On assertiveness and criticism

Brian and I traveled to Alabama this weekend for the American Tomiki Aikido Association Fall 2015 seminar. For two days we got to play with unfamiliar partners, learn alternate approaches to the techniques we study at Full Circle Aikido and in general be immersed in the martial art.

In the week or so leading up to the seminar I had been contemplating starting to document my training journey (four years in is better late than never, right?). I wanted to talk about what I was currently focusing on, what I'm trying to do better, what I'd like to learn in the future, etc. etc., but one of the things on my mind from the seminar now is more personal.

I confided in Brian that there were a couple people I'd wanted to work with at the seminar but did not get to. One I decided I'd rather wait until next time, the other I'd started to get the feeling just didn't like me much, so I defaulted to staying away. Brian told me what I already knew and had been trying to do: just grab the people I want to work with.

I've never been an aggressive person in any sense and the idea of just walking up to someone and saying "Let's work on this" is only slightly less terrifying to me now than it was to me ten years ago. Approaching people does not come easily to me. I don't have any problem working with someone unfamiliar or practicing unfamiliar techniques with people, I just don't like to be the one to instigate things. I want someone else to approach me or, even better, to be assigned a training partner.

From group projects in school to my freaking adult life the prospect of approaching someone makes me intensely uncomfortable. I feel like I need the security of someone else choosing me to stifle that fear of being an undesired group member, to say "hey, you're not completely repulsive and I wouldn't mind being in close proximity with you for a while."

Isn't that pathetic?

Stemming from these thoughts is the admittance that I also do not take criticism well. The slightest non-glowing comment is enough to make me want to admit defeat and walk away from any endeavor. Honestly, it was one of my biggest problems in newswriting too, but not one I talk about.

If I had to guess why, it would probably be that I did not receive a lot of criticism as a child. I was always an A student. The oldest child. Generally an independent worker. There was little need for my teachers or parents to tell me what I was doing wrong, so it happened so rarely I never grew any kind of endurance for it.

These have been two of my most prominent flaws -- in my view -- lately. Maybe it's why I've been itching to get back into my quiet solo hobbies, the kinds of things I can do and show no one and never have to deal with anyone else's input on the final product. Maybe I'm just getting frustrated with actually wanting something and being in my own way of getting it. Or maybe I just need some damn sleep so I can go back to being the moderately-adjusted adult I've grown into being.

Sometimes things get too quiet

Looks like it had been too long since something shook up life for Audrey and Brian, so fate decided we needed two extra dogs, a parrot and eventually another person in the house.

Sunday we heard that Brian's friend/ex-stepmother had fallen from a tree and broken her back. While checking on her in the hospital, she was concerned about her animals (four dogs hers, three foster dogs and a parrot). Collaborating with her rescue friends, we got everyone into temporary homes. Brian and I took the parrot, one boxer and one jack russell terrier, the dogs that our dog would not have a problem with.

I was able to adjust okay the first couple days to keeping three mouths and a beak fed -- though that last one did require a battle of wills -- but after three days I realized I needed to make sure I took care of myself too. I took a night to not drive to Moody or Killeen and just relax and I felt a lot better this morning.

Oddly, relaxing is all they've done this morning too.

My eventual-mother-in-law (by-default) had surgery a couple days ago and is doing well and will be coming to live with us when she is discharged. Our house is closer to the hospital and will not leave her living alone while trying to recover, so it makes sense to have her here. I'm not antsy about it; she's awesome and I'd love to help her out, even if she would rather do it on her own. I just don't know what all I will be expected to do. Transport to therapy? Cook every night? Tie her to the couch to make sure she doesn't hurt herself trying to do too much? All are possibilities.

But other than that excitement, things are still okay here. The bell peppers are growing a total of two peppers, and I made a last-ditch effort at radishes in a pot, which look to be doing well. Most everything else has died though. Sometimes I wonder why I put in so much effort in the spring and early summer when I get almost no results, then I remember how much I enjoy the process and keep on daydreaming about next year.

I've also been thinking a bit about future career paths and am wondering how to start teaching myself graphic design. What I've researched makes me think I can do it if I can get past the technology challenge. The best idea seems to be trying it out as a hobby first, then attempting some freelance if I like it enough. If I don't, well, at least I've learned something new.

But I need to really get off and try to get some tasks accomplished today. I want to visit the hospital, get the transition lenses for Brian and go to the grocery store. Though staying here surrounded by sleeping dogs, Pandora and Pinterest also sounds like a good plan...

A few diabetic thoughts

Today is Friday, but it's the Sunday of my mid-week weekend. Tomorrow I'm back to work for Saturday and Sunday, so I'm trying to enjoy this day off with nothing to do. I did the grocery shopping and even made a big dinner yesterday, so there are leftovers in the fridge to get me through quite a few lunches and don't-feel-like-making-a-mess dinners.

I was making a cup of the new French Vanilla coffee I got yesterday and somehow started contemplating my current frustrations with my diabetes. Most of the people reading this blog are aware that I am Type 1 diabetic and I have been since I was 8 years old. Lately (meaning for the last couple of years, but this year in particular) I've been working to try and get back into checking my blood sugar regularly. I'm getting a lot better, especially using this phone app, Diabetes+, that lets me log everything from my glucose and insulin to activity and carb intake.

When I first started using it, I did log EVERYTHING.

It's becoming more of a habit for me, which is good, even though it's still only sporadic that I actually get to test four times a day like I should -- generally I only make it to two or three times.

But the more awareness I have of what my blood sugar is actually doing, the more frustrated I get about it, particularly the morning highs that have apparently been getting me for a lot longer than I've been aware.

Morning is usually the time I don't forget to test. It runs high at that time, so there are a lot of purple/high readings. It almost makes me start to hate purple. Almost.

For example, last night I went to bed with my glucose at 117, which is right in line with the 80-120 goal. All I did was take my Lantus (the long-acting insulin) and go to sleep. When I woke up today, my blood sugar was 177. Up sixty points after just sleeping?

It's not an isolated thing. The night before my glucose rose 38 points, and the night before it shot up by 80.

It's why most of the line graphs the app generates look like the world's worst roller coaster.

I am aware of the "dawn phenomena," where the liver will dump glucose into the blood during the night. Theories on why vary, but the one I remember is the body thinking that the blood sugar is dropping, so the liver dumps its store into the blood to bring it up. Regardless of why, it's a bitch to control.

Aside of rises in blood glucose beyond my own control, I'm also learning that I probably have less of an idea of how many carbs are in what I eat than I thought I did. This has led me to just take insulin for what I think is in something, plus a couple extra units depending on what that food did to me in the past. Some horrible offenders are pizza and coffee. The fat in pizza causes a delay in the processing of the carbs in it, resulting in a delayed spike in blood sugar. I don't know what it is about coffee, but even when I drink it with just half and half and Splenda, I have to correct for 25-30 carbs worth, even though I probably only ingested less than 10. Members of some of the diabetic Facebook groups I'm in have reported similar spikes, even when drinking coffee black, so my theory is that it's something to do with the caffeine content.

Yet I just keep coming back...

In general though, getting back to monitoring myself has been frustrating but will be worth it. I feel more in control when I KNOW what my glucose is doing, not when I just make a vague guess. It's costing some time and definitely some money to keep all the supplies in stock, but all necessary evil.

I have to commend my doctor, also. She gave me the kick in the rear that got me to actually try taking care of myself again. She hasn't ever really lectured or belittled me, either, but she works with me to try and figure out carb ratios and correction scales that will actually help keep things in check. Honestly, I'd forgotten about her suggestion to use a 1:8 ratio in the mornings and 1:10 the rest of the day until maybe a couple of weeks ago, and it really brought my lunchtime readings back down.

Yes, the number of readings per day is still under-par, but there's much fewer purple/high readings in the last couple of days, which makes me happy.

In case anyone thought diabetes was an easy thing to deal with, hopefully this will make you ask some questions and be interested to learn more about what's involved with controlling this disease. I'm free to take a crack at any questions you may have. :-)

Projects and thoughts of reinvention

Hello random readers. A bit of non-plant oriented thoughts to share today.

I realized how "meh" I have been feeling with life a couple weeks ago. An old friend will ask me how things are going and I don't have much more to say than "fine." It's not that things are going badly - things are much better now compared to last year - but I don't feel excited about anything. There's no passion or force guiding my thoughts or actions.

Reflecting on this, I tried to think of times when I was excited. Usually, they happened when I had some kind of short-term goal or project in mind. A book series I was determined to finish; an item I wanted to sew; a garden to plan; a drawing to complete; a push-up goal to reach. Any time I had one of these, there was something to think about during long work hours. The creative gears turned and I brainstormed ideas for variations and improvements to projects waiting on my return.

Lately the only way I've been able to get this kind of release is by picking and choosing recipes to try, but by the time I get home other tasks would take precedence or I'd simply be too tired to take action.

I'm tired of just floating through the day, waiting to go home so I can watch reruns of TV shows (because everything is in its summer sabbatical) or go to sleep. Besides being tired, I'm lacking a initiative to actually start a project. The last thing I tried to sew, a pajama pant project, I didn't get past the first leg. I have one book left in a trilogy I started last year, but finishing another series butted in to that plan, and I haven't been able to drag myself back to it (I did re-start the Harry Potter series though, go figure). The garden is at that watch-and-wait point, so there's not a lot of active work required unless I wanted to buy more plants, which is the last thing I need to do at the moment.

As a branch-off to this vein, I was thinking about a possible project: reinvention. Sort of, anyway. For a long time I have admired "nice" clothing and people who always look put-together. Despite this, I have always found myself defaulting to T-shirts and jeans, not bothering much with my hair and almost never wearing makeup.

Almost all the clothing tutorial pins I've collected are for skirts, though I almost never go out in skirts unless it's a job interview or a formal occasion. Like a lot of women around my age, I have an infatuation with 40s and 50s era women's fashions.Thrift store dresses are one of the easier items to repurpose, but I don't have a lot of reason to wear them now that almost everyone I know has graduated and there aren't any weddings scheduled to happen in the near future.

It's unfortunate that I feel I need a reason to look nice, but with a job that requires scrubs, a hobby that requires a gi and no energy afterward to do much more than sit or sleep, I just can't justify dressing in more than pajamas or a glorified version of them most of the time.

There's not really a point to this rambling. I just feel better writing it out for future reflection.

Audrey documents her newfound ruthlessness... sorta...

All right. It's been a while since we checked in on the plants (because that's really the only reason for you to check this blog, I'm sure).
When I last updated, it was to share that I had to start over as almost all of my precious plants had been eaten by furry or slimy demons. It was then that I lost my ability to really see rabbits and slugs as "just other creatures trying to survive." I'm striking back now.

I posted on Facebook about killing a particularly large slug with salt on the porch. It seemed to delight everyone who read it (several friends at aikido commented on it during class, calling me "killer" for a short while). Now I can't pour a salt ring around my plants, but I'd been saving egg shells for a few months since reading about them being good for putting calcium into soil and at the same time repelling slugs and snails. I smashed them in a big old ziploc and sprinkled it around my bell pepper sprouts, which I repotted last weekend.

No more nasty slug trails around MY peppers.

One of my four remaining plants had begun to wilt before the transplant and has not perked up since, so I'm prepared for it to be a loss.  But the other three are leafy and strong and I have high hopes for their future. I feel particularly protective over these plants because they are the survivors. I raised them from seeds and have been very attentive to them. Acer tried to snack on the one that is currently wilting away, and he got a firm talking-to and finger wag for his actions.

I've also mixed up a jug of rabbit repellent made from water, red pepper flakes, garlic and dish soap. The recipe suggested letting it sit in the sun for a couple days to let the flavors and smells saturate in the mix. When I opened the jug to pour it into a spray bottle, I caught a whiff of just how rank it was. I've been spraying it on bean vines, pumpkin sprouts and a sweet potato sprout that poked itself up but apparently attracts bunnies.

 This plant has grown a fair amount since this photo was taken. There are actually the beginnings of buds on it now.

Sweet Group Shot! Meet the new sweet banana pepper plant and the regrown sweet potato sprout.

I'm also trying a second round of radish seeds, but may have lost them as well. I did not get the spray on them before something ate about 75 percent of them. But I still have lots of seeds left and the warm season isn't going anywhere soon.

After I lost a lot of my plants last month, I decided to let plants grow larger before putting them in the yard. My two pumpkin vines are weathering being in the ground much better since I let them bulk up before moving them. I did purchase a six-pack of tomato sprouts for my Topsy Turvy stand and they are looking very happy in their spot in the middle of the yard - the best place for them to get the sun they need. I had to move it from a spot next to the fence when I caught a squirrel eyeballing it from the fence post.

I'm getting excited about the garden again, even though it's spread throughout the yard and kind of at a point now where all I have to do is make sure nothing is getting nibbled on and everyone stays watered. I don't foresee any more transplants, so it's really just waiting on the blossoms to appear. Here's to rank rabbit repellant and sharp shards of slug deterring eggshells all doing their jobs.

Quick and dirty check-in

Hi there. I know nobody is probably checking this blog for updates, but I realize I haven't posted in almost a month and wanted to do so. I don't have a lot of time, so this will be picture-free.

My Facebook friends are aware that not long after I put a slew of seeds and sprouts in my garden, they were devoured by fiends unknown. Most likely rabbits, but I'm suspecting certain bugs and squishy things outside also played a small part. "Devastating" is only slightly too strong a word. I cried a little. All that work, gone in just a few days. With it being so late in the season, I'd almost resigned myself to buying some plants at Home Depot to replace them, but decided to give the pumpkin seeds another shot. My rationale now is to get the sprouts to be big enough that a few nibbled leaves won't destroy everything. There are two of them pushing up on the porch now.

I haven't replanted the radishes and a few spinach sprouts seem to have survived. The shallots haven't been touched and -- the most relieving point for me -- I hadn't put the bell peppers in the ground yet. I still have four of them, currently sitting on the surface of the dirt in a large houseplant's pot that I left outside for some reason. It's on the porch and kind of high off the ground, so the only thing knocking them over is the strong wind from all the freaking rain we've been getting.

Seriously, more than two weeks almost straight of rain we've had. When did I move to the Pacific Northwest?

Anyway, the lack of sunlight also killed the sunflower sprout from the seed kit my mom gave me for Christmas. The zinnias, likewise, didn't survive the transplanting. Either I watered them too much in their bags or they were too shocked from the move to the pot. I just don't have luck with gifted plants it seems.

However, I was gifted some other seeds after furry demons ate my garden. A good friend in Dallas saw my post and sent me a whole set of Miracle-Gro seed pods. Tomatoes, peppers, lettuces, herbs, watermelons, a really nice assortment. It still feels too late in the year to be messing with seeds, but I have put one each of spinach, basil and green bean pods into some dirt to see how they do. The beans already have a sprout, and I put them in the dirt on Saturday(?). I will probably hold on to the rest until next year, when I can get them started ahead of time. Yay for pre-preparedness! (In case I didn't say it enough, Thank You, Korri!)

So, I've lowered the expectations of, but not quite given up on, my horticulture daydreams. If I ever find time with my new full-time schedule, I do intend on buying some established plants, but I'd really like to wait for the sun to come back. The rain is nice and oh-so-needed, don't get me wrong, but I can't keep things alive on moisture alone.

In other news, Brian and I have fallen off the push up challenge wagon. We are both working full-time now (horray!), but it quickly took a backseat to us figuring out how to schedule dinner when he gets home after 5 p.m. and I'm not there until almost 8:00 p.m. But with two full-time incomes, we managed to get me a new car last week! Now we are both mobile!

Ok, I lied. One picture. I'm squinting because it was one of those weird "overcast-but-bright" days.

 

Hopefully soon I can find time to update with more photos, but I didn't want the silence to unnerve anyone. I'm just busy with life at the moment. :-)

Into the ground we go

As my Facebook friends learned yesterday, I finally got some compost for my garden.

Brian convinced me not to buy a dozen more plants while we were at the store, and we hauled the two bags (plus another bag of potting mix) into the backyard. My shoulders were, and still kind of are, hurting from Sunday's push ups, but I managed to turn the existing dirt, dump in the bags of compost, and mix them in with a hoe. I was extremely pleased to find a really fat earthworm in the dirt as I mixed it up. As the dirt in the box came from a store, I had taken to pulling worms out of weed roots when I pulled them from the yard and throwing them into the box. Most of them were pitiful, skinny things, but the one I found yesterday was a hoss. Something in that dirt is doing the worms right.

However, in mixing the dirt I did realize just how shady my little garden is in the afternoon. I am questioning how happy my mostly-full-sun-wanting plant choices will be there, so I first moved my five remaining bell pepper seedlings to the brick wall side of the garden. Their roots are not yet showing through the peat pots, but I figured this would be a good opportunity to see whether they will thrive or die in the partial shade of the area before I commit to putting them in the dirt.

Don't mind us, we are just taking in the view.

I was all ready to start putting actual plants into the dirt when I realized I couldn't even list everything I had to plant yet. So... I went to my notebook to make a list and draw a plan.

Believe it or not, I do have a rather organized way of approaching projects.

Brian helped with the planning, suggesting putting the pumpkins on the side so the vines could grow over the edge of the garden instead of just blatantly taking up space in the middle.

All I managed to do yesterday was put the five shallots into the bottom left hand square foot, park my long pot of garlic to the right side of the box and sprinkle the questionable-vitality spinach seeds into the top left hand square foot. I bought the seeds last year, if I remember right, and never planted them. Because I never throw anything away, I still had them and figured "what's it going to hurt?" to throw them into a corner of dirt. If they grow, cool. If not, no loss.

The first thing I did this morning was put some pumpkin seeds in a bag to germinate. This should have been done weeks ago, but with the stalling on getting the garden ready, timing was hard to get right.

 When we grow up, we're going to make pies!

With the pumpkin seeds on the windowsill, I set out with the radish tape. I smoothed out a portion of dirt and dug two trenches with my hands and lay the radish seeds in them.

 

I also put a single pumpkin seed in the top right hand corner of the box. Kind of to see which grows faster or stronger: separately germinated or in-ground germinated.

 A brave seed goes where its brethren ventured not.

I marked its spot with a rock, then put some water on everything.

 Apparently the early morning sun is stronger than I thought. At least when photographed.

So thus far, I have five sprouted shallots, one packet of possibly expired spinach seeds, two strips of radish seed tape and a pumpkin seed in the garden. The bell peppers are still parked on a wall, deciding if they like the environment (if they end up not thriving, I intend to put them in pots with the potting mix I bought and placing them in a sunnier position in the yard).

In less-thrilling garden news, I also bought a crutch for one of the plants I've been taking care of since I found it on the porch last year.

A friend told me it has "bat wing" in its name, but I can't remember the rest and Google shows 

weird things that don't look like this.

I also was excited to find on Sunday the mystery bulb I threw into some dirt on a whim is sprouting!

 

Yet another mystery plant. Anyone who knows anything about bulbs is

welcome to weigh in on this.

People think gardening is a "girly" activity, or that it's boring because of the patience required or it's a hippie choice because of the green/homesteading trend going around now. For the most part, I'm not as interested in flowers as I am in utilitarian plants (though I obviously have a soft spot for some pretty blooms). I find excitement in the progression of plant growth, not just in the end results. And I don't do it to try and provide food for myself -- while it's not an idea I'm against, I am just not good enough to rely on it yet, though homesteading projects like gardening and chicken raising do appeal to me. I garden because I like to see what I can help to create by providing dirt, water and food to a little seed or small plant. I like to watch something small grow into something self-sufficient. I like tending to an ongoing project.