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It is 28° this morning. It's supposed to get up to 47° and rain later. The forecast says the temperature will continue to rise overnight, then fall sharply tomorrow, and there is a red winter storm warning band on the long range forecast for the rest of the week. Oh, joy. Good thing I really don't have to go anywhere, excepting tomorrow, when I have a bunch of errands to run.

I ended up not going anywhere yesterday, either, not even to my recycling bin or my mailbox, because when I went outside to do the former, the pellety ice had solidified overnight and was just thick ice. I decided I didn't need to put those collapsed boxes into the recyling bin that badly, and I more or less forgot that I needed to go get the mail. It's fine. There's probably only some credit card advertisements and maybe a catalog in there, anyway. The check I have been expecting arrived the day before, so it's sitting on my desk now.

I started the Grand Work yesterday with the back room. I collapsed all the boxes that I had been saving, except for the one that actually fit the giant dog toy that I bought for MyNuncle (because it was a capybara (and, yes, there's a story behind that)). They made it as far as the breezeway (see above, re: ice). I put away, or at least moved, all of my Christmas gifts that had just been stacked on the table. I packed the capybara for shipping. I gathered up a bunch of stuff that I had ordered from Kohl's and been iffy about keeping (including a full-size wreath, and all the Halloween dishes I ordered) and got it ready to go back to the store (tomorrow), after the ice melts but before the next snowstorm starts.

I basically got the room down to its baseline level of clutter -- which means there's still cleaning to do out there, but there was progress.

A few things got ticked off my do-list for yesterday. While listening to Wait Wait Don't Tell Me, I drew the February pages in my desk calendar. I signed up for a budgeting workshop next month hosted by CSEA. I finally put together the vacuum I ordered on Black Friday and which has been sitting in the laundry room for a month. It was very simple, too -- all the pieces just clicked together, so I didn't even need any tools. I ran it in the kitchen; the beater bar seems to propel it on carpet, then that can be switched off for uncarpeted floors. It's heavier than the Hoover that it's replacing, though, and I'm not certain I like it. I don't think I want to try lugging it upstairs.

I wouldn't be replacing the Hoover at all if I could get the damn thing open so I could get at the filters to clean them. I didn't have this trouble with the last one. It simply requires more hand strength than I have.

There was no napping yesterday. I tried to call MyAuntie and Nuncle, but they were out, so I got my book and retired to the couch and read for the rest of the day. I finished Sorceress of Darshiva and have only Seeress of Kell (which I did not start last night) to go. I don't think I'll read The Rivan Codex, which is basically the story of how Polgara takes care of Garion's ancestors through the centuries (if I recall correctly, anyway; I have only read it once). After ten straight books of Eddings, it's time to move on to something else.

I went to bed around the normal time. I was able to reach Parker, so I kicked him out of the bedroom...and that was probably a mistake, because about an hour and a half later, he woke me up by scratching at the bedroom door to be let in. So I got up, used the bathroom, and went back to bed...and fifteen minutes later, he was scratching at the door again, so I got my little misting spray bottle from my craft room and spritzed him with it. He ran off, but fifteen minutes later he was back. So I spritzed him again. Again, he ran off and came back. After the third time, I was wide awake, so I ended up getting up and playing games on my computer until 1:00 a.m. And did Parker come to sit with me to get the attention he was apparently craving? No, he did not. He disappeared completely, the fuzzy little bastard. But at least when I finally went back to bed, he left me alone. Unsurprisingly, it was 7:00 a.m. when I finally woke up again -- two hours later than usual.

Today...I haven't quite decided what I'll tackle. I should probably just keep working in the back room until it is finished. I'll need to put yesterday's laundry away and maybe do another load -- I have accumulated enough rags now to do a rag load (which will include my sandals, because they were waiting for a load to go into). I need to sit down with my calendar and plot out do-lists for the rest of the week. Oh, I have to clean the kitty fountain today; it's Other Sunday. (It gets taken apart and scrubbed every other Sunday.)

The temperature is supposed to rise slowly today, by the looks of the hourly forecast, so it'll be a while before the ice starts melting, so I probably won't be going anywhere until this afternoon, if I go anywhere at all. Though I do need a couple of things from the grocery store. On the other hand, they could wait until I am running errands tomorrow....

According to their FB page, the new bookstore is going to start running three book clubs: a romance one (ugh), a general one (different topic every month), and a silent one. I may try the latter two. What I would really like is to have a language club where people could practice languages or even start learning new ones. I wonder if the library would be amenable to hosting something like that? I'm pretty sure there isn't already something like that and I'm not sure I'd want to have to organize it. I may check with them tomorrow, though.

I really don't want to spend my vacation cleaning. Have I mentioned that I really don't want to spend my vacation cleaning? But this is what happens when I don't spend my evenings and weekends cleaning....