Village Energy Tuesday PWYC

[Kathryn-in-Canada]

Someone else can come along and reopen the day with something inspirational.

For now, I just need a place to come and post and get strength and energy from the village.

[Kathryn-in-Canada]

Jaw is sore. No pain until I do something that moves it (i.e. yawn, raise my voice, certain words, eating, flossing, brushing teeth.) The more I think about it, the more it hurts, as well.

Harriet: I'm doing the tongue against the roof of my mouth thing instinctively. Dh said I snored for about 45 minutes out of every hour when I was sleeping because my mouth was open. I, of course, had my mouth open to keep from clenching. That made my mouth/throat dry and I noted the 'sucking' motion one does to summon up saliva to swallow to relieve the dry throat hurt. Makes me wonder if I've been doing all this subconsciously for days/weeks/months and so it is a repetitive strain injury.

Holding my jaw joint when I have to move it helps slightly. Rubbing and heat help too. A facial massage could be in my near future, but we'll start with the dentist. I have 25 minutes until they open so don't expect a call for a few more minutes.

I'm on the treadmill since I can, it doesn't hurt more and can be a distraction. I'm hungry (didn't eat much yesterday because I was expecting a big dinner so saving the points for that and then my jaw went out while dh was making up the burgers.) I'm trying to think of non-chewing foods.

What you all don't know is that when I was 20, I had my jaw broken and surgically reset in order to correct an underbite. The point of the surgery at that point was to avoid arthritis in my jaw by the time I was 40 due to unnatural bite and chewing motion. It appears the surgery may have only bought me a few years, not a lifetime free from the pain. Although with arthritis developing in various areas of my body (back, hand, eye inflammations) I'm not overly surprised at this development.

Anyway, I'm madly trying to remember what I ate for the 6 weeks my jaw was wired shut so I can reintroduce some of those foods into my diet. I just remember how much Ensure made me gag and me buying my mom a blender so when I ate at her place (which I did a lot during that time) she didn't have to hand-puree all my food. That's my blender now, since the one I got when I first got married died a couple of years ago.

I'll make jello and my mom's potato and green bean soup this morning. I still have one serving of carrot/ginger soup in the freezer. I'll try eggs for breakfast or maybe shredded wheat made with hot milk to make it go all mushy. I hate mushy foods (just learned to eat mashed potatoes in the last 10 years or so.)

Edited to add that I have a 12:30 dental appointment.

[Lilac]

(((Kathryn))) I am so sorry that you are dealing with this. I am so claustrophobic that if I had my mouth wired shut, I would probably implode. How about cottage cheese, applesauce, yogurt, pudding, smoothies and.........? Hopefully our wonderful friends here will have many more ideas. I am so glad that your dentist can get you in today. It will help to know what you are dealing with as soon as possible.

[Harriet]

Kathryn, I "came along" and gleaned your own words about what you needed today and put it into the topic. if you suspect arthritis is likely the underlying problem, then I'd suggest learning all you can about slowing it in general, with nutrition and lifestyle. I imagine healthy choices you have made over the years have already helped when you didn't even know it, but perhaps you could learn even more. I'm glad to hear you counting your "can-do"s. And I still think you will get relief from the immediate pain.

((lucylee)), reading your post came right on the heels of dd telling me she wishes she could be homeschooled. Although she has a semblance of social acceptance at school, she doesn't really feel a close relationship with anyone and is always on edge. When I took her to drop-off this morning, she had me slow down and wait until a particular boy had rounded a corner and wouldn't see her, and I think there are a lot of people she avoids. Friends told her just this past weekend that they have found high school is better, and I truly hope so, but these were football players who just live for the games and have almost all football friends. Anyway, I'm sure you sometimes feel no different from the teenagers around you when you are hit with new work, frustrating expectations, and still have to deal with the personalities. Do you also want my advice to her? It might apply. I said, "You just pay no attention to those people, honey, and you have a good day anyway." There. Does that help?

HRH is completely incommunicado today. Dd off to school. I am going to try my best to see that my ddad has a good day. If it is possible, I'll keep working on my recent projects, but if I have to I can find something to do right at the front door in the dining room - that's the Focus declutter for this week, anyway.

[Kathryn-in-Canada]

I'm done exercising. Dh is back in bed. He was up from 2 onwards. I was awake at 1:30 and up at 3 when dh turned the light on and sat up on the side of the bed to make notes on his smart phone. That spurred me to get up, go to the bathroom, put on my eye mask, start my mp3 player and I went back off to sleep.

I still need to eat breakfast but I'm afraid to.

[Harriet]

Holding Kathryn's hand virtually.

Here is a bit of cleaning news that came out today. What Errand Day surface that you regularly touch do you think has the most germs? Be aware of these Germ-y surfaces

And while I'm posting links, here is a info I came across last evening pondering the right scent for a desk area. This article is from India and is more in-depth than I'd ever need about how to use flower oils, but there are tidbits about different aromas that were really interesting/useful. Aroma info

[Elizabeth]

Good morning everyone! I made lots of crisis cleaning progress yesterday. LR is done, half the kitchen looks terrific. I still need to do some stuff in the kitchen: one counter, table, mop. I even remembered to do 5 minutes on the exercise bike. Tonight not much cleaning will be done because it is Girls' Night Out with DD9. She still has a brace on her wrist, so I am not sure if she will want to go to Chuck E Cheese. She can still eat Chinese food though!

Today, I have called the life insurance company to straighten out a bill and am on page 248 of 357 for the document I am proofing.

Harriet: The aroma info links to the gas pump handle page. I don't think that is the aroma you were referring to .

[BookSaver]

Good morning, villagers ~
This morning I turned a handle at the kitchen sink and hot water came right out of the spigot -- it's magic!

Today will be mostly desk day, catching up on the online work that had to be postponed while I was waiting on phone calls.

Hmm, now I'm waiting on email replies, and it feels very much the same as waiting for the phone to ring ...

3 kitchen drawers to deep clean, now that hot water is more easily available:

1) Knives and other sharp implements -- I don't use most of them because I have my favorites, so the extra pieces can go into a donation box.

2) Food storage bags, foil, wax paper, etc. -- just needs to be neatened, the drawer washed & new liner installed

3) T'ware & other plastic lids -- Anything that doesn't match a container (& any container that doesn't have a lid) needs to either be tossed or donated. We also have too many containers, so possibly a third of them can be donated.

Once I get these drawers taken care of, there will be space to store a few things that are currently up on the counters. From yesterday's work, there is 1 big empty space on a counter, which fills me with delight.

I'm starting to have hope that I can get the house in better shape before someone nominates us for the Hoarders shows. (Although I wouldn't mind the Clean Sweep folks stopping by. I love the way they always made it look so easy to just haul a couple of rooms full of furniture and everything out onto the lawn.)

I thought about running to the grocery store, but I don't want to be sidetracked from this at-home stuff.

[bittersweet]

I'm finally up - after sleeping in and then laying in bed for the best part of 10 minutes trying to figure out what day of the week it is!! First on my agenda this morning is some coffee, and figuring out where there are parkades/parking lots downtown. For some reason, our acting director has insisted that we attend the branch quarterly meeting, and although there are two 12-passenger vans going from work, I don't ride in other people's vehicles...just one of those weird things that gives me major anxiety.

There! Coffee cup full, and parking lots located - there are several within a couple of blocks of where the meeting will be held. Rates don't matter much, since I'll be reimbursed for my parking cost.

As soon as I'm done my coffee, I'm going to get started on my two main tasks for this morning - critter care and tidying/vacuuming the living room.

I could definitely use some energy today! We might be in the running for either Hoarders or the Clean Sweep show, Bookie! Possibly even How Clean Is Your House? since with all the critters here, things do tend to get MUCH dirtier

[Elizabeth]

I just started a FIFTH page of modifications needed for the document!!! Generally minor and better found by me than by the customer.