Slowly getting better

I guess. Right now my worst complaints is that my throat is still sore (from what used to be called "catarrh," which I think is a more evocative word than "post-nasal drip") and the hives I got - OMB, the hives - as a response to the virus* are really itchy

(*Apparently this is a thing for some viruses, especially in people prone to hives? I looked it up online and the couple of urticaria sites that referred to it seemed to treat it as no big deal, so I won't worry. But I'll be glad when they're gone. It does seem any more when my immune system is challenged, I get more hives: got a few after the flu vaccine)

I did push through and decorate the tree last night. I had enough ornaments, especially after stopping at Lowe's (for hooks) and buying a box of glass balls in silver glitter, copper-color, and white with gold and silver stripes.

Yes, I prefer the glass balls. I looked at the "shatterproof" ornaments, but they always look kind of cheap and compromise-y to me. Like, "Yes, we have hyper dogs and a small child, but we still want to put up a tree, so here, let's have some plastic things that look like glass." I was hoping the technology on these things had got better, but you can still see the seams from the molds and the chunkiness and everything.

And anyway: it's just me in the house and I kind of bent the hooks around the branches so I expect the ornaments will stay on.

Even at that, I had a REALLY hard time putting anything breakable on the lower branches: memories of years and years in a house with cats. We used to have a tradition of putting bells - real bells, like the sleigh-bell type jingle bells - on the lower branches because when my parents cats were young and rambunctious, it served as an early-warning system that one was messing with the tree. They never tried to climb it, but when they were young, they did like to lie under it and sometimes swat at the ornaments - so we just put light, unbreakable things (and the bells) on the lower branches.

I have a lot of ornaments. I even didn't wind up using all I had, partly because I ran out of steam (I may fill in one or two gaps, as I spot them, later this week. And I do want to run to the CVS just on the off chance the Applejack ornament that is supposedly out is there....Amazon has it but only in a 2-pack with Twilight, which I already have, and also I think they were "third party prices," which I tend to be unwilling to pay.)

I have LOTS of "toy" type ornaments: the My Little Ponies, yes, but also a couple of Snoopies and Hello Kitty and a SpongeBob SquarePants I totally forgot I had. And lots of just little soft-toy things: a couple of reindeer, a few unicorns (one from this year's collection at Target), some mice...I suspect it's showing my 1970s roots that I have a lot of handmade (or handmade-looking) ornaments, and my tree isn't really "themed."

We never did "themed" trees when I was a kid - it was just "what ornaments do we have and which ones to do we like?" Every year a few of the glass balls would perish as someone dropped them, or one of the cornhusk ornaments would crumble or get an infestation of bugs...we always had more ornaments than we put up, anyway. But some of my friends, their families did "themed" trees where the ornaments were all one color or shape, or it had a theme like "lodge style" or some such, and I often wondered: what did they do with the ornaments after the theme was over? Because some people had different themes every year. (Now that I think of it: it's entirely possible all the stuff was rented. I think I've seen businesses locally that do that. But that makes me kind of sad because I always liked seeing the same ornaments come out each December.)

I just realized I didn't get my Rudolph out....I will have to find that ornament and put it up.

So I don't have to go to Sherman this weekend, and I don't think I will. For one thing: I need the time to be sure I'm FULLY recovered before traveling for Thanksgiving next week (It will be semi chaos at my parents' house: my brother and sister-in-law are bringing both their dog and their two new cats, and my niece is now 5 and apparently pretty hyper). Also, I could get a start on writing an exam I give the week we come back....that would make my life easier if I did that.

And it will be nice to just have some quiet time at home. And to finish the AAUW hat gift.

Photos of the tree will come, but will come later, after I get home and get a few things done this afternoon.

But it was nice to focus on that. I half-watched a Hallmark channel movie ("Carols and Angels," or some such? One of the characters was an angel, apparently in Clarence Oddbody mode, who was supposed to get a particular man and woman to fall in love, because they were destined for each other?) while I trimmed the tree but yeah.That kind of thing puts me in a better headspace than the news (the worst news of late: the guy in California who went on a "killing rampage" even though his neighbors had apparently called the cops for some time warning he was dangerous. The most potentially interesting in a geopolitical sort of way, so probably won't get reported on much Stateside: what's going on in Zimbabwe. I'm hoping hard that if Mugabe gets ousted, they have elections, some reasonable person gets elected, and things go better for the ordinary people of that nation, but I think "hope" is about the best I can say there...)