Macaroni and cheese and peas

Yesterday was rainy and cold and gray. And cold. Did I say cold? So I did what I've been doing most Sundays lately. I read (finished American Fuji, by Sara Backer, which was excellent--a novel about Americans living in Japan, which turned out to be something of a mystery, and also kind of a comedy, which surprised me, and I thoroughly enjoyed it), knitted (finished the first Mexiko sock and cast on for the second one), and messed around on the computer.

At around 4:00 I braved the elements and went out for Diet Coke and bread and went by Sweet Tomatoes for a salad for my dinner. I'm not sure what was going on there, and 4:30 or whenever it was should have been a fairly light time, or I would have expected it to be, but there were probably forty or fifty people in line, most of them together, part of some kind of group. They were all dressed up, but the men had their ties off and collars pulled apart, so it was like whatever event they'd been attending was over . . . maybe a wedding party or something? I have no idea. But I stuck it out and got my little salad to go, and took it home and ate.

At about 7:30 or so, I started feeling kind of sick, just sort of vaguely nauseated. I was on the computer, reading Socknitters newsgroup messages, and I figured that it must be eyestrain. I think I probably need to get my eyes checked again, I think they're getting worse. And the glasses I wear at home are my old ones. I keep the newer ones in my purse and use them at work.

It was too early to go to bed, and I everything I could think of to do--read, knit, write--needed my eyes, and glasses, and it just made me feel kind of sick. So I thought I'd see if I could watch television without making it worse. I settled down on the couch with the remote, and Dinah came in and laid on top of me, and we watched television--the last half of "Space Cowboys," then the last few scenes of "Rainman," then part of the war news, then something about dinosaurs on The Discovery Channel.

At 10:00, Bob called, and since I had to get up to answer the phone, dislodging Dinah, I went around shutting off lights and picking things up, then made my way up to bed.

He was originally going to come home yesterday, but decided to stay another night and drive home this morning; he called this morning, though, and there was a house fire in the area, and the only road out was blocked by emergency vehicles (as Dave said when I told him this morning, well, how are you going to verify that?), so hopefully he'll start out sometime early this afternoon and get home by the time I'm home.

I've missed him. I always kind of look forward to a few days by myself, but once he's gone, I always miss him. I was kind of an emotional wreck yesterday, but I think part of it was the rainy weather. Part of it was probably loneliness, too. Then I called my mother in the evening, and my dad is having some tests done this week--nothing is wrong, it's just preventative, routine stuff, but it always reminds me of their age and how fragile it all it . . .

Which leads right up to what happened this morning.

I was still kind of a wreck this morning (although I wore my new blue socks to work, which was cool, and got to show them off to everyone, and they were all suitably impressed, or at least they pretended to be, which is the same thing), and I read Misty's journal entry from last night, which made me cry, and I was thinking about my folks, and about how I need to get out and see them soon, and it was still gray and rainy and cold . . . And I woke up with a headache that still, at 12:30, hasn't gone away, despite the application of a Diet Coke, a cup of chai, and four generic ibuprofen tablets.

I got to work and went into my office, and Cello and Gard were over in Dave's office next door to mine having some kind of conversation, and they heard me come in, and Cello said, "Willa?" and I said, "Yeah?" and he said, "Your mom died."

My heart stopped, and there was this kind of shocked silence (realistically, no one would announce something like that in that way, and in the seconds that followed I thought either that I had misunderstood or that it was a joke of some kind), and then he rushed over and said, "CALLED. She CALLED. Your mom called. I'm so sorry, we were talking about the war, and I misspoke." It was one of those kinds of things that, after my morning, almost caused me to start crying, but I didn't. He hugged me, and apologized again, and I told him it was okay. And it was, of course, and on a different morning would have been even more amusing. Or, well, you know, amusing at all.

There's a billboard that I pass on my way to work every morning. Well, there are lots of billboards; I always look for the lottery one on Monday and Thursday mornings to see if anyone won, but that's not the one I'm talking about now. No, the one I pass every morning and try to remember to write about is one put up by a jeweler. I couldn't tell you which jeweler; Helzberg's, maybe?

Anyway, it shows an enormous pair of diamond stud earrings with the caption "Relationship Superglue." And it annoys me every morning. It's like: "Marriage in trouble? Buy her jewelry! That will fix everything!" I mean, you know, it's no big deal, but it's just so stupid, so condescending. Sort of like the diet banners I see every day on Yahoo Mail: "Love yourself more by May 7" (Because, you know, you can't love yourself if you don't weigh 98 pounds.) "Get sexy by May 7" (Same deal--you can't be sexy if you weigh a few pounds over emaciated.) I'm just glad they've stopped using that awful, "Love your tummy by whenever" one, with the woman making a heart shape with her fingers around her bellybutton.

I did pretty good food-wise this weekend, I think, even though Bob wasn't there to cook for me. Thursday night I got a big salad, and Friday night I cooked frozen ravioli. On Saturday night I made macaroni and cheese from scratch and had it with peas, and last night was salad again, with asiago focaccia from the bakery at the grocery store.

Lunch today was bean soup and a chicken sandwich made from leftover chicken from a Boston Market lunch on Saturday (which was mashed potatoes and gravy and creamed spinach and a chicken breast, which I ate about two bites of), and tomorrow's lunch will be leftover macaroni and cheese (and peas), which I also had for lunch yesterday.