January 2012

There were 3 posts published in January 2012.

[not] the snot slideshow

Not a lot to say here because it’s mostly “I hear squeaky noises when I blow my nose and it makes my eye hurt a little.” I am sorry that some of this is a little gross. I have spared you the Snot Slideshow. You are welcome. Part of healing from this sinus surgery is blowing out the chunks of leftover stuff, scabs and mucus, that are in your sinuses. I seem to be having trouble with this for whatever reason. So, after spending probably too long thinking “Should I call the doc back or just Try Harder?” I decided to make a phone call and I have an appointment to have my nose peeked at tomorrow. I get along well with most authority figures, even most policemen, but for whatever reason I am not great with the gauntlet of people whose job it is to keep you from pestering the doctor. Not that I don’t understand why the doctor needs to not be pestered, but I have a difficult time with the “These are my bona fides!” discussion convincing them that I have very sincerely done all the things that they suggested [sinus rinsing, vaseline, hot showers, staying hydrated, taking all the medicines] and it’s not doing the trick.

I know this tendency too. When someone’s explaining something they did to their computer, something that really should not be possible, and the two options are user error or something really broken, I find it easier to blame the user. Uncharitable perhaps, but true in my experience. However this has different ramifications with tech than with health, at least that’s what I tell myself.

Anyhow, my car was also weirdly broken last week–the transmission cable snapped, how weird is that?–and so I was home typing and reading and listening to music and rinsing my nose and there’s not that much to tell. Resolutions are going well. Car is now fixed, a cheaper and faster repair than I was expecting. The night before last a few of us headed out to go aurora hunting and that was a lot of fun. We saw a pink shimmer on the horizon, in the direction where there isn’t usually a town and were pretty sure that was it and hustled back to the warmth of the car. It’s been beastly cold out in a sort of “stay inside” way the past week or so. I made some ice candle holders. For some reason that’s more fun to do when it’s -10° outside than just doing it at home in the freezer. This photo is one of them. I’m teaching a class called How to use iPhoto and needed to start the class off with some pictures that weren’t the Snot Slideshow. So far okay.

resolved

jessmayn and jim go hiking in the snow

Spent some time hanging out with the usual neighbor friends talking about resolutions. While in the past I’ve made more specific resolutions (2009, a while ago), lately the things I resolve are sort of short term things to keep doing better and not so much big changes. January is a terrible time for big changes. I find that my resolve is at an all-time low. But I’m home a lot. I have big stretches of time. My friends are around. So there are some pieces in place, pieces you can make things out of.

My resolutions are to try to finish more books, to take care of my health, to keep writing letters and postcards, to be creative and to nurture relationships with family and friends. To go outside more. To cook my own meals more. To help people solve problems. To not make anyone’s problems worse. I have one “don’t” type of resolution and it’s to not let fear keep me from doing stuff that I otherwise enjoy. Some of these ideas are hand-wavey and some are pretty targeted and specific. This past weekend Jim came up and we attacked the various little eddies of mess in my small apartment; took down some shelving that was not working, tossed out the old shoes I never wear that were too ratty to donate (I have trash phobia from growing up in the seventies and sometimes feel I’d rather store broken shit than put it in a landfill), got stuff out to the redemption center and cleaned and swept places that haven’t been cleaned and swept in longer than I’d like to mention.

That night we went out to dinner with local friends (on me, yay for getting paid in gift certificates to local restaurants) which involved driving over a snowy mountain together in the dark, had a great meal and then headed back to Randolph to eat gingerbread and listen to a CD together. Rachel had never heard Mitch Hedberg before and so we hung out at Forrest and Kelly’s and listened to a comedy album straight through, just sitting and laughing together in a warm, comfy room. And I’m no mind reader but I got the feeling that everyone there, in some way or another, was thinking some variation of “If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is” and my resolution, more of a story than a sentence, is: more of this.

to-dos

The To Read pile - 1/1/12

So yesterday was the first and since I’d felt like I’d been totally social all week I had a don’t-leave-the-house day and just cleaned up all the silted-in crap that had been lingering on the “one of these days…” lists. So I got the vacuum out, and framed and hung some photos that had been sitting around, and piled all the “to read” books into one big pile, and cleaned the yik off of the dish drainer, and mailed off some overdue notes and papers and stuff, and put away some stuff that really should go away. It was great. I even got the rowing machine out and flailed around on it a bit. I was also able to blow my nose finally according to doctor’s orders. Gross but fascinating!

I woke up today in a house that didn’t seem like a project. It’s easy to blame the short grey days and prednisone and holiday eating for feeling sluggish and unmotivated, but that doesn’t really help with the actual getting up and getting stuff done part. Internet people have taught me that “fake it until you make it” tends to work for things like this, so I got up and got dressed as if I actually had stuff to do and sure enough, got stuff done.

The exercise thing is more of a small part of my life now than it was back when I was swimming at least a few miles a week. I had another shoulder problem this year which was probably brought on by NOT swimming as much (I think it corrects for some of my over-mousing). That, combined with the nose stuff and bereavement/travel stuff made it a pokey year, exercise-wise. That said, it looks like I didn’t even do an end-of-the-year exercise post last year. My goal this year is to do a few miles of something every week, and I’m happy that I have four pleasant choices of ways to do that.

Am also focusing on Albatross List tasks including things like Sell My House and Get Stuff from Indiana [formerly Seattle] and both are proceeding but if you have help/suggestions, I’m all ears. Thanks. And happy new year.