Gratitude Journal #25

It is Sunday evening, and I am actually getting this written/posted! I have decided to try something new. On Thursday, I bought myself a giant (and I do mean giant) new monitor in order to create a docking station for my laptop in the office. Since I am working from home on Fridays, it is nice to have a big screen on which to do my work. Spreadsheets on laptop sized screens aren’t always the best. Anyway, my thought is that I am going to leave the laptop actually plugged in in the office the majority of the time. I can use my Surface in the bedroom. So if I actually want to write, I need to get up and go to the office, and then I have the good set up.

I know that this may seem like it will make writing on Sunday evening less likely. Since this is only the second time I have managed to actually do Sunday evening writing since I said I wanted to do it, I am not super worried about “less likely”. But I think it may actually help. Because instead of thinking “I need to write” and then just going on to the next thing and forgetting about it, if I think “I need to write” well then, I need to get up and go to the place that is set up for the writing. I am hoping that will actually help me. We will see.

Gratitude Entry #57 – Yoga Class
I have started going to a once a week yoga class offered at a church in my neighborhood. The class costs $8 each night, which is a lot less expensive than any studio. There is nothing religious about the class, the church is just the neighborhood location where the class is held.
The first night I went was a restorative yoga night. I am in such poor shape that my stomach muscles hurt for two full days after the class, basically from just stretching. I have been going to 5 weeks now. I can feel the difference the stretching is making in my hips and my bad knee. I am having a lot less passive pain in my knee, and pain in my hips is rarely waking me up at night.
But it is not just the hips and knees where I am seeing improvement. I had a massage therapy appointment on Friday, and my massage therapist mentioned that everything seemed in just a little better shape than usual. My neck and shoulders are a mess, but only my really bad side was really bad. And because my quad muscles were not as bad as usual, she got to spend more time working on that bad shoulder.
So I am super happy with my decision to start taking this class. The whole point was to increase my strength and flexibility, specifically because of the passive pain I was having in my knee. It is extra nice to have confirmation from my massage therapist that the classes are also helping my shoulders and neck.

Gratitude Entry #58 – Home Grown Produce
I do not have a green thumb. I just do not. But I have found out there are some plants I can grow without killing them, partly because I now live in the PNW, which is an environment that actually likes growing things (as opposed to norther Nevada, where I used to live). I container garden because that is the simplest form. Right now I only have three plants – a rosemary bush, a basil plant, and cherry tomatoes. And we are getting into the season when the tomatoes are ready to be eaten.
My lunch tomorrow is a salad. In addition to spinach leaves and baby bell peppers from the store, I have mixed in basil leaves from my basil plant and the tomatoes in it are from my tomato plant. The hardest part of making my lunch was not just simply eating the tomatoes fresh off the vine.