Dichroic Reflections

anticipatory stress

I don't know. I'm feeling overextended again and there is NO GOOD REASON for it. I flew on Sunday, the roughest flight yet: not only couldn't I hold altitude, the CFII couldn't hold altitude. ANd meanwhile the whole aircraft was bobbing and rolling like a boxer despite my best efforts to hold it steady. We'd have side to side rolling and small dips and bumps as well as long slow thermals and sinks that I couldn't seem to counteract, so we were moving around on two time scales as well as three axes. Yuck. (At least the CFII admitted he didn't like that shit either, instead of the usual "What? This stuff is fun!" And this was the first guy I'd flown with who shares my views on the header bug used to mark course on the gyrocompass, which is that it's annoying and obscures my view of the compass ticks. Most of the instructors insist I use the damned thing.)

I was sore Monday just from flying with my shoulders hunched up around my ears. I'd considered taking the morning off from workouts but was feeling allright so I did a relatively intense erg piece. Then last night I felt icky (possibly dehydration) - fortunately not too bad since I had to drop my car off for 30000 mile service. (I am *not* convinced 30kmile service is anything but a moneymaker for the dealer, but the car is leased so I feel I should be good about maintenance.) I did take this morning off and slept until 6. Or tried. Between Rudder's 4:30AM alarm and the cats, I wasn't terribly successful.

I think I'm feeling stressed partly by what's to come and partly because the heroine in my current book really is stressed and put-upon. (The first Sarah Kelling mystery.) Work is being relatively calm, but everything else isn't. Tonight I pick up the car after work. Tomorrow morning I ought to row or at least go to the gym. Tomorrow night I fly again. Thursday I work out, Thursday night.... I think it's too early to make matzo balls, but maybe not too early for the torte. Rudder will be injecting the turkey, though, which always means a kitchen atmosphere thick with onion and pepper and garlic, not the best baking environment. Or maybe I'll hit the supermarket for horseradish and apples and whatever else I've forgotten. I'm considering attempting a charoses-inspired Pasadic apple crisp, as if anyone faced with a chocolate torte really needs dessert choices. Clearly is a Bad Influence, though overabundance of food at holidays can reasonably be called one my traditions as well. Friday we'll be registering people for this weekend's juniors regatta, and I need to make the matzo balls so they can sit overnight before boiling. Saturday She-Hulk and I will be dockmistresses for the regatta after which I change clothes in a phone booth and fly home to make the soup and the torte, and set the table and neaten the house. Then later I need to make the asparagus and probably scalloped potatoes. And I need to make charoses, though I won't bother with the whole Seder plate (no idea where to get a shankbone, for one thing.) And then there's the fun of having people for dinner and the drinking wine and eating, and then there's the cleaning, then Sunday morning I have to fly again. I signed up for a slot at 10AM, in hopes I can have at least some wine the night before and not be feeling it by then.

So apparently the stress isn't entirely just rubbed off from my book. But pre-emptive stress is sort of a stupid idea.