Yesterday I had a truly lazy day. After Halloween night out I felt really tired but, as tends to be the case with me when exhausted, slept very little during the night. I was up far too early and after making myself breakfast and returning to bed with it, I read for a while and then managed to turn over and sleep a little more. It all meant that the day got off to a very slow and sluggish start and it didn’t really pick up speed in any noticeable way at any point thereafter.
I spent the day here, at home, going to the gym for a while and then just lounging on the sofa, interspersing these periods with a bit of laundry and ironing just to make myself feel as if I wasn’t wasting the whole day. I also finished reading a book I started the day before and watched a couple of episodes of tv series that I like. In all, an almost horizontal day.
At several points throughout the afternoon I found Practical listing things that I know I need to be getting on with before I move away from this city. I have to get to a main post office – finding one has proven more difficult than you can imagine as there are no major ones within the French Quarter – in order to send back home all the summery gear that I have with me to make room in the suitcase for the new items that I need to purchase in order that I am well wardrobed for the next places I’m set to visit. I then need to actually purchase some new clothes and boots to fill the half of the suitcase I will have vacated after my visit to the post office. And shopping here is actually not as easy as you might think.
In most major US cities you are usually swamped with a choice of malls within the city centre where you can spend a day and exit with everything you could possibly need clothes, shoes and accessories wise. But not in New Orleans. Here you find quirky little boutiques which are interesting and fun to browse through but you have to travel through many, many of them to be able to buy everything you need. I have really not been keen to do this at all. I’ve been into a few of these boutiques and seen nice things there but I’m really in need of winter staples and said boutiques aren’t catering for those. So, I’ve found a major shopping mall here but it’s not in the centre. It’s about ten miles out of here and I’m going to have to taxi it there and back. Not an issue per se but I really don’t want to visit it during the weekend as it’s just going to be that much busier than any weekday. So that’s on the list for early next week.
And, where is she going next? I hear you ask. Well, that would be telling and I’m not telling just yet. But it is definitely to colder climes. And since I arrived in the US without a coat, boots, gloves, scarf, and, in fact, only one jumper, I really need to hit the shops. I don’t deal with the cold well, I’ll have you know, so I need to get me a heavy duty survival kit.
I need to finalise some flights and want to make a start deciding on hotels for the last few weeks in the US. I also have a week with nothing either planned or booked yet which is proving almost impossible to decide upon; I feel like that week is almost the last element of freedom within this whole escapade and I’m reluctant to fill it just yet. But, I do need to make a decision soonish.
So, yesterday when I heard Practical running through these items in my head I couldn’t miss his admonishing tone because of my not moving away from my almost permanent horizontal position and doing something about it all. I told him that I’d deal with it today. And yet, I’ve had another odd night’s sleep and am feeling incredibly lethargic right now. In fact, I’m slowly slouching back into that really comfortable horizontal stance.
I’m really not going to fight it. I’m braced for Practical’s buzzing and whining about my not being efficient to say nothing of Indiana’s full blown sulk at my wasting time when I might be missing out on potential adventures out there in the wild outdoors. But, hey, I’m strong. I can battle them both and I’m pretty sure I’ll beat them down.
And I’ll do it all, I will prevail, without having to raise myself into anything resembling a vertical position; I’m good that way 😛
E x
Losing Sight of the Margin 