Still Sick but getting better. I no longer have to sleep reclining, I can now lie down. But I still cough & hack. And now my mouth is raw from all the lozenges.
Neat! I came across the life & work of a very interesting woman; Frances Benjamin Johston. She was a professional photographer, circa 1889-1930+. She was widely reknowned, even when she turned to strictly architectural & garden photography in her later years. Luckily, she donated much of her work to the Library of Congress before her death. She took pictures of young & old, rich & poor, unknowns & famous. Many of her pictures can be cropped for multiply 'mini-pictures.' One photo, of school children boarding a trolley, can be seen as one entire photo, or as multiple portraits, framed by the trolley's windows.
Thanksgiving: Talked to mom last night. Instead of me driving to see her, she's coming to see me. So I'm 'preparing' the second most popular Thanksgiving meal: Chinese food.
Tatting: Making more of the small snowflakes from Vida's book; often using beads. I need to count how many I've made so far.
Clothes: yesterday & today; black jeans & loafers, braided hair, Celtic jewelry & an additional silver band. Yesterday I wore a black polo & today a multi-colored plaid blouse from Alexander Julian. Not from a recent line; but pretty & long-sleeved. It's quite cold & windy today. I wore socks & tennis shoes to work; changing when I got here.
Labels: Frances Benjamin Johnston, sick, Thanksgiving
Sick I been sick. Hacking (& recently productive) cough, sore throat, etc. As a result, cancelled Thursday's Mutants & Mastermind game (well, David cancelled the entire game because he had a work deadline).
Played Living Greyhawk Friday, maybe a mistake. No game on Saturday, or today. Didn't go see my Mom. Didn't go to the Wake Co Library sale.
Barely got any cleaning done. The only useful think that I've really done; put the tags on my car.
Books: I read
Diamonds Are Forever by Flint & Spoor, pretty good, a little short. Re-read some others.
Tatting: more snowflakes done.
Labels: Diamonds Are Forever, sick
Cold continues: I still have the cold, partially because I've only rested one day. My sore throat on Friday was probably from my sinuses draining (note, this is the first time that I've had sinus problems in 30+ years). Nonetheless, I packed Friday night & went to Steve & Anitra's early Saturday morning.
I spent some time with Carry Saturday morning, learning how to use a knitting loom. I used that thread that I bought to attempt tatting; white string with multicolor thread wrapping it, in segments. Since it didn't have a smooth enough twist to slide the knots, that experiment failed. It worked well enough on the knitting loom. I was asked multiple times if it was beaded, that should give a clue about how the multicolor thread wrapped.
When I boothsat for her at dinner & supper, I continued to work on it. We didn't use the entire loom; just a half-dozen pegs or so. It made a somewhat narrow scarf, made narrower by the fact that it curled.
By Saturday night I was so miserable. I had the full-blow cold symptoms; my back ached from shoulders to hips; clogged head & less than full faculties.
I felt better the next morning, especially after taking some alka-seltzer cold remedy. So I worked with Anitra again. Since it rained off & on all day, it was a very slow day. Nonetheless, we kept busy & I finished my scarf. It's almost 6' long; I plan to give it to mom. After Anitra paid me, I went shopping. I bought some stars for my co-workers & some origami cranes for some other folks at work; stuff like that.
Monday, I dragged around & read a couple books. Then Anitra & I found the Hold Your Own in Cameron Village & picked up a couple items. I found a folder to hold my spell templates for D&D plus a 'pocket' that clips onto the vent in my car; to hold my cellphone where I can reach & find it.
I called Chris to cancel gaming, because after all, I'm still sick. Then I called in sick on Tuesday. I went to work on Wednesday, despite still being ill because I had stuff that had to get done.
Get to work; my boss is pissed because I hadn't done the org chart the way that he wanted. I had asked Craig for help because I didn't have anything that could format the way he wanted it. Craig NEVER got back to me, not even a 'I don't have time to help you with this'. So I didn't do it. So my boss did, which pissed him off. The funny thing is; per the way he had it; it was already in OrgPlus that way.
Plus, a funding change disappeared. I know I did it, in mid to late June to early July. But there's no sign of it. The server had some hiccups about that point & I wonder if it got eaten. But my boss is pissed because in the meantime; it's been wrong since July 1. What a welcome back. Of course, this is the same boss who has said thank you about 5 times in the last 5 years. He's not real good with the positive reinforcement.
I cried a bit, because frankly, the way I felt I just didn't need that on top of it. Then I couldn't find my request for the weekend (Thursday through Monday) off. I thought that I had copied the email to my supervisor but no sign of it. I finally found it about 4 pm. Whee.
I got everything done except for getting some action confirmations & let my supervisor know what to expect Thursday, etc. I was sooo glad to get out of there; it's not even funny.
I washed clothes Wednesday night & managed to stain a number of items pink. The first load was white & delicates; including that red silk shirt with the bleach spots. I'll have to check once it dries & see if it dyed the bleached spots. The ultra-soft Japanese print tee that I bought in 'Japan' at Disney World is now pink instead of white; at least it's even.
Thursday morning I packed, my crate of books & PC notebooks plus the drink bag before Chris left so he could take them with him. After my laundry was done I packed my clothes & other stuff. Managing to forget my laundry bag, my tote bag & diddy bag. Luckily, our room & the con are in the same hotel so I won't have to haul around too much. At worst, it's around a couple corners & up a flight of stairs.
I rushed around & got to Rosemary's at 12:30. She & Chris worked til noon & I was first to arrive. We managed to leave her house about 2pm. We got to our hotel, Holiday Inn, about 12:30 am. We missed the last turn & ended up 16 miles (round trip) out of our way.
Books: a couple at S&A's; one was a 'Bad Boy' anthology & I'm not sure about the other one. I read all day Tuesday & don't remember many details; except
Smoke Thief &
Bad Boys Over Easy (anthology). I also read
I Brake for Bad Boys & a Dick Francis novel,
Knockdown I think, on the way to PA.
Tatting: I started a snowflake from Vida Sunderman's Tatted Snowflakes, the 2nd one, & finished it this morning. I also put tatted 'flags' on my D&D spell templates. Only two or three pieces lack anything & I might finish them during gaming.
Clothes: at the Village I wore my ~Colonial outfit all weekend (yay washing machines). Monday I wore jeans & some tee, I don't remember which one, plus the Salem Mass sweatshirt mom found; the black one with the cat eyes. Tuesday I schlepped around in leggings, UNC CAP tee & a chambray shirt, plus slippers.
Wednesday it was black slacks, black knit shirt (long sleeves), Celtic knot jewelry & loose hair. Thursday it was SheVa Con (2005 I think) tee, greyish blue jeans, chambray shirt & white tennis shoes. I wore the Celtic knot jewelry & kept my hair loose so it would dry.
Today it's my long-sleeved grey 'Evolution of the Bull's Head' tee, black jeans & tennies, moonstone ring, earrings & trimoon pendant; plus rope band & flower band.
The connection here at the hotel is pretty bad. So I'm going to try one more time to enter my blog. If it doesn't work; I'll wait until Monday..or later. Okay, I got this posted but I'll add the links later.
Labels: Bad Boys Over Easy, Carry, emotions, I Brake for Bad Boys, knitting, Knockdown, laundry, sick, Smoke Thief, State Fair, tatting, work
Blech. As in, I feel just lousy. I only came in to work to finish the monthly spreadsheets (I had 3 left on Friday). Now they are done & I've taken care of one or two other little things (returned mail, personnel updates, etc). I'm about to head home.
Unfortunately, I just missed the last bus until 1:30. So, I think I'll get some lunch & then decide if I feel well enough to come back to work or if I'll go and curl up in some corner until my bus comes.
Today's outfit: black Origins button-down shirt (has an red & yellow dragon ~yin-yang w/ a blue & light blue dragon above the breast pocket), black jeans, black socks (that are driving me nuts), black tassel loafers, dragon pendant, dragon earrings, dragon band ring, dragon ring, flower band, lapis lazuli center flower ring & my hair was plaited the elastic fell out so now it's loose.
Labels: sick
Today's outfit: red cotton sweater, khaki slacks, cream trouser socks, brown loafers, Celtic knot jewelry, silver ring band, carnelian ring & 2 'bone' hairsticks in a small bun (with rest of hair loose).
Was sick part of the week & busy the rest of the week. I am still trying to get one more player for both games tomorrow, with no luck.
Labels: gaming, sick
Mental note: at cons make certain to drink lots of water. Or I will, again, regret the aftereffects. I called in sick to work yesterday. Not because I felt awful but because I thought it would be difficult to get work done between hour-long bathroom trips. So I stayed home, watched tv, read, did laundry & cleaned up the kitchen a little. Plus, I moved stuff from the coffee table to the dining room table in prep for last night's gaming & I cooked chili for supper.
I did have lots of fun on Saturday. I was very tired by the end, but that's to be expected. I saw Bob again. I met him in the con suite at SheVaCon & here he was in the con suite at Stellar Con. I keep feeling that he's a guest & that I should know who he is. I 'met' Timothy Zahn & complimented him on his work. As he said, 'all authors enjoy that. It helps to make up for the months at a time isolated in our offices.'
Lots to do today to catch up from yesterday, so must get working.
Labels: sick, Stellarcon, Timothy Zahn
Well, that's just spiffy. Due to a personal-type emergency I'm heading home now. Bleah.
And today is Rut's last day, too. I'll miss him.
Labels: Rut Tufts, sick
I am back from Hochcon (sound of much rejoicing). It was a lovely drive to McLean, Va. Which, btw, can be made in 4.5 hours, plus half an hour meal break.
I played several RolePlaying Gamers Association Living Greyhawk adventures, including one battle interactive. I played my secondary & tertiary characters for that campaign. The secondary one is now down to 1 time unit, military and has now survived 3 modules, including a double round one, at 5th level. FYI, that's Reed, my wood elf CatTail cleric/fighter, combat specialist, spellcaster corps in the Gran March army. The tertiary one, Edana Tiernan, is now 3rd level and has a leadership commendation. It's kind of a sad thing when the Combat Specialist (who only outranks the enlisted, even corporals outrank her) rogue in the Scout corps is the ranking military person at the table. So, Edana, the blond halfling on her first military mission was giving orders. That is just so wrong. I played her in 4 out of the 6 games that I played, so she saw quite a bit of action this weekend.
Driving back from McLean, I slept most of the way. I was not the one driving so you can relax. Even with that I felt exhausted through yesterday. I'm finally starting to feel better. I think I'm trying to kick another cold, which doesn't help. I bought some echinacea/zinc lozenges in Falls Church, VA before we started back. They taste nasty, but they seem to work/help.
Haven't heard from Diana yet as to why she didn't show for gaming on Monday. Since she's running, we didn't play. Instead, we talked a bit, Rosemary drank coffee to wake up for her drive home and Chris played Halo.
I went to bed at 9:30 last night. Still didn't want to wake up this morning. Since I have gaming tonight I'd better kick that. I stayed at work a little late last night. I did the in character posts for Reed to the CatTail mailing list. One of them is kinda funny. No response yet, though.
Time to get more work done. It's been a busy day. Being able to think helps.
Labels: CatTails, Edana, Hochcon, Living Greyhawk, Reed, sick
It's Monday. I just sucked down 16 ounces of diet coke, and I still don't feel awake. Hopefully, this will not last. Thank goodness I have reminders on my calendar to remind me of time sensitive tasks.
The last weekend of the fair was great fun, but boy was I tired. Saturday, Sharon Hill, a seamstress in the Village, loaned me a dress to wear. This was a good thing as my silk blouse was still drying & the substitute was less than satisfactory. The dress is a reproduction of an 1810 dress & it is comfortable & flattering. Sharon & I both benefited. I went to buy a new garment, something to extend my Village wear and she offered to make that dress. I got to see if the dress would be comfortable, etc while I tatted and I was a model so that other Village craftswomen could see how the dress looks on someone who isn't slim. I need to check my fabric stash for 5 yards of suitable calico & 4 yards of a coordinating calico for the apron/pelisse. If I don't have it, I may buy some. Then I'll send it to Sharon & she & her daughter Beth will sew it for me. Then later I can make my own from that. Wheee! Lots of dresses. I got a picture of myself in that outfit too. Must send a copy to Mom.
(15 minutes & I'm still on hold)
Sunday night I helped Anitra & Steve pack the booth. Anitra & I slept in on Monday while Steve went to get the booth hardware, display case for the Village History display & breakfast. Steve took care of the birds, daily task, while Anitra & I went to the Fairgrounds to pick up our entries. (20 minutes & I'm off hold, whew). We stopped by the Village to say goodbye to the last folks packing up & to give 'drive by' hugs. Peter Blum & his sister were the first folks we saw. Wow, they look different in jeans. Then, everyone does. After we left the fairgrounds we stopped by Reader's Corner, after all, I had a 5 dollar check burning a hole in my pocket. That $5 is the 3rd place prize money in Infant's Wear, Other category.
I found a copy of
Perfect Patchwork Primer, the book that inspired me to start quilting. I also found a copy of
Diplomatic Immunity in hardback as well as
War of Honor and some other assorted books. I bought a book on hemp braiding as a gift for Nora, Amanda or Hailey. The
War of Honor isn't out in paperback yet (insert gloat). I spent more than I hoped but less than I feared at Reader's Corner.
I made it home about 1pm and started unpacking. Well, I got my dirty clothes out of my bag anyway. I settled down to read one of my new books & relax. About 3 pm my throat started hurting. Sure enough, I'd caught Anitra's cold.
Monday night, people finished their characters to test play Diana's supplement. I had finished mine but it disappeared so I wrote it again. Then we went through the first encounter. We'll finish it, hopefully, on the 10th.
I called in sick on Tuesday. Then I drank soup, hot tea, and lots of soda & juice. When I could I watched tv & read. Frankly, I was too tired to really pay attention to anything. Tuesday afternoon, I called in sick for Wednesday. Linda handled Tarheel Temps for me. Wednesday was a repeat of Tuesday, except I slept later. I took a 3-hour nap Wednesday afternoon, skipped gaming & went to bed at 10 pm.
I wasn't feeling any better, but no worse so I went to work on Thursday. The dayquil was worse than the cold. It made me feel dizzy, in addition to the sore throat, runny nose & sneezing. The zinc lozenges, while tasting nasty, did more good. According to my co-workers I was looking a little pale, even for me. I took care of some time sensitive tasks and then headed for home at 4pm. I stopped & mailed my latest letter to my mom. Thanks to an accident of Farrington Road I finally made it home at 6pm. Bleah.
Friday, I felt better, consumed more lozenges & actually stayed & worked until 5pm. I was all alone in the office. Mike, Ira & Jim are at a conference. Rut was in DC & Susan almost never comes to this office on Fridays. I picked up a little candy on the way home, changed into something vaguely costumey, and was ready to answer the door for Trick-or-Treaters.
We had 2 groups. The first one was two little girls; a fairy & a princess. The fairy complemented me on my braids; I had unbraided my hair & then re-braided two plaits next to my face. The 2nd group had 4 kids, one still a baby being carried, dressed as a bumblebee. The first child took all but two pieces of the candy I had. The 2nd child took the next to last piece & the 1st child took the last piece to put in the 3rd child's bag. Momma was not happy & told the 1st child to put that candy back. The child did so. When he put one back that
wasn't mine, I told him to stop & gave it back to him. He was sooo cute. If I'd known that was the last group I would have let him keep the candy.
I was up later than I should have been, watching tv. So I slept late Saturday. Barely had enough time to clear the dining room table for gaming & go pick up Ted G. He's a student at State who was going to play in our session of Birthday Bash, RolePlaying Gamer's Association Living Greyhawk game. Since we were meeting him at Foundation's Edge, Chris picked up his comics & I bought
Forgotten Realms: Underdark. We ended up with 6 players, Chris, Rosemary, Ted, Jenna, & Bill D. It was a fun game & not as bad as it could have been. But we had some close moments. My character, Nadia, is a senior squire, so she was mentoring Ted's character, Julia, a junior squire.
I basically changed clothes, ran out of the house & made it to the COTE board meeting barely on time. Anitra is still sick so she wasn't there. It was just Steve & I. So we worked on the lanterns for the ritual and then went & picked up supper from the Jade Garden. Steve had brought Digdug, a burrowing owl from Utah that had just arrived at the Refuge last week. Digdug was perching on his shoulder as I arrived & I did not see him/her until Steve brought my attention to him/her (we don't know which gender she is yet). Part of one wing is amputated from a car collision injury & Steve is training her/him to be an education bird. It's a very cute owl.
Things went well Saturday night. But I didn't leave until 11:30. So I called Chris & I crashed on Steve & Anitra's couch. Again. Their dog Siesta was glad to see me again so soon. Anitra & I caught up (on the whole week's worth of doings) and then off to sleep. Anitra drove me to my car on Sunday, I drove home, showered, dressed & made to Foundation's Edge in time to run my Ironclaw demo.
I had 3 players. One who had played my Jadeclaw demo and one guy who had the book but who had never played before. He had a character half-made and I helped him complete it. I ran until 6 pm & then headed home. Chris played Halo all day, so we had pizza delivered for supper. I went to bed early, 9 pm. Still had trouble waking up at 6 am.
It's a beautiful Monday morning & I will wake up at some point. It was almost 9 am before I saw anyone else from my department. I was feeling very lonely when Linda finally stopped by. I was just exclaiming about how alone I'd felt when Paula walked in, too. Very funny.
Off to more work type stuff.
Labels: 1810 repro dress, Digdug, Halloween, Ironclaw, Ironclaw demo, Living Greyhawk, Nadia, Perfect Patcmmuhwork Primer, Peter, Sharon, sick, Siesta, State Fair, Steve and Anitra
