Gratitude List (September 7, 2019) #TToT

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone! I’ve been wanting to write a lot today, but somehow, I once again couldn’t find the words to write a proper blog post. This week was a good one in some major ways, but it was also a very stressful one. To focus my mind on the positives, I’m joining in with Ten Things of Thankful (#TToT).

1. The sensory room at day activities. I have been relaxing in it a lot lately. There’s a guy who uses it often, but he was off this past week, so I took full advantage of the available room.

2. Tranquilizers. On Tuesday, I was very irritable. I am so glad that the staff offered to give me my lorazepam and it worked.

3. Great news from the care facility, of course. I got to speak to the behavior specialist and support coordinator, which was good. It was great to hear that I will most likely be moving by September 23.

4. Hearing more about the house we’re buying. We got a go on the mortgage and are now waiting to get the keys.

5. My husband having been able to change the days he’ll be off work. He would originally have the week of September 16 off, but since I’ll be moving to Raalte on the 23rd and we’ll get the keys to our house most likely on the 25th, that wasn’t ideal. My husband will now have the week of the 23rd and the week of the 30th off.

6. Nice food. To celebbrate the great news about my moving to the care facility, my husband got us pizza and a tompouce (a Dutch pastry) on Tuesday. On Thursday, I was stressed, so I bought myself a lot of snack food. Still, I enjoyed it.

7. Horseback riding again. Yesterday marked my first riding lesson after the summer break. I rode Morritz again. I didn’t ask about Angie, the horse I previously often rode, who was injured some six months ago. As the weather was relatively good, we rode our horses outside.

8. My stuffed bear. I had a lot of nightmares and vivid dreams this past week, so I am all the more grateful for the stuffed bear my mother-in-law won for me at an animal shelter event last year. I have a ton of other soft toys, but this one is the biggest.

I am also grateful for the extra duvet my husband laid over me some nights back when he realized before me that I’d otherwise feel cold.

9. Painkillers. I’ve been having a toothache lately and had a headache yesterday. They may or may not be related. And yes, my father-in-law is a dentist, but this makes me more wary of going to the dentist (him) with this. Thankfully, paracetamol has been working.

10. My amazing fellow clients at day activities. A new girl started yesterday. She’s nice. So are the others. Most don’t understand that I’ll be moving, so I haven’t told them yet. I’ll be missing them.

What have you been grateful for lately?

My Favorite Ways of Staying Active

Posted on by Astrid

Today, I am joining in with the RagTag Daily Prompt for Thursday. It is “Exercise“. I am a pretty sedentary person, but nonetheless, I love getting moving every once in a while. Here are my favorite ways of staying active both physically and mentally.

1. Walking. My absolute favorite way of physical exercise has to be walking. Due to my disabilities, I am not safe leaving the house on my own for a walk, but I do enjoy walks with my support staff or other people. As regular readers of this blog know, I go for a long walk each Monday at day activities. This week, unfortunately, it started to pour when we’d just been out of the door for five minutes, so we had to return. Both today and yesterday though, I went for an hour-long walk with my support coordinator.

2. Swimming. My second most favorite way of exercising physically has to be swimming. We do it at day activities every other Tuesday. My Fitbit activity tracker is water-proof, so it tracks my swimming activity too.

3. Going on gym equipment. I have an elliptical at home, which I really need to use more often. I manage twice a week on average, but sometimes I don’t go for over a week.

I also discussed with my support worker getting myself a gym membership. There’s a gym in the nearby city that has services for people who suffered brain injury. I’d love to go there.

4. Yoga. I used to take yoga lessons at the institution in Nijmegen many years ago, but I quit eventually. Then I tried to practise on my own. My husband eventually borrowed my yoga mat for his own exercise, then threw it out because it’d disintegrated. I just ordered myself anew one, which should arrive tomorrow. I tried to do yoga on my bed today, but that wasn’t really ideal.

5. Horseback riding. This isn’t particularly exercise-y if you ask me, since we just step around. However, it is an activity that I commit to once a week and that keeps me healthy – or so I’d like to think.

What are your favorite ways of staying healthy?

Gratitude List (March 16, 2019) #TToT

Posted on by Astrid

I have been feeling a little off lately. This morning (or early afternoon to be exact), I awoke and immediately felt grumpy. I had a hard time snapping out of the moodiness. Then I read in a Dutch Facebook group about listing the positives of a day. I haven’t participated in #TToT for a while, so it’s about time.

1. Pizza on Sunday. We’d planned on having fries and snacks on Friday, but then my husband had to work late, so I ate at my in-laws. I don’t know whether the pizza night on Sunday was to make up for that, but I loved it.

2. More day activities! From next week on, I’ll be going to day activities a full day rather than just the morning on Monday. On Tuesday adn Friday, I already go full days and I’ll try Wednesday someday. Thursday will remain my day off.

3. Swimming on Tuesday. I was able to go in the deep pool again and swam almost the entire half hour.

4. Eating potato and carrot mash at my in-laws. There’s a word for this in Dutch, but I’m too lazy to look up whether there’s one in English too. My mother-in-law gave me the choice between that and sauerkraut. I didn’t expect to like the mash either, but I definitely hate sauerkraut. Surprisingly, I liked the food. Not enough to ask for second helpings, but enough to eat my first serving.

5. Phone check-ins with my support coordinator. As of last week, she’s been checking in with me at the end of nearly each day she works. I love it.

6. Being able to go for a short walk with my support coordinator on Wednesday. It rained almost the entire day, but when we went for a walk, it didn’t.

7. A rainbow. When walking with my support coordinator, she spotted it and took a photograph. She says this is our lucky rainbow.

Rainbow

8. Blueberries, bananas and honey liquorice. I went to the supermarket with my support worker on Thursday and got myself these. I particularly loved eating the blueberries in my yoghurt on Friday.

9. Outdoors horseback riding. Again, the weather treated us well on Friday afternoon. It rained the whole day, but when it was time for us to go horseback riding, it didn’t. I don’t like indoors horseback riding nearly as much as I do going outdoors, so this was wonderful.

10. Meditating. I’ve been doing a bit of it again this past week. It’s still hard to find the time and focus for it, but I love it. I finally figured out a way to play the learning to meditate course on Insight Timer. For whatever reason, VoiceOver renders the button to play it non-clickable, but somehow I got it playing. Now I may get Insight Timer premium once my disability payment is in.

What have you been grateful for lately?

Things I Do at Day Activities

Posted on by Astrid

This is my third attempt at writing a blog post for today. I started writing a random ramble, then started sharing ways to relax. While writing about that, I noticed I was explaining all about the snoezelen® room at day activities. I then wanted to write more about things I do at day activities. So here goes.

Usually, I start the day with a cup of coffee. The staff drink coffee in the central area of the day center before the clients arrive, and since I usually arrive early, they offer me a cup too.

Then, when I go to my group’s room, the other clients arrive and the staff help them unzip their coats. They also read the other clients’ diary, in which their home staff write about them.

I usually do a table-based activity first. This involves sorting tasks, construction play, etc. I particularly enjoy shape-sorting activities.

At 9:30, the second staff for the day comes and we drink coffee. Then, we each go to the bathroom. After that, there are set activities for most mornings. On Monday, I go for a long walk with another group. At my group, the other clients play some games and do other table-based activities. They go for a short walk when the other group returns.

On Tuesday, I go swimming every other week. The day center’s people have the pool to themselves then and most clients have an assigned volunteer or staff to help them. The other week, a volunteer comes to our group and we run some errands.

On Wednesday, we have a cooking activity. For this, another volunteer comes. We generally do some really simple cooking. Since it’s a busy day, the staff really do most of the work. I feel sad that they don’t really involve us much. Of course, watching is cool too.

On Friday, we go to the marketplace. Each of us brings some money and we buy something that everyone likes. Sometimes, it’s fish, while other times it’s a bread roll, fruit or salad.

On each of these activities, the staff can’t take all of us. As such, we take turns going with one staff to do the activity, while the rest do table-based activities with the other staff.

Some people also love the snoezelen® or sensory room. I for one do. The sensory room has a water bed, but also a bubble unit, which is a water-filled unit which makes bubbly noises and has floaty objects in it that you can look at. There are also several tactile boards with all kinds of textures on it that you can explore.

Most people also love listening to music. On Wednesday afternoon, a music therapist comes to our group. I only attended this once, as I normally have the afternoon off on Wednesday, but I love it. The group also owns several tablets, a CD player and a TV to listen to music on or watch videos on.

I currently go to day activities two afternoons: Tuesday and Friday. On Tuesday, we have no set activity for the afternoon. This can get a bit boring, as staff usually spent most of the time writing in people’s diaries and doing administrative tasks. On Friday, I and two other clients go horseback riding with one staff.

At 2:30PM, we have a cup of coffee again, After that, most people hang out some and are getting ready for the bus home, even though we won’t be picked up till four o’clock. On Friday though, we have a dance at another group which everyone from the entire center is invited to.

There are four groups at the day center. My group is for the most severely intellectually disabled people. Another is for the elderly. Then there’s one for people with autism and others who need a lot of structure. This is the group who go for the long walk on Monday. The last group is for relatively capable people. They do kitchen-based tasks like loading the dishwasher. They also do creative activities.

Like I said, I’m in the group for severely intellectually disabled people, even though I’m not intellectually disabled. The reason is I need a lot of support and no pressure to achieve. I can visit other groups if I want to though.

Gratitude List (February 23, 2019) #TToT

Posted on by Astrid

This week was a truly mixed bag. I am tempted to focus on the negative. I mean, even my Thankful Thursday post sounded more negative than grateful. For this reason, I’m going to write a gratitude list for this week. As always, I am linking up with #TToT

1. Nearly 14,000 steps on Monday! I had over 120 active minutes thanks to a long walk in the morning, another long walk in the afternoon and going on the elliptical.

2. No more need for painkillers. It’s been five weeks since my collarbone fracture and I am now almost pain-free without medication.

3. Lovely weather. It’s been a lot warmer than is normal for February this past week and it’s supposed to get even warmer next week. I know this could be bad in terms of climate change, but I’m so grateful.

4. No weight gain. I had my annual physical check-up at the mental health agency last week and weighed the same as in late December. Since I’ve not been minding my diet at all, this is good news. My blood pressure was also pretty good.

5. PRN tranquilizers. I haven’t needed them anymore after Wednesday, but I’m still glad I have them.

6. My cynical sense of humor. By 2021, everything will be okay. I know really I can’t wait that long, but everytime I say these words, they still bring a grin to my face.

7. Horseback riding with my day activities group. Because two clients from my group are currently not capable of horseback riding, the staff asked me whether I want to ride in their place. I loved it.

8. My mother texting me. She rarely calls or texts me and I’d let it go and not contacted her after our visit last December. She asked how I’m doing. Of course, I still had to avoid the elephant in the room that is my going into long-term care, but oh well.

9. Getting more used to my Mac. Yesterday, I even started writing a blog post on it using an external blogging app (because WordPress is hard to use). I haven’t figured everything out, but I’m sure that I will.

10. My mood being slightly better thes elast few days. I am not nearly as anxious as I was early in the week.

What have you been grateful for lately?

Loss #WotW

Posted on by Astrid

This was truly a mixed week. I wanted to write a gratitude list for it, and maybe I will do so tonight, but right now I don’t feel like it.

On Monday, I attended day activities as usual. A fellow client, an older man, attended too as usual, but he was very unwell. He had been ill for a long time and the staff had feared for his life on a few prior occasions. I attended day activities during the morning only and I worried in the afternoon that he’d die soon.

On Tuesday, the man wasn’t at day activities. I heard the staff talk about his group home staff having had a scare in the morning, but he was still alive. In the afternoon, I heard them talking about palliative care. By late afternoon, when us clients werre ready to leave, I heard that he’d passed. For those who don’t know, my day activities group is for people with severe intellectual disabilities, so i’m the only one who understands the conversations staff have among themselves basically.

On Wednesday, the other clients were told that this man had died. Most still don’t fully understand, but some have made beautiful drawings in his memory that will be given to his family on Monday. Near the center’s front door is a table with (electric) candles, a picture of the man and all the drawings. I decided to make a butterfly soap for it. I made it on Wednesday afternoon with my support coordinator. It turned out great, a beautiful lavender blue with lavender fragrance oil.

On Thursday, I was off from day activities and I spent the morning in bed. It didn’t really feel good, but I had nothing planned for the day except for horseback riding at 4:30PM. That was a great experience. I rode Aagje, a fjord horse with long hair (which is unusual for this breed).

Today, I showed my day activities staff the butterfly soap I’d made and placed it on the client’s remembrance table. We tried to do day activities as usual as much as possible. We walked to the marketplace in the morning. In the afternoon, when I went for a short walk with the day activities coordinator, I told her I wanted to ask a rude question. I wanted to ask whether, now that this other client had died, I could take his place at day activities on Thursdays. I still feel pretty awkward having asked this, but she understood that, if I waited a while, they might’ve gotten a new application. I E-mailed my support coordinator on this issue too.

Early this week, I got an E-mail from my support coordinator forwarding the termination letter from the Center for Consultation and Expertise. I didn’t understand this, as the consultant had offered to be my contact for the long-term care funding agency. Apparently, she still is somehow. I really hope I hear from that agency soon. My support coordinator did E-mail the local authority’s social consultant, who is in charge of my community care funding, to extend my funding for two months as we wait for long-term care to kick in.

Right now I feel… numb? I was a bit dissociated this afternoon, as my day activities staff were discusing clients’ severe challenging behaviors (not current fellow clients of mine). I remembered my time on the locked psychiatric unit, where I was often threatened with seclusion for problem behaviors and was in fact secluded or restrained a few times. It felt good disclosing this to my staff, but I did feel a bit awkward.

Now I’m waiting for my husband to get home from work. He’s going to bring French fries and snacks. I look forward to that.

I am linking up with Word of the Week. I choose “loss” as my word of the week in my fellow client’s memory.

Gratitude List (January 4, 2019) #TToT

Posted on by Astrid

Yay, it’s time for my gratitude list with #TToT once again. I am also linking up with the Word of the Day Challenge, for which the prompt is “gratitude” today. Do you want to know what I’ve been grateful for lately? I love to share!

1. Two wonderful full days at day activities between Christmas and New Year’s. There were only about five clients there each day and two staff. On Thursday, I went for a walk with one of the staff. We also ate pancakes for lunch. On Friday, the staff drove the center’s van to a restaurant in a nearby village, where we had a drink. I had hot chocolate with whipped cream. One of the clients from my group, an older man who used to drink beers with his friends regularly before he declined from a brain injury, had an alcohol-free beer. I could tell he thoroughly enjoyed the experience. So did I.

2. Resting over the week-end. I was pretty tired from all the Christmassy stuff by last week Saturday. So was my husband, so we chose to have a lie-in. I normally feel bad about getting up at like noon and my husband doesn’t like it either, but neither of us minded.

3. Oil balls or whatever the English term is. These are fried balls made of the same stuff that pancakes are made of. They’re a traditional New Year’s snack here. I was nauseated from them for days, but who cares?

4. Not having gained any weight over the holiday season. That is, I may’ve lost then gained some or vice versa, but in any case I was at the exact same weight last Monday that I’d been in early November. I already mentioned this last Monday, but I’m still so grateful for it.

5. A long walk with my mother-in-law. On Wednesday, she visited me and we went for a walk into the next village. This was about a 5km walk that took us 70 minutes.

6. Horseback riding with my support worker. Yesterday, for the first time in a while, my support worker was available to assist me as I rode the horse. It was truly a lovely trip. While waiting on the taxi back home, a young man from my day activities came into the canteen. Once she’d made out that we knew each other, his staff prompted him: “Who’s that?” I was delighted to hear him say “Astrid!” I only see this man on one of my days at day activities and I hadn’t expected him to recognize me, so it was truly lovely that he did.

7. Fried chicken. Yesterday, my husband cooked a rather boring meal of macaroni with bell peppers and leek. He surprised me at the end by saying that, if I admitted this was the most delicious meal I’d ever had, he might have some chicken for me. So funny! We had wings and filet. I liked the filet better, so my husband gave that to me.

8. Getting a head massage. We havve a head massager at day activities. I love it and today, my staff were doing beauty stuff. I asked for the head massage first, but I also had my nails done.

9. Looking at an online store for sensory supplies with my staff. I already knew the store and have my sensory cat from there, but my staff hadn’t heard of it. They probably got the sensory room modeled by Barry Emons, the inventor of snoezelen, but his shop is harder to use and the itmes are more expensive than the store I found. I was totally excited ooohing and aaahing at all the lovely supplies and all the more excited because my staff was excited too. We might get some stuff for my day activities group.

10. Dancing. On Friday afternoon, one of the staff at another day activities group organizes a “prom” for the entire center. I only went once before, but today, I decided to go again. I loved it.

11. Eating French fries for the first time in a while. Today, my husband heard a doctor on the radio say that you need to go to the snack conrer once in a while or you’ll get fat, or so he said. The real talk was probably about crash diets not working, but I loved my husband twisting it to an excuse to get us fries. We also each had a burger with it.

12. The lovely blog interaction I’ve been involved with this past week. I’ve gotten more interested in reading and responding to other blogs and it probably pays off on my own blog too. Besides, I just love reading other blogs, as it inspires me too.

What have you been grateful for this past week?

Gratitude List (November 30, 2018) #TToT

Posted on by Astrid

It’s Friday again! I am not a big fan of the week-end, but I like Fridays nonetheless. I don’t relly know why. Maybe it’s just that they’re blue in my mind’s eye’s synesthetic perception and blue is my favorite color. Who knows?

Friday also means it’s time to link up with #TToT again. Here are the things I’ve been thankful for this past week.

1. Tarot apps. I don’t really believe in the spiritual basis of tarot, but I wanted to learn it anyway to use as a thought-starter. I read up about it on some blogs, but didn’t know how to make it work for myself, as I, being blind, cannot use real tarot cards. After looking for a while though, I found some accessible-with-VoiceOver tarot apps. Of course, I still miss out on the visual aspects, but I can still reflect on the card meanings.

2. Gratitude journaling. Okay, yeah, I am doing this now, but I also have been doing it in an iPhone app this past week. I couldn’t manage to do it daily, but I managed two tims since installing the app on Monday. It does help me.

3. Yet another extra afternoon at day activities. This was just once though. Because my support coordinator was off sick and my support worker or mother-in-law couldn’t come either, the staff got the manager’s permission to let me stay at day activities on Wednesday afternoon. It was really nice.

4. Horseback riding with my mother-in-law. My support worker couldn’t come on Thursday to go riding with me, but my mother-in-law could. It was a lot of fun.

5. Dinner with my in-laws. Alos yesterday, I decided on a whim to go have dinner with my in-laws. I was scared my husband would be mad with me for it, but thankfully he wasn’t. We ate delicious macaroni.

6. My fabulous husband. Need I say more? I just love him.

7. Good food. My husband has been experimenting with healthier food choices. On Tuesday, he made zucchini noodles. When on Wednesday he made rutabaga (Swedish turnip) fries, I was a little suspicious. However, I liked it.

8. A lie-in on Thursday. I didn’t have anything to do except for horseback riding at 4:30, so I slept in till 11AM. I also listened to some relaxing music in bed.

9. Relaxing in the snoezelen (sensory) room. On Tuesday, I took my phone into the sensory room with me and listened to whale sounds and music while lying on the water bed. I also took time to relax in the sensory room on Wednesday morning.

10. Chatting to a former nurse. Yesterday, a former nurse from the acute psychiatric ward I spent sixteen long months on in 2007-2009, sent me a text message. It wasn’t intended for me, so I told him who I was and that he probably had texted the wrong Astrid. He started chatting to me anyway. I don’t have a lot of memories of that time, but I did remember him.

What have you been thankful for this past week?

Gratitude List (November 23, 2018) #TToT

Posted on by Astrid

It’s been forever since I last shared a gratitude list. Since yesterday was Thanksgiving in the United States, I felt it’d be about time again that I post one. Here goes. As usual, I’m linking up with #TToT.

1. An extra afternoon at day activities. In fact, I started writingg this post while there. As of last week, I go to day activities each Tuesday and Friday for the whole day (and Monday and Wednesday mornings). I am loving it.

2. Horseback riding. I had to shift my riding lessons to another day to be able to go to day activities for the whole day on Friday. The only day off I now still have is Thursday. The riding instructor didn’t have a volunteer then to help me, but my support worker offered to help me. Yesterday was the first time I went riding on a Thursday. It was great!

3. A long walk with my support coordinator. Normally, we walk to the ferry at the end of my road and back. This is about 2.5km total. On Wednesday, I asked her to walk in the other direction. We walked all the way to the next village and back. This totals over 3km.

4. Chinese takeaway. On Sunday, my father-in-law came to our house to watch soccer and other men’s programs (that I secretly do like) with my husband. Usually, he “cooks” for us on these days and this time, it was Chinese. I loved it. I did suffer bowel cramps and bloating for several days after it, but who cares?

5. French fries for lunch. To continue on the food track, we had French fries for lunch at day activities on Wednesday. The reason was they still had some money that needed to be spent by the end of the year. The staff were initially worried that we wouldn’t have a full meal, but we definitely did! It was so tasty! I was a little scared that my husband would be angry because of my weight gain, but he wasn’t.

6. My new stuffed bear. I already got it two weeks ago, but am still so grateful for it. My mother-in-law won it at an event she went to for the animal shelter she works for. I’m calling it Little Bear, because my husband has a big bear too. That one is a little damaged and the littles not-so-secretly want another one, so that we have both little and big bear for ourselves.

7. Swimming. I went swimming with day activities again on Tuesday. This time, I swam a record 52 pool lengths.

8. Getting my hair done. On Friday, the support coordinator at my day activities group braided my hair. I didn’t even know I had long enough hair for that, but apparently I do. On Tuesday, a staff at another group made an even more beautiful braid.

9. New books to read. Last week, I moved all my eBooks and Bookshare books from my computer to my iPhone, because I could no longer read them on my computer. I have since been greatly enjoying reading. I haven’t bought any new books as of yet, but I did download several books off Bookshare.

10. My mood still being pretty good. I can’t say it’s great, but it’s not bad either.

What have you been thankful for in the past week?

Gratitude List (October 26, 2018) #TToT

Posted on by Astrid

Man, I really am falling into a writing rut. I don’t even know why. I’m still not feeling too well, but I wouldn’t say I’m seriously depressed either. For a bit in early October, I did feel extremely low, bu I picked up the pieces again reasonalby soon.

Today, to get myself motivated for writing again, I’m participating once again in #TToT. It’s not a weekly gratitude list anymore and I may be sharing some things I’ve been grateful for over the past few weeks.

1. A skirt-wearing day in October! This was already a few weeks ago, but I’m still so thankful for it. About two weeks ago, the temperature rose to 26 degrees Celsius and I loved it!

Generally speaking, the weather has been extremely mild here with hardly any rain. We got some rain only over the last few days and that wasn’t a lot. Today is one of the first days it’s really rather cold.

2. Sleep. Like I said above, fall weather came late this year but it well and truly came. I am very sensitive to cold, so I’ve been complaining for a few days that it’s cold already. This means that nothng’s cozier than crawling under the covers against my husband or with my sensory cat. The sensory cat is a soft toy that can be put in the microwave and then gives off heat and a lavender scent.

3. Swimming. At day activities, we go swimming every other Tuesday. Two weeks ago, I was a bit sick, so didn’t go. This week I did though. It was lovely. My Fitbit activity tracker says I swam 1200m total, which I can’t believe but oh well.

4. A full day at day activities. Three weeks ago, I got permission to come to day activities one full day a week in addition to the three other mornings. I now go on Tuesdays for a full day and Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays in the morning. I am still settling in a bit but so far I love it.

5. Making smoothies. I really, really need to get into a healthier eating habit again. I haven’t been on the scale in months and I’ve probably gained lots of weight. To get myself motivated, I bought a lot of frozen fruit and a can of soy milk last Monday. Bananas were sold out, so my husband bought those on Tuesday. Yesterday, we made a banana-strawberry-soy milk smoothe and it was delicious!

6. Horseback riding again. Some of my fellow clients at day activities go horseback riding at my riding school on Friday afternoons. I go on Friday afternoons too, but usally the class after theirs. Today, one of these other clients was on vacation, so my staff offered to ask whether I could come in her place and I could. My assigned support worker from day activities walked beside my horse. It was a lot of fun!

7. My very accommodating staff. My support coordinator and home support worker are going out of their way to help me. So are my day activities staff. Particularly, they offered me to come to day activities two full days on December 27 and 28, since the other days of that week, the center is closed for Christmas. They’ll have room for me even on that Thursday, which is normally my day off. I’m so grateful for this!

8. Accessible games on the iPhone. I never took much of an interest in accessible computer games, because I believed most would be very boring. Now this week I decided to take a look at the AppleVis directory of iOS apps in the Games category. Of course, most games that are really popular with sighted people, are totally inaccessible. However, some accessible games are pretty cool after all. I so far downloaded Dice World, which is a collection of six dice games, and Alter Ego.

Alter Ego was originally created as a fully text-based game in 1986 but was adapted for use on the smartphone. It is a game in which the scenario is that you’re born and will eventually die. The life you lead in between will depend on your answers to a lot of multiple-choice questions. On my first round playing, I chose to be a very angry, rebellious baby and ended up with burns from an iron in infancy and killed by a kidnapper in childhood.

9. Twister fries! I have no idea whether twister fries exist in other parts of the world and, if so, whether they’re really called twister fries. They are my favorite type of fries, but they had apparently been taken off the menu at my local cafeteria. Last week at his once-a-week round to the cafeteria, my husband informed me that he had a nice surprise for me and it turned out they were back. I enjoyed them both last week and this week. I also love love love the African-style burger they have on the menu.

10. My mood being slightly better. Like I said, I had a really low few days earlier this month. Over the past two weeks or so, my mood seems to have been slowly but steadily improving. I cannot say I feel good, but I don’t feel that bad either.