even though i’m tremendously tired from a long night of eluding sleep, i managed to drag my sorry (non-shrinking) butt to the gym. not only did i do forty minutes of weights but i then took the stairs back home. granted, it was only seventeen flights – nowhere near yesterday’s sixty-nine – but it still kicked my butt. that’s far too much talk about my butt (though there’s more than enough of it to talk about).

it’s funny because i was so exhausted all evening from my stair climbing yesterday but if i slept an hour the whole night, i’d be shocked. i finally fell asleep well after 04:00. i was wide awake again at 05:00. i dozed a couple of times before the alarm started hounding me at 06:30. i LOVE nights like that. i was so tired but i was just… restless. and to top it off, there was a noise. see, hubby has been doing some a/c work around here. he’s been adding vents into our bedroom to get me more of the cold at night, which is wonderful! unfortunately, the stronger air is apparently affecting the fan so when the air starts blowing, the fan makes this horrible clicking noise sporadically until the air stops. granted, the sound is not incredibly loud. i’ve actually noticed it for days but hadn’t paid enough attention to it to figure out exactly when/how it’s happening. but i’m one of those people that when i can’t sleep, ANY noise is enough to drive me batty. this is how hubby gets in trouble for snoring. it’s not that he really snores loudly, really just heavy breathing, but when i can’t sleep it rubs my nerves and furthers my non-sleeping. i strongly considered putting in ear plugs last night (since they are right there next to the bed from all that concrete drilling last week) but i’m the keeper of the alarm clock. hubby doesn’t even hear it in the morning. by this morning, the clicking of the fan had me wanting to drill a hole through my brain with a rusty spoon. here’s hoping that ya’ll had a more restful night than me.

today was stairs again. it looked something like this:

– 22
+ 24
– 24
+ 24
– 5
+ 5
– 6
+ 6
– 6
+ 6
– 2
+ 2
– 2
+ 2
– 2

that brings today’s total to 69 flights of stairs up and down or approximately 2484 steps in 55 minutes. the two full climbs weren’t any easier but the shorter pieces after that seemed much easier today. my legs never really gave out on me so maybe i won’t be unable to walk tomorrow. i did a much better job of stretching before and after today, which may have been part of my too-tight-calves last week.

fifty minutes of weights

the weekend was sort of a bust because of my non-cooperative head. i had planned on doing some nice paddling on the kayaks but it just wasn’t meant to be. for the most part, we just rested and hot-tubbed. yesterday afternoon, we did manage to get the snorkel equipment out and enjoyed some underwater voyeurism. we found several pretty shells and i even nearly caught a few fish. one shell, which i just HAD TO HAVE, was occupied. hubby and i spent about an hour trying to find another shell with the right shape and size for tenant relocation. (no, the tenant was not happy to be carried around that whole time and kept pinching my fingers in protest.) hubby finally found another shell just like the one i covetted but with less pretty coloring. i held the two shells together and it only took a minute or two for the tenant to relocate. everyone was happy (well, one of us might have been a bit angry and kept waving claws at the two crazy giants that had held him hostage). we released him and then continued to follow him as he made his underwater getaway. i’m certain he was happy after we left. i wish we had a reef here. that would make this the absolutely perfect home. in the meantime, all of this practice snorkeling is getting me very excited about the snorkeling we’ll be doing on our cruise in fourteen days. assuming, of course, that the cruise doesn’t get cancelled due to a parade of hurricanes!

i don’t know what i’ve done wrong but my head has been so very angry at me this week. much more so than it has been in quite a while. last night was pure hell. usually, even with my worse migraines, i can take some motrin, lay down in the cold, wrap a blanket around my head, and it’s gone in just a few hours. last night, i took four doses of motrin and still ended the night in agony and sick to my stomach. fortunately, i am able to move again this morning but my head is still hurting. i am very much hoping to keep it at a dull ache today and not let it spiral into that hellish torture again.

it was a wonderful evening of wine and hot-tubbing. we had a very nice conversation with a nola evacuee. she was a pleasant woman with a jovial kid. she’s going through a divorce and, for some reason, i get very sad when i hear about someone becoming a divorcée.

one hour of weights at the gym. for some reason, i’ve always had a much easier time of gymming when i’m doing weights. i don’t get endorphins apparently because i never leave the gym with a feel-good, life-is-great, love-the-burn feeling but, while i completely loathe cardio which feels entirely like work, weights give me a powerful feeling that works well with the loathing i feel while gymming. does that make sense at all?

i was disappointed that i didn’t get to the gym wednesday since this was my first week of trying to get back into a routine but my head was so not into it thanks to all the concrete drilling (yes, today is day 4). yesterday was my cardio day so instead of going to the gym and getting nowhere on the treadmill, hubby and i walked about 4.4 miles on the beach last night. it was a wonderful walk and the sand was great for stretching out my calf muscles that have been so tight since tuesday’s stair-stepping session. between stretching them out on the walk, sitting in the hot tub when we got back, and making myself smell like a little old lady by slathering mineral ice on them before bed, my calves are feeling much looser today. yay for that!

as you can see from the sidebar, i spent far too much time today plurking and working to even try to think of a post. shame on me.

really, what more is there to say on day three?

i’m really starting to feel like all of this drilling is a personal attack on me. the headache that i worked so hard to get bearable is now throbbing my eyeballs again. this is the first thing that has really had me questioning condo-living. i know things have to be fixed but all i can think while trying not to cry from the pain of the drill reverberating through the concrete and into my teeth is “why won’t they just leave me alone?!”

so the headache that started yesterday afternoon lasted all night and this morning. i took countless motrin and could not knock it out last night. i couldn’t even get up to reheat leftovers for dinner. this morning, i couldnt’ lift my head off the pillow so i had to call in sick. i took some more motrin and waited for it to dissipate enough to start working. after two and a half hours, it eased off enough to login to work. the wonderful part is that they are doing more concrete fixing today. i wonder how long it will be before they drill right into my skull again.