How Are You Doing?

[Jeremyf]

How Are You Doing?

[Teresa Edgerton]

Somehow I missed this thread.

I think I've fully recovered from the surgery in August, but the anemia is proving harder to beat. I do feel much better, though, and I'm writing again. It's hard to get back the momentum, but at least I'm moving ahead.

Oh, and I'm doing a lot of embroidery on SCA costumes for myself and family. It's creative, but requires hardly any brain power, which suits me pretty well just now.

The house is very crowded since my son, daughter, son-in-law, and grandchildren moved in, but we're all managing not to get in anyone else's way too much. Unfortunately, I'm wondering how we're going to find space for even one Christmas tree, which is depressing since I usually have three or four. (These are artificial trees, I hasten to add; we don't chop down whole forests during the holidays.) We're thinking of designating part of the backyard as Narnia, and decorating that accordingly, but that's the only clever alternative we've come up with so far.

[Jeremyf]

I'm happy to hear that you have recovered from your surgery and I hope the anemia improves.
Of course I'm also happy to hear that you are writing again. I'm looking forward to the results.
Will your children be staying with you for long?

[Teresa Edgerton]

We'll probably all be living together for the next two years at least -- for various reasons that have to do with our personal finances and the lovely economy we're all living in.

Fortunately, we're all getting along. But we're the kind of people who have lots of projects and the stuff that goes with it (and then, of course, there are the thousands of books), so even though we've rented a storage unit there are still a lot of things piled up here and there, and that makes me feel a bit boxed in and claustrophobic. And I'm not even one of those people who can't stand clutter. I can ignore quite a bit of it actually. But there's too much of it even for me. However, since I'm contributing to it, I can hardly complain about anyone else.

[Jeremyf]

Which gets me back to the advantages of ebooks.

[Michael01]

Hmm, it must be happening a lot these days. Your living situation sounds very similar to my family: I'm living with my parents, a niece, her daughter and her boyfriend. Since my son is in boarding school and I get him nearly every weekend, might as well say he lives here too .

Not one but three Christmas trees? We've always had only one. Wow. And it's cool that you use artificial trees. When I was on my own, that's what I used, and hopefully I'll be on my own again by next Christmas. I try to talk my parents into it (partly because I'm the one who must clean up the pine needles afterward), but my step-father just won't hear of it.

[Teresa Edgerton]

We've managed three trees after all. For the big one (which looks quite real, by the way, and your step-father would probably be pleasantly surprised), because it has to stand on the floor, we had to buy a whole new set of ornaments (cheap, plastic, but not bad looking) that the twins couldn't mangle. We didn't want to spend all of our time yelling "don't touch the tree," and we wanted the boys to be able to enjoy it, rather than making it a source of contention. So far, we've spent a lot of time replacing the ornaments they remove, but nothing has been broken. Another tree is on a counter where they can't reach it, and the white tree (with a lot of delicate things on it) is in my office, where there are baby gates on each of the doors. Too date, they've been happy just to look at it from afar. In fact, Jack gives a little gasp of delight whenever he sees it, as though he'd forgotten it was there.

As for my health, I've finally conquered the anemia! There was a time when I was on a new antidepressant that made me sleepy all the time, but we've changed that and I feel much better.

As a result, now that I've finished my Christmas shopping, I hope to get in several hours of writing a day, and leave everything else for the evening. We'll see how that works out ...

[ctg]

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, Teresa. Thank you very much for helping me earlier this year. You're the best. May Santa bring you loads of gifts.

ctg

*bearhug

[Jeremyf]

I'm glad to hear you're over the anemia. May you have only good health from now on.

[daphling]

Happy New Year! Hope this year brings a swift recovery and good things for you and your loved ones. I just flew back from visiting my parents where at night I snuggled up with The Gnome's Engine and The Queen's Necklace (as a teacher, school breaks are the only times I can read for fun). I love the familiar, but also looking forward to whatever new projects you're working on!

[LauraJUnderwood]

Eekkkkk! Wondered why I hadn't heard anything from you in a while, but with all the insanity in my life...

Glad to hear the anemia is getting better. Will ship you Good Health Vibes to keep up the improvements.

Laura J. Underwood

[Teresa Edgerton]

Well, it was a hard year. I'm hoping this new one will be better. Thank you, everyone, for your good wishes.

And with the holidays over things should be less chaotic. That's the theory anyway.

[Jeremyf]

Is your bronchitis feeling better?

[Teresa Edgerton]

The bronchitis is better, but it's been succeeded by a long list of other problems. I just don't seem to be able to get a breather between the time when something gets better and the time when something new comes up. But I don't want to afflict everyone with a history of my recent afflictions -- what one of my friends calls "an organ recital."

I was at a birthday party yesterday, and by about halfway through all the conversation had become a comparison of ailments, injuries, and surgeries. Finally, our hostess said, "Gosh, why are we all talking about our health?" and one of the guests answered, "Probably because we're all about the same age."

No wonder young people find old people boring.

[Jeremyf]

If I thought it was boring, I wouldn't keep asking.