February 24, 2008

• It seemed like a good idea at the time.

  Yesterday the sun shone and I could feel its warmth where the sunlight touched my skin.  That’s a clear indication that it is past the middle of February.  At this latitude, winter sunshine may be blindingly bright on snow, but it holds no warmth.  Just the opposite:  clear days tend to be colder than cloudy ones, until about this time of year.  Days are longer now, too.  The sun rose today at 8:22, and will set at 6:07.  We are gaining daylight at a rate of almost six minutes a day.  In another month our daylight hours will exceed those of places farther south.  Midnight sun, here we come.

  The warmth made me overconfident, I guess.  Besides that, all my profile pics were at least a couple of years old, and I wanted something that would show my new shorter haircut.  I went out in the early afternoon, captured a few shots of cats and trees, and tried to get a decent self portrait.

  

  

  I got several shots that showed part of me.

  

  …and one that caught my shadow.

  

  I was stumbling with fatigue and out of breath when I got back into the house.  In case you’re imagining me wading through deep snow or trekking down the road, that is not the case at all.  I had walked slowly out to the sunny end of the driveway — that’s all.  I’m just way weak and out of condition.

  By later in the day, I felt recovered enough to try again.  I went out during the golden time just before sunset and, out of close to thirty attempts, got one shot that shows the current length of my hair.  It’s my new profile pic.

  I got my first clue that I’d overdone it when I started back up the driveway to the house.  I was in serious respiratory distress by the time I got inside.  Before bedtime, my muscles were all unresponsive and aching.  I slept in only brief periods of an hour or less, and finally gave up and got up around six AM.

  Doug had started letting the fire go out so he can clean out the stovepipe.  Add the discomfort of chill to my already aching muscles.  Greyfox called from the store in town, to consult me on some grocery choices — he will be making an extra trip up here before the scheduled trip to the clinic, because I am running out of asthma meds.  He was having trouble understanding what I said, because I was having trouble talking.  Breathing, swallowing, moving… it all takes extra effort and the results are not always what I intended.  Typing is no easy thing either.  I think I’ll quit now and crawl under the covers.

  The image below was in the camera when I started saving yesterday’s photos.  I must have taken it in December, before my trip to the hospital.

  

  • 2:12 pm
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