Hello

So I'm at a friend's appointment, which usually lasts a couple of hours, and I brought my laptop with me to work on the game notes, because apparently at some point when we took a break and I was out of the room, the recorder stopped, and I wanted to make sure I got everything down before I forgot what happened. I also went online to change some settings on A's mail account, so that he can send/receive e-mails from the phone. All the settings on the actual phone look correct, so hopefully I've fixed it. He's at a meeting right now, so I can't test it.

It's cooler than last week, but still in the 50s today and it will be in the 60s tomorrow. The sun is beautiful, and it seems like spring even though last week we were in the high 70s and it was almost summery. Rain is in the forecast later in the week, but I don't think it'll last particularly long, so that's good.

I'm hungry. Lunch was not satisfying this afternoon at the cafeteria (I had a tuna sandwich), and I forgot to bring anything with me to eat over a YKWIA's when we're finished here, and we have a project to go through, so I may have to stop and get something on the way back. I did get word that my small refund is coming from the IRS soon, but it looks like I may be paying for a car starter with that, as the car is intermittently not starting. It is possible it's a key transponder gone bad, or even something else. I have a mechanic that I trust, but they're not open on weekends, and I don't know if I can really afford to take off more time at work. But I don't want to get stranded or spend too much money, either.

Okay, I should start on the notes, at least getting the audio transferred over, etc. Hope you've had a good day.

Blah

For dinner tonight:
• 2 California soy turkey patties from Morningstar Farms that has been in my freezer for I don’t know how long, and have thawed and refrozen at some point when my electricity went out
• A can of spinach from the back of the cabinet
• A stale piece of bread with honey on it
• Four Jello snack pack sugar-free strawberry gelatin packs from October 2013, when I had a colonoscopy

I haven’t felt okay all day. I think part of it is hormonal (my period finally came back with a vengeance, although it’s almost over now). But part of it is that I simply am eating very little, or getting creative about what I’m eating in a near-empty cupboard. About all I have is some microwave popcorn, hot chocolate, some multigrain crackers and Nuthins, some of which have been opened and are stale, some of which haven’t, a few end-of-the-jar jars of peanut butter (from stopping and taking some over to my friends’, in case you’re wondering why there are so many), oatmeal, pasta without sauce, some rice and couscous, and the makings for bread. It’s going to be a long four days to pay day. I might be able to make some pasta with a little olive oil (I think there’s an inch in my little jar) and some herbs from the cabinet tomorrow. I have steel-cut oats I could make for breakfast. But otherwise I’m mostly eating crackers and a little peanut butter.

I went over to my friends’ house and helped with the Sunday chores and watched an episode of ‘Ugly Betty’. I wasn’t going to stay too long because I wanted to get back before it started snowing in earnest, but I wound up coming home about 2:30 after fixing him up some food to heat up later and I just went to bed for three hours, until I got hungry and came out and made dinner.

I am off tomorrow and want to get certain things done, although plans are subject to change. Among other things, I want to:

1. Work on the house.
2. Water the plants.
3. Put water in the fish tanks.
4. Do my taxes.
5. Go to the library.

I have a PT appointment, my last, tomorrow, but I am going to try to do all the other stuff on my day off. I was happy to have a day that we were off but not the library, as I can come over and do some things on the computer.

Okay, I think I’m going to go back to bed now. I’m not sick, but I’m achy and blah and just have no energy. In fact, I’m writing this a little before 6:30 and I’ll go ahead and schedule the post later when I get my phone out here and get online with the hotspot. Right now, I just want to crawl into bed.

It's amazing

how hungry you can get when you're told you can't eat for a few hours. Today I had a chest CT scan with contrast, and couldn't eat for four hours prior to the test. Fortunately, the imaging centre is very close to my apartment, so I came home and am having a peanut butter and fruit sandwich with some vegetarian baked beans, and plenty of water.

This has been a very rough week in terms of scheduling my friend's and my appointments so they don't interfere with my work. My relative is doing better, although still in the hospital; her husband texted a picture of her to me today, and that was nice. I now face a very difficult decision--do I drive an hour away to see her, visit, and then return, or do I take care of some things that have been on the back burner and basically regroup and get recharged while I have some time tomorrow? If I get up very early, I might be able to do both, but I think that would be pushing it. I haven't been taking care of myself very well of late, something I'm trying to get back to doing.

In the meantime I'm going to take a friend to get some furnace filters and leaf bags (in Lexington, leaves and other yard waste must go in either big paper bags or the Lenny (yes, we name our trash receptacles here, there's also Herbie and Rosie) container, which fills up pretty easily, although it is pretty large. I also going to try to do some laundry over there, as I missed it last Sunday and didn't manage to do it any of the rest of the week, either, and I'm kind of down to very little cool weather clothes--although it was fairly warm today, in the high 40s, low 50s.

I think I'm going to lie down for about a half-an-hour nap, then stop by the grocery store briefly and go over there. I should still be there before the friend I'm taking shopping gets home.

Awake

Me in my hotel room this afternoon, flushed from all that walking

Although the salmon and risotto was very good at dinner, it was much smaller in portion than some of the other, cheaper, things on the menu, so it didn't stay with me and I actually woke up in the middle of the night hungry. We ate at Park Grill again, and it was excellent. Like I said, it didn't keep me satisfied till morning though. Yesterday's meal of cheese curds, black bean burger, and fries was almost too much to eat by comparison.

I headed down to the lounge in the hopes that they'd still have some fruit down there, but apparently they take it up on the weekends, starting early Friday. Pooh! So I came back up and made a cup of (decaf) coffee in the Keurig in my room, the first time I've used a K-cup machine. Since I wasn't sure if you took off the foil or not (you don't), I viewed a review/demonstration video on YouTube. I always found them a little intimidating, so I've never used them, and of course, unless you have a reusable cup, the plastic ones are expensive and bad for the environment. But I think, despite the fact that I don't particularly like coffee, that it helped stave off some hunger for now, by filling my stomach with something. The Wi-Fi is still a bit temperamental here at the corner of the hotel, so I moved over to the bed from the desk and it's doing better; now I'm getting two bars.

Overall, my stay at Club Quarters at Wacker and Michigan has been very good, though, and the hotel staff have been very pleasant. Unlike my stay at the Marriott--UIC previously, I've had no trouble using the key card in the elevator. I always had to rely on strangers to get me up to my floor there, because I could never make the system work. I don't know if that was user error or a problem with their system, but anyway, it's working fine here.

Tomorrow we have a meeting that runs from 8 am to 1 pm, and I'm lucky to have a ride to the meeting thanks to a colleague who I met over dinner. We talked quite a bit through that, and then some more during and after the walk back to the hotel, and so she's going to give me a ride, since she has a car here. It does mean that since check-out is by noon, that I'll have to have everything ready to go and check out by 7 am, just like I would have if I'd taken the Pink Line train, but I don't have to carry three bags on the train and walking, either. I had planned to take the Blue Line back to O'Hare afterwards, but I'm not sure I'll have time. I may need to take a cab. If I stay for lunch, it'll be 1 pm, and my flight leaves at 3:52 or so. With O'Hare I definitely need to get there as early as possible to deal with security, etc. We'll see. Maybe I can share a cab with someone else going to the airport. But if not, I think I have enough cash on me to get me there.

I should probably try to go back to sleep. I have to get up in less than four hours. Good night.