I am heading to Reno, Nevada tomorrow morning bright and early to visit my brother who I haven’t seen in about three years and to see my two adorable darling nephews who are 3 and 5.
I’m heading out with daddy…so this will be a really fun time cause my dad is waaaay cool. He loves to gamble so we have fun in the casinos at night and then boogey all day.
Anyhow, I’ll be taking lots of pics and will share when I get back. See you in about 10 days.
Today I started practicing my calligraphy skills…SHIT, I am really rusty at this! I am seriously trying to remember that last time I actually did basic Italic calligraphy and I’m thinking it was probably well over ten years ago for my son’s Bar Mitzvah invitations.
I really do enjoy doing things with my hands, so I’ll be taking my time to practice the strokes well before I put pen to wedding invitation envelope paper. After all, I only ordered 25 extra envelopes!
Calligraphy really isn’t too difficult. The main thing is the angle of the nib. If you fail to maintain the right angle, it messes up the entire letter formation. One of the things I always do is to give myself adequate guidelines. I live for mechanical pencils and nice soft erasers when I do calligraphy.
My favorite letters…yea…dorky, I know but I DO have favorite letters to draw—F, L, M, R…ooooo, you can just get such a nice flair on those. I like lowercase ‘k’ too…kinda fun to make that.
Anyhow, that is what I am doing right now on this July 4th holiday…then I think I’ll go read a bit of Twilight (yep, I got sucked in) and then go see Three Dog Night and the fireworks at the ‘Point’.
Have a good one folks!
Yes, the next story up was the first car. Here is a picture:
Could you die???
When I graduated from college, I had some money that was left to me in my grandpa’s will. It was about $1800 and at the time, that was a nice chunk of change (actually, given today’s situation, it still is). My dad had a friend who owned at Datsun dealership. Does anybody remember Datsun?? That was the failing precursor to Nissan. I t was a crummy car company with crummy cars, but my dad was convinced that he could get me a great deal on my first car, so I grudgingly went with him to see his buddy Al. I don’t think I had two words to say as Al basically told my dad which car would be perfect for me and blah-blah-blah. So we plunked down $2500.00 for a Bumblebee Yellow Datsun B210 sedan. (My wonderful dad paid for the other part of the car as a gift for me!) I no sooner drove out of the dealership and the brakes didn’t work properly. Back I went, sat in the customer “lounge” and sat until they figured out a cable wasn’t hooked right. So, I drive a bit more and speedometer stops working. I mean, no needle movement at all. BACK to the dealership again, and yet again, a cable was not connected properly.
Now, I want to say that this was a real pain in the ass because we didn’t live anywhere near the dealership. I lived in an area of Pittsburgh called Squirrel Hill and this dealership was out in a suburb called Monroeville. It was probably a 20-25 minutes drive…not that bad really, but a superb pain in the ass AND their service hours were awful…none on Saturday.
So, little stupid things like this kept happening for over a year. There were no lemon laws then, so all I could do was keep taking the little piece of turd back for constant repairs and of course after a year it was out of warranty. It was about a year after I got the car that I met DD and was introduced to what a real car is…he had an Oldsmobile Cutlass 442…OMG…it was gold with a racing stripe and had beautiful leather interior and it was a very hot car for the time.
Sooo, after DD and I took a little roadtrip to Niagara Falls (my dad called it our early honeymoon–teehee) and the stinking car did some more stupid stuff, I decided it was time for me to take on some debt and get a REAL car. I gleefully traded that Datsun in on a 1976 Olds Cutlass that was the most gorgeous car I had ever seen (and to this day, I still think it is the most gorgeous car I ever had)….it had a sparkling midnight blue paint that just glowed like diamonds, had white swivel leather bucket seats, had everything that a car at that time could have…V-8 motor…etc. I LOVED THAT CAR and kept it until the gas crisis in the late 70s forced me to get something that was less of a gas guzzler…that is another story, for another day.
Here is a very close picture of that pretty baby (I didn’t have the 442 model, but the shape and color is right)…
My first love...
Now, THAT, is what I am talking about!
Back into the ‘I got nothin to say’ thing again…I’m starting to think I’m bi-polar. Watched Princess Diaries last night when I couldn’t sleep (stress, anxiety but I DID NOT eat disgusting fatty foods, just had some cut up healthy fruit to kick up the natural sugars)–progress on that front.
Got the wedding invitations delivered today and of course there were a couple little glitches on two of the items so the company is reprinting those two items and shipping them out post-haste….InvitationConsultants.com has been a terrific company to deal with…and of course, there is still time.
Writing the 2nd edition of my book and kind of got a block at the new chapter 5 (on Cohlear Implants if you are interested)…I’m sure the block will dissolve like a good little blood clot soon.
Like I said, nothing really of substance…so, I think I’ll go get a glass of wine, maybe go out to see a movie and just blow off some time…there ain’t no energy right now.
Today is our 32nd anniversary. THIRTY TWO YEARS…that is a very long time to be with one person and I can’t wait for the next 32!
I love you DD!!
AT LONG LAST…what you have all been waiting for with baited breath. MY PSA (Public Service Announcement for getting your innards checked).
Seriously folks…I do plan to show you the pictures, so if this topic turns you off, do sign off now.
First I had the endoscopy. Arrived at 6:30 AM and got taken right back to the procedure room. It is so nice to be FIRST…no waiting, no worrying if the doctor is going to get called out or anything. And, my weight was where it needed to be as I had eliminated the 2 gnarly pounds I previsouly discussed.
One of my greatest assets is the fact that I can fall asleep anytime and anywhere. So they really didn’t have to worry about me relaxing enough for the procedure…say the word and I am in my own twilight. But, alas, I do have a mighty fine gag reflex, so drugs were most certainly needed to ensure they would have a jolly easy time feeding the tube down my throat. “Turn on your left side”, “Put your head on this pillow like this” and that was the last thing I heard…until DD was making light conversation to wake me up….I actually think I heard myself snore in the middle of all of this…but, I stirred, then drimmeled, stirred again enough to hear that I had a hiatal hernia…a small one…but that I had NOT done any damage to my esophogus from the reflux and honestly, if I lose weight, that will take care of the problem and likely end the need for Prilosec. This is a good thing.
Next up was the colon. How can I count the ways that one can run like a madman for the toilet? Colonoscopy prep is the fastest way I have ever found to lose a good five pounds. Not that I would want to make a habit of strapping a potty chair to my butt, BUT, my God, who would believe so much is still stuck in you? Such a joy that Sunday was…Lilacspecs chatted with her dad the entire time I was trotting back and forth to the loo. Monday comes and back to the same MD. He comes in all ready to go and looks at me and says, “Weren’t you just here?” Like, DUH….”I asked if you could do both ends the same day, but nooooooo, could not be done…so here I am yet again for the poke at the bottom end.” (Said this with a smile and a laugh as the man was about to invade my butt and I didn’t want to make him unhappy.)
Ahem, assume the position once again, get the IV again, go niteynight again. This time it was a little different though cause I FELT IT on the way out. That was wierd, not painful, not even uncomfortable, just WIERD to feel this tube thingy jiggling around where only food byproducts should be. I heard myself say, “oh, I can feel that, I can feel that…uh, I can feel that” and then I dozed back off.
Outcome (no pun intended- HA!), I had several small eraserhead size polyps removed and sent off for investigation. It took a little longer than I expected, but they came back clean (damn well should be clean after I shit myself to death getting ready for this test). All in all, it really wasn’t a bad test.
Last, I went to the foot doctor and NO, I do NOT have plantar fasciitis, but I do have some ligament issues on the sides of my feet-lateral faciitis he called it. Basically the ligaments tighten up when I am not standing so that when I do stand up, ZING…the pain just shoots through my feet until the ligaments stretch out. I can do some stretching exercises, eh….but he thought that it would be better to give my feel more support so he ordereed custom orthodics.
So, I THOUGHT I would get to stick my feet in goo for them to take impressions, but, NO…I had to lay on my stomach and they wrapped some kind of plaster around my feet to get the mold! RATS, I couldn’t get any pics of the process, just the product. According to everyone, my WEIGHT had nothing to do with my foot pain…WOOHOO for that. I got the impressions done on May 27th…and got the funky inserts a week later….jeez louise…they add an inch to my height! I guess that isn’t entirely bad!
I am healthy on the inside, at least my stomach and colon are and that is a good thing. The feet are survivable and I got an inch taller in my orthotic shoes. What more can one ask for??
ALRIGHT, I hear you…pictures, pictures, we want pictures. Here are my latest portraits, for your viewing pleasure!
Now, GO GET YOUR COLON checked! PSA, signing off!
Travel without the laptop…bwahahahahaha! First lie…I packed up the bugger and took it with me but didn’t use it to teach…that part was true. I did, however, use it to work…something I didn’t think I was going to do so much of….I know, don’t end a sentence with a preposition.
Second lie, I’m just going to drive over to Tampa and Orlando and veg on the beach for a few days. Uh, the ultimate prospect of driving for almost 20 hours over a few days made me shudder and changed my mind, so I stayed in Kate’s backyard and took in the sunny 95 degree days on her patio.
I came home having accomplished actually quite a bit…taught the class, got two syllabi written (the contract better come through now that I’ve done a chunk of the work without it), and helped support the city of Slidell and New Orleans.
And I came home with one more thing…..Poison Ivy…all over my face…did I ever tell you how sensitive I am to Poison Ivy? I just have to be in the same neighborhood with it and I get it. Sigh…………hopefully it will stop spreading.
So, next up, as promised, my colon.
I’m heading to my second home, New Orleans, on Friday and I am NOT planning on taking my laptop. I am going to teach sans computer baby. Just me, the students, a couple books and a white board. I can do this because I only have 3 lovely ladies in the class and I can cover the content of the class in Speedy Gonzalez mode.
So what is my reward for finishing up in record time? I am driving to Florida to visit my sister (Orlando) and my cousin Donna (outside Tampa) who just built a huge beautiful mansion on the beach with a swimming pool, jacuzzi, etc. Yes, people….I am going to veg on the beach for about 3-4 days in FLORIDA (and of course pray that no hurricanes will rear their ugly heads for the 10 days I am down south).
So, TA for now! You get to see my colonoscopy, endoscopy, and lateral fasciitis foot casts when I get back.
Now THAT is something to look forward to!!!! ;P
One year from today, May 21, 2010, is my official retirement date. It can’t come soon enough…not that I want to wish time away, but every day I realize how much more that it really is time for me to retire.
I think I’d like to take this opportunity to periodically tell some stories from my 36 years of teaching to celebrate my upcoming future.
Story 1 – How I Got My First Job
After I graduated from Ohio University in December 1973 I knew that there would be no school jobs open for an SLP midyear, so I took the time to go to Pitt to take a few grad classes, investigate other grad schools, and work as a cashier for Lerner Shops (my salary was minimum wage, $2.70/hr…yep, you read that right). After looking around at grad schools I decided that I really did want to work first and then do grad school part time. So I started applying for school-based SLP positions (SLP is Speech-Language Pathologist if you didn’t know). I sent applications in to the Pittsburgh Public Schools, the Allegheny Intermediate Unit, the Cleveland Public Schools, and the Fairbanks Public Schools –yes, Fairbanks, ALASKA.
The Allegheny IU indicated they had no positions but would keep my application on file. Fairbanks interviewed me by phone and my mother nearly had a heart attack because she always called me her “wandering Jew” and was totally convinced that I would be offered that job and would be gone in a heartbeat. I wasn’t offered the job. I was contacted by the personnel office of both Pittsburgh and Cleveland to schedule an interview. (I LOVED Cleveland, btw as I had done my student teaching there and really enjoyed the city…loved those inner city kids, I truly did. What heresy that would have been for a Pittsburgher to move to Cleveland…but, I had a great time with the radio stations during all the Steelers games…and I would ALWAYS be a Steeler fan no matter where I lived!)
Back to the story….so, I scheduled an interview for Cleveland and asked my mom to come with me on the roadtrip. She was always SOOOO MUCH FUN to travel with…she was like a great girlfriend…loads of fun…shits and giggles! And, Pittsburgh had their own style of interviewing and they told me when to come in for the meeting.
Cleveland was first. So, we set off for the adventure, got checked into a nice hotel (Cleveland is only about a 2 1/2 hour drive from the ‘Burgh, right up the turnpike…EZ) had some dinner and I practiced answering some questions with mom…we watched some TV and the next day I had the interview. It went FANTASTICALLY well. I felt very confident and was getting all positive vibes from the interviewees. So thay thanked me and said they would be in touch. So, we get back on the road to head home and a TORNADO hits northern Ohio. It hit Xenia, Ohio to be exact but then traveled right along the northern boundary of the state and was wreaking havoc on the Ohio Turnpike. I have NEVER been in rain and wind like that in my entire life. Cars were pulled off all over the road and lots of cars were parked under overpasses. It was just so dangerous driving but becasue of the number of cars pulled over, it was almost just as dangerous trying to stop cause you’d just get blown into someone if you didn’t keep going. So, we did keep going and my heart was in my throat the entire drive back to Pittsburgh. Once we got near Sharon, PA the winds died down a bit, but that was closest I had ever come myself to being in a tornado. Kind of made the positive nature of the interview that much better!
Next came Pittsburgh and can I tell you that it was a really terrifying interview scenario. I went into a room with about 10 professionals all holding clipboards and score sheets. As each asked me a question, it was like staring down the barrel of a gun (and yes, unfortunately I had the terrifying experince of doing that, but that is another story)…I would answer each question and one at a time they would mark their score cards. I mean, NO FEEDBACK, NO FACIAL EXPRESSIONS, NADA! After about an hour, they said thank you and that was it. Don’t call us, we’ll call you…literally!
So, I went back to Lerners and worked…and waited. As August rolled around I started getting nervous and made a couple phone calls. Both Cleveland and Pittsburgh said they hadn’t made decisions yet and I’d hear from them. Arghhhhh! So, I wait, and wait, and wait. One week before school was set to start I figured I would call one more time, Pittsburgh first… and here is the response I got from Pittsburgh.
Me: “Hello, this is DH and I’m calling to inquire as to whether the SLP positions have been filled for this year.”
Them: “DH? Well, we were wondering when you were coming in to sign your papers.”
Me: “Sign papers? What papers?”
Them: “Your contract. You do still wnat to work for us, don’t you?”
Me: (sincerely speechless for probably the first time in my life)…”Contract? You mean I got the job? Nobody called me!”
Them: “Yea, you have the job if you come in to sign your contract.”
And THAT was how I found out I got my first job. I went in immediately that day to sign my contract, sign all the other paperwork required, yadda, yadda, yadda. Now, there is ALWAYS irony in my life..ALWAYS.
The very next day, around 8AM, the Cleveland Public Schools called to offer me the job. WFT! I really wanted the Cleveland job more, really, really did and it KILLED me to tell them that I had just literally signed the contract with Pittsburgh. They actually asked me to go back to the Pittsburgh Schools and cancel the contract…they said I could do that since it was within 24 hours. But, I am a person of honor and integrity (I am, really) and just could not nor would not do that. As fate would have it, I met my future husband at the end of that first year of teaching/SLPing.
Ahhhh, all things happen for a reason. So, that is how I got my first teaching job 36 years ago. My salary $8,600.00. I was in heaven! The story still makes me smile…
Next up…the first apartment and first car.
Does anyone remember the post I had a few weeks ago where you could figure out how much longer you had to live? This one.
Well, it looks as though if I don’t significantly change my lifestyle, my Ouija Board’s prediction about the ‘length of my days’ may well be spot on target. At the ripe old age of 12 I asked it when and how I would die. It said, and I will never forget this, 58 years of a heart attack. Mind you, NOBODY and I mean NOBODY in my family at that time had had a heart attack let alone died of one so I really didn’t know what that was…but, the mystical magical Ouija Board said that was to be my fate.
Which brings me to the events of this past week. It was time for my medical exam. Goddamn it, I hate going to the doctor because I ALWAYS FEEL GUILTY. But, I went. I got weighed at home first to see how far off the scale at home was from the doctor’s…oh, before I forget, DD came with me to my appointment to keep me honest and make sure I told him everything…keeper of the truth, he is…like Obiwan.
Anyhow, I went and the doctor’s scale and mine matched! Now, in my mind, that was a very good thing. I mean, I was much heavier than I should be, but at least it wasn’t heavier in the doctor’s office. So, if I decide to get serious about my weight, my scale is honest.
Then came the requisite exam: breath, cough, squeeze, poke, push, probe (sounds like a porno flick) and the questions….and the answers…mainly my damn feet hurt and I mean almost all the time…I think it’s my weight and he thinks maybe plantar fasciitis. Go to the foot doctor for that one (or Wikipedia).
I have a nigly stupid cough that I’ve had for months and I mean MONTHS. Lungs sound OK but get a chest x-ray to be sure….result: CLEAN. (This is a very good thing considering I had been around intense second hand smoke my entire adult life…but no more…everyone now has QUIT–woohoo)
I have heartburn which we all know is reflux and I mentioned that gee, maybe it is the reflux that is giving me the cough. Once a speech therpaist, always a speech therapist. So, we get a prescription for an endoscopy and while we are at it, I MUST have my baseline colonoscopy as well. DAYUM…get me at both ends.
And of course we cannot forget the requisite blood tests and urine specimen…dontcha just love that whole ‘clean catch’ scenario we ladies have to go through to pee in a frickin cup?!
So, where was I going with this..oh yeah, I forgot to tell him about some memory issues that I thought I was having (ministrokes actually)…but I guess I didn’t think of it enough to remember to tell him what I was thinking of and everyone around me ASSURED ME that I was just GETTING OLD and it happens to everyone AT THIS AGE.
OK…OK….I’m getting to the results….
I’m fat…they call it morbidly obese…BMI over the magic number of 30.
But that wasn’t the good part.
My pee is turbid and has hemoglobin in it…both of which is not normal but that is not the good part yet. (Actually, the doctor ignored this test result.)
The blood results….ah yes, a heart attack in the making….elevated cholesteral–the BAD KIND, elevated triglycerides (whatever the hell they do, I don’t know, just know they aren’t supposed to be elevated), elevated glucose…WTF…am I living with DD so long that I have to share ALL of his little traits, blood pressure is OK but to be honest a tad too high ….what a banner day for the QUEST lab that was….all those little ‘H’ s next to my test scores. But that STILL was not the best.
HERE. is. the. best.
I called the gastroenterologist’s office to make an appointment for my double dipping, get alll things scheduled (for those who don’t know, the colonoscopy is a two day process becasue you have to PURGE your entire bowel system the day before so you DARE NOT make any plans at all cause you are on potty call all day that day) and wait to get the forms in the mail. HAHAHA! As I’m driving on a highway to get back to IUP I get a call from a schedule person in the office that they have to make other arrangements for me for the tests. Oh, why?
Are you ready? Are you sitting down??? DO NOT drink anything for a minute now becasue I don’t want you losing it through your nose..
They cannot do the test s on me in their specially designed medical center because
I
AM
TOO
FAT
Uhhhhhh, folks, I weigh 210 pounds right now. YES, that is twice the size I should be cause I am just a cute little petite girlie (NOT), but they were able to do these tests on my husband who is like well maybe around 275 pounds.
I was 2 pounds over their limit so I have to go to a hospital for my excavations. KELLEY, are you reading this?????
Puts a whole new spin on what FAT means in different contexts. So, what did I do. What any normal person would do, I CANCELLED BOTH APPOINTMENTS. I told them I would lose 10 pounds and call them back.
I’m not done yet.
So, yesterday, as I was driving home on the Pennsylvania equivalent of the autobahn, the PA Turnpike, I get yet ANOTHER CALL. This time from the Director of Surgical Operations for the doctor. Oh, she says. She overheard the technician or whoever the person was who called me talking about my ’situation’ and thought, WELL, THAT”S NOT RIGHT! ( Implied statement: She can’t be so fat that we can’t do the test because afer all, she does have reflux and we can’t let that go without an offical diagnosis or anything.) She called the big kahuna at the main hospital to get clearance for them to do the tests on me in their own specially designed office. Ahhhh, those evil 2 pounds really won’t hurt me that much so they can load my lard butt onto one of their tables and do the tube-thing….both ends.
My tests are sandwiched on either end of a lovely May weekend..not Mother’s Day weekend at least.
So, what have I learned. The Ouija Board just might be right. I really need to eat my oatmeal, cut back on carbs and sugars, increase my physical activity, lose the red meat, take my meds, measure my blood pressure and take this shit seriously or 58 is gonna come pretty darn fast. And it won’t be pretty.
And to think that some people thought I would just drift into retirement…..
Time to get out the motivation theme songs. I have to make me a CD…a REALLY GOOD CD with really excellent theme songs that will keep me motivated….this is where you, my loyal readers, can help…..any suggestions for motivating songs?
I have two top songs that will go on first…When the Going Gets Tough and Eye of the Tiger…what else should I add? Let’s keep things interesting…
