than overwhelmed by the beauty of New Hampshire - being the spoiled world traveler that I am - its tamed beauty has grown on me considerably over the years. And I will say that fall in New England is deserving of all the accolades it's drawn. In a good year. In a bad year, you might as well be in the Midwest. But in a good year... It's breathtakingly beautiful. As long as you aren't expecting great swathes of red and orange, that is. The maples do not change like the aspens, all at once and brilliantly so. They are individuals, and so must be looked at as such to see their incredible beauty, not as part of the whole forest.

Speaking of which, the maple in the back yard has begun to change. Bright red is creeping in from the tips and edges of the leaves. It'll be another week at least before it's in its full regalia, but I'm looking forward to seeing it again.


Day 15 – Your childhood

My childhood was one of freedom. I didn't realize just how much freedom until I had a child of my own. And even so, I remember chaffing at the restrictions that were put on me.

( Read more... )

Yesterday evening, I was thinking about my sister-in-law, musing that I really ought to send her a note, even if it was a pathetic scrap just saying, "Thinking about you and wishing you well." I figured that maybe a random note might reassure her that I sure do love and appreciate her, even if my telephone communication "style" leaves that in doubt.

I wish I had.

Today the news came in that her step-son (G, whom she raised from toddler to teenager) had died. He was in his early twenties.

( Where I make all sorts of assumptions )

The European Union speeded up action on a sweeping reform of its air traffic control system Friday...

Shouldn't that be 'sped up'?


There is no rhyme or reason to it, but I am feeling 150% better today. My limbs aren't leaden, my brain is only minimally fuzzy, and I've managed to get something other than self-care done today! While being nice and loving and (mostly) attentive to Babe.

All on six-ish hours of interrupted sleep. (Maybe the night-sweating got some nasty stuff out of me?)

Granted, the only thing I've got done is cutting and installing the baseboard (all but one piece), but hey, that's been needing to be done for over a year and a half now!


One thing I want to jot down before I forget, however, is that I promised Babe that he could stay up to watch the sun set on the Summer Solstice. We'll be at my parents, so the sun shouldn't be setting till fairly late (I'll have to look it up). I also have to refresh my memory on what constellations are in the summer sky. He wants to count the stars. :-)


But now I have to go prepare some sweet potatoes for the potluck. The church is hosting an old time hymn sing-a-long tonight after a potluck. More singing! Yay!