well . . . maybe?? -- nope I guess not
Shobhit's back pain seemed to improve markedly yesterday. It gets a little worse after any time he lays down and it's the worst after sleeping overnight, but in each case it seems to be notably better than when he was last in the same position. Suddenly I'm filled with hope for the weekend.
We're not out of the woods yet in terms of my being disappointed, but Shobhit was in a better mood yesterday than he's been in all week -- like, in a legit good mood -- and when I said, "Maybe we can just go down on Friday to stay one night in Portland instead of two?" he replied, "Maybe." I'll take it!
His original intention with two nights included a vision of the trip that included an extra day that I could have taken or left anyway: a day trip from Portland over to Cannon Beach and Tillamook. If we just drive down tomorrow instead, a) we'd just stick to visiting Portland, which was basically all I wanted anyway; and b) we'd only pay for one night at the hotel instead of two, which will save me money I thought I'd otherwise be spending. Booking so much later might cost more for a single night, but I can't imagine it costing more than the originally booked price for two.
Furthermore, Shobhit had a doctor's appointment today that we were going to have to wait until after, before driving to Portland. We'll have no such barrier if we get up and go tomorrow morning.
I am still steeling myself for the possibility that we don't manage to go, but I remain hopeful that we can make it work. Shobhit doesn't seem all that excited about trying to fit a Portland visit into a different weekend this summer, and we have plans to go to Denver in August already, and July weekends are already full of plans of one type or another -- most of which can be moved around if necessary, but it would still be more of a pain than just getting the Portland trip out of the way now. So I'm hoping we can make that happen.
...
. . . So much for that! Shobhit finally texted me after seeing the doctor. He took L&I forms to both his jobs. And he finally said he still doesn't think we should go to Portland tomorrow. "Just do something fun locally," he wrote. "I don't wanna drive 180 miles one way." Fine, fine. We'll have to do plenty of driving down to Chehalis for the wedding Saturday as it is.
This does mean I will now have to make a herculean effort to go to Portland sometime in July though. Or sometime, I guess it's not mandatory that it happen in July. Maybe September or even October would be a better idea, given all that's already planned in July.
Most of the evening yesterday was spent on the largest outdoor deck atop the west building of the Braeburn Condominiums, as we had a community barbeque. We were up there far longer than I expected -- like, three hours -- so I was sure glad I had the wherewithal to put on sunscreen, especially on by far the hottest day of the year thus far. We skirted 90° yesterday and that sucked. I was pretty sweaty by the time I got home on my bike.
I was even originally planning on attending this event without Shobhit, when I thought he'd be working. He's called in sick to both his jobs the past few days though because of his back, and so he was actually able to attend. It worked out well as he became the de facto Braeburn representative, being the only Board member who either bothered or was able to attend.
The whole thing was organized by another resident, a former Board member named Mary, because of having experienced property theft in the garage. So this was both a spring barbeque and a "safety demonstration," with three "community outreach" officers from the Seattle Police Department present for the first half hour or so. It was kind of jarring, exiting the elevator to the roof and then seeing cops there, with all their firearm gear strapped to the outside of vests. "Why are the cops here?" I wondered, thinking for a second maybe there had been some kind of incident. I was definitely not the only resident for whom that was the effect, but it was soon made clear what they were there for.
And admittedly, I found their presence at least somewhat illuminating, although most of the information being hammered into everyone was stuff I have long been over-familiar with -- never let people tailgate behind you at building garages and entrances, that kind of stuff. As for Mary and her focus on property protection, I honestly found her a little insufferable, particularly when she would try -- and fail -- to get the police to comment on whether the city's homeless population was addicted to opioids, something I'm not convinced is that relevant to her stuff in storage getting stolen.
She'd only get the Silver Medal in the Annoying People Olympics for the evening, though, thanks to another older man who apparently has lived in the building since it opened in 2005 (I have long thought the entire complex opened in 2006, but learned last night the west building opened in 2005, and only the east building, the one Shobhit and I live in, opened in 2006 -- a year before we moved in). He was kind of a yeller, would not stop and listen to people actually attempting to address his concerns, and it was difficult to get him to just shut the fuck up. At one point Shobhit even got up and had a bit of a private conversation with him, which actually seemed to kind of calm him down. I have to admit, Shobhit did a pretty good job of displaying diplomatic leadership capabilities last night, and I'm actually not often prone of give him compliments of that sort.
It was pretty sparsely populated when Shobhit and I arrived, and Alan, the building manager, had both regular and veggie sausages already on the grill. I'm all about the free dinner! That was the whole reason I was going to go even by myself if I had to. As time went on, though, a pretty nice number of people actually came up, until both the circular picnic tables were quite full. At one point I was at one while Shobhit was at the other; after a while I joined Shobhit at the other, but then Shobhit got called to my first one to answer a question, and then for some time we had basically just swapped tables. And I did quite a lot of chatting with plenty of people at both tables -- even Mary, who was far more tolerable when she was just sitting and eating and visiting, rather than attempting to get everyone to listen to a presentation at an event that wasn't optimally designed for presentations.
It was nice that the event happened at all, and it's only because of Mary that it did, so I have to credit her for that. The young photographer woman who has previously been the Social Committee Chair had to abandon the post due to her busy work schedule, and I don't think there is one officially currently. Sometimes I wonder if I should consider it, but I'm selfish and just not sure I want the responsibility. In any case, it was a nice evening and I was surprised it was already 9:00 when Shobhit and I returned to the condo.
[posted 12:28 pm]