The start of a nice weekend

 

As I've mentioned quite often, I don't have the energy that I used to have years ago.  In past years, I'd set myself up to do several things in the same day, and get them all done.  For example, I'd create a checklist for the things that I wanted to accomplish that day such as that below:

1. Call Cruise line about promotion offer.
2. Call Doctor's office regarding being set up to be able to leave messages after hours.
3. Lunch with a friend.
   
4. Shopping at the supermarket.
5. Ear Piercing.
6. Manicure/Pedicure.
7. Dinner Meetup.

When I was working, I had the energy to fit all of this into a weekend day.  (Not all of these things could be done on the weekend.  But I digress.)  These days, if I'm lucky, I get around to 2 or 3 of them. So when RQS came up for the weekend, I knew I had time to do only 3 things before she got here, and only accomplished 1 of them - the Mani/Pedi in that list. Retirement changes a lot about what one can expect from herself.  In my case, I manage what I do, so that I have enough energy to enjoy the time that RQS is here.

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My day started slowly, and I got out just early enough to have time for a Mani-Pedi at the local nail salon.  I'm not a conversationalist when I'm at the salon, as I am not a regular, and I don't want to use my voice that much.  So, my visits become a sort of quiet time that I can enjoy while someone takes care of me.

Once done with the Mani-Pedi, it was off to Dunkin Donuts where I sated my hunger with a egg & chorizo wrap.  It would not fill me up enough to make me skip an early dinner.  But if needed, it would hold me over until we ate a late dinner.  Either way, I'd be able to be in sync with RQS when she arrived at the train station.

As usual, I was in Marian mode when RQS arrived in Croton..(What would you expect after getting a Mani-Pedi?)  She liked the dress from Flax that I was wearing, and this confirmed my desire to continue purging clothes that no longer fit my style and fill more donation bags.  Since we both could enjoy an early dinner, we went to a nearby place for Greek food, then took a drive before getting ice cream for dessert.

Finally, we were in for the evening.  And it was time to strip.  But before I did so, I showed her an exercise dress I got from Macy's (online), and she liked it on me.  Yes, the hemline was a bit short for purposes other than exercise.  But it looked good enough to consider buying another.  (Now, I really have to prune what's in my closet!)

Tomorrow, it'll be off to have a delayed birthday dinner.  (More on that later.) 

Boy, did I need a day off to do nothing.

 

 

It was a great relief not having to go to work and spend 8 hours at a mostly mindless task.  The reason why my job exists is that machines do not yet have enough pattern recognition ability to locate specific information in an almost randomly formatted document, nor do they have the ability to figure out what data has been captured incorrectly in an automated OCR scan of the page.

For example, take the business information below:

Dewey, Cheatem and Howe, Esqs, LLP
101 Vesey Street, Suite 10L
New York, NY 10007

Often, a person's signature may obscure some of the text.  So we have to figure out what text is underneath the signature.  Sometimes, letters are mixed up with numbers and vice versa.  Suite 10L might be scanned as LOL, 101 or 1OL.  We have to fix that error as well.  And then, some of the information we need to enter into a database is not found on the main page, but on a second page.  A lot of micro decisions are made throughout the day, and I am exhausted by day's end.

When one does work like this on a daily basis for months at a time, one's mind gets a little fried.  I do not have the energy to read books anymore.  Instead, I surf the web for short articles worthy of a skim.  Lately, I'm watching YouTube videos for information related to cruising, car purchasing, and other information I find of interest. (I'm lucky to be able to filter out the people who don't know what they talk about, leaving only decent sources of information in the areas I've just mentioned.)

Soon, I plan to leave this job.  It's a little scary to shift into a new phase of life.  But it will be rewarding.

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On a side note, my company asked me to supply a picture for a new ID card.  This picture was emailed overnight.  I'm very glad that they didn't ask me for a copy of my driver's license!

How things have changed

 

This is not a flattering picture of me.  But it is a reminder that I need to do something about my weight.

Why do I mention this?

First, I started going out in the world as Marian, knowing I was far from perfect.  It took a lot of internal energy to start going out in the world as Marian, and I was very scared to have people know about me where I live. Now, I don't care who sees me in either presentation.

Second, at the beginning of the pandemic, I was having problems with an ex girlfriend regarding meetup groups which she didn't want me attending.  Although she was able to blackball me from the one surviving group from that time, it really doesn't matter much anymore.  I don't have the time or energy to go to many of these functions any more.

Third, as much as I like having a job to keep me from getting too lethargic, I'm now at the point where I'm planning to retire for good.  It's a strange feeling for me, as I have almost never left a job on my own volition. The census was a job that I knew was going to end as soon as I took it.  I was laid off from most of my other jobs, as I either didn't perform up to standards, or that I was caught up in a purge - as happened at the bank I worked for 30 years.

Now that I have other things to do with my life, I may end up changing the frequency of published entries here, as I do not have enough to say for all of the 7 days of the week.  I'm out and about socially as Marian these days, and I am fully comfortable in the role of Marian.  There is not much new to me as Marian anymore, so I've been talking about other things than my life as Marian.  So to keep publishing new entries, I will be talking more about things going on in the world than what's going on in my life.  Hopefully, my readers will find this interesting....

It was just as well I didn't go out today.

 

This will be a short post today....

Have you ever had a day where you barely had enough energy to get up just to go to the bathroom?  Today was one of those days for me.  

Being sleep deprived much of the time, I have gotten used to feeling tired - but not this tired.  I wasn't sure whether the headache I had for part of the day was related to a lack of hydration.  But I'm pretty sure that my lack of energy was related to my hydration level.

Luckily for me, MWL was not feeling well today, and that freed me to do much of anything I wanted.  However, this was a blessing, as I was too tired most of the day to do anything other than lay in bed.

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And now to explain why I posted "Enjoy Every Last Moment" phrase....

I am now 64 years old, and the thought of old age and death comes to me more often.  For the most part, it has been a good life, but filled with emptiness and sadness.  No, I am not in a depressed mood today.  Instead, I got into the "coulda, shoulda, woulda's" lately, and it got me thinking about life.  And if there's one thing I realized, it is that it would be a shame if I wasted any of the time I have left to me.  So, "Enjoy Every Last Moment" has a certain positivity to it, as it is an instruction to avoid putting off the things you really want to do, as you may not get the chance to do them later on.