Of Moose And Men
The Best Laid Plans Of Both Often Go Astray

As he likes to do, the husband wanted to escape to the movies this afternoon, so we went to see Digger. I really enjoyed it, I don’t want to spoil anything about it yet, but I will note that I particularly enjoyed how any scene with a politician in it was completely washed out, color-wise – pale, drab, dull. Thought that was a fun note.

Grocery shopping afterwards, which was good for him to pick up some stuff for work. I normally do the shopping solo, so he doesn’t get to grab stuff he needs unless he specifically asks me to get it.

Wet day today as the remnants of the hurricane work through the area. Living room is a tad warm without the AC running, but I’m not about to let all the humidity in. Just running fans in the meantime, and waiting for the HVAC appointment, which is now confirmed for first thing tomorrow morning.

The husband needed to go clothes shopping, so after hitting the barbershop for cuts it was off to the big outlet mall up near Baltimore. He did very well with sales, and while I wasn’t intended to get anything I found two pair of casual, non-denim pants. Not bad.

Eating has been off today, at odd times because of the barber visit and the shopping. Debating what, if anything, to eat this evening while the husband takes care of the weekly laundry.

Our downstairs HVAC isn’t cooling as of a day and a half ago. Tech service has been called and after talking to a couple different people they’re sending someone out on Monday to look at it, thereby avoiding the emergency service call they wanted to send someone out today. It’s definitely not an emergency, but we do want it addressed before we go into heating season.

Rearranged some of the legos to make room for the new sets. The husband also went through some of our older, unopened sets that we are not likely to build and is listing those for sale, with the proceeds going into a home repairs account for things like the HVAC system. Timely, that.

Called my dad for his birthday today and we talked for a whopping six minutes. The man is not taking care of himself physically, nor is he using his hearing aids consistently, and you can tell the cognitive decline is well underway. Let this be a lesson, folks, there is a well-documented connection between hearing loss and cognitive decline, and I can attest that it’s a real thing. I feel sad for mom and my brother and his family who are there and have to watch it in real time. Yet another reason why I exercise, because I’m not interested in that being how I go through my 80s, assuming I make it there.

Since we got funded through mid-December it’s been relatively quiet at work (and I sincerely hope I didn’t just jinx it). Random little questions, just enough that I haven’t been able to dig into any long-term projects as yet.

Did manage to finish two books on the commutes today – Strong Ground by Brene Brown and some forgettable fantasy/sci-fi thing that was on Kindle Unlimited. Enjoyed Strong Ground a lot, but that’s not surprising since I’ve enjoyed/found useful her other books. Debating the next ‘serious’ read for the morning. I’ve been reading non-fiction on the commute in to work, and something that requires less brain power on the ride home, which has worked pretty well. I have quite a queue of books, including some started but not yet finished, so I’m going to try and get through those first.

Waiting for the husband to land at National in about an hour, then I’ll grab him from the local Metro. I picked up this week’s comics for him, and thankfully it was a light week, so it wasn’t hella expensive. Catching some Netflix before I have to go get him, and cleaning up some digital properties. I think I’m going to have to switch a bunch of accounts off of one of my email addresses because the local ISP looks like it’s going to be shutting down in the next couple of years. They sent an email saying they’d sold one of their domains; not the one my email is on, but adjacent to it. So, time to switch stuff over.

I needed to refill my frozen lunch supplies (I cook a bunch of stuff to freeze for lunches during the week), so today was all about cooking. Which was slightly ironic because my actual eating was all leftovers from ordering a ton of Chinese food yesterday. Finally trying out the 2 cup freezer cubes with some vegetable beef soup, though even if it doesn’t fit the lunch slow cooker (it should), I can always bag it that way for regular dinners later. But that would be a nice change from the usual mix of squash, fennel & mushroom, rice, and poached chicken. I mean, the stuff is good, and it doesn’t break the bank, but it is getting a little tedious.

Around that I watched a lot of Netflix, and put together two of the lego sets that the husband got me. I ditched the two social things I could’ve gone to today for the cooking (run club and knitting group), which was the fiscally responsible thing to do (eating out is sooo expensive now). Managed to get it all cleaned up and put away as well, so I don’t have to face dishes in the morning. Only thing I didn’t get done is any laundry. The husband does that normally on Sundays but he’s out of town at a conference this weekend and early this upcoming week.

Took about a week off to work on my calves and otherwise let myself rest. I’m intrigued that while my calves were cooked from the start of running, my quads have been fine. I’m chalking it up to a combination of paying more attention to my form, and 9 months of strength training. Before this, the spot on the quads right above and to the outside of the knee (the head of the rectus femoris muscle) would always work itself into a knot that was a bear to untangle. But I’ve heard not a whisper out of it of late. And I’ll take that, even as I spew out a steady stream of curses whenever I work on the sore calves.

Work is work. As I called right after the Mad King’s UN speech, he’s issued an executive order this evening directing agencies to switch from calling it “artificial intelligence” to “super intelligence”. Po-tay-to, to-mah-to. While I’m not a fan of the super left-wing of the opposition party I do hope they wipe his party out in this fall’s election.

The husband’s birthday weekend went well. We attended Baltimore Comic Con on Saturday, ate at his favorite pizza place afterwards. Sunday was Avengers Endgame on the big screen, which was even more fun because the two of us and a friend were the only three people in the theater, so we could point things out without disturbing anyone else. The pinnacle was of course getting the new Lego Enterprise bridge set that came out earlier in the month, though the flat (no rim) serving plate that he’s been asking for for years was a close second (it’s useful if you want to decorate or cut something like a cake without hitting the rim). Oh, and I tried some non-alcoholic beer Sunday night, which I quite enjoyed as a nice option, with no hangover after.

My own birthday this weekend will be quiet because I’m kicking him out for an out-of-town work conference (for him) starting Saturday. LOL And no shut down this time, which is a pleasant surprise.

Metro extended the track work they were doing this weekend into today, meaning I got to take the long way around to get to work. I don’t subscribe to any alerts, so it was a surprise when I got to the station this morning. Just took it as more time to read my book.

It might extend into tomorrow, and Wednesday they’re single tracking part of the way, so I’m just planning on longer commutes.

The husband and I met up on Metro on the way home, mostly avoiding the rain. Got him home in time to grab some packages he needed to send out from UPS and FedEx, got those dropped off at their respective outlets, and then to Mod Pizza for dinner. That was fun – I’ve ordered delivery from them many times (they have vegan cheese), but never eaten in the actual restaurant. Was a pleasant change getting the pizza right out of the oven.

Over dinner I started a discussion with the husband about what retirement for me in three years might look like. I’d be open to moving for his work, so I planted that seed with him. All depends on finances, of course, but if we’re no longer tied to DC for my job, why not? Also had him think about that that might look like in eight years versus three. Or perhaps somewhere in between.

Friday, while still full in my rundown at work feels, I wandered into my supervisor’s office after lunch and asked if he minded if I went home early, “because I really just don’t want to be here.” Heh. He understood, we chatted a little about the current craziness, and I took off for home. Laid on the couch for a bit with cats (the husband was working from home, but between his regular job and his various side teaching and writing gigs he’s swamped at the moment), and generally just vegged for a bit.

Saturday we had plans – the city had one of their occasional bulk trash drop off days that we wanted to take advantage of. Hauled out a ton of old, broken deck furniture, as well as our old bed frame (finally!) and a bunch of paint. Felt very cathartic to get rid of it all. The top deck is now half furnished (an outdoor couch, two chairs, and a coffee table over a rug), but in better stuff that we’re taking better care of (it’s all covered when we’re not using it). Took our friend who helped us haul the stuff to lunch, then the three of us walked over to an arts festival just south of where we live. It was a lot larger than what we were expecting, which was a pleasant surprise. It was also populated with local folks, so not just the same vendors you see every week at the permanent weekend markets in DC. Picked up a drop bowl for the husband, for keys and what not for his dresser, and just enjoyed running into neighbors.

This morning I met up with the local running group, in the same general area as the arts festival. Before we ran they asked us to introduce ourselves and what we were looking forward to later in the day. Favorite answer was the poor parent saying they were going to go home and watch K-Pop Demon Hunters with their small children, as they had been doing since the movie came out. Heh. I said I was looking forward to my knitting group, which led another guy to come up afterwards and give me his email so I can have the other organizer add him to our group. Sweet. The run was a little shorter for me than I have been doing (2.27mi), but given all the rain we got this morning (so. much. rain.) that was fine. Got cleaned up, bought some vegetables for the week, then off to knitting where I made some progress on a scarf for the husband that I had put down several months ago. Back home to make fried rice, start watching Monarch with the husband (I’m intrigued after the first episode), clean up the kitchen, and shortly to crash.

No word back from the financial advisors yet, but it’s also the middle of several jewish holidays so I expect they’re busy and I’ll hear back after those wind down. Which is just fine.

The past few days, and especially today, I’ve just been really down about work. I’ve also been really tired, physically, from all the work I’ve been doing with exercise and running, which is probably contributing. But in reading Brene Brown’s latest (Strong Ground) I’ve been thinking over some of the lessons from the predecessor book, Dare to Lead. There’s one particular exercise she recommends, where you drill down to the 2 factors that really motivate you as a leader. Mine were “Learning” and “Making a Difference”. And in thinking about those this week, I’m really struggling to see where those are kicking in. There’s a little bit of learning, but making a difference? Under this administration? Ugh. And given the direction and partisan polarization that both parties are indulging in (thanks, social media) I don’t really see where it’ll get better any time soon. The Mad King is sure to be nuts, one way or another, and if they retake one or both houses of Congress the other party will just make our (Federal employees) lives miserable as they try and undo some of what the Mad King is doing by flooding us with information requests. I fully expect he’s going to fire all of the “Schedule F” employees (or “Schedule P/C” as it’s now known) on his way out the door. That’s one bullet dodged, since I’m not on that employment schedule, but really, this isn’t what I signed up for when I signed on to public service.

And yes, I know this is exactly what his party wants, to drive off good people, but at a certain point you have to wonder if it’s worth dealing with the dysfunction on a personal level. I really don’t know. I also don’t know what else I would do, but I think it’s time to sit down with a financial advisor who knows Federal benefits and map out what an exit might look like.

In the meantime, I also need a rest day from exercise, so that’ll be tomorrow (and Saturday – I want to check out the local running group on Sunday morning). Based on the stream of curses I let out when I barely touched my calves with the Hypervolt massage gun this evening, they’re a little overworked. That may be contributing to the mood; it certainly isn’t helping.

Sharing some photos of the finished dancing droplets scarf in color way Gloria (as opposed to the previous one in color way Sunfish).

I bought hair clips today. Not because I need them for my hair; I’m far too lazy to keep and/or style much more than the inch (2.5cm) or so on top of my head. No, I bought them for yarn. Specifically, for holding the end of a yarn ball in place so it doesn’t unravel. And once I wind up a new ball or two I’ll let y’all know how it works. I also finished the dancing droplet scarf, but it’s still blocking downstairs, so no pictures quite yet, mainly because the towel I have it on as it dries clashes badly with the colors.

Rest day today from exercise because my male cat uncharacteristically slept on the bed last night and managed to find his way into the middle of where my legs normally go. Not wanting to disturb his majesty (the things we do for pets), I contorted myself into shapes that were not conducive to the most restful sleep. Ah well, it was probably a needed rest in any case.

Comics run this evening, then tried a different branch of the TGI Friday’s chain. The food was good, but we almost left because there were only two waitresses who were both slower than a bowl of molasses in January. A Target run after that, then home to wrap up the evening. Work officially extended our telework through the end of this week so they can finish the cable work, and the husband should be home the next two days as well (which is good because a sewage pipe burst in his work building this morning, and it sounded like the smell was pretty bad). We’re planning on catching Practical Magic 2 this weekend, and hoping it has fewer plot holes than the original (which I love, but which has plot holes you could drive convoys through).