It's been a weird week of ups and downs.

Bad news: Last Friday, I received a letter from Social Security telling me that they are re-evaluating my circumstances. They require me to complete half-a-dozen pages of forms, then mail them back along with copies of all my paystubs since January of 2021.

Good news: My employer has my paystubs available online.

Bad news: The online tool to print out a report of all the paystubs in one document isn't working.

Tedious news: I was able to download and print fifty-five paystubs, one at a time.

Bad news: Last Saturday, when I went online to order my regular monthly refill of my specialty medication, I discovered my oncologist hadn't renewed the prescription yet. I sent a message to her via MyChart.

Good news: On Monday morning, the oncologist's office responded to my message.

Good news: At lunchtime on Monday, I was able to send a package by certified mail off to Social Security. Delivery expected on Thursday.

Bad news: Wednesday morning, I still couldn't place my prescription renewal order.

Good news: Wednesday night, I was finally able to complete the renewal order.

Mediocre news: Prescription delivery was forecast for Monday, but that left me only three days' margin.

Conflicting news: The specialty pharmacy's email on Thursday again said to expect my meds to be delivered on Monday. FedEx's email on Thursday said to expect delivery three days sooner, on Friday.

Bad news: My certified mail to Social Security wasn't delivered on Thursday. Or Friday.

Good news: FedEx delivered today (Friday)! I have meds for 35 more days!

Disappointing news: The bottle was packaged in a tear-open pouch, instead of the usual heavy-gauge ziploc bags. I feel oddly bereft.

Timelies all!

That's a lot of ups and downs, dcp.

No set plans for the weekend. There's the usual grocery run tomorrow and I want to return some books to the library.

That's a lot, dcp! Good luck with Social Security. I don't understand certified mail not getting delivered when it is supposed to. What is the point of certified mail if it doesn't get delivered? Weather related, maybe?

I ended up working an extra hour today because when someone sends out an email saying “can you look into this?” I think “surely this can wait until Monday” but despite myself I do, in fact, look into it because I am curious. Oh well, there’s a sr mgr whose grateful to me for my partial fix, so that’s nice.

Anyway, now ready to curl up, eat something out of a can and maybe watch the Mandalorian.

Tim and his brothers decided at the last minute to go camping this weekend, but then the weather got SUPER bad in exactly the path they would be driving for 3 hours, so instead of leaving this afternoon, they're leaving at 5 a.m. tomorrow. Which is insane, but hey, I'm not the one who's doing it, so more power to them.

My latest attempt to do something craft-like — the clay handbuilding pottery class — starts tomorrow morning. Let's hope it doesn't get cancelled like the previous 2 things I tried.

And then I don't really have any plans for shenanigans while Tim is camping. Maybe I'll eat a pile of sushi and finish watching the episodes of Interview With the Vampire that I haven't watched yet.

That sounds like a good day!

I'm making bread for this dinner party tomorrow, and for some reason thought it would be a good idea to try a new recipe and also change it somewhat? I'm sure it will be bread in the end.

That is one of my favorite things about baking bread. It almost always turns out bread.

Craft~ma, Tep!

Good luck to Tim and his brothers! Seems to me that camping in early March is kind of ...? but ok!

Despite my staffing issues, I took 2 hours off this afternoon to climb at the gym, and then had dinner with my sister and we watched some "soothing veterinarians" -- i.e. "All Creatures Great and Small". I may have had too much wine. Or bourbon.

Gotta plan the girls' getaway before the wedding. Possibly in wine country, but there must be fancy robes, and a hot tub, and good restaurants.

All the rain and warmer weather has my yard sprouting/blooming earlier than expected. I appear to have one jonquil plant, scattered dandelions, several dieffenbachia along the back of the house, and something with tiny purple flowers that might be creeping Charlie along one side. Nothing flowering in the actual flower beds yet. It looks like much of the back yard is clover, or at least that's what's pushing out of the leaves now. I'm going to see about getting them and the sweetgum balls cleared once the plumbing excavation is done, but I wouldn't mourn if the actual grass gets smothered in the meantime and leaves me with clover as ground cover.

Good luck to Tim and his brothers! Seems to me that camping in early March is kind of ...? but ok!

Traditionally, they've always gone camping in late February/early March because the colder weather means no bugs and a way lower chance of running into drunk rednecks with guns. That trip was always backpacking/tent camping.

But now that they're in their 50s/early 60s, oldest brother has a camper (not an RV; the kind you tow) (although on the inside it's the same as an RV), so they're camping in the camper. But they also plan to hike and whatnot, but then they don't have to sleep on the ground when they're done hiking.