creative.mother.thinking

I mean, I’m spending most of my days at home but this week was a bit different. And I didn’t even travel.

I had gone to bed an hour too late yet again, this time because I missed the right point in time to get ready for bed and then just sat there, unable to move. Harumph. I have to say, I feel like an idiot with these things but, well, I can just continue trying. This time it was also partially due to the boy asking me to help him study right when I was about to go to bed with a cup of tea and a book but he didn’t really force me to stay up for an hour afterwards.

I did my complete morning routine regardless even though I only wrote very few words but I always feel better when I try.

I was totally determined to do the weekly cleaning and also do the dishes for once. I did do the dishes and went through half the weekly cleaning list before my husband came back from his run and started cooking.

Lunch was a bit unexpected, we had some goulash in the fridge that was supposed to be good until Sunday but when we opened the package it looked – not good. So we had pasta with tomato sauce instead:

After lunch, just when I was about to break into a burst of cleaning the boy showed up and we talked a bit and that was that. I had an early start to teaching, a potential new student showed up who wants to learn ukulele. That was nice.

As were my other students that day.

I was finished around 6.30 and met my husband who was doing more dishes. The load of laundry that he had put in in the morning was sitting there in a hamper and since I had about 15 minutes until I was due to do bodyweight training with the boy I hung the laundry up in the meantime.

By then I was in that stage of exhausted and tired where you sway when standing still and start feeling cold for no apparent reason, always fun.

We did bodyweight training anyway. The boy complained about not making progress, so I pulled out the book we’re basing our training on and found that we have been doing week 3 and 4 over and over. So I guess it’s time to progress to the next part of the program.

Then I finally got to eat dinner, ate more chocolate than planned, sat around, completely energy-less for an hour and decided that getting myself in front of TV to watch C-drama would be too much effort and went to bed with my book.

I’m still reading „Guardian: Zhen Hun“ by priest, I finished part three of the novel but there are a couple of bonus stories in the back of the book and I’m both interested in reading them and a bit meh about it.

I turned the lights out almost on time, which is good, and slept well.

Today I will do all the things! For real this time.

I went to bed on time and did most of my morning routine. YouTube apparently knows that I want to see a short morning yoga video by a certain instructor and now offers it to me when I turn my TV on in the mornings. Which saves me the time to search for it but also feels a bit weird.

There was breakfast, talking with my husband who was feeling down and scattered, then the usual morning things before I had to wake up the boy and catch another train.

I fumbled around again, just like the day before, when I tried buying a physical train ticket. I tried paying with my smartwatch but failed, then tried with my debit card, failed again, then the train arrived and I gave up for the moment. The weather was not the best:

I renewed two prescriptions, went to the nice health food store for some meat (and chocolate), walked back to the train station and tried my luck with the ticket machine again. Managed to botch not only contactless payment but also put my debit card in the wrong way twice. Each time I had to start the whole ticket buying process over.

But I prevailed and after finally getting my ticket I saw why contactless payment wasn’t working: the sensor was in a completely different part of the machine than I thought.

And this is what a natural affinity for technology looks like. Ahem. You just try and try again and don’t let yourself be deterred by looking extremely silly. And next time I’ll do a little better.

I took the train home, made a short detour to the pharmacy and am now done with errands and shopping for the week. I hope.

I came home just in time for lunch:

I ended up not eating that particular piece of chicken breast because it turned out to be so thick that it wasn’t done in the middle. My husband shared his piece with me that looked bigger but was only half as thick. This piece was then put back in the frying pan.

I ate some chocolate and more coated peanuts. I will have to instate a ban on snack-buying, I think, this is getting out of hand.

I had a short break and then taught a handful of delightful students before meeting the rest of the family in the kitchen. They were doing the dishes together which was very nice.

The boy showed me the latest model that he painted and told me all about his day where he went to uni to look at one of his exams. The students have the right to see their exam paper and if they think the TA made a mistake in grading they can basically haggle for points. Which the boy did this time because he was one point short.
And he did find something, talked to the TA and – got an additional point. And passed! Hurray! One less exam to retake.

Then I started writing this post, did Duolingo, made a list for today and watched some C-drama.

And today I won’t go anywhere, I’ll just stay home, maybe clean a bit and teach. And then the weekend.

I went to bed too late but got up 15 minutes earlier than usual so that I could do the complete morning routine on time. I almost managed to finish in time for breakfast with my husband. I’d say that being only 3 minutes late is impressive, unfortunately my husband was not impressed.

I had to leave before I even finished my morning tea to meet my Apple Genius Bar appointment. With the error message regarding the battery I decided to have it changed sooner rather than later.

The trip to Munich was uneventful, the train was even on time.

Everything went smoothly and I was told the repair would take an hour.

Being without a smartphone felt weird. Also, no camera, no music, no looking up train schedules, no map. I did have something to read because I had packed my eReader. I also had borrowed my husband’s phone in case I needed to leave the phone overnight or something. My train ticket was on my phone as well and the idea was to download it to my husband’s phone.

I went to one of the cafés right across from the Munich town hall and ordered hot chocolate:

I didn’t stay long and went to the nearest department store. After a brief look at bags I went in search of food, of course. I looked for crackers, mango chutney and a few other things but only got the crackers. Oh, and at the café I bought some pastries for the rest of the family.

Then I got my phone back after paying the fee and went back home. On my way from the train station to our house I went and bought some mango chutney (failed to find some in three different stores!) and chocolate.

I was very happy to be back home.

My husband was not as happy, he had one of those days where everything feels wrong and he had his own string of errands and chores. Lunch was rather simple:

Then I had twenty minutes to read and eat my chocolate.

There was some teaching, one student after the other, but not for as long as usual, my last student had canceled. Instead I wrote the grocery list and went out again into the rain to walk to the nearest supermarket.

That went okay but they were basically out of bread. The bakery right next to it at least had some bread left, so no one will have to go hungry for now.

That supermarket run I also did something I had never one before, I paid with my smartwatch. It was rather funny. I had used the self-service stations often before but this time I tried paying several times too early. I wasn’t at that stage yet. And then I did every possible thing wrong.

But I prevailed! Milestone reached.

It’s funny, every time I help someone who isn’t as tech-savvy they tell me how easy these things are for me. Yeah, right. Because I get it all right away, no problem. Says the woman who had to fumble around on her watch while squinting under the watchful eye of a supermarket employee for ten minutes. Sure. Easy. And not humbling at all.

Anyways, after that I went home, packed the groceries away, then waited for the boy because we wanted to do bodyweight training.

We did our training even though my stomach had been rather unhappy for hours, then I forced myself to take a much needed shower (I knew, if I waited until after dinner I’d never do it) and then I ate all the junk food. Note to self: you only think coated peanuts and candy will make you feel good but they never do.

Anyways. I briefly talked with my husband, forced the boy to do the dishes, started writing this post, did a brief session of Duolingo, made a list for today and went to bed.

Today will be the last day taking trains and rushing around for now. Or at least I hope so.

Lots of excitement for not much result.

I went to bed an hour late, bad move. I had helped the boy study thermodynamics (no, I have no idea either, he just gave me some notes and asked me to check if he remembered things right) and that seems to have thrown me off.

As we have already established, it doesn’t take a lot to throw me off.

The other thing was that my phone displayed a message that there was an issue with the battery and to make a service appointment for a new one. Sure.

I woke up first myself and then half an hour later the boy who was supposed to show up at uni for a lab safety briefing. I went back to bed and wrote morning pages. And then I got stuck. And felt unable to open the manuscript. I was already late (as usual) and decided to eat breakfast alone in peace instead of the rest of my morning routine.

And so I did.

My husband and I then had a lovely and very long conversation about our respective morning routines. He wakes up between 6 and 7 and wants to eat breakfast at 8. I wake up around 6.30 and then want to write morning pages, spend some quality time with the manuscript, do yoga and meditate before I eat breakfast.

If there was no transition time I would need about 90 minutes. Perfect!

But wait. What I really need is 90 minutes plus the time it takes to actually become awake, use the bathroom three times or so, open the windows, close the windows, set the table, get everything out that we need for breakfast including thawing some blueberries, carry my stuff from the kitchen to the bedroom and back, weigh myself, dress myself, open the computer and wait until it’s all booted up, change to reading glasses and back, turn the TV on and unroll the yoga mat, search for the yoga video and start it, roll the yoga mat up again afterwards, plus – and this seems to be essential – check email briefly twice or so, and accidentally start reading something online.

So. We’ll both be aiming for 8.30 from now on. Wish me luck.

After that it was already a bit late so getting ready for an epic round of errands got a little hectic.

I packed my backpack, changed into actual jeans, told my husband I was ready to leave, fought with my phone and earbuds so they played what I wanted to hear and was off.

After all that hectic I was 10 minutes too early at the train station and then the train was late. No worries, I would still have 20 minutes to renew my prescription before the doctors office would close for lunch. Enough time for that doctor, another prescription renewal, then the health food store there, taking a train back, go to the supermarket where I buy yogurt, to the pharmacy and the the health food store in town.

Great.

I left the train, walked to the doctor’s office, decided to take my insurance card out before getting into the building and sensed that something was off.

I didn’t have my backpack.

Shock!

I remembered stamping my ticket before getting on the train and that ticket lives in my wallet so it was clear, I must have left my backpack on the train!

What to do?

The backpack itself was not much of a loss but my wallet. With all the cards, my ID, my driver’s license and quite a bit of cash.

I walked back to the train station. I couldn’t do anything about prescriptions without my insurance card. I mean, I could have because there is a way to show the card from the app on my phone but, well, I didn’t want to deal with that as well.

I tried calling the lost and found but didn’t succeed. I had to top up my phone card as well. Which I did.

I tried figuring out if I could catch the exact train I had used again for my way back. Maybe the backpack would still be there?

I realized that I didn’t have a train ticket. I thought about buying a new one with my phone.

I searched through my pockets for some reason and found – the ticket I had stamped before.

Huh. So the ticket had not been in my wallet after all, it was in my coat pocket.

So, if the ticket had not been in my wallet in my backpack, then maybe – I had not left the backpack on the train but instead – at home?

I thought about calling my husband on the phone but he doesn’t answer the phone. Not the landline and not his cell.

I took the next train back home. As the train doors were closing I realized that I had forgotten to stamp the ticket for my way back. I decided that if I were checked I would break into tears and tell the whole sorry backpack and wallet-story.

On my way I texted my husband and asked if I had left my backpack at home.

I was almost back home before I got an answer. Yes! The bag was sitting on the kitchen bench.

Phew.

I went straight back out after coming home, to buy yogurt and groceries. Since there was no more time for the things I had gone to the next town over for I’ll have to do those another day.

My husband had made risotto which we ate a little late:

Then I had a long teaching day, ate dinner, did Duolingo, actually watched a bit of C-drama and went to bed.

And today I will take a train in the other direction so that my phone can get a new battery.

I went to bed too late yet again, barely managed to write morning pages and then went down yet another research rabbit hole instead of writing. Yoga? What yoga?

And then not only was my brain mush, I also ended up being super cranky because it was the end of carnival break and the whole week had been going different than expected. Fun!

Husband and I started the day right by making each other more confused and cranky over breakfast. We did sort things out but still. I talked with my mother on the phone for almost an hour, then sat down to start project planning on index cards and planning out the week.

I helped a little with cooking when lunchtime came around and my husband was right in the middle of cooking. There was pointed cabbage stew:

Since the boy is vegetarian we always get our meat on the side these days. Then there was a break and chocolate and more planning and index cards, I read and played iPad games for a bit and went on social media, then spent some time watching course videos about book launches and marketing (brr), realized I was hungry and decided to eat dinner at 5.30, talked with my husband some more, did bodyweight training with the boy (and felt stupid and weak which seems to be an inevitable part of the process), helped my husband with the dishes, spent some time reading, started writing this post, did my foot exercises, watched some C-drama while spinning and crocheting and went to bed.

And now it’s back to teaching every day. I’m looking forward to getting more stuff done now that I have less time, you know how it is.