A Weekend Review

Friday Social & Outings
--started with breakfast with my buddy at one of my favorite funky breakfast joints downtown. We had a great time and he took me to this lil shop he'd found the last time we met for breakfast--totally the type of funny place that only N would have noticed AND would have taken me to-HA! Made tentative plans to get a longer run in together in the next week or two, as he's totally wanting to join in on the half-marathon bandwagon.
--ran errands...and surprising didn't get much and what I did get (letters to finish signs), I made sure to pay with debit and not credit. I HATE having credit card debt...and I think its existence allowed me to walk out of Target 100% empty handed.
--returned home with just enough time to squeeze in an Insanity work-out and hop in the shower. Then cousin A arrived and we loaded her delish taco soup into the crossover and took off across town to Book Club. Interestingly it was just the 5 of us original members and it was really a great evening together--lots of laughter, lots of catching up, and lots of encouraging each other toward new endeavors (one of my gals is moving in Jan/Feb to the bay area....sad but happy!!). On Friday we reviewed The Happiness Project (which was November's selection) and Where We Belong (which was December's). Somehow it's my turn next month and I had just a few selections I'd brought down from my "to read" pile.....and we ended up selecting Lucy by Ellen Feldman, which was donated by Mom. It's about an affair from FDR's days---plenty of fodder for a group of females to talk about!

Granny Move Time
--the alarm went off way too early on Saturday (especially after lots of vino and lots of sugar the night before) and I brewed coffee to drink en route to Salem to help load up Granny's stuff for her big move. I'd hoped that Tall D was going to come help out like he'd said, but luckily my brother was there and my uncles & father (all in their 60s/70s) were able to do a great job too. Within the first 40 minutes, we had all the heavy stuff loaded and from there it was getting things situated in the moving truck (Dad gets the truck set "just so" and almost everything gets its own blanket coating), packing up the rest of the inside goodies, farming out more items, and loading up boxes and items into our vehicles for additional transport. The entire process went incredibly smooth and Granny did a great job supervising while remaining in great spirits.
--about 12:45 we all arrived at the new place up here and unloaded the moving truck and our vehicles. Somehow unloading seemed more tiring than the loading, and I'm not gonna lie, I was dragging by about 3:30! My cousins and my aunts did a wonderful job of tackling the unwrapping of all the trinkets, getting things situated just so inside the place, etc.
--a handful of us returned today and finished getting Granny's new apartment in order. Her new faux fireplace was set up, the bed switched out for a better fitting model, the TV hooked up, boxes unpacked, pictures hung, and part of her Xmas decorations arranged....all before the Queen arrived at 3:30pm to check out her new home. A glass of vino and some popcorn later, she remarked that it felt just like home--definitely good to hear!
--tomorrow she can officially move-in. I'm picking her up from my aunt's at 10:30 and will keep her entertained until 1:30 when she'll be able to check in at the new place. Maybe I'll take her out to lunch somewhere near her new residence....
--next Saturday we'll finish going through the old place and taking things to be donated or transporting items for storage for other family members to the family beach house. Hopefully after next weekend, all will be settled and we can just enjoy having Granny closer!
--on the emotional side of things, Granny was in great spirits both yesterday and today...and the new neighbors are quite interested in knowing who she is....so I'm hopeful this move is going to go even better than we could have imagined!

Recoup Time
--I mentioned being exhausted, but I was SO exhausted yesterday. In fact, so wiped that I honestly barely remember driving down or back from Salem. I do remember sitting down on the move job quite a bit yesterday and I recognized about 3:30 that I hadn't eaten a solid meal yet (just snacking on items I'd brought). Luckily my cousin A has spent enough time with me in the last year that I think she recognized too that I'd hit the wall, and she gave me the words I needed to hear to make myself go home. I got home about 4pm, unloaded my rig, crammed food in my body, vacuumed the house, hopped in the shower, and was laying in bed by 6:30pm. I pushed myself to stay awake until 8ish by reading a few chapters and chatting with my housemate.....and then I passed out until about 10am this morning.
--I woke up for about an hour last night and my brain thought through a lot of things I've been worried about lately (I was suddenly adamant that I need to get a full time job and sell my car for something cheaper in order to pay off my debts & credit card; I also was 100% sure that I need to move out of the rental ASAP either to a different area of Portland or out of Oregon period) Obviously these must be things that I'm not dealing with in my daily life, so some extra time will be devoted to working through some of these decisions.
--However mainly, I slept fairly solidly for over 12 hours.....and I can't remember the last time I've done that...and honestly I could have spent all day in bed. Physically I worked out a lot this week so I think my body is tired....I also had some weird sleep nights earlier this week....I was exposed to sick germs earlier this week also.....and obviously, emotionally, I'm probably more extended than I'm realizing. Regardless of the why....my body needed it....and I probably need to take a few more days of keeping it easy....and process some stuff I think I must be shoving to the back corners of reality.
--Tonight after getting home, I took it easy---grabbed some grub out of the fridge, got the laundry done, chatted with the housemate, and then curled up in front of the TV and watched one of my favorite movies of all time: The Family Stone (here's the thing Meredith, you have a freak flag.....you just don't fly it.) (Although I'm not going to lie, the movie always stirs up some other concerns especially now with all of dad's continual health issues.....ie what if by the time I have kids, they never get the opportunity to know my father...I hate even saying that outloud.....return up to the statement about thoughts I'm hiding in corners....)

Tomorrow after dropping Granny off, I've got to run to campus to make copies for the final exams on Tues/Weds and for next term (the office is moving and we might not have copy machine access).

Hope y'all had restful weekends!