Thoughts

I have acquired more stuff. On Friday we travelled to a Sam's Club out of our area so I could get a shiny red tricycle rather than the shiny gold ones available at our local store. Yeah, we checked out regular bike shops first but the price difference for the rather boring and mundane model that I wanted was huge - I'm not ready to spend a minimum for $500 for a bike when I don't even know for sure that riding it is going to be something I can maintain! So - shiny red bike came home in a box. Sunday morning, after he woke up and saw that I was desperately fighting to get to sleep, my man waited until I'd succeeded and built the bike on his own, letting me sleep for eight hours rather than waking me up to be a part of the Trike Building Team. There is now a long scratch through the paint on the support leading up to the handlebars - and I don't care. Because he sunburned the heck out of himself and sweated a few pounds, too, so I could have my new toy for this week's increase in my physical activity plan. I'll get some car paint to dab onto the scratch marks. Or maybe just by some reflective paint and decorate right over it.

Riding a trike is weird. You can't lean into a turn. In fact leaning seems to be counter-productive, as it misaligns the rider to the bike frame. That is going to take some getting used to and will likely impact any decision about buying a regular bike down the line.

I've been researching headlights and tail lights. I already know that I will most likely be riding during the night so those are quite important. I don't know how it is in your area but my little corner of suburbia has few sidewalks, if any, and we are legally required to ride out bikes on the roads... where reckless drivers can ram us on their own terms. Or so it seems. Which is one reason why I'd rather ride at night - fewer cars on the roads and bright lights on my trike will make me far more visible than I shall be during daylight cruising beside parked cars and trailers on the sides of the roads.

I am not actually required to buy a helmet. My own doctor told me that I needn't, pointing out that since helmets are normally worn to protect a rider from damage while falling and the likelihood of falling off of a tricycle is about 5%, it is not necessary for me to wear one. (He said that if I were to be riding and fall because I'd been struck by a car, then there would be a lot more to worry about than head injury. Likely he is right about that but the cautious part of me is still looking at a helmet. If I can wade through all of the ones offered online. Good gravy! It is worse than porn!

Saturday we delivered the small fridge to its new owners and came home with my 15K89 Singer sewing machine. Which does not have an operator's manual online. I shall have to use the 'generic' 15K manual. Oh, and it does come with a case. So this is what I've got now.


I haven't tried to use it yet and likely won't until I get the 22 sheet walls for our GDH camp perimeter sewn and painted. Or at least as painted as they are going to be by mid-October.

On Friday I woke up at 6:15 to a grey day - only, well, I didn't know it was 'day'. I had slept so hard that when I woke up to the overcast light I thought the sun was setting and I'd slept all through the day and Bossman had gotten home while I was still abed. I shamefacedly made my way into the kitchen and was sitting at the table glumly contemplating what that meant for the chances of getting any sleep that night when Bossman came into the room and asked me why I was so down. Then he reached for his denture case. I asked him what he was doing, and he replied that he was getting ready for work as he does every morning. Oh dear. He got a huge laugh out of my bewilderment. I shook off my dazzlement enough to quickly dress and drive him to work, giving me the car for the day, then called our youngest to see if he'd worked overnight. And that resulted in a lovely breakfast with my son followed by a trip to the DMV to procure a new ID card for him. He refuses to get a driver's license for some odd reason, even in this city-transportation benighted area, but after he'd been mugged he had no ID at all and had been putting off the (dreaded) trip to the s-l-o-w DMV office ever since. With the presidential election season creeping near his need for one was becoming dire. It turned out to be a quick trip - only around an hour. But with the time it took to find all of his paperwork beforehand it was nearly lunchtime when we walked out and his father, having a short day, was ready to come home. So we fetched him for lunch and then dropped our boy/man off for his bedtime while us older folks drove off for fun.

By which I mean that we gassed up the car and then braved the Sprint store to get a new phone for the Bossman. His was so old they didn't even accept it for a trade-in. Somehow along the way I got a new phone also, thanks to the BOGO deal they had going, and a free Samsung tablet E for the man, too. And we came out of it with our monthly bill lower than it was when we walked in. I'm a little confused about how that all happened - especially since we, the two of us, have a third cell phone line now, but there we go. They used my husband's old phone for the new line's number and handed it back to him. I guess we needed a 'new' line in order to get the BOGO deal. I haven't checked to see how long we have to keep it activated. Both of us are now working on learning the ins and outs of our phones' operating systems. We moved away from Samsung models to the newest LG. It is a big phone and barely fits in my pocket. It does NOT fit in there when I have it in its (also freely given before I could say "I don't want that, actually") waterproof case. Apparently with it in that I can take a bath with the phone or take it swimming and use it as a camera. Okay, sure. So there are two cases for mine now - one for everyday which I bought at the mall (a vivid blue case which looks nothing like my husband's previously matching one) and one water-, earthquake-, drop- proof case for Pennsic use. It will be in a pouch then, tucked inside a knitted bag*. We both went to bed early that night. Evidently the process of phone acquisition is exhausting.

Saturday morning started with the uncomfortable awareness that I'd contracted another UTI and off to the Urgent Care clinic I went. I loaded up my sewing equipment before I left the house and after an exam, lab test, and prescription stop I was on my way to a "Sew-appaloosa" at a local library. One of the chatelaines in our barony had reserved the space for the pre-Pennsic panic stitching frenzy. Only about six of us showed up but we got a great deal done and left contented. I worked on creating a groundcloth for our pavilion. There doesn't seem to be a local source for 16x16 canvas tarps but we'd found a 12x16 last year while setting up for service week and made do with it and two 8x8s. Friday morning I bought another 16x12, and that night tore out all of the hemming on both of them, then laid them out on the floor at the library to double-check their measurements. A little cutting and stitching later has gained us a 17x18 groundcloth... yeah, I know, not "16x16" but my beloved husband insists that it be larger than the tent's actual interior footprint. I don't know why. I suspect I'll be making it smaller after we try out his suggested size this year. I've one edge hemmed and tomorrow I'll finish the other three. Today has been 'lazy day' and all we've done is visited Long John Silver's for dinner and then lolled in front of the television to catch up on episodes of the BBC's "Endeavor". And maybe a couple of other shows too; "Houdini & Doyle" and "Royal Pain".

Tomorrow, or rather later today, we'll host a traditional bar-b-que party and cards.


*Why do I need to carry my phone at Pennsic? Because only one of my department heads has a phone assigned to them. We need our phone to communicate with each other. I anticipate that it will feel very weird next year to not need to carry the thing around with me.

Helped one of my protégées with their sewing yesterday and was glad I was there to do so since she had a technical problem she had no idea for fixing (neck hole was cut wide and shallow, too wide to sit comfortably on her shoulders.) She now has a gown with a contrasting yoke, inside and out, and it encases the wide opening and has a smaller, more flattering one instead. The color combination is not what I would have chosen but these are her heraldic ones so I can't argue with the decision... well, artistically I can. Fashionably I can. But as a Scadian herald I just have to shrug my shoulders and suggested that with the new yoke she might as well add cuffs too. Some of the people reading this will see that gown in a few weeks. :)

I am feeling lighter in spirit already. My resignations had been sent a few days ago so the changes in attitude were already working through before I posted yesterday's scree. I've already caught up on the 1200+ "SCA Heraldry" list messages that I had not yet read, as well as fourteen month's worth of SCA-cooks list messages. And all of my bookkeeping (love that word - oo-kk-ee) is done. So is 'catching up on all the emails for Cultural Affairs'. In fact, I am now cheerfully going back to check on them two or three times a day, out of (gasp!) curiosity and a desire to see if there is anything I need to handle quickly. Because I want to. That's new and I like it.

I am using today to repack the Rubbermaid bins holding all of the loaner clothing and am washing all of the fabric that I'd set aside for crafting new pieces of loaner apparel. We have a couple of spare bins left over from something else we'd been doing and I shall carefully pack all of the ready-to-cut fabrics in there, safe and out of my sight. I am leaning towards passing those on to the new Gold Key deputy. He doesn't sew but he is quite conscientious. It may be that other members of the barony who do sew would be willing to 'check out' a length of fabric and return it as a completed article of garb. It doesn't have to be me.

While the fabric is cycling through the wash I believe I shall build one of my Lego kits.

It has been a tumultuous week & a half. I'm going to bullet-point. Sorry, I know that is not the best journalistic style.

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I've been too sick to drive for Uber. I haven't been sleeping well but even though I'm awake during the hours I'd normally be driving, I'm tired and dizzy. I miss it. I also miss the minor extra income it brings in.

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We drove to Cooper's Lake a week ago, on a Friday as folks were getting out for lunch, which meant hitting DC rush hour traffic midway through our trip. Luckily for us we always take a route that runs diagonally across the state so our overlap with the dense traffic was short term. And, although I shouldn't have, I had a Dairy Queen banana spilt for dinner. Because I could and we were there. It is at our traditional gas/food stop during that trip.

I was stressed about the meeting for the next day. My lousy health this winter/spring meant that I was not as diligent about getting my Pennsic job done and I had 37 email strings (Gods do I hate gmail and its formatting!) to wade through before the meeting, some of which were letters asking for my help and having been dated a month ago. It was shameful. As it turned out, I was about even for 'doing my job' with the rest of the Deputy Mayors, which is both heartening and embarrassing all at the same time. Guess we all had a lousy few months. Nonetheless the emails were sorted, my departments were updated, and I'm now back in the loop again. Although about $200 poorer because I can't request a refund for my travel costs.

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I've decided to take a break from Pennsic staff next year. Sure, I'll do duty - we all should volunteer a few hours - but overall I am going to be a 'tourist' and relax. It is the first time since Pennsic 21 that I will not be on staff. I did schedule a break one year but a friend guilted me into running a Page's School once we got onsite. The autocrats had never bothered to find a staffer for it and there I was, sitting with her on the Cooper store's front porch trying mightily to resist while drinking Pennsic Chocolate Milk (it deserves the capitalization) when a little girl came out of the store with her brother excitedly telling him that "THIS year I'll be eight years old so THIS year I get to go to Page's School too. You don't get to have all the fun this time!"

Well yeah. We were both Boy Scout Commissioners and we could put a one-week school together while standing on our heads and blowing kazoos. So no break for this staffer. (It was a good school and people were absolutely fantastic about stepping up at the last minute with few financial resources. I still remember some of the classes with nostalgia.)

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The lumpia fundraiser thing is done. More specifically, I am done pimping the sales. It was a total flop in that we profited only $80 and I have sealed and frozen lumpia filling our freezer to the very top. Over 900 sticks of it, not to mention the 200 or so over at our Baron and Baroness' house. But - done and no longer my headache. Except that my failure haunts me.

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I've 'fired' my weight loss dietician, which means I've quit their program since there is only one 'non-surgical' doctor. I've finally learned that 'encouragement' isn't an aspect of their care but pushing more drugs as an answer to the slowing down of loss is. I've not lost any weight in months but neither have I been the least bit diligent about cooking, exercising, or watching my calories during the months of feeling sick as a dog. Twice I asked for a 'pep talk', a group to meet with or anything that may help me regain my perspective when I went in for my follow-ups and each time I was told that they "didn't do that and have I considered this drug or that surgery?" I need to regain my enthusiasm for cooking foods again instead of tiredly reaching for whatever ready-made or easily-grazed item is in our cupboards. Now that the exhaustion from last month's cold has begun to lift the kitchen is starting to look more attractive to me. Next comes motivating myself to the gym.

- Sewing must happen. A lot of it. I had a family and a single guy needing loaner clothing for the event this weekend (the single guy's roommate posted at 10am on Facebook on the day the event opened, asking for 'whoever is in charge of Gold Key". They didn't actually get to my house until after 8:30 at night, long after the event had started. Yes, it was crazy for me to even allow it. But I did so knowing that with such a gross abuse of courtesy on her part (he didn't know any better but she is a Laurel), I could now have a group-supported 'rule' put in place requiring borrowers to contact me at least two days before an event. And the new guy, who'd never met me or anyone else in our group, has a few names and faces to remember. He seemed rather embarrassed about it. I learned later that it may have been because our Chatelaine visits their house two or three times a week to see their other roommate and she'd told the Laurel over and over again during the past month that she should contact me early if she needed to borrow anything.) I was at home because I was sewing a tunic for the son of the first family, who could not find a single thing in our Gold Key that would fit except for one cotton and one thick wool tunic. With an expected high of about 90f, wool wasn't going to do.

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I am lividly angry with our country's health care situation. Our (past) baron is dying of a cancer that cannot be cured. That makes me angry in one direction but more importantly to me (given the 'somethings we just can't take care of' situation for cures) is the fact that his wife is killing herself trying to take care of him, their child, their home, and keep an income coming in while the medical community stands by and whistles in the wind as she whittles herself down past the point of exhaustion. Cancer shouldn't cost two lives for every infection.

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And a man I respect highly and love dearly is dying of a different kind of cancer because he cannot afford health care. He's too proud, too private, and too, too exhausted with the medical merry-go-round to even consider trying to start a "go fund me" sort of thing so he is going to die while ignorant idiots posture and rant about the 'evil that is Obamacare'. I swear by the Almighty, if one person snarks "Obamacare" to my face I am going to pop them in the kisser. Yes, it is a freaking ugly package - but that sure as shooting wasn't Obama's fault and the politicians who posture and prance while fanning their egos with it have cost, or will cost, many of us the lives of people we care about.

And I don't love that man half as much as his partner, who is the mother of their pre-teen daughters does.

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I'm wiped out tired. Think there is a way to change out one's batteries?

I've spent the last two days rolling lumpia - or more precisely, chopping up all the ingredients to go in the lumpia and finally getting to the point where I could roll a batch up. Beef ones, 115 of them so far. I'd meant to do more today but instead went shopping for more ingredients - tomorrow one of my protégées/apprentices will come over and we'll get started again. I must have all six types done by next weekend so there is a lot of chopped oriental ingredients in my fridge right now, waiting to be mixed in with the rice and soy sauce.

Everything is going slower than I want it to - the elms and oaks are pollinating the entire corner of my world and I happen to be allergic to them. Staying inside is helping - going shopping means that I'll be trying to claw my throat out sometime before I can get back home again. May I say that I am grateful to the inventors of the neti pot, Sudafed, and Zyrtec. Oh yes. And Motrin, unfortunately, as my head aches all the time right now.

So I have not been driving for Uber in the last two weeks - headachy and fuzzy-brained as I am, I don't trust myself behind a wheel. Although the loss of my weekly mad money is hitting me. How quickly we adapt to extra income, eh? I'd not realized what a sense of fulfillment it was giving me, to be able to not stress over an extra bill or a higher-cost item that I'd normally have to scrip and save for. Those trees better find a room - I want my driving evenings back.

In spite of not feeling well* I've been fabric shopping. Yes, Ms. "I don't want to stockpile fabric" went out and poured cash into the hands of retailers. Some of it was personal purchases due to Hancock's closing (over 300 dollars spent, although a chunk of that was on tools rather than fabric. I'll be setting aside my plans for buying an adult tricycle for a while until I reimburse our household account for that trip!). Other spending was not my own money. But of our own, one of the things we picked up was 'trim fabric' These ones:


A few yards of each will net me some lovely early-period stripes to turn into trim that is lightweight enough to actually bend and drape as fabric should rather than being thick and rigid as so many hand-made SCA trims end up. One of my goals as I learn how to weave is to make pretty trim that is pliable instead of stiff. I dislike seeing sleeves, for example. bow out in a stiff circle at the biceps because of the trim applied over the seam line.

We got over a hundred yards of various fabrics and one trim in three colours from an upholstery shop that was going out of business. Those are for the barony's Gold Key (newcomer's loaner items) collection. I'll be sewing until Pennsic, most likely, to get all of that converted to clothing. Of the blue there is about 53 yards. Wow! But at a dollar a yard for fabric and 75cents a yard for trim, it will be a real money saver.






*We thought I was struggling with a mean UTI - treated it once, had it return, treated it again, and then the longer test results came back showing no evidence of bacteria, so now a week into the second round of antibiotics and pain meds we've hit a wall. The next step is a specialist. In the meanwhile, I have deep-seated pain at the kidneys and lower abdomen which is sapping all of my energy. We've a weekend demo for the SCA coming up where I'll be doing onstage presentations - and all I really want to do it stay in bed and try to sleep. Somehow we'll make this work. I am not looking forward to loading our tent and equipment up, setting up, demoing, and then tearing down again. The thought exhausts me. But Bossman says we can do it so I believe him.

Two weekends ago I drove for five hours to attend an SCA event called "Atlantian University" - a daylong classroom event with (usually) 8-12 classrooms set up to host 1-2 hour classes about medievally-related subjects throughout the day. As well as sundry "how to do your SCA job" ones thrown in along the way. (The five hours back was much harder on me than I expected. Perhaps 'ten-hour daytrip drives' are not as much of a good idea as they were when I was younger.)

One of my Apprentices rode with me as well as my oldest BFE (Best Friend Ever), who kept the conversation going by asking the occasional off-beat question. One she asked my Apprentice was, "Where do you see yourself five years from now?" and it hit me pretty hard - harder than it did the respondent.

I haven't been thinking about "The Future" for a very long time. Not in any useful manner, at any rate. To tell the truth, I've never expected to actually reach 'the future', old age, in any case. My health never lent itself to the making of plans or of envisioning such a thing as a real possibility I'd have to deal with in my life.

The question has caused me to look at our home, our hobby, and our finances in a new light. For example, I'd been haphazardly clearing out this and that for the last couple of years after seeing what my adult friends had to deal with when their parents passed on and thinking about what it would be like for our children to have to pack up/clear out our home once we did too - but now, well now I'm looking at it and thinking more along the lines of "what will it be like to have to live with this stuff for the rest of a long old age? Do I want to? Do I even look at most of this anymore? Use much of it any more? Do I want to settle for this item or that one instead of reaching for something which would light up my (or Bossman's) eyes when I saw it every day? And what about when we, as some of our friends have, hit the "we're not going SCA camping any longer, nor schlepping all that medieval furniture around" stage? In all honestly, that isn't too far off - I can't see us being willing to do so in, say, five or six years. Not at the level that we currently do. By Pennsic 50 Bossman will be 69 and I'll 64... loading the truck full of wooden furniture for a two week long vacation just doesn't seem all that inspiring in that future.

It's very odd. I have never - ever - needed to consider my own 'old age'. I trained myself out of that sort of daydreaming when I was a teenager and was diagnosed with my heart condition and its limitations. After it failed and was magically corrected, multiple surgeries kept me focused on the 'now', and then my cancer struck. And four years later while I was still under treatment his did. Again, the 'now', the 'let's get through this' mode was predominate.

And now I have a real future with no plans and no goals. It is rather intimidating but exciting all blended together.

I was reading someone else's blog and they mentioned that they'd be 'taking a week off' because they were starting on an anti-depressant/anxiety medication which they knew would give them mild flu-like lethargy and aches. It made me stop and think for a moment. Two weeks ago I, too, was prescribed the same sort of thing... I've rather violently rejected the idea of taking anything like that for years - actually, rejected taking any kind of pill at all, having been raised by a woman addicted to prescription drugs. It scars a child, being the one who sits with her parent and cares for them while they detox again and again at home, away from medical care, throughout that child's middle years of growing.

But my insomnia was getting worse. To the point that I was willing to ask for sedatives (figuring that my expected lifespan will be at best 20 years, I was willing to risk getting addicted to them if I could just sleep more often than once every couple of days.) Instead the doctor suggested that I was experiencing heightened anxiety and suggested treating that as a first step. So with trepidation I've started the regime... I have been sleeping better. Sometimes f-a-r better than I think I should be. Some days have seen as much as 16 hours of sleep but I supposed I've some 'catching up' to do. I haven't, however, completely kicked the bouts of insomnia nor found an improved ability to concentrate and have been spending a goodly portion of my awake hours sort of in and out of focus. Which brings me back around to what I first mentioned reading. Perhaps, since it 'takes a couple of weeks to adapt to the medication' what I've been experiencing is akin to the aforementioned author's 'flu-like lethargy'. I hope so. I also hope that it will go the heck away soon because I have things piling up on my desk which need addressing. As well as sewing projects that are beginning to clamor for attention. (I am a deputy chatelaine specifically in charge of our Gold Key/loaner clothing and have not yet even looked in the bins to see what is available, in need of repair, or needed to be re-stocked. We don't have an event scheduled until January, which gives me a nice healthy chunk of time to get that taken care of, if I could just motivate myself.)

It is funny how (mostly) unacknowledged fear can cripple a person. A month ago, I struggled to make seven tunics and one gown for people headed to Pennsic. It took me two weeks and at least one evening of tears, with background mind-music playing "this used to be so easy, what's wrong with you?'. I left the event with the intention of making two more gowns for a person who didn't fit anything I'd prepared, yet no scissors met fabric until today. Although I did dye 4 yards of white so it'd be a nice lavender.

Tuesday was my dietician appointment. I approached it with dread - too many crisis's, too many party/celebrations over the last two months had garnered me too many pages in my food log with "over allowed amount" or even just "binged" written across the page. I was ashamed and the only thing that forced me to make the appointment was the big banner I'd read on their welcoming page which said "don't avoid your appointment if you've not lost weight - we are here to help you when you need it most!". So I went. And was surprised. I've lost five pounds. That's not the pound-a-week that I'd been doing at the beginning but it was more than I expected. And rather than getting chewed out, the dietician complimented me because, as she explained, under the circumstances of the last couple of months most people would have gained weight rather than lost any at all. She also gave me some strategies for dealing with people pushing food on me that I shouldn't be eating. It is very hard to turn down someone's homemade treat that they are so proud of, and danged irritating to have someone else shove a spoonful of something at my face with the demand, "taste this!" only to scowl and glower when I decline. "It's a small amount and you should have tried it" seems to be justification enough to treat me like an antisocial meanie because I wouldn't put that bit of food in my mouth... which social pressure I have difficulty dealing with. You know - that 'wanting to please people' thing is hard to turn off!

The downer side of the visit was learning that the soreness I've noticed in my legs when I've pushed to stay upright long enough for them to go numb before I sit back down is oxygen starvation in the cells. I was, as I had thought (but my Primary Care doc brushed off) actually harming myself by attempting to walk more daily. She wants me to start noting exactly when the circulation begins to cut off - I really only notice once the whole leg is mostly numb, because I'm focused on whatever it is that I'm doing - shopping, usually - so now I need to pay attention and get a time line. In the meanwhile, mobility at Pennsic is going to be limited far more than I had planned.

Anyway. So Tuesday afternoon had me humming to myself because a dreaded appointment had been positive and affirming. Wednesday was my oncology appointment, where I would get the news about the enlarged lymph node - was it still enlarged? If it was, that pretty much meant cancer again.

It was not. My doctor said, "You keep passing all of my tests" and has placed me on what would be a maintenance regime - my appointments will now be twice a year, and the same with CT scans. While they do not use the word 'remission' with my type of cancer, for all intents and purposes that is what I am in.

And I left his office, came home to lunch, then put music on and cut out & made two gowns from scratch (no pattern), then fitted them onto the new owner this evening and that was that.

Fear. I wasn't even aware I'd been carrying it. I now feel as though I've woken up from a sludgy sleep, mentally.

Friday featured a 10-hour drive to Slippery Rock, PA, so we could attend the Pennsic staff meeting on Saturday. It was a long drive. We decided to check out route 68, which is West Virginia's pride - it was a lovely route but not a particularly safe one - the road hugged the hills and featured many three-lane sections specifically designed to handle the slower traffic of 4-cylider cars and laboring 18-wheelers. Of course, even though our little economy vehicle was stressed trying to go up the hills, the 85-mile-an-hour coasting down the other side was nice. We opted for our traditional route (Penn turnpike) on the way back, though, as a severe storm was sweeping through and we (rightly) anticipated flooding roads and rain-squall blindness. Normally the home drive is two hours shorter than the Pennsic drive but the rain squelched that so it was a little over 10 hours each way. That made for a very long weekend. Also a downer was the discussion with our hotel, which charged us for an extra night because we had secured our reservations for "Friday and maybe Saturday" with our credit card, only to find out on Saturday that they do not consider it 'securing' a reservation but rather booking the room. So even though we told them at check in on Friday that we would not be needing the extra day, and stressed it multiple times, we found that we were charged for it anyway, "because we had to turn other people away who wanted to reserve for that night, so you owe us that." A family-run hotel, just getting started, with only 18 rooms and the oddest one we'd ever stayed in. Needless to say, we will not be staying there again. (Not because of the misunderstanding, but because of spotty service and communication, and because the bathroom, while much larger than a regular one, was lit only by one light bulb so showering was done in a dim closet-like environment with no exhaust fan from the room. Bossman was smart enough to grab one of the floor lamps from our suite and place it in the bathroom, which helped with visibility.

The trip actually was a waste of time. I had a three-minute face-to-face with the mayor, and then on Saturday morning we had a less-than-one-hour general meeting, and that was it. It all could have been accomplished just as well over the internet via email. Thankfully this is the last time I'll be called on to make that meeting - I do not anticipate ever being in a key staff position again. Since I have no plans to train as a possible mayor, and have never been one in the past, I am not a candidate for a senior staff position. This year was my one 'shot', which I appreciate but am glad to walk away from. It has been a frustrating year of no training, no SOP, and no idea what was needed from me until a series of public messages announced that I was overdue on deadlines. My comment that an SOP would be useful was met with derision... I can find other ways to meet my 'frustration and humiliation quota".

Although - I am considering checking out the Lost & Found department. There have been some 'lean' years of people doing the job more because they were trying to take care of an empty spot in the staff rather than because they wanted the position. There hasn't been a good fit for a while now. I know I could do it well, and it would give me a niche to fill. Not to mention that the hours are great compared to the hours needed for the other jobs I've done!

This afternoon at the grocery store I picked up a 24-can case of soda to bring home and then stopped, grabbed an additional 12-pack to hold at the same time, and felt good about myself. The combine weight of the two is how much I've lost since mid-February. It was cheering to hold that awkwardly heavy bundle and realize that it was something I'd not be subjecting my bones to ever again. So even though I haven't lost a clothing size yet (that happens when you are as heavy as I am), it feels good to have an awareness of my progress. I do have more of a waist, though, now - my tummy no longer juts out beyond my chest. That is nice.

I'm spending the week sewing two Russian sarafans for a friend. I've only made their pattern so far so actually creating a real one is something I am looking forward to. I don't know much about the style - I'm copying a set of finished ones someone else made for her - but I feel confident these will look good on her. The pattern did, and it was just made of junk fabric. She is paying me to do the sewing so I might be able to afford ordering our new pavilion after the weekend. That would be one worry I could set aside.

And now I should go to google and see if I can learn a little more about sarafans, just to satisfy my own curiosity.