I can't believe that trail misled me AGAIN!

I slept in again this morning.  It feels so good!  It will be hard to get up on time tomorrow to go in to work.  C'est la vie.  At least I had a few days of slack. Next week will be a regular work week, but I just checked the calendar and noticed that I have a tea date with JD on Monday the 16th.  Day off = woot!  Although this year that's a floating holiday for me, so I don't have to take it off if I don't want to.  I was not informed about our new holiday schedule until after I made the reservations, so a holiday it will be.  Lots of long weekends (when it is dark out a lot) agrees well with me.

Today I thought maybe I'd do two laps around the park, for a total of about eleven miles.  I still felt great at the end of my first lap, but did not have the mental fortitude to revisit ground I had just walked over for hours.  Instead, I did some trails around the interior of the park for an hour.  I got lost (again!) on the Dogwood Trail.  Some day I am going to go there with my GPS and find the daggone trail intersection that I have missed EVERY TIME I've tried it in the last few years.  Maybe I'll start out clockwise instead of counter clockwise.  Maybe I'll take flour to mark the trail.  I don't know exactly what I'll do, but something's gotta give.  I am tired of that trail getting me turned around.

So today's hike was around 9 miles rather than 11.  I felt great at the end, though.  Probably should have done a couple of loops of the Azalea Trail to wrap it up.  Instead, I texted JD to meet me for a meal at Chanan's.  Hiking around in the cold boosted my hunger.

I always get cold after eating a meal post-cold-hike, so today I tried out something different.  Before I left the park I put one of my new insulated Skhoop skirts on over my warm hiking tights.  It definitely slowed down the chilled feeling to the point where I didn't feel the need to wear my warm upper layers in the restaurant.  By the time I got home, I was chilly enough to want to keep my layers on for half an hour or so.  But the skirt made a big difference for me.  I must remember to carry it on future winter hikes, and it is definitely going in my backpack for cold weather backpacking trips.  I think it will help a lot with Cold Butt Syndrome in the sleeping bag.

I know I said today would be chili day, but lunch was held near dinner time.  So tomorrow will be chili day.  And the day after that, and the day after that.. I love that a pot of chili feeds me for so long.  The habaneros keep me warm.  So do the beans, though the officemates appreciate it less.

Tomorrow: chocolate habanero chili

We've had a very quiet start to the year.  Our get together with neighbors ended well before midnight.  Just before the hour, JD walked up to me and showed me the seconds counting up to midnight on his iphone, so we were on time with our kiss.  And that was it.

Today all I've done is laze about and pack up Christmas decorations.  And make chili.  Originally I had thought about doing a brisk 12 mile stroll today, but when I woke up with a migraine I chucked that idea.  Maybe tomorrow.

I'm sad to see the lights go away, but then again I don't want to live with them all year.  The house is a much less merry place without all the twinkly lights, I must say.  I think I'm having post-Christmas let-down.

I think I'll go curl up with a dog and a book.  Happy 2012, y'all.

And it burns burns burns, the ring of fire

This is the last thing I saw before leaving for work this morning:

I have no legs, you guys!  I have no legs!

I can't believe you'd rather go to work than stay home with me.

You can imagine how hard it was to leave.

There was a fire drill at work today.  I missed it.  Or most of it, anyway.  Since I arranged with the boss and the manager to come in late until I'm over Lyme this time, I arrived at the office building after the alarm started going off.  It took me a while to find a parking spot, because security had for some reason blocked off two or three possible entrances to the parking area.  By the time I parked and got out, the alarm had been going off for five minutes or so and the building had been vacated.  I opted not to go in, find my yellow vest and helmet, and check on all "my" offices.  Screw it.  You want me to be a fire warden, you hold the fire drills when I'm actually there.

This equipment leads me to believe that they expect me to work, or be helpful or something.  Hmmm.

So I felt kind of guilty and kind of grumpy about that.  Also, after standing there in the parking lot with everybody else for several minutes, I realized that I was sunburning.  Frack!  I moved over into some shade, but my left ear and the left side of my neck were already red.  Stupid sun.

Probably everybody else was happy they held the fire drill on the first day in a while where it wasn't raining.

I spent my day laboriously creating accounts on various computers.  It's not so easy to do these days, especially without console access.  First you have to disable the password policy settings that make accounts lock as soon as you create them.  Then you create the account (probably 8 lines of commands), then you create a home directory, then you login as that user.  Then you reset the password policy.  Lots of typing.  Fun times!  While I was there I checked to make sure the other password policies were correct (in many cases:  no) and added some hosts to the allowed list.

I was actually happy to go to a doctor's office as an alternative to doing that all afternoon.  Having a relative stranger peer at my crotch, grope my chest, and discuss my sex life with me is preferable to the work I was doing.  Which should give you some idea of how much I enjoy the particular work I was doing in the office today.

This evening I alternated between reading log files (fascinating.  not.) and cooking chili.  JD or I (I've lost track) have had a hankering for my chili.  Our chilis do not resemble each other, so it's a very specific craving.  My officemate brought in a bunch of habaneros for me, and I used them in the chili.  Verdict:  excellent!  Even JD agreed that my chili was almost as good as his, which from him is high praise.  Generally  he won't even agree to call mine chili.  He feels that it is a stew, almost but not entirely unlike chili.  Tonight's however, was chili, and darn good chili.  I'm letting it cook down more until bedtime, as I like it to be closer to sludge than to soup.   I anticipate chili that will blow the top of your head off after it's had a chance to sit in the fridge for a day or two.

When there are bees in your head

When you're super tired and buzzy, it's best just to go home.  A good meal and a nice rest make a world of difference.

I'm not sure that a bowl of nuclear chili and sleeping with El Nutso Muttso qualify, but it's all I got.

Delicious barley beverage

I'm drinking a hot beverage.*  And why am I doing that?  Because it's 47 degrees out.  That might seem warm to you if you're in Minnesota, but it was nearly 80 here earlier this week and I have not adjusted.  All my surfaces are cold.  You can feel the cold through my clothes if you put a hand on me, as JD is wont to do.  Fortunately he usually has enough warm to go around. **

I look forward to the change of season, because it means I get to wear different clothes.  They're the same clothes I had last year, but different from what I wore last week.****  Fuzzy sweaters, warm socks, hats, scarves, gloves.. it's all novel for a little while.  By April I will be desperate to wear shorts.  And to do five loads of laundry instead of ten.  Winter clothing is so bulky.

This week has contained something new to me.  Headaches.  I get migraines, yes, but on a schedule.  I don't get, you know, HEADaches.  Like other people, I mean.  Only the left side of my head ever hurts.  But now I'm like regular people.*** I've been squinting at teeny weeny eye-strain-o-vision type while trying to make sure that three columns of similar numbers are all correct.  I've heard that this can give you a headache but I've never experienced it before.  Fortunately it's not bad.  More of an annoyance than anything else. 

With luck tomorrow will involve no numbers.  What it will involve is chili and candy.******  I'm making chili because JD and I disagree on what chili is.  He makes a very nice stew, but it's not chili.  So I must make it myself.  (And it's DELICIOUS.)  He had the nerve to suggest I put it in the ... what do you call those things that slow cook your food?  With a ceramic pot and a heating element?  One of those.  The thing is, chili is supposed to cook down.  Those ceramic thingies just don't do it for me.  There needs to be browning involved.  Preferably a layer of starch actually bonds to the bottom of the pot.  That's when you have good chili.*****  We have habaneros so it should be spicy.  I hope so.  Ideally the top of my head will tingle when I eat it.  Less ideally, I'll probably have a a burning ring of fire the day after.  I consider it a sacrifice to the gods of chili.

*Pero
**So much so that he goes to lengths to get cold before bed so he doesn't roast under the covers.  I'm not sure we're of the same species.
***In this instance only.
****The cat just introduced Christmas lights into the coat closet.  He has lit the Cat Cave.  I am still speculating as to whether or not this was on purpose.

Notice the strand of lights now tucked behind the closet door

Did he do it on purpose, or not?

 

 

*****As long as you're not the one cleaning the pot.
******Oh god, candy.  I hope we have a lot of trick or treaters on Sunday or I'm going to be wearing a bag of candy on my thighs in a week.