just not the same

Wednesday, as we saw, migraine leading to stickies on the door at work and a general feeling of fragility.

Thursday was no particular problem, but yesterday I had that headache when I woke up, so I bagged work and stayed home and rested and eventually took something because I wasn't a big fan of waiting for it to go away on its own. Also missed skiffy because I was not in any mood to deal with a crowd (but I did watch the relevant episode on my own screen over here, so it's almost like I was there, in a way [g]).

Strange dreams this morning, with some of you in them, and some of my family, as well, including my mother referring to my brother as "your nephew", which is odd, because she hasn't called me by her sister's name in years. Not upsetting dreams, but I nevertheless felt kind of grumpy when I woke up, and I decided I'd HAD IT, and I fired up the coffee maker. With decaf in it, mind - I haven't fallen off my (four weeks and a day) wagon, but the first day of no caffeine I had decaf coffee and then I haven't had anything so much as coffee-flavored since then, and I couldn't take it any more.

But it is not very satisfying.

Still: soon I'm off to my voice lesson, and then I will go teach people to curl, and then I will pick up some groceries and come home and do some laundry, because tomorrow I can has houseguest, yay!

some thoughts

I walked to my voice lesson today. I've been meaning to do this since I began with this voice teacher, because she's only a few (long, admittedly) blocks away, but it's always been too hot or raining or I've needed the car right after or whatever. So today I walked. I passed by a small crowd of people picketing in front of what I hadn't realized was the sort of building one picketed, but they seemed to think there was a purpose to their anti-choice flyers and prayers and whatnot. (I didn't make a complete survey, but I only observed one - older - woman, just by the way, and about half a dozen men.) They didn't get in my face or give me any trouble as I passed, but I still wished I'd crossed the street to avoid them. Then at the end of the block there was a guy singing some response-y chants.

I was cranky and out of sorts until a block and a half later when I passed by a neighborhood park, where there was a man in a yarmulke pushing a couple of kids on the swings. This didn't seem like the sort of Shabbes activity I've ever seen a yarmulke-wearing family get up to on a Saturday, but on a bit of unqualified reflection I thought enjoying the laughter of children might be the best celebration of the sabbath I'd ever heard of.

Sang pretty well at my lesson. I've got a physical habit I don't know how I picked up - I mean, I've got several, but this one in particular - where she asked me if anyone had taught me to release the back of my neck when I get to the highest notes. Apparently I sort of duck my head above about A flat. But it turns out this isn't so bad, because - and this is probably where I got the habit in the first place - it's better than lifting my chin. So there you go. A habit to break, but not something I'm hurting myself doing while I'm doing it. More importantly, my "ah" vowel needs a lot of work. Sigh. That's going to be a challenge.

Learn-to-Curl was good. Taught some people some stuff, and got at least two new club members out of it. Also pointed out, when the subject of the Bigspiel and its team requirements came up - at least one person with a year of experience or less, at least one person with three years of experience or less, at least one person with five years of experience or more, and at least one woman - that in fact it also requires at least one man. That is, it can't be four women with these differing experience levels; the teams have to be mixed. It is true that there are fewer women than men in our club, but someday the men in our club will understand that nevertheless the categories are not "curler" and "woman curler", for CHRIST'S sake.

Can't find new clothes to buy no matter where I go. But I did get some groceries (NB: I did not try to buy new clothes at the grocery store), and the cashier told me she'd just had another woman come through her line with a seatbelt bag. I pointed her at the website. :-) And then I came home and made my bed up tight with clean linens, but will do the laundry tomorrow when it's been longer since it rained.