Lost Hours

Posted by tmycann on Mar 13th, 2023 in indie | 0 comments

I've already lost an hour. I might as well just spend the rest of the day reading.

It’s that time of year again when my obligatory rant about the futility of “saving daylight” comes around, and I grouse about another week lost to the adjustment required for a purely ridiculous political construct.

It doesn’t help that this time of year is also when my allergies are at their worst – the two times I’ve been hospitalized for anaphylaxis were both at the beginning of bloom-time. This past week was edging that direction with a complete torso full of hives.

Luckily, we have tools at home that help me get through those difficulties, and my lungs are settling down again. But my eyes have taken on the puffiness of an excess of histamines in my system, so I retreated into a book yesterday. I found another new-to-me author, AE Jones, who worked a new angle to cozy mysteries with her Paranormal Wedding Planners series that had me thoroughly entertained. Enough so I lost even more of the night than I would have without the bloody DST kicking in. So I had to laugh when I read about words avid readers regularly mispronounce.

But since sleeping (and losing even one precious hour of it) is most particularly on my mind this week, I found it interesting to read how work-from-home schedules tend to lend themselves to worse sleep habits. I’m lucky that I have an in-home office, so at least I don’t have the disruptive association of a laptop in bed. On the other hand, following the advise of improved sleep hygiene according to what is recommended for getting toddlers to go to sleep also seems a stretch.

Then there were the two stories about the impact of place on people that caught my eye. The first was the ubiquity of naming places in Britain after the local soundscape. The second was that the majority of what are classically considered Italian foods, are, in fact … not. It’s remarkable that ancient trade routes still have such a profound impact on what people consider native.

And now that we’re completing our first year in our new home, and pondering our next gardening moves, I’m drawn back to those considerations. What are native species and how do we support native wildlife? In my wildest dreams, I think about building a recreational pond. But then you check on YouTube about costs, and come back to earth with… maybe this year we’ll just add another raised bed or two, and make sure to get in on ordering artichokes early enough that we can eat those showy flowers sooner than later.

In the background, I’m back to dipping my toes into the writing water. Between work and allergies, I haven’t had much energy for that effort, but it is definitely my intention to buckle down in the next few months. I’ll keep you posted.