Bored and sick

Since the machine is down and there are no samples to prepare I am basically down here in the DC area doing nothing. I was supposed to meetwith a friend yesterday evening but her car decided it needed to die. I did chat with her on the phone for an hour and a half. I als got a phone call from my boyfriend that morning and later that evening as I was vegging out and reading I got a phone call from my parents. I don't think in a normal week I ever hear from that many people. I am still a little on the sick side but I seem to be getting better. Mostly I feel like crap in the morning with an extremely dry throat due to the dry air in the hotel room. I tried to humidify the room with a steamy shower but that really only lasts a few minutes and I feel bad running the shower for longer than 10 minutes. Tonight I will be meeting with the people I stayed with when I first got off the trail. That should be fun. Then I leave in the morning. Hopefully all will go well. I will try to remember to not go through security with metal knee braces on.

The knees do feel better for the wearing of the braces while I am moving but for long term sitting, they are uncomfortable and unnecessary. Maybe once I get back to Boston I will just wear them occassionally. Mostly I have a lot of stairs on the commute, so I could put them on for the commute then take them off at work. I really hate having the restriction of not being able to walk up stairs. My knees feel fine until I do actually start walking up a lot of stairs then they complain a little. If I rest them they are fine. I think I am pushing then more than they are ready to do at this point. I think having the braces on will be a continual reminder that I shouldn't be doing lots of stairs and then they will get better. Rather then my thinking they are better then having a set back or pushing them more then they are ready for.

So it is back to the apartment rental lists. I will still try to work on the landlady one last time about the great apartment I say and wanted but I think it may be too late. I am also wondering if it was the agency's fault. There were a few badly written statements in the lease and they seemed unwilling to reword them and may have just presented a list of demands to the landlady who them balked because there was no prior discussion about them. Well now I know, next time make sure the landlord can come for the lease signing or modify the lease to something I feel I can sign and see if they will sign that.