Missed and Not Missed

Nice to watch a couple NY baseball games, even though the Yankees lost in extra innings and the Mets are being clobbered as I type. I've missed baseball, apparently the Yanks clinched while we were away. The Emmys were also televised, probably the first year I can remember not being able to see them. Most of the rest I haven't really missed, especially work. I came back to 200 emails, but I'm not complaining as a fellow exec assistant who had been on PTO returned to over 2000! By the time I logged off, with this head cold still kicking my butt (I've cancelled my plans to come into the office tomorrow), everything in my inbox was under control again. We caught up on all the "special" Jeopardy episodes, and now have only three regular-season shows to watch, but not today. Time for more medicine!

Last Round

I still can't walk well, and unfortunately our friend Jane's lovely flat was way too far away from the train station, so between the walk there and back I was absolutely shot. Maybe one visit too many? On the other hand Andy had a car, and even though he took us to dinner scarcely three hours after our big carver's lunch, it was nice not to have to walk anywhere. Hope I sleep well tonight, tomorrow's going to be a long day!

Round Town

Ah, west and wewaxation at wast! Interestingly, I found that the two small toes on my left foot which had been giving me so much trouble lo these many days really liked walking on cobblestones, so the problem definitely has something to do with my gait (probably the IT band thing). We stuck close to the hotel, slept a lot which we both needed, I bought my requisite touristy t-shirt, and we enjoyed a terrific sushi dinner. Tomorrow we wind things down again with one last round-trip train ride before packing for departure on Tuesday morning. 

A Banging Time

Are we home yet? The roofers have just about stopped their banging. This has dragged on for a full week, thanks to them not being around last Tuesday through Thursday, and I've never been so happy to be away. A decent night's sleep at the hotel, followed by a lovely brunch this morning that lasted way shorter than we thought it might, so we Uber'ed it to 30th Street Station and waited a couple hours for our train, running into our cousins (the groom's parents) who were taking an earlier train, for the traditional Jewish goodbye that lasts a bit longer than the Irish one. Yesterday we'd had trouble finding seats on the southbound Amtrak, and figured if we stuck with the redcap we'd have better luck with the northbound train. Alas, although we got seats they were hardly together. Lesson learned, it pays to be fleeced a bit if you want to sit together. I just hope we can get adjoining seats on Tuesday's flight to London! By the time we got back to New York, I wasn't thinking straight enough to remember the subways weren't running to our neighborhood, so we walked through Macy's and waited for the express bus home, which detoured a bit due to street fairs, and we finally got home about an hour ago to, as mentioned above, the sound of banging. It should all be over by the time we return from across the pond, and I'm looking forward to the relative quiet!

Goodbye Manhattan

Well, I'm coming back to the area on Saturday and Sunday on my way to and from Philadelphia, but this was my last day in the office for the next two weeks. Unfortunately I got very little sleep last night, probably due to nervousness about impending travel, so I sought to leave as early as possible, pretty easy considering very few people were in the office, certainly nobody I supported. So I hightailed it out at 3 PM, sped through Moynihan and Penn, got the subway just as the elevator doors to the platform opened, got a seat right away, and all was fine (give or take having to stand too long on the local bus) and I was able to log on again and do another hour of work when I got home. Trying to wrap up everything before travel time! There's a non-zero chance that I will in fact log off tomorrow with inbox zero...

Roofer Madness

Had Robin not encountered our landlord at the mailboxes last week, we would never have known he'd hired contractors to redo the house's roof. Well, they arrived today and summarily asked (very politely) if I could please move my car out onto a main street so they could park their behemoth of a dumpster in my parking spot. The downstairs neighbor had to move his car as well, so I wasn't the only one affected. But I wasn't feeling well, and having to look for a spot then trudge back even that 1-2 blocks did me in. And this all happened in the middle of working. It was impossible to concentrate on any job stuff with all the banging going on; today seemed to be removal of the old shingles and putting down big wooden slabs to protect the area from the coming rains. At the end of the day I was able to move my car back to at least a spot where I can see it from my living room window, but I'm very glad I'll be in the relatively quiet Manhattan office tomorrow. And I believe the worst of my ailment is over, judging by my multiple trips to the "reading room"...

Jonny Come Lately

My darling godson Jonny came to visit us today. He's moving back to New York City from Austin, TX, where he felt like he never quite fit in, and wanted to assure us that we'll be a major part of his NYC experience, at least until we move. Speaking of which, he's vital and strong (he does rock climbing and lifts weights) and was able to help Robin take down our printer and AC boxes almost single-handedly! Not only that, thanks to him all the boxes from the loft that aren't filled with receipts waiting to be shredded are now situated where the old AC/printer boxes used to be, freeing up space for us to steam our kurtas for this coming weekend and retrieve our suitcases for the weekend as well as the UK trip. Plus, he will help us rehome all our tech and appliances in the next few years as we get ready to downsize all the things that run on US outlets. Best of all, we get to cat-sit his lovely orange tabby Mango when he travels, satisfying my urge to have a kitty that won't completely be fulfilled until we've emigrated. We had a lovely visit with my uncle (his grandfather) then a nice lunch locally before he took off for more parts unknown. A bit of a whirlwind, exhausting day, especially being out in non-air conditioned areas for a longer period of time than I'm used to in muggy weather. And I'm still not walking properly despite having changed back to the sneakers I was wearing before my most recent pair, so that was pretty tiring as well. But so, so worth it!

Muggy

A bit hard to breathe this morning, but Robin swore to me that his weather apps indicated no rain in the forecast despite a flood watch in effect, so off I went without my raincoat. A bit of drizzle greeted me as I exited the local bus near my firm's office, but aside from having breathing difficulty I saw no real signs of rain. At lunchtime I noticed the ground at Manhattan West plaza was pretty wet, but I figured maybe I could still get away with dancing between the raindrops on the homeward commute. Alas, it was not to be, as I got caught in quite the deluge on 9th Avenue crossing to the Moynihan train hall and decided to stay underground until I got to my homeward-bound subway. By the time we hit the Bronx the rain had stopped, so it wasn't really that bad, but it started again when I was on the local bus so Robin met me at the terminus with my rain jacket. My feet are in a lot of pain right now so I've ruled out the socks I've been wearing and am once again assuming it's the new sneakers, and will put on my "old" pair again to shop on Saturday. This too shall pass!

Filling the Day

Got through my commute and work day just fine, no real down time at all in the office, but my feet were bothering me too much to visit my partners so I settled for MS Teams conversations. Not sure if it's the new sneakers (possibly not as I was having much the same issue with my previous pair), the socks, or just me getting older. I'll be wearing thicker socks tomorrow with my support slippers to cushion my feet when I go out to get the car inspected (this time for sure!) but that'll be first thing in the morning so it shouldn't affect me too much. What is affecting me, more than I thought, is the death of the saintly Dolly Parton; we won't see her like again.

Like Unto a Zombie

No real news today, I just couldn't wake up after yesterday's driving and car stress. I'm not used to being out and about two weekend days in a row. Also, when we returned around 6 PM we found the landlord's gutter repair/replacement folks hard at work, so I had to park in a different spot than my usual one right in front of the house, and retrieve my car to repark it around 9 PM when the gutter replacement was finished (and that was a bit stressful seeing them walking around the makeshift platforms outside our top-floor living room). I don't drive well at night, even tbe 30 or so feet it took to park it, and when I blearily glanced outside this morning I saw the car was crooked, which I never do in the daytime. Good thing I decided against taking it in for inspection, as I could hardly open my eyes all day. Somehow I got through work and made lots of progress, tried on my new yoga pants which I'm wearing under my kurta for the wedding reception (the first pair got waylaid so I ordered another pair to arrive today and, lo and behold, wound up with both pairs), and now I'm all packed for tomorrow's sojourn into Manhattan. I cannot believe I made it through the day like this.

House Call

This morning I had a necessary telehealth visit with my new primary care provider, who will take care of renewing all my prescriptions under her name as both my old PCP and endocrinologist have left their respective practices. I like her, she seems very nice, and best of all she's in my neighborhood, but she may wind up being a little hard on me. Ah well, I'll probably need it. Meantime, the inspection machine is still broken at my usual auto shop, and the one around the corner doesn't do inspections, so I'm still on the lookout. I also had a lovely text convo with my godson today. He's back in New York City to stay, at least for now, and wants to come up and see me (and my uncle, his grandfather). Which I want as well, as I hope to pass along to him a lot of our household belongings in a few years when we retire and move countries. But for now, I have to deal with the fact that I actually have a social life. I'm way too old for that!

There and Back Again

The back is still twingy, and I'm sure the backpack this morning didn't help, but the naproxen kicked in and by noon I was busy enough at the office that I didn't really notice. This evening we watched the best episode of Beat Bobby Flay I've ever seen because, even though it was scripted up the wazoo with them all pretending it wasn't, they made it extremely official that Flay and Brooke Williamson are A Thing, and it was totes adorbs all the way, lots of huggy kissy and such. I'm a sucker for that sort of thing. And it made my back feel better too.

Temporarelief

Not permanent by any means, I'm still doing naproxen in the morning for the next few days, but I could actually move around without pain today, which made job stuff a lot easier. And because it was a work-from-home day I could also relax a bit. Goodness only knows how I'll fare tomorrow when I have to go into the city. Meantime I have to call my former doctor's office to see if I can get a telehealth visit with my new primary doc prior to my annual physical in late October, as I'll need someone in-network to sign off on my prescriptions. Lots of hoops to jump through, it being the US, but another reason I would not have taken the early retirement package this year. Very content to get a steady paycheck for another two years!

Debilitating

The back was bad enough this morning that I opted for naproxyn, which feels like it never quite kicked in. Fortunately there's no pain when I lie down, but I don't want to spend the entire day in bed, and I really can't if I'm running to the bathroom every couple of hour and sweating the rest of the time. At least I got all my work tops steamed, and there's nothing else really pressing that I need to do. Let's hope it eases by tomorrow!

Back, To the Future

SuperCuts did their usual terrific job and I am shorn for the foreseeable. On the other hand, my back has gone all wonky. Fortunately I have a back brace, a heating pad, and plenty of ibuprofen, but it's still a nuisance and a half. I was able to move around enough by mid-morning to pass along some old sneakers to a neighbor, then get the haircut and Robin's meds and go grocery shopping, but after that I was shot for the rest of the day. I've never been a good patient, and back pain is one of the worst for me. I just hope it eases by Monday, as the auto place called and said their inspector isn't in tomorrow so I'll have to take a couple hours off work (if I can even walk) to take the car in.

OMG Shoes

Now that my tech issues at work are temporarily behind me, I can again concentrate on my personal health and such. To that end, I wore my new sneakers to work. I still have problems with the fourth toe on each foot, particularly the left one, but I'm guessing that's just a breaking-in thing. I love these sneakers, they only cost $50 and they have very wide toe boxes so things should settle by the time we're in England. I just hope the trains are running OK by the time we arrive, the tracks near where we'll be just buckled and three train cars overturned (fortunately no deaths) so it'll be awhile in repairs. I don't mind buses though!

Insomniac

Let's just blame the air-fryer chicken wings. A few of them smelt a bit "off," and while I don't think I got food poisoning I was certainly up in the night sweating and such. In fact, almost all night. I got maybe an hour of sleep before my 5:15 AM alarm, and the commute into the office was a whole lot of fun, but I made it there in one piece. Unfortunately I started falling asleep at my desk, and when wide awake I couldn't concentrate on work as the fellow in the next workstation was not exactly using his inside voice, so I made an executive decision to stow everything but my laptop and commute home at 2 PM so I could still do work once I was back. So worth it! And I plan on falling asleep tonight as soon as my head hits the pillow or a NY baseball team starts losing...

Sapped Again

I'm not as young as I used to be, and when the weather is dicey everything seems to move in slower motion, including me. I got through work today just fine, but had to collapse into a nap right afterwards. This heat wave is supposed to last through the weekend, and unfortunately I'm here for it, but I guess that's okay considering the alternative. I just need to pace myself, things are going to start happening pretty fast towards the end of the month, with the wedding celebration then England pretty much back to back.

Silly Site o' the Day

I'd rather not talk about my homeward commute on a crowded subway today, which exacerbated my various Old Person aches and pains to an uncomfortable extent, so I'm thinking about Merrie Olde since it's just about a month before our holiday there. I'm hoping to see some of the castles and such listed on this map (via BoingBoing), but we'll see how well I can walk.

I've Had It for the Week

Two Manhattan days in a row, two pretty miserable subway commutes home, and that's it for me. My left foot is in a lot of pain, very likely referred pain from calf muscles refusing to relax, so I'm limiting motion for at least the next couple of days as I work from home.