SHEs Organized

Sorry your restaurant eating wasn't so "scrumptious" last night, Helia. I've been thinking of trying a new Thai restaurant here, but not quite sure.

Dh and dsonil have gone to ROMEO'S (retired old men eating out) this morning.

I'm right there with you, Harmony, on the coughing. My hope is it's allergies but it's becoming much more persistent. Afraid to go see my very good friend (she's going through chemo for the 2nd time in a year) as I sure don't want to spread germs if it be a bronchial infection again. It's too cold for my liking as well. My shoulder is really letting me know the weather is downright 'wintry' even here. Aches like a toothache.

DD is trying to get some Z's this morning after her stint from Tuesday night to early Friday morning at Daytona. She taught yesterday. Think this coming week she heads to Orlando with her TSA team for their state competition.

Proud of myself for coming up with a last night. After forever (I sit on the couch in the living room & the end table is to my left) of reaching around with my right hand for a drink or whatever something hit me last night. I'm usually the only one on the couch. Sitting in front of me was a lap desk I sometimes use for my laptop. I put that on the couch to my right and got it all situated so it sits level. I now have a very nice 'stand' to my right that I can use quite easily and well. Once in a while the light dawns. I so enjoyed that last night. There is a coffee table in front of me but it's really in front of the love seat and I can't quite reach it without scooching off the couch a bit. (exercise probably wouldn't hurt me.)

Time to get moving.

Speaking of light bulb moments, when CF used the bathroom last night, he came out with a question. Keep in mind he works at L*wes in charge of contractor installations.... "Why is your light fixture mounted upside down in the bathroom?"

We checked and all three are the same way. It has the effect of throwing the light up onto the ceiling and so the rooms are much brighter than they'd be if the light fixtures were mounted correctly. On the other hand, the gap between the shade and the ceiling is about 3" which means when a light bulb does fail, there is no way to change it except by removing the whole light fixture! Of course, as dh said, "Not our problem!" (except in a way it is because changing light bulbs is once they fail is our job - although in this case, the superintendent will obviously have to call in an electrician or do the work himself.)

I will say that the apartment is very dark except for the bathrooms so I don't look forward to lightbulbs failing and the fixture being remounted properly. They do have incandescent bulbs and the bathrooms were redone just before we moved in so there's a good chance this problem is 5 - 10 years away from requiring resolution. At the house, we had incandescent bulbs that lasted over 15 years (and not one of the CFL bulbs lasted more than 5 - so much for them saving you money because they last so long.) One of Edison's original bulbs is still burning, after over 100 years.

Here's a link: http://priceonomics.com/the-mysterious- ... ight-bulb/

I'm up. Feel rested and popped out of bed at the 7:30 news. Sure enough, my sleep quality graph agrees with my personal assessment. After over a week in the 60s, that night was 80%. And the graph is beautiful, the cycles are even. You can even see how I didn't actually fall asleep for the first 38 minutes because I failed to put my dressing gown over my side of the bed for extra warmth and I needed at least the weight if not the warmth. Once I did that, I was asleep in minutes.

Today I have to prep for tomorrow's meeting (never got that done) and write the service and sermon for March 1. I'm also hoping to do create my packing list and inventory meds for the trip. Monday will be a shopping day for me if all goes according to plan (and the forecast snow doesn't come.)

We have a snow storm today but only 4" expected. Another 4 inches will come overnight on Sunday but tomorrow is supposed to be just cloudy and actually almost freezing. It is cold now but the high today will be bearable so we will probably walk to dinner or at least to the grocery store to get something pre-made.

Life just works better when I consistently get enough sleep.

Amen to that, Helia!! It's a rare night that I get enough sleep. Last night, though, was pretty good.

I think the northland will be glad to see moderating temperatures!

Just finished doing up the dishes and cleaning up the kitchen. DD is still in bed -sure she's reading or posting on fb -or some such thing. Dh is out shoveling along the drive and walkway -he used an edger the other day and has been turning the resulting long piles to dry. Today he's cleaning them up. Want to get our car vacuumed out sometime today or tomorrow. Tomorrow is probably out -have church, then a birthday luncheon for an 88 year old member and then home to watch Daytona. This afternoon we're going to S onny's for an early dinner. We both have gift cards and 2 $5 cards that have to be used by the end of this month -think that leaves us today.

Think I'll go read for a little while. Put a whole stack of hot pads on the counter for dd to go through. Sure we don't need 15 of those and some are pretty old. Seeing them out like that will spur her to get rid of some of them. Going to try to challenge her to at least 5 items (decluttered) a day. Will point out that that's 150 a month. I'll try to match/exceed that making the grand total even higher. I've already done my '5' and better for today but will shoot for some more. I know I can downsize our room. One thing I need to get rid of is books. Some haven't been touched (nor will they be) since we first started coming here for the winter.

Dee: I don't know if you recall but once we decided we'd be moving in 18 months, I started to work to getting a garbage bag of stuff a week out of the house. Didn't always make that goal but it did help and I found that at the end when I was doing the last minute rush, there wasn't near the amount of crap we expected. I just kept cycling through the rooms of the house so hit each room at least twice during the grace period (taking into account I failed to do this weekly!)

I'm now s2s. Daily foot treatment done. I'm trying the cornstarch all over my foot treatment again today (in addition to the soaking in tea tree oil.) If nothing else, my feet felt fabulous last night. I've also put a coating of corn starch in my slippers in the hopes that will help absorb moisture and possibly fungal spores. I'll brush that out in the evening.

Trimmed my toenails today and continue to prep them for a pedicure in 10 days or so. Have decided the nail colour will be black since that goes with almost everything I wear and is supposedly a trendy colour. Red is considered an old lady colour these days.

I need to get something accomplished this morning and then work hard in the afternoon. The snow is really coming down right now, looks really pretty if you don't have to be out in it.

I offered to get dd anything she needs (she's sick right now) but all she needs is for us to pick up an exercise bike for her and deliver it to her house while she's skiing tomorrow. That's not going to happen. At best, dh and dsil will go get it some night this week. I did question her purchase, though, since we've had bad experiences in the back with mass-marketed exercise bikes. She would have done better to buy a used one like ours (they are designed to be used in hotel fitness rooms, not to hold laundry piles.) Our first one broke in 10 days because we didn't check the duty cycle (30 minutes at a time, 3x per week!)

I had some scrumptious raisen bran with cranberries and raisens today for breakfast. Chicken chores done. I need to go out and clean the run and refresh waterers today before winds in the forecast hit.

I need to do better with my exercises today and do work clothes.
Got a mitten done last night and started another one for a pr. For dgson. Sunny today but cooler nights here this week.

Feeling a bit puny will skip spinning mtg I think.
Granny duty later on today.

Dsonil just came in and I lost a whole post! Grrr... Was saying I do remember you doing that, Kathryn. We're slowly filling boxes for give away and putting them in the garage. There was already an antique bed set out there waiting to be picked up. So decided to put the other things with it. This set was given gd16 but she never took very good care of it. When they were carrying it out to the garage she dropped her end of the very expensive mirror. Any need to say what happened to the mirror? DD offered it back to dbil/dsil but they've never shown an interest in getting it. So we'll give it away.

At some point soon dd and dh need to take apart the loft bed they built a couple of years ago for gd. DD will try to sell that. They're using that bedroom as an art/craft room and it's lending itself very well to that. Dh and dd also need to take apart the very large computer desk unit in the office. They've decided to use that as her craft desk and that should be very good for that.

Helia, no nothing is definite at this point. Dsonil has an interview with co ca co la on Tuesday in Apopka. Sounding quite positive but we've been down this road before. Apopka is a 60 mile drive (at least) from here so sure dsonil would not like the commute very long. DD has finally decided if they should move that way that she doesn't really care if she finds a teaching job in this county (the upper northeast corner) or not. The only thing is it would affect her retirement. Just taking it day by day. I would like to know whether they might be moving or not as it would certainly be a great motivator for me.

Gd will be 18 in 17 months at which time all responsibility ends. Right now they're paying a substantial 'child support' to her guardian family (one that the guardian has repeatedly told her is not necessary -but she & dsonil feel it is). The guardian is hoping (greatly) that they can make a difference in her life by then. She is currently attending a special behavior school but if that doesn't work the next steps are Teen Challenge or Military boot camp. Sure hope something turns her around.

Dh was practicing his music for the service tomorrow and could hear our downstairs neighbour practicing so he went down and asked if he'd like to jam.

He came back up to get his guitar and asked that I get on the treadmill for a bit so he can get a sense of how bad it is for our neighbours, since their den is under our office/workout room.

So I'm on the treadmill.

Good morning to everyone!

My first thought is brrrrr... and -- at helia's dh out running in 18 degree temps! I am such a sissy. I cannot even IMAGINE going out to exercise in any form or fashion at 18 degrees. Wow. Once it gets into the 30s, I really start complaining, and below freezing -- ooohhh... I just want to curl up and hibernate. Of course, that would explain why helia & dh are both probably in a thousand times better shape than I am...

We had an exciting night. DH, now aka (by me, anyway) as Captain Adventure, decided we would go to a movie, about 40 miles away. I said, "Aren't you worried about the roads?" No, he said, he had driven through the Ozarks in an ice storm. * sheesh * Famous last words. About halfway there, or maybe a little more, he decided maybe we should skip the movie and just eat and go back home. Nothing was open. Apparently most of the world was a lot wiser than we were. Finally got S ubway sandwiches at a truck stop and started home. We were less than 15 miles from our house when we started up a hill and it was blocked in both lanes by semi-trucks. Had really been making it fine until then, driving about 20-30 mph. Well... we actually tried to go up the wrong side of the divided 4-lane -- we stalled out. Backed down to the median... turned around... tried a county road, it had hills and curves... stalled out... got out of there... decided to head BACK the way we came and try going home another way, which added about 80 miles to our journey, but was pretty much flat land.
* sheesh * You don't realize how steep some hills are when you're driving on a sunny day. Got almost to the place where we could finally turn and head back in the right direction... and trucks were stopped AGAIN. This time however, they had left one lane open... and with the help of a Good Samaritan, we got through there and finally * FINALLY * were able to make it home. But what should have been a 2-hour round trip ended up taking almost 8 hours.
* shaking my head *
All this while, I was following along on FB with a dcousin whose dh had ended up in the ditch at their neighbors', while taking her to her grandmothers before he started to work. She had told him to call in to work, the roads were too bad. His famous last words were, "I think I can make it." So they ended up in the ditch and walked back to their house. She said, "Now he says, 'Do you want to watch Dumb & Dumber 2?' Hah. Dumb and dumber just walked/crawled across the ice on highway XX."
I didn't tell her on FB how much dumber WE were. Good gracious, we're old enough to know better.
Giving thanks for safe arrival home.

Oh -- and btw -- Captain Adventure has not learned his lesson yet. He said, "I'm just glad I can get out and do this! Someday I'll be in bed like my daddy and can't get out and then I CAN'T do things like this."
* sheesh *

Re: moving or preparing to move, I think that is dh's strategy, Dee & Kathryn. He keeps going over to dmil's and sorting through things, throwing out some things, bringing some things home... s l o w l y getting more and more out of the house. We told dbil to make sure he had made his final sweep through before antique lady comes next week b/c at that point, we will be ready to pack it up and move it out. 5 things a day is a great goal, Dee!

I'm pretty sure I do not sleep well. I don't wake up a lot at night, but I just feel tired a lot of the time. Could be the way I eat, too.

So glad you are safe, Lynlee!

Harmony, dgs will be spending the night with us tonight. In spite of all dh's complaints re: OTHERS... I doubt if we will make it to church tomorrow. We are just not in practice of getting up in time to feed and clothe a two-year-old, and ourselves, in time for 9:00 a.m. service.

Electricians do some strange things, don't they, Kathryn? Dinlaws' house is so strange. For just one example, they have lights at the driveway. The on/off switch for these lights is in the master bedroom, and the lights themselves cannot even be seen from the master bedroom. That seems so strange to me. Why not by the outside door? It creates a situation that we are always uncertain whether we have turned on those lights or not. I could give many more examples. And dfil wired the house, remember. I think it's SAFE... just strange.

Love the idea of the ROMEO'S, Dee. LOL!!!

Hope Dee and Harmony both recover from coughing trouble soon!

I really do need to tackle that ironing pile today... and s2s/wash my hair... and finish some laundry.
AND call dmom, which may make everything else impossible. One never knows what that simple phone call will lead to.