Well.

This last week has been really great. I really mean really great.

Last Monday, after waiting over a month for my appointment and suffering ever increasing physical pain and further loss of mobility in my joints, I got to go in and see a rheumatologist. After reviewing my lab work from last time and sending me for more blood work and over twenty x-rays, he sent me home with a prescription for a low dosage of steroids. I began to feel better in less than a day. I cannot tell you the difference that this has made for my quality of life.

Today, I have taken no pain killers. None. Zip. Last Sunday, and for a month prior, I had been taking 9-12 pills per day just so that I could function at a basic level (and by basic, I am excluding such luxuries as being able to reach and touch the back of my head, or undress myself at night). After just one week of the steroids, I can dress myself, reach all of my hair, my knees have stopped hurting almost completely--I sometimes feel like I want to jog up the stairs--my hands and arms look and feel so much better, I've stopped dropping things so often...I want to write a sonnet to steroids. Or maybe to my rheumatologist. Or both.

And did I mention how much more energy I have? I've actually started wanting to clean in my spare time, and to go out to the store! After so much time being unable to do so many things, the actual desire and ability to accomplish these previously impossible tasks is a miraculous blessing. I feel awake! And energetic! After getting up at 6:30 and working all day in the office!

So that's how the week started. And then Friday was my birthday. A wonderful, joyous, delicious birthday. We got to welcome our brand new nephew into the world, I got to eat all of my favorite foods (thai food, baked apple pancake with cinnamon glaze, braised beef with roasted root veggies, pumpkin pie... oh, there was so much eating...), I watched The Fall with my family, and I hardly hurt at all.

And my husband gets amazing husband points for a perfect birthday gift: Godiva Dark Chocolate Assortment. Heaven. In. Your. Mouth.



I like food. I really like food. Have I mentioned how much I like food before? I am looking forward to lots more delicious food, and the prospect of gaining some weight (one of the potential side effects of the steroids, but one which would be a much needed help).

Prayers are still appreciated, especially for no nasty side effects from the drugs. I'm a teensie bit concerned about my vision being affected, but I'll be going back to the doctor next week for a check up and the latest test results, so I'll see what he says then.

Hooray life and God and doctors and medicine!

A

What?!

I know. Anyone reading this will probably die right now because this is the SECOND POST IN THE SAME WEEK.

I think I may be developing the urge to post after I teach my classes. It's one of those weird things about teaching online. Last year I had an hour and a half commute with one of my coworkers, so class would let out, we'd chat with students or parents, and then we'd leave and drive for an hour and a half and talk about our classes, or books, or Arrested Development, or other random things. Now, I finish my class, I hang around and answer questions as my students vacate our online classroom, I sign off, take off my headset, and it's me and the cat, who is asleep. There's still an hour and a half left before Josh usually gets home. I can't TALK to anyone. There's no one to debrief to/with. I begin pondering the fact that I physically spent the last two hours alone in a room talking at plastic and metal, and there actually weren't any other people in the room. I know, because if there were, I probably would have brushed my teeth today and changed out of my pajamas. But I didn't. (EWWW.)

I need people. I really, really do. Hence, blog. I get to empty out my thoughts, and someone somewhere will probably read this tonight, and that's enough to tide me over until Josh gets home.

As I have said before, technology is weird.

I will now either find something to clean/decorate for fall, or bake pumpkin bread. I may also brush my teeth. Great weather lately, yes?


A

Worthwhile

4:39 pm: the sound of rain outside the window; the smell of old books on the shelf; my laptop on the desk with the headset still plugged in; a leftover mug of tea, cold from breakfast; my brown office chair, which despite how comfy it is, cannot seem to keep my back aches away; over four hours today spent talking online to 21 high school students scattered throughout the country about assurance of salvation, faith and works, and what virtue is and how one attains it; I turn now to grade synopses.

In which I ask, with much anguish, WHY?

Two questions:

1. WHY MUST MARTHA STEWART TEMPT ME WITH DELICIOUS AUTUMNAL BAKED GOODS?

2. WHY MUST IT BE OVER 110 DEGREES IN LATE SEPTEMBER? I guess that not having a working air conditioner is technically our fault, but still. Yesterday was the hottest day ever recorded in LA. Let me repeat: since at least 1877, when they began recording such things, it has never been this hot in LA. Gross.

But seriously, how am I supposed to bake a fall chocolate pumpkin cake with cream filling in this kind of heat? Have some mercy, Martha. I guess I can at least do this one:



Happy Blistering Heat! I mean, Fall!

A.

Lazy and Delightful

10:46 am: a mug of Irish breakfast; a plate of eggs with havarti, glazed ham, and applesauce; Josh on the couch reading blogs; Ivan perched on the loveseat behind my head; no fan going because the marine layer is thick and the air is cool; all the windows are open; a neighbor plays Mozart exquisitely on the piano; I choose not to read my book.

Take 2

In case you were unaware, we've moved. Goodbye little green-door apartment, goodbye tiny kitchen, goodbye awkward heater placement on our living room wall, goodbye overbearing management company, goodbye no parking and dark alleyways at night. Hello spacious green-door condo, vaulted ceilings, wood floors, kitchen that needs some love (read: foreign substances caking the drawers and cabinets that smells like bad soy sauce, plus meal bugs devouring ancient crackers in the bottom drawer), dishwasher(!), broken air conditioner, and tall, lovely redwood tree that shades our patio and makes us feel like we live in a treehouse. Also an unfortunate hello to chaos. We moved in June, but from the looks of things around here, you'd probably guess we'd only moved two weeks ago.

Josh and I came to the realization this time around that we are really not very good at moving. We are both procrastinators of one sort or another, but the key difference is that I am of the "I shall take my time and carefully place each item in its group's box, and I shall label the box with its contents, and then I shall indicate the future destination of said box in our new abode, thereby taking 1-2 hours per box, but avoiding chaos" type of procrastinating mover. Josh is more of the "here's an empty box; I'm going to put all of this stuff in it and worry about it later because it all needs to move anyway; did I mention that I packed this entire room in two hours?" kind of procrastinating mover. Because we procrastinate, I get three or four boxes done, and then Josh's method wins out. Thus, in the current state of our new home, I have frequently found myself wandering around teary-eyed with frustration while Josh is out somewhere, muttering under my breath about where the MEASURING CUPS are because I really need to make LITTLE CHOCOLATE CAKES. No, the little chocolate cakes were nowhere near a necessity, and the world would not have ended if I had not found the measuring cups, and yes, this is a lot funnier to me now as I write it, but in the moment these small instances seem gargantuan. I really do have a hard time dealing with disorganization, especially in our home. How can I do the stuff I wanna if I can't FIND it? It! You know, that thing that you saw that one time when we were looking for that other thing that we couldn't find. YES I WILL CRY OVER NOT BEING ABLE TO FIND THE SPATULA.

Things are improving only slowly, due in part to the new position I have at work that demands more of my time in the office, to Josh's work (introvert in an extrovert's job=tired husband), and to my chronic pain and weakness (doctors are doing labwork on my blood, btw, to see if I might have RA); I can only do so much before I need to sit down and not move for a while. It's frustrating (the clutter and chaos), but I'm learning to deal with it better. One bright and shiny light in the darkness is the unexpected joy of being forced to read books I may not have otherwise chosen had I access to our entire wealth of literature. Only the boxes that had spilled over onto the floor were accessible, so I read A Ring of Endless Light just because it was there, and it was a dear and deep delight. It was insightful, moving--made me cry--and gave me a lot to think about in regard to my grandmother, who has severe Alzheimer's. L'Engle was also much kinder as an author than I anticipated she would be, and I think many greener authors (including myself) would have handled the story differently, making it more contrived, and thereby ruining a great deal of the poignancy and sweetness that L'Engle instead produces. I've also finished books I'd only read one or two short stories from, and read others that I'd always meant to read, but kept setting aside for another day. The whole experience is like discovering friends living in my house to whom I had previously been blind. Oh, hi L'Engle. Thanks for being here and changing my life. Pull up a shelf and stay forever. Hey there Byatt. You can be my edgy-mystical-modern friend, just don't send any djinn my way. We can totally have drinks, though, and talk about narratology.

That and camping is pretty much my summer in my nutshell, but add two words: kitty parkour. Yes, Ivan likes our new place too. School starts up again soon, and all my classes are online this year, which promises to be an interesting adventure in new teaching methods for me. I keep needing to remind myself that just because they're online students it doesn't mean that they're not real. Sigh. The internet is weird.


A.

Edit: I posted this, and then thought, "I should include a picture." A few minutes of searching my computer produced the information that I have not uploaded any new pictures since November. I have a bajillion photos on my camera of cool things we did or made in the last year, but they are required to live there for now since--you guessed it--I have no idea where my camera cord is. Don't worry. No tears this time. Instead, here's a Facebook photo I stole from my mom of us camping.



Also, why is it so hot at 1:30 in the morning? It's at least eighty degrees in here! G'night.

Easter Break

Dear Easter Break,

You were kind of crazy for a while, with all that grading, but you were real real sweet, too. I'm going to miss you.

Love,

Anna