February doldrums

That's not a very cheerful blog post title. I will change it if I think of a better one while I'm writing this. But I must admit it's accurate, so far. Despite all the chocolate -- and we've already eaten a lot of it -- and despite the Girl Scout cookies that were delivered today (see photo -- this is half of them, with a duplicate box of each waiting in the garage), February isn't feeling very cheery.

Usually I look forward to writing my blog post on Sunday afternoons, but today I'm not feeling the joy. I don't feel like describing my blah feelings.  

I suppose this is just more depression. I don't feel sad, but I'm having more than my usual trouble getting things done. It doesn't even feel like what my mother used to call "iron bands," the feeling that you just simply can't do whatever it is, that you're being held in place by invisible iron bands. This is milder. I think about what I need to do (litter boxes, dishes, finally putting the stupid Christmas tree away), and I think, hmm, OK, and then I don't do it. Any of it.

I don't think it's because I'm tired. I think I have a normal amount of energy, or nearly. When I manage to get out the door for a walk, there's a spring in my step. It's hard to get out the door, but not because I can't move my arms and legs. It's more like I think, hmm, I should take a walk. And then I don't. I do a little better on the weekends because then Teen B (at least) goes with me. We walk to the school and play basketball with whatever ball we can find lying around. Today was excellent: we found three balls. We played for a long time.

I think part of the problem is The Tale of Genji, which I am continuing to slog through. Last Sunday I was on page 494 and today I am on page 850, so that means I read all of 356 pages this past week. My normal reading pace is faster than that, but Genji is not a fast-paced book. OK, wait, I also read the book group book, which was 170 pages, so that's a more reasonable page count. And this means I only have 305 pages of Genji left to read. Only 8 or 9 chapters, depending on how you count. At my usual rate of about 2 chapters per day, I might finish by Thursday. But on the down side, Genji (the character) is dead and I am deep in the so-called "Uji chapters," which are not very interesting. I now know that the first two thirds of Genji are considered more interesting than the last third. In fact, it is believed by some that Lady Murasaki did not even write this section.

But I still have to read it, if I want to complete this Challenge. And so I slog on. And it is true that it is distracting me from regular life, at least a little. I've spent some time reading about Japan and remembering when I was there, 36 years ago almost. April of 1986. Immersing myself in 10th century Japan means I don't have to think about 21st century America, or at least not as much. I still try to skim the New York Times home page every day, so that I'll do well on the Weekly Quiz, but as soon as I see an upsetting article, I'm gone -- and so many of the articles are upsetting.

I didn't do well on the quiz this week. The New York Times is very stern with me: "Your score is below your recent average." Then it tries to get me to read its digest, so I'll do better on the quiz. To me, that seems like cheating.

I am doing pretty well with Wordle, though. Teen B has gotten interested in Wordle, and we have a low-key competition going to see who can solve the word fastest. Here are my results for today:

Wordle 232 4/6

🟩⬜⬜⬜⬜
🟩⬜⬜⬜⬜
🟩🟨🟩⬜🟨
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Teen B also got it in four tries, but that was because I gave him a hint (there's a double letter in it) and he peeked at my screen and saw that the first letter was an "S." He struggles with it a bit, putting in somewhat random combinations of letters, but today he got lucky -- two of them were words. I looked at his screen and said, "Those aren't words! Why did they let you use those?" and then I looked them up and hmm, turned out they were words. But not words he knows, not even words I know. Anyway.

I'm trying to think of things that happened this week. I saw the orthodontist again on Monday and they took x-rays and photographs. I'm going to have one tooth pulled and then they'll put on the bands. When the orthodontist (who graduated from dental school the year I graduated from high school) looked at my x-rays he said, "Whew, that's a lot of dental work! Root canals, crowns, fillings..." I pointed out that I am old, but he said kids today don't get cavities like we did. These days dentists "seal" kids' teeth so they don't have decay. I know he's right -- when we saw the dentist a couple weeks ago, after a full year, nobody had any cavities. It was crazy. He said he wondered how dentists pay off their student loans these days, with no dental work to do.

So now I'm waiting to hear from my dentist, so we can schedule that extraction. I'm dreading the braces but also kind of looking forward to them. I keep feeling my funky teeth with my tongue, thinking, huh, maybe in a year or two it won't be like that anymore.

We had another big snowstorm, about 10 inches, and wonder of wonders, they cancelled school completely. We spent Wednesday sitting at home. I did go out in the afternoon and shovel the driveway (a neighbor snowblows the sidewalks) and uncover the car, so that I'd be able to drive the twins to the bus stop on Thursday, because it was -12 on our front porch when I got up that morning. Even at -12 (actually it was -10 when we left the house), the twins refused to wear their warm coats. They just wore their dumb sweatshirts. Stupid twins.

I made lovely squash-apple soup on Thursday, but we didn't actually eat it until Friday night. Thursday, Teen B and I went to "WinterFest" at the school. It wasn't very well attended compared with two years ago (they didn't have it last year), but it was OK. The main problem (and the reason it wasn't well attended) was that it was so cold! You could be either indoors or outdoors -- outdoors they had space heaters and a hot chocolate bar, but the hot chocolate bar was a little disappointing because the whipped cream froze and wouldn't come out of the cans. We settled for mini marshmallows instead and hurried back indoors. I felt sorry for the kids who were manning the bar. Indoors there was pizza and a Spanish version of bingo called Loteria. I found it a little difficult to distinguish the words because I am going deaf and because (of course) the caller was wearing a mask! and Teen B found it difficult because he doesn't know Spanish. We went in the gym and played a round of cornhole and then we agreed it was time to go home.

So we had the soup on Friday night instead, but the kids didn't like it! Rotten kids. It's such a lovely soup, too. We ate out Saturday, at Shake Shack -- not worth going to, we agreed, just as we agreed when we went to it last summer but then apparently forgot and went again. Whatever. Tonight we're having the lovely soup again, that is, I'm having it again tonight, and I'll probably make scrambled eggs or something for the kids. But first I should clean the kitchen. Sigh.

This week they have tomorrow off, but not for weather. It's some teacher work day thing. I'm in favor of all such days, so it's fine. We'll get to sleep late for the third day in a row, and then spend more time lazing around with kitties. This photo shows the beautiful Mr. Merlino (aka Baby Kitty) with all his fish toys. The regular fish and the fish skeleton came in a toy can, but I don't know where it is. The fish in the middle is actually a fish taco. Mr. Merlino loves them all.

I won't cook tomorrow night, because I get to eat out at my book group, but I'll cook Tuesday, something full of vegetables that the twins won't like. Also, I should think of something to mail to Rocket Boy for Valentine's Day. I could make Valentine's cookies or brownies or something. Just don't have the energy! But I do have a card for him. Maybe that's enough. I know he'll appreciate whatever I manage to send.