April 3, 2003

What a day!  It's only a little before two and it feels as though I should already be going to bed.  Or maybe should have stayed there.

Today is the day of "Craving That Which I Cannot Have."  Harrumph.  I want to crawl into bed with a big fluffy pillow and a cup of hot cocoa with marshmallows and the remote control and sleep and watch TV and sleep and read and eat a bunch of crap that's really bad for me.

I don't know if it's a fatigue thing or a deprivation thing or a nurturing thing or a human thing or what, but this morning, I woke up with an empty space inside and I haven't been able to get the right bandaid on it.  I *think* the general sense of dissatisfaction comes from the fact that I'm very cold.  Our heat has been out for a couple of weeks and it wasn't much of an issue when we were actually having spring weather in California but now we are having a cold spell and I just get grumpy and feel put upon whenever I'm cold.  It only gets down in the 60s in the house at night, but to me, that's freezing and I can't seem to shake the chill when I wake up no matter how many layers of clothes I put on.  The property managers haven't returned our calls yet, but they are both getting on in years and I always wonder when they don't call if someone is in the hospital or having troubles.  Regardless, I'm cold.  I know it will be warm soon, but meanwhile, this kind of blows.

On Sunday, we get to go to a town about an hour from here and see Josh, who will me stopping over en route to his base in Fortuna.  He had to go to San Bernardino to assist with the Newcastle Emergency.  Exotic Newcastle Disease is an airborne virus that affects all birds and is fairly devastating, often displaying no symptoms.  Hundreds of thousands of chickens and pet birds were euthanized in the past few months and it has just been a mess.  Fotunately, Josh was working in the supply zone and not the chicken killing zone, which really would have been a bummer.  Some of the guys who went before him had a really tough time.  So he's been down there for two weeks and it will be good to see him for a little while.  He can't leave the camp because for the entire time he's away from his home base, he's considered to be "on duty."  He's been working 12-15 hour days for 2 weeks with no days off, so he's pretty fried.  We can at least grab some pizza and eat it in the car with him.  :)

I'm trying something different for dinner tonight that I should have had before now, which is Shepherd's Pie.  I've read a few internet recipes and I'm ready to give it a shot.  I never had it the whole time I was in England and that needs to be fixed.  I will be using good old ground beef instead of lamb, but such are the sacrifices we make in time of *cough* financial prudence. 

Not much to offer today.  It's just a blahhh day!