Look at the time...

Just noticed the posting date, there... so, Merry Christmas to all for whom it is denominationally appropriate and good tidings and best wishes to all!

Observations while traveling

1. I guess we aren't as extravagant with the heat as I thought we were. I was positively baking on the cab ride into Logan this morning (ok, yesterday morning) and waiting around at JFK. I normally wear a fleece around the house, and yet I was overheating in just jeans (unlined), T-shirt and a light button down. I'm pretty sure it wasn't just my body chemistry gone awry from lack of sleep given the number of stocking-less short skirts and be-sandaled feet I saw in the terminal waiting for my connection to Burbank.
2. I not sure I should be grateful or concerned of the apparently more-limited water processing done in New England. All I can say for sure is that there are a lot more chemicals that I can smell (some kind of chlorine, but also seemingly something else) in the water at both JFK and in L.A. I'm thinking I'm a bit dehydrated from all the flying and the general distractedness I've been experiencing in the last few days leading up to today's (yesterday's) travel, but I'm being deterred by the smell and have only been drinking juice and tea in any kind of quantity so far, which is to say, not much at all.

80 degrees and sunny today in L.A. -- nothing to complain about there.

overlooked

Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

Just documenting the cute; he's been climbing onto my shoulder since we got him as a kitteen. (kitty teen)

Last day of work tomorrow before the holiday and the honeymoon. (w00t!) But still lots to do before getting on the plane early Monday morning.

sick thoughts

I've been pretty much out of commission since Friday with some kind of bug. I thought I was mostly back yesterday, but I guess I got a little cocky (I saw a client in the afternoon), and ended up almost back to square one last night. Anyway, not really feeling up to doing much else, so just a few thoughts and observations:

• It's probably been the longest that I've been sick since I started having regular acupuncture treatments almost two years ago. I'm pleased that I've only had a moderate cold maybe once in the last year, but I guess I'm kind of bummed that I've been laid up for over 3 days now. It makes me wonder whether the new assistant who works at the clinic doesn't have the same skills as the previous one or if maybe I need to reiterate that one of my original treatment goals was to keep my immune system up to snuff.
• Does anyone else find that they can't remember what it's like to feel healthy when they're sick? Over the weekend, I kept noticing myself doing little check-ins: Am I better now? How 'bout now? Is this better? Is this how normal feels? It's like a bunch of kids on a road trip asking "are we there yet?" Answer: no. (Also interesting that the opposite is true.)
• It figures that the nicest weather we had in the last week was yesterday and the day before when it got into the 40s. I was finally starting to ramp up the miles and was looking forward to a longer run on Saturday and I ended up not leaving the house. I barely left the bedroom.
• It also figures that I'm sick over the weekend. Of course, it was probably the stress from preparing for a meeting on Thursday that pushed me over the edge in the first place.
• Started reading the Golden Compass series. I'm enjoying it so far, but it's kind of a bummer when reading makes me tired. Geez, when am I supposed to find time to read if not when I'm home sick? Sucking it up and reading anyway. Probably part of why I'm still sick today.
• Being able to sleep on and off all day -- good.
• Not being able to fall asleep at night after sleeping on and off all day -- not good.

Also, less computing -- good... So I'm signing off now.

Later folks.

late to bed, early to rise

Woke up around 4am this morning, dreaming about some crazy Nerds animal launcher to capture some accumulated in-game collectable item (small nautilus-shaped radio/TV sets?) and thinking about user interfaces and gameplay and then recognizing an underlying rate-matching problem that mapped into a problem I've been trying to solve at work. After lying in bed for an hour trying to figure out a workable algorithm (I hate it when the solution only makes sense in the dream state), I finally realized I wasn't falling back asleep. I think I was also hungry.

All that, after lying in bed awake for at least an hour after going to bed a bit after midnight last night a few hours ago.

So I got up a little after 5, and tried to capture some of what I was trying to work out in my head. (Sadly, not much progress.) And installed some new anti-virus software* while I was at it. And had a cookie and some warm Ovaltine.

I did have this crazy idea that I might try going for a morning run, seeing as I was up and all -- I'm still trying to figure out how to fit the workouts into my schedule these days -- but a quick check of the weather seems to indicate that it went from unpleasant to inhospitable in the hour since I was up, dropping from a balmy 16°F to 10°F between 5 and 6.

*sigh*

Productive, and yet, not so much.

Ok, I think that's it for my gripe this morning.

*And, hey Norton Anti-virus? Since when does "dismiss pop-up window" mean "accept the query as to whether to restart my machine right now?" God I hate it when installation programs to that.