break right through this glass house in 2013-2014

Ice doom happened. We edged out of the worst. My power went out for about 10 minutes, long enough for me to pack my freezer full of snow and ice and duct tape it shut, since it's not sealing too well these days. Then it popped back on and all was well, and I felt kind of dorky for having so much water stashed everywhere. We got... 4ish inches of stuff? Sleet and snow mixes. Enough for good frolicking once the snow transition happened, and that I had to shovel my walkway with a storage container lid and a century-old Russian bayonet. If it can handle Siberian battles in January, it can handle anything the southeastern US can throw at it. Shoveling is hard work. I was out of breath in a few minutes. We got 3 days off of school and work, and when it melted in a hurry, everything was so wet it was still almost impassible. There are still some glaciers hanging around in parking lots, sooty and gross, even though these last few days have been in the glorious 70s.

Last Sunday, I didn't wake up until Aaron called me at 3 to ask if I was still alive. I could have gone right back to sleep. By Sunday night, I was a congested, stuffy mess. Monday was miserable and I went home early, took some Benadryl, and slept for four hours. Then I barely slept Tuesday, off and on in that sick sort of way, and showed up late Wednesday after only falling asleep at 5am. On Monday, or Tuesday, I don't remember, I could only handle eating sandwiches and such, no dairy, so I was pounding toast and PB&Js. The next day, I was prepping another sandwich and realized that my bread was not just slightly moldy. I felt a LOT better in terms of the head cold, but that was the least of my problems. I couldn't sleep. I averaged 3 hours of sleep a day. I couldn't really eat without stomach cramps and immediate, non-traumatic evacuation.

It. Sucked.

I counted down until Aaron's arrival Thursday night, because if nothing else, he can always make me sleep and he would force-feed me if necessary. The first of many big storm systems was to roll through, triggering a bunch of storm anxiety and nervously watching the tornadoes spin up in the states northwest of me. He called me Thursday night as I was trying to study for my Russian test in the morning (not effectively, given hunger and sleep-deprivation). I was expecting the 'on my way' message and got the exact opposite in a very upset voice. Despite asking for the weekend off a month ago, his crap job hadn't processed the request and if he didn't show up, he would lose the job. We had a very emotional talk for about 30 minutes and were both very upset. I cried. When we hung up, I really cried. I felt so bad, in every way. I was too exhausted to manage a disappointment like that, a stormy night alone, and I barely had the calories to function. I was borderline light-headed most of the time as it was. I didn't cry out of disappointment so much that I did out of sheer just feeling bad.

And then he called me back to say that the new shift's manager had walked in, declared it all bullshit, and kicked him out to come see me. The emotional whiplash there was brutal, but still, something to live for! Yes, I shaved and straightened my hair in the next 4 hours, but it was therapeutic. It was stress grooming. I was a cat or dog obsessively grooming myself because the repetitive, controlled actions felt so good.

I studied to the best of my limited abilities. I was wide awake (as usual) at 3am when he rolled in, eyes already glazed from tiredness, and informed me that he had gone 80mph with the windows down the entire time, felt scuzzy and disgusting, and had set a new record with 4 hours and 6 minutes. Idiot. We went straight up to bed and he collapsed. I just laid there and was happy. I finally dozed off sometime after the storm rolled in. He and Lena made a sandwich out of me, and smushed between their sleepy, mildly-snoring warmth I was secure and cozy enough that the thunder didn't keep jerking me awake. I didn't sleep well, but I still slept.

Took the test. It was rough. I would have done so much better had I been physically competent. After I finished my work, I went home at 12:30. We went out for lunch and I ate more than I had in a few days (and just crossed my fingers). After lunch, he set up his PS3 and hunkered down for a gaming binge, and I curled up in his lap and took the best nap of my life. When I woke up a few hours later, I felt drunk and euphoric. It was delicious.

We had pizza for dinner, which I managed through the use of probiotics and lactaid tablets. We tried to watch TV, but Charter is still inept and the channel we wanted kept either freezing or going black.

Saturday he let me sleep in until... about 1, I think. I got about 9 hours of solid, quality sleep. It was magical. We were going to watch Vampire Academy, but it left the theaters on Thursday. Then we were going to watch Frozen, but it was only evening showings. We settled on the Lego Movie. I wasn't too keen on that, because if I wanted fantastical Lego adventures I would just go upstairs and make my own, but it was a date, so fine. I dressed up with makeup because he is easily delighted by eyeliner and we went out to get some gourmet cupcakes. I had a bourbon cupcake with cream cheese icing that was perfect. His was devils food cake based. They were like bricks. I smuggled them into the theater in my jacket and we worked on those for the first half of the movie. I thought the Lego movie was fairly cute, very meta, and had its funny parts. (BATMAN.) Aaron turned into a little kid and was delighted. An actual little boy was sitting next to him, and at one point they both burst out laughing at the same time, in the same way. Watching him turn into a six-year-old was better than the movie. :)

Post-movie we wandered through the nearby pet store with its dog adoption fare and cooed over giant dogs, plotting out our future menagerie, and then headed to Publix to get the steak for dinner. He did the steaks over the stove, I cubed up some potatoes and roasted them with a bunch of seasoning and toasted some VERY buttery, garlicky cheesy bread, then we curled up with cartoons on Netflix and Mountain Dews.

At some point, he got a text from Micah. The concert festival we go to every year, where we met, hasn't been scheduled yet and we've had a sad (this also ruins his proposal plans; as he told me this weekend, he's on Plan D now due to lack of cooperation from concert schedulers), but Micah's heard somewhere that the concert is being rescheduled for this summer! And Avenged Sevenfold is doing a big US 2014 tour, so our fingers are so crossed. We'll be formally engaged by then, by early June actually (so as to avoid a revolt by my friends, and then a revolt if I showed up at his family reunion without a ring on my hand), but still. That festival has serious meaning now. If we go and I don't have to drive home afterward, that would be even better.

The steak and potatoes were possibly better than sex. I INHALED it. I'm an infamously slow consumer. It can take me hours to finish eating or drinking. I was done in minutes, a pound of steak and a bunch of potatoes and two thick slices of toast. It was heavenly. Ecstasy in my mouth. NUTRIENTS. Oh man. My stomach felt like a brick from eating so fast, and it was totally worth it. We ended up cuddling on the couch, letting our food babies digest, and basking in the after glow of a perfect meal as we watched endless Netflix. The post-meal sleepiness was so overwhelming that we legitimately went to bed early. We took our laptops up and posted on FB about our food delight, which was written as pure innuendo that cracked up his sister, before crashing.

I got up for church. He did not. I had 12 hyper 5-year-old kids, 9 boys and 3 girls. Whew. I then stayed late. One boy stays for both services, and his favorite picture book has one of those things where it goes through the alphabet twice (1 toy car, 2 balls of yarn, whatever, followed by an exercise in alliteration in the form of "playing jacks in Japan and kickball in Kenya). One of our weekly stations had included a world map, so he ran and got that, and we went through the entire book. I would read the game and the country, and he would plot a course from the US to whichever country it was. I told him about the pirates in the Arabian Ocean and Somalia, his little world was rocked, and his challenge was to avoid the pirate zones in his routes. I left after we finished the book, but he loved it so much that he nabbed another volunteer and had her do it with him again. :) YAY GEOGRAPHY.

After church I crashed back in bed for another few hours. Aaron stayed with me, getting out his laptop again while I cuddled up against his hip. He finally got me up, we got dressed, and headed to my supervisor Biff's house for the cookout celebrating the last week of our student worker before he goes forth as a Real Adult with a Real Job as an investment banker. We rolled in just as the burgers came off the grill. Aaron has the best timing. It was a really nice lunch with everyone and they finally got to meet Aaron, although they'll all suspect that he's just a paid actor and the real boyfriend is still just a wraith. It's the Office Narrative.

Normally on visit Sundays, Aaron leaves around 3ish. Today at 4ish, we left Biff's house and he wanted to go to the bookstore instead for our usual roam. Then he sat on the couch with me and worked on his resume, because fuck Cracker Barrel and their ridiculous hourly, inconsistent wages. He finally left at... 7-something, after lots of prolonged goodbyes and silliness and hugging and shameless making out in the parking lot.

...We have been judged so often for kissing in the car. Quit looking in our car, judgmental asshats.

And now I am sitting here with Lena, with a kitchen to clean and a bed that's torn apart because someone here is a restless sleeper. And I feel like a functional human being again, and I can't freaking WAIT to move down there and be done with all of this commuting, long-distance, short-visit bullshit. I haven't had a 'home' in ten years. Letmeatitletmeatitletmeatit.

The countdown resets at 4 weeks. In 2 weeks, I have a 7k obstacle run, so hopefully, that training will take up my time. If I can stay healthy. Gr. I have bigger free weights to continue the strength training, but what I need is some distance work. Please cooperate, weather. The exercise bike only gives so much stamina. (This is going to hurt.)