A New Week Monday

[lucylee]

Hmmmm… hope ddil is “wonderfully forgiving…” Thanks for the encouraging start-up, Harriet!

I did start out well, though, today. Up and at ‘em w/all my morning habits –
-- Straightened bed
-- 5-min floor exercises
-- Weigh/record * down 2 lbs from last week! *
-- Breakfast/vitamins
-- Bible reading
-- Watered plants
-- Rescheduled ob-gyn apt
-- Called daunt but she didn’t answer… * sigh *
-- S/S all three baths
* I really think our toilet is a lost cause. This is the “new” toilet that I SWORE I would keep pristine… nah… stains around the (plastic) hinges just WILL NOT BUDGE. I used toothbrush, SOS pad, and Mr. Clean pad. Ugh.
-- Spent approx.. 30 minutes in kitchen zone
* Not really kitchen work though – I was counting and listing dmil’s silverware. 4 different patterns, no complete sets. LOL. Maybe I’ll find some mates at her house when I go count dishes. I’m thinking some of the silver may be in the china cabinet, or mixed in with her everyday stuff.
-- Walked 1 mile, no time for more.
-- S2S

Ready to go to Wmart

Good to see you, Kally!!! Waving to Nancy… FF…

(((Dee))) for the difficult task of making dh slow down… and for your ddil’s upcoming tests…

Hope things go smoothly with your mom’s business stuff, Twins.

Kathryn, I think we are all just sooo thankful to have you and Ken looking out for us that we can handle a little bit of time off-line! Glad things are straightened out.

DH is ready to go. See y'all later!

[Harmony]

Aw, now I know why I couldn't get site to load. Earlier it was me, had to reset the modem.

Trying to get caught up. Need to send a couple messages.

Was out helping DH with trucks, not enough drivers. If you look at the florida radar, that mess over the southern half of the state: I've just recently drove through that. Called my own personal weathergirl (Sunny) who looked at the radar and told me what was going on. Lots of flooding. Couldn't even get into 1 shopping center, parking lot was deep water.

I was getting a bit spooked with the dark clouds so long overhead. I've turned on a few extra lights in the house and that definitely helps. Last evening for hours we had rain, then when that stopped, just rumbling and lightning well up through midnight.

Kathryn, I did read that clearing page and it caused me to think. What ceo has about it reflects mostly household things and makes perfect sense to me. What I need though is how to clear my head of the other things I worry about, health, finances, business happenings, etc. I couldn't see how to adapt the "clearing" idea to that.

Store I was in to get birthday gifts the other day was unusually busy, with the tax free holiday.

Hello to Kally. Missing posts from Lynlee, MT, and the Most Important Person.

Kathryn, how is DSiL. Still in hospital?

Harriet, so nice of DD to think of helping more. She's a gem!

Didn't make church yesterday. Missed helping with communion.

Desk is a mess. Spent 2 1/2 hrs. on one statement this morning.

My happy spot: 500 piece puzzle nearly completed. (See what I've been wasting my time on?!) It's a beautiful picture of Hallstatt, Austria. Lakefront mountain town. I just googled the name, and the pictures and history are breathtaking. Very old beautiful place. Wiki pedia has a nice article with pics.

Lucylee, stains are probably rust. Replace the bolts with stainless steel bolts. We had the same problem.

[Kathryn-in-Canada]

Just lost a post. That so seldom happens to me but suddenly all the html of the page was displayed.

I've wasted today and I'm truly annoyed, disappointed and devastated. Dh indicated he'd be willing to enjoy the holiday today but we were tied down waiting for my senior friend to call. She never called. Then it rained.

Had we not been tied down with my senior friend we could have biked downtown and enjoyed the holiday activities. Had she come to visit, I would have had a chance to show off the place and then driven her home and gone out for supper.

As it is, we didn't go anywhere, do anything, have any fun and I'm tired, cranky and achy from my TOM. I'm sure that's spoiling any chance of a good mood for me.

Update on dsil. He's much better and will be returning to work tomorrow. He had a double ear infection, in that it was infected on both sides of the ear drum and the swelling has gone down. Not sure if he can hear or not. We talked to him today and he sounds fine now so his voice is back and there's no sign of congestion.

Dd will be home tomorrow night. She managed to miss almost the whole time he was sick.

Since my last post I did wind the clocks, tidy the kitchen, water the plants, do the ironing, put away laundry and other odds and sods. Just nothing beyond routine tidying or simple chores.

[Harriet]

Yes, thanks ...water plants. Got it. BRB.

Ahem. Now.
(that was on my 5x5! How could I forget!)

Oh, so the site was down a while - I didn't know, but that explains a low post count by this time for PWYC. Mondays are usually rather fast-paced among the days of the week.

I need to call ins co. next and also order stamps.

TaDas include Desk Day.

"It's the little things" dept - HRH moved Tobias' (large, gravity feed) water in front of the washing machine - a place he assumes has no traffic. Pieces of laundry fresh from the dryer fell in. Dd couldn't understand why this bugged me so much. Well, HRH never gets around to buying more underwear, although he will toss out what needs to be replaced, making that laundry load come up more often in rotation as it is. Of course, what would fall into the water. Of course. She doesn't understand why I don't just let that dry, put it in the stack, and go on. Sigh. I don't know. It's juuuuuuuust beyond a certain level of (un)cleanliness my brain can't bear. Clothes that fell into pet's water are dirty now. Don't ask me why. I don't make the laws, I just enforce them.

Nancy, isn't it wonderful that we have the option of ordering and expecting quick delivery these days. I remember needs going unmet back when shopping for anything unusual meant a day trip that had to be planned.

Hmmm... ... maybe I should order men's underwear.

[Harriet]

Harmony - Clearing - yes CEO zeroes in on the practical. In The Happiness File, P and P give an example of a person's list that is all over the place, from grocery shopping to "I'm 20 pounds overweight!" . From "I need to clean out the cabinets" to being frightened to face balancing the checkbook . They say in the margin, go back and write whether each item is past, present or future. For "past" transfer to 3x5s and file in front of next year and don't look at them until then, when you will be able to address them with clearer thinking. Cross them off list. For "future" decide on the best upcoming month to handle each, transfer to 3x5s and file in front of that month. Cross them off list, too. Then you are only faced with what is really "present".

THEN prioritize "present" ones, and choose some action, such as - routine - go - buy - pray - call - do . You may find some that are really "delegate", so do that, and cross them off the list. Transfer these to an Immediate Action Card for the front of the current day, and move it to the next day even if it takes a week of moving it daily. That's okay. When it's almost done, transfer the last item to a new Immediate Action Card with anything else that has come up and file the previous IACard under "success". At the prioritizing step, some may be confusing enough to have only a question mark for an action, which is okay. The answer of what action may: 1) come to you later, 2) come to you through asking advice of others, 3) come to you by breaking the problem down into smaller sections.

This is an over-simplification of about 8 pages in Happiness File's fourth chapter, and they are thinking in terms of cardfile. But it gives one good idea of approaching those tougher concerns. P and P say it helps to get things down on paper and then organized/transferred into sections before they get out of perspective and into the realm of MSTOGCH ("more strain than one guy can handle" ).

[Nancy]

Journaling done.
Bed made.
Laundry going.
Nap check.


Time to unload the dishes.
Then sweep and mop.
Quiet time still to do.
ToddlerN is napping.

Glad I renewed my driver's lisc. last week, it came today so I can check that off with a success!

[FelineFriend]

Laundry done and put away/hung.
Called pharmacy.

Need to MT the DW, but a lot of times, DH does it. Loads it, runs it, too.
Laid down for a couple of minutes, but immediately got up, to call the pharmacy. Need eye drops, quickly, so tomorrow DH will pick them up when he gets my prescription and the OTC eye drops.

Got DH's new colored men's socks washed/dried; he put them away.

Watched DH fixing his new timer/clock, which times him doing a 90-minute fasting before a meal.
Then, watched him fix his high-tech blood sugar monitor. These things are so high tech, they give no lessons, send them home with books, to fend for themselves. Oh, well. He did it.
Then, he informs me, 1 day next week, he needs to be HOME ALL DAY to do his blood sugar readings ALL day. We picked out a day. At least the firewood's in, the grandsons will all be home, and we can get back into a normal schedule again.

OH! DH bought Dgs a jogging outfit. It's navy with orange outer stripes down the sleeves and legs. It fits him perfectly, too. It is so nice. What a Gpa! ♥

I need to go journal again, think about my evening routine and plan out tomorrow. At least I dusted and dust mopped the house. Getting 1 story done by hand again, wore me out. 2 down; 3 to go. Am trying to work in baby-steps on them, when Dgs is busy or gone with Gpa.

[Nancy]

Swept dining room mopped kit. Yea for more progress.
ToddlerN "helped".
We are watching cars while it dries.

[Kathryn-in-Canada]

I want a do-over on today.

We went out to dinner because I wanted out. We drove because I wasn't sure I wanted to bike all that far - it is south of here and the bike routes south are all on traffic roads for a good portion of the way because there's a freeway to get under and a gravel pit to get around. The place we chose was closed so we went across the street to a 'drive-in' (no longer, now sit down) and had dinner there. Everything was supposed to be homemade (including my hotdog) but it didn't seem all that special. I'm pretty sure my sweet potato fries weren't, dh's hand dipped onion rings seemed too perfect to be homemade but his hamburg was good. The shake was so-so (I had soda but national brand not local.) We were disappointed because we had hoped for something more special.

I passed on dessert because I wanted a chocolate brownie with ice cream and it wasn't on the menu. So I came home, unloaded the dishwasher, carefully measured and made brownies (quite likely for the first time in my life.) It was a complicated recipe but seemed to be going well. I had the timer on the stove set to time the cool a bit before adding eggs stage while the oven was heating up and messed up - turning off the oven as well as the timer (the cancel button stops both.) So ended up putting the batter in a lukewarm oven for 20 minutes.

I'm exhausted, upset and now angry. And I have no idea if they'll be okay. It is time to test them now.

It is an interesting recipe in that it has only 1/2 cup of flour. And is made with cocoa so says it is lower in fat. It is funny how the recipe talks about how much healthier it will be than melting chocolate, since it doesn't have the fat or sugar of the chocolate and then, of course, has you add in a ton of butter and sugar to turn the cocoa into chocolate!

Edited to add: possibly the best brownie and ice cream I've even had. As promised the brownie was crispy on the outside, chewy inside. Next time, I'll cut the brownie up into small chunks and mix it in with the ice cream. Now to freeze the leftovers (90% of the pan) and I'll have them to use at the open house I'm having on Sunday.

[lucylee]

Harmony -- the "rusty" stuff is on the plastic part of the hinges -- I just hate to say it but you know what I think it is... b/c I've got a man with no aim!!! I swear... to keep my bathrooms really spotless, I'd have to follow him in there every single time... and he will NOT confine himself to just the bedroom bathroom; he has to go to the "guest" bath too, b/c it is more convenient to the den. * sheesh * I wish I could build him an outdoor toilet.
Well... guess that's MY contribution to TMI for the day.

RE: ddil... I think she's over her "mad" already. I told ds to tell her to call me when she got home tomorrow so she could either come get dgs or go with me to count & pack dishes at dmil's. He sounded like that (one or the other, anyway) would be agreeable to ddil. He says she's not mad -- I think she just sorta "reacted" when she saw the message from me.
Dgs is spending the night again b/c ds is helping a carpenter friend lay brick at my dmom's tomorrow. Ddil won't be home till after lunch, and ds will be leaving at 7:00 a.m. so we figured it was easier on me AND dgs to get to sleep in a little later.

My daunt called me back and we talked for a long time... she is so sweet... offering to help us clean at dmil's... or keep dgs while we do... she's just wonderful. This is the mother of the dcousin who passed away. We talked about dcousin just a bit, but didn't dwell on it at all. Just talking about waiting to put up the tombstone, and stuff like that. But daunt sounds like she's doing okay.

I love The Happiness File method of clearing... I should actually do that more often. How often do they say do the clearing exercise? (I can look it up; I have the book -- just thought you might have it in your mind right off, Harriet.) This is what you need to do, Harmony, (IMHO Please don't get offended like ddil, LOL!!! Harriet explains it very well.

in front of the washing machine - a place he assumes has no traffic

(((Harriet)))

Glad to hear your dsil is doing better, but wish YOU felt better, (((Kathryn))). Some days are just like that. (((BIG HUGS))) Hope the brownies turn out good!

Your experience waiting for senior friend is a lot like our experiences with dmom...
She was going to bake a cake for dh's birthday and deliver it to us w/his gift on Friday, his birthday.
Didn't happen. And she didn't go to her class reunion, either.
We were gone Saturday; she was going to bring it to us Sunday.
Didn't happen. And she didn't feel like us stopping by on our way out to eat. She would bring it today.
Didn't happen. I talked to her a little while ago; she will try to see us tomorrow.
* sigh *
As y'all well know by now, it just drives dh crazy when people say they will do something and don't. It's not that he is so eager for his gift; it's the being tied down WAITING for her to show up. He'd almost rather NOT get a gift than to be constantly ON CALL like this. But that sounds ungrateful, and unsympathetic to dmom's problems.

That WAS very thoughtful of dd to suggest helping more w/her grandparents, Harriet! * Someone has certainly trained her up in the way that she should go...

DH is reading a book to dgs. I was planning on vacuuming tomorrow while dh played golf. I still might make an effort, even with dgs here. Also have to go to Walmart and get boxes... and go to post office. DH has reminded me more than once about the post office. MUST GO TO POST OFFICE b/c football tickets should be arriving tomorrow. * whew *

Waving to ALL... y'all have a good night if I don't get back before bedtime!