Happy Halloween!

Today is Halloween, but I’m not wearing my pirate wench costume until the party tonight. Apparently nobody at my work dresses up for the holiday, which I think is just plain sad. I don’t want to be the only one, so I’m not dressing up either.

Stepped on

Last night at the grocery store, I was walking down an aisle when a guy who was blabbering away on his cell phone stepped back from the row of chips he was looking at and stepped squarely on my left foot. He was wearing hard-heeled dress shoes and I was instantly afraid that he had given my foot a good crunch. He apologized, saying “I didn’t see you back there.” Well of course you didn’t, you moron! You weren’t looking where you were going! I’m hypersensitive about my feet after dealing with that wretched stress fracture in my right foot earlier this year. I don’t want to go through THAT again. Fortunately, I think no damage was done this time, but only time will tell.

Sun in autumn

I had to work yesterday, which means I only get a one-day weekend this week. I had a three-day weekend last week, so I can’t complain. But yesterday was totally beautiful out and it really sucked to be stuck indoors. Today, though, I’m outta here. My sister and I are going hiking. Yay!

Last weekend was really nice. Back in May, Greg and I had to cancel his birthday weekend in Ashland because of me being so sick. So last weekend we had a makeup birthday weekend, though not as far as Ashland. Hoping to see good fall color at Silver Falls State Park, we stayed a lovely B&B in Silverton, the Water Street Inn. I really love staying at nice places, although it makes it so hard to go back to staying in cheap places! We had a jacuzzi tub and a very comfy large bed. Mmmm….nice.

We did indeed see some fall color at Silver Falls SP, but not as much as I had hoped. Around here our primary color-giving trees in autumn are bigleaf maples and vine maples. Many of the vine maples had turned yellow, but only about a quarter of the bigleaf maples had donned their stunning yellow autumn colors. Still, it was a nice hike.

Now sis and I are off to hike the Salmon River Trail up on Mt. Hood. Ta ta!

Market of Choice

Near my library is a Market of Choice grocery store. I go there regularly for snacks or lunch or whatever. It’s an okay store. A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to visit the original Market of Choice in Eugene, two hours south of here. Holy moly! It’s twice the size and has WAY better selection of everything. I feel like we got cheated! My Market of Choice looks pretty pathetic next to the big store in Eugene, which in addition to having a MUCH better selection of things at the deli counter, they have yummier things too. Dang it!

There isn’t much in the way of lunch selections near my work, which may be a good thing. It would mean me spending more money on eating out, which would be very bad indeed. But I do get tired bringing the same small rotation of foods to eat for lunch. You’re pretty limited when you have to make it ahead and only have a microwave at work for your use.

Relaxing

I’ve been pretty stressed lately about maintaining a balance between my work life and my non-work life. Since going to 40 hours a week earlier this year, I have not managed to find a good balance. Part of the problem is that I refuse to be one of those people who doesn’t get out and do things. Many people who work full-time spend their evenings and weekends taking care of the yard, raising a family, running errands, paying bills, etc. Then they don’t get out and do things very much. I’m fortunate that I don’t have a yard to care for or kids to run me ragged. Except for the running errands and paying bills thing, much of my free time can be devoted to play, and I have done my very best to make that happen this summer. I think I did a pretty good job. One of my library friends from an old job told me that she was impressed with how much I was doing, all the hiking and camping and outdoor play. She said she and her husband talked about doing that stuff, but never did.

Since I don’t want to cut into my play time, and I can’t cut into my work time, A LOT of other stuff has been put on the back burner the last few months. This has led to more than a little stress. The mail has piled up, I haven’t read as many books (though I still keep checking them out!), the laundry keeps piling up….argh! I realized I needed to find a way to de-stress and bring more calm to my life. I wanted to take Tai Chi this fall, but none of the classes fit with my schedule. So Greg and I are taking Qigong, which is a form of Tai Chi. We had our first class this Monday, and it goes all through October and November. I liked it. It was relaxing and calming for both of us. I think there’s a second installment of the class during the winter, and if this continues to go well I’ll probably take it. Even though I’ve only been to one class so far, I already feel like I should recommend it to anyone looking for a way to relax, release your stress, and calm your mind. It’s pretty great.