I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, so gosh-darnit, why is this so freaking hard?!?

 

How does a person get confidence?

Why do so many other people have confidence, but I don't?

What is WRONG with me!?!?

Wait...don't answer that last one.

Hi! And welcome to another installation of Tash's Random Thoughts and Outpourings.  If I changed that to Random Outpourings and Thoughts, I could call it TROT, which is horse-related and therefore uber-cool.  Remember when "uber" was a wanna-be-cool way to say "super" and not a driving service?  Man oh man, I have a headache.  I hope it's not a tumor.  It's probably due to the weather change, and/or leftover from me trying to go all day yesterday without any caffeine.  I didn't intend to go without caffeine all day yesterday, but I was out of diet Dew at home and didn't have time to stop and get any before work. I was going to run up to Wal-Mart on my lunch break and get some, but due to minor schedule changes, that didn't happen, and I didn't feel like having coffee at work because I didn't have any creamer there (and I like my creamer with a little bit of coffee) and besides, ice water was suiting me just fine yesterday in the moment.  Work was keeping me busy enough that I could brush off the headache I was getting until after work when I was taking my mom shopping.  That's when I broke down and bought a 6-pack of diet Dew.  OK, I didn't "break down," I was going to buy one anyway.  Actually, my mom bought it for me, which was totally unnecessary but she insisted, and it was easier than arguing with her.  My point being, it'd been a long time since I went that long on so little caffeine, I was pleasantly surprised at how functional I was. I was chugging water all day to try to fend off the headache, but it still hit me, and I still have a headache now which may or may not be related.

I mean, it could be a tumor.  No offense at all to my friends who have actually had (or have) brain tumors.  I should know better than to make light of such a horrible condition.  On the other hand, I know that headaches can sometimes be a sign of something more sinister.  But it's probably just the weather changing. 

But back to my original question, which is inspired by the fact that I had my annual review this week. I always dread the annual review. I always have, since my very first job. It doesn't seem to get any easier, thank you, Anxiety.  I've been ruminating on why that could be, and why I have the particular faults I have.  Not just at work, but in life.  Because, let's face it, one thing I've never been known for is having a lot of self-confidence.

This never seemed to be an issue until the last 10-15 years or so.  I was always "just shy".  In my first semester of nursing school, in our first clinical rotation, our instructor told me I needed to be louder and more outspoken.  I could've died right then and there, yo.  Calling me out like that??  I'm just shy. It's just how I am. I can't fix it.  I don't like drawing attention to myself.  Maybe I'm not cut out to be a nurse.  

I have since come to understand what she was getting at, though.  It wasn't the first time, nor the last, that I was assured in not so many words that I had the knowledge and skills to do exactly what needed to be done, I just lacked the courage to actually do it.  Words that continue to haunt me to this day.

I don't understand it. It's not as though I was constantly belittled when I was growing up.  Au contraire, my parents were very supportive and encouraging.  My sister, not so much, but by the time I was old enough to understand that, I was also old enough to understand sibling rivalry so I tried not to let it get to me.  Maybe it did, anyway?  Your guess is as good as mine at this point.  

One can only ruminate on the past and speculate on these things for so long, though.  

Also, one can only put off finishing a blog entry for so long.  For example, I wrote all of the above last Thursday, and here it is Monday, and I'm trying to remember where I was going with that last sentence.  I hate it when that happens! 

Anywho, even though I don't recall which path I was trying to take to get there, my point was to be that I am hereby officially working on ways to boost my own confidence.  The word "affirmation" keeps running through my mind, so I'm starting there.  Telling myself all the time that I can do the thing.  It sounds so basic, doesn't it?  But this is what depression and anxiety can do to a person.  It's always in the background, telling me I can't do the thing, or I shouldn't do the thing, or if I do the thing incorrectly I'll mess everything else up, or it would be much better if someone else did the thing because they're better at it than me.  I h8 you, Depression and Anxiety.  You suck.  Would you please just leave me alone, for the rest of my life?  Can I break up with Depression and Anxiety?  I never asked them to invade my life, anyway.  Are there any tests out there yet that can localize where exactly in my brain these ideas are coming from so someone can go in and zap them out and I can be a normal person again who doesn't have to psych herself up to do things that normal people just do without even thinking about it because that's just what it's like to be normal?  

Go, me. Identifying the problem is half the solution. Or so I hear.

Feb-Roo-Airy!

...is obviously NOT when this photo was taken! But oh, how I need to see the green grass, and leaves on the trees that have been stark raving bare naked since seemingly forever (or at least as long as we've lived here).  Don't get me wrong, there's still a beauty and a certain peacefulness and calm in the winter woods, where everything is literally black and white and cold and deserted, and all the magic that is hidden away under the shadows of summer is exposed for all the world to see.  The trees are plentiful enough out here that, even sans foliage, they make an impressive barrier between you and whatever is on the other side.  But it's a wall of sticks.  Nothing can hide there.  The silence is as deafening as the air is frigid.  I long to hear the sound of leaves rustling in the warm summer breeze.  I want to be able to stand out there and immerse myself in nature and forget that there's even such a thing as "inside".  All the animal tracks we can see in the snow now just reinforce the idea that those woods, the woods like the ones in the photo above, will be alive and teeming with life in a few short months, rather than standing around desolate and barren and full of potential and/or promise. 

Yep. Gotta love living in the upper Midwest.  I know I've stated this before, but Spring Fever is hitting me particularly hard this winter, and while I don't want to wish time away faster than it needs to go, I do wish spring and summer would hurry up and get here. And then stick around for a while.

In case you haven't seen my FB recently, my latest enamoration is deer in our yard.  This has further led me to all kinds of conflicted feelings.  I'm an animal lover, but not one of those super die-hard animal lovers who is completely and totally against, say, hunting.  I'm not a hunter, but I'm not against other people hunting.  If my hubby, who is (or should I say has been) a hunter, wants to shoot one of those deer in our backyard (legally, in season), theoretically I don't mind.  It's a hunter's perfect scenario, isn't it?  Getting a deer right off your own deck?  I mean, if I could fish from my back step, I totally would, but it doesn't work that way.  I know there's a deer overpopulation problem around here. I know they cause a lot of damage because of that, especially when they get out on the highway and people hit them with their cars, and such.  There are deer in the city, for crying out loud.  There shouldn't be deer in the city.  They should all be out here, in the wilderness, living their little wilderness critter lives.  

But then I see them and their little wilderness critter selves in my backyard, which is all covered in snow, scrounging around for something to eat, and I imagine what it would be like to be a hunter and to pull up my rifle and shoot one of those beautiful, innocent animals that is doing absolutely nothing wrong but trying not to starve to death in the middle of a world that has been taken over by selfless humans... and I can't do it.  I can't pull the imaginary trigger.  It's just a creature trying to survive out there, just like the rest of us.  

My parents always said I'd've made a horrible farm girl.  It's true!  I have nothing against eating meat.  As long as I didn't know it first.  :)  True story -- once upon a time, I went with the hubby when he went deer hunting.  Mostly just to have a weekend away, as I had no intention of joining him in the woods or trying to take down Bambi's dad.  Well, as (my) luck would have it, my hubby got himself a deer that weekend. And we didn't have a trailer with us, just our good ol' trusty Chevy Venture minivan.  So that dead deer rode home from Up North in the back of the minivan.  Well, mostly in the back of the minivan...her head was basically intruding upon the front space (on the floor -- hubby, in his wisdom, had removed the back 2 rows of seats, so picture Bambi's mom laying on the floor...well, on a sled on the floor of the minivan with the back 2 rows of seats removed) with her big, brown eyes looking at me the whole time.

The moral of the story is that I could not eat that deer.  I never saw her alive, but riding home with her body in the back of my minivan was close enough.  Believe me, I wanted to! I want to like venison.  I wanted to enjoy the meat that my hubby had provided for our little family.  But I couldn't.  I just kept seeing those big, brown eyes, staring up at my from the back of my minivan.  I think I tried a bite or two but couldn't do more than that.

But, wait! There's more.  There was the year we raised chickens!  We started out with a couple as pets, and that went well, so we got a bunch of chicks one year with the sole purpose of growing them up to eat them.  Oddly enough, it was easy to NOT get attached to them. Most of them.  ;)  Chickens are fun to watch, and to have around (they eat bugs and rodents and weeds) but they can also be disgusting (they also eat each other if the opportunity arises) and sometimes not friendly.  And they poop all over if they're free-range, which ours were.  I felt no love lost when it came time to butcher them. In fact, I was glad, because they were getting too big for their little legs and it kind of disgusted me that they were even bred that way.  

But, you know what? I still couldn't eat them.  Again, I really wanted to, because chicken is one of the meats I generally love, but I could not eat a single bite of our own chickens.  Even worse, I couldn't eat any of the eggs from the layers, either.  That part really made me mad, because I love me some eggs, and having that many at our disposal was like winning the lottery.  But, nope.  As soon as I cracked one open, my appetite went right out the door.  

I know what you're wondering now.  Do I eat the fish that we catch?  The answer is No, I don't.  But that's because I'm allergic to fish.  I don't know if I would be able to eat them if I were not allergic.  I used to when I was a kid, so maybe?  

And here ends another chapter of Things You Didn't Know You Wanted To Know About Me.  Thanks for reading!

Almost 2 months

I heard on the news the other morning that winter is officially half over!  That's all they said, or at least all I heard, so I don't know* if they meant meteorological winter (which runs from December 1 through the end of February) or astronomical winter (which runs from around December 22 to around March 21).  I'm pretty sure they didn't mean Midwest winter, which runs from November, sometimes October, rarely as late as December, until at least the beginning of April but sometimes into May.  

*And I don't feel like doing the math to figure it out.  Since the meteorologist was the one talking about it, my money would be on meteorological winter, but I'm not in a betting mood today.

Nevertheless, it was nice to hear the words "winter" and "over" in the same sentence from voices other than the ones in my head, for a change.  😆

It's hard to believe that we've lived here almost two months already.  It definitely feels more like home every day.  I think we have all the light switches figured out (ha, ha), at least on the main floor!  I was keeping up with unpacking totes at first, but I finally conceded and now there are some totes out in the garage waiting to be unpacked.  Mostly because I haven't decided how to display the ashtray collection yet.  

Yes, we have an ashtray collection.  No, we don't smoke.  Well, we've been known to enjoy the occasional cigar or flavored cigarillo every now and then, although that hasn't even happened for a few years.  I used to smoke in my late teens/early 20's, but quit when I got pregnant with the boy.  No, the ashtray collection doesn't stem from a smoking habit, it stems from an interest in collecting odd, affordable things.  Hence why I want to find a way to display them, not just keep them in totes in the garage.  There are some really cool pieces in there!  I think one of my favorites is the ashtray that was *ahem* once in a pediatrician's office.  It actually has indentations of baby's feet at different ages.  I can just imagine new moms sitting around in the pediatrician's waiting room with their babies, smoking to pass the time, and comparing their baby's feet to the ones on the ashtray, right before ashing in it.

I know I suck at describing things, so I found a picture of a very similar ashtray on the Googles.  This is not the actual one we own, as far as I know, but it could be.  It's not my picture, though.  The ashtray in question looks just like this: 

See? Craziness!!  It was made (or at least distributed by) Similac.  That is NOT meant to be any kind of slam against formula-makers.  I'm not one of those moms.  My baby was a formula baby and a breastfed baby.  I just think it's funny.  Or brilliant.  Similac knew their target audience with this one.

So, yeah.  Two months.  And I'm tired of seeing everything covered in snow.  Although I do have to say, I have been kicking ass at keeping the house clean!  This is generally not one of my strong points.  I used to joke that I was born without the housekeeping gene.  Have I written about this here before? I feel like I have.  Either way, get this: we were out of laundry detergent for a couple of days last week, and the growing pile of dirty clothes spilling out of the hamper and on to the floor around it was actually disturbing me.  I could feel it in my bones, and grating on my last nerve, and I hated it!  I was so relieved when we finally got more detergent so I could catch up on laundry.  This is so unlike me, at least unlike the me I used to be.  If something like that bothered me before, I just ignored it.  WHO AM I!?!?!  I don't know either, but I like me a lot better now that I have in a really, really long time!

Trust me, I've been doing a lot of self-analysis into why that could be.  I have some theories, but nothing I want to share yet.  Especially not right now, considering my break is over and I have to get back to work. 

Toodles!

No changes are permanent, but change is.

 

You know how when you have a newborn, and everyone tells you to cherish those moments because time flies thereafter?  Holy hannah.  I mean, this is certainly NOT the first time I've had this particular epiphany, but there's a milestone tomorrow that I'm having trouble wrapping my little brain around.  

*ahem*

Twenty-four years ago today, I had my very last prenatal appointment. Ever.  I was 38 weeks and 6 days pregnant. I relive this in my mind every year, and I'm not even going to apologize for re(x24)-hashing the story.  People who were never told they wouldn't be able to have children, or people who have never suffered pregnancy losses, or people who don't blog or like to otherwise document their thoughts may not understand (or they might, IDK).  It's my story, and I'll tell it again if I want to, tell it again if I want to, tell it again if I want to...(I'm not stuck on repeat, that's a random song reference. Just to clarify.)

But don't worry, I don't feel like getting super-introspective this year.  I'll just point out that today was the day I had my last appointment, but I didn't think it was my last appointment when it started.  I still remember the surreal feeling when, after spending about 15 minutes trying to relax so they could re-take my blood pressure (I don't recall that it was definitely 15 minutes; I'm going by what I know now that I didn't know then.), my OB (the guy -- I think his name was Scott? I don't remember his last name. Maybe Carlson? There were three different providers at that practice, one man and two women, and I'd seen all three of them but I think I saw him the most...) said all non-chalantly, "Why don't you come to the hospital tomorrow morning and we'll have a baby?"  

I remember trying to argue that the reason my blood pressure was elevated was because my in-laws were visiting from out of state and I was stressed out because of that (no real reason other than I'm an anxiety-riddled introvert and had only been married just over a year at that point; having my in-laws visit now certainly would NOT stress me out!) but he wouldn't hear it.  I was told that my blood pressure was elevated (and, I'm almost sure, questioned for any other signs of pre-eclampsia) and the solution was to be induced the next morning, which would be exactly one week before my actual due date.  

And so signaled the start of the next phase of our lives.  Well, the signals had been there for quite a while, of course.  You could say this particular signal started the day I decided to take a home pregnancy test some months prior after having spent a few days ill miserable with what I had convinced myself was a stress-related ulcer and having it suddenly dawn on me that my period was late.  Or a few days later when a blood test at the doctor confirmed those test results (because I never took just one home pregnancy test; I took several. To get an average).  

I guess one reason I dwell on this day is because it was the last day we were just a couple and not a family.  Re-reading that, it almost sounds selfish, which is not my intent.  Ok, maybe it's a little of my intent, lol.  I know it's the boy's birthday and I have no desire to take away from his celebrations, but it was also the day I physically brought a new life into the world, which is an amazing feat that not everyone gets to experience at all.  We had only been married for 16 months when the boy was born, but we'd been living together for about 2 years by then, and had been dating even longer than that, and some other time I'll write a blog about our history together but suffice it to say that we had spent a significant time of our pre-parenthood late-teenaged and young adult lives together, yet now when I look back it seems like the boy was always there.  Like I can't remember what it was like NOT being his mom.  

Alright, I have to get back to work.  Later, gators!

It's waaaaaaay too early for Cabin Fever.

It's only the first week of January, and I'm already tired of the snow and cold, and ready for spring.  I'm ready for green grass and flowers and fresh air that doesn't freeze my nose hairs.  I'm ready for snow-free roads and I'm ready to have a vehicle that doesn't have any salt on it, or under it.  I'm ready for the sun to stay up later.

Go ahead, laugh. I deserve it.  As you may have gathered by today's title, I know it's much too early to feel this way.  We're barely into the new year, I've got at least 4 months before any of that is happening.  

So, we're getting the house settled pretty well.  Just today, we brought over what I believe is the last of the things we had at the old house.  Our new couch is being delivered this week.  I've been slowly putting the Christmas decorations away (except the lights, I can't take those down yet) and re-decorating for "the rest of the year".  That's one good thing about moving right before Christmas -- you can put Christmas decorations up wherever you want them if you unpack them before everything else!  

Hold the applause.  We still have the two barns' worth of stuff, including the F-mobile, the riding lawn mower, the hubby's woodworking stuff, and my horse stuff that actually survived the flood, as well as the camper and the Big Green Egg and the patio set from the back deck and misc other outdoor decorations and at least two non-running vehicles (3 or 4 if you count the dune buggies, oh wait, there's a dune buggy body in the old cow barn, too...) to bring over.  And two horses.  

I think that's part of what's fueling my fever (whether it's cabin fever or spring fever, which have always been the same thing in my mind but apparently are not): I've been having fun setting up and decorating the inside of our new place, but I want to get the outside set up, too!  I miss having my horses in the backyard.  Our deck is bare (except for the snow all over it) and the cute little patio on the back of the house looks so empty.  I was able to get a couple of things out there before the snow fell, but not much.  

Sigh.

Remember how I was just getting over COVID when my parents both ended up in the hospital and I had to switch my life's focus from me to them for a while?  I feel like I'm picking right back up where I left off on October 31 or so...in other words, run down, tired, and trying to recover.  That's not helped by the fact that I have a crappy head cold right now, but in these new and unprecedented times there is no such thing as "just a cold" anymore, so I'm under quarantine right now until the COVID test I took yesterday comes back.  There's a meme that goes around the nursing groups on FB that says something along the lines of how a voluntary 72-hour hold sounds like a nice, relaxing little get-away, and I can definitely relate to that right now.  Nothing to do but lay in bed and have someone bring me my meals and ask me every hour whether I'm feeling alright.  Can I 72-hour-hold myself at home?  Can I say that I have multiple personalities, and the responsible nurse personality can take care of the personality that needs rest and relaxation for a bit?  

For the first time, I've really been missing those 32-hour workweeks I had when I worked at the hospital.  Working four days and having three days off would be a nice gig to have again!  Not enough to go back to shift work and working holidays and weekends, but...it would be nice.  I've even thought about asking if I can work four 10-hour days instead of five 8-hour days (which are typically not just 8 hours...) but I haven't yet.  IDK if it would even make a difference in the job I'm in now, I think it would just turn into me trying to fit 5 days' worth of work into 4 days.  

Anyway, all this talk about how worn out I feel is making me sleepy.  Go figure.  I'm going to sign off and crochet some mittens or something.  TTFN!!

 

One.

All weekend I've had the song "One is the Loneliest Number" playing in the back of my head.  (Because of something someone said at Bible Study on Saturday morning that made that line come to mind.)  So when I was looking for a pic to go with today's blog entry, I started by Googling images related to that song.  I didn't come up with anything that spoke to me, but thinking of "One is the Loneliest Number" led to me thinking about "One" by Metallica.  And that is what inspired today's pic: the video for "One" by Metallica, which also has clips from the 1979 American anti-war movie called "Johnny Got His Gun," adapted from the 1939 book of the same name.

I've read the book.  I don't think I've seen the movie, though.  I remember finding the book at a flea market in the early 90's, and so I probably paid like 25 cents for it.  Of course, I'd never heard of it until the Metallica video came out, but so what?!  It was a good book.  It is a good book.  

My point? Don't be frightened by today's pic.  We were watching The Twilight Zone all weekend so I'm in a very "insert Twilight Zone theme music" mood. 

And also, get a load of the "PPE" of the medical personnel in the above pic.  I'd presume they are portraying physicians, but I can't say for certain.  The more things change, the more they stay the same. 

ANYWAY...remember last year when the whole "internal monologue" thing was big, or should I say, the acknowledgement of an "internal monologue" was big?  I do, because I never could conclude whether I had one or not.  And mind you, this is based on random tests that were posted on FB, so, highly scientific and reliable.  I remember one that went something like, When you see the word "apple", does an image pop into your head?  And my answer was...no.  It doesn't.  When I see or hear the word "apple", the word "apple" pops into my head.  Not an image but the word itself.  

Maybe I'm confusing "internal monologue" with something else. Something that I can't find the words for right now.  Because I remember other questions along the lines of whether or not a person envisions like an internal movie or something like that when reading.  You know, like if you read the sentence, "The man ate the apple," do you actually picture a man eating an apple?  Because I kind of don't.  I don't know.  I know the words, and I know what they all mean, and I understand them all put together in a sentence like that.  But I don't get a movie playing in my head when I read something.  I mostly just get words.  Maybe that's why my reading retention is horrible at times. 

It's not like I can't get an internal movie going, though.  I just have to either read things really slowly, or re-read them several times to get that effect.  

But, is anyone else distracted by spelling out words in their heads, or is it just me?  I've been this way for as long as I can remember.  I'll involuntarily pick out a certain word from something I've seen or heard, and ruminate on that word.  It's like my mind is playing with it and won't let it go.  Spell it forward, spell it backward, put all the letters in alphabetical order, count the number of letters and if it comes to an odd number, add letters to it to make it an even number.  Lather, rinse, repeat.  

So! I get to have my first COVID test of the year tomorrow morning.  All weekend I've been feeling kinda crappy, with a headache and a sore throat and achy body and such.  But then, it got super cold out and I've been doing things I don't normally do, as well.  (Get your mind out of the gutter; I'm talking about painting the bathroom.  Which involved more standing on ladders and stretching into odd positions than I remembered from the last time I painted a room.)  Plus, it's winter.  Who doesn't get a cold in the winter?!  It's only a matter of time.  But now, thanks to COVID, there's no such thing as "probably just a cold" anymore.  

Oh, well.

On that note, I'm going to sign off.  If I have COVID again, I'm going to...IDK...I want to say I'll be mad, but I don't know who I'd be mad at.  Cry is probably a better answer.  Yes: if I get another positive COVID test tomorrow, I will most certainly cry.  

That is all.

HNY!

Mandatory year-in-review post, dead ahead!

😉😁😀😄

Just kidding.  If you want to know what happened to me this year (which probably no one does), you can just go back and read my previous blog entries.  There were lots of good things and lots of bad things challenges.  

If you want to know what's happening to me right now, you're in the right place!  I'm in a good place right now.  Not emotionally, I'm just in my favorite chair with my dog.  ha! ha!  Alright, alright.  I kid.  I'm in a good place emotionally, too.  Except that my throat hurts like hell and I've had a headache for the last 3 days, and I'm sore and achy and as soon as I finish this I think I'm going to go to bed even though it's only 7:15pm right now.  I already had COVID so hopefully it's not that again.  

Despite feeling like crap, I got the first coat of new paint on the guest bathroom today.  And the hubby got the master bathroom painted.  Tomorrow I'll hopefully get the second coat on and then I can put it back together.  

I really don't have much else to say right now.  I'm gonna sign off and go to bed.  Just wanted to get my First Post of the New Year out of the way. 

TTFN!

On the third day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...

When I was little, the two saddest days on the calendar were September 4, and December 26.  The day after my birthday, and the day after Christmas: the most anti-climactic days imaginable.  Nothing sternly whispered, "It's over," like those two dates.  All those weeks of anticipation and preparation and upcoming celebration, and then, it's over.  Go back to school, go back to work, blah blah blah.  The decorations would come down and the long, boring school year (in September) or winter (in December) would begin.  

Perhaps that's why I'm never in a rush to take the Christmas decorations down.  Not that I have many up this year -- the vast majority of my Christmas decorations were destroyed in The Flood and haven't been replaced yet because I hate paying full price for things and I also hate shopping immediately after Christmas; go figure -- but I did hang a couple strings of lights, and set out some shiny things, and found one of my favorite Scentsy warmers that happens to be Christmas-themed.  Soon enough I'll take these things down and pack them away until next year.  But not until at least January 5, because that's the 12th day of Christmas.  In the past, I've kept the decorations up until the middle of January, because that's when the boy was born so why not keep the tree up until his birthday?  Alas, I didn't put a tree up this year, and the boy doesn't even live with us anymore.  I guess the bottom line is that I'll take my decorations down when I feel like it, and not a moment before.  :D

I have the day off today.  It's our Christmas holiday day, since the actual holiday fell on the weekend.  So yeah, I'm definitely not complaining about life or my job today 😍.  A day off without using PTO? Yes, please!  Of course, last night as I was falling asleep I had all these ideas of things to do: hit the basement floor with the carpet cleaner, set up my sewing machine, organize my craft supplies, go to the old house and pick up some more things to bring here (the end is in sight, at least for the stuff we have inside the house; don't ask about the barn or the garage for a while), go through the rest of my clothes and sort out what can be donated.  So what have I actually accomplished?  I slept until 9am, had banana bread for breakfast, parked my butt in my living room chair for a while, and played games on my phone, until about noon.  Then I started some laundry, swept the floors, unloaded the dishwasher and loaded it back up again, cleaned the air fryer, changed the bedding, took out some garbage, packed away some Christmas gift bags to reuse next year, and went through some more of my clothes to sort out what can be donated.  Apparently the roads are bad out there, so I decided to stop at the boy's house and pick up more stuff another day this week.  I had leftover egg bake for lunch.  Oh em gee, egg bake is the most perfect dish ever!!  Every time we have it, I think we should have it more often.  Yet I never do anything about that.  To quote Homer (Simpson), "Well, excuse me for having enormous flaws that I don't work on!"

Speaking of which, the last few days I have had incredible sewing cravings.  I just want to make something -- some curtains, a table runner, a queen-sized quilt for our bed, you know, something useful -- but I don't know what.  That's why one of my goals for today (last night when I was trying to fall asleep) was to set up my sewing machine and organize my stuff so I could actually make something again.  It's one of those cravings that feels like I should let it build up a little bit more, first, so that when I do attack the craft supplies, I will actually get things done instead of just poking around a little bit until I get bored. Know what I mean?  

But there is one enormous flaw that I have been working on, thankyouverymuch.  I've never been great at keeping up with housework.  I was the kid always getting yelled at to clean their room, so I can assure you this has been a lifelong struggle.  I love having a nice, clean, organized home, I just don't like doing the work to keep it that way.  I always used to joke that I was missing the gene that makes women (or men) instinctively want to keep things neat and tidy and presentable.  I've now come to realize that a lot of the struggle was probably due to depression.  There are lots of ties to depression and the state of my home, actually.  When it's nice and clean and organized, I feel like I have my shit together and am functioning more like a normal person, and life in general doesn't seem so overwhelming.  There are still moments, of course -- there will always be moments! -- but overall, knowing that I can keep my house clean gives me hope for the rest of my life, whatever other struggles I am currently up against.

So I'm beyond proud to admit that I've kept this house clean since we moved in, one month ago!  I know it's only a month, but it's a start.  It bothers me now when the hamper is full, or there are crumbs on the countertops, or dishes in the sink or even in the dishwasher.  It's so easy to keep up by doing a little bit every day, here and there, before I sit down and play games on my phone or watch TV or anything like that.  And waking up to a clean house is one of the best feelings on earth!  Especially on days like today when I get to plant my tired butt in my favorite chair and just veg out and not do anything until I feel like something needs to be done.  I worried that once we got real furniture, I'd be more inclined to sit on my butt and do nothing more often and the housework would start to slide again, but that hasn't been the case at all.  I even feel bad if I don't put the clean clothes away right after taking them out of the dryer.  CRAZINESS!

Speaking of which, I just let the dog out and realized the steps and sidewalk are still covered in snow.  I think I'll go out and take care of that now.  Then take care of the random tote of stuff that's in the kitchen.  And then? Who knows.  The world is my oyster! My nice, clean, organized oyster!

TTYL

Closing in on week 4. I think.

Well, it's been almost an entire month in the new place.  It doesn't feel like a big, empty house anymore.  It looks and feels like a "recently moved into" house.  There are a few areas that are set up and nice and decorated, yet there are also random boxes and totes on the floor, and things that don't have homes yet.  The back of my Equinox right now has about five big bags of stuff to go to the Goodwill one of these days, and every week so far our garbage bin has been completely filled.  We have a nice mountain of cardboard waiting to be burned this spring, too.  

As overwhelming as the task of going through literally everything we own and finding new places for it (whether in our house, in the trash, or in the back of the 'Nox) (oh and occasionally but rarely, into someone else's house) can be, it does feel good to go through, take a mental inventory, and declutter.  It can help one discover a lot about oneself.

For instance: I have a lot of pens.  There, it's official.  Admitting the problem is the first step to solving the problem, right?!  I don't know when my pen addiction started.  I think I've had it forever.  I remember being in middle school junior high school and even late elementary school and being enamored with pens.  Pens with colorful inks, pens with scented inks, gel pens, funky-shaped pens.  I had a bracelet that was also a pen once.  And a pen shaped like a hip bone (wish I could find that now, I'd give it to my mom!).  And pens that looked like silverware, real life-sized forks and spoons and knives only they were pens.  These days, I'm way more into how pens write than how they look.  You know, being that I'm older and wiser and stuff...function means more than fashion.  

Do you want to know how many pens I've found during this move?  

When I was packing up the stuff from my old desk, the one drawer was like 95% pens. Perfectly good pens, but I didn't like the way most of them wrote, so they weren't in rotation.  As I envisioned myself putting all those pens into a box to bring them to a new place where they would likely sit and never be used, it occurred to me that I might have a problem.  (HA HA HA!  Nah, it occurred to me long before then. It also occurs to me every time I go out to eat and the person I'm with warns me not to steal the waitresses' pen.  For the record, I don't steal waitresses' pens; but I just might replace them with another pen from my collection. Except if it's a gel pen; it's not even funny to consider copping someone else's gel pen.)  I ended up leaving a handful of them for the boy (with his permission), taking a handful with, and *gulp* throwing away the rest.  Also, by a handful, I mean quantity-wise, 5 or fewer, not as many as I could scoop up in one hand.  BIG difference.

Now, don't start telling me that I shouldn't have thrown them away, I should've saved them and donated them somewhere.  I've done that, plenty of times.  I just didn't that time because I was on a mission to declutter, not to pass the clutter to someone else.

Besides, that was just one drawer! Just the tip of the iceberg, as they say.  A drop in the bucket.  

So, then I was unpacking things, namely tote bags and purses.  Going through and emptying them before I put them away, because I also have the undesirable habit of not unpacking purses or tote bags before I switch to different purses or tote bags.  (I don't have issues, I have subscriptions.)  Found more pens!  Most of them weren't worth keeping, but I did find the mother lode of Baldwin Area Medical Center pens.  It's funny, I could tell which era of my life I had used the particular tote bag or purse by the types of pens I found in them.  I found pens dating all the way back to nursing school.  So the BAMC pens were a nostalgic little find, and of course I couldn't throw them away because BAMC doesn't even exist anymore.  That makes them...COLLECTABLES!!  Alright, alright; I'm mostly kidding, but also not because those were some smooth-writing pens.  I kept a handful of them.  Actually, the "mother lode" was only a handful anyway. 

Right now, in a box next to my desk, waiting to be sorted and unpacked/tossed, is a box of random office things.  Including a gallon-sized bag of pens.  Not just a few pens; it's stuffed full of pens.

But wait!  There's more!  When I was on the Tote Bag and Purse Cleanout kick last week, I actually found a tote bag that was literally full of pens. Read that again: a TOTE BAG FULL OF PENS.  And not a small little tote bag, of course.  That is actually the point where I decided to be done going through tote bags for the time being.  So. Many. Pens.  It was too much to contemplate at that moment.  

I should just toss them, or donate them (I do prefer to donate them, and the hubby pointed out that he can never find a pen at church when he needs one, so...) but as I mentioned earlier, I love a good pen.  What if my new favorite pen is in that bag?!?  I have to look to be sure.  I'm down to one cup of pens on my desk, but I can always switch one of those pens out if I find one I like better.  

I. Do. Not. Need. More. Pens.

I. Do. NOT. Need. More. Pens. EVER!!

To answer the question I posed, about if you want to know how many pens I've found during this move, I have no idea.  A lot.  Too many.  It doesn't seem like it's going to be a problem at first, because pens are so small and fit in so many convenient places, and you can tell yourself they're practical things because there's always someone somewhere who needs a pen when they think they won't.

But when you have a freaking tote bag full of pens -- each one different and unique, it's not as if the whole tote was full of boxes or bags of pens like you'd buy them at the store -- you begin to realize that maybe you don't need to collect them like souvenirs from every place you go.  That just because a company is giving them away doesn't mean you need to take one.  Even if they look cool.  You know what?  The novelty pens write like crap, and I can say this from a lifetime's worth of experience. 

My favorite pen is the good ol' BIC Crystal, in blue. The ones you can get a whole package of for like $1.00 during back-to-school sales.  Best pens ever!!  The next runner-up is the BIC Round Stic.  They don't make 'em like they used to, but they're still a great pen.  Also in blue.  I'm not a fan of black ink.

Speaking of pens, I gotta get back to work. This has been another sneak peek into the craziness that is my mind.  Today's blog entry was sponsored by BIC, Pentel, and Uniball.  They just don't know it yet.

Everyone says I'm looking great, but it's hard to stand up, let alone to try and concentrate...

Today's title and pic are brought you by the letters B, N, and L.  

Which reminds me, we haven't been to any concerts lately.  As I mentioned in an earlier blog entry here, we secured tickets (and in some cases, airfare and hotel reservations) for three separate and much-anticipated concerts back in 2019.  Then 2020 happened, as you're likely well aware, and all three shows (actually it's four shows, but three different artists.  We have tickets for two shows by the same artist.  And the one concert is actually slated to have three bands, or was it four?  I'm not into mathing today.) were postponed until 2021.  

The point I'm trying to make is, we didn't go to any concerts in 2020.  

And in 2021, I think we just went to one concert. We saw Casting Crowns in concert at the MN State Fairgrounds -- and again, because sometimes technicalities are my thing, more specifically it was in the Midway parking lot.  It was a drive-in concert, because indoor venues hadn't opened back up yet.  It wasn't quite the same, because we were sitting in the car listening to the concert being broadcast on the radio (it was cold that night, so we didn't stand outside like a lot of people were) but it still counts as going to a concert.

For 2022, we will hopefully be able to finally use those tickets we bought back in 2019!  At least a few of them.  One of the tours was cancelled altogether and the tickets were refunded.  But now we have tickets to a concert that never happened!  That'll be worth something someday, right?!  😆  I've been to enough rock n' roll museums to know that unused tickets to concerts that were cancelled are worth their weight in gold. Um.  If they're rare, and by well-known artists, and all that.  I'm pretty sure no one else has tickets from concerts that were cancelled in 2020, so I'm golden.  Alright, so I won't quit my day job.  Yet. 

I remain hopeful for the two remaining tours that were rescheduled for 2021 then cancelled again and are now rescheduled for 2022.  Three shows, two tours, four (or was it five?) different bands total.  

I wish I would've saved all the tour books I bought at the first few concerts I went to, though.  I don't even know when they stopped doing tour books; it feels like I'm dating myself by even mentioning tour books.  Of course, this was way back when you couldn't take pictures at concerts without being all ninja-like and sneaking a camera in, and then afterward waiting for a week or whatever it was to get your film developed to see how (or if!) the photos turned out.  How did we survive back before digital photography?!  So much waiting.  Because one-hour photo developing was way out of my budget back then, I tell you what.  Not that I ever snuck a camera into any concerts, because I had a huge Fear of Getting Caught.  (Actually, it's more of a Fear of Disappointing People in Authority. Maybe I'll save that for a future blog topic.)  That's why I loved the tour books so much.  I loved photography as well; that's probably another reason why I didn't try to sneak my camera into concerts, because I didn't want to risk having my precious camera taken away.  They didn't exactly grow on trees, you know.  One more thing about film photography: I was always annoyed that the people developing the film would get to see how my pics turned out before I did.  That was so not fair!  Photography is an art, and what other artists have to let other people see their finished product before anyone else?!  Hmph.  So as you probably already know if you know me at all (or have perused my FB), I still enjoy photography.  The fact that I have a camera on my person at all times (that also happens to function as an internet-accessing device and, oh yeah, a phone) amuses me muchly.  And every now and then I take some halfway decent pics, too. 

I'll have to finish this later, after work.  Toodles!

(Nineteen hours later...)

...speaking of photography, I actually got out of bed at oh-stupid-o'clock this morning (translation: 4am) just to take a couple of pictures.  After which, I went right back to bed.  

I spent a good part of the night wondering why the backyard floodlight was on last night.  Our new house has some strange electrical quirks.  Not "strange" as in we should be worried that the house is going to short circuit and burn down (I hope!) but "strange" as in, this place has more light switches and electrical outlets than other house we've inhabited.  It probably has as many light switches as all our previous homes put together, and I'm only slightly exaggerating.  I think we have most of them figured out by now (closing in on week 3!) but the logic behind them is still a bit perplexing at times.

For instance, in our living room we have a switch that activates only the top input (probably not the right terminology, but dammit, I'm a nurse! Not an electrician!) on each of the outlets in that room.  Now, I'm familiar with the concept of having an outlet or two wired to the toggle switch, especially in rooms without ceiling lights, so that you can have a lamp plugged into that outlet and turn it on and off with the wall switch.  But I'd never heard of wiring only the top plug-in thingies of each outlet.  The first time I tried to vacuum the living room, I was disheartened thinking none of the outlets worked because I was only trying the top input thingie.  My hubby mentioned this to an electrician he works with and was informed that this was a popular trend in the early 2000's.  Who knew?!  

Another example is the three light switches that are next to the patio door in the dining room upstairs.  One switch turns on the chandelier above the dining room table -- that makes sense.  The next switch turns on the light outside, which probably has a specific name other than "decorative light next to the door".  That also makes sense.  The third switch turns on an outdoor flood light that's down on the lower level, and lights up the yard closest to the house.  Ummm...okay, but why wouldn't they have put that switch on the lower level instead?  It's a walkout basement on that side, and the basement is completely finished.  There's a switch down by the basement patio door that turns on the decorative light just outside that door.  I don't know, to each their own I guess.  

This is relevant, I promise. Because while I was trying to fall asleep, there was a bright light on our windows that was distracting me.  I figured I had accidentally turned that light switch on when I was turning the dining room lights off, or something.  (Actually it was more like "or something".  After the storm the night before last, our TV antenna wasn't working; and neither was the outside outlet on the top deck. This I know because I have a string of twinkling lights plugged in there and wrapped around part of the deck railing, and those lights weren't twinkling yesterday morning! It didn't seem like the two should be related, but it was an odd coincidence that those were the only two things not working after the storm and power outage.  Long story short, they were related. The antenna booster and the outside top deck outlet are both on the same GFCI outlet.) (And I totally did not just Google that to make sure I was using the term correctly.)  

So when I woke up at about 1am to empty my bladder, I peeked out the bedroom window.  The flood light wasn't on; the moon was just that bright.  See?

But that's not the shot I pulled my tired self out of bed to take, a few hours after I made that discovery.  No, I took this one while lying in bed.  

The one I actually got out of bed and made a half-awake effort to take looks more like this:

And it made me think of that line from "Twas the Night Before Christmas" that goes, "The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow, gave a luster of midday to objects below."

Of course, it's NOT the night before Christmas, but that's not in the specific line I have stuck in my head now, so it works.  

And, I totally didn't Google the words to make sure I had them right, either, which is good because I thought the moon was on the crest of the new-fallen snow, not the breast.  Wouldn't I have looked silly with that mistake!?

Then, after I took the above pics (and one more very similar to the second one, but in landscape orientation) I tried to go back to sleep but for some reason my brain decided we should try to remember as much of that poem as we could.  (Which, after looking at the poem in it's entirety this morning via Google, we didn't accomplish very well.)  Which then lead to me wondering why I would think I knew that poem well enough to recite it by heart, anyway?  We certainly didn't have the Christmas tradition I've only read about in fictional stories (and/or maybe the Little House books) where the family sits around the fireplace on Christmas Eve while the patriarch reads the poem to the eager listeners before sending them off to bed.  (Do people actually do that in real life?)  No, I remember reading it for myself when I was little.  Over and over and over and over, because I was young enough that things like "the moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow gave a luster of midday to objects below" sounded nice and poetic and beautiful, but I had no idea what they actually meant.  I mean, I knew what each word individually meant, and I got the general idea in context, but I didn't understand the image those words were painting until about 1am this morning. 

And on that note, it's about time for work to start.  Yes, I'm blogging before work today, because I didn't want to leave this entry unfinished. I hate it when that happens.

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!