Still alive

Still sick.
What can you do.

Sniff

Well...I'm officially ill.
I've had a bit of a tickly throat and the odd sniffle the last week, but this morning is full out stuffed up coughing badness.
Boo.
I didn't go for my run today (sniff) but at least got out for a walk in the sunshine...it was 10 degrees and sunny skies.
Not too shabby.
And I haven't been sued by the blind lady yet so hey...should be OK.
AND my lovely husband is saying lets order in so I don't have to cook.
I like weekends...

Blinds and falling down.

Well...it's been a good day...except for nearly maiming and crippling the interior designer.

To order wood blinds they have someone come by your house, show you all the woody bits and then measure and give you a quote. And with them being half off right now we can actually afford them...only just...but I've always wanted wood blinds. And they'll even put them up for us (which is good as I have no idea how to). They're just so freaking expensive I never thought we could afford them for a long long time. But we noticed the deal in the paper...so we thought we'd at least have them come by and give us a quote. There's a lot of wood in the house, with the doors, trim and a big wood beam across the main room so we've picked a nice warm teaky shaded wood that matches everything as best we could. We picked hte warmer richer shade over the slightly more dull and boring shade that also kind of matched...I am very excited. I love having real wood all about the place, and this is just so cool. They're lifetime warrantied, so we'll have them working forever. Yay. Income tax rebates are awesome. :)

It all went well with the appointment and such, except for when the decorator left to go home with her things and then at the sidewalk, after our yard (which can be a bit tricky with the stairs and railway ties) she somehow rolled her ankle and fell in front of her car. Rather spectaculartly it would seem...samples falling about on the walk. I ran down to help her up and a nice doctor who was out walking his dog checked here and said she should be OK...but should have it Xrayed just in case.
Eep. It wasn't our fault but I feel bad. If we *hadn't* bought blinds I'd feel like a huge tool :).
We helped her up and she drove herself off so she'll be OK...I imagine she felt as silly as I did. Hope she is alright.

Wood blinds. I'm very excited.

Meep.

Cartoons of us

I can't come to work. I have the ennui...

To try and shake my funk, here is a current update on my current life...currently.

Current clothes: Jeans, brown belt, green Maybe Smith band shirt, green fuzzy hoodie, superstars, black specs

Current mood: I have the ennui. I feel like staring out the window all day...but have no window. So I'm just getting on with things...like a meme.

Current music: Flaming Lips - Soft Bulletin

Current annoyance: Winter. It just won't end. The snow is melting away AGAIN but it's still bitterly windy.

Current thing: Staring at my navel. Seriously. I bought a few belly rings a while back and keep changing them out. And realising I need to do some situps...

Current desktop picture: A picture of a family that is happy because they eat lard. It's an old 50s ad.

Current book: Just finished Neverwhere by Neil Gaman. Love that man...I'm hunting for another book to start. Any ideas?

Current song in head: Cold Brains by Beck. No idea why.

Current DVD in player: Season 3 disc 1 of 6 Feet Under. The first 2 episodes we've seen really don't grip me. They're odd characters but I think BSG has ruined most TV for me...I expect a lot now.

Current refreshment: Just finished a cup of coffee.

Current worry: I'm going to look at wood blinds for the living room tomorrow. I've always wanted ones...and to have some that match the big wood beam in our house would be cool. I'll sniffle if they cost too much tho. They're on sale so I'm hoping we can swing them...so nice.

Current thought: I've got the urge to do something, but don't know what. I have a list of things I want to start as long as my arm but I just can't bring myself to start any of them. Suppose I"ll put them all on paper in a hat and just pick one and get at it. Perhaps that'll banish the ennui...

Slow day and it's just begun

I woke up early this morning for no good reason and can't get back to sleep. It's my "not run" day and my shoulder still is a bit sore, so I have no workout...just a very snuggly cat and too much time on my hands. I've tried to sit and look out the window but I'm ansty...came to check my email. That's a whole 5 minutes gone.
Hmmm...I think I'll just go into work a bit early. Not much to do there, but at least there is a loaf of bread and some grape jelly for some breakfast. Perhaps I'll sit and look out the window there for a change of scenery.
J has been working nights and I'll be glad when he's home tonight...the cats aren't very good at conversation :)
Have a good day all.

Critters abound

There are thousands of birds back from their winter lands. If I had a bird paranoia I'd be inside and covering my head a lot - it really is like the Hitchcock bird thing...*magnified* in number.
Seriously...there were over a thousand robins and sparrows flying about whirling clouds in the neighborhood last night while I was talking on the phone (yes I counted each and every one...). On my run this morning down by the river there are dozens of ducks and geese back on the river already and everywhere I looked there were clusters of fat little robins seed hunting in the rising sunlight. Even the crochety pair of geese that live under the bridge every year and come out to hiss at you when you run by without stopping to feed them (oh the nerve of me and my not having breadcrumbs!) are back...it's so odd and wonderful to see and hear so many birds in the neighborhood. I even saw a bluejay this morning. The bats are back too...I've seen them fluttering about at dusk trying to snack on the clouds of mayflies by the weir.

Critters! :)

Robot friends

Geek has made friends with the Transformers lately.
I think offerings of food helped...

Brrrrr

Meh.
It's suddenly winter here again - blizzards and -15 with snow.
It's very heard to train for a 10K run when you can't go outside :). Ah well..it has to melt eventually I suppose. I'm sure by the run in June it will have melted...knock on wood. SO far I"m up to about 6K or so, with 7 minute stretches of running. Not too shabby.
I did my taxes last night...what a thrill. We're getting abit back, which is nice, but we have a crappy little calculator, so it was a team job, with me reading off numbers and J adding them and doing each calculation 2-3 times to be sure the calculator wasn't screwing up. At least it's done now...any $$ we get back can help with repainting the living room this summer. I'd like to get some new blinds too, so we'll see how it all comes together. I may regret it once I'm halfway through it all...but it is the last room left in the house to redo, so I'm forced to deal with it. We'll have to rent scaffolding for the one wall and to do the ceilings, but in the end it will be nice. The whole house was the same shade of brain melting beige when we moved in...we've been filling it with colour room by room. It will be nice to be "done" the painting soon. We're sort of tactfully ignoring all the nail holes a the moment. The previous owners had a thing for covering the walls with stuff, so I'm sure it'll take me a whole day just to fill holes...but in the end - spiffy.
Must go...my lunch is over and I have much to do. Bye.

Impudence. Won't you come out to play?

You know what?
I had a lovely weekend.
We were supposed to go to Banff, but the weather was horrid and driving conditions were nasty so we stayed home...driving through the mountain roads in a blizzard is not my idea of a good time. We stayed home and relaxed...went out to a great dance party saturday night and ordered in chinese food sunday. I am so very mellow from a relaxing weekend reading, drinking tea and snuggling on the couch, listening to the new Orb album (which is very good BTW). It was nice...not at all what we planned, but, as it turned out, exactly what we needed.


Gotta run...so to close off things...here is a sweet photo of my two little nieces together from the weekend. Are they not adorable? :)

Labrats anonymous

Blah blah blah.
I ran about 6 K this morning...I'm a bit tired.

I'm having an "thing" with my current research project.
I fixed one big problem with it and another little one has arisen out of the mist to make faces at me and fart in my general direction...Damn.

The thing about working with living bacteria, DNA and cells is...well...they are alive and have (as crazy as it may sound) an attitude some days.
After days like today, offering someone fries with their burger sounds rather appealing...WAY less things to go wrong. :)

But then, like today, I bang my head and use my little brain of mine to solve the problem and feel like the Queen of town after.
So it all evens out in the end.
Such is the joy and curse of research science.
All in the days work of a labrat...I confess I'm hooked no matter what.