dynamic elf

Well, I would post a photo of my gorgeously shattered iPhone screen, but either my camera was stolen out of my car or I left it at a nightclub. On the other hand, the screen protector is holding my phone together, so it's still usable. Also, I'm over my cold, and even my magnificently twisted knee didn't stop me from trying some weird tricky climbing stuff at Metrorock tonight. Also also, starphire gave me a hug and put in an air conditioner, and dilletante is heading home with ice-cream-making supplies right now.

Things that should be outlawed: having a stomach flu at the same time as back pain so bad you can't stand or walk or sit or roll over, for days.

Things that are wonderful: ceelove with helpful drugs and hands, dilletante keeping me company lying on the hardwood floor and watching Burn Notice, sitting on the retaining wall at Revere Beach while jojotbird and N run around and throw sand at each other, helpful company from spike.

I'm healthy and walking today -- the pain isn't gone, but it is enough better that I slept in a bed last night instead of on the floor. Time to take up yoga.

It is perhaps unfair that when you run out of cope, run out of ability to deal with the world, when you can't even get dressed or cut your own meat, it is the people closest to you who have to deal with your bitchy self-centered pain and drama about not being able to get dressed or cut your own meat. And by you, I mean me.

I had a sunburn of epic proportions, recently. Bad like I probably should have gone to the hospital bad, and even with ibuprofen and aloe and lidocaine I couldn't sleep well for days. Everything sucked, everything was hard. I was lucky enough to have taken a few days off of work already, and I'm lucky to have the kind of life where if I need to, I can sleep in (ha ha sleep) and get a couple extra hours of rest. I'm lucky to have the kind of relationship with my body where I know that even though driving and sitting in chairs is excruciating, biking 12 miles will be totally fine (and in fact, it was the best thing I did for my body the two days we did that). Good thing I did, too -- it's hard for me to be completely wiped out while simultaneously having my muscles screaming at me because I hadn't exercised. I was pretty much afraid to even show people my skin for a week, and even after that much time people would wince and gasp when I uncovered my back. It was a wreck. But it's basically healed now. I don't think I have any scars, though I bet I'll have the tanlines of that particular bathing suit for a year. Maybe more.

Saturday, I went canoeing with veek and N on a lake in Maine. The first island we got to had some broken glass, so we found another, where we clambered on rocks and ate huckleberries and blueberries (highbush and lowbush) and watched ducks jump up to gobble berries from high branches. It came time to go home and make food and eat supper and read stories, so we paddled all the way back. But for this three mile lake jaunt, I was in the back the whole way, using the same side the whole way, and not thinking about my arms at all. I followed this up with some failure to take advil and then recreational dehydration; this led to poor sleep, which led to a day of complete grouchiness until some time in the afternoon I realized that my left arm hurt so much I couldn't pick stuff up, even towels. I couldn't even point at things. I couldn't pick up my kid or use both hands to get myself water. This came as a complete surprise to me, which made me into a bit of a grouchopotamus, because my left hand? I use it a lot. It's Monday and I couldn't even imagine biking today, which sort of put a wrench into our plans to have another Family Bike Jaunt. But veek and spike took care of me, and dilletante takes care of me, and later I will ask ceelove if she can poke my arm at some point to tell me what I did and what I should do next. It feels just like muscle fatigue, but it's in a place where that is extremely inconvenient at best; will I be able to get to work tomorrow? Will I have to take the train?

I realize that these are pretty cushy problems -- two temporary, self-inflicted, stupidity-based injuries that will heal and go away, in an environment where I am surrounded by people who love me and want to help even when I hate accepting help and cry about it. But it SUCKS to not be able to live my life by myself. I am reminded of how much I disliked my own pregnancy-induced helplessness and all of its associated problems. I got my skin back, now I want my hand back. My body! Mine!

Many things are fired. My throat, for example: fired. Tea is not fired, though. I am actually asking tea if it can put in some extra hours on nights and weekends. If tea keeps it up, we're talking promotion, here.

It's interesting to try to take and post a photo every day when I'm so grouchy. I nearly took yesterday off, but when it got late, I realized I was feeling a little empty, off, like I forgot to buckle my seatbelt or wear pants or something. Oh! No photo. Funny how quickly habits can form, and unform.

I know I'm hard to schedule with -- perhaps actually impossible, for one on one time -- but it occurred to me today that there's a distinct lack of group socializing in my life, and only I am to blame for that. So! People! Please do keep inviting me to things. I appreciate it every single time and eventually I will show up at a party and when people say, holy crap, you still exist?, I will say proudly: fuck yes I do! now pass the rum and whatnot!

I was a grouchopotamus last week. ( cut for grouchopotamus: not for the faint of heart ) I had yet another in a series of seemingly unending doctor's appointments, I hadn't lifted weights in over a week, and even though the world was basically okay I couldn't shake the feeling of ARGH GRAR AWFUL WRONGNESS *GRUMP*. But then, in the past few days, I have:

* helped people move
* seen folks I rarely see
* had a party with spike
* found my wallet which had been missing for a month (please, please do not ask)
* changed my diet in ways that make me happier
* played Rock Band with fennel -- specifically, ALL OF DOOLITTLE OMG AAAAAA *flapflap*
* gotten happily soaked in a rainstorm under rainbow umbrellas
* taken photos
* gotten sweet hugs, kisses, and snuggles
* gotten SLEEP
* played with LED toys
* eaten stinky, stinky French cheese
* biked to work (after D graciously pumped up my tires for me!)

So yeah, I'm happy, and I have good people. Thank you for bearing with me until I returned to my regularly scheduled mollypotamus self.

Seriously shitty week in many ways. ( Here's a pile of otters and Natalie drawing on the bathtub wall. )

(Not, sadly, a pile of otters-and-Natalie drawing on the bathtub wall.)

Cheer me up! Give me something to think about. :)

So - hey, when do I get to spend all day sleeping to make up for this sleep loss? Or even all night? I get to do that at some point, right?

(1) I tried to log into livejournal but forgot my username and had to stare into space until I remembered it.
(2) I got into the shower with my bra on.
(3) I genuinely forgot that eating breakfast makes the day run more smoothly, several days in a row, until ceelove started making sure I was eating in the mornings.

So, my hands and forearms started hurting about a month ago, my very first RSI pains ever. Yay. Swapping to left-handed mousing seemed to stave it off a bit, but it still made me grumpy. A week or two later, I learned that several of my coworkers had also spontaneously developed exactly the same problem: it became clear that it happened to all of us a couple of weeks after we moved to a pretty but ultimately poorly-designed new case management system. HMMMMMM.

Fishy. Anyway, I have a slick little thumb-trackball now. but still. For what it's worth, this isn't one of the things I hold against management, it just makes me grumpy.

Also: there are things in my life that aren't my job. Good things, even! I guess I just don't talk about them.

Yesterday was an absolutely stunning day, weather-wise - I was happily walking around in short sleeves, savoring the sun and picnicking on the porch, etc., etc. Naturally I was thrilled when the weather report claimed that today would be almost as nice - what a perfect opportunity to get my butt back into biking to work!

The shoes I wore on my trip this summer are completely trashed, and not very winter-worthy. So, a few weeks ago, after biking to work in the cold-cold and getting frostbite on my toes, I decided to spring for a new pair of winter biking shoes. These shoes kick ass. They are completely insulated and enclosed. The sole has a thick barrier between the footbed and the very bottom of the shoe where the cleats attach - most bike shoes are ventilated there. They've even got little neoprene gaiters and a flap that folds over the neoprene-backed lace area, and I can wear them with big fluffy socks (as I am doing in this photo). Dude! Cool.

What I didn't discover until actually leaving my house this morning is that these shoes aren't actually compatible with my pedals. Almost perfect, but not quite. The cleats themselves would lock with the pedals, but they are about 3 mm more recessed than the cleats on my old shoes. All this wouldn't matter at all if I didn't have those city-bike pedals. I love the fact that I can use them even without clipping in - one side has a clip for my cleats, and the other side I can use with sneakers or sandals, or I can use it in city traffic when I don't want to have both feet locked in. This is a great feature, except that it makes the pedals so big and fat that they don't work with my new shoes. (For reference, this is what other clipless pedals look like. note the distinct lack of big-and-fatness.)

This sucks! So I came inside, took pictures of my shoes, and drove to work, tail between my legs.

In other news, it was a great weekend. I think we ran into almost everyone we know at the Fetish Flea, even though we were only there for an hour or two. Stayed in a swank hotel for a company party on Saturday night, played DDR and Pump It Up in the arcade Sunday morning, then had the aforementioned porch-picnic and sat around chatting all day. Fabulous, lazy, and happy.