Last Friday was rough.  In my brain I know that if a company has bad news for you they wait until Friday.  But I made it through Friday unscathed.

We get Veteran's Day off, but I still needed to be up to get kiddo on the bus so I took advantage.  I had a list of things I wanted to achieve - including hoping on to get a bit of documentation work done - and got to them.  I got through my morning and successfully exceeded one goal - instead of completely clearing 2 cabinets I did 3.  I threw some old things out, I gathered some things to give away on the local facebook group.  I even inventoried the Christmas gifts purchased and tucked away in my closet, so I know where I stand.

I was going to run out and grab some lunch and then come back to hop on the computer for a bit when I saw the text.  It prompted me to log in faster and I saw the stop work order.  They're still trying to work through the appropriate channels and processes.  I took the newly found time to go to the adoration chapel to cry it out and pray.  I remain a bit sick to my stomach (it keeps churning) but I did sleep without any memorable dreams.

Today I almost don't know what to do with myself.  I've spent some of my morning already updating a resume.  There are lots of other things I could get to around the house but I feel like I need to be at the computer waiting for some additional message.  It reminds me too much of a different time.  I hate that I've had to rely 100% on me for the past 23 years.  I hate how fragile stability and comfort can be.  I'll be okay and have resources, but it's still scary.

There is a crack - inside and outside - running the whole width of my slow cooker crock.  I'm so sad.

No news on the other worries.  Still waiting.  I'm having my moments, but I'm finding peace.

I won't lie, I'm struggling with fear and anxiety.  I don't want to - I have faith that God will take care of things regardless of how it goes, but I remain scared.  I hate it not only because of the way I feel, but it so blatantly flies in the face of my belief that I will be cared for by our creator and I can't seem to squash it.

I'm not good at waiting.  I like to prepare in advance for all things.  I've done some legwork in that regard, but I know I have to draw a line just short of execution on things.  It gives me too much time to think and therein lies the problem.

I don't think I mentioned that one of my work computers crapped out too, so that throws off my routine, typical activities, and flow of the day.  I'm sure this is also fueling things.  It'll be good to get the new one later today and get stood back up.

On a scale of 1-10 how much do you worry?  Is it just naturally where you land or are you able to self-soothe in some way?  What do you do to manage your worries?

It's a waiting game now. We wait to see if there will be a gray area that can cover me.  I'm doing my best to not allow the situation to distract me, there is after all still a lot to get done every day.

This weekend, so far, has been quite a pleasant distraction.  Yesterday my sister and her husband came in for dinner and a bit of quality time.  Today kiddo and I went to the high school pool for a few hours followed by a visit to the library and a walk down our main street (Pike) for the trick or treat being put on by the businesses.

The foster kitties are doing well.  The one that was the most leery is now the first one to run up for attention.  They're good kids, a bit wild, but they keep each other in a good place.  All three are now listed and available for adoption -- here too we wait and see when things happen..

This morning a technical meeting went REALLY well.  I was so pleased I decided to reward myself with a quick lunch out. I needed to pick up something at the pharmacy too, so I ran out.  Got back just in time for another call - and had the wind knocked out of me.  I've been knocked over harder... I'm mostly looking at you January 2003 and November 2021. It's something I can't control and worrying isn't going to help.  If you're inclined I ask for your prayer to leave my worry at the foot of the cross.

No alarms, thank goodness.

The evenings are definitely getting cooler.  I still have a few peppers growing that I'm trying to bring to fruition.  I pulled most of the tomato plants last night as they were done.  I think two remain with numerous green fruit.  The only other things left are the green beans, which blows my mind because they continue to produce, and my few beet plants, but if what I pulled earlier this summer is any indication they'll be long and spindly not bulbs.

Halloween decor outside is good to go but nothing inside yet.  I need another full day working in the basement and I need to get through the bins that were moved to the garage to purge more goodies and put the remaining "away".

The other news is we had three more kitties join us as fosters.  The rescue held off until Mercury and Venus' adoptions were finalized and that just took place.  These three were with one of the group's leaders who also had their mother.  They're fully vetted already, so a bit older than what I typically get and what a mixed bag!  The girl, Leona loves pets and she has a beautiful coat; she is totally ready, I just need to get good photos of her and get to know her more to create a write up.  The first boy, Frankie, needs a bit longer to adjust but is friendly enough and also likely ready to roll.  The second boy, "Mama's Boy" is just that.  I guess he hung tight to his mom and thus didn't socialize as much, he'll need some time to decide I'm cool.  We'll work on it and get him a new name.  I'm thinking Marlon Brando to stick with the Italian vibe and to keep the MB initials.

 After the battery swap the whole house went off one more time as we prepared to climb into bed.  Fortunately, it gave us peace until 5am when one room started to chirp like it had a dead battery.  After church today I made the run to Home Depot.

They also had extra batteries for the new mower for $99 as end of season clearance (vs $329) so I picked up spares.  This was not something you could order online, so I had to go to the store - and figured I'd just get the detectors while there.  Note that online if you buy 6, which I need to do, you get 15% off making it cheaper to buy individual detectors instead of the 4 pack.  They do not honor this in store and customer service couldn't care less when you point out the online discount stating "it depends on the item".  Online customer service told me I should have talked to a manager.  Gee, thanks.  So I overpaid AND ended up with one that already had the batteries activated.  Regardless, we instead used the second carbon monoxide detector from the previous replacement scenario in the basement and I needed the base from the smoke detector to do it.  Whee.

Hopefully those two issues are resolved.  Now I'll just sit here and fight with my tv and internet trying to get it to stop buffering.  I still may lose my mind.  It's already been way too frigging expensive of a weekend.  PBJs for dinner this week.

Last night I mowed part of the lawn but ran out of juice. This morning the fully charged batteries did nothing to start the mower.  eff.  I could have invested in another GreenWorx mower and potentially been able to keep using those batteries and have the existing chargers to help me -- but that would be ordering it online. So I ran to a local place that features Toros.  I ended up coming home with another electric mower, Echo brand.  This time I went with self-propelled to try and help me out a bit on those super hot days on the sloped part of the yard.  It would have been nice if the existing mower could have made it to the end of this mowing season, but here we are.  I guess the old one had an ok run (over 9 years - thanks blog).

Back in June when my fire alarm went off at 3am I vacuumed everything and have had peace ever since.  Today that came to an end.  As I sat at the kitchen table relaxing for a moment it panicked me out of my seat.  Another run through the house proved everything safe and clear.  It turned off within two minutes. Then peace... for a couple of hours.  At that point it started sounding again running for approx 10-60 seconds each time it went off. After about the 5th time I decided to change every friggin battery (even though none of them have beeped to indicate an issue).  I just hope it doesn't terrify me awake tonight.

I guess it if goes off again the next step is replacing all of the sensors.  If you recall I replaced the one that alerts "fire" or "carbon monoxide" and doesn't have a replaceable battery a while back (didn't manage to timestamp this one in my blog).  That for sure had a 10 year life span.

I'm GenX I'm not supposed to give a crap what people think about me.  I wish I didn't.  I more so wish I could not care what people think of my kid, or rather that she not have people dismiss her in any way.  Truly that's the bigger part.  Hate me, I'll dislike it if I didn't do anything to earn it - but I'll deal; please don't treat my kid less than.

There's the group of folks that repeatedly ignore me at work or treat me like crap.  There's the circle of moms and kids at kiddos jiu jitsu that I/we aren't a part of.  There's even neighbors that continue to separate away from us at every given opportunity.

What makes someone just never fit in?  Of course I've had my circle of friends my whole life.  I love them and I wouldn't trade them for anything.  But why do some people just seem to be who everyone wants to be around and others are cast off to the side feeling out of place?

7th grade was 40 friggin years ago, why didn't it end?

No new (or former) foster babies yet.  I spent my Labor day holiday laboring in the basement.  I made great progress sorting canned goods so I'm not hunting for things and unsure of what I have left.  I should be able to send the kid or the guy down to grab something for me too without it being a thing where only I know where things are.  I also tossed some snacks that have gone out of date since kiddo got her braces and can't eat them.  There were also things put aside, perhaps for the rescue's garage sales?

Other than that the weekend was pretty uneventful, but that's ok.  With the rain we've had lately I could do with uneventful.  While working in the basement I dumped the container I put under the pipe where the water comes into the house - it was full, so it's no longer a one-time thing and I'm glad I left the container there.

Happy spooky season!  It's time to load Steve our friendly skelly into the car and to start decorating.  Hopefully I'll be more into it than I was last year.

My doctor visits all went well last week, and we're trying something.  We'll see how it goes.  In the mean time, I was reminded in the middle of the night with a terrible leg cramp what a beotch all of this is.

I am waiting to get final word - I heard that one of the former fosters was getting returned (for a second time) due to kids with allergies but they had also slated to bring me three kittens this week.  Either way, I will be adding a bit more mayhem to my days.

We've settled in to the new school year routine.  Frankly, I hate it.  I don't want to share a bus stop, I want it to still be just us two.  I'm now officially embarrassing her when I want to give her a hug and a kiss goodbye.  It's happening.  Make it stop.

If I didn't 100% know better I'd think I had PMS.  Today was rough.  It was all little things, not big things, but it all _felt_ rough, amplified, chaotic, and frustrating -- and it should have been a good day.

I'm feeling 95% better, a bit of a cough still and I had a moment of woozy today, but I'm good. So tell me why when I got up today I had lost all memory of the correct mass times at which church.  In my mind, we should NOT head to the church closer to the house because there is no longer mass there at the time we liked (except that is the Sat eve mass), so I headed to the main church in the parish to walk in as communion is starting.  I look up times and misread it and was half way to the 3rd church before I realized eff, that's the church I thought we shouldn't be going to and had to turn around - either way I'm destined now to be late for the 8:30 mass.

We get there just in time, but mentally I'm a wreck.  Did they change the times while we were away on vaca for ONE WEEK?  Surely not, they always give warning.  What is going on?  This doesn't jive with my brain at all and it leaves me in tears - the whole mass, crying, can't stop, whilst we stand at the back because we were riiiight on time to catch the blessing.  In my addled brain this is assuredly another sign in my deteriorating memory that I am headed for early onset dementia.  That at any point is always a fear after living with a senile great aunt in our house when I was a teenager.

I leave there and head home, we have my sister and her hubs coming to celebrate kiddo's bday with us, lunch and some ice cream.  My frustration with myself lingers and I can't shake it all day plus my eyes hurt, they are dry and itchy to the point that I can't see right even with my glasses.

After our day together has ended my favorite egg goes about replacing the garbage disposal - have I posted that that started to leak water a while back, stopped, and decided to start again the day before vacation?  Oh yeah, good times.  So yesterday I went and spent the money on that after the new stove was finally delivered two months later (and well after the cutoff for the submission of the rebate).  Oh - and I noticed the bottom drawer doesn't sit straight on the stove, so that's great.  Anyhow he seemed to get the disposal in without a hitch and then the dishwasher wouldn't run (glad I wanted to start it before he left).  Turns out the easiest troubleshooting is the solution and he hadn't removed a plug - dishwasher is now running.  This is all after he arrives today with my fixed expensive hairdryer in tow that pulled apart at the plug when I went to unplug it.

He leaves, I sit down and now my roku remote doesn't work.  New batteries didn't fix it, restarting things didn't fix it... as I type this the tv et al crashed and rebooted and now it's working again. The universe needs to slow its roll, I'm not hear for it right now.  With the medical appointments lined up for this week, I don't need this pace to continue.  It will encourage me to discuss my overall menopausal changes with my female care doctors - namely memory among others.

Alaska!  We left on the 9th to Seattle.  I wasn't expecting Seattle to be as clean and safe feeling as it was.  We had an easy direct flight and success using the light rail and buses to get to our hotel to drop off luggage.  The hotel was a two bedroom suite since we had my favorite egg's parents with us and it worked out quite well.  There were several eateries nearby but we returned to the one (Queen Anne Beer Hall).  We walked to the space needle, which I was at when I was maybe 6 or 7?  It is definitely not what I remember inside, but it remained pretty cool.  Then we took the bus to Pike's Place market for a bit of a stroll.  Didn't see some of the cliche sites on my list, but it was nice to walk around and relax a bit after a long day of travel.

The next morning we were up and headed to the cruise port to meet Anthem of the Seas.  When I tell you I didn't know how to pack I mean it.  It's supposed to be colder (50-60) this time of year, especially on a moving ship but I'm always warm.  I tried to have a nice balance so I could layer.  I didn't need too much of the layers or my waterproof jacket - the weather was amazing with the exception of our second day at sea, which was very foggy, but then I got to hear the horn every minute or two as a result.  We saw blue skies and the tops of mountains.  There was so much sun we could barely see the Mendenhall glacer when the ship spun around in the channel to give us a view.

One day at sea at the start allowed us to adjust to the time change further, then we were in Sitka where we took the free shuttle into town and we walked adventuring on our own.  We went to the Totem Trail and it was a beautiful forest to walk.  A quick stop at a local grocery store, and then a local frequented place for some of the best (and most expensive) fish and chips I've ever had.

At the end of the day I had a voice mail, our tour for the next day in Skagway was being cut short due to a landslide:  https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/mudslide-south-klondike-closed-aug-11-9.7229001 fortunately it didn't happen while we were on the other side of it and instead of a full day tour we had a half day tour.  We road the railway up the mountain and bused back through Chilkoot Charters - and it was beautiful and peaceful.  Not much for wildlife - you needed binoculars to prove the one spot on the hill was a goat.  The shorter tour gave us time to walk the local area here too and I had a lesser fish meal and a drink at the Skagway Brewing Company.

The next day was Juneau, but in the early morning we cruised in the channel and saw the mendenhall glacier.  As mentioned it was hard to see from the ship, so I was really glad we had planned to shuttle to the area where we could then walk a trail to Nugget Falls.  It was all stunning.  On the way back we got a quick treat at a local coffee place and I didn't stop to get king crab at Tracy's but I probably should have.

Finally, Victoria BC which was also easily walkable - we meandered to some of the local sites like a government building and the Empress Hotel then to a park before we stopped at a local place and had the most delightful rootbeer with ingredients that don't aim to kill you:  https://phillipssoda.com/soda/captain-electro/

As mentioned there was then a day at sea and a return to Seattle where we headed to the airport and after only a small delay in our flight we were on our way (pretty smooth).