Archive for tobacco shop
>A busy day…
>Being nearly out of tobacco, I walked with Tyke to the tobacconist at 8:30 am and got a new supply. Tyke’s smart enough to know where we are going now and walks into the shop on his own and tries to wait patiently, which is tough to do when you are a little dog. He also can’t wait to be outside again and return to the business of smelling everything in the gutter, which means it takes twice as long to get home, as I either wait patiently or drag him with me.
>Today…
>
I got up on time to answer my emails and have some coffee and smoke some cigarettes and blog a little. Before I do anything today, I have to go to the tobacconist to get my supply of tobacco and filter tubes. I can walk Tyke at the same time and then do a few chores around here. I have to get the apartment ready for the domestic help. There can’t be any kind of a chaos for her to start with, not even a little one. So I must organize the kitchen and clean up some things that are lying around in the various rooms.
>Wish I could figure it out…
>I slept more than 8 hours last night and it was wonderful. I thought I had lost my capacity to sleep long, but I need not have despaired and slept a hole in the day. I went to bed late, so I got up late and took my medicines late. Then, for some reason that I couldn’t figure out, I realized that I didn’t start feeling bad. I felt quite cheerful and was in a good mood, even though it had been well over an hour since I had taken my medicines.
I thought that was awfully strange and thought back on me taking the pills and then convinced myself that I had forgotten to take my Welbutrin. I had no other explanation for it. So I took that pill, but for some reason, I’m still in a good mood one hour later, so maybe I hadn’t forgotten it and I’m over feeling bad when I take them. Now I may have taken 2 Welbutrins, so I won’t take the one I was supposed to take later. You are supposed to take them all at once in the morning anyway, and the way I was taking them was an exception to this rule.
Anyway, the sun is shining outside even though it was supposed to be raining. I assume it will rain later on, it is forecast at any rate. I’m supposed to go to the tobacconist, because I won’t make it through the long weekend, but I’ll take an umbrella with me. Tyke will get wet, but I’ll rub him dry with a big towel. I can also quickly go on my bike and take the chance that I’ll get rained on. Then I’ll have to rub myself dry with a big towel. My hair will be in ruins, but it already is anyway, so it doesn’t matter.
It’s very nice to sit here in the middle of the day in my bathrobe. I do have to get dressed, but I’m putting it off for now. My sister called me and we both decided that we didn’t give a hoot that this weekend was a holiday and that we were going to live through it the best way we knew how and get on with normal life as quickly as possible. Maybe it would be different if we had a large family and a lot of celebrating to do, or should I say, commemorating? There does not seem to be much soberness to this holiday, but maybe there’s not supposed to be. Over here it’s a nonstop feast and food seems to be the main ingredient, not so much religion.
Well, I have to take Tyke for a walk before it starts to rain. There are clouds moving in. I hope you all have a nice day with pleasant weather. I just hope for a dry spell to go get my tobacco.
Ciao,
Nora
>Another fine morning.
>
I’ve just made myself another cup of coffee to get the sluggishness out of my system that is usually there in the morning when I first have gotten up. I’m very much looking forward to the day when it won’t be there. As a matter of fact, I think I am going to have to take a proactive stand in that and make the decision about that myself. Yes, I think that will be best.
I’m almost out of tobacco and must go to the tobacconist right away at 8:30. I also have to remember to buy some lighters, because I’m using matches now and they don’t work very well. They are inferior matches.
There’s nothing like a few cups of coffee to set your world right. It can change your whole outlook on life. That is, as long as you don’t dig too deep. You just have to stay near the surface. That’s where I’ve been keeping myself for years now. Living a shallow life. Trying not to feel anything too much, but being overwhelmed by my feelings anyway as if they were a disease that needed to be cured.
Not too long ago I asserted that I didn’t need too much coffee to keep me going during the day, but lately I’ve been finding that the opposite is true. Well, I need about 5 or 6 cups, although very often I don’t finish all of them and have to throw the last bit away because it is cold, and they are really mugs, not cups. That’s why the coffee always ends up getting cold. A mug is too much and a cup is not enough. I do have a “mup” that’s just right.
I went to the tobacconist with Tyke and forgot to buy lighters. I tore the apartment upside down to look for some and found a box of better matches, but it’s a small box. I called the Exfactor, who had said he might be by today, to bring me a lighter, but now he’s not sure if he’s coming. I’ll have to go back to the store to buy lighters and I am not amused. I’m having a hard time understanding the Exfactor on my mobile phone and it sounds like he is mumbling, when I say that I can’t understand him, he mumbles louder. I also don’t understand my psychiatrist who always insists on calling me on my mobile phone instead of my land line. It sounds like he is whispering. Now I don’t know if I need to have my ears checked or if it is their problem.
Gandhi barfed on the stove. Tyke tore my whole Trivial Pursuit game apart in the bedroom and it is all over the place. I can just get a trash bag and throw it all away. I haven’t done any cleaning, nor have I done the dishes. I am out of patience and out of energy and I need a vacation. I want to run away from home. Instead of that, I will clean up the cat barf and clean up my bedroom and do the dishes and dust my computer desk, but that will be it.
So, I better get to it then. There is no rest for the wicked. There is only postponement.
Have a good day.
Ciao,
Nora
>It’s the coffee…
>
You see, it’s the coffee that’s keeping me going now. I had that decaf, but it didn’t do me any good. I just mentally collapse and find that I’m on the verge of the throwing in the towel. I just want to give up and more than anything throw all my medication down the toilet for all the good it does me. I know I can’t do that because of the withdrawal symptoms, but I wish I was a year along and off a lot of these things I’m taking now. I’ve never been as depressed and anxious and stressed and unstable as when I’ve been on the medication.
Anyway, I make myself a cup of coffee and drink it and I’m okay again. I’m not collapsing any more, but I can’t stop and think about my situation too much, because if I do, I become very disheartened and disgusted and I want to run away from it and wish myself into another life. I am most unhappy and I don’t care who knows it and everybody can have their opinion about it and their suggestions about how to make it better, but I tell you, I have to get off those drugs that are screwing up my mind.
I’m always having to artificially pep myself up to make it through the day because of all the sleep inducing medication I take, and I take a lot, even though I want to take a little. I had just reduced my anti-psychotics and my tranquilizers when my psychiatrist increased them again when I started on the Welbutrin and stopped taking my other antidepressants. I’m sure that this was well intended and done as a precaution against the problems I would have with withdrawals, but I think it wasn’t necessary, really, and now I have to reduce those medications again. I can’t do anything on my own without his express approval, so my hands are tied.
For as well as I was doing for the first 2 weeks on Welbutrin, I am doing badly now, but I will also blame it on withdrawal of one antidepressant that I completely went off immediately without any back up. It’s gone completely out of my body now and no doubt it is having its effect. If I don’t feel a marked improvement on the Welbutrin in a little over 2 weeks time, I’m going to stop taking it and not use another antidepressant, but just depend on my mood stabilizer. Then I can start reducing the anti-psychotics, which is a medication I really want to stop taking, having never been psychotic.
You realize, of course, that I’m using this blog to organize my thoughts. As I write these things down, they become more clear to me and my course of action becomes more obvious. I’m not really writing this down to get answers to questions from you, though input is always welcome. I guess I’m trying to make clear to you how I live in the artificial world of pharmaceutical products and how that influences my mind and my body and how really unhealthy that is. When my second psychiatrist had to hand me over to my third psychiatrist, he worried a great deal about how he was going to explain my list of medications to him. You know something was rotten in Denmark.
So, I’m having my second cup of coffee now. If that’s what it takes to keep me going, then so be it. It’s really an hour earlier than it says on the clock and I will pretend I live on the Mediterranean and have a nightlife. I started out this post with a feeling of despair, but it has settled down now to a feeling of control. I see what I need to do and the road that I need to take to get there. That does not mean that I will not sit here the next time without feelings of despair again. My moods are as unpredictable as the March weather here.
For those of you who think I like changes very much because I changed my blog template, I have to tell you that it s very double. I get very excited because it is something new and I look forward to how everything will look and which template I will end up with, but at the same time I also don’t like changes very much and am most at ease with the familiar, so doing this is a daring step for me. It’s a challenge and I have to get used to it myself and I feel very insecure about it. I would have liked to stay the toad forever, but now I’m a watercolor. I’m trying it on for size. Maybe it will be scary and I will flee back toward toadness.
I have a feeling that I’m not going to stay up that late, in spite of the coffee. It will be good to get a decent night’s sleep or as long as I manage it. I have to pick up pieces of cardboard in the morning and go to the tobacconist.
Thank you for letting me bounce my thoughts off you. It’s been very helpful.
I wish you all a good night.
Ciao,
Nora
>Another post to let my words out.
>
The domestic help was here this afternoon. She was a real nice young woman. Unfortunately, she is not going to be my steady help and I don’t know who that is going to be yet. I may have several different people here before that is decided. It’s a real shame, because I liked the one I had today and got on well with her. She cleaned my whole kitchen from top to bottom. I dusted the living room really well, including the lamps and the picture frames. She vacuumed and mopped the apartment and I cleaned the bathroom sink and the toilet.
I didn’t do a fraction of the work she did, but I was so tired that I spaced out and had to sit by the dining table and recuperate. She was a hard worker and didn’t take a break. She left me a daily list of little jobs to do, so that when the domestic help gets here, she can concentrate on the big jobs, such as washing the windows and mopping the floors and cleaning the shower basin and all those fun things. I have to do things such as vacuum once a week and sweep the floors and keep the toilet clean and change my bed, beside the laundry and the dishes and the usual things that come with the household, such as dusting which always needs to get done.
Lord, you should have seen the dust I got off those lamps. It was plain scandalous. I don’t know why I never did that before. Or clean the light switch covers. I was lucky in that I didn’t suffer any embarrassment. I figured she had seen worse and I was a needy case. It was good to have someone in who said to me, “Now you go and do that.” To celebrate, I will clean the utensil drawer tomorrow and throw away obsolete items that are sitting on the kitchen shelves that were cleaned today. Does anyone want a toaster? I really don’t have room for it and it is in the way of everything. These European kitchens are so little.
My sister and I went grocery shopping shortly after 8 o’clock this morning and we were done quickly, because it was very uncrowded in the store. That time of the day really is the best time to shop. I bought huge amounts of milk and a big jar of Nutella and good things for the dog and Fish Menu for the cats and I threw away their old bowls and gave them a new ceramic bowl to eat from. They can dine in style.
We also stopped by the tobacconist, without to much complaining from my sister, and I got my supply of tobacco. It is very frowned upon that I smoke and I told my sister that my psychiatrist had said to me to please not stop smoking. It is like medicine to me and I would get into deep doodoo if I tried to quit now. It would be different if I were an alcoholic, I’m sure. I would be incoherent then.
I was walking Tyke this evening and suddenly a wind started to blow hard and very threatening, dark clouds raced across the sky, and I thought, ‘Oh boy, it´s really going to rain hard now, I better get home and bring the laundry in,’ but then nothing happened at all. It was all a false alarm and not a drop of rain fell out of the sky and this while they had been predicting a light rain all day that had never materialized. They never get it right for our little part of the country. I´m glad because the laundry is still hanging outside and I do want it to get dry there, because they are bed linens and I want to make my bed with them and have it smell good.
I changed my email addresses, because it turned out that the old addresses were still in the Exfactor´s name and I had been warned that one day, when the company went through all the obsolete accounts, they would be removed. So now I have two email addresses under my own name. One incognito and one real one. I´ve also simplified the username and the password with the help of the excellent people at the helpdesk. You just need to talk to the technicians and you are in good hands. Nobody else there knows what they are doing, but these guys do. They are the best.
I now spend half of my life being Nora Ibsen and I´m seriously considering changing my name to it, although they are rather strict in the Netherlands about that. You can´t just up and decide that that´s who you are going to be now. A judge has to rule over it and the queen has to sign the final papers. I can´t change my name until after my daughter has gotten her Dutch passport, which should happen this year and she will have all the rights of a Dutch citizen. She´s so excited about it and so am I. Her son has a German passport, so he is already a European.
Every once in a while I have a tiny little fall in a pothole moment. It lasts just a minute, but for that minute I feel like shit, and then it´s over and I´m fine again. It´s hardly worth mentioning, but an interesting phenomenon. It reminds me that I can´t take anything for granted, although I´ve had a good day.
I do easily get tired, though, and I realize that I have to build up my mental stamina slowly again. Doing physical jobs is not physically so much tiring as it is mentally, because they have a tendency to defeat me. It´s the endless futility of them that bothers me so, although I guess if you really get it cleaned up well, it does stay that way for a while, and if you keep on top of it, it doesn´t get out of hand and become a huge chore for you to tackle. You know, I used to do these things so easily when I was younger and happier.
I´m planning on being happier again, though. It´s definitely a short term goal and I feel it is within easy reach. I just have to have a lot of faith. I hope that by being proactive I can make a change in my life. I have to believe in that process.
I hope you all have a great night.
Ciao,
Nora
>Spontaneity!
>
I did sleep well last night. I went to sleep early and had the sound of the TV turned down so low that I could hardly hear it, so I basically looked at the moving images until my eyes closed and I was gone. When I woke up this morning peace reigned until I started moving around and Tyke decided to assert himself by barking at Toby, who doesn’t give a hoot. He then chased Gandhi around the apartment for a bit and finally settled down again to sleep some more by my feet where he is now. I would say that I’m properly awake after all that. I don’t think I’m supposed to have many dull moments in my day anymore.
I’m drinking my second cup of coffee now. Yesterday evening I had to go to my sister to borrow milk, because I was all out of it and I can’t drink my coffee without milk. We will probably go food shopping today. I’ll have to check and see how healthy my bank account balance is. It’s best not to live in complete ignorance of that, although it would be nice to assume there’s always enough money there (I just checked my balance, it is healthy).
At 8:30 Tyke and I will walk to the tobacconist for our morning constitution. It will be a hurry up and stop expedition, because that’s how Tyke moves through the world. He behaves alright in the shop itself, but I keep him on a short leash. I’m sure he would get into everything given the chance and tear the wrappers of the candy bars that are so invitingly displayed at the front of the counter.
I have to do paperwork that is stacked up on the dining table and first sort out the important stuff from the things that can be tossed out or filed away. It will probably leave me with very little that I actually have to do anything about. The dining table has become a catch all for all things, because it’s the one place that Tyke can’t get to. As long as the chairs aren’t pulled out anyway. It’s where I keep everything that needs to be handy and within easy reach. I used to be able to lay things on the coffee table, but that’s not possible anymore. I was so used to Jesker who ignored everything around him unless it was food and even then he wouldn’t touch it unless you gave it to him. He would just sit and look at it. Tyke’s not the least bit like that yet.
I have to do laundry, but oh, when do I not need to do laundry? It’s an ongoing project. I think my laundry multiplies in the basket. I used to enjoy doing laundry, but lately I’ve been completely turned off by it. Now it’s a job I have to force myself to do. I have to talk myself into it. I think I really want a tumble dryer. I know that would be decadent, but it would make my life so much easier.
It’s cloudy and 3C outside. It’s going to be cloudy and 7C today, but no rain is expected yet. I suspect that weather wise, it will be a dull day today. It doesn’t look like we’re going to see any sunshine. What’s a day without sunshine? Surely we need our vitamin D?
It’s slowly becoming time to get the show on the road. I have to take my medicines and eat breakfast and feed Tyke his. Another cup of coffee would taste nice. I have to wash my hair, because I can’t do a thing with it. I think it’s time to call the hairdresser. Oh, they’re not open on Mondays. I have to find a clean sweater to wear because I spilled food on the one I was wearing. I like big sweaters that hide a lot.
Have yourselves a good day. Mondays never seem that good, do they?
Ciao,
Nora
>Walks!
>
It was cold yesterday and in the morning it very briefly snowed. I dressed myself appropriately and at 7:30 took Tyke for a half hour walk. I was planning on going for a longer walk, but I had forgotten my gloves and after a while my fingers were freezing, so I had to go home again.
At 8:30 we walked to the tobacconist, me with my gloves on, and that’s when it snowed, much to my surprise. I was wearing a double layer of clothing, so I was warm enough, and I dropped off my purchases at home and continued on with Tyke in the cold for a longer walk. This time we walked for an hour on a route that I had not taken before and Tyke had a ball. There was so much to see and smell. We walked past the graveyard and the hardware store and over the path through the wild field and back through the old part of the neighborhood. There was no traffic where we walked, but luckily, Tyke understands the concept of a sidewalk and stays on it.
At 1 pm we went for another walk on another route we had not taken before in a totally different direction. We walked all the way to the children’s farm, which is like a petting zoo, but the animals are all penned up, so you can’t actually touch them. The first thing we saw on the path walking towards it were two big peacocks that got out of the way quickly when they saw Tyke, but Tyke was quite excited about them. Then we got to the meadow where the sheep were and Tyke stood in amazement at so many strange animals. There were more peacocks that moved to the top of their shelter when we got close and then we got to the chicken coops and Tyke was mesmerized by the chickens and the roosters that behaved just like they ought to have. They all clucked and the roosters strutted. Tyke thought it was great and we stood for some time watching them. Then we moved to the rabbit hutches which interested him not at all, and the horse which he thought was pretty neat. He was just a bit scared of it. He was not scared of the big ducks in the next meadow and wanted to chase them, but the ducks kept moving out of his range. They were very big ducks and would have made a nice meal. Peking duck… mmm! After that we circled our way back home and when we came back I saw that we had been gone for an hour and 15 minutes. So that was not bad.
You see how Tyke is getting me out of the house and into the world without me even realizing that he is. It happens without me thinking about it. I just do it. Before I know it I’m a few kilometers away from home. I do have to add that all these walks are followed by long naps on the sofa by the both of us and when we wake up he greets me as if he has not seen me for a long time. He’s so full of love.
It is now very early in the morning and it is snowing just a bit, but it is nothing to worry about because it will be 6C today and whatever stays on the ground now will melt. We’re going to have rain showers today and I hope there aren’t too many because I do want to go for more walks with Tyke. There are more routes we can take that we have not been on before. I want to take him to the woods that are a few kilometers from here where the pond is and where dogs are allowed off their leash. I’m not going to let him off his leash yet, but it’s a nice walk, albeit somewhat muddy at this time of the year.
Well, I’m going to sleep some more.It’s too early to stay up. You all have a good day!
Ciao,
Nora
>Delete everything…
>
I’ve tried several times today to write a post, only to stop after a paragraph or two and to delete what I had written because I was unhappy with it. I turned off the computer each time and retreated to the sofa where I napped all day long in between attempts at writing a post. You all know that sleeping is my way of dealing with emotional upset, so I suppose this is my way of dealing with Jesker’s death, which really does bother me in many more ways than even I am consciously aware of. I guess I am in mourning.
I did make it to the tobacco shop and I brought Tyke with me, which was a treat, because it was hurry up and run to the next interesting place and stop suddenly by the succeeding good smelling spot. I had to hit the brakes many times or drag him with me against his will. He does provide recreational entertainment.
And here is where I freeze up and don’t know what else to write. A great tiredness falls over me and all I want to do is sleep and it seems like so much effort to keep on writing. So you’ll have to excuse me if this is all I write, because I’m not going to delete this also. I’m going to put on my pajamas an bathrobe and pretend it’s very late at night.
Ciao…
>Waking up!
>
I suppose when it really comes down to it, I don’t so much write for the sake of you as I write for the sake of myself. I mean that I have a compulsion to write at certain times of the day even when I don’t have anything noteworthy to report. I just need to sit here and tell a story and I don’t know if I tell you the story or if I tell myself it. I guess it is a letter to myself to remind me of what I have done and thought and mused over and observed, yet if that were completely true I might as well write it in a notebook and not make it public, so obviously I need an audience and feedback. I write an ego document that I want to make known. But I’ll try to write as if I’m the only witness to it, though I doubt very much if that is possible. Even Anne Frank wrote to an imaginary friend she called ‘Dear Kitty.’
I’ll set the scene. I’m sitting here in my very warm, red bathrobe by the desk lamp with my cup of coffee and the inevitable cigarette. My feet are still bare, but soon I will get my slippers on, because my feet will get cold and my toes will feel like ice cubes. The dog is asleep on his blanket, but has been over here to be petted several times. He wags his stubby tail and gives me a mournful look that means, “Don’t neglect me.”
Outside there is still a little bit of snow, but not very much. Only in the places where the sunshine doesn’t reach during the day are there a couple of centimeters. It is 0C outside and it’s supposed to be snowing now, but I see no evidence of it. Oh yes, I just had a better look and it is snowing indeed. It’s supposed to do that the rest of the day also if I’m supposed to believe the weather forecast on my browser.
I didn’t fall asleep until almost midnight. For some reason I went to bed late and read for a long time. I also ate Pringle’s Onion and Cheese potato chips. Those were very nice, but made me very thirsty. They must be very salty and I probably had a week’s worth of sodium last night. I don’t recommend anyone doing this before they go to bed. It’s a foolish thing to do. I shouldn’t even buy them, but sometimes it is hard to withstand them when you’re in the supermarket and you see them there so invitingly on the shelf. I shouldn’t go down that aisle anymore. It’s actually easy to avoid. I have no business being there.
I can’t go back to sleep this morning, because I have to go to the tobacconist and he is only open in the mornings on Mondays. In a little while I have to take my medicines and when I’m done writing this I’ll take the dog for his walk. Maybe I’ll lie down on the sofa after I’ve gotten my tobacco. In the afternoon I have to go see my GP for the results of the blood tests and I have been trying to figure out all weekend what he wants to talk to me about that he couldn’t discuss over the telephone. It’s a mystery to me. I suppose it’s normal for me to say that I’m just a little bit worried.
Well, that’s all the sharing I have to do this morning. It’s not very deep, but I’m not in the mood for an intellectual post today. I have other things on my mind. I’m preoccupied.
Have a nice day!
Ciao.
Another Splendid Day 