Because it rains on Tuesday and Wednesday I drive to work. On Tuesday I manage to go walk/run for an hour before work and strengthen the core muscle group on Tuesday night. On Wednesday I lift heavy but am hampered a bit by the cough and general malaise that has come over me. But it's still a good session with the weights.
On Wednesday I share with a few people that today is the third anniversary of Nopester's death. It's also Karen Revolution Day (for the Karen people in the eastern part of Mynamar and western part of Thailand). Both anniversarys mean something to me.
On Thursday my cough is getting worse and there is a time or two that I have to leave a meeting because I'm coughing, my eyes are tearing up, and I'm sneezing. I manage to get in the heavy workout with the weights before the ResourceScout meeting. After getting to sleep at a reasonable hour and having deep sleep, I'm jolted awake by a text message from Person C_V indicating that he will be in Los Angeles the next night and they we should hang out. I have trouble getting back asleep as I have hallucinations about not being able to move and not being able to wake up - is it a fever or the cough medicine doing it?
On Friday I'm in bed until 8:30 and have a slight fever of 0.5 degrees above normal. I guess that fighting something off required that extra sleep. The day starts slowly as I wash the motorcycle, but then it picks up steam as I get out for the aquarium bicycle ride at late morning, work on the roses in the warming sun, and finish some trimwork inside the house. It's a slow day, but I probably needed that.
Saturday sees a return to normal body temperature. Thus I get out for the loop bicycle ride early in the morning. A bit too early today because it is kinda cold to start. Afterwards I quickly do the laundry and meet up with my city councilperson at a coffeehouse at a community gathering. She sees me enter again and comes over and touches me on the shoulder during a break and asks how I'm doing. The group ends up discussing the nuts and bolts of standard of living, such as potholes and noise, rather than the recent verdict from the Halloween beating case. The rest of the day is kinda slow as I wax the motorcycle and then just relax around the house. I turn down offers (for the second night in a row) to go out clubbing. As I tell Mom and the youngest kid who come over and surprise me, "I'm being a hermit right now".
On Saturday night (really Sunday morning) at 2:15 am I wake up and cannot fall back asleep. I toss and turn until 4 am. Now, when I would sometimes just be getting to sleep after a night of clubbing, I get up. I go out to the garage and wax the rims of the motorcycle. At 4:45 am I am finished and I go back in the house and surf the Internet for a wile. At 5:15 am I go back to sleep.
I get up late on Sunday morning and mill about the house until the February sun warms up the day. The ride is good and then I relax until the Super Bowl starts. Do I cheer for Peyton Manning and the Indianapolis Colts or Ricky Manning and the Chicago Bears? Well, it's a close game and the result is reasonable though the advertisements are disappointing.
Monday sees a day filled with meetings. In fact, it is so filled and I am not able to skip any such that I don't get lunch until after 2pm. After work I work on abdominals and stabilizer muscles before heading off to buy carpet and arrange for the installers to come. Later I get an email from Person J_VKPI. Person J_VKPI has not been heard from for a while, but he was visiting his home country and only has two weeks before he ships out for bootcamp.
The week is a weird motorcycle commute week. Of course the weather is strange changing between very very warm and somewhat wet and chilly. But other things contribute also. When I get home on Monday I see a giant sploch of something on the side of the freshly waxed motorcycle, but nothing on my pants. How did it get there? And what is it? Well, whatever it was, it certainly isn't alive anymore. On the Wednesday night ride home I'm riding along when a car next to me decides to spray it's windshield washer fluid all over me (because his/her sprays are misdirected). I only raise my fist at the driver as I pass. And then, later in the same ride, a truck ahead of me stirs up a cushion from a couch laying on the freeway and I miss it with the front tire but catch a bit of it with the rear tire.
On Tuesday and Wednesday I lift heavy with extra repetitions, thus I sleep very well those nights.
On Friday, after a 6 am teleconference with the east coast, I ride the motorcycle over to El Segundo to witness a test. When I return before noon, a coworker says, "I saw that guy cut you off this morning and almsot run into you". At first I don't know what he's talking about, but after I confirm that it was me leaving the facility near 8:30 am and recalling that there was a bit of an incident, I just respond with, "Oh that wasn't that close. We didn't even trade paint". I guess it looked closer to an observer than it did to me.
After work on both Thursday and Friday I get in extra heavy workouts. And by Friday evening a lot of muscles are getting sore. But I still climb up on the ladder after work and try to fix some holes in the roof. When I come down I grab a quick shower and deal with people visiting. By the end of various visits I smell like condoms and lubricant and leather. But I'm hungry, so I drive over to Subway and hope that nobody can smell "the supplies" on me. At least there are no strange looks.
I get out for an early Saturday morning walk/run before doing the laundry and meeting up with the carpet measuring people and the baseboard installer. I babysit the baseboard installer until he's finished near 2 pm. Later I collapse for a nap and feel worse afterwards then before - feeling as if I might be sick. But I mill around the house waiting for the rain before lifting very heavy for abdominals and lower back. Since I've increased he weight today I try to maintain strict form and perform slow lifts for the region near the lower back (where I've had problems before). About an hour after lifting I realize that my lower back will be sore (in a good way) tomorrow from the added weight. I have phone calls throughout the day with Person T_U, Person C_T, and Person C_U as it's a slow day as I wait for the rain.
There is rain on Sunday morning so I spend time reading the newspaper and painting around the inside of the house. But I see sun poking through, so near noon I get out cycling for the aquarium ride. This is a great time to ride - the air is clean, there are watered-up smells, and the Los Angeles river is gushing. Some of the natural areas of the river are now under water as all the runoff heads down towards the ocean. It's a great ride! During the afternoon I cook plenty of vegetables and pasta for the week, read the newspaper, and relax.
Later on Sunday I finish the painting that I had to do, work on abdominals again (but not lower back), and purposely avoid the Grammy awards. There is nothing in it for me. Finally I speak with Joe and we talk about Person J_VKPI and others and Joe gets the revelation that he wants to introduce me to his friend, Person T_J. I agree that this could be a good idea and we agree to try and make it happen shortly.
On Monday morning I have the dropsies - I drop a couple of things at work until I have the ultimate drop - the coffee cup that I use for juice and diet Coke. Though it falls on the carpet, it still shatters. But I just put my head down and stay focused on work today and have a fairly productive day. After work I get in another heavy session with the weights before taking a 30 minute walk. I catch the tape of "Desperate Housewives" from last night before doing a few other little things around the house.