Hi Lila,

I tell myself "just do something!" Sometimes the something isn't even on my "list" but it gets me moving - like I might walk up to get the mail and plan my next move on the walk. I tell myself "ok, I got the mail, and I got a little exercise. When I "get home" I'm going to go straight to the phone and call."

I do take a multivitamin every day - plus extra iron and a vision support capsule, but thank you for the thought.

I think what I might need is more faith. It's like my inner judge is saying "seriously? You can't handle your life now. You're going to start plants? Why? When are you going to plant them out? You'll forget them in the greenhouse and they will all die. Have you seen the greenhouse? How long do you have to clean that out after you plant seeds? Tick, tick, tick."

Yeah, it might be that.

Right now I am eating lunch.

I wormed the buck goats and trimmed their hooves and gave them their shots. I also cleared out a few wheelbarrow loads of deep bedding - enough to cover the cardboard I laid down on two future 3x20' garden beds.

All that is standing between me and 4th and ten is seven baskets of clean laundry and a wet couch cushion.

Dh doesn't think the cushion will be dry enough to put back tonight.

But I think that since I have actually accomplished some other stuff in the last two days, I'm going to give myself a first down if I finish the laundry.

Road, I think you have to prove you are human more times early in the day. Maybe captcha needs a certain number of picture scans each hour and they give you more if traffic is light.

I tend to ask leading questions or share my experiences rather than give advice. Mostly because i feel like in the ymmv category, everyone else is in a car or bus or train or on a bike or maybe a boat or walking, and I'm on a pogo stick.

My kids were pretty much free range. We moved here right before the little one turned 7, so they were 7, 9, and 11. I gave them whistles. I said "if you get in trouble, blow the whistle. If you hear me blow my whistle, blow yours back - I'm trying to find out where you are. And if I ring the bell (big farm bell) come straight back to the house. Now go play outside." I also told them not to go in the creek or the pond alone, and not to stand on a branch thinner than their wrist. Basically as long as they read a book now and then and did their math workbooks every year I was happy. Dd is always telling dsil stories about what a terrible parent I was, and when she gets to the end he says things like "you realize you had the childhood every kid dreams about, right?"

One day she decided she couldn't stand her ($10 thrift store) dresser one more day, and they carried it out to the bonfire pit and burned it. I watched the whole thing from a window. All I said when they got back was "I'm not buying you another dresser". She kept her clothes in cardboard boxes for two years until she found a dresser she liked and bought it. # terrible parent.

Road mentions Easter. Subc puts her hands over her ears and sings "lalala I can't hear you."

Lila, I typed so long we crossed.

Obviously you have to keep the appointment.

Then I would do the work meeting, because it says "have to". After that I'd do things you can't do later - like get stuff out of the house before your Dh comes home, and the dog, because it depends on you.

Thank you so much SubC. I was so frozen and after I read your post, I just told myself to do ANYTHING. I got up and chopped the strawberries and put them in the freezer. That did get me moving, so then I sorted out the freezer and fridge, threw away anything old.

Then I asked my son to take out the trash, and put the trash cans by the road for tomorrow. I also asked him to put away the sidewalk salt, and had him take a bag of frozen food from the upstairs freezer to the downstairs one since it was too full up here.

Then I cleaned the dog's ears, since I don't want him to suffer for my laziness. He is happier. My son will walk him while I am at my appointment.

I saw some frozen smoothie mix in the freezer so I made a smoothie and am sitting down drinking it now. I have to leave for my appointment in 15 minutes. On the way I will go to the bank.

I should go to work and move the snacks but I would have to put on some mascara at least if I am doing that, or any visits. I will see how I feel when I am done with the smoothie and decide if I am doing any of those things today, if I have time.

Hope your day goes well. I'll be back later.

Glad your injuries aren't too bad. Still, sorry for your burns. You got a nice jolt of adrenaline! Do you have that sort of sick feeling you get afterwards? We drove by the marsh this am and I noticed all the banks had been burned. Thought of you!

I am super irked with this neurologist as he seems to be taking a very laissez faire attitude about my son's brain. Sometimes you get that attitude from drs. - like, well, he's already abnormal so ??? I had that when he was a baby with his head shape. He prob should have had a helmet but he has Down syndrome so meh. The neurologist may end up being correct but his attitude is incorrect so I have to figure something else out. Today I'm putting My own fires with special olympics forms and people at the district not doing their jobs and people in the drs offices not doing their jobs... and a mom with ADD and psychological problems with dealing with schools and drs. Offices not doing HER job (that's me). Adrenaline! I kept checking the time as I was keeping notes on my daily thing and I kept thinking an hour had elapsed and only 10 minutes had. Nothing like a fire under your ass to make your brain work. Then again, sometimes the pressure makes it worse. Hmmm.

So anyway, productive paper work & life untangling yesterday and today... putting out fires, cleaning up messes and organizing things enough to prevent an upcoming season of potential fires. Am I taking this too far? Lol

Had a weird convo w the H last night... I was having an extreme pain day as opposed to bad or moderate. Never pain free. And he said "have you gone to see a dr. About it yet?" FullY knowing I haven't. Then something like "I'm not going to talk to you til you do..." huh? Then he padded around trying a couple other things and finally said "what can I do to help?" And I said "there you go." As in that's all he really needs to say but ironically he misunderstood and thought that comment was for something else. Omg we are a mess. I usually get motivated and able to deal with medical stuff in the spring. I want to tie up some loose ends with my son and get a couple things in motion for him and then I will focus on getting stuff on the books for myself. If my doctor blows me off again I'm prepared to ask her if there is a type of doctor who will work with you to figure out what's wrong. Seriously! I know if I didn't have this ptsd issue with medical appts. And if I didn't drop the ball so much I would have probably gotten some resolution to my problems but honestly, they never take stock of the overall situation and really think anything through. It's just a never ending churn of off the cuff referrals and patronizing attitudes. Ugh. I hate them so much. Do you think they can tell? Haha no actually I am overly polite in the office. That might be my problem.

Just thinking out loud but if anyone has suggestions I am open to hearing them.

I can't believe it's still not noon. I am in a time warp.

Minor internal struggle with acquiring new stitch projects. This time of year there are a lot of new releases. I kind of earmarked $100 and ordered some things. I guess I got about 5 or 6 things. But the shops are stuffed full of bright and shiny new things... so far all I did was walk into the store, pick up my order, pay for it and walk back out. I had blinders on. But now I'm dying to go in. It wouldn't be unreasonable to buy a few more things but I just want to be intentional about it and not reactive or whatever...

Hope everyone is having a good day.

I want to hope that the doctor is laid back because he knows everything is probably fine and just hasn't been able to communicate that to you.

People who don't treat other people like human beings make me crazy. My friend's sister had a surprise baby (in her early 20s) because the people in her life and her boyfriend's life had just assumed that they were basically big children and didn't need information about sexuality and reproduction. She went the first six months with no prenatal care.

Write down the things you want to say to/ask your doctor ahead of time so you won't be overly polite? Even if you have to hand them the list. "You could just say "doctors offices make me very uncomfortable" and hand over the list. You will not be the first person. I have white coat hypertension and I always open with "my blood pressure is going to be really bad. It might be lower at the end of the visit if you tell me everything is great. But it might not."

Maybe your medical support friend could help you write up your list so you feel confident about it.

My Dh has decided it has been long enough. I was upstairs getting laundry and he said "how is your day going? Did you set anything on fire?"

I finished cleaning out a stall and resolved a social issue that was causing me stress.

I also remembered that way back at the beginning of the pandemic, the pottery studio had a "buy a $125 gift certificate for $100" sale to keep them going, and I bought one. I found it and it expires April 6, so I need to go shop!

As far as your projects. The obvious answer is to not buy anymore projects until you have used or passed on all the projects you have, but I also know the inner squirrel must be fed or it starts chewing holes in our brains.

So, what if you figure out how much space the new projects would take up, and then clear that space out - by actually removing things from your property - it doesn't have to be craft stuff, it can be socks or paperwork or hotel soap - anything that can be thrown out or donated, but no fair just shifting stuff around - plus one item per project. Then - you can get your projects and have progress too! The projects become rewards. And, you can look at stuff and ask yourself "would I rather have this, or a new stitching project?"

Ok, off to try to make more progress!

It has been a pretty productive day.

Besides the stall and the laundry (4th and 20?) I disbudded the triplet baby goats and gave them their shots. I also got hay and unloaded and racked it (sometimes I leave it in the truck overnight)

I cleaned up a broken jar I'd been ignoring for days (it wasn't where bean could get to it)

Ok, actually that doesn't look like that much when I type it out, it seems like I should have had more time. But it was a lot and I am tired.

I REALLY need to start my seeds tomorrow. I don't know what is stopping me. It is as if I can literally feel the block pushing against me but I don't know what it is.

Thanks subc, so much for some great advice. I think I'm going to printout that blurb and post it. I'm taking all of that advice.

Today was rather epic in the headache/hassle department, I didn't feel physiologically agitated like I did yesterday but more shite hit the fan today for sure. I had a long convo with my niece which is loaded with baggage. I gave her advice (and listened)... she said she agreed and would do what I suggested but we will see. I'm more worried about my sister now though based on what she told me. Tried to talk to my bro about it but he got testy about it so that didn't end up being helpful. The school and medical miasma proved even more complex and aggravating than I thought earlier in the day. This is why having Swiss cheese for brains is not working for me. If I don't keep on top of stuff and other people (literally ALL the other people) drop the ball, then my son gets excluded from sports for another season for no reason. Part of it is picking up the pieces post (pretending it's post-) pandemic where all the extracurriculars were cancelled Or virtual and I had to stop caring about his iep because it all went up in smoke anyway, but now that I need to get it together again, I am struggling. The runners up today were: $400 windshield wiper repair and I found doggies medicine and food untouched in her bowl and she's already asleep for the night. Bright spot was my son singing for his karaoke zoom call. So cute. Also, snowdrops are blooming, birds are singing... spring has arrived.

Alright gonna bail out early tonight and see if I can take half a melatonin and sleep through tonight. Oh, forgot to tell you that I bought some cbd gummies to try again for pain and I kept crashing, took some pretty long naps and then figured out there was melatonin in the gummies! Lol. Returning!

Ouch on the windshield wiper repair!

I got up and did yoga this morning and restarted the wash I left in the washing machine all night.

I did not get enough sleep. Yesterday made it clear to me that I need more sleep - I was able to do two hard things on the same day and still accomplish some other stuff.

Right now I am facing chores and starting seeds and I just want to climb back into bed with a book. I used to love starting my seeds and I do not know what is wrong with me this year.

Dh and I got Chinese take out last night, so there is the packaging from that added to my life. It includes a greasy paper bag and two rice boxes that I would normally burn, but currently I am not feeling enthusiastic about setting aside the burnables.

Dsil took bean to a park with a creek yesterday - Dd bought him water shoes. Apparently when it was time to go, he said "lot more creek!" Our creek has not gone down enough for him to play in yet.

Aww "lot more creek!" That says so much! I keep seeing this thing come up on Instagram about letting your kids do dangerous things carefully. That's probably really true. I think my nephew and his family take an approach like that. They are both outdoorsy adventurous people. Their kids would definitely say "lot more creek!"

I haven't started seeds yet either. I am just not feeling it but I know if I don't I may regret it later... I have a couple little greenhouses I bring into the dining room til mid April or so... I've really enjoyed doing that in years past, but gonna either drop it or kind of force it this year... fake it til you make it? I know I can start some stuff later, but having all the different nightshade varieties is what really lights my fire and the time is now.

Sounded like my dad was over at my bro's yesterday "helping" him improve his life. Sadly it's more like my dad not hiding his disgust disapproval and disappointment very well, saying 83 critical things and then wondering why they end up in a fight. I also grappled with that concept all day with my niece and sister. Mind your own business? Offer open ended help (to do what?) offer advice? Usually not appreciated or advised... at what point is kindness or inaction enabling? I am on the other side of that as well. If I put myself in the place of how would I want other people to approach me I guess I would want someone to say "is there something I can do to help?" But then I am really. Motivated to change and I've tried so many things (and have had some progress but still a long way to go)... but what do you do if the person isn't willing to do anything about it - or doesn't want to change ? or doesn't even agree there's a problem...

So my plans for today...
- brought up Easter stuff
- organized laundry a little bit downstairs, started a load, bringing up a load of clean towels to fold,,,
- must clean kitchen
- returns
- Aldi run
- Kick everyone's ass at the drs. offices til they do their job.
- possibly shop for needlework squirrels... (still Employing stall tactic with self)

Ok, are we all having issues with the "prove you're a human" thing required to post? I find I'm having to do more of them - sometimes 4 - before it will let me pass.

Subc, thanks for the hug! heres one for you...(((( ))))) I'm ok again... but it's all there bubbling right under the surface. Ugggh

Your grass fire tale was quite harrowing. It's amazing what your brain can process in a crisis. I am not trained in first aid (Recently) but in an emergency my brain does seem to process pretty efficiently. Like if I witnessed a car accident I would jump into action. But I feel like most of the time my brain is in a foggy muddle. Trouble processing, overwhelmed, flatlined... That must be a brain chemistry thing. Maybe I should work in an emergency room. Forget I said that. Joking!

My nephew worked as a wildland firefighter. He would do seasonal gigs on a specialized mountain terrain crew based in the four corners. Sometimes they would deploy to different states. He knew some of the crew from that Prescott disaster a few years ago. He's worked in sped also but has issues with authority and tends to get fired. Lol no I shouldn't say that. He's stood up for things that have gotten him in trouble. (Ok maybe his judgement is not always the best)... Now he's in Young housedad mode And doing an amazing job at that.

I'm getting the chills watching the news (must cut back!) the coverage of that news editor who stormed the set to protest Russia 1's propaganda and the Met opera's tribute to Ukraine. Holy cow. Chills again. My god I'm an emotional wreck. People are really amazing. So many people with major balls. Excuse my French.

Ah! The time change. That special time of year when I spend the next 3 weeks walking around asking people "now is that old time or new time?" I can report one positive thing and that is my 3:30 insomnia is not migrating and hence it is more conducive to just staying awake instead of falling asleep again moments before I have to get up and be functional. If that doesn't make sense it's because I am suddenly crushed with fatigue and the desire to go back to sleep.

Phew almost lost this post. Gotta post and come back after the school drop off.

Oh one more minor major thing,,, I washed out the little white bathroom garbage can. Lila reminded me of it in the not throwing things away. Category. It's those little pesky (gross) jobs... but anyway, I did that. I use plain black grocery plastic bags as liners for the little garbage cans around the house but the bathroom one still gets gross because god forbid a male ever uses a trash can liner before they put gross stuff in it...

Ok now I'm really going to crash right after I said the time change is helping me not do that, ha!!!

Ok guys, I am having a work day. Fairly productive til I went down the Instagram rabbit hole.

- partial reset of room (swept floor, cleared off nightstand, laundry to hamper)
- moved current-ish paper work to the H's room to sort.
- cleaned back 40 a little
- organized toiletries a little

Sorting paper into:
School (daily sheets, academic papers, correspondence, etc.)
Health (mostly medical bills and notes, Covid stuff)
Creative (mostly needlework books and x-stitch charts)
Genealogy

When I sat down to type this I knew the time was running out for me to accomplish my must dos and my hands started trembling and started to feel anxious. I was a-ok and feeling great sorting the paper... but when I approach calling the school or calling the drs office I come unglued. Or at least unraveling at the edges.

I am now going to figure out if I can get around calling somehow and still get the info, I need. Ugh!

Hi me again with my one man show.

OK. I contacted the neurologist through the my chart thing. He answered one ? And blew off the other so now I gotta figure out what to do. I guess I will try to call.

I have not contacted the school yet because I was too jittery to have a phone conversation... so I still need to deal with that.

In going thru my paperwork I found a few things that were urgent and of course added to my to do list.

So that unsettling feeling when you know everything is in disarray and you're forgetting things - has been tamped down (with a wet jacket.) ( like a grassfire)

Swept floor again. Picked up more laundry
Brought basket downstairs. My hip is really bad today so that was no fun, I started putting paperwork back "where it goes" so now I just need to clear off the rest of the bed (which is full of sorted papers)...

Still super jittery. Leaving soon to pick up the boy and then will have to swing back up to pick up the H. (My car is in the shop)

You know, I actually prefer the grass fire. It's very focusing. No questions about priorities, no quitting, clear goals and an obvious pass/fail metric.

Today I had some plans for Bean's nap time, but they were replaced with:

Wash all the things Bean threw up all over

Search for my credit card (no luck and out of ideas of where to look. Store of last use dies not have it.)

Contact tge neuro through my chart again with just the second q?

I slept late today. I turned my alarm off and then just fell back asleep instead of getting out of bed. Dh alarm woke me an hour later.

The visit, the fire, and bean's stomach issues created a lot of extra laundry. I'm hoping to get the laundry back to where it was on Friday today (4th and ten.)

Bean's toys are spread all over the house. I have a backlog of eggs and milk. The scullery counter is more buried. Everything is dirtier and weedier and (in the barn) poopier. I am out of hay.

The dishes are about the same. I have kept up with email except for one thing a student sent that I need to print out - I want to use the school printer.

My runny nose is mostly gone, my throat is no longer sore, and the headache and the wheeze in my left lung are gone, but I still have a bit of a cough. The burns are just itchy now.

I have nothing scheduled at any specific time today and nothing on deadline for today, so we'll see how far I get.

I was resting and processing.

Didn't really finish the fridge, but I got all the really gross stuff out and one crisper drawer washed.

Both blisters are on the insides of my thumbs. I assume they are from the wet canvas. One is about 1/4" and one is about 1/2" and both are completely ripped open. I didn't notice them until I was washing my hair in the shower. Saw the burns in the mirror when I got out.

I have minor smoke inhalation - runny nose, sore throat (breathing not swallowing, so nothing really soothes it) a cough, a headache, and a slight wheeze on the left side - nothing significant, just if I breathe really deeply. Plus side, I did not burn down the barn. Or the house. Or start a forest fire.

Dh keeps telling me I did a good job, and I'm just like "but I STARTED the fire."

The burned patch is about a tenth of an acre.

SUBC YOU ARE MY HERO! Quick thinking, smart, capable! You amaze me! Your husband is right! You are so smart! Lila is right! You did this!

I could almost smell the smoke as you described your injuries. Be kind to yourself. You do not control the wind.

I took a two hour webinar today on organizing and prioritizing and I learned a lot. I feel different and better about myself already. There wasn't one system being pushed. It was eye opening for me. It made me realize that I complain about being too tired to do anything after work each night and then I play on computer til 2 AM. I want more out of this life.

After work I went to see BF to find out what he wanted for dinner and I ended up staying with him til about 9:30. Now I'm home and showered. We never did get dinner. And I'm not eating after 730 PM so I'm on my own til morning.

yes SubC, you are amazing dealing with that. You didn't start the fire, really. The wind did. You started a small controlled burn and the wind started an out of control blaze, which you battled!

Tatoulia, so happy you are learning about organizing because I bet you will be able to share new ideas as we struggle with things on here.

I spent the day eating and laying around and skipped my meeting which I am a bit ashamed of, but I did do a few things:

-unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher and ran it.
-wiped the counters off a bit
-washed, dried, and put away one load of clothes
-sorted coins

I did play with the dog, and spent time thinking about tomorrow.

I am a planner addict and always want to write down lists of what I am going to do. But this time I am just going to do it. I will post more on the decluttering your waistline thread as I go along.

Aghhh this is the problem with. Not checking in for a few days! You miss so much!!

I'm reading up and catching up and will be back.

LILA has returned !! Yaaay

SubC 4th & 10 made me lol.

Sunday I/we made last minute decision to host a st. Paddy's day dinner with all the Americanized versions of traditional st. Paddy's fare. It was just my Ps and brother but this much really does seem to push us to our max capabilities (and capacity)... we invited his bro and fam and my sister, niece and her Bf, but they all declined. Actually my sister never responded at all, and my niece was either wasted or sincerely confused about the invitation. (You can never tell What condition she is in) but honestly it was vague so that part was on me. Anyway, it turned out beautifully and my dad had seconds and really seemed to enjoy it which was surprising. But aside from that he seemed more frail than ever which is troubling. Also I could tell my mom was noticing some of the stuff going on with my son and she got emotional a couple times. I have a short list of "MUST-DOs" related to his situation that I haven't been able to bring myself to do and have got to pull myself together enough to get those done today. Somehow. Gotta do it. Also a very LONG list of overdue "should dos" that need doing, of course. Ok after writing that sentence about my mom through tears I am emotionally flooded so I am going to stop and get a grip. But I will be back.

I could have planned for the wind. The ground is very wet here, but it had been sunny and windy for a couple of days. I should have known the grass was dry and I should have checked the weather.

The experience made it very easy to understand how fires burn for miles and miles in California.

Have I told you that my bonus son recently started work as a firefighter? I kept thinking both "now would be a good time for him to stop by" and "oh lord, if the fire department gets involved in this I will never live it down."

Today is a busy day. I pick up Bean this morning, and then take him home this evening, eat dinner with his family, and go to my class. The weather is supposed to be really nice, so I think we will go outside and have bike (big wheel) riding time and work in the garden. This is the year I teach him to pick up the small rocks and put them in a bucket so we can "dump" it.(the geology where I live means the land is always throwing up rocks.) He loves anybody dumping things. I may give him a little bowl so he can collect the rocks and "dump!" Them in the bucket.

Then he will need a bath.

Road,

We crossed, but I am sending you a big hug!

Good morning everybody!

I'm extra busy at the end of quarters. Tax time doesnt affect me. End of calendar year does. Last week was a special and unexpected project.

I'm grateful for the sunshine today! I checked my to do list from yesterday and all was accomplished!

Way to go Tatoulia!

It is noon. I did my chores, baked the bread, switched over the laundry and started a second load, unloaded the dishwasher and put a few things in, and started picking at the downstairs fridge.

Cleaning out the downstairs fridge is my big goal to complete today. I have some other jobs I have committed only to "work on" including stall cleaning.

Good morning SubC and Tatoulia (and whoever else is reading).

I had a meeting cancelled this morning so am home, unshowered, in sweats, wishing for fried chicken because I saw someone eating it on tv. Sheesh. But I am having coffee and thinking about what to do.

My little Tot girl is my only local grandchild, so I revolve around her a lot. But soon there will be two.

What should I do today? So unmotivated, would like to take a day off, but I have a meeting tonight so at some point I have to get it together, shower, and get dressed. I should dye my hair today.

Been sorting coins a bit more last night.

I guess I will go in the family room and garage and other room and start getting things into the car to donate before dh gets back from his trip.

I started a grass fire.

It was very scary. I had a bucket of water and I was burning the burn box and it was very calm and the ground is wet, but the dry fall grass was still in the field.

And all of a sudden the wind picked up like crazy and I had five fires, and I couldn't keep up with them with the bucket, so I dunked my canvas jacket in the pond and beat it out. I let it burn itself out on the pond side and the swale side (it was headed toward water in both directions) and just prayed it wouldn't gust up and jump to another field. I got it out in the direction of the woods and then just followed a roughly diagonal line to the swale and kept it out of the next field. I'm not sure how much grass burned, but a lot. I think we lost three small trees. Thank god the leaves were off!

My back and shoulders and arms ache, my throat is raw, and I have blisters, some bad briar scratches, and a couple of first degree burns.

I didn't have my cell phone.

Dh came out with me to confirm that it was out (I went in the house to get him when I thought it was - he couldn't see that field from his office window) and just shook his head. And said "you astonish me sometimes." I said "I know. I should have had my phone and I should have been wearing boots (although I think the boots would have slowed me down. I was wearing crocks - I went in the pond up to my knees in my jeans and still burned a hole in my sock.) and I should have had a rake." He said "using your jacket was good thinking. Another woman would have run for help and it would have been too late."

oh my goodness SubC. That sounds so scary. You did handle it well, level headed. I'm glad it did not get more out of control. How bad are your blisters? I'm sorry you had to deal with that. Sounds exhausting and deflating.

I am feeling like a huge waste of space. I went to the store and got fried chicken and other junk and am sitting here eating chocolates, trying to get moving. It is after 1 and I have a meeting in a few hours that I am very tempted to skip. But shouldn't. But might. Tomorrow I HAVE to do things. Ugh I dunno.

I put a load of clothes in the wash. That is all.

I walk into the cluttered rooms and just feel completely overwhelmed and walk back out.

I will be serial posting today.

This time yesterday I was still in bed.

I have been up for three hours.

I drank my coffee, partly caught up on my "daily" meditations, wrote in my journal, did yoga, ate breakfast, made Dh breakfast, partly unloaded the dishwasher, started a load of laundry, and started a loaf of bread (it's rising)

I put off my chores, but I am going to go do them now.

Tatoulia, I am often curious about what kind of work you do. I totally understand that you don't want to be specific, but I know that Lulu does crisis care work, and Road runs a household and facilitates her sons education and socials, and CM writes and quilts and wishes she could find a practical way to do something from home at least a few hours a week. Your boyfriend does some type of retail, but your job seems to vary from light and flexible to overwhelming and very demanding and I wonder what your field is.

I am not a football person, but a lot of my people are football people.

I was wandering around the house picking up dirty dishes and Dh asked "what are you doing?" I said "trying to reestablish a baseline." He said "what?" I said "I'm trying to get back to 4th and ten." He said "you mean first and ten." I said, "no, that implies net progress. I just want to get back to where I started before I run out of time - 4th and ten."

SubC, I have three grands and one on the way this summer. They are all very little and such fun. I do wish the far away ones were closer. How about you?

So nice you had family over, but I know how exhausting that is, too. How are we going to get some motivation and stop eating cake (for me, it was cookies this morning)? I dunno. I did nothing yet but church.

hi Tatoulia! Thanks for stopping in. I hope you have a good day and get back to see us soon.

The time change is rough!

I did a funny task last night for like 2 hours. I sorted change! I have had a literal bucket of coins on my bookshelf for about 25 years (is that crazy??) When my kids were little we would always throw the pennies and nickels in there and I'd say "we will do something fun with it when it's enough!" Well it was never really enough or I never got around to counting it, it got all covered in hair and dust. And then a few years back I thought, what if that million dollar penny everyone wishes they had is in there? And I bought a coin value book and a little magnifier. And did nothing!

Anyway for some reason last night I wanted to do "something" but not anything strenuous. I wanted mindless. So I took handfuls of coins on the coffee table, watched tv, and put the pennies, nickels, few dimes and few quarters in different piles. Then I looked it up and sorted the 1982 and older pennies into a separate pile (they are real copper), the 1983 to 2010 in another pile and the newer "shield" pennies into a different pile (less likely to be valuable). I found three "wheat" pennies which are older. I sorted the other coins into 1990 and newer, and older. At some point I will figure out how to look through each pile to see if there is anything valuable. Wouldn't it be cool if I had a coin worth a few thousand? The newer ones I will spend.

Then today when I came home from church I brought in all the loose change in my car and started to sort it as well. I put newer quarters and dimes back in the car to spend if I stop for a coffee or something.

I have to say, sorting coins is pretty relaxing. Like doing a puzzle. I am going to check in the garage and see if there are any containers of coins in there to add to my sorting pile.

By the way I am bagging them up in ziplocs by type, and have the ziplocks in a shoebox. I think coin sorting will be my new pasttime, as it is very relaxing and once I find the ones not extra valuable, I can spend them (getting them out of my house).

I have Bean. He is our one and only. Sometimes before he really understood English, dd would look at him and say "some day there is going to be another baby and Grammie will think the world revolves around BOTH of you - and you won't like it." But I don't see another one any time soon. Ddil is in no hurry, dd2 is single, and Dd1 is quite happy with Bean. I am happy with Bean too - I like being able to let the world revolve around him.

Dh retirement plan includes me working for two more years, but I have told them, if dsil needs to go back to work, i will quit and watch Bean. I can do something to get some more money later. I can never get back this time.

So, i literally did nothing today but chores, eat, watch videos, and run two loads of laundry. I need to go do evening chores now, set up the coffee, and go to bed. I am hoping I will wake up refreshed and with some energy tomorrow.

Hello, all!

Wheatback pennies are my favorite, Lila. They are little works of art. I save them.

BF owns a few businesses, which he started from scratch. His office is a few blocks from my place, so I can see him a lot. He is working way too many hours and I need him to rethink things a little bit. But I won't say anything because that's not our deal. Our deal is to be supportive and not make ?helpful suggestions' when it comes to work. We bounce things off of each other and ask for advice, but we don't make gratuitous statements such as "you work too late" or "you don't work enough".

I'm in the corporate world doing corporate stuff, essentially. I work for a very large company. Work with numbers and money and audits and stuff like that. I took this job about a decade ago after a very nice albeit stressful career in a related sector. I have never worked for myself. I like the rhythm of a regular paycheck.

This job has been very stressful for about a year. I'm not ready to rethink it. The company is great. The stress over the past year hasn't been great. But I have three new employees who are great and I'll see how it goes with them.

I did some groceries for mom today and cleaned her cat's box and did other stuff. I got some work done today. I did not see BF.

I didn't do any work this weekend. I'll try to get up early tmr to start slogging through my emails.