click click click sigh

Left work, excited to spend an evening with MyFriendJen at the Celebrity Forum lecture tonight. Call her on the way to my car: "Hey, since I'm parked two blocks from your place, want to meet there, catch up, grab some dinner before the lecture?" Get in car, turn key...

...click click click click.

Dead battery. Dead dead, shuffled off this mortal coil, nailed to the perch. Bleedin' demised.

Call Jen, let her know I can't make it. I look for my State Farm 'roadside assistance' info...what's this?? The roadside assistance code isn't on my insurance card...but I'm pretty sure that I have the coverage. Hmmm....call agent, leave message asking her to confirm that I have it.

Call AAA. "Hi, I'm Alex. Oh, I see a Stacey Gladman in our system, but I'm afraid your membership expired." Doh. But very, very, VERY nice AAAlex looks up a local towing company for me on Yahoo and gives me the number [that was some incredibly cool customer service...thank you, AAAlex].

Call MyFriendJen to let her know, and she offers her AAA card. She comes by [since I'm only two blocks away], calls AAA for my car, and then hangs out with me while we wait. And she even brought me chocolates [my birthday present...extremely yummy Godiva choccies].

[Have I mentioned how much MyFriendJen rocks?? It's worth repeating.]

Car started with a simple jump [hurrah], but turns out I'm in the sixth year of a four-year battery, so need to replace it, don't trust it, et cetera. Had to keep car running for half an hour or so to let the battery charge, which meant I couldn't make the lecture [darn it!!], since I would be late, and I wouldn't trust the battery afterwards anyway.

Puttered around for a while, sending positive thoughts to the battery. Made sure to park on the street and not in the garage, just in case it doesn't start up again. Tomorrow will be the necessary chores of trying to start car, calling dealership to get car in as soon as possible, dealing with car if it doesn't start, and all that fun stuff. Oh yeah...and renewing AAA.

Now to get some dinner, then most likely go out and see if car starts [out of sick curiosity], then come back in and catch up on life around the house, medicate the bronchitis [still there, but not coughing as much, which is a truly wonderful thing], and then sit down to breathe for a bit [as much as my congested lungs will let me, of course].

Isn't being a grown-up *fun* sometimes?? :^p

stupid stacey

Whoops. Didn't see the 2-hour parking limit sign, got a Palo Alto parking ticket. Whee.

Parking in Palo Alto for the day is annoying...everything close to work is a color-coded 2-hour zone [and that's a daily limit, so you can't just move your car to another spot in the same color zone]. Most of us end up parking 5-6 blocks away, on residential streets, and even then it's tough to find a spot with so many people vying for them. And walking from/to the car to/from the office is fine when the weather is nice, but once it starts raining, I'm sure it will get annoying.

Looks like I'll have to look into buying a parking permit...

lung update

Voice is a bit more audible, though I now sound like a Florida retiree who has been smoking 4 packs a day for 40 years ["So I says to Gertrude, he's a BUM! A no-goodnik!" <draws deep drag on cigarette, then waves it around expressively, gesticulating wildly at Gertrude> ].

The flip side is that there is a bit less air coming through [lungs are constricted], so while I have more bass, there is less volume. But you know what? It's a change, it's different, and I choose to see it as progress...I'll beat this thing yet!!

productiveness

Still coughing, voice was mostly gone for most of the day, though some relaxing at home after work brought it back for a bit. Made some time to kick back, stay in the moment, not worry about anything but what was right in front of me...amazing what a difference that made. I took advantage of it and got some grocery shopping done, then followed up with some domestic chores when I got home: putting groceries away, cleaning out fridge, doing dishes, taking out trash and recycling, feeding the cat, putting away random things that were lying about, packaging up some goodies to get mailed out to loved ones, pulling together stuff for work tomorrow.

Now to medicate and try to get some rest...

a sweet quote

Watching 'Bones' tonight, and one character said to the other [while proposing]: "I believe that if two people care enough about each other, the rest of the world disappears when they are together."

I like that. I'd like to find that...

4am

cough.

cough cough cough.

coughcoughcoughCOUGHcoughcoughcough.

coooouuuggghhhhh.

<grumble>

speaking of the past...

Today (whoops..."yesterday" now) would have been our 17th anniversary.

Even though I miss those more innocent times, I can be honest enough with myself now to admit that I wasn't happy. *We* weren't happy. But it was easier to keep moving, keep going, heads down, blinders on...

...until finally the balance tipped and we overcame the fear and inertia and we broke free. Yes, it was hard. Yes, I was scared. Yes, I fought to keep things status quo for far too long, at what ended up being a very high price. And oh yes, I was afraid to leap into the unknown.

But to paraphrase Neil Gaiman: sometimes when you fall off a cliff...

...you end up flying.

pluses and minuses

Spent part of tonight chatting online with a long-time friend, talking about times past, present life, and what the future might bring. He knew me as I was before, years before I had to rebuild, and loved me as I was...then saw me as I changed, grew, grew up, became who I am now, and loves me as I am.

It was a bittersweet conversation, as we relived heartache past, decisions made, paths not taken. I realized that while I like who I am now, I hate that it came at the cost of innocence and naivete. Talk about pros and cons...I wouldn't be who I am now if I hadn't gone through everything I had, but then I wouldn't have some of these buttons, landmines, and traps that came with those experiences. We talked regrets, pain, woulda/coulda/shouldas, hindsight...you know, just the light and frivolous stuff <chuckle>.

He and I don't get a chance to talk like this much anymore...it was nice. It's been years since we've seen each other, and I'm not sure if he would recognize the person I've grown into...

...but then I realize that somehow, he seemed to always see a bit of that person in me, even back then.

liquid lung

Or, as MyFriendJen calls it, lung butter. Yes, the bronchitis is now past the dry, hacking cough stage and into the disgusting, juicy, deep, hacking, phlegmy coughs. And fever. And little sleep. And aches. And the voice that goes from sultry Kathleen Turner to squeaky Minnie Mouse to scary Bea Arthur, with no warning in between. Fun!

I love that the descriptions for cough medicines talk about making more "productive" coughs. As if your coughs had just been lollygagging around, goldbricking on company time, futzing about...but now, with new patented CoffMore(tm), you can get those lazy good-for-nothings off their keesters and make them start producing!! Expectorants for all, huzzah!!

Off to medicate and get those coughs producing...hup, two, three, four, hup, two, three, four, move it, move it, MOVE IT!!!

fun with fever dreams

Fever dreams are very, very strange...then when you add medication, the brain of a geek, not having eaten for 16 hours, and no air-conditioning on a 90+ degree day, you get a weird landscape of gaming, hiking, installing a 24" flat-panel monitor, upgrading a computer, sex, finding a GPS unit [and using it to navigate the gaming world], fajitas and chicken philly cheesesteaks, showing off the new 24" monitor to fellow geeks, plus other stuff that maybe it's better I don't remember.

I need stronger meds. Or maybe no meds. Sheesh.