Somewhere in the world...

it is 2009. A couple of my resolutions (all completely do-able, I think):

be wiser with money
return emails more quickly
respond to blog comments (either through email or here)
actually DO the things on my to-do lists
finish projects I've started
repaint the boys' room
walk to get healthier
eat healthier
and possibly the most important...
be more positive!

So Happy New Year to everyone! Be safe and have fun!

Peace out!

Comment replies:
**Anja, you said you'd help me paint their room! So our lists are the same! ha ha ha**

I hired a personal blogger...

and she hasn't been doing her job. She will be let go.

Anyway, over here in my world we're just getting ready for Christmas. Exciting, I know. Here's a breakdown in case you're interested:
● Working on an 8x8 scrapbook for a gift.
● Took down all the regular household brick-a-brack (is that how that's spelled?) to prepare for Christmas decorations.
● Have most of the shopping done.
● Made a gingerbread house
● Penguin lawn decorations are set up (I'll get pics of them later)

I still have lots to do. Small stuff. I'm also revamping the photos above our entertainment center. Painting frames black for that. Changing out pics. I just got tired of the old stuff, which has been there for way too long. It'll be nice to have new stuff to look at. Art from friends, art from fave etsy artists, art from the husband (most of the pics around the house were taken by me...but I spend a lot of time here, shouldn't I get to see my own pics that I love?)

Ok, so now this post is old news. I wasn't finished and just saved to drafts. So all of those things are done (well, mostly) but have been replaced by a new list. Isn't that how lists work? I'll put it on my list to research the dynamics of lists.

I'll try to post more. Haven't I been saying that for a long time? :D

Peace out!

To All my Internet Friends:

Happy Thanksgiving!

I'm counting you all in my blessings. Have a safe and wonderful day with your loved ones.

Peace out!

PS: Back in 2001 a group of wonderful ladies joined together on Yahoo to chat about scrapbooking and life and whatnot. We all became good friends! But the last couple years we've spoken less and less. This week one of the members, Anna, contacted us and invited us to become a group once again, this time on Facebook. I joined and quickly found my newest, older, and oldest friends again. Isn't the internet amazing? So if you wanna link me on Facebook, click on my link over there ---> and add me!

PPS: I also added a "follow my blog" thing below the clock. So if you wanna see what's up when I post a new post, click there, okie dokie?

Dwigt

●Search and replace doesn't work on misspelled words. Referring to two episodes of The Office...the pic is something Pam made in art school that makes me laugh. :D




●So what up, blog land? Not much here. That's about it! Watching Season 4 of The Office, doing a little bit of digital scrapbooking, etc etc.

●Had some Halloween fun. The usual. School parade. Candy. Trick or Treating. More candy. Click on that for a bigger photo.






●That's about it! This must be the shortest blog post ever (at least on my blog!)

●Peace out!

Weekend Frenzy

Well, it was really only a frenzy for a person who has recently become something of a homebody. Have not had the desire to leave the house for anything but picking up the kids from school. So going to breakfast, Franklin Covey (got THE cutest calendar pages for my planner!), the costume store to finally get E his costume, and then the shoe store to get some proper shoes for idiotic foot structure.

This you may or may not know...I honestly can't remember ever having a pair of comfortable shoes. Sure, I've had less-painful, tolerable, mediocre shoes. But for my high-arched, anatomically-skewed, wide-as-the-Grand-Canyon excuses for feet, I needed something special. I found that at New Balance. Walking shoes. That hopefully won't have me in tears after walking two miles. They felt like heaven in the store, so keep your fingers crossed that they will live up to their rep. They have amazing arch support and some sort of metal rod in them to improve the step. They look a little strange, but as long as I don't feel like having a foot-ectomy after walking, they could be neon orange and I wouldn't mind.

As for the Halloween costumes...I had hoped my boys wouldn't be enticed into the freaky/gory/scare the sweet bejesus out of children costumes. But that seems to be the case. Last year E had a gladiator costume complete with a mask that had such a disconcertingly blank stare, I refused to let him wear it at home. This year he has some sort of grim reaper which is not much better. At least it isn't that horrifying mask from the movie "Scream", which I saw eons ago and that mask still brings tears of fright to my eyes. I never wished for a girl child so much as this Halloween costume dilemma; I would gladly shell out the ducats for a nice fairy princess costume. Or a hippie.

Word of the day: pu-pu. Pronounced poo-poo. Remember in A Bug's Life, the waitress in the tavern walks around and says "Who ordered the poo-poo platter?" and these flies all land on it and go to town chowing down? Very clever double meaning. It's actually a tray of Hawaiian hors de'ouevres.

So there you go.

Peace out!

Speaking of lists...

So as I lay in bed after a really bad day during which we all seemed to be at each other's throats, I found that thinking of the things that make me laugh til my face hurts chased away the tears. Here are some of those things:
1) Bumper cars
2) Jumping on the trampoline
3) Teeter totters
4) Arcade racecar or motorcycle games
5) Listening to my little sister's stories
6) Looking at pics of my nephew where he's making hilarious faces (which seems to be nearly every photo)

Shows/Movies that make me laugh til my face hurts:
1) Along Came Polly (specifically the bathroom scene and the club scene, both with Ben Stiller)
2) Phoebe and Ms. Pacman
3) Jerry Seinfeld as Raif
4) The Scrubs cast does A Charlie Brown's Christmas
5) The faces of Jim Halpert from The Office
6) The Chinese Backstreet Boys singing "That Way"

Random things that make me giggle:
1) B saying "1.21 gigawatts!" said in the voice of Doc from Back to the Future
2) PJ's goofy dances
3) E's neverending, outrageous stories complete with talking-with-his-hands
4) Little inside jokes between me and my friends and family
5) Chats with Rhian-that girl is so funny!

I may add more. But that's it for now. Click the links. You won't regret it!

Lists, Lists, Lists

My sweet friend Rhi and I had a hilarious chat about to-do lists the other day. Lists make me crazy. They really do. I write down all this stuff I need to do and then I basically don't look at the list again. Or rarely. It's almost like my brain figures that once it's written down, it's done.

The tricky part comes when I realized that I never did the things on the list. Didn't I do that already? No you weirdo, you didn't. I need a hand to come out of the list and slap me if I don't actually do the thing.

Oh, and sometimes, to make myself feel like I did something productive, I add things I've already done to the list, and cross them out. See! I did something! Proof!

Today I did do a few things that were on my list. Held some books at the library (then I will pick them up when they are set aside for me, very handy!), got some stuff to finish a very late birthday gift, and did the dishes <--- one of those things I add later to make it seem like I did more. I also dropped off a utility payment, called and paid a bill over the phone (also very handy), checked out a new quilt shop, called in an rx refill, looked around for a photosafe pencil...all before NOON! See, I did something!

Whatever works, right?

Where DID you get those peepers?

I'm not sure, but they ARE splendid, don't you think?

That's my niece, I got to tend her for the day last Saturday. She's such a hoot! I lost my phone (it fell down in the couch) and I was like "H, where's my phone?" and she goes "Phone, where are you?" lol We were looking out the window at the rain and she was totally bummed that everything was getting wet. She kept saying "oh-oh, wet" and "rain". And while we were looking out the window, we heard a car honk twice, and she goes "beep beep" and then I said it and then she said it and we just laughed and beeped. It was so cute! And then when my sister-in-law got here to pick her up, as they were leaving, she said "see you". See? A hoot, I tell you!

That's one of the things I miss about having small kids. My boys were hilarious and always making me laugh with the things they said, and the way they said it. They still say hilarious things though, so I still get the laughs. But the way small kids say such things, so fun!

Like the other day, we were walking home, and E (out of nowhere) said he likes fog. I was like, why? Then he tells me the fog gives him a "moisturizing sensation". lol I think those were the words he used, I'll double check. But he definitely said 'moisturizing'.

I write down these things they say, I have for years. Anytime I need a laugh, I go read some of them. It's as close as I will get to having them be small again, I guess.

I am so glad I have pictures and the little snippets of the things they said. And now I have the little things she says and does that make me laugh. This little girl cracks me up and makes me smile, and I absolutely adore her for that!

So there you go. Enjoy the little people in your lives. They won't be so little for very long. :D

And your point is???

The weather has been cooler. Sort of. The afternoons are a little warm, but otherwise the days are nice. I adore fall. I wish it could be fall all year. No extreme hot, no extreme cold. I like spring, but not as much as fall because I know the extreme hot is coming. And yes, I know that with fall, the extreme cold is coming, but I much prefer the cold. Heat just makes me feel icky. Bleh.

So the picture up there is an odd tree I found in the parking lot at B's work. It's like half and half. Weird, huh? Click on it to see the full photo.

That would be the first time I've used the camera in a long time, to take pictures of something other than my quilt or one of my self-portraits (and I even missed a week, but I didn't beat myself over it. I missed one in 66 weeks. I deserved the break).

So I've been quilting. Playing Brain Age, CrossworDS, and Solitaire Overload (mostly just for golf and freecell) on my Nintendo DS. Best investment in the world people! If you don't have one, I highly recommend it. I have a lot of puzzle games for mine. Actually, the only non-puzzle game I have is the Sims and that got boring PDQ.

Speaking of Sims, I've been playing the old skool Sim City (from 1001) that we downloaded for our Wii. So fun! Back in high school when I was getting really bad sinus infections, I'd skip my afternoon classes and B and I would go to his house and play Sim City and F-Zero. So naturally, whenever I get a sinus infection (still after this long!) I get the urge to plop and veg and be a captain of industry. It's fun. We have newer versions of the game, but the old one is way easier and we know the cheat code to get $999,999 dollars. Usually you start out with $20,000 and rely on taxes and whatnot to build and stuff. I like to completely cover my land with park though, and that takes a lot of money. And it the little neighborhoods and factories and train tracks (less pollution, see?) have to be in perfect alignment. Except for waterfront properties...I treat my residents right and give them beach and views. Sometimes there's a plane crash. And you get libraries and casinos and amusement parks. Very relaxing.

I've been on antibiotics of the strong variety for about a week. The ones I was on early last month did enough to get me through our trip and some, but my infection came back with a vengeance and I went in and got on the good stuff. It has some odd side effects (I've never farted so much in my life!) but I think it's doing its job. I hope.

I really need to post more often, so the posts are shorter. See, when I go to a blog, and I see big chunks of text in a post, I get overwhelmed. And here I am, doing the very same thing to you. I'm sorry! I will try to post more often!

And thanks to my peeps who still visit and comment. I love you guys! I really do! So I will end this post now and see you in a few days!

Peace out!
--J

Busy Busy!

Working madly on two quilts, one for charity (which I will upload a photo of sometime this week) and one for my sister in law. The charity one I had to handtie, which I am not crazy about, but I think it looks great! The other one I took to the quilt store for the most amazing longarm quilter in the universe to do for me.

I am so glad those two things are done! They were big projects, weighing on my poor, overtaxed brain for months and months.

I also have stories galore from our trip to Montana (including a treacherous hike in which I tumbled down a shale slide and got pretty banged up), Yellowstone (where we saw several large animals cross the road right in front of us), the Tetons (hello, is Jenny Lake the MOST beautiful lake EVER? I think so!) and all the while in excruciating pain from the fall which happened on the 2nd day of vacation. Still recovering. Hurts to breathe, may have injured my ribs. I also have this rattle in my chest when I cough, which is probably unrelated to the rib thing, but it makes my ribs hurt very badly.

So I have some more quilting to do. Dentist appointments. Boys go back to school next Monday. Birthday packages to ship. Photos to take of SD cards, but not sure how (different camera and file format than we usually do). Busy busy!

TTFN!

To Clarify...

my last post.

I honestly do not send the holiday cards in hopes that the doctors will call in rxs for me or anything. I send them because I am truly grateful for them; I know (as my friend kimmy pointed out...and I'm glad she did) that there are, umm...less grateful patients out there. Patients who act as though the doctors should be or are superheroes and when they run behind in their schedules, it's unacceptable. I know that's not the case at all. I also know that when the doctor would 'squeeze me in', it caused him to run late, and risk getting scolded by the other patients. So for that, added to all the other things they do for me, I am grateful.

And I'm also not one of those people that will call every doctor they know til they get what they want. When the nurse called me back from the doctor's office I'd never seen, and said that not only could they not call in an rx, nor see me anytime before Sept 15, I was geared up to go to the urgent care to be seen.

So I called my gyn office to get the results of my blood work for my thyroid, and figured, hey, why not at least ask? My motto (if I have one) is that it never hurts to ask. I fully expected her to say no and to say I'd need to be seen first.

This morning, my regular GP was in and the nurse called bright and early and said he'd squeeze me in as soon as I could get in, even though he didn't have any openings. I told her that I'd called my gyn office and they called in an rx for me. And she said ok and we hung up.

But I felt badly...I didn't want her to think I am one of those people who would call around til someone did what I wanted. So I called her back, and told her that. And I explained in a little more detail what happened, and that I was going to go to the urgent care place. She and the doctor (whom she had told our conversation) were both cool about it and glad I got what I needed and not to worry about it, they know I'm not like that.

So anyway, just wanted to clarify that.

Never Underestimate the Power of Greeting Cards

And I am totally serious here people!

Of 3 doctors, 2 of whom I see regularly (gyn and GP) are totally willing to call in an rx of antibiotics for my chronic sinus infections without seeing me, since I only call when I am certain I have one (maybe twice a year total). The 3rd doctor is in the same practice as my GP. The two that would call them in without seeing me first are doctors I send Christmas cards to every year. Cheesy? Maybe. Heartfelt? Yes.

You see, for about 3 years we didn't have any health insurance. And lots of medical issues. So they would give me samples to avoid pharmacy full-price expenses, draw blood for tests so I wouldn't have a separate bill for labs, avoided ordering costly tests that I believe they might have done if we had the insurance, etc etc. And not just for me. My whole family. So I am eternally grateful to them for that.

Coincidence? I think not.

And to clarify, my GP was out of town or he would have called in the rx. So I ended up calling my gyn office about some other blood work and figured since I had the nurse on the line, why not ask about the antibiotic? Never hurts to ask, right? And if she said no way, I'd make do without, since neither had an opening for that sort of problem in the foreseeable future.

But in that 3rd doctor's defense, even though I had been seen by another doctor in his practice, I hadn't personally seen him, though I believe that one or both of my kids has. So I get why he wouldn't.

I am content to believe it's because of the Christmas cards though. :D

And thank you for the commiseration on my last post. I beat myself up more than necessary, so I definitely don't need it from some outside force. It all worked out though.

When the Hour is None

I've always liked that phrase for some reason. Maybe because it implies that time can be nothing, or maybe stopped, even for a fraction of a second. Or an hour. I guess an hour.

Just finished reading a fantastic book called My Name is Will by Jess Winfield. Parallel eras. Drugs. Shakespeare. Excellent read. Might want to remove the dust jacket while reading as it does clearly state 'sex, drugs and Shakespeare' on the Bard's forehead right on the cover art.

It seems I've become the type of person who is terrible at being independent. I have this God-awful list of shit to do, and yet, during the times I should be shit-doing, I'm doing nothing. Afraid of my shit list. Seriously. I cannot handle one thing on it. Well, maybe the smallest things. But the list seems so...what's the word...inconceivably overpowering that it threatens to swallow me whole if I engage it.

I also cannot make any decisions while shopping for some lame reason. Every time I go to Target or something, I have to call my lovely husband to make a decision on something so random and mundane. And when I realized that, I was sickened and ashamed. So today, I went to Costco, made a decision on some t-shirts for our upcoming trip (since I have 3 shirts to my name, I would like to have a few more so no repeats shirt-wise). I selected 3 of these tie-dye ones, and they don't have dressing rooms. So I got them knowing I might end up bringing them back. Then I saw the two-pack of fitted t's that just called out to me, so I got them too. Knowing I might end up bringing those back. While the tie-dye ones make my jugs look nice, they are too tight around my waist. Pity, they are so cute. The other 2 make my jugs look smaller than my belly, which is more honest, but they fit better. So I am keeping those.

Back to my point, I made these decisions (as well as to take the 3 cute ones back) all by myself!!! Gold star for Jocelynne? No. As soon as I told my lovely husband of the shirt debacle, I was scolded most severely as apparently I was warned last week that we can get no extra ANYTHINGS to save for the trip. Nevermind the fact that I desperately need t-shirts, nevermind the fact that any time I've bought myself a necessity I end up taking it back out of guilt in lieu of something my family needs more, nevermind the fact that I'm taking the 3 back; the two I am keeping are apparently an extravagance the likes of which have never been recorded in history.

So I pouted. And I'm mad. At being spoken to that way. Hmph.

And in addition, I've apparently pinched a nerve in my neck which has been sending excruciating pains down my arm and burning in my shoulder. Lovely.

So, my dear internet peeps, it has not been a most joyous week, I am sad to say. And yesterday I had one of my lovely crying jags whereupon I burst out crying for seemingly no reason and every reason simultaneously.

Here's to a better rest-of-week and hopefully I've not brought you all down to the bottom of the barrel with me. Who will throw the rope if you're all down here with me?

Peace.

PS Click on the pic to be taken to the full-size version. Just a bit of tongue-in-cheek humor.

Bad Friend

I've been a bad friend since I started using this laptop. I need all my old links on here and in the meantime, I intended to use the links on my blog to keep up with blogs. Well, it hasn't happened. Same with email addresses. The email program I'm using on the laptop is the a very basic thing, and it doesn't have any of my contacts. Grr.

So I hope everyone will forgive me! It basically comes down to the fact that I am probably the laziest person on the face of the earth. Seriously. Or maybe it's just a summer thing.

I gotta go to the mall and hopefully find a decent pair of non-RX sunglasses as mine fell in the river/stream in Big Cottonwood Canyon on Friday. Lovely. I get migraines in direct sunlight (even cloudy days now that I think of it), so I've been forgoing my contacts to wear my RX sunglasses. So I can't see at night or in the house during the day, unless I wear my sunglasses around the house. And that just seems weird to me.

I decided I'm not cut out for manual labor. Or at least two days of manual labor. My back and feet hurt like you would not believe. We laid some sod our neighbors gave us on a small area in our backyard.

I've also been dogsitting (is it dog sitting if you leave them at their house and go put them in and let them out and feed and play and bring in mail and water flowers?) for my brother- and sister-in-law. I'm usually rather uncomfortable around dogs, but this has been a great way to get used to them better. Love the little one, Pookie. She's a Boston Terrier and she's the perfect size and has the cutest personality. She looks at you with her head tilted and ears up, like "what are you doing?" Cracks me up! The other dog Roxie is a Boxer, and she's a little too big for my comfort. I swear, I must have had a bad experience with a dog when I was little and I blocked it out. I should ask my mom. I'm extremely weary of dogs. But maybe it's like with kids, people are weary of other people's kids til they have their own. Who knows?

Well, I better get. Places to go and housework to avoid. You understand. Right?

Cricket Serenade

crickets serenade me
they sing their songs
in the dark part of the day
a nice contrast to the sting
of my blistered fingers
blistered from cutting
the unwanted growth in nature

it's too warm for sheets
too cool for the fan
stuck in the middle
of being asleep
and being uncomfortable

sleep eludes me
and on the nights
when sleep eludes me
i realize just how much
i hate how my brain is wired
how much i long to be outside
myself
even for a short time

i know that won't happen
can't happen
so i shall lie and listen
to the crickets serenade me

Now...

Sorry, it took me a few days to get off my lazy butt and photograph the pages and get them loaded. Click here to go to the 52 weeks mini book! Though it's not really 'mini' anymore. It's fat. I need to take a side photo.

Also, I didn't finish week 32. I think I messed up the page the first time and ended up starting over, and I haven't printed a new picture for that page yet. No biggie!

Peace out!

Prayers and peaceful thoughts...

please, for my friends Monica and Kimberly. Both are having rough times right now (understatement of the century) and I know they would appreciate all the help they can get.

My heart aches for them...one I've met and love, one I haven't met and love. And their families, because when one member of a family is in crisis, it affects the whole family.

Thank you peeps!

In other news, I finished my 52 weeks album! YAY! It's fat and messy and I LOVE it! I shall post the remaining pages over on my SIStv gallery...the link should be over to the right. Such a huge project and I'm glad it's complete! As you may also know, or not, I am doing the 52 weeks project again, for a second year. And I plan to do the pages as I go instead of trying to do it all massively.

My boys began 5th and 3rd grades. I am a mom to a 5th and a 3rd grader. Umm. That seems weird to me. Sheesh! Oh, and get this, E and I have the same size feet. I kid you not. Barefoot, side by side, same size feet. I must take a photo before his feet surpass mine.

Virtual Vitamin C thoughts to my friend Jen K. who has succumbed to a summer cold. I do hate those and I am glad I haven't had one yet (knock on wood).

My friend Mike is the new sheriff in town, or at least switching cities, so really just a cop in a new town. He's been a cop for a long time. I just wanted to say that sheriff thing cuz they always say it on tv.

My sister's family in Texas came down with cryptospiridium from a lake they swam in before coming to visit Utah. Last year, Utah had 1900 confirmed cases of this parasite, mostly in public pools and so far this year, the public pools are clean. Yay!

My mum (I got that spelling from my UK friend Rhian and I love it, so I'm using it more) seems to be doing better. Surprising due to the severity of the heart attack she had. It's left us all with questions, but do we need the answers if everything seems to be ok? I haven't called or seen her as much as I should, mostly because of B's surgery and post-op care. I had a hard time getting the bandages to work this time, last time I was quite proud of my handiwork, but this time? Not so much.

Speaking of which, I have a bit of a crush on B's podiatrist. What will I do when B is completely healed and it's no more Dr S? I keep teasing that my toe hurts, I better go see Dr S, or my ankle hurts, I better go see Dr S. lol B just rolls his eyes and laughs. He says if Dr S doesn't know about my crush, he must be blind or an idiot, because apparently, I am subconsciously flirting with him. Ugh! It's all harmless, so don't get all your panties in a bunch. :D

Movies. We saw "The Bank Job"...excellent film people! Watch it! I am now enamored with Jason Statham (no clue if I spelled that right), the lead in that film. We also watched "Reign over Me"...yes, old news, I know. I really think Adam Sandler did an amazing job with this serious role. Not like Spanglish, which I think sucked. But this was a whole other side of him and I am impressed! And you gotta love Don Cheadle. That guy acts so well, that it doesn't even seem like he's acting! Like in "Crash". His delivery is flawless, and so seamless, it's amazing. He's either a total genius, or he's really good at playing off the other characters. Incidentally, both "The Bank Job" and "Reign over Me" have the same actress, her first name is Saffron, I don't know her last name though. Like that song..."I'm just mad about saffron, and saffron's mad about me. They call me mellow yellow. Quite rightly." Saffron. Now that's a cool name.

Crickets chirping, time for sleep. Gotta get my beauty rest for the a.m. visit with Dr S. ;)

Favorite Lyrics Part 8

Superman (It's Not Easy)
by Five for Fighting

I can't stand to fly
I'm not that naive
I'm just out to find
The better part of me

I'm more than a bird:I'm more than a plane
More than some pretty face beside a train
It's not easy to be me

Wish that I could cry
Fall upon my knees
Find a way to lie
About a home I'll never see

It may sound absurd:but don't be naive
Even Heroes have the right to bleed
I may be disturbed:but won't you conceed
Even Heroes have the right to dream
It's not easy to be me

Up, up and away:away from me
It's all right:You can all sleep sound tonight
I'm not crazy:or anything:

I can't stand to fly
I'm not that naive
Men weren't meant to ride
With clouds between their knees

I'm only a man in a silly red sheet
Digging for kryptonite on this one way street
Only a man in a funny red sheet
Looking for special things inside of me

It's not easy to be me.
-----------------------

Why do I like this song, you ask? I think it's an important reminder that the people we look up to or idolize or try to emulate are just people dealing with their own shit. I've always held firm to the idea that, while I admire certain people, I wouldn't go so far as to call them heroes, because that's putting them on a pedestal they may not want to be on. There are so many expectations on people, especially celebrities or popular figures in the media, that I think we as the general public forget that they still have to poo and brush their teeth every day, just like the rest of us.

Puts it in perspective.

And again, that photo really has nothing to do with this post. I couldn't find anything to go with the song lyrics. So you get an old school Fisher Price Little People playing hopscotch. Click on the image to go to the full size version, if you please.

Peace out blog peeps!

Toe, Part 2 (really long, but possibly interesting!)

So the Mr had his left big toe bones fused like he had done with his right big toe. Man, those people at the outpatient surgery center really need to get their act together and schedule better. Or maybe it was the surgeon, who is consistently way behind on appointments. Or the people that do his scheduling. Anyway. The surgery was scheduled for 2 pm, They told us to get there at 1 for paperwork, not realizing that the same excruciatingly detailed questionnaire had already been done the last time. So we sat in the lobby and waited and waited and waited and waited and waited. Finally got called back to the 'gown room' as I shall call it. This is where the anesthesiologist and surgeon come to discuss the procedure with the patient prior and go over any last minute questions, and also where the patient changes into a gown. This time we had the boys with us the whole time, and we waited and waited and waited and waited. We took goofy pics of B looking like a pregnant mom in her gown about to have a baby (again!), played emesis basin ball (I put one of those little pink puke trays in the corner, gave each of the boys a paper towel to ball up, and see who could make their ball stay in the tray). (I think I could be persuaded to sell that picture for the right price! lol)

Finally, when the little boys couldn't handle the waiting, we bid adieu to B and left to go eat. This was at 3:15 or so. I stopped the nurse in the hallway and asked about when he would go back (30-45 minutes, and how long the surgery would be (I swear she said an hour) so we calculated that we should be back at 4:30. So we went to eat and then went to Kmart to do some pics in the old school photo booth they have, as well as look at school supplies. We got back to the hospital at about 4:50-ish. He was just barely going into recovery part one. It's a good thing his dr is incredibly hot (at least I think so) or this scheduling thing would be a lot worse. ;) We met with the dr to go over the surgery and stuff.

We were literally the last people there. They had actually locked the lobby. Well, why not? It was 5:30. So the nurse took us back to the recovery part two area and set us up with some cold beverages and about 20 minutes later B came out, barfing. Bleh. The dr told me that the regular sedation they use for that procedure (as they used last time) didn't quite work, and B kept kicking and resisting, so they unexpectedly had to put him under a general instead. Hence the barfing.

All the while P is messing with this damn wheelchair, making this clanking sound that was irritating the hell out of me. E kept changing the channel on the tv and making weird sounds. I was snapping at them, P kept getting upset and crying and running into the other room. Ugh! Such a different experience from the last time! B is barfing and I'm trying to keep the boys from seeing that, only they won't mind and kept going around to watch, therefore getting nearly ill themselves. Kids!!!

So we finally get B in the car, and partway home, he says he's going to barf. I realized the puke tray we took from the place was in the trunk, and told him to just wait, I'd pull over. But he couldn't. So as B is barfing, P is screaming in HORROR and I'm screaming P's name over and over to chill. I pull over, get P out of the car and tell him to sit on the grass, open the trunk, dump all the crap out of B's plastic clothes bag, and run over with it. The 7-11 hot dog box B grabbed to catch the stuff wasn't up to the task. He let loose in the bag.

Ok, back on the road. B has his bag, P is calm. We pull into the driveway and B starts hurling again. Luckily P was asleep and woke up as we pulled in, I jumped out, pulled open his door, told him to hop out quick (which he actually did!) so we wouldn't have another screaming fit. Finally got B into the house.

Now let me tell you about the first time (right toe). Went to the surgery center, filled out the paperwork, promptly called back to the gown room, took goofy pics of B in gown looking pregnant, met with anesthesiologist and surgeon, they took him back, I drove home to get the boys from school, came back to the surgery center where we were promptly called back to the recovery part two room, sat for about 20 minutes, drove him home, and settled in.

WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED??? I guess when you're having the same procedure twice, you have certain expectations for the second one. My advice: don't. Assume each thing will have its own problems or lack thereof, and go with the flow.

And once again, the photo has nothing to do with the post. :D
Peace out!

I SSOOO Need This

A hamburger phone a la Juno. The only glitch is that I don't have a land line. I wonder if the company would consider making a hamburger cell phone? I would be first in line for that bad boy. Oh yeah.