Feeling heavy

I feel heavy.

Not a physical heaviness. More a spiritual weight that drags me down to the point where I don’t feel like anything can lift me back up.

I don’t know why I’m feeling this down.

The house is clean. I’m on top of the laundry. I’m on top of the dishwashing. I’m on top of the floor - keeping it clean, that is.

I should be on top of the world.

But I’m not.

I feel like if I lie down, I’ll just sink into the centre of the earth.

And nobody would notice.

I want/need to do something stupidly rewarding. Or rewardingly stupid. Something that makes me clap and squeal because it’s all working… and then catch myself out for being a massive nerd/tard.

But I can’t think of anything ‘cause I’m down. Feh.

I’ll play some music and some Minecraft and hope that works.

But don’t worry - by the time you read this, I’ll be long out of this feeling. Or into a new one. I’m very easily distracted :)

I’m up to 94 kilos :(

I successfully got down to 92.5 kilos. Shortly before it rained.

Now that it’s raining, walking the dog is out, and sitting on my behind and trying to stay warm is in. This is why I’m back up to 94.

What I need to do is get my fattening arse up on my exercise bike and pedal ‘till my legs fall off.

Not happening today, probably. Life is busy getting in the way.

Flooding rains, kids, school, packrattus… all have to be dealt with.

Phooey.

Drainage

I discovered yesterday that the masses of water gathering around the uphill side of my house were due to masses of wet grass blocking the drains.

It was an education getting rid of that shit.

Mainly because the hound kept trying to fetch the sodden masses of grass as I chucked them onto the jungle lawn and then shaking off on me when he came back under shelter again.

Now that the grass is gone, the calf-deep puddles have drained away and I’m feeling a little bit more confident than I did yesterday about our ability to survive this wet spell unmildewed.

I’m not so confident about the kids’ school’s unfloodedness though.

I’ve told the kids: if the water is anywhere near the bridge, today, I’m turning around and coming back home.

And BTW - the QLD government road closure site only covers main roads, not piddly back ones, so getting to and fro is going to be an adventure.

Yay.

Not.

The last time this happened, I had to dash madly to the school to fetch the kids after a day already spent in and out of the rain. I got sick as a direct result.

Today, I’m hoping the weather calms the hell down so I don’t have to do that kind of thing again. Besides, I have plans to get the last of our quasi-useful packrattus up to St Vinnies.

Flip a coin

Weather in my neck of the woods has no middle gears. It’s either boiling or freezing. Soaking or bone-dry.

As I watch the flowing water encroaching on our house from the drainage ditch, I have to wonder why so many people are in denial about climate change.

Most of the denialists still call it “global warming” and I feel obligated to punch sense into the next person who denies global warming during a cold snap. But I digress.

When we have sunshine, we generally also have drought-style heat. The average person bakes, flakes or hides in the AC. [Aside to Americans and other non-strine speakers: flaking, or flaking out, is a synonym for having a nap or falling into a deep sleep] And in the heat, a siesta sounds very nice. Especially if you have a fan.

In the truly vicious heat, sleeping under the gentle hum of AC is an even wiser idea. So is having some variety of sports drink in the freezer, to combat the heat and the heat-prostration at the same time.

When it flips to wintery cold and flooding-type rains… that’s when you need to bust out the slankets and the kettle and have warm, dry clothes on hand.

Today [the 24th Jan] I plan on going to pick up the brats in my wellies. [That’s “galoshes” to the Americans] You know it’s stinking wet when you have to wear wellies on a school run.

Bleh.

I’ve had it with the weather.

Poor dog

The hound has taken to racing up and down the yard in the rain. I have only just figured out why.

He’s looking for his people.

Unfortunately for the hound, his people - Mayhem and Chaos - are back at school. Until it floods out with all this fargnaxing rain.

So in order to keep him at least dry, I’ve had to keep the front door open so he knows I’m around. Poor thing’s huddled up by the door and occasionally looking in with soulful eyes.

He stinks and he’s wet, so he stinks worse. Plus, he tends to chew everything he can get his teeth into, so there’s no way on this green [and waterlogged] earth that I’m going to let him indoors.

Best I can do for him is sit on the veranda when the wind is driving the rain away from it and give him company and pats.

Poor mutt.

Rain, rain, go away. We’d all love to do some stuff today.

It’s raining, it’s pouring…

Every time we try to fix the house or our land, it effing pours with rain.

When we tried to fix the patio, it rained almost nonstop for two months and Southeast Queensland got flooded.

Now we’re fixing up Mayhem’s room, it’s pouring nonstop. For two weeks, now.

At least the drainage ditch is working and we don’t have a small swamp happening in the back of our house.

OTOH, we have miniature lakes forming where the drains let out from our land to the gutter…

Still, I’d rather have the lakes than the swamp. Those readers fortunate enough to have good drainage have no idea how heartening it is to see a kilolitre or so rushing merrily through the area designated for it to flow. It means no swamp. No mildew creeping up newly-painted walls or infesting newly-laid floors.

Of course, with all the rain, the ditch at the back of the house is filling a little, but the key point is that it isn’t filling permanently. Or as near to permanently as it got last time,

We had algae growing on the grass, last time. Ick.

And the thing that’s stopping the small jungle that used to be our lawn from being mowed is that the mower has burned out one or more of the belts it’s needed for making it go. And three guesses when the shops are shut! That’s right! The weekend, when everyone actually has time to get the parts.

I swear to the Higher Powers, I would buy a scythe and do it myself, except there’s no real way to juggle a scythe and an umbrella.

Maybe I should invest in a raincoat. And one of those ludicrous brolly-hats to keep my glasses clear.

Alas, all thoughts of trimming the jungle have made it rain harder.

Rats.

If anyone wants to take some of my rain, they can have it for free. Just loan me some of your sunshine and I’ll call it square.

By the time the sun comes out, I’ll need a machete. I love the “banana leaf” ones. Anyone know where to puchase them legally in Sunny (cough) Queensland?

One more kilo

Including the standard daily wobble, I’m losing roughly a kilo a week. That’s progress of a sort. I did have an alarming jump of more than a kilo upwards, but I’m back down again.

Not by the kilo and a bit I gained, of course.

Weight is easier to gain than drop. Everyone should know that.

The slow diet is working. Exercise, chia and determination help.

Of course, since I am being good at my diet, I’m battling depression. Diets lead to depression, the same way that eating releases endorphins. I have to push through it.

Easy to say. Hard to do.

Harder, when the known universe seems to be conspiring against me to make me sad and angry and frustrated.

I have to stay strong.

Spinning my wheels…

I hate wasting time.

Lots of things that need to get done depend highly on other people doing them. Because I lack the skills, the knowledge, the money or the resources to do it myself. So I end up sitting around waiting for other people to get the thumb out of their collective butts.

Time bleeds away. Hour by hour.

I’ve organized and packed the kids’ bags so they’re ready for school. I’ve matched and rounded up socks for the kids. We have new shoes. Fresh lunch boxes and things to fill them with. Clean drink bottles for their water. New cooler bricks to keep their lunches cold.

Mayhem’s room is still not organized, though. That depends on Hubby and his brother. I lack the knowledge and skill to do what I’m depending on them to do.

For all I know, they won’t do a damn thing about the room and the renovations, and decide to play computer games all day. And all night. Keeping Mayhem awake and ensuring his sleep cycle’s ruined for Monday.

Hubby and brother have a long history of ignoring me until the last possible second before meltdown.

It makes me depressed to know this. Depression makes me neglect myself. That’s not good. For me, or the kids.

Progress and AntiProgress

Sir Terry Pratchett argued convincingly that everything must have it’s opposite. Not just the light-dark opposite, but the opposite that goes through the conventional, traditional opposite and out the other side.

We have progress. What I’m having is a kind of anti-progress that has gone through retention and out the other side.

I am getting fit enough to take the dog around two blocks -yay- BUT, on the anti-progress side, I’ve been struck from asthma as a direct result of Mayhem’s Carpet From Hell [coming to a cinema near you!] and literally can’t walk more than a block without wheezing and coming over all blue.

Progress: we got all the filth out of Mayhem’s room. Something of a Herculean task, I can tell you. The Augean Stables were easier.
Antiprogress: Since the Carpet From Hell™ needed to be got rid of, Hubby and Brother-in-Law [aka Normally Shiftless] thought this was a brilliant excuse to renovate. Now I have furniture blocking further progress in getting the house clean and thanks to Mayhem’s hazmat situation I now have two cubic metres of laundry to tackle.

Progress: I’m getting more than five steps in a row before having to stop and re-introduce the hound to the concept of “heel”.
Antiprogress: He gets the idea that when I stop, he should be next to/behind me, but hasn’t connected the command with the action. Thus my entire walk is me saying “heel” practically nonstop for fifteen or so minutes. The word is losing all meaning.

Progress: Chaos is starting to help with small household cleaning tasks.
Antiprogress: it mostly consists of grabbing the nearest sponge or towel and wiping five square centimetres of countertop. Adorable, but useless.

Progress: I think I’m getting the household to start picking up after themselves
Antiprogress: There’s still vast swathes of “That’s not mine” when I’m after whoever left a mess. One day, I shall get them to clean the mess they see.

Of course, one day, the sun will grow cold and die… but I hope I can achieve that goal before then.

It’s a constant, uphill slog. I’m tired of it.

I can hold out the hope that I’ll get there, and achieve a lovely house and keep it that way… But I was nearly there… and now my house is once more crammed with stuff I have to get out of the way.

Some times, it makes me want to cry.

Crying never got anything done. Guess I have to get up and just do it.

Because no-one else will.

Take good from the bad

The dog got out of the yard. I don’t know how. What I do know is that when I discovered the resultant mess, Chaos was out of the yard chatting with the Neighbour Who Loves to Complain™ and both Mayhem and the hound were nowhere to be seen.

I got Tessa inside and at least got a direction to look out of him. That was almost all the helpful he was. Only after I’d gone running up the footpath to the main road - visions of gory consequences flashing through my head - and come back in blind panic did he tell me exactly where both son and hound were.

Then he flat out told me I didn’t deserve to have kids.

With a smile on his face.

Knowing his fine tradition of dobbing us in to every authority he could conjure, I instantly knew he’d be calling Child Protection Services. And the house is still a wreck from Christmas/New Years’.

So, of course, I panic and start cleaning like a mad thing. But at least I had a brilliant idea. Call some cavalry.

I don’t have much of a network. Just one friend. For the sake of privacy, let’s call her Powerhouse. Powerhouse is everything I wish I could be. Organised, efficient, taken seriously… With her on my side, instead of dithering around from one task to another, we got together and started an organised dervish of cleaning.

And when I say we got a room and part of a hall done, I mean we got it DONE. Heck, it’s practically scotch guarded against further pollution. Past “just for now” debris is gone. Or stacked neatly and looking like it should be there.

It was an anxious, sweaty day.

BUT, I do try to take something positive out of any negative thing. So.

I got a room and a part of the hall done.

And once the whole house is done, I’m sure I can keep it up. And badger the rest of the lazy slobs in this house to keep it clean.

And with Powerhouse as my adopted un-sister/personal trainer, I’m determined to turn a new leaf and keep it turned.

Nobody taught me to be neat when I was a kid.

Something tells me I’m about to get schooled in a good way.

P.S. I also found $50 in the clean-up. Yay!