Learning to See

Yesterday was a food poisoning day.

In response to a birthday dinner for my sister on Wednesday night at Marmalade in Redondo Beach (if you haven't been, keep that trend going) I had a stomach-cramping, headaching, sleeping-in-the-bathroom-with-a-pillow kind of day.

T woke up and ran to get me some medicine (which I didn't take...I'd been throwing up water and was afraid to eat anything, gross I know), but by afternoon I was starting to rally.

So, that means food poisoning to me.

Today I feel tentative, but still on the upswing, so that's good. We were planning to go to Magic Mountain this weekend, but I'm thinking that it might not happen....

Today's whiteboard quote:

"Besides learning to see, there is another art to be learned - not to see what is not."
~Maria Mitchell

Today, not seeing what is not will be to not get aggravated over silly things....I'm sure my absence yesterday will cause an overwhelming influx of tasks at work today, and my fatigue may or may not turn me into a half-witch, half-Charis hybrid....we shall see.

However, it's Friday, and that makes most things better, so I'm not complaining!

(It's also raining outside, which is awesome. The combo of dreary skies and oldies on the radio during my super-long drive in because Californians don't do rainy tarmac made me feel I was back east again...sigh)

Heavy

Today I feel horrid (physically, that is).

I feel heavy and yucky.

From past experience, I know that the only cure would be to lay in bed all day, drifting in and out of sleep as the misty sunlight falls across the blankets from the shaded window (it's a hormonal thing. Girls, you know what I mean).

However, I'm a working girl (not that kind) so this staying in bed all day business isn't possible. Wednesday is my busy day. So I'll be drugging up and stumbling along, trying not to think about it.

But T brought me flowers last week and they're finally blooming, which makes me happy.Maybe I'll take a sick day and sleep all day tomorrow instead....

Today's whiteboard quote:
"You may have to fight a battle more than once to win it."
~Margaret Thatcher

MIAness

I am (somewhat) back from the land of the sick and decrepit. Here are some things I learned along my journeys:

1) The flu actually does suck. I'm one of those who always thinks (when everything's peachy, of course) that the being "sick" can't actually be that bad. Well, I'm wrong. Uncontrolled teeth-chattering shivering after hours under blankets, dizziness, achy joints and muscles, and no sense of hunger or thirst at all, rather, in fact, a strong aversion to food, really are as bad as you may imagine.

2) Being sick while on a school retreat where everything's cold and drafty, and everyone around you is all sunshine and loveliness and hugs and prayers, is not as positive as it may sound. At all.

3) It's amazing to be hungry when you haven't been for days. Remember the little things, people!

4) Fruit smoothies are safe. And T makes good ones. Oh, those are good to have around. Both the T's ad the smoothies, but I'm referring to T in the previous sentence. But not my T, that one's already busy taking care of me.

5) Plugging in memory cards and uploading pictures is rather unappealing when your eyes hurt if they look in any direction other than straight forward and/or if they hit bright light or sunlight.

6) 8-hour trafficy drives home are much less fun being sick and not agreeing on music with your carmate (which is why we both wear ipods in times like these)

and, last but not least, and I may well get crucified for this but it's totally true:

7) Having the flu is really, really good for your abs.

I had to say it.

Big Move

So the boys are moving in this weekend.

That means that this guy will be making delicious meals,

And this guy will be giving me backrubs.

I am very excited.

And not worried about roomate-type things at all. The townhouse is really too big for just my sister and I to rattle around in, and the more the merrier. Maybe now we'll actually use all the rooms, which definitely did not happen in the Pasadena townie. And this way, there'll only be one long drive and not two for when we all want to hang out.

In other news, I have a scratchy throat today. Ergh. I'm guessing it's from the hectic pace of last weekend, along with the weird weather (according to my body. 6 degrees one day, 60 the next, what's going on?....)

So today I will go home and go to bed. Maybe watch yesterday's episode of Lost, then go to bed. And crochet and/or read until I fall asleep. At 6 pm.

Hopefully by Saturday morning I'll be ready to tape boxes and open doors and "supervise" the boys moving furniture...

Just kidding. I'll be carrying stuff too. May even make some cookies.

Wish me luck!

Prayers for Ward

My little brother Ward Brown was in a motorcycle accident last weekend. A car ran a red light and his bike hit it, catapulting him into the air where he somersaulted, landed on his back on the other side of the car, then slid for 40 feet on the asphalt.

When I got the call I was concerned, but calm. I knew in my heart that he would be alright.

And, he was. They had to put him out and intubate him because he was concussed and combative ("He was the most polite combative person I've ever seen" a nurse later told my mother), but he had no broken bones, no brain damage, only major bruising and swelling. He was sent home after about 2 days.

This morning at 6:21am I got a text from my mother, saying he is back in the hospital for blood clots in his lungs. Apparently he was staying at a friends house last night and had intense, almost unbearable chest pain. Jay (the friend) took him to the hospital, where they did an MRI then a CAT scan, and found the clots. He's on cumadin right now to thin his blood, and they're keeping him for a few days.

This time, I don't feel so calm. I'm afraid. My heart is afraid. And he's 3,000 miles away, on the opposite coast of the country, so I can't even see him.

Blood clots are scary. Nearly everyone knows of someone who's had serious injuries from blood clots, even the most serious injury, which I don't want to say in relation to my brother. But, of course we're all thinking it.

Please, if you have any spare time in your day, even 30 seconds, say a little prayer for him. His name is Ward Brown, and he's one of the most amazing people - the world needs him in it.

I'm 100% convinced of the power of prayer, so any help at all will be greatly appreciated, and I'm sure it'll be felt. Please help.

Thanks,
Charis

Sick Day

Today's whiteboard quote is:

"Fortify yourself with contentment, for this is an impregnable fortress."
~Epictetus

Yesterday was a sick day. I wore my pj's all day, finished watching a movie that I'd needed to for at least a month, and read when I should've been sleeping (can't help it, I'm an addict! Once T walked into the room and I heard a booming voice say, "What did I tell you?" ... I'd promised no more opening of the book....). I also carried a little box of lotioney tissues around with me (my nose officially thanks T for getting me that kind), blew my nose about a zillion honkin times, which is gross -the blowing in general, I HATE that feeling-, and did not write anything, which I had planned to do.

I was also made homemade chicken soup by T (best boyfriend ever), with help and tips from B (thank you SO much B, especially since I know you hate cooking using meat!), and ate lots of raw-garlic popcorn, which will probably make me smell bad for the next 2 days, but what always works to knock out a cold.

Somehow, as always, even when I'm snotty and disgusting, T made me feel beautiful. Love him.

Finally I fell asleep around 6:30ish and woke up this morning, only slightly sniffly, and with none of the vertigo or gross swollen eyesedness I'd had yesterday. I was surprised, because I didn't get nearly the amount of sleep I'd expected!

So, I armed myself with some leftover chicken soup, bundled up because I'd heard a newscast on Wednesday that said we're getting in an "Arctic breeze" or something that had made it 60 below in Russia so it's supposed to be really cold this weekend.... Yeah. 52 degrees. Bollocks!

Sick days are nice. Even though you feel like poo, it's nice to have a free pass to do nothing but lay around. Not that I don't have plenty of laying around in my life, but usually I feel guilty afterward for not being more productive. Not today!

What makes it better? I come back to the world to a Friday! Woohoo! And M and I are throwing a dinner party tonight, which I'll have pics from tomorrow, if I can force myself to be productive enough to post them on a Saturday morning ;)

Happy almost-weekend!

Trashy

I just dumped my mini-paper-recycling bucket into the big paper-recycling-bin in the hallway. A couple post-its floated behind the big blue can, and I bent down, scooted it out of the way, and reached into the grimy corner to retrieve them.

Because I'm that neat?

No.

Because I don't want anyone to see my inspirational stuff I post around my office here and there (my daily affirmations go on the stickies. Today's is I receive goodness from the Universe).

I'd be embarrassed if someone saw them. I'd feel like a dork.

And yet, I

#1) write one on my hallway whiteboard every day (Today's is "Our truest life is when we are in dreams awake" ~Henry David Thoreau), and

#2) just posted this on my blog, for the whole world to see...

How does that make sense?

I'm bleary eyed and my nose is running like an Olympian. In a half hour I'll drive home, and into striped pajamas and bed I go.

Happy, healthy Wednesday to you...

Lovely Lazy Weekend

So I haven't posted in a few days because I didn't have much to say at the end of last week after a slightly torturous ortho appointment on Thursday (I'm thankful for my Invisalign, thankful, @$%^%$) and Glee Club performances on Friday and Saturday nights (rocking my "Quaker going to the prom" GC "regalia"). Besides, I thought that today I'd have lots of things to write about, like my exciting weekend of Christmas shopping and ice skating (that's right boys and girls, there is OUTDOORS ice skating here in SoCal, and I am thankful for refrigeration technology. Fo real.)

And here it is, Monday, and what did I do this weekend?

Nada.

It was awesome.

Granted, I did become a little disgruntled (a.k.a fire-breathing dragonish. Poor T) on Saturday afternoon when I realized that I was exhausted for some strange reason and my day was gone already (in hanging out around the apt, I didn't even get dressed til around 1 or 2) because I only had time for a much-needed nap before driving all the way to Pasadena for the performance (by the way, hello traffic jam...I ran in after the warmup and after the soundchecks, getting lost in the crazy maze of a church, and finally taking my jacket off about 10 minutes before we started, and 50 minutes late. Thank goodness for car-driving-vocal-warmups, is all I'll say about that).

Afterward, it was back for some band practice and midnight pumpkin cookie baking (didn't turn out so well. I didn't realize til halfway into the batter that the boys didn't have any eggs. Oops...)

Sunday morning was a walk down to the farmer's market with T, then a yummy and healthy brunch (we have to get on the good-eating train now because the holidays back east are going to be food-debauchery. Can't wait!), followed by naps, dinner, movie night (we watched Goodfellas, which I'd never seen and gave me nightmares, I'm a pansy I know). Yesterday was a one-hour-in-jeans (the farmer's market), the-rest-of-the-day-in-T's-sweatpants (that sounded much worse than it actually was, I borrowed his sweatpants because they were comfy) kind of a day. Oh, besides the fact that around noonish yesterday, I started to notice a kind of ouchy tickle in my throat...

Remember that "random" exhaustion on Saturday afternoon?

...I failed to mention a moment at the Friday night performance where all the members were rushing around getting ready to file into the main chapel, and I was reaching around someone to get into a cabinet. She was coughing into a hanky - not an "oops there's something in my throat" cough, or even a "sip of water just went down the wrong pipe" cough. No, it was one of those rough, rattling "I have disgusting strep throat-or-some-such-other-unfortunate-winter-illness" kind of a cough. I didn't think much of it, you hear people coughing all the time. Until. She removed the hanky from in front of her face, turned to leave the cabinet area, and coughed. In. My. Face. DISGUSTING.

I remember thinking at the time, "oh no that can't be good", quickly followed by "okay little immune system, go to work! I will not get sick, I will not get sick, not get sick....." (I totally believe in the power of affirmations, can you tell?)

And here I am, Monday, sore throat, tired, a bit achy (which may have just been the yoga and Pilates that I did yesterday afternoon. Forgot to put that in there. It was after the nap and before the movie, and yes, I do choose to exercise on my mat in T's room just to inspire him to work out too so I can watch...I'm allowed to do that!)

Anyway, along with affirmations, I'm a big believer in kicking illnesses a#$ by the following methods (depending on the illness), so I'll choose to drink one glass of water each hour, and eat only things loaded in Vitamin C, with the odd carb here and there.

The end. I'll let you know how it goes.