The key to living dangerously

So last night, I dropped my keys while walking my dog.

In the dark.

While listening to a podcast about an unsolved murder.

The keychain had my flashlight and pepper spray on it, so I was forced to retrace my route unarmed and in the pitch black.

While listening to a podcast about an unsolved murder. Did I mention that?

My hound insisted on going forward, not backward, so I ended up carrying him. I recalled the spot where I last shined the light while my pup took a cigar break. No keys.

We returned to the house and, since the lost keychain had my house key on it, we couldn't get inside. Fortunately, I keep a spare. But it's hidden in a spot that had just been painted two hours previously. This led me to do the splits, balanced on one toe, to pluck the spare out of its hidey-hole. No problem.

Inside, I fetched another flashlight and headed out again to continue the search.

Voila. The keys appeared within a yard of where I realized they went missing. Yes! Victory.

Since the mishap cheated my furry friend out of his full walk, we went for another.

This time, nothing dropped (except his cigars).

Baby, I was born this way?

A loser. Yes, that's it. I'm a born loser.

The other day, on my birthday, the very last day I could renew my driver's license before it expired, I went to the local DMV. Which was fun, don't get me wrong. I love to people-watch and wonder about their lives.

In order to get the new federal I.D. that goes into effect in 2020, at which time it will cost $14 but is free if you apply for it when you renew your driver's license, you need to bring your birth certificate, social security card, passport, old driver's license, etc. I emptied our lockbox into a fresh, new, padded manila envelope and took it with me to the DMV. (Did you know the D stands for Division?)
Quit getting Distracted, Mea.

They told me the yellowed piece of paper I thought was my birth certificate was not, in fact, my official birth certificate. I needed one with an official seal. They told me to truck downtown to the other side of the river, stand in line, and get the real deal. So obediently I went home across the river and dug through a bunch of old, old, old (like kindergarten old) folders full of report cards. Out popped the official certificate, and off I trundled back across the river to the DMV, grateful at not having to stand in line at another government building.

After that three-hour cruise, I couldn't resist the thrift shop across the street from the DMV and lugged home two garbage bags and a suitcase full of stuff.That night for giggles, my mate and I looked at all the dippy photos in those ancient school files. No birth certificate, but surely it would surface.

Two days later, I went through piles of files and garbage bags, and the manila envelope didn't show up. I uprooted the house much of the day yesterday, then as a desperate measure, called the DMV. Which doesn't have a local number. So you need to call the state DMV.

They called me back a few hours later and said yeah, they had my stuff.

Hurrah! A small victory! But hours (and dignity) lost in the search.

Today I hope to get around to schlepping across the river to pick it up.

Rain of terror

OK, so I'm a little distracted today. It's a new deadline for a new issue of the magazine I edit, and I've got a couple stories to write besides. Things on my mind include:
1. Getting my 2016 year's taxes done by Sept. 10, my acountant's deadline for the fall late filing date;
2. The pain diary I'm supposed to be keeping as an exercise with my therapist to gain control of my osteoarthritis pain (I'm a huge slacker and have only made two entries in three weeks, even though I keep a personal diary daily, religiously);
3. The two prescriptions to pick up today;
4. The sources to contact;
5. Renewing my driver's license before Oct. 23;
6. Trump's horrid DACA ruling this morning;
7. Filling out some papers for Met Life;
8. Guilt for not helping my parents more with the family business;
9. Concern for my mother and her issues ....

So all that's hogging my limited brain space.

Meanwhile ... the vice president of the nonprofit for which I'm (the worst ever) secretary emailed me asking for the results of last year's board-member election in October 2016, as she lost track of the length of term for our new treasurer.

So I'm searching in vain, all the while slowly consumed by the uneasy recollection that, at that Annual Meeting event, I'd gotten so distracted by the speakers and by my own nervousness at having to say a few words to the audience that I forgot to take notes for the first three-quarters of the event.

The last quarter I wrote on a napkin, and it amounted to so little of import that I ended up sneaking by without putting anything on record. By the next meeting, November, everyone had completely forgotten that they'd never received minutes for the previous month, October, and I didn't bother pointing it out.


I popped two Adderall in an effort to gain some focus. While in the kitchen, I ended up rinsing out some recyclables ready to be binned. I'd been set to accompany my fluff-bunny Lhasa out for a walk, but we discovered it was raining. Feeling bad for him, I decided to play chase-the-treat with him around the house -- he needed some activity.

I could hear the rain falling harder and harder, so I hopped on the computer in the kitchen to do some work for a bit till it settled down. My partner came into the room.

"Why is the water running?" he asked.

I followed his glance at the sink and saw the water on full blast.

OMG. I'd left the water on while rinsing empty coffee jars and milk jugs.

The rain had petered out but I'd continued to hear the loud, pounding, soothing shower and assumed it was rain gushing out of the clogged eaves.

Perhaps this calls for a brisk walk to get blood flowing to that empty jar I call my brain ....

Looking for things is a full-time job

OK, I'm really having issues here. 

Ever since I got back from my trip down to Piddleyville, I've been searching for one thing or another. It's really getting ridiculous. My whole life is an Easter egg hunt.

Right now it's a library audio book on CD that's disappeared. Not the whole set of 5 CDs, just one that escaped its case and got separated from the rest of the crew. 

I remember very distinctly that, as I was packing up my stuff down in Piddleyville, I put it inside another audio book case and put THAT in my designated, organized "media bag." This media bag held all the books and audio books I brought down there and all the magazines and newspapers. All together. Like with like. Just like those nitwit organizers preach. I did what I was supposed to, like an organized person. Look where it got me.

So what went wrong? I don't know.

I shook out all of my books upside-down, took every CD out of every case to make sure two weren't hiding in one slot. I looked in my car, my clothing, the lining of my coat. I even searched under those little stiff things on the bottom of every cloth shopping bag I took down there.

See, the audio book, "Rumpole and the Primrose Path," is due Saturday. I've renewed and re-renewed and have maxed-out the number of renewals on it. 

This same thing happened last year: I lost two library audio book CDs and had to replace those, for $10 apiece. 

Two other things that went missing: my umbrella, which I left in a church 70 miles away. At least I know where it is. 

And a new USB cord I bought en route to Piddleyville to assist in downloading my library audio books. (A necessity because THE RADIO STATION DOWN THERE SUCKS and it's impossible to tune in NPR.)

My USB process has been slow, so I figured a deluxe $13 cord would do the trick. 

Now it's nowhere.

But wait, there's more. In between the realization of the missing disc and the last stupid thing I lost last, as documented in the last post (glasses? garage door opener?), I misplaced a rent check for $800 from my tenants. You would think one would have been mindful where one put that. 

Nope. 

This took several  hours out of one day last week before I found it in my pen case. (I knew I put it somewhere "special," I just couldn't remember where "special" was.) My Pilot P700s are definitely special as they can't be bought in actual stores. 

And so today I've spent the entire day searching for that stupid missing disc -- way more time than the $10 replacement fee warrants. The catch is, I TOOK AN ADDERALL TODAY. I'm medicated and SUPPOSED to be functioning like a grownup.

Instead, half my brain feels like it's yawning, and the other feels like a ball of yarn whose loose end is being yanked tight, so that the yarn ball is being squeezed into knots.

Anyway, I should get back to my actual work -- the kind that pays, albeit pretty feebly. Wonder if the IRS would mind if I deducted the $10 replacement disc, the $13 USB cord, and my time searching for them?

Until later ....

Someone asked me, "What do you do in your free time?"

HA HA HA HA.

I'm laughing not because I'm the typical overstressed, overscheduled, over-appointmented, never-say-no-to-any-committee type of Superwoman you hear about. 

I'm not. 

I've learned that I'm not to be trusted to show up to meetings on time or get things accomplished or benefit an organization in any way, so the word no is a key member of my vocabulary.

No, I'm laughing because I spent "spring break" down in my hometown, taking care of my parents' house, business and three dogs while they and my brother and his family spent 18 days in Hollywood, Fla.

Since packing for my "staycation" down in Piddlyville is another story for another blog entry, I'll spare you.

I did think that, since my workload at the family store would be shared by two other employees despite its being open seven days a week, I'd have plenty of time and energy left over to read several back issues of Writers Digest (catching up on a subscription I had in 2005), prepare my tax documents for the accountant, work on my novel and see a friend at least once.

Ha ha ha ha!

Here is an example of four days in the life of Mea Scatternoggen that totally illustrate what I did in my free time:

• Tuesday, I lost my mom's garage door opener -- searched hours, ripping apart my car, the garage, my tote bags and handbag -- and, just before dark fall, found it in the alley behind the store. 
• Wednesday I went to a funeral 25 miles away for my partner's aunt, and while riding with him in the convoy, left my keys to the store and my car in his car. So they ended up at home with him at home 70 miles north. Fortunately there were spares lying around my parents' house.
• Thursday I lost my glasses and spent the next 50 hours searching for them. They later turned up in a laundry basket full of shop towels I was laundering for the business.
• Friday morning, as I drove in to the alley to park my car, I saw my big pink foam lumbar support thingy sitting there in the parking space, where it had evidently rolled out of my car, completely unnoticed by me.

So ... What did I do in my down time while my family went sightseeing and exploring the beaches and shops of Hollywood Beach?

I went on a veritable hunting safari for my brain ... and concluded some lost items are better replaced than found.

Life's a real gas, all right

How to describe this particular ADD feeling?

Dear ADDers, I had to stop in the middle of my retail project to write about this sensation, because it seems like this is distinctly ADD that's rearing its pretty little head.

Speaking of heads, mine feels odd. Emptyish, like it's filled with gas instead of gray matter and other gross stuff. Not liquid like gasoline-gas, but some gaseous element ... is gas an element? I guess an element can be a gas but all gases aren't elements. I spaced out during high school chemistry.

Something like helium. Yes, that's it. Helium. So my head feels like an empty, dried gourd filled with this gas, and my neck is the only thing anchoring this gourd onto my shoulders, otherwise it would fly away. Maybe it has -- my brain is MIA.

Seriously, folks, it feels like nothing's in this cabeza (or shall we say calabaza). Yet at the same time, it feels heavy, like a 20-pound pumpkin.

And my eyes seem to be going in different directions inside of my head. Not literally, but that's the sensation, like balls are shooting out of the back of my eyeballs into my head. One's rolling left, inside my head, and the other's rolling right, like those illustrations of electrons and protons circling a nucleus.
 

... only there's no nucleus in my head, just those little balls flying round in different directions.

Can anyone relate to this, or is this just the freakiest damn thing anyone's ever heard of?

It's like the protons and electrons -- instead of having different charges so they attract each other -- have the same charge so they repel each other and go round and round in circles, orbiting nothing, really, because if the nucleus is there, it's tiny.

So I'm waiting now for an Adderall to kick in and make those electrons and protons gravitate to the nucleus and have a creative powwow together. It seems to be taking forever, though.

In the meanwhile, I'm at work in my family's store, tasked with the project of generally updating merch displays. Which is fun; I love rearranging stuff. But I can't think or focus and instead start one project only to be drawn to another three minutes later. (Like posting this, for example.)

I just want to hide in a corner on the floor with my head between my knees until some sort laboratory explosion of ideas and thoughts blasts me back into the present.

I remembered what got lost...

I didn't lose you! 

OK, so it's been awhile. You probably thought I'd misplaced YOU, my dear blog, along with the crystal doorknob, spare mailbox key, newish Ethiopian-opal earrings, pepper spray, pedometer, common sense, entire mind.

Don't worry, you haven't been festering on some sidewalk somewhere under rotting leaves and piles of snow.

No, dear blog, I've known exactly where you've been this whole time.

(Wellllll, technically that's not true, as I had to Google you to find the address of your special online home.)

But I knew how to find you. (If only I could just Google to find the above items.) HOW DOES ONE LOSE A DOORKNOB, you might ask. Never mind, it's a long story.

So today is the first day of my new medication -- an old one known for its use on antsy little boys. Ritalin. I was apprehensive at first, but so far, I haven't had delusions or the urge to chug a pitcher of purple Kool-Aid while stomping on ants and tipping over chairs. I'm not outside launching bottle rockets or shooting robins with BB guns.

Being highly suggestible, I admit, I am determined to make this one work, as Adderall, Vyvanse and bupropion haven't made a damn dent. 

"This will change your life," I keep telling myself. If I tell myself it will be so, it will be so. For all I know, it could be a sugar pill: I'm exactly the type of person who could heal from a placebo, because the power of my imagination CAN BE fierce. I have just kept it buried, though, for years. Too many years.

You see, my dear blog, the thing I've lost is my self. My creativity. That spark, that sparkle, that light. That urge to go out and do something, go somewhere, start something new. I have had no motivation for months. Years, even. And I'm really, seriously sick of it. It just can't go on. 

I'VE LOST MY MOJO.

Which is why, last fall, I began seeing a therapist that charges (my insurance company) a wee $435 an hour. I'm amazed anybody, insurance company included, thinks I'm worth that amount -- thinks there's something here worth salvaging. Every day I expect them to terminate my policy. BUT THANKS TO THE MUCH-MALIGNED OBAMACARE, I guess they can't.

We'll call her Marlee. 

Marlee has concluded my brain is too cluttered with negative energy and old tapes to function. It's exhausting me, draining me, and maybe that's what's adding to my "inattentive ADD" and contributing to the lack of focus, scatteredness, flightiness I endure each day. Maybe I'll chronicle here what we talk about each week. She's a regular part of my life, and I practically adore her. Yesterday we talked about thoughts being a choice. "You can choose how you feel, you can choose your thoughts," she said.

So today, I choose productivity and positivity.

Until next time,
Mea Scatternoggen

Strange fruit

So I went to my garden this morning to pick beans, and what did I find? Shoes.

Yes, the pair of fairly nice flats I wore last week to see the ADHD therapist. Growing right there between the green beans and Swiss chard. So much for that. I vaguely recall walking up the driveway, spotting some beans and getting distracted by them, of course, and harvesting a huge happy heap then and there.

I must have stepped out of my shoes -- no, not must have, obviously DID step out of my shoes. And there they stayed.

Over the weekend, I traveled out of town to work for my parents. Managed to get back home last night with everything I left with -- at least, I think everything's intact.

It was the item I didn't bring down there with me that bit me in the butt: My paycheck.

My dad had handed me and another coworker our paychecks and then asked me to follow him in his car to their house. He's ADD, too. He was in a hurry, so I left pronto without grabbing my purse.

Back at the store five hours later, I realized my handbag did not contain a check. I searched all over the store, trash, my car, bags and purse, dumping the latter out three times. I vaguely remember folding it up discreetly when my dad gave it to me -- but fog takes over after that.

Dad later called me last night to say he'd found the check in his car. Pfffewwwww.

But jeez.

So the reason he asked me to drive his car home in the first place -- not that it's to blame in any way. The evening prior, my parents (who drove separate cars) left work early to go to church and dinner directly from work (we all worked together Saturday). Since they took off in my mom's car, he completely forgot that he left his own car (unlocked and windows wide open) at the store overnight until he arrived at work Sunday morning in my mother's car and saw what appeared to be a car just like his.

He even had to check the license plate to convince himself it WAS his, as he hadn't noticed his car missing when he pulled out of the garage in my mother's car.

The tree doesn't grow far from the apple.

Redeploying the troops

I've just arrived home from my third meeting with the therapist I've enlisted to help me battle these insurgents in my brain called ADHD. Trying to corral all of the mental missiles, projectiles and drones has left me battle weary. So I'm refreshing/recharging with my chosen ammo, coffee with cocoa-flavored cream, which is sure to frighten off these cranial terrorists just by the sound of it.

In the last eight days, I've dropped my MP3 player (a/k/a my pacifier and grip on life) into the toilet and ruined it, dropped my cell phone in the dewy grass at 9 p.m. in the dark on a state trail and didn't realize it till I got home (fortunately, subsequently retraced route and found it), and completely lost my pedometer (a/k/a my keeper and evaluator). I ordered replacements for No. 1 and No. 3. This neurological condition is draining my war coffers.

To top it off, I LOST or misplaced the 4-page questionnaire the ADHD coach/therapist gave me to fill out. And it was partially filled out. Which means that somewhere out there floats a document with my vitals on it along with a list of my private medications (including Adderall, so welcome meth dealers, here is my stash right at this address) and a checklist of my physical maladies. Thank goodness I did not check the box that said "sexual dysfunction" and also that there was no box marked "constipation," as practically all of these medical forms of every kind seem to have. Why everyone wants to know if you're constipated remains a mystery.

At least something went right today.

Roster of things currently missing from my person:

1. One Swiss-blue topaz ring, a gift from my sweetheart;

2. Antique glass doorknob (long story; I took it out walking with me)

3. Many, many earrings but most importantly the original non-allergenic earring that came with my piercing.

4. Two library CDs from an audiobook by Jonathan Kellerman

5. A hot pot.

6. Key to our mailbox.

7. My MP3 player.

8. My sanity.

Instead of hunting for Easter eggs ...

I spent the morning looking for my glasses. At least a good share of the morning. Finally found them peering out at me from atop the coffee maker.

I'm "on the road" right now. Not literally; in fact, I'm sitting at my parents' den table. They're in Florida right now, basking in the sun, whilst I stay home with their two obnoxious male dogs and my brother's obnoxious male dog, for a total of three OMDs. One kept me up all night barking because his arthritis has practically crippled him, and the poor thing couldn't move for about 20 hours. I finally hoisted him up with a scarf as a leverage device and got him outside this morning, where he remains, because he won't use the makeshift ramp I made for him.

Anyway, over the last few days, I've spent practically half a day searching for misplaced stuff. Yesterday, en route on the 100-foot walk from the parents' dining room table to my car in their garage, I managed to misplace their garage door opener. I must have emptied out my purse and totebag six times. Finally, it surfaced on the seat of the car. Pfffeww.

That was how I arrived at my parents' place of work, which I'm more or less tending while they're gone: flustered, annoyed with myself and with my hair standing on end from all of the fruitless tearing at it that occurred during the search.

WHEN I ARRIVED BACK HOME afterward, I realized I couldn't locate the USB cord for my MP3 player. (Catastrophe on the scale of Katrina.) Again, the totebag, laptop bag and handbag were dumped upside down and their contents sifted like a baker with his cake flour. Not once, not twice, but at least four times each. No sign of it.

Searched the car: Nothing.

Searched my pockets: Nothing.

It has become physically impossible to walk dogs without MP3 entertainment. So at 9:30 p.m., I headed back to my parents' place of work downtown. Still nothing.

Got home, parked the car in the garage, went inside, vowing to buy another cord at Walmart the next day.

Searched the car one more time. Voila! There it was under my shoe on the garage floor! Must have leapt out of the car when I alighted it.

NOW GUESS WHAT IS THE PROBLEM. I'll give you three guesses and the first two don't count. But it's probably obvious: My MP3 player has slipped out of my periphery.

Aaaaah, well, it's Easter. Just pretend these are adult Easter eggs.

No calories, at least.

And the toothbrush ran away with the spoon.

It's deadline time and I'm not in my right mind. To illustrate, I found a wad of chewed gum in the coffee cabinet, where I apparently put it instead of in the waste receptacle 18 inches away, and with the intention of brushing my teeth, I grabbed the toothpaste and ran a spoon under the faucet instead of the toothbrush. That could have hurt.

I just came back from a few brief and circumscribed errands after a week of what seems like nonstop writing. One of the errands was the bank, where I deposited some checks (yay!) and asked for 1. some temporary checks (because I'm all out -- yay for me for planning ahead), 2. a summary of my balance (yay for me as I may have enough to add to my Roth for 2014), and 3. some cash back (yay for me for thinking ahead again!).  I'm taking charge, thought I; I may lick this disorder yet!

Two stops later, I am at the library self-checkout kiosk when I realize the bank dude gave me my balance summary, the temporary checks, a receipt ... and no cash back. Went back to the bank, only to arrive at 5:01 p.m. and locked doors.

At least I noticed the lack of cash back. That's a sign of progress, I guess. Regarding the spoon and the gum, that's another story.

As long as I made it back home in one piece and with my library materials, that's all the matters, right?

Shoes this time

So one day this week, I wandered around the house for 15 minutes with my coat and mittens on, with one shoe on and one shoe off. Isn't it obvious what I was doing? Looking for the shoe's mate.

I'd gotten the hounds leashed- and sweatered-up, had my phone, MP3 player, poop bags and all of the ingredients that go into a dog walk. While sitting on the step, putting on my shoes, I remembered that I needed to call the vet and make an appointment for Hound No. 1. So I ran mid-shoe to the kitchen to make the call.

I then noticed dishes in the sink that needed to be put in the dishwasher because it was wet outside and I no doubt would need to put Hound No. 2 in the sink to de-muddify his hairy paws after the walk.

This led to cleaning off the counter, updating the grocery list posted on the fridge and checking my email.

When I finally got my act together, I realized only one foot was shod.  My poor dogs were forced to wait patiently while the Scatternoggen wandered around the house like a 5-year-old, looking for her left shoe. My better half finally pointed it out, on the floor at the foot of the staircase, also waiting for me.

Burning socks, drowning electronics

We've had our new microwave for four days now, and already, I've burned up two pairs of socks. It's not funny. 

Let me explain: It's freaking cold outside (30s) and my hands are terribly prone to freezing, so I like to carry hot bags of rice or other grain or legume in my mittens. 

The first hosiery execution can be chalked up to the newness factor of the microwave -- there's always a learning curve while you get used to a new appliance, its whims and personality. This one is just plain prejudiced against socks. White socks. (Hey, maybe it's a certain neighboring state's baseball team it doesn't like.)

Tonight I put a pair of rice-filled cotton anklets in for just 36 seconds. A whirling black fog practically hurled me across the room when I opened up the door. It continued to smolder for a half hour in the trashcan outside. Thanks to my dogs needing certain byproducts to be disposed of, I opened the trash can (again, to a whirling black fog) and found it continuing to smoke and smolder. 

From now on, I'm pledging to heat the rice up separately (in a bowl) and spoon it into the socks, rather than heating up the socks. 

Speaking of issues with new electronics, my significant other's new SanDisk MP3 player arrived a handful of days ago. It's a replacement of the one I accidentally dropped in the toilet when I forgot it was clipped to the waistband of my sweatpants. (Oops ...)

 

Just had a mini anxiety attack when, in the midst of writing something on deadline, I forgot how to spell the word anxiety.

Note to Self

Must remember to remove Icy Hot tube from toothpaste drawer.

It took me three months 

... to reply to a letter from my perfect, wonderful tenant, who has offered to BUY MY HOUSE several times over the past year. But I finally did it yesterday. TRIUMPH!

This presented a huge "drauma" for me -- dramatic and traumatic. I sweated and shook as I wrote the letter in the smallest print possible, to disguise my quakes and discourage anyone from reading it.

The letter basically said nothing, other than maybe buying me a few more months to make up my damned mind. I really love that house but have no business being its owner. For one thing, I'm 72 miles away from it. For another, in the event that a roof or furnace needed replacing ... OMG. Enough said.

My wonderful and loving partner (WALP?)  is saying, "MEA, LET IT GO, TAKE THE MONEY AND RUN LIKE HELL." He doesn't understand the mental hold that big old place has for me. I can't explain it, either, and it makes no sense. But then, so little of my life actually does, so why would it?

And en route to the library to photocopy said letter (yes, it was written in that prehistoric medium called ink) drauma struck again.

After climbing through the huge construction zone on the main drag (I'd parked on the opposite side because I'm too cheap to pay 25 cents to park at the library) and nearing the building, I noticed that my eyeglasses were not hooked on my shirt-neck, where I had tucked them to make room on my face for sunglasses. 


PANIC!

This discovery required poring through the construction rubble, attempting to retrace steps (but since I had taken a winding and random route, not finding them), running home to see if I lost them there, frantically searching the house as well and yard between the back door andcar, lamenting and berating myself and finally accepting the fact that yet another pair of eyeglasses were lost and this was one seriously expensive letter I had written, and why the hell didn't I park near the library? 

Returning to the library in a depressed state, I planned to park closer this time. But then, thanks to the ADHDer's lack of impulse control, I swerved around at the last minute and parked where I'd parked before. One last attempt at retracing my initial blase route through gravel, outhouse-sized holes in the road, damp cement and sweaty guys in chartreuse shirts.

Then yelling HOLYSH**!! when I saw them literally in the middle of the road, smack dab underneath a rope I had lifted to duck under. My spectacles were within feet of a cement mixer. But saved and unscathed!

Then, I was smiling like Stevie Wonder, saying what a wonderful day this was and being inside the library calmed me down immeasurably, because libraries elicit that wonderful calming response for me. 

Copy made, I hazarded the construction zone again to the post office a block away to mail the damn letter.

I got within two yards of the front entrance, but since I was on the street-rubble side of the fence, there was no easy way to actually get IN the post office. A kind stranger on the other side of the fence saw my lame leaping and halted high-jumping the fence and offered to post my letter for me.

What a great day it turned out to be.

Scatterbrainedly yours,
Mea

Still rehabilitating from Thanksgiving

I made it through an overnight trip out of town and back without leaving anything behind besides a coat. For three days afterward, I couldn't find my polar fleece hat and my latest book, but they turned up in the bottom of my bag and in a pillowcase, respectively. The logistical situation, I declare, was a success. 


Never did find the MasterCard I lost last month, or the eyeglasses that fell into a black hole in September, but welcome to my life.

For the most part,  I'm still plugging along without Adderall --  with the exception of two doses of 1/4 tablet each on Thanksgiving, in order to sort out and pay attention to all of the various kinfolk conversation-strings being strung and woven across the room. I really haven't noticed much of a difference, since it never seemed like I was that much sharper on Adderall than off it. Dull on both sides of the knife, I guess.

Yamming it up in Scatternoggenville,
Mea

The sheer number of stupid things I've done in the last four days alone has prompted me to take up this blog again.

As I pen this, my cell phone is sitting on a brick outside in the sun. Drying out. Yes, I washed it. In the high-efficiency front-loading Fisher & Paykel. Not just a wash cycle, but an added spin cycle for good measure. 

Today is Thursday. It happened Wednesday, the same day I misplaced my credit card for the second time in three days. Wednesday is also the day I discovered I had a whole series of books-on-CD overdue at the library. And stepped in a paint-can lid loaded with of wet, black flat interior latex. And used my mate's BP savings card to put in eight gallons of gasoline when he specifically told me an hour prior that 10 gallons was the magic number to achieve the savings tally. (In my defense, I had just picked up my terrier from cancer surgery and was not all there. Not that I ever am.)

Tuesday, I lost my cell phone, literally. On the trail near our house. I finally found it in some long grass after two laps of the trail on my bike, with my mate at home repeatedly dialing my number and random strangers being alerted to be on the lookout. 

Monday, I discovered that my overdue library magazines are at my mother's house 72 miles away. And don't get me started on how many items I misplaced at my parents' house.

My own house is a disaster. Hobbies in progress, projects in progress, unfinished projects, paper lists of to-do's, stacks of bills, scattered newspapers, prospective "merchandise" for my mother's resale business, cans of paint, paintbrushes, lampshades, broken knickknacks that need gluing or touching up. My purse sags with a disorganized array of coupons, grocery lists, lip gloss, a tape measure, Swiss army knife, toothpaste. Checkout counters mean a red face and a major archaeological dig to find my driver's license.

She's baaaack

And just as spacey as ever.

2014 was supposed to be The Year of Getting Things Done.

But have I?

1. Here it is, mid-August, and I STILL HAVE NOT FILED MY TAX DOCUMENTS. WTF?

People just don't understand this, and yes, it makes absolutely no sense. (Yes, I filed for an extension, wonder of all wonders).

I've had plenty of free time -- I'm unconstrained by kids, needy parents or a real job of any kind other than writing my brains out and occasionally helping my parents at their store. Surely plenty of time exists for making messes around the house? But seemingly none to clean them up.

2. After being out of town for three weeks working at said store, I've been home for five whole days now -- 120 hours -- AND IS MY SUITCASE UNPACKED? Hell no.

It's wide open, in the middle of the hallway, a humongous green zit that just got popped. And it took me till yesterday to notice that the butt-cushion I'd been driving around with in my car is actually a Sendik's bag filled with dirty laundry from said trip.

3. I still  haven't sent out my Christmas cards. Is that really even still on my to-do list?

Give it up!

Scatterbrainedly yours,
Mea