Day 25

Wow. It amazes me that in just under a week I will have gone an entire month of writing in this blog. When I was at work on my first day of the week, Tuesday to be exact, I was outside briefly talking to the maintenance man and the house supervisor. They were outside taking a smoke break. I wasn't though. I have never been, nor do I ever see myself being a smoker. No way! So anyway, we were standing there, and this dark figure walked slowly past. The individual looked to me like a teen. Not quite 5' 9", pretty thin, black sweat pants, black sweat shirt with the hood over their head so you couldn't see them clearly. When they walked past us Tuesday night, all 3 of us went "hmmm, that's suspicious." I followed them from a distance to see where they went, and when they went north on 4th street and away from the hospital I let it go, but kept a close eye out any time I was outside.

Last night while I was out on the other side of the parking lot, the house supervisor called me. She was like "You know that kid we saw last night?" I was like "Yes?" to which she replied "He just tried to break into my car." I asked her what exactly happened, and she said that he came up from the direction I had followed him the night before, that she had come out for a break, and that he just walked right up to her car and tried to see if the door was unlocked. The lights came on in her car, and she basically yelled "HEY! WHAT THE F*** ARE YOU DOING!" The kid apparently whirled around, seeming surprised, hands up in the air, and then took off running. When I got over there, I couldn't find him. He was apparently long gone. She told the rest of the staff about the prowler, so that everyone could keep a close eye out. Tonight I let the 2nd shift house supervisor know about it, so that if the kid changes up his approach and tries earlier, people will be more prepared.

So this morning, I got off right at 6. I didn't have to sit one on one with any patients so I was able to get off when I was supposed to. Went home, got Lex's cereal on the table for her, went upstairs and turned her light on. Today is officially Alexandria's 9th birthday. HAPPY BIRTHDAY ALLY! (Not that you will read this, but hey ;) ) After a few minutes, I went in there and she had pulled the covers over her head. I pulled them off, then said "Drum roll please!" I started drumming my finger tips on the railing as though it were a drum. "Happy birthday to you!" Pause, then I'd tickle her side "tickytickyticky", followed by her saying "doooooooooonnnnnnnnnnt." Then I'd go on. "Happy birthday TOOOO you! tickytickyticky!" "DOOOONNNT!" she would say again. "Happy BIRTHDAY to Lexi! Happy birthday too (I'd mimic the word "too" the way the bird delivering the baby elephant in dumbo sings), YOU! tickytickyticky!" O:-)

Better than 9 birthday spankings I guess. :) When it was close to 7, ally had eaten and was laying on the couch across from me. This morning I finally decided that I should officially get into the water aerobics. So at 6:50, I said to Ally "Lex, I will be back. I have an exercise class I'm going to. Just hang out down here and watch tv, and I should be back just after 7:30 some time. Maybe 7:45 or whatever. Then I will take you to school myself in the truck." She was like "OK!"

The pool exercise is fun. I handed the lady at the desk my YWCA membership card, and went into the pool area. As soon as I came through the doors, I could see that there were probably about 15 to 20 people in the pool. Everyone appeared to be up there in age. When I told Erin about it, I said "senior's." Well I took off my shirt and shoes, set my bag of stuff up on a chair, then turned and jumped into the pool. Today was the first time I have been in the pool at the Y. When you are sitting along side the pool, it is very easy to over heat. That room, for whatever reason, is kept much warmer than the other parts of the building. Well the water was nice and comfortable. It wasn quite warm. Usually when you jump into a pool, you prepare yourself for a bit of shock before you get used to the cool water. Not this morning. I jumped in and the first words out of my mouth were "the water feels great!"

Well for the most part, I was able to do all the exercises the instructor had us to. The ones I struggled with were not because I couldn't, but more so because I wasn't sure what the exercise was. Sometimes she would say "OK! NOW THIS!" and she would describe the movement. I'm a visual guy so for me I have to see stuff that I don't get at first, in order to fully understand it. Thankfully a few times she got out of the pool so she could imitate how the exercise was done. Did things like Cross Country Skiing in the water, running in place, side lunges, stretches, etc. At one point, I didn't feel winded or tired, and my leg cramped momentarily. I immediately straightened it all the way out and waited about thirty seconds for the cramp to go away. Leg cramps suck!

So after the water exercise, I went to get my card back, and asked the lady at the counter how I get officially in the class. I guess it really doesn't matter. I could technically come and take part in the work out without officially being on their list of people. But, I figure for my sake, it will be easier to not allow myself to let it slide, if I know that I am registered with them. Today was the shallow end of the pool, but I believe monday, wednesday, and friday is in the deep end. I'm thinking I will go tomorrow too, so that I can see what that one is like. Maybe I will want to stick with the deep end part of the class. Maybe I will stick with the one I registered in, Tuesday, and Thursday, and then just be a guest on Friday for the Deep End. If I could get up every day (Even on my days off), I think I would be willing to do monday through friday. It's a great work out. I realized it when I was going to bed, and I could feel it in my legs and arms. A small, but not uncomfortable burn.

After dropping Lex off at school, I came home and went to sleep. By this point it was already 8:30. By 11, Zoe had gotten up, and Erin had gone to get her and bring her in. Zoe came over, grabbed my side, and climbed up. After a few minutes, Erin did take Zoe out of the room and close the door so I could sleep. Probably an hour or so later, she was back in the room. She was working on tidying up the house, and was needing to do something in the room. Of course, she needed light for it. Then a little later she left again, turning the light off. Then again not too long from that, she came in, waking me up again and told me that Tinche, our cat, got out the door when she had gone out on the front porch to grab something, momentarily leaving the door open. Our cat goes into heat like every 2 weeks it seems, and we don't have the money yet to get her spayed. I found out this morning when I got home, that there is a male cat lurking around the house every so often. He apparently has heard Tinche and her constant meowing. I was in the kitchen at 6:20 and heard meowing much like Tinche's, but tinche was on the floor by my feet. I looked outside and saw this orange cat that I'm sure is a boy.

This afternoon when I found tinche and got her back inside, later on the male cat was lounging at the foot of the stairs connected to our front porch. I said "Erin! Look! That's the cat I told you about!" If she wasn't going to get pregnant, and have kittens, maybe we could try to explore the option of letting her out and seeing that she comes back. 1) I'm afraid she will not come back (get lost or whatever), and 2) if she gets out, and mates with another cat, I don't think we can keep her. In the rental agreement with my parents, I don't want to push it by saying "our cat is having kittens!" No, that won't go over well. We were lucky to be allowed to get Teagan! They almost didn't let us. We adopted him, then were forced to take him back to the original owners for fear of being kicked out, then they rethought it and said he better not mess up the house.

So, today I am pretty damn tired. I napped off and on on the couch, but that kind of napping almost does not mean anything. Sleeping for a few minutes, waking up, then sleeping for a half hour, waking up to something, etc, that is not sound recouperative sleeping. Just like, when I go to bed in the morning, if I only sleep 1-3 hours, get woken up, go back to sleep, awakened shortly after, I eventually get up feeling groggy, EXTREMELY cranky, tired, sometimes depressed, and irritable. If I can get 5-7 hours straight without interruption, then I can usually wake up feeling ok. 7-9 hours and I wake up feeling like "ok! I can take care of this, and this, and this, and this!" But when I'm lacking sleep, I can't motivate myself to get too many things done. Single tasks take too much energy out of me when I'm lacking sleep.

So in closing, when I got up, I grabbed my phone and had 24 emails. They were all comments on the blog from the same person. I texted her and was like "HOLY SHIT!" She was like "?" And I was like "You didn't have to comment! I understand!" I'm glad she did, and now I will make sure to return the favor to her as well, but I was just blown away. I will write more for you tomorrow.

Thanks for being here!

CB