High Time

I figure that since it's been almost two months since I last updated, its high time that I finally let people know what's been going on.

At work, we learned mid-March who our new supervisor would be (for those of you who don't know we waited for around 5 months for this answer)-his name is Mike Picardi, and as far as I'm concerned he couldn't be more welcome!! While I did apply for the job, I had reached a point where I just wanted the question answered! I also admit that it was something of a relief- while I believe that I am capable of doing the job, I had hit a high-stress point in my life and was ready to let some things go. Now I can enjoy my job and not worry so much about possible drama, both within my department and without. I do have to say though that it is rather interesting to train your own boss.

At home, I've been babysittting my nephew Dalton every Wednesday (well, more often than not). What a cutie!! He's filled out quite nicely and has most definitely grown. As much as I love taking care of him, though, I recently decided to try to take a day off last week for a break. What an ordeal-not getting the time (thanks, Sarah!), but what happened with it.

Even with another person working in our department, until he is trained there's only so much he can do. I have recently had to pick up extra hours for various reasons-staff absences, getting backed-up on processing paperwork, the museum being very busy due to Spring Breaks across the state. After working a few overtime hours a week for several weeks, it ended with working a total of 15 overtime hours in one week. Wowzer. While I appreciate getting the work done, and I know I'll appreciate the paycheck when I get it, by Saturday I was quite drained. I slept in on Sunday, broke down a bit, regrouped my emotions and faced Monday with a positive outlook.

On Tuesday morning my mom helped me take my car to the shop to get it through safety and emissions. My dad kept me updated on the repairs, etc, and we were able to get it through the tests, fix an oil leak (knock on wood-still testing the results on that one), and get the registration renewed. I got off work at 4 pm, made it to the shop by about 5 pm (give or take), and was home before 6 pm. I knew before leaving work that something wasn't quite right- I felt a bit light-headed and weak. I chocked it up to the week before. At the shop, however, I knew something more was up. By the time I made it home, I decided it was time to find ye olde thermometer. My average temp is somewhere between 97.6 and 97.8 degrees- I had hit 99.4. A bit of a fever, but not much, right? Within one hour I was up to 100.7. At this point (obviously not thinking entirely straight, but erring on the side of caution (ok, probably paranoia)) I asked my dad to check in on me occasionally, and then added a blanket or two to the bed and more or less crashing. Before I fell asleep for the night I was up to 102.7. My throat was killing me, and I just couldn't get warm.

Fortunate I suppose that I had previously asked Lisa, Dalton's mom, for a "day off", right? I spent the entire next day in bed. I got up a couple of times knowing that I needed to eat something, despite having no appetite whatsoever. I ended up with a package of Ritz crackers. I think I remember making Ramen that night, but ate only about half of it. I just couldn't bear thinking of eating more. So much for my "personal day" that I was going to spend out doing whatever the heck I wanted. Though it really was fortunate that I wasn't depended on to care for Dalton that day. Thanks again for the Nyquil, mom.

The fever finally left around 4 am Thursday morning. I was scheduled to work, but called Mike and got permission to only come in for our scheduled meeting. Thank goodness-my throat was still absolutely killing me. I spent the morning in various pursuits while recovering-taking my brother to school when my dad didn't have keys, weighing in at Weight Watchers (I lost 6.6 pounds last week!), and then driving up to my favorite restaurant for breakfast/lunch before the meeting in hopes of gathering some sort of energy. Sadly, Litza's wasn't open yet. I then went to the Gateway and killed the pre-meeting time with some very light shopping and a quick trip to the food court. I guess it was a good thing that Litza's wasn't open as I could only actually stomach part of a cheeseburger at that point.

After the meeting, during which I was mostly silent-being reluctant to talk due to my throat, not lack of opinion-I finally made it back to Litza's, starving after having had very little to eat over the previous 2 days. I quite thoroughly enjoyed my meal, and took a larger-than-usual portion home for dad to share. I quite gratefully spent the rest of the day in bed.

After spending most of Friday being weak and coughing a ton, I awoke on Saturday with, joy of joys, pink eye. I went to work nonetheless, being very careful to use plenty of hand sanitizer and frequently washing my hands. Sadly, though, my energy was pretty much gone within the first hour of work. I set up an appointment at my clinic for just after noon and left work as soon as Nate got in. No wonder I was so tired- my blood pressure was way low! They tested me for strep. Even though the rapid test was negative, I was treated for it anyways, along with getting a prescription for the eye. Oh joy. I spent the rest of Saturday and most of Sunday in bed, hacking up lungs left and right.

Finally on Monday I was feeling ok-I kept hydrated, and was also grateful to find out I didn't have strep when the more reliable 48 hour culture was also negative. I spent the day getting caught up on paperwork...again. I guess its a good thing that its actually my favorite part of my job :). Today I spent doing other office work that has been waiting a very very long time to be worked on, and anxiously checking ups.com.

Why check ups.com? I was tracking a package, of course. What package? The package containing my new toy-an Asus Eee PC 1000 HE netbook :) In otherwords, its a 10 inch laptop. Yay! It's not meant for gaming, or heavy-duty processing, but for basics its perfect! I mostly want it for internet and basic word processing, and possibly for music. It has built-in wifi and bluetooth, a webcam, and a 160 GB hard drive :) Even better, its a cool shade of blue! ;) There was a fair amount of drama initially-I had incorrectly installed the upgraded RAM I got for it. Not until I had let it sit for a few hours could I come back to my broken toy to fix it. I'm just glad that I figured it out.

So far so good-anyone with questions about my netbook, feel free to ask! Chances are I'll probably even have it on hand and can show you personally. Right now I'm trying to run down the battery before charging it again- I'm at 51% with almost 4 hours remaining.