Sitting Pretty
Thursday. After breakfast and the papers this morning at the usual place I drove on to Safeway to pick up cat food. Well, I'd run out of cat food as I often run out of cat food, but my thought was, as I was walking through the store, what in the hell is there in this place that I myself might want to eat? Why have I been having so much trouble getting interested again in food? Yes, there's still a certain “sourness” to the stomach now and again, but that's been improving. It's hard enough finding something on the menu in the mornings at my café, why so hard to find something to pick up and eat in the afternoon? I bought a small box of crackers because they were on sale, but have nothing to go with them. Cheese wasn't appetizing, hasn't been now since the operation. I have oranges in the refrigerator and I'll eat one now and again with some interest. Cereal, usually a safe bet, didn't attract at all.
Some people would not be complaining. You are, after all, losing weight.
Yeah, but nothing spectacular. I've been losing a pound, maybe a pound and a half a month now for well over a year as a result of the schedule changes that came into effect when I retired. I lost ten pounds after the operation. Fifteen right away before five came back when I started eating halfway regularly again and I've lost maybe another three these last two months on top of that through my normal course of after retirement attrition. I figure another ten pounds and I'll be where I want to be, let it decide where it wants to go from there. The appetite, for whatever reason, is just gone.
You're drinking less?
I find a little sake is nice in an evening, but I'm less interested over time, it seems, in drinking alone. Or, for that matter, out with friends, although that's probably the sour stomach talking and I'll get back to some sense of normalcy when it eventually takes care of itself. If it takes care of itself. I did buy one of the small four packs of Merlot with the idea of drinking it, of course, but the thought at that moment was I need to pour a glass of red wine to use for a prop when I redo my artandlife photograph (old coot with glass of wine and sun glasses, attempting to look relevant), something I've talked about but I've been putting off. Is that any reason to buy Merlot? (Well, yes, actually it is, but my haven't priorities changed.)
You talk too much and think too little.
All good things come with retirement and practice.
Later. A bus ride downtown and then a walk around the Old Oakland area passing a news conference being held in the City Center by two fighters promoting an upcoming boxing match. Lightweight? Heavyweight? I didn't even stop, didn't get their names, although I've seen stories in the paper recently promoting the match. Which is to say I've taken the bus downtown to Oakland and walked around whatever area maybe too many times. I need to get out of town. I don't need to do this for a while, maybe a long while.
I was going to meet Mr. E in San Francisco originally for lunch and now at The House of Shields around four-thirty for a couple of drinks after what is now no longer work: he laid off last week and I retired. I was up for lunch, sort of up for lunch, not sure about The House of Shields. Been there many times now, an interesting place, but like my walks around Oakland, maybe I've been there enough. For now. For a while.
And?
And feelings like these seem to come and go. Maybe a good sign in that they seem to come when my energy's up to the point of feeling antsy. Something like that, anyway, here on a sunny day in the apartment, sitting pretty with a glass of Merlot.
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