Day 93 & 94: Fighting Back

 

I haven't returned to the treadmill yet. I'm not happy about that but I also want to be sure I am ready physically and emotionally. It's 10:40 am as I start to write this and my goal for today is to complete the checklist. That means at least one workout. This is NOT a big ask. I feel better and my stool remains normal. I've stopped sitting on the yoga cushion and I'm making an effort to sit more upright on the couch. I physically feel many times better but I'm still struggling emotionally, because too many things remain up in the air. I'd like to abandon looking for a job, but if I want to collect unemployment I'm going to have to show that I am trying. I keep telling myself I will be fine financially, but I still have a lot of anxiety about that. The anxiety is misplaced because I know I can collect social security now. I can collect my pension now. I can start drawing a small amount from my IRA as well, if necessary. Yes, I have to pay for my own healthcare until I'm 65, but that is less than 3 years away and I know I can survive until then. My problem is the uncertainty right now. I know I will feel better once all is settled and I've either found a job or started receiving a stable monthly income.

Despite not getting to sleep until very late I managed to get myself out of bed around 9. I only had 4 stray cats to feed today. It's another beautiful sunny day ! Rain is in the forecast for late tomorrow and Thursday through Saturday. Some parts of the country are experiencing drought conditions, so I can't complain about that. I had put the trash out last night and got the recyclables out this morning. My next project is breaking down the tv boxes on the porch so that I can put those out next week. Well, instead of putting that off to another day/week, I pushed my fat ass off the couch and did it today ! By 11:15 am it was done ! All the styrofoam is broken up and bagged for next week's trash and all the cardboard is out with today's trash. I also have broken glass to dispose of and I'm going to try and do that today as well ! I also have two tv's to dispose of. I can probably sneak the smaller one into the regular trash another day, but not the 65" one. I might drag that one upstairs and put it in the storage area above my office.

It's just before 1 pm and the garbage men have come. I managed to get all the cardboard out to the trash and I broke up all the broken glass and boxed that up for next week. I also swept the porch floor to get rid of all the debris from the styrofoam and the mums, that were also bagged up for the trash. The porch looks so much nicer now ! I didn't move the big tv as it's pretty heavy and I didn't want to take a chance on hurting my back again. For now it's against the back wall of the porch and out of the way. It took me less than an hour to take care of everything and I feel so good about getting something done ! For today I will call this "exercise" and I've set a goal to restart the treadmill on Thursday. It's hard to describe just how good I felt after getting the trash out and the porch cleaned up. I was giddy ! So happy. So excited ! By 1:30 pm our sunny day had turned gloomy, so I'm glad I was able to enjoy the sun and relative warmth of the porch this morning ! I'm also so glad I took care of the broken windows out there. Hopefully it'll be a bit less drafty this winter. It definitely looks better !

In political news, Trump is going full steam ahead with preparing to take office and the opposition is continuing to melt down and trying to tear down anything and everything he is doing. As has been the case for the past 8 years, it's impossible to know what is truth and what is fake so I don't listen to anything other than what I hear on Fox News and even then, I don't believe everything I hear. I am taking a wait and see position. Change is hard and it won't happen overnight. I'm looking forward to seeing our borders strengthened and many of the illegals being deported. I'm also looking forward to seeing the ax swing on a lot of unnecessary agencies and personnel in the Federal government. The Feds were never meant to have so much control over the states and the states should be happy to hear they will be given more autonomy. They're not happy though, and I know that's because they suck so much money out of the Federal government for nonsense. Washington DC itself is the most fearful, because they've been living off the taxpayers for way too many years. I spent some time watching Fox video's last night only because I enjoy many of the presenters (Meghan Kelly, Jesse Watters and Greg Gutfeld) and their content. 

I checked in on my finances today to ensure the car payment posted and to ensure there was money in the account to cover the gas I bought yesterday. There was enough, but I added an extra $100 and made a note to always keep an extra $100 in the account for gas expenses. I also checked on my insurance coverage to ensure the extra $11.24 for EAP benefits was removed. That is nothing I need or want and I was certainly not going to pay for it. So my medical insurance is $599 per month now. This includes $1 per month for "Care Plus" coverage. I'm not sure I really need this, but for $1 it makes sense to just keep it. In January I'll start paying just over $30 a month for dental insurance. I'm looking forward to going back to Aspen Dental and getting my outstanding issues taken care of. It'll probably cost me a couple thousand dollars, but my plan is to use my HSA and move some money from my IRA to the HSA, to ensure all medical and dental expenses are paid for with pre-tax money. In 2025 I can contribute up to $5,300 to the HSA,  which is perfect ! Once you're enrolled in Medicare you can't contribute to an HSA, so I need to make the most of it over the next 3 years.

I mentioned I bought gas yesterday. It was slightly lower in price at $2.82 per gallon. I went out to get gas and buy groceries. I ended up spending $300 on groceries, which was unexpected ! However, that's because I bought 62 pounds of dry cat food, a 40 count box of canned food for the strays and two 30 count boxes of canned food for Minnie. Pet food is ridiculously expensive ! I bought so much dry food because I went to Walmart in Cicero first and they only had the 16 pound bags. They had none of the canned food I needed, so I stopped at Walmart in Central Square. They had the 30 pound bags and they had all the canned food I needed. I like to stock up for winter, so it was fine. I also bought some of the things I need to make stuffing, like sausage, chicken broth and poultry seasoning. I also splurged on a big bag of holiday Hershey Kisses. That was like $15. I also bought a couple beef pot pies, a box of chicken egg rolls and some nuts. I didn't need a lot of the things I bought, but I'm not going to deny myself everything because I "worry" about money. I can afford to splurge a little every now and then. I also bought some General Tso's chicken tenders and some potato wedges at the hot food counter. I haven't bought any of that stuff in a long time and honestly, I was starving ! I had half of each for dinner last night and I'll have the other half tonight. I probably could have stuffed it all down last night, but I didn't ! I also bought a cheese danish. That was my evening snack last night and my breakfast this morning. Other items were the usual whipped cream and yogurt. The next couple of months are going to involve spending a bit more money due to Christmas, heating bills, property taxes and insurance expenses, but it will level out by March. I'll have a tax refund and small residual bonus to help offset some of that, so I'm not worried. I may also start collecting unemployment. I did the math on my spending a while back to determine how long I could live on my savings and I took all of these things into consideration. I still feel I can survive on my savings alone for at least a year. I just can't be foolish with my money. Barb & Rich are talking about a trip next year involving train travel and hotels and I don't think I'm going to go. I just can't leave Minnie to eat dry food for several days and I also don't want to hand her over to Alyssa & Erin. They didn't care for the cats the way I asked, though I'm grateful I was able to take 2 trips to Disney thanks to them. Minnie is 15 now and she clearly had a rough time when I left her alone this past summer. She was all backed up and couldn't poop. I know that was uncomfortable and I was very worried about her. I read recently that cats get most of their hydration from wet food ! So I'll limit myself to day trips for as long as she is with me. She does eat dry food, but she also gets canned food 3-4 times a day.

In ironic news, I read yesterday about a carrot recall that involves organic carrots purchased at Wegman's ! I always buy my carrots at Wegman's and I recall buying some organic ones at least once. I'm really thinking the bloody diarrhea I had in April was e-coli related from fresh produce and now I'm wondering if the blood in my stool recently had anything to do with carrots. I lean more towards the effects of ibuprofen, but who knows ! Things have returned to normal, though I still get some gas buildup. That doesn't concern me too much. I don't think anybody ever died from not farting !

Below is what I achieved today. I am focusing on what I do each day, and not looking back to what I did or didn't do any other day. I hope that one day soon I won't need a checklist to ensure I do all of these everyday tasks !

Make the bed - x

feed cats - x

have breakfast - x

get dressed - x

exercise - 

clean litter boxes - 

have morning snack - 

have lunch - x

have afternoon snack - 

have dinner - 

have evening snack - 

shower - 

skincare - 

brush teeth -