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The Hurricane Was The Easy Part
Aug. 30th, 2023 08:37 pmI had a hard time on Monday.
Woke up with gas pains in my abdomen. Either it was a lactose attack from pizza the night before, or I'd been swallowing air in my sleep again (an anxiety thing I assume.) But it persisted pretty much all day and had me walking the edge of a panic attack and barely able to focus on work. Because I was so anxious I was looking forward to therapy, but the emotions experienced there very nearly shoved me off the edge. I had to talk myself into staying in the room at one point because the panicked urge to leave was so strong. So I made the logical part of my brain grab the subconscious part, throttle it real hard, and ask, "Why do you need to leave the room?" and "What will you do that will make any of this better once you leave the room?" There was no answer to either question. So I stayed in the room.
Part of the problem is I'm essentially not getting any exercise right now, and my days are extremely repetitive.
The lack of exercise makes me jittery with energy that I can't release.
Jameson knew that something was up--when I'm REALLY upset or hurting I can't hide it well--so he suggested we eat dinner out and then go to Target for "hurricane supplies." It was a good idea. I was still feeling very uptight and panicky, but knew that getting out would help.
We ate at Cowboy Chicken, a new chain down here that turned out to be essentially a western version of a Boston Market.
Rotisserie chicken or brisket, plus sides.
That's Jameson's food. It was pretty good! Nothing crazy special, just decent.
The "hurricane supplies" were candy and alcohol.
We already have a case of water and toilet paper. The water aisle was pretty picked-over, but surprisingly there was plenty of bread still. Then again tourist season is over and the locals know we're too far inland to experience much damage unless it's at least a Cat 3, plus it's not even forecast to be a direct hit. At most we'll experience topical storm stuff, maybe a power outage.
But it's a great excuse to buy candy and alcohol.
And Jameson is so thoughtful, to try and cheer me up. Even if it's with Unhealthy Things :)
I got Fruit By The Foot, York Peppermint Patties, and Two Chicks canned cocktails.
I hadn't actually planned to get alcohol as we have plenty at home, but they had a Gin Apple Cucumber tonic and that was just weird enough for me to pull the trigger on it.
Jameson got several kinds of chips and crackers (he's a snacky guy) and some Nerd Rope Bites, Twizzlers, Sour Patch Kids, and Pumpkin Spice Oreos. For his booze he chose Crown Royal Peach Tea. We certainly are in that weird flavor-midway between summer and fall.
Also that's a LOT of candy, we'll probably have it through the end of September!
Back home I went for an abbreviated walk as the sun was setting.
The clouds look strange. Like the normal thunderheads were meeting with some outlier hurricane bands.
It was pretty to see, though.
As dusk fell the bats came out. They are too fast for a good picture but you can at least tell it's a bat.
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Tuesday I didn't wake up with pains, so it was just "normal anxiety". Sigh.
Breakfast and checking on the storm, which is now a hurricane and expected to be a Cat 3 when it makes landfall.
I've been through worse so am not very worried.
We were supposed to go drink with a friend at Epcot tonight, but obviously that was weather-contingent.
It wasn't raining at 5pm so we gave it the ol' college try...
Yeah, no. That's an outer hurricane band.
And it opened up on us the minute we pulled into the parking lot.
"Just run over to the bar!" our friend texted. Nnnnno. It was POURING.
Of course as soon as we got home it stopped raining, but it's going to be on and off from now until that thing makes landfall so there's no point trying to squeeze activities in. Time to hunker down. We had a quiet night at home.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wednesday was anticlimactic, which is a good thing.
But made me feel bad about buying those "hurricane supplies." It's clear we won't be needing them.
The hurricane passed quite north of us. We had abnormally strong wind gusts, and it rained all morning, but by 1pm it was practically sunny out again and the rain had mostly stopped. I hope the people who actually got hit with this made out all right.
I worked as usual, practiced trombone after lunch, back to work, then since it was no longer raining I decided on a post-hurricane walk!
The clouds were pretty cool, kind of mammatus-type.
I didn't see any damage at all, just more leaves and acorns than usual. And magnolia cones of course.
Our little lake has a ring of bright green pollen around it now.
There is a frog in this photo, can you find it? He hopped into the water with a big sploop when I turned to walk away.
There were a surprising number of people out and about...probably because this is going to be the coolest day we'll have until October (at 86 degrees.) Back home I had one of my "hurricane supplies", the Two Chicks gin apple cucumber cocktail. It was good, tasted like something I'd get at a bar...that is to say, sweeter than I prefer, and with less actual alcohol than I prefer. But it was still tasty, and I won't have a problem finishing the others at some point. Jameson's Crown whiskey peach tea was good too, it was like a liquid peach ring.
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Tomorrow I should be able to finish my 30 hours for the week, then I want to get ingredients for marinara and breadsticks to make for us this week. Also, our HelloFresh showed up damaged--a package of pork ribs was punctured and the bottom of the box was like a murder scene!--so I want to get replacement ingredients so we can still make the meals.
Nothing else on the docket, except I need to book myself a massage to see if that helps me to calm down at all.
And now it's September.
Oh, did you find the frog?
Woke up with gas pains in my abdomen. Either it was a lactose attack from pizza the night before, or I'd been swallowing air in my sleep again (an anxiety thing I assume.) But it persisted pretty much all day and had me walking the edge of a panic attack and barely able to focus on work. Because I was so anxious I was looking forward to therapy, but the emotions experienced there very nearly shoved me off the edge. I had to talk myself into staying in the room at one point because the panicked urge to leave was so strong. So I made the logical part of my brain grab the subconscious part, throttle it real hard, and ask, "Why do you need to leave the room?" and "What will you do that will make any of this better once you leave the room?" There was no answer to either question. So I stayed in the room.
Part of the problem is I'm essentially not getting any exercise right now, and my days are extremely repetitive.
The lack of exercise makes me jittery with energy that I can't release.
Jameson knew that something was up--when I'm REALLY upset or hurting I can't hide it well--so he suggested we eat dinner out and then go to Target for "hurricane supplies." It was a good idea. I was still feeling very uptight and panicky, but knew that getting out would help.
We ate at Cowboy Chicken, a new chain down here that turned out to be essentially a western version of a Boston Market.
Rotisserie chicken or brisket, plus sides.
That's Jameson's food. It was pretty good! Nothing crazy special, just decent.
The "hurricane supplies" were candy and alcohol.
We already have a case of water and toilet paper. The water aisle was pretty picked-over, but surprisingly there was plenty of bread still. Then again tourist season is over and the locals know we're too far inland to experience much damage unless it's at least a Cat 3, plus it's not even forecast to be a direct hit. At most we'll experience topical storm stuff, maybe a power outage.
But it's a great excuse to buy candy and alcohol.
And Jameson is so thoughtful, to try and cheer me up. Even if it's with Unhealthy Things :)
I got Fruit By The Foot, York Peppermint Patties, and Two Chicks canned cocktails.
I hadn't actually planned to get alcohol as we have plenty at home, but they had a Gin Apple Cucumber tonic and that was just weird enough for me to pull the trigger on it.
Jameson got several kinds of chips and crackers (he's a snacky guy) and some Nerd Rope Bites, Twizzlers, Sour Patch Kids, and Pumpkin Spice Oreos. For his booze he chose Crown Royal Peach Tea. We certainly are in that weird flavor-midway between summer and fall.
Also that's a LOT of candy, we'll probably have it through the end of September!
Back home I went for an abbreviated walk as the sun was setting.
The clouds look strange. Like the normal thunderheads were meeting with some outlier hurricane bands.
It was pretty to see, though.
As dusk fell the bats came out. They are too fast for a good picture but you can at least tell it's a bat.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tuesday I didn't wake up with pains, so it was just "normal anxiety". Sigh.
Breakfast and checking on the storm, which is now a hurricane and expected to be a Cat 3 when it makes landfall.
I've been through worse so am not very worried.
We were supposed to go drink with a friend at Epcot tonight, but obviously that was weather-contingent.
It wasn't raining at 5pm so we gave it the ol' college try...
Yeah, no. That's an outer hurricane band.
And it opened up on us the minute we pulled into the parking lot.
"Just run over to the bar!" our friend texted. Nnnnno. It was POURING.
Of course as soon as we got home it stopped raining, but it's going to be on and off from now until that thing makes landfall so there's no point trying to squeeze activities in. Time to hunker down. We had a quiet night at home.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wednesday was anticlimactic, which is a good thing.
But made me feel bad about buying those "hurricane supplies." It's clear we won't be needing them.
The hurricane passed quite north of us. We had abnormally strong wind gusts, and it rained all morning, but by 1pm it was practically sunny out again and the rain had mostly stopped. I hope the people who actually got hit with this made out all right.
I worked as usual, practiced trombone after lunch, back to work, then since it was no longer raining I decided on a post-hurricane walk!
The clouds were pretty cool, kind of mammatus-type.
I didn't see any damage at all, just more leaves and acorns than usual. And magnolia cones of course.
Our little lake has a ring of bright green pollen around it now.
There is a frog in this photo, can you find it? He hopped into the water with a big sploop when I turned to walk away.
There were a surprising number of people out and about...probably because this is going to be the coolest day we'll have until October (at 86 degrees.) Back home I had one of my "hurricane supplies", the Two Chicks gin apple cucumber cocktail. It was good, tasted like something I'd get at a bar...that is to say, sweeter than I prefer, and with less actual alcohol than I prefer. But it was still tasty, and I won't have a problem finishing the others at some point. Jameson's Crown whiskey peach tea was good too, it was like a liquid peach ring.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Tomorrow I should be able to finish my 30 hours for the week, then I want to get ingredients for marinara and breadsticks to make for us this week. Also, our HelloFresh showed up damaged--a package of pork ribs was punctured and the bottom of the box was like a murder scene!--so I want to get replacement ingredients so we can still make the meals.
Nothing else on the docket, except I need to book myself a massage to see if that helps me to calm down at all.
And now it's September.
Oh, did you find the frog?
