Cav's Place

I once again used some cream on my hands before going to bed on the morning of February 2. And after waking up around 8:55 AM and deciding to pee, just in case, and exchange a few words with dad, I couldn’t get back to sleep, so a little after 10:10 AM, when he left, I got on the computer, only getting back in bed at noon… And I still needed a very long time to get back to sleep. But I eventually did, and the couple of times I woke up after that I barely had time to be aware of it before falling asleep again, and I wasn’t awake for that long when I got up, at 5:15 PM. And dad got back minutes later, so I started working on defrosting the freezer, as I had said, to have a reason to make myself a pizza at night and use some of the mozzarella which he had bought and which had expired the previous day. But he cooked that evening as well, so I also cleaned after him, leaving cleaning the fridge for another time, so we didn’t move it and I just dealt with the freezer and the top shelf of the fridge door, to be able to clean the mold from the top of the door. But the very concerning thing was the spark when I plugged the fridge back in, and after unplugging it and plugging it back in again the compressor wouldn’t start, and then there was another spark when dad did the same. It seemed to start running normally again after I unplugged the extension cord and dad plugged it back in after a little while, but something’s wrong there. Still, we didn’t do anything else about it that night, and I eventually made that pizza, in two parts, eating it, as a combined lunch and dinner, between 4:55 AM and 6:30 AM. And it probably had by far the most calories, and definitely the most animal fat, out of any I’ve ever made. Either way, after putting cream on my hands again, I got in bed at 7:30 AM.

After waking up a few minutes before noon, I decided to check some things, including on the computer, so it was just under half an hour later when I got back in bed… And I couldn’t get back to sleep, so I eventually decided to cut my losses and got up at 1:25 PM, so I only slept for some four hours, which initially made me change the plan of going out that evening. On the other hand, that evening I won Final Fantasy IX in a giveaway on the GOG.com forum, at least from a different user. But when dad brought mother, she said that she wanted something from Kaufland that was only discounted until that day, so I had lunch, did the day’s squats, and left at 8:40 PM, once again wearing a mask and taking the recyclables with the deposit symbol, and I picked up a couple more on the way to the Mega Image that closes at 10 PM.
After getting there a couple of minutes before 9 PM, I tried to put the recyclables in the machine, but it briefly stopped after two, allowed me to continue after printing that voucher, but then stopped again after just one more, so I ended up with a second voucher and plenty of remaining recyclables. So I waited for the 50% discount labels to be placed on the bakery products, and when the employee was almost done I reached for a sweet pastry, but the label from another bag was stuck to that one, so I carefully peeled it off, and since that employee, who tends to snap at people who take things before she finishes putting labels on all of them, eyed me as I did that, I then just closed that drawer again and waited for her to be done, taking that pastry and a couple of buns after she walked away. And when I had another quick look at the other expiring products, she held something out and told me that it was the only remaining product with the 90% discount that evening, but I wasn’t interested, so I thanked her for showing it to me and then just bought those things, using the vouchers as well.
After picking up another recyclable on my way to Carrefour, I entered through the parking lot and decided against going to that machine, since I was in a hurry and was going to go to Kaufland next, so I put everything in a cabinet, got what I wanted to get for mother from there and something that was among the expiring products, then retrieved what I had in the cabinet, grabbed some more recyclables… And was left with all of them, since the machines from Kaufland weren’t working. So I once again put everything in a cabinet, and I’m pretty sure that I entered the store before 10 PM, though whether only by a couple of minutes or a little more than that, I can’t recall. Either way, after grabbing some expiring germinated wheat that had a good discount, I was relieved to find the main thing that mother had asked for. And then I looked around and, while those Moldovan grapes, which had an evening discount, had been cleared away from where they should have been, I managed to spot plenty left in a crate that was under another, a little away from the fruits and vegetables area or the places where they stack what they take away from there, so I spent the remaining time selecting some, reaching the self-checkout just when the closing announcement came.
After retrieving my things and washing my hands, I continued to that Mega Image, putting the purchases and the gloves in a cabinet that I didn’t lock and the recyclables on top of the cabinets and getting two bakery products and some packaged garlic, all of these being discounted by 50%… And getting that garlic proved to be a very bad idea, not only because the higher base price and the fact that the bag only contained some 420 grams instead of 500 meant that the real discount was less than 20% compared to the full price of the garlic that’s sold by piece and some of it was obviously going to be thrown away, but mainly because the garlic that’s sold by piece apparently had a higher discount, of about 27%, those days and I somehow failed to notice! So I could have picked really good garlic, discarding any piece that I thought had any problems, for an even lower price… And then the cashier just moved on to the next customer, without giving me the 0.50 RON that should have been the change, and when I asked for it she said that she didn’t have change left. But she did ask whether I had such a coin, so she’ll be able to give me 1 RON, and I did, so I gave it to her and then waited for her to be done with that next customer… Only for the lack of change to become a problem yet again, and while that guy said that it was all right if she didn’t give him the coins, she didn’t even seem to have enough 1 RON bills for him either. But I had several, so I exchanged 5 RON for her, which sorted things out, and then she tried to excuse herself, saying that she gives change all day and before closing time she tends to run out. Either way, she forgot to give me my receipt and I didn’t ask for it, just retrieving my things and then going to that bench and arranging everything. And I picked up a few more recyclables on the way back.
I got back a little after 11:35 PM, with two fingers being painfully frozen, so I had to wait for the pain to subside before cleaning the litter box and going to drop a bag of trash down the chute. Then I exchanged a few words with my parents, sorting out what they were going to take in the morning, put the purchases in their place, separated the olive pieces that dad had dumped over Liza’s food, since she tends to ask for olives when he has some, and left them there while I put the remaining food back in the can, ate a banana, and went to wash at 1:15 AM. I was done just over half an hour later, but I had seen that some of the dishes had been supposedly washed by my parents and I didn’t know which ones, so I thoroughly washed all of them again, then also cut my toenails and ate a sweet pastry, and as I was finishing the salad I noticed that a lemon had gotten moldy in the fridge, so I tried to clear those parts from it, finally eating dinner between 4:30 AM and 5:30 AM, while doing some things on-line… And it also seemed that one of the computer’s fans was somewhat noisy, and while the speeds seemed normal, lowering them seemed to indicate the CPU fan as the culprit, which is a concern… Either way, I got in bed at 6:40 AM.

I guess I was exhausted enough to sleep completely through my parents getting up and leaving in the morning, but I woke up at 10:45 AM, when there was some steady hammering, though it wasn’t that loud and I’m not sure if it was the real reason why I woke. Either way, I knew that the interest rates for state bonds were going to drop yet again and, while I didn’t have much saved up, I wanted to buy some more. But I wasn’t entirely certain, so I spent some time weighing the options, eventually deciding to go through with it and getting up just before 11:20 AM… And when I briefly turned on the light from the small bathroom, someone shouted and then cursed the target of that shouting for not answering, so I wonder whether that was aimed at me and whether the workers were trying to get in touch with someone from this apartment. But I shrugged it off and, as their break approached, I went to the kitchen, washing what my parents had left and cleaning up a little, deciding to also open one of the bags of recently expired bio (organic) spelt flakes and put some in the yogurt that I had as part of the breakfast, and leaving at 1:30 PM, without a mask, since I just meant to get those state bonds and have a quick glance at the expiring products from that Kaufland.
After jogging intermittently and picking up a recyclable, I reached the Sector 3 Treasury at 1:50 PM, so even if I had to wait a few minutes, I was able to deposit the money before 2 PM, so there was no question about the deposit being registered that day and I could then go and buy the state bonds, initially walking up to where some employees seemed to be paying attention only to be sent to the spot where I should have gone according to the first letter of my last name, where I waited for a while before somebody finally looked up and came over. And then I waited some more while the guy updated my information in the system, even if you’d think that it could be done automatically after the ID card is changed, if these parts of the administration would communicate with each other. Either way, I eventually bought those state bonds and it was almost 2:10 PM when I walked out.
I then continued to that Kaufland, putting that recyclable in the machine and initially just getting one of those cheap yogurts, to be able to use the voucher and not have to ask to be allowed to walk out, but then I spotted two boxes of cat food that I could get among the discounted products. The discount was 30% and the boxes were torn and wrapped in tape, so I had to check whether anything was missing and after weighing one of them along with one taken from the shelf and seeing that they had the same weight, I tore that discounted one enough to be able to check properly and bought it after confirming that everything was there, obviously using that voucher as well when I paid and then discarding that torn packaging and putting it into the recycling bin.
On the way back, I also checked two Mega Image locations, putting my things in a cabinet both times, though I didn’t lock it the second time, and getting something that I ended up eating as lunch that day from the first one and something for dad from the second, all of these being discounted by 50%, though in the first case I was also charged for the “thermal” bags that the food was in, and there were two of them, the pieces being bagged separately. And in the second case I had to wait in line for quite some time, and this coupled with the fact that Kaufland had been quite crowded and a few people were coughing rather badly made me feel pretty uneasy about the fact that I had decided against wearing a mask. Either way, as I made my way back after retrieving what I had in the cabinet and arranging the purchases again, I spotted a recyclable that was cut up, with some paper inside it, so I initially dumped the paper in a bin and wondered whether I could get a machine to accept it as it was, but then I wondered what had been in or on that paper and decided that I didn’t care to keep the bottle, so I discarded it and just kept the label. And after entering the building I grabbed another recyclable.
I was back for the first time a few minutes after 4:05 PM, and then I cleaned the litter box and went to drop a bag of trash down the chute, picking up another recyclable from the garbage room. Then I did the day’s squats and took what I thought was the last of those supplements for immunity that didn’t look suspicious… Only to find that it actually also did. But I had just finished those vitamin D3 supplements and didn’t care to look for something else, so I tried to clean up the pill and took it anyway. And then I ate lunch and left again at 8:05 PM, that time wearing a mask and taking the recyclables with the deposit symbol… And on my way out I bumped into dad, who was just coming up. Either way, I then put the recyclables in the machine from the nearby Mega Image… After which I finally noticed that discount for the garlic, and it was listed as applying between February 2 and 4, so it should have definitely applied the previous evening. But I couldn’t do much about it then, so I just cashed in the voucher and then took the metro to Obor, since I had dad’s card.
After checking a bookstore and putting the two recyclables picked up from that mall in the machine, I entered Carrefour and saw that many bakery products already had the 50% evening discount even if it was several minutes before 9 PM. But more, including most of the bread, were yet to be discounted, so after initially taking two sweet pastries that were supposed to have a discount for the second one, using a self-checkout to see whether it applied even when they had the evening discount, and putting them back when it didn’t, I took some other sweet pastries, checked the expiring products and grabbed some tarragon, eventually decided on two breads as well, and then pretty much stood around, waiting for that employee to finish. And she kept asking to be left to do that while a coworker kept calling her over to help her clean, so at one point I asked that other employee whether I could help her with anything, since I was standing around anyway, and while I just held something and exchanged a few words with her before stepping away, that seemed to make her leave her coworker alone and she could finally finish, the nice thing being that one nicer bread was in the last batch, so I took that one and put the other two back.
Well, just that bread caused a problem, though the first issue was that a single self-checkout that accepted cash was still working and two women with a full cart and a little girl who kept trying to use the machine and messing things up were using it, and I still wanted to get to Kaufland as well, so after a little while I resigned myself to using a regular checkout, and since there were two people in line at the first cashier, who’s that one that’s slow but particularly correct, always making sure that everything’s just right, and the second one was just closing up, I ended up at the third, who’s a guy who always struck me as not caring, and who also seems to always take a break to check the pastries after they’re discounted… And that bread apparently didn’t scan, so he peeled off the discount label, at which point the bag that the bread was in got badly torn. Admittedly, I’m not sure that it hadn’t already been torn, but definitely not that badly, so I told him that I really wished that he wouldn’t have done that and I’ll go back to grab another bag and he took a plastic bag from under the counter and threw it at me and said that the bread wouldn’t scan, so he did something else, which was obviously scanning it at full price and then entering a discount manually. However, that discount was less than 50%, so the total was a little more than what it should have been, and when I told him that, after also giving him the voucher received for those recyclables, he asked whether I wanted him to give me that difference, and as I was stuck between wanting to get away from there and getting angry he just gave me a little more change than what he should have given me if the total would have been correct. He then complained about me to the next person, but I just walked away.
After putting the purchases in a cabinet, it was past 9:50 PM when I entered Kaufland, and when I checked the expiring products I saw a carton of eggs at half price and some deeply discounted high-protein milk drinks. They were in a crate that was next to the refrigerators, but I nevertheless grabbed one of the drinks and looked in that carton of eggs, which wasn’t wrapped in tape, as they usually are in Kaufland, replacing two eggs from it, including one that was clearly cracked, with the only two that were left in the other carton that was there, which looked good. And in fact most of the eggs from that carton already seemed to be from the other one, and the rest from three others, considering the different markings, but none of them were expiring soon. Either way, I then also took many pieces of processed meat products for dad that also had good discounts and two other products that were at half price because they were rather crushed, not because they were expiring. But I had also seen some of those Moldovan grapes once again left in a crate which had been taken away from where it should have been and stacked in a corner of that area, so I then went back there and picked some, initially just telling the guy who called after me to give him the phone that it was mine and shrugging it off. But he seemed convinced that he had left his next to the scales and I had taken it, so he asked a few more times, then I heard him talk to some employees before passing by me as I was still selecting grapes and mentioning that there were cameras there. But I just said that I knew that and continued picking, then went to the self-checkout and was relieved when everything was accepted, albeit on the second attempt in case of the carton of eggs. I was just about to finish scanning when the closing announcement came… And that guy also passed by and apologized for accusing me, and said that he had found his phone.
After retrieving what I had in the cabinet and quickly arranging the purchases just enough to be able to carry them somewhat better, I picked up a few more recyclables on the way to the metro station and when I got there I asked the employee to write the date when the monthly pass will expire on it, since it hadn’t printed properly and dad hadn’t done it, so we’d have had no proof that it was still valid if it’ll stop working before that date, which happens quite often. And, after rearranging the purchases a little while waiting, I took the metro back and after getting off I checked that non-stop Mega Image again, putting my things into two cabinets that I didn’t lock and then just retrieving them.
I was back close to 11:25 PM. Then I cleaned the litter box and went to drop a bag of trash down the chute, put most of the purchases in their place, talked to dad a little, and after he went to bed I went to the bathroom, to use the toilet and shower. That was just after 12:50 AM, and the water was a little below body temperature until I was close to finishing, when it seemed to gain a few degrees. But I wasn’t going to wait and see whether it would get even better, so I was done a few minutes after 1:30 AM, but then I spent some time on the computer, getting back to the kitchen at 2 AM. And then I struggled to remove the bad parts from a banana and ate the remaining pieces, washed what was in the kitchen and cleaned up a little after dad, put the remaining purchases in their place, which also included checking the grapes more carefully and placing them in a bowl, also dealt with my bread and moved something into a jar, eventually put jam on a large pancake and ate that, and finally ate dinner between 5:50 AM and 6:30 AM. I got in bed at 7:10 AM, but I actually got some eight hours of proper sleep, just getting up to pee once, getting right back to sleep after that, and getting up a little after 3:50 PM.

Since I once again had no green onions, I used a red one in the salad made in the early hours of February 6. And before dinner I took one of those vitamin C supplements expired since 2022, to finish those as well. And then I once again slept quite well, getting right back to sleep after going to pee at one point and barely even noticing that I woke up when dad left and then came back, the one issue being when some drilling woke me and kept me awake for a little while. Since the alarm was set to ring at 1:30 PM and it was 12:49 PM when I checked the time and that drilling had been going on for some minutes by that point, I considered turning off the alarm and getting up, but I made another attempt to get back to sleep instead and it proved to be a good idea, because I eventually managed to catch another little nap by the time the alarm rang. A problem was that my body still seemed to be working through something, the feeling having appeared after having lunch the previous evening, but the plan was to run, so I ate a Pinova apple and part of that vanilla-flavored fat-free milk drink with 10% protein from Kaufland, which had just expired, mixing raw almonds into it along with the cereals, so I’ll still keep more of the other kind, which are also larger, for a later time. And the sweet thing once again consisted of two of those nicer, albeit expired, biscuits, with added honey… And the workers were right outside the bathroom window while I was on the toilet. Either way, it was almost 4:15 PM when I left, wearing the full running gear, that old and pretty torn training shirt, that thing that goes on my neck, and the old gloves, plus the jacket on the way, keeping it tied around my waist as I ran. The reported temperature was 4°C, holding steady.
The time was 1:22:21, with sector times of 4:16.32, 5:22 (5:21.91), 6:14 (6:13.93), 4:37.66, 5:21 (5:20.37), 6:14.16, 4:42 (4:41.88), 5:25.46, 6:23 (6:22.60), 4:53, 5:31, 6:29, 4:53, 5:39 and 6:22, making for lap times of 15:52.16, 16:12.19, 16:30 (16:29.94), 16:53 and 16:54. I meant to continue to 16 km if it’ll look like I’ll go over 49 minutes on ten, but I didn’t know how much I wanted to push, thinking that if I’ll be slow on the first three laps despite pushing and then continue for two more, I’ll end up around 1:23… And that proved to be the case, but after the first sector, when a couple of other runners kept me honest, I was thinking more and more of not tiring myself too early if this was going to be the first time I’ll run more than ten kilometers in almost four months, and those terrible times on sectors two and three of lap one made it clear that I had to, since I was unlikely to even stay under 50 minutes on ten kilometers. But I was still uncertain, wondering whether it wouldn’t be better to push and settle for just staying under 50 minutes, while on the other hand I also considered continuing to a half marathon distance, even if I’d have clearly gone over 1:50 and that’d have been as disappointing as going over 50 minutes on ten kilometers. That meant that I never really pushed, but even so, ending up averaging more than 16 minutes over the first two laps was just terrible, and things only got worse after that, the only thing that I still hoped for after lap three being to somehow avoid going over 17 minutes on either of the next two laps, which should have also meant squeezing under 1:22:30 instead of that 1:23 that I was initially estimating. And I managed that, which I guess was another reason why I settled for 16 km instead of continuing to a half marathon distance, though yet another was that it was getting too dark and I was losing too much in order to get a good look at the time.
Speaking of that lost time, I probably would have only had to stop to get a good look at the time on lap five if I wouldn’t have checked the exact times on the first three laps, but I did, so I stopped on sector two of lap one and then on every sector starting from the third one of lap two, with the exception of the last one. And those stops were for just an instant only on sector three of lap two and sector one of lap three, the other earlier stops being for a couple of seconds and the later ones, starting from sector three of lap four, for several seconds, and that was despite making them in spots that were better lit. And in fact on that sector three of lap four I stopped twice, since I had miscalculated and expected to have already gone over one hour after sector two, so I initially looked in the wrong place on the stopwatch, resumed running right away when I realized that I had been wrong, and then stopped again, for several seconds. But this is my tenth worst time over this distance and all of the above adds up to some 40 seconds or so, possibly up to a minute, if I’m generous, if I also add the times when I slowed in order to have another look at the stopwatch and the small loss of time caused by probably slowing while I took the glove off and put it back on, so it’ll still be awfully slow even without all of that. And what makes it worse is that there were hardly any other notable issues to speak of. There were few people and, while it was wet and there were some puddles, which led to some weaving and going the long way around, it shouldn’t have had any significant impact. And that possible digestive issue didn’t seem to bother me while I ran, while a slight pressing need only appeared on the last sector, which was the only one after the first when I pushed.

On the way back, I picked up a bottle that seemed to fit the label that I had, and then I ate a banana and a sweet pastry, went to the toilet again, my body definitely working through something, placed that label on that bottle, did 200 squats, since the previous day I had once again kept putting them off until I forgot to do them at all, changed, albeit leaving on what I wore above the waist, and left again just before 8:45 PM, wearing a mask and taking the recyclables with the deposit symbol and a small bag of trash, which I dropped down the chute. And I picked up another recyclable from the garbage room and two more on the way to the Mega Image that closes at 10 PM, despite jogging intermittently.
I got there a few minutes before 9 PM, and then I put the recyclables in the machine, being left with one that wasn’t accepted, and after waiting for the labels with the 50% discount to be placed on the bakery products, I initially took two and then kept waiting for the products with the 90% discount to be brought, seeing just a few set in the area where those labels are placed, out of reach, but not daring to ask that employee when she was there. And then she vanished for a while, and when she came back and I passed by there again she asked whether I was waiting for those products, and when I said yes she told me that those were all that was left, and they actually were interesting and I took them… And she went to a self-checkout with an overflowing basket, which I saw contained products with the 90% discount, so she had just left those few for customers while buying the rest herself. But those products meant that I only needed one of the bakery products to also use the voucher received for the recyclables, so I put the other one back and grabbed another bakery bag for the remaining one, because it didn’t quite fit into the one it had been placed in, and when the total was only 0.18 RON above the value of the voucher the cashier said that I could give him that amount if I happened to have it, and when I initially pulled two 0.50 RON coins out of my pocket he said that it was fine like that, waving away the difference, so I took him on his offer and didn’t look for smaller change.
All of that time wasted to see whether more products with the 90% discount would be brought meant that it was a few minutes past 9:30 PM when I walked out, so I once again jogged intermittently as I made my way to Kaufland Basarabia, the machine from there actually accepting that recyclable which hadn’t been accepted at that Mega Image. Then I put my things in a cabinet and entered the store at 9:50 PM, getting a cabbage for myself and a couple more discounted pieces of processed meat products for dad, and then I saw that what had basically been a negligible evening discount for bananas had increased to 90%, so I added some of those as well before also using the voucher received for that recyclable when I paid, retrieving what I had in the cabinet, and using one of the tables that are outside to arrange everything in the backpack. I walked away a couple of minutes after 10:30 PM.
I didn’t bother to put the backpack in a cabinet when I reached that non-stop Mega Image, even if it wasn’t even 10:45 PM when I entered the store… And I really shouldn’t have bothered. I had some hopes, seeing what the employee who was about to make the 90% discounts was gathering in the cart, but before it was brought out she and a couple of others walked out of that back room with pretty much all of the interesting products, so there was nothing that I’d care to get left for customers. And then I walked out through the entrance gate, when it opened for other customers, only for that same employee to rush after me and call me back, bringing the guard with her and asking what I had in the backpack and why had I used that gate, so I showed the guard the receipts and the products, and then I used that moment to find a slightly better way to arrange the products when I put them back. And on the way back I grabbed some more recyclables.
I got back at 11:50 PM, and after putting the purchases in their place, I went to wash at 1:05 AM, being done almost 50 minutes later. And then I searched the cabinet from the living room to see what other supplements we had and found two more of those for immunity, and while one looked suspicious, the other actually seemed perfectly fine, so I took it. And I also washed what was in the kitchen and fixed something for lunch, which I ate, on and off, between 3:50 AM and 4:40 AM, while I ate dinner between 5 AM and 5:40 AM. I got in bed at 7 AM, after rubbing cream on both hands and feet.

I got six and a half to seven hours of sleep despite the awfully loud drilling which started at 9:45 AM and lasted for about an hour and a half, since I got back to sleep soon after it stopped, only woke up again some time after 3 PM, since it was 3:10 PM when I checked the time, and while I was awake for a while before getting up, at 4:50 PM, I had napped some more until then. And that night I switched to a simple vitamin C supplement which had only expired in May. On the other hand, this morning I was awake for a while when I checked the time, saw 10:52 AM, and decided to pee, just in case it’d help… But it didn’t, and then dad got up and the chances of getting back to sleep became even lower, and while I initially meant to stay in bed at least until after he’ll leave, I eventually got up just after noon and exchanged a few words with him, then got on the computer and played some more Morrowind before getting back in bed at 1:35 PM… But the alarm was set to ring at 2:55 PM, for handball, and it was most probably pretty close to that time when I finally managed to fall asleep again, after almost giving up when it seemed that I was just wasting even more time. And I’ll also add here that I hadn’t finished the part about this week’s run by 11:59 PM, and the initial title didn’t seem right either, so I edited this post a little later, first to change the title, then to add the rest of that part, and then to also add this note.