syrena_of_the_lake

Today is going to be kind of stressful. I have to meet Cordelia at school when the school day ends because the choir fundraiser stuff is coming in. I didn't see any way for her to be able to carry it home on the bus, so the best option seems to be me going there and then us getting a cab back.

Some of her teachers have requested Kleenex donations, so I can take those at the same time.

Cordelia has an appointment at 5:45, so we won't have time to waste on the way home. I wish the bus website was actually reliable about the bus that goes between Skyline and downtown. There are two or three different route variants (I've seen the A and C. I'm assuming there must be a B).

We'll get home from the appointment just in time to have friends over at 7:00.

I need to figure out a way to get myself to bed earlier in the evening. Scott and Cordelia really, really want me to watch TV with them which pushes getting ready for bed to 9:00 at which point, Cordelia generally wants to shower. I think that what I need to do is to get a second tube of toothpaste and to keep that and my toothbrush and bite splint in the kitchen so that I don't have to wait for her to get to done to be able to deal with that bit of my routine.

I still have the problem that 8:00 or 9:00 is the point when my writing brain suddenly turns itself on with great enthusiasm. Given that I can't get my body to nap, I have a choice between sleep and writing that's pretty frustrating.

I must have done something yesterday, but I can't for the life of me remember anything. Somehow, time is getting away from me.

I posted a story for weissvsaiyuki today. I still have four WIP that I would love to complete for the challenge, but I don't know if I'll manage any of them.

Title: One More Folded Sunset
Fandom: Weiss Kreuz
Rating: T
Pairing: Crawford/Schuldig, background Crawford/Manx
Tags: Implied/referenced rape/non-con, Implied/referenced torture, Alternate universe - canon divergence, Alternate universe - dark, Ambiguous/open ending, Amnesia

//Brad, where the fuck are we?// Once he was sure he had a connection to Brad’s mind, he opened his eyes. He felt safer that way.

//Schuldig? I wasn’t— No. That’s not true.// Brad sounded uncertain, fragmented even, in a way that scared Schuldig even more than the odd landscape and his inability to stop walking. //The hill doesn’t look that big, but it will probably take you another half an hour to get here. Things… stretch. Sort of. You’re being watched. She can’t hear when we talk like this, but she’s watching, and she’ll hear if you speak out loud. I’d come to meet you, but… I can’t. I’ll explain when you get here.//

Schuldig knew Brad well enough to know when he was lying. You’re not going to explain anything. Well, we’ve been there before. I’ll get it one way or another. He rubbed his face with one hand. Why don’t I remember anything to explain this?

The story at AO3.

I ended up going with Scott to take Cordelia and her friend to the restaurant. The plan was that I'd wait wherever he and I ended up for dinner until after he took the 3-4 kids to the dance. We had trouble finding a restaurant and ended up at Seva, a vegetarian place. We tend not to go there because my food options are severely limited by needing to avoid tomatoes and peppers and walnuts and peanuts and eggs.

I ended up ordering a cup of soup and two sides, asparagus and sweet potato fries. The soup wasn't edible by me, and Scott didn't care for it either. The menu said 'butternut-apple bisque,' and I couldn't taste either apples or butternut squash. It went more toward the savory end of flavor, and I couldn't place the herbs, so I didn't force myself to eat more than a couple of spoonfuls. I was concerned that the soup contained something that would make me sick. The restaurant ended up removing the soup from our bill. We hadn't asked them to. I'd have been cranky about spending $4 on a cup of inedible soup, but I did order it, so...

I also got dessert, banana cheesecake. It was recognizably cheesecake, but even though I could see banana chunks, I couldn't taste the banana at all. Scott tried it and also couldn't taste the banana, so I'm again puzzled. I think that, when something with a particular flavor is in the name, it's weird not to be able to taste even a trace of that in the food.

Cordelia's only comment about the dance was that it was loud and that the music was terrible. I'm not sure if the latter refers to sound quality or to song choice.

Scott's parents have reserved a house for a family vacation next summer. They didn't consult with us about potential conflicts first but did consult Scott's brother and sister, so we're a bit puzzled. We won't know for at least another month whether or not Scott can get that time off, and I'm pretty sure that the timing will mean that Cordelia couldn't do choir camp even if she wanted to. (Though Scott thinks the location of the house is actually kind of near Interlochen.) Scott's parents have promised to 'help' us with the costs but want us to tell them how much we can afford to pay. Which is both reasonable and burdensome because Scott finds it shaming.

To be honest, I'm not sure we can afford anything but gas money and our share of the groceries. I'm not convinced that Scott will be able to tell his parents that. He was able to say, months ago, that we couldn't go because we couldn't afford it. Now, we can't just not do it. We have to figure out what we can scrape together and ask for the rest. I understand why Scott's parents want everyone there. They're both 75 (and will be 76 next summer), and their oldest grandchild is 18 and in college. The odds of getting him to come to future family vacations aren't really all that great. The odds of Scott's parents being up to such a vacation in three years, five years, ten years... Yeah.

Is it weird that I feel that 'tell us what you can afford, and we'll cover the rest' is more embarrassing than 'because you can't afford it, we'll cover the expenses'?

I tried taking two Halcion tablets last night (adding up to 0.5 mg) and slept well. Barring a couple of trips to the bathroom, I didn't get up until around 10:00. I even slept through Scott getting out of bed. I'm not sure how much of that was complete exhaustion and how much was the medication.

Scott has managed to repair the bathroom sink. It wasn't exactly broken, but the stopper had broken, so we had a gaping hole down the drain. Now, we have a strainer in place. There's no longer a way to seal the basin, but that's not generally something we've wanted, so I don't think it will matter.

Skyline's homecoming dance is tonight. Cordelia's going with a group of friends. They're planning to get dinner first at some place that we've not previously heard of. Scott's driving them to the restaurant and from there to the high school. He's not supposed to have dinner in the same place as they do, but he needs to stay nearby in order to retrieve them when they're done. I can't go along because there will be four kids to wedge into the car somehow. Scott plus three is comfortable. Scott plus four is... feasible. Scott plus five is impossible.

It's a pity because it would be really nice for me and Scott to be able to get dinner out together tonight. The dance starts too late for that to be feasible after it begins. Him coming home to get me or to bring carryout is theoretically possible, timing wise, but we have no idea how long the kids will take, and I think it would be good if Scott were nearby in case one of the kids doesn't have enough cash (they're 13/14 years old).

The dance is 'semi-formal,' and tickets are $28 each (not per pair but each). I have no idea what that money is paying for. Gold plated paper plates? Silk ribbons instead of paper? It's not like they're paying a band.

I slept really, really terribly last night. Every time I started to fall asleep, I had reflux issues. I had had some vanilla ice cream, and that made the reflux not be of the burning kind. I just kept coughing and jerking upright. Sleeping on an incline doesn't help. Not even sleeping upright helps. The trigger seems to be me starting to fall asleep. That somehow makes something in my body relax enough that the reflux starts.

I know perfectly well that the thing I need to do when that starts is to go and sit upright for 30 to 60 minutes before I try to lie down again. It's just very hard to get myself to do that when I'm utterly exhausted and desperate for sleep. I think I finally managed to sleep about 3 a.m., and I really couldn't get myself out of bed when it was time to get up to help Cordelia get ready for school. I have no idea what would have happened if Scott hadn't been able to step in at that point. I'd probably have managed somehow. I just have no idea how.

Scott came back to bed after walking Cordelia to the bus stop. We both slept another four hours. I'd have liked to sleep longer, but I had a horrible headache and knew that I needed to get up to take my medications. I still have the headache, and I can't tell if it's due to lack of sleep, due to menstrual stuff, due to stress, or due to something else I haven't thought of. I've taken naproxen and have had caffeine. I've also eaten. Cordelia has an appointment in two hours, so I don't think that a nap is going to be possible.

This afternoon, I did some minor beta reading on a paper that Cordelia's best friend was writing. It was mostly punctuation and verb tenses. The real challenge was explaining why. Cordelia thinks the idea of consulting a style guide is ridiculous (also the idea of asking a teacher which style guide they want used). Is that just a college thing? It just seemed to me that it would be helpful to know which set of rules the teacher is expecting.

I ended up taking a very long walk today, more than two hours, in spite of the fact that it was raining. I think that, as far as the rain goes, I'd have turned back sooner if it had started raining hard sooner. As it happens, I got to the end of the route I had decided on, and then it started pouring. I was pretty thoroughly soaked by the time I got home. I had to change my clothes entirely. I hacked six new-to-me Ingress portals and made several tiny fields while i was out.

I'm not commenting much right now because I'm doing a lot of my DW reading on my cell phone. I can type on that, but I always end up thinking that I'll remember to come back to the post when I'm on my laptop and then... Well, I don't. I am reading pretty reliably.

It's probably also likely that being low on sleep contributes to me not commenting. I felt so much better today after ten hours of sleep that I almost couldn't believe the difference. I wish it wasn't something that requires a huge family production about making happen.

Scott's brother and his family are thinking to come to Michigan for Christmas. We haven't seen them in a couple of years, so it would be really nice if they did come. Scott even managed to get some vacation time in between Christmas and New Year. I'm not sure about whether or not them staying a night or two with us will work now that their youngest is six. I think she was three the last time they stayed here, and at that point, she just slept in a port-a-crib in the basement with her parents while her older sister shared Cordelia's room. Now? I really don't know. I'm not sure that both girls can fit in Cordelia's room, and I'm quite sure that a port-a-crib won't be an option. Scott's sister and Scott's parents both have more flexibility that way, but it would be sad not to have them spend at least one night here. Scott and his brother don't get much time together.

My parents haven't told us that they'll be coming to Michigan in December. They did last year, but I don't know if that means doing it this year as well. At this point, I'm figuring that Scott's chance to see his brother outweighs time with them. I love them, but I'm pretty much never happier after I've seen them. I'm sometimes no less happy than I was but not always.

I had lunch with evalerie yesterday. We went to Juicy Kitchen which is out near Cordelia's school. We got there just before the lunch rush started. The place is tiny. I'm not sure that, even including the outdoor seating, it can accommodate more than twenty people.

I got myself to bed by about 8 p.m. last night. I hadn't really fallen asleep by the time I got a phone call at 9:30 (another mother calling about a school thing that actually did need to be dealt with last night). At that point, I took a second Halcion and then slept pretty soundly. I was able to sleep in a bit because the school had a late start. The 11th graders were taking the PSAT, and other grades didn't have class until 11:15. The district only ran the school buses for the 7:30 start time, so anybody who didn't go in then needed other transportation (that's what the other mother was calling about).

It's almost 9 p.m. now, and I really would like to sleep soon. I'm just not sure that I can get away with it without serious drama.

I walked for a little more than an hour this morning after walking Cordelia to the bus stop (a careful twenty feet behind her). I went to the science and nature center and got bitten by more mosquitoes than I expected to see this time of year. I then walked a bit further up the road to the two portals near the golf course. (There's one actually on the course, about 80 meters from the road, but I think no one ever goes after it. I think I've only seen it captured once in the two years I've been playing. There isn't a fence or no trespassing signs, but there are people actually playing golf, even at 7:30 in the morning.)

I've been lying flat on my back at least twice a day for a while. The hard floor hurts, but it's the one thing I can do that makes my shoulders and neck release some tension. Lying on a more yielding surface doesn't do it. I can only tolerate a few minutes of lying on the floor at a time. I've been tempted to try a little alcohol to see if that will help those muscles relax, but I'm taking Tylenol at least once a day for the elbow pain (can't sleep at all without it). I'm not willing to trade shoulder/neck tension, even at these levels, for liver damage.

I did no writing this weekend. I was kind of frustrated about it, but I can't write anything at all when Cordelia's reading over my shoulder, and I don't seem to be able to wedge things into the times when she's not sitting next to me.

I have six interlibrary loan books that I want to finish and return. I've also got a couple of books that can't be renewed. I'm trying to work on some of the audiobooks I've got on my laptop, too. It's just that those take so very, very long to get through.

I think I didn't quite get the cold Scott had. He's still coughing a lot, but I'm better already. Cordelia was feeling a bit off over the weekend, too, but she didn't mention it this morning.