Baby Steps

Gainesville

Ah yes, Mom, you've learned the first lesson of the cute little mini-phone: keeping track of the damn thing. I must say, I much prefer my PocketPC, which is the size of a pack of cigarettes (remember them?) -- and it has a keyboard and a screen big enough to browse the web, do email, and play games-- which I did in the dentist chair this morning. Sometimes a little bit bigger is a whole lot better. (And a whole lot more expensive and complicated, but that's another story...)

Good luck with the decluttering of your nest. You will like it a lot more if you're easily able to FIND things you keep handy there. Fifteen minutes a day. And a 5 minute hot spot drill will keep it from getting bad again. You can do this.

My day was dominated by the trip to the dentist-- replacing two ancient fillings on the bottom. Dentist commented they must have been put in when I was a child, judging from the composition and style. And, since we're about the same age, we commiserated about how dentists in those days didn't bother with novocaine for children. Today's procedure was quick and practically painless-- the TMJ is by far the worst of it.

Stopped by Border's and picked a few graphic novel things (their selection is much better than the more convenient B&N's) and then hit Fresh Market. I got the usual buzz off the place, but I must say that I was mildly disappointed in most of the stuff I bought. Just wasn't as good as expected, from the bland roasted garlic bread to the completely tasteless blueberries -- there seems to be a blueberry blight this year. Oh well, they had THE Olives, so that's worth a lot. And I haven't yet tried everything I picked up there.

Yesterday when hauling recycle stuff to the curb, I started counting steps: nearly 1500!! That got me thinking about exercise, a continuing problem with me. After dinner tonight I got Bill to help me program a pedometer we've had laying around, and I've worn it since: I've logged over 1/2 mile just walking back and forth in the house! My goal is 3 miles a day, but that doesn't seem so daunting when I realize that's just twice around the circle plus the usual walking around in this long house, and back and forth the long driveway. Interesting.

As for the aforementioned dinner, it was something with the unpromising name of "Herby Turkey Zucchini," and indeed while cooking it, I assumed it was a failure. Surprise! It was wonderful, and so easy to fix that we ate early. Another nice surprise for us low-carb types: Tofu Shirataki noodles are great, and incredibly easy to fix. What a great find.

I see it is officially August already (EDT). For us swamp dwellers, this is Hump Month. Make it through this, and the worse of the heat is over for the year. Not the worst of the hurricanes, though-- still keeping a close eye on that situation.

Need to get to bed, as I want to go in and work on comics tomorrow.