Lazy Blogging and the Third Storm

I admit that I have been a lazy blogger the past few weeks.

I have an excuse. I have had a cold that turned to pleurisy--an inflammation of the layers around the lungs. Pleurisy is often a complication that comes with RA.

Dry Pleurisy is not in and of itself dangerous, but it causes breathing to become painful, and coughing even more so--which causes me to be breathless and grumpy. And not terribly interested in blogable events.

Rest is the Rx that is most difficult for me, far more difficult than getting an antibiotic from the pharmacy. I am a wife and a mom. I own my own corporation. I am mother of the R3volution and the legislature is in session! I don't have time to be sick.

But enforced rest is exactly what the doctor ordered. Especially because I also slipped on black ice while I was walking the dogs this week.

It must have looked comical--A bold, careless step on what looked like pavement in the pre-dawn. Then the arms waving wildly, the trying to regain balance. Then my feet sliding forward and the small of the back, the upper back and shoulders, and the back of the head hitting ice. Somehow, the right middle finger and the left wrist got involved.

It happened very fast--down before I could do anything. Then two adult dog faces looking down at me with puzzled expressions. And a biggish black lab puppy on my chest, licking my chin frantically. "Get up, get up!" they seemed to say. "Lying in the snow is okay, but not on your back!"

I did get up, leashes tangled in my hands. I walked home. Slowly and carefully.

That was Wednesday.

Of course it was the next morning that I really regretted that one careless step.

But I had to go out to the store. the Third Pacific storm--the one with the most snow--was on its way. But it was up late Thursday night, too, to finish and edit a statement with the New Mexico delegation of CC2009 via Skype.

So now, enforced rest. Stay in, they tell me.

And the foot of snow that has fallen in the past 36 hours makes that easy to do.

I'm not risking more black ice!

Yesterday I spent my morning in bed, sending out a statement to each of the CC2009 state delegations, one at a time, while snow fell outside the window. I sent the Engineering Geek to walk the dogs. I did get up to bake some Challah in the afternoon--there was no way I was going to fight the truck down the hill and into town. And it was very good, thanks to my high altitude recipe and the stand mixer the Engineering Geek got me for my birthday. The Challah was still warm for our Shabbat dinner last night.

Today, more rest. Almost all day. I did cheat a little and went with the Engineering Geek to walk the dogs in the incredibly deep winter wonderland. Snow was still falling.

Today the snow came in bands. Ocassionally the clouds would teasingly part and the sun would shine momentarily. Then the room would darken as the snow outside began to fall again.

Tomorrow on the agenda-- storm over. And still more rest. My home confinement sentence will be complete sometime at the beginning of next week. In the meantime, praise the lord and pass the anti-inflammatories.

Ragamuffin Reading: The New Library is . . . Comfortable

NEARLY WORDLESS WEDNESDAY

I was going to call this post 'the new library is finished.' But then I realized that I added five new books to it just this week. Libraries are never finished!

It may not look like it, but these books are in order on the shelves now--These shelves contain world history, American history, Judaic studies, world religions, field guides, and science.

The quilt (left) is 24 years old this summer. My coworkers at "The Children's Meeting Place" made it for me just before I stopped working to give birth to the Chem Geek Princess. The center panel has her ultra-sound picture, back when she was "Junior" (as in a Junior Lotaburger. I was addicted to the Green Chile Junior Lotaburger while pregnant).



These shelves are also in order: general psychology, politics, practical arts and how-to, writing and language, biography, and fiction. (Teaching, schooling, ASD, and gifted kids, are all in my office. Astronomy, Math and Woodworking will go in the Engineering Geek's office).







In honor of making the library a cool and comfortable place to read, and to assert the never-finished dogma of libraries, I ordered some new books this week: Bastiat's That Which is Seen & That Which is Unseen and his The Law, as well as Murray Rothbard's The Ethics of Liberty. The Amazon reviews for Rothbard's book promised that reading it will make me an anarcho-capitalist.





I also ordered Henry Hazlitt's classic Economics in One Lesson, and at Borders I picked up The Politics of Freedom: Taking on the Left, the Right and Threats to Our Liberties by David Boaz. He is a fellow at CATO.

This July the heat is bothering me more than last year--ah, the joys of RA--and the library-guest room is the coolest room in the house.




Although she has been subdued this morning after the strange and abberation of a fight with Lily last night, Shayna wagged her tail in the cool of the library this morning.


I hope the calm of the library will be a place for them to rest while I read through the heat of the remaining summer afternoons!


Summer afternoons, cozy winter evenings, happy spring and fall mornings--these are all times to curl up in platform rocker and read. As Jefferson said:


"Every government degenerates when trusted to the rulers of the people alone. The people themselves, therefore, are its only safe depositories. And to render even them safe, their minds must be improved to a certain degree." -- Notes on Va., 1782.


If I am not out and about, you'll find me in the comfortable but unfinished library, improving my mind!

Ahhhh! (Blogger Withdrawal)

Since I blogged last:
1) I finished a paper entitled: Evidence for two different visual processing theories in ASD: A comparison of neuroimaging analysis (It took forever, because I am clearly a novice at this! I took the class in order to be able to tell how good the claims are for neuroimaging studies. I'm not sure I should say this, but . . . there's a lot of crap out there. I suffered but I learned a good deal).

2) I finished a paper entitled: Seeing the trees before the forest: the structure of visual intelligence in ASD (This was for my readings course. It was more within my knowledge base and more fun to write. I learned a lot with this one, too. Even if it wasn't painful and I could smile sometimes while writing).

3)The Boychick got his Blue Belt with a stripe, wrote a paper, and took his finals. Today, he slept until 10 A.M. and then we went into town to turn in that last paper and spent three hours at Borders. I read an entire mystery novel. Light reading is so nice!

4) I became the Mother of the Revolution in New Mexico. (I'll explain that one . . . someday. Relax, Mark. It's all in good fun).

5) I seriously neglected my blog. I am behind on comments, and lost one of them somehow--sorry again! I probably have it in my overflowing personal inbox. Which I will get to . . .
(But I did discover that I am the only person that gets excited about F.A. Hayek. Ah, well. I did marry a geek. Does that mean I am one?)

But that's a serious question, not one that is appropriate for an end-of-the-semester Friday when all the papers are turned in, and there are no more hanging over my head until August!

Right now . . .

it's Guiness time!


Ahhhhhh!

The foam is the best part.

Have a great weekend!