First workout in awhile

So I joined the YMCA again. This is my first workout since joining (since we had our for for a week). Did 10 minutes on the Nu-Step (reclining elliptical). I made it 10 minutes, but hey, baby steps. Since I'm so out of condition I don't want to do too much too quickly. But I got my heart rate up some and got sweaty, so I guess I did okay. My right knee hurt during it, so I lowered the load a bit, but it feels better now that I'm sitting and hydrating. Trying to decide if I want to do anything with the warm pool today or wait. The weather has closed the aquatic centre outside, so I'm sure the kids are in there.

PS Thanks to my coworker Darren, whom I ran into at the Beaumont Kroger and who guided me to a new lock for the locker room. I'm not familiar with that store as it's across town. Of course, it's got a lot of non-food items so of course I got other stuff, much more than I planned on (I really just came in for the lock and a bottle of water). I have a regular lock but have no idea where the keys are, and I can't remember the combination on one I finally got rid of, which is typical.

:(

I'm a little frustrated. On the one hand, I finally made it back to the YMCA after an absence of nearly a month [things happened], mainly because the Cthulhu game was called, and open swim in the warm water pool is all day, from 10 am-7:45 pm, so I made an effort to get over there after doing my Sunday chores. Unfortunately, that means that lots of kids, who could not be in the main pool due to a full round of lane swimming, were all through the warm water pool, jumping in and splashing and playing with balls, etc., and there was precious little space to actually use the pool for exercises while this was going on. I won't say they were young hellions or anything--they were just kids being kids and largely unsupervised ones at that. So I managed to do some exercises next to the wall, but I couldn't do the warm-up walks or anything. After about half an hour I gave up, got towelled off and dressed, and went home. On the other hand, previously to going into the pool I managed to use the Nu-Step reclining elliptical for a longer period than before, about 15 minutes, or about 2/3 of a mile. I also tried out my new Bluetooth headphones, which are placed inside a sport band that is washable (you just take the speakers and controller out). They worked well. I think the solution, for now, is to go to the pool late in the day, after the swim lessons and classes, so about 8:30 pm-9:45 pm. It's late, I know, but hopefully, it's quieter and the kids will be in bed. Of course, it's about the time I start winding down for bed myself. But I'd hate to not be able to use my membership fully or have to cancel, but I'll have to find a time to do my exercises, as that was absolutely the whole point of joining. And the Beaumont YMCA is the only one in town with a warm water pool, so I can't just go to one of the others for that, anyway.

Feeling a little better

I went to my counseling session yesterday evening, and I feel much better and have some ideas for reducing my stress levels, taking care of the things that I can take care of, and trying to let go of the things I can't. The hoarding issue can wait a little; I've got to get a handle on how I feel, the panic I've been under lately. Meanwhile, my friend YKWIA and I have had several discussions, and he's right, I let things build up over and over again, only to blow up emotionally and melt down. There's actually an analogy he mentioned, taken from Transactional Analysis and entered into popular psychology, where you 'save up stamps' like people used to do when they went to the grocery store. Unlike the prizes that you could get through the stores, this allows you to save up until you're ready to blow, and all the little issues justify the blow up. Of course, if the person does so around someone else, that's really not fair to the other person, and that's what happened the other day. I've been so busy keeping things together in other arenas, like work, that I let go around someone I felt comfortable with, and caused an issue.

So, I obviously need to work on my emotions and on taking a proactive, not reactive role in meeting problems head on rather than letting things pile up. It's like emotionally I'm doing the same thing as my house--pushing the stuff around, at best, not dealing with it, and then it piles up and causes me problems.

My mom, who had been back in the hospital, seems to be on the mend, so that's one stressor down for now. Work is going well in general, although the end of that run is quickly approaching, and I'm having a lot of anxiety over that. My counselor made some suggestions for the running to appointments issue as well, some alternate means of transportation that we need to find since when I find another job, I will 1) not have PTO to burn at all and 2) most places will not be as understanding about my taking someone I'm technically not related to around to various appointments. So we need to find a good alternative. Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated. Our local partnership between the local bus system and the Red Cross, Wheels, is apparently meant to be a transient service when a person is getting used to being disabled. I'm going to check out a service called ITN, which my counselor suggested, as it is more of a subscription-to-ride sort of service, and can take him anywhere in town, not just doctors and grocery stores. But it's meant for seniors and those with certain disabilities, so he may not qualify. Oh, and Uber and Lyft are not tenable, as you need a smartphone for that, and he doesn't even have a cell phone. Cabs are prohibitively expensive and, in our town, rather unreliable.

So there's that. In the meantime, I'm doing some things to try to get things back on an even keel. I'm trying to get more rest (although I only got about three hours' sleep last night because I made the mistake of taking a cold medicine with pseudoephedrine in it, and couldn't sleep after 2 am). I'm reading or at least listening to an audiobook for at least 30 minutes a day, possibly longer. I'm still making my way through The Cave and the Light: Plato versus Aristotle and the Struggle for the Soul of Western Tradition by Arthur Herman. I just finished chapter 18 out of 31. They are long chapters, and of course the material is rather dense, although not exceedingly so. But each chapter lasts about 50 minutes of recording. So I'm doing half a chapter to a chapter a day.

I've also exercised a little. Last week I spent some time on the exercise bike in our fitness room at the apartment complex, then walked on the treadmill--not for long, but enough to get a start. Tonight I'm doing laundry in the same building, and they have Wi-Fi, so I'm writing this from the laundry room, but before sat down to the computer I put my laundry in the washers (three loads!) and then went over and biked for a few minutes and then tried the elliptical, which I do not know if I am coordinated enough for that. I lasted three minutes total on the elliptical. 1) I have a tendency to go backwards, and 2) it's not supposed to hurt my knees, but does, mainly, I suspect, because I don't use my knees correctly enough. I bend at the back rather than my knees (yes, I know that's bad) because I have hard problems with my knees since I was a teenager. I also have to be careful if I stop with the elliptical because it practically throws me off. I'm glad no one was in there. But I'll keep trying, anyway. I'm also using Habitica, which I've mentioned before, to help with the stress-reduction, reading, and de-cluttering. I reached level 121 as a mage and have used the Orb of Rebirth so that I have been 'reborn', so I'm a level 9 warrior at the moment. I think I'll stay a warrior this time; you can work your way through all the classes, including rogue and healer. It really is helping, though, and I'm questing with others, which keeps us accountable and more likely to take care of our daily tasks. In other words, it's helping with my resolutions to de-stress and de-clutter my life.

Okay, I promised a friend who doesn't have a computer that I'd upload his résumé and help him apply for a job listing. Time to be productive. Have a good night.

Go figure

Funny how usually I make excuses about exercising, but since I've been having an asthma flare up, I've actually wanted to go to the gym.

This was taken

Right after I finished the bike ride.  Don't I look thrilled?  There was another the tracker didn't save that had me looking a bit like a scared prairie dog.  :)  My ankle's feeling better now.  I have it propped up and I'm in front of the fan.  I'll take a shower and start my day properly in a little while,  starting with some caffeine.

One good thing,  my tracker (Samsung Health)  is saying I'm at 60% of my daily activity goal and it isn't even 10 am . Usually I hit about 50% around 1 pm.

I've gotten a lot of rest this afternoon

I got home from my friends' house about four-something and took a nap, and have been up and down since then just sort of chilling out.  I should have done some things around the house, like take down the tree, and I'll try to do that in the next couple of days, but it was nice just to spend some time thinking and relaxing for awhile.

My counselor says that introverts process things internally, meaning by thinking, whereas extroverts process externally, mainly through talking things out.  I'm definitely an introvert, so it's nice to sort of decompress and think about how things are going in my life, and what I want to do with it next.

I still haven't heard more about the position I had the phone interview for, but I haven't given up hope on that.  It's a university position and those soemtimes take awhile to go through the various steps.  I do hope I hear from them soon.  Obviously, I'd really like to get an in-person interview, but however it works out, I'm happy for the opportunity.

I paid my rent yesterday, the second time in two paydays in a row, and so the next couple of weeks are going to be very tough financially.  I need to make some calls and arrangements tomorrow sometime.  I still don't have Internet at home, which means I have no working home phone (it is Vonage, and so it works over the Internet).  I need to call and cancel that or at least put off the next month or so until I can get it working again  I also need to see about delaying my cell phone payment, which I hate to do, but I simply have about $15 to last me almost two weeks, and there isn't money for anything beyond gas and maybe a little food. I bought flour today so I can make my own bread. I have a little peanut butter and jam in the house, some oatmeal, tuna, that sort of thing, but it's not going to last.  I should get a reimbursement of banking fees on the 17th for $10, and of course, somewhere that reimburseemnt for the trip in Novemmber is in process, which at least could get me some groceries.

I was doing so well for awhile there, several years, in fact, but I've just gotten myself in a difficult position what with having to finance dental work and not having money from the settlement any more.  A lot of that is my fault--I let a former friend, or someone I thought was a friend, borrow quite a bit of money because he was basically in dire straits and had a family to worry about, and he not only didn't pay me back, he blamed me if I even brought it up and treated me like crap. So obvioulsy, he is an ex-friend, a user who really took advantage of me when I was hit by the car and was recovering from it, and then had some money for the first time in, well, ever, really.  Now he's probably much more stable, as he has disability now and his wife has a better job and degree, but I'll no doubt never see that money ever again.  Word of wisdom: if a person's family won't help them from getting evicted or to get back in state after getting stranded hundreds of miles away, there's probably a reason, and it is more likely that they've used up all their goodwill in the past rather than the fact that they're inexplicably mean and grinchy.  Oh, well, Brandon will eventually reap the rewards of his actions. I know karma doesn't really work like most Americans talk about it doing, but I do believe ther will be justice for people who go from person to person using them up like a parasite.  I just didn't want to see his family out on the street, especially during the holidays, and also felt that the only reason he would like me was if I helped him out.  That may have been true in his case, but you can't really buy love and friendship.  My true friends have demonstrated that to me on a daily basis.  Any way, I'm going to chock this up to a very expensive learning experience, and while I do believe in paying things forward, one should only do that if you can afford it and it it's for a good cause, not for emotional rasons.

Well, it's almost 11 pm.  I've taking my nightly meds, brushed and flossed my teeth, put all my daily accomplishments into the Habitica application (I'm almost level 15), and I think it's time to go to bed I'm going to try to get up early, maybe do some exercising tomorrow morning befor work.  It's cold outside (finally), we even had some snow today, so it's nice that the apartment complex has a gym now.  I really haven't used it yet this year, and I should.  Good night!

I actually went to the pool today and exercised

for about 45 minutes. I was afraid to stay out much longer because I am pretty pale, it was sunny, my sunscreen is from last year, and I couldn't get my back well. But I didn't have any good excuses not to go get in the water and exercise, so I did. My knees and other joints felt so good while I was in. Mind you, the water was a bit cool--no one else would go in, because they'd try a little at a time and didn't like the temperature. I went in pretty much all at once, got my head wet, and then I felt fine.

I did this despite the fact that two years ago when I went looking for a bathing suit, the only one I could find to fit me was very, very bright, shall we say even neon, pink. So I always feel like a giant pink blobbie in the pool. But today I decided to not focus on that at all, and just go have fun. Anyway, I'm glad I did.

After that, I came in and got a shower. I'd gotten a late start to my morning; I'd slept till 10:30 am, which is almost unheard of these days, but what can I say, it's been a difficult week. I went into the pool about 11:30. After my shower, I found I had a voice message; a friend was out of medicine and the pharmacy was going to close in less than half an hour. I dressed quickly, called the pharmacy to let them know I was coming, and then booked it all the way across town, hitting just three red lights, and arriving with two minutes to spare. Then I stopped by Kroger for drinks and something to eat, and when I got back to the car and sat down, the inside seam of my capris tore all to hell, about five inches down, even though the capris are not tight, but comfortable. I went on to my friends' house, delivered the medicine, and visited for awhile, watching videos on YouTube. Then we went for the grocery run, stopping by my house first so I wouldn't be out in public with torn pants. When we got back and had put away the groceries, YKWIA and I watched Joyful Noise with Queen Latifah and Dolly Parton, which was fun. Now I'm home, and I need to work on the game notes. (Yes, I left them till the last minute again.) But all in all, it's been a good day, and fairly productive.