the_rck

Cordelia got off to school just fine this morning. She left a lot earlier than she needed to because she was worried that she'd miss time with her friends. I ended up getting out of bed at 7:20. My original plan was to wait to get up until Cordelia left, but I'd forgotten my pain med at 5 a.m., and I was feeling that. Also, she opened and closed the front door (apparently she wanted to know how warm it was outside), and that woke me entirely. I assumed that it meant she'd left without saying goodbye and only realized that was wrong when I sat up and saw my clock.

The mother of Cordelia's friend who'll be catching a cab home from our place every day has had breast cancer (double mastectomy three years ago) and wanted to talk to me to see if she could give me any support. I wasn't sure when she'd come by, except that it would be after she dropped her kids off, so I wanted to be up and dressed by the time school started. As it happens, she didn't call and come by until about 9:00, an hour after school started. (There was some sort of welcome back thing for parents in the cafeteria involving muffins and coffee. I think she went to that.)

The main thing that came from the conversation was her suggestion that it might help Cordelia to talk to this woman's daughter. The daughter knows that it's not the end of the world. Sadly, the girls aren't in the same class. All of their mutual friends are in Cordelia's class. I hope there are some new kids in the other girl's class who can become friends of hers.

The other mother and I agreed that it's a good thing that the new gym isn't ready yet. Neither of us likes the idea of our daughters in a locker room, changing for gym. Right now, there's a bit less pressure for physical conformity in terms of things like bras and shaving. Changing in a locker room means the kids have no choice but to let others see their bodies.

Scott and Cordelia were at the fair for about three and a half hours yesterday. Scott says he was able to find a place to sit in the shade while the girls went on the rides. It was fairly hot, so they went through the water they'd taken with them and got smoothies and more water on top of that.

it was hot enough and late enough that we decided to get pizza rather than cooking, but I'm not sure it wasn't a mistake. I had minor reflux when I went to bed. It wasn't enough to make me get out of bed, but it was enough to keep me awake. I really desperately wanted to turn on my left side, but that would have hurt way too much.

Yesterday, the state Girl Scout organization sent me email saying that Cordelia and I had been registered for the upcoming year. I was concerned because I hadn't signed us up-- There probably won't be a Cadette troop at her school this year; there may not even be a Junior troop unless there's a fourth grade parent willing to run it. The mother who did it last year isn't able to this year.

At any rate, I sent an email back to GSHOM, protesting. They got back to me today to say that last year's troop paid for our registration (and presumably registration for everybody else who was in the troop then) and that that's a common way for a troop that's disbanding to use up the money in its account. It seems sort of silly to me-- If there's no troop, what's the point? They allow girls to be scouts when they're not part of a troop, but that doesn't do the sort of thing that most girls are interested in. Mainly, it's for girls who are more interested in badges than in the social aspects or for girls who expect to want to go to Girl Scout camp next summer or to participate in a lot of GSHOM activities of some sort.

Oh, well. I guess Cordelia and I are Girl Scouts this year whether we do anything else with it or not.

Getting up at 5 a.m. to take my thyroid medicine proved to me that walking semi-normally without the boot almost doesn't hurt at all while doing anything with the boot on hurts like the dickens. (I can't use the walker for this early morning trip to the bathroom because there's nowhere in our bedroom to put the walker and because putting it in the hall outside our room would mean that nobody could get out of their bedroom without moving the dratted thing.) I also still haven't figured out a way to bring my coffee into the living room while using the walker. I did bring a bottle of water into the living room at the same time I brought my coffee and my breakfast. I noticed yesterday that I was getting dehydrated because getting to the kitchen for water was so darned difficult (and painful). I am a little worried-- The ankle on my good foot is starting to hurt. I'm afraid that all of this may be putting too much strain on it.

I did crawl across our bed to get to the dresser this morning to retrieve my clothing. Usually, I'd get up and walk around the bed. I suspect that tomorrow I'll walk around the bed. Crawling hurt a lot.

Cordelia did a fine job getting dinner yesterday. Of course, she decided that she didn't want any of hers heated up, not the turkey and not the green beans. I had cold turkey, too, so the only thing she had to heat up was my green beans. The real test will come when I ask her to handle raw meat and get it into the oven. She's said she's not willing to do that, but it will need doing.

We watched The Flash last night. I had to cover my ears and look away during the scenes between Barry and Iris. I do not handle vicarious embarrassment well.

Feedly is giving me trouble. If I try to open it in a new tab, I get an error message claiming that it can't load and that it must be due to some extension I've tacked onto my browser. I've looked at what I have, and none of it should have that effect-- Not to mention that nothing at all changed in between Wednesday, when everything was fine, and yesterday. Scott suggested opening Feedly in a new window, and that worked. I have no idea why, and I worry that it won't continue to work. I use Feedly for metanews link finding. I'd say that about 90% of our links come from the blogs we follow on Feedly.

I have arranged for Cordelia to have a ride to the Girl Scout thing on Saturday. Apparently it's more of an open house than an all day event, so they don't have to be there at any particular time as long as they've got at least an hour before it closes at 3:00. The woman who'll be giving Cordelia a ride says they'll likely leave about 11:30 and that I should both feed Cordelia lunch before that and provide her with a snack to take along.

Tonight, some parents from Cordelia's class have organized another bowling night. Cordelia is going as is her best friend. I offered a ride to Cordelia's best friend, and her family accepted. Scott will be doing the driving alone because I don't want to have to get in and out of the car. It's a pity because the original plan was for us to go out for dinner while Cordelia was bowling. It's just too hard to do now. Maybe we'll get some kind of carry out and watch a movie. We have a movie that we've been halfway through for about three weeks now. Scott and I both keep forgetting about it.

I was awakened early this morning by a phone call from the school district informing me that there would be school today but no buses. We're only three minutes walk from the school, so that's not a big deal for us, but Cordelia's friend's mother has asked me if I can take her two kids after school because there's no way she or her husband can pick them up until some time after 5:00. This may mean that I have to walk over to the school to pick the kids up. I think they'd be fine walking on their own, but I left it up to the other mother.

Yesterday's Girl Scout meeting was busy-- The troop is doing a brunch in April for the Brownie troop. In preparation for that, the girls decorated flower pots and planted seeds. There are twenty four Brownies, and generally only six or seven girls attend meetings for Cordelia's troop, so this should be interesting.

When we arrived at the community center for the meeting, the food bank that also uses the spaces was filling bags and sorting the contents of boxes. We helped them move their stuff to their office. I was afraid, when we first arrived, that we weren't going to be able to use the space at all.

Scott and Cordelia insisted on driving to and from Girl Scouts even though it's only four or five blocks. They pointed out that the last time Cordelia and I walked it completely wiped me out for the rest of the day. The difference between that time and this one was that yesterday was considerably warmer. I think we would have been fine walking.

We went to the library immediately after the Girl Scout meeting. I had about twelve items to pick up, mostly CDs. One of the books I picked up will probably go back unread-- It's the fourth book in a series that Cordelia's been reading, and she's still on book two. When I put the hold on the fourth book, there was a long wait list, so I expected it would be quite a long time before I got it. I thought Cordelia would have plenty of time to read books two and three.

Cordelia and Scott want to watch The Hunger Games together. (Scott mostly feels like he ought to see rather than actually wanting to see it.) I have negative interest in seeing that, so we have to figure out some place comfortable for me to go for a couple of hours. I can't plug in my laptop in the bedroom (no accessible outlets), and the dining room is cold. I'll probably end up in the dining room.

I did no writing yesterday. I just couldn't focus. I felt like the day was too fragmented. It shouldn't have been, but it felt that way.

Scott paid bills yesterday but ran into problems. Several of the bills were missing, and he had no idea how much to pay. For my credit card, he was able to log in and find out how much I owed, and it turned out he'd already paid the water bill, but the cable bill and the AT&T bill are difficulties.

The Girl Scout cookie booth went okay. The girls didn't sell a lot of cookies because there simply weren't a lot of people coming through. Several cases of cookies went back unopened. Thin mints and Tagalongs were the big sellers. Trefoils must have sold really well during the first half of the booth, before we got there, because they were gone by the time Cordelia and the other Cadette took over the booth at 2:30.

Scott went out to run some errands, leaving me and Cordelia at Busch's. There were two other parents present, so I really didn't have to do much but stand there or sit on the bench a few feet away.

The booth was right by the exit which was configured in such a way that there was a blast of frigid air every time someone left the store. All of us adults kept our coats on, but the girls took theirs off.

We stayed nearly half an hour past the official end of the booth time, and the girls sold another four or five boxes of cookies. They did get one woman who donated $10. She said she couldn't eat cookies but that she wanted to contribute.

We had fish for dinner. Last week, we had cod, and Cordelia liked that. This time, when we went grocery shopping, tilapia was on sale, so we bought that. Cordelia does not much like tilapia-- She says it has no flavor. Unfortunately, we've still got another two, maybe three meals worth of tilapia. We also have two servings of cod left. I may prepare some of that for Cordelia on nights when Scott and I are having chicken-- It's easy enough, twenty to twenty five minutes in the oven from frozen.

This morning, I increased my morning dose of Wellbutrin to 150 mg. I'll be keeping the lunchtime dose at 100 mg for a while yet, just so I can see how the change affects me. The idea is, eventually, to go up to 150 mg twice a day.

Cordelia has the next week off from school. We'll have her friends over Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. Thursday and Friday, we'll be able to sleep in. I don't know if the friends' mother will be sending lunch or not. She hasn't said. She usually does, but I bought some stuff to feed the kids anyway, just in case. I don't have enough for three lunches, but I do have enough for two lunches.

I woke up with a headache again today. It's not as bad as yesterday-- For one thing, this one didn't wake me up and keep me awake. I went straight to naproxen for this headache. It's too soon to say if it will help, but I'm optimistic.

I spent a good chunk of time yesterday link finding for metanews. I normally do that on Tuesdays, but I won't have as much time on Tuesday as I usually do, so I want to get ahead as much as I can.

Cordelia got six books at the library yesterday. Three of them were books she'd put holds on-- the next two books in the series that started with Ruby Red and Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (she wants to reread the series and couldn't find our copy of the first book. I believe it's somewhere in her room, but who knows?). The remaining three were the first books she found on the shelf in the teen section. We'll see if she likes them.

I got about half a dozen CDs and a DVD (Maleficent) that the whole family wants to see. None of my book holds were in which may be just as well given how many books I've got that I simply haven't opened. I have two books due next Sunday that can't be renewed. They're both graphic novels, so the time involved isn't a big deal. I ought to be able to get through them quickly. I just have to start.

We ended up going out to dinner at Applebee's because I discovered that the chicken Scott bought wasn't what I'd thought. I thought it was just ordinary chicken breasts that could be baked in under an hour. As it turns out, it's a bigger chunk of chicken, and the package calls for roasting it for at least eighty minutes. It was too late when I pulled it out of the refrigerator to manage that much time and still get me fed by my 8:00 deadline (I can't eat later than that because of my reflux, not if I want to be able to sleep). I'll put the chicken in at about 4:30 today, and that should work just fine.

Cordelia complained about going to Applebee's but didn't offer any alternative suggestions. She was also quite happy to eat the burger she ordered. She wasn't as happy with the fries because they sprinkled black pepper on them. I also had a burger. Scott had a chicken dish.

We went home for dessert. Scott bought a dozen paczki on Saturday, and we're trying to get through them before they get too stale. He says he'd have bought half a dozen, but all of the small boxes were prune filled which he didn't want. The dozen he got are half raspberry and half cream cheese. It seems early to have paczki since Ash Wednesday isn't until the 25th.

Scott is delivering about half of Cordelia's Girl Scout cookies today, all the ones that go to his coworkers. She only sold eighteen boxes, so I paid for them up front so as not to have to worry about getting the money in on time. If she'd sold a lot more ($4 a box), I'd have been reluctant to do that, but eighteen boxes was only $72, and we'll get money from people fairly quickly.

I have to pin down Scott and Cordelia about signing up to volunteer at one of the troop's cookie booths. Cordelia doesn't want me to volunteer, but so far at least, other adults haven't signed up, so I may need to. The first cookie booth is Saturday, and it's only half staffed. The second booth is 6 March and is less than half staffed.

I managed to write about 600 words yesterday, finishing the section of fic that I was working on. The pieces I have of this are still wildly out of order and much more focused on one particular character than I want the work as a whole to be. I just haven't felt moved to explore what's going on with the other characters yet because they're more difficult and because they require some research and some writing skills I'm not so great at.

This is a story I haven't touched for about fifteen years, and I've done a lot of editing to earlier bits of it. The original plan, way back when, was to collaborate with lunargeography, but she and I have really fallen out of touch over the last decade, so I don't think that's going to happen.

I need to find someone who knows Rurouni Kenshin to take a look at what I've got and to help me fill in the gaps. I know a couple of the things that have to happen aren't particularly well supported in what I've written so far. I do have a couple of people who've said they'll take a look, but one of them seems to have vanished, and the other is very busy and not particularly keen on the sort of dark thing that I see this turning into.

I baked bread yesterday. We ran out of bread flour, so I mostly used all purpose. Normally, I'd add gluten when doing that, but I couldn't find the box of gluten that I'd have sworn was in the refrigerator. I even had Cordelia look for it to be sure I wasn't missing it. Fortunately, the loaf came out okay. It's not as tall as it could be, but it looks okay and, according to Scott, tastes okay. I didn't really expect otherwise, but we've had bread machine disasters in the past without any obvious reason.

Cordelia is currently rereading the Percy Jackson books. She's finding them simpler than she remembered, and she misses the multiple points of view. She has three books waiting for her at the public library, two new to her and one reread (We can't find our copy of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone). I don't know if she'll want to get more books than that or if she'll wait another week to start her book by book conquest of the teen section.

Tonight, the three of us will be going to the Girl Scout troop leader's house to help her sort out cookies. She's got all of them; she just needs to organize them so that each girl's orders are separate and easy to find. I suspect we'll end up spending a fair amount of time in her garage as that's where she plans to store the cookies while waiting for pick up. Fortunately for me, she's allergic to cats and dogs, too, so I don't have to worry that I'll end up sneezing half to death. (I could handle a dog for the amount of time we'll be there, but a cat could be a really big problem.)

Cordelia's Girl Scout troop is going to be doing something on either the 24th or the 26th. The message said 'Saturday 1/26,' but the 26th is Monday this year. There's no school that day, so it is possible the troop could have an activity then, but Saturday seems more likely. If it is Saturday, Cordelia will miss it because some sixth grade parents have organized an ice skating outing, and we've already signed Cordelia up to go to that. One of her closest friends is going ice skating, so she's inclined to stick with that.

Cordelia couldn't find her gloves this morning. I have no idea where they could have gotten to. I'll have to look for them later. Maybe they're in her room or something. She went to school wearing her extra pair of gloves, but those are so very thin that they're only good for a short time outside.

I have a dental appointment this morning at 11:00. That means leaving the house at 10:00. That will likely get me there twenty minutes early, but that's better than being late. I should find and charge my e-reader so that I can take it with me. Cordelia wasn't best pleased by me getting up when she did this morning, but I wanted to shower, and I wanted my hair as dry as possible before I go out. It won't be fully dry, but it'll have had an hour longer than if I waited for Cordelia to leave before getting up.

I'm debating getting lunch while I'm out. I like the chance to eat out, but getting to the restaurant I'd prefer is a bit of a hike. Of course, if I'm willing to go for a burger and fries, there's a place between the dentist and the bus stop. But, if I go to the Japanese place I really like, I'll be halfway to downtown and could take the #1 bus home instead of the #2. (The #2 lets me off at the bottom of a steep hill, on the wrong side of a busy street. Getting home from the #1 stop is considerably easier.) I guess I'll see how cold it actually is, come time to decide.

I'm currently reading a book called The Far Traveler by Nancy Marie Brown. I'm about halfway through, and I'm kind of bored. The blurb promised the story of a particular Icelandic woman who traveled to Vinland with Leif Erikson, but, so far, the book has only been a little bit about her. There's been a lot about the ecology of Iceland and why anyone would choose to settle in Iceland or Greenland and about the hints in the archaeological record of what life was like back then. I think the problem is that, while this particular woman's story captured the author's imagination, there simply isn't much to go on-- She's in two brief sagas, and there's evidence of a house from the right period on the property she's supposed to have farmed after returning from Vinland.

I've spent more money so far this month than I really wanted to. I've bought socks and a few pairs of pants (it's cold enough that I'm wearing layers even inside). I've bought Scott's birthday present (his birthday is in late February, so I'm rather early). I've bought Cordelia those Just Dance games she claims will give her exercise. I've bought myself a CD (at 50% off) and some Christmas ornaments for next year (also at a good discount). Hm. Going by all of that, perhaps I shouldn't have lunch out... Then again, lunch is likely to be about $10 so not much relatively speaking, and I don't get out more than about once a month.

There's another volunteering opportunity at the school-- They're looking for parents to help with student drop off in the mornings. The way things are currently configured, there's always a long, long line of cars waiting to drop kids off in the morning, and the construction isn't helping (the door used to get all of those kids in and out ought to be closed by the construction, but there's no other way to do drop off and pick up). They want volunteers to be out there, helping kids get out of cars and to the door safely. They're expecting things to be bad enough that they're not going to mark kids as tardy as long as they're in class by 8:15, ten minutes after the second bell, and they really, really don't want driving parents to get out of their cars for any reason.

Yesterday, Scott and I napped, more or less, until around 11:00. Then he got up and showered, and I got up and did the dishes. He had more saltines for lunch. I had my usual cheddar chicken sausage and an apple. Around 1:00, Scott took me to the grocery store and then went on to the hardware store to buy what he needed to fix the toilet.

I found most of what I was looking for at the store. I don't usually do the grocery shopping, so I don't know where most of this stuff is. I only forgot one thing on the list, and there was one other thing that should have been on the list and wasn't. Scott caught up with me around the time I hit the frozen foods (didn't buy anything there) and accompanied me through the rest of the trip.

We made a quick detour into town to pick up my library holds. That only took five to ten minutes because all I had to do was run in and check them out. I've got a couple of books now that I expect I'll read through without stopping. I wish I could find more books that read that easily for me.

Apart from sleeping in and not eating anything but saltines and ramen, Scott seemed well. I think he made the right call in not going to work, though. He was pretty worn out yesterday morning, and, prior to the shopping trip, we didn't have anything he could eat but saltines. I don't think he could have managed a full day of work on saltines.

Cordelia's Girl Scout troop is planning to go to an event at the regional center in Ypsilanti in December. It's called Glow Dance. I don't know yet if Cordelia wants to go. I'd like her to. She missed all of the Girl Scout meetings and events this month, and the Glow Dance is the only thing the troop has scheduled between now and the next meeting on 21 December.

Apparently, they gave out the cookie order forms at the meeting we missed on Sunday. I'll have to arrange to get those. Sales aren't supposed to start for another month, so I'm not sure why the troop leader is already handing out forms. I'd be afraid of the girls losing them between now and 13 December when sales start.

I think I've figured out a starting point for my Yuletide story. I'm very relieved because I'd been mulling it over and mulling it over, and nothing was coming. Now I can start to write. I do wish I knew someone else who knew this canon. I'd love a chance to talk my ideas over with someone. Scott tries, but he doesn't know what I'm talking about (and he's not interested in consuming the canon just to talk with me about it. He tried once and bounced hard).

Yesterday was a busy day. We went to the library about 12:30, getting back just in time for Cordelia and me to go to Girl Scouts. That lasted an hour and a half. Then we had a soccer game at 3:45.

The Girl Scout meeting went pretty well. There were a lot adults hanging out in the doorway, so perhaps I need not have worried that I'd be the only adult besides the troop leader. Of course, none of those other adults did anything to contribute toward the meeting. They just watched and talked with each other. The girls brainstormed some ideas for things they'd like to do. Some of those ideas are feasible, some not so much. The troop leader had a craft project-- She had the girls take largish washers and decorate them with nail polish and then hang them on ribbons as necklaces.

I have difficulty with craft projects both on a practical and a philosophical level. On a practical level, I never have any ideas for projects and, when faced with one, never quite know what to do. On a philosophical level, I tend to view this sort of craft project as busy work. It never produces anything useful. In most cases, the product is just more clutter that we can't throw out but have no use for. I try to suppress this attitude because I know that kids have fun making things. I don't want to detract from that. I just wish that craft projects weren't so central to Girl Scouts.

It was about 55F and windy during the soccer game. When the wind died down and the sun came out, it wasn't horrible to be sitting there, but most of the time, the sun was behind clouds, and the wind was blowing. Cordelia's team won the game. This was the third game in a row where they played a team called the Cheetahs. Out of seven teams playing in the league, three are named the Cheetahs. (Cordelia's team is called the Leopards.)

I was glad of my winter coat during the game. I think I've waited too long to get the dratted thing dry cleaned, however. I'm going to need it for the rest of the soccer season. Then again, there's no game the weekend of the 18th. That would give me nearly two weeks to get the stupid thing to the cleaners and to retrieve it again.

We stopped for bubble tea on the way home from the soccer game. Usually, we'd get it right after going to the library, but I didn't feel that we had enough time for it, given Girl Scouts.

Scott grilled chicken for dinner. I made pasta and steamed some pea pods. We heated up some Alfredo sauce, and mixed that with chicken and pasta. Cordelia didn't even complain that Scott put her chicken and Alfredo sauce on top of her pasta. Normally, she likes to keep that separate.

Cordelia has started doing something, and I can't decide if it's cute or annoying (it's definitely unsanitary). She will open her mouth and 'kiss' my nose, getting spit all over me. She thinks this is great fun and will keep trying to do it even when I ask her not to. I probably don't help because, as I fend her off, I start laughing and laughing. She's probably doing it just for that. She does object strenuously when I wipe my nose on her shirt after she slobbers on me. I really need to get her to stop, though. It's getting into cold season, and doing this will guarantee that she gets what I get and vice versa.

I almost did something that would have Cordelia really, really mad at me-- She needs a booster for the HPV vaccine (apparently she was due in September. My understanding was that the doctor's office would let me know when she needed to come in. They didn't). I scheduled it for tomorrow and then realized that Cordelia would kill me. The book she's been waiting a year for, The Blood of Olympus, comes out tomorrow, and I've pre-ordered a copy from Book Bound. Cordelia plans to walk over there after school to pick it up. Going for the vaccination would mean she wouldn't be able to get the book tomorrow. I've rescheduled for a week from tomorrow. (They don't do vaccinations on Mondays or Fridays, and Wednesdays and Thursdays, she has sports practices. She's going to be pretty sore from this one, and I don't want to send her straight to practice afterward.)

Last night was the big meeting for Girl Scouts. It was an opportunity to meet the leaders and to get paperwork. It was under attended because not all classes got the flyer announcing it. Cordelia's class didn't, and at least one of the fourth grade classes didn't. I still knew about the meeting because I'm on the e-mail list for troop leaders and volunteers.

The situation for Cordelia is complicated. There are, at present, only two Cadettes. The plan is to fold them in with the Juniors under the same leader. The representative from the Council said we may have to form a Cadette troop under the leadership of the Junior leader just so that the girls can be registered as Cadettes. The Cadette troop would meet with the Juniors and do all activities with the Juniors and, for all practical purposes, be part of the Junior troop. It would just exist as a technicality. Of course, we need five girls to form a troop, so that may not work. Cordelia and her friend may simply have to live with the Girl Scout automated system thinking they're Juniors. (It will matter if they want to sign up for special activities or summer camps.)

The woman who has volunteered to lead the Juniors is overwhelmed and not particularly organized. I feel like I ought to volunteer to help more, but I don't want to get entangled in something that will make me really anxious.

I've been exhausted the last couple of days. I actually napped both mornings. Yesterday, I knew I was going to nap, so I delayed my coffee (Cordelia told me it was utterly unfair for me to go back to bed when she and her father don't get to), but I had coffee this morning and napped anyway. I'm tempted to have more coffee now but will probably settle for tea.