Sunday Productivity and a Hat for Me

The past few Sundays have been lazy. I haven’t felt too guilty about it, but some weekends it’s nice to get something accomplished. Yesterday I managed to get things done around the apartment, but we never ventured out, which is kind of silly considering it was nice yesterday and today was super cold. But sometimes things just work out that way.

A smallish chunk of time was spent at work today making up hours ahead of time for volunteer meetings I have this week. One would think working on your day off would be rough, but not so much because I find my job fun most days. Which doesn’t mean Monday will be easy, because it never is, but at least I can relax this week when it comes to making up time.

I called my brother to wish him a happy birthday. I’ve officially had a little brother for 32 years. Time flies.

I went to Stitch n’ Bitch tonight. I took a bit of a hiatus for a few months because I wasn’t knitting at all, but I’m getting my groove back. Our location rotates, so tonight we were at Hastings Hardback Cafe which is kind of my go-to location for everything because I like their coffee and I’m comfortable there. And wouldn’t you know it…I finished a project.

I’d originally set out to knit this one for my nephew, but honestly? I think I really like it for myself. I don’t wear hats well, but I think this one looks kind of cute and it’s comfy on my head. So he’ll get the next one I do, which I went ahead and cast on for this evening. I’d better prepare myself…8 1/2 inches of 2 by 2 ribbing is coming.

I’m finishing off the night with some blogging and movies, including The Dark Crystal and Zoolander, though I probably won’t finish Zoolander because I’m getting sleepy. But I’ve seen it about 22 times, so no biggie.

You might be wondering why I’m blogging all of a sudden after going for months with nothing. I have no answer. I go with what I’m feeling and for some reason, I was in the mood to blog tonight. I even have a few scheduled for the next couple days…so yay again for Sunday productivity!

A.

Christmas Caches, Groceries, and Getting Outdoors

It was a beautiful Sunday. I know it’s too much to hope that the worst part of winter is over, so I made sure to enjoy the sun and the slightly warmer temperature today by getting out and doing things in the outdoors. After solving another puzzle cache at home, we went out to do some geocaching, grabbing several in the Countdown to Christmas series.

The plan was to get the caches, go to the gym,  then go get stuff ready for gaming. Unfortunately, our game was cancelled for the day, so we changed things up a bit. Since we had to go grocery shopping anyway, we went to town to do that before heading back to Wamego. Instead of going to the gym, I used the daylight to do a zombie mission at the rec center track.

I made it around the track twice, walking for forty five minutes. I decided to go ahead and do the zombie chases even though I was walking the longer duration. It wasn’t bad at all. I did four chases and even jogged a little bit longer on one of them. They weren’t as hard as they’ve been in the past, so at some point, I’ll have to legitimately lengthen all of the jogging sections. The fact that I can jog even a little bit is pretty crazy, but I’m loving it!

Jon made us soup and sandwiches for dinner, and I watched The Polar Express to solve another puzzle cache. I also worked on a writing project for my mom. My writing brain doesn’t want to work tonight, so I’ll have to finish that tomorrow. I’m going to finish off the night with a shower and some reading before bed. It wasn’t an overly strenuous day, but I want to be fresh for another Monday. I’m hoping this coming week isn’t as harsh as last week was.

A.

 

Overestimation and a Cut in Entertainment

I completely overestimated my endurance on Sunday.

As previously talked about, Saturday was really active as far as walking went.  I’ve been slowly building endurance, but I’m definitely not up to marathon walking. This is something I conveniently forgot when I decided that Sunday would be another “walk in the zoo” day.  I suppose it might not have been bad if we’d gotten out of the house earlier to do this. As it was, we stayed in the comfy house until after noon, enjoying the air conditioning and The Best Couch I’ve Ever Sat On. If those two reasons weren’t good enough, I had to finish “Sharknado” and then there were other movies to watch. Completely legit!

We then decided to have lunch before going to the zoo.  Delicious Mexican food. You know what makes walking less fun? A belly full of lunch. By the time we got to the zoo, it was midday, so while the heat wasn’t “that bad” at first, we were only shortly past the gates before we realized we may have made a mistake.

What frustrated me was that the day before, I’d walked around a whole zoo with just one rest break, and then 24 hours later I was so exhausted I couldn’t seem to remove my butt from a bench. It felt like a backslide to me. After conferring with my partner in crime and evaluating the situation, I realized that this wasn’t necessarily the case.

1. We did a TON of walking the day before, more than I’ve done yet, and so it was a given that I was going to be tired without a rest day.

2. None of the breaks had to do with back pain or knee pain or even foot pain. It was pain that was making me sit like it was 3ish months ago. This time, tt was just exhaustion and heat, plain and simple.

3. The heat, man. It seriously saps my energy.

We decided that near-future zoo walks will take place in the morning, before a huge meal is consumed, and not after a day where we’ve already logged several miles.  I say “near-future” because I don’t think that will be the case forever. I’m steadily increasing my walking endurance and my energy levels, and I think that in a few more months I will be able to walk long distances on consecutive days. But I don’t have super powers. I’m coming off of two years of limited mobility…this isn’t going to resolve itself in just a few weeks.

The day wasn’t a total waste. Some walking is better than no activity, even if it several breaks did happen. We got yelled at by a prairie dog and judged by a peacock. Jon made friends with a young Colobus monkey. As miserable as we were, we still had some fun.

Monday returned with a vengeance but its vengeance started on Sunday when we returned to the apartment to find that the post office sent Jon’s eBay items back to us instead of to their recipients.  In typical Amanda-anxiety fashion, I instantly assumed that they’d tell us it was our fault, that they’d charge us again for shipping and handling, that they’d stand over us in a black robe and judge us for doing something wrong (even though we did everything right). Turns out, all was well. They claimed it was their mistake and re-sent the packages today at no extra charge. Thanks, USPS!

Sadly, today we cancelled our GameFly membership. It’s nothing personal. We’ve enjoyed GameFly a lot, but we’re trying to cut some costs to get through the next semester, and this seemed one of the most obvious. Jon does a lot of PC gaming and we have some games at home that I can finish. For now, while we have a working XBox 360, we can take finished games and trade them in for new-to-us used games when the time comes.

I was feeling good about our very grown-up choice…until I went to actually cancel, and GameFly turned on the digital puppy dog eyes:

Are you sure you want to quit?

You won’t get all your perks!

Want to reconsider for a free month?

You have three days left for this month…don’t you want to use them?

You’re really going to cancel? Why? (to this I picked moving and traveling, because that’s partially true. I felt bad saying “Too expensive” because we don’t actually believe it’s too expensive in general, we just need to conserve money right now). 

We have a lot of shipping centers…please stay with us!

You’re going to leave? Well, okay. Make sure to *sniff* return your games in 7 days. 

Really?

Okay, then…

Good-bye…

…but click this link if you ever want to reactivate!

So I feel like I didn’t break up permanently with GameFly, but by the end of that ordeal, I kind of wanted to cry.

Adulthood is painful, my friends. Very painful.

A.