Winter is Coming 'Round

Yeah, yeah. It's been too long. November is over half done already. Craziness.

I won't bother with a long update. Don't much care to consider the past few weeks, to be honest. Life is still trudging along.

Mom brought back a computer from Grandma's house (I think it was Grandpa's) and Wes got it set up for Allenna and I. We both suffered computer crashes in the last few months. The new computer is a good ol' desktop, and I've been avoiding having to use the keyboard. I was just getting used to Dad's, which I've now decided I don't dislike half so much as I'd said I did. There's no Microsoft Word installed yet, which means I can't access my writing files. (For some reason, they all turn to gibberish if opened with WordPad or Notepad.)

But now I'm blogging, at last.

We got snow last Tuesday. Granted, it was just flurries and it didn't stick, but it was our first snowfall of the season. Since Friday we've had foggy nights and mornings. Cool to look at, but scary to drive in. I actually haven't been the one driving yet, and I'm not too eager to try. We've also seen plenty of sunshine, which is great.

I've been fighting a cold since last Tuesday. It started as a tickle in my throat and, by the next day, had developed into a nasty head and chest cold. Then it was a stuffy nose and a cough. Now I have remnants of the cough and a slightly runny nose. And just when I was thinking I would be the only one in the family to get it, Wes and Allenna mentioned sore throats. I'll get blamed for that.

Besides the massive headaches that make it feel like my head is going to explode, having to breathe through my mouth all night, and getting a coughing fit in church, I discovered another problem with having a cold: stuffy noses make it very hard to read books out loud. I babysat on Friday night, when my cold was reduced to sniffles and a choke. I felt bad just trying to maintain a conversation with the parents. Then the kids decided they both wanted me to read a whole bunch of books to them. Normally, I'd be loving that, especially because the boy prefers to be more active and only his sister begs for me to read a third and fourth book, but they both insisted on Friday. If they understood half of what I was reading, I'd be surprised.

On Saturday, Mom, the girls, and I went on a shopping trip with some ladies from church. It's an annual thing, and the intention is to get a bulk of the Christmas shopping done. Neither Mom nor I am are much of shoppers. We both like to go, get what we need, and leave, and neither of us much cares for window shopping if we don't have money. However, on occasion I don't mind it, and the mall we go to is bigger than our own (and also nearly 2 hours away, but worth it). I've been on the last three or four trips. Last year we went twice; once with the ladies and once as a family a couple weeks later. It was nice then because I had a significant amount of money for the first time, and I got most of my Christmas shopping done.

This time, I got some things for Mom and Heather, but.... Yeah, I spent the rest of my money on myself. I do feel kind of bad about that, but the rest of the family wants things that require all of us pitching in, or things like gift cards and money to spend at the local used bookstore (don't worry, she already knows). Plus, the mall had a Teavana store!

Teavana tea was on my Christmas list, but I figured I make it easier on Mom and Dad and take care of it myself so they wouldn't have to worry about it.  :p  I also put the Underland Chronicles on my list, so it's all good. (If my family doesn't understand my desire for books as gifts, they understand tea even less so. Which usually means my Christmas presents are a complete surprise, which I enjoy.)

Okay, I know there was something I wanted to post about, but I can't think of it right now. Bother it all. I should know by now that this is what comes of waiting so long between posts. I didn't mean to. I started writing one last Tuesday, but I didn't get very far.

Oh, well.

It's hard to believe it's Thanksgiving week! For us, this means morning routes during the week and pizza for our Thanksgiving meal (still not sure how that became a tradition). Our house seems to run through a cycle of cleanliness and disorder, and, in honor of the holiday, Mom bumped things up so the clean part of the cycle is coming around. (Yes, roll your eyes. It's a stupid pattern to which I contribute and from which I ought to withdraw my support.) This means that, while I write this, the counters are waiting to be cleaned and the laundry to be put away. We're also planning to move our old, very used table out into the garage and bring in a "new" table given to us by some friends a while ago. Somehow that hasn't happened until just now.

That's life?