Checking in for 2023-09-11:

• Last week my intention was to practice with being consistent with working on my projects. For every success that I had when I made this intention on 2023-08-28 I have not had much success at all this past week. I've felt tired or scatterbrained and unable to pick up the pieces and begin again. Part of this is because I've been sleeping an awful lot lately. I'm tired, and my energy is pretty fractured. This morning I got up at 9 a.m. and threw myself into getting things ready for the day rather than starting my projects (unfortunately I didn't have much choice in the matter as there were several things that needed to be done first). This afternoon I slept for two hours. Not the kind of "burning up the dance floor" sort of productivity that one might want to have when one is trying to be productive. Plus there are little things that feel like they're not getting done in the process (my office is a bit of a mess and the house could use some cleaning). This coming week I'm planning on getting things out of the way to regain my energy and give myself more permission to work on things as much as possible.
• I did some of this today. I had some errands that I wanted to do (mail a letter and drop off some clothes that we wanted to donate). I've been practicing what this might look like in my head; planning out routes and getting myself motivated to do this. Today I put the clothes and the letter in the car so it would make the whole trek simple to start. I also told myself that if I needed to I could bail and do this tomorrow after my doctor's appointment. With that in mind I collected my keys and wallet and headed for the garage to run errands. There was a certain trepidation around doing errands but lately I've noticed that most of the time the spells of bowel movements happen in the morning and in the evening. I've also been practicing with not taking Lomotil or Imodium to see if that might help things. First stop was the mailbox. I opted for one that was on my route. I slid in and dropped off the note in the mailbox. First errand done. I checked with myself to see if I felt I could continue on. All systems felt capable so I headed to my next stop. It was further away so I had more time to think about my feelings. I noticed that it felt a lot like when I was in high school driving the car. There were times when I would go somewhere that wasn't part of my normal routine and those sorts of feelings came back to me; the unsure feelings, the feelings that I was doing something transgressive and that somehow it would all go wrong. I haven't felt those feelings in a long while. But I also knew that this was pretty much a routine drive. I've driven to this place many times so there was nothing special or transgressive about it (it's literally a CVS pharmacy). Unfortunately once I got there I realized the donation boxes that I was relying on being there were long gone. Nuts! I felt slightly annoyed that I couldn't complete my task but at least I had the journey. I drove back home but thought of another donation place that I could drop them off. Unfortunately it wasn't convenient to get to so I bailed on the whole thing. I'll try again soon.
• I mentioned that tomorrow is my doctor's appointment. I thought I'd be nervous about the whole thing but frankly I don't feel the need to be nervous. It's not like there's any preparation I need to do for it; it's just a snapshot in time.
• In "good things that I didn't expect", a friend is still using 10-year old code for a photo booth, and it still works. I whipped up that code initially for his wedding so he could have a photo booth. That it's still working is both amazing and a little frightening.

That's all for now. More as I know it.