Wooo! Writing twice in one week! Two in a row actually. That should be an achievement in itself.

Quick recap before getting into more “life” stories since I do have a stash of some pretty good ones… ones without graphic pictures of near-death experiences due to cats…

Not a whole lot to report for yesterday. I did laundry. I meal prepped. That’s another thing that should be listed as an accomplishment. I haven’t been prepping meals or grocery shopping like I used to. I’ve been haphazardly eeking by for so long that anything even halfway resembling my previous routines is celebrated as a win inside my head.

So yeah, there’s that. I put clothes away. Still waiting for the drawer organizers to come via Amazon. Looking forward to those and forcing organization back into my life. I talked to a coworker for a while. I organized the bathroom drawers where I keep all my morning stuff. Still not 100% happy with them, but they’re better than they were.

Mama Ox cleared off a shelf for me in the kitchen last night. That might be factoring into my whole “lack of routine” mood. For the longest time I didn’t have a place to keep anything. Maybe with having a spot where I belong in the kitchen that will change.

I did go through my notebooks yesterday. I haven’t been the best about making to-do lists but out of everything, that’s probably the one thing I’m most consistent with other than meds.

I registered for my summer class. That took some back and forth with my dean since the class I needed wasn’t showing up for me. It was nice to “talk” to her. It’s been almost four months since I’ve had any interaction with the nursing staff. I had another email this morning from her with the contact information for my Nursing Lab 2 instructor. I plan to reach out and introduce myself since she’s one of the few people I haven’t met in person yet.

I also found out I can register for fall classes already so I intend to do that at some point. Maybe today. Today is going better than it was this morning.

There was a lot of sexy time yesterday with Ox. Not going to lie, I was totally ok with all of it. I don’t think it was so much the sex that I needed or wanted. It was the intimacy. The closeness. The touching. The warmth. The moments of life not mattering and to-do lists not existing and levels of productivity not being met.

For a few hours, none of that mattered. It was just me and him and that was really nice. Connective. Stress-relieving.

I did read him my writing. That’s something I like and sometimes dislike about our relationship. He lets me read my writings to him. It’s how he can know what’s going on in my head. What I’m feeling. What I can’t communicate sometimes when we’re trying to have a conversation because I still don’t know what I think or feel yet.

It also means he knows about the times like last week, where he said my name. He sees me cry as I read out loud how I felt and why I felt that way. And so, just like that particular writing, yesterday he heard all about my connective experience with Jon and I realized how it must have made him feel like a third wheel.

Here Ox is, super supportive, stood with me through cancer, let’s me cry, and never once said “no” to anything I wanted to do with the bedroom. Yet here I am, talking Jon up like he’s the only support person I have in my life who understands me or cares… It left me feeling sort of shitty to be honest. It gave me some things to think about at the very least. I’m still thinking through them.

So… that was yesterday. No trip to the gym. No breakfast with my brother since we did lunch on Tuesday. No crazy day of crushing my lists. But it was a good day overall and in the frail emotional state I find myself in most days recently, I take comfort in knowing that I was able to have two good days in a row. I got stuff done and while it might not have been everything, “some things” is more than the “nothing” it could have been.

Today hasn’t been a total wash either which is comforting. I woke up at 8:30 which is late for me. I didn’t do a whole lot. Had part of a protein bar, talked to Ox, curled back up in bed…

It wasn’t until around 10:30 that I started actually “doing” anything. Jon had messaged me asking to take his dog out. I guess he had been running late and didn’t get a chance to do it before he had to go to work. Since I was literally still in bed I didn’t have a reason not to agree to help him out.

Ox called when he was off work. We agreed to meet at the diner I really like for lunch. That forced me to get out of bed finally. I drove to meet him and we had an enjoyable meal together. I don’t know why I love their omelets and hash browns so much. Maybe because it’s the closest thing I can get to Waffle House here in Nebraska.

We went to Costco afterward to get gas. That was the last “work prep” task I had on my list. Making sure I didn’t have to wake up super early in the morning to fill up before driving to work.

Nope. Here I am with clean clothes, food for lunches, and a full tank of gas.

Irrational Right Brain: Bring on the work week!

We stopped at Walmart after filling up. Ox wanted to look at mounting brackets for a hard drive. We also wanted to take a look at some bedding stuff and totes for winter clothing.

The mounting bracket was a bust as was the bedding. But we did get the totes so I can take care of some of the remaining piles in the room. That will feel nice when I get around to it.

I stopped at the apartment to take care of the dog. Since Jon wasn’t home and everyone else was at work, the apartment was extremely quiet. I ended up staying there for a while, napping, soaking in the solitude. I hadn’t realized how much I missed silence and the lack of energy around me until I curled up on my memory foam couch under my weighted blanket and just breathed.

I didn’t have to think. I didn’t have to do. I didn’t have to worry or process or any of the stuff I feel like I have to constantly do. It was one of the best naps I’ve had in a while.

After waking up I came back to the house and so here I am. Writing. I feel ready to pack away the winter stuff. I feel able to register for those final classes. It’s odd how a little bit of alone time can completely change my mindset and mood, but there we are.

There’s still a few hours left in the day. It’s sunny outside and the wind it’s horrifically cold. I still have time to write a list and take care of a few things before enjoying an evening of cross-stitching and I’m looking forward to all of it. The productivity and the relaxation. I’m even looking forward to going back to work which is something I forgot I could do.

Alright. Now that “catch-up” is done, on to storytime.

Early on in the renovation process, Ox and I decided that we were going to tear out the ceiling. The room had a drop-down ceiling for whatever reason. Neither of us liked it. So since we were working on the room anyway, we decided we would take the extra time to get rid of it and make the room more like what we wanted it to be.

Well… come to find out while the addition was being built, someone stepped through the ceiling, so there was a giant hole no one knew about in the southeast corner of the ceiling… Well… there was no going back with the drop-down ceiling at that point, so it became an issue of, “How do we want to fix this?”

We tabled that issue for a bit as we continued removing tiles from the ceiling. When we got to the northeast corner we started finding Reese wrappers… in the ceiling…

Ox looked short of sheepish as he explained when he was younger he and his brothers used to have a bunk bed in that area, and his bed was the top bunk. The wrapper most likely was hidden in the ceiling after he had snuck candy from his parents.

I gave him points for being creative in hiding the evidence. XD

So… with all of the tiles and supportive framing removed, all that was left of the drop-down ceiling was the metal supports lining the walls. They were being held in place with screws.

Irrational Right Brain: I can totally take screws out and be helpful! Woo! Something I’m not terrified of fucking up!

Universe: Hold my beer.

Things were going well. I had taken the east wall supports down, most of the south wall, and was beginning to work on the north wall. I got about three screws in. Everything’s going fine. Got to the fourth screw. Began to take it out… and the power to the house goes out.

Irrational Right Brain: Oh god! Oh god! Oh god!

Ox had been out of the room while this was going on. He came back in calling out, “What did you do?”

Me: I did what you told me to do!

We got the power turned back on by flipping some of the breakers. Ox had me get back on the ladder to show him EXACTLY what I had been doing when the power went out. As I started trying to remove the screw I could see sparks inside the wall.

At that point, Ox took over. We got the screw out and removed the drywall around the area in question. Wouldn’t you know… thirty years ago when Ox’s dad had been building the room, he put a screw directly through the electrical wiring and into a stud…

Yeah… THIRTY YEARS… and the house never caught on fire… So now whenever I have to use a power tool I give Ox shit about knocking the power to the house out or being “set up for failure” from thirty years in the past.

We were able to fix up the ceiling and we corrected the electrical issue. I have way more respect for people in those home improvement/remodeling shows. This endeavor was no joke. It did make for some good stories though, and even though there were moments of frustration between Ox and myself, I think we worked pretty well together as a team.