Bits of this or that

The flower shops were delivering to the hospital all day; bouquets, balloons, and boxes of chocolate. Sadly, I still can't smell anything (darned cold) and could only admire the beauty of the roses. One thing I did notice was all the deliveries were to the young (30s and under) wives and girlfriends. Nothing for the women who have been married for decades. Is romance for the young? Or just romance on demand per arbitrary holidays?

The other day I came home feeling worn out from trying to learn new procedures while fighting the horrible head-cold. Then, heading out to do chores, I spot a woodpecker industriously pecking away at the feed block I bought just for it. Hooray! Funny to see all the tiny mouse tracks in the snow under the feeder, too.

I watched a teen leaving the clinic with her mom, take off the mask she had been asked to wear for others' safety, throw it away and walk into the cafeteria. Grrrrr. Influenza is rife in town.

Sometimes when asked if I'm ready to check someone in, I have to fight the urge to mimic Mr. Humphries from Are You Being Served with a cheery 'I'm free!'

We're still getting new snow almost every day; light stuff that swirls around the buildings and blows constantly. So, with all this snow pushed across the roads, creating near-whiteouts, I'd expect most to drive with their headlights on...or not. I wonder how many drivers are so used to their vehicles turning the lights on automatically that it never crosses their minds that it can be daylight and still very difficult to see. Drive carefully!

Grumble

If someone could come up with a cure for the common cold I would fully support them receiving the Nobel Prize. How can something non-fatal make me so utterly miserable? Not to mention, by taking in so many fluids yesterday, my bladder had me up and down all night. :)

Other grumble-worthy stuff: still too cold to let the chickens out, even if they would venture out into the deep snow. Eggs are all frozen. And it's snowing again today...and tomorrow. I've run out of lettuce. So many dishes to wash.

There has to be something good to say...the fire is burning nicely. I spent yesterday curled up with an old favorite book. Yep, that's all I can think of.

Stretching my brain muscles

I made it through the first week of my new job. So much to learn! Every other patient I have to jump up and ask someone how to do something. By the end of the month I should have new insurance cards down pat. :)

Each morning when I get dressed I send a mental 'thank you so much' to my sister who sent me her ENTIRE wardrobe of business/dressy tops. Not having appropriate clothes can be very stressful; I will definitely support the charities who help with that.

Back to the weather (because that's what small talk is in South Dakota), we started warming up on Friday and Saturday was gorgeous. Almost too nice because today didn't go above freezing and all the mush has frozen into bumpy, slick walking hazards. Back to normal tomorrow with the highs only reaching single digits above zero.

It's been fun to see the chickens traipsing back and forth between the two coops after a week shut inside. Kraken has a bad case of frostbit comb, but it isn't slowing him down at all. In important news: I finally settled on a name for my stealth rooster; he's a buff-laced polish and waited to start crowing until after the extra roosters were moved out of the flock. Slender, jumpy and quick to run away...he is a Rincewind through and through. (If you don't get the reference, get yourself to the library and read Terry Pratchett!)

News from the frost front

I started a new job at a hospital today. Yay! Much to learn. One of my tasks today was to do a 'back screening' with a physical therapist. All my new co-workers moaned and said it's awful but I won't get fired for failing and I only have to do it once.

I didn't think it was that bad. After I explained about my history of back problems and the bad knee, he found ways to work with me. The funniest part was the wall squat, which is what most people do the worst on. I kept my bad knee straight so most of my weight was on one leg, but had no trouble holding the position. The PT commented on my strong legs and said I did better on that test than the other parts. I chose not to mention that my legs carry a very large amount of weight every day so they better be strong.

We're heading for the worst cold snap of this winter. The forecast calls for tomorrow's high to be -10F and a brutal low of -34F. Wednesday is supposed to be worse. These numbers are before the winds are factored in. Yikes.

Is it spring yet?

Friday we received 12+ inches of snow; dry, light snow at least so easy to move around. Which is exactly what the wind proceeded to do. It's also been bitterly cold and the chickens are tired of being shut up in the coops. It's supposed to reach 15 F today so I opened the pop hatches, they can at least look outside even if none of them want to venture into the snow.

Odd thing at work yesterday. Customer was upset that $60 of k-cups weren't coming off her ebt card (food stamps). She ended up not buying them, instead only getting the $40 of 'food' items: chips, pop and two boxes of cold cereal. During the conversation she showed me her $350 ebt balance. Normally, I don't pay any attention to what people buy with ebt, but this struck me as odd.

I remember getting WIC when my son was little. Cheese, milk, and a few varieties of cereal; nutritious and very welcome. Something about the current ebt program seems a bit off track.

Brrr, I need to put more wood on the fire. :)

Best not to compare

What I get done is laughable compared to other bloggers, but I felt really good about washing the dishes and cleaning the bathroom this weekend. So good, in fact, that I rewarded myself with a new bookshelf to keep everything I want close by my favorite chair. Top shelf has a basket of yarn, jar of needles and a salt lamp. Next down is a stack of knitting and sketch books, knit kit, pencils, scissors and current project yarn. Down again is kleenix, remotes, current project, kindle and gun (in case the zombies break in suddenly). Bottom shelf holds more knitting books and open space for other items I haven't thought of yet.

My other reward for such amazing accomplishments (cough, cough) was starting a new knitting project and watching Flambards. Of course, now the theme song is running constantly in my head.

Does anyone have a convenient way to store circular knitting needles? I looked online and really like the idea of a cloth container with pouches marked with the needle sizes, but the ones I found  seemed either overpriced or shipped from China at such a low price it did not bode well.

And so on

I haven't posted in a while; not really a lot of fun stuff to report: winter, work, bad cold, blah blah blah.

I trapped an opossum in the chicken coop on an evening when my son was home, so he shot it for me. Yay!

I've been knitting an ear warmer/headband for my mom. About halfway through I realized I misread the instructions; instead of size 10 needles, it said UK10 which should have been size 3. Being too stubborn to start over, I will have to figure out a way to double it up so it doesn't end up looking like a hat with a hole in the top.

Tonight I feel equal measures of virtuous and rebellious: I ate a lettuce salad made from romaine bought the day before the recall. Honestly, I'm not at all worried about illness; none of the reported cases were anywhere near me, 43 illnesses out of how many millions of lettuces eaten is pretty good odds and I'm the only one at risk since my son doesn't eat lettuce willingly.

Oh, yes, a weather update: we were forecast to have an ice storm followed by snow with blizzard type winds. The news has been howling about it for days. And we got...no ice and a dusting of snow. At least they were right about the winds, but it's not that cold so even those don't seem so terrible.