Author Archives: Brad

The sidewalk right in front of the middle school building has been full of bird poop. Its poopy whiteness was hard to miss against the dark cement. I avoided stepping on it. I am normally a don’t-step-on-the-cracks person, so I look down as I walk.

But as I thought about it, the poop was kind of weird. There are no trees or power lines above this section of sidewalk. The birds who left this poop had to have been flying. Then I noticed that all the poops had the same diagonal strike pattern. Was this a squadron of birds who were intentionally trying to strafe the school? Have the birds declared war? Should we be worried? I’m keeping my eye on you, birds. I’m keeping my eye on you.

A couple weeks ago, I mentioned that I’ve been napping harder than usual. My tiredness during the day has continued. I was going to chalk it up to stress or allergies or whatever, but this past weekend, I started feeling kind of weak too. When I worked in the garden, I got light-headed a few times. And I finished way earlier than I wanted to. If not for my tiredness, I could have worked out there for hours. And I haven’t posted about it because I was waiting to see how long I could sustain it, but I did daily push-ups and sit-ups for Lent, and was continuing even after Easter. But I stopped doing them last Thursday. And Sunday, when I tried to do them, I couldn’t even do one. Tiredness AND weakness was enough to send me to the doctor.

My doctor had a student with him, which made the visit take longer than usual. First the student checked me out, then he talked to the doctor. Then the doctor checked me out, then they talked again. Then we all talked together. It took a long time. I arrived for my appointment at 3pm. I left the office at 5:30pm. Whew!

In the end, they didn’t have a definitive answer. The doctor asked me a lot of questions about allergies, my sleeping habits, my family medical history, my Seasonal Affective Disorder, and my diet. He has decided to have me do some lung test thing (for the sake of allergies), some heart check thing (mostly because he was curious – and he said that), and lots and lots of blood tests. The ones he marked that I recognized were blood sugar, thyroid, and lyme disease. After all these tests, I go back in a month for a follow-up. (That is, if nothing shows up on the tests.)

Here is my concern: In the past, when I’ve had weird afflictions, they’ve sometimes gone away on their own. I’m left with such an unresolved feeling. It’s nice to feel better, but what the heck caused me to feel bad in the first place? On the other hand, feeling better for no reason would be a lot better than still feeling this way a month from now. I will of course keep a record of events here at Bradaptation.

I spent a lot of time in the exam room. The posters on the wall grossed me out.

I’ve been bringing an apple to school every day this year as part of my lunch. I’m feeling good about eating some kind of plant material. I’m sure it’s good for me. About a month ago, I said that after slicing and coring an apple with one of those handy-dandy all-in-one slicer thingies, I would wrap it in Press’n Seal. Using Press’n Seal daily seemed extravagant though, so I looked for something else.

And I found it! It’s a carryout soup container. It’s exactly the right size for a sliced apple. You’re welcome, environment. You’re welcome, Lauren.

Now if I can just decide on a washing schedule for the container… it’s getting kind of sticky.