The Neon Nurse's Charting

As you can guess because I am posting, we did NOT drive to Denver today.

I managed to be in bed before 1am, which would have given me a fighting chance to get up at 6:30 and be competent drive 225 miles. (Each way.) But what I failed to take into consideration was how much cough syrup I'd been chugging all day. It can disrupt the sleep cycle, you see. So I lay there awake for at LEAST an hour, trying to tell myself that resting my eyes and body would be good enough.

Mike woke up at 5am, all bouncy and ready for adventure and excitement. The excitement he got, when he let our dogs Cowboy and Climber outside to go to the bathroom.

None of our pets are completely normal, except maybe the goldfish. At the top of the Wackazoid Pyramid is Mad Sheila, a blue heeler. We got her from a rescue organization some years ago, but even with a lot of effort, she was never quite normal after being abused as a pup, and in her golden years she's gone, well, completely psycho. She got to where she would not come in the house, no matter what the weather. But we had some other very furry dogs who preferred the cold outdoors to the heated house in winter, so we figured hey, why force her? She had her favored sheltered nooks in the turnout pen, and the company of the other dogs, and all seemed well.

I think it was an accident last week when she found out she could break into the basement. There's a window well with an air conditioner in the window part where she liked to den up sometimes. I think she got startled by some unusually loud thunder and accidentally pushed in through that accordion pleated side thingie they come with. That ACs come with. Not thunder. Although thunder comes with lightning, which is zig-zaggy, just like...never mind.

I guess breaking into the basement isn't at all the same as being lured into an evil house to get safely crated up in the cozy warmth. Despite my increasingly profanity-laced efforts, Sheila kept getting in all week. Yesterday my very handy son-in-law came over and HE finally managed to seal off the window well in a way that even Sheila's wily and insane cattledog brain could not circumvent.

But she had gotten into the idea of getting out into the not-her-pen area of the world. So last night she experimented around and managed to not only bust out HERSELF, but also free her two compatriots, Buddy, a free spirit who is mostly harmless, and Appy, Climber's sworn enemy. Thus when Mike turned out the inside dogs...instant dog brawl.

By the time my finally asleep brain had registered what all the snarling and screaming meant, and I had furthermore gotten untangled from my blankets, Caro had made it outside and broken up the fight. She told me to go back to sleep (my hero!!!) and fixed the escape hatch as well.

But going back to sleep? Yeah, right.

So at 6:30, when I had intended to be getting up, I instead admitted it was probably not such a good plan to bull forward stubbornly and attempt to complete a 450 mile round trip drive on three hours of sleep and a bit more cough syrup. There's Indomitable Spirit and then there's plain old stupidity.

And it's not like I don't have plenty to do right here at home. :/

Here I am struggling to the end of my 12 hour day, which feels like it was about a week long. But I think I have everything done and ready so that I can take Mike up to Denver tomorrow for his annual visit to his neurologist. Zach is going along to GameBoy with Mike. I am going to pretend I am on vacation and therefore excited about getting to drive for eight hours in a day.

On the plus side, we do plan to dine at the Golden Corral!

See you Wednesday!

Darn the cough syrup! It always makes me a little loopy, and apparently posty as well!

This is a story I was telling my friend Kielle in response to an observation she made about the infamous Runaway Bride and her "deer in the headlights" look.

***

I was a single mom living with two very young kids (hadn't hooked up with the clone yet) and since childcare was pretty much impossible to score if you had one still in diapers, we were all on ADFC/Medicaid.

So my appointment was at a clinic in a teaching hospital, with a noob learning his trade. Fair enough, someone has to help them get a start. But he visibly started the second he looked me in the face, and started firing off questions about headaches, blurry vision and other scary symptoms. Specifically, he demanded to know if my eyes had "always been like that?!?!"

So he rushed out to find his instructor, leaving me with heart palpitations and wondering what to name my future guide dog. He came back in with an older, calmer doc who looked me over and clarified the question. My lower eyelids do not come up to touch the bottom of my iris, leaving a thin gap of the "whites" showing any time my eyes are open. If it wasn't something new and sudden, we had no worries. I said that so far as I could tell, never having paid much attention to it before, that was how my eyes always looked. "Lucky," the suave older doc observed. "They say it's one reason Liz Taylor is famous for her beautiful eyes...hers are the same way." (Go Google up some pix of her--it's true!)

So the baby doc came back to finish the exam. He seemed a little disappointed he wasn't going to get to write up an interesting case. "I thought you had...(I don't remember what it was), which can be serious. But you don't need to worry," he added, almost patting my head with his superior tone, "it's only a congential variance."

"Oh, thank goodness," I replied, trying for my best innocent look to better deliver the Subtle Smackdown du Jour. "I was afraid you were going to say it was something weird that had been wrong with me since I was born."

Some friends on a mailing list were talking about raccoons, and I was reminded of a story. Having gone to the trouble of typing it out, I figured I might as well share!

***

Quite a few years ago, a group of us were camping for the weekend at a state park in Colorado. Once our tents were up, we went exploring down the path leading to the lake. At a nearby site, we spotted someone's pet raccoon being walked on a leash. Charmed and delighted, we went to investigate. Being the un-shy type, I asked to hold it.

The owner said yes, so I passed Caro my Pepsi and gathered the darling creature of Nature into my arms. The darling creature of Nature got a whiff of my Pepsi-breath and instantly grabbed me by the ears, then jammed its HEAD into my mouth as far as it could reach and started licking my tongue!!

Happily the owner and my friends leapt to my aid and I was quickly de-raccoonified, with no harm done to either of us. But I've always been a LEEEETLE bit suspicious of darling creatures of Nature who trade on their cuteness ever since.

Friday, first no-school day of the summer, had its ups and downs. Short version is that Mike, while verbally willing to try new ways of being a semi-adult family member and all around Good Solid Citizen, is also prone to the human tendency to 'buyer's (contract-makers) remorse' and cling to the familiarity of the bad old days. So we are seeing occasional outbreaks of testing behavior. And I am sad to admit I am not getting the best grades possible on my tests....

Although some of that is probably because I have caught a doozie of a cold. Sneezing, wheezing, coughing, dragging around with all the enthusiasm of a deflated balloon...plus a special extra I will not mention because of TMI. It's only indirectly related to the cold, in that while searching through the leftovers on Friday my nose could not help me decide whether a strange baggie of meat was chicken or pork. So I nibbled a morsel. BAD idea. (It was chicken from at least two weeks ago.) And thus because of the TMI issue, let's just say having a bad cough is an even worse problem than usual at this time.

So Saturday I laid around in bed quite a lot. Today, ditto.

On the plus side, the extra rest is good for my knees. The extra Lasix is helping too, I think. We'll see if the puffiness returns when I go back to my former dosage.

Well, in about 7 minutes Mr. Mike is going to come in the front door, and his 2004-5 school year will be done!

Will we all be alive, sane and speaking to one another come fall? Stay tuned!

I have successfully fought off the temptation to post the longest and whiniest record-breaking complaint rant ever...for now. There's a dog that has taken up breaking and entering for a hobby; a lost, now probably deceased, bird somewhere in the living room; a leaking fishpond (outside, at least); my annoying knees (better but far from acceptable in quality of function); sudden outbreak of itchy bug bites; and the general and usual Stuff Going On I Do Not Like, from the Federal Government on down to the cat box needing to be cleaned out.

But I will persevere and press on, don't worry. Without too much whining, I hope.

This afternoon's moderate uptick in outlook is closely correlated with a nice afternoon nap, which was needed because I had to get up very early and attend Mike's 6th grade award ceremony. He got something for trying hard in Social Studies and something else for liking Art. :) Yes, I took some pictures...except now I am paranoid about them, because Damaris's camera, which is the same model bought at the exact same time a little over a year ago, has suddenly refused to close its cover or do anything but blink the dreaded E18 message. So I am worried, and also reminded I was going to have another look around for the paperwork which includes the warranty.

Or maybe I will do that later, after I go stroll the grounds looking for dog-repellent fencing materials....

I've been meaning to do this for a few days, but either too tired, or too something, to get to it. Also, I worry that people will think I am just spamming them to get them to buy my stuff. Which I am not! I am spamming you because I am Annoying!

Anyway. I'm at the part of the day where I can go fix the window where the dog broke into the basement last night, go try to find the leak in the fishpond, do something productive...or write up this post. Right, here we go, then.

Did you ever hear of the Saturn awards? Me neither. This is a video of those awards, for excellence in science fiction, fantasy or horror films, circa 1991. The narrator is a self-centered talking weenie-head you want to smack into low Earth orbit, and the video is artfully shot to not quite disguise how poorly attended the ceremonies were. (You can practically hear the crickets chirp in the unparked on streets.) Got some interesting star shots, including Rays Harryhausen and Bradbudy, plus 'makings of' and la la la. Good party vid for MST3King.

That one goes off real soon now, by the way. For more leisurely persual, appropriate for the poets among us, I have a bunch of LP records salvaged (and I mean that literally--they were going to dumpster them!) of various famous poets reading their poems, or in some cases having them read by other famous types. Plus there are some plays and things, like The Little Prince in French. The Sea Chanties by the German Sailors Chorus looks like a hoot, with a bizarre cover thrown in free!

When I listed these I was 'zosted', as Mike says, and I didn't look them up for price, I just stuck them on. So some may be way under the money, and some way over. As a reward to those who read all the way down this far, if there are any of the LPs you want, and they don't sell, get ahold of me. You can have them for the shipping cost. I just couldn't stand to see them tossed, you know?

Clicky link to see

When last we left our intrepid heroine (a week ago), she was getting ready to embark on the unexpected thrill ride of a SECOND Dime Listing Day within a week (!) on eBay. Which is a big "huh, say wha'?" to most regular folks, but something like a combo required by law religious holiday to all the eBabes and eBoys.

So this time, since I had already scrambled around to get nice listings of my best stuff, I was TOTALLY unprepared to come up with yet more. That's part of why it took me until yesterday to FINALLY take pictures of the last few remaining things and get them up within their auctions.

I also had a little more going on this week. I went back to the doc about my seriously unsatisfactory knee action. How can I be a proper knee-jerk liberal if my knees refuse to move much at all? I ask you?! Seriously, I had been inspired to do some web research because of noticing a woman with lymphedema while out running errands. As you may or may not know, that's where there is damage to the lymph nodes or vessels (a system that is as extensive and important as the circulatory or nervous systems, but doesn't have nearly as good an agent), so that fluid becomes trapped in one or more extremities and makes them swell up and pretty much stay that way no matter what.

I didn't want this to be that. And I don't think it is, I think it is just regular edema, only a symptom and not a syndrome. You see, I take generic Lasix to help with blood pressure control, and also to combat the tendency to water retention in my feet and legs caused by sitting here at a computer all day. (As I am, uh, pretty much doing now.... What?)

What I think happened is that I got a tolerance for the dosage I was at, and that slow building-up was gradually stressing my knee ligaments because of the stretching (and the extra weight). When the April book sale came around, standing up for five hours, leaning over JUUUST a little, actually gave me a minor sprain. Which I, with my tremendous innate talent, quickly worked up into semi-major ones.

That's my theory, anyway, and the doc thought it seemed sound. So he said to double up on the Lasix, cut down on salt, and don't sit at the computer without moving for hours on end.

Re that last, my little TurboNote timer just went off! So I will now get up and walk, and come back to post some more later!

How I do it, I mean. If I knew, I would send out the "MUST HAVE!" rays from my brain and get us some World Peace. Or at least some winning lottery tickets for me and my friends.

See, as you may recall, I was having a sour, whiny, bummed out week last week, despite a very pleasant and fun Mothers' Day hol. At least part of this mood was due to my starting the week contemplating All Things Personally Financial. All those Things currently pretty much suck.

So I had set myself to working extra hard at the book selling biz, with Dear Daughter Damaris doing the same (she's our new junior partner, you know). And as I was working, I got to thinking about the fabled special listing days eBay has now and then, and how very very much of swag we have sold when those days came around and we put as much as possible of our best stuff up for sale. So I thought, "Gee, maybe I should just go ahead and PRETEND it is a special listing day, and put up copious mass quantities of goods, even though the listing fees will be very high and make me weep sad Susan tears to spend them...."

That afternoon the announcement came through that Thursday would be a Dime Listing Day for Fixed Price items.

We all said, "Wooty Hooty HOO!" and got to work. On Thursday I got up at 6:30am and went to bed at 12:30, and in the middle put up 102 listings of our highest priced books and things. It didn't do my current knee problem all that much good, but we've already had a few sales that plumped up the old bank account in a very pleasant way.

Unfortunately quite a few of our good things did not have any pictures, and eBay buyers loves them some pictures, yes they do. So Friday Damaris came and helped take pics while I added them to the listing. Caught us up a bunch. The sales made us feel optimistic, too, and we started saying maybe we should begin a program of trying out medium-nice books so many a week, even if it meant paying out the 60 cents per....

Saturday I thought I was feeling well enough in my feet and knees to make the yard sale rounds with Caro. But I was wrong. Most of the rest of Saturday I laid around in bed with my feet propped up, back to square 1 of grouchiness.

Sunday and today...much better. We finished off picturing the rest of the poor words-only auctions and heaved some sighs of relief.

Then the email came through this afternoon. I have NO idea why, or what eBay could POSSIBLY be thinking....

But tomorrow is another Dime Listing Day, this time for auctions.

Here we go again. :/ See you in a few.

Click here to see the Stuff (if you want)

Among the first things that happened to me this morning were getting bitten by a mouse and stepping on a tack.

And STILL today was a much better day than yesterday.

Anyway, still reading LJ and email, just not commenting much. Again deeply involved in trying to Make $$$ FAST on the Internets.

I'll be back, no worries.

An interesting little yard ornament, and no, I don't mean the very small portion of dog in the background which is doing the usual small dog trick of barking at me furiously while looking away, so he can do his dog job without the risk of making a bigger creature mad about it.

We drive down this street every time we head for home, and I've long admired this windvane, though from a distance I thought it was made out of plywood. When you see it in motion, it does look like the horse is flying.

I've been experimenting with yet more little tricks to helping myself get things done in a timely manner. The 28 hour day thing is not thus far coming together as I hoped, but I keep dreaming on....

I had an idea about spacing out my posts here by first being sure to answer all the day's incoming email, and THEN start working my way BACK through previous days. While this IS helping me keep up with email, it's kind of a failure posting-wise. So obviously the plan needs work.

Back to at least the occasional post, then. Thus we gently segue into this evening's festivities at Lincoln Elementary, a really big PTO extravaganza of a carnival for Cinco de Mayo. Damaris worked the drink stand and Zach helped with a football toss game for a while, as the girlies flitted about gathering swag at various other game booths. Caro walked Mike around to do the same, while I sat resting my knees and people-watching.

There were lots of them to watch. But out of them all, I only saw ONE kid, done with his share of the tickets for the games, carrying a book around with a finger marking his place as he ran errands.

Yeah, that would be Our Zach. The apple don't fall far from the tree, y'know.

I am continually re-overcome with awe at the wonder which is The Internet, and the fact that we can hook up to it as easily as our forebears used to whistle for the family dog.

Because my knee has been so much on my mind (insert your own contortionist joke here), I did some Googling to try to get some answers to things I was wondering about. This is where my 'OMG teh Internets is teh seXX0r!' spouting is coming from.

I found a study that indicates that some people taking naproxen found it was causing the Lasix they also took to not work as well. I take it as part of my blood pressure control, and I HAD been thinking I was puffing up more than usual lately. So I started thinking, hmm, maybe going back to good old aspirin for a little while might not be a bad plan.

Then I found some other studies pointing out that although it is also a pain-relieving anti-inflammatory, naproxen does NOT have the same effects as aspirin in regards to avoiding heart problems and/or reducing clotting time.

One of the side problems of having wonky knees with deficient stability control is that all the other muscles have to work double time to keep one upright and lurching more or less in the desired direction most of the time. I hadn't given much worry time to the increase in little charley horses and the formerly familiar feeling of over-use of the calf muscles...until I remembered muscle damage + pain behind the knee(s) + limited mobility = blood clot?

I don't have some of the other telltale signs of a crouching clot waiting to strike, don't worry. But I probably need not say I have switched back to my little white round friends for a while!