Snow, snow

So, there's a lot of snow out there. Last week when I wrote we had gotten about 8 inches, and then we got about 4 more the next day. Then we shoveled, but then we had some very high winds which blew the snow around so we had to shovel all over again. And then yesterday we got another dumping, I think about 7 inches if I'm reading the National Weather Service report correctly. 

The snow in the side yard looks really deep, in part because we haven't shoveled there since this round of storms began (so that's 19 inches total?), but also I think mainly because the wind blew more snow over there.

We'll probably just leave it. There's no reason to shovel it, no need to go over in that corner or open the back gate. And it's supposed to warm up this week, into the 40s every day, so some of it will melt.

Gad, what a mess that's going to be! Best to leave it alone.

Leaving it alone is also what I'm going to do with all the Trump news. I decided I don't want to write about that here. It's just too depressing. If I think of anything to do about it, I'll write about that, about things I actually do, not just things I think of. But otherwise I'm going to leave all that awfulness out of the blog. For the most part.

I went to my doctor last Monday, to find out about my bug bites, and from her I learned that they are not bites at all! All that work to get rid of bed bugs, the spraying, the dismantling of the bed and the room. All pointless (although the room is cleaner now, so that's good). We do not have bed bugs and also I do not have scabies, which was my next guess. No, according to her I have "prurigo nodularis," a chronic skin disorder often related to eczema (which I am not aware of having). She doesn't know what caused it or why it is spreading. 

My treatment plan consists of: switching soap and laundry detergent to gentler versions, using special lotions on my itchy skin, and taking a high-powered antihistamine called hydroxyzine. We had been using Irish Spring soap in the shower which for some unknown reason Rocket Boy bought -- he doesn't even remember buying it -- so I've switched us back to Caress. I was already using sensitive laundry detergent, but I've now switched to even-more-sensitive laundry detergent. I put lotion on my itchy skin every night, and I've been taking the hydroxyzine.

But I've decided to stop taking it. It makes me horribly groggy, and also just kind of lethargic. I haven't had the energy to exercise at all this week, and this morning when I tried to shovel snow, I could barely lift the shovel. Also, although it is also prescribed for anxiety and tension, it seems to have almost the opposite effect on me. I have gotten terribly crabby and I keep yelling at Rocket Boy for no reason at all. Like he'll ask me how I'm feeling and I'll bite his head off. Now, I have to admit that the Trump news could be another reason I'm feeling that way. It's hard to figure out what's Trump and what's the drug. But I *think* the drug is making things worse.

Also, it doesn't seem to be helping. After four nights of taking it, I'm just as itchy as ever. So I'm going to stop taking it and keep up the other parts of the plan, and in a week I'm supposed to report back to her and then she'll put me on an antibiotic. I see online that tetracycline would be the choice, probably. I hate taking antibiotics, but I also hate itching.

This would probably be the right place for the Mounjaro report. It's not the best news this week, but there are good reasons for it.

• Weight the morning I took my first shot: 254.6
• Weight last Sunday: 226.2
• Weight this morning (after 31+ weeks on Mounjaro): 226.8
  

Yes, that's right, I gained half a pound. But I'm not upset about it. I hardly exercised at all! Just could not get myself to do anything. Plus, the stupid hydroxycine seems to make me hungrier. Yesterday I could not stop eating sweets. I even finished off a pint of Ben & Jerry's (granted, it was about 2/3 empty already). It is not a good drug for me.

Also, I am pleased that I'm still below 227. We are making progress here, and if I don't take the drug and get some exercise this week, I bet I'll lose.

What else is there to write about? Not much happened this week. Mostly I just lay around feeling groggy and crabby. I did manage, finally, to get the last of my ornaments off the Christmas tree. We're scheduled to take it down next weekend -- though Rocket Boy doesn't want to, he wants to leave it up indefinitely because of Trump -- I guess because he finds it cheering -- but we ARE going to take it down, I don't approve of having Christmas trees still up in February. Anyway, in preparation for that, I got all my ornaments off it and packed them away. There are still a few of Rocket Boy's ornaments up, plus the lights, but that's all.

I think I only made dinner once -- those wonderful sweet potatoes with black beans and cheese. Rocket Boy fixed salmon one night, but Sprouts only had a little salmon, so he got some barramundi to go with it. I'd never had barramundi before. It's not bad, and apparently it's a very sustainable choice. Tuesday night we just got pizza from Abo's, even though pizza gives me terrible heartburn. It was the one night each month that they donate a percentage of their profits to the twins' old elementary school, so I figured that was a good thing. Oh, and Friday night Rocket Boy made a creole cod dish, which the twins refused to eat, but I thought it was pretty good.

This coming week I'll try to cook more.

As I said above, I basically got no exercise, and I also didn't manage to stick to my new schedule -- mainly because I was so tired in the mornings that it was all I could do to feed the cats, start a load of laundry, do the dishes, and eat breakfast. Forget things like paperwork and genealogy and planning the trip and finding a dentist. I did manage to do a little writing each afternoon (I would be slightly more awake by then), but I couldn't work on my novel, not enough brain power. 

Instead, I worked on my memoirs. When I can't focus on anything else, I can always write those. I haven't gotten very far -- just to the beginning of junior high -- and this week I mostly cleaned up sections I'd written before. But I took a closer look at something that has been puzzling me. In my mother's Life Story, when she's writing about her breakdown, she says the Saturday before she was hospitalized, she and my father took me to buy a skirt and blouse for a choir performance I had the next day, i.e., Sunday. I'm pretty sure that would have been the All-City Chorus. But then who took me to that, if my father and my aunt were off taking my mother to a mental hospital? I wondered if my mother had her dates wrong.

And then I thought, hey, we're members of Ancestry.com now, which gives us access to Newspapers.com. I'll bet the All-City Chorus was mentioned in our local newspaper. So I did a search, and I found it. But it was on Friday, February 20th, 1970, not a Sunday, and my mother's breakdown was Sunday, March 15th (my older sister confirms this). I don't know what to make of this. Was I in some other choral performance that year, at age 9? I can't think what it could have been, and anyway, I'm quite sure the All-City Chorus was what I needed special clothes for.

I have no one to ask about this. My old friend Ellen might have a memory, since we were in the All-City Chorus together, but she doesn't speak to me anymore. And of course my mother is gone.

I guess it doesn't matter.