book: Dead Reckoning by Charlaine Harris

I got the latest Southern Vampire book from the library. I really really enjoyed it, Dead Reckoning.

( For spoilers, for repetitiveness, and for seemingly contradicting myself. )

Chewing and chewing...

I think I've been ruminating too much. I also think I need to go out more and need to exercise more. I need to go back to drinking more water. And I need to go to bed earlier....

I knew if I stopped doing the volunteer gig that I'd need to find something to replace it so I didn't wallow. I took an extra tai chi class instead but it tends to make my shoulder pop. Provably, not doing this tai chi class helps my shoulder not be as damaged. It's more athletic than it was but I am not. I haven't found another knitting group. I'm not really interested in joining a spinning group after reading what other people who want a spinning group want from it. (One woman says she's hoping there's a group so more advanced people can give her "advice". I'm thinking, "That's teaching. It's not a group." But I know until I had the volunteer gig where I was expected to teach, I was flattered to be asked when I was at a knitting group. So there are probably people who aren't hearing it as a demand like I'm hearing it.)

Things are ridiculously stressful here. That's why I'm not putting a lot of effort into finding a new something. I sort of feel like there are three weeks left and the world will end. That feeling is exacerbated by Simon's urge to declutter and tidy. He wants to move, I want to move. We don't want to move things that are actually trash. I understand this. My mental block is akin to 30 year old people not wanting to make a Will because it's "morbid". I'm sure I'll get over it, but it would help if the current path wasn't littered with crushed and mangled "Cliff!" signs that had been destroyed by a mass horde of lemmings.

I am, however, amused by one of the things I'm planning to do as part of my declutter. I am going to get an opaque storage box, the kind with the non-annoyingly loud lid, I'm going to label it, "These things cannot be unseen." Then I'm going to keep my sex toys in it. I don't have children, so there's no ick factor like when a 70 year old woman realizes her 90 year old mother had a hot pink vibrator and a collection of dildos. [ps. Not my stuff. I would obviously buy purple.] But I think a lot of people would prefer being able to chuck the box wholesale without looking at exactly what was inside. Not like they're going to get handed down!

There are some really good personal hygiene things. 1) I've found deodorant I like the smell of, it's effective, and it comes off with the matching body wash. (Axe makes really good deodorant, it smells like limes, and the lime body wash uses these moisturizing microbeads as the scrubbing grit.) 2) I finally have a good hair washing solution so my scalp doesn't fight me. I condition it every other day with non-buildup conditioner. I only wash it every third day or if there's something that needs cleaning. The other times I just rinse and scrub the water through with my fingers. 3) Spray on sunblock works well, makes it possible to get your back covered without feeling like you've stolen your real life lines from a porn movie. 4) Those arthritis rubs actually work. I have the non-scented Aspercreme which has salicylate in it, one of the biochemically active components of aspirin, and it's actually better than plain lotion and significantly better than the menthol rubs which I loathe so they never get used.

Does anyone else take B complex vitamins separate from a multivitamin? I really like the effects in how I feel. I took one today and I feel so much better adjusted than most of the rest of the week has felt. However the brand I'm taking, Nature Made, completely reeks. I have the jar of vitamins inside an (empty + clean) glass mayonnaise jar on my desk because otherwise the whole room smells like 3 day old cat urine. So... if someone else is taking these could share their experience, that would be nice. The Nature Made ones have no coating on the pills, I'm sure that's part of the problem. A lot of the other brands have extremely high niacin amounts... and my research suggests that there are health concerns for excessive niacin intake. There aren't really concerns about riboflavin or thiamine intake because they're water soluble. I know I'm getting sufficient amounts of the riboflavin because it adds yellow pigmentation to your urine if you're excreting excess to what your body needs. But I would definitely prefer to have less niacin in the pill, and for the pills to have a membrane locking the odor inside so I don't have to have this double-jarred system.

Can someone point me toward a diagram that explains how to use separate covers on a shared bed? I can't stand having my covers tucked in at the bottom of the bed. Sheets aren't really wide enough to share when someone wants to tuck them around himself. But I don't want to end up with "separate like single-zipped sleeping bags." I can't quite imagine it working unless people tucked their covers around themselves and at that point I might as well get us separate twin beds.

I think I need one more good thing:
I have been enjoying cranberry+pomegranate juice mixed with naturally carbonated water. I especially like it with fresh lime juice and slices of fresh lime added. I can drink a whole quart of it without any dismay. Since I'm using more than half water, I figure that's a pretty good deal.