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Swimming
I get into the pool for free at least a couple of times a week due to my work as a carer. My client does the aqua aerobics class regularly and I have taken lately to walking and swimming while he’s occupied. I do this in the lanes next to the classes so I can keep an eye on his. Some carers stay right next to the clients for almost everything but I find this causes my client to become too dependent on me. Also I find it easier to keep a watch outside of the class. Anyway, I do keep busy while he’s busy, either with him or nearby.
Initially I was mostly just doing lots of aqua walking and that was good. But in more recent weeks I’ve started swimming, or what I consider my close approximation of swimming. I don’t use the proper strokes all the time but I am kind of close. I never learned to swim properly so really need to take a class to learn proper breathing and the proper strokes but I am reasonably competent at moving the water now. Just a bit slow.
The swimming sort of evolved from some movements I was doing in the water with my arms and added the feet along with it. Seems they turned into actual swimming even though I was doing most of the movement in the walking lane. I’ve been working on building up some stamina while swimming and have gotten a lot faster on some of the strokes. I hadn’t been timing my swims but tonight I started seeing how long it took me to swim the length of the pool (25m). The first time I checked I was over a minute but when I put more effort in I would get faster and I had several laps where I managed to get there in about 45 seconds. I was kind of impressed with my progress. I couldn’t sustain this for too long. I might start out going at a good pace but could sustain it for the full 25 m. I guess I started to flag around the last third so I’d end up taking over a minute in the end. Still it feels good to make some progress. My aim isn’t to become particularly fast but enough to feel like I’m not in the way of other swimmers.
My Apple watch updated its system recently and the activity app changed a few things so that it now is able to distinguish strokes while swimming. It doesn’t recognise my butterfly but it does get the other ones right most of the time. Plus it records how fast I got and how long I rest and all sort of interesting information Who knew this watch would be so cool. I don’t regret the purchase at all. :)
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Fitness
I think I posted that in June I had a nasty respiratory infection that affected me pretty badly for nearly two weeks and then lingered on as a nagging cough for weeks after that. Until that point I’d been keeping to some good exercise and eating habits and I was fitting into smaller-sized clothes again. I tried to keep up the exercise even when sick but my body was determined to rest and so I had to get back on track. I thought I had got back on track in July but I couldn’t quite keep going and kept relapsing into bad habits and an inclination to doing very little activity. I suspect some of this was related to the usual winter malaise that hangs over me.
I finally got going again a few weeks ago and can happily say I’ve been on track since then. I mostly work with my Apple watch activity monitor and try to increase that every week. I do take one day off each week, the day I have tai chi. I still get some exercise but it’s a it’s not enough to meet daily requirements. Well that could happen some of the time but I am not making any special efforts towards it at the moment. I am keeping it truly as a rest day.
I really do feel it’s a mental battle on some days to force myself to get the minimum of exercise. But I find it easier to win that battle when I keep up than when I get lazy. I guess it provides a bit of momentum. It’s much harder when illness kicks in and makes you stop for long periods of time.
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Upgrade
A while back when the Scientist was doing yet another component replacement/upgrade I said that next time it happened I was going to switch to a laptop. My desktop computer has been problematic for a few weeks. Sometimes it wouldn’t boot properly and then there has been an ongoing problem with trying to update apps and even to do any downloads. So I casually started looking at laptops without much serious consideration. I almost bought a laptop at a local retailer but the only model left was the floor model and the salesperson refused any sort of price reduction for what was essentially a used machine. I really wasn’t keen on having a demo model anyway. Who knows what sort of damage might have been done to it.
I started looking more seriously and ended up at the Dell website. They had a number of models on sale and I wavered between various types. I was really keen on the 2 in 1 machines but wasn’t sure if that was a good direction when I was replacing a desktop. I finally set my sights on what is essentially a low-end laptop. It isn’t cheap but it has plenty of RAM and an I7 processor which should last quite a long time. I ordered it last Thursday and it arrived yesterday. Not bad service considering the ETA was originally the 20th. So far the machine is quite lovely. It has a 256 SSD and a 1 TB HD so it should be good for a while now.
One of the most noticeable things about it is how quiet it is. Admittedly I haven’t used any power hungry programs yet but it has hardly made a sound since I got it, aside from audio sounds. The trackpad is nice and smooth and far easier than others I’ve used. I particularly like that it has a numeric pad on it, which is one of the things I would miss with a laptop.
I’m still setting things up so I am still getting to know it. While waiting for this to arrive I’ve been using an old Samsung PC tablet. I think I’ve had it for four or five years now and I’m amazed at how good it still is for what it is. It’s an i5 processor and it also has an SSD which makes start up really quick. I seriously thinking about using for iTunes so I don’t have to have all the extra programs on my laptop. One thing that neither has is an optical drive so I am waiting for the local shop to get more in stock so I have something to use on the rare occasion when I need it.
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Scarred
I was doing weeding in the yard at MIL’s house a few weeks ago ahead of her return when I was attacked by ants. I couldn’t say what sort of ants but I suspect they might have been some sort of fire ants. At first I thought I’d scratched myself on my stomach but when I checked I could see there was evidence of ant bites/stings pretty quickly. Later that day I found there were several on my back too. Usually when I had ant bites they resolve within a few days but these were still pretty itchy a week later and only stopped a bit after that. Itg’s now three weeks and it looks like I might have scars near and on my belly button and a couple on my stomach.
Just feeling a bit annoyed those little creatures may have left such a lasting impression. :(
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Copper
My passport expires in January and there’s no way I can use the current one with so little time left. I think it has to have at least three months left on it. Anyway, the time to renew is now so that I have my new one in time for travel at the end of next month. Before I can renew, I need the all important photo done and so I decided it was time again to get my hair cut. I think the last cut I had was in January just before I got my new driver’s license. Seems the photo requirements are the motivating factor for me to get on to getting hair cuts. :)
I made an appointment for Friday with intentions of a colour job and cut. I did colour my hair with a home kit a while back and it came out pretty well but it didn’t stay the purple for all that long. I think part of the problem is I didn’t take the best care of it and it faded fairly quickly. Exposure to pool water was also a problem. I need to get a cap to wear over my hair at the pool so this doesn’t happen again.
I arrived a bit early for the appointment and there was just the woman I’d seen the day before when making the booking, and a guy who turned out to be the hairdresser. I was surprised because the shops I have gone to haven’t had male hairdressers. In fact I thought it was the first time I’d had a guy do my hair but then I recalled the time when I must have been a teen that my mom took me to a barber to get a perm. I don’t know why that happened that way and it was all weird. But it was a man who did my hair at that time…so not the first time. :)
Anyway, I had to wait for a bit for the guy to finish up with the previous client but was able to sit in the chair for the duration. It wasn’t that long before he got to me and so we discussed what I wanted done. He had a strong accent which seemed European in origin but his English was pretty good. I shouldn’t be surprised by this since English is so widely spoken there. Our first discussion was about the colour I wanted. I asked about going with some sort of purple but he steered and persuaded me to a copper/brown combination which he thought would work better. Then he was gone again for a while to mix up the dyes.
The process of putting the dye on my hair took quite a while to do, longer than I expected. He was quite methodical with his work and it eventually did get done and then I was waiting the thirty minutes for the colour to set while he did someone else’s cut. The next client was a nine-year old girl who had long hair and was getting it cut off.
I spent my waiting time playing games on my phone and occasionally watched the progress with the little girl’s cut. The hairdresser was meticulous with his work on her hair too. When he finished it looked good and was quite cute. Someone else came for a cut during this time and he started on that and soon it was already thirty minutes and I was still sitting. It must have been about forty-five minutes by the time the woman took me off to rinse and treat my hair. Then there was the five-minute wait for the treatment to work. Which was really more like 10-15 minutes, lol…there seemed to be a pattern about the whole place.
He did get back to me and then we had a look at the colour and it really did look nice. The most obvious change was at the roots where he’d put just the copper. Our next step was the hair cut and I gave him license to use his own judgement as to how much to cut. I was happy to lose a fair bit but wanted to keep it below shoulder length. I think he must have cut about three inches or more. Finally all the dry and damaged hair was gone and it looked much better already. He then went on to the blow dry and I thought that would go a bit more quickly but I was wrong again. It was around this time that our conversation picked up a bit and I learned that he had only just moved here, apparently from Italy, and he’s still working on getting things he needs for his day to day living. He said that situation here is much better than in Italy, where it’s hard to make a living and afford basic necessities. All the time we were talking, he would stop regularly from the work to speak and then start working again.
When he finished everything, it really did look nice and healthy again. The colour turned out really well too. I must make a better effort at getting cuts a bit more regularly so that I don’t have so much damage at the end of my hair.
Once I paid, I collected the boys from the library next door (they’d been waiting for over two hours in the end) and then I rushed off to get my photo done at the camera shop in the same complex. That part took very little time but it was late enough I didn’t have time to get to the bank for the cashier’s check for the fees and to the post office to post to the consulate. Instead I decided to wait for Monday when I had more time. Instead we headed off to do our shopping for the week and only just got home a bit after six in the end.
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Rainy season
Typically the winter is the rainy season here in Perth. I think over half of our rain comes during this time of year. So far this year, though, we’ve had quite a bit of rain through the late summer and autumn. In fact the only month that seems to have been spared was June, which was unseasonably dry this year.
The past few weeks we’ve had rain almost every day. Well, at least a forecast of rain and some drizzle most days. It’s rained so much there are lakes within some of the park lands around here. A couple years ago this was a problem due to blocked sewage drains plus rain. I don’t think the drains are particularly blocked now but the rains have continued.
Last week we had a nasty storm that brought heavy rain and thunder and lightning one morning. I will point out that thunderstorms really aren’t all that common here although they aren’t a rarity either. It’s just a lot less than I used to experience while living in North Carolina during the summer. Anyway, that storm came along and the power went out that morning. The lightning never even hit all that close to us so I am surprised we had an outage. I will also point out that we often go a year or more without a power outage here. Well I guess that was the case when we first moved in here but it’s probably a bit more often now. Still it’s pretty rare. Initially I didn’t realise the power was out. I had woken up and I realised my Apple watch needed a charge so I connected it to the charger. I heard the usual ping sound once it connected. Then I connected my phone to its charger and there was no ping. I thought something had happened to the power outlet (which would have been bad since it was only put in last year). Still nothing. I went out to the living room to try it in a different location. I went to turn on the light and nothing happened. A light bulb went off in my head…lol.
The power was out for about an hour and then all was well, or so I thought. I don’t know whether it was an issue from the start or not, but our router/modem seems to have died soon after the power returned. Died as in it wouldn’t power up at all. After an exchange of a few text messages with the Scientist, I went out in search of a new router/modem. The funny part of this is that we were in the shop a couple days before that and the Scientist had spotted one that he said he planned on getting when we next needed one. The expectation, of course, was this was not going to be any time in the immediate future. So this turned out to be the means of getting that really good one sooner than later. It is a much pricier model than the previous one but does have a few bells and whistles that hopefully will make up for it. Also we had a gift card for a retailer that sells these and I was able to reduce the price by $154, which still left it expensive but less so than it started out to be. The new model has been going pretty well so far. I did have a couple problems connecting my iPad at first, until I connected ot the 5G network instead of the usual one. Since then I’ve not had any issues at all.
Meanwhile, there is still a bit of rain in the forecast but I see a break in precipitation for the coming weekend. I’m looking forward to a bit of clearer weather for a few days as we finish up our winter season here. We did have a lovely sunny day last Thursday but it’s not been very nice since then. And before we know it, we will be in spring and the allergy season should ramp up. I suspect the only reason it hasn’t right now is the rains washing off the pollen.
And on a slightly related note, I heard on the radio today that Australia may be in its worst flu season ever recorded. It has been a terrible winter for flu around here. Almost everyone I know has been struck down at some point. I am still not sure that we had the flu here back in June. Whatever it was was pretty nasty but it didn’t include fever and it didn’t include the usual aches and pains that come with flu usually. That reminds me of something else I heard on the radio today at the same time. There was a discussion of the difference between a cold and flu and the doctor they were talking to would say that if you have to ask that question you probably have never had the flu. That reminded me of my first experience of flu when I was a freshman in college. It was February and pretty much everyone else on my floor of the dorm had had it before I finally succumbed. And yes, it was like nothing I’d ever had before and was quite memorable. What I had this year wasn’t at all like that and yet it was just as awful and probably longer lasting. So my thought it was it could have been a totally different type of flu than I had in the past or it was a random, but nasty, upper respiratory infection. One last thing to take away from the interview today was that it was still a good idea to do a flu vaccination so maybe I will see about doing that.
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Part-time contact lenses
It’s been a few weeks since I started a contact lenses trial and while I’ve not worn them daily, I do find they fill a need to some extent.
I never followed up my previous post to share my experience of the monovision contact lenses, which is the alternative to the distance lenses. I tried them a couple of times and they just didn’t work for me. The main problem is they didn’t work very well for driving and I felt I was better off wearing my old glasses. The biggest reason I like wearing contacts is the addition of peripheral vision, particularly while driving. Also, my close up vision was too weird and trying to do close-up things made me feel a bit sick.
My optometrist had ordered another brands of contacts for me to try and there really wasn’t much of a difference with them to the original brand. In the end I opted for the ones that were cheaper and I should have those available by the end of the week, assuming no delays.
The optometrist has also ordered a pair of multifocal toric lenses for me to try out too. These have to be custom made and they are monthly which has both plusses and minuses. The positive is there would be far fewer resources required for them, being changed every four weeks as opposed to daily. I really prefer this option, especially if I find they are useful. The downside, of course, is the higher risk of infection. There’s no foolproof way to do it but I believe I should be okay so long as I use good hygiene practices while using them. These take a month to get in so I won’t be trying them out for a bit. I’m rather hopeful they will work for me but I don’t have any plans for them being part of my eye care at the moment.
Meanwhile it’s just a matter of using the remaining trial packs up. I think I’m going to have quite a few of the mono-vision left lenses left over though, since I can’t really bring myself to use them much. Maybe I can save them for a rainy day? :D
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I can see clearly now, sort of…
I was overdue for my eye examination and the Scientist was long overdue for his. We finally made appointments and saw an optometrist last weekend. I knew my vision had gotten worse, particularly in my left eye, so I guess it wasn’t too much of a surprise to be told my left eye had worsened by one dioptre, which is kind of significant. My right eye was worse but not by nearly so much. I think the vision change happened not far into last year so I should have seen to this long before now.
I ordered new glasses which haven’t come in. The Scientist got a message yesterday that his were ready but today I found out mine had to be redone due to a problem with the coating. Mine are far more complex than his, though, so this doesn’t surprise me too much. I’m just anxious to have them again.
I haven’t been offered contact lenses for a very long time, presumably due to the dry eye problem I have from the Sjogren’s syndrome. But this optometrist suggested I have a trial of them and see how I do with them. So I did and I was “fitted” for them today. The appointment was for an hour but I didn’t need that long. My history is mostly linked with rigid gas permeable lenses but that was off the table this time. Still, I remember quite a few of the important parts of wearing contacts, particularly the hygiene. I’m trying out disposable soft lenses that will correct my astigmatism. One thing I came away with this time is a proper way to remove them from my eye. I didn’t do well with soft lenses in the past because I kept gouging my eye trying to get them out. Getting them in wasn’t a problem at all. It’s pretty similar to the harder lenses except there’s a lot more coverage of the eye.
I have two different variations to try out with these contacts. The first one is wearing them for distance only and using readers for close up work. The second one is using one contact for distance and one for close up.
Going in I felt like it would be best to go with two distance ones, but I am not so sure after wearing them for the better part of the day. I will say they were pretty comfortable for most of the eleven hours I was wearing them. I did use eye drops once when they started to feel dry but otherwise it was fine.
Seeing at a distance is absolutely brilliant. I shudder to think how poor my vision has been all this time and I suspect that I shouldn’t have been driving when my left eye was so off. I can only hope my right eye has compensated to some degree. I could read the computer screen from a fair distance, which is something kind of new for me. At least I don’t recall having such crisp vision from so far away.
Seeing up close is really tricky. I can still read unaided pretty well but with the contacts in, my close-up vision was impossible. I couldn’t even look at my phone properly and squinting is no help at all. I did buy some reader glasses from the pharmacy to use for close up and that makes a huge difference but putting them on an off to read things up close is kind of maddening. Still it’s mostly doable that way.
The real issue came when I sat down at my computer. That middle distance is too close to see with just my contacts but the readers aren’t all that effective either. I was getting blurriness both ways and it was kind of exhausting too. I will be giving them a few more times before I throw in the towel with them just to see if I can work with them in the longer term.
More realistically, I suspect I will have to hope I can work with the other configuration with one eye for close up and one for distance. I have a vague recollection my mom had this set up many years ago and I think it worked okay for her. It sounds a bit crazy to me but possibly not so much as being so impaired on my close up vision.
One thing that struck me after I got the contacts in and wore them a bit was how wonderful it was to see again. It was like I didn’t know what I was missing and was a similar feeling to when I first got glasses as a teenager. I don’t know how bad my vision was at that point but I recall being thrilled to see so many things properly again. The best part of all is the peripheral vision. With glasses that pretty much goes out the window and I did adjust to it but I like being able to see off to the sides. I will admit that if I decide to stick with contacts I will need to buy some sunglasses again. I haven’t worn them for ages because my glasses have had transition lenses the last several times which has worked really well for me.
Anyway, I will update again after trying out the other set up for my contacts and after getting the new glasses.
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Reading habits
I seem to be back into a habit of reading books again. Not that I ever stopped but I’d been reading all sorts of mixed media and much of that was manga and webtoon titles. I’m still reading some of those but the manga types I like have been pretty much exhausted as far as what the library has and it felt like time to mix things up a bit anyway.
I’m currently reading lots of straight fiction, mostly romance, mostly light reading. I tend to give a miss to the Harlequin types. Some of what I am reading probably would be similar to chick-lit. But I also started reading more young adult titles too. It’s kind of a weird territory for me. It wasn’t around back when I was in the targeted age range so I mostly read adult novels once I reached my teens…probably before that.
Something I’ve noticed about the YA titles I’ve read are that they are fairly easy reads. Most I’ve finished in a few hours. Maybe it’s just luck of the draw. Of course there are books like the Harry Potter series that are longer reads but I haven’t found any like that lately.
One of the series I’ve read recently is a sort of Twilight wannabe series. It’s not terrible but not great either. I have only finished the first book of what seem to be three or four depending on how a prequel is counted. It deals with paranormal stuff and supposedly dark romance. I don’t know if the darkness is really that dark though and the romance isn’t written that well…but maybe it gets better in the second book. I read another book from a different series which also probably qualifies as a Twilight wannabe. I think I liked that better but I haven’t found the next books in the series to find out what happens next. I haven’t actually read the Twilight books but I am thinking about tackling them some time soon just so I can make comparisons. I know the series isn’t known for any great writing so I won’t be going in expecting much. I suppose it will give more context to all the pop culture references though and I might still enjoy it for what it is.
One of the reasons I’ve delved into YA romances is to compare them to the shoujo manga I’ve read. There are lots of tropes that show up in manga and I am already seeing how there’s some overlap in the YA books although without some of the more culturally Japanese tropes, of course. There’s definitely lots more available these days but I must admit to being disappointed at the way so many books represent romance with such negative behaviors in relationships. Too many girls are just too accepting of the guy doing things they shouldn’t. That’s not stopping me from reading but it does leave me wondering when the culture will change enough that it will be reflected in the literature. So far, I’ve not found much to hold up as particularly good…but it’s still early days in my reading.
I’m also reading books on my Kindle which works better late at night because I can read in bed for a while and just go to sleep. If I’m reading a physical book I need to get up and move to the bed and that often gets me awake again. Anyway, the ebooks are so much easier to carry. I get a lot of the books from the free books on Amazon but I also buy some when they are reduced price too.
Part of my intent in reading is to have a broader understanding of what’s out there in the literature since I do have aspirations of working in a library and probably a public library soon.
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Still coughing but…
That’s about all that’s left of the crud going through our house for a while last month. Interesting is that Lego Lover had the shortest version of bug and is probably the most recovered even now. Most of the coughing is currently done by Game Fanatic and me…we seem to be the ones who get the long-lasting cough these days.
My cough comes and goes and is often triggered by cold foods and spicy foods and sometimes warm foods and sometimes cold air…fun. It won’t last forever but it’s aggravating.
Anyway, I am getting more regular exercise again. After my pool exercise last week I took another break and then restarted exercise again. This week when I was at the pool I was fine with the deep breaths so I figure my lungs or something was still healing the week before. I was in the pool twice this week and both times I felt pretty good afterwards. The other days I’ve been walking or using the spin bike. Tomorrow I’m kind of hoping it’s sunny enough to ride my bike. A bonus would be if it’s not too windy also. I didn’t do as much exercise today because my knees were bothering me a bit. Not painful but a bit sore after walking around in Fremantle for while today. So I didn’t end of burning off as many calories but I am going to try to not obsess about doing a minimum each day just yet.