this is real life

 april 22, 2022

it's earth day! i only have twenty minutes before my shift. the nice thing about working from home is that i don't have to scramble to get anywhere, and i get to use this time how i need/want to!

yesterday was the great recycling that fAe and i had planned a couple months in advance. for his schedule, thursday worked better, so we went the 21st.

wednesday night, kelly was kind enough to come help me sort through all the bags of recyclables that i had. i didn't take an actual count when all was said and done. but kelly and i hustled and managed to get through everything within about an hour. then we sat at the dining room table and just chatted for a bit. it was a nice, unexpected end to 4/20. not that i had any intention of doing something special. but just like i figured, i had waited until the last minute to take care of the chore of going through all the bags we had. i remarked that i never thought i would feel proud of my recycling techniques. but aside from some of the bags that had beer cans or bottles that people hadn't taken time to rinse out, my recyclable material was all fairly clean, and not gross to go through with no gloves. i do think i should have worn a mask, because my cough was worse this morning, and it made me feel like the bronchitis was back. 

thursday morning i was also very proud of myself for being exactly on schedule. i got up (even got to sleep past when i planned, because i didn't have to wash my hair and knew it would be a quick shower), got clean, got dressed, and talked to my mom while i worked on making egg and cheese biscuits using the pillsbury biscuits leftover from the morning i was craving biscuits and gravy (onion gravy, of course, which noah always comlains is so weird. i tell him it's the vegetarian version. the gravy is fucking delicious, so idc!). so i chatted with my mom, and made eggs adding an assortment of spices including turmeric (fAe and i talked about how we use it whenever we can. i have since i got lyme disease, just in case there are long-terms effects on my joints), then melted the provolone cheese in a separate skillet where i was warming/toasting the refrigerated biscuits. fAe called when he was about 10 minutes out and asked for a cup of coffee. i was thrilled to be able to offer oat, coconut, or almond milk for it. he asked for a splash of oat and coconut lol. he ended up coming in to use the bathroom, so we chatted a bit at the dining room table while we ate our breakfasts and had coffee. i had put everything in containers to go, but i didn't realize he would have time to come in and sit down here. it was nice. noah joined for conversation. the only difficult thing was poor tina had what seemed like a seizure in the middle of our talking. it was worrisome, but she did recover by the time i got back. 

fAe and i carried out the bags from the basement, and while he secured the tarp (it was raining) over the trailer, i came in for one more layer of clothing since it was cold and wet. 

after we'd talked a bit more, and i had asked noah to come downstairs to keep an eye on tina, fAe took me out to the scrapyard on 108, just down the road from here. it was pretty cool, since i had never been to a scrapyard before. once we figured out what we needed to do, we pulled into a large building, where a giant metal container sat, filled with cans that had already been deposited. fAe talked to one of the workers, and then i got out to help him dump the bags of cans into the pit. it was quite a sight. it ended up that i had delivered 62 pounds of aluminum. granted, that was from almost 2 years of adding them. but that's a lot of aluminum for people who don't even really drink beer. they were mostly from fizzy water, so it looked like an easter egg pile, with so many bright colors from all the variations of drinks noah and i and our guests had from various times. 

i ended up with an extra 55 dollars i hadn't expected to receive, and fAe said it wasn't necessary to go with him to west sunbury--that he could take the bags of recycling for me. i had originally wanted to go along so that i knew where it was, how it was set up, and where exactly to go, but he explained it to me, and that was good enough for now. i was glad to be able to stay home after that, especially with tina's episode. 

i didn't sit still too much the rest of the day. i did laundry, vacuumed, cleaned up my bedroom, switched the white bookcase with the desk in my room so that the desk is in the office now, and then also had time to watch some tv with noah (i asked him to watch sing with me so i can show him the 2nd one, since i haven't watched it really yet). after i had chilled in my bed a bit to cool down after moving furniture, i made the hoisin sweet potato, mushroom dish that noah and i both love, and then i met with my mentee, and then we resumed the movie. 

before bedtime, i put away laundry, and picked out more clothes that are safe to give away at this point. i felt good going to sleep, and had no issue passing out after i was in bed just a little while. i was pooped from the day, just how i like it. that's another reason to engage in some exerting activity--i have a much easier time going to sleep. 

and now it's time for my shift. i've already worked on 2 loads of laundry today, cleaned up the kitchen, moved a couple things on the wall behind me, and had a meeting. ready to finish out the work week and enjoy my weekend!