In the late evening...

Now, in the late evening, it is raining buckets, but I don't have to be out there so I am glad. The dog very briefly went out back and was more than happy to come back inside. He got wet enough in the very short time that he was out there. The cat very wisely is staying inside where she belongs. It may be a matter of being smarter or having better bladder control, I don't know. 

I'm fighting my sleepiness with a cup of instant coffee. It does serve its function in that capacity.  I haven't replaced the coffeemaker yet. There's been no opportunity for it yet. It will wait a while as long as I have the instant coffee, I just have to get a better brand.  Much as I dislike drinking it, I'm sure that will make a difference. 

It's been an interesting day today. I found out what I already suspected. I didn't have to file income taxes over 2011. I had gotten no paperwork about it and started to get big doubts so I called the tax office. The woman I got on the line confirmed my suspicions and reassured me that I would not have to. That was a relief to hear. I thought I might have been going into default and have gotten into trouble.

Because I'm switching energy companies, I was waiting for the final closure bill from my old energy provider with some dread. I thought I might be owing them all sorts of money because it had just been wintertime and an expensive time of the year. That bill came in the mail today and much to my relief, I'm getting a nice amount of money back that I can really use. The gods smiled kindly upon me. 

Because of circumstances beyond my control. I had today to get a new telephone number and I thought that was going to be a quite involved process, but it turned out to be fairly easy. After a few formalities it was done in a flash and I will know my new number in a few days when it will be sent to me in the mail. My old number has already been disconnected so the problems with it should be resolved. The new number will be a secret number. 

I made an appointment for the dog to get his fur trimmed and I don't even know if the Exfactor will be able to take him there. If he can't, I will have to take him and I will have to be up to that, but at least I will have the money to pay for it thanks to the windfall from the energy company. 

That will also pay for the new identity card that I have to apply for shortly because my passport is about to expire. I will have to have those god awful passport photos taken and go to city hall and be finger printed. At least you can make an appointment for it nowadays and not have to wait in line. 

My headache has returned and I'm taking the painkillers again along with two tranquilizers a day to help relax me. The area around my right eye is hurting too and it seems to me that my eye hurts also. I do definitely have to wear my glasses and I can't cheat and only wear them now and then. It's too much of an adjustment to take them off and later put them on again. It's always something...

That about sums up my day, except for the usual odds and ends. The laundry and the dishes and changing the bed, etc. 

I hope you'll all have a good night and lots of good news. 

Ciao,

Irene

During the night...

I'm drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes, although it's awfully early to be up already. No doubt this means that I will go back to bed later, but it is Christmas day and everything is allowed. I didn't hang my stocking, because Santa Claus was not expected here, so I don't have to inspect it for any goodies, although some mandarin oranges would have been nice. I did have some cookies as a treat last night before I went to bed and I shared them with Tyke. They were in the care package I received. We enjoyed them very much and there are enough left to last the weekend.

It finally stopped snowing sometime at the end of the afternoon yesterday after it had snowed for more than 24 hours. Limburg got about 50 cm of snow. There was a strong wind also that blew the snow sideways. Nevertheless, the Exfactor managed to get here by train and bring me the extra mobile phone, bless his heart. He is a noble knight indeed. I told him that this was over and beyond the call of duty, but he considered it a matter of honor.

There was some question if my sim-card was undamaged, but when we put it in the other mobile phone we found out that it was and that it worked fine. It recognized my code and it did have all my phone numbers in its memory. All we had to do was recharge the phone. Since then I've played with it and changed all the sounds it can make and I've picked out a jazzy tune for when it rings. Now I just want someone to call me. Hopefully, that will happen soon, although my sister called when it was still playing Pachelbel's Canon. 

I really have to stop and remind myself that it's Christmas, although it's a white one, because it feels just like an ordinary weekend. My sister and I are supposed to go on a guided town walk, but we won't go if the weather is bad. It's going to be partly sunny today, but there may be a cold wind blowing, so we will have to see. It would be nice to stay home and read a good book also. There's quite a bit of snow out there, so it may be tough going. 

Anyway, have a Merry Christmas you all. I hope you enjoy yourselves a lot and eat well and get lots of good presents. 

Ciao,

Nora

Some of everything...

There was icy rain last night when I went to bed, but it has since turned to snow and there's a new layer of it on top of what was left of the old one. It's going to snow today and tonight and tomorrow too, so we will have a white Christmas. That doesn't happen very often, so I guess we should be happy about that, because of that song that says that we're always dreaming of it. Just like the ones we used to know. Even back then people were nostalgic for white Christmases. Well, we are having one, so that takes care of that.

Because it's been too long since I've had my hair cut, I get to go to the hairdresser this morning. I can't wait to go and get a decent haircut. It's more than high time. I called for an appointment yesterday afternoon and they were kind enough to squeeze me in, even though they were pretty much booked full. I think it helped that I've been a steady customer for such a long time. Cutting my hair doesn't take such a long time, so it can be done somewhat easily in between everything else. I do appreciate that. 

You all know that I love going to the hairdresser and getting my hair washed and fussed over. I like nothing better than sitting there and watching the girl shape my hair with the scissors. I'm never in any fear of it being ruined, as long as she follows my instructions. You must never be afraid to speak up. That's what's so good about always going to the same hairdresser. You aren't shy when you want to put your two cents worth in. 

Yesterday, I received a large box with a Christmas care package in it. There were all sorts of wonderful and practical foods in it. I found out that I had gotten it from the Green Cross through the mediation of my Wednesday personal helper. She got to pick out some clients who she thought were deserving of a useful surprise and had picked me amongst them. It was a true cornucopia. 

The Exfactor was here when it arrived and we looked through it together, which gave me the opportunity to give him the things that were made of meat, such as the large salami. I would never eat that. I saved the can of knackwursts for Tyke. There were enough foods in there that I can use, though, including a big piece of cheese and a package of coffee. I can't tell you how happy I was with it. It really was a big surprise. 

Last night, I left my mobile phone sitting on the small table next to my armchair and you can all guess what Tyke did with it, right? He chewed on it to the point that it isn't working anymore. Now nobody can call me, because I don't have my land line anymore. Luckily, the Exfactor has another mobile phone that he can let me use and he is going to bring it by on Friday. I will be able to stick my memory card in it and have it work, hopefully. Unless it is ruined also. That darn dog! And the Exfactor had just bought him new rawhide bones and he had one available that he had been chewing on. Grrr...

It's going to be colder for the next several days and I think I'm going to need to wear a warmer cardigan than the one I've been wearing. It will be a great opportunity to wear my red one, which is my favorite one. All my clothes are starting to smell like the new perfume I'm wearing and it is very pleasant, until I wash them. My scarves all have that scent. I've just found out that this discount store where the Exfactor bought it, also sells Gloria Vanderbilt perfume very cheaply, so I may want to get a bottle of that and alternate scents on different days. 

Well, it's been a mixed bag of news. Some good and some not so good, the former outweighing the latter.  I think I'll get dressed now and get ready for the rest of the day. I've got to find a battery for my alarm clock. It's stopped working and continually points to 5 o'clock. 

Have a good day.

Ciao,

Nora 

Starting the weekend.

Much to my satisfaction, I slept nine hours last night and I think I could actually have slept more. I went to bed early, because I was pooped and fell asleep almost instantly. I woke up at 7:30 this morning and thought I was done sleeping and had only one cup of coffee initially, but just now I had to make myself a second cup, because I started to yawn something awful and the sofa was starting to look awfully attractive. I'm sure I will end up taking a nap today, but for now I will keep myself awake with the coffee.

I went on the bathroom scale this morning and had lost another 1.5 kilos. So now I have to lose 6.5 kilos total (14.3 lbs). I can't tell that I've lost the weight. My stomach is so bloated for some reason. I think I'm going to have to eat some high fiber cereal. Things get more complicated as you get older and you need to make all sorts of efforts to make them work well. I may try that special yogurt with the good bacteria that's supposed to be helpful with these kinds of problems. I'll add it to my shopping list the next time.

Sleeping well is such a blessing. It's an amazing thing to wake up with the sun shining through the blinds and not to be up in the dark. Of course, it makes me have to answer my emails and write my blog posts during the day, but since it's the weekend, it doesn't matter much. I do miss out on all the birds singing in the early morning. I sleep right through that.

I took Tyke for a walk this morning and he was just stubborn enough for me not to worry about him too much, and when we got home he pestered Gandhi for a bit. Other than that, he is well behaved and sleeps a lot, very close to me and sometimes right on top of my feet. I think he wants to feel secure and hasn't forgotten his operation yet. His eye still looks red and I'm waiting for that to start looking better. I think he is having a little bit of a harder time than the first time he was operated on.

I made the mistake of drinking sweet lemonade after I had my first cup of coffee and it made me feel very tired and down, making me more sure that I should not have sweet things to drink. They go into my system rapidly and I do not react well to them. I always become very down and out. I react the same way to alcohol. It works as a downer. So does sugar. It sure doesn't make me hyper. A cup of coffee is the best solution, as it straightens out my head very quickly.

It's supposed to rain this weekend, but so far the sun is shining and it's pleasant outside. I did have to wear my denim jacket, but it was actually not too cold. At least it has pockets to put the baggies and my keys in when I walk Tyke. I always forget to bring my mobile phone, but I don't think it is necessary that I'm available all the time. I figure if I miss a call, I can always call back. I'm not so important that I need to be within close distance of it all the time.

I think I'll call my sister and see if she wants to take the dogs for a walk together.

Ciao,
Nora

Too much for me...

I'm up again after having been asleep for 4 hours. I thought I would go to bed early tonight, because of the missed hours of sleep last night, but it didn't quite work out the way I had planned. Now I'm awake, somewhat stoned from the increase in antipsychotics, which I do not like at all, and I've made myself a cup of coffee to try and sober up a bit. I had no other recourse. I think I will not take the increase again, it is too much for me and it did not help me sleep and for a while I actually felt sick from it and broke out in a sweat.

I think the coffee is helping, though, and I'm slowly starting to feel better. I don't enjoy drugs to the point that they alter your mind in a negative way and that was the case here to the point of quiet deperation. In my mind's eye I was calling the SOS line asking them what to do if you had taken too much of something, though not an overdose. In the meantime, I think I've solved the problem myself. I was typing emails earlier and making a lot of mistakes in them and it took me twice as long to write them, but now this is going better.

So in the end, the only thing that will have changed, is that I will take one tablet of Welbutrin instead of two, and less is better, right? I have to have the same amount of faith in it that I had in the two tablets and I think I can if nothing negative happens. I'm assuming everything will be well and will see the glass half full. So, I didn't take my Welbutrin at 6 o'clock and you would have thought that I had expected the sky to come falling down on me. Of course, nothing happened and nothing will, because I haven't taken it long enough yet. My reaction was funny, though, like Chicken Little.

Don't you hate it when you hold the mouse and your middle finger keeps clicking on the right button when you don't want it to at all? It happens to me constantly and I really have to let go of that mouse when I don't need to hold it, but that habit dies hard. Even when you need to hold it, your middle finger reflexively keeps pushing down that right button, showing that whole little menu that you don't want and then you have to find a white space to left click on to make it disappear. It's just one of life's little irritations.

I just went on the scale, which is something I said I would not do regularly, but I thought, "What the heck, lets see the state of affairs," and I have lost 4.7 kg. That's more than 10 lbs. Not bad, eh? I celebrated that by eating a couple of teaspoons full of Nutella. Mmm... Those are Dutch teaspoons, not American teaspoons, which are much bigger and would be dessert spoons here, except that we eat pie and cake with little forks that are especially made for it, and we don't eat ice cream with them so we don't need a spoon for them. But if you are an American, and you come to my place for apple pie, I'll make sure you get vanilla ice cream with that. But if you're a non smoker, you don't want to come to my place, because if you spend any time here, your clothes and your hair will smell of smoke and you will find it very unpleasant. So, only smokers please.

I'm being a real slow poke in typing this. Hours have passed since I started this and I don't know what I do with my time either. Proof reading, because I don't have a spell check, although I just imported an American English dictionary, but I don't know what happened to it. I'll have to figure that out later. I don't know what else I do, except daydream a lot about what is important in my life and what is not and I think about all the different ingredients and people in it. I don't ponder and worry, these are very light hearted thoughts. I lightly touch on each subject and linger there for a while. Basically, everything and everybody is okay. Everyone is busy leading their own life and doing a good job of it. There's not much to worry about, except the little every day things, but even those aren't real worries. It's kind of nice, isn't it? A worry free life?

I'm keeping myself upright now with coffee. I've had two cups. I think I will sleep in the morning like I used to do. I may be getting back to my old schedule. It's not such a horrible thing, because at least I have the quiet nighttime hours to sit and write in. I've got the ringer on the phone turned down low, so when I'm asleep, I don't hear it and I can't be wakened up. I hardly hear it if I'm in another room. If they are people who really know me, they've got my mobile number. If not, it's tough on them.

For the post with the information about my hypomanic episode and my medication change go here if you're interested. If not, don't worry about it. In the end it doesn't really matter.

Have a good morning when you get up. I hope it's a bright day.

Ciao,
Nora

It's too early to go to bed.

Well, you all know that I slept well last night, don't you? I mean, I was up for a little while, but I went back to bed and slept until a decent hour and I did go to sleep early the night before. But guess what happened today? I napped and napped and wasted the whole day on the sofa. This tiredness just takes me by surprise and before I know it, I'm asleep again. I get over it at the end of the day and get my energy back at around 5 pm. That's when I come back to life, just as it is getting dark outside and I have to walk the dog. I'm fine the rest of the evening and am not the least bit sleepy until I go to bed, because I look forward to the coziness of it, but tonight I'm not looking forward to going to bed, because last night was such a struggle with those night sweats and the pain in my arm. I don't have good associations with going to bed now and I'm postponing it.

I guess I slept long enough, but not pleasant enough. The night sweats are the most uncomfortable thing, though. They really wake me up and I have to get out of bed and cool off. I'm really starting to dislike my bed. I'm going to stay up late tonight and sleep on the sofa and see if I have the same problem when I sleep there. I'm going to take the back cushions off the sofa and make more room for myself to lie down. I've been having these night sweats since last summer and I thought it was because of the heat, but I guess I was wrong and as far as I know, I am not in the menopause anymore, so that's not it either.

For some strange reason, my regular telephone has started working again without me changing the batteries. I haven't done a thing to it but take the batteries out and put them back in and unplug the cable and plug it back in again. It's a mystery to me. That leaves me undecided if I should keep it or not. First I need to find out how much of my all in one package are telephone costs. I'll have to call about that and be put on hold forever and have to listen to inane music while the call is costing me money. That ticks me off, but that's how it's done nowadays. I'm sure it's the same in your country. Whoever decided on that policy is a rip off artist. Some calls cost as much as 45 cents a minute. But anyway, my phone is working again and at least I didn't go out and buy a new one, though if I do keep my regular phone, I still may go out and buy a new one, because I'm not very fond of this one, as it has such a shape, that I cut people off with my cheekbone and I don't have especially pointy cheekbones.

My dog has decided it is bedtime and has gone to sleep on his pillow in the bedroom and that is where the cats are too. So you see, they do have their habits and they aren't always dependent on what I do.

I walked the dog at 9:30 tonight and all the slush had frozen over again and it was very slippery out there. I'm amazed by the fact that I have not slipped and fallen yet, because last year I fell three times. I'm being very careful, though, and I'm wearing different boots that may make a difference. These may have a little bit more grip. I worry about breaking a bone and lying there helplessly with the dog. He's not a St Bernard, after all. Or Lassie who will run and get help.

I have no interest in my household. I do the barest of necessities and wait for the moment when things are just about to get out of hand, so that I will very quickly get them back under control again only to return to my previous indifference. That's the state of affairs. It's no way to run a place, but that's the way I'm getting by right now. I dump things in the trash and rinse out dishes and empty ashtrays and pick things up and move them, but that's about it. I don't really feel depressed, but I feel physically tired all the time and not up to expending the energy. I thought I would feel better now that I'm taking the vitamin pills every day, but I'm not. I marvel at my sister who gets so much done in one day's time. I used to be like that too.

The dog missed me and has come to lie down beside me on the area rug, which is not the most comfortable place to sleep. He's such a loyal dog. At least I've got him, even if I've got nobody else.

Well, it's late enough now. I'm going to get my pajamas on and have something to eat and take my medicines. Then I'll make myself cozy on the sofa with my book. I am looking forward to that. I hope I have a good night's sleep and that I will feel fantastic in the morning. I'm going to try and sleep all through the night. With a little bit of luck I should make it.

Sleep tight, everyone!

Ciao,
Nora

Not going there!

There's one place I'm not going and that's back to bed, because I have to go see my SPN today and I'm worried about sleeping too late and not getting my act together on time. I do need a certain amount of time after I wake up to sit around and drink coffee and smoke cigarettes and do nothing for a while but stare into the middle distance and pet the dog. So, I've got to make myself another cup of coffee and then another one and be fully awake for the rest of the time until I leave. I've also got to go by the post office to drop some packages off on the way there. That means I have to leave a little earlier, as there is always a line there of people having to do complicated things, such as mail ten different sized packages to Shanghai and nine other cities in the Far East.

I'm walking, of course, and the sidewalks are still icy, so I have to tread with care. Today we are expecting both snow and rain, because the temperature is going to be 1C and that is just cold/warm enough for both. I sure hope none of it comes down while I'm out and about, but I'll wear my long coat and my snow hat and be prepared and carry an umbrella too. When I get back, my sister and I are going grocery shopping, which is good, because I'm all out of sugar and the dog is nearly all out of treats. The cats are out of their food in pouches and they do beg for it, those poor things. You'd think a calamity had struck them the way they stand there and wail like banshees and bleat like goats. They pull their whole repertoire out of the closet.

So, if I'm not going back to bed, I'll be forced to keep myself occupied in a different manner and I've decided that will be by doing some housework. I have to do dishes and clean up the kitchen (again) and do laundry. I also need to vacuum the living room and dust the furniture and water the plants. I'll take it one chore at the time and not try to overwhelm myself by trying to do to many things all at once. I'm not the young, indefatigable chick I used to be. It wears me out to drag the vacuum cleaner around and shove that hose around. I don't do it with any pleasure at all, except for the result afterwards, but it gets old after you've done it a 1,000 times in your life. Housewives never get a job promotion.

My regular telephone isn't working and I've just tried to replace the rechargeable batteries with some that I still had, but they didn't work. So now I'm recharging those batteries in the hope that when I replace them again, they will work and I won't have to buy a new telephone. Not that new telephones have to be that expensive. I just wasn't counting on it this month. I can't call out or receive calls, so I have to rely on my mobile phone. Yes. I would love to go out and buy a new telephone, a really nice and neat one, but I don't need it. I hardly make phone calls. As a matter of fact, I may as well give up my regular phone and just use my mobile phone. I may be cheaper of, because I already make most calls from my mobile phone. That's where all the numbers are stored after all.

I hear my bed calling me, but I'm not going there. At the most I'll go lie down on the sofa, after I've done some chores. It's time for me to change the sheets on my bed anyway. It will be nice to get into a clean bed tonight. There's nothing like it. That's a chore I'll gladly do. The reward is great.

I think what I'll do first is walk the dog and get a good bit of fresh air. It's -3C outside and that ought to wake me up well. It will be invigorating anyway. Watch me seize the day and make something of it. Ha, if I don't fall asleep halfway through it. Getting dressed is the hardest part. I'm so comfortable and warm in my bathrobe and slippers, the thought of taking them off doesn't appeal to me very much.

She who must go and suffer greets you!

Ciao,
Nora

Barely any time...

I don't have much time to write this post, because it is my intention to go to creative therapy this morning and I don't want to be too late. I'll just rattle through this as quickly as I can and drink my coffee and smoke my cigarettes at the same time. It should be easy, I do it all the time.

I finished my book, The Reading Group, and it had a predictable happy ending, which is okay if you're in the mood for that. It was all a little bit too easy, I thought, but it was a pleasant read before going to sleep at night and on those occasions I read it on the sofa before taking a nap. It was a good book before falling asleep. I have now started on a book with short stories by Alice Adams and finished the first one. It was good. The book is called Return Trips. Both these books were mooched and neither one of them were originally on my wish list, but as I expanded it, they got to be on there. My wish list is long. I look for authors I like and see what books are available and try to mooch them. They stay on my wish list until I'm successful.

I slept well. Not as long as I would have liked too, but long enough, I guess. I also slept on the sofa in the evening. I have the ringer on the telephone turned down low so that if I'm asleep, it doesn't wake me up, because there's nothing worse than being woken up by the telephone. I figure, whoever tries to call me can call back. Nothing can really be that urgent that I have to wake up for it and then there's always my mobile phone if I really need to be reached, but it is in my purse and I may not even hear it. I may in fact be incommunicado. What a wonderful idea.

My mood is better. I haven't gone tumbling down again, but I must add that I take regular naps. I have made a decision, but I don't have the time to blog about that now and will leave it for another time, but since I have made that decision, I feel like a weight has fallen of my shoulders. I take the Temazepam when I need to and it helps, but I don't need to take it often and I'm going to try to do without today. We'll see if I can make that, even though it may turn into a hectic day.

I actually feel pretty good now and am not as down in the dumps as I have been in the morning lately. I look forward to the day with a healthy amount of excitement. I see this as a good sign and I hope I can hang on to that mood for the rest of the day, but if I can't, I know what to do. It is solvable.

It's good not to see everything in a black light anymore, but to be able to look at things more optimistically and with a certain amount of confidence. I have the feeling that I'm on the right track and that I can look into the future and catch a glimpse of how things are going to be and I think they are going to be alright and that gives me courage.

According to this weather forecast thingy I have on my computer, it is going to be 16C today, that's 61F, can you believe it for November? I hardly know which clothes to put on. I better try it with layers, because in the morning it is still cold. At least we're not expecting any rain, thank goodness. That's the worst stuff when you have to go out on your bike. At the rate I'm saving money now, I will be a very old lady before I can afford a car and stay dry.

Well, unfortunately I have to get the show on the road. Duty calls. The animals and those sort of things.

Have a nice day.

Ciao,
Nora

Help!

I had fallen asleep on the sofa when I was rudely awakened by the phone. By the time I realized what that noise was, the ringing had stopped and I was too late to answer it. I can never remember which button it is that I push to see who tried to call me, so I don't know who it was. They'll have to call back, but now I'm sort of half awake trying to decide what to do. Do I go to bed and continue sleeping or do I stay up for a while now and go to bed at a more normal time? It's a toss up.

My stubborn me says to stay up and make myself a cup of coffee and have a good time sitting here for a while. My sensible me says to put on my pajamas and go to bed. Tell you what I'll do, I'll put my pajamas on and meet myself halfway.

After I was awakened by the phone, Jesker decided that he needed to go for a walk, so I took my half awake body and went for a walk with him. I thought this might wake me up completely, but it did no such thing and Jesker led the way around the field while I obediently followed him. At least he didn't lead me astray and straight back to the apartment. He could have easily taken me for a long meander through the neighborhood, I would not have protested very much, but he's a creature of habit and keeps turning left until he is home again.

I never did change the sheets on my bed when I said I would, so I will do it tonight and put the dirty ones in the empty washing machine right away, so they can be washed tonight and hung up to dry in the morning. I won't be able to hang them outside, because it is going to rain. But at least I have the resolve now to have clean sheets tonight and just to make sure I do, I'm going to strip my bed now.

There, everything is in the washing machine and it will be churning away in a minute. Now I can't change my mind about changing the bed, I'll just have to do it. It will be my last housewifely act before I go to sleep tonight. Maybe I will also sweep the floors before I go to bed, because I still haven't done those. I'm getting an amazing surge of energy now. That sleep on the sofa must have done me some good.

I remember scrubbing the kitchen floor at midnight when my kids were little and I thought it was because that's when I had time to do it. Or working in the garden at 11 o'clock at night to get some rocks exactly in the right place, in the sense of inches away from perfection. I also used to change the living room furniture around all the time. I would manhandle all the bigger pieces by myself until I got them all in the "right" place and could surprise my family with a brand new lay out, and they would come home and say, "Oh no, not again!" I've completely gotten over that. My furniture has been in the same place for quite a while now.

I also used to paint whole rooms in one day while the kids were at school. If I didn't like the color, I got new paint and painted the whole room with time to spare. I can't imagine now where I got the energy and the muscle power. I used to wallpaper too.

Ah, that was when I was a young and energetic person and I did whatever came into my head. Now I ponder things for a long time before I do them. I take a long time to undertake a project. That's because I know I don't have the mental and physical energy anymore that I used to have. I have to paint my bedroom, but I know it will take me months before I do it and I will want help when I do. I don't see me taking on that project by myself. I will be a broken woman if I do.

I remember in one house not liking a wall where it was, so I took a sledge hammer and a crowbar and removed it. I knew it wasn't a load bearing wall. Those were my "do it yourself days." I hammered and sawed and drilled and did whatever needed to get done to improve the house we were living in then. It was fun while it lasted and we sold it for nearly double than what we paid for it and moved to a bigger and better house.

The house that we worked on so hard, was in a small town in the mountains, we'd call it a village. It was in California, but we got snow there in the wintertime, which was great for the kids, who wore snow suits and snow boots and dug forts in the snow, which was piled up quite high at times. Sometimes we had power outages and we heated the house with a wood stove and our light came from oil lamps. We always had dogs and cats, but if your cat disappeared, you could bet that a coyote got it. They hung around in the woods behind the house at night.

Well, so much for reminiscing. It all started with laundry and I can hear the washing machine doing its work. The fun part is picking out the clean duvet cover. Which one shall it be? I usually pick the one that's easiest to put on, but sometimes I pick the most romantic one, just for me, all by myself. I'm glad I'm laying there by myself in my own bed and I don't have to share it with anybody who has strange habits like sleeping with his socks on or who snores at night, because only Jesker is allowed to snore and he does it so civilized. He has a quiet, gentle snore. I don't think I will ever share my bed again with anyone, except another dog.

I have made my plan. Since tomorrow is Sunday and I can sleep late, I am going to do some chores tonight, now that I'm in the mood for them. I never want to do things during the day, because I always look for excuses not to do them, but I won't be now. It will be a perfect opportunity to sweep the floors and do the dishes and whatever else I can think of, oh yes, make the bed, of course. I won't take the last of my medicines until later when I'm ready to go to bed. Isn't that just grand?

I know you must all think I've gone off my rocker, but I think It's a good idea. It's nice to be up and about when the rest of the world around me is asleep and if I stay up long enough, I can hang up the laundry to dry.

Toby is asleep on the kitchen counter. I ran out of that food in pouches a day ago and I haven't got any new ones. I've got some very good and appetizing kibbles that the cats will just have to like. I am not sponsoring them with the expensive food anymore. They wanted it three times a day! Money still does not grow on trees, although I wish I had a Euro tree on my back patio. Wouldn't it be nice to go pick your daily harvest of fresh Euros every morning and all you had to do was iron them?

Okay, I'm going to work now. Wish me luck in getting a lot of things done. It will be so satisfying. I think I'll do the bed first, just in case I topple over. Nah, I'm not planning on that, really. I feel full of spit and vinegar.

Sleep tight!

Ciao...