September plans

It occurred to me that since it's September, I should review my summer achievements (or lack thereof) and make fall plans.

I'm not really in the mood to do either thing. I'm weirdly apathetic these days. I think it's partly the endless heat, partly the recovery process from my surgery, partly feeling strange with the twins being in college. 

But let's look at that list that I made back in May, see if I did anything on it.

1. Get Teen B to pass his driving test. YES! Done! He got his license!
2. Get passports for me and Teen B. NO. Did not do. Maybe this fall (for me). I doubt if we'll be planning any international trips before next summer.
3. Plan trip to California. YES! Planned and taken!
4. Prepare for college. YES? We screwed up on some things, but basically, yeah, we got ready and they're both doing it.
5. Teach independence, e.g., laundry, banking. YES/NO. They're both doing their own laundry now, although it was kind of a last-minute thing. I just said to Teen A -- Teen B has to do it at college, so you do it at home, and he did. I think he's done it three times now (but he won't put his clean clothes away, just leaves them in a pile). And Teen B is apparently doing his at college, since he hasn't brought any dirty laundry home, and each time I see him, he's wearing clean clothes. Both of them could use some more money knowledge, though.
6. Clean & reorganize the kids' room. NO. Teen A actually did some of this himself (see photo above). He cleaned off the desk in their room and set up his gaming computer on it. But I did nothing, no energy all summer long.
7. Work on files and piles in the desk room. NO. I did absolutely nothing on this all summer.
8. Write thank-you notes. YES (almost). One set of cards & cash came in very late (from our next-door neighbor) and we didn't write her a note (yet), but everyone else got thanked.
9. Flying lessons for Teen A. YES/NO. He took a couple, but then he stopped and it turned out he doesn't want to be a pilot after all, so it's fine...
10. Continue working on the yard. NO. Once it got hot, I stopped doing anything.
11. Convert my blogs to books. NO. I actually forgot about this. Maybe this fall?
12. Take Teen B's clarinet to be refurbished. NO. He told me it didn't need refurbishing. I could still do it this fall, because he doesn't need it until second semester. I'll see. 

So, four yes, two yes/no, and six no. Not a very good record, but oh well. Summer is hard. And we did some of the most important things.

OK, now it's fall (doesn't feel like it, but it's September, anyway). First day of astronomical fall is September 22nd, so 16 days from now. But the first day of meteorological fall was September 1st, so it's kind of fall.

And the hummingbirds are gone -- so early! Why did they leave when it's still so hot? I thought mid-September was when they leave, but this year it was more like mid-August. I should probably take the feeder down, maybe fill it just ONE more time, but I don't think any birds will come to it.

Hmm.

I was thinking that it occasionally snows in September, but I can't remember when it last did that. Looking back at old blog posts, I found one from September 11th, 2014 where I said "it's supposed to snow tonight." Then in another post, from September 24th, 2016, I talk about going to the mountains to look at leaves, and on the road over Boreas Pass the temperature dropped to 33 degrees and it began to snow lightly. Then in a post from October 9, 2017, I mention that we had the first snow of the season that day. And in 2019 our first snow came on October 10th.

Oh! September 8th, 2020, it snowed heavily! So there's a fairly recent one, only six years ago. It CAN happen! 

Wouldn't that be amazing, if it snowed this week? (Or any time this month?) Instead, it's supposed to be: 91 (today), 89, 87, 85, 91, 91, 88. I guess I should make plans to really enjoy Wednesday, the 85 day.

So, do I have fall plans? Well, there was that interesting schedule I made for myself a month ago, let's look at that again.

• 7 am: Rocket Boy gets up, goes to work.
• 8 am: I get up, feed the cats, have breakfast, do the dishes, start a load of laundry, do an exercise video, etc.
• 9:30-10:30: read for an hour
• 10:30-12:30: work on writing projects
• 12:30-1:30: lunch break, put the laundry in the dryer, do other miscellaneous things
• 1:30-3:30: do genealogy
• 3:30-4:30: read for an hour
• 4:30-7:00: put away the laundry, do other household tasks, take a walk, make dinner 
• 7:00-11:00: eat dinner with RB, spend a pleasant evening together, feed cats, bed 

I took a stab at following this schedule one day this week, Thursday or Friday, I forget. There are a few problems with it, to wit:

• I don't really get up at 8, when my alarm goes off. Sometimes I get up at 8:30, sometimes 9, sometimes even later. (Today it was 10, but of course it's Sunday.) I think it has to do with the heat. I'm just so lethargic This means that I don't have time to get my morning chores done by 9:30. But one day this week I was ready by 10, so I read for about 45 minutes and then moved on to writing.
• I simply do not want to cook. Not a couple times a week, NOT AT ALL. But Rocket Boy still wants to eat dinner when he comes home. Again, this may get a little easier when the weather gets cooler.
• As I noted back when I first made this schedule, there's no time in it for planning meals, going to the grocery store, paying bills, etc., except maybe in the late afternoon, but hmm.  

OK, I think that was enough planning. Realistically, it's going to take a while to get back into a fall routine.

I wish it would cool down.

We've been dealing with a lot of issues with the cats. Sillers is still peeing on everything. I ordered six more reusable pee pads from Chewy and they came today. We made up Teen B's bed with clean sheets and then put a giant pee pad on it, in case she decides to sleep on it, as she does sometimes (you can see it in the picture at the top of this post). We've been keeping pee pads on our bed, and I've been continuing to do laundry. But today, when Teen A and I got home from Starbucks, we discovered that she had peed on the living room floor. It got on a little washable rug, so I threw the rug in the washing machine. It's on the line now -- I should probably bring it in.

Baby Kitty got out briefly one day this week, ate something in the yard, and the next day had diarrhea in All Three Litter Boxes (and on the pee pads under the boxes). That was fun to clean up. Then we thought he was better, but today he had diarrhea in two of the litter boxes and on the floor. Why do we have cats, I keep asking myself. Is it worth it? I don't know.

Last night we went out to dinner at the restaurant at the golf course and brought Teen A's girlfriend along. I like her a lot, and it's nice that she's getting more comfortable with us. She and I both ordered the beet salad, which is very delicious. But for dessert, a sad thing happened. She and Teen A ordered the tiramisu to share, Rocket Boy ordered the lemon tart, and I ordered the orange pana cotta. But the waiter didn't bring my dessert, and he didn't come back to our table until the others were done with their desserts. He said, "Can I get you anything else?" and I said, what happened to my dessert? He looked stricken and offered to go get it, but at that point it seemed too late. So I didn't have dessert (I had some ice cream at home later). It was fine, the world is so full of misery, who cares about me not having dessert? But it made me oddly miserable, as though I had been found unworthy of having dessert. It brought back memories of childhood, when I was always thought to be too fat and thus shouldn't have various treats. Silly, I know. It sometimes seems as though we never grow up. 

This coming week is going to be mainly taken up with medical appointments. First we've got Labor Day, tomorrow, so the kids don't have school, but I think Rocket Boy may go to work anyway. He's considering it. He's had a hard time the last several days -- another bout of cellulitis, and then a head cold -- so he'd like to get back on track.

Tuesday I have my follow-up appointment at 2pm, for the knee, and I'll find out if they want me to have physical therapy and all that.

Wednesday I have a 9:45 am appointment to get bloodwork done. I am not sure if I have to fast or not, have an email into my doctor's office to find out.

Friday I have my half-yearly appointment at 1:30 pm with my regular doctor. 

Saturday is our neighborhood pancake breakfast, and I have signed up to work for part of the time. I hope my knee won't object. They've had a hard time getting people to sign up -- there was a big brouhaha because of course Saturday is also Rosh Hashanah, which the breakfast organizers apparently didn't realize, or didn't care about, I don't know, but anyway, many people in the neighborhood got upset about this when they noticed the schedule conflict. The organizers promised never to do it again, but it was too late to change the date this year. 

Saturday is also Rocket Boy's birthday, but since he doesn't like to be reminded of it, I don't have to do anything special for it, just get him a card. If I feel ambitious, I might make a cake on Friday. I like to make him cakes full of fruit and nuts, the kind that the twins hate. I'll see how it goes. 

I hope it's a good week.