Counting down

 In one week from today, we will be with my family. Hopefully.

This weekend, we got the lawn mowed, and I am working on cleaning in the house, so that our dear friend who is going to stay here while we are gone, has a pleasant environment to enjoy.

She calls our house her sanctuary, and I want to be sure this continues for her.

So, given the fact that we still have much to do today, we skipped our morning hike in a park, and will focus on what needs to be done.

Details like the kitchen backsplash, which gets overlooked 90% of the time, the bathroom floor, cat "comfort stations" (including the automatic feeders and fountains), and the dust...oh, the dust.... will be dealt with today.

Other tasks, like scrubbing the bath tub, and mopping the floors, will happen during the evenings this coming week.

On the night before we leave, I will vacuum, change the sheets, and put out fresh towels.  Dave will refresh the cat fountains and litter boxes again, and we will make sure all is in order.

Something that concerns us about our visit with family is that they have been ... doing stuff.  

We have been isolating as much as possible, but they've been going to group gatherings, and concerts, and baseball games.... 

Granted, the COVID numbers up there are nothing like they are here, but ... there's still COVID!  

We took the incentive of being able to go up there, and have been staying away from others as much as possible in order to stay safe before traveling.

They have not been doing this, in anticipation of our arrival....so we are a bit worried.

Be that as it may, we have a package of N95 masks we are taking with us, and we will insist that anyone who comes close to us wear one.

Sigh.  If ANYONE in the family comes up with a positive test in the next 5 days, we will scrap the plans and stay home.

Anyway....today, I am also going to do some pickling.  The two beets that actually grew in my container "garden" are ready to harvest.  I'm also making pickled red onions...one jar for our friend, and one to take up to Illinois.

My doc gave me permission to stop taking the hormone blocker for a month.  It's been a week now, and the pain has been less debilitating.  I still feel it in the evening, and it's still at its worst when I first get up in the morning....but there IS an improvement.

I worked really hard yesterday, mowing the back yard in the heat, and vacuuming the whole house....and the pain was only slightly annoying last night, and this morning, I barely felt it.  We will see how the day goes, with more work around the house to be done.

That's about all I have to report this week.  Given the fact that we will (hopefully) be gone the next two Sundays, there won't be any blog posts.

Enjoy your Labor Day holiday, and the next couple of weeks. Please stay safe, be smart, and I'll update you in a couple of weeks! 

Summer's return

 We're in the midst of another heat wave, here.  This one is supposed to last longer than the previous ones.

We had rain last night, so the high humidity will make sure it's oppressive outside in the afternoon.  The dew point is 73.

As a result of all of this rain and heat, we had to pay someone to mow the back yard again.  It's so frustrating!  

Also, my herb garden is completely overrun by grass and weeds, because I have not been able to get out there to clean it up.

This morning, we got up and went walking at a park, and then went to Costco, and came home to make brunch.

Then, we realized that there was one more errand to do (we can get that yummy locally produced goat milk yogurt at Urban Agrarian, which carries all organic and locally produced meats, dairy, and produce), so Dave went and did it, and I stayed home and did some reading.

Now the Cubs game is on the radio, and I am trying to decide if I want to go through all of my clothes and get a bag ready to donate.

Sigh... stuff to do when house bound because of the heat....ugh...

This week's biggest news is that my boss called me on Tuesday, and told me that I am to resume working from home full time due to the Delta variant of Covid.  I am being asked to NOT return to working one day a week at the office until the 20th, and ONLY THEN if the spike is over.

I will go back to making a visit to the office once a week to send faxes, and pick up / drop off paperwork.

Then, by the end of the week, we had an email that EVERYONE in our department is returning to work from home full time immediately.  They are being asked to do this for two weeks, instead of four, but I am higher risk than anyone else. 

I suspect that this is because two of my direct co workers, who work in the same rooms that all of us do,  now have the Delta variant.

My decision to stay away from in-person dance classes is turning out to be the right thing, too.  One of the dancers in my class has the Delta variant.

It's getting WAY too close to home, which is why we are staying home 99% of the time.  Any errands that we do have to do ourselves (like Costco), we wear KN95 masks, and are extremely vigilant about staying far from others.

I've recently ordered some new to me clothes from an on line thrift store, and some actually new clothes from Kohl's clearance pages.

I've submitted a request to my doctor, via my nurse, to take another month break from the hormone blocker.

We'll be going on vacation soon, and I want to be able to enjoy our trip without the pain I have been dealing with.

When I couldn't walk in December, and we stopped the hormone blocker for all of January, all of my pain went away...so I am hoping that happens again, if he says yes.

My nurse said he would most likely give the OKAY, since, even though we did it earlier in the year, my scans still came back looking great.

I am wondering if we can rotate the different hormone blockers, with an occasional month off to get over the side effect, since they ALL give me pain in different ways, and different areas of my body.

Anyway, other than getting a few new pieces of clothing before vacation, I also was determined to get a professional hair cut before we leave.

It took trying five different places to find one that a) follows safety protocols, and b) could fit me in before the trip.

The place I had really wanted to go, because they made the news due to their strict safety protocol, could not get me in until October.... probably because they were on the news!

Be that as it may, I got my hair cut yesterday, for the first time since February of 2020, at the salon at the ULTA store.  

Everyone was in masks, and I wore my KN95, so I felt pretty safe.  My stylist was the only person in the area with me, and the area was big and open, at the back of the store.

It felt so good to get that stupid top layer cut again.... it weighs everything down so much...being absolutely straight, while the rest of my hair has a beautiful spiral wave to it.

He also cut off some of the length, just to make it lighter, and more flattering with my facial shape.

Nothing much else to report.  

Wishing everyone a good week!

Sunday Funday

 There was another torrential storm on Friday.  No damage here, but it sure did bring a cool front, for which we are very grateful.

Yesterday, it was only 90 degrees.  In Mid-August!! Today's predicted high is 88!!

This morning, we got up and went out for our sunrise walk at a park up north of town.  It was 72 degrees.  Humid, but so refreshing.  The water was like glass, it was so pretty in the hazy sunrise.

Got home by 8, cooked a somewhat labor-intensive breakfast, ate, and everything was all done by 8:45am.

I LOVE days like this....because now the whole day is stretched out in front of us, and we can take our time about anything else that we want to do.

Dave still has all of his chores to do, because he has trouble motivating himself to just get them done.  He will do them today, though, and he can take his breaks to sit and stare at his computer, and still have time to do it all.

I did mine Friday night and yesterday morning, for the most part.  I like that feeling of accomplishment, AND of not having it hanging over my weekend!

This whole past week, we got up at dawn and went for a walk before coffee, breakfast, and showers.  Then, on my 9:30 morning break time, we went walking again.  

(The only day we skipped was Monday, because that's the day I have to go to the office, and it's really hot there by 9:30 because it's all concrete and buildings.  I did go out for a few minutes and walked around the block, but when I am not home, Dave tends to not move from his seat all day.)

Then, because it was so hot in the afternoons, we did indoor workouts.  

Well, I did... Dave got up and lifted his little dumb-bells for about 2 minutes (which is something, and something is better than nothing), while I did two sets with my hand weights, using different muscle groups, two sets of squats (unweighted, then weighted), two sets of posterior leg lifts, two sets of crunches, all twelve reps each, and then some exercise bands, yoga and stretching.  

It takes all of my 15 minute break, if I go fast, and let it get my heart rate up!

My left hip and hamstring are my newest pain (it's scaring me a little, and reminding me of last December), and it's really bad in the morning, and after sitting at my desk....but it seems to resolve after I get up and move around.  Getting up and moving around, though, it intense.

The shoulder is doing better now, thankfully...but that's how this works.  The pain travels, and the intensity of it waxes and wanes.  

It's so weird, and I am so sick of it, after years, but oh well.

In other news, the Delta variant of COVID is burning it's way through Oklahoma.  

The numbers just keep going up and up, and the stupid governor refuses to do anything about it.  He doesn't think it's worthy of a declaration of emergency.  If he would just DO THAT, the over-run hospitals would be able to get assistance....but he doesn't see a problem!

School started this past week, and OMG, the uproar about masks is mind boggling.  Children are DYING... and parents who don't believe this is real are beating up school personnel over mask orders in school districts.

What has become of this world??

Anyway, I can't do anything about that, so instead, I try to focus my energy on my own inner peace, and on trying to spread healing energy however I can.

It's kind of what I've always done anyway.

So, we are on household lock down, for the most part.  We never stopped wearing masks when going out to do errands, so nothing has changed for us, other than we are not going out and doing errands unless we absolutely have to, like last year.  

We had gone out to eat a couple of times since spring, but always masked, and sat outside whenever we could.  We met with friends a couple of times, but have stopped doing that, too.

I had my last pre scheduled massage yesterday, because I really needed it for this pain I am having, but we both wore KN95 masks during the appointment (I took mine off when I was face down, though, because I literally could not breathe).

I also had my yoga therapy appointment, and, again, we both wore KN95 masks, and mostly stayed distanced.  It's terribly uncomfortable, but we need to protect each other.

My sister got the last of the jaw wiring stuff taken out of her mouth on Friday.  

They unwired her about 2 weeks ago, I think, but they left the brackets in, just in case they had to close her up again.

Thankfully, that didn't happen, so the brackets came out Friday.  That took 14 novocaine shots and sedation... sounds like it was terrible....but not nearly as bad as when they put everything in while she was awake!!!

We are all SO HAPPY that this ordeal is OVER for her, but her sense of relief must be exponential.

My brother has to have another surgery to release an impinged nerve in his RIGHT arm this time, and his back surgeon wants to re-evaluate him, since he's having issues again, and his back first surgery was less than a year ago.

He did lose his kitty cat about three weeks ago, too.  She finally passed after 11 weeks of decline, during which he cared for her vigilantly. 

Our Frank is still acting weird, but not AS weird, so we have not called the vet again.  

Dave is going to see his psychiatrist soon, and we are hoping that a new medication, or a dosage change, will help him to overcome his gradual increase of depression, which is probably responsible for his ever increasing lack of motivation to do ANYTHING at all, and his pervasive negative attitude.

That's about it from Dragons' Roost.  Wishing you a healthy, easy week!

Thunder and rain

 When the storms started at 5:30 this morning, I turned off the alarm that had been set for 6:30.

No early morning hike for us today.  It's still dark and rainy, with lovely thunder.  

We have to have lights on in the house right now (at 9:30 am) because it's so very dark outside.

It may clear out later, but now we also can't mow the lawn today, as we had planned.

This has been a very unusual summer for central Oklahoma....and, while I am grateful that we have not had many 100 degree days, it makes me worry about what we are in for as the seasons change.

Last fall and winter's catastrophic weather events are still VERY fresh.

This is especially true when I am out of the house, anywhere in the area...and see all of the trees that broke off at the tops from the inch-thick ice in October, and all of  the crepe myrtles and shrubs that died from the never-before-seen-here arctic cold in February. 

I definitely have PTSD regarding power outages, too.  Any time the lights flicker, I feel deep anxiety.  Living without power or water pressure for two full weeks was a nightmare. 

Anyway, yesterday was a very productive day at Dragons' Roost.  We got up and grocery shopped early, and were happy to find very few people were out and about yet.  By "early," I mean we left the house at 9 am and were done, and home, by 10:30.

The Covid numbers in Oklahoma are skyrocketing, and I wanted to do the shopping in person one last time, before we go back to relying on the shopping service.  I wanted to stock up on some things that were on sale.  

Our shopping service never seems to find the things that are on sale, and I also think they substitute items un-necessarily in order to "fluff up" the check-out amount.

It's comforting to know that Costco and Target have reinstated their mask requirements....we still have to go there about once a month or so.

We have a large package of KN95 masks, the ones that are supposed to be the most effective, and will wear only those going forward.

It's a month until our trip to Illinois, and we went ahead and booked our rooms for the road up and back.

My brother in law has canceled the big gathering we were going to have, and we all feel very good about that.  

We can have a small gathering with my family (everyone is fully vaccinated), and I can see my friends one on one, hopefully outdoors, since we won't be booked solid going to museums, restaurants, ball games, etc, due to Covid.

This trip is all about seeing people we love.  We HAD hoped to get Dave to the Art Institute for his first time, but that's probably not a good idea.

And, now that the Cubs team has been gutted, we have no interest in even thinking about the ridiculously high cost of bleacher tickets, not to mention how stupid it would be to sit in a crowd of yelling fans.

Once the storms move out today, we will be dealing with high 90s, and an intense heat index due to the humidity level. The dew point will be in the 70s after all of this rain.

The next several days will be get up and walk at sunrise if we want to get outside at all.  It will be too hot the rest of the day.

Wishing anyone reading this a good week.

TOTALLY forgot

 It's Tuesday... LOL...I forgot to post my weekly Sunday blog because we did a little get-away.

On Saturday night, we stayed at a real BnB with a full breakfast, and then went hiking at Roman Nose State Park early in the morning.

The BnB was booked through Air BnB, but was not a private residence, like many of them are.

It was a really cool, old hotel, which was restored starting in the 1990s.  It has guest rooms upstairs, with a full restaurant down stairs. It even had a ghost!

It's in the closest town to the park, which is about an hour from home.

SO... our weekend was busy, but also very nice. Just the right balance.

My next tattoo is happening this coming Wednesday.  I would not normally be doing this, but I have the money now, and I have wanted these for a looong time.  

Summer time is the best time to get tattoos so that they can be uncovered to heal.

Okay, off to work! Have a good rest of the week.