Day 18: So Over Winter

 

Here we go ! It's a new year. Time to get back on track with diet and exercise. The goal is 100 pounds by 12-31-25. Can I do it ? Well, I won't know unless I try. My original Day 18 blog can be found here. It was MLK day and I was at home. I'm not sure if it was a company holiday or if I opted to take the day off. More than likely it was a holiday.

It was about 7 degrees when I got up this morning. Just like yesterday, I had left the cabinet doors open under the sink and I did not use the kitchen faucet. I used the water in the laundry room to warm up Minnie's food and wash my hands. It was so cold I didn't even put out dry food for the strays, mostly because they haven't been there for several weeks. To my surprise, when I did go out to fill up the dry food 2 of the strays were there ! It was the older orange & white guy and the white female ! I quick grabbed a can of food and warmed it in the microwave for them. They ate every bite and probably had some dry food too. I tried the kitchen water around noon and it was fine. I have no idea if it was frozen but I'm being careful ! Tonight it's going down to 5 so I will definitely not use that faucet tomorrow morning. The low for Wednesday is 11, Thursday is 15 and Friday is 12. After that we'll be in the 20's at least through Monday. We got very little snow yesterday and none today, though it's in the forecast starting at 11 pm. The radar shows the lake effect dumping way north of me, so that is likely going to dip down my way. The storm warning expires at 1 pm tomorrow. I swear this is the 4th week in a row that we've had a M-W storm event ! Spring cannot get here soon enough !

I spent the morning watching a storm chaser down in Louisiana, which is experiencing record breaking snow ! I played Cookie Jam for a while to finish up the weeks challenges and then switched over to my casino apps, which I'm really enjoying ! I have 3 of them and 2 of the 3 have been generous enough with coins to allow me to play for long periods of time. I played till very late last night but I don't intend to do that again. I am not dragging my tablet upstairs every night.

Breakfast was a 180 calorie cinnamon roll. I didn't have a yogurt or morning snack. It's a good thing, because lunch was a 410 calorie beef pot pie. It was tiny in comparison to the calories ! I had some cashews for a snack after lunch. Later I had some hot chocolate with marshmallows. Dinner was a 260 calorie roast turkey with mashed potatoes and the last of the stuffing I froze at Thanksgiving. I also had some roasted carrots. Evening snack was a 140 calorie lemon zest cake with whipped cream.

I made the pot pie for lunch since it meant having the oven on for an hour. That helps warm up the house ! Between 4:30 and 5 I put a pan of carrots in the oven to roast. Those will be part of my dinner. It's 5:15 now and I'm starving !

I remember that I needed to certify my unemployment claim for the week, so I logged in to do that. It looks like my claim has been approved with the $504 figure on my initial letter, so I'm not going to bother sending in the form they sent me about my bonus. I'm sure they got info  from ATT that is was for 6 months salary. It looks like it will be effective January 25th, so I'll keep an eye out for the money to start hitting my bank account. This money will pay my medical & dental in full, along with some other monthly bills for the next 26 weeks ! I haven't finalized my tax return yet as I don't have the official tax forms from my bank. I like to have those before I send it off. I don't expect my return to change, so I'll be looking forward to seeing that $9500 hit my account ! Things are starting to fall in place for 2025 and (hopefully) 2026.

I've kept the space heater running all day, mostly to keep Minnie warm enough ! I think it was 58 or 59 in my bedroom when I got up today and it was 66 in the dining room. It think the laundry room was 58 or 59 as well. This is typical when it's this cold. My next utility bill is going to be huge, that is for sure.

Well, it just turned midnight as I'm finalizing this blog. I went upstairs to turn on my electric blanket and grab my water bottle so I could add some ice to it. I only turn on the blanket long enough to warm up my bed. Once I'm in bed I'll turn it off. The temp upstairs is only 62 but that is plenty warm enough for me. 

I spent the evening watching storm chaser live streams in Louisiana and later Florida (of all places!) and playing my slot games. I used all my coins on all 3 games, which was a disappointment. I'll recharge tomorrow and spend more time playing Cookie Jam. My phone says it's 9 degrees but the thermometer in my kitchen window reads about 14. I like that number better ! The high for today was 15 and that is the high for tomorrow too. We did have some sun today and I'm hoping we have some tomorrow too.

As much as I hate to do it, I'm going to turn off the space heater and go to bed. I can't leave it on all night because they're a fire hazard. Minnie will be warm enough, I wrap my blanket around her since she won't let me cover her up. My hope is that is keeps her a little bit warmer. I need to buy one of those self-warming pads. She lays on my pillow and I could put the pad between the pillow case and the pillow. I'm going to look on Amazon tomorrow and see what I can find.