It’s a glass is half full/half empty kind of day. At least, it averages out that way–my glass today is chock full of productivity but completely empty of any energy (grin).

Let’s see, today I:

8:30 Got out of bed. (Harder than you might think, but I was still tired from yesterday, and so . . . an accomplishment.)

9:00 Went downstairs and, even before making coffee, mixed up bread dough. It’s been months since I made any–not since we got our new kitchen counters in May–and I had a lot of things planned for today and couldn’t afford delaying. Oh yes, started a load of laundry.

9:30 Cooked and sat down to eat breakfast. (Two eggs on toast–a heavier breakfast than usual, but again, planning ahead. I needed my energy. Fed Chappy.

10:00 Went upstairs to brush my teeth. While in the bathroom, cleaned the sinks, cleaned the counter, cleaned the bathtub, cleaned the toilet. Also watered the plants.

10:30 Mixed up an applesauce cake. I promised Dad I’d bake something for him this week since he was nice enough to take my car in to get its headlight fixed the other day. Took a 15-minute break to finish the cup of coffee I’d poured (luckily, into a thermal-mug) when I ate my breakfast.

11:00 While cake was in the oven, went out in the garage to start assembling furniture. What, hadn’t I mentioned? We’re replacing the desk and computer desk with three filing cabinets topped with one, long counter top. Except, they required assembly. If you look at the picture, imagine that three-drawer unit broken down into its individual pieces . . . five piece for each draw, a top, sides, back for the unit, the rails on the side for each drawer, the handles, the multitude of screws . . . Ugh.

I covered the garage floor with a huge, plastic tarp, and started pulling piece after piece out of the box, while Mom sat on the garage steps and Chappy sat in the kitchen doorway watching everything. Every once in a while, “Oh, I need scissors to get into this box of parts.” “Could you maybe get me something to sit on? This cement floor is really hard.” “Why wouldn’t they say that I need a hammer?” And Mom would nicely go get me whatever it was I needed. Like, checking to make sure the cake wasn’t burning.

11:30 The cable-guy came to replace our cable-tv boxes. (Yes, on a Sunday!) Thank heaven–now we can watch West Wing tonight. He came in through the garage and asked me how I was as he followed Mom into the kitchen. I said, sitting there surrounded by thousands of pieces of desk, “Oh, just peachy.” An expression he obviously had never heard before because he smiled and said “I’m oranges,” and headed inside.

12:15. Uh-oh. The piece that’s supposed to attach the front of the drawers doesn’t fit the holes pre-drilled. That’s weird–everything’s been so well manufactured up until now. But . . . clearly . . . the wrong size. Mom grabbed (well, not literally) one of our handy neighbors who offered to drill the hole larger for me. Very helpful. We offered him some freshly-baked applesauce cake later, once it was cool.

12:45 Finally get the drawers assembled and slide them into the cabinet and . . . uh-oh . . . why don’t the two smaller drawers fit properly? A dim bulb lit over my head as I realized . . . what I’d done was assemble the drawers backwards–the front was the back and the back was the front. That’s why the holes weren’t the right size and, apparently, they’re positioned just a little differently from front to back . . . Well, for now, it’ll do. They close (mostly) and I’ve got two more of these things to put together. This floor’s getting awfully hard, though . . .

1:00 Pause for lunch and a pet for Chappy, who’s been very good about not entering the garage . . . well, okay, he came running in after the “orange” cable guy had left, to make sure I was okay . . . and there was that one other time when he just came down out of curiosity . . . but really, he was very good.

1:20 Back out to the garage to start the second filing cabinet. Ask Mom to slide my car down the driveway so that it’s blocking Dad’s garage when he gets home, so he won’t automatically pull into the garage and run over me and the assembly line. The second cabinet goes a lot more smoothly. I paid close attention to the fronts and backs as I assembled the drawers and the only mistake was screwing the drawer tracks on upside down on one of the drawers. Mom nicely puts my [forgotten] laundry in the dryer.

2:30 Take a break between cabinets to get the bread dough (you thought I’d forgotten it, didn’t you?) shaped into loaves. While doing that, Dad comes in and makes some comment about the construction site in the garage, collects the papers and heads into the family room (now, with a functioning cable-box) to watch some sporting event or other. I put the loaves into the microwave to rise . . . what? . . . it’s the perfect place. You bring a mug of water to a boil, first, and then put the dough in there–warm, moist, draft-free, and off the countertop. It’s perfect. Anyway, back to the garage.

3:00 By now, my back is tired, my legs are tired from kneeling, the skin on my knees is complaining (despite the jeans and the folded blanket I’m sitting on). The drill isn’t screwing screws as successfully as before . . . on closer inspection, the drill bit is being eaten away by these screws . . . the tip of the phillips-head bit is reduced to a pinpoint. Luckily, it’s still successfully getting the screws in for me, but it can’t quite get them as tight as I want . . . the last few pieces are a little . . . loose. Not so much that the units are going to fall apart, but the drawer fronts (the last pieces to screw on) are going to need tightening.

4:00 Finally! Done. Exhausted. Hands shaking. Need tea. Put kettle on to boil, preheat oven for the bread. While waiting, cut a piece of cake for the neighbor, put on a disposable plate that Mom found for me, and head out the door . . . oops . . . go back to get my car key so I can move the car on my way back. Deliver the cake. Happy neighbor. Back home. Move car away from garage door. Inside. Put bread in oven. Pour water into mug for tea. (Yes, remembered the teabag.)

4:10 Ah . . . sitting down. On furniture. A book. Chappy (relieved to be in the same room as me).

4:30 Bring empty teamug into kitchen. Check on bread in oven. Getting close, but not ready . . . not enough time to go do something else . . . Go into the garage to try moving the completed filing cabinets out of the way of Dad’s car.

4:32:57 Uh-oh. As I slid the first cabinet–the one with the badly-fitting top drawers–the top drawer slid open and pitched to the ground, breaking the drawer-pull which was made from silver-painted plastic. Cheap stuff that can’t stand an impact on a cement floor. Argh! Oh no! No way to replace that . . . And now the drawers aren’t going to match . . . Being calm, told Mom. Then went and got blue painter’s tape to tape all the drawers closed.

5:00 Go upstairs to check my e-mail for the first time all day. . . . Except . . . just as I reach the top of the stairs, my sister calls–my niece is having trouble with her social studies homework (one of her least favorite subjects, but one of the ones I like). Spend the next 15 minutes browsing the ‘Net for information about types of propaganda and suggesting examples she could use.

5:30 Dinner. By now, Mom’s as exhausted as I am

5:50 What do you mean, all my e-mails to my sister have been returned as spam???? Talk to my sister on the phone, tell her the site I went to and dictate my suggestions so they can find the information themselves since I clearly can’t send them links. (And, since they use dial-up, they can’t look at the sites while on the phone, either.) Do a quick check of my own e-mails. Realize my post from last night never got uploaded–post that to my blog.

6:30 Go to take my shower and decide to take a quick bath instead . . . my legs feel like they’re about 30 years older than they were on Friday, between yesterday’s standing and today’s kneeling.

7:15 Downstairs. Make some tea. Have a piece of cake. Go into the family room to watch West Wing’s season premiere

8:00 Pull out my knitting to try to regain the ground lost with Friday night’s frogging session.

8:40 What happened to the cable?? They just fixed that! Don’t they know one of my favorite shows is on?? Show blinks back on just in time for the 8:45 commercial. (Really needed to see that!)

9:00 Turn on Desperate Housewive’s season premiere

9:01 My brother-in-law calls to try to figure out why my e-mails are bouncing back. Thank heaven for the time-slip feature on the DVD recorder. Pause the show, to talk to Mike, basically saying that I don’t know why their system is refusing my mail.

9:10 Restart the show . . . at least now we can fast-forward through commercials.

10:00 Come upstairs. Bring Chappy in to say goodnight to his Grandpa. Check my e-mail. Write this while playing CNN in the background.

Next . . . go brush my teeth, crawl into bed–a bonus night for Chappy because I’m taking tomorrow off from work. (See? I knew I was going to need a day off after this weekend!) Phew!

• Tags: Baking, Knitting/Spinning, Reading, Uncategorized • Permalink:So, so tired… //