Insomnimusing: Allons-y!

I was facing a very busy schedule today, but oddly, every single thing went faster than expected, so I'm home at a reasonable hour with time to cook, do some laundry and do my yoga too. I went to work and got through posting the day's stories to the web pretty quickly. After my boss came out and handed me a new assignment that's officially an ongoing whole new job, I was in no mood to hang around any longer. I'd already requested the afternoon off, and with 10 comp hours to my credit already, I decided to leave at 11:15 a.m. I surprised the girls by coming home early, and told them to get ready to go. We have a stray who had kittens in our garage 10 weeks ago. One of them injured her foot last week. Infection had set in, and I wasn't about to watch her die a slow, agonizing and completely unnecessary death, so I resolved last night to take her to the vet. Fortunately, my short morning meant I could do it today. We got the kitten ready and I took the girls in tow...

I'm making a point of relaxing this Sunday morning. I slept in for a while, waking at 10:30 a.m. (that seems to be the limit of my "sleeping in," as I wake up by 10:30 regardless of how late I've stayed up). I have about 10 minutes left of morning now. My summertime hectic schedule has continued unabated. Last weekend, the girls and I took Book to the Columbus Zoo for his birthday. It rained most of the day, but that didn't prevent all of us having a good time - or all of us getting some moderate sunburn. We drove home during some horrible thunderstorms, which fortunately I was skirting the edge of most of the way. That was bad enough. It definitely tried my nerves. This week, Gin had her cheer practice on Monday, then the girls spent the afternoon with my mother on Tuesday. They got to swim, and I got to stay at the office until 9 p.m. finishing a special section I was building for the paper. I was very proud of how nice it looked and got lots of praise from ev...

As I face an uncertain future (isn't it always, though?), I find myself thinking a lot about the past lately. I think about the opportunities I had and the opportunities I could have had but never pursued. I wonder where I'd be right now if I had. I remember having so much potential. My career choice was a mistake. I know that. I could have been anything, done anything. My marriages were certainly mistakes. There's no question there. My first husband was on impulse and was meant as a means to escape. Instead, it just left me more trapped with fewer choices left to me. It lasted only five months, but I knew it was a bad idea even before I said my vows. I just thought, maybe, I could pull it off. My second marriage was far worse. He was unworthy even to date me, but I fell for a charm at first and then had this overwhelming need to fix him. That's pure foolishness at the outset. It was pure misery. I've been thinking about the ones who got away, too - the ones I lo...

Oh so NOT! Summer has officially, or unofficially, arrived, as the girls have finished the school year, and the days' temperatures top 90 degrees. We've found very little time to get out and enjoy those days though. Of course, there's my work - my long days' journeys into nights for many, many nights. We've got another vacationer out of the office for the next two weeks, so naturally, the pile on my plate has grown. It's not so bad at the moment though. I've certainly had worse. We also haven't gotten the call about the inspection for my house yet. "Within the next week or two" has stretched well beyond, and we're finding that keeping up with the clean is nearly as hard as getting it clean in the first place. No surprise there. We've never had time. Twenty large bags of garbage made their way to the curb over our two-week cleaning spree, and we had at least eight bags of clothes that went to the donation box. We've provided a ne...

The girls headed out the door yesterday to go to school, and a moment later, Gin popped her head back into the house to tell me that someone had run over our mailboxes (the four units of my building have four boxes on a single post.) I went out to look at it and saw that the post had been completely snapped in two and the boxes were on the ground. Great. So I finished quickly getting ready for work and headed out. I called my landlord when I got there, and he informed me that it was my neighbor, who'd called him about an hour ago to let him know that she'd backed over it. "While I have you on the phone....." Those words are never followed by anything good, have you noticed? "Mom's decided to sell the apartments." The owner of my apartment died on Christmas Day. I was wondering what was going to happen with my place, but enough time had passed that I thought I was safe. You see, his sons had been managing his properties ever since I moved in 10 years...

Another season of the Barclay's Premier League has ended, and though it did not end quite as I would like, it did have me transfixed right up until the last minute. Manchester United were written off to win the league title just before the last match of the season, but during that match, QPR led Manchester City against all odds, so the possibility of retaining the title was renewed right up until the last minute when Sergio Aguero scored the winning goal in the "other" match. Even at our final whistle, we stood a chance. It is somewhat satisfying to know that if QPR had just managed to hold on to that draw, we would have won on points, while City's win was achieved merely on goal difference. A second-place finish by only a hair's breadth is not too damn bad. And truly, what an exciting way to end the season. My only problem is this: Since football is such a big part of my life, what am I to do now that the season's over. Let's see. Tonight, I take Gin...

It's a rare day indeed in this household when a financial surprise is a good one. Today was one of those rare days. My daughter checked the mail after I arrived home from work and handed me an envelope marked from the child support agency. I pay child support for my son, Book. I used to receive child support for my son, Pooh, but he's 21 now, so that stopped long ago. I had a debit card for Pooh's support, onto which the state deposited my payment each week. I had a total of $4.77 left on it when Pooh turned 18, which I just never ended up using because, you know, it's a debit card, and it was $4.77. I never felt comfortable saying, "Here, use $4.77 on this card and then I'll pay some other way for the rest of the cost." So I just left it sit there. Apparently, that card has expired, or was due to expire soon, because I received a replacement in the mail today. I remembered, "Oh yeah, it had a couple of bucks on it so they sent a new card. Oops....

I'm struggling to make it through my Monday at it's not yet 10 a.m. Granted, Mondays are never easy, but the return of the insomnia makes it especially difficult. Saturday night I even had a glass of wine, which normally helps, but I lay in bed until probably at least 4 a.m. unable to doze off. Naturally, I couldn't fall asleep and had to get up early in the morning. OK, I suppose I didn't HAVE to get up, but it was a 7:30 a.m. kickoff for the Man United match Sunday morning, and I can't miss that. Well, I did miss kickoff, but I managed to drag myself awake before the first half hour had passed. Almost wish I'd slept through it….. Last night it struck me that I was just suffering for no good reason as I again lay in bed until the wee hours. I took a sleeping pill, but it was quite late by then, and any sleep I managed to get (which was still far too little) is not offsetting the additional lethargy brought on by sleeping pills taken too late.

Hey, so you all know I'm a total shoe hound, right? I'm also cheap, cheap, cheap! No, I'm FRUGAL. I economize. In short, I hate to pay full retail for anything. I love a deal, so here's a good one I wanted to share. Check out these sassy, fashionable boots at a whopping 74% off the regular price! So what's that come down to in cold, hard cash. Just $26. Yes, it's true. :)

So, it's a little bit depressing when you have something exciting coming up, and there's no one around to share the excitement with you. I'm at work. I'm going to see The Fray in concert tonight. (!!!!!!!) I'm surrounded by sexagenarians (and up) who don't even know who The Fray are (yes, I used the British practice of a plural verb for a collective noun. I prefer it. Sue me.) In other news, the neighborhood stray who adopted us as a kitten has had four new little ones in my garage. Born April 15, I'm sure it was very taxing. (I truly apologize for that horrible, horrible pun - but I'm not deleting it anyway.) There are three tuxedos and one calico. Very cute. Sign up now, and get your own in six weeks. :)

I was concerned Sunday night when it started up again. I was lying in bed, exhausted, staring at the inside of my sleep mask and waiting for rest to finally come. Somewhere around 5 a.m. Monday morning, it finally did. Unfortunately, my alarm sounds at 6:45 a.m., so there was little true rest to it. It's been a long couple of weeks. Or months. Or years, really. But particularly, the last couple of weeks have been tiring. It seems every time I come in to work I find that another coworker is off for one reason or another, and I'm always the one asked to fill in. The choice is obvious, really. I can do more in the same time than anyone else in the office. I'm not being arrogant. Frankly, I wish it weren't so. It's terribly frustrating. I watch my coworkers half-ass their way through the day, and it's fine with the powers that be. Me? I can't even force myself to slow down to their speed. I've gotten fed up, to be sure. I am tired of always having the extra ...

Spring has arrived! I know because the following traditional signs are here: 1. The daffodils are in bloom. I don't have any around here, but I've passed them in my car on my way to work. 2. There's an annoying fly buzzing around in my room. 3. Munch is now wearing the same skirt for four straight days. Previously, she wore the same pair of pants for four straight days. 4. The backside of the wing mirror on my car is covered with a layer of dead bugs. 5. It's gorgeous outside. I'm still hunched over my computer holed up in my room. But the curtains are open. And it's hot in here. 6. I can no longer stop at the pet store after the grocery to look at the fishies because all of my frozen items will melt. 7. I'm lookng forward to Manchester United winning the Premier League title - but dreading the season ending and not having my footie anymore. :( 8. I have to dress in layers, so I can take them off on my way and from work and pile them on in the office where t...

Sometime back in October or so, I started getting emails from Accuweather warning me that this was going to be a winter to make history. The gist of it: brutal cold and snow measured in feet. Usually, the warnings say one or the other - brutal cold and not much snow, or tons of snow but not as cold. Anyway, I never look forward to winter, but this ominous forecast I was definitely not wishing to see come true. Then at the tail-end of October, we got a sudden burst of snow. We knew it wouldn't stick around, but it hinted at an early beginning. Then ... nothing. Well, nothing as far as "winter" was concerned. We had rain and wind some days; we had sun and warmth some days. In fact, it was quite as "autumnal" as weather could get for the midwest. And it kept going, and going, and going. Christmas came and went with the background of a dead and brown landscape. The temperature hovered around 40 degrees most days, and the rain continued a couple of times a week. Then...

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of Walgreens for SocialSpark . All opinions are 100% mine.   For several weeks, every time I'm in my car, I've been hearing radio commercials from various pharmacies saying, "We still take Express Scripts." I've wondered what this was all about. Now I know.   It seems that Walgreens' contract with Express Scripts expired at the end of last year, and Walgreens and Express Script  attempted to negotiate a new contract, but the negotiations were unsuccessful. As of Dec. 31, the contract expired, and, therefore, Walgreens is now excluded from Express Scripts' provider network. All Walgreens pharmacies and Duane Reade pharmacies in the New York City area are affected.   Having read Walgreens side of the story, I've seen that they negotiated in good faith with a genuine effort and desire to help their customers be able to have the lowest  health care...

I'm a big fan of loyalty and points programs. I don't go out of my way to earn big numbers most of the time, knowing that my points will just keep adding up until I can use them for something. My latest favorite is the Delicious Rewards program from Lean Cuisine. This is not a promoted or paid post. I don't even get referrals. I'm just loving it and want to share! I just discovered Lean Cuisine last year. Of course, I'd heard of it, but I never really thought it could be any good, because... well, you know how those frozen meals in a box are. And this was "diet food." How good could it be? Boy, was I surprised! This food's actually good! I mean REALLY GOOD. What started out as a what-the-heck-I'll-give-it-a-shot-it's-on-sale purchase has turned into my every-single-day-at-work-lunch-time-staple. So, since I was eating all these meals, I decided to start collecting those codes on the boxes. And then I got my boyfriend started eating them. (He...

I've reached the end of my vacation week, although I still have a weekend ahead. I imagine I'll be able to return to work at least marginally recharged, having spent a considerable portion of my break sleeping. I also managed to get many, many loads of laundry done, in addition to some other things that needed doing. I don't really look forward to returning to work, but at least the nightmare end-of-the-year scramble is over. I won't have to spend my work days doing my own work while trying to do the jobs of two or three other people at the same time. Honestly, after the previous eight weeks, I deserved this time off. I was also able to watch a midweek Manchester United match, which was a loss, but still, it's rare that I get to see a match in the middle of the week because I'm always working. I was also able to go to one of my daughter's basketball games (she's a cheerleader), which I don't ever get to do during the week because they start too early...

After eight weeks of severe overwork and abuse in office, I'm doing something this week that I've never done before in the last 12 years - I'm taking the whole week off. It's not costing me much vacation time, as I have almost two days of comp time built up from the past two months and yesterday was a paid holiday. It seemed the perfect opportunity. Yesterday didn't really count much. I stopped in to the empty office for two hours to gather my material for my entries into the annual AP contest. This is the first year I've bothered to enter. I'm not much into seeking awards for my work, so I've never bothered before. Today, I turned off the alarm after the girls left for school and turned off the ringer on my phone so I could sleep undisturbed until I woke up on my own. That was an especially nice treat. I slept until noon. I'll be filling the day catching up on some household work until this afternoon, when Munch and I will go into Sidney to see Gin...

I made my munchkin some candy sushi for her Christmas party at school. I kept it a secret until she watched me make them. Sushi (real sushi) is her favorite food, so when she saw these, she was ECSTATIC!

I'm a Who-phile, a Whovian, or just another Who down in Whoville who cries boohoohoo during the far-too-long breaks of this most excellent and engaging series! Check out this work of brilliance! (I've even forgiven the typo of "Shelock Holmes") And just click on the graphic to see the original if your screen is too narrow to view it in its entirety. Via: CableTV.com

Every day seems to grow more frustrating, with more being piled on me just as I've reached - and passed - my limit. Mondays are supposed to be the day for catching up at the office, because we don't publish a paper on Tuesdays. It never seems to turn out that way. I only had one item on my schedule, so I thought I would be able to get some of the assignments done that I have coming up and then leave a bit early to try to get rid of some of those "vacation hours" I have remaining. No such luck. I came in to find an assignment to attend a meeting at 8:30 tomorrow morning. But my boss didn't know where the thing was supposed to be. Well, more precisely, he thought he knew, but he was wrong, and I knew he was wrong. I also had no contact information. So I called the location where the meeting was held six months ago - the latest agenda we had. They didn't know a thing. So I called the local police chief, who would certainly be attending the meeting. Got his voicem...