Happy Thanksgiving week

I'm feeling good. And have been, mostly, for a few weeks now, which is a nice change from the previous couple of months. My psyche seems to have two basic settings: pleasantly happy and down in the dumps. I almost never get wildly happy, and I almost never get so depressed I can't get out of bed. But even though my depressions are manageable, I naturally prefer the happy times.

I think I never mentioned what happened with my drug situation. I had stopped taking rosuvastatin after becoming convinced that (a) I didn't need it, and (b) my super low LDL cholesterol might be contributing to my depression. I was off it for probably a couple of weeks? Then I met with my endocrinologist, and she convinced me to go back on it -- but at half the dose. My regular doc agreed and so I cut all my 10-mg pills in half and now I take half a pill a day (5 mg). I'm OK with that for now. The endocrinologist explained to me that rosuvastatin is the best statin there is because it works so well at such low doses and has so few side effects compared to other statins. Even though I don't have heart disease, since I have diabetes I'm still at risk for strokes and other problems that the statin will help with. And a 5 mg dose should do the trick. If my cholesterol stays super low, we could always cut 5 mg pills in half (they don't make them any smaller than 5 mg).

Anyway, maybe my cholesterol had nothing to do with the depression and it was just time for me to feel better. Or maybe my LDL has gone up a little and that's helping. Or maybe Rocket Boy's arrival pulled me out of the swamp. Whatever it is, I'm feeling better. 

Oh, and I am almost 100% over my cold, after more than two weeks. No one else has any lingering traces of it, but I still have a slight cough. But it's very slight.

This is all good, since Thanksgiving is right around the corner. I am ready, more or less (unlike "The Woman" in "Breaking Cat News" today, who is taking a nap with all the cats because she feels overwhelmed). Here are the plans:

• It will just be us four, unless an unexpected guest pops up at the last minute. We'll eat at our regular dining room table. I will probably not change the tablecloth (just sponge it off). I won't make a centerpiece (there's no room on the table), but I might set up a little decoration on the coffee table or something like that. Has to be cat-proof, though.
  
• We will have our usual menu: swordfish with lemon-caper sauce, mashed potatoes and gravy, sweet potato casserole, spinach dish, rolls, cranberry sauce, sparkling cider, pumpkin pie and whipped cream. I already have most of the ingredients. I'll do a Sprouts run on Wednesday to get the swordfish and some more lemons.
  
• I will pretend to forget that there is such a thing as stuffing until the last minute when Rocket Boy decides we need it and runs off to the store to get the ingredients. I feel that stuffing is one starch too many. Sometimes I win that argument and sometimes RB does. 
• The house is already pretty clean, but I will do my usual "home blessing" on Monday so it will be cleaner.
• I will probably make the cranberry sauce on Tuesday, and maybe some other sides on Wednesday. I'll see. It's totally doable to make it all on Thursday instead. I'll try to get the twins to help with at least one dish each, like we did last year.
  

It should be a nice day.

We had two snowstorms last week, a little one on Monday night (or was it Sunday?) and a big one on Thursday. We got about four inches with the first one and about 10 inches with the second one. It was extremely cold all week, so nothing has melted yet, but it's supposed to be in the 40s and 50s in the week ahead. Thank goodness. I understand, I live in Colorado where there is snow and snow is a good thing. But I'm still always relieved when it melts.

Nobody made a snowman or snow angels with this storm. Maybe during Winter Break the kids will feel more like kids. Or maybe they're just too old for that sort of activity.

Thursday was a pretty yucky day, with snow already starting to fall when the kids were getting ready for school. Extremely cold, too. I thought it was too cold to snow, but apparently not. 

Teen B had a band concert scheduled for 6 pm and I was sure it would be cancelled, sure the superintendent would cancel all after-school activities -- but the ways of superintendents are mysterious, and he did not. So the band teachers had to go ahead with it. They sent out emails saying the kids wouldn't be penalized if they couldn't make it (concerts are part of their grade), but we decided to try. We took Rocket Boy's car and he drove, which was good since I kept my eyes closed. I've been driving in winter weather since 1988, when I started grad school in Michigan, but I still hate it. I don't have the confidence of a native. Rocket Boy learned to drive in Colorado -- icy roads don't scare him.

And I was very glad we'd made the effort, since if they'd rescheduled, Rocket Boy wouldn't have been able to go -- and 13 out of 14 kids in Teen B's class were there. I think there were a few more missing from the advanced band, but not many. The sound was a little ragged, but I think that's because there are so few kids. They lost their one and only trumpet player a while back. There's only one flute player (an unidentified adult stepped in and played too, to help out). It's all because of Covid disruptions over the last few years. They do the best they can. 

White-breasted nuthatch (above the squirrel)

So now we have Fall Break week, which is also Rocket Boy's last week here. He should leave next Saturday to drive back to St. Louis. He's already started saying things like "I might leave on Sunday instead" and "I might still be driving on Monday," but I am trying to put a stop to that. He told his boss he'll be back on Monday, so he should be back on Monday.

That means we only have five more days with him, not counting today. At his request, I made a Projects list for him, things we should try to get done before he goes. So far, there are 8 things on the list and only one has been done (putting the last dose of sealant on the bathroom tile). By me, today, because Rocket Boy took Teen A to Denver to go to the History Museum. It's OK, I'm glad they went. We're trying to do more things with the twins separately, to reduce the competition and fighting, and RB took Teen B mini golfing last weekend.

So I did the tile sealing by myself. Probably wrongly, even though the tile guy showed me how to do it. The bottle of sealant said to put it on a clean white towel and then rub the towel on the tile, but it wasn't clear that enough sealant was really going on the tile. The towel seemed to soak it all up. I kept putting more on the towel, but it didn't seem to matter. When the tile guy did it, there was drippage.

It might be because I left the sealant outside for most of last week and it froze (and then thawed yesterday, when I brought it in). Maybe something about it changed, due to freezing and thawing.

Oh well. It will probably be fine.

Anyway, we've got five days to get seven more "Projects" done (and whatever else I think of for that list), plus do fun things with the twins who will be off school, plus celebrate Thanksgiving, plus Rocket Boy has to work.

I don't know how it will all happen, actually. But it will. And it will probably be fine. Happy Thanksgiving!

P.S. There is a magpie in this picture, in the middle near the top.