day 50

Today is the 1st day of the 7th week, the 19th day of the 2nd month, the 50th day of 2023, and:

• Best Friends Day - whoever does the holiday lists must be a SpongeBob SquarePants fan
• Daytona 500
• International Tug-of-War Day - why isn't it in the Olympics if it is an international sport?
• Iwo Jima Day
• National Arabian Horse Day
• National Chocolate Mint Day
• National Lash Day - my first thought was that the BDSM community would love this day, but it really has to do with eyelashes.  It's one of those days created for the sole purpose of merchandising. 
• National Vet Girls Rise Day
• Prevent Plagiarism Day
• Shrovetide - the week of Ash Wednesday
• Skate Shop Day

When I went to put the title on today's post, I realized I had two 'day 48's and no 'day 49'.  I corrected yesterday's title and reposted it.  Then, I realized that not only had I lost count of the number of days, when I checked, I realized that I had been miscounting the weeks too!  For the record, when I type that out each day, I usually start verifying the number of the day and week after January, and got a little overconfident this year but we are back on track now.  

February is always a bit of a muddle for me, due to the amount of time I spend in my job with the end of the previous year throughout the first two months of a new year.  I am still muddling through answering questions about the reconciliations and reports for 12.31.2022 for auditors, trying to help credit unions' accounting departments with questions for their call report and their auditors, plus dealing with our loan review of the portfolio for the year, and NCUA is in for two of the 23 credit unions we service.  The EOM for 01.31.2023 kinda gets done in a rush, and we go back to 2022 rather quickly it seems even while processing 02.2023 transactions

Yesterday just wasn't a very good day for clearheaded cognitive processing - I really hate it when I lose an entire day of my weekend, even a long weekend, to just recuperating from the work week and new meds.

Quote of the day:
"Your mind is like a mirror, reflecting everything without discrimination. If you have wisdom, you can control the kind of reflection that you allow into the mirror of your mind. If you totally ignore what is happening in your mind, it will reflect whatever garbage it encounters." 
~Lama Thubten Yeshe, “Your Mind Is Your Religion”

This morning Alexa informed me it was 'National Chocolate Mint Day' and that mint-microchip, which she then corrected to mint chocolate chip, was her favorite ice cream.  I have an entire set of conversations I have fallen into the habit of having with the Amazon Echo in the morning, starting out with the morning routine with the weather for the day.  Then, as I am getting myself together, I will say "good morning" and get some tidbit about the day.  After that, I ask for the quote of the day, the joke of the day, and for whatever question she answers every day in a given month.  January, if you said "happy new year," and February, if you ask "who inspires you," you get brief biographies of folks you may or may not have ever heard of.  

I find the echo quite a handy little gadget, and have one in every room of the apartment.  I use it in different ways:  the one in the bedroom is primarily for my alarms, and helping me sleep by reading audio books or playing white noise.   The Echo Dot [an older, flatter, smaller version than the ones sold now] hanging on the bathroom wall answers questions, gives me the weather, reads books or plays music if I am soaking in the tub.  The Echo Show in the living room is a clock, and plays ambient music while I am working.  The Echo in the computer room/ library answers questions and is tied to the Echo Clock hanging in the kitchen so I can set timers and see how much time is left. 

In 2004, when Frank died, I started learning to live alone at the age of 54.  At first I found it difficult.  Moving in 2007 made a huge difference, and in 2009, I settled into this apartment.  It took a couple of years for me to settle in, but lately I have come to appreciate just how much I enjoy having things set up solely for my convenience.  

And yes, all this meandering somehow connects in my mind to the quote above as I think my home mirrors back to me the contentment I feel with my own space, as tenuous as that connection may seem to those not used to following the tortured interweaving of my thoughts