It’s another of those weeks when so many little things are happening and none of them are worth a full blog post and all of them I want a record of. Perhaps my brain is just a bit scattered lately. My thoughts really do seem to be running in circles.

New toys: I’ve mentioned the pain and swelling in my left foot from the last few months, and I discuss this more in depth in the next section. Last week, Jason and I decided to put part of our tax refund toward a rower, thinking it would be a good way for me to exercise off my feet (or at least, less pressure on them!). We got a fairly low-level ProForm model, which came home on the 11th. First time using it, I had to stop twice in ten mins, ha! My body is def not used to this, but it’ll be a good exercise eventually. Unfortunately, after that first time, Laurence tripped on the cord and broke the head off, so we had to go in search for a new one (which we finally found yesterday). Our other new toy is the Ring Fit. Laurence and Ambrose pooled their money to buy a Switch, and Jason and I decided to get the Ring to go with it. It’s a fun little way to get in exercise, and reminds me of the days we were all excited about the Wii Fit when we got that one back in 2011!

Foot: My foot has been so bad lately** – swollen and painful – and I started to think that I might have a stress fracture or something. So I made a doc appt on Monday (after getting the rower, ironically) and started the ball rolling on getting x-rays, specialist care, potential MRIs, etc. She checked to make sure it’s not something vascular or circulatory, which is isn’t, and she agreed that it was likely stress fracture or ligament tear or something similar. I had a series of X-rays taken on Friday, and I see the specialist on Thursday this week. Likely I will need an MRI, I’m told, but we’ll see what the specialist and X-rays say.

**and by “lately,” I mean “since mid-October.”

Birthday: Laurence’s 17th birthday was last week, as I mentioned that weekend. We didn’t do much for his birthday. It was low-key, his second covid-birthday. But L tends to like things low-key, so that wasn’t too much of a problem. He got to rent a movie of his choice (he chose The Devil Wears Prada, which none of us had seen – it was quite good!), and then he ordered Chinese food curbside for dinner. We made donuts – in oil after a disastrous attempt at an air fryer version that basically turned them into weird bagels – for his requested dessert. Then he and Ambrose played Splatoon 2 all night (he got that for his birthday). (Yes, he was making that face on purpose in that picture. It’s a thing he does.)

Job: A few weeks into this semester, Ambrose decided to leave school. (He really hates online school.) So we told him that he needed to get a job instead – he couldn’t just hang around the house watching TikTok, yeah? So he began applying, and when the one he wanted fell through, he began work at our local nursery. (On Laurence’s birthday!) His first day was a ten-hour shift – he posed for this photo afterwards to show how “tired” he was. Unfortunately, he had a minor car accident on the way home, running over a curb in our neighborhood when his foot slipped off the pedal. (He’s not used to wearing his work boots yet.) It popped/slashed the front tire of Jason’s car, so suddenly we had to go out and replace both front tires. Sigh. At least no one was hurt, right?

More new toys: My trail shoes were absolutely obliterated at a hike a few weeks back, caked with clay that I couldn’t get off for the life of me. (A friend in the same situation literally had to use a pressure washer on her shoes!!) Since mine were a year old anyway and needed replacing, plus I had a few rewards from Fleet Feet to use before May, I skipped the pressure washer and got new trail runners. I also decided to get with the trend with a new Hydro Flask because my other water choices on hikes were 1) a small running bottle that didn’t insulate, or 2) a full-on Camelbak, which is a bit overkill for a 3-4 mile walk/hike!

5K: So you know how I was saying I missed in-person 5Ks so much? Well, I’ve signed up for one in May! It’s limited in-person participation (max 250 people) and there’s still a possibility that it’ll have to go virtual due to what circumstances will be like at that point. We’ll see. It’s a 5K I did (virtually) last year. I’d signed up before covid, and the event got delayed, and then turned to all virtual in July. Some friends of a friend host this one to raise funds for pediatric brain cancer research, so it’s a good cause!

Plant-mom: I’ve officially become a plant-mom in addition to a cat-lady. Not sure how that happened, as I hated plants and touching any kind of “nature” for years. Turns out, it was really just grass that I hated (and still do!). So in addition to all the gardening and landscaping we’re doing lately, Jason bought me a hibiscus to keep indoors! It’s hard to find plants that are nontoxic for cats that you can keep indoors, but this is one of them. In the picture, it’s outdoors because it had a ton of new water put in when we transplanted it from its plastic container, and we didn’t have a tray for it yet. But it’s going to go in the corner by the french doors, getting plenty of light! It’s blooming all over, too, which makes me so happy! I’ve been taking waaaaay too many photos, ha!

Torrid: For the first time, this company has really disappointed me with horrible customer service. They sent me a birthday reward of $15, which I used on an item that didn’t end up fitting. When I returned it, they gave me back the money I spent on it, but not the $15 birthday reward. I asked, and they said basically too bad so sad. Rewards, once used, can’t be refunded even if you don’t keep an item. WTF, Torrid? How’s that for my (nonexistent) birthday gift? Definitely means I’m less likely to shop Torrid in the future, grr.

Baby shower: Fellow hiker/hike-leader Lindsay is now about 33/34 weeks along in her first pregnancy, and the leadership team threw her a surprise baby shower yesterday morning under the guise of our monthly leader hike. It was chaotic and not at all like we were originally planning (the park was SO FULL because of youth sports games, and we had to move areas twice because apparently we chose spots that were reserved), but it was also really awesome. Food and games and gifts all covidified to be safe especially for the future mama. And it turned out that while we expected she’d had other baby showers already, she’d opted out of them and feeling a bit sad about that, so this was just perfect. It feels so nice to have a group of friends who care enough to do stuff like this for each other!

So that was my week. I had to opt out of this morning’s hike due to foot/hip issues and massive #plaguelife mask-line sunburn from yesterday’s event (you can see it a bit in the coffee photo above). Sooooooo much has been happening that I’m quite overwhelmed – all good things, so I don’t mind! – and hoping to take today as a way to rest, recuperate, reorganize, and get caught up!!