Congratulating myself

Because of my anxiety and also having bipolar II (mainly depression,  but also sometimes hypomania, I use an app called Daylio on my phone to track my moods every day. I have kept that mood diary for exactly eight years today. 

Random things about this week

• Sunday we didn't actually play the game.  Brenda came over, and we talked and played The Dresden Files Cooperative Card Game, which was quite fun.  We mostly visited and snacked.  Afterwards, I applied for the second time for a job that had been re-posted from the public library.  I'd love to work there, I'd love to do this particular job, it's a great branch to work in serving a diverse population, and yes, it would mean more money and better financial security.  Keep your fingers crossed for me that at the very least I'll get an interview.  Given my track record of getting nervous and tanking during interviews, cross your fingers again that I'll actually do well on that.  I've got a couple of books on questions to ask and answer and I'm thinking (at a co-worker's suggestion) of running through scenarios with YKWIA, who is a good critic.  The little dog apparently went into the bedroom and harrumphed as she laid down because I froze her out of my room with the fans on, YWKIA told me later.  She's older and gets cold easily.
• Monday:  I had to shoo a duck out of the driveway to go to work.  She was quacking in an annoyed fashion and walking up to the house when I left.  Work was busy.  I came home, was asleep by 8 or 8:30 pm, and woke up just long enough to take my medicine at midnight.
• Tuesday:  It was a good day at work.  Either Monday or Tuesday (I can't remember), there was a spectacular car wreck outside our building where someone ran the red light and one vehicle was literally on top of the other.  One person got out on their own, and (I think the one on top) had to be taken out.  Hope no one was seriously hurt.  I came home, had dinner, fed the dogs, and still fell asleep by 7:30 pm and woke up at midnight.  I'm not really sure why I was so tired.
• Wednesday: I started out the day by accidentally killing either a small rat or a baby opossum by turning on my car engine, which bothered me greatly, but thank goodness it wasn't the neighbour's cat.  It was another busy day at work.  There was a major accident at Alumni and Nicholasville Road that I avoided while taking a co-worker to her car at her boyfriend's workplace.  Despite all that (I do have driving anxiety, after all), I ventured back out and went to the church where the Bluegrass Orchid Society meets, only to wander aimlessly through a very large church wing trying to find it.  I finally ran into some nice ladies who were members of the church, one of whom had the phone number for the president of the society.  Apparently, their speaker came down with pneumonia and they couldn't come up with a replacement programme, so they cancelled it by letting the membership know by phone and posting it on their Facebook page (which I neglected to check, so that's on me).  They may reschedule that talk (on general orchid culture) to a later date.  There is one in May on orchids and viruses.  I may go to that. But kudos to me for speaking up and asking for directions, as I'm shy and don't usually do great at approaching strangers, even nice middle-aged and older women.  That night I checked my account, and I discovered that the treasurer for the state association for health science librarians to which I belong cashed my dues cheque a day early when she said she'd hold it, thereby over-draughting my account. :(  She must have forgotten.  I'm debating if I should mention it or not. I'm sure she would apologise, but it's not going to undo the damage.  The fee was twice the amount of the cheque, which at least was paid by the bank, so I guess that's a bright side. I almost never write cheques because it's harder to track when they'll come out.  I so should have mailed it in.
• Thursday:  I had a blood draw first thing in the morning and got up early for that.  YKWIA had me move the carcass out of the driveway before I left. I saw a former friend/co-worker there at the doctor's office and caught up with her on what's been going on our lives. Then I went to work and was in physical therapy almost all day learning how to do things so that I can fill in for a woman who's going on maternity leave.  It's a much slower pace but there's a lot of little things to do with many steps that require a good bit of work.  Then I went back upstairs for about a half an hour and caught up on my e-mail and checked out the last patient.  A co-worker went with me to the pharmacy to pick up some medicine YKWIA needed, and then she treated me to an excellent dinner at Planet Thai as a birthday treat.  It was absolutely wonderful.  I had fried tofu (which I adore, although every Thai restaurant I've been to does it differently) and three-flavour (I think that was what it was called) fish, in this case, salmon,  with a medium (3 on a scale of 5) spice.  It made my sinuses run, was very tasty, and was very filling.  Feliz' drunken noodles came in a huge order; I think 3/4 of it had to go home in a box.  We had a good time and talked a lot.  I feel like we're kindred souls.  I'm pretty jazzed from lots of Diet Pepsi, too.  I took her to her car and then stopped by the grocery for bananas.  Now I'm home and I've changed into comfy clothes.  I think I'll listen to some music before bed.
• Tomorrow should be a calm day at work, a catch-up day (I have about five issues to e-mail about).  I don't really have plans for tomorrow evening. It should be about 76 degrees tomorrow (it was close today), which is remarkable given that we had snow early this week, freeze warnings every night, and frost on the cars in the morning.  As far as my productivity at home, I think I'm falling asleep early to avoid the financial issues I'm having.  I should sit down and work on finances, as my bills are piling up and I'm really not sure what to do about it.  It's like everything's haemorrhaging out.  It's really my main subject of stress. I don't have enough to pay for the preparation of my tax forms, which are sitting at H&R Block, and next week is the deadline for filing--and let's not even get into what I actually owe for my taxes.  I don't get paid for two more weeks.  I'm not sure what to do.  Things are looking bleak.  Maybe YKWIA, who is quite sensible about the management of money, can help me get back on track in terms of planning.  I don't know.  That money could milk money from a walnut.

So anyway, that's what's going on in my life.  It's just a little below average due to the financial woes, which will pass eventually, especially when I sit down and face them head on, which I will do tomorrow and this weekend, for I really don't have much choice.  Avoiding the situation further will only make it worse. :(  Otherwise work and personal life is going well.  So while my emotion tracker on my phone, Daylio, has been set at 'meh' a lot lately, it's not too terrible.  'Good' has to be just around the corner, and 'rad' days will happen, too. Let's try to avoid 'fugly'. :)

Speaking of mood

One of the applications I have on my phone is called Daylio.  It's a mood tracker  and I've used it for 100 days in a row as of today.  It is simple and allows you to rate the day using faces and icons for activities. It will back up to Google Drive,  too,  so I didn't lose anything when I changed phones.  I've found that overall I have good days,  although today was just  'meh'. Anyway,  if this is something you're interested in tracking,  I highly recommend it.

I'm feeling a little better today than I have in awhile

One of the challenges I took on through Habitica was to rate my emotions at least three times a day and then graph them every week, and at first I didn't take it very seriously, but I've been a little labile and more anxious of late, and when you have a mood disorder it really helps to pay attention to what's going on emotionally and what might be triggering it. I downloaded an application onto my phone called Daylio that allows you to pick from a scale of faces and what you were doing at the time (more than one, which is handy), and then it graphs the trends. It's free. I think it's helping.

I also, on a totally unrelated note, downloaded an application called Simple Metronome, not for any musical use, actually, but to read by. WHenever I read out loud in front of YKWIA, he says it sounds rushed and I trip over the words, because it's like my brain is moving quicker than my mouth. It's almost push of speech for reading. That's how I read in my head, for that matter, and I sometimes miss things because of that, as it's almost a skimming. When tested, I can focus and get the reading comprehension I need to, but if I'm not being tested, if I'm reading for pleasure, etc., then I just rush ahead. He pointed out that being a quick reader is not something to be particularly proud of; being a careful reader is better. This is an aspect of my attention-deficit disorder, we think. He suggested reading to a rhythm. I couldn't read and hit the beats at the same time, so he did the latter and I read out loud, and did much better. So he suggested I get a metronome to read by. So I got a nice simple one that allows you to change the rhythm and has a few different sounds, and it is helping.

In addition to work today, I went over to the University of Kentucky's Medical Library and took an hour-and-a-half webinar on Statistics for Librarians, sponsored by the Medical Library Association. I did well on the exercises and caught a few mistakes in the presentation (typos, mispeaking), and I really enjoyed it. It was very basic stuff, but I am terribly rusty, having just had two statistics classes in my life, years ago. The first was business and oeconomics statistics, which I hated, because the book was huge, I'm not good at oeconomics, and the teaching assistant's English was minimal, and it was a difficult class that needed some clarity of language. The whole book was word problems, which you would think I would do well in, as I'm very verbal, but actually I always did better with pure math equations and had trouble setting up world problems. I took this class because it fit my schedule better, which was a mistake--I think I wound up with a C. Later I took statistics for the humanities for my sociology degree, and that was better and more relevant, and so I understood and did better. But that, as I said, was years ago. I really enjoyed doing a class. I'm really thinking of taking a class on Coursera or watching some TED talks regularly. I feel I'm stagnating and just not mentally stimulated enough anymore.

It took 45 minutes to get back to work, with the walk to parking and then rush-hour traffic, but I came back and did my data entry so I wouldn't be behind because I said I would. I stayed till 5:30 pm, which gave me an extra half-hour, which is good, as I left a little early yesterday to take care of some things, when clinic was much slower. I also shelved a bunch of bound and unbound journals that were in the library today, and started pulling the book collection over two shelves over so I can integrate the newer books into the collection. I did stop after one shelving unit today because I was perspiring pretty heavily and didn't want to go to the class all stinky. Tomorrow I'll wear something not quite as dressy and cooler that I can really work in. I'd worn full-length pants and a button-up shirt today, with my Mary Janes and socks rather than sandals, mainly to look more professional for an academic setting--I am, after all, likely to apply for a job there if one comes up, so presentation can be important, even when you're not being interviewed. I'm lucky that my employer lets us wear Capris and sandals, so long as we're not working directly with patients or in a hazardous position, but I recognise that other institutions are more conservative. For example, I know the Lexington Public Library requires closed shoes, which makes sense, really. On the days I push around the book carts I tend to, so I don't hurt myself if I run over my foot with one. But I don't do that every day, just when I'm filling up the kids' books in the clinic, shelving, or adding books to the collection. Actually, Friday might be best to do the main shelf-moving, as I can wear jeans on Fridays. :)

I found out yesterday that one of my bosses is retiring soon, which made me sad, but I'm glad she's doing what's right for her. I don't know who my boss will be for the last three or four months, therefore.

Okay. I've eaten some burritos, listened to a Rob Thomas station on Pandora, blogged, spent some time with friends after work, and now I think I'm going to go do some reading. I'm trying to find some strategies to work on some issues, and so I've gotten some Kindle books and then also checked out a couple of physical books on the subject. That only really helps if you actually read the material, though. :)