Out from under

Wow. I hadn't realized it has been two weeks without a post. Not that you have missed me, but while I've thought about posting several times, I didn't quite make it to the keyboard.

Bear with me - it's not quite 4 a.m. and I've been up for half an hour. Sleep cycles lately have been challenging, I think thanks to a med I started taking three weeks ago. Usually, I go to bed just before night, get up once for a pit stop somewhere between 1:3 - 2:30, then fall right back asleep until just before the alarm goes off.

Lately, though, bedtime has crept closer to eight. When it does, I tend to get up twice, once just before midnight, and again somewhere after three. Since I get up at four, that last awakening can be a bit dicey. Today, for instance, it just didn't make sense to go back to bed.

The earlier bedtime, I'm fairly sure, is the result of the med counteracting some of the effects of my thyroid med, specifically, the one that keeps me from being an exhausted slug. Eh, we'll do a blood test to find out for sure; in the meantime, I'll be a bit of a zombie.

Last night I met with the second of three landscapers about the front flower bed edging. This is the same firm that does the landscaping and snow removal for our association. He actually turned the existing edging over to see what was underneath, made himself a drawing, asked a bunch of questions and measured the bed. The first company, though they sounded eager for my business when I called (and I explained very clearly it was a very small project) sent out a salesman who was rather...uninterested.

The guy last night also gave me an approximate quote - considerably lower than the first company.

One more estimate to get, but things are looking good for this guy. If I make a decision for them by the end of the week, they can get to it within the next three weeks or so. Yay!

All the board-approved tax returns have been filed for last fiscal year, which means I'm at the start of the slowest part of my work year. For the next couple of weeks, at least, I can cut back to regular hours. At the beginning of June, however, I'll go back to putting in an extra hour each day, which, with our "summer hours" policy, will give me Friday afternoons off. I've done the "work four ten hour days, take one full day per week off" thing in the past, but ten hours during the slow part of my year simply doesn't pass as quickly as it does when I'm busy.

Besides, it's kind of fun when your half day ends at 10:15 in the morning - it's almost like having a full day off.

Other than the landscape project, I'll make a short list of things to do. Some fun, some home projects. I still haven't had the Fit out on the highway for a nice, long drive. Aimless driving isn't my thing, but I could take a trip out to the Elegant Farmer. Or go to the quilt shop just outside of Madison to shop for a bit.

Then again, I may just sit on the patio and read. The Readathon lit a fire under me, and I've finished at least five books in the three and a half weeks since the event. None of them from the huge pile of nonfiction looming on my kindle. Most of them were the books recommended by Facebook friends as fodder for the Readathon; I'll put up my thoughts on them a bit later.

I'm rambling, and it's time to watch the news for a bit before clearing the sleep sand out of my eyes to get on with the day. I'm foreseeing an early bedtime...