Category: Daily Life

Yesterday morning I went into work, where I was informed in no uncertain terms just how bad I looked and promptly sent home. 

I spent most of the day sleeping, lying in bed contemplating the peeling wallpaper, cracked plaster ceiling and cobwebs in the corner of the door, then sleeping some more, and occasionally rising briefly to check my e-mail and respond to anything that seemed urgent.

I finally went to the doctor at 4:30, listless enough that I ended up lying down on the exam table while I waited for her to come in.  I was afraid she was going to tell me I had a virus and nothing could be done about it, but tests revealed a kidney infection.  I was so relieved that I had something treatable, I almost started feeling better when she handed me the prescription slip.

Thanks to my first two doses of Cipro (which will protect me from anthrax, too – bonus!), no doubt boosted by the placebo effect, I’m headed to the office again today.  I still feel as though someone kicked me in both kidneys, but I imagine that will pass unless it turns out I have kidney stones (again), too.  The doctor thought that was possible but unlikely based on the symptoms, so we’ll see.

I’m looking forward to thinking about something besides my own health for a change, and I’m sure you’re tired of hearing me whine as well.  That’s the problem with a daily blog – you’re forced to talk about what’s happening, no matter how uninteresting it might be for the audience.  I’ll try to discuss something more relevant to the general public tomorrow.

I woke up yesterday secure in the knowledge that, sooner or later, I was going to have to throw up.  I was not wrong.

I actually managed to interview someone over the phone and then take notes through another hour of phone meetings later, but by the time all that was over, my fever had kicked into high gear and I ached from head to toe.  My skin hurt, my muscles hurt and my stomach was too touchy for even the mildest food.

After a shower, I retreated to bed at noon and stayed plastered there like roadkill until it was almost dark outside.  I’d feel hot but with cold hands and feet, then cold all over, then hot all over.  One cat kept trying to lie on me, and I had to push him away repeatedly until he decided he could soak in enough heat if he just lay next to me.

I turned on the television once, but I couldn’t concentrate so I turned it back off.  Sometimes I dozed, but much of the time I just lay there in misery.

My husband offered to get me something to eat and I requested cherry Jell-o.  I wish I hadn’t been so specific about the flavor because he returned with the only brand the store had in cherry:  Jolly Rancher gelatin snacks.  If you’re an adult and you’ve never had this product, let me just say that it’s not for you.  It’s rubbery, gaggingly sweet and it assaults you with flavor.  It was nothing like the cool, refreshing snack I’d been craving, but I ate one anyway because my blood sugar was scraping bottom.

I finally gathered the energy to get up and take a couple of Tylenols.  They eventually knocked back the pain and fever so I could take a long nap…just in time to wake up for a couple of hours and then turn in for the night.

Today I’m feeling somewhat better but I’m still a trifle warm.  I think a trip to the doctor is in order – I’m going to try to get an appointment later today.  In the meantime, my workload hasn’t gotten any smaller so I’m going to head to the office and see what I can accomplish.  Wish me luck.

I don’t know if it’s food poisoning or a stomach bug, but something has me feeling very, very bad.  I think you’d best entertain yourself with my blogroll today.  I’m going back to bed for a while…

Well, that was a nice respite from work, but I’d take another day or two if I could get it.

On Friday evening, we went and saw Hitchhiker’s Guide as planned.  As I said in a previous post comment, I have read the books countless times, read the radio scripts, listened to the radio program (programme?) version that came out in album form, and seen the TV show.  I’ve been as immersed in the variations of the story as a person can be.  That’s why I think I was absolutely fine with the story changes:  every version is slightly different anyway.

My experience of the movie was comfortable recognition of the familiar parts interspersed with interest in the new parts.  In general, the movie was quite faithful to the tone and many of the particulars of the books.  I was pleased to hear that they’d chosen to use the old theme song, too.

It was rather interesting to see the characters recast and reimagined a bit, although I’m not sure what Douglas Adams would have thought of Zaphod Beeblebrox played with a George W. Bush accent and smirk.

On Saturday, we drove to a huge, twice-annual flea market about an hour and forty-five minutes away.  The sales sprawl out over two towns and we spent all afternoon wandering through the collections of antiques, collectibles and junk.  I couldn’t help wondering what makes a flea market seller eventually decide that a particular piece is never going to sell and should be thrown away.  In some sellers’ cases, it seemed nothing could ever tip the balance.

I didn’t really buy much, mainly because I wasn’t looking for anything in particular.  I bought a couple of faux copper Jell-o molds, but it turned out I already had those designs.  Most of my spending went toward fresh-squeezed lemonade, kettle corn and a bowl of homemade chicken and noodles.  Even my snacking was minimal compared to previous years, so I have plenty of lunch money left for the week.

By the time Sunday rolled around, I was ready to take it easy.  I slept late, went out for breakfast, lazed around some more, and finally spent the rest of the afternoon and evening at my sister’s house.  My sister informed me that my niece believes that I may be a robot and not a real person at all.  Apparently this has something to do with my not having children, but the logic wasn’t all that clear. 

I finally took my tired, non-mechanized self home and turned in relatively early last night.  Now it’s off to face another week at the office.  Oh, if only I were a robot!

Oh, how I wish I could go on vacation right now.  Unfortunately, I don’t have any plans to do so until June at the earliest, then I have another long weekend booked in July.  None of that helps in the short run.

At least it’s Friday.  Tonight my husband and I are planning to see The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, even though the reviews have been rather mixed.  Tomorrow we’re taking a road trip to stroll through two big flea markets all day long.  On Sunday, I’ve promised my dad I’ll spend the afternoon at his house working on some publishing projects.

I’m too fried to think of anything interesting to say.  Hope everyone has a good weekend.  I’ll report on my weekend treasure hunting Monday.

My entire evening yesterday was taken up by the kind of activity that makes me realize I’m entirely too old and responsible.  My husband and I and our neighbors attended a lengthy informational meeting about the feasibility of switching from septic tanks to sewers.

Our neighborhood was established in 1947, and for some reason that I’m sure seemed very valid at the time, all of our houses have septic tanks instead of being tied to a sewer line.  About once a decade, a couple of people on our street decide that this Can’t! Go! On! and start the process of informing the rest of us about the joys of spending massive amounts of money to fix something that’s not broken.  Most of us stop the process in its tracks at Step 2 (a postcard that asks, "Would you sign a petition in favor of a sewer district for your neighborhood?"  No!) and everyone lives happily ever after until the subject comes up again.

Anyway, to prove that we’re responsible homeowners, we sat through the world’s most boring presentation.  They showed us a map of our backward neighborhood surrounded entirely by progressive, sewer-using people who are probably mocking us when we’re not looking. 

For some reason, there was an exhaustive (and exhausting) PowerPoint presentation detailing every type of septic system on the market, which seemed odd in that all of us already have septic systems and I’m willing to bet that most of us don’t have any idea what kind they are.  The presenter used terms like "scum layer" and "solids" that made me glad I hadn’t eaten dinner beforehand.

Finally, a planning engineer made a case for installing low pressure sewers (LPS to those in the know), introducing another disgusting concept:  the grinder pump unit.  Ick.

The question and answer session got rather heated, mainly because there’s a new regulation in effect that requires an extensive septic tank inspection when you sell your house that could possibly force you, the seller, to establish a connection to any sewer line that’s within 200 feet of your property.

After more than an hour and a half, we finally left because, despite the increasingly angry questions, it seemed clear to us that there was no way the majority of homeowners in our neighborhood were ever going to agree to step forward and pay $15,000 to $20,000 each for no good reason.  I’m sure it’ll come up again around 2012.

In my profession as a Marketing Babe, I’m familiar with the concept of customer evangelism.  In a nutshell, it’s the idea of a company’s customers becoming so enthralled with a product that they’ll voluntarily urge others to buy it.

I’ve always been inclined to share my opinion of products I particularly like or dislike.  However, I’ve lately found myself in the position of repeatedly being asked my opinion about one particular consumer good:  my hybrid car.

Ever since gas prices went from uncomfortable to downright painful, strangers have been approaching me to ask about my car almost everywhere I go.  One day I even had a guy next to me at a stoplight gesture for me to roll down my window so he could quiz me about my gas mileage.  Almost every trip to the bagel shop, the grocery store or the gas station results in my reciting the pros and cons of the Honda Insight.

I really like my car, so I’m happy to share my thoughts about it.  Unfortunately, the Insight is the rarest hybrid on the market.  According to this MixedPower.com article, it’s only available by special order, which would explain why I’ve seen a mere handful of others. 

The Insight is the only two-seater hybrid out there, and I’m sure that’s probably undesirable to many people.  It’s the tradeoff that gives it the highest potential gas mileage of all of the hybrids on the market, but only people without kids or dogs can really take advantage of it.  Wired Magazine recently published a good comparison of available hybrid models.  I should probably print it out and carry it around with me to hand out!

People always ask me about my gas mileage and I have to admit that I’m not trying very hard.  I’ve carried over my lead-footed driving style from the last few sports cars I had, so my gas mileage has been hovering around 50 mpg.  One of these days I’ll start paying attention to all the advice on InsightCentral.net to see if I can achieve the big numbers.

Would I recommend a hybrid?  Definitely!  I’m aware that the Insight isn’t for everyone, but I’ve heard good things about the Toyota Prius and the Honda Civic Hybrid.  They’re all small with no frills, but that doesn’t seem important when you’re spending less than $50 a month for gas.  The new hybrid SUVs aren’t quite as impressive in the gas mileage department, but I’m sure they’d provide welcome relief for people who are used to filling up almost daily.

I wish this post title referred to my virtuoso guitar soloing skills but, alas, I have no knack for stringed instruments.  No, I’m talking about shredding my junk mail, a task that I am beginning to resent more and more.

I spent about 30 minutes this morning shredding an armload of unwanted mail, mainly consisting of credit card and mortgage loan offers.  That was just what I’ve received in the last two weeks;  I have an enormous cardboard box and an overstuffed grocery sack full of other candidates for the shredder.

I estimate that about 5% of the mail I receive is actually of interest to me.  The other 95% sometimes overwhelms the bills, letters, cards, magazines and other items I actually want.  As I was shredding, I found the May/June issue of Archaeology magazine buried in the pile.  I have no idea when it arrived.

I’m in the habit of shredding at least the name and address portion of every piece of mail that arrives.  I used to keep the shredder in the kitchen so I could keep up with the mail every day.  Unfortunately, that got away from me fairly quickly, so now the shredder is up by my desk surrounded by its eventual victims.

I’m hoping to put a stop to some of the excess mail by using the Direct Mail Association’s Mail Preference Service.  Unfortunately, they have a finky policy of charging you $5 to register online (even though you’d think that would be cheaper for them in the long run), so I’m planning to register all our name/address combinations by mail instead. 

Maybe soon the shredder (me) can have a much-needed break.

It’s tornado season in the Midwestern United States.  Spring arrives with robins and blooming plants, then tornado season follows, marked by the wail of sirens and the appearance of multicolored county maps plastered across the lower left of the TV screen.

We had a severe storm yesterday that came up quickly and dramatically while I was still at work.  The sky turned dark with a greenish cast, then came heavy rains, hail and the distant sound of sirens.  The bad weather lasted only a few minutes, but the watches and warnings persisted into the evening.

When I was growing up, we lived out away from the city and took tornado warnings very seriously.  I remember our family huddling in our dank cellar with a flashlight, a battery-operated radio, and every dog and cat we could round up, waiting for the all-clear.  We never had a tornado touch down near us, but because the high school a few miles away had once been demolished by a tornado (before I was born), we figured it was better safe than sorry.

My husband believes for some reason that tornadoes never hit within a city.  He’s of the "stand on the porch and watch the sky" school of emergency weather reactors.  I don’t know how safe and sturdy our basement is, but I’m willing to spend some extra time down there sorting laundry or organizing our holiday decor storage during a warning period if it could mean the difference between life or death.

After years of tornado watches and warnings, it does get kind of easy for me to downplay the danger.  However, I’m sure everyone who lives somewhere that’s prone to its own variety of natural disaster gets used to the looming threat.  Whether you live on a fault line, near an ocean or river, adjacent to a semi-dormant volcano, or in "Tornado Alley," you probably learn to put the worry aside until something bad starts to happen.

What’s your area’s biggest natural threat?  How do you react to it?

Yes, that’s right, I’m left-handed.  Supposedly that makes me clumsy, accident-prone and right-brained.  Considering that I have a big bruise on my foot from dropping an insulated coffee mug earlier this week, the clumsy and accident-prone part sounds right, although I can’t positively attribute it to my being left-handed.  The right-brain stuff sounds correct though, as writing is my preferred occupation (despite my being shoehorned into a left-brained project management job right now).

The world isn’t particularly accommodating for lefties, but I’ve adapted some ambidextrous habits that serve me pretty well.  For example, in elementary school I started out competing for the few pairs of left-handed scissors available before giving up and just learning to use right-handed scissors instead.  That alone has probably saved me an enormous amount of inconvenience in my lifetime.

I embroider left-handed but crochet right-handed, because my great-aunt taught me crocheting and we both found it too complicated when she tried to teach me "backwards."

There’s only one specialized kitchen tool for lefties that I’d like to have:  a left-handed measuring cup.  I always end up with the metric side facing me and it would be nice to be able to see the English measurements without awkwardly holding the measuring cup in my right hand.

I put my computer mouse on the left (which doesn’t always reach very well, let me tell you!), but I use the buttons in the usual right-hand configuration.  Several jobs ago, an IT person helpfully programmed my mouse buttons in reverse but I couldn’t get used to it and I made her change them back.

I’m curious about how many of my fellow bloggers and blog readers are left-handed. Left-handers are a distinct minority among the population at large, but the whole right-brained thing could tip the balance a little more toward lefties among bloggers.  Which are you?