I don’t know how to attribute it, but I just folded yesterday morning while getting ready for work. Sneezing like nobody’s business, ankle swelling painfully, and enough verging-on-weepiness that I would have suspected PMS if I weren’t roughly three years past the M. So I called in sick, and I went back to bed, where I promptly fell asleep for the next four and a half hours.
It made for a weird day. When I awoke, I had gotten over the sneezing, my ankle had calmed down, and I no longer wanted to pull my lower lip up over the top of my head and howl. I still didn’t feel like knitting. (I know!) So I went into Ravelry, updated some of my pictures, and discovered that the photographs stored on the old computer did not transfer to the new one. I have a whole raft of empty folders which I will delete a few dozen at a time, and I guess I will be going back into my blog archives and copying/pasting pictures individually.
That should keep me out of the pool halls awhile longer.
The new guy and I were in touch via email last night. He has a pump that is supplementing the in-house treatment he received yesterday. The pump is Not Small. The cancer cells have been partying like it’s 1999 since his last blood test. They really grasp that whole “be fruitful and multiply” thing. He is (we are) hoping that the next blood test will show much improvement. I just had a mental image of the old RAID commercials. The can shows up. The bugs run, shrieking.
I like that picture.
I also photographed some old finished objects, the better to update Ravelry, and discovered that there were several pictures I had not published here on the blog, for items that were gifts. I deleted some frogged projects, linked a blog post or two, and finally, finally was in the mood to knit.
I’ve cast on for Chemo Cap the Second, worked the ribbing in the dark green, and worked two rounds in the bright yellow. I’ve also typed out the instructions (which were written for flat knitting) and adapted them to knitting in the round, because I don’t necessarily trust myself to remember to flip the knits and purls on even rounds.
My late mother-in-law used to say, “Trust in Allah. Trust in Allah, but keep your camel tied.” (She practiced Vedanta, not Islam; she just loved the saying.)
I have prepared my next KnitPicks order and parked it in my shopping cart for next payday. I will be filling in gaps in my needle inventory, in the smaller sizes. I entered all my pretty new 4” Harmony DP’s into Ravelry yesterday.
And I spent a little time looking for remnants of the fabric for Firstborn’s wedding gown, but found none. [Fourthborn, did I give those to you during a studio purge? Probably not.] But I did find my MoTab rendition of Messiah. So that was pretty cool.
I guess that’s it for today, unless I have another meltdown in the shower. I think I will be swinging by the pharmacy on my way to work, to see if they have any support hose or compression stockings in my size. One of my friends at church is going to give me a link that she uses. I think that will help a lot. I found some online a few weeks ago, but now I can’t find that link.
If I scoot now, I can get the Bittiest’s birthday present soaked and blocked before I have to leave for work. It’s a simple stockinette tube, so not much pinning required. I might just be able to smooth it out on the blocking board and call it done.
*Today is going to be a better day; repeat from *. (Just a little knitting humor.)
About Me
- Lynn
- Eleven years into widowhood, after one year of incredible happiness and nearly 14 years of single blessedness. Retired, and mostly enjoying it. Still knitting. [Zen]tangling.again after a brief hiatus.
Wednesday, July 20, 2011
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
Faits accomplis!
Bittiest’s birthday present is done, all but the blocking. I have wound the yarn for the new guy’s second chemo cap. Had a nice quiet evening, mostly at home, just me and the knitting and the podcasts.
Schlepped the trash and the recycling out to the street. Ran to the store for some groceries. Put them away.
Bought my ticket for a special showing of 17 Miracles, about the Willie handcart company, for Friday night. Am going to an earlier showing than most of the singles, because I don’t want to hang out in Plano for four hours after work until their showing starts. I want to be on my way back home by then.
Meeting a new girlfriend from the singles for refueling before the movie. The new guy and his mom and some of his kids may be at the same showing. That will depend entirely on how his chemo goes today, and whether/which side effects show up.
In a fit of wild optimism, I bought a curling iron with a fat barrel while at the store last night. Not quite in the mood to wrangle with it today. I haven’t even gotten it out of the packaging at this point.
This is the part where I sluice off, rinse the socks that I washed last night and hang them up to dry, do something plausible with my hair, and scoot out the door with all sorts of healthy options for my food cubby at work.
I am losing my nice neighbors. They have found a place that’s bigger, a few blocks away. They have been pure joy, but I knew that the other half of the duplex was just a temporary stop for them while they solidified their plans. I’m going to miss them.
Correction: this is the part where I start sneezing, and my ankle blows up, and I call in dead and go back to bed. But I have gorgeous, shiny hair.
Schlepped the trash and the recycling out to the street. Ran to the store for some groceries. Put them away.
Bought my ticket for a special showing of 17 Miracles, about the Willie handcart company, for Friday night. Am going to an earlier showing than most of the singles, because I don’t want to hang out in Plano for four hours after work until their showing starts. I want to be on my way back home by then.
Meeting a new girlfriend from the singles for refueling before the movie. The new guy and his mom and some of his kids may be at the same showing. That will depend entirely on how his chemo goes today, and whether/which side effects show up.
In a fit of wild optimism, I bought a curling iron with a fat barrel while at the store last night. Not quite in the mood to wrangle with it today. I haven’t even gotten it out of the packaging at this point.
This is the part where I sluice off, rinse the socks that I washed last night and hang them up to dry, do something plausible with my hair, and scoot out the door with all sorts of healthy options for my food cubby at work.
I am losing my nice neighbors. They have found a place that’s bigger, a few blocks away. They have been pure joy, but I knew that the other half of the duplex was just a temporary stop for them while they solidified their plans. I’m going to miss them.
Correction: this is the part where I start sneezing, and my ankle blows up, and I call in dead and go back to bed. But I have gorgeous, shiny hair.
Monday, July 18, 2011
A grate time in the kitchen.
He let me help make dinner Saturday night, because he tires easily. [Not a whole lot of help, but enough that I didn’t feel like Simone Legree, watching him slave over a hot stove.] I grated the better part of a pound and a half of cheese: Tillamook cheddar and some lesser variety. And when dinner was over, he put food away while I rinsed dishes and loaded the dishwasher.
My children are going, “She did what???”
I did remind him, on the drive to the dance, that I am just fine with PBJ’s if they are eaten in his company.
Church was good yesterday. I was late (fourth Sunday in a row, sigh...), and instead of frowning at me from the front of the chapel, Bishop’s face lit up. So it wasn’t “You’re late. Again.” More on the order of “Oh boy! You’re here!” He is a very, very good shepherd, and in our interactions I feel my Savior’s love.
I came home, drank a quart of water, and lay down for a nap, expecting to wake at sundown. Instead, I awoke two hours later, refreshed and mindful. I spent most of the rest of the day knitting and listening to podcasts, and the birthday present for my youngest grandchild is nearly complete. Not sure if I should wind up some of the new Malabrigo for Chemo Cap the Second. He [the new guy, not the grandson] approved one of the yellows as being the perfect shade for a Packers cap. Now to design one.
I discovered to my chagrin that my two favorite spreadsheets did not make the transition from the old computer to this one. I had the 2010’s, but not the 2011’s, so I spent awhile saving-as and tweaking until I now have [more or less] what I lost. Some would consider that to be laboring on the Sabbath. For me, it was on the order of a nice long chat with a particularly bright and amusing friend. I love math.
So, I have leftovers from Saturday night’s dinner to enjoy. [Yesterday, after my nap, I polished off the ones from Friday night. Waste not, want not.] He also sent home some of the from-scratch macaroni and cheese he was teasing me about after the temple session on Wednesday. I have been craving mac and cheese. It will be fun to see if his is as good as my mother’s was.
Today his chemo port goes in. Tomorrow they start pouring in the bug juice. I am planning a quiet week, myself: very little of the running-and-seeing that was last week, although every part of me but my ankles, regrets none of it. And even they are not whining [much] this morning.
This is looking like a brillig day, but the slithy toves had better watch themselves.
My children are going, “She did what???”
I did remind him, on the drive to the dance, that I am just fine with PBJ’s if they are eaten in his company.
Church was good yesterday. I was late (fourth Sunday in a row, sigh...), and instead of frowning at me from the front of the chapel, Bishop’s face lit up. So it wasn’t “You’re late. Again.” More on the order of “Oh boy! You’re here!” He is a very, very good shepherd, and in our interactions I feel my Savior’s love.
I came home, drank a quart of water, and lay down for a nap, expecting to wake at sundown. Instead, I awoke two hours later, refreshed and mindful. I spent most of the rest of the day knitting and listening to podcasts, and the birthday present for my youngest grandchild is nearly complete. Not sure if I should wind up some of the new Malabrigo for Chemo Cap the Second. He [the new guy, not the grandson] approved one of the yellows as being the perfect shade for a Packers cap. Now to design one.
I discovered to my chagrin that my two favorite spreadsheets did not make the transition from the old computer to this one. I had the 2010’s, but not the 2011’s, so I spent awhile saving-as and tweaking until I now have [more or less] what I lost. Some would consider that to be laboring on the Sabbath. For me, it was on the order of a nice long chat with a particularly bright and amusing friend. I love math.
So, I have leftovers from Saturday night’s dinner to enjoy. [Yesterday, after my nap, I polished off the ones from Friday night. Waste not, want not.] He also sent home some of the from-scratch macaroni and cheese he was teasing me about after the temple session on Wednesday. I have been craving mac and cheese. It will be fun to see if his is as good as my mother’s was.
Today his chemo port goes in. Tomorrow they start pouring in the bug juice. I am planning a quiet week, myself: very little of the running-and-seeing that was last week, although every part of me but my ankles, regrets none of it. And even they are not whining [much] this morning.
This is looking like a brillig day, but the slithy toves had better watch themselves.
Saturday, July 16, 2011
Small personal victory, and a not-so-bright idea.
I’ve spoken before about the principle of fasting. This is something that we do in our church, if we are physically able to do so, once a month as a ward, giving up two meals and donating their value for the blessing of the poor. And from time to time, we may choose to fast individually, to foster a greater connection to the Almighty, to receive needed inspiration or guidance, or on behalf of a loved one with serious personal needs.
I fasted a lot when I was a new member of the church. I had many changes to make, and I had gone twenty-three years without much of a connection to Heaven. For me, fasting increased the depth and sincerity of my prayers, enabled me to strengthen or adopt character traits which my parents had taught by precept and example [but which I may not have embraced] and helped me to feel really clean in my heart.
I was not plagued with the headaches which many people experience when they fast. I did not get dizzy, or cranky, or excessively hungry. I got answers. And I liked it.
After four children in seven years (and a fifth one four years later) and month after month of breastfeeding, plus a string of minor health challenges, medications which required me to take them with food, and general you-name-it, I sadly concluded that my fasting days were over. I continued to make a monthly donation to the fast offering fund. I continued to bear testimony as inspired, at our monthly fast-and-testimony meetings, about Heaven’s blessings and tender mercies in my life. And I really, really missed that clear connection.
I woke up Wednesday morning feeling tired, achy, and scattered. [Hush.] On the drive into work, it came to me that maybe the best thing I could do, would be to fast. I would take the day an hour or so at a time, monitoring myself for negative physical or emotional symptoms, and see how it went. I spent the rest of that drive singing bits and pieces of my favorite hymns to put myself in the right frame of mind, as I had not begun a proper fast with prayer after dinner on Tuesday night.
It went wonderfully. I was productive, I was clear-headed, I had enormous energy, and I was deeply happy all day. Truly, one of the best days in recent history. And I am looking forward to next Fast Sunday, because I have proven to myself that I am not going to faint or get weird[er] if I attempt to honor that particular commandment.
Where it turned out to be a not-so-bright idea, is the fact that I was scheduled for a massage that afternoon, in preparation for which I should have been hydrating steadily all day. I did break my fast after the massage, drinking two glasses of water before leaving the office to head toward the temple. I stopped at Rockfish and had a real meal: cream of jalapeno soup and one of their heavenly side salads. I drank more water. And I paid for it Thursday and yesterday.
The massage itself went well. She said there had been so much improvement in my back, that it was almost as if it were a different back. So she focused her efforts on the top of my neck, my traps, and my lower spine between the sacral dimples and my coccyx.
Ow. Ow!Ow!Ow!Ow!Ow! I am [still] hearing from bits that I didn’t even know I had. And they are not warbling “Indian Love Call.”
When I went to bed Wednesday night, my left ankle looked like a Shar Pei. Bulges and folds going this way and that, all of them distinctly angry. I was so sleepy that I forgot to set the alarm on Wednesday night. I got seven hours of sleep. You wouldn’t have known it by the state of my feet and ankles when I woke up Thursday morning. I was on my third tall glass (a Wendy’s “medium”, so maybe a quart?) of water when I started the draft of this post, that morning. I hit the bathroom about once an hour all day, and the swelling had gone down significantly, as had the related discomfort, by the time I left for the temple on Thursday night. I got through that day with patience and a modicum of dignity.
Yesterday was not significantly better. I did set the alarm on Thursday night, but I woke when it was light, in a panic, ten minutes before I needed to leave for work. Turns out that my alarm was set to go off at 5:45 at night. (I woke ahead of the alarm on Monday and Tuesday, thus had not discovered this. But it explains why I woke up late on Wednesday and Thursday.)
Lesson learned. Ecclesiastes was no fool. To everything there is a time, and a season, and a purpose. I can fast, and I need to pick my timing better. And it is unwise for me to attend the temple on two successive nights, particularly when it is 107F outside.
I have about six inches left to knit on the Bittiest’s birthday gift. I may very well finish it tomorrow. It will be interesting to see which runs out first, the yarn, or my patience with going round and round in one-row spirals of stockinette. I will be ready for fat yarn and patterned knitting when this project is done.
I would go sit on the couch and knit some more, but my iPod is charging. I suppose I could put in a movie. What I really want, is to go back to bed, but I have the temple with my ward this morning, and all sorts of noodling-about in the middle of the day, and dinner at the new guy’s tonight, and then the dance. He told me to bring a small cooler, so I can take home leftovers.
It was so good to serve with him in the temple on Wednesday night. I’ve invited him to join our ward this morning, but I’m not holding my breath on that. He tires very easily, and I would prefer to enjoy his company at dinner tonight and then a slow dance or two tonight before we go to our respective homes and crash.
I am not planning on a late night, tonight. This heat is really taking it out of me. But my heart is peaceful, even if my ankles are intermittently cranky. Life is good.
Dad would have been 106 today. Middlest had her umpteenth on Thursday. Firstborn’s is a week from today. I do not understand how a young thing like me [snort!] can be the mother of people their age.
I fasted a lot when I was a new member of the church. I had many changes to make, and I had gone twenty-three years without much of a connection to Heaven. For me, fasting increased the depth and sincerity of my prayers, enabled me to strengthen or adopt character traits which my parents had taught by precept and example [but which I may not have embraced] and helped me to feel really clean in my heart.
I was not plagued with the headaches which many people experience when they fast. I did not get dizzy, or cranky, or excessively hungry. I got answers. And I liked it.
After four children in seven years (and a fifth one four years later) and month after month of breastfeeding, plus a string of minor health challenges, medications which required me to take them with food, and general you-name-it, I sadly concluded that my fasting days were over. I continued to make a monthly donation to the fast offering fund. I continued to bear testimony as inspired, at our monthly fast-and-testimony meetings, about Heaven’s blessings and tender mercies in my life. And I really, really missed that clear connection.
I woke up Wednesday morning feeling tired, achy, and scattered. [Hush.] On the drive into work, it came to me that maybe the best thing I could do, would be to fast. I would take the day an hour or so at a time, monitoring myself for negative physical or emotional symptoms, and see how it went. I spent the rest of that drive singing bits and pieces of my favorite hymns to put myself in the right frame of mind, as I had not begun a proper fast with prayer after dinner on Tuesday night.
It went wonderfully. I was productive, I was clear-headed, I had enormous energy, and I was deeply happy all day. Truly, one of the best days in recent history. And I am looking forward to next Fast Sunday, because I have proven to myself that I am not going to faint or get weird[er] if I attempt to honor that particular commandment.
Where it turned out to be a not-so-bright idea, is the fact that I was scheduled for a massage that afternoon, in preparation for which I should have been hydrating steadily all day. I did break my fast after the massage, drinking two glasses of water before leaving the office to head toward the temple. I stopped at Rockfish and had a real meal: cream of jalapeno soup and one of their heavenly side salads. I drank more water. And I paid for it Thursday and yesterday.
The massage itself went well. She said there had been so much improvement in my back, that it was almost as if it were a different back. So she focused her efforts on the top of my neck, my traps, and my lower spine between the sacral dimples and my coccyx.
Ow. Ow!Ow!Ow!Ow!Ow! I am [still] hearing from bits that I didn’t even know I had. And they are not warbling “Indian Love Call.”
When I went to bed Wednesday night, my left ankle looked like a Shar Pei. Bulges and folds going this way and that, all of them distinctly angry. I was so sleepy that I forgot to set the alarm on Wednesday night. I got seven hours of sleep. You wouldn’t have known it by the state of my feet and ankles when I woke up Thursday morning. I was on my third tall glass (a Wendy’s “medium”, so maybe a quart?) of water when I started the draft of this post, that morning. I hit the bathroom about once an hour all day, and the swelling had gone down significantly, as had the related discomfort, by the time I left for the temple on Thursday night. I got through that day with patience and a modicum of dignity.
Yesterday was not significantly better. I did set the alarm on Thursday night, but I woke when it was light, in a panic, ten minutes before I needed to leave for work. Turns out that my alarm was set to go off at 5:45 at night. (I woke ahead of the alarm on Monday and Tuesday, thus had not discovered this. But it explains why I woke up late on Wednesday and Thursday.)
Lesson learned. Ecclesiastes was no fool. To everything there is a time, and a season, and a purpose. I can fast, and I need to pick my timing better. And it is unwise for me to attend the temple on two successive nights, particularly when it is 107F outside.
I have about six inches left to knit on the Bittiest’s birthday gift. I may very well finish it tomorrow. It will be interesting to see which runs out first, the yarn, or my patience with going round and round in one-row spirals of stockinette. I will be ready for fat yarn and patterned knitting when this project is done.
I would go sit on the couch and knit some more, but my iPod is charging. I suppose I could put in a movie. What I really want, is to go back to bed, but I have the temple with my ward this morning, and all sorts of noodling-about in the middle of the day, and dinner at the new guy’s tonight, and then the dance. He told me to bring a small cooler, so I can take home leftovers.
It was so good to serve with him in the temple on Wednesday night. I’ve invited him to join our ward this morning, but I’m not holding my breath on that. He tires very easily, and I would prefer to enjoy his company at dinner tonight and then a slow dance or two tonight before we go to our respective homes and crash.
I am not planning on a late night, tonight. This heat is really taking it out of me. But my heart is peaceful, even if my ankles are intermittently cranky. Life is good.
Dad would have been 106 today. Middlest had her umpteenth on Thursday. Firstborn’s is a week from today. I do not understand how a young thing like me [snort!] can be the mother of people their age.
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
“Work is love made visible.”
Thank you, Brother Gibran. This is Chemo Cap the First, in a reasonable depiction of its color.
Here is a detail of the braided hatband. The color is definitely off. The pattern is Coronet, from Knitty.
And here are all of my KnitPicks Shadow laceweight yarns bought in the last couple of months, supplemented by Rebecca’s laceweight leftovers in sundry fibers, and the pale yellow Misti Alpaca Lace I bought from Tola, and the last little dab of Shadow in a discontinued green (fourth from the left, in front; it’s what I used for Chutzpah’s sweater and its clone).
So, tonight I will be at the temple for the new guy’s ward temple night, at his invitation. And I will give him Chemo Cap the First. And two cartoons from my friend Candayce’s desk calendar at work, which are fishing-related. And a bushel of hugs, before and after the temple session.
I tried to go to bed somewhat early last night, because tonight will be a long one. His ward’s session does not begin until 8:00, finishing around 9:30, which gets me home sometime between 10:30 and 11:00. To be repeated tomorrow night for my regular temple service assignment. I wonder if I can sneak in a nap between 5:00 and 8:00?
I am hoping that inspiration or revelation smacks him upside the head tonight [what? the Almighty doesn’t thimp you sometimes? happens to me, a lot!] and gives him a definitive answer to the $64,000 question. Or tells him how to phrase the question so that he gets an answer he can recognize. Even if it’s to marry the other petri dish.
This is her night to serve in the temple. I know what I want. I think I know what she wants. [And she’s my friend, and I love her, and I want her to be happy.]
Tonight is only a quasi-date. He’s cooking dinner for me on Saturday, before the dance. And I’ve invited him to my ward’s temple session on Saturday morning, but I think that will depend upon how tonight goes, and upon his energy level.
I have to finish by razzing my children. I texted Lark last night to see when she would be home, so I could take her her last-year’s birthday present (the finished Oslo Walk shawlette by SusannaIC, much oohed and aahed over at Knit Night). She was at a concert. With three of my daughters. Which concert, you ask? Britney Spears and Nicki Minaj.
Really? [On the other hand, we’re supposed to be kind to the sick and the afflicted, so maybe I should look at this in the light of doing-unto-others and as your collective semi-random-acts-of-kindness for the day. Britney’s kids are likely to need therapy, and Ms. Minaj was beaten up by some guy in Dallas the night before the concert.] This is how you spend your hard-earned money? And you think I’m a little crazy for collecting dolls?
Oh my. I think I’m having a fit of the vapors. Somebody pass me my smelling salts!
Here is a detail of the braided hatband. The color is definitely off. The pattern is Coronet, from Knitty.
And here are all of my KnitPicks Shadow laceweight yarns bought in the last couple of months, supplemented by Rebecca’s laceweight leftovers in sundry fibers, and the pale yellow Misti Alpaca Lace I bought from Tola, and the last little dab of Shadow in a discontinued green (fourth from the left, in front; it’s what I used for Chutzpah’s sweater and its clone).
So, tonight I will be at the temple for the new guy’s ward temple night, at his invitation. And I will give him Chemo Cap the First. And two cartoons from my friend Candayce’s desk calendar at work, which are fishing-related. And a bushel of hugs, before and after the temple session.
I tried to go to bed somewhat early last night, because tonight will be a long one. His ward’s session does not begin until 8:00, finishing around 9:30, which gets me home sometime between 10:30 and 11:00. To be repeated tomorrow night for my regular temple service assignment. I wonder if I can sneak in a nap between 5:00 and 8:00?
I am hoping that inspiration or revelation smacks him upside the head tonight [what? the Almighty doesn’t thimp you sometimes? happens to me, a lot!] and gives him a definitive answer to the $64,000 question. Or tells him how to phrase the question so that he gets an answer he can recognize. Even if it’s to marry the other petri dish.
This is her night to serve in the temple. I know what I want. I think I know what she wants. [And she’s my friend, and I love her, and I want her to be happy.]
Tonight is only a quasi-date. He’s cooking dinner for me on Saturday, before the dance. And I’ve invited him to my ward’s temple session on Saturday morning, but I think that will depend upon how tonight goes, and upon his energy level.
I have to finish by razzing my children. I texted Lark last night to see when she would be home, so I could take her her last-year’s birthday present (the finished Oslo Walk shawlette by SusannaIC, much oohed and aahed over at Knit Night). She was at a concert. With three of my daughters. Which concert, you ask? Britney Spears and Nicki Minaj.
Really? [On the other hand, we’re supposed to be kind to the sick and the afflicted, so maybe I should look at this in the light of doing-unto-others and as your collective semi-random-acts-of-kindness for the day. Britney’s kids are likely to need therapy, and Ms. Minaj was beaten up by some guy in Dallas the night before the concert.] This is how you spend your hard-earned money? And you think I’m a little crazy for collecting dolls?
Oh my. I think I’m having a fit of the vapors. Somebody pass me my smelling salts!
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
A Beastly Day
No, no, not a bad one! Just “Beastly”; my girlfriends and I watched the first half of it at lunch yesterday. I love MovieMom’s take on it, basically that the beast is always far more interesting than the prince.
That has certainly been my experience.
Can’t wait for lunch today. I love books and movies where the guy wakes up and realizes he wants the smart girl with character. Vanessa Hudgens is lovely in a smart-girl way; she reminds me a little of Maggie Gyllenhaal. And Neil Patrick Harris is perfect in his role. Especially when he is playing darts. Or picking out his tie.
Bittiest’s present is more than halfway done. I don’t anticipate a lot of progress on it until Knit Night, as I don’t want to miss anything while watching the movie today.
I blocked Lark’s shawlette yesterday. I will take it to Knit Night and then drop it at her place if anyone is home when I’m ready to go. Firstborn and 1BDH work full time and go to school full time. Including summer school. And Lark just got a job. [So proud of her!] Here is a close-up of the pattern. You can just barely see the beads at the hem.
I was feeling mildly ambitious after I unpinned it, so I put Willow’s shawlette to soak but was suddenly too tired to pin it out before going to bed. So it spent the night in the fridge, wrapped up in a towel.
I wanted to take it to Knit Night too, but it dried out a little too much while I pinned it out this morning, so after that was done I goosed it with a spray bottle. I’ll take it next week then bring it home to be properly wrapped for Willow’s birthday in October.
And then there was the matter of the surprise package from Tola: one full skein of Malabrigo in a luscious Tuscan red, and a partial ball of white, and a skein of Berroco Ultra Alpaca in basic black, all to make chemo hats for the new guy. Just about did me in. Pictures later, if I remember.
Very interesting discussion with the new guy last night, via email, re: his chemo drugs. I will likely spend the next few nights reading up on all that. How to phrase this delicately? Men with a romantic partner are strongly cautioned not to impregnate said partner while on chemo, or for six months afterward. *So* not a problem, as we both live the law of chastity.
I have not seen the Red Fairy in over three years. But yes, I will be discussing this with my doctor when I have my well-woman in a few weeks, because when I did that post-menopause study in December, my blood levels indicated that I was only perimenopausal. I told him it was an interesting thing to be discussing, even peripherally, when we are not even holding hands at this point, and when he has more urgent things on his mind than popping the question.
But yeah, I had wondered, fleetingly: if one is married to a man who is on chemo, and the man has enough energy between bouts of vomiting and hair loss to be romantically inclined, does one have to worry about glowing in the dark, oneself?
[My poor daughters. I suspect that they are all gagging at this point.] OK, one of my characteristically abrupt changes of subject. I love my iPod. It really takes the drudgery out of things like blocking, a process I like only slightly more than cutting out things to sew, or getting my teeth cleaned. Thank you, ladies. Ya done good!
That has certainly been my experience.
Can’t wait for lunch today. I love books and movies where the guy wakes up and realizes he wants the smart girl with character. Vanessa Hudgens is lovely in a smart-girl way; she reminds me a little of Maggie Gyllenhaal. And Neil Patrick Harris is perfect in his role. Especially when he is playing darts. Or picking out his tie.
Bittiest’s present is more than halfway done. I don’t anticipate a lot of progress on it until Knit Night, as I don’t want to miss anything while watching the movie today.
I blocked Lark’s shawlette yesterday. I will take it to Knit Night and then drop it at her place if anyone is home when I’m ready to go. Firstborn and 1BDH work full time and go to school full time. Including summer school. And Lark just got a job. [So proud of her!] Here is a close-up of the pattern. You can just barely see the beads at the hem.
I was feeling mildly ambitious after I unpinned it, so I put Willow’s shawlette to soak but was suddenly too tired to pin it out before going to bed. So it spent the night in the fridge, wrapped up in a towel.
I wanted to take it to Knit Night too, but it dried out a little too much while I pinned it out this morning, so after that was done I goosed it with a spray bottle. I’ll take it next week then bring it home to be properly wrapped for Willow’s birthday in October.
And then there was the matter of the surprise package from Tola: one full skein of Malabrigo in a luscious Tuscan red, and a partial ball of white, and a skein of Berroco Ultra Alpaca in basic black, all to make chemo hats for the new guy. Just about did me in. Pictures later, if I remember.
Very interesting discussion with the new guy last night, via email, re: his chemo drugs. I will likely spend the next few nights reading up on all that. How to phrase this delicately? Men with a romantic partner are strongly cautioned not to impregnate said partner while on chemo, or for six months afterward. *So* not a problem, as we both live the law of chastity.
I have not seen the Red Fairy in over three years. But yes, I will be discussing this with my doctor when I have my well-woman in a few weeks, because when I did that post-menopause study in December, my blood levels indicated that I was only perimenopausal. I told him it was an interesting thing to be discussing, even peripherally, when we are not even holding hands at this point, and when he has more urgent things on his mind than popping the question.
But yeah, I had wondered, fleetingly: if one is married to a man who is on chemo, and the man has enough energy between bouts of vomiting and hair loss to be romantically inclined, does one have to worry about glowing in the dark, oneself?
[My poor daughters. I suspect that they are all gagging at this point.] OK, one of my characteristically abrupt changes of subject. I love my iPod. It really takes the drudgery out of things like blocking, a process I like only slightly more than cutting out things to sew, or getting my teeth cleaned. Thank you, ladies. Ya done good!
Sunday, July 10, 2011
Not a very good ninja.
So said Fourthborn, when I told her there was one parked next to Lorelai outside the apartment, and I was going to take a picture of it.
“If you can see it, then obviously it’s not a very good ninja.”
At the doll meet-up, I handed Fourthborn my camera and told her to knock herself out. I was happily knitting away on the birthday present for Bittiest, and disinclined to get up.
As with their owners, the dolls themselves embody Diversity with a capital D.
That little one with the blue feet? Mel-Mel-Chan did the face-up. It’s one of the Soom mini’s, approximately the same size as my Faith, or 28cm tall, maybe a little taller because of her feet. This one is a human/dragon hybrid. The little dragon horns are incredibly cute.
Your usual assortment of ghouls and hussies.
In the red, lounging gracefully against the wall, is Fourthborn’s FaithAnn, in a prototype of Fourthborn’s future wedding gown. I am guessing that the gown itself will be a more traditional white-to-cream. I’ll get back to you on that, as I will be sewing it in the next couple of years.
On the left is her Rosalie, representing LittleBit, complete with piercings and the 50’s-pillowcase birdies just below her collarbone. My two are nowhere in evidence. Camera-shy, or off filching somebody’s chips and salsa?
Honor went home with Mel-Mel-Chan to be restrung. Temperance is smirking on the sofa table, because she got to go yesterday, and Chutzpah did not. Sibling rivalry. Still not done with that, apparently.
I am now off to do battle with the wasp in my bathroom, so I can blow-dry my hair and look somewhat presentable for church.
“If you can see it, then obviously it’s not a very good ninja.”
At the doll meet-up, I handed Fourthborn my camera and told her to knock herself out. I was happily knitting away on the birthday present for Bittiest, and disinclined to get up.
As with their owners, the dolls themselves embody Diversity with a capital D.
That little one with the blue feet? Mel-Mel-Chan did the face-up. It’s one of the Soom mini’s, approximately the same size as my Faith, or 28cm tall, maybe a little taller because of her feet. This one is a human/dragon hybrid. The little dragon horns are incredibly cute.
Your usual assortment of ghouls and hussies.
In the red, lounging gracefully against the wall, is Fourthborn’s FaithAnn, in a prototype of Fourthborn’s future wedding gown. I am guessing that the gown itself will be a more traditional white-to-cream. I’ll get back to you on that, as I will be sewing it in the next couple of years.
On the left is her Rosalie, representing LittleBit, complete with piercings and the 50’s-pillowcase birdies just below her collarbone. My two are nowhere in evidence. Camera-shy, or off filching somebody’s chips and salsa?
Honor went home with Mel-Mel-Chan to be restrung. Temperance is smirking on the sofa table, because she got to go yesterday, and Chutzpah did not. Sibling rivalry. Still not done with that, apparently.
I am now off to do battle with the wasp in my bathroom, so I can blow-dry my hair and look somewhat presentable for church.
Saturday, July 09, 2011
M-pressed
You know you have it bad when you see something random like this...
...and think of the guy of whom you are inordinately fond, whose name begins with M.
How I have felt in recent weeks:
Kinda like that scene from “Footloose” where she has one foot on each car and is screaming at oncoming traffic.
But if your eye takes you up the side of that left mini-crate, down the left handle of the bulldog clip to the business end, up the right handle, and down the side of the right mini-crate, you find another, somewhat wobbly, M.
Something else I love that begins with M. Ditto for this:
There is a bag of ossifying, geriatric Marshmallows up in my cubby at work. I’ll spare you the visual.
So: today there will be a Modicum of laundry, a Manicure if I have my way, and then I will pick up Fourthborn for the doll meet-up, where Mel-Mel-Chan will take Honor home to re-string her. [Asian ball-jointed dolls are held together by elastic, which, in this lovely Texas heat, poops out on a somewhat regular basis. I haven’t been able to play with Honor, and I haven’t tried to sew for her, because she is all floppy and flails about and will not stay put when I pose her.] I am also taking Temperance, because she’s the newest and hasn’t gotten out much. She’s just not as portable as Chutzpah, who can fit in my pocket.
Depending upon how I feel physically after the laundry and the running about in a non-AC’d car, I may go to the game night at my friend’s, which is just south of downtown Dallas. The doll meet-up is a 70-mile roundtrip, not counting the drive to Arlington for my nails and to pick up Fourthborn and whichever of her dolls is coming along. I may just want to come home and go to bed, or go slog through the pool first and then go to bed.
I had a great dinner with Brother Sushi last night. We went to Pie5, and he enjoyed his pizza. [Goes without saying that I enjoyed mine. This was my fifth trip in roughly three weeks.] Then we drove to Braum’s for ice cream. Braum’s was a whole lot less crowded than Pie5, and we did our usual sitting-and-talking there, until we were both yawning prodigiously, and I made him take me home.
We were too tired to solve any of the world’s problems last night, so today you guys are on your own! But I have faith in you.
...and think of the guy of whom you are inordinately fond, whose name begins with M.
How I have felt in recent weeks:
Kinda like that scene from “Footloose” where she has one foot on each car and is screaming at oncoming traffic.
But if your eye takes you up the side of that left mini-crate, down the left handle of the bulldog clip to the business end, up the right handle, and down the side of the right mini-crate, you find another, somewhat wobbly, M.
Something else I love that begins with M. Ditto for this:
There is a bag of ossifying, geriatric Marshmallows up in my cubby at work. I’ll spare you the visual.
So: today there will be a Modicum of laundry, a Manicure if I have my way, and then I will pick up Fourthborn for the doll meet-up, where Mel-Mel-Chan will take Honor home to re-string her. [Asian ball-jointed dolls are held together by elastic, which, in this lovely Texas heat, poops out on a somewhat regular basis. I haven’t been able to play with Honor, and I haven’t tried to sew for her, because she is all floppy and flails about and will not stay put when I pose her.] I am also taking Temperance, because she’s the newest and hasn’t gotten out much. She’s just not as portable as Chutzpah, who can fit in my pocket.
Depending upon how I feel physically after the laundry and the running about in a non-AC’d car, I may go to the game night at my friend’s, which is just south of downtown Dallas. The doll meet-up is a 70-mile roundtrip, not counting the drive to Arlington for my nails and to pick up Fourthborn and whichever of her dolls is coming along. I may just want to come home and go to bed, or go slog through the pool first and then go to bed.
I had a great dinner with Brother Sushi last night. We went to Pie5, and he enjoyed his pizza. [Goes without saying that I enjoyed mine. This was my fifth trip in roughly three weeks.] Then we drove to Braum’s for ice cream. Braum’s was a whole lot less crowded than Pie5, and we did our usual sitting-and-talking there, until we were both yawning prodigiously, and I made him take me home.
We were too tired to solve any of the world’s problems last night, so today you guys are on your own! But I have faith in you.
Thursday, July 07, 2011
When the going gets tough
The tough get up from their desks, ransack their food cubby, and walk to the break room to make a S’more. Microwave S’mores are S’mores in the same sense that near beer is beer. [Mark Twain is reputed to have said, “The man who named it near beer was a poor judge of distance.” But I digress.]
Note to Middlest: actually, I was not in a bookstore. I was also not in the alternative location for the knitting group that you know and love. I have defected to an alternative, alternative location, with an alternative knitting group consisting of some of the members of the former group.
So I could not have thrown a thesaurus at the miscreant. Not mine, nor one of the store’s. I could, however, have chucked an iced coffee belonging to one of my friends’ at him, but she might very well have objected to that as “roughing the coffee” and thrown a flag on the play.
Note to Alison: yes, there was more than garden-variety indignation that went into my experience on Tuesday night. It was as if all the frustration I feel at the new guy’s situation, and my own while waiting on the outcome, got funneled into it.
I am quicker to laugh, quicker to cry, quicker to speak, quicker to become angry, and quicker to tire. I have zero patience, although I hope I hide that fairly well. Indecision, not following through on a commitment [hello, legal secretary at opposing counsel who promised to email me discovery in Word format, are you listening?], rapid changes of plan all disorient me.
I am trying to be sensible about bedtime. I am trying to eat intelligently. I got a half-hour chair massage at work the other day, which took me from PretzelWoman to MerelyVeryTense. She will be back next week; I will be back for more.
When I had that other massage a couple of weeks ago, I asked her if what I was feeling in my joints was early arthritis. She said no, it is all muscular tension. Which is relatively good news.
I will take relatively good news.
The new guy talked with his cancer people yesterday. The port goes in on the 18th. The chemo goes in on the 19th. His treatment will be slightly to somewhat complicated because of other medication he takes on a regular basis.
And I have a wickedly funny blog post title to throw at you sometime in the future.
Good stuff planned for this weekend: dinner with Brother Sushi tonight, possibly a doll meet-up tomorrow afternoon [remind me to call Fourthborn to see if she wants to go], game night at a friend’s house tomorrow night as another option [no, I still don’t like games, but I love that friend, and we have great mutual friends, and I think I might need to be around them] and my short people at church on Sunday and hibernation for two to seven hours immediately afterward.
There are chocolate chip cookies in my fridge (one less than when I awoke this morning) and the makings for more S’mores in my cubby at work. I haveseven six minutes to shower and foof and be out the door if I don’t want to deal with crazy traffic. I had better stir my stumps.
Note to Middlest: actually, I was not in a bookstore. I was also not in the alternative location for the knitting group that you know and love. I have defected to an alternative, alternative location, with an alternative knitting group consisting of some of the members of the former group.
So I could not have thrown a thesaurus at the miscreant. Not mine, nor one of the store’s. I could, however, have chucked an iced coffee belonging to one of my friends’ at him, but she might very well have objected to that as “roughing the coffee” and thrown a flag on the play.
Note to Alison: yes, there was more than garden-variety indignation that went into my experience on Tuesday night. It was as if all the frustration I feel at the new guy’s situation, and my own while waiting on the outcome, got funneled into it.
I am quicker to laugh, quicker to cry, quicker to speak, quicker to become angry, and quicker to tire. I have zero patience, although I hope I hide that fairly well. Indecision, not following through on a commitment [hello, legal secretary at opposing counsel who promised to email me discovery in Word format, are you listening?], rapid changes of plan all disorient me.
I am trying to be sensible about bedtime. I am trying to eat intelligently. I got a half-hour chair massage at work the other day, which took me from PretzelWoman to MerelyVeryTense. She will be back next week; I will be back for more.
When I had that other massage a couple of weeks ago, I asked her if what I was feeling in my joints was early arthritis. She said no, it is all muscular tension. Which is relatively good news.
I will take relatively good news.
The new guy talked with his cancer people yesterday. The port goes in on the 18th. The chemo goes in on the 19th. His treatment will be slightly to somewhat complicated because of other medication he takes on a regular basis.
And I have a wickedly funny blog post title to throw at you sometime in the future.
Good stuff planned for this weekend: dinner with Brother Sushi tonight, possibly a doll meet-up tomorrow afternoon [remind me to call Fourthborn to see if she wants to go], game night at a friend’s house tomorrow night as another option [no, I still don’t like games, but I love that friend, and we have great mutual friends, and I think I might need to be around them] and my short people at church on Sunday and hibernation for two to seven hours immediately afterward.
There are chocolate chip cookies in my fridge (one less than when I awoke this morning) and the makings for more S’mores in my cubby at work. I have
Stuff that is going right.
One of my co-workers held an estate sale for her late mother-in-law’s stuff last weekend. She set aside vintage crochet cotton for me in classic 50’s variegated pastels. Behold.
...and...
Five dolla! No, really.
My order from Jimmy Beans arrived yesterday, with two more Namaste circular needle organizers, only one of which I technically need at the moment. (This will change, and soon.) One is red, and one is purple. So now I have four.
And the boxes in which they were shipped are just the right size for wrapping birthday presents.
That’s BittyBubba’s on top. Or maybe Middlest’s.
Also in the big box were the skeins for the new guy’s next chemo cap. Which will have X’s and O’s knitted into it. Because I can. We call that subliminal advertising.
There is something that sounds large, tapping in the kitchen. I’m off to investigate, flyswatter in hand. Cue the scary music.
...and...
Five dolla! No, really.
My order from Jimmy Beans arrived yesterday, with two more Namaste circular needle organizers, only one of which I technically need at the moment. (This will change, and soon.) One is red, and one is purple. So now I have four.
And the boxes in which they were shipped are just the right size for wrapping birthday presents.
That’s BittyBubba’s on top. Or maybe Middlest’s.
Also in the big box were the skeins for the new guy’s next chemo cap. Which will have X’s and O’s knitted into it. Because I can. We call that subliminal advertising.
There is something that sounds large, tapping in the kitchen. I’m off to investigate, flyswatter in hand. Cue the scary music.
Wednesday, July 06, 2011
Ridiculously quick post.
Knit Night last night was no fun. Young twit, about 14, humanoid male, potty mouth. When the manager at the venue did nothing after three f-bombs in five minutes, I voted with my feet.
Oh, how I wished that Brother Sushi (multiple black belts) and/or the late Brother Stilts (6’5” of pure gristle and German-Irish attitude) had been there. Probably just as well that they weren’t, but I was definitely in the mood for a little applied mayhem at the time. 1BDH and 2BDH both have martial arts training, and Fourthborn’s beloved (like Brother Stilts) is redneck-once-removed. It would have been fun to have had all five of them there last night.
Sometimes I am not at all inclined to turn the other cheek; sometimes my warrior-queen is screaming to get out. Last night was one of those nights.
When I finish calming down, I will write a letter to the manager of that venue.
BittyBubba’s present appears to be bone-dry on the blocking board, but I’m giving it today as well, before I wrap it up. His little brother’s present is nearly a quarter done.
Also found Firstborn’s present, at the fourth Target store in as many days.
The new guy has invited me to his ward’s temple night, next week. In return, I have invited him to my ward’s session a few days later. He is making noises about feeding me dinner soon. I like this!
A dear friend, who lived with us briefly in the mid-1980’s, has moved back to Texas with her family. We’ve already spoken on the phone and are getting together soon. She was living in Houston-adjacent when life was falling down around our ears in the Hill Country, and she drove up one afternoon for some chick time. That was 18 years ago!
Work was really good yesterday. I closed two cases and opened another.
And now it’s time to grab various and sundry stuff and ease on down the road. Beausoleil, or Scotland the Brave? I think, perhaps, the latter.
Oh, how I wished that Brother Sushi (multiple black belts) and/or the late Brother Stilts (6’5” of pure gristle and German-Irish attitude) had been there. Probably just as well that they weren’t, but I was definitely in the mood for a little applied mayhem at the time. 1BDH and 2BDH both have martial arts training, and Fourthborn’s beloved (like Brother Stilts) is redneck-once-removed. It would have been fun to have had all five of them there last night.
Sometimes I am not at all inclined to turn the other cheek; sometimes my warrior-queen is screaming to get out. Last night was one of those nights.
When I finish calming down, I will write a letter to the manager of that venue.
BittyBubba’s present appears to be bone-dry on the blocking board, but I’m giving it today as well, before I wrap it up. His little brother’s present is nearly a quarter done.
Also found Firstborn’s present, at the fourth Target store in as many days.
The new guy has invited me to his ward’s temple night, next week. In return, I have invited him to my ward’s session a few days later. He is making noises about feeding me dinner soon. I like this!
A dear friend, who lived with us briefly in the mid-1980’s, has moved back to Texas with her family. We’ve already spoken on the phone and are getting together soon. She was living in Houston-adjacent when life was falling down around our ears in the Hill Country, and she drove up one afternoon for some chick time. That was 18 years ago!
Work was really good yesterday. I closed two cases and opened another.
And now it’s time to grab various and sundry stuff and ease on down the road. Beausoleil, or Scotland the Brave? I think, perhaps, the latter.
Sunday, July 03, 2011
So far.
We got to go home an hour early on Friday. I ran by Pie5 and grabbed dinner, met the husband of one of my knitting friends (he manages the restaurant and is every bit as delightful as his charming and somewhat exotic wife). Came home and let that settle a bit, then was overcome by the need to sleep.
Lay down for a nap, planning to go to the dance in Denton, and slept for seven hours. Seven. Obviously, I needed to sleep more than I needed to dance, but still.
Stayed up for the next four hours, made another pot of Texmati, but this time I remembered to refrigerate the leftovers. Finished the hatband on the new guy’s chemo cap while listening to a podcast or three. Went back to bed and slept for another three or four hours.
Got up and picked up stitches for the crown. Alternated knitting and reading, reading and knitting, with a side order of podcasts, until I needed to get out of the house. Went looking for Firstborn’s birthday present (I already have Middlest’s). Stopped at Pier One and bought four placemats to cannibalize for DP holders, then to JoAnn’s for grosgrain ribbon and thread to match. Came home hot, tired, and probably stinky. Took another nap, but only for a couple of hours.
I had decided earlier in the day that I was not going to drive on the far side of Dallas, to watch fireworks and a movie projected on a sheet hung on the side of the house belonging to two friends who graduated from the single adults a few years back. [I told her, back then, that I was delighted for her, but that she really had no right to marry him, because he was one of the few guys at the dances who actually knew how to lead. They both laughed and cheerfully ignored me.]
But when I came home from my errands, there was an email from the new guy inviting me to stop by for a quick visit on the way to the movie. I told him I was probably not going, I was definitely taking a nap, and I would decide when I woke up. And, if I was coming, I would call him but not to expect me [see hot, tired, and probably stinky, above].
I woke up with just enough time to print off driving directions, grab my folding chair, and scoot.
Yes, I will drive an hour just to spend 20-30 minutes with him. Ariel’s got it bad, Daddy.
Nice visit: two hugs, with a tall glass of ice water and some great conversation in between.
I got to my friends’ house and set up my chair less than five minutes before the fireworks started. Had the perfect seat, oohed and aahed with the best of them, and ate about a third of my pretzel M&M’s, washed down with the last of a large root beer.
And then we watched “Despicable Me.” I had seen parts of it at Firstborn’s, but theirs is not a house wherein one sits and watches a movie without discussion or distraction. And if the Bitties are visiting, all bets are off.
I always have fun when I go; I just go, knowing that it will not be a time for cinema.
Time to put on my shoes and grab my bags and scoot out the door for church. I’ve been invited to Firstborn’s after church. I’d like that. And it will depend entirely on how wiped out I am by the heat and my beloved Primary class.
Side note: the chemo did not take place on Friday. There was a miscommunication, so his port was not installed. We are hoping that is remedied this week and that he doesn't have to wait until the 17th. His doctor is Seriously Unhappy. His doctor is not the only one.
We are burning moonlight, y’all.
Lay down for a nap, planning to go to the dance in Denton, and slept for seven hours. Seven. Obviously, I needed to sleep more than I needed to dance, but still.
Stayed up for the next four hours, made another pot of Texmati, but this time I remembered to refrigerate the leftovers. Finished the hatband on the new guy’s chemo cap while listening to a podcast or three. Went back to bed and slept for another three or four hours.
Got up and picked up stitches for the crown. Alternated knitting and reading, reading and knitting, with a side order of podcasts, until I needed to get out of the house. Went looking for Firstborn’s birthday present (I already have Middlest’s). Stopped at Pier One and bought four placemats to cannibalize for DP holders, then to JoAnn’s for grosgrain ribbon and thread to match. Came home hot, tired, and probably stinky. Took another nap, but only for a couple of hours.
I had decided earlier in the day that I was not going to drive on the far side of Dallas, to watch fireworks and a movie projected on a sheet hung on the side of the house belonging to two friends who graduated from the single adults a few years back. [I told her, back then, that I was delighted for her, but that she really had no right to marry him, because he was one of the few guys at the dances who actually knew how to lead. They both laughed and cheerfully ignored me.]
But when I came home from my errands, there was an email from the new guy inviting me to stop by for a quick visit on the way to the movie. I told him I was probably not going, I was definitely taking a nap, and I would decide when I woke up. And, if I was coming, I would call him but not to expect me [see hot, tired, and probably stinky, above].
I woke up with just enough time to print off driving directions, grab my folding chair, and scoot.
Yes, I will drive an hour just to spend 20-30 minutes with him. Ariel’s got it bad, Daddy.
Nice visit: two hugs, with a tall glass of ice water and some great conversation in between.
I got to my friends’ house and set up my chair less than five minutes before the fireworks started. Had the perfect seat, oohed and aahed with the best of them, and ate about a third of my pretzel M&M’s, washed down with the last of a large root beer.
And then we watched “Despicable Me.” I had seen parts of it at Firstborn’s, but theirs is not a house wherein one sits and watches a movie without discussion or distraction. And if the Bitties are visiting, all bets are off.
I always have fun when I go; I just go, knowing that it will not be a time for cinema.
Time to put on my shoes and grab my bags and scoot out the door for church. I’ve been invited to Firstborn’s after church. I’d like that. And it will depend entirely on how wiped out I am by the heat and my beloved Primary class.
Side note: the chemo did not take place on Friday. There was a miscommunication, so his port was not installed. We are hoping that is remedied this week and that he doesn't have to wait until the 17th. His doctor is Seriously Unhappy. His doctor is not the only one.
We are burning moonlight, y’all.
Friday, July 01, 2011
Sitting here in limbo.
He has his first chemotherapy treatment today. His mom and new daughter-in-law will be with him, as will our mutual friend who is driving everybody there and home again.
I will be at work. My attorney will be working remotely, and my inbox is nearly empty. I do have one report which must go out today, but I transcribed it yesterday, and it is probably sitting in his outbox. I also have four new cases to open, none of them with an answer due on Tuesday.
Both of the secretaries whom I back up, will be out today. So life could get interesting. One of those attorneys is on vacation; the other has depositions and will be out for a good chunk of the day. Sudden horrified thought: I hope the depo’s are not in our office, where I might be expected to make coffee. Oh well, I’ll burn that bridge when I come to it ;)
I am nearly done with the hatband on the chemo cap. I think this one may end up being solid green, because neither of the two local yarn shops which carry Malabrigo, have the yellows I need. I will order them from Jimmy Beans immediately after writing my tithing check.
I love paydays. This one is basically tithing and rent, with a side order of gasoline and food. And a modicum of yarn.
Emails are lobbing back and forth between the new guy’s inbox and mine. We are talking about Important Things. So that source of stress (the lack of communication) is somewhat relieved, even if the uncertainty is not.
I need time and space in which to write at length, not necessarily for here. That will not be happening today, but thankfully this is a long weekend.
There is a dance in Denton tonight. I am going. I do not know how long I will be staying, but I will be going. I need to move this body, and I need about a bajillion hugs, even if I am currently at the point where I will cry if somebody is nice to me.
This life? It is a soul-stretching experience. And while I would have told you, six months ago, that I had already experienced my own personal Gethsemane about five years ago, I begin to suspect that that may have only been a prelude. And I am okay with that.
I know that God lives. I know that Jesus is the Christ. I know that the Holy Spirit is truly a Comforter. I know that the age of miracles has not passed. I know that the power and authority to speak in the name of the Lord, are invested in the prophet and his counselors. I know that Joseph Smith was speaking the truth when he bore witness of the Father and the Son. I know that the Book of Mormon is the word of God, and that the Bible is also the word of God (insofar as it is translated correctly). I know that prayer sometimes changes our circumstances, and that it always changes *us*.
Tithing check written. Rent check written. Yarn ordered. Life is good.
I will be at work. My attorney will be working remotely, and my inbox is nearly empty. I do have one report which must go out today, but I transcribed it yesterday, and it is probably sitting in his outbox. I also have four new cases to open, none of them with an answer due on Tuesday.
Both of the secretaries whom I back up, will be out today. So life could get interesting. One of those attorneys is on vacation; the other has depositions and will be out for a good chunk of the day. Sudden horrified thought: I hope the depo’s are not in our office, where I might be expected to make coffee. Oh well, I’ll burn that bridge when I come to it ;)
I am nearly done with the hatband on the chemo cap. I think this one may end up being solid green, because neither of the two local yarn shops which carry Malabrigo, have the yellows I need. I will order them from Jimmy Beans immediately after writing my tithing check.
I love paydays. This one is basically tithing and rent, with a side order of gasoline and food. And a modicum of yarn.
Emails are lobbing back and forth between the new guy’s inbox and mine. We are talking about Important Things. So that source of stress (the lack of communication) is somewhat relieved, even if the uncertainty is not.
I need time and space in which to write at length, not necessarily for here. That will not be happening today, but thankfully this is a long weekend.
There is a dance in Denton tonight. I am going. I do not know how long I will be staying, but I will be going. I need to move this body, and I need about a bajillion hugs, even if I am currently at the point where I will cry if somebody is nice to me.
This life? It is a soul-stretching experience. And while I would have told you, six months ago, that I had already experienced my own personal Gethsemane about five years ago, I begin to suspect that that may have only been a prelude. And I am okay with that.
I know that God lives. I know that Jesus is the Christ. I know that the Holy Spirit is truly a Comforter. I know that the age of miracles has not passed. I know that the power and authority to speak in the name of the Lord, are invested in the prophet and his counselors. I know that Joseph Smith was speaking the truth when he bore witness of the Father and the Son. I know that the Book of Mormon is the word of God, and that the Bible is also the word of God (insofar as it is translated correctly). I know that prayer sometimes changes our circumstances, and that it always changes *us*.
Tithing check written. Rent check written. Yarn ordered. Life is good.
Thursday, June 30, 2011
Progress ... not our most important product.
If you are older, like me, you will remember the ad campaign from the 60’s or 70’s, in which progress was their most important product. Obviously, they didn’t live chez Ravelled.
I came home last night, made a fresh pot of Texmati rice, chopped up half of one of those Dolly Parton chicken breasts, topped it with a reasonable portion of rice, and called it dinner. Left the pot on the stove to cool a little before putting it away, except I realized upon waking this morning that I forgot that little detail.
So, none of the chicken was wasted, but three-fourths of the rice is going out to the trash this morning, because I have no desire to be singing that famous Clapton parody, “Ptomaine”. You know the chorus:
It’s all right, it’s all right, it’s all right ... PTOMAINE!
And you know me. I hate wasting food, because I remember when we didn’t have much.
I frogged about two-thirds of the new guy’s hatband at lunch yesterday, but in the quiet hours last night [while the rice on the stove was going sour], I got it all re-knitted, plus a little more. Listened to some of the new podcasts, and early issues of some of my favorites. Just about dropped my teeth when I realized who one of my blog readers is: a former officer of one of the yarn companies I support, who loves Jacqueline Fee’s Sweater Workshop Book every bit as much as I do (yay! for thinking knitters).
Emails are once more flying back and forth betwixt the new guy and me, and considerably more substantive than in the last few weeks before his surgery, wherein they consisted of my asking him how he was doing, and his giving me witty and non-whiny accounts of his latest symptoms.
I sent him that eight-page dissertation yesterday. He sent back a well-reasoned, if considerably shorter, response. We have some talking points, and I no longer feel quite as stuck as I did.
Feeling less-stuck is not exactly progress, but it is a lean, if not quite a step, in the right direction.
Have I mentioned lately how much I love my new computer set-up? Blogger on one monitor, a Word transcription of the new guy’s latest on a second, and a fresh Word document awaiting my ramblings on a third.
I’m going to see if I can cobble together an intelligent response to his reply, before I hit the shower and then hit the road. But first, there is rice to be bagged. Sigh.
I came home last night, made a fresh pot of Texmati rice, chopped up half of one of those Dolly Parton chicken breasts, topped it with a reasonable portion of rice, and called it dinner. Left the pot on the stove to cool a little before putting it away, except I realized upon waking this morning that I forgot that little detail.
So, none of the chicken was wasted, but three-fourths of the rice is going out to the trash this morning, because I have no desire to be singing that famous Clapton parody, “Ptomaine”. You know the chorus:
It’s all right, it’s all right, it’s all right ... PTOMAINE!
And you know me. I hate wasting food, because I remember when we didn’t have much.
I frogged about two-thirds of the new guy’s hatband at lunch yesterday, but in the quiet hours last night [while the rice on the stove was going sour], I got it all re-knitted, plus a little more. Listened to some of the new podcasts, and early issues of some of my favorites. Just about dropped my teeth when I realized who one of my blog readers is: a former officer of one of the yarn companies I support, who loves Jacqueline Fee’s Sweater Workshop Book every bit as much as I do (yay! for thinking knitters).
Emails are once more flying back and forth betwixt the new guy and me, and considerably more substantive than in the last few weeks before his surgery, wherein they consisted of my asking him how he was doing, and his giving me witty and non-whiny accounts of his latest symptoms.
I sent him that eight-page dissertation yesterday. He sent back a well-reasoned, if considerably shorter, response. We have some talking points, and I no longer feel quite as stuck as I did.
Feeling less-stuck is not exactly progress, but it is a lean, if not quite a step, in the right direction.
Have I mentioned lately how much I love my new computer set-up? Blogger on one monitor, a Word transcription of the new guy’s latest on a second, and a fresh Word document awaiting my ramblings on a third.
I’m going to see if I can cobble together an intelligent response to his reply, before I hit the shower and then hit the road. But first, there is rice to be bagged. Sigh.
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
"Be brave. Ask questions."
I saw that on the side of a bus in downtown Dallas last night as I was on my way to Knit Night.
So, I got another interesting email from my bishop on the subject of the new guy, and I wrote back with some clarifying questions, and his answers were waiting for me when I woke up at 3:00 this morning. I have an eight-page draft or dissertation that needs to ferment a little before I send it.
I have something like eight repeats done on the brow band of the chemo cap.
Brother Sushi is engaged. I am over the moon! When we were at dinner Monday night, he told me all the he-said-she-said stuff, and I asked if I could tell the new guy, and he said I could tell anybody I wanted. I asked if I could blog about it, and his eyes got really big, and he sighed, and he said yes, I could.
So I have.
Not as if I had put it out there on Facebook, where his status remains unchanged. And likely will until the fait is accompli.
I was sitting in Knit Night when I had the sudden, overwhelming impression that I needed to go home. So I did. Still no idea why, other than the email from my bishop. All appears to be well at the Better-Than-OK Corral. I have a lot on my mind, but am not sure how to say it, so I will just get ready for work and ease on down the road.
So, I got another interesting email from my bishop on the subject of the new guy, and I wrote back with some clarifying questions, and his answers were waiting for me when I woke up at 3:00 this morning. I have an eight-page draft or dissertation that needs to ferment a little before I send it.
I have something like eight repeats done on the brow band of the chemo cap.
Brother Sushi is engaged. I am over the moon! When we were at dinner Monday night, he told me all the he-said-she-said stuff, and I asked if I could tell the new guy, and he said I could tell anybody I wanted. I asked if I could blog about it, and his eyes got really big, and he sighed, and he said yes, I could.
So I have.
Not as if I had put it out there on Facebook, where his status remains unchanged. And likely will until the fait is accompli.
I was sitting in Knit Night when I had the sudden, overwhelming impression that I needed to go home. So I did. Still no idea why, other than the email from my bishop. All appears to be well at the Better-Than-OK Corral. I have a lot on my mind, but am not sure how to say it, so I will just get ready for work and ease on down the road.
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
Overslept!
All kinds of good news to share, some of it not-mine but shared with permission, and it will just have to wait. I need to put on my socks and shoes, grab the leftovers from dinner last night, and scoot on out the door, stopping long enough to set out the trash and the recycling.
I start working on the chemo cap today and cannot wait to get my hands on that Malabrigo!
I start working on the chemo cap today and cannot wait to get my hands on that Malabrigo!
Monday, June 27, 2011
Stealth project nearly done!
I have four rounds left. And I need to join on another ball of the main color, which, thankfully, I have.
I also have a skein of Malabrigo in my stash, leftover from knitting Autumn Asters, in a plausible approximation of Packers green. Do any of you have half a ball or more of Malabrigo in a rich VW yellow that you would be willing to sell me? If not, I will just have to make a field trip to Knitting Nook on Saturday.
Oh, darn.
The water was shut off in our meetinghouse yesterday, so we only had sacrament meeting. I came home, ate a snack, and took a nap. When I awoke, I spent the rest of the day reading and knitting and listening to podcasts.
This is what is on my iPod at the moment [not counting the music]:
1. Knit Picks. I have started over from the first one. She has a lovely voice.
2. Sticks & String. I do love me some David Reidy.
3. Knitting Rose. She is local!
4. The Savvy Girls. So far, squeaky clean, and one of them sings opera.
5. The Anatomy of Knitting. I have not listened to her yet, but I have 25 of her 27 episodes loaded. Episode 6 is marked explicit [she dropped a stitch? in silk?], so needless to say I am not loading that one. And another appears to be simply an announcement of who won a contest for some Wollmeise(!!!)
6. A church-ish one, wherein one of my friends recorded an episode on interfaith marriage. Until I have listened to the others in that series, I will not share the name of it. Some of the non-official websites, such as Meridian, are careful to be doctrinally correct. Others are corrupted by worldly philosophies. I lived a worldly life for 23 years. While none of you would jump off a roof if I suggested it, some of you value my opinion sufficiently that if I said I liked something, you would try it. Ergo, I have a responsibility to make sure that anything I endorse, will be edifying.
So:
Pie5 Pizza in Montgomery Plaza
Malabrigo
::cough:: not living in sin ::cough::
[wipe the milk off your monitor; you know I love you!]
Harry Potter, whether written, filmed, or knitted
Chop House Burgers on Park Row in Arlington
That ought to keep us all out of the pool halls for awhile.
I also have a skein of Malabrigo in my stash, leftover from knitting Autumn Asters, in a plausible approximation of Packers green. Do any of you have half a ball or more of Malabrigo in a rich VW yellow that you would be willing to sell me? If not, I will just have to make a field trip to Knitting Nook on Saturday.
Oh, darn.
The water was shut off in our meetinghouse yesterday, so we only had sacrament meeting. I came home, ate a snack, and took a nap. When I awoke, I spent the rest of the day reading and knitting and listening to podcasts.
This is what is on my iPod at the moment [not counting the music]:
1. Knit Picks. I have started over from the first one. She has a lovely voice.
2. Sticks & String. I do love me some David Reidy.
3. Knitting Rose. She is local!
4. The Savvy Girls. So far, squeaky clean, and one of them sings opera.
5. The Anatomy of Knitting. I have not listened to her yet, but I have 25 of her 27 episodes loaded. Episode 6 is marked explicit [she dropped a stitch? in silk?], so needless to say I am not loading that one. And another appears to be simply an announcement of who won a contest for some Wollmeise(!!!)
6. A church-ish one, wherein one of my friends recorded an episode on interfaith marriage. Until I have listened to the others in that series, I will not share the name of it. Some of the non-official websites, such as Meridian, are careful to be doctrinally correct. Others are corrupted by worldly philosophies. I lived a worldly life for 23 years. While none of you would jump off a roof if I suggested it, some of you value my opinion sufficiently that if I said I liked something, you would try it. Ergo, I have a responsibility to make sure that anything I endorse, will be edifying.
So:
Pie5 Pizza in Montgomery Plaza
Malabrigo
::cough:: not living in sin ::cough::
[wipe the milk off your monitor; you know I love you!]
Harry Potter, whether written, filmed, or knitted
Chop House Burgers on Park Row in Arlington
That ought to keep us all out of the pool halls for awhile.
Sunday, June 26, 2011
Yesterday was great!
I spent a couple of hours, off and on, in the kitchen. When I was done, I had three cooked chicken breasts, a pot of Texmati rice, and 2.5 quarts of chicken broth leftover. I took my friend half of one of those chicken breasts, chopped/shredded, over a bed of rice, with some marinated mushrooms and a splash of marinade. No idea how it tastes, because I threw together a salad, did a drive-by fooding, cooed at her new baby, and headed to Arlington for the single adult mini-conference.
As always, Brother Sushi and his elegant sisterly counterpart (I used to have a code name for her, but I’ve forgotten it; Firstborn, she taught Gospel Doctrine in your ward and has the same given name as Fourthborn) made the impossible look easy. She gave the first presentation and called several of us up out of the audience to share our experiences. Yes, that would include me. Then we moved to the chapel, as we had filled the Primary room to overflowing, where we heard from the good brother in Plano stake who is a licensed professional counselor and such a dynamic and enjoyable speaker, finishing up with a member of the Arlington stake presidency.
And because we are singles, there was food for the body, as well as for the heart, mind, and spirit. Tons of it. If anybody went home hungry last night it was their own fault.
I stayed for the dance, because my favorite DJ was in charge. All those bits that the massage therapist worked on so diligently Wednesday night, which have given me not a squeak of trouble since then? They were yodeling to beat the band last night. And I am distinctly stiff, though not what I would call in pain, this morning.
I finally found out who is DJ’ing at the dance in Denton on Friday night. Same DJ, so I am definitely going. I wonder if I can squeeze in another massage between now and then?
In knitting news, I have a bit more than one repeat to go on BittyBubba’s gift. I should make significant progress on that today. Possibly even complete it, as I have a whole bunch of podcasts on the iPod, and if I can keep my eyes open after church I will just knit-knit-knit until it’s done. [I got lots of compliments on it yesterday, and not just from the other knitters and crocheters. There were four or five of us, most of them sitting on my row. Woohoo!]
I remembered to pick up graham crackers for my Primary class. This is the part where I run the lesson material across my retinas, print off coloring sheets, pray, and hope for the best.
The new guy starts chemo on Friday. I’m a lot less nervous about that than I was about the surgery. So maybe I can get more into actual lesson preparation, for next week’s lesson, but I do not feel the slightest bit guilty about skimping on this week’s. I have tried to stay in Mary-mode all week. Martha-mode will get its own turn, soon enough.
He went home from the hospital yesterday! They had told him three to five days, and he did it in two.
As always, Brother Sushi and his elegant sisterly counterpart (I used to have a code name for her, but I’ve forgotten it; Firstborn, she taught Gospel Doctrine in your ward and has the same given name as Fourthborn) made the impossible look easy. She gave the first presentation and called several of us up out of the audience to share our experiences. Yes, that would include me. Then we moved to the chapel, as we had filled the Primary room to overflowing, where we heard from the good brother in Plano stake who is a licensed professional counselor and such a dynamic and enjoyable speaker, finishing up with a member of the Arlington stake presidency.
And because we are singles, there was food for the body, as well as for the heart, mind, and spirit. Tons of it. If anybody went home hungry last night it was their own fault.
I stayed for the dance, because my favorite DJ was in charge. All those bits that the massage therapist worked on so diligently Wednesday night, which have given me not a squeak of trouble since then? They were yodeling to beat the band last night. And I am distinctly stiff, though not what I would call in pain, this morning.
I finally found out who is DJ’ing at the dance in Denton on Friday night. Same DJ, so I am definitely going. I wonder if I can squeeze in another massage between now and then?
In knitting news, I have a bit more than one repeat to go on BittyBubba’s gift. I should make significant progress on that today. Possibly even complete it, as I have a whole bunch of podcasts on the iPod, and if I can keep my eyes open after church I will just knit-knit-knit until it’s done. [I got lots of compliments on it yesterday, and not just from the other knitters and crocheters. There were four or five of us, most of them sitting on my row. Woohoo!]
I remembered to pick up graham crackers for my Primary class. This is the part where I run the lesson material across my retinas, print off coloring sheets, pray, and hope for the best.
The new guy starts chemo on Friday. I’m a lot less nervous about that than I was about the surgery. So maybe I can get more into actual lesson preparation, for next week’s lesson, but I do not feel the slightest bit guilty about skimping on this week’s. I have tried to stay in Mary-mode all week. Martha-mode will get its own turn, soon enough.
He went home from the hospital yesterday! They had told him three to five days, and he did it in two.
Saturday, June 25, 2011
So, can we call that a date?
I have yet to hear back from him on that. I went to the hospital after work. The newlyweds were there, with his mom. They stayed for about another hour, then went home; they’ll be back again today.
I settled in with my knitting, we talked, he wrangled with the laptop a bit, and we fired up a movie. Shortly after which we were joined by mutual friends, who stayed for a good, long visit [but not too long] and left. We watched the last few minutes of the movie, hugged carefully, and I came home.
I teased him that slow dancing is going to be a bit of a challenge, as his stoma is pretty much front and center.
His color is good, his attitude is great, and he has acquired a new talent which will delight his grandkids: unscented but distinctly audible farts. [I hope that word doesn’t offend you; it was not in my vocabulary, growing up, but life with the children’s father changed that. LittleBit’s first complete sentence was, “Hee! Hee! Daddy fart!”]
He says it ought to liven up sacrament meeting in his ward. All of his kids and grandkids live within his ward boundaries.
I grabbed something on the way home and stayed up just long enough to finish it. Had a couple of quick chats with friends via FB and was in bed a hair after midnight. I hope he slept as well as I did: roughly six hours.
My next two tasks are to spit-splice another ball of the main color onto BittyBubba’s gift, for uninterrupted knitting at the singles mini-conference this afternoon and evening. And then to figure out what to fix for my friend who just had her baby: no corn, no beans, no broccoli (no problem!), no cabbage (ditto!), no chocolate. I have three ginormous chicken breasts in the freezer. That’s a start.
I settled in with my knitting, we talked, he wrangled with the laptop a bit, and we fired up a movie. Shortly after which we were joined by mutual friends, who stayed for a good, long visit [but not too long] and left. We watched the last few minutes of the movie, hugged carefully, and I came home.
I teased him that slow dancing is going to be a bit of a challenge, as his stoma is pretty much front and center.
His color is good, his attitude is great, and he has acquired a new talent which will delight his grandkids: unscented but distinctly audible farts. [I hope that word doesn’t offend you; it was not in my vocabulary, growing up, but life with the children’s father changed that. LittleBit’s first complete sentence was, “Hee! Hee! Daddy fart!”]
He says it ought to liven up sacrament meeting in his ward. All of his kids and grandkids live within his ward boundaries.
I grabbed something on the way home and stayed up just long enough to finish it. Had a couple of quick chats with friends via FB and was in bed a hair after midnight. I hope he slept as well as I did: roughly six hours.
My next two tasks are to spit-splice another ball of the main color onto BittyBubba’s gift, for uninterrupted knitting at the singles mini-conference this afternoon and evening. And then to figure out what to fix for my friend who just had her baby: no corn, no beans, no broccoli (no problem!), no cabbage (ditto!), no chocolate. I have three ginormous chicken breasts in the freezer. That’s a start.
Friday, June 24, 2011
So, a good day all around.
He sailed through his surgery. I taught his new daughter-in-law the knitted cast on and, from that, how to knit. I will leave it to Mel to teach her how to purl, but when I left the hospital, C had about two inches of astoundingly even stitches worked and was patiently soldiering away.
I like his mom.
When the boys showed up, with real food for his mom and C, I shook hands with the one I barely know, and he said, “None of that!” and pulled me in for a bear hug. Got another one from C’s hubby.
Met up with BFF for a late lunch at Fuzzy’s Tacos. Fish tacos were excellent as always. Guac was painfully hot, and I had forgotten that they oversalt their chips, so most of that went to waste [instead of to waist]. Drove home with the intention of freshening up and heading over to the temple for my Thursday night shift, but about midway home I just wilted, so I emailed my supervisors and then left messages on their cell phones. Drank a glass of water and went right to bed, where I slept for six hours[!].
I am ready to go back to bed. The new guy has his laptop and a portable DVD player with him. He’s been on Facebook already, thanking everyone for their prayers. Presumably he is out like a light. He was pretty pleased that he got two hours of unbroken sleep while they were operating on him.
Kristen, how is your niece faring?
I put another seven inches or so on BittyBubba’s birthday gift while at the hospital. It is looking really, really good, and I hope he will be pleased. I already know what I want to do for his little brother’s scaled-down version, and [I think] also for BittyBit’s, although that design is still negotiable.
Wednesday night’s massage was amazing. She is very strong, and quite intuitive. I thought we would work on the trigger points in my neck and shoulders and upper back. She spent most of the time working on my ankles and resetting the lymph pumps in my feet, and I am starting to feel a real difference there. She also gave me the name of her chiropractor. I went to the pool afterward and walked for about a third of a mile. Would have walked longer, but she warned me that the work she had done, would keep my bladder busy for several hours. She wasn’t kidding.
The wedding bouquet is drying nicely in the doorway to my studio.
My hands want to knit. My eyes want to sleep. My mouth is parched, and my cell phone needs charging. I think I will try for a two or three hour nap and then get up and go to the gym before work.
MizA, you will be in my thoughts and prayers today.
I like his mom.
When the boys showed up, with real food for his mom and C, I shook hands with the one I barely know, and he said, “None of that!” and pulled me in for a bear hug. Got another one from C’s hubby.
Met up with BFF for a late lunch at Fuzzy’s Tacos. Fish tacos were excellent as always. Guac was painfully hot, and I had forgotten that they oversalt their chips, so most of that went to waste [instead of to waist]. Drove home with the intention of freshening up and heading over to the temple for my Thursday night shift, but about midway home I just wilted, so I emailed my supervisors and then left messages on their cell phones. Drank a glass of water and went right to bed, where I slept for six hours[!].
I am ready to go back to bed. The new guy has his laptop and a portable DVD player with him. He’s been on Facebook already, thanking everyone for their prayers. Presumably he is out like a light. He was pretty pleased that he got two hours of unbroken sleep while they were operating on him.
Kristen, how is your niece faring?
I put another seven inches or so on BittyBubba’s birthday gift while at the hospital. It is looking really, really good, and I hope he will be pleased. I already know what I want to do for his little brother’s scaled-down version, and [I think] also for BittyBit’s, although that design is still negotiable.
Wednesday night’s massage was amazing. She is very strong, and quite intuitive. I thought we would work on the trigger points in my neck and shoulders and upper back. She spent most of the time working on my ankles and resetting the lymph pumps in my feet, and I am starting to feel a real difference there. She also gave me the name of her chiropractor. I went to the pool afterward and walked for about a third of a mile. Would have walked longer, but she warned me that the work she had done, would keep my bladder busy for several hours. She wasn’t kidding.
The wedding bouquet is drying nicely in the doorway to my studio.
My hands want to knit. My eyes want to sleep. My mouth is parched, and my cell phone needs charging. I think I will try for a two or three hour nap and then get up and go to the gym before work.
MizA, you will be in my thoughts and prayers today.
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Mindcrumbs.
Tonight I am getting a massage. It is months overdue, not even counting all that has happened since mid-March. I set the alarm an hour early so as to go to the gym this morning, and instead I spent that hour writing to the new guy and pondering stuff.
We have our monthly staff meeting this morning. I am hoping it’s a short one. I have lots to do before leaving an hour early so I can make it to my appointment on time. And I will be out all day tomorrow. The new guy will call me today or tonight and let me know what time his surgery is scheduled.
I am about 30 rounds from the midpoint on BittyBubba’s birthday present. I expect to be there by bedtime tonight.
I can feel your prayers, y’all. This gathering sense of peace and calm enveloping me. Thank you. My thoughts are still running around in my head like a hamster on a wheel, but mostly they are positive thoughts. I have sticky-notes all over the house, not filled with affirmations, but with reminders of things to do. Yes, I put it all on my calendar, but I also need the little visual triggers. Sticky-note on ATM receipt: Budget $30 + tip (massage 7/6/11). That would be the chair massage at the office, where I bought up the first three ten-minute slots the first week she is coming, and would have bought the first three of the following week if I hadn’t thought it would get me killed or at least severely bruised.
We had more lightning last night, and presumably more storms. I came home a little early from Knit Night, and I think I was in bed by 10:00. Much better than the night before. I certainly slept better.
6:00p.m. cannot get here fast enough, although I will try very hard not to wish the day away, but to notice and savor all the small, good things that will happen between now and then.
Be good, and be good to yourselves. This is the part where I go soak my head.
We have our monthly staff meeting this morning. I am hoping it’s a short one. I have lots to do before leaving an hour early so I can make it to my appointment on time. And I will be out all day tomorrow. The new guy will call me today or tonight and let me know what time his surgery is scheduled.
I am about 30 rounds from the midpoint on BittyBubba’s birthday present. I expect to be there by bedtime tonight.
I can feel your prayers, y’all. This gathering sense of peace and calm enveloping me. Thank you. My thoughts are still running around in my head like a hamster on a wheel, but mostly they are positive thoughts. I have sticky-notes all over the house, not filled with affirmations, but with reminders of things to do. Yes, I put it all on my calendar, but I also need the little visual triggers. Sticky-note on ATM receipt: Budget $30 + tip (massage 7/6/11). That would be the chair massage at the office, where I bought up the first three ten-minute slots the first week she is coming, and would have bought the first three of the following week if I hadn’t thought it would get me killed or at least severely bruised.
We had more lightning last night, and presumably more storms. I came home a little early from Knit Night, and I think I was in bed by 10:00. Much better than the night before. I certainly slept better.
6:00p.m. cannot get here fast enough, although I will try very hard not to wish the day away, but to notice and savor all the small, good things that will happen between now and then.
Be good, and be good to yourselves. This is the part where I go soak my head.
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Achy breaky bod
No, I’m not hurt. No slips, no falls, no Keystone Kops antics. Just two loads of laundry last night, and an hour or so in the pool moving stuff that had kind of set-up since last I went, and a cooler than usual evening because of the rainstorm last night. My hands, and various other bits, are quite stiff and tender this morning. It will pass.
The light show was amazing while I was out and about. I thought, briefly, about fire falling out of the sky and obliterating Sodom and Gomorrah, it was that intense. [Wonder if any of the bars or “family restaurants” (you know, that chain with the owls that proclaims itself to be one, but isn’t) got hit?] Couldn’t hear any thunder from where I was, and the sky was only partially blanketed with clouds. We have had crazy winds since Saturday.
I was awakened briefly about an hour ago by rain pummeling the window unit in my bedroom. I suppose I ought to check it for hail, but it wasn’t that noisy.
We have had a stand-down in terms of the level of care needed for the postpartum sister. [So glad that I am no longer in charge of all this.] I gave the compassionate service leader my availability this week, and thus far my number has not come up. So it looks as if I will be able to go to Knit Night with a clear conscience.
Work is a little crazy, but in a good way. I opened two new cases yesterday.
Late-night exercise is not for me. There was some serious but chaste flirting going on amongst the 30-somethings. A couple of guys acting as if they were 13, i.e., loud and goofy. It was more endearing than annoying, but there were way too many people there at 10:00 last night. The ones who show up at dark-thirty in the morning are there for exercise and not for fellowship or romance.
And I was still wide awake after midnight, so I am going to have to get my rear in gear and set the alarm earlier and scoot out the door tomorrow morning, though I might go again tonight, after Knit Night, depending upon mood and need.
But yeah, I got a lot done last night even if my body is grumbling good-naturedly. I have clean clothes. I have new toothbrushes and more water for my CPAP and some things I picked up with a coupon. I woke up a trigger point or two, and might even have gotten rid of one if the itching in my back was any indication. And while I was at the store, I got cash to pay the massage therapist tomorrow night.
I am more or less on track with my knitting goal for the week, so that is good.
And my ankles are a lot happier this morning.
OK, you know the drill: be good, remember who you are, and let people know that you love them. I, um, may have done just that Sunday night.
The light show was amazing while I was out and about. I thought, briefly, about fire falling out of the sky and obliterating Sodom and Gomorrah, it was that intense. [Wonder if any of the bars or “family restaurants” (you know, that chain with the owls that proclaims itself to be one, but isn’t) got hit?] Couldn’t hear any thunder from where I was, and the sky was only partially blanketed with clouds. We have had crazy winds since Saturday.
I was awakened briefly about an hour ago by rain pummeling the window unit in my bedroom. I suppose I ought to check it for hail, but it wasn’t that noisy.
We have had a stand-down in terms of the level of care needed for the postpartum sister. [So glad that I am no longer in charge of all this.] I gave the compassionate service leader my availability this week, and thus far my number has not come up. So it looks as if I will be able to go to Knit Night with a clear conscience.
Work is a little crazy, but in a good way. I opened two new cases yesterday.
Late-night exercise is not for me. There was some serious but chaste flirting going on amongst the 30-somethings. A couple of guys acting as if they were 13, i.e., loud and goofy. It was more endearing than annoying, but there were way too many people there at 10:00 last night. The ones who show up at dark-thirty in the morning are there for exercise and not for fellowship or romance.
And I was still wide awake after midnight, so I am going to have to get my rear in gear and set the alarm earlier and scoot out the door tomorrow morning, though I might go again tonight, after Knit Night, depending upon mood and need.
But yeah, I got a lot done last night even if my body is grumbling good-naturedly. I have clean clothes. I have new toothbrushes and more water for my CPAP and some things I picked up with a coupon. I woke up a trigger point or two, and might even have gotten rid of one if the itching in my back was any indication. And while I was at the store, I got cash to pay the massage therapist tomorrow night.
I am more or less on track with my knitting goal for the week, so that is good.
And my ankles are a lot happier this morning.
OK, you know the drill: be good, remember who you are, and let people know that you love them. I, um, may have done just that Sunday night.
Monday, June 20, 2011
I can feel those prayers, thanks!
Yesterday at church was pretty good. I wept and smiled through Sacrament meeting, cried when telling friends between meetings, got through Primary just fine, cried some more while telling other friends on my way out the door.
Kristen, I inadvertently deleted your kind comment, but thank you. My fine motor skills are not quite up to par these days. I managed to evaporate a bamboo DP somewhere between church and my couch, although it might be out in the car. I strip-searched my purse, twice, and it’s definitely not in there. Thankfully, these are Crystal Palace resin-infused DP’s, and I have two sets of everything from 0 to 2. When I went into the second package, I found that a DP was already missing. It’s a little like an Agatha Christie mystery: And Then There Were Eight.
I am nearly done with the second repeat of the pattern in BittyBubba’s stealth project. I am still loving it. This is fat(ish) yarn on what are for me middling needles (US 1.5), and it’s all cooperating nicely, except when one of my needles does a Houdini.
The new guy has requested a hat in Packers colors; I spent half an hour or so searching nine pages of chemo caps on Ravelry and tossed every one that I liked into the queue, including some lacy ones should I get bad news about any of my girlfriends.
Speaking of whom, I have plans to get together with one of my BFF’s after the surgery, depending upon when it is scheduled. The new guy will call me on Wednesday when the hospital gives him his time slot. He told me he had lost that battle with his new daughter-in-law, and I said, “Oh good. Then we won’t have to argue about my being there.” He says that we [d-i-l, his mom, and I] are likely to have company, as a number of former petri’s have stated their intention to show up to support the family. I told him that was a non-problem, as I am the one with the sharp, poky sticks.
He also said that from where he was sitting or standing at the reception, it looked as if I had hip-checked a former petri in order to grab the bouquet.
Negatori, GhostWriter. I was merely inspired by a just cause, and extremely determined.
My friend, Bookgrump, posted a lovely photo and story about her dad, for Father’s Day. He had been given a six-month prognosis when she was a teen. He told them that he would dance at her wedding. He did. And at his own, nearly a decade after that. They gave him six months. He lived 23 more years.
I love success stories. Please share yours. I will add them to the scripture study, prayer, etc., hymns at the top of my lungs while driving to and fro.
This is the part where I turn off the AC unit in the front window so I can sluice off and blow-dry my hair and ease on down the road. I think it’s going to be a great day.
PS: MizA, I passed on your experience and excellent advice to the new guy, muchas gracias, along with your email address, along with the emphasis that you were already taken.
Oh dear, the street wreckers-and-fixers are firing up their giant Tonkas already, a full seven minutes ahead of schedule. Gotta scoot!
Kristen, I inadvertently deleted your kind comment, but thank you. My fine motor skills are not quite up to par these days. I managed to evaporate a bamboo DP somewhere between church and my couch, although it might be out in the car. I strip-searched my purse, twice, and it’s definitely not in there. Thankfully, these are Crystal Palace resin-infused DP’s, and I have two sets of everything from 0 to 2. When I went into the second package, I found that a DP was already missing. It’s a little like an Agatha Christie mystery: And Then There Were Eight.
I am nearly done with the second repeat of the pattern in BittyBubba’s stealth project. I am still loving it. This is fat(ish) yarn on what are for me middling needles (US 1.5), and it’s all cooperating nicely, except when one of my needles does a Houdini.
The new guy has requested a hat in Packers colors; I spent half an hour or so searching nine pages of chemo caps on Ravelry and tossed every one that I liked into the queue, including some lacy ones should I get bad news about any of my girlfriends.
Speaking of whom, I have plans to get together with one of my BFF’s after the surgery, depending upon when it is scheduled. The new guy will call me on Wednesday when the hospital gives him his time slot. He told me he had lost that battle with his new daughter-in-law, and I said, “Oh good. Then we won’t have to argue about my being there.” He says that we [d-i-l, his mom, and I] are likely to have company, as a number of former petri’s have stated their intention to show up to support the family. I told him that was a non-problem, as I am the one with the sharp, poky sticks.
He also said that from where he was sitting or standing at the reception, it looked as if I had hip-checked a former petri in order to grab the bouquet.
Negatori, GhostWriter. I was merely inspired by a just cause, and extremely determined.
My friend, Bookgrump, posted a lovely photo and story about her dad, for Father’s Day. He had been given a six-month prognosis when she was a teen. He told them that he would dance at her wedding. He did. And at his own, nearly a decade after that. They gave him six months. He lived 23 more years.
I love success stories. Please share yours. I will add them to the scripture study, prayer, etc., hymns at the top of my lungs while driving to and fro.
This is the part where I turn off the AC unit in the front window so I can sluice off and blow-dry my hair and ease on down the road. I think it’s going to be a great day.
PS: MizA, I passed on your experience and excellent advice to the new guy, muchas gracias, along with your email address, along with the emphasis that you were already taken.
Oh dear, the street wreckers-and-fixers are firing up their giant Tonkas already, a full seven minutes ahead of schedule. Gotta scoot!
Sunday, June 19, 2011
Good news, bad news.
I caught the bouquet. Right after he caught the garter. It was a lovely wedding, poignant as all are which are not a sealing in the House of the Lord. [They will take care of that little detail next year, but this was one of those rare cases (as in, not involving moral transgression, more like a technical glitch) in which it is better to marry first and seal later.] And the more poignant because I did attend our ward’s temple session yesterday morning, where I was reminded of the covenants which bind both Heaven and earth, when made in that holy place.
The new guy called, as promised, on Friday. I am still reeling. Fourth stage colon cancer, into the liver and lungs. Colostomy on Thursday, chemo beginning the following week. He dropped another bombshell, quietly, at the reception last night. Prognosis is six months to two years, I think even with the chemo. But on the other hand, he has promises made to him by the Lord and also by his bishop, so he told the oncologist, “You’re the one with the fancy piece of paper on the wall, and there are some things you don’t know.” They will be using a protocol developed at the University of Kentucky which is the current gold standard.
I have a dear friend who’s had a colostomy and has offered her expertise. She has also knit multiple chemo caps (not for herself, for loved ones), and I will be drawing upon that as I start cranking out caps for the new guy.
But today it is all about the stealth project for BittyBubba. I am going to try to get at least one full repeat done today, and another by bedtime on Wednesday.
I don’t know if the new guy or his family will want me there at the hospital on Thursday during the surgery, but I hope so, and I’d like to send him home with a chemo cap resplendent with fishes. I asked him for his favorite color. He said bright.
I think we can manage that.
I have an appointment with the massage therapist on Wednesday night, and one is coming to the office for chair massages in early July. I’ve already signed up for the first three 10-minute slots.
The Primary lesson today will be a trainwreck. I did not get any graham crackers bought (no grocery shopping yesterday, except for milk and juice and cottage cheese and chocolate chip cookies at Braum’s on the way home from babysitting the Bitties so that Secondborn could run down the block to an open house for friends). I will be Solomon-izing the cookies and giving each precious child half of a deliciously large and decadent chocolate chip cookie. I haven’t even cracked open the lesson manual. Thankfully, it is Fathers’ Day, and we can color.
Oh, and one of the sisters we visit-teach has a newborn and a c-section and requires 24/7 care until her family can get here in two weeks, but thankfully she and the baby do not come home from the hospital until tomorrow.
I feel rather like the mom in The Incredibles at the moment. Isn’t she the one who could stretch out, very thin?
I’m off to fix the cookies, and then my bath, and then I’ll take a squint at the lesson.
Friday, June 17, 2011
Too many athletes, not enough horses.
And my camera battery died, early on in the parade (before I could get a picture of the Clydesdales or the bagpipe corps).
So, all I could offer you is a view, seven stories up, of the pre-parade crowd, but I don’t have the energy to pull it off my camera and paste it here.
I had a fairly bad case of the idawanna’s yesterday. It did not go away, overnight. I didn’t sleep well on Wednesday night; my [CPAP] mask slipped around on my face, so I think I probably woke up a lot, but not enough for it to register consciously. And last night was more of the same, except that I did wake up once and was grateful to go back to sleep, plus weird dreams.
All I know is, I sure hope I start sleeping better once we get a precise diagnosis, a surgery date, and the new guy is all patched up and on the road to recovery.
MovieMom reviewed Green Lantern and managed to get in digs at the casting, the editing, the unimpressive use of 3D, the vavoom factor of the obligatory girlfriend, and Ayn Rand. [My girls will appreciate the last.] I still want to see the movie. Furthermore, as soon as practicable, I also want to take up Firstborn on her offer of Ironman and its sequel.
This would not be the night. Tonight I have a party for the Primary leaders and teachers at our bishop’s house, assuming I am up to it after the new guy calls me this afternoon.
In knitting news, there was steady progress on BittyBubba’s present yesterday, and because I got to leave work half an hour ahead of schedule, I stopped at Holley’s Yarn Shoppe, which is a relatively new place quite near to the temple, and bought some four-inch HiyaHiya DP’s in the size I meant to buy when I bought the extra set of 6-0’s the last time I was in Shabby Sheep.
I coveted some of the Manos Lace (the yarn I’ve used for Lark’s and Willow’s shawlettes) in a rich variegated ruby red. If the news this afternoon is not as wonderful as I hope it will be, I will go back and pick up a skein, or possibly two: one for me, and one for a sweater for Honor and then miscellaneous small items for sale. I have some teardrop-shaped beads in the right color, in my bead stash.
The tub is full. I am nearly done with breakfast. And if I hustle my bustle, I can stop at the store on my way to work and pick up an industrial-size bottle of Cherry Coke; the deli at work has been out since I drank the last bottle earlier this week. And I strongly suspect this is going to be a Cherry Coke day. There was only one item on my to-do list when I left the office yesterday. I may be sending out a will type for food email to the other legal secretaries.
Prayers for all concerned, if you please. His mom flew in last night. I get to Meet-the-Mom at the wedding tomorrow. [And I get to decide if I’m going to ask the bride to pitch the bouquet directly to me, or if I’m going to trust fate on that score.]
So, all I could offer you is a view, seven stories up, of the pre-parade crowd, but I don’t have the energy to pull it off my camera and paste it here.
I had a fairly bad case of the idawanna’s yesterday. It did not go away, overnight. I didn’t sleep well on Wednesday night; my [CPAP] mask slipped around on my face, so I think I probably woke up a lot, but not enough for it to register consciously. And last night was more of the same, except that I did wake up once and was grateful to go back to sleep, plus weird dreams.
All I know is, I sure hope I start sleeping better once we get a precise diagnosis, a surgery date, and the new guy is all patched up and on the road to recovery.
MovieMom reviewed Green Lantern and managed to get in digs at the casting, the editing, the unimpressive use of 3D, the vavoom factor of the obligatory girlfriend, and Ayn Rand. [My girls will appreciate the last.] I still want to see the movie. Furthermore, as soon as practicable, I also want to take up Firstborn on her offer of Ironman and its sequel.
This would not be the night. Tonight I have a party for the Primary leaders and teachers at our bishop’s house, assuming I am up to it after the new guy calls me this afternoon.
In knitting news, there was steady progress on BittyBubba’s present yesterday, and because I got to leave work half an hour ahead of schedule, I stopped at Holley’s Yarn Shoppe, which is a relatively new place quite near to the temple, and bought some four-inch HiyaHiya DP’s in the size I meant to buy when I bought the extra set of 6-0’s the last time I was in Shabby Sheep.
I coveted some of the Manos Lace (the yarn I’ve used for Lark’s and Willow’s shawlettes) in a rich variegated ruby red. If the news this afternoon is not as wonderful as I hope it will be, I will go back and pick up a skein, or possibly two: one for me, and one for a sweater for Honor and then miscellaneous small items for sale. I have some teardrop-shaped beads in the right color, in my bead stash.
The tub is full. I am nearly done with breakfast. And if I hustle my bustle, I can stop at the store on my way to work and pick up an industrial-size bottle of Cherry Coke; the deli at work has been out since I drank the last bottle earlier this week. And I strongly suspect this is going to be a Cherry Coke day. There was only one item on my to-do list when I left the office yesterday. I may be sending out a will type for food email to the other legal secretaries.
Prayers for all concerned, if you please. His mom flew in last night. I get to Meet-the-Mom at the wedding tomorrow. [And I get to decide if I’m going to ask the bride to pitch the bouquet directly to me, or if I’m going to trust fate on that score.]
Thursday, June 16, 2011
Parade? Downtown? For this?
I know the Mavs fans are happy, including the new guy. However, there is a parade in downtown Dallas this morning, and there will be street closings beginning at 8:00a.m. The parade starts near the back of my building, so we will be affected.
Security will be standing at the entrance to the parking garage, to make sure that parade watchers do not fill it up and make it impossible for those of us with parking passes to access our spaces. [Thankfully, the head of security knows me quite well and shares one of my hobbies.]
This means I need to leave shortly so that I am well ahead of the curve of rush hour and can be in my building in an hour, knitting, and at my desk at 8:00. The good news is, I can also close down the popsicle stand half an hour earlier than usual, making for a leisurely commute to the temple.
My bags are by the door. Lunch is packed. I know what I will be wearing. I just need to step away from the computer and start foofing.
Bread and circuses, people, bread and circuses. Although there should be horses aplenty, and marching bands.
mmm, drumline. OK, I feel better about this.
Security will be standing at the entrance to the parking garage, to make sure that parade watchers do not fill it up and make it impossible for those of us with parking passes to access our spaces. [Thankfully, the head of security knows me quite well and shares one of my hobbies.]
This means I need to leave shortly so that I am well ahead of the curve of rush hour and can be in my building in an hour, knitting, and at my desk at 8:00. The good news is, I can also close down the popsicle stand half an hour earlier than usual, making for a leisurely commute to the temple.
My bags are by the door. Lunch is packed. I know what I will be wearing. I just need to step away from the computer and start foofing.
Bread and circuses, people, bread and circuses. Although there should be horses aplenty, and marching bands.
mmm, drumline. OK, I feel better about this.
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Having fun on Facebook
Just learned this morning that a dear friend will be moving back to this area soon. Oh, how I love blessings that do not arrive wearing fake glasses and a funny nose and a moustache.
There will be a modicum of dancing at the wedding reception on Saturday. Bride gets the first one, his mom gets the next, and I get the third. Good thing that the other petri will be out of town visiting grandchildren, because it is questionable whether he will have enough energy for a fourth dance. So there is no danger of one of us ladies drawing the short straw and having to sit, smiling politely, on the sidelines.
I did half of the laundry last night, because I was wearing the very last of my clean underwear. I did not take the bag of colored clothes, and it is a good thing I didn’t, because seven of the twenty-three dryers were out of commission. Might be time to think about finding another laundromat. But this one is so close.
My friend Rebecca brought me a Ziploc bag full of laceweight remnants in yummy colors. I think I will have to sit down and rewind them all, not because she did anything wrong, but because I want to see what they feel like flowing through my hands.
I put another two inches or more on the current stealth project. It is in timeout, on the front seat of Lorelai, because one of the DP’s poked me in the cheek as I was getting into the car at the laundromat. So, penalty for roughing the knitter.
I had a wildly productive day at work. Got the last of my attorney’s revised vacation letters out. He is in trial today, so I should be able to help one of my friends get her attorney’s letters out. And also deal with yesterday’s mail, which I barely looked at.
The wedding gift components look great. I still have ends to trim, but I think I will wait until this evening, just to be sure that everything is well and truly dry. I found a gift bag and a card last night, both of them sufficiently non-bland. I will probably save the actual wrapping for Saturday.
Meeting with my visiting teaching companion for a quick bite tonight and to discuss strategy for what remains of the month.
This would appear to be all the news that’s fit to print. Time to see if I can fill the tub without a repeat of Monday morning’s damp shoulder.
There will be a modicum of dancing at the wedding reception on Saturday. Bride gets the first one, his mom gets the next, and I get the third. Good thing that the other petri will be out of town visiting grandchildren, because it is questionable whether he will have enough energy for a fourth dance. So there is no danger of one of us ladies drawing the short straw and having to sit, smiling politely, on the sidelines.
I did half of the laundry last night, because I was wearing the very last of my clean underwear. I did not take the bag of colored clothes, and it is a good thing I didn’t, because seven of the twenty-three dryers were out of commission. Might be time to think about finding another laundromat. But this one is so close.
My friend Rebecca brought me a Ziploc bag full of laceweight remnants in yummy colors. I think I will have to sit down and rewind them all, not because she did anything wrong, but because I want to see what they feel like flowing through my hands.
I put another two inches or more on the current stealth project. It is in timeout, on the front seat of Lorelai, because one of the DP’s poked me in the cheek as I was getting into the car at the laundromat. So, penalty for roughing the knitter.
I had a wildly productive day at work. Got the last of my attorney’s revised vacation letters out. He is in trial today, so I should be able to help one of my friends get her attorney’s letters out. And also deal with yesterday’s mail, which I barely looked at.
The wedding gift components look great. I still have ends to trim, but I think I will wait until this evening, just to be sure that everything is well and truly dry. I found a gift bag and a card last night, both of them sufficiently non-bland. I will probably save the actual wrapping for Saturday.
Meeting with my visiting teaching companion for a quick bite tonight and to discuss strategy for what remains of the month.
This would appear to be all the news that’s fit to print. Time to see if I can fill the tub without a repeat of Monday morning’s damp shoulder.
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
I didn’t know we had a team?
A week or so ago, I noticed that phone number on the back of a landscaping truck. I frantically fished up my bag from the foot-well, keeping my eyes firmly on the road, and rummaged about until I came up with my camera. Alas, my lane surged ahead, and I did not see that truck again.
I was driving home last night, dithering about whether to have a sensible bowl of cereal at home, or another individual pizza at Pie5. And suddenly, to my right, there was the truck! Or another of their trucks. I almost missed it because of the folded-up grate that covered the back doors. So I got around them, and in front of them, and waited patiently, camera in hand, until the road funneled down to two lanes for construction, and they moved over and pulled up alongside. I snapped this without looking and hoped for the best.
Fourthborn and I don’t say that we have ADD (not sure that we do, but we are easily distracted). We say that we have OLS: Oh Look! Shiny!
And guess what, Fourthborn, we have a team, and green trucks! I thought you’d like that.
In knitting news, the stealth wedding project is finished and blocking as we speak. The stealth birthday project is underway once more.
Speaking of weddings, the reason you girls did not see me at that wedding reception last weekend, is because I didn’t get an invitation. My invitation to her shower went to Fourthborn’s house, and I had already made other plans when she told me about it. Heaven only knows what happened to my invitation for the reception. It could be buried in junk mail at the end of the couch, although I’m usually pretty good at dealing with that as it comes in. [Yesterday’s went straight into the recycling, as there was nothing which required shredding.] The past month has been something of a blur.
The new guy had his CT scan yesterday, and I had about half of the office praying for him. He has more tests on Wednesday, and on Friday he meets with hematology, the CT interpreters, and the oncologist, presumably to be given his surgery date. I got to speak with him a little last night. He was very tired but in excellent spirits, a bit abashed at the outpouring of love and support from the single adults.
Well, duh! It’s because he’s a nice guy. If he were a bozo, it would be just him and his mom and maybe his kids praying for him.
Boys are so funny.
Monday, June 13, 2011
Smooth
One of my all-time favorite Santana songs. Twelve years later, and it still gives me goosebumps. [Was going to insert the YouTube here but after viewing, I decided it was too sensual; I don’t think I’d ever seen Rob Thomas before: the kid is gorgeous!]
This post is inspired by an exchange over on FB after church yesterday. It’s a challenge to come up with age-appropriate treats for my Primary class. At four and five, they know what they like, and they are not shy with their opinions. After the sharp cheese fiasco, I was reasonably sure that it would be a waste to give them edamame hummus and a slice or two of baguette. Let them get a few more miles on their individual and collective palates, and a job, and they can buy their own edamame hummus.
So I made pigs in blankets, to the enthusiastic devouring of three little girls and the near-meltdown of a fourth. The consensus is that graham crackers should be the treat du jour, next week. Preferably washed down with milk, but they all agreed that it would not be fun to drink it warm if I brought it in my bag, and reasoned that it might spill and get all over the lesson. (That ability to foresee cause and effect will stand them in good stead when they are old enough to date.)
I think many kids just naturally prefer bland food. I vaguely remember having read something about how taste buds develop or wake up, over a lifetime. When I was a kid, I liked my food smooth and predictable. Smooth peanut butter (still prefer it; had to work for a couple of years to be able to eat the old-fashioned kind that you have to stir, with any degree of enjoyment). Brownies without nuts.
Hated pizza the first few times I tried it: there was too much going on all at once. Took me a couple of decades of hard work to eat Chinese food the way it is intended, a bite of this and a bite of that. If you had given me a handful of wasabi peas as recently as ten years ago, there would have been weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth.
I’m not one of those people whose peas can’t touch the carrots can’t touch the potatoes can’t touch the salad can’t touch the meat, but I totally *get* them.
[The comments, almost to a mom, averred that children who are exposed to non-bland foods at an early age and who are not allowed to be picky, develop a proper appreciation for flavorful foods. Perhaps, but none of those moms have five children. I was not allowed to be picky, and my mother was a gifted cook, and there was still stuff that made me gag.]
Still are. There is a whole raft of vegetables which induce social embarrassment of the ascending (cukes) or descending (onions, beans) sort. The brassicae (broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage) are almost painful to eat.
I think it might be a matter of how one’s brain is organized, and where one’s talents lie, and I think it might be partly genetic. [Thankfully, at least two of my children are able to eat what they choose; one can barely eat tomatoes, another is allergic to nuts, and LittleBit’s hiatal hernia severely limits her intake.]
There are areas in my life that I like to keep separate from one another. When they stay in their boxes, life is good. And when they overlap, it can be crazy-making.
Here I am again, obsessing over food. The new guy has his CT scan today, when they will determine the stage of his cancer and the extent of his treatment. He had a pretty rough day yesterday but was elated that the Mavs won. I think the chances of my getting to meet his son’s fiancée before the wedding on Saturday are fairly slim, as there is only tonight or tomorrow night before his insane work schedule takes over.
I finished parts four and five of the wedding gift yesterday and am nearly half done with the sixth and final part.
Hee hee hee, somebody forgot to flip the switch back in the shower yesterday, so when I went to fill the tub (I alternate between a shower when I need to wash my hair, and a bath when I do not), one shoulder got a damp surprise. Thankfully, the spray missed my head. And just as I sat down here to type this, the shower rod fell into the tub, bearing my towel.
This Monday is getting off to an amusing and interesting start.
This post is inspired by an exchange over on FB after church yesterday. It’s a challenge to come up with age-appropriate treats for my Primary class. At four and five, they know what they like, and they are not shy with their opinions. After the sharp cheese fiasco, I was reasonably sure that it would be a waste to give them edamame hummus and a slice or two of baguette. Let them get a few more miles on their individual and collective palates, and a job, and they can buy their own edamame hummus.
So I made pigs in blankets, to the enthusiastic devouring of three little girls and the near-meltdown of a fourth. The consensus is that graham crackers should be the treat du jour, next week. Preferably washed down with milk, but they all agreed that it would not be fun to drink it warm if I brought it in my bag, and reasoned that it might spill and get all over the lesson. (That ability to foresee cause and effect will stand them in good stead when they are old enough to date.)
I think many kids just naturally prefer bland food. I vaguely remember having read something about how taste buds develop or wake up, over a lifetime. When I was a kid, I liked my food smooth and predictable. Smooth peanut butter (still prefer it; had to work for a couple of years to be able to eat the old-fashioned kind that you have to stir, with any degree of enjoyment). Brownies without nuts.
Hated pizza the first few times I tried it: there was too much going on all at once. Took me a couple of decades of hard work to eat Chinese food the way it is intended, a bite of this and a bite of that. If you had given me a handful of wasabi peas as recently as ten years ago, there would have been weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth.
I’m not one of those people whose peas can’t touch the carrots can’t touch the potatoes can’t touch the salad can’t touch the meat, but I totally *get* them.
[The comments, almost to a mom, averred that children who are exposed to non-bland foods at an early age and who are not allowed to be picky, develop a proper appreciation for flavorful foods. Perhaps, but none of those moms have five children. I was not allowed to be picky, and my mother was a gifted cook, and there was still stuff that made me gag.]
Still are. There is a whole raft of vegetables which induce social embarrassment of the ascending (cukes) or descending (onions, beans) sort. The brassicae (broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage) are almost painful to eat.
I think it might be a matter of how one’s brain is organized, and where one’s talents lie, and I think it might be partly genetic. [Thankfully, at least two of my children are able to eat what they choose; one can barely eat tomatoes, another is allergic to nuts, and LittleBit’s hiatal hernia severely limits her intake.]
There are areas in my life that I like to keep separate from one another. When they stay in their boxes, life is good. And when they overlap, it can be crazy-making.
Here I am again, obsessing over food. The new guy has his CT scan today, when they will determine the stage of his cancer and the extent of his treatment. He had a pretty rough day yesterday but was elated that the Mavs won. I think the chances of my getting to meet his son’s fiancée before the wedding on Saturday are fairly slim, as there is only tonight or tomorrow night before his insane work schedule takes over.
I finished parts four and five of the wedding gift yesterday and am nearly half done with the sixth and final part.
Hee hee hee, somebody forgot to flip the switch back in the shower yesterday, so when I went to fill the tub (I alternate between a shower when I need to wash my hair, and a bath when I do not), one shoulder got a damp surprise. Thankfully, the spray missed my head. And just as I sat down here to type this, the shower rod fell into the tub, bearing my towel.
This Monday is getting off to an amusing and interesting start.
Saturday, June 11, 2011
Suddenly, I'm sleeping?
“Inconceivable!” as the short bad guy in “The Princess Bride” would say.
Got my much-needed manicure after work last night. My hands are pretty again, or as pretty as workhorse hands can be. At any rate, I’m pleased with them. Had quite the discussion with NailDude about his sister’s idea of good nails, and mine. She is all for delicate, thin nails that look natural. Excellent in theory, but impractical in my own version of reality.
I learned to type on a manual typewriter. If you were sitting on the couch listening to me type, you would hear bangity-bangity-bang. Have you ever seen an old Underwood, with grooves in the keys where fingernails have them a kajillion times? In the thirteen years I have owned a computer, I have killed three or four keyboards. [In the library. With a lead pipe. While flirting with Professor Plum.]
So the three or four nails which she bullied me into removing and replacing, did not hold up well. One popped off, blowing her theory that the reason my natural nails curl away from the acrylic is because the acrylic is too thick. My own theory is that the solar nail powder, while producing a prettier nail, does not bond as well with the glue. When I was getting standard American nails, I never lost a nail, nor had my own curl away as my nails grew out. I pop a nail every four to six weeks, on average. And I am daily on the lookout for the start of nail fungus.
Sorry, you were probably eating.
I pay for acrylic nails because my natural nails are thin and brittle, and if left to muddle through on their own they split just below the quick and snag on things and rip. I pay for acrylic nails because long nails make me feel feminine. [I pay for acrylic nails because I get to hold hands with a middle-aged, straight, Lutheran guy every three weeks.] I pay for acrylic nails because it keeps them all more or less the same length, and other than the constant inspection mentioned above, I don’t have to do anything about them until it is time for a fill, or the replacement of one that has gone flying. Since I have switched to the famous brand of polish with the clever names for its colors, the actual manicure lasts and lasts and lasts, as well.
But enough about my nails. Let’s talk about sleep. Eight hours last night. After an excellent dinner of the caprese from Chop House [that’s not what he calls the salad, but mozzarella + tomatoes + basil + olive oil = caprese, and it was gooooood], I got woozy about 8:30 and shut down the popcorn stand and went to bed. And I don’t remember waking up during the night. At all. If you’ve been reading the blog for any length of time you will know that this is not the norm, for me, but I wouldn’t mind if it were.
My neck, shoulders, and traps are, well, not exactly relaxed, but palpably less tense. You could still bounce a quarter off them; it just wouldn’t ricochet off the ceiling this morning.
I had planned to attend a fireside about 50 miles from here tonight, but the speaker was called away for a family emergency and will be rescheduled. I like my single friends who live in that neck of the woods just fine, and I have zero interest in getting into Lorelai during the hottest part of the day and driving for more than an hour, without air conditioning, for what has now become a simple potluck. With the likelihood that after working until 10:00 last night and from 6:00 to 2:00 today, the new guy will not feel up to attending.
I did not get the last three rows and the binding-off done on part two of the wedding gift, before I crashed. I will take care of that shortly and cast on for part three. And since I no longer have a social engagement this evening, I foresee much knitting progress throughout the day and into the night. I only have a few groceries to pick up, and Mount Washmore is far from critical mass, so I think this will be a day for reading and pondering and knitting and pondering and napping and pondering.
I hope y’all have a good one, too.
Got my much-needed manicure after work last night. My hands are pretty again, or as pretty as workhorse hands can be. At any rate, I’m pleased with them. Had quite the discussion with NailDude about his sister’s idea of good nails, and mine. She is all for delicate, thin nails that look natural. Excellent in theory, but impractical in my own version of reality.
I learned to type on a manual typewriter. If you were sitting on the couch listening to me type, you would hear bangity-bangity-bang. Have you ever seen an old Underwood, with grooves in the keys where fingernails have them a kajillion times? In the thirteen years I have owned a computer, I have killed three or four keyboards. [In the library. With a lead pipe. While flirting with Professor Plum.]
So the three or four nails which she bullied me into removing and replacing, did not hold up well. One popped off, blowing her theory that the reason my natural nails curl away from the acrylic is because the acrylic is too thick. My own theory is that the solar nail powder, while producing a prettier nail, does not bond as well with the glue. When I was getting standard American nails, I never lost a nail, nor had my own curl away as my nails grew out. I pop a nail every four to six weeks, on average. And I am daily on the lookout for the start of nail fungus.
Sorry, you were probably eating.
I pay for acrylic nails because my natural nails are thin and brittle, and if left to muddle through on their own they split just below the quick and snag on things and rip. I pay for acrylic nails because long nails make me feel feminine. [I pay for acrylic nails because I get to hold hands with a middle-aged, straight, Lutheran guy every three weeks.] I pay for acrylic nails because it keeps them all more or less the same length, and other than the constant inspection mentioned above, I don’t have to do anything about them until it is time for a fill, or the replacement of one that has gone flying. Since I have switched to the famous brand of polish with the clever names for its colors, the actual manicure lasts and lasts and lasts, as well.
But enough about my nails. Let’s talk about sleep. Eight hours last night. After an excellent dinner of the caprese from Chop House [that’s not what he calls the salad, but mozzarella + tomatoes + basil + olive oil = caprese, and it was gooooood], I got woozy about 8:30 and shut down the popcorn stand and went to bed. And I don’t remember waking up during the night. At all. If you’ve been reading the blog for any length of time you will know that this is not the norm, for me, but I wouldn’t mind if it were.
My neck, shoulders, and traps are, well, not exactly relaxed, but palpably less tense. You could still bounce a quarter off them; it just wouldn’t ricochet off the ceiling this morning.
I had planned to attend a fireside about 50 miles from here tonight, but the speaker was called away for a family emergency and will be rescheduled. I like my single friends who live in that neck of the woods just fine, and I have zero interest in getting into Lorelai during the hottest part of the day and driving for more than an hour, without air conditioning, for what has now become a simple potluck. With the likelihood that after working until 10:00 last night and from 6:00 to 2:00 today, the new guy will not feel up to attending.
I did not get the last three rows and the binding-off done on part two of the wedding gift, before I crashed. I will take care of that shortly and cast on for part three. And since I no longer have a social engagement this evening, I foresee much knitting progress throughout the day and into the night. I only have a few groceries to pick up, and Mount Washmore is far from critical mass, so I think this will be a day for reading and pondering and knitting and pondering and napping and pondering.
I hope y’all have a good one, too.
Friday, June 10, 2011
Feeling a little rash.
No, literally. There is something weird going on with my neck and collarbone area, but I don’t see or feel any bite marks. I think a food allergy would have shown up sooner. I’ll spare you the visual.
Nearly done with part two of the wedding present, which puts me somewhere between 25% and 33% finished. I hope to complete this part by the end of lunch, and I am aiming for lots of happy knitting this weekend.
There is a young married sister in the new guy’s ward who serves on Thursday nights in the temple. She took me aside last night and said, “I have something to give you, from somebody.” It was a hug, from him.
He is just the dearest, kindest, funnest [it is too a word!] guy. This morning he has his pre-op consultation. I am hoping to be busy enough at work, not to spazz, but not so busy that I can’t think or pray.
One of the single adults is checking to see if we can organize a group fast for him. I told a friend at work, not of our faith. She told me to let her know, and she would fast for him.
The kindness, unselfishness, and generosity of my friends just blows me away.
I took some pictures while in traffic yesterday. No telling if any of them turned out, but I may have some comic relief for you this weekend.
Getting my nails done tonight. Hoping for an early bedtime. I slept well, and I suspect it is going to be another Cherry Coke day.
Nearly done with part two of the wedding present, which puts me somewhere between 25% and 33% finished. I hope to complete this part by the end of lunch, and I am aiming for lots of happy knitting this weekend.
There is a young married sister in the new guy’s ward who serves on Thursday nights in the temple. She took me aside last night and said, “I have something to give you, from somebody.” It was a hug, from him.
He is just the dearest, kindest, funnest [it is too a word!] guy. This morning he has his pre-op consultation. I am hoping to be busy enough at work, not to spazz, but not so busy that I can’t think or pray.
One of the single adults is checking to see if we can organize a group fast for him. I told a friend at work, not of our faith. She told me to let her know, and she would fast for him.
The kindness, unselfishness, and generosity of my friends just blows me away.
I took some pictures while in traffic yesterday. No telling if any of them turned out, but I may have some comic relief for you this weekend.
Getting my nails done tonight. Hoping for an early bedtime. I slept well, and I suspect it is going to be another Cherry Coke day.
Thursday, June 09, 2011
Exceptionally random synaptic firings.
Having friends is one of the things that makes life worth living. Weird, random, not-entirely-awake thought that just poked its head up like a prairie dog: all of the people praying for the new guy, in and out of the church, make the world just that much better of a place. All of us uniting our hearts and minds and voices in hope on his behalf, helps to bring about Heaven’s will for him, and also strengthens and purifies and reconnects the rest of us.
I worked on his kids’ wedding gift last night while 2BDH worked on my computer. At this point I am approximately 25% done, if all goes according to plan.
Had pizza with the Knit Night group at a new place that just opened up (as in, last Friday) at Montgomery Plaza. It was just a little too salty; my ankles are a bit swollen this morning. I'm sure it didn't help that my attorney took me, and his former secretary, to lunch yesterday to celebrate our anniversaries with the corporation: 12 years for me, this month, and 16 for her. A wrap place in the tunnels. I got all kinds of veggies in mine and was only able to eat half. Will have the other half for lunch today.
Had an almost stellar day at work yesterday. Much accomplished in a reasonably orderly fashion. Desk is looking more the way I want it. Physical inbox (where my attorney puts the dictated tapes) is not in cup-runneth-over mode. Electronic inbox has been whittled down to size. All of which dovetail to make the workday sweeter.
Very much wishing I could go back to bed and sleep until it’s time to go to the temple tonight. I’m sleeping better but still not feeling as if it were *enough*.
I need to followup on that call I made to the massage therapist.
Sorry: you’re getting whatever is bubbling up to the surface, this morning. I think I will go back to bed for another hour and try again.
The new guy says they may be able to do his surgery laparoscopically.
Be good, and remember who you are.
I worked on his kids’ wedding gift last night while 2BDH worked on my computer. At this point I am approximately 25% done, if all goes according to plan.
Had pizza with the Knit Night group at a new place that just opened up (as in, last Friday) at Montgomery Plaza. It was just a little too salty; my ankles are a bit swollen this morning. I'm sure it didn't help that my attorney took me, and his former secretary, to lunch yesterday to celebrate our anniversaries with the corporation: 12 years for me, this month, and 16 for her. A wrap place in the tunnels. I got all kinds of veggies in mine and was only able to eat half. Will have the other half for lunch today.
Had an almost stellar day at work yesterday. Much accomplished in a reasonably orderly fashion. Desk is looking more the way I want it. Physical inbox (where my attorney puts the dictated tapes) is not in cup-runneth-over mode. Electronic inbox has been whittled down to size. All of which dovetail to make the workday sweeter.
Very much wishing I could go back to bed and sleep until it’s time to go to the temple tonight. I’m sleeping better but still not feeling as if it were *enough*.
I need to followup on that call I made to the massage therapist.
Sorry: you’re getting whatever is bubbling up to the surface, this morning. I think I will go back to bed for another hour and try again.
The new guy says they may be able to do his surgery laparoscopically.
Be good, and remember who you are.
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