Merry Christmas

Happy Holidays!

"Nothin But Love"

Gay And Voting For Mitt Romney

Yeah, it starts off all goofy and junk, but the real, serious message finishes this out.

Ohio Romney Rally - Interviews with Supporters

Okay, it's another political video. I know I mentioned in my last post that I generally try not to talk too much about politics. I'm well aware of how much I know about politics and even more aware of how much I don't know about them. I think I'm better versed than most people out there, but I know I have a lot to learn.

That's why I'm posting this video. These people have absolutely no clue what they're talking about. I've never seen so many different ways to say "I'm not voting for that black guy" in my life. Without ever saying it. These people take ignorance to a whole new level. Just watching it kind of made my stomach churn.

Ultimately, I don't care who you vote for. That's your choice. But please have a legitimate argument for why you're choosing who you are if you're going to talk about it.

I posted a Facebook status update venting my frustration for all the idiotic, ignorant posts that were showing up in my feed. Like I mentioned before, I don't care who you're voting for, just don't back it up with an argument made up of falsehoods. It takes two seconds to do an internet search to see if what you heard from a friend who knows is actually true.

Tuesday can't get here soon enough.

Don't Let Mitt Turn Back Time On Women

I really don't much forward or share much in the way of political stuff. But I saw this and even though Cher is looking not so fresh, I wanted to share it anyway.

Tuesday

Tuesday wasn't a good day.  Not at all.  It was bad enough that I wasn't feeling the day.  I can't say for sure if I was in a shitty mood or if I was just feeling down.  No matter what I was feeling, I just wasn't feeling the day at all.  

The end of my work day is 3:45, though I usually stay late.  Most days I leave around 4:30.  That was the plan for Tuesday.  I talked to Ken earlier in the day and he said he would come pick me up and bring me to my car, but he needed to run an errand first.  His plan was to leave at 4 and he'd be to my office between 4:30 and 5.  But about quarter after 4 he sent me a text saying he was still at work.  So I decided to pack it in and hop the shuttle bus to my car instead of waiting a little longer for him.  As soon as I got home, I headed straight to the bathroom.  As I reached to flush the toilet, my iPhone dropped out of my hoodie's front pocket and right into the flushing bowl.  I panicked.  I tried to grab it, but the rushing water was keeping it in the bowl, so I just held on for dear life.  I can't believe I flushed my damn phone.  I hate how attached I am to the thing.  I guess I never realized exactly how much until the second it was submerged.  

The first thing I did was dry it off.  Then I checked the pantry for rice.  I heard you were supposed to put the phone in a bag of rice.  Next, I booted my desktop and started searching for info.  The phone was probably a loss, but there's a chance it's not, I read.  I read that I should know in about a week.  I looked to see if the iPhone 5 (mine was an iPhone 4) was available.  Apple's website said it could ship in 3 to 4 weeks.  The Apple Store said they didn't have them in stock, but if I wanted to come down every morning and stand in line, there's a chance they might get some in.  No thanks.

After I started to calm down and think logically again, I called back and found that they had plenty of iPhone 4S's in stock.  And so I headed straight out to get one.  I decided to go for the 4S instead of wait for a 5 for a number of reasons.  One, it's still an upgrade to the phone I have.  All of my stuff will be compatible with it, like my car charger, the various chargers I have in the house, my case, etc. The differences between the 4S and the 5 weren't enough for me to care.

I'm lucky.  I didn't lose too much when I flushed the phone.  Just anything on the phone since the last time I synced it with iTunes.  So two weeks worth of pictures an data and games.  No big whoop.

And on a side note, I saw on Facebook today that Geri Reischl did the same thing this week.  Not sure who Geri Reischl is?  You can google her.  

Whedon On Romney

Definition

I don't know if it's called sabotage or motivation.  In the last twenty-four hours, I've had two of the biggest, chocolatey-est cupcakes I've every had, as well as a piece of chocolate cakes filled with some sort of pudding or custard.  I didn't need any of those things, but damn, they were good.  They also gave me an upset stomach, but it was kind of worth it.  

I'm not sure if I ate them because I'm all about self-sabotaging my diet or because I'm all about looking for motivation to sweat my balls off at the gym.  Only the scale will be able to properly judge me in the morning.

Until then, I have Project Runway All-Stars tonight.

Doctor

This year was supposed to be all about taking better care of myself.  (And now that I think about it, 2011 was also supposed to be all about that, but it didn't quite happen.)  By "taking better care of myself," I mean making sure I go to see the doctor, taking care of ongoing and lingering issues, taking care of new aches and pains and stuff as they arise.  And I started the year off right, but got quickly derailed.  One of the first things I wanted to take care of was the one tooth that needs a root canal.  I would have done it last year, but I used up all of my benefit.  So my plan was to get a referral at my first cleaning of the year. About a week before that cleaning, another tooth that was going to need addressing sooner or later broke.  Luckily it was a small piece and it didn't hurt.  My dentist said because of the shape it's in, it needed a crown.  He insisted that it didn't need a root canal, but the crown itself would fix the situation.  I listened to him against my better judgement (he said the same thing about the two previous crowns I had and both ultimately needed root canals.... the root canal I mentioned needing above is for one of those teeth.)  And then it turned out his preliminary work upset the tooth so much that I was in massive pain.  So the crown was put on hold until I could get that root canal.  The whole experience was just awful.  My mouth had never been in that much pain for that long before.  And it was enough to put any other doctor visits on hold.

Well, the year is coming to a close and I'm biting the bullet and starting to do what I intended to do all year.  Today I had my teeth cleaned.  I also had an MRI done of the foot that's been bothering me.  I'm fearful that the MRI isn't going to show anything out of the ordinary.  But at least I'm addressing it.  I love that I managed to fall asleep while having this MRI done, as I've done with every other MRI I've ever had done.  I don't know how.  The machine is so loud, but I guess after a few minutes it just becomes white noise and I'm out.  

On the way home from the visits, I stopped and made an appointment to get my eyes checked.  My benefit renewed a year ago and I haven't taken advantage of it.  It's been three years since I had my eyes tested. 

I have a few other things I need to do.  I cancelled an appointment with my urologist a couple months back and haven't rescheduled that yet.  It's another follow up for my kidney stone (which happened two years ago this week!)  I haven't found the urgency in rescheduling because the last few check ups have all come out positive.  I'm sure I'm out of the woods.  I also need to schedule a physical.  I can't remember the last time I had one.  I'm getting older and it's probably not such a good idea to go so long in between.  I've worked so hard to get myself healthy.  I need to take some measures to maintain that now.

Getting old sucks.

This And That

I had a couple ideas of things I wanted to write about while they were still on my mind, but something else just came up and I thought I'd write about that instead.  

My friend Maria, one of my oldest and dearest friends, just posted on Facebook a few minutes ago that today marks the one year anniversary of her being cancer free.  I feel so happy for her right now.  It's terrible that she got the cancer in the first place, but it's so fucking great that she beat it.  

Not that there's ever a good time to be diagnosed with cancer, to me, Maria's diagnosis and battle couldn't have come at a worse time.  Her ordeal was at the same time as my Mom's battle with cancer.  I was so focused on Mom during that period in time that I was unaware of what Maria was going through.  It's understandable.  It wasn't until a few days after Mom's funeral that I found out about Maria.  I was talking to her and she mentioned that she tried to come to Mom's service.  She had, in fact, driven to the funeral home, but she couldn't bring herself to come in with everything she was going through.  Absolutely understandable.  If I was in her place, I don't even think I would have left the house that day.

And this brings up something that I've been feeling lately.  I've just about shaken off all the blahs and blues I've been feeling in regards to the first anniversary of Mom being gone.  It really affected me more than I thought possible.  It brought up all sorts of unresolved feelings and emotions and it really caught me off guard.  The whole month of September I was a miserable bitch.  I'm starting to feel more myself again, but also very different.  Last year after we lost Mom, and when I was starting to come out of the fog I'd been in, I realized that the whole ordeal changed me.  I came out of it feeling a lot stronger.  For the first time in my life, I realized that I actually like myself.  I don't know if it was because I wasn't quite the same as before, or that I was just seeing myself in a new light, but dammit, I really think I'm not that bad a guy.  The whole time Mom was sick, I pretty much cut everyone out of my life.  When I hurt, I want to be left alone.  I process stuff better that way.  As I was feeling better, I really didn't go back to the way things were.  I really didn't take (m)any steps to reestablish contact with people the way I was in touch before.  To be honest, I just didn't care.  As the anniversary of Mom's death approached, I found myself doing the exact same thing.  I backed away (though not nearly as far as last year) to heal myself.  And this may have been the final step in process to becoming the new me.  For the first time in my life, I feel like I'm living my life unapologetically.  I've always lived my life trying to please others first.  I've always done things because others really wanted to do them or really thought I should do them.  I no longer have the time nor the need to live my life that way.  And I don't really give a fuck what anyone thinks about it.  It's a whole new and improved me.  

If anyone told me a year ago something good would have come out of Mom's illness, I would have punched them in the throat.  Shows what I know. :-)

Frustration

I'm trying to work my way through another fit of frustration right now.  I hate when I feel this way, even though I know it will eventually pass.  But right now I'm smack dab in the middle of it.

Some background first.  I used to be a fat boy.  A very fat boy.  A 300 lb fat boy.  And that fat boy spent most of his working life in the world of retail.  It meant long days on my feet.  For years.  And being that big and on my feet for that long meant that I did some real damage to my feet.  By the time I finally got out of retail, the problems started showing up.  I've got neuromas in both feet.  It got so bad in one of my feet that I ended up going through a series of injections to kill the nerve endings in and around the neuroma so that I could walk.  

Anyway, I've been experiencing more pain in my left foot for quite a while now, but it's something that I could live with.  It's been going on for a few years.  Recently, it started to feel worse, so I finally made an appointment with an orthopedist to have this addressed.  His exam turned up no good reason why my foot should hurt.  I had x-rays taken of both feet so that he could look and compare and still saw nothing out of the ordinary.  He gave me three choices as to how to proceed from there.  I could get an orthotic, which he wasn't convinced would do much, I could have an MRI done on my foot to see if that would turn up anything else or I could just live with it.  I decided to do the MRI first, just to rule out any other problem.  I go on Wednesday for that.

But since he said he saw no reason why my foot should hurt, I decided to do something foolish.  I went to the gym and I decided I was going to run.  I don't run because of my feet.  I don't run because of my knees (but my knees have been feeling amazing for a while now, so why not?)  So I ran.  I didn't do much, but I did better than I thought I would do.  I ran for sixteen straight minutes, and then two more stretches of about ten minutes each.  And I felt good.  Really good.  My feet held up.  My knees held up.  It was a good day.  

I missed the gym for the next week because I got sick and then was away for a few days, but earlier this week, I decided to run again.  My only goal was to do better than the last time I ran.  And I did.  I ran for thirty solid minutes before I had to slow down to a walk, and then two more shorter intervals before I was done.  Again, I felt amazing when I was done.  Until the next day.  My feet couldn't take the abuse.  And since then, I've been hurting.  Not to the point that I can't walk or anything like that, but there's constant aching in both feet.  Which sucks, but in a way is good.  I'm having that MRI in a few days and maybe this will show something in the foot that the exam and x-ray didn't.  But I'm so fucking frustrated that I'm not going to be able to run.  I never had an interest in running (or any other physical activity, for that matter) when I was younger.  Now that I'm older and trying to keep in the shape a healthy person is supposed to be in, I keep hitting road blocks. But it's my own damn fault.  If I'd just taken care of myself when I was in my 20s and 30s, I wouldn't be so pissed off in my 40s.  I should be happy that there are plenty of other things my body is still allowing me to do, but I'm focusing on what my body won't.  And that's just making those things more desirable.

I know this frustration will pass soon.  As soon as my feet start feeling better.  But for the moment, I'm working up to a slow rage at myself.

I hadn't planned on taking a break from jotting my inane ramblings here, but it seems to me that I did.  And it's been longer than I thought.  I haven't abandoned this place, I'm just taking some much needed mental health time.  And physical health time, too.  I'll be back shortly, not that anyone but me cares.  :-)

Just home from the gym and feeling it.  I went in feeling pretty beat and came out even beater.  But there's one thing that keeps my mind off of the fact that I don't actually want to be at the gym, and that's music.  Here's the playlist for today's workout:

Anyone who knows me knows I'm a major music nerd.  Major.  I have my iPod on from the time I get up in the morning until I get home from work and even then, I usually have a couple more hours of listening before bedtime.  Last Christmas I got a new computer.  The first thing I did was transfer over my music library from the old computer to this one.  All my music is stored in iTunes (and on a second back up drive).  The one downside of moving the music is the play counts on all my tracks got reset.  That kind of annoyed me because I made a point of going through and making sure everything had been played at least once since being added to the iTunes library.  Now I had 85,000 songs with a big fat ZERO in the plays column.  So naturally, being the OCD kind of guy I can be, I set out to listen to everything again.  I set up all new playlists.  I made one for each genre.  I made one for each decade. I made one for each year.  I wanted to make sure I had a good representation of music on my iPod at all times.  A couple of months ago I got an idea.  I wanted to start listening to everything in chronological order. So I started with my year by year playlists and began listening to the earliest one.  And I've been going through, one year at a time, listening to the gradual evolution of popular music.  Now I don't listen to stuff like this every single day.  That could get pretty boring pretty quickly, but at least two or three days a week I do.  I started listening to 1930s stuff and have managed to work my way up to 1973, which is what I'm currently listening to (Diana Ross' album FIRST TIME I SAW HIM, to be specific).  It's been fascinating listening to stuff this way.  A few weeks ago I noticed a definite shift in style.  The year was 1971 and there was a definite line drawn separating stuff that's considered Oldies from the beginnings of the modern easy listening radio format.  

Something else I've noticed as I've been progressing through the years is back in the 50s and 60s, it wasn't uncommon for someone to release two or even three albums in a single year.  As time is going on via my iPod, I'm noticing the frequency is getting a little further apart.  It's still not uncommon to see two releases from an artist (for example, Diana Ross' FIRST TIME I SAW HIM was one of two albums she had out that year), but it's more likely they'd be putting out one in one year and following up the next year.  Nowadays it's almost unheard of two put two albums out in back to back years, let alone in the same year.  

I'm having a blast making my way through time.  I'm edging closer and closer to the disco era.  A few more weeks and I'll be there.  And before you know it, I'll be firmly entrenched into the New Wave era, something I'm seriously looking forward to.  That's the stuff from my high school years and stuff that I've never tired of.

I haven't really had too much on my mind lately, and therefore really haven't had a whole lot to say.  I had an idea earlier today for a blog post, but now as I sit here at the computer, overfull from eating way too much today, all I can think about is going upstairs, grabbing a book and climbing into bed.  Ollie, my needy boy cat, has an uncanny internal clock.  Almost every morning at around 3:45 is when he wakes up and needs to get in my business to start kneading and licking my face.  I think that's finally caught up with me tonight.  So maybe if I can keep my eyes open tomorrow...? 

I really am rather dull.

I'll admit that this was going to be another "boo hoo hoo I miss my Mom" post, but that's not really where my head is right now.  And it's a welcome relief.  I've been spending too much time focused on that and only that and it's exhausting.

Part of the reason my head isn't there is I had a happy distraction this weekend.  My good friends George and Steve came up from NYC for the weekend.  They were having their apartment painted and needed to vacate the premises and we've got plenty of room.  It's been a while since we've had any good one on one time with them.  They were here for our wedding in June (but we had a houseful of people) and last month we saw them briefly (as in for five minutes) in Woodstock.  The Woodstock story was kind of funny, actually.  To me at least.  Ken and I headed down (it's just under an hour south of where we live) for the afternoon.  Ken had a banner made up for my Dad.  He sets up a table of his handmade toys at the Woodstock Flea Market every weekend.  Ken decided he needed a banner and had one made.  So we brought it down to him, spent a little time at his table and then wandered away for lunch.  We were going to go to a place called Oriole 9, which has fantastic food, but sometimes it's not very cool in there.  And this was a hot Saturday, so we skipped the place.  Instead, we went to Joshua's, a restaurant about six doors down.  While there, I checked in via Facebook.  About five minutes after I did that, I got a text message from Steve saying that they were in Woodstock and they were at Oriole 9.  I nearly crapped my pants.  We stopped in when we finished lunch to say "hi."  They were in town visiting some of their friends from the city who have a weekend home in the area.  Too funny.

But we had house guests and it was great.  And since it's a three day weekend, I got my day of beauty today.  I didn't do much of anything.  I got my grocery shopping done right after George & Steve left yesterday.  Today was all about lounging.  Except for my trip to the gym.  I ate like the old, fat Walt over the weekend and the scale agreed.  Friday morning I was 188.8 lbs.  This morning I was 165.1 lbs.  I managed to bring it down to 193.5 after the gym, though.  I was very happy with that, but then I fucked it all up again tonight.  We went out for Mexican when we should have just stayed in (where I can control my eating habits.)  My Kryptonite is the tortilla chip basket(s).  Twice this weekend I ate my weight in chips.  Ken hasn't been to the gym in three or four days and I think he had no intention of going tonight, but I kept gently prodding him into it.  I went with him just to walk off a mouthful or two of guac.  I'm dreading what kind of profanity the scale has learning when I step on it tomorrow.

I've got great friends.  That's all I need to say.

I've not been myself lately.  For much longer than I think, according to Ken.  He says I just haven't been myself for many weeks now.  I didn't think it was that long, but I do agree I just haven't been my usual self.  A lot of stuff lately has reminded me of Mom and her last weeks.  This week, especially.  The Friday of Labor Day weekend is the day Mom went into the hospital.  And she stayed there until she passed away a few short weeks later.  I've been having a really hard time with this, which really surprises me.  I've been carrying around a lot of sorrow, a lot of bad feelings and a lot of baggage in regards to this.  I thought I came to terms with most of it months ago, but I've been realizing that's anything but the case.  

It's kind of funny that I'm going through this.  I've always had sympathy for people who have gone through something similar, but I always thought they were overreacting.  Their loved one is gone, get over it and move on.  Yeah, well, now that it's happening to me, I'm seeing things slightly differently.  I can understand what they were going through, but at the same time, I keep yelling at myself to get over my bad self.  Being depressed isn't going to do anything for anyone.  It's not going to bring Mom back and it's not going to help anyone.  But, easier said than done.  

I don't think I ever let myself properly mourn her loss. I took it on myself to be the strong one for everyone.  I didn't want anyone to see me cry.  I wanted to let everyone else do that and in my head, the way to let them do that was to be strong for them.  And I think I screwed myself over in the process.  I've had a lot of raw emotion bubbling under the surface the last few weeks, but I've been fighting it.  I would do whatever I could to escape things.  Saturday marked the 21st consecutive day for me at the gym.  By escaping to the gym for an hour or so at a time for such an extended stretch, I managed to injure myself.  I'm now forced to slow down my pace for a while, which is killing me.  Today (as well as a lot of days lately) I found myself emotionally eating rather than eating because I was hungry.  I've done this my entire life and I don't see that changing ever.  I also found that when I'm hurt or hurting, I tend to pull back from everyone.  This includes Ken, my real life friends, my online buddies.  The entire time Mom was sick, I dropped off the face of the earth.  I'm fighting against that right now, but it's a losing battle.

I know this is just a temporary thing and it will pass soon.  But I foresee the next month to be a really rocky time for me.  I'm really looking forward for it to be October.  I'll have made it through all my firsts.  My first Thanksgiving and Christmas without Mom.  Her first birthday.  The anniversary of the hospital.  The anniversary of her passing.  Where's the fast forward button?

Been a long ass day.  I'm just home from a road trip to Connecticut.  My cousin's husband passed away unexpectedly this week and Ken and I went to pay our respects today.  As sad as the event was, it was really nice to see family I don't normally see.  I have stuff I'd like to say about it, but my brain is so fried right now.  I hope what I have to say manages to stick around in my brain until I get a chance to sit and write.

Cousin update.  After I wrote my blog post a couple days ago, things changed again.  Zach went into a seizure that lasted nearly four hours and seemed to undo all the progress, what little it was, he made.  He had to be put back on the ventilator and while he's not back in his coma, he's been sedated.  Since Facebook has been the easiest way to stay in touch and updated with my family, here's the latest, directly from his mother.  

Zach's doctors are trying something called a ketogenic diet now. This diet has been proven to reduce or stop seizures in some kids. However, they're not sure how well it will work for him because his ammonia levels keep fluctuating which leads them to believe that his liver is having a hard time breaking down protein- one of the main c

omponents of that diet. They continue to monitor those levels and if they keep elevating, they will be forced to stop it. He is being kept sedated while they try to figure out how to treat him since his body has not been tolerant of most of the seizure meds so far, and the ones he has tolerated have not been stong enough to be effective. They have not been able to find a cause for the seizures yet, so all they can do right now is try to prevent them from happening through diet or medication. 

The poor kid cannot seem to catch a break.  I've been thinking about him non-stop since he ended up back in the hospital and am hopeful the doctor's can get a handle on his condition and get him back on the road to recovery quickly.

Six years ago today, I took actions and completely changed my life for the better.  Six years and a day ago, I had a physical and was shocked when I stepped on the scale to find I was 300.5 lbs.  My home scale never told me that.  As far as it was concerned, I was still in the 290s and I was happy being there, too.  I wasn't 300, so why bother doing anything about it.  But seeing that 3 on the scale scared the shit out of me.  I took the rest of the day to figure out what I was going to do about it, stopping at McDonald's for lunch even.  My doctor didn't give me very much advice, but what he told me stuck and helped tremendously.  He told me that if I wanted to lose weight, I needed to watch my calories, watch my carb intake and get some exercise.  If he told me anything more, I don't know if I would have been able to do what I've managed to do.  When I got home, I googled how many calories I should eat to lose weight.  It seemed like a tremendous amount until I started counting calories.  Suddenly I realized my average meal was my suggest daily caloric intake (and sometimes more.)  But I was committed to losing weight.  I don't know how I let myself get so far away from healthy.  So August 5, 2006, I changed my life.  I started eating healthy.  I started to exercise.  My exercise consisted solely of walking.  I was so out of shape that I couldn't go very far at first.  My initial walking goal was to leave the house and walk for three songs, turn around and head home.  I know that's not very much, but it's all I could manage.  My legs killed me, but I pushed through.  Soon it was four songs, then five, then six, then I stopped counting.  The first year, I managed to drop 66 pounds.  That alone is something I should have been proud of, but I only saw it as being a little more than half way.  I wasn't willing to give up yet.  I wanted to be 200 pounds in the worst way. 

As year two started, my weight loss had slowed down, but that's just natural.  Sometimes I'd let the frustration of the smaller drops get to me, sometimes I just used it as reason to push harder.  As I was nearing the 200 pound mark, I decided that it just wasn't good enough.  I wanted a little more drama, so I readjusted my goal to 190 pounds.  I can't tell you the last time I was in the 100's.  I was probably thirteen years old.  But I was determined to make it.  And on August 5, 2008, I weighed in for the first time as an adult at 190 pounds.  Two years to the day I started.  

If someone told me when I started this crazy journey that it's a journey you don't ever end, I think it would have derailed me.  In my head, I needed to lose weight and as soon as I did, I could go back to my old ways.  I don't know why I thought that, but it kept me going.  Since hitting my goal, though, my eating habits have definitely changed.  I'm not as strict as I was during the two years I was losing the weight.  I now know what I can eat, how much I can eat and when I can eat it.  Sundays, for instance, are my go crazy day.  I eat poorly on Sundays.  My official weigh in day is Sunday, so I figure it gives me the rest of the week to undo the damage I just did.  Tonight, for instance, I just ate a big ass ice cream sundae.  It was delicious, I didn't need it, but I wanted it.  And because I know how my body works, my weight should spike tomorrow and then goose up just a little more on Tuesday before regulating.  I weigh myself every day, so I generally know what to expect when I step on the scale.  Sometimes I get awesome surprises, though.  Yesterday morning I had no idea I'd be 190.  I thought it would be a little higher based on how I'd been eating.  Today was extra special because I weighed in at 186.3.  It was great seeing that, especially because it's an important day.  It's the best showing on the scale for 2012.

I'm so proud of myself.  I worked so hard to get healthy and still can't believe I did it.  I look at old pictures of myself and although I still feel like that fat guy on the inside, I don't recognize the fat guy I'm looking at.  I don't know how I ever let myself get to be that man.  And looking in the mirror today, I still see some of the damage that fat guy left me with.  I have a permanent muffin top.  My skin was stretched so far for so long that it's retracted as much as it's going to.  I see the extra skin and it's hard for me to convince myself it's not fat.  It's just leftover skin.  And stretch marks.  I've got plenty of them, too.  But they're my war wounds.  They're there to remind me of who I was and the man I will never be again.

It's been a pretty stressful week for me.  Probably one of the worst in quite a while.  I've had a lot on my plate and everything just kind of fell by the wayside for me.

Last weekend, my sweet little Lucy stopped eating.  Food was completely uninteresting to her and she had no interest whatsoever in eating.  I've talked about her before and how she is on a special prescription diet because her digestive system can't handle regular food.  She's not a fan of what she can eat and will often protest her food, but she always caves in when she's hungry enough and eats.  Not this time.  She just stopped and that got me scared.  The last time something like this happened was with my old cat Puss Patrell.  She was fine and dandy and then one day she stopped eating.  With her, it turned out she had pretty advanced cancer and within a few days, she was gone.  Naturally, this is the first and only thought I had with Lucy and I was panic stricken.  We got her to the vet and she thought after the initial examination that Lucy might have pancreatitis.  It's inflammation of the pancreas which would cause her not to want to eat.  We left Lucy at the vet for more tests, observation and medication.  Her blood work came back great and her x-rays showed a hazing around the pancreas.  After a day of meds, she started bouncing right back.  We brought her in on Tuesday and she was supposed to stay until Friday, but she was doing so well they released her on Thursday.  The only test we don't have results back from yet is her ultra-sound, but we're hoping that comes back clean.  Right now all I care about is Lucy is feeling better, her appetite is stronger than it's been in a long time and she's home.

But Lucy wasn't the only thing I've been worried about.  My little cousin Zach is the other.  Technically, he's my first cousin's grandson, but he's still my cousin.  Third cousin?  I don't know how that works.  Anyway, last weekend Zach, age 9, had a series of three seizures with the third lasting over an hour and he ended up in the hospital on a ventilator and in a coma.  He's been having seizures for the last couple of weeks.  His first one hit while he was at summer camp and it took away all the feeling on his right side.  It starting coming back, but he was still pretty weak.  No cause has yet been determined.  He's had tests up the wazoo, though.  He's had them on and off since, but last weekend was the worst.  He's been diagnosed with autoimmune encephalitis, something that's not good at all.  Still no idea what's caused this.  He's still in the hospital, but as of yesterday, he's come out of his coma.  He's still not strong enough to breathe on his own, though, so he's still being helped with the ventilator.  I'm just relieved he's awake again.  

So needless to say I've had a lot on my mind.  I've had the worst stress headache of my life this week.  My head hasn't been with me at work and I've blown off the overtime because I just couldn't do it.  I'm happy that things are slowly getting better, though.  It's a huge relief.  Lucy may be out of the woods, but Zach isn't yet.  But we're making progress.  Slow but steady progress.  And that's all I can ask.

I'm pretty beat, I've still got some things to do around the house and I just want to go to bed, but for some reason, I'm writing down random thoughts for no good reason at all.  I don't really have anything to say.  At least not anything worthwhile, which is just like every other blog post I've written in the past.

There's not many things more uplifting and good for the old self esteem than flirting with a boy you think is hot who thinks just the same about you.  Seriously.  My self esteem can always use that.  Not that it's terrible, but still.  I've come to a weird realization recently.  My self esteem isn't nearly as bad as it once was.  I find myself looking in the mirror (a lot, actually) and liking the person I see reflecting back.  That's never really happened before.  I don't know what's changed, but more often than not I see someone handsome in the mirror.  Not always.  I've got days when I need to bag my face cuz it's not pretty, but more and more I see someone I actually like.  And then hearing nice things from someone under no obligation whatsoever only helps.

My hand is doing so much better already.  After two days on the steroid, the hand looks almost completely normal again.  I tried to put my wedding band back on this morning, but it was still just a little bit too tight.  I'll try it again tomorrow and see how that does.  The hand itself is still a little stiff and still a little red, but it looks nothing like it did on Sunday.  I was fearful that it was going to take longer than expected to get back to it's normal state because of how swollen it was.  Luckily, it's nearly it's old self again.

I like Strawberry flavored Crystal Light.  For real.

See.  I really don't have anything to say.  I'm dull.  I'm mundane.  But I like it.

A few weeks ago, I went to a pool party at a friend's house.  Before the end of the party, I noticed my ring finger was starting to swell up.  Apparently I was bitten by something that my body just didn't like.  A week on a steroid and I was back to normal.  Yesterday, I went swimming there again and sure enough, before I was ready to head home, my left hand started puffing up again.  Instead of just my ring finger, this time it was my pointer and middle fingers and a good portion of my hand.  When I woke up this morning, my entire hand was a big puff ball.  I got home too late last night to stop at the Urgent Care near the house, so I went first thing this morning.  I got another prescription of the steroid and just popped my first pill.  Last time my finger shrunk back down pretty quickly.  It took all week for it to be 100% back to normal (it took that long before my wedding ring fit again).  I'm afraid it's going to take just a little longer this time as my hand is way more swollen than the last time.  In addition to my hand, when I was showering this morning, I noticed the top of my head had a bit of a bump on it.  It looks like I got bitten or stung there, too.  I have no idea what it is that I'm allergic to, but I'm not too happy about it.  This is putting a damper on my fun time this summer.  Meh.

This is my puffed up left hand

This is my normal sized  right hand

I've started making some plans for the fall.  A few weeks ago a friend called and asked if I wanted to go see Morrissey.  I saw that he was coming to town (Morrissey in Albany?  Seriously?) and thought it might be fun to go see, but didn't think anything more about it until I got the call.  I'm actually kind of excited by the thought.  Nothing like a night of maudlin teenage suicide music!  The weekend before Morrissey is here, I'm going to be in NYC for the New York Comic Con.  I just bought my tickets tonight.  I can't wait to get my geek on!

So another week has gone by.  Where is all my time going?

Every day I can think of something I want to write about here, but when I actually do find the time, it all flies out of my head.  What a way to maintain a blog, huh?

I'm bummed I'm home in New York while the San Diego Comic Com was going on this weekend.  I would have loved to have been there.  All it's doing is getting me excited for the New York Comic Con come this October.  I need to start hammering out my plans for it.  I love little more than getting my geek on.

The week that is just ending now was a pretty stressful one for me.  I started it out on the wrong foot and it just went downhill quickly.  Last Sunday was fantastic, and I did everything I wanted to do except nap.  And I ended up staying up too late reading.  So I ended the day exhausted and started the next day even more tired.  And it was a domino effect all week.  And the more tired I get, the crankier I get.  And the crankier I get, the more the little things really bother me.  Mid-week, I lost my shit over something small and insignificant that I really have no control over.  It made me feel like shit. It was kind of a wake up call about my currently living situation and got me to rethink some things.  I've been in a much better mood since.

The stress I've been feeling has had one positive end result, though.  I've been channeling my irritation and rage into the gym.  I've been wearing myself out, but I've had some pretty fantastic results.  For the first time this year, I've seen the 180s on the scale again.  I think it was November when that last happened.  The last three days I've been below 190.  That's huge considering I've spent all of this year hovering around the 200 lb mark.  Tomorrow I fear will see a decent jump in my weigh in.  I've been eating like a 12 year old left alone in a bakery all weekend.  And I'm drinking a big ass chocolate beer.

Ken and I are helping out some friends next weekend looking after their cats.  I'm really looking forward to housesitting for them.  I won't have any of the regular distractions of home around me and I need a little of that right about now.  This is contingent of Ken's nephew getting back to town by them.  He went to New Hampshire for the weekend, but I have a feeling he's going to be away for a while.  If he doesn't come back in time, I'll split my time between my house and their house, which won't be as much fun, but it's still better than nothing.

I had what might be the best burrito I've ever had last night.  We were in Kingston and went to a place called The Armadillo.  It's a small little place and it was amazing.  Just amazing.  Next time I'm down at my Dad's house, I need to go.

Today was nearly the perfect kind of day.  The type I've been longing for for a very long time.  It was one of the laziest days I've had in longer than I can remember.

I just don't know how to turn off.  I always have great plans to take a day off and do nothing.  Just lounge around, read and not much else.  I always seem to find something to keep me from doing the nothing that I want to do.  Today was different.  Granted, I can't say that I was 100 percent successful, but it was close enough.  

I got up really, really, really early for some dumb reason.  I knew I wanted to hit the gym pretty early, but it was ridiculous that I got up before six this morning.  The gym doesn't even open until seven on Sunday.  Anyway, I got up, poked around online for a little bit before I motivated to the gym.  I got home in plenty of time before Ken had to leave for his business trip.  But he was gone by 10 am and I was on my own.  A load of laundry in the washer, a little bit of organizing the pantry (which has gotten way out of control) and then the day was mine.  I sat outside in the sun for a little bit reading, which made me very happy, but also made me realize I was very hungry.  I decided I needed pizza.  I had an awesome fucking weigh in this morning and I deserved it.  So I headed out, ate, came home and plopped myself back in my chair in the sun.  This time, I grabbed a beer to go with my book.  That lead to a little nap, which lead to another beer, which lead to more reading, which lead to more sunning.  I'm getting pretty tan.  

I'm taking a little computer break right now to eat my ice cream and then I'm heading back upstairs shortly to read some more and then pass out for the night.  What's going to make that extra nice is that I changed the sheets today.  New sheet night is always the best night of the week.

I haven't been able to have one of these days in a long time.  With Ken's nephew living here, he's ALWAYS here.  He hasn't worked in months, so even when I have a day off from work, the house is never empty.  It makes it hard for me to truly relax like I want to.  But today was different as I completely tuned out the rest of the world and had great success with it.

Back to the real world tomorrow, though...  I have a feeling tomorrow isn't going to be fun.  Prove me wrong, universe.  I dare ya!

I'm pretty convinced I'm not allowed to sleep.  Ever.  This week has been kind of crazy for sleep.  The other night, Ken's nephew woke me up about a half an hour after I fell asleep for the night.  While that kind of sucked, what sucked more was the fact that thirty minutes is about all you need to keep you up the rest of the night.  Tuesday was hard because I was working on two plus hours of sleep.

I had Friday off for the second round of my root canal work.  I was very excited because I would be able to sleep in a couple extra hours, always a good thing.  Until Ken woke me up to ask me what time I needed to wake up.  At 6:15.  Forty-five lousy minutes after I normally get up.  And that was it.  I was awake.

After the dentist, I ran errands, came home, read for a bit, headed out to the gym, came home and sat in the back yard.  When I do this, I tend to fall asleep.  And EVERY SINGLE TIME I've done that this summer, Peter, the nephew, wakes me up.  And Friday was no different.  I must have been asleep fifteen minutes before he comes out and wakes me up.  Seriously.  I'm not allowed to sleep.

This morning I planned on staying unconscious until noon.  I've been dragging.  Dragging.  No one lets me sleep.  At 6 o'clock, Ollie decided he was hungry and started licking my face.  Awake again.  I can't catch a break.  So I got up and started my day.  I hit the gym again, I came home and showered.  Ken suggested getting breakfast, so we did that.  Ran a couple errands.  Then I decided I needed to go grocery shopping.  Half way to the supermarket, this huge wave of exhaustion hit me.  HUGE.  I don't know the reasoning behind half the stuff I bought today other than I just was wandering around the market like a zombie.  I got home and put the groceries away, called Ollie and ran up and took the first decent nap I've had in probably six months.  I think I might still be asleep now except in the position I was sleeping, my hands kept falling asleep and that would wake me up.  But I was too tired to change positions.  Plus, Ollie was sound asleep on top of me and that made me happy.

Today didn't really pan out the way I had hoped it would.  My big plans for today were to get up early (fail), go to the gym (success), go grocery shopping (success) and then spend the rest of the day lounging out back in the sun (fail.)  Instead, I slept in later than I had planned, but I'm not complaining about that.  I never let myself get enough sleep, so this was okay.  Sleeping in meant I got a later start for the gym, which I desperately needed today.  I spent the day at my friends' house at their pool party and I over indulged (like I always do.)  I got home, showered and headed out to the supermarket.  When I got home, I decided that rather than put things off like I'm apt to do, I should go take care of something.  Yesterday, at the aforementioned pool party, I noticed my wedding ring was feeling really tight.  My finger started swelling up a little.  I pulled the ring off thinking that might help, but it didn't.  The finger continued to blow up.  When I got home last night, I took a Benadryl, thinking maybe I got a bug bite.  This morning the finger was no better.  After shopping, I decided to take a quick trip over to the Urgent Care to have it looked at.  That was mistake number one.  I walked in, said I'd like to see a doctor about my finger.  The wench at the reception desk asked what I did to it.  I told her I didn't know.  It's all swollen and I'd like to see a doctor to see what's going on.  She then spent the next five minutes discouraging me from seeing a doctor.  She did everything but say "leave."  She said if I broke my finger, I'm going to need an x-ray and they don't do those there.  She said I should go up to the Latham Urgent Care because they do x-rays.  I was really fucking annoyed, to say the least, that this woman gave me the runaround like that.  I turned around and walked out and headed up to the other location.  Long story short, he couldn't tell if it was an infection causing my issue or an allergic reaction.  He wrote me a prescription for something to fight both and sent me on my way. 

While I was at the Urgent Care, I got a text from Ken asking where my car was.  He had been at work and I texted him that I was going there.  On his way home, he stopped but didn't see my car.  That's when I told him I'd basically been turned away.  He lost his mind and went in and went off on them.  Both the receptionist and the nurse (who I hadn't seen) came up with some cock & ball story about why I wasn't treated.  Whatever.

By the time I got home from seeing the doctor and then the drug store, it was dinner time.  I started making dinner and Ken jumped in to take over from me.  While he was cooking, he saw what he thought was a bee and being allergic to them and slightly irrational about them, he grabbed the vacuum (don't ask) and was going to suck it up.  Instead, he accidentally kicked the vacuum and broke his toe.  He's now all black and blue and puffed up and hurting a lot.  He's good to break a toe every six months or so.

After dinner, I've been working on chores.  I want a do-over for today.  Luckily Wednesday is a holiday and I get my chance then.

I mentioned a post or two ago that I attended the Albany Comic Con a week and a half ago.  What I love about small conventions like these is that you get a chance to mix and mingle with the guests who are appearing.  The crowds are much smaller than the big shows like San Diego or New York.

I got to the show pretty early and was shocked by the size of the line waiting to get in.  It was out the door and maybe fifty people deep outside waiting to get into the hotel lobby.  And once you were in, the entrance to the show was maybe another fifty people away.  I was very happy to see such a great turnout.  This keeps  meaning the show will continue and that makes me happy.

I brought my sketchbook and was ready to get some commissions done.  Here's what I got this time around.

The first sketch I had done was this fantastic Wonder Girl by Bill Walko.  I've known Bill for many years through comics fandom.  We were in an amateur press association dedicated to all things Titans for many years.  So it was only natural I'd ask him to do a Titan.

My second commission of the day was this Mera by Fred Hembeck.  Fred and I have also known each other for years.  He was a regular at the comic shop I worked at back in Kingston, NY in the 80s.  I usually only see Fred at shows like this and we get to talk and catch up.

Next was this sketch of Gates from the Legion Of Super-Heroes by Lee Moder.  I actually wanted him to draw me a Monstress, but he said he doesn't even remember who that is.  Sadsies.

Matt Smith is a regular at the Albany show and this time around I got him to draw the 11th Doctor, coincidentally portrayed on television by an actor named Matt Smith.

My final sketch of the day is by someone else who was a regular at the comic shop I worked at.  Unfortunately, Joe Staton doesn't remember me anymore, but that's fine.  Here's his take on Power Girl, a character he was known for drawing back in the 70s.  She nicely compliments the Huntress sketch I had him do last year.

I also picked up a pile of trade paperbacks.  I love conventions because there are bargains to be found everywhere.

On Tuesday I posted here that I thought I was getting sick.  I wasn't feeling all that great then and I was feeling even worse on Wednesday.  I really hate getting sick, but if I have to be sick, I'm glad it's now and not a couple weeks ago when I had all sorts of stuff going on.  Thursday I was feeling a lot better, though not 100%.  I figured I was feeling well enough to get back to the gym.  As much as I don't really care for going, I need to go, both physically and psychologically.  I always feel a million times better afterwards and am always glad I went.  So I went.  And a little while after getting home I was feeling even more run down than I'd felt the day before.  So that was a dumbass move on my part.  Today I woke up not feeling as good as I did yesterday.  One thing I hate about myself is I push myself too hard sometimes.  I really could have used at least one more day to rest up.  But I didn't let myself, because sometimes I think I'm Superman.  So today I'm feeling a little worse, so it's a good idea to just go home from work and rest.  Except by the time I left work I was feeling pretty good.  So I went again.  And right now I feel like I want to sleep for a month.  I don't always take my best interests into account when I make decisions.  Tomorrow I'm without a car while it's in the shop, so I'll be forced to lounge around the house and rest.  We'll see what dumbass move I do instead.

I was off work all week last week.  I had my Texas family here until Wednesday and I contemplated going back to work on Thursday, but I had a dentist appointment for Thursday and I didn't really want to go in for a couple of hours only to have to leave again.  So I took the whole week off.  After the dentist on Thursday I had a few errands I needed to run.  Last on the list was Target for a few items I needed to pick up.  I wandered the store grabbing what I needed.  The last item was fabric softener (this is riveting, isn't it?) and I started to make my way to that aisle.  Half way there, I realized I forgot paper towels, so I backtracked to that aisle, grabbed what I needed and then made my way to the fabric softener aisle.  As I turned into the aisle, I saw a woman and her two kids walking up from the opposite end.  I paid them only a second of attention until my brain screamed at me that the woman might actually be someone I used to know.  I debated very quickly whether or not to say her name and decided to.  "Jen?" I asked.  She stopped and then there was that second of "who the hell are you" from her before it hit her.  Now you need to know, I have not seen Jen since 1989.  We were both living in the Kingston area (about an hour south of here).  I moved out of there in January of 1990 and fell out of touch with a lot of people.  We reconnected maybe a year ago on Facebook.  She is living up here now, though probably 40 minutes north of me.  It was such a bizarre thing to happen.  I'm not usually in a Target on a Thursday afternoon and she's not usually this far south, but just happened to be.  We chatted for a little bit, but the tiny bladder on one of her young sons prevented a lengthier conversation.  I love when crazy shit like that happens.

I think I'm getting sick.  Woke up with a sore throat today and I'm none too pleased about it.  Tonight is one of my regularly scheduled gym nights and there's no way I feel up to sweating my balls off.  I better feel more myself tomorrow so I can get back to my regular schedule again.

I didn't know until today that Albany Gay Pride was this past weekend.  I don't generally go to any of the Pride events.  I mostly don't really give a crap about them.  I guess the reason is Albany is a small town and whenever there's an event, it's always the same old sad faces mixing and mingling (to be polite) in a drunken and inappropriate stupor.  Albany is a small town and it seems everyone knows everyone else.

But it got me to thinking about being a gay man in this day and age.  I don't define myself as being a gay man.  I'm so much more than that.  But I know plenty of people who do define themselves as gay men and nothing more than that.  To me, that's sad.  To pigeonhole yourself as one small aspect of yourself seems ridiculous to me.  Why would anyone want to ghettoize (is that a word?) themselves?  It's like me saying I'm going to self-identify only as a blue eyed man.  I'm only going to associate with others with blue eyes.  I'm only going to talk about being blue eyed.  I'm going to go blue-eyed shopping and I'm going to go blue-eyed hiking and I'm going to throw blue-eyed dinner parties and go blue-eyed kayaking.  I'm going to paint my entire house blue and I'm going to wear more blue than I know what to do with.  When it's put that way, doesn't it seem very sad?

Being gay is such a small part of who I am.  I'm that, but I'm so many other things.  

So nothing against Gay Pride events.  I've been to them.  I've had a good time at them.  I especially loved going to the NYC event.  But I really don't need the crap that quickly gets associated with Pride.  It seems like getting drunk (again, nothing wrong with that) is the number one focus of just about any gay pride event in this area.  I'm 46 years old.  I outgrew my drunken college days a lifetime ago.

I Hate Pears

I love the behind the scenes kind of things like this.  Watch the first half.  It's as it aired on tv.  Then watch the second half.  You get to see what actually happened during the fast forward portion in the first half.

I've spent the last two days decompressing for what was probably the craziest, happiest week of my life.  Actually, I'm decompressing from the last few panic filled, stressful yet hopeful weeks of my life.  But the last week was the best part.  

I started my vacation from work on Thursday.  Not to say that this meant it was time to kick back and do nothing.  No.  Thursday was pretty busy.  We put the last few finishing touches on getting the house ready for house guests.  We went to town hall to get our marriage license.  I went to the airport to pick up my non-biological family from Texas.  The countdown to getting married was officially on.

This blog post is probably going to be very light on details because everything is a giant blur by now.  Sorry.

Anyway, the wedding was full steam ahead this time.  The last attempt is best left in the past.  Freddy, Jed and their boys were here and I feel kind of bad because they really got put to work for the first couple days they were here.  Freddy was an enormous help.  He helped take a lot of stress off of Ken's shoulders so that Ken could stress out over other things.  I'm forever grateful for that.

Saturday was the big day.  We invited a handful of friends to join us for lunch and to witness the ceremony.  Everyone was to arrive at the house by noon.  We arranged for transportation to get us to the restaurant where everything was to take place.  So everyone got to meet and we had drinks before departing.  Once we got to the restaurant, there were cocktails and hor's d'oeuvres.  We were a little concerned that the photographer wasn't there yet, but we found out he was all set up upstairs where the ceremony was going to take place.  The weather held out so we could do the ceremony on the restaurant's rooftop overlooking the city skyline.  Our other option would have been the banquet room overlooking the same view.

I'm shocked I didn't bawl more than I did.  I think it helped for me to just concentrate on Ken and Lori, our officiant.  Lori both performed the ceremony, but also spoke on our behalf.  It was really beautiful and touching what she said.  Ken elected to have me read my vows to him first.  My intention was to just stand up there and speak from my heart with nothing prepared.  The night before, however, I was panic stricken when I realized there was a chance I could get up there and freeze.  So I typed in what I wanted to say on my phone and used it as backup, which I needed to refer to once or twice.  I didn't really get out what I had written.  Some got left out, other stuff popped up.  But one thing I included that absolutely made it was a song lyric.  I heard this song a few weeks ago randomly on my iPod and the lyrics struck me as saying what I wanted to say.  So at the end of my vows, I recited them.  And it was pure me, because it was the chorus of "Never Gonna Give You Up" by Rick Astley.  Ken yelled that he was being Rick Rolled at his own wedding!

Ken surprised the hell out of me by including lyrics in his vows as well.  I played him a song 18 years ago when I realized I was falling head over heels for him called "Simply" by Sara Hickman.  Not only did he still remember that, but he made me cry when he read the lyrics.  And I could hear similar sounds from the witnesses.

After the ceremony we had more cocktails and hor's d'oeuvres before lunch was served.  We created the menu together mixing in lunch type dishes with proper dinner dishes.  I opted for the wedding staple of a turkey club and fries.

Oh, as for wardrobe, it was very non-traditional.  We told everyone to go casual.  I had on a green button up shirt with a Star Sapphire t-shirt underneath (can any comic book nerd tell me why I chose that one in particular?), khakis and my Batman Converse.  Ken was in a button up shirt and slacks.  We really wanted things to be casual.  Because seriously, does anyone really enjoy getting all dressed up for a wedding?  

I forgot to mention, we had official ring bearers.  Adrian and Nathan, Freddy & Jed's two sons, were our ring bearers.  We found t-shirts that said "Ring Security" on the back and "Official Ring Bearer" on the front. We housed our rings in little Batman and Superman lunch boxes.  When the time came, the boys brought us our rings and then we exchanged them.

The whole shindig couldn't have been more perfect.  

After the lunch, we threw a party at our house.  We got to invite more people than we could have done for the actual wedding.  Not everyone was able to make it, but we did have four states represented.  And I'm told that I may have had a cocktail (or eighty-seven).  I felt it the next day, but who cares.  I had the time of my life.

It's hard for me to accept the love and friendship of my friends at face value sometimes.  It's one of my hugest character flaws and I'm working on it.  That day, however, it had never been easier.  I'm truly blessed to have the people in my life that I do.  They're there for a reason and I'm so grateful.

Betty Bowers Explains Traditional Marriage to Everyone Else

Timebomb

My plan was to post on my blog more often, but like everything else in my life right now, those plans have taken a left turn somewhere near Albuquerque.  There have been a number of reasons for my sporadic posting.  Time management has been a huge reason, but another reason is I don't want to use my blog page to just bitch and moan and cry out "Oh whoa is me."  It gets tiring for both me to write and for both of you to read.  But I'm afraid I've been having a rather large pity party for myself lately.  I'm so easily defeated sometimes and when I get to feeling that way, it's hard for me to lift my head out of the sand to see that I'm blowing things way out of proportion.  I've been having moments of clarity again, so I feel confident enough to write a little bit here again.

So what's been getting me down?  It's actually a series of smaller things that, by themselves, aren't so bad, but once they start piling up, the load gets heavy.  I think, for the most part, the unexpected sadness for my Mother's passing that recently popped back up again got the ball rolling.  I think I mentioned earlier that at the beginning of May, the non-stop advertising for Mother's Day really caught me off guard and kind of reopened the wounds I thought were healing rather nicely.  The first half of May was really, really hard for me.  Hell, it's still harder than it should be, but I'm coming around again.  May is my favorite month of the year for a couple of reasons.  One, spring is in full tilt boogie.  I'm usually in my summer wardrobe by the middle of the month (shorts and tee shirts, both at work and at play!).  The windows are open and we're starting to get some amazing days weatherwise.  Add to that that May is my birthday month and that's why I love this month.  But Mother's Day is in the mix and that brought me down.  Not getting a birthday card from Mom, as minor as it may seem, brought me down further.  And a few days before Mother's Day having Ken's Mother end up in the hospital, nearly dying, just added to the fun.  I really wasn't ready to spend ANY time in a hospital yet, but I manned up and did my duty.  Thankfully she's feeling stronger and better and is home now.

So that's my base.  Add on top of it car problems, very minor, but car problems nonetheless.  I wasn't too happy about that.  And more aches and pains.  My knees haven't been right since the beginning of the year.  They were feeling a whole lot better in March and it got me back to the gym, which I missed desperately.  But the last couple of weeks they've been acting up and it's been upsetting me.  My left foot, too, has been acting up.  I believe I have another neuroma in it and it needs to be addressed, but I've been putting it off.  Odds are, the treatment will be a series of shots to the foot to kill the part of the nerve the neuroma is sitting on.  I believe it's a shot once a week for six or seven weeks.  It did wonders for the one in my right foot.  I've also been going through some unpleasant dental woes.  I went in at the beginning of the month to get a crown on a cracked tooth.  Tooth didn't hurt or anything, but the dentist has been worried about that tooth for about a year.  I ended up chipping it and thought it was time to address it before it got bad.  My mouth has been in some hurting shape ever since.  I was supposed to get the permanent crown on Wednesday, but I still can't bite on the tooth and it still hurts too much.  My dentist is pretty convinced it's not a nerve issue, but instead some sort of infection.  I'm on an antibiotic now and we'll see what that does before taking the next step.  And finally, in the department of aches and pains... I've been working out my arms at the gym.  And I've been loving it.  Until last week.  I've managed to take my weight lifting and somehow bring back my carpal tunnel in a big way.  My poor wrists hurt like a bitch all last weekend.  They've been calming down this week, but if they continue like this, I'm probably looking at surgery.  

So are you with me still?  Missing my Mom plus my entire body falling apart with a splash of car troubles have really gotten me down.  But I'm sick of being so down.  I'm over it.  And I'm really working on pulling my shit together and getting out of this funk.

Oh, and I was basically accused of being an asshole by someone I'd prefer to think of as a misjudgment on my part in the area of friendship.  I really should listen to the mutual friends we have about this person instead of thinking there was a chance at being friends.  Live and learn, I guess.  Live and learn.

But let's talk about what's good.  I'm getting married in a week and a day.  This is something I never in a million years thought I would ever do.  Me.  Married.  My boss asked me today if I'm starting to get nervous about Wedding.  I told her that to be perfectly honest, with everything going on at home (in the way of preparations) I haven't had a chance to think about it.  The only thing I'm really nervous about is getting as much work done at work before taking off for my vacation.  And it's true.  I have a feeling by the middle of next week I'm going to be nervous as shit.  But I'll also have so much else going on that maybe it won't happen.  I'm so looking forward to having a houseful of people.  The wedding is going to be small, with only a handful of friends.  I made a rule when we were planning the wedding.  I only wanted to invite as many out of town friends as we could house overnight.  My reasoning is that I HATE going to out of town weddings because of the expense.  I didn't want to pass that expense on.  Ken and I had arguments about it and I (mostly) won.  I wanted to invite a couple more, but we ran out of space.  So we have a handful of out-of-towners and a handful of locals.  After the wedding, we're having a party at the house and we've invited a bunch more people.  Out of the guest list, everyone has accepted but three.  One was a definite NO, one was dependent on a pet sitter and one needed to confer with her wife about the wife's schedule.  I'm really looking forward to just hanging out and having fun.  It's been nearly ten years since we've thrown a party, so my party skills are definitely rusty.  I'm sure there will be plenty of missteps, but fuck it.  It'll be a great time.  I'm off from work starting Thursday.  Thursday morning Ken & I will get our license (for the second time.  We're getting to be pros at this!) and then take a trip to the airport to fetch our first group of house guests.  The next group may or may not arrive on Friday (still up in the air) and everyone else on Saturday morning.

I'm going to try to blog some more between now and June 2, but if it doesn't happen, it's because I'm extra busy.  We've got so much going on to get ready for this event.  If it were up to me, we'd be done, but Ken's in charge of all this and he's got so much lined up.  Today we had a crew of maids in.  Someone is coming to power wash the house.  We've had landscapers here to do some work.  Ken spent last weekend shopping for plants for the back patio.  We still have supplies to buy for the party.  I'm not even scratching the surface on the list of things to do.  Unfortunately with his Mom getting sick, a bunch of things had to come off the list because that took up a lot of time we needed for prep work.

And that's it for now!