sick dream

after a successful mid-distance bike ride on saturday, i felt crummy the rest of the weekend. i thought it might be allergies because air quality was supposedly pretty nasty. but symptoms kept piling on and i was feeling quite bad by sunday late afternoon.

monday morning i dreamt dad took my temperature with an old-fangled mercury thermometer (don't tell - but i never traded mine in for a new electronic one), and the mercury steadily rose and rose and rose until it hit the very tip of the thermometer, and in anxiety i clenched my jaw and my teeth bit through the thermometer end leaving me fragments of broken glass and rivulets of mercury in my mouth. "that's it, i'm taking you to the hospital," dad said. i quickly swabbed at my tongue with a paper towel before we left for the ER.

i woke from the dream, and went to bathroom to take my temperature, careful not to tense any facial muscles. although it wasn't high, i did have an elevated temperature. that information coupled with my other symptoms and lack of vivacity, i made the decision to stay home from work and rest.

last night i slept almost 9.5 hours and, according to nate, sweat myself silly. but i did not have another sick dream, thankfully. what's worse than a dream that gives you no relief of your reality? like dreaming you are waking up late only to wake from that dream and find you are late. it's like being kicked before you even realized you were down to begin with.

it's bike to work week here in massachusetts. and by golly, i biked myself to work today. i'm now questioning the wisdom of my choice as my self-rated energy/overall wellbeing percentage started this morning at 87% and dropped to 65% by the time i got here. i've already attended to the most pressing tasks and am fighting the urge to put my head down. lunchtime may become naptime. a peaceful dream-free naptime, i hope.

a lovely week

[warning: i am link-happy today]

this is turning into quite a lovely week. it started out with completing the final assignment for my developmental psychopathology course, and the rushing wave of relief that accompanied my submission of it to the course dropbox. although my work schedule meant i wouldn't be able to make it to the confirmation of olivia, nate's cousin, i had the good luck of making the guestlist for a taza chocolate tasting/marketing event in cambridge last night, and took katy as my plus one. katy and i made plans to meet up again tonight at diesel so i can benefit from her help while i start working on a new knitting project: calorimetry. i've been listening to great free music from the npr music website, from a short playlist by johnny rotten, to live performances by the emerson string quartet and charlotte gainsbourg. i've had delicious and lovingly prepared food at home, worked and stretched my muscles out of complacency, and am about to dive deep into a new book. we had extra hand soap under the sink when i though we were running low, and we have a new houseplant.

this is a week worthy of using as a standard. all other weeks please take note: you will be expected to live up to this one, so go ahead and make any appropriate adjustments so i will not be disappointed. thank you.

(and, button jar - you, too, should pay attention. make your location known to me or suffer a downgrade in my estimation. thank you.)

picking and choosing

i gave myself a hiatus from ffv in order to focus more laser-like on my out there in the world responsibilities. and my experiences over the last month have re-taught me the same lessons i learned in middle school: procrastination is not about using specific and familiar tools to distract myself but about an ever-flowing and imaginative stream of ideas in which i cast my net wide, catching all sorts of interesting flotsam and jetsam that i let distract me. and i hardly ever throw anything back. i can and will distract myself using anything i can. fortunately, all the things i needed and wanted to do have been done. and there were no all-nighters. i'm taking that as a step in the right direction.

apparently it's spring weekend on tufts campus. last night there was a posse of sturdy looking dudes in a backyard nearby playing a very loud drinking game that appeared at times to be a riff on baseball, or just organized chugging. unclear. the good news is that nobody puked on our yard, and nobody slept outside all night. the partying, actually i'm assuming it's partying when all i know is people are yelling a lot, started up again around 10am this morning. nate and i stayed up late last night entertaining ourselves with tv we normally don't watch (jimmy fallon and carson daly - yes, really) and i was kind of hoping to wake up around noon. these damn tufts kids. isn't college supposed to keep them all up partying late so they can amble out of bed in the midday sun looking for fried breakfasts? i now have an entire academic year's worth of evidence and proof that tufts kids don't know how to party.

it's a beautiful may morning and i'm thinking it's time to pot the bulbs i bought the other day, get some fresh air, test out my knee at some physical activity, maybe clean the house a bit. with the warmer and more hospitable air there's no end of things i want to do, places i want to go, and chores i'd like to accomplish. my interests and energies are coming out of hibernation, slowly but surely.

before i go out into the beautiful day, let me share a small slice of life from the dojo:
[late night, living room at the dojo. windows are open and fresh air is wafting through. the tv is on and nate and sarah are sprawled on the sofa after eating dinner and large portions of chocolate ice cream and strawberries.]
sarah: [farts]
nate: do i have to marry that part of you?