Home again, jiggety jog

leather skin and the fingers of a three year oldHmmm.  Been a long time since the last post.  Nothing ominous about that - I had a few days feeling crappy in there somewhere and suffered from really gruesome jetlag upon my return to NC but I am really feeling fine.
I had a lot of fun in NZ getting lab results - the results from some labs got emailed to me (or not) while other labs insisted on mailing them to me for security reasons.  The mailed results never arrived so I hope whoever got them enjoyed them.  So, having had a couple of weeks to recover from the NZ trip, I trotted off to Cancer Care of WNC to find that all my blood numbers are pretty healthy - a couple a bit out of whack and most of them towards the lower end of the  "acceptable" range but nothing to set the alarm bells ringing.  I will have a quick whinge about the format of the new reports, though - the old ones came in a simple table form, one line per item.  It is all now laid out "prettily so you have to scroll through many screens to see who you're doing.  I suppose that's progress and explains the exasperated sighs from the medics who look after me.
Now to get on with life which involves finding stuff to do that's not simply doing stuff for the purpose of staying "active".  So I've been busy trying to keep busy.

• I've signed up to work at a polling station on election day.  It's a long day - about 15 hours - but it doesn't seem too arduous though I am guessing that the turnout will be higher than usual at the next lot of elections.
• The Tutoring Connection has thus far lined me up with two tutoring students.  I hope they haven't left it too late in the year - exams are about 6 weeks away so miracles may be called for.
• I've let the world know I am available for substitute teacher work which pays the princely sum of $105 a day.  It's a  fun thing to do, though, as you get a real mixture of pretty much doing nothing for the day (showing your class a movie, for instance) and having some real fun (when  teacher suddenly comes down sick and you are thrown in at the deep end).  There's also the odd opportunity to show off - "Any questions about last night's homework?".
• Last week I worked with Habitat for Humanity installing the grossest piece of home equipment ever - an all-in-one washer and drier combo with both devices built into a single box.  The cables could only be attached by someone with leather skin and the fingers of a 3 year old.
• On Saturday I will be playing a gig at a local bar with a country trio.  I know about half the songs and have never heard of the other half.  Must try not to say "it's only country so it should be easy" as some of those folks sneak in some nasty key changes when you're not expecting it.
• Oh yeah - Susan and I have decided to redo the master bathroom.  My contribution is likely to be doing the flooring and leave absolutely everything else to the pros.

But, to get my week off to a swinging start, it is time to head for the dentist.