out and... out

 my niece has been waiting for attention in an NHS hospital in london, things are becoming... tense. i guess that's what happens when your healthcare is at a third-world level...

my mother, gd and i bussed to ikea, stopping for a few minutes between buses to walk through the mall in glilot. we arrived with some time to spare, found a surprisingly nice coffee shop where i plugged in, enjoyed my coffee and had my daily with my team.

then i joined gd and my mom at ikea itself, and settled near a plug-point in the food court while they did the slowest part of the shopping.

i actually got some work done. including getting my client to change their substack profile name; as soon as i pointed out that it didn't look good, nobody argued (it looked like something a pornographic site might be called).

a bit later they joined me, and i continued to work until i received a reference phone call for my british devops coworker, which i really hope helps convince them to make him an offer.

my cousin arrived, with a very stiff neck, and we sat and talked for a while, which was lovely as always.

from there we headed downstairs and through the second part of the gauntlet, then through the warehouse, finding pretty much everything we needed, including a really nice big carpet for the living room.

the wait for the cashier was long, but i guess not as long as it looked from the back of the queue. i bought fries while we waited, and it wasn't until i picked them up that i realized they sell falafel too, but i ended up getting a falafel later so it's all good. a bit dry, but for NIS 5 it tasted pretty good :P

once we paid - with a lot less drama than last time - we very quickly got called to the delivery counter. while taking care of that and also severely instructing mr smear to do what he was supposed to (what was written in his temporary diary) before coming home, there was some kind of incident between a couple next to us and a very angry dude with a particularly dark energy who i'd noticed at the cafeteria earlier. just after two of the mentally handicapped staff almost came to blows. weird times.

on the way out, waiting for gd and my mother with my falafel in hand, i noticed a tall, heavy, older security guard angrily speaking in french while eating a small ice cream. i didn't take a photo, 'cause that would have been rude, but i have that image in my head now 🤣

they wouldn't deliver the big heavy carpet, so i had to shoulder that along with my heavy backpack for the not-inconsiderable walk to the train station. it was okay for me, but my mom and gd were both feeling a bit sore (for different reasons) by the time we eventually got home.

while there was a stretch of fighting with mr smear just before dinner - due to his "sensitivity" to "cringey" music (johnny clegg) or any level of noise that isn't silence - for the most part he was compliant this afternoon and did a fair amount of math catch-up.

when i threatened him with punishment, i tied it into his homework - he's just learned about the fibonacci sequence, so i explained that he would lose hours of privileges in accordance with it. he found that funny just before he realized i was serious :P

dinner was great. mr smear ventured a drop of scorpion pepper sauce this evening and did just fine :)

...

i've really struggled this past couple of weeks, and i'm anxious about the coming one. i've worked a lot less than i should have, mostly due to the combination of family surprises (gd's health and mr smear's schooling) and me being sick and losing a heck of a lot of sleep.

i've taken my supplements, and i've turned my brain off for the day. hopefully tonight will be smooth.