Today did not go as well as yesterday. I did not want to get up and laid in bed until my alarm was about to go off. Then I just stared at my phone for fifteen minutes before going downstairs, hoping I'd feel more awake. I didn't. That meant I didn't really have time to clean the kitchen. I did manage to unload and load the dishwasher and clean two counters (but not all of them). I never got around to sweeping which sucked since I brushed a bunch of stuff off the counters onto the floor. Oh, I also emptied the trash can.
I guess on a positive note, I actually wrote something today. I suddenly decided to edit this novel-length fanfic I started writing in 2017 but hadn't posted since 2018 or worked on in any way since 2019. I got stuck on the next chapter and just sort of gave up with the chronic fatigue hanging over me and crushing my creativity. I opened up the file today and just forced myself through the next edit of that chapter, realizing it didn't need as much work as I remembered (or my expectations have changed enough that I just didn't care anymore). Then I moved on to the next chapter which wasn't finished. I managed to breeze through that which brought me to an even more challenging chapter. This one had been written in the original draft and logged somewhere around chapter 18. Since then, I had moved stuff around and now it's chapter 40. A lot of details changed so it needed extensive rewrites to what was there plus adding a bunch to bring it up to the length I want the chapters to be. But I got it done. All despite trying to keep two kids on track with their homework and make lunch.
I did kind of give up after that. The next chapters were a mess, and the fatigue had started to settle over me like an uncomfortably hot and fuzzy blanket in the summer. Ugh. I couldn't sort out my thoughts anymore. After I got done with that, I moved upstairs because my husband came home and turned on the TV. My daughter was taking an extended break from homework because she had to go exchange her middle school iPad for her brand new high school Chromebook at 3pm. After she got back, I had to start dinner. I decided to make chicken tortilla soup using a leftover rotisserie chicken. It should have been quick and easy, but then I found out my oldest daughter used all of my cumin and cumin is what makes the recipe so yummy.
So instead of a quick meal, I had to stop what I was doing and drive to the store, risk my health and all that, just to get cumin or what was even the point? And it cost me $10! I bought the big container since I use so much of it and it was only a few dollars more than the small spice bottle. I also picked up a small bag of dry cat food in a brand we don't normally buy.
My cat, Silver, is really starting to worry me. A few months ago, he was a healthy 12.5lbs (down from nearly 13lbs over the winter when he gets lazy). The other day I weighed him in at just over 10lbs. He looks like he's starving. Actually, he is starving. I bought a new back of catfood a couple months ago. Same brand we had but a different flavor. We often do this. Some of the cats might have a little issue switching over, but they always start eating the new stuff (some of them never care what we buy). But this time... Silver just refused to eat the new flavor. Weeks passed with him barely touching it, getting skinnier and skinnier. My husband kept saying he'd eat it if he was hungry. Except he wasn't eating anything.
So we finally bought another bag in the flavor we had before, thinking that would be the end of it. Well, none of the cats will touch that food at all. We've had the bag a week and I've filled the bowl twice from it. Last time was three days ago. It hasn't been touched despite being in my room where cats get locked to keep them out of our hair while we're doing schoolwork. The other two cats are barely eating either so I bought some canned food to encourage them. Of course, now all they want is canned food.
Desperate, I picked up a bag of Friskies Surf 'n' Turf on sale to see if that would entice them--Silver most of all. He devoured an entire bowl himself. I expect he might throw half of it up later because he ate so much so fast. Bellamy and Leo each ate a bowl themselves. And I mean a full bowl. Normally, we leave the bowls full and the cats munch on the food as they want, never eating more than a quarter of the bowl at a time. They pretty much finished off their bowls. They were all starving.
The only one that was eating any of this food was Lilah, but she died ten days ago. I don't think it's from the food. I watched her eat from both bags. She threw up her last meal which was the new flavor I bought, but the cats had been eating that for weeks before she got sick (and died less than six hours later). I do think there's something wrong with this newest bag that we bought of that brand since none of the cats would really touch it despite it being the same flavor they had before and loved. I'm going to write to the company to let them know.
I only bought a 3lb bag of the Friskies. We don't normally buy that brand because of the cost since we go through a lot of food with the number of cats we have, but I think I'll splurge while we have the extra money. I'll have to go back and buy a bigger bag in a couple days because they are going to blow through this tiny bag. But at least Silver is eating again. Maybe he won't be so whiny and clingy anymore either. Or fight with Leo so much (the two have really been going at it the last couple weeks which now I think might be from the hunger).
Anyway, now I'm just sitting here waiting for my daughter to be done with her school work. She did three hours of English this morning and has been working on her other classes for nearly four hours now. I think she'll catch up with her English assignments by next week if she keeps working this weekend. She was moaning about it, but I told her to just suck it up and put the 6 hours in each day and get it over with now. Then in a couple weeks, she'll be caught up and can take weekends off again.
I really wanted to take a nap today but couldn't since she has to do her afternoon work in my room where I can make sure she stays off her phone and help her when she gets stuck. I'd also like to lie down so I can put my feet up. After two days of almost no swelling, my feet ballooned up again. I can't bend my toes on either foot and they hurt so bad. Normally, I prop them on my office chair, but my daughter is using that right now. Sigh.
I'm still hoping to do some more editing tonight. I have a system of rewrites and three levels of editing before I post a fanfic online. The first chapter I worked on was a level 1 edit so I'm going to do the level 2 tonight (level 3 is optional depending on how level 2 goes) which means I could post the chapter tomorrow. The other two weren't even quite a "rewrite" level as neither was technically finished. Depending on how much I change during the next pass it'll either be labeled rewrite or level 1 edit. Either way, I'd like to get the next pass done for each chapter.
Tomorrow will hopefully go better than today with my energy, but the trend the past few weeks seems to be that each day is a little worse until I'm barely able to stay awake all morning by Friday. But I'm still hoping tomorrow will be better because it will be another long haul.
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