2's Day, somewhat unbalanc ed

Space intentionally left blank. And right blank.

Woke up around 5, Spook was on the bed, I was feeling achy and not able to find a position where I felt I was getting enough air. Breathe-right strip was not doing its job very well. Slight panic triggered by that phrase "difficulty breathing" which is a red flag for us heart attack prospects. But it wasn't that kind, it was just my nose feeling pinched. Deep breaths through my mouth helped calm me down.

Went into the kitchen and took a blood sugar reading just in case it was an insulin reaction. Just the opposite, it was 248, so I shot up some high-test.

Back to bed, fell asleep probably close to 7, alarm woke me at 7:30.

Somehow between doing stuff online and just being slow I didn't get to work until 9:30.

More frustration at work, getting conflicting info about two of the tests I'm running, and whether a feature is missing which should be there or not. I couldn't find it in the requirements, but the lead tech did. My copy was somehow missing that whole section.

Lunchtime was scheduled to be Costco to return the HP "Envy" laptop, but as I was getting close my insides decided it was time for the immodium to wear off, and I just barely made it to the nearest restaurant's rest room in time. I would not have made it to Costco's, which is up a long ramp and all the way across the warehouse.

Back to the car, got the laptop, only waited in line at returns for 5 minutes, but it took them 20 to process the return. Since I bought it online they needed to use two workstations, and she also had to pull out the unit and compare the model and serial numbers on the unit with the ones on the box with the ones on the order. When she was done and a manager did the register key twist dance, twice, the only question was whether I wanted cash or a store credit. They can take Discover Card online, but not in the store, so they had no way with the in-store system to refund the money to the card. You would think they would fix that. Anyhow, my psychic powers told me that cash would take a long time, we're talking almost $700, so I got store credit, which turns out to be a prepaid credit card which can be used in store or online.

Back to work, did a doc editing job for Boss, and installed new software on my current machine, then went back to running tests on the new machine until at about 5 pm it decided it no longer had a video card. Unplugged it, re-seated the video card, plugged it back in, and it still failed. And there's a red light on the front where a green light belongs. Tried some other things until a bit after 6, decided I'm not in the office tomorrow so I'll wait till Thursday to ask the hardware guys to check it.

It was raining moderately hard, enough to put the intermittent wipers on the fastest setting. Plan A if it was not raining was to go to El Camino and get some items from CVS and Safeway, but I can do that tomorrow do I just went straight home.

Spook is now meeting me at the carport door, sort of. She stands in the door frame (there's no door, just a frame) between the kitchen and the laundry room, and the carport door is at the other side of the laundry room.  As soon as I come in she makes a leisurely dash for the door, which I close before she gets there.

Caught up on TMZ, had the last orange turkey leg and some veggies, and watched the Graham Norton show. He gets the most amazing talent on there. That Keaton guy (Batman/Betelgeuse) in the first segment and One Direction with  Sir Ian McKellen, who apparently is a fan of theirs and they, of course, of him. He's a wonderful talk show guest. He said that it is young children who know him as Gandalf, the adults know him for XMen. And he said it was amazing because none of those children were even born yet when the first Gandalf movie was made. He did an interpretive reading of the lyrics of one of One Direction's songs, and it was very different. And amusing.

Onto the PC, made copies for my USA sisters of a CD from a long ago friend called Back In Seattle Again, and a copy of another of his CDs, this one parodies based on old movie posters he has. That one is going to my very macabre theater buddy Jeremy, because it is dark and twisted and amusing just like him. He owns a murder mystery theater company, and is the star of many very violent and bloody indie movies, having been adopted by a local filmmaker.

No deliveries today, none expected until Thursday - the SDD and RAM for the laptop. Unless the NFL shop surprises me and gets my custom Seattle 12 t-shirt done early. Or ships the Raiders Howard t-shirt separately.

It has been painful getting out of a chair and walking, all day. Sciatica. I looked it up on Kaiser's web site, and the symptoms fit.

Plans for tomorrow:
Sleep in
Take Mathilda Ave to El Camino and do some lightweight surgical shopping
Petfood Express, finally need indoor cat food and another bag of litter, and the 20% off coupon they gave me at 9Lives expires at the end of the year.
Do some reading
Maybe get a massage.

 

Unconscionable, yes. But...

The massacre of children in Pakistan hurt me to the core, but it also reminded me that throughout history, people with weapons, but only a small following,  have secured their place on top of the heap by genocide.

Mostly shopping

And staying in bed.
Woke up at 5 am again, this time I really did have an insulin OD, Hgl was down to 69. Ate a Klondike bar, then three scoops of mint chocolate chip ice cream.

Back to bed, it was easier to get to sleep. Woke to the alarm, which was set to play a Thai pop divas CD. This one is a very good compilation. The bad news is most of the tunes and singers are ones I already know,  the good news is I like the selections from them, and I have discovered one new (to me) voice which I will be ordering more music from.

Picked up the Nexus, which was fully charged, meaning to do some reading and web browsing, but it would not respond to touch. So I picked up the Samsung, which was a little slow to respond but most of that is it wants a solid press, where the Nexus wants a light touch. Early during that exercise Spook jumped up on the bed just as I was getting up and I knocked her off. She got the wrong message from that and wouldn't come back up.

11:30 or so I finally did my morning routine, at noon-ish my Hgl was up at 168, which is a tad high but not too far from the 150 ceiling I'm shooting for.

Not raining, took the CDs to the mailbox, and the Pet Food Express coupon to the car and drove to the one in MV which their web page said was the closest to me. It sort of is and sort of isn't. The Palo Alto one is more of a straight shot but the one they suggested had a CVS and Safeway right next to it, so that one won.

Halfway down the block I did a U-turn and went back home to use the facilities, remembering the near miss from yesterday.  PFE is a yuppie store, they only stock Healthy food. There's a fridge with paleo and raw food. I did not look, but would not be surprised to find fresh killed mouse. I bought a brand of dry food called "Wellness" which had ingredients I would eat, but probably not from a bowl on the floor. Their selection of litter is very small, they only had two flavors of World's Best, which were the same price so I got the multi-cat variety because it's supposed to repress odors more.  They had a lot more and better accessories then the chain stores, and also a smaller but more intelligent selection of toys. I got a 4-pack of golf ball sized soft balls which Spook can bat around or carry in her mouth. And a soft fuzzy animal toy which has a tail long, wide and sturdy enough for her to toss around. After I paid for the stuff, it was time to hit the john again, and the cashier let me use theirs, back in the employee space.

Next stop was a short walk to Safeway, which had everything on my list, so I didn't need to go to CVS. The highlight of that visit was limes. Big, ripe limes almost the size of handballs. I haven't seen any that good in a year or more. And the lowlight was having to push aside half a dozen "cheesy chicken" pot pies which had been shoved in front of the beef pot pies. Marie Callender makes their bird pies with white meat, which I am not find of, their beef are the only adequately edible ones. The pot pies have not been truly edible ever since they went el cheapo and did away with the metallic browning grid embedded in the carton cover.

Heading home, time for another U-turn because I figured since I was already most of the way there and it was still working hours, I may as well go to Milk Pail, and get some exotic cheeses. They had the sheep milk soft ones I like, and a couple of types of goat brie. And for once they were not out of sourdough baguettes.

Home, put everything away after one more trip to the loo. Since the immodium is not doing its job, I popped some anti-lactose pills. Should have done that when I scarfed that ice cream.

Spent some time vegging in front of the TGV. Also cleaned Spook's water fountain - there were several little dead bugs on the bottom. No idea what that's about.

Did some Facebooking, checked LJ but there was nothing new since this morning. Blocked someone on Flickr who had "favorited" several of my Reims photos, because she doesn't have any photos of her own to share, and she's using a very stupid pseudonym.

No deliveries today. Nothing useful in the mail except the receipt for the mortgage, which is sent in the form of a bill. Go figure.

Discover Card keeps sending me pre-approved forms for my new-student loan.

And today's loser recruiter email was for a contract job proofreading technical marketing copy in North Carolina.

Logged into work email after work hours and half the team took the afternoon off. At least two of them were leaving before the party. One of them had told me yesterday he was going to do that, for about the same reasons I was. Tomorrow I'll find out what was served because there will be leftovers set out at lunchtime. Or a lot of empty pizza boxes in the trash cans.

Plans for tomorrow:
Work
Possible 1-on-1, but maybe not because there are two other meetings scheduled
Thursday Night Football, the two worst teams in the league play each other, it should be quite a battle.
Toshiba parts delivery expected, I may spend halftime copying my data from the current drive to the new one. The new drive is supposed to come with ghosting software.