Year 5, Day 68: I woke up to a very swollen hook finger (swollen so much it can neither bend nor be straightened out. Hook!) and that set the tone of the day. Smol Acrobat was very clingy all through breakfast. I couldn’t shake the looming doomsies feeling from the moment I sat down to work, I also couldn’t quite focus without being hyper aware that I’d overdone it over the weekend and that should have provided dopamine for days, instead my brain is quietly chanting new dopamine new dopamine in the background like whispering Minions. Waiting for a lot of things to ship/arrive: snacks for my Lakota sponsee, the hose accoutrements so the drip watering system can work properly, an answer about my new seeds order.
I keep hoping something going right will fix the mindset or settle down the unpleasant unsettled restless feelings but that’s not happening.
Instead I got the opposite of a fix: a meeting ran way too long and then my team ran into tech problems that ate the rest of my afternoon like a hydra chomping on a nice snack. What a Monday. I received too much Monday, I need to return some. Where do I send it?
Year 5, Day 69: I miss my girl. I just realized again today that I can yell at my computer in frustration without upsetting any canine sensibilities. On the one hand, great, I’m yelling, but on the other, of course I wish I couldn’t. The grief has dulled, it’s a bearable sadness.
Whenever the turmoil at work gets to be too much and a friend says “you’re great you can get another job if they suck”, I feel the opposite of reassured. I know what they mean but also (I sound whiny even to me here, sorry, I know) I don’t wanna. Where else can I be a total gremlin? Avoiding talking to people 99.9% of the time is a huge factor in my quality of life. While the job is definitely imperfect, it caters to the highly antisocial part of me. I can exist in almost sheer isolation, while still managing a large team, which has preserved a good deal of my energy for the important things all these years. That’s the part that’s so hard to replace. Any other high level management job is going to require peopling to an unbearable degree.
Changing jobs may be unavoidable but … Cross your fingers that it’s not?
Year 5, Day 70: My hook finger is a hook no more! Yay!
We can never use up a whole container of sour cream or even remember we have it. The waste makes me sour. How do you remember things that accidentally get pushed to the back of the fridge or are only a sometimes food?
PiC brought home a chocolate chip and a raisin bagel, the tasty and the terrible respectively, leftovers from some work meeting. Raisins are for other people (like everyone else in my household).
We’re on the last steps of THIS chore!: The will and trusts have been updated to include Smol Acrobat, change our executor(s), disinherit my biodad and biobrother from claims on the estate or guardianship of the kids (in the hopefully unlikely event that our chosen guardian won’t be available, the court will generally go first to bio relations and I don’t want them to be in the mix AT ALL), and name backup beneficiaries. We need to sign the documents with a remote notary, and we need to find a friend to witness that signing. Once that’s done, I’ll make copies available to our executors and our chosen guardian so if they’re actually needed in the worst case scenario, all responsible people have the required documentation in hand already. I’ve seen some horror stories about people having had wills made but locked them in some drawer where they couldn’t be found, thereby rendering them useless and the estate went to someone it was not intended to go to.
I’m beyond overwhelmed right now. In the next two weeks, at home, we have scheduled: a (much anticipated) family visit, a wedding, 2 more family visits, a funeral (not someone I knew but family knew). At work, everything is a complete mess, and tons of vacations requiring coverage coming up, and tons of recruiting I have to somehow do at the same time, and KPIs to meet. My ears and shoulders have become one.
Year 5, Day 71: Work: terrible. Spreadsheets to document the terrible have been enabled so we can try to attempt to fix ALL the terrible and also because there is SO MUCH terrible that I can’t keep track of it all.
Also terrible, I’m still waging bureaucratic war with UHC that is holding more than $1000 hostage. They keep rejecting my therapy claims with “PLEASE PROVIDE DESCRIPTION OF SERVICES PROVIDED SO WE MAY PROCESS YOUR CLAIM REQUEST”.
I DID! SIX TIMES! On every claim! There is absolutely no rhyme or reason to the ones that they accept and the ones they reject. For some claims, it looks like they have actually sent more rejections than I have submitted claims. United Healthcare is the worst.
Also also, Smol Acrobat spiked a fever and tested positive for COVID AGAIN today. Then negative six hours later. I’m thoroughly confused. PiC and I are negative… I’m not feeling great but that’s as much attributable to stress and sleep deprivation as any virus.
But my claw finger is still not a claw (yay!) and the green bean sprouts have put out two large leaves each (yay!) and the snap pea and snapdragon seeds have arrived (yay!) so I will plant some tomorrow? This weekend?
PiC is a saint, he ran to Costco late tonight to pick up supplies and also get me a new hose for our drip irrigation system that’s awesome except for the wickedly leaky old hose that we haven’t used in about 7 years and no wonder it’s leaky after sitting in the sun and fog all this time.
Year 5, Day 72: Smol Acrobat’s third COVID test is negative. So did they have COVID this round of fever or not? I have no idea and I hate this all so much. Smol Acrobat has also started engaging in prolonged histrionics this week, screaming they want or need a hug at the top of their lungs but refusing all overtures. These fits last anywhere from 15 minutes to a record 75 minutes, set off by the most innocuous things. It’s exhausting. I can’t tell if this is a post-COVID or a terrible-threes or both thing but I’m very much ready for the fits to stop.
I was going to push myself to help clear out the work logs for my team who are swamped because of the Terrible, but then remembered that I handle an entire section of work alone on top of active management work . They each have 2-6 people backing them up, and I have no one. So it’s probably ok that I don’t ALSO over extend myself to help them (which necessarily means neglecting my whole host of responsibilities).
1. I’m really glad we have the new washer. It washes efficiently! It spins efficiently (and doesn’t need to be spun 3 times to be dry enough)! I can set a delayed start so it runs after peak hours! It handled the 15, no, 20 loads of laundry in 3 days for the Pine Ridge Reservation like a champ.
2. Nicole and Maggie shared this GoFundMe for a study on “the enduring impact of childhood exposure to violence on bilateral intimate partner violence in Northern Uganda where thousands of boys and girls were abducted by the Lord’s Resistance Army during childhood.”
3. I forgot how glorious it is to get 8 whole uninterrupted hours a day alone. I dislike the scheduling chaos that is generally summer but I very much love the few solo days I get this. Thanks, summer camp!
Challenges this week: everything is overwhelm. There’s too much going on and I’d already hit the upper limit for planning things when a funeral (not someone I knew but still an obligation) entered the chat and wanted scheduling. UGH.
Our long term goal is to replace our day job income with passive income before my health prevents me from working. I know from my Mom’s experience that qualifying for or relying on disability is incredibly tough or near impossible here in CA. Aside from that, I aim to do my best to make the most of what we can do while we can.
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Dividend income. We received $1,053.00 in dividends from the stocks portfolio. Bigger than usual big month, but it all averages out to only a few hundred dollars a month. It was all reinvested immediately as usual.
I moved our emergency fund to Vanguard’s Cash Plus account to get more interest there as well though that might have been a futile attempt since it looks like that APY went down from 4.7 to 4.6 (vs Ally’s 4.2%). Oh well, every penny and dollar count.
Year 5, Day 61: Despite wearing sunblock and a hat, I managed to get sunburned this weekend. It’s really unusual for us to get enough sun for that to be a problem! Truth: We didn’t.
We went a little outside of our usual radius to spend time with friends and that little microclimate had Roasty Toasty temps. My face feels crispy. But I got to pet two large fluffy dogs at length over the weekend which is exactly what the doctor ordered so it was totally worth it. (Remind me I said that if I’m peeling like a lizard next week.)
School is nearly out and we waited too long to book some camps for JB. Our schedule is a bit spotty in places and we were trying to coordinate with their friends for some camps so ended up leaving it long enough that we missed out on some spots.
It’s ok, I don’t think they need to be booked every day of every week. They can handle a few days that are just unbooked and boring – they can sleep in, clean, read, do art, etc. Maybe I will also make myself take them on walks those days. Probably be good for both of us.
Year 5, Day 62: Holiday weekends are nice but the short workweeks after a long weekend are BRUTAL. Someday this will not be the case! (I am trying to have faith. In what, I don’t know. Maybe I’m just trying to have hope.) It’s also a wallop upside the head to try to get focused when you’re starting with a double Monday workload on the wrong day. It’s like trying to start a race with your weight on the wrong foot. I don’t get the Sunday Scaries but I sure do have the short workweek wobbles. Ugh. Anyway I’ve learned to plug those time chunks when I first sit down and need to corral my brain by doing a chore that I have to do anyway first. By the time I’m done with that bit of administrative nonsense, my brain has had time to remember what we’re here to do and can get to work again.
Having the strangest feeling: Do I know this song? Sort of? But I have no memory of hearing it in the past.
Year 5, Day 63: Did my 15 minutes of “KB Spangler” weeding this morning, with a begrudging heart. Someone ought to have warned us how much time in adult life would be spent waging a hopeless battle against the weeds. Also, I find it deeply unfair that the shallow rooted weeds are out in the open, easy to grab and easy to uproot but the deeply rooted weeds are wedged into the sidewalk and driveway cracks so I skin my fingers trying to get enough of a grip on them to dig them out. Humph.
Usually my pain pays me the courtesy of waiting until I lay down at night to spike into “curl up an cry” territory but mid-morning my back pain spiked. Like a genius, I pulled out the Hyperice to massage the muscles into submission. Usually I forget about it! Buuuuuut that backfired terribly. I had to pop some OTC painkillers and crank the heating pad to try and get it to back off. Nothing like getting mugged by your pain midday.
Then in the height of my pain, I had to conduct an interview. That was a miserable 10 minutes of anticipation. But the conversation went well enough that my pain faded to the background. I liked them. That doesn’t often happen!
Year 5, Day 64: I had to crank through mountains of work today: training people and processing documentation and planning for summer coverage and recruiting and OH GAH. So much. I hadn’t complained yet but PIC
Smol Acrobat didn’t nap again today and they are always a hysterical (both kinds) mess by the time we get to the bath and bed portion of the night. They cackled the whole way to the toothbrushing station, hissy-fitted between that and the toilet, then cackled all the way to the shower. It was emotional whiplash even though I was prepared for it. They rallied after the bath to run at me HARD and slam into me (JB style, honestly). When I objected “why did you push me?” they replied in a hurt voice, “I was trying to play a game!”
“OH! I didn’t know that! Ok, now that I know, let’s try that again.”
And then they gleefully rammed me again. All was well.
Year 5, Day 65: Just like that, JB is done with third grade! It wasn’t the easiest of years, when is it ever?, but they are sad that it’s over.
We went back to the school once everyone was gone and cleaned out their lost and found for them. This saves them the trouble of doing that laundry and donating it themselves, we get free clothes in generally good to great conditions (KIDS) to pack and ship to the Pine Ridge reservation. I can ship like 75 sweaters and jackets for $30! Wins all around except for my arms which are going to fall off!
Then I had to get to work 😱
I continue to wage war with United Healthcare which keeps denying my FSA claims for perfectly legitimate expenses. They tell me to “describe the service so we may evaluate your claim”. I DID. ARGH. But I will persevere!
I’m also on the hunt for native flowers for our front yard. I don’t typically want flowers but I’m indulging a weird kick right now and it also occurs to me that getting seeds of flowers I LIKE would be a step towards fighting against the weeds that keep taking over. I’m thinking snapdragons to go with my poppies?
TIL clumping bamboo exists and isn’t the terrible invasive type.
Year 4 of COVID in the Bay Area.