Just Call Me Goldilocks ~ Saturday 7/21/18

I know, I know, I complain too much about my sleep, my bed, waking up too often, etc.  Sorry! But that's life. Well, my life right now!



For the 2nd night in a row, my bed feels like a block of concrete. It is so hard!  I wonder why this is bothering me now when I slept on it for 14+ years without any problems?!  I did add a mattress foam top to it about 3 years ago so perhaps I did think it was too hard and forgot about it? But this time I didn't put the foam pad back on because I've had problems with being too hot so I thought it would be better to sleep without it.



I'm thinking that I might try to put it back on, though, because I wake up so sore, especially in my shoulders.  It could be that I'm still sore from moving the beds around 2 days ago, though, so we'll see.



In the meantime, I'm happy to report that I'm definitely not as hot at night!  So at least a victory in this long quest to be comfortable when I sleep.  But I still wake up every 1 to 3 hours to use the bathroom. I'm thinking I need to go back to not drinking as much.  Damned if I do, and damned if I don't!



I went to cuddle with Greg when I got up this morning because he hadn't gone fishing.  The mattress, the very one that I gave him because I hated it, felt so soft and comfy!

But the man is a furnace and that, with the heat coming off the mattress, meant that I cuddled for about 3 minutes and then couldn't take it anymore, I needed to be cool!



I came downstairs (where, incidentally, it was freezing, because we need to keep the downstairs at 73F to be at least comfortable upstairs) and decided to drink last night's decaf COLD. I get hot flashes during the day but I definitely think that they're more frequent or made worse by the fact that I drink my decaf hot.  Not actually drinking full caffeinated coffee seems to have no effect on my hot flashes, but it sure makes me feel like a zombie!



I saw the free sample pack of Dunkin' Donuts Cold Brew that I'd gotten in the mail a few weeks ago, and decided to try that.  You have to let it steep for 8 to 12 hours... I should have read the instructions first!

Then I looked up online instructions to make Cold Brew coffee with regular coffee. I might try the French press method, we will see.



I also brewed a pot of decaf since I'll have to wait until tomorrow morning to drink the Cold Brew!



I had a bowl of cereal and saved the inner bag to reuse as a freezer bag.  There were a couple of strawberries that I could save from the last container in my fridge, so I added them to my cereal, but I still had to compost several of them, and then I also had to compost an avocado that we never used.

Apathy towards my diet + no meal planning = food waste + gaining weight.  The obvious solution is to get back on the horse so why is it so hard to do so?!?

I earned the daily rewards with Explorer cuddling next to me in the spot that his sister usually occupies. But I yelled at her a couple of days ago when she very purposefully knocked a cup full of water off the side of the futon, so she's been taking refuge on Greg's recliner ever since, and pouting.

I caught up on emails and blogs and the news, and then Greg got up.  We chatted for a bit and then I offered to cook him breakfast. I cooked eggs and bacon, toasted an English muffin (and one for me!) and brewed him coffee and brought it to him on a tray in the living room. It took less than 10 minutes and I quickly counted that it probably cost us $1.50, tops, for the whole thing.



A dear reader, Michelle, emailed me TEN Coke codes that she snagged from her son (and the trash can!) because she knew I use those from time to time. Isn't she so sweet?! She also commiserated with me about menopause as we're the same age and she's also going through the sleep problems. It sounds funny to say this, but it really helps to know others are going through the same thing, because I always beat myself up (internally) for complaining so much about something that women have been undergoing for millenia!

I printed a Petco Pals Rewards coupon for a free 4-lb bag of dog food.  It needs to be redeemed this weekend so I might not be able to make it but if I do, I'll give it to Middle Son for my grandpup.



Greg was saying that he was feeling weird, dizzy and just not like himself ;(  I miss our hikes but it's too darn hot and humid right now. I mean, our high will only be 88F today but the humidity is a killer. So we'll just stay put.



I went to take a shower and wash my hair... and shave my legs. I felt like the yeti!

I used shampoo and conditioner from the Holiday Inn Express, it's a Bath & Body Works scent with lemon in it that's quite invigorating, I always like it.  And I used some soap that Greg had brought back from his hotel in Madrid.



When it was time to make my bed, I decided to try putting on the foam mattress top.  When I bought it, the king-size was cheaper than the queen-size, and I never got around to cutting it up to size. We made it work but it really stretched our sheets and it was a pain to make the bed, lol. Yes, I'm that lazy that in 3-4 years, I never bothered cutting it down to size!



But today I didn't want to deal with that headache anymore so I cut a cutter and a pair of scissors and trimmed it to size before putting the fitted sheet back on.  It's the one that I bought at Amazon and it's very soft and has deep pockets so it works great.  And then I decided to use the top sheet too.  You see, at night, I'm either cold or too hot.  I have a thin "cotton" blanket that I'd bought at Aldi last year, but when I'm cold, it's not enough so I add a small sherpa blanket on top. But then I'm too hot!  So I figured that I'd try the top sheet with the thin blanket to see if it might be the right mix. After all, I never take the top sheet off when we're at a hotel!  So here's hoping that I might finally be quite comfortable and not too hot!

I had to take the picture with my Kindle in my dark room so it's all fuzzy. I can't make the bed

very well since it's pushed against a wall so it never looks great, but I don't care. This is the

remnant of the pad that I cut off. I'll set it aside in case we need it for something, I guess.  I could make cat beds out of it.

On my way back downstairs, I swept the stairs with my microcloth broom. There was a bunch of cat hair on them as one of the Kittens always like to wait for us at the top of the stairs in the morning. And it's not always the same, they take turns!  Then I also swept the hallway, exercise room, breezeway, part of the Cat Room, and the stairs to the Gaming Lair.

This was actually my "good morning, it's about time!" committee this morning!

Greg said "It's not Domestic Saturday, sit down!" but I told him that since he felt weird, I felt compelled to do weird things, like cleaning on a Saturday :)



I'm worried about him, he's never really out of sorts like this. I mean, he feels sick more often than he should, but usually he knows what's wrong with him. For him to say he feels "weird" without being able to describe it, is not normal.



So I offered to go get him lunch anywhere he wanted. He decided that he felt like a burger from McDonald's but said he'd come with me.  I grabbed my phone and realized that I had missed a call and had a voicemail message from our neighbor Jeff. The message was very muddled and we couldn't understand what he was saying, but the gist seemed to be that he needed help.  Greg went to put on his shoes but since he felt "weird", I wasn't about to let him go do something that might make him sick, so I went outside so chat with Jeff. Turns out, he had needed help to hold something on his mower while he unscrewed something else, but he got his wife to help him.  I suppose that he's like Greg, he'll ask anyone for help before he asks his own wife, because we tend to question why men do what they do and they just want to do it, lol.



When I went back indoors to tell Greg he didn't need help anymore, he didn't feel like coming to McDonald's with me anymore, so I went on my own.  It was just past noon so I was dreading having to be in line at the drive-through for a long time, but I lucked out and got there right as no one was in line...but a long line formed behind me almost immediately!



I got lunch for the three of us (I always know what YS wants!) and used a $3/$10 coupon from my app to lower the cost a bit, and charged the OOP to Discover for 5% back in Bonus Rewards.

Back home, we ate lunch and Youngest Son finally got up!  He and Greg are supposed to play "Warhammer" today at some point. I guess I'll watch TV while they do that.  It was supposed to rain all afternoon and indeed the clouds had gathered about 15 minutes ago, but now at 1 p.m. the sky is blue with some white clouds and it's sunny.  If it weren't so hot and humid, I'd go sit on the porch but the futon in the living room will have to do, I suppose.



I looked at the ad preview for CVS and Walgreens and updated my shopping list. I'll get my milk at CVS, as usual, because I get it for free with the CVS gift card from Amex Rewards, but I don't need anything else from there, and I'll skip Walgreens altogether.  I've really been lazy this week and have yet to transcribe my receipts into my spreadsheets for the week and see where I stand as far as my grocery budget is concerned. Next week's shop will be the last for July so I ought to do that this weekend to avoid going over budget! This might mean buying only the bare essentials as I have a feeling that I've spent quite a bit of the budget, already.

Tabby Kitty is the only cat I know who answers to his name, although he only does that when I call him out of exasperation. He'll sit at the top of the stairs and cry for Greg if he thinks Greg is upstairs, or will sit in front of the closet that contains his favorite toy and cry.  So as soon as he cries, I call his name, and then I hear a throaty growl that he does, and he comes running to me, LOL, and then sit there in front of me and waits for me to do something, silently. If I get up, he'll run back to the spot where he came from and wish me to do something to satiate his urge.  Today, he ran back to the closet where the toy is, so I got it out and then played with all three Kittens for a short while. But as fun as it was when they were kittens because they would run and jump non-stop, now they just crouch and observe the feathery toy being shaken and tapped, and then make a half-hearted attempt to catch it. I tire of the game easily, so I just place the stick under my thigh, at the edge of the futon and then they do "run bys" and amuse themselves.  This reminds me that, if I do go to Petco this weekend, I'll need to get them a toy replacement because one of the kids must have broken the stick at some point, as it is shorter than it used to be, I think.

Then I remembered that I'd gotten them another toy for Christmas. It's a little bit different, and I was amazed by the interest that they showed in it! In 2 seconds I had all three Kittens jumping around and doing all kinds of acrobatics to get the bright pink feathers, lol! So we played for a while.

LOL, Explorer would growl every time he caught it in his mouth, to warn the other cats that it was his, and then would try to leave with it...

But I wouldn't let him

Tabby Kitty loved catching it and then sniffing the string. 

Weirdo!

Meanwhile, Princess went straight for the replacement feathers that had come with the toy!  Cheater!  I had to put them away.

Greg decided to go take a nap. I offered for him to use my bedroom since it's cooler in there than in his, due to the fact that I have two air returns for a smaller room while he only had 1 air return for a room twice the size (old houses... I guess they didn't have too much choice when they fit in the central air?)



Youngest Son spent the afternoon doing algebra homework. Boy, I don't miss being a kid all that much!

At 2:00 p.m., I decided to go harvest some tomatoes, thinking I should have a bunch that ripened since the last time...not so!  The damn bugs that have infested my tomato plants have cut a bunch of the fruit off or sucked the plants so much that the fruit has fallen. I was able to harvest 3 small tomatoes, only!

Here is one of the bugs, in the lower right quadrant. I hate those things!

My pitiful harvest :(

I pulled weeds while I was out there, sprayed a few wasps nests, refilled a couple of bird feeders, and cleaned a third one. I broke a piece off that one, by accident, so I washed the broken pieces and will try to superglue them back together once they're dry.

The volunteer papaya tree is really growing well right there. I guess I'll leave it and trim it once it gets close to the power line, if it ever does.

It's already the end of the lilies :( This is the only flower remaining on the two plants that actually grew. Such large flowers for such tiny plants!

The grey clouds are moving back in, maybe it'll rain some more! (spoiler: it didn't rain!)



Ah crap, my Publix had a Greenwise tasting event today until 3 p.m. and I had put it on my calendar but forgot to set an alarm on my phone... and it's now 2:55 p.m.! Oh well. I'd probably have spent money on stuff that we don't need.



I brought the 2 jugs of rainwater from the upstairs bathroom back downstairs, and then decided to make "chocolate instacake" for Youngest Son and myself.  I melted a whole stick of butter by mistake, instead of a half, so I saved the melted butter in the fridge (I'll just have to make more instacakes tomorrow!), and also froze the butter wrapper so I can reuse it to grease a bread or cake pan in the future).  The magic of the microwave meant that we got chocolate cake in 2 minutes, woohoo!

Gooey and yummy. I wish I still had whipped cream to put on top, though, that would have been perfect.

Princess decided to cuddle with Greg since he was insisting on using this recliner. She never ever does, so he was thrilled!

I went to add 3 cups of water to my pitcher of DD Cold Brew since it'd been 8 hours since I'd started brewing it. It's fully caffeinated coffee so I need to wait until tomorrow morning to drink it!



Greg has asked me for an automatic ice maker for his birthday since I refuse to get a whole new fridge.  So I ordered him one on Amazon, using my $5 credit from Prime Day and the $5 gift card earned with Microsoft Rewards. His birthday is not for several months, but it'll be an early surprise :) I got the red one that was cheaper than the other colors. I like red :) We'll get 5% back on our Amazon Visa card.  I should have checked if it qualified for Ebates, Ibotta or Swagbucks but I forgot. Oops, where is my head?!

Still cheaper than a whole new fridge!

Well, I guess not so much a surprise because, as soon as he came back to the living room, I told him about it, lol. He was pretty excited :)



I fake mopped the kitchen while I was boiling water (in my thrifted electric kettle) to make hummingbird nectar. "Fake Mopped" meaning I used a square of an old bath towel, wet it, and scrubbed the worst of the kitchen floor's stains and splatters with my foot on top of the rag, and then threw it in the wash. It's not the best way to clean the kitchen but it's one way to make the kitchen look cleaner, lol.



Then I went to compost the bowl of coffee grounds and filters that I'd been keeping next to the coffeemaker. I deadheaded some roses while I was outside. It's still hottish, at 6:15 p.m., but not too bad. If it weren't humid, it'd be perfect to sit outside with a nice drink and contemplate life.

When the water had boiled, I mixed it with sugar and it's now cooling off. I'll probably refill the hummingbird feeders tomorrow.



I was going to cook tilapia for dinner but then I remembered all the Chinese Pork roast that's still in the fridge (I have got to freeze what's left after dinner!) so I think we'll have leftovers. There's still some rice left too so YS and I will split that and Greg will eat the rest of the broccoli from a couple of nights ago. Easy, peasy.



I texted Middle Son to offer him the AMC voucher for the large popcorn and soda and he sounded pretty excited when he accepted it. Well, I mean an exclamation mark does signify excitement, yes?



I decided to buy another Roku 2XD, the same one as we already own, because it's my favorite version  of the hardware as it still supports the Netflix app that does NOT automatically play trailers and shows the better layout (but the remote doesn't have the headphone jack on it, crap, I just remembered that!).  I want to eventually have a TV and Roku in my bedroom so I can also have a DVD player to watch all the DVDs that I have when I'm sick or when I just want to relax in bed.  I checked Amazon but the sellers of used ones didn't have great ratings so I went on Ebay and found one from a seller that has 100% positive ratings (with a lot of ratings) and only wanted $20 + shipping for the Roku AND the remote.  I paid with Paypal so I used up $2.97 in Paypal credits that I had earned from the Coupons.com app and the rest got charged to my Discover card.  I hesitated because I recently found our Roku 1, but it had limitations and if our Roku 2XD craps out downstairs, then I can replace it with this one.

Now to get a flat screen TV for my room...  an hour later... and I went ahead and bought one off Amazon... plus a bluetooth adapter so at least I can use my bluetooth speaker with the TV since the Roku 2XD definitely can't be paired with a remote that had headphone jacks (I checked! I can put the bluetooth speaker behind my pillow on low, that way it won't bother Greg) and an HDMI cable for the Roku. So I spent about $200, yikes, but that'll be MY early birthday present.  I know I should have just waited and perhaps shopped around some more, but I've had those items on my wishlist for over a year so I just pulled the trigger.  And now Greg doesn't have to think about what to get me for my birthday!