Mrow!

technically, i'd be home by now anyway, but i did not goto work today or yesterday.

at least now I'm feeling well enough to play catch-up with chores... yesterday, i didn't even manage that.

the thing that worries me is that this is the 3rd time in about 2 months that I've been ill.  The boy thinks it may be a combination of stress and getting run down from the new sleep schedule.  I'm starting to wonder if it may be some kind of food intolerance, but I can't pinpoint anything new/different that I've eaten all 3 times.

off to get more stuff done...

I just recently found out exactly why bromating flour is maybe not the best idea.  Aside from the fact that some people can taste the difference (most can't), the potassium bromate "cooks off" in baking... as long as the quantity is right, and the baking is sufficient.  Otherwise, it may remain behind, and it's a carcinogen.  So... what about all the uses of flour that don't involve baking?  i.e. soup thickening, roux, etc.

It got approved by the FDA before the Delany clause went into effect in 1958, barring carcinogens from being approved by the FDA.  I'm not entirely sure why an amendment was required - I'd have thought that carcinogens would fall into the category of "harmful" already.

Anyway, now you can be mildly creeped out too.  Lately, a lot of food stuff creeps me out.  I blame the internets.  And Steve.  And Food Inc.  On the other hand, lots of food stuff rocks my socks, too.  I blame... the internets.  And homemade bread.  And homemade yogurt.

Brief end of year update:

1) I got married in October. YAY!

2) I still have a job (not really in danger, but since I work for a bank, I'll take it as a positive). YAY!

3) I have, using the official term from my cardiologist, "fully recovered" from Idiopathic Cardiomyopathy and the associated diagnosis of Congestive Heart Failure! YAY! (The cardiologist believes it was all a stress-induced condition, so I'm going to be spending the rest of my life watching out for stress, but that's a very small price to pay for being "fully recovered.")

4) I've been accepted into an MBA program and am starting - VERY PART TIME (see above note on stress) - in January. YAY! Wait, what? ;-) (This will make College Degree #6, for those keeping score.)

5) I turned 39-Mark-I in November. YAY! (If I use the official number, this would be placed on my list of negatives.) ;-)

While every year has its ups and downs, and I've had my share of both this year, the positives far outweigh the negatives. I hope you and yours take the time to appreciate all of the positives over the last year, but do keep the negatives in mind so as to minimize them in the new year.

Happy Holidays, everyone!
- Dr. James -

So, yeah, certain things in my life have been crappy lately.
But...

We're moving up north.  The house and land have been transferred in the boy's name (some day I'm gonna remember to ask him if I'm supposed to refer to him by name on the interweb).  It's his.  His asset, and, until we get some work done on it, his liability.  Bonus: unlike an inheritance, no one had to die, so there's no weird guilt about the happiness of having a house.

The move is planned for March.  We were going to wait a bit longer (basically until we could start farming), but it's starting to look better to go sooner, for a lot of reasons.

Once we are up there, our income will drop (how drastically depends on when/if/which of us can find work), but our bills will drop even more drastically, and both of us are ready to not work where we work now.  Plus, we will not have to drive an hour + to get to the garden.  Since we want to eventually be farmers full time, this is good - travel time & expense hurt us more last summer than 29 days of rain in June.

I've already started dabbling in some of the things that I will be doing more up there, especially in the weeks where work was scarce.  I've started making most of our bread (flour = less than $0.50 /lb, bread that is made of ingredients and not crap = $2.99 /lb or more).  I made yogurt last weekend for the same reason.  I'd like to try my hand at mozzarella, but haven't bought the "kit" (which I just put in quotes because the blogger who totally sold me on it did - it is apparently just rennet, citric acid, a dairy thermometer, and instructions... but a kit, or even a "kit" is nice to have the first time).  I really dig cooking and baking, and just because the boy is good at it doesn't mean he should have to / get to do all of it.

So, aside from the things in the pityparty post (and granted, they are big things, and anyone who has had chronic pain knows just what it is like to go through what I'm going through (at least I got a four or five month break from pain everyday) but let's not get started again...)

... aside from that, one problem with an end date approaching, the other I expect will improve or resolve after the first... Things are actually going pretty well.  I'm happy when I come home to the boy, or, like tonight, when he comes home.  I'm enjoying the feelings I have when I am cooking, baking, or looking up information on  replacing a fuse box with a proper circuit breaker.  I'm looking forward to breaking ground this spring, without the background worries that came from gardening on someone else's land.  I'm looking forward to inviting my friends up to visit in a  place that has a guest bedroom to see what I want to do when I grow up.  I'm looking forward...

Edit note:
I just re-read this incomplete post and realized that it is the quintessential example of throwing myself an LJPityParty.  I'ma post it anyway, 'cause few if any of my friends know what's going on in my life.  But then I'ma write another entry.  It will more accurately reflect how my life is going.
-georges



Six months or so later, where we at, yo?

Thoughts on my job and my health...

Work: 
I am officially so broken that I have been pulled out of the job I was in, permanently.  I got a nice four month break in a made-up (unbudgeted) office job, and then accepted a temporary assignment in... my old job, the one I had before the job that injured me.  So, I am currently back on first shift, starting at 5 am.   Since the economy is such crap, and this company's focus on competition is not centered on price, we had an abysmal Christmas selling season.  Last week was the first week in probably a year or more that I worked a full 40 hours, due alternately to physical inability and poor sales.  It was agonizing, in a purely physical sense.  I now have a medical restriction against working more than 8 hours in one day and prohibiting overtime.  The emotional outcome of this could be it's own post.  I really thought that once I was no longer in a job that my knee problem does not tolerate, that I would be able to rehab/strengthen it so that I could do everything that I could do, say, 2 years ago, before I switched departments.  Sadly, no.  On top of that, if I cannot work overtime, than I cannot make up for the month that I worked about 20 hours a week (due to crappy business).
Work, however, is nearly a moot point.  The current plan is to move north in March, which will mean quitting my current job.  Unfortunately, I'm now going to enter a job market that is not expected to show signs of recovery for 9 - 15 months from March.  Also, I'm entering it with physical limitations.  I am thankful that they are not visible - it may eliminate discrimination, but a lot of the jobs in the area are now  things that I can't do.  Our bills will be lower, and perhaps we could live at the same level (or better) than now without me working, if only I were not carrying any debt.  Haven't quite figured out all my options on this one yet.

Physical Health:  So, I am left at a point where I don't know how much damage has been done.  I don't know what my limits and capabilities are anymore.  The only way that I find them out is when I exceed my capabilities, and I'm not so crazy about the consequences of that.  When I moved back to my original department, I thought that I would be avoiding the one and only thing that had been causing all my physical problems.  Well, I'm still avoiding that one thing, but apparently, that's not enough.  I'm a little bit terrified about what this means for the rest of my life, especially since the 'd' word got used in the discussion about what we do if I cant work in this department.  Disability is for people who can't work... I can work... can't I?
On a happier note, today I had enough money to re-fill my script for breathing medication.  On a terrifying note, what happens if I don't find work up north that provides insurance?