New desk, who dis?

 I downsized my clutter a lot when moving to the new house and once I got all my stuff in… the room still had that echo quality that screamed emptiness. At first, the minimalist void felt like an accomplishment but then it felt like I was in someone else’s home. And it was technically someone else’s home not long before then so I wondered how to make it my own.

One of my first big purchases was my corner desk. A humble behemoth that would fill the yawning space of the corner between the two windows. My little computer desk was some ramshackle abandoned Walmart buy my friend left behind when moving in with a boyfriend but it was perfect in my attic room with sloped ceilings and limited space. It didn’t make the trip here (my dad and stepbrother managed to bang up my storage ottoman and TV stand too but those were able to survive, albeit irregularly) but it would have looked ridiculous in the gaping corner space.

It took myself, my brother and nephew to help me put it together, if only to maneuver the thick instruction booklet, someone to hold and another to assemble. Two people was enough but being able to concentrate on the instructions and guide the assembly made for a smooth job for me, with each of them assembling a wing of the desk and referring back to me for their next step. Still, it took nearly four hours to reach completion and give my trusty old 2009 iMac a home. My graphics tablet (more often relegated to a second monitor) and printer joined the tech force and I was happy to assemble a proper filing system in the file side, adding a shelf to the big tower cabinet that needed no tower so I could file the odds like my mobile graphic tablet, binders, a photo box of resumes, fancy parchment papers and so on. It didn’t take long for dolls and a spice rack I converted into a craft bit keeper to move in. When my sister got me a Cricut and a 3D printer over the next couple years, I was truly at a loss for spaciousness.

I ended up converting my humble craft table into the only surface that could accommodate the 3D printer tent that is a necessity in a house with cats and shoving all craft stuff onto the right wing of the desk. My printer is in limbo between a grey end table and a wheeled laptop desk. Storage between the 3D printer and corner desk became… am I moving again? Boxes! Too many janky junky boxes! How did I get here AGAIN?!

So my new mission became to get… another desk. Something that could hold the entirety of the monster printer tent and provide sleek storage for all the craft-toting boxes. I wanted a craft table again. I wanted my corner desk to migrate back into a proper office setup (plus the whimsy of a cat cafe diorama but I’m not trying to become bland) and instead extend the space to accommodate having TWO Cricuts (yes, that’s right; as a product tester, I accumulated a spiffy new Cricut Explore 3 to now be the Queen of Craft Machines). I also wanted a proper cabinet to sort all this eyesore clutter into so I don’t look like a hoarder. Things eventually leave as I gift quite a bit rather than make and hoard. I wanted the journey, not to get saddled with a dust collecting neglected accomplishment. I find someone who will appreciate it and it’s theirs.

In any case, laptop desk will migrate into another space, as well as the grey end table, which will find a new home in the bathroom next to the sink most likely. The printer will go back on the corner desk and the craft table will fill that spot, getting all its crafting stuff back.

But, thanks to a friend of my sister’s needing some impromptu graphic design assistance and her adding another $100 for Christmas, I’m getting the desk I’ve wishlisted and mooned over for months! Measured, planned, perfect space saving and eye-pleasing compromise for that space. A black and faux wood miracle of modern space.

 I’ll post the proper before and after once I’ve gotten everything sorted and can say for sure what I’m pleased with. It should come the Sunday before Christmas so my sister will be here and offered to help me build it. So eager to get it up and functional.

As for life, I started the diet I was successful on years ago to help me lose weight. I haven’t been ambitious with exercise yet but dropping the weight is crucial in alleviating some of the pressure on unfixable joints. Diet is still the best way to do this, with exercise being better for toning and eventually burning off the more stubborn fat later. I’ve been going almost three weeks strong now but I’m avoiding the scale for now, just focusing on reducing stress (which can trap weight loss more than anything) and keeping a clean focused diet. 

For those wondering, breakfast is typically an egg on whole grain toast or tuna salad. Lunch is a prepped variety of 1/2 cup lentils added to soup. Dinner is either one of my prepped chicken dinners (sauces ranging from creamy avocado, creamy Dijon, hoisin sesame, and teriyaki, with broccoli, spinach or pineapples as the side. Snacks are usually honey Greek yogurt with chia seeds, cottage cheese with fruit, a hard boiled egg, typically a protein to keep evening cravings in check, which is one of my weak spots. Evening anxieties tended to result in unsatisfied grazing.

I haven’t done much crafting but this can happen when I’m focusing on diet. It’s not an easy habit for me, especially one not even a month old. I’m hoping the new desk and organized space may rekindle some of that ambition but it’s okay if some things need to be shelved while I focus on wellness. I resorted to extreme fasting and overdoing exercise in my desperation before surgery just to watch the number on the scale go horrifically higher. Now I have gastritis so if I want to court ulcers or cancer, I can skip meals but the only real option is a very protein focused steady small meal plan. And that is exactly what my old diet had been when I was doing well.

So that’s that. I’d probably go into more detail but I gave cats to feed. Man, can I fill time typing though!

Spontaneous Change

 Sometimes you plan for changes in life. I’m rarely able to do that successfully so more often than not, I end up… just doing it? Honestly, the results of the US election got me so low that I decided I was done with social media. I don’t know for how long but the month so far without it hasn’t made me miss it. 

My health is still subpar but I decided after Thanksgiving that I would go back on a strict diet that worked prior to the hormone hell of the ovarian fibroma. I don’t know how much exercise I can manage just yet but diet is far more pivotal for needing to lose weight. I don’t see my new doctor until February (a nurse practitioner but the semantics are ridiculous here and NPs are the real deal) after ditching the one that caused me more stress than helped. This also means I’m doing without Vyvanse (hey, I had to cope without meds most of my life; it’s not a setback, just a bit more work). Had to get an ultrasound but my gallbladder is okay. My liver is slightly enlarged but I’m thinking taking green tea extract might’ve been the culprit. Still have to speak to the stomach doc to run it by him. Either way, I’m going to make a shift. Try to see if I can take drastic measures to reverse some damage while also being certain I’m not encouraging disordered eating or excessive muscle damage. I still have the deteriorating foot bone. I still have osteopoikilosis in my left hip. I still have degenerative arthritis in my lower back. Those things don’t get better but I can at least lighten the load.

And I’ve been crafting though that’s a bit of a slog. I’ve finished two tiny houses, I’m attempting to crochet some plushies before Christmas for gifts, I fixed some patches that didn’t glue onto a coat right the first time (make sure you remove the backing off of patches; the glue doesn’t stick to certain backings. Test prior to sticking onto a jacket with any kind of scrap cloth. If it sticks, don’t worry about peeling it off, just trim the scrap and glue it directly to the coat. If it peels off, you need to get enough of the backing off to dab the glue directly onto the patch for attaching). 

Long parentheses, but that’s what I’m good for. Those asides that get away from me!

I have a couple more of the tiny houses to make and I’ll post them to this blog altogether once I’ve finished. And think about committing some shelf space to bringing their tiny neighborhood to life. I would love to find stable work from home. I have no desire to convert my hobbies to that space. I will either to design, copywriting or data work if I take it to monetizing, but never again making my hobbies and passions subject to custom order hell. I’ve been doing decent with generating a humble passive income with selling patterns but not a livable one. It constantly eats at me that in my early 40s I’m not in a stable place. That my mind, body and emotions are in a sort of chaotic limbo that I can’t do much to break out of. I’ve had to put commitments with dear friends on hold just to try to focus my limited energies on what little basics I can. 

I really hope I can adhere to the diet. Not gonna lie, it takes weeks to establish this kind of habit and falling off the wagon can make you vulnerable to where the ‘get right back on’ doesn’t always inspire confidence you can stay on. That can take months to believe you’re capable of. But it’s really the only way I have left. Doctors have only been able to do so much and the wait between what I should do is maddening. I have this one nugget of a time where I was turning things around and I have to REALLY work twice as hard to do that again. So much has changed with surgeries and menopause and time that I know I will need more patience with the process than before and that had pushed me to the limits before already.

No time like the present for change though.