Good Times All Around

OK I started this day out with the joyous knowledge that as I was waking up, the OMA was on a train for Kiev, starting the first leg of his journey back to the same continent. I'm so excited. To be able to talk to him whenever I want again, for however long I want, and not have it cost me a small fortune every time....YAY!!! To be able to text throughout the day. Sigh. I can't wait. So here's the breakdown; I wasted $20 the first week cause the phone cards I got were crap. Then I called on my cell phone; $32 for 12 minutes. I got 2 more phone cards and spent $20 for 50 minutes. Ridiculous, no? YES!

So right after I woke up I figured I'd follow the James Herriot principle and drug myself back up so I could sleep, sleep, sleep and heal myself. Took some cough syrup and went back to bed until around 2 p.m. Woke up feeling good but as I tootled around I became shaky and nauseated again. I'm like, WTF do I have to be SICK about??? Then I thought about my food habits of the past few days, example, yesterday's menu:

• a nectarine
  
• 1/2 fried potato w/chili & cheese; took me 1/2 the day to eat it, too
• a few bites of ham (probably 10 diced chunks)
• 1-1/2 cups zesty zucchini soup (SOOOOOOOOO good)
• 1/2 bowl (perhaps 2/3 cup) of chili
• about a cup of shrimp and mushrooms pasta with basil

Now that's not a lot of food, and I had about that much if not less the day before. I had to write it in my journal to make sure I wasn't making it up! Now if you know me at all, you know that I don't lose my appetite, even when I'm sick. So this is really something for me. And it's been like this all week. I'm calling it the flu diet and looking forward to getting on the scale in the morning! :)

So anyway I was getting ready to blog about my fun project last night, and I started feeling sick to my stomach again, which really pissed me off cause I had a nice pot of txdsajumpsk on the stove, and it smelled so good. Discussion with Michelle on the phone let me to conclude that perhaps my lack of nourishment might have something to do with it, as all I've had to eat today is a peach, and it IS almost 4 p.m. So I sucked it up, made myself a small bowl of soup, and am already feeling loads better.

So onto the project! I got myself an attachment for my Dremel last night, with the goal of taking my cast iron skillet down to the metal cause it's been in really bad shape for awhile (BAD Carey). So I got a 3/8" Flaphwheel, 80 Grit, and went to town. Thanks to Science, I have safety glasses, which I donned, and used a cloth napkin for a face guard against the dust I generated. So what do you think I look like? A bandit? About to rob a bank? Hold up a liquor store? A complete loon?

So I laid down old newspapers to catch up the mess. I checked my e-mail before starting and was startled by Henri zooming across the room and attacking the papers. I yelled 'what the hell are you doing????' which startled her, and I was bummed that I did cause she was at the start of Something Big. Felis Catus Interruptus. Not good. So she stopped her antics and sat, princess-like under a piece of newspaper for a good while. I laughed out loud then got my pan and tools. I started with the Dremel, but it was taking forever. So I took a screwdriver to the mess and discovered that most of that shit came off that way. Of course a screwdriver is awfully small, so I found an old paint scraper and went to town with THAT. Boy oh boy. I had a pile of crap on there that was truly fantastic. Black shit all over the living room, iron dust in the air (super good for the old lungs).

Unfortunately, being a black, cast iron skillet kind of precludes you getting a good look at how dirty it was and how clean it IS, but here are the before, during and after. I think I finished somewhere around 12:30 a.m. after working on it probably an hour, maybe a little longer. I washed it down with soap and water and then seasoned that sucker in the oven for an hour, and now it's good to go! Of course it's a little sticky since it's not completely seasoned yet, but that will come with time. And that was my "God I'm going out of my mind with boredom after 3 days of being sick on my Death Couch and I've GOT to do something" project. :)