Strange Times
Really feel out of sorts today and have felt this way for more than a week now.
- Delbert is no longer eating. I got him to lick tuna and chicken today, but that was it. He has taken to hiding away under a cabinet in the back room. If we can't get him nutrition soon his chances for living much longer will decrease significantly. I got a stool sample from this afternoon and we have an appointment with the vet for Monday morning at 8 a.m. It is all we can do now, yet I feel aimless and depressed, even with tons of things to do.
- After a two day face to face meeting locally with the people I work with I spent the following two days in a sort of withdrawl. It was like during those days I was all hyped up and come Wednesday I felt ultra-tired and unfocussed, even with some very important items to do! On top of that I felt guilty for this condition when all of my collegues had to deal with travelling from various locations to attend the meeting...and travelling back (facing difficult weather problems).
- My computer is silenced. Last week I got notifications from Windows but also the BIOS that the hard-drive was not working correctly. While it seemed fine, I have spent days backing up my most essential files on DVD and then spent $100 to get a terrabyte USB drive and then did a complete restore-backup on it. I had considered bringing the computer to Grate Computers in St. Johns but was quoted as the work costing $40 an hour! While I might have to take that route, I decided to try to fix it myself and ordered a replacement hard-drive. Once I get it I will replace it and restore from the system restore disk I burned on DVD and the USB drive. If this fails then will go to Grate with all the hardware (in other words, I am only out my pride and a little time...they would use my new drive), but it should be fairly simple to do it myself.
- I have not had any meaningful sessions with my computer since last week because I did not want to do anything to change the content sitting on the hard-drive. So: no e-mail, no Facebook contacts, no research, no organizing digital content on the hard-drive. To say this is not a problem for me would be dishonest: I have come to rely on home computer and getting on the computer was part of my routine.
- Spent 4 hours planting new trees in St. Johns with the Friends of Trees and arrived at home wet and muddy. It has been raining all day and in the late afternoon the wind kicked up--definitely stormy.
- Last week we had snow and I had to work from home on Friday following a harrowing trip Thursday night (ice forming on windshield wipers...reducing visibility...had to pull over to pull the ice off so I could see where I was going...however could not find a safe place to do that when I needed to do that). Saturday and Sunday we were cooped up at home.
- Thursday morning worked from home so our furnace could be serviced. Not much really came from it except spending the money for the two hours work ($75 an hour or so...geez).
- The television schedule is a mess with the NBC pre-emptions. It would not normally phase me, but it is one more change to a routine which included Grimm, Evolution, Dracula and The Black List. CBS is repeating old episodes of the Person of Interest rather than airing new ones. However, CBS's new show Intelligence does have new episodes and the series is getting better...and Fox still shows new episodes of the robotic cop show Almost Human. BBC America has an interesting show about how Ian Fleming pulled from elements of his own life to create the Bond character. Again...nothing really wrong here, but it is a lot of change and I don't need it right now!
Certainly some good things have happened.
+ Marisa took me out for a Valentine's Day Dinner that was suprisingly filling and delicious...followed by a burlesque performance upstairs at the Analog on SE Hawthorne in Portland. Parking was easy and driving conditions were good that evening. I worked at home that afternoon so it was easy to go there after 5:30 p.m. We finished dinner just in time for the show. It was a great experience without a single flaw. Marisa looked wonderful!
+ The Face to Face worked out very well: everything we planned came together and we shared/discussed/received a lot of very good information driving our work for the next several months at least. The dinner Monday night was excellent...at Thai Elephant on The Streets of Tanasbourne in Hillsboro...my choice from several selections I felt that would be best. And, the dinner featured an appearance from our friend, M., who just recently retired but who had been working with us for years before.
+ I learned a lot about planting trees and enjoyed working with others to plant them! I drove the truck loaded with shovels, rakes, stakes and the trees. Our house was first....
+ We got a Purple Catulpa tree which now is planted in our park strip. Everything was handled by Friends of Trees with call before you dig and city marking the spot for the tree (last Fall!). The gas folks this time did a much better marking than the last time complete with yellow flags every yard or so back to our meter (they did not want to repeat the experience we had the last time I went digging!).
So, on balance, it would appear everything is fine. However, one can not discount how our lives have been disrupted in the past week and how the well-being of our loved ones will emotionally sidetrack us.
Here is hoping next week improves and we get back to a safe routine for a while.
I do have a end of week deadline to deal with which I am very nervous about meeting.
Saturday I need to buy some Oregon native plants I contracted to buy weeks ago. The weather might be a bit rough then, too. Buying the plants won't be an issue but I will want to plant them immediately.
Even though Monday is a holiday, it will be spent bringing Delbert to the vet.
Financially we did not need the vet visits Delbert has had to make in the last couple of months...first for his eyes, now this. I would not hesitate to bring him to the vet, but with the heater, my computer issues, the native plant purchases and an upcoming dental visit (and with unknown and probably less liberal insurance coverage), money is tighter than ever. We have a looming big bill to pay or face financial penalties...then another big bill I want to settle (not to mention our annual tax bill).
When the weather gets better and we get past deadlines and get caught up financially...and if we can find some way to improve our health (especially Delbert's)...we can get back on track. It is possible. I hold on to that hope.
- Delbert is no longer eating. I got him to lick tuna and chicken today, but that was it. He has taken to hiding away under a cabinet in the back room. If we can't get him nutrition soon his chances for living much longer will decrease significantly. I got a stool sample from this afternoon and we have an appointment with the vet for Monday morning at 8 a.m. It is all we can do now, yet I feel aimless and depressed, even with tons of things to do.
- After a two day face to face meeting locally with the people I work with I spent the following two days in a sort of withdrawl. It was like during those days I was all hyped up and come Wednesday I felt ultra-tired and unfocussed, even with some very important items to do! On top of that I felt guilty for this condition when all of my collegues had to deal with travelling from various locations to attend the meeting...and travelling back (facing difficult weather problems).
- My computer is silenced. Last week I got notifications from Windows but also the BIOS that the hard-drive was not working correctly. While it seemed fine, I have spent days backing up my most essential files on DVD and then spent $100 to get a terrabyte USB drive and then did a complete restore-backup on it. I had considered bringing the computer to Grate Computers in St. Johns but was quoted as the work costing $40 an hour! While I might have to take that route, I decided to try to fix it myself and ordered a replacement hard-drive. Once I get it I will replace it and restore from the system restore disk I burned on DVD and the USB drive. If this fails then will go to Grate with all the hardware (in other words, I am only out my pride and a little time...they would use my new drive), but it should be fairly simple to do it myself.
- I have not had any meaningful sessions with my computer since last week because I did not want to do anything to change the content sitting on the hard-drive. So: no e-mail, no Facebook contacts, no research, no organizing digital content on the hard-drive. To say this is not a problem for me would be dishonest: I have come to rely on home computer and getting on the computer was part of my routine.
- Spent 4 hours planting new trees in St. Johns with the Friends of Trees and arrived at home wet and muddy. It has been raining all day and in the late afternoon the wind kicked up--definitely stormy.
- Last week we had snow and I had to work from home on Friday following a harrowing trip Thursday night (ice forming on windshield wipers...reducing visibility...had to pull over to pull the ice off so I could see where I was going...however could not find a safe place to do that when I needed to do that). Saturday and Sunday we were cooped up at home.
- Thursday morning worked from home so our furnace could be serviced. Not much really came from it except spending the money for the two hours work ($75 an hour or so...geez).
- The television schedule is a mess with the NBC pre-emptions. It would not normally phase me, but it is one more change to a routine which included Grimm, Evolution, Dracula and The Black List. CBS is repeating old episodes of the Person of Interest rather than airing new ones. However, CBS's new show Intelligence does have new episodes and the series is getting better...and Fox still shows new episodes of the robotic cop show Almost Human. BBC America has an interesting show about how Ian Fleming pulled from elements of his own life to create the Bond character. Again...nothing really wrong here, but it is a lot of change and I don't need it right now!
Certainly some good things have happened.
+ Marisa took me out for a Valentine's Day Dinner that was suprisingly filling and delicious...followed by a burlesque performance upstairs at the Analog on SE Hawthorne in Portland. Parking was easy and driving conditions were good that evening. I worked at home that afternoon so it was easy to go there after 5:30 p.m. We finished dinner just in time for the show. It was a great experience without a single flaw. Marisa looked wonderful!
+ The Face to Face worked out very well: everything we planned came together and we shared/discussed/received a lot of very good information driving our work for the next several months at least. The dinner Monday night was excellent...at Thai Elephant on The Streets of Tanasbourne in Hillsboro...my choice from several selections I felt that would be best. And, the dinner featured an appearance from our friend, M., who just recently retired but who had been working with us for years before.
+ I learned a lot about planting trees and enjoyed working with others to plant them! I drove the truck loaded with shovels, rakes, stakes and the trees. Our house was first....
+ We got a Purple Catulpa tree which now is planted in our park strip. Everything was handled by Friends of Trees with call before you dig and city marking the spot for the tree (last Fall!). The gas folks this time did a much better marking than the last time complete with yellow flags every yard or so back to our meter (they did not want to repeat the experience we had the last time I went digging!).
So, on balance, it would appear everything is fine. However, one can not discount how our lives have been disrupted in the past week and how the well-being of our loved ones will emotionally sidetrack us.
Here is hoping next week improves and we get back to a safe routine for a while.
I do have a end of week deadline to deal with which I am very nervous about meeting.
Saturday I need to buy some Oregon native plants I contracted to buy weeks ago. The weather might be a bit rough then, too. Buying the plants won't be an issue but I will want to plant them immediately.
Even though Monday is a holiday, it will be spent bringing Delbert to the vet.
Financially we did not need the vet visits Delbert has had to make in the last couple of months...first for his eyes, now this. I would not hesitate to bring him to the vet, but with the heater, my computer issues, the native plant purchases and an upcoming dental visit (and with unknown and probably less liberal insurance coverage), money is tighter than ever. We have a looming big bill to pay or face financial penalties...then another big bill I want to settle (not to mention our annual tax bill).
When the weather gets better and we get past deadlines and get caught up financially...and if we can find some way to improve our health (especially Delbert's)...we can get back on track. It is possible. I hold on to that hope.