Very little sleep last night, and miserable this morning because of it. I have a lunch meeting at 11:30 with our capital campaign committee - bank CEOs, investment firm bigwigs, a sports team owner - well, you get the idea. I’m not running the meeting (thank Gawd) but should look brisk & efficient and like that as opposed to walking in with bags beneath my eyes that I could pack a week’s worth of luggage in. I’ve been sleeping in *our* bedroom again over the past week or two rather than in the guest (my) bedroom because DH has been feeling neglected and lonely. Up until last night, he had his snoring pretty much under control - not that it stopped, but it was relatively low-key and not too bad as background white noise. I was sleeping okay. Then, LAST NIGHT - when I had to be up at 5:30 this morning - he started trumpeting again, and I came close to smothering him with my pillow, I swear! This was right around midnight, and I went into the other bedroom, but could even hear him from there! Not as loudly, obviously, but enough to be annoying, nonetheless. I was soooooooooo incensed that it took every ounce of will power I had not to wake him up and give him h*ll !!!!! Poor guy certainly doesn’t MEAN to, but my gawd. It’s terrible. So, the last time I remember looking at the clock next to my bed, it was 1:45 in the morning and I had counted everything I could think of to count from sheep to shoes and bottles of beer on the wall and nothing was making me even remotely ready to drop off to sleep. I guess I must’ve, finally, but feel this morning like crawling into a hole somewhere and sleeping for about twelve hours straight. My stomach is queasy and my bones are achey - all of which occur when I am overtired. Hardly the shape I want to be in for this danged meeting! I did the best I could with make-up, only I wear very little to begin with, and plastering on more only emphasizes the hills and valleys of the “more mature face”…LOL…so that’s not an option. What I wouldn’t do right about now for a tube of Preparation H!!!! Omigawd. You never used that to tighten up the skin around your eyes? It’s an old actor’s trick. One of my college roommate’s fathers was a Broadway producer and she used to hang with a lot of the actors and such when she visited him and his third or fourth (I disremember which, exactly) wife on school vacay. They all swore by Preparation H back then, and I guess it was about the best thing out there in the late sixties, early seventies. Of course now they have fifty different eye creams that probably work as well if not better, but they probably cost way more, as well. Doesn’t matter, of course, because I have neither Preparation H nor the expensive temporary tightening eye cream, and my bags will stay in place until I get some decent rest which will hopefully be tonight, when I shall put myself to bed in the *other* bedroom right from the start. I know. Whine, whine, kvetch, kvetch. I probably shouldn’t have bothered posting this morning, but I haven’t for a while, and wanted to hop in and do at least a little bit of venting - LOL. I’ve always been a great one for writing things down. I don’t know, really, why I haven’t been more active in the blogging community on the web in general. I guess it’s my inability to produce when it’s expected of me. (Except at work, but that’s because my production is tied into a pay check. If it weren’t, I’d fall into a slump on the work front, no doubt, as well). Other than at work, when something is EXPECTED of me, I just really have a hard time following through for some demented reason. And if someone TELLS me to do something (ex-h) fahgeddaboutit!!!! I guess I’m just an old anti-authoritarian hippie, and you can’t teach an old dog new trix.

I also had a conversation on Saturday with DH about money. He’s presently collecting unemployment, but that will run out mid-July if he hasn’t found full-time work somewhere by then. It’s really not in his best interests right now to take on any contract work because he would then have to pay for his own health insurance, which could cost $700-800 a month Plus. But in the meantime, we’re doing just fine financially. Our bills are paid with a pretty decent reserve in the bank, and if worse came to worse, DH could retire in August when he turns 62, collect his social security, his (small) pension from the hospital, and do a little part-time consulting work. So, I’m not worrying over it at all, but he is, and we had to talk it through on Saturday when we sat down to do our weekly bill-paying and fiscal review. He tends to worry and get depressed, and I have to point out the obvious - that our expenses are now about half what they were before, and we are doing fine. He’s been doing quite a lot around the house of course, but he really needs to get out and have some interactions with other people during the day. I told him to look into doing some volunteer work. I’m sure there are any number of non-profit neighborhood centers and such out there who would be thrilled to have software to meet their needs designed free of charge. Or, even computer classes. Something. Anything. He needs some outlets for his energy and he needs more people to converse with than just me and occasionally the kids when they come by or we go to them.

Sunny today but cold. No snow. No snow is good. Cold isn’t so great, but I suppose we can handle it for a little while longer.

I have been eating quite conscientiously but haven’t weighed myself. Will do that in another week or so, I think. I’m still awaiting daffodils in the backyard here. I know they’re out there because I saw them last year.

Omigawd, I am sooooooo tired! Need to put my head on my desk and close my eyes for a few…

 TTFN,

Z