An Itsy Bitsy Long Day...

It feels good to finally sit down here and to know that I really don't have to do another thing until tomorrow morning. All I have to do is write this post and watch the news and drink my decaf and smoke my cigarettes. For some strange reason, though, the Senseo machine isn't turning out good cups of coffee and I wonder if I have to kick it or give it a good cleaning with vinegar. It's giving me very watery cups of coffee that don't taste very good at all. As a matter of fact, this morning my first cup refused to wake me up. I guess I'll put vinegar on the shopping list for tomorrow.

It seems like I had a long day, but it was actually over in no time at all. For a change the alarm clock woke me up and I considered shutting it off and turning over and going to sleep some more, but then decided that I shouldn't miss creative therapy, although I had no idea what I was going to do there.

So I very sleepily got up and made that lousy cup of coffee and drank it in spite of it being so bad, but made up for it by smoking three cigarettes and then I got up to see what was in my closet that I absolutely had to wear today, I picked two safe things to wear, both weather wise and fashion wise and ended up looking very demure and matronly. Well, maybe it was not quite that bad...

Just as I was getting ready to walk Jesker, a thunderstorm hit and it started to pour, which gave me an opportunity to make a better cup of coffee and feed the cats, those poor animals that are always hungry. We had to wait for about half an hour for it to stop raining and then I took my chance and we went out for a quick walk around the block.

After that it was time for me to leave and just when I got to the clinic and locked my bike, it started to rain again, so I hurried inside and just got some big splatters on my head. Timing is everything in this life. It poured like crazy once I was safely inside. The weather gods are kind to me, but then who are they unfriendly to? Some poor bloke must have been out there getting wet. More than one of them, most likely.

At creative therapy I worked on a project that I had abandoned some months ago. It is a collage booklet that I had halfheartedly started on and I finally decided to finish it. So I had to find more images and texts and paste those in and then paint the pages, which I did. Now I have to jazz them up a bit with pastel crayons and whatever else I can think of.

Sometimes I don't know why I start these projects, because I have a half baked idea in my head and just start to work on it without thinking it all the way through. I guess I think I'll just go ahead and surprise myself.

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I had to stop writing this post, because I was so sleepy that I had to go lie down on the sofa for a nap. I did and fell sound asleep and vaguely remember making it to my bed sometime during the evening. I have my pajamas on anyway. Then of course, I woke up a while ago, wide awake and ready to go in the middle of the night, but that's okay, because I like these quiet hours.

It's confusing to Jesker who thinks it's time to get up and do a piddle and eat, but he is now sound asleep again by my feet on the hard linoleum. The cats also thought it was time to eat, but I ignored them and left them to their kibbles, which they are perfectly capable of eating.

I did manage to get a good cup of coffee and am going to try and get another one now.

Anyway, yesterday afternoon I met Von at café Charlemagne on the Our Dear Lady Square and we were lucky in that it didn't rain all afternoon, which was good, as I sat just at the edge of the overhang and would have gotten wet.

All around us people were eating and I decided to order a grilled cheese sandwich with curry sauce, but my eyes were bigger than my stomach and you can imagine the later results when we were walking through town and I had to visit the ladies room in a department store. I felt much better after that and could shop, where before I had been unable to concentrate on the items on sale.

We ended up in my favorite women's store and I found a long, knitted, black, short sleeved top on sale for 10 Euros and a set of 5 matching bracelets for 4 Euros, which was just about all the cash I had with me, so that was perfect. Von asked me if I didn't need to try on the top and I said that I never tried anything on, and I was right, because when I got home, it fit me perfectly and I was quite happy with it. Of course, it's black and knitted and attracts all the dog and cat hair and I constantly have to keep it clean, but what the heck!

Oh, and let me tell you. Making any sort of trip on my bike now is so much easier and safer. I don't have to worry about a thing. I stop and go when I want to and keep going when I want to and I don't have to worry about falling over and breaking my neck, and the pedals are always in the right position when I want to take off, because that was a problem too. I need to start off with my left foot downward, otherwise I don't get going properly and get in trouble. So, here's to my new bike!

Now, before I forget to do this, John of typos.daylight.fate has granted me an award for which I am very grateful and here it is:

There are some rules that go with getting this award and here they are:

1. Accept the award, post it on your blog together with the name of the person who has granted the award, and his or her blog link.
2. Pass the award to 15 other blogs that you love and/or have newly discovered.
3. Remember to contact the bloggers to let them know they have been chosen for this award.
4. Use the One Lovely Blog award picture from my blog, on your blog to let everyone know that you have one lovely Blog!

I am breaking the rules and am not passing this on to 15 other bloggers. I think that would be too much of a good thing and I would sit here for hours doing that, but I will pass it on to a few people I think are especially deserving of it.

1. Babaloo @ Fairymix.com
2. Grit @ Grit's Day
3. Maggie @ Nuts in May
4. WWW@ The Other Side of Sixty
5. Laurie @ Three Dog Blog
6. Connie @ A Crone's Chronicle
7.Angelique @ Sugar Cain
8. Sanna @ Violet Sky
9. Gail @ At the Farm
10. Casdok @ Faces of Autism
11. Jo @ Jo Beaufoix
12. Lisa Sarsfield @ Lucky Dip

Well, that is close to 15, but not quite. I think it is enough, but God forbid I forgot someone. Please let yourself be known to me if you think I forgot you. I scanned two lists and may have overlooked you in my eagerness to get it right.

In the meantime, the clock's hand are moving toward the dawn and at any minute now some birds ought to start singing. I've got the blinds open and can see the whole street by the light of the street lamp. That way I'll see the morning start sooner. Only one cat is visible, but I'm sure the other one is laying on my bed.

Today will be housecleaning and grocery shopping day. Oh, such fun, will it never end? The only good part about it is the Brie I will buy. I also must open my mail and check my bank account to make sure I'm still solvent. I'm amazingly free of fear of opening my mail today. That must be due to my medication. Those good old pills!

Have yourself a terrific Saturday and hopefully we won't get rained on too much, although the trick seems to be to wait for the afternoon, when it stays dry.

Ciao...

Almost dinner time.

If I do all the things behind the computer that I want to do, and I don't mean just farting around, I can easily spend a whole afternoon and still not be done. Not because I'm slow, but because there's so much to do and it all takes time, which I don't mind, but it's time taken away from doing other necessary things.

I tell you, though, there's nothing better than coming home from therapy and walking the dog and turning on the computer for a nice long session. Today I allowed myself that time. I made an executive decision. Especially when I checked the shelves and the refrigerator and saw that I do not have to go to the store for at least another two days.

I very moodily got out of bed this morning when the alarm clock went off, because I thought it was way too early, but then I saw that cute face of Jesker who wanted to be petted and I had my coffee and cigarette and I felt a lot better. So, I took my time to become a fully functioning human being again and then got up to properly start the day. Once I get going, I'm okay. I move like a train, albeit an early locomotive, not a high speed one.

Today I had creative therapy, but I got there early enough to hang out in the stinking smoker's room with a very depressed woman who wished she was home in bed and looked it too. I wanted to cheer her up, but didn't know the words, not being depressed myself anymore to that point and only having vague memories of what that was like. It's like childbirth, you forget how awful it was.

Soon enough it was time to go down to the studio and go to work on my attempt at a sculpture. I'm calling it an attempt, because as I worked on it, it became clear to me that the design didn't lend itself well to the clay and that the whole thing was likely to collapse upon itself, and sure enough, pretty soon I reached that point. Do not despair. I folded the whole thing over and took the rest of the clay and pounded it all back into a solid block and started over again to redo the sculpture that came out of the oven in fifteen pieces. I do want that one and I want to give it one more try.

As I'm building it up, I'm trying not to make any mistakes in it and avoid getting any air trapped in it, because I think that's what happened before. I'm paying close attention to what the therapist tells me and follow the instructions.

I'm always covered in white clay dust by the time I'm ready to go home and try to get most of it off me and the rest gets blown off as I ride my bicycle home. Sometimes I still have some on my boots when I get home and I forget about it and walk around with it all day long. That shows you how much attention I don't pay to my appearance sometimes. I can be vain at the start of the day and then forget about it for the rest of the day.

In the meantime, I'm trying to figure out how deaf Jesker is. I try to get his attention when he is not looking at me and I just start talking to him. So far he doesn't seem to hear me much, or he is ignoring me, but then that would be something new. He's always been very alert and now he seems to use his sight more. He has also been sleeping behind the front door when I am gone, so he knows immediately when I am home.

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I had to interrupt myself, because I had to take Jesker to the vet for new ointments. The vet looked at his eyes and we are only preventing them from getting worse at this point. I also mentioned the fact that Jesker seemed to be getting deaf and he looked at his ears, but saw no ear infections or anything, so he is just getting deaf, which the vet said is a fact of life at his age. I now have to keep this in mind when I talk to him and when I am out walking with him. I am not going to let him off the leash again.

Anyway, I noticed that he watches me more closely now to see what I am going to do and when I go to bed at night, while he's asleep on his blanket, he searches the whole apartment for me when he wakes up, while I call his name from the bedroom.

Tomorrow I have creative therapy again, this time in the different room with the different therapist. I'll finish my third and last doodle and I'll try to remember to take pictures. Then I am going to be doing some painting. There is a whole collection of art postcards to choose from in all diferent styles to copy and I think I'll have a go at that. Unless I change my mind between now and tomorrow when the moment is there,

Alors, it's time to put my pajamas on and get comfortable. I'm starting to yawn, but it's to early for that. This old body wants to just sleep more and more. I wish I had a soft ice cream. That would taste so good right now, But alas.

I hope you all had a good day and that you will have a splendid night. We are supposed to have rain. It's cozy when it rains and you're laying in bed.

Ciao...