Getting back to normal

After what seems like a week of illness, Dad and I are both on the mend.  Lots of phlegm loosening up, but it's finally almost over.

While sorting the laundry today, a gigantic spider came out of Aspen's pile!  I screamed, killed it, and sent Aspen to clean his room.

We cleaned Hammy's cage, too.  I used the shop vac to remove the litter, then got it all back together.  Hammy seemed pleased.

Also refilled the wild bird feeder, potted my ivy that I've been rooting, and cleaned the shower.  Then I took an hour-long nap.  Tomorrow I plan to do some grocery shopping.

Dad rearranged the dogs' sleeping area, and put Brodie's crate back out there.  She is NOT thrilled to be between Copper and Dash.

Aspen put Dash in the house and threw the ball for Copper, and Copper played!  We were so excited to see him take a break from chicken-staring.  He's a little out of chasing shape, but he should get better with practice.

Pretty busy day for people who really needed a lot of breaks in between tasks!

Hammy is a martian!

So cold. . .

Copper is so cold!  "Holdya??!"

Enough already!

My summer cold has kicked in for real now.  Let's just say it's an upper respiratory infection, and let it go at that.

I spent a quiet day posting grades and processing data for my study of how men and women differ in their interpretation if sexual interest.  The data's looking pretty good now that I got the insight that I needed to calculate my own factor analysis of the items before computing my statistics.

If you're still awake after reading that...  Aspen has been completely ODing on his video games for the past two days.  He's taking advantage of Pat's and my illness.

Key to my survival will be getting my sinuses clear so I can sleep tonight.  We all know I cannot breathe through my mouth!

Back to archery!

First I tried to take a pix of Pat shooting his bow and arrow, but he forbade a shirtless pix. 

Then I took this pix of his perfect bull's eye, and he complained that the score of all arrows together isn't very high. 

Shows that he's feeling better -- he's shooting, and dissatisfied with a perfect bull's eye from 40 yds.

SOOOOO uncool!

So, Pat came down with a cold on Sunday, and I tried to be a reasonably decent caregiver -- I provided medications, fluids, and bland foods.  Yesterday, his head was really congested and he was coughing, and he had a headache.  Poor baby!

Despite my awesome attention as a nurse, I still got cursed with the same malady!  The nerve!  I'm on Day 1, with the periodic opening of my nose-faucet, alternating with the complete stopping of all air through my nose.  Perfect for napping.  I'm not really coughing -- knock on wood.  I'm sure that's tomorrow.

Long story short:  I'm sick!  :-(

I still managed to record my Chapter 4 lectures, so I'm a trooper.  I've been working on my data from my sexual interest study, and I'm completely flummoxed by it. How can men and women be scoring the same way?  I don't understand. . .  I've tightened up everything I can think of across three studies, and I keep getting this weird pattern.  Sigh.

Pat is feeling way better today, but we both took it easy today.  He kicked back on the recliner on the back porch for much of the afternoon.  Aspen's the only truly healthy one, and I'm not comfortable placing our survival in his hands.  LOL

I think Hammy's going feral.  I went to get him last night, and he was sitting in one corner of his cage, where he's kicked out all of his litter.  He was sitting upright on his haunches, front feet tucked up to his chest, with a look like a prairie dog. 

I opened his door and tried to lure him out, but he got one sniff of my hand and fled through his tube to his other cage.  He adopted the same stance in a corner of that cage; I opened the door over there, he sniffed my hand, then recoiled to the back of the cage.  I finally grabbed him (he didn't bite me), and took him to see Pat.  He climbed around a bit, with the overhead lights on so we could see him, and when Pat gestured (causing a shadow to pass over Hammy), Hammy dropped to his stomach and froze -- like a hawk had flown over.  That was pretty cute.  But he didn't really want to explore after that.

I took him down to see Aspen, and he squeezed upward in my hand so that only his lower hips were in my hand, then froze in that position.  It was really weird.  I put him back in his cage, and he fled for miles in his wheel.  I think he misses his Mommy!

Tuesday at home

Poor Patrick has a cold.  He's coughing, his head hurts, and he feels nauseated.  I begin this post with this description because it's the reason that I delayed my walk with Cathy from 8:30 to 9 am this morning.  And I'm so glad I did, because Sierra Skyped us at 8:30 this morning!  I answered on my Galaxy Player, so she couldn't hear me, but I could hear her.  And we could see each other.

It was funny trying to respond to her, first with rudimentary ASL (which she doesn't know), and then with little signs Pat made for me to hold up.  I think Sierra was as glad to see us as we were to see her.  All of our antics cracked her up!

After our walk to the boat launch (I rousted Aspen out of bed so Dash could come, too), my lungs were pretty thrashed.  I've detoxed from my daily 24-hour allergy meds, and am completely clean now.  But it feels like I've got asthma when climbing hills.

I got online and paid some bills, then the boys and I headed out for lunch at Quizno's.  Mmm-mmm-mmm:  Toasty!  We haven't had Quizno's in ages.

We headed over to the motorcycle shop to pick up the belt for Pat's quad, and Aspen tried out the different quads that they have for sale.  He's really interested in getting a bigger quad.

Speaking of which, he had his phone interview with Home Depot yesterday.  I don't know what the next step is supposed to be, but at least they let him know that it's a 20-29 hr/week stocking job.  They said NOT to go to the store to inquire, but it seems like he should go to the store and make himself known.

He's still on the waitlist for his classes, and no one has contacted him about the entry code for the one class that is not full and for which he has all of the pre-reqs fulfilled.

I am plugging along, updating my online lectures, and am getting ready to start working on my report on my inferring sexual interest study.  Different things keep interfering with my getting to work on that. . .

The weather is beautiful up here right now. . .  upper 80s and sunny.  It's great for our break from school.