Checking in for 2023-09-14:

This update in one word: eventful. This is another long one.

Content Warning: Bodily fluids. Ho boy there's a lot of bodily fluids in this one.

• I finished up the 24 hour urine test this morning. I have learned a few things about myself with this test that I feel need sharing:
  • I was able to make this all work, but it was a bit of a challenge. Having the waste receptacles close together can make for some interesting times. Fortunately I don't believe there was any cross-contamination between the two.
  • When I really, really had to go I ejected over 700ml of fluid (the "flying nun's habit" has a measuring cup on it). That is an awful lot.
  • I almost filled up the singular jug that they gave me. So there's no question of whether I am piddling or not. (In fact the tag on it had a space for which jug this was and how many total jugs there were in total).
  • Dropping off the ginormous jug is considered an "office visit" with the laboratory.
  • Driving with a giant jug of urine makes you really cautious on the road. I stopped fast and the jug went forward with inertia. Fortunately it didn't open but it scared the daylights out of me.
  • You haven't lived until you've gone into a hospital with an orange jug and a big ol' "biohazard" bag. I do not recommend the circumstances that lead to this but you can tell the staff from the visitors and patients with this one trick.
  • I have never been happier to hand a giant jug of piss to anyone in my life. Again, I do not recommend the circumstances that lead to this. Please find your joy elsewhere. Maybe needlepoint or crocheting?
• Yesterday I just wanted to be left alone. I was feeling a bit down because of the test and the reasons for it. I've perked up since but this really took a lot out of me (and not in the obvious way).
• I had a meeting at noon today so I wanted to get this jug out as soon as possible. Once I was "done done" with the jug I hopped into the shower and hopped into the car. The whole process took longer to drive to and from the hospital than it did to shower and drop off.
• I did some work on the Pepper&Carrot RPG this morning. I decided to take a look at the table of contents issue that I noticed before. That lead to a bit of reading on how to make that happen, which lead to me realizing that I could also add the table of contents to the document itself. Then I played with the Creative Commons logo. What I noticed throughout was that I was starting to get energized while doing this. When I started I didn't think I had even 20 minutes of energy in me. When I finished I had clocked in one hour and thirty minutes (including some bathroom breaks). That's a data point I need to remember.
• As I was pulling into our subdivision I got a phone call from my parents. My mom and dad offered to come over to do the lawn. On the surface this seems like quite the gesture, but unfortunately I was not in the space of "having people over". I was in the space of "I need to get to my meeting that is starting in 10 minutes and I haven't even made lunch. Poof! My fuses blew. I begged off on doing the lawn tomorrow. They didn't seem pleased but they were accommodating. After my meeting I called them back to apologize for being so short with them. Then this part gets a little ugly. I thought about what tomorrow would bring, with JoDee having Zoom meetings and the like. Tomorrow wouldn't work either. "Fine!" I thought, "Let's get this over with. We shall not be at peace until the lawn is done". Now, I must explain that I am of the generation that mows the lawn when it gets to the point where not mowing the lawn becomes more arduous than mowing the lawn. I am not the previous generations, represented by my neighbors, who can detect if the lawn is even remotely out of alignment and rush to correct the oversight. Seriously, we're the mohawk (or is that mow-hawk?) in an otherwise perfect plane. The anomaly. So if I'm agreeing to make mowing lawn happen then it was pretty bad. I told my parents they could come over to help. Thing is I felt like I was fully capable to mow the lawn. I have the energy from time to time to make "mow lawn" happen, but today I had other things on my plate that needed my energy. What blows my fuses now is not doing the lawn, it's making sure I can allocate the amount of energy to the task without disturbing the careful balance (at least in my head) of what I can accomplish that day. Had I known that "mow lawn" would happen I would have scheduled it appropriately. Now I had to jam that into my psyche. And, yes, my parents did not expect me to mow the lawn, but I'm not about to make someone just do something like "mow my lawn" without me helping. So no matter what, "we will mow your lawn" became "we're all mowing the damn lawn" in my head. And all of this without me asking for assistance. I was extremely annoyed. I quickly changed to my lawn mowing outfit with all of the frustration welling up inside of me. I took it out on the lawn. I mowed the front yard and a good chunk of the back yard before my parents could arrive. When they did arrive I stopped and explained to them the situation. When I had the 5Fu pack it did make things a smidge more difficult, mostly because I was wiped out when the pack came off. I'm not on 5FU anymore so my energy is a little more plentiful (but I still get tired). So my dad coming over to help with the lawn was more of us just getting together to have some time to talk and what-not. I didn't need him to come over, but he expressed that he liked doing it and I felt like it was a reasonable trade-off. I know that my parents wanting to help is their way of trying to control a situation they cannot control. They do this by offering to help; sometimes without asking. Unfortunately this can lead to some head-butting because unasked for help is not the same as help desired. If I say "please help me with X" then that's me asking for some help. If you, on the other hand, shove me out of the way to help I'm going to be annoyed (or worse). I'm already in a position where I'm trying to figure out what I can and cannot do while trying to keep my own autonomy for as long as I can so I don't take kindly to folks shoving me out of the way to help. I doubt anyone relishes being shoved out of the way when they're perfectly capable of doing the thing. Also when someone offers to help I have to then schedule when they can help. There's an extra burden on me to figure out how to let folks help me out. Sometimes the burden isn't that much. When we had snow-removal in the winter there was little for us to do; it just happened. Low cognitive overload is good. However, when help comes from your elderly parents (one of which fell over the weekend and just got the OK from their doctor) it requires effort on your part to make sure that nothing goes wrong. It's expended effort in order to make sure that you can be helped without harming the other person.
• We discussed all of this after we finished mowing the lawn. I told my parents that I appreciate their help, and I understand that this is their way of trying to regain control of a situation that is decidedly out of their control. I think they understand now that if we need help we won't be shy about asking for it. But it is actually more work for us to accept their help when it isn't needed. I love my parents and I hope they took it with the grace and empathy that it was offered.
• Just after dinner I had to run to the bathroom to take care of business. Once again I didn't successfully contain the mess that followed. I actually had to take off the seat this time in order to clean up what I hath wrought. Never a dull moment here.
• We did have "birthday" coney today from National Coney Island. If you're in the Detroit Metro Area do check them or one of the other fine coney establishments out.
• Overall the birthday week has been good (or at least memorable). Life is definitely interesting.

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