supercheesegirl: (stop hammer time)
I once again have the weird non-curable cold/flu/allergy thing. The thing that starts with a sore throat and continues to have a sore throat but adds on stuffiness and exhaustion. The thing that doesn't respond to cold meds or allergy meds or OJ or vitamins or herbs. The thing that I at one point suspected of being related to taking Flonase regularly, so I stopped taking the Flonase and then a few weeks later I got it again so I should safely be able to assume it's not the Flonase, but I still have suspicions. I'm now also suspecting really random things: we changed the sheets this weekend, could it be the sheets? But I had this thing all the time during the spring, and we don't change the sheets all THAT often, and I generally wash clothes with my sheets and I've never gotten sick just from wearing freshly laundered clothes before. Unless THAT's been the reason all along! But why am I not sick constantly then? And we've been using the environmentally friendly detergents all year! Maybe we should switch back to super-chemical-ly detergents! Could the problem be hot dogs? And etc.

Current strategy: F said the doctor once told him to try Benedryl, so we're trying Benedryl. It seemed to work last night--I slept really well, anyway, until I woke up at 4:30 from a dream about two murdered little girls and staggered to the bathroom to take some tylenol for my sore throat.

Marginally related to the Benedryl issue, my office is trying a pilot project with the Flavia and Keurig fancy coffee machines. My office previously had ancient diesel-fuel-producing coffee makers, so this is a welcome change but also probably a bad thing too--I should be able to cut down on Wawa and Starbucks coffee runs, which is good for my wallet, but I think my overall coffee intake will increase drastically. The only real problem with the Flavia machine is that it only dispenses liquid in the approved 4 oz. amount. The people who want 16 ozs. of coffee are annoyed, and the people who just want a big cup of hot water so they can make their own tea are annoyed. I'm trying to think of it as a bonus--this means I can try three different flavors of coffee instead of just one! In fact I may go try the cappucino in a few minutes.

Unrelated to sickness, sleep, or coffee: for over a week now, the ceiling above our refrigerator has been leaking. By "leaking" I mean sometimes it's like a babbling brook in our kitchen--not all the time, apparently only when the people upstairs run the dishwasher or take a shower or something (the water tends to be warm and sometimes foamy). We've called maintenance every day and they haven't figured out how to fix it yet, nor have they been particularly communicative about their efforts to do so, which has been maddening (i.e., did they even show up to look at it?). The other day F called maintenance from the kitchen while the river was flowing and held the phone up to the deluge so the voicemail could hear it gushing. Meanwhile we keep emptying buckets. With this and the fire alarm issue (which did eventually get fixed, at least, but not nearly quickly enough) I can say that I am not overly thrilled with my landlord. There are also several places on our walls where there were leaks after all those big storms in the winter where the paint has bubbled and chipped, and it looks like crap and they haven't fixed it yet, although at the moment I would rank the kitchen fountain as a higher priority. Silver lining we are trying to keep in mind: at least we don't own this place ourselves, so this is better than if we had bought a house and had to fix these problems personally.
supercheesegirl: (little worker rox)
One of my pain-in-the-neck editors, a guy whose book is publishing a year late, just finally sent me the preface. The book's in production and we've been asking for the preface for weeks now. So I finally have it, and I read it through to make sure everything is correct, and I get to this:

We have also been privileged to work with an indefatigable team at Elsevier. Roxanne Halpine demonstrated a remarkable combination of patience and perseverance. No matter how busy the editors and authors, Roxanne somehow managed to coax us all to complete our chapters.

Isn't that nice?! I'm kind of shocked, I always figured these guys hated me for nagging them all the time. Maybe not!
supercheesegirl: (conan the barbarian)
My dad had spinal surgery this morning. My parents were up at 4 AM, at the hospital at 6 AM, and my mother called me at 9 AM to let me know she'd just talked to the surgeon and the operation went well. Go, efficient surgeon man, go. Dad just called me from Mom's cell phone to let me know they're on the way home. (His SPINE was operated on this morning and he's on the way home! So amazing!) It was really great to hear his voice--I hadn't realized how worried I'd been until I felt that relief to know he's awake and okay.

In other news, I skipped jogging this morning because I have yet another cold. However, this time I did a (teeny tiny) bit of internet research. I've been using Flonase for allergies and to improve my nighttime breathing, and it totally works, but apparently side affects can include a mild sore throat or flulike symptoms. This is unfortunate! I've been using the Flonase since probably October-November, and I've had a LOT of colds this winter, always starting with the sore throat. And OTC decongestants haven't seemed to work at all (I've tried store-brand ones, TheraFlu, and just today took Mucinex, none of which did anything at all, and Mucinex totally cleaned me out when I took it last year). If my theory is correct, and I'm not having colds but experiencing Flonase side effects, then it totally makes sense that drugs wouldn't work, because the actual condition is chemically induced to begin with. Argh. New plan is to discontinue Flonase usage for a few weeks and see what happens. Hopefully the sore throats will cease and desist.

Yesterday the computer network went offline for everyone in my company's Philadelphia office. The problem started around 9:30 AM and affected network drives (where everyone stores all of their files), email, and internet. Internet came back eventually, but not the network drives. At 1:45 I decided to take a half sick day and go home to at least get something done. So yesterday I:
- called four hair salons, got good information about wedding hair, made a preliminary decision (pending paperwork to be sent from the first choice salon either yesterday or today)
- unloaded the dishwasher, washed all remaining dishes, tidied the kitchen, rearranged the freezer
- got the mail, opened the package with the sample bridesmaid bouquet in it, squealed with delight
- cleaned both toilets, wiped down the sink, scrubbed the tub with the scouring pad until it was whiter than I'd ever seen it
- took a nap

It was a pretty delightful afternoon. Then F came home ("Honey, go look at the tub--isn't it magnificent?") and he played me acoustic versions of various songs that we could use for our wedding ceremony, and we had comforting soup and grilled cheese sandwiches for dinner, and watched last week's episode of LOST (the Richard one, I haven't seen this week's yet). Overall, a pretty excellent day, and I got a lot done, but none of it was the work they pay me to do.

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