Happy Bealtaine, by the way!

Today I:

1. Got pooped on by a bird within 30 seconds of exiting my front door, on a day where I was happy with my outfit and thought I looked nice. Fortunately, I was in a thin but long-sleeved shirt, so I didn't get any on me.  I walked back into the house, went to the front entry closet, where my clothes are kept (left over from when I was living in the living room), and changed shirts, although things didn't match quite as well.  Everyone I've told the story to has told me that it's supposed to be lucky.  I'm not sure how.
2. On the other hand, I went to take my medicine at the beginning of work and realised that one of the pills looked off, and in fact looked a lot like something I took last night. I pulled out a magnifier I keep with me to look at the imprint, put it and the shape and colour into the drugs.com database, and it wound up being tizanidine.  They're pretty mild, really.  Each tablet is only 4 mg and you normally take three at night, but they can make me loopy.  So I'm glad I caught it.  I went through the other bins of the pill reminder box and there was one more.  I'm not sure if I consolidated some other medicine and accidentally put tizanidine into a similar bottle, then put them in the reminder box, or what.  I think that's what happened, anyway.  To be honest, I'm not sure what small white pill I accidentally substituted it for; I think it was my furosemide (Lasix, or diuretic).   Thankfully, tizanidine (also known as Flexeril) has a scored side where you can divide it into fourths, and that's what clued me in because I noticed it last night when I took them. I guess that was lucky.  Oh,  wait, we're back to the bird poop.
3. After work (which was steady) I went and picked YKWIA from our friend's house, took him home, let him rest for a bit, then went on a major grocery run on my own.  It took an hour and a half.  I got everything on the list except wine.  I got to the liquor store that's attached to Kroger just at 10.  I asked the security guard if they were closed, and he said they were.  I asked when they closed, and he says, 'They're closed now.' Well, gee.  I got that part.  So I ask, when do they normally close so I know next time.  Nine? Ten?  It was ten--so technically I came up at 9:59, but oh, well, we'll have to get wine to cook with tomorrow instead.  Most of it was fresh produce, dairy, beans, that sort of thing.  YKWIA pretty much never cooks out of a box--it's all real food.
4. I came home, he helped me bring things in, and he put them away and I did a few small things to help.  Now I'm going to go plotz on the bed.

PS I started the manual update to the April 2018 Windows Update before I left.  It's still in the downloading phase, at 18%.  This may be an all-night sort of thing.  Okay, again, time to just collapse on the bed, listen to music and pretend my back still likes me.  Oh, and maybe take a couple of those tizanidine pills. :)

I'm pooped, and it isn't even game time

Today I've:

1. Laundered my bedding and clothes
2. Changed out the spring and winter clothes, put spring clothes away, packed up the winter ones, and prepared to take them to storage
3. Swept and mopped the floors
4. Cleaned the bathroom
5. Taken out the trash and recyclables
6. Cleaned the cat boxes
7. Started a loaf of bread

Yesterday I cleaned a very dirty shelf with magazines and did YKWIA's laundry, and that was enough to make my back hurt quite a bit, so I laid down for awhile while he helped a friend out at his house who is battling cancer.  They called me to go get Subway and we all ate and visited, then we got home about 8:30 pm.  I think we were both done in by midnight (he's been over several days in a row and took the bus out Friday, getting lost on the walk over there, and probably walked four miles back and forth until he found it), and we .were up by 7:30 am.  I have no real reason to be as tired as I've felt lately.  I've done some housework and of course, I worked at the medical centre, but still, I'm just tired all the time.  I've been up doing my stuff and listening to shows he's watching (he finished the 'Almost Human' DVDs and we watched a couple of episodes of 'Up the Women'.  I unplugged my tablet, which has been on the charger for two days and really needed to be unplugged and just turned off.  He's got a lot of documents to transfer to it and we're going to see if there's enough room once I cleaned my stuff off of the microSD card.  There's not much on it, now, just some basic applications and one from Adobe for reading PDFs and one for reading Word files.  That should suffice for him.  I haven't used my old tablet for some time.  I'm not sure it'll have the processing speed he'll need, but it's worth a try since neither of us can afford a newer tablet or laptop right now.

Today I'm looking forward to the game.  I'm kind of grungy and should go ahead and take a shower, but I'm just not up to it.  I'd like to lie down for awhile, but the bed hasn't been made yet.   I just feel a mess today. 

My strawberry plant that Brenda gave me is back outside after being brought in for a frost advisory last night, and it has two ripe strawberries and one that is turning on it.  I have lost three smallish African violets recently, including the two pink ones in the bathroom and a purple one in the bedroom.  I'm not sure what happened; they got puny and I tried to save them, but it was a no go.  On the other hand, one of the orchids has grown a new leaf and I have two that are getting ready to re-bloom.  Maybe orchids are more my thing, although I've had no problem with violets before.  The window seat in YKWIA's room is lush with shamrocks, an umbrella tree I just repotted, dumb cane, and philodendrons.  They love that window:

So overall, the plants are doing well.  Also, the orchid at work is putting out new shoots and buds.  I separated the stems out to give them more room:

It's the same colour as part of my mousepad, my pen holder, and my water cup, so it's coordinated to the checkout bay. :)  What can I say, I like it when things match.

Okay, I'm going to go check on the last of the laundry.  I realised I started the bread while still running the dryer (the bread machine is on the washer, as that's a good place for it usually when I'm not washing, as it has a tendency to 'walk' as it mixes, which is apparently supposed to happen, according to the manual.  But the vibration isn't good for rising bread.  I don't want to mess up this loaf.  I'm experimenting with all-purpose rather than bread flour, as I'm low on the other.  But the other day I forgot to put the yeast in until 30 minutes into the cycle.  While it was edible and looked fine, it was chewier than usual.  I can't believe I did that.  I was washing dishes and remembered suddenly, doing what I could to fix things.  It wasn't bad, but not ideal.  Hopefully, this one will come out fine; I definitely put all the ingredients in. :)

So tired

I finished everything on my list except putting away clothes and bringing the winter ones out for storage.  That will simply have to wait till another day.  YKWIA called me about 4:30 or 5 and wanted me to make a run to Long John Silver's for everyone, and I went over there, got some money, got some gas, as I was on my light, with the last of my funds, and got the food and went back.  We visited for another two hours or so, and it was good to do so, but I stood most of that time and YKWIA had done a lot of helping around the house, so by the time we left we were both hurting and tired.  I got home and had to put my feet up for a bit, and then got up and did the dishes and floor.  YKWIA made some coffee and then went into the bedroom.  Now everyone else in the house is asleep in there.  I had to pull out the little dog's bed because she'd been in the kitchen with me and I'd taken up the blanket to sweep and mop, and she was distressed to not have a blanket in every room. :)  The bedroom one is fleece over a comforter, so particularly cushiony.  Anyway, I'm finished.  I'm going to go to the bathroom, drink a little water, listen to some music, and lie down.  At eleven I'll get up (that's the plan anyway, take some medicine, get him to take his medications, and then I'll go back to bed for the night.  I may have to take some tizanidine--everything feels like it's out of alignment and there are pain and numbness radiating out to my limbs.  Our friend's 93-year-old mother is probably in better shape than either of us, really.  Bless her heart, she has a lot on her plate, with his illness and her age.

Okay, I'm definitely lying down.  Everything's hurting.  Rain is coming, and that's part of it, perhaps.  Oh, and the cat is awake, so I think he wants me to lie down so he can cuddle.  Good night.

I'm rarely home without YKWIA

But he decided he wanted to do some things for our friend alone and just needed me to take him there, so I came home.  I've got several chores to do today, so it made sense.  I made a quick stop for cereal at the store (I needed some and I was one point away from 40 cents off a gallon of gas, and I need to get some when I pick him up).  He's going to call the house phone when he's ready, so no headphones while I work.  So I brought my little boom box out from my room and I'm playing Pandora through my phone on the auxiliary setting.  The dogs were angrily barking when I got back; they hate being left alone completely.  So I've let them out and back again, I am eating some of the cereal, and I'm listening to the music (the 3 Doors Down channel, which I've listened to for a couple of days and liked almost every song played).  I took a shower earlier, which was great, as I hadn't had one yesterday or the day before (I usually skip a day at the most and usually shower every day or my hair looks horrible, even though daily cleansing can be drying to the skin).  The bread cooled before we left, so I put it in its container to keep fresh.

So what do I need to do today?

• Laundry
• Pack up the winter clothes and put away the spring and summer ones, then take the winter ones to storage
• Cat boxes
• Clean bathroom
• Sweep and mop tile
• Put away dishes and load dishwasher
• Do the plastic dishes/hand washable ones
• Finish backing up the computer (I've mostly gotten it backed up but had to leave in the middle)
• Make my bed (the cat was on it earlier, on the blankets--he claimed the bed when it was first delivered about a month before I came to live here

I took out the trash and recyclables yesterday, although there are a few more to go out, and I forgot the wine bottle where we had a whole bottle go into soup the other day.  I think there's just my laundry to do, maybe a little of his, but no bedding this time, hopefully.

Okay, I should start working.  Hope you're having a good Sunday. I wish there were three days to each weekend--I need a day between Saturday and Sunday just to relax.  But it's been a nice weekend so far, really.

I'm up and

listening to Pandora this morning and getting some caffeine after a fitful night's sleep. This song came on, which I have always loved. Today we're going over to an old friend's house who is very ill and helping him with some things. I think I'm going to consider this an anthem for today, in terms of helping make the world a better place and making a difference in other people's lives.  Since we're going to be there this afternoon, I'm making bread now and then later, when we get back, I need to do laundry.

Yesterday was pretty productive.  First, I went over my next few pay periods to see if there was a chance of taking care of anything I'm behind on financially.  Then I called H&R Block to discover that the Richmond Road office is already closed, but my paperwork should be at the Tates Creek office waiting to be filed as soon as I can pay to do that, and they'll keep it up to a year. I filed for up to six months of an extension with both the state and federal governments.  Then I called a creditor, but they'd closed a few minutes before.

I took the recyclables out, repotted several plants and watered them all, put the strawberry plant Brenda gave me for my birthday back out on the hanger (there was a freeze warning the night before).  I cleaned and dusted two shelves (we're doing that on a rotating basis so the bookshelves aren't too overwhelming.  There are five walls between the library (my bedroom) and the bedroom that are entirely built-in bookshelves.  Next week I'll only do one, as it's a large shelf of magazines on the bottom of a range.

I spoke to our friend on the phone, and then to Brenda's husband to cancel the game since we're going over there today.  Because of that, I didn't work on the game notes.  Instead of that, I went and looked up part-time work (I'd applied to Kroger earlier in the week, as well as a part-time computer associate at the public library), and in the process discovered a job at the University of Kentucky and one a Bluegrass Community and Technical College, and I applied for both.  The first is a temporary, grant-funded position but pays very well and while only lasting two years, pays over twice what I make now.  YKWIA thinks I shouldn't consider it. because it's essentially got an expiration date.  But one thing I've discovered in the lay off is that all jobs do, and at least this one has a set date you know to have everything wrapped up by.  It could also help me with my need for more supervisory experience and consists of digitising a collection, which appeals to the historian and librarian in me, but also would help increase my experience in digital preservation and provide professional academic library experience.  So I went ahead and applied.  The BCTC position is a circulation manager; again, it would help with being pigeon-holed as a solo librarian for all those years.  I have supervised student workers, but I need more real-world experience as a manager.

YKWIA is up and has made coffee.  The cat is very happy as YKWIA does morning feedings and I do evening, and we instituted that from the get-go so the animals wouldn't beg for food and be loud in the morning when I was getting ready for work and YKWIA was asleep.  He's been fed, and the dogs have as well and are outside, although little dog didn't eat (she does that sometimes) and I had to take her food away from the cat, as he's allergic to, we think, chicken and grain, and so he has his own special grain-free fish-based food.

Okay, I'm going to go check the news.  Have a woderful Sunday, and remember, it's Earth Day!

Love Google's Earth Day Doodle this year, featuring Jane Goodall

This year's Earth Day theme is fighting plastic pollution.  Do what you can to remember the day on April 22nd and celebrate the diversity and fragility of life on our planet.

Interested in a huge sound database that you can download from for free?

Look no farther than the BBC! Sounds are copyrighted by the BBC, but available for download and can be freely used for personal, educational, and research purposes.  There are over 16,000 sounds in this collection.  Go to BBC Sound Effects to download or learn more.

Thanks to Darren Moura-Smith for the heads up, sharing this link on the Call of Cthulhu Role-Playing Game & Players Facebook page.

Interested in Kindle books in translation from around the world?

Amazon is giving away nine books in honour of World Book Day.  See the particulars at:

Amazon announces several free Kindle books for World Book Day

The free books are:

1. A River in Darkness: One Man’s Escape from North Korea by Masaji Ishikawa, translated from Japanese by Risa Kobayashi and Martin Brown
2. The House by the River by Lena Manta, translated from Greek by Gail Holst-Warhaft
3. Still Waters by Viveca Sten, translated from Swedish by Marlaine Delargy
4. The Great Passage by Shion Miura, translated from Japanese by Juliet Winters Carpenter
5. Last Train to Istanbul by Ayşe Kulin, translated from Turkish by John W. Baker
6. The Gray House by Mariam Petrosyan, translated from Russian by Yuri Machkasov
7. The Question of Red by Laksmi Pamuntjak, translated from Indonesian by Laksmi Pamuntjak
8. The Light of the Fireflies by Paul Pen, translated from Spanish by Simon Bruni
9. Ten Women by Marcela Serrano, translated from Spanish by Beth Fowler

I had already purchased the Turkish one, but I got the other eight for free during the promotion, which runs through April 24th.  All sound very good, although I am particularly intrigued by The Great Passage and The Gray House.  We'll see.  I thought I'd pass this along, though.  If you need a direct link to the giveaway, go to their Read the World page.  To explore more to do with Amazon Crossing, which aims to bring world literature in translation to a wider audience, you can check out the Amazon Crossing page.

Enjoy!  😀

Sigh

After writing today, and visiting our friend--which it was very good to see him and speak with him after all this time-- I went to the grocery to get more contact lens cleaner, took out the trash, and started the laundry (I'm having a devil of a time trying to get the bedclothes dry), and then I've spent the last couple or more hours going over some financial things. I've come to the conclusion that the only way I can make it at all, especially with the taxes to pay, etc., is to get a second job, something part-time.  I went ahead and applied to the Chinoe Kroger, and I'll keep looking for other opportunities.  I think I could work on Tuesday, Thursday, or Friday evenings and most of the day on Saturday, without being terribly tired, maybe 16-20 hours a week.

YKWIA is watching 'Hunderby', a British comedy set in the 1830s.  It's got a lot of mystery to it.  I moved into my room (although I can still hear it fine), mainly because the computer has been off its charger all day and I needed to plug it back up.

I called Brenda and we're set to play tomorrow.  So it's just the laundry to get finished, and like I said, it's being very slow to dry.  I'm thinking I may use the spare bedding and concentrate on the comforter and blankets.  The pillowcases didn't really need to be done (the sheets, despite a cover, get the blonde dog's little tiny hairs all over them).  The black dog is blowing her coat; I'll have to sweep the house tomorrow in addition to the usual things I do to prepare for the game.  But they are very sweet doggies.

Okay, I think I'll listen to some music while waiting for the laundry to finish.  Good night.