Call Me Crazy

But I think I should be wearing my winter clothes in the winter. No?

Here I have a lovely assortment of sweaters and sweatshirts and heavy-weight tops, and they are all just taking up space in my closet. Instead, when I go to work, I wear a tank-top or t-shirt with an open button-down shirt over it. Because on any given day, it is between 75 and 80 degrees at my desk in the library. The temperature varies all over the school, and actually, all over the library, but where I am, and anywhere else I could go, it's as if all the oxygen has been sucked out of the air, and out of the lungs of anyone who comes near. Fun.

The Hubs, I have not mentioned -- to anyone, lest they good-naturedly ask him about it -- has stopped smoking. He stopped exactly one month ago, and used no drugs or aids of any kind (of course.) And he is suffering. I have seen plenty of people quit smoking, and heavy smokers, too, but I've never seen anyone go through what he's going through. His cough is almost constant, way worse than when he was smoking, and he feels sick all the time. Now of course, there's always the possibility that he actually is sick, as well as not smoking, but we'll never know that unless he loses consciousness. He is almost never sick, so the odds of him picking up, say, pneumonia at the same time he stopped smoking are pretty slim. Even so, he looks terrible and feels terrible and is, needless to say, pretty grouchy, which I figure he's allowed to be. He says (of course) that he's not sick; I'm sick and anything he's feeling is just foolish compared to what I'm going through. I say bullshit to that, because he's never sick and he feels like crap and that counts. There's always someone worse off than you are, but that doesn't negate the fact that for you, you're sick.

Anyway, he's been sleeping later in the mornings, a little bit, as have I, so our whole morning routine for the last 30 years is different -- I think I mentioned that the other day -- and now K is finally substituting again, so she's added to our morning mix, but so far, we're pulling it off like seamless choreography. Anyway, I made sure not to get into the shower this morning before I saw the Hubs off, because I wanted to see how sick he looked (not bad today), but he came to the doorway of the family room to say goodbye and had this very tense, tight-lipped look on his face. I said "Oh, you look so tense! And so early in the day!" He said nothing, but continued to look like that, and after a moment, passed his thumb over his upper lip. "OH! No mustache!" I said, and then he smiled and laughed. So he is without facial hair for the first time in maybe 22 years. I said "I remember that face!" and he laughed again (so I hope that was the harbinger of a better day for him today), but he said with all the coughing and everything, he just couldn't stand to keep the mustache anymore. And this after losing the full beard last spring. So now he looks something like a little kid, but with white hair.

Also, I would have to say that my condition is improving. I still think it will be a while here, which is okay, but I have longer periods in the day of feeling all right, and when it's bad, it's not as bad as it was. I still get up in the night, but hey, really, when didn't I?

No real plans for the weekend here, other than certainly not watching football because I could care less, but the weather is supposed to be beautiful -- near 50 degrees, I hear -- so maybe I'll get to go out in the world. I would love to just take the half hour ride and spend a little time at R's. I think I may also have to stop by the gym and try to cancel my membership in person. I called on Monday and they said they would send me the form, but I haven't gotten it yet. I do love that gym, but it's just not for me, especially now, and there's just no point in a membership that I can't use. We'll see how that goes.

So that's it, made it through another week at work. I can't believe that there's only two more weeks until winter break, but of course, I kind of zombied through the last break (at Christmas) so it feels to me like we've only been back at school for three weeks. Even though it's really just that I've been back at school for three weeks; everyone else has been there since New Year's. Anyway, today I re-scheduled a whole variety of medical appointments for other things that I had to cancel because I was so sick. More on that another time, perhaps. But I'll be plenty busy that week off.


WATCHING FRIENDS :: ENTRY #1669