Monday, February 7, 2005

#138 I Think Maybe I'm Cutting Class Again

All week I'd been looking forward to dance class this evening, after having missed the past three weeks for various real reasons.  Right up until it was time to get ready to go.  I'm not going.  Pick a reason from the following list - they are all equally valid (and equally invalid):

  1. I'm afraid of a turkey attack.
  2. I don't feel like washing my hair.
  3. I don't have any clothes hemmed that I haven't already worn at least once in the past year or two.
  4. I can't find my underwear.
  5. Miss Thunderfoot is predicting a tornado.
  6. I've decided it would be more beneficial to unclutter the treadmill.
  7. I need to switch the furnace from electric to oil, and that will make me late.
  8. I ate dinner already, so my stomach is sticking out.
  9. My hands hurt.
  10. The BBC News is on PBS at the moment, and I don't want to leave it.
  11. I can't find the diningroom table.  It's in there somewhere west of the kitchen - I just can't find it.  I saw it briefly in November, but it has escaped again.  Not that this has anything to do with not going to class, it's just generally depressing.
  12. I don't want to take my feet outside.  I've got umpteen pairs of winter boots and thermal lined shoes, and none of them keep my feet warm.  I've got like umpteen pairs because I keep searching.
  13. I'm feeling lazy, and it's so much easier not to go anywhere I don't have to go. 
  14. I haven't been out of my nightgown in three days.  See #4. 

(#7) The furnace thing is a real problem, but of course it doesn't need to be done this very minute.  Back just after Christmas,  I noticed that the gauge on the oil tank said I had only a few drops left.  I was expecting a delivery as soon as the truck could get up the drive, so I switched to electric temporarily to avoid any problems, and then forgot about it.  Getting the expected oil delivery would be the signal to switch back.

It turns out I had gotten a delivery just BEFORE Christmas.  Apparently, the gauge on the tank isn't working.  I didn't get another delivery until now - and the oil man was surprised that the tank was still full - AND I just got the electric bill.  Pardon me while I faint.  Maybe it's a good thing the Chinese man went NARU.

(#8)  For dinner, I had 4 oz. of steak and two stalks of broccoli.  Why is my tummy sticking out?

(#9) My hands do hurt.  I had forgotten about how they used to hurt, back in the '80s and early '90s, a deep bone pain through the center of my hand and in the knuckles.  The doctor said it was arthritis, and gave me superpills, but I rarely took them because I didn't want to start the APC problem again.  The way I controlled the pain was to make tight fists and stab my fingernails into the palms.  That would blunt the deep pain for a while, confused the nerves or something.  The pain eventually wandered away.

I woke up this morning with deep inprints of nails in my palms.  It's back.  My fingers feel weak.  It feels like a horse jumped on my hands.  Daughter, remember when I couldn't open jars, when my favorite kitchen utensil was the jar opener we called "the man of the house"?  That's what that was about.

I don't think it's arthritis.  I think its fibromyalgia.

(#10) There's a story on the BBC news about a young woman (I think they said 20 years old!) who just broke the record for sailing around the world alone.  On one hand I am very impressed. On the other hand, I am having trouble with their definition of "around the world".  She headed south from England to Antarctica, went in a circle around Antarctica just outside the ice, then headed back north up the Atlantic to England.   Well, if you want to get technical....

(#12)  The boot situation is so frustrating.  I have a 20+-year-old pair of white pre-thinsulate puffy boots that close up the back with velcro tabs that stick out to the sides.  They look like marshmallows on my feet.  I think I paid like $10 for them at K-Mart or somesuch.  Even when they were new, certain women would look at my feet and sneer "Nice boots."  But they were WARM!!! 

Now they are covered with gray smudges of loving wear that won't wash off.  Their soles are cracked in several places.  Even the waterproofing on their puffy sides is crazed and flaking off.  I, with my famously low standards in clothing and reputation for eccentricity, am finally ashamed to wear them in public.  When I'm feeling particularly put-upon, I sometimes wear them around the house, like bedroom slippers.

I've been trying for years to find something as good.  I've got Thinsulate and I've got real wool shearling.  I've got felt.  Nothing works.  Even if the tops are warm, the cold from cement and blacktop seeps up through the soles.  I tried a pair of those silly 3" thick soles, and they didn't stop the seeping cold.   My toes are very sad.

Pardon me while I go put my poor little love boots on............................

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