Shake It Up

...which is what my youngest seems to be demonstrating here, though in reality, we had a minor shaker the night after this photo was taken by one of my grandgirls who was trying to stay awake during a family wedding planning session by playing with the camera in between reading snippets of May Bird while her sister chowed down on chili cheese fries. I think my daughter was probably demonstrating either removing the wedding veil or else, some sort of coverage of food at an outdoor reception -- or possibly some obscure marital ritual from another culture. Hard to tell...but since it seems to illustrate a later part of the story, I decided to go ahead and post it, since I have nothing else to show you, and you know how I like to have a picture for everything.

Anyway, Wednesday night, I made a brief foray out into the world after days and days of quarantining myself for the good of the world, and we all met up after cheerleading practice for the youngest grandgirl...for one thing, I hadn't seen them since before New Year's, no thanks to those recent bouts of illnesses, and for another, there's a wedding in the planning, coming up sooner rather than later, thanks to frequent flyer miles that need to be used or losed lost. Also, I was feeling better than I had in days -- at least, at that point in time. So we met up at a fast food restaurant, which might have been my biggest mistake - though maybe not, since I was the only one to become ill - and it's hard to tell for certain anyway, without going to the doctor - again -- which would mean sitting in a room full of other sick people, some of whom are possibly carrying the one or two viruses that I haven't yet managed to pick up in the past couple of weeks, so whether the digestive ailments now plaguing me are food- or virus-borne, I don't know. It doesn't really matter enough at this point, to take the risk of catching yet something else in the waiting room, to go find out.

After our outing, I came home, managed to visit one or two blogs and e-mailed a few people that I was feeling better than I had in days, then went to bed late Wednesday night still feeling as though I were finally on the mend. Which, as you might guess, is not how I woke up on Thursday morning, by any means - and that didn't improve till late Thursday evening, when I finally dared crawl away from the bed and bath area, towards the kitchen, to see if my body was ready to accept water again.

Which is when the earth started to shake.* As these things go, 4.5 is not a huge one, and as a California native, I think I'd normally have taken it in stride - but the way I was feeling at the time, I wasn't sure if it was the earth or me...and with the epicenter, roughly right under us, 4.5 feels a lot stronger. It didn't help my confusion that while I was telling K. to sit down, it's an earthquake, he was insisting that the cats were 'just doing something.' Which, yes - yes, they were - they were bouncing off the walls in terror, in fact. I think one of them was climbing the curtains, actually. However, I knew they weren't bouncing hard enough to make the light fixtures swing -- or was that me just having another dizzy spell? Nope. I received confirmation from the radio and internet. Just the earth waiting till I tried to get on my feet again, to shake things up....

So I did the only sensible thing and went back to bed. I didn't want to tempt fate anymore this week. Today, I'm still shaky - though obviously not as much as yesterday. Hopefully I'll be ready to shake things up, and get some things done on my own terms again, soon. Meanwhile, I'm just taking it all one step at a time. Possibly wearing a protective mask of some sort.**

*I tried to link to the USGS site showing the map with the epicenter, but I'm not sure if it will continue to show the same map or not, since it's a 'real time' web page. Updated - It did keep changing - so HERE is a static page of it.

**Just so you know - I have been trying to be 'creative every day' (well, except for yesterday), even while recuperating. I'll try to show you some journal pages, a little later on.

Have a wonderful weekend!

Comments

[Janet]

HB told me there was an earthquake last night but I didn't feel it. Then I heard about it on the news and knew he was right. I'm glad you're ok. Stay calm, rest, and feel better.

[violetismycolor]

scary, scary...I grew up in California and remember our earthquake drills. I actually believed that my flimsy desk could protect me.

[Caroline]

Wow - I do hope you are feeling better soon - it sounds like you've been shaken up in more ways than one.

[gemma]

I'd love to laugh at your dizziness during earthquake season but I seriously hope you feel better soon.
xx

[Pacian]

*Clearly* she's riding a make-believe motorcycle.

I'd kind of like to be in a small earthquake one day. But I wouldn't like one to come and find me at home. All my books would fall off the shelves.

[Tara Bradford]

Oh my! Sounds like bed was/is the best place for you to remain until you're feeling much better! Poor you - all that and an earthquake to boot! Hope you're on the mend soonest. xoxox

[pam aries]

Whoaaaa...girl! Earth shakes and shakey viruses. Dang! I hope you are feeling better.Shake your booty!

[Lisa]

Glad you're feeling better. Only you could make illness so comical. hehe

[stephanie]

You have really been through the wringer! Hope you are ALL done with this stuff.

AND, yikes, did you at least move your bed under a doorway...

[paintandink]

I didn't even know there had been an earthquake... I just wrote about the Northridge earthquake, actually (I moved my blog, but I hope you can still find it through my blogger profile)...

I'm so sorry you haven't been feeling well... hope you are better now!