All work and no play

I haven't been able to play all week and the effect has been to turn me into a cranky person.  I haven't watched a single movie or done one thing that's provided relaxation, and that includes knitting.  The one time I did sit down to knit Sara's mittens, I made a mistake that led to ripping out an entire cuff and the mess that made is still sitting in a heap in the corner of the room.  I did, however, teach Sara how to cast on and have fixed a few of her newbie knitter boo-boos, but however enjoyable teaching someone to knit may be, that's not really knitting for me.

I plan to remedy that today.  The only work I plan to do is throw a stew into a pot for dinner and then I'm going to knit.  I won't make the bed, pay the bills, shop, cook or clean.  In fact, I may stay in my pajamas all day long.  It's cold, overcast and a rather blah looking day, so maybe that's a good plan. Tomorrow, I'm working a men's health screening event that's free for the public, but I don't consider volunteering my skills to be work.  That's the kind of thing that fills the spiritual gas tank.  We're expecting at least 1,000 uninsured men to take advantage of this event.   Can you imagine?  We live in a country where there are still some people that cannot get even a basic health evaluation and so their issues go unattended.  I fully expect that it's possible my heart may get broken a bit by the things I see and hear.

On Thursdays, Sara babysits for her best friend and Rylan comes here to spend the day.  I'm usually around to spell Sara, but worked for 10 hours yesterday away from home.  It wasn't so bad when Rylan napped all day, but apparently those days are quickly coming to an end.  I think she plans on skipping the whole crawling thing and will likely graduate to walking soon.  She is 6 1/2 months old and was 4 weeks early.  I will venture to say being early didn't hold her back at all.  She loves Mr. Leo and he is smitten with her, too.  I'm pretty sure he'll be ecstatic when she starts eating real food and leaving crumbs all over the place.

The last time Rylan was over, Leo, who has a really frightening voice, barked loudly at her and made her cry.  Since then, Rylan has perfected her own squawk and gave it back to him yesterday.  Loudly.  According to Sara, this startled Leo, who tucked his nubbin of a tail as best he could and, frightened, ran out of the room.  I wish I hadn't been so hard at work that I missed that comical event.

Incidentally, Rachel was here yesterday, too.  She spent a lot of time petting Rylan's fuzzy little head.  I'm sorry I missed that, too.  Next week, I promise to cut myself some slack.