All or nothing

I'm an all or nothing kind of girl.  I tend to dive into something with great enthusiasm, then decide to think about it for awhile, or maybe make an excel chart or something...

I have walked two days in a row.  Bob and I walked about 30 minutes each day.  I promise, it was ALL uphill.  What's with that?  If burning butt muscles means they are getting strong and firm, I'm well on the way to having a butt.  We can only hope and keep tromping.

Bob has been pretty good about not leaving me in the dirt as I toddle along with him.  He even pulls me up the hills when they get really bad.  Mostly, he encourages me.  Sometimes he decides to talk politics, which pisses me off, but I suppose it raises my heart rate.

I have made better food choices.  Two days, what can I say?

I am using the 15 minute timer thingy to get myself cleaning.  Monday I only cleaned about 30 minutes total, and yesterday I had to go to work even though it's my day off.  But today, I'm going to set the timer as soon as I finish this ramble.

Mark left for a school field trip this morning.  They are going to a CSI camp --- Crime Scene Investigation without the blood spatter.  They will learn how to observe and measure and do cool stuff.  I'm glad he's able to do this.

Friday, Bob, Mark, Roslyn & I go to Kanuga, an Episcopalian retreat center.  We are going to have a great time.  It's in the mountains, so I plan to work on my burning butt muscles.  It will be too cold to swim, but there is a lake and maybe I'll get to canoe or kayak.  That's one of those things I like in theory more than fact.  I guess it would be good to work on my flabby back and arm muscles too.  And I hear the food is marvelous!  I'll try to pick veggies and fruit.

Speaking of which... time to make a smoothie.  I have some locally grown strawberries that really didn't want to be picked.  Now I need to use them before they go bad.

What else do you do on a rainy day?

I woke with an urge to go tromping through the Congaree National Swamp, but it's raining.  A real frog-strangling soaking rain that may even clean the pollen out of the air.  Or not.  And even though Bob says it's not raining that hard (he is upstairs in bed and doesn't know), I'm not going out today.


Today, I am going to clean something.  I just can't decide what.  The kitchen?  That would be good.  I need to sort through my cupboards and clean out the fridge so I know what I have and what I need for the next week.  I want to try out the chicken salad & pita recipe I found at Cinnamon & Spice.  I need to make rainbow slaw for my Dad's birthday cook-out tomorrow.  A clean kitchen would help.  And a good thing about cleaning the kitchen is that you can see the results.  It smells better.  People say, "Wow, good work Mom/Kathy/lady."

I also need to clean the closets so I have places to put the things I plan to keep after my house purge.  Starting today or tomorrow, I am sorting, trashing, giving away all of this crap in my house.  I have too much stuff.  Too much that I might use someday to make 10,000 crocheted blankets.  Too much stuff I might use when I re-pot 4,000 African Violets.  Too much stuff that could outfit a dozen kitchens and a couple of apartments. 

Since Joseph is making moving out noises, I want to box some of this up for him.  I also need to box up stuff Robert & Katy will need when they are able to move into their own house or apartment and out of her mother's house.  I'm not really sure what to do with the furniture, since it's hard to store extra couches and king-sized beds, but I'm going to do something. 

A lot of this is going to Goodwill.  I still sort of kind of not really want to have a yard sale, but I know I will be miserable, make very little money, and end up taking it to Goodwill and Habitat for Humanity any way.

I'm not really sure where to start, but I figure I'll quit thinking about it and just do it.  Tomorrow.

Slowly returning to the world of the living...

I spent most of Saturday in bed and made it to church yesterday.  I decided NOT to try to go to the baseball game because it would have ruined everyone's fun if I'd a fallen out in the middle of the game.


It was a shame though.  Yesterday was a beautiful day.  Warm but with a cool breeze.  Bright sun.  Still the pollen, but no count is more like 2000 parts per square inch rather than the 5 billion parts last week when even my cats turned green.


Today is a "day off," but it's a "clean the house that has been neglected since Christmas" day off.  Since I'm still a little tired, I'm moving slowly, but I'm working....


I didn't sleep well last night because the cold medicine gave me weird dreams.  One of them was that two cats were fighting on top of my head.  Oh no, wait... that really happened.  Our cat Mars and my son's cat Kay (Mars' daughter) got into fight in the middle of the night.  On my pillow.  On my head.  We have too many damn cats.


So now, I'm moving... sort of...


I'm making rainbow lamb korma for dinner.  I started with a simple "convenience food" recipe from some magazine... Good Housekeeping, I think.  I'm cooking the lamb cubes and a jar of korma sauce in the crock pot for the rest of the day.  Later, I'll add fresh veggies.  The recipe called for microwave frozen green beans and carrots, but the produce was pretty this morning, so I got small yellow and green squash, baby carrots, and red, yellow and orange bell peppers.  See, no blue, but I'm making a salad with purple  & green lettuce, raddichio, shredded carrots, grape tomatoes & broccoli slaw mix.  The korma will go over whole wheat couscous.


We'll see how well this goes over.  Mark and Joseph aren't sure they like lamb very much.  They can have hot pockets if they want.  Whatever.


I need to go wash some dishes then maybe take a little nap.


Or maybe I'll nap then wash some dishes...

A new year

Tax season is over and I have a chest cold.  I have spent the last couple of months saying I couldn't get sick until after tax season, and it appears my body has taken me literally.

My husband asked what my schedule is for today and I tried to give him a look, but went into a coughing fit.  My schedule is to (1) go to work to see if any e-files were rejected (there were two) and fix them, (2) go to the store and buy paper and cd labels so I can make covers for Bob's cds, and (3) go home and go to sleep.  I'm at step two and a half: reconnecting with the blogosphere.

After I sleep awhile and enjoy a happy hour knowing I don't have to go to work in the morning, there are lots of things to consider.

My work situation is changing.  Not me, but the job.  We may move offices, combine spaces, enlarge.  I need to decide what I want my place to be and how I can ensure that.  You can tell I'm not ready to talk about it.  Sleep.

I have signed up for an online course to prepare for the enrolled agents exam.  Next year, all paid tax preparers will need to pass some sort of test.  I might as well go for the biggest one I'm interested in.  I plan to take the first course, then take the first part of the test.  At the beginning of next month, if I like the course, I'll sign up for the second part & for the second part of the test.  Part three is ethics and only a week instead of three weeks.  Telling, huh?  I passed the ethics part of the exam without any problem, but I want to be completely comfortable.  I should be finished with the three parts of the test by July, then I will do whatever else I need to do to become an enrolled agent.  (I hope I pass the background check.)  And BAM! next year I will be a professional tax preparer with a set of initials behind my name.  Cool huh?

Then I can think about why I have choosen a career that makes me miss spring.  (I heard it was a nice day this year.)  I'll think about how Mark came running from the house yesterday and said, "Mom!  Tax Season is OVER!  YEAH!!!!"  I'll think about developing coping mechanisms that don't involve yelling at people I love and eating large amounts of fried food.  But that can wait.  I think I'll go check up on my blogging friends... how have you all been?