CONfabulation

This cold, wet Sunday morning, I give you more Hazbin Hotel! I woke up with this song in my brain, so now I shall share it with you.

Today, we shall have a crab feast! There is 8lbs of high-quality Dungeness crabs sitting in my fridge, and today I finally get to put them to good use! We're going to eat until we can't eat anymore. We got the deluxe crab picking kit, complete with crackers of varying kinds and pickers. If you've never had them, and you get the chance, I highly recommend it. The meat is sweet, tender and very buttery. It may rank up there with lobster for my favorite shellfish.

After that, we shall relax and then have dinner and then we have a 5:30pm game, which should be super fun. Then, tomorrow is back to work.

Yesterday was pretty quiet. We played Arvandor, which went very well. It's always fun when you finish a game and are thoroughly energized and happy. Of course, it only lasts for a little while, then you have the adrenaline crash and you're exhausted and ready to nap. It's optional whether the crash comes with bonus anxiety, of course. Y'know, did I talk to much, was I too quiet, did I give them enough guidance, or am I railroading them into doing what I want them to do? Yesterday waas blissfully void of the post game anxiety, I was just wiped out. I actually took a little nippy nap.

We are down to 109 days now. As usual, when I tick past a multiple of 10, I get excited. I desperately want to go away. With several outings cancelled because of illness and what not, I'm a little bit claustrophobic. I just want to go away. I don't think we'll have the time before then, which makes me a little sad. We've got a day trip to NYC to see the Lost Boy Musical in April, but nothing before then. I want a little trip as a treat. I will survive, though. Realistically, I know that I don't need to go anywhere. We've got a freaking enormous trip coming up, and that's more than enough. But part of me is like "I was supposed to go to Philly in January, so I'm owed a trip!"

I will either get over it, or I'll find a little trip to take. It really could be either.

And on that note, I'm going to go forth and put on pants and make sure all the butter containers are washed, in case people want to dip crab in it. Shame I don't have any lemons. I could probably get some, but since we're supposed to have a band of heavy snow moving through at 7:30, I'll wait til a little later in the morning to do that. It's supposed to be done by 9am. I could order it at 10, and still have it by noon.

Everyone have an awesome Sunday!

It's Thursday, or as I like to call it, Friday Eve. We're getting there! I'm really looking forward to relaxing for the weekend. I feel like that might help clear out the last of this crud. I'm defintely doing better, but I'm still coughing a bit and my voice varies between semi normal, gravel filled and hoarse and squeaky, sometimes all in the same sentence. It's annoying.

Yesterday was another busy day, though I spent some of it making outbound calls to fill in some slots and get some patients in sooner. Still, I kicked so much ass. One of my favorite things is playing tetris with the schedule. Sometimes, you'll have a 1/2 hour slot in a few days, and then two half hour slots with a patient in between them. So you're going to call that patient and move them. Preferrably to the earlier slot, but if not at least up or down 30min. So you end up with a 60 or 90 minute slot. I have very good luck at getting that 90 minutes. Case in point yesterday, where I opened up two hours (which coincidentally was how much we needed for a patient's MRI).

I got a bunch of clothes delivered from Thredup, which are all pretty nice. There's two pieces that weren't what I expected, so they go into the donate pile. Then, there's one I'm not sure of. But what I definitely got out of it is two fleeces, a cute orange cardigan, a swim cover up and a little black purse for the vow renewal that I absolutely love. Need to have my room key and inhaler with me when I'm out of the cabin.

Then, after work, there was an exciting thing. I was sitting and relaxing and I got a call from a 604 area code. Which is Vancouver, CA. I knew this from setting up stuff for the Alaska trip. So, I picked up. It was our hotel, the Pan Pacific calling to offer an upgrade for our room. Previously, we were staying in kind of the bottom tier of rooms. Still gorgeous, because it is a 5 star hotel, but their basic room. They offered an upgrade to the Club level for $50/night. I of course said yes. So now we're going to have breakfast, snacks, sodas and appetizers in our club lounge. I'm looking forward to trying it out. Looks like it's very nice. So that made me happy.

Something about speaking with an actual human made things feel more real. Like holy shit, y'all, I'm going to see the Pacific Ocean! It's been three years since we had a really good vacation at Disney, so this is very exciting. I've never seen another ocean, always the Atlantic. Even when I went out of country, I saw the other side of the Atlantic from the plane that took me to Scotland.

Today, I shall work, it will hopefully be a less busy day, and I will have some interesting projects.

Today, we have two packages coming. First one is from My Ireland Box. I had gotten my sister a box from Ireland for Christmas, but I ordered it too early and a lot of the baked goods had gotten moldy. (I wasn't sure about shipping time with the shit that was going on with the mail and tarrifs, so I ordered in November.) The second box is from Sitka Seafood. The Dungeness crab that came with our last monthly box was so good that I ordred more. We're going to invite the BIL over for a full out crab feast. It should be delicious, but I'm a little nervous about where we're going to put them while we wait for Feast Day. I need to get some good butter for dipping.

Payday was yesterday, so I paid all the bills this morning, whoo. It's nice not to have the car payment. I still owe money, but I'm paid up til 2027. I just keep putting some money down every month, so hopefully I'll have it paid off early next year. But the internet and car insurance are good.

I didn't end up doing the halibut last night, so I'll have to do that today. I wish I had a beer, so I could do a beer batter, but it's such a pain to order it and wait for delivery. It takes forever to get here. I could just run up the road to a liquor store and grab a six pack, or to the slightly further one and get an individual beer, but that seems like a lot of work. I'm excited to try halibut, as I have never had it before. I may just bake it, we'll see how it goes. I need to get some tartar sauce and lemon. I might make a lemon butter sauce. I'll source it from the internet how it's best to cook it.

This weekend, we have one game on Saturday and nothing else. That's probably for the best, since my voice is so unpredictable. I can get through DMing one game. Plus, it's Arvandor, which is a small party, which makes it a bit easier. Less talking over each other. There is one currently scheduled on Sunday, but that's dependent on how poisontaster is feeling. And I'm not GMing that, so I don't have to talk nonstop.

Okay, time for me to hop off, and consider getting dressed. Everyone have a stellar Thursday!

It's Wednesday! Halfway through the week! I'm very tired and would like to go back to bed. Normally, I wake up to take Rybelsus and then just doze until I get up, but today I fell asleep hard and since there was only about an hour until my alarm went off, it's left me somewhat woofly.

This upper respiratory bug has really been annoying the everliving shit out of me. I'm so sick of coughing and having a hoarse voice. It's slowly improving, I think? But yesterday I had a lot of coughing and a really raw throat. Thank goodness the PA gave me codeine for bedtime. I actually slept through most of the night without waking up coughing til I gag. I have no clue what I actually had. Random virus? Covid? Flu? RSV? Not a clue. None of the tests came back positive, but according to the PA, that's not unusual for this year's flu, which is where she was placing her bets. Whatever, it sucked.

My sister is only coughing once in a while now, and Jess is back to taking their daily walk, though still coughing some, so we're all getting there.

After the deliciousness of the Dungeness crabs, I went back and ordered more. They come tomorrow, so we'll be having a big ol' crab feast this week. They're coming tomorrow, so hopefully, we can do it on Friday or Saturday. They were just so delicious. I may like Dungeness more than lobster, though I need a side by side taste test. We've told the BIL that he can join us for the crab feast, of course. He's never had Dungeness, so I hope he likes it.

I sent him a couple of links of our hotels and ship, and he is currently freaking out at how expensive my choices are. lol He went to my sister and asked if she knew how expensive the Pan Pacific is!?! I will admit, it's pricey. Which I won't lie, it is. But I chose convenience over cost in this case. It sits on top of Canada Place, which is the cruise terminal, so going to the port is as simple as taking an elevator down. They will have a porter come and get our luggage the morning of the cruise and transfer the bags directly to the ship. Plus a breakfast buffet. A choice between that and getting an Uber and getting dropped outside, then having to go to the lower level to drop of our big bags, and back up to start embarcation? This sounded much simpler, and I don't care if the price is a bit steep. Plus, I got a pretty good deal. Also, it's a five star hotel! I've never stayed in a 5 star, so this should be fun.

Presumably the one on the way back is less objectionable, as it's only a 4 star and a lot less expensive.

He, my sister and Jess are basically travel princesses. (Gender neutral princess.) They're just going to show up where I tell them to, and enjoy the ride. I've got everything in my email and we're ready to go. I just booked dinner for the first night of the trip. It's a place across from the hotel called ARC. I hope it's as good as it's menu looked.

I'm debating on dinner tonight. Do I feel up to cooking a nice fried halibut? I've had the filets hanging out for weeks, so it might be time to make a battered fish. I have no fries, but I could put in a wee order and get some. Might be tasty. We shall see.

And on that note, I'm going to hop off and get myself together. Everyone have an outstanding Wednesday!

Greetings on this Tuesday morning! Turns out, even with the good cough syrup, I'm still awake at night. Freaking steroids. Oh well, it's okay, at least I got a little more sleep than the night before.

Yesterday at work, it was bugfuck insane. The one offices PET machine has been down for 4 days, and will be down again today. Patients were understandably upset, since this is part of their cancer diagnosis, but goddamn, stop taking it out on us. We did not have the machine break AT you. Also, you are not special, we'll get you back in as soon as we can, but I'm not bumping someone else for you.

Add to that, call volumes were incredibly high. At one point, we had 37 calls waiting. It was absolutely the busiest I've ever seen it. I took 52 calls, and that was with making some outbound calls. I was waiting for it to slow down to make them, but I finally had to just do them because it wasn't slowing down. When I left, there were 25 calls waiting. If I hadn't had a doctor's appointment at 4:45, I would have offered to stay and get a little OT.

Instead, I hopped off and right onto a virtual doctor's appointment. The nurse practitioner I saw was very sweet. She kicked down the codeine cough syrup, and told me if it goes past day 17, I. should let her know and she'll order a chest xray. I can live with that. The cough syrup was very important to me. It means actual relief. I didn't cough much last night between that an our vaporizer, which was good. Like I said, the steroids are still making it difficult to sleep straight through, but when I am sleeping, it's pretty good sleep.

After I finished with the nurse practitioner, I threw on some hamburgers and Twice baked potatoes, which turned out very well. We're still using the good grass fed beef that we got from the farm, so it's especially tasty and not too fatty. It's expensive, but I highly recommend Evensong Farm's Beef shares. You get to choose your cut package. The beef is grass fed and delicious. I've done it for two years, and I plan to do it again in the spring and pick it up at the Silver Spring Farmer's market. If any of my DC peeps want to get some, I'm happy to put in the order when it comes time.

Then, I went to get my prescription, and came home to walk the dog. Then, right after, I took the cough medicine and went to relax. We listened to another episode of Bake On, which is a podcast about the Great British Bake Off, and I fell asleep halfway through.

Today, I'm still coughing, but maybe a tinge better? The voice is annoying--it's kind of raspy and deep, and I'm going to have a fun time talking all day. I sound like a sex bot, so that'll be fun.

We're down to 114 days til Alaska. Every time the clock ticks another 5 points, I get excited. It's below 115, which is something. By the end of the month we'll be in double digits. I want to start getting our dog used to the sitter, but I need to wait until this crud is done. I don't believe that I'm still contagious, but the cough *sounds* abysmal.

The sitter is the last piece of the puzzle. I'm sure Yoda will be okay with her, though I'm sure he's going to be a pain about eating while we're gone. Boodle probably will be sad, but she'll be okay. Hopefully, Yoda bonds with her, so that he will spend the day pushed up against her like he does us. Thanks to the way he loves his groomer, I'm cautiously optimistic.

It's slowly dawning on me that I'm going on a cruise. I know I booked it, and have scheduled excursions and done research, but it's actually going to happen. I'm terrified that something will go wrong, but mostly I'm just excited about it. I'm actually going to see the Pacific Ocean and Seattle and Vancouver, and some of the Alaskan ports. We talked about this cruise years ago, but couldn't do it because of Dad. But it's all paid off. I paid everything up front except the one hotel and one of the car services.

I've decided in our Vancouver day we're going to get passes to the hop on hop off bus, so we can get to all the major tourist attractions with no problems. It might mean missing out on a few local gems, but that's okay, there's no way we could see everything in one day. My two things are Granville Island and Gastown. I'd like to see Stanley Park, but we'll see what we have time and energy for. Oh, and I want to do the Flyover ride. Totally a tourist trap, but the version in Disney was one of my favorite experiences. It looks like they have two possible experiences, one a flyover of Canada, and one of Iceland. Ideally, I'd do both if there's time.

Okay, time for me to consider the merits of pants. Everyone have an awesome Tuesday!

And, we're back to Monday! Whooo! IT's probably going to be a busy day with a lot of tea and warm drinks to get through without coughing. I think it is slowly improving, just a lot slower than I'd like. At the rate I'm going , it'll be another 3-5 days before I'm better, unless the steroids do a sudden kung fu maneuver on my lungs. Which is not seeming likely. It's helped some, but not like I was hoping. On the plus side, aside from some sleep issues, I haven't been overly angry, so the ADHD meds are holding strong.

It's weird that ADHD meds have done so much for my anxiety and mood swings. It's just like a warm blanket and cup of tea for my body and brain. When he gave the meds, the doctor mentioned that it might cause anxiety or hype me up. But in reality, I feel much more solid and relaxed when I have the medication. Apparently, it's not unusual for women to have that reaction, because for us sometimes, ADHD can be different, and of course no one studied it until recently, so it's tough to find the info. For women, it can involve being inattentive--having trouble concentrating on one thing, anxiety, mood swings, feeling the desperate need to be doing something, but not being able to chose or focus. And the meds just...turned that off. Now I only have anxiety in the evenings when the drug wears off. I really wish I could have a short acting that I could take at about 5 to ease me into the night time sleepy meds. But doctors are weird about controlled substances.

Yesterday was a nice day. It started with a game that coyotegestalt is running--a 9 session "one shot." To be fair, it probably would have been a shorter game if I was a bit less of a chaos demon from Hell. It was planned that the giant and his dragons would fly away, and we'd have to chase.

In practice, I blinded one of the dragons, and they crashed, and I started an absolutely bonkers fight with probably a hundred enemies. (Most low level and easily destroyed, with about 6 heavy hitters.

Most of my rounds have been given over to healing, but this last game, I got the chance to do something cool. One of my spells was "control water." We had a giant water elemental come in and flood an enormous swath of beach, catching several of my companions in it. Control water is ridiculously overpowered, so in one turn, I cleared half the beach of water, ala Moses. This allowed Jess' character Kragnik to run up the beach and punch a dragon to death. (The Monk class is wild.)

Then, before my next turn, Kragnik ran after the giant, and was about to try to take him on solo. My character, Casey has a bit of a crush on Kragnik, and was not having that, so they cast Harm on the giant, which killed it. Of course, immediately afterwards, Kragnik got smacked real hard by a the giant wave, so next turn will definitely be healing. It was super fun, and I felt good that I could get us out of the problem I had 100% caused. Fortunately coyotegestalt does not blame me for my Chaos Muppet tendencies, even if it changed the game they planned.

After that, we sat and watched two episodes of Bake Off, which was lovely. We finished Pastry and Meringue week. Then, I fucked around on the internet and looked at vacations for 2028. We're already set for this year and next, with Alaska this year, and Iceland to Rotterdam next year.

I'm thinking about a Mediterranean cruise in 2028. We'd board in Barcelona and go to Athens with stops in Cannes, France, Sicily, Rome, Crete and Mykonos. It sounds very tempting. The real expense is going to be the airfare. I joined Ratepunk, so I can keep an eye out for the cities to see what we can find.

I'll have to continue to hoard my PTO so that I'll be good for that in 2 years. It's a 10 day cruise, so I'll need at least 14 days of PTO out of the 17 I get. (18 if MLK continues as it's been.). It's a lot, but it's a 10 day cruise, and I'd like a day in Barcelona and a day in Athens to explore. It's Europe, so we're going to eat a 15-20hrs each way with travel. So that should do it.

After spending years not being able to really go anywhere, I'm definitely making the most of the ability to travel. There's places I want to see, dammit.

After I finished looking at the possibile ships available to cruise on, I made dinner, pork chops with Saltverk's Arctic Thyme salt and perogies with sour cream and sauerkraut. (Jess skipped the sauerkraut. Not a fan.)

Then we walked the dog and retired to our bedroom to wind down. It was a lovely day and I am glad I had it, since work today is sure to be busy.

And on that note, I shall hop off and get myself together. On the plus side, I got some hard boiled eggs, so I don't have to worry about doing that. It's lazy, but I'm still sick, so fuck it.

Everyone have an amazing Monday!