And, we're back to Monday! Whooo! IT's probably going to be a busy day with a lot of tea and warm drinks to get through without coughing. I think it is slowly improving, just a lot slower than I'd like. At the rate I'm going , it'll be another 3-5 days before I'm better, unless the steroids do a sudden kung fu maneuver on my lungs. Which is not seeming likely. It's helped some, but not like I was hoping. On the plus side, aside from some sleep issues, I haven't been overly angry, so the ADHD meds are holding strong.

It's weird that ADHD meds have done so much for my anxiety and mood swings. It's just like a warm blanket and cup of tea for my body and brain. When he gave the meds, the doctor mentioned that it might cause anxiety or hype me up. But in reality, I feel much more solid and relaxed when I have the medication. Apparently, it's not unusual for women to have that reaction, because for us sometimes, ADHD can be different, and of course no one studied it until recently, so it's tough to find the info. For women, it can involve being inattentive--having trouble concentrating on one thing, anxiety, mood swings, feeling the desperate need to be doing something, but not being able to chose or focus. And the meds just...turned that off. Now I only have anxiety in the evenings when the drug wears off. I really wish I could have a short acting that I could take at about 5 to ease me into the night time sleepy meds. But doctors are weird about controlled substances.

Yesterday was a nice day. It started with a game that coyotegestalt is running--a 9 session "one shot." To be fair, it probably would have been a shorter game if I was a bit less of a chaos demon from Hell. It was planned that the giant and his dragons would fly away, and we'd have to chase.

In practice, I blinded one of the dragons, and they crashed, and I started an absolutely bonkers fight with probably a hundred enemies. (Most low level and easily destroyed, with about 6 heavy hitters.

Most of my rounds have been given over to healing, but this last game, I got the chance to do something cool. One of my spells was "control water." We had a giant water elemental come in and flood an enormous swath of beach, catching several of my companions in it. Control water is ridiculously overpowered, so in one turn, I cleared half the beach of water, ala Moses. This allowed Jess' character Kragnik to run up the beach and punch a dragon to death. (The Monk class is wild.)

Then, before my next turn, Kragnik ran after the giant, and was about to try to take him on solo. My character, Casey has a bit of a crush on Kragnik, and was not having that, so they cast Harm on the giant, which killed it. Of course, immediately afterwards, Kragnik got smacked real hard by a the giant wave, so next turn will definitely be healing. It was super fun, and I felt good that I could get us out of the problem I had 100% caused. Fortunately coyotegestalt does not blame me for my Chaos Muppet tendencies, even if it changed the game they planned.

After that, we sat and watched two episodes of Bake Off, which was lovely. We finished Pastry and Meringue week. Then, I fucked around on the internet and looked at vacations for 2028. We're already set for this year and next, with Alaska this year, and Iceland to Rotterdam next year.

I'm thinking about a Mediterranean cruise in 2028. We'd board in Barcelona and go to Athens with stops in Cannes, France, Sicily, Rome, Crete and Mykonos. It sounds very tempting. The real expense is going to be the airfare. I joined Ratepunk, so I can keep an eye out for the cities to see what we can find.

I'll have to continue to hoard my PTO so that I'll be good for that in 2 years. It's a 10 day cruise, so I'll need at least 14 days of PTO out of the 17 I get. (18 if MLK continues as it's been.). It's a lot, but it's a 10 day cruise, and I'd like a day in Barcelona and a day in Athens to explore. It's Europe, so we're going to eat a 15-20hrs each way with travel. So that should do it.

After spending years not being able to really go anywhere, I'm definitely making the most of the ability to travel. There's places I want to see, dammit.

After I finished looking at the possibile ships available to cruise on, I made dinner, pork chops with Saltverk's Arctic Thyme salt and perogies with sour cream and sauerkraut. (Jess skipped the sauerkraut. Not a fan.)

Then we walked the dog and retired to our bedroom to wind down. It was a lovely day and I am glad I had it, since work today is sure to be busy.

And on that note, I shall hop off and get myself together. On the plus side, I got some hard boiled eggs, so I don't have to worry about doing that. It's lazy, but I'm still sick, so fuck it.

Everyone have an amazing Monday!