I packed items, 29 of them actually which used to be as many as we sold in a week, until about 6AM when I just ran out of gas. I drank probably a bit more then needed and finally hit the sack at a bit after 7. I had totally weird dreams, basically a compilation of a lot of stuff I worry about.
I woke up at 8 after 4, and I needed to be out of here at 5 like the proverbial cat of the scalded variety. I had time to make my coffee and take my "vites" and have a few chocolate chips and a walnut or two, and was out the door with a very loaded bike trailer at a minute before 5.
I noticed the nasturtium patch still there, so maybe my coughing fit wasn't noticed, but I didn't pick any because I've got a nasturtium salad in the fridge already. The post office drop-off went fine, and so did the FedEx drop-off, but the H Mart parking lot was like opening day. It was awful! Before leaving, I'd "fortified" a bottle of ginseng drink with a little of the Chinese white liquor I'd bought yesterday and since they didn't have "my" brand, I got some other stuff that was maybe a dollar more, with a picture of a bull on it. It turns out in the Eurasian area, vodka/liquor made from bisongrass is a thing. That would explain what's probably a bison, on a green label. It's rather awful. So I'd contemplated coming back up after I'm done using the trailer to buy some more of the right stuff and since I'm out of cash, I'd go up to 99 Ranch where my card works. But after seeing the parking lot frantic scene, I congratulated myself for thinking ahead and shopping yesterday, and decided I'll just learn to appreciate bisongrass.
I checked my usual places for packing supplies, and saw some nice long boxes from car shocks over by "Grill-'Em" so I came back, unloaded the trailer, then headed out again with my "getter stick" and got 'em. Coming back around, Kyle the security guard was locking the front gate at Smithfield and said hi. We talked a bit, he's not been avoiding me or told to do so, but is staying more near the back because the place next to them that used to be a big scrap metal operation, has been broken into. Not only that but there are "a couple people" living in one of the big empty buildings, and they'd already cut the fencing separating that property from Smithfield.
He gave me my book back too. I'm glad there was a brisk breeze blowing across us to any droplets between us would be blown away at right angles because I sure don't want to give him the 'rona. I've definitely got symptoms and wish I could get tested. I told him to just toss the book over the fence, that it'd not hurt it, but he handed it to me through the gap in the gate. I was just careful to only touch the book and not his hand.
The front of the ex-scrap-metal place has a car-sized hole in it, so someone used something to just ram on through. It's a huge property, and I suspect it will develop into a large homeless encampment, with fights, fires, drug OD's and all the things essential to bum life.
I came back in here, noting Crazy Chrissie with her two cars out on Rogers Avenue, another gal sleeping in a car several doors from me in the complex here, and the usual nogoodniks prowling around in their cars that look OK until you notice things like poorly repaired dents, rear windows painted black etc.
I'm really happy I came up with my schedule and thought it over while riding. It's not inspired by jobs I had, because in those it was the same thing every day. Serve ice cream or pump gas or clean dog kennels etc. No, this is inspired by the kind of schedule I had in college. I started out with a strict M-W-F shipping schedule. That's the day I load up things packed the day before and take off like a shot for the post office etc. It's like having a M-W-F class. Other classes might be T-Th, and those are the days I do shit like pack 29 #%%#$%^ items. Sunday's a packing day too, to "study" for the M shipping day. On shipping days, since all I've done is load up the bike and go on my little route, when I get back I list 10-20 items on Ebay. So, M-W-F are two "classes", shipping and listing. Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday, are packing days and I don't think about listing at all.
This is exactly how a college student goes through their week. Classes will be M-W-F or T-Th, and what does any respectable college student do on Saturday? Goof off, of course! That day I took off last week, treating that guy to lunch and just riding around without a purpose, was so much fun I am going to require myself to have a day off every week. Then on Sunday, any decent college student kind of has a day off, but they're also doing homework for their Monday class, in this case it'd be packing for my shipping "class" on Monday.
This is going to be very liberating, because all this time I'd been doing my work pretty much when I "feel" like doing it, with the result that I'd have all these things I need to do kind of hovering around me and making me feeling overloaded and miserable, and much more so with our greatly increased sales of late.
Now, all I have to do is wake up on a given day, and I only have to worry about the things assigned to that day. And on Saturday I am required to think about nothing and to go out and have fun. It will literally be mandatory fun.
I cooked up bacon and scrambled eggs with one of my scrounged poblano peppers chopped up in the eggs - really good. Those are expensive in the store, and the only caveat about them is they can be really spicy before they're cooked. As in, I should see about getting at least some food service type gloves to wear when I cook with them.
I got a call from Ken because we've got to solve a snafu with this large ugly thing we shipped ... then had a regular old Chatty Cathy long call like we used to do years ago when I lived much farther away. Good old times. I told him about my new college student inspired schedule.
I then got in a good practice. I was able to do all my Irons exercises, and did some real work on the old WWII song "We'll Meet Again". By this time the ice cream trucks had left and Crazy Chrissie and some other bum were out there, with Chrissie in bum heaven sanding on Bondo patches on the minivan, and I guess on her car too. They never paint, just sand. I didn't care. Let 'em hear my fucking annoying trumpet exercises and me fucking up "We'll Meet Again" they know I'm in here.
It was a good practice, even with my clearing junk from my lungs. And I've developed a theory of how trumpet players progress. First they think it's "the lips" then eventually they discover it's tongue level, but what's really going on is it's a whole system and I find I'm playing with my midsection. It's not squeezing inward, either; it feels more like down. I believe this is called "support" but this is using my abdominal muscles in slightly different ways for each note, making it easy for the mouth and lips. I've only made this discovery and been aware of it in the last week or two.
Dinner was beef with some garlic and scrounged long Vietnamese green beans. I'd thrown out the "American" green beans I'd scrounged because they were actually spoiling, where the long skinny ones were just drying out a bit. It was easy to snip 'em into little pieces with scissors, throwing away what I didn't want, washing the pieces, and having them ready to go in a bag in the fridge. It was quick, easy, and delicious. I think I can get used to this scrounging/foraging way of getting my veggies.
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