ImPastaBle!

Mal wanted plain pasta or ramen (NOT MAC AND CHEESE) and we don't have any, so I decided to make pasta from scratch.

It's not difficult, per se, just it has to sit a while so it takes some time. AND I don't have my pasta roller anymore (when I moved into the trailer, I had to let some stuff go), so I had to roll them out by hand and it is DIFFICULT.

My noodles ended up being thicker than ideal, but whatever. It was fine and Mal said they were "okay" (meaning he's eating them).

When I explained that maybe I'll get a pasta roller again (I can get one to fit onto my Kitchenaid mixer) so the pasta will be easier to roll out, he said, "Now you know what it's like to be an Olive Garden worker."

So I guess he thinks Olive Garden is hand-making all of their noodles??

One more thing I just thought of about Mexico City that I LOVED!

When we're traveling, we try to take public transit. Even if we drove to the location! When we were in New Orleans, we parked our car in a garage and took buses and ride shares when buses weren't a timely choice (or it was raining and walking to a bus stop would have been miserable).

We did this in Mexico City, as well. I'd hoped to take the metro more often than we did, but going up and down stairs is a challenge for James, who was on the tail end of a gout attack and we did not want to add an Achilles tendonitis flare-up to that, so...

We did take quite a few buses (including trolley buses that operate on an overhead power grid, which is neat; and some buses with their own lanes so that traffic only sort of impedes their progress).

A couple of times, the drivers managed to get food in ways that just delighted me. 

The first time, we were heading out of CDMX to Teotihuacán. After picking up at all of the stops, the driver rounded a corner in a neighborhood, got out, ran to a stall, and they had a bag waiting for him. He hopped right back in the bus and we kept going.

Another time, we were heading down a main thoroughfare and got stopped at a light. The driver motioned to a vendor, and at first I just thought she knew the other woman. But before the light changed, the vendor hopped on board, gave the driver some food, and the driver handed her payment.

These moments and other times of people recognizing each other at a crosswalk with 200 people waiting for the light to change helped Mexico City feel less like a sprawling metropolis and more like a series of small towns whose borders are murky. It was very charming,

First time for everything, and how I'm saving money now that it looks like this financial situation is permanent

About a year ago, our local library was hiring a part-time library aide. I applied, the process took months, and I never even got an interview, even though several people acted like I was going to.

Unfortunately, that employee did not work out and got fired just before the holidays. 

I'd learned that he apparently had gotten the job because he was able to do tech support and explain computer stuff to the library patrons. Knowing that, I brushed up my resume to include a WAY BACK job from more than 25 years ago where I... provided tech support to casinos and other clients in Las Vegas.

This time, at least, I got an interview. I hadn't heard anything when we left on vacation (two months after I'd applied, and several weeks after my interview), but when we got back, I saw a social media post and knew immediately that someone had been hired.

I feel like this person is a better fit, but I'm kind of bummed because we could have used the money, part time as it was. Plus, I could walk to work. I am not ready to get a job where I'd need to 1) buy a car and 2) leave Mal in a town alone. 1431 closes down too often, and I am not ready to make an 11-year-old responsible for navigating a forest fire or no electricity when it's 100 degrees out.

Incidentally, I might never have had this worry but in 2021 when we had a bad freeze, there was a guy from across the highway who ran into Cedar Park to check on his jewelry storefront and by the time he tried to get back home, the road was closed and troopers would not let him through, even though he explained that his 10-year-old was home alone. Our electricity went out and the roads were impassable for days. I have no idea how that turned out but I would like to avoid that situation.

So, the "first time for everything": I have gotten every job I have ever really wanted. I have even been told no, they weren't going to go with me and then came back to them with something my dad (an HR specialist) mentioned they did wrong in the interview and rather than deal with a lawsuit, they did end up hiring me. They also tried to frame me for theft, but I outsmarted them (on accident, which I guess isn't "smart" per se but just fortunate that I was as pragmatic as I was and didn't use or take home the key they gave me one day because I never needed it).

For an overachiever like me, a job rejection hurts. I can't imagine the dozens of times James went through it over the past two years. Ugh.

NOW. 

I've been poor before, and while we're not in crisis yet, I want to avoid that. Our expenses outpace what James makes by quite a bit. So here are some things I'm scaling back on that I've done before when money wasn't plentiful:

1) We're back to Supercuts or Great Clips. I'm very lucky that my hair got wavy because it's easier to cut and style now! So it's $25 cuts instead of $60-80 cuts for me. James never gets his hair (except that time I had a mystery shop specifically for a man's salon where they do face massages and stuff; it was cool!) and D pays their own stylist, so it's just Mal and me, and we both get our hair trimmed about every 9 months. 

2) No more boutique food splurges. Piroshky Piroshky is a fabulous bakery out of Seattle. They travel down to Austin once a year or so, and we used to order $100ish worth of items from them to enjoy for a week or so. No more. Same thing with Doughees (which seems to be closed, anyway, but from which I used to order once or twice a year), Fat and Weird Cookies, and any food subscription period. Instead, I try recipes I find online and have recently made conchas for the first time, and a big old cookie with chocolate chunks and caramel chunks. I'm thinking about making an Easter basket cake for Easter. We're not buying expensive treats anymore.

3) I'm not getting energy drinks, even as a splurge. They're $1-2 per can (more usually, but I only got them on sale even when I was buying them). Instead, I get Great Value Energy Drink Mix, which is just under $.20 per serving. What's crazy is that Celsius sells a powdered drink mix but it's still over $1 per serving! Stop!

4) I would grab take-out for the whole family once a week or so, and I have just stopped doing that. Maybe once a month now? But usually, I'm just cooking... unless Domino's has half price pizza and then only Mal and I are usually at all excited about that. With James and D often working full days, I'm having to do lunches, too. D would just suffer without at-work calories, but James works near a bunch of food options, so we're trying to prevent temptation (it helps that his lunch is only half an hour and honestly, it's hit or miss whether you can get a full meal from Whataburger in that time frame).

5) We're definitely cutting back on our trips now that we're back from Mexico. We can't make up the $20k a year I'd have made if I'd gotten the library job, but we can recover a chunk of it by reining this in for a while. I'll be on the lookout for sales and deals, of course. But we'll be staying closer to home for a bit.

One good thing in that regard is that one of Mal's friends moved into our neighborhood earlier this year, and they're having a great time running around being big kids. Yesterday, they'd gone on a walk and when they came back, I was surprised to see a third friend with them... she lives on the other side of the lake, and I was very confused about how she'd joined them, but apparently her parents had driven her over. Having home and the 'hood be a social outlet makes staying home even more appealing.

6) I stopped taking Minoxidil a few months ago. I'd started it when I was losing a LOT of hair, I thought because of perimenopause? I was just going to take it until I'd gotten through to menopause. But what I realized is that I was probably losing hair because of hyperparathyroidism, which I don't have anymore, thanks to surgery 2 years ago.

I went through this whole cycle of when I started taking it, my hair barely shedded! I started having baby hair, and that was a drama. Then after about a year, my hair started falling out at what I'd say was a "normal" rate, and I wondered about whether the meds were still working. I changed to a topical rather than a pill, and I was still losing some hair. So I decided that I could save $175 every 5 months by just stopping and see if maybe now that my hair is wavy, I could absorb some hair loss without it being so shocking. 

I had what I think was an extinction burst where I lost A LOT of hair but now it's stabilized and it's fine. Plus, I've had a lot of talks with myself about how I got to a place of body neutrality where I don't feel like I need to do anything about my weight. I don't wear much makeup (saw a video of me from a few years ago yesterday and it seemed weird that I had eye shadow on!). I dress how I want to. So why was I so caught up in the hair loss, which is also a normal part of aging? I guess I'm just a hypocrite.

Ha ha. Here's a picture of money. I posted it because I was trying to think of something to go with this theme, which is... money. And also, last night Mal was showing James something on his iPad and accidentally dropped it on his face, knocking a baby tooth loose that wasn't ready to come out before. But it's probably going to happen pretty soon! He's currently trying to save money to buy a $80-ish LEGO Star Wars set. This is another change; he's going to have to save up for it on his own because he has so many LEGOs already and we just can't chip in this time. Wish him luck!

More CDMX!

Continuing with random observations:

8) The kids are working! Lots of people have little stalls or stands or they just take up space on the sidewalk selling things. I've seen kids playing around their parents while they work, but I've also seen them trying to get people's attention, helping display stuff, and just now we saw a small child carrying a mop bucket down the stairs of our hotel to help his parent, too.

The metro here has separate cars for women and children, and recently I saw a lady asking if when she visited the city, her 15-year-old son would be able to ride in the women/children car with her. People were incredulous. One person said, "That car is for unaccompanied women. You'll have a man with you." It helps me see how much "younger" 15-year-olds are in the US than here.

9) Wash cloths aren't really a thing. We had to ask for a couple, and the gentleman at the front desk took a minute to understand what we were talking about. We did get a couple, but when they were dirtied, they weren't replaced like the towels and shower mat.

10) People walking their dogs in Centro Historico seem to carry a large plastic bag with several pieces of half-sheet paper in the bag. When their dog does their business, they use a piece of paper to pick it up and put it in the bag. That way, no matter how many poops your dog(s) has, you only have one plastic bag!

11) Hot carrots are awesome.

12) Shoes get really dirty. The hotel where we're staying now even provided shoe mitts and little sponges to buff our shoes. We need them! I walk at home, outside and off-road, and it's not the same thing. I guess it's a combination of the pollution falling to the ground and just a lot of outside life?

13) I had read before we came that if you don't speak any Spanish, to stay in the touristy areas and you'll be able to get by okay... but I don't see how! We have toddler-level Spanish and have made it with effort... but there has been only once that we were even offered an English menu (which we declined), and maybe three or four times in over a week so far, someone has switched to English when talking to us. Overwhelmingly, everything we've done has relied on Spanish, including Uber drivers asking exactly where we were going even though it's literally in the app. I'd say that if you're traveling to Mexico City, study Spanish for a while first! 

James started Duolingo about a year before I did, and I started with French just to hit the ground running. After we got back from Montreal in May 2024, I switched over to Duolingo. After about a year of just that, I started listening to the Duolingo Spanish podcast, then other beginner and intermediate Spanish podcasts. Some were lessons proper, and others were just people talking or telling stories.

If I'm having to rack my brain to order for Mal at Subway, I don't see how someone having no Spanish could really have a good time without much frustration on the part of both the visitor and the vendor or customer service professional.

More later! 

CDMX!

I had a whole thing written up about our travel from Jonestown to Ciudad de México, but let's get real: No one cares.

We're having a great time. We've already seen so much and eaten such good food. We've found the people to be kind and forgiving of our meager attempts to communicate in Spanish. 

I'm too tired to do a whole round-up, but here are a few random thoughts I've had:

1) WOW, these people know how to drive. A lot of streets have no lines. Many intersections are crosspoint of 5 different streets. Traffic lights seem to be suggestions. However... everyone seems to be getting where they're going pretty safely as far as we've seen. I'm GLAD we didn't try to rent a car!

2) I feel like I'm seeing a lot more people walking with canes than I usually do, even in densely-packed urban areas. Thinking about that made me realize that Biblioteca Vasconcelos has some of the most overt and neat accessibility infrastructure I've ever seen in a public building like that. There are tactile "rows" on the floor that show where to go for someone with limited vision using a cane. They have ridges but when there's an intersection or turn, there is a tile with bubbles instead of rows. They go throughout the library including into the restrooms. Outside of the braille room, they have a gorgeous tactile sculpture of a seaside beach with very delightful detailing. Yay for accessibility. 

3) Nacho cheese Doritos in Mexico are more peppery than nacho cheese Doritos in the US. Mal thinks they're more spicy, James said he tastes a bite. I only ate one and what hit me was that it tasted more like a pepper tastes.

4) I was prepared not to be able to find public restrooms (at least for free use) but I think it's even harder to find public trash cans! I've located a few, but mostly we just carry our trash until we get home.

5) It's interesting to see how many buildings and homes have their own roof-mounted water "towers" to deal with the inconsistent water availability here. 

6) I don't understand how Uber drivers make any money when the price of gas is more than twice what it is in the US, and the rides are less than half the cost the same rides would be in the US.

7) The Health Ministry isn't playing. 

We got some room snacks and they have big old health warnings about excessive calories, sugar, salt, and saturated fats. Doesn't stop us from eating them, but it is interesting.

I'm sure I'll have more thoughts but that's it for now. Que tanga un buen dia!

Update, almost 2 years later: my neck

 Remember this?

It's that time back in May 2024 when I had a bunch of throat hardware yeeted to save my health and maybe even my life!

Briefly: diagnosed with hyperparathyroidism in early 2023 due to labs indicating high calcium followed up by labs showing high parathyroid hormone levels. Took a while to work through referrals for bone density scans, ultrasounds and a nuclear scan, needle biopsies, etc. before I finally found a parathyroid/thyroid surgeon who took care of everything. In the process, we learned that I had papillary thyroid cancer, but not until it was already out of my body and everything was good.

I just had labs done and the goodest news is that there are no thyroid antibodies in my blood anymore (and there haven't been since I've been tested starting a year after surgery), which means my body isn't fighting tumors because they all got removed! Yay!

But also good news is that my parathyroid hormone level is within range, meaning my three remaining parathyroid glands are doing their job.

My thyroid stimulating hormone is still a little low, but this is the first time it has been detectible since my surgery. This is because after having thyroid cancer and the removal of the thyroid, I was put on a suppression dose of synthetic thyroid medication to reduce the chances that any tumor material might get "fed" and grow. When you're overmedicated, your body doesn't send out thyroid stimulating hormones because you have plenty. That's not a good solution long-term, as being overmedicated can of course have negative health outcomes.

BUT this means that, as we've lowered the dose, we've allowed my body to move closer to equilibrium. My T4 free level is within range, but if it were just a little bit lower and my TSH were just a little bit higher, we'd be in that sweet spot and everything would be just peachy.

I don't have any symptoms from overmedication that I know of, and just like with my original diagnoses, we're just going on labs at this point. 

I feel really fortunate!

PS That picture was also from a few months before I realized that my hair was curly and I don't know how I missed it! 

Or maybe THIS was the "best day ever"?? /s

Today was a day off for James.

It was also the third and final day that D had an appointment before work. 

It was also open gym for Mal.

The kind of stuff I see every morning, but this was specifically today.

I got up, walked, and then was getting ready for my day when I heard an explosion and our power went out. 

As I was reporting that, I got a message from D that the car had crapped out, they'd gotten it pulled over, and once it was off, it wouldn't restart.

They got an Uber to take them on to their appointment, so I started getting ready to go pick them up. I asked James if he wanted to go with me to see if he could restart the car before we had it towed somewhere.

During this, I asked if Mal wanted to go with us or stay home. He decided to stay at the house until I reminded him that without the internet, he wouldn't have a way to get in touch us, so he elected to accompany us.

We went to the restaurant where D had parked the car, we couldn't start it, and I called AAA. James and Mal stayed and had breakfast while I went out to get D.

D's appointment took a while, so in the meantime, Mal and James got the car squared away, walked across the street to a grocery store, then went to the bank to order some pesos for our upcoming trip. From the bank, they could see a frozen custard store and decided they needed that.

Mal and James were walking across a parking lot to find a bathroom to wash their custard-y hands when we found them. We then came home, D went to work, James got some day off rest, and Mal and I hung out in his room for a while. 

Now it's pretty early but I'm very tired. The garage said they'd maybe get to our car Saturday but it might be Monday, so it's a good thing that D doesn't work at Ross anymore and can walk to their work now. 

Oh, and our electricity was restored while we were out and about. I had loaded the washing machine (with the second of 3 loads of wash I needed to get done today) and turned it on before we left, just in case the power came back on whilst we were away. It worked! The basket of clothes was clean and ready to dry upon our return!

Best day ever?

I feel like yesterday was a banner day for Mal and a couple of his friends. 

First, we had our library group. We met at the library where the kids played games. Then we went to the park as usual. 

When that was over, Kona had already asked to come over, which is always fine. But they also wanted Caleb to come. He was with our group for a couple of years then moved away for a year. Not only are they back, they are just a few blocks away so he and Mal have had a great time playing in the neighborhood.

We all walked back to our house and for the first time ever, Caleb's mom let him stay at a friend's house unsupervised! 

They all had so much fun, then about an hour and a half in decided to walk over to Caleb's house.

Kona's mom said she loved just roaming the 'hood with friends and I know Mal does, too!

After everyone went home and had dinner, they all three got online and hung out. They have a gaming group they've kept up during the year Caleb was gone.

Love love love to see these relationships flourishing. 

Guess where I am.

Did you guess? If so, congratulations! You just won an all-expenses-paid trip to the next paragraph!

I am at the mall on this very rainy Saturday.

But I'm not shopping because I'd rather stick a toothpick in my ear.

Rather, I'm sitting in the food court whilst these two kiddos do their kiddo thing.

I believe it's both of their first time to be let loose without family to window- and birthday shop on their own.

I'm fortunate in that Mal is a pretty mature kid, and he has some mature friends. I wouldn't trust every tween in this way, but these young 'uns got it.

It brings back memories for me of walking around Central Mall in Fort Smith, Arkansas, as a teen. I loved Coach House Cards and Gifts. They had such beautiful trinkets that I could never afford; but I still enjoyed staring at the figurines with the crystals and dragons and mermaids. Also, I LOVED humorous gift cards. There was also a big "pool" in the center of the mall with four separate fountains. It added some ambient noise to quiet the hubbub of the masses, and it made the whole place smell vaguely of chlorine.

Before that, when my mom would go shopping at Walmart, she'd give me a couple of quarters and I'd play the PacMan arcade game in the entry vestibule for half an hour or so.

We're at that stage where it's time to give Mal some slack to play with. One of his friends recently moved into our neighborhood, and he's walked to their house to hang out a couple of times already. That was after his solo excursions during the icy few days we had last month. He'd walk around for half an hour, check in, and go back out. He's showing himself to be pretty responsible in that respect.

By this time next year, I'm really hoping that his youth group (all kids roughly the same age, +/- a year) will be pretty fully autonomous. I enjoy the parents in that group (as opposed to all of the parents I ignore at most of the other places we go; not because there's anything wrong with any of those moms, but because I've already seen that when a homeschooled kid grows up, I'm not likely to be friends with many of those other parents), but I think giving the kids the opportunity to make their own decisions, take some risks, and even make bad decisions in a pretty safe environment is definitely the move.

If I won the lottery, I wouldn't tell anyone; but there would be signs...

Let's say I suddenly had unlimited money. What would I do? Here:

1) Take care of all of the deferred maintenance on the house: replace the rotting boards on the porches (probably with low-maintenance Trex, since we're filthy rich here), paint the exterior, replace the flooring in the bathrooms and bedrooms, patch and paint all of the walls, etc. I'd probably have in-floor heaters put in the tiled areas (bathrooms, but maybe remove the wood from the cooking part of the kitchen? We've dented it multiple times dropping ceramic and damaging the surface).

2) Might as well pay the house off, as well.

3) I'd have Ruggables all over the place. They have such neat designs, including subtle (and not-so-subtle) Star Wars ones:

This is "Mandalore" with the helmets they wear in the center.

Also, they just have super fun and colorful designs that I dig.

They are so enjoyable to look at!

The rugs are fully washable, which I dig... but they're really too expensive so I can't justify it. Unless I win the lottery!

4) For the bedrooms, instead of area rugs, I might go with Flor washable carpet tiles. What I like about them is that they adhere to the floor, so there's less chance of tripping if the rug folds over on itself. Also, if you ruin a tile, you just replace that tile and the rest of the carpet stays in place.

5) I would buy my first electric car.

Right now, a 2025 VW Electric Buzz is just under $60k! In 2026!!

6) Obviously, James would quit his new job; I hardly ever see him anymore and I kind of like that guy.

7) If I couldn't find what I need at a thrift store, I'd only buy sustainably-made, high-quality clothes made by people who are paid a living wage. I've never felt like I could swing $75 for a t-shirt, but if I were loaded? Yup!

8) Speaking of trying to make the world a better place, we'd get back into supporting ReWork, a local program to help people transitioning out of homelessness by providing job skills, work, and every day life training. We kept donating for a year after James got laid off, but then we had to stop. I'd love to rejoin at a higher level. I'd also ratchet up the giving for BlackMamasATX (which we kept our monthly donation with them because it wasn't as much as we were giving ReWork). They provide services for pregnant black women, who have a higher maternal mortality rate than white women; plus, as recently as 2016, fully half of medical residents believed that black people have higher pain tolerance than white people, and because of this, black people are less likely to be believed when they report pain. I love the idea of EVERYONE having a baby to have a doula, someone whose sole job is to advocate for the patient so they can just focus on having their baby and not medical stuff.

9) I'd buy more online treats from places like Fat & Weird Cookie, plus almost everything offered by the King Arthur Baking Company, whose catalogs give me the worst FOMO.

10) We'd be able to help D "launch" more significantly. 

11) MUCH more travel. We've been planning a trip to Chile for about 5 years. A lot of the waiting has been because Mal does NOT want to be on an airplane overnight (he's never used an airplane restroom and says he absolutely will not). But it's not a cheap trip, and we keep kicking the can down the road. We'd fly to Santiago and spend a week, then take the flight over to Rapa Nui (Easter Island) for several days. After that, back to the mainland for a week  on the coast at Valparaiso and Viña del Mar. Heck, though, if we were rich, we could take a monthlong trip! 

Now, there are some things that would not change if we won the lottery: 

a) I still wouldn't be a spendthrift. I'd still look for coupons and deals and use them when possible. Although I mentioned buying more sustainable clothes, I promise you that my sense of fashion would not improve in the least and I'd still frequently look like a hot mess.

b) I wouldn't waste money on expensive real estate or "nice" cars just for the sake of having a "nice" car. (But if I could find a Chevy Astro that had been meticulously cared for, I'd snatch it right up!)

c) I'd still only have one purse at a time. I don't understand people who have a handbag for every outfit. I need one purse where I know where everything is. I received a purse for Christmas and it has taken me until now to fully intuit which pocket holds which thing.

d) I'd still cook at much as I do. The only real difference is that I might subscribe to Chef Unity or Factor meals for stuff for James to take to work. I'm trying to pack him a lunch every day (and D, when they're scheduled open-close) and it's a lot of thinking and planning. If we had a place to put a deep freeze, I could meal-prep every week or two, but that's not an option with our limited room.

e) I wouldn't build a garage for our cars. We don't have a driveway, carport, or anything. We park on the side of the house where the ground has some gravel, but people always stop by asking if they can put down more gravel or blacktop. Nah. I don't want to build a structure there because it would kill my view! I love the trees, seeing birds and having sun flood into the kitchen in the mornings (except when it reveals that I need to clean better).

f) I'd still keep my phone, watch, computer, etc. until they wear out. I have an iPhone 12 mini, which I bought 5 years ago. Last year, I paid Best Buy $100 to replace the battery and it's been as good as new ever since. I have a camera I love, so I don't need to upgrade for photos. I just like to use things until they're no longer usable. 

Okay, thanks for this brief low-stakes flight of fancy. Have a good week, friends!

Mal has to get used to this

Over the past couple of weeks, Mal has headed back into James's office or our room to tell James something... only to find that James isn't home.

Today, on the way home from meeting a friend, Mal said, "Since we didn't watch that program last night, we should watch it as soon as we get home, if Dad's awake. 

I had to remind him that his dad IS awake and is, in fact, at work.

It's an interesting situation. Mal is 11, and for the past six years of his life (minus about a month), James has either worked from home or not worked at all. 

That's more than half of Mal's life!

Another thing is that James is often absolutely exhausted when he gets here, and at night, like yesterday, he's ready to go to bed as soon as he's eaten dinner. 

One of the traditions that James and Mal have had over the past few years is that at around 10 PM, Mal will go into James's office to announce that he's "ready to talk." (I'm usually well into my night's sleep by then.)

James will go into Mal's room, and they'll catch up for 10 minutes or half an hour or whatever it takes. 

I think this is beautiful. It's something James is going to try to make sure happens whenever he can, even if it's less than when he didn't have anywhere to be.

On the way home from Temple yesterday, we stopped in at The Home Depot because I needed to pick something up (nope, we don't get an employee discount; they don't have one). 

While I ran in, Mal hung out in the garden center with James for a few minutes.

You might notice that James is standing upright without crutches! He was limping around, but able to work without crutches. He took them, and he used them to walk into the store, go to the break room, and just get around in general. But he could hobble out of the little garden center hut to scan stuff, so that's a good sign!

What I have done today...

 ... At this moment, I'm standing at the kitchen counter waiting for my Instant Pot to come up to pressure. Because I'm boiling water! Yay! We're under a boil water notice! Freezes in a small town with old water infrastructure are SO MUCH FUN.

At least it's pretty out there!

This morning, I got up and got some breakfast for James so he could take his meds, then was headed out for a walk when I realized that both D's and James's cars were undriveable due to ice on the windshields. I came back in, got the keys, and went to work on both. D and James both worked today, but while I was scraping, D messaged me that their blood draw had been postponed as the lab was delaying opening for a few hours. 

I concentrated on James's vehicle, then moved it to the street so he could go down our walkway instead of having to walk all the way around the house. Problem there is that the walkway had refrozen overnight, but I did not have time to deal with it before James had to go, and told him to use his crutches in the grass. He made it!

D's car was stuck in the ice, a problem for later.

I managed to get in a pretty good walk. I had wanted to go down to the lake because there was a lot of steam rising off of the water, but I couldn't get down the hill safely. I did a big loop of the neighborhood, saw that D's work parking lot was like a skating rink, and came back home.

I made myself some breakfast and was finishing up when D was ready to go to work. I helped rock the car out of the rut and D was on their way.

We were running out of food and Mal was up and hungry, so I started using the three potatoes we had left to make him some oven fries. In the meantime, I used two heels of bread (the only white bread we had left) to make him some cinnamon toast.

D got off of work and headed into town to do labs, and I went outside to try to clear the walkway. Most of the ice was slushy, though some of it still needed a shovel to help it calve off. I spent about an hour banging ice with a shovel, getting up under large pieces and prying them up, and then using a push broom to move it into the grass. Good exercise, and I wasn't even a little bit cold!

The group that usually meets at the library on Tuesdays decided to have a virtual meetup because 1) the library was closed and 2) at least one person couldn't get out of their driveway yet because it's steep. Mal, Canyon, Blake, Kona, and Alota had a nice couple of hours hanging out online!

Leading up to this, Kona had quite the adventure: She'd gone to a friend's house for a sleepover Saturday night and couldn't leave Sunday because of the roads. Things thawed a bit yesterday afternoon, but her parents still couldn't come get her: parents live at the bottom of a big icy hill and friend lives at the top of a big, icy hill. This morning, everything had refrozen and the overnighter had turned into a three-nighter.

Fortunately, Kona's sister has a friend whose dad had realized that by letting some air out of the tires, he could get around in his big truck pretty well. He drove out to Kona's friend's house and waited for Kona at the bottom of the icy hill. Kona packed up her stuff and sledded down to him! 

Back to my day: it was time to start on dinner and, like I said, we had little food. I googled "pantry-friendly pasta sauce" and found this. As I was making it and had decided to do the whole "cook the pasta in the sauce" thing, I received the aforementioned boil water notice, so I spent about an hour boiling 6 gallons of water I had hoarded when I heard our water might be turned off completely. I used the induction burner and the Instant Pot, and can report that the burner wins the speed test on boiling a gallon of water by about 4 minutes.

Good news for Mal is that the boil order means no bath for him tonight (he likes to play in the tub, and I don't want him accidentally ingesting bacteria that might make him sick). They said not to even brush teeth with the tap water until further notice.

Mal spent a good deal of time today walking around the neighborhood, enjoying the last of the frozen stuff. He walked for quite a long time Sunday, to the point that I got in the car to go get him at one point, because he'd been out for almost an hour without checking in, when he'd been sure to pop in every half hour or so before that.

Yesterday, we'd tried to walk and realized it was a LOT worse, having melted and refrozen, so he had to stay in the yard all day Monday.

Today, he got to walk a bit more, and he wore his AirTag this time, in case I needed to verify his general vicinity.

James got home and had dinner, then we watched "Stumble" and are winding down. I'm hoping Mal's gym is open Thursday, because we're at risk of catching cabin fever over here.

Eeeeee! It's almost time!

About a year ago, we started planning what was to be our last "big trip" until James got a job.

Well, he has a job now and this is STILL going to be our last "big trip" because this is such a major pay cut, and I'm not even mad about that part. I'm grateful! But our trips for the next few years will be a lot closer to home, places we can drive, and we're putting Chile off maybe until Mal is turning 18.

Where are we going? Here:

Yay! Ciudad de México!

Hopefully our years of Spanish will pay off, and hopefully our host country won't want to pay us back for what our country is doing to their compatriots who are here in the US. It's infuriating and embarrassing to be from the US right now, honestly. Sorry if that offends anyone, but we are being TERRIBLE neighbors, we are breaking laws, we are violating human rights. 

Last night I was looking at the plan I've made and told James, "I'm really disappointed; we don't be able to see all of Mexico City in the 2 weeks we're there!" Of course, I already know this. But I like to have a lot of options on the table so we can not waste time on the ground trying to figure out where to go and what to do. 

A lot of museums are closed on Mondays, for instance, and it helps to know that before you get there so you can plan other things on those days. Some days there are deals for locals, and that's great to know if you don't want to visit somewhere that might be more busy than usual. Other places are hyped up as "must see" that after some investigation, you realize are mostly tourist traps or for rich people, and that there are better places to visit or try. 

So I enjoy learning things and seeking out the best things for our family to experience. And I'm super excited that after almost a year of planning (I bought our airline tickets in April 2025!), it's right there on the horizon.

Also, as per usual, we have a house-sitter so don't think you're going to come break in while we're gone.

We will be staying at three different spots in town, so we can have bases of operation close to where we plan to visit. We'll be walking a lot and using public transit as much as possible. But some places, where it might be 10 minutes to drive or 45 minutes by bus, we'll just take an Uber or Didi. I'm hoping James's gout clears up ASAP and he's going to be taking tart cherry supplements for it from here on out.

Also, we have to stay ahead of Achilles tendonitis, which acted up when we were in Montreal but not when we were in New Orleans. We learned a lot on the Montreal trip! Namely that we need to avoid steps as much as possible (which is difficult when using a subway, but Mont Royal was the thing that probably really kicked him off), James needs to wear ankle supports, and he also needs to take an analgesic in the morning and with lunch. Doing that, even though we walked a ton in Louisiana, he didn't have a flare-up. 

He didn't bring the ankle supports on our cruise, and he ended up needing to borrow my dad's cane after a few days. I had to run into town at Cozumel just to get him some steroids to jump-start his recovery (which we learned later were 10x the dose he'd been given before, but we didn't have internet access and fortunately he lived).

Anyhoo... Yay for travel and it'll be a different kind of fun to plan the least expensive trips I can plan again in the future. For real!

More about that

I am sitting in the parking lot of The Home Depot waiting for James to get off work. Driving him to and picking him up from work was not on my agenda for the day, but while his knee is getting better, swelling in his ankle and stress on that area from how he's had to hold his lower leg to prevent pain in his knee means that he's wearing a boot. When he got into the car this morning, he realized that he probably couldn't drive with the boot but he definitely could not hold his knee at the correct angle to be able to drive at all.

I think he's a trooper for continuing to go to work, and very fortunate that he still has training to do so they are putting him on a computer to ensure that he won't be walking around all day.

It is helping me realize that I really enjoy not doing anything. Most of my days start pretty early. I usually get out of bed between 6:00 and 6:30, go on a walk, feed the cats, and get ready for my morning by getting some caffeine and doing some puzzle games online while everyone else is still asleep.

Since Malcolm stays up much later than I do at night, this is the one time during the day that is truly mine.

Except for right now. And I'm not mad, but I am tired.

When I first get up, I am making James some breakfast so he can take whatever medications he needs to take. If he has to go to work, we make sure that he is dressed before I leave for my walk. He has trouble putting on one of his socks and also getting his pant leg over his foot. He can't bend his knee very far, and his foot actually hurts now. 

After that is done, I do go on my walk. But this morning by the time I got home, I needed to help James get into the boot before he left. 

When he was out the door, I went in the bedroom to get dressed and ready to start my day with some caffeine and breakfast. I knew that someone had texted me, but I didn't have a chance to check it. He was halfway back to to the house (he is going the long way through the yard because the stairs on the side of the house nearest the vehicles are very deep) before I realized that he was telling me he could not drive the car.

I left a note for Mal and drove James to work, then went back and finally had breakfast at around 10 AM, which is super late for me.

Then I cleaned the kitchen and the bathrooms, my normal Friday chore.

When I finished, the groceries were arriving. I put those up then it was time to start on lunch because I wanted it ready when James came home, and also before D has to go to work at three.

Today, we are having a baked rotini, marinara, and cheese dish with a side of green beans. I had the pasta in the oven for about half an hour before I had to leave, so I did get to sit down and do my puzzles right around noon.

James should be out of the car at any minute, and then we'll go home and have lunch. I need to get Mal to Urban Air at 4 PM today, and then when we get home I will need to clean the litter boxes and feed the cats. This is something that James has been doing for about the past year, but he just can't right now.

When I write this out, it kind of just seems like a normal day. But it helps me see how much James does do around the house, for himself and for the rest of us.

One thing I did get to do this week was visit the newly-reopened Hope Outdoor Gallery.
It's near the airport now, and I swung by on my way to get D, who was coming back from Minnesota.

Caretaking

You guys. I'm tired!

Want to hear something I don't like doing? Talking on the phone! 

Want to hear what I did most of this morning? NOT talk on the phone, but wait on hold. 

And also, talk on the phone.

First, I need to let you know that for the first time in more than 8 years, James has come down with a case of gout. His right knee is so swollen, the doctor measured it at 1.5 inches wider around than his normal knee!

He just started his new job at Home Depot on January 1, and of course it involves a lot of walking around and standing at a register... and he's on crutches.

If I could have blurred this until you clicked on it, I would have.

So. Today.

First, I got a phone call a bit after 9 from my eye doctor. Last week, I'd ordered contacts from them and had gotten a whole year's worth because there was a pretty substantial rebate in that case. I had tried to file the rebate, but it said that my purchase wasn't eligible as the paperwork the office had given me was for last year. I'd left a message asking them to get back with me with the correct code, and they did! Yay! So I talked to their office first.

Then I called my doctor's office because I'm out of a medication I reordered on January 2, knowing I'd run out this past weekend. I realized on Sunday morning that I was out and hadn't even thought to follow up; they were just supposed to be delivered. Walgreens had in their records that they'd ordered the refill on January 5; my doctor said they don't show anything for months (I get a 3-month supply at a time). My doctor's office said they'd send in a new prescription.

I had to call Walgreen's, too, because I had put the order as delivery and now I need them to keep it so I can go in and pick it up ASAP. I've missed 2 days already. Fortunately, this isn't the thyroid meds or I'd be very ill by now! I don't sleep on that one.

NEXT, I got a message from D, who is in Minneapolis right now, asking if I could call their doctor to reschedule an appointment that got auto-scheduled for when they'll be on the plane home. They were out and about and didn't want to have to give personal information out in public. I called their doctor's office but then they couldn't help because D's an adult and I'm not on any authorization list. I tried.

But THAT reminded me that I haven't gotten the ID card for D's new Marketplace insurance, and they're going to need it. Allegedly, I can get it online, but that hasn't worked because they want me to set up a new profile for the plan, but D already has a profile with the provider because that's their existing doctor. 

So I called, and was able to order the ID cards. Again. But I wanted to talk to someone about how to print out a card in the meantime. I was on hold for more than half an hour. Mal showed me some videos, I did some stuff online, and after nearly one full hour... I somehow hung up when I moved my phone! 

Despondently, I called back. This time, I got routed somewhere that an automated voice gave me a group number and an ID, which I've never heard before. I tried adding that to the existing profile and... we wait.

Then I tried to call the VA to see if there were any way that I could come pick up the sleep study that James was supposed to go get today since he can barely walk. But infamously, the local VA clinic does not answer the phones. I still did wait on hold after they tried to patch me through. 

I drove James to the VA, but surprise, his appointment wasn't at our local one. He knew this back when he made the appointment, but he'd forgotten and I didn't even check. We weren't going to drive into far east Austin after all of that, so we just came home and the doctor called him.

After that, the doctor wanted James's old sleep study. He hasn't been to a regular doctor in years, since his primary care physician moved to another practice, so we decided we'd get in touch with their office to have them send EVERYTHING to the VA. I called them, and that didn't work. They had an option to chat online, so I tried that.

They asked me the practice name, so I guess it's a medical group? But then it turns out that since James went there, it's gone through two takeovers and is now managed by a huge hospital group in Austin. I have no idea who to contact or how to get his records now, but I did spend some time this afternoon trying to figure that out.

In the meantime, I made James a crunchwrap for breakfast. Mal just had leftover pizza. 

I had to water all of my outdoor trees and plants because it hasn't rained appreciably since the beginning of November. Mal played outside for a bit while I was out there. We also worked on a diorama of a level of Super Mario U based on Stone Eye Habitat. And played Uno. 

Mal is in a stage of wanting me to get and bring him all of his food, which he had gotten away from and I have to say it's stressing me out. I tell him to take care of himself quite often, but still just being on the receiving end of the constant asking takes some of my energy. 

I'm cleaning out the litter boxes while James is unable to access them. I did them exclusively for a long time, but a year or so ago, James offered to take over. Weirdly, I don't miss it.

I made James a big salad for dinner, and he's up and rattling around now (literally: the crutches). 

Mal really wants me to go look at D's hamster with him. 

We need to listen to a Spanish podcast.

I'm just tired and I want to do nothing/whatever I want to do the rest of the day. But that's not how it's going to go, so it's time to woman up and do all of the things before bedtime.

The Fifth Anniversary (yes, of that, but that's not what I'm talking about)

Five years ago today, I put in my earbuds and went for a walk. I even blogged about it a few days later!

Ever since then, I've walked pretty much every single day for roughly 2.5 miles. In the beginning, I mentioned being legalistic about it. I got over that pretty quickly. There are days when I don't walk because I do weights and balance exercises at home (once every 7-10 days). There are days when I know I'm going to be walking a lot or getting other exercise that I don't make it a point to walk. There are days when I have an early appointment and don't have time.

But I'm guessing that about 98% of the time, I roll out of bed, throw on my shoes (and sometimes an extra pair of pants, gloves, a hat, and a coat... but maybe not this winter??), and take off. I listen to podcasts most of the time. Sometimes I talk on the phone with my parents or my sister. Very often, I'm back from my walk before anyone I know is even awake. This time of the year, that means it's dark for most of my walk.

I've seen some gorgeous things on these walks. Sunrises, flowers, wild animals (raccoon, skunk, fox, coyote, armadillo), feral cats, free-range dogs, amazing clouds, the construction of home after home... 

Sometimes it gets tedious, walking the same few miles over and over. But I've noticed that on the days I don't start that way, I feel less focused and settled.

I've walked well over 4000 miles on these morning treks. I've gone through 4 pair of sneakers. I've learned that having a good pair of shoes is the difference between the blisters I mentioned in the first post and not even thinking about my feet at all. Hard lesson for a cheapskate like me, but I do enjoy being able to get from here to there without limping.

I've also learned a lot from the podcasts I listen to, from American History Tellers to Reveal to Maintenance Phase to various Spanish-language podcasts. Sometimes I just need some entertainment and will put on Handsome or Selected Shorts. Other times I want to feel inspired, so I listen to The Moth or Story Corps. Occasionally my brain just wants to be alone with itself so I just listen to the birds and my feet crunching the gravel. 

I don't like to carry water, especially when it's cold, so I usually chew gum to keep my mouth from drying out. There are mornings when I take a red flashlight because there's no moon and we don't have streetlights, but I also don't want to contribute to light pollution. On the rare occasion, I'll stop by a convenience store to see if any of their energy drinks are on sale and might pick up a couple of those.

I've walked the dry lake bed. I've gingerly made my way down steep rocky trails I'm not sure how they got there. I've come upon homeless people sleeping in a tent in the greenbelt or with just a blanket on a sidewalk near the bus stop. I've had to stop to catch my breath on a hill, then realized months later that it's not as challenging anymore. 

Another thing I've done is that everywhere we've traveled since January 6, 2021 (yes, that January 6), I've looked at Google Maps to plan where I'll walk if the occasion arises. I've walked all around Temple, where my parents live. I've walked through Wickenburg when we've visited James's mom. I've walked from a hotel to a nature preserve in the dark to watch the sunrise in Sonora, Texas, on a road trip. I walked the liminal underground passages in downtown Oklahoma City. I even broke tradition once and rented a bike in Montreal to bike across the Jacques Cartier Bridge to Île St. Helene, Île Notre Dame, and across to Habitat 67.

This kind of movement has become a priority to me for both my mental health and for the longevity of my mobility (hopefully). And often, for the sheer joy of seeing a bunch of vultures staring at me from their perches in the trees 40 feet above me in the Canyonlands Trail.

Happy anniversary to me! (But not to anyone involved in that other thing that happened on the same day this good habit started.)