RantWoman Sleeps--or Not

Spoiler alert: sleep total about 4 hours in bed with CPAP on. Ibuprofen would have made it longer. And we do not count the time half-dozzing in various phases ofER and And we celebrate glorious halloween motif of face flaking off all over black jumper.  Trick or treat. The longer version: What brought you here tonight? Gravity and a deep-seated desire to have about 17 people most of whom did not tell me their names ask me the same questions over and over. The prequel: I intended to go to an event furhter south but needed to cross Rainier with the light. There are two ugly bouts of tree vs sidewalk on the path to the stoplight. I know they are there. Usually Ambassdor Thwack finds them with no problem, but thwack was bieng lazy still foldedup in my hand.So I tripped. And in the keep trying to make peace with what my body will or won't do realm, I could not get up. As in it hurt like HELL to put any weight on m right arm. So I sat and pondered for awhile. Call a friend ...

All together some where close to 6 hours of sleep. There was that part about drink tea and eat cheese and popcorn and then go to computer lab at like 11:00. It was easy to write some clear thoughts but when the computer shut down automatically and the second time in keyboard and mouse frozen until updates happen mode, I decided to GO TO BED. In bed about 1:30 and awake before 5 with blechy taste in mouth.Eat oatmeal and go back to bed for two hours 7-9. Second day of NOTHIGN on face sxcept clean with antifungal shampoo. A layer of scaly stuff to wipe off BUTg TRYING to keep hands away from face and all the pairs ofeyes peering say less red than last week. Here is the selfie of the day.. Not sure by the way how I feel about all the grey hair, but someone gave me some purple and some line green "hair chalk" in case i want to experiemtn with other color schemes.

Saturday: Roomie wanted to go to Hospitality. Dropped her off in the trasnport chair; asked if she could get somone to bring her back to the room. Nah. I went back to room and drowsed about 1.5 hours Roomie called a littel after 12. Sure I can go get her. At leas ttransport chair i can just push is SO much easier than out of control scooter. Back to room and in bed about 1 but realize I need to hit sleep button on her talking book player because she fell asleep as soon as she hit the bed. She was listeing to some thriller so I decided not event o go with the Korea book.  I think I slept until about 6 and wound up not going back to sleep. Just pack. Tell roomi repeatedly that I need to leave  at 10. She kept falling back to sleep and I decided I just needed to tell her where a couple things were and leave as scheduled.Becasue of previous day breakfast and issues with hypoglycemia asked if she wanted me to bring her something from cafe. No. Data about a reason beside ge...

How (NOT) to sleep well: a grande mocha at abou6:30 pm. This was a a meeting about hiring someone to do a website. Kind of gratifying that other people besides me wehre like It's the gig economy so of COURSE self-employment makes sense but how about you work on these steps to amke it easier on everyone as far as contracting with you. Talen show: they let me perform again. I said well Ithink I am recycling some material from last year but think of it as saving the planet one recycled joke at a time. I had meeting so I am not sure what happened for Roomie about dinner. I just know she had a hypoglycemic episode after the talent show. She got some juice and called bot the consulting nurse and the crisis line. Consulting nurse said if she has another episode that would be three in recent weeks, she needs to go to the ER.Crisis limne said good for her for calling. I think so too because I did not have mucjh in me. We decided thank heaven no hospitatlity tonight. Roomie left he...

WA Council of the Blind convention. Roomming with same roomie as previous years. I tried to get a friend of hers to be sighted guide so I could just commute. That did not happen. I of course am quite uncentered and expect little help on that score from roomie. Roomie is more uncentered than average. Feeling many issues of housing insecurity for herself and because of advocacy ties. Also problems with wheelchair battery so she has a manual transport chair and a gnarly scooter she has not practiced how to drive. Sound environment alone is going to be a challenge. Scriptalke presceription label reading machine. talking book player. iPhone. talking Clock. Sometimes all at once. Or roomie bursts into song and then tells Siri to play the song she just started to sing. Efforts to drive scooter also accompanied by more cursing that my fragile ears need to hear. Oh and Roomies bad habit of making a loud comment for every item that comes up and even for door prizzes is in evidence worse th...

Will all the pieces of the public transportation infrastructure that need to line up actully line up? Stay tuned. Yesterday was the pre-trip purse purge and a short shopping trip. Today was wrangle the science projects in the fridge and freezer, see if that will be enough to get the fridge working again after de icining key elements. The sleep data: dozed from 10-about12:30 in chair. IN bed bclose to 4 hours. Could have napped after the fridge wrangling; instead remembered I need to pakc my CPAP.

Maybe reconsider the pressure washer. RantWoman does not have energy to handle a water cannon right now., Plus it's the season to sunbathe and soak up all the glorious fall colors  and it will rain some more soon. Went to dinner a apartmetn of younger friends, I guess fine to call them friends. We do not know each other well. There is a Quaker connection but  pretty hit or miss right now. . Affected by same rent hassles as everywhere else. Also run some ofthe most energizing meetings I go to, meetings that can actually deal with disability AND get things done. . They listened well and articulated a version of question on multiple people's minds running away screaming...would be an option..." Wife will be cat sitter since husband is allergic. Wife walked me to bus stop. Both of admitted even though we declined dessert at dinner that Molly Moon icecream good sounded. I had a whole scoop of pumpkin clove.Wife got 3 kids scoops for two people. I will remeber abotu kids...

No water cannon, justa pressure washer. Hmmm. If what is needed is a water cannon and the only thing available is a pressure washer, maybe a good way just to stay out of trouble. LOTS of people are worried about eye yuck. I went to dr. yesterday. He was GREAT. He asked about timeline and could see I went to Bastyr IN NOVEMBER. He asked about ID pictures and I just renewed my state ID in July: no swelling. Tells me part of the issue is probably stress. Working eyes-free in new browser so everything is slower. As in computer boots up with screen reader but not magnifier. So I cannot really see anyway but I do not know all the keyboard commands so things are slower based on what I know.. Eventually I shut down screen reader, open magnification program and then re open the screen reader because that is the order the current versions of the software need to be started in order for everything to play well together. And we do not even talk about other devicies and needing to know d...

Need to go to primary care dr. Nurse at Council of the Blind meeting said just go to ER. ER on weekends SUCKS and I ain't died for weeks so aim for primary care. possible digression to tirade about pedestrian environment and pedestrian networks and how the subject is or is not present in data, planning, thinking. Then digress to other unrepresented topics. Then Dial-a-Tirade shorts out on account of RantWoman should maybe just have gone back to bed. Tired from day's travvels. DUcked out of dinner with mom because of the rain. Then she texted saying she missed conversation. I did too but she made the offer to skip. Guess I should note that but glad for time to tend to other things including a valuable phone call. Note to self: need to pay attention to moments when I kind of jump out of my skin for example if someone interrupts me while I am working with headphones on. Further side data: tyring to do more eyesfree. This means teaching myself and practicing a lot of stuff ...

Just the sleep data? Go to bed by 11:30. For one's trouble, wake up at 1:30. Drink a small can of juice over ice. Go back to bed. Wake up again at about 3:30. Need to pee. Guess why. Go back to bed until close to 6. . A good bit of just lie in bed with CPAP mask on and be warm. A break to read part of Psalm 50 in braille. It is about 2 braille pages long. I read about one page. Will I get to more later in the day in a different medium? probably not. More hear about actual capacity to read. Whine Skin is less scaley than yesterday. Is that fewer carbs in diet? Is it day before yesterday's ibuprofen. Is it all the unintended walking> Unintended walking? As in early getting to greenwood so go to library a stop earlier than restaurant. Skip trying to connect with Beloved Elder at the Norse home though. Library ROCKS. What particularly ROCKS: I can sit down at any computer, put in my library card number and access accessibility software! Sweet! After meeting, get ...

So um, going to bed at 10:30 automatically adds up to more sleep, right? Hah! Wide awake about 2:45. Various options: --feed the cat of course no question but I think I managed to string her along until 4 --Go walk the breezeway? --Eat breakfast --drink tea --do weekly #caturday post on Twitter --let Ambassador Thwack post some more sark on Twitter. --Clean the old bungee cord out of the cane that still needs restringing. Less arduous than for the last one. Flak for Seattle fabrics on Twitter because they have bungee cord by the yard. --go walk breezeway Okay  so go walk breezeway gave way to go back to bed. somewhere 6 ish  wake back up around 8. So close to 6 hours. Face yuck appears to be spreading which probably means it's not an eye drop issue. Fairly newly blind nurse at chapter meeting said just go to ER but i dd not want to brave husky traffic. So tomorrow or maybe monday to primary care.

Today's weird creature motif: chiggers and pissants. Yep. Too cold and rainy for them but it just sounds good. The sleep data inbed around 12; awake the first time about 4. Not clear whether go back to bed was 5:30 or 6. Awake again about 7:30. In sleep while it's dark mode so permission to get up.  total 5.5+. God laundry is good exercise. Blocks and blocks of walks just to and from laundry room plus all the loading nad unloading, folding, hanging. No equivalent chore today. ALso got floor mopped yesterday. Finally. Refrigerator and bathroom beckon. Other chores such as clear out paperwork and sort clothers need eyes  and ears for stories. Other thoughts roiling but need seasoning. Stay tuned.

Cut to the chase. 10:30- to about 3:15 is just under 5 hours. Maybe RantWoman will get back to bed. Probably not since more stunning clariy came in a form succinctly described as "cannot in good conscience..." SHIT. But first laundry. Today's elevator moment: the same mysterious packets of not quite thawed fruit on the bench as last night. Welcome to the food bank. People get delivery or visit area food banks. They wind up with things they do not want or cannot use. The elevator is one place things get passed on because that happens between the times the staff is around. RantWoman has many times benefited from people's lack of interest in lentils and oatmeal. This hour is a glorious time to do laundry. All the machines are free. The caregivers have not arrived to work.  The households iwth kids who "help " about laundry in teh early evening are still asleep. The only twitch is if one wants to fill the internet with words via a keyboard and the keyb...

By the way one of my neighbors said my eyes look better last night. This morning at least for now much less scaley. Neighbor needed to tell me about her new computer. Good thing she bought insurance. The service python and the flock of emotional support chickens have decreed that from time to time this blog will need weird animal motifs. Today's is centipedes. Think of them as a secret password. I went to bed about 12:30. The clock on the phone said 3:54 so I WILL go back to bed. But first check to see that the trash mess is back to normal.. On way to elevator think of long ago former neighbors. One of them lived on my floor. They are deaf blind. One now has a walker. The other as another neighbor puts it "used to be a guy." She favors value Village formal wear and they were both part of conversations about "community teas about rape and violence." They are still in the area though I am never sure where or by whose grace. The floor is much quieter since t...

...are not the epirtome of nutritional responsibility, but BOY is RantWoman enjoying the ones from the discount carbs shelf the other day. RantWoman is in this weird space iof energy flow different from LOTS of pretending nothin has happened and being paralyzed until things cool down. RantWoman also needs to read some stuff about a greant and finish writing a resolution / recycling one she wrote 6 years ago for a different issue. RantWoman had a phone conversation of the form RantWoman how are you? How do you think I am? (Substance of conversation spoke to many things on people's minds. Stay tuned. also multiple email exchanges reveal confusion muddle and also some terminology resonating sort of Anyway answer Probably better than RantWoman's line last week yesterday was annual inspection. I forgot about it or I would have worked hardeer at getting floor scrubbed. Reasons that actually might have been a rational approach. Stay tuned. So far I have managed to ...

Cut to the chase. Somehwere over 4 hours of sleep. More would have been good, but as soon as brain focused enough to realize what day it was, .... reared it's head. Feed cat. Go ahead and decide to eat breakfast. Water plants including especially the tomato plant that still has tomatoes that might ripen. One of the cherry tomatoes disappeared. I ate the other one last week. Try to take kitchen compost and recycling out but trash area was too much of a disaster. Try later. Shower. Did not occur to me to try to go back to bed. Need food. Finally decide to walk to QFC. Glad to see they are opening the N doors again but the doors were not yet open past when the sign said they were.Place was crammed with restocking carts and dollies and it was hard to find my limes. Bananas the perfect shade of green and a large container of baby spinach. Plus a couple items from the discount sugary carbs shelf. Anxieties rippling but moving helped and also staying out of the way of all the c...

Went to Symphony with Mom. Saw a BUNCH of Quakers Program was: Brandenburg Concerto (which one?) Premier of modern piece I would characterize as The Crazy Cat Lady Starter Kit romsps with the Brandenburg concerto. Mozart's Jupiter Symphony. Transportation, o transportation. I should not be surprised how hard it is to go places with Mom. For things like the concernt she would stand up straighter if she used two walking poles instead of her cane. She bobs and weaves in a way that is hard for me to stay out of the way of and also hard to follow. Oh and she has a hearing loss all of which works oh so well in crowds. She got taxi home and it seemed she would be safe enough for final wait that I cauth the bus when it came before her taxi. Made breakfast before bed. Hard-boiled eggs and oatmeal. forgot step about stop for milk and eggs at the 7-11 near the bus stop. Because geography Inbed shortly after 12. Awake about 4:30. More sleep would have been nice but not gonna hap...

Preservative free eye drop feels better in eye and seems to have better effects too. Woke up with less crusty scaly than day yesterday. PHONE Calls. One that ended just with silence for awhil and one that ran over 2 hours and at least 3 tries to end . After that just sleep. From about11:30 to just before 4. Wake up hungry. Pee  feed the cat. Emit the weekly #caturday tweet into the universe. Go back to bed. about5:15. Get up about 6:45 Last segment was mainly  lie in bed w CPAP and be warm wi8th cat curled up around my head. REALLY clear...

The good thing about waking up at 5 am is getting a shower and dishwashing done before the 8 am water shutoff. Water shutoff? The notice pasted on the door did not say why but there is some noisy pumping thing parked by the back door. It comes every day and I have to assume there is some plumbing cleaning thing going on maybe in different parts of the building. But maybe that is just my imagination. Other interesting thing: I went to eye dr yesterday. He is appropriately concerned about my face but got why not even topical steroids around my eyes. He said maybe the preservative in one of my eye drops is the problem so try a preservative free (and probably spendier) version. This morning there is less itch in the eyes. But the level of crusty flaky is about the same. But then there is the matter of sleep: I should have just gone to bed earlier. This morning's LIght might have been even clearer. But about 4 hours total.  Yikes. Sleep matters for the face. And I have to hav...

Random moments The next in a too long series of conversations of the form : RantWoman shut up you are taking up all our airspace but NO we cannot listen to what you think would make things better. Really COOL conversation about a moment when RantWoman did not want to yell about accessibility andduring an event when nothing could be done about access to the mic system. RantWoman talked or emailed after and this conversation was about The group presenting did not ask about mic until the day of the event and I had no way to get into the office, but gee it would be AWESOME to have a checklist when plannign events or requesting space. Ding ding Ding. RantWoman has already been truying to cause this to occur. Further conversation with a Friend with Mobility impairments: I am right there with ya about Friends and their inaccessible homes and planning Quajker events but how about we sand away a couple rough edges to talk further. Oh, and worship was one of those SQWEET moments  whe...

RantWoman's need for self-care reaches to get a machine she can do work on in her own house. As for sleep, in bed by 12:30.Awake before 5. Make oatmeal in the microwave and save portions ahead. Go back to bed about 6 until about 8. Not bad. RantWoman also probably could have slept more.

It was blind people in a bar night. Mostly guys, Amazonians talking shop. Enough other moments to be worth the time to go. Chatter about dog-friendluy workplaces and guide dogs. Data about server skills: usual server was busy tending to sports fans or somehting. He knows all the regulars' names and usually picks up new names quickly. He also comes in to check and pretty much asks everyone by name if they need anything, more of whatever they are drinking, food if they haven't ordered... Last night's server does not quite have the blind people thing down, RantWoman wanted coleslaw with her pork sliders. RantWoman asked at least 3 times but server did not get it. At least RantWoman got more hot water for tea. Sigh. Roasted butternut squash turned out to be a good thing when RantWOman got home, that fall orange food zing plus not disturbing sleep. Not disturbing as in fall asleep in chair for like two hours, go to bed about 12:30, wake up before 5, go back to bed abou...

Official bedtime earworm. There is a whole series of different rappers trying to rap this children's book. All the guys manage really quickly to turn the rap into something parents should giggle about after the kid goes to bed. Sleep: fall asleeop at computer until 2. Got to bed and sleep until almost 7 So not sure how to count.

The second half of the title is techno-nerd speak tha tRantWoman needs to figure out. It involves accessibility software, a new  browser and stuff RantWoman feels like she is supposed to know even theough the supposed to know might also be freighted with does not actully work as it should. RantWoman thinks the problem is more likely RantWoman error of some kind, but blame and the software is a tried and true out for many things. Notes: in terms of food before bed: Ideally none. Hard boild egg seemed to have no impact either on sleep or graungy taste in mouth. Pistachios grungy tasty and thirst. Anyway, rantwoman achieved almost SEVEN HOURS of sleep. in bed. With one interruption somewher eclose to 5 long enough to text Little sister about emojis and CPAP masks. Then back to bed. Late to adult ed about particle physics. The world will not stop even though particle physics and home thermodynamics experiemcnes about the cooling of one's weekly pot of soemthing and meal-size...

Data in advance of sleep data. Ugkly crusty scaly thing around eyes. I wake up with things that will flake off over the morning. i put calendula cream on after shower and once later. The creat REALLY helps but the flakes continue. Also some weird similar thing on lip. People keep saying go to doctor and i do not even know what kind of dr to go to and ... But maybe Bastyr. And tonight's exercise: turning ingredients (yellow split peas and various veggies into food. Good for exercise. Good for keeping congestion loose. Flavors turned out well and 4 meals besides supper. Note to self for future: if cake makes eyesburn, EAT LESS or no cake. Okay SIX AND A HALF HOURS of sleep. Nice that it was headed toward dawn but not yet dawn when I awoke. More sleep  less scaly stuff around eyes and also lip in better shap though that might also be THE RIGHT lip balm.

Deep dark secrets of GETTING MORE SLEPP: Reimnder. Maybe it is not so wonderful to have one's phone remind one midday that bedime is 11:00 pm. Whassup wid dat? On the other hand if one is still writing at 1 am and does not catch the automatic shutdown warning that turns the computer off AND shuts down the keyboard and mouse for awhile for some cleanup processes one should just GO TO BED. Last night reminders added up to over 5.5 hours of sleep. The new CPAP mask makes a difference. More sleep would not have been terrible but it's the go back to bed in the morning thing. Now to other blog for meditations on Powerpoint and why we deliberately leave things in an annoying but informational state at .... but first a good bye party. MLEAH

One of RantWoman's well-adjusted or not blind person tropes is about asking waht is available at places like the salad display at grocery stores. Last night RantWoman kind of cheated: the person ahead of her ordered curried chicken salad and that sounded good to RantWoman, but rantWoman asked about a couple other trays. One was some kind of cauliflower dish. Definitely worth asking for. And in the latest chapter of refrigerating while blind, where the #$*#$ are muy limes., the ones I make lime water out of for part of my daily fluids. Never mind. The sleep data. Sat down to plug phone into charger and woke up 2 hours later. Then went to bed for just under 4 hours. Then work up and got into Twitter and should have gotten at least another hour of sleep. Sigh.

Not like I needed to cathch up or something. NO late night snacks. 20 minutes of walking the breezeway because I did not go anywhere else. Ignore one thing that is still outstanding. But six hours of sleep in bed with new CPAP mask and gentle but helpful nag from Mom about ask for help avilable through never mind full characterization. It is what is available.

Two phone calls on continuing topic. Perhaps RantWoman was sufficiently clear about one issue OR perhaps tides were moving anyway. RantWoman was VERY blunt! A call this afternoon while an African squash dish was cooking  at least got an appointment scheduled in daylight, reasonably promptly after something else and NOT at the last second before other events. Is thunderous applause ever also dripping in sarcasm? Hold that question in the Light. Rest of questions on mind get an email. Two hard-boiled eggs for supper. Eggs are brain food and good early in the day but I am not sure whether they also help keep one awake. Not sure if the coffee flavored yogurt also contributed caffeine. Dozed off while trying to write late at night. Woke up somewhere after 12:00 am.. Should have just gone to bed, but no. Kept writing. Until almost 5 am. In bed just after 5 and slept until almost 9. Good thing schedule had room. Now, about defrosting the fridge and the topographical floor grime in...