Busy Saturday

I think the nicest thing about Saturday is that I can spend pretty much the entire day doing exactly what I want to do.  Except that I can't because I get overwhelmed by thinking about all the stuff I need to be doing, but don't want to. 

I saw on social media that the inability to get started doing anything is a symptom of burnout.  Maybe that's been my problem here lately.  I'm just burned out.  I wish I knew how to not be burned out, but I don't.  

I'll give you an example.  I've needed new glasses for a while now, only my eye doctor has retired.  I have to find a new eye doctor and I don't do new well.   The eye doctor by Walmart doesn't accept our insurance, and I had a bad experience at 20/20 a while back.  That leaves a relatively new place, A Look Ahead.  

I went to their website to get their phone number, and much to my surprise, they had a form online to request an appointment.  I filled it out and submitted it, and got a message saying one of their friendly staff would be in touch with me.  

A day passed, no word.  Two days, three...after a week, I decided to try to call them.  I went back to the website on my phone, and lo and behold there was a button that said "Call Us".  I clicked it, and nothing happened.  I clicked it again.  Nothing happened again. I clicked it a few more times with the same result, so I backed completely out of the website and punched the number in manually on my phone's keypad.  

It said my call could not be completed.  I did it a second time and got the same message, so I went back and filled out the form on the website again.  It's been three days, and I haven't heard back from them.  At this point, I'm wondering if it's just me.  Am I doing something wrong?  

What is wrong with me that I can't even make a simple eye appointment without screwing it up?  I guess I'm going to have to go back to 20/20 if I want new glasses.  I'd never intended to buy glasses from there anyway, though.  I'll just go to the eye doctor and get my glasses from the optical center in Walmart.  

OK, on to more pleasant things.  I finished another sailor hat this afternoon.  

Yarn:  Red Heart Bitty Stripes

Colorway: Rainbow

Pattern:  Basic Beanie

Needles:  US 8 / 5mm

Before I did that, I got up and did a thing.  A thing that required me to leave the house.  If you know me at all, you know I'm totally not a thing doer, and I'm totally not a house leaver.  But I did it and need to tell you about it. 

I went down to the Spring Market on the square.  It wasn't much, though.  It's a new something they're trying to get going, but so far it's not going well.  There were only a few booths, and the so-called entertainment was just a guy with giant speakers playing a playlist.  So, I left there pretty quickly and went to the Spring Wings event at the Lee Tartt Nature Preserve.  

Only I got there too early and they were still setting up.  I did talk to one very nice young man who is doing his Master's Thesis on the Chackchiuma people who lived here before.  He had a table showing some arrowheads, pottery shards, and other artifacts from their archaeology site.  

There was another man selling native plants, but he didn't have anything that I wanted for my native pollinator garden.  So, I just walked the trails and came on home. 

I was pleased to see that they'd removed the tree that had fallen across the Old Man Of The Swamp, but he still needs a little sprucing up in the form of fresh pine needles rewoven into the wire frame. 

I also walked the river loop trail, but didn't do a Pokémon Go route.  I just walked it.  Even though I knew we are in extreme drought, I was still a bit shocked at how low the river is.   

I even walked across the street and walked the Bottomland Trail part way.  By this time, I was getting tired.  My legs were getting heavy, and my bladder was getting full, but I kept walking.  I didn't want to leave the woods. 

I walked to my second favorite sitting bench -- which used to be my favorite until they built the one overlooking the swamp-- and sat there for a while.  

So, I somewhat reluctantly walked out of the woods and came on home where I had a whole list of chores waiting to be done. 

One of those chores was cleaning out the two remaining snake tanks, which I did pretty quickly.  Those had paper pulp bedding in them, but I figured it's still biodegradable, so I used it as mulch in my tomato bed. 

I saved a little back for when I get those tomatoes planted, which at the rate they're growing won't be much longer.  Heh, I'm sure the gardening experts on YouTube would have something to say about me using old snake bedding as mulch, but hey, I've been putting it into the compost for years.  It would have gotten there in the end anyway. 

On a similar note, I finally got around to making paths in my fairy garden.  

I took the leftover stones and made sort of a central patio area where the fairies can gather. 

Maybe I'll buy some fairy chairs and put them out there, too.  And look what I found while I was doing that!  

It's a bud!  I'm going to have zinnia blooms pretty soon.  

And finally, remember this guy?  Just a few weeks ago, I thought it was dead and was going to put it into the compost.  Just look at him now, all perked up and happy. 

I just wish I knew why it was struggling so much, so I don't make the same mistake next winter.