Young Again

The grand experiment mentioned at the end of this earlier post ended positively for the future of The Mrs. - I slept some on one of her down pillows and was very shortly overcome with asthma. In addition, the weather has been nicer, so The Mrs. has moved back up from the basement bedroom.

And I've had asthma every single night since then.

To remedy this, we decided to head off to Macy's semi-permanent clearance sale, where damn near everything in the store is enough off to be within the realm of competitive with what a normal person would consider a fair price. Pillows were 20%-50% off, and we loaded up. I got myself a "regularly $100, now just $49.99" memory foam pillow, and HannahC noticed that this was more expensive than the pillow she had picked out for herself, so she immediately switched. MaxieC got a new pillow that he refuses to sleep on because it is "too thick" (to be fair, it's about twice the thickness of MaxieC). And The Mrs. not only replaced her down pillows with fiber fill, but also scored a big, giant "body pillow" which she has used in order to replace both her "knee pillow" and her teddy bear (who is almost completely worn through).

Despite the removal of down from the marital bed, I continue to be stricken with breathing troubles during the night. Troubles that can only be explained by an allergy to The Mrs. herself.

However, the memory foam pillow has thus far proven to be quite a hit. I used to wake up each morning in pain which I first blamed on the mattress, though acquiring a new mattress did not solve the problem, and then I blamed it on just being old beyond my years. Since switching to the memory foam pillow, though, I'm sleeping much more restfully and waking without back pain.

It's like I'm young again.

Only without the hope and dreams and aspirations.

I may have to run back and snag a second memory foam pillow. I normally switch off between two pillows during the night because I don't like when my pillow gets hot, but I didn't want to blow $100 on unproven technology. I wonder when the clearance ends.

Tomorrow, The Mrs.'s brother swings through town on a bidness trip. We're having fajitas for dinner because there is some kind of tradition that you must always have fajitas with The Brother. I don't understand it, but it's not my place to meddle with The Mrs.'s fambly and their traditions, what with me being an outsider and all.

The Brother's fajita recipe is the best I've ever had, though. They're almost enjoyable, as opposed to most Mexican food that you just stuff in your face and hope to god you can choke down enough to tide you over until you can find some proper food like a steak or fried chicken or mac'n'cheese.

Or a Taco Bell.

I found new life in the back pond on Sunday. HannahC has been reporting that there were three baby goldfish (she named them all "Minnow"), though for weeks I have seen but two. Then I finally saw the third. I also found a bullfrog hanging out in the skimmer box. We had bought four bullfrog tadpoles a couple months ago and hadn't seen them since, except for one I pulled out of the filter the next weekend. Now we've got at least one bullfrog.

So lets see...that's:

• Dog: Freddy
• Rat: Jackie
• Grasshopper: Giant
• Grasshopper: Speedy
  
• Crickets: Unnamed - maybe 20 of them
• Leopard Frog: Tiny AKA Frogger
• Bullfrog: Bully
• Koi: Charles
• Koi: Whitey
• Fancy Goldfish: Spotty
• Fancy Goldfish: Spotty (a different fish)
• Black Catfish: Lethel
• White Catfish: Eddle
  
• Koi: Shimmer
• Koi: Shiny
• Baby goldfish: Minnow
• Baby goldfish: Minnow (a different fish)
  
• Baby goldfish: Minnow (a different fish)

I think all the pet spiders and ladybugs are are dead.

We're thinking of going on vacation in September, but I don't think we can afford the pet care. I suppose it could be worse. We could be collecting large, unruly dogs.