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Today, another neighbor (heretofore known as Duck Lady for reasons which will become obvious) witnessed yet another catfight.  Of course Kitten is a little ninja girl, so she was inside a hedge, while her Arch Nemesis was standing outside of it like a sore thumb (or a bright gold cat), looking very guilty.  Duck Lady yelled at Arch Nemesis until he ran home.  He's a very sweet cat when he isn't around Kitten.  Then she started in on me, telling me all kinds of horrible things would happen to Kitten because he is a Serial Stalker!  Apparently she's caught him pouncing at her pet wild ducks.  I know my little girl, and although I was concerned for her, I knew she was fine because she's a ninja like that.  :)  I kind of brushed off Duck Lady while we both looked for Kitten, who of course vaporized the second Arch Nemesis had his attention distracted.

I left to run errands knowing (& hoping) that Kitten would be waiting for me when I got home, which she was.  Yay!!  I checked her out and she was fine aside from needing lots of hugs.  I went over to Duck Lady's house to apologize for being snippy with her, thank her for caring about the well-being of Kitten, and to let her know that Kitten was fine. On my way, I got intercepted by Joe (Arch Nemesis' owner). He’s all kinds of furious at Duck Lady for calling him at work to bitch about his cat. Apparently, she made him drive 30 miles back to put the cat inside. Duck Lady is a little overzealous about animals but means well. She has 1 or 2 housecats of her own that never see the cruel, scary outside world. Joe was practically spitting, he’s so mad.  He’s ready to sue her and feed bread to the ducks. Hehe, he actually threatened that. They’re on some special duck food diet apparently. He said if he were 10 years younger, he would … and then trailed off … mumbled something about prison, then said not that he’s ever been in prison before. He’s kind of a rough-edged guy but not really that scary. Plus, he has a point. The neighborhood yentas do seem to go out of their way to harass him.

Anyway, he tells me that some other neighbor guy complained about a brown cat carting off a mouse AND mousetrap from his yard. He swears it wasn't his cat, so I went over to the direction he pointed. I knock on their door. No answer. Then, I hear Joe yell “Sweetheart”. He’s forgotten my name already. It’s been 3 minutes. He says maybe it’s actually the house next door.  So I go next door to knock and secretly congratulate myself on being so brave today. This tiny little woman answers. Hehe, okay she’s probably my size but shorter. I ask if she lives there cuz Joe specifically mentioned a man. She says yes, and I felt dumb at this point. So I started the story about the mouse & mousetrap, wondering now if Joe misremembered it. She says she’s an animal lover and would never kill anything. It turns out she & her son have been feeding Kitten cuz they thought she was a stray lol. They apparently love her (who wouldn’t?) and even gave her milk this morning. I wonder if that was before or after the fight. :P  I thanked her for being nice to Kitten and asked her to talk to her neighbor if she gets a chance, if only to let him know Kitten isn’t a stray. Fuck, I guess I should keep buying collars, even though she's lost 5 or 6 by now.

At some point, I was able to talk to Duck Lady's husband to ask him to let his wife know that Kitten is fine.  I tried very hard to keep this from escalating into some dumb neighborhood drama that shows up on the news.  I know most of you are wishing for the news because it would be funny if it weren't my neighborhood and my cat, but I ask that you think peaceful thoughts for Kitten.  The last thing she needs is to have Animal Control coming around.
 

Being the organized person I am, I left my cell number with the shop in case of emergencies arising.  However, I completely underestimated Swedish planning since it seems they built that store like a bunker.  No cell phone signal to be had anywhere in the giant store.  I didn't realize this for a couple of hours though as we were completely engrossed in the whole experience.  We ended up spending over $200 on little things, and enjoyed the experience immensely.  I ran half a mile to get outside for a cell signal and found that everything was copacetic.  Those Jamaicans are awesome!

Once we picked up the car, we made a quick stop to get some beef patties & coco bread.  Mmmmm.
 

Kitten's Pictorial Life Story
 

One of my brothers missed his early morning flight because they said he got there too close to the flight time, even though the airport was deserted and he could see the stairs still attached to his plane.  I blame Cheney again.  Fortunately, Galahad stayed to drop him off and was there to bring him back to our condo until the later flight.

Most of us left today and were sharing the same connecting flights.  My niece's plane to Dallas got diverted to Denver for not enough fuel before they even boarded!  Again, I blame Cheney.  His transport plane took off right before us.  Besides that, the flight home was uneventful, although I ended up going through the rest of my Imitrex supply -- 9 total for this reunion trip.
 

Later on, we took the chair lift up the mountain to ride the Alpine Slide back down.  My sister and I were all proud of ourselves for conquering our fears (& migraines) to ride this down.  Of course two of my brothers decide to race.  I bet that the younger one would win.  Everyone else said the other would since he's bigger, and his weight would give him the advantage.  But I know that crazy always wins!  And, sure enough, he won by a comfortable lead even after wiping out on the way down.  =)
 

It's wonderful seeing everyone!  A bunch of us decided to go to the Grand Tetons to hike.  This worked out well as I was able to spend some time chatting with a few people here & there along the trail as we got strung along.  We would catch up with each other at moose sightings.  And then there was the Great River Crossing.  One of my brothers decided to cross it on a fallen log 15 feet above the white water & slippery rocks.  That prompted Galahad to cross the slippery rocks and then rock climb up the other side.  Which prompted my next brother to cross on the fallen log, too.  My 9 year old niece was begging her mom to do that, too, but alas, she had to cross on the lower log downstream in the calm section.  Of course at some point, it started to lightly rain. 

This led my 15 year old nephew to ask me which way he should cross it.  Since it was a "TestFest" as my sister so aptly called it, I took his request seriously and told him that the bigger challenge was to cross the slippery rocks and rock-climb up the other side.  He's very big into martial arts, so I thought following his martial-arts-uncle's path was apropos also.  Galahad was very good about coaching him across, telling him where to place his feet, and what to hold onto.  It was somewhat amusing to see other tourists gathering around on the other side (the trail eventually winds that way) asking if this was a rescue mission.  He did make it successfully with no serious injuries, just some wet feet and blisters.

At the top of the mountain, I couldn't take it anymore and called my neighbor to see how Kitten was.  ;)  She said she was fine but lonely.  :(
 

Plus, I'm going to miss Kitten like crazy!!! :((((
 

When I got home and showered, I was pulling chunks of seaweed out of my hair.  It was almost the exact same color and blended in nicely.
 

Seven hours later, Galahad the perfectionist finished the roof.  =)  At that point, he was too exhausted to go out as we had planned, thankfully as I was beat, too.  I was on ground detail.  I had to throw bottles of water up to him periodically, check the fuel level, and move the 200 pound machine around so the hose would reach various spots on the roof.  Obviously my job wasn't as tricky, but it still wore me out.  Plus I got filthy.  :p
 

Once we got home, she bolted out of her carrier, and then proceeded to come back and play in it for the next half hour.  :p  Fortunately, she was fine all night.  No reactions, no symptoms, which leads me to believe even more strongly how unnecessary this shot was.
 

On a positive note, I had a lovely weekend in between bouts of pain.  I had sushi with my in-laws (I love them so much!), watched the new Harry Potter movie with my Shihan followed by Thai food, lounged by the pool, and read my book. 

Before I could enjoy my pool time, I had to clean it first, and the Polaris pool-scrubber thingamajig had been making me crazy for weeks now.  It's so hard for me to unscrew the Quick Disconnect (ha!) in order to clean the filter.  I'd always have to wait for Galahad to get home to do it for me or open all the valves for an hour to let the pressure out.  Today, I finally had enough and gave myself an Idiot Lecture.  As I was standing in the pool to try and unsuccessfully connect it back (more leverage from inside the pool or so I thought), I had a little light bulb go off (figuratively thankfully so I wasn't electrocuted).  I decided that Google had never let me down before, and why hadn't I bothered to Google this problem yet.  In the past, Google has helped me figure out how to un-jam the coin holder in my car and how to change the special a/c filters among other things.  I jumped out of the pool, and before I had dried off, I had my answer.  Not only was it simple and easy to do, it worked brilliantly.

I bow down before the almighty Google.  Now, if only it could help me open the jar of mixed nuts that I'm jonesing for.  I tried all of the methods I knew plus some that I Googled.  I suppose I need to keep working out.  Sigh, Galahad needs to hurry up and come home. 
 

And there was my Galahad waiting to pick me up at midnight at the airport.  And, omg did I miss my Kitten!  Apparently she missed me, too, as she gave me lots of snuggles when I got home.  =)
 

We stopped at one of the trailheads to try hiking.  I figured the fresh air might help my sis.  Haha, here I though I'm in the best shape of my life, and I could barely make it 100 feet up the trail.  The altitude almost killed me since I live at 3 feet and this was close to 9000.  My leg muscles never got sore, but omg, I couldn't catch my breath.  Needless to say, I was happy to stop and rest and just enjoy the beauty.  We talked for a bit and munched some beef jerky, and she encouraged us to go hiking and she'd wait for us.  Neither my bro nor I wanted to leave her, so we just ambled a little bit (which was about as fast as I could go anyway without oxygen).  And, she's stubborn so she pushed herself a bit to keep up.  The fresh air (and meds) did help a bit.  We maybe only ended up a quarter mile up the trail before we turned around, but some of that was over 45 degrees steep. 

We continued to the top of Mt. Lemmon to get a bite at the little town.  At that point, my brother realized that his truck burned through way more diesel than it should have and we were in danger of running out.  When I say little town, I mean one store and one cafe (which was closed, the fkrs), and no gas station.  So, we tried to coast down, without going too fast so my sis and I wouldn't get carsick lol.  It was a harrowing ride down watching the Distance to Empty gauge count down until it just read out Lo Fuel.  We barely made it to the gas station and were happy when they had diesel there and we could refuel. 
 

I woke up early cuz I was still on EDT, so I had about 3-4 hours of sleep.  I tried to be quiet while everyone else was sleeping, but my quest for food woke up my sis.  She mumbled something barely intelligible like "you'd better be making coffee," so I started a pot for her. 

We all sat around most of the morning catching up and chatting (and playing with Bella!).  By the time we decided we wanted to do something, half the day was gone, so we spent an hour or so at the Botanical Gardens before they closed.  Then it was off to Trader Joe's to get some food.  We don't have those in Florida, so it was a treat for both my brother and me, although now that he lives there, I'm sure he'll be there often.  My sis cooked us up some yummy, healthy food back at his house,  and again we stayed up all night talking.  :)
 

I texted my sister, who was also connecting to that flight, that she needed to hold the plane cuz I was running for it!  The airlines told me they wouldn't hold it and since it was the last flight of the night, I might get stuck in Dallas the whole sold-out holiday weekend.  Cheerful pessimists they were. ;)  I knew how my sister is and I knew I'm in pretty good shape with a damn nice wheeled carry-on.  It never tipped!  Thanks, my friend, for letting me borrow it and thanks also to Delsey for designing it.  So I ran like a spider monkey hopped up on Mountain Dew.  Of course my next gate was in a completely different terminal. 

My sister is a smart cookie and started chatting to anyone who would listen; and somehow she got lots of people caring if her little sister whom she hadn't seen in 2 years would make the plane.   Laugh, she was the last person in line to board and yelled my name when she saw me running.  I came tearing over, and the flight attendant was very nonplussed.  He made some comment to my sis like why'd you make a federal case out of this.  :p  Of course, when I actually walked onto the plane behind my sis, almost everyone cheered to see I had made it.  And, because she's an amazing sister, she had snacks ready for me!!  =))  I had assumed I would have 90 minutes in Dallas to grab a a bite to eat.

She called my brother from our seats to let him know I had made the plane, and he picked us up with a huge smile at the Tucson airport.  :)
 

Iguana Plague
 

After she got settled in her room (who knew ERs had private rooms?), we joined her and tried to keep her spirits up.  I know all too well what it's like to be in so much pain, you need to vomit.  Poor girl.  I held her hair while she threw up.  We quickly persuaded the nurses to up her painkillers instead of waiting to see if what they gave her worked.  Pretty soon, we were having a party in her room.  We had us plus a few staff members laughing away at dumb jokes and her ratty socks.  :p  She told me later that she went home and threw her socks away.  ;)  Somehow no one cared that her underwear was brand new.  We just teased her about her socks.  The P.A. told me that she had never seen someone in that much pain laugh before.  Welcome to my world.  Laughter doesn't make the pain go away, but it helps to distract for a split second here & there.

In hindsight I bet they were glad they gave us a room instead of one of the curtained-off areas because of how loud we were.  I absentmindedly wondered if our laughter helped anyone else or offended them because of the gravity of their loved one's condition.  We played around with all of the gadgets and supplies in the room and asked the nurse where the bar was in the hospital.  Haha, she was great and said in her locker!

Anyway, my friend finally passed her stone and was medicated enough to be released.  I'm sure we'll talk about & remember this night far better than if we had gone to see Spiderman.  Sigh.  But I still want to see Spidey!
 

Running alarm clocks!

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Oh, and Kitten finally caught & ate Mr. Lizard.
 

Kitten finally did her kitten job and came to snuggle.  That helped put a smile on my face.  So anyway, today I look like a mongoloid.  Thank goodness for creative eyelinering.  ;)  

By the way, don't you hate when you get 9 million free address labels in the mail.  Who even sends mail anymore and needs to use them?  I especially hate when it's from an environmental charity --- although most charities are on my shit-list lately.
 

I wonder what today will bring...
 

To take my mind off of it, I've been researching political candidates for November's election.  Haha, I am so voting 3^rd party on everything I can.  Fuck all of the corrupt lying 2-party bastards.  I love some of the gubernatorial choices:  John Wayne Smith & Max Linn

And omg at Clay Shaw & Ron Klein smearing each other.  That equals a vote for neither but rather a vote for Neil Evangelista.  I haven't worked my way down to all of the ridiculous amendments yet.
 

I did get all health conscious and buy her organic food, plus all natural, perfectly blended raw food for my carnivorous kitten.  Omg, she loves that!  And, it doesn't smell all nasty like normal wet cat food.  The down side is that it's not cheap, but she's worth it.  I did save a bundle of money on cat toys though.  She loves her tennis ball, her bottle caps, and paper bags.  ;)  She plays soccer with those bottle caps until she loses them.  By then, I've usually finished another bottle of Kefir, so she gets another one.

She's met so many of my neighbors.  They all think she's a stray and try to feed her cuz she's so skinny (like owner like kitty I guess).  Plus, I haven't put a collar on her and probably won't.  I asked about micro-chipping her and heard about some huge controversy of 3 different technologies and politics and blah blah blah, so I haven't done that either.  She's very quick, smart, and knows her way home.  She grew up on the mean streets, so she's fairly savvy on staying alive.  Anyway, they all know where she lives now and haven't given me too much shit about letting her outside.  Who knew that was another whole controversy?  Almost everyone has tried talking me out of that, but she loves it.

She's so darn needy for attention; she's sleeping on my lap as I type this.  She always comes home crying and needing snuggles.  =)  How did I ever survive without my Kitten??
 

My brother came over to help us fix our roof tiles (damage from the hurricane 9 months ago), and he's quite the dog person.  Laugh, this kitty just adored him.  She/he climbed all over him, nibbling & pouncing & purring until she fell asleep on him.
 

I promptly threw those instructions out the window when I saw how cute & hungry he was.  I kept feeding him a bite at a time, moving the tray closer & closer to our front door.  Two hours later, and he was still yowling away and licking up every drop of sardines right on our front porch.  I let him inside the house for a bit, but he seemed traumatized, so I let him back out.  Plus, I wasn't sure how Galahad would react when he came home. 

A big thunderstorm rolled in, and I tried to get him to hide out on the porch with me, but he bolted.  Three hours later, I was missing him like crazy.  I couldn't find him anywhere.  I kept checking back in the original spot every half hour.  Finally, there he was!  I called Galahad and asked him to pick up some food at his mom's house on the way home since he was stopping there anyway.  Kitty still wasn't letting me anywhere near him.  I tried feeding him some rice milk, and that's when he just lunged himself on me and tried to snuggle for hours.

Of course I brought him inside, and he sat on my lap (purring & yowling) while I worked on the computer.  When Galahad came home, he saw him on my lap and kind of rolled his eyes at me.  But then I noticed that he had stopped at the store and bought him special food.  So, who's the bigger sucker now?  =)
 

My close friend came to visit, whom I hadn't seen in far too long.  Man, I love her and miss her so much.  We laughed and reminisced and laughed and cried.   Her kid is absolutely adorable!  We went to Lion Country Safari, workout class at the beach (where we built sandcastles afterwards), and just did a whole lot of nothing.  I took the day off yesterday so we could do more of the same.  She's having a rough time adjusting to single parenthood, and her father was just in a very serious accident, so she's stressed to the max.  It was nice to have our biggest stressor be what to eat next.  Hehe, although when we were at my brother's house, that can be very stressful.  :p  Another brother came over & taught her son how to make paper airplanes.  Laugh, we littered his house with so many.

It did reaffirm to me though that as much as I love her kid and enjoyed him, I'm glad I don't have any.  I just don't have the energy to keep up.  It's quite exhausting.  But omg he's so fkn cute!  He's a lil' genius at 5 and knows all about rockets & planes.  And, he has such a sunny disposition.
 

Anyway, the tree has been replanted in the far back, kinda near Bertram.  Hmm, I guess he needs a name now, too.  However, I don't know if he'll live since I am completely ignorant & klutzy in replanting trees.  Galahad has been working 6 days a week, so I figured, fuck it, how tricksy can it be.  This little seedling started in a clay pot and grew right through the bottom and rooted itself a few feet down.  I ended up smashing the pot and broke one of the roots.  Plus, he's kinda leaning all crazy-like.  Hmmm, I need a crazy-like name.  Maybe GG Allin?  Or is that too crazy?  :)  It probably doesn't bode well for him to be named that, but we shall see.   He was still standing after my shower, so I'm thrilled!
 

When I walked in, there was quite a hullabaloo in the waiting room.  Some woman (I'm always the youngest patient by 30 years or so) was ranting up a storm at the check-in window.  I caught the eye of the hygienist, mouthed my name, and she snuck me in behind the angry lady.  I started laughing as I sat in my chair.  Then, the woman burst through the door down the hall into the room where the dentist was working.  She started insisting that she needed to be seen immediately.  She wouldn't shut up and ranted about how she hated everything in Florida.

As if that weren't entertaining enough, another lady came in after her cussing her out and following her down the hall.  She was pissed off that this BITCH as she kept calling her was cutting into her time.  Laugh, it took her about 3 minutes to make it down the hall with her walker.  She cussed the whole way until she caught up to her and then called her a BITCH to her face.  Holy shit I was almost crying.  This kept up the whole time I was there.  The staff threatened to call the police.  She said that the Trump didn't work like this.  And how uncivilized Florida is.  Laugh.  We're in the middle of fkn suburbia.  I'd like to take her to the Everglades and show her uncivilized.  Actually, I'd like to take her to the airport and tell her to never come back to Florida again.

During one of the quieter moments, the hygienist commented on how comfortable my shoes look.  I get more fkn comments on these shoes from both men & women.  It's always the same exact comment, too.  I keep wondering if it's code for "Holy shit those are ugly!"  I was wearing my Columbia mocs.  They're gray-ish and nothing special to look at.  I think it's kind of funny when women comment on them.  Most women are so wrapped up in fashion and looking good that when they see a decent shoe that doesn't torture feet, they freak out.  Maybe it's cuz I refuse to conform to fashion.  I need my feet to be comfy.  How they look is secondary.  Maybe they're really commenting on my bravery to shun convention and feel good instead.  Whatever I have to tell myself to live another day as Wendy.
 

She moved me into a room across from some guy with gout.  Ewwww.  I don't really know what that is.  Hello Google.  So you don't have to Google (since no one alive knows what gout is), here it is: Gout is a systemic disease (i.e., condition that occurs throughout the body) caused by the buildup of uric acid in the joints.  He was a 38 yr old man who hurt his arm at a retreat in NY.  Yes, I heard his whole story.  I think there may be a HIPAA violation or three going on there.  Anyway, now he has some weird staff infection.  Ewwww.  By the way, I tried to hold my breath the whole time I was there but 55 minutes is a looong time.  And, apparently there's a new antibiotic-resistant staff infection out called Merca.  I was informed of this as a needle was being stuck in my arm.  Gah, I hope she washed her hands with soap.

I had assumed I would say hi to the doc and get rushed out, but he was very thorough (listened to my lungs and everything).  Laugh, he shut my exam room door so my history was private.  He reviewed where I was 5 years ago health-wise.  Again, I had to explain I've been healthy.  Because I'm a woman of a certain age, it's mammogram time.  I refused that on x-ray grounds, so I acquiesced to the blood work so as not to be perceived as difficult.  Yeah, yeah, I know I have rights, but I've been fired from doctors before so it's just easier to play along and get my refills for another 5 years.  Plus, he gave me samples of other ones.  I had to take back some of my unkind thoughts about the pharmaceutical reps for the 2 minutes he was handing me those (Maxalt, Imitrex, and Frova).  Overall, he's a good guy and I have my refill.  He did say I needed to get annual checkups.  We'll see....
 

Curly tail lizard:

Cute lizard that's shedding:

 

Laugh, my email to the Pres of course went into the 4 month delay to properly fix my cable after Hurricane Wilma.  
 

And mine is awful.  My laptop fought so much between wired & wireless if I switched back & forth that I finally stopped switching and just left it wireless (after spending hours & rebooting into safe mode to fix it).  However, that causes random weird lag so I've gone back to wired for the time being.  Gah I hate this shit.

Anyway, I had a very lovely time there, although it saddens me to see his dad falling further into the decline of Alzheimer's.  I was able to tell him I loved him and that it was good to visit with him.  He got teary-eyed and said he loved me, too.  =)
 

Operation Not Axing Myself continued today with a visit to Pablo to do my hair.  I got the lecture that it had been too long since the last time and then spent almost 3 hours and gobs of money (and he wonders why it takes me so long between visits) changing my hair into something fun.  I now have strawberry & chocolate highlights.  Yay!  I had an embarrassing moment when the woman went to wash the dye out of my hair and saw the ear seed thingies I had.  She started scrubbing and then realized they were not dye and actually there on purpose.  Since she didn't speak much English, I decided not to go into a long explanation of what they were.  We both just nervously laughed and that was that.  In case you're curious why I have things stuck to my ears, they are tiny beads that are taped to pressure points to supposedly help my migraines.
 

I run the wizard.  It does something with the router.  I try the client side on my laptop and it errors out.  Sigh.  Of course the software won't work on a Mac, but I can manually copy/paste some long encryption key from a  text file, etc.   I just want to be able to enter a password and go.  Why is this so hard?  I decided not to go back to Live Chat.  I ask around about WEP vs. WPA vs. all of the other ones.  WPA doesn't appear as an option on the Mac.  Sigh.  My laptop is fighting between the Windows wireless configuration utility and IBM's.   Everyone says use IBM.  I disable Windows, and still no luck.  I go back to the Mac and monkey around a bit (even though I am about 5% proficient with a Mac).  I find where I can make it WPA & WPA2.  Yay!  Can't find WPA2 on my Windows XP laptop.  WTF??? 

I eventually get the Mac connected.  Yay!  I update the drivers on my laptop, try reinstalling, etc.  Finally, I use the Windows utility and it finds it.  And now that it does, so does IBM.  Fkrs.  All of 'em.  So, now I've kept out all of the amateurs but I'm sure my network is still unsecured for professionals, but I kind of don't care anymore.
 

I also noticed a new spot on my chest which is making me think about calling my dermatologist.  I'm sure 2 days of lowered C wouldn't be enough to let a skin cancer grow like that (well almost sure), but it makes me wonder.  I'm so sick of all of this.  The C was making me feel good about it all and feel healthy.  Now, it scares me because there are conflicting reports of its safety.  Nothing like being one's own science experiment.  :\
 

I was reading a magazine but couldn't concentrate and really started to feel like a left out freak.  Here I was at the beach on one of the most perfect days of the year, fighting back tears and hiding under my Gilligan hat.  I ate my snacks, drank my water, and read my magazine.  Finally, they were ready to go and were making plans for dinner & movies, etc.  I was so over hanging out by then but somehow felt like I couldn't say no.  Hate that.  We all went to our respective homes to shower & change.  I of course grabbed a small snack to tide me over.  In hindsight, I should have grabbed a real meal.  It turns out girls take forever to get ready, and I was way beyond hungry by then and onto a full-blown migraine.  So, I ended up saying no to the rest of the night and spent a quiet night by myself on meds.

They all said I should have told them I needed to leave, but I didn't want to ruin their fun.  In retrospect, I should have because they were burnt pretty bad.  When did I become such a sissy girl?  How much of a loser am I that I got lonely in the middle of all that humanity and fun-ness?
 

After the Tai Chi, we started our normal workout stuff, punching sand, pushups, sit-ups, etc.  Somehow I fucked up my shoulder hanging from a beam and doing leg lifts.  I'm not sure how or why since I've done it before without injury.  Anyway, I lost 75% strength in my right arm which made eating breakfast a challenge.  (It was technically Tweensies since I had eaten breakfast before Tai Chi.)   At the time, I assumed it was muscle fatigue but it didn't seem to get better after an hour.

The next morning my shoulder was much better but my neck was all fuxx0red, so I paid an emergency visit to my chiropractor who laughed at me for being a dumbass while torturing my every pressure point.  Then, I underwent an hour-long massage session with the nice lady with the mean hands.  Holy Shit, that hurt!  So, here I am a few days later and feeling about the same as I did three days ago.  Sigh.  If this is part of getting older, I want no part of it.  I shouldn't be this goddamn delicate.  FFS, I hurt my neck sleeping from what I can tell.  That's just plain wrong. 

On a completely unrelated note, one of my nieces is in all kinds of trouble.  I've been debating with myself having a heart to heart with her.  We aren't very close emotionally or geographically so I'm not sure how well received it might be.  But then I think at that age, kids are begging for role models and guidance --- they just don't always realize it.  But really wtf am I to tell her how to be?  I did already tell her parents what I thought of their parenting techniques while offering my condolences.  It's time for Tough Love.  Most kids are way too molly-coddled these days.  Haha, so says the mother of none.  I feel for her pain, but I know from personal experience that PityParties just lead down a useless path.  Aunt Wendy to the rescue?  Bahahahah I can't even rescue myself.
 

I've been trying to puzzle this out but can't seem to figure it out.  It sounds bad though.  =(
 

Last night, I went to visit my friend.  She had pretty heartbreaking news a few weeks back, saying her cancer situation was worse.  It deflated her morale, and that scared me.  But she was her high-spirited self again last night, for which I was grateful.

I counted myself lucky that I didn't get sick after returning home from my trip.  I was sucking down vitamin C like crazy but falling deeper into sleep debt and exposing myself to all kinds of nasty germs.  Apparently, quite a few people succumbed to the sickness.  And just when I was feeling high & mighty, I had my knees kicked out from under me.  Holy fuck, I woke up in pain this morning.  I took a double dose of Imitrex (that I keep by my bedside) and finally crawled out of bed at about 1 PM when I was starving & thirsty.  Jeebus!  It felt like someone took a sledgehammer to my head, in time to Madonna's newest hit.

I crawled down the stairs and fixed my morning oatmeal and was a couch potato all day.  I watched all kinds of bizarre daytime TV.  Wow.  Just wow.

If I didn't have anyone needing/wanting me in his life, I don't think I'd still be breathing right now.  I'm so over this.  The good isn't outweighing the bad anymore.  It's been about even lately --- with today knocking the scales hard into bad.  I'm on my 3^rd Imitrex currently and conscious enough to come here and whine.  I hate whining to my friends & loved ones.  I know it's not easy to listen to someone you care about in pain and feel helpless, so I choose not to do that most times.  Hell, I can't stand myself when I'm whiny like this.  Thanks by the way, if you're still reading this.

I hope I feel better tomorrow...
 

Afterwards, we all went to Denny's for breakfast.  I fkn hate Denny's, but I was starving and for some bizarre reason there are no delis anywhere around.  To add insult to injury, we had to wait for our table.  However we did get somewhat of a floor show with that.  Two old guys almost duked it out over a front row parking space.  It was funny seeing them, in shorts with their black socks pulled up too high, shouting and acting tough.  My friend was ready to cheer them on, but I almost walked over and asked them if they knew how stupid they looked.  Since one never knows about who owns what semi-automatic weapon, I let the moment pass.

Our waitress was godawful.  I wouldn't be happy to work there either, but FFS at least fake a smile when you're working for tips.  Then she sneezed twice while taking our order.  Wet sneezes.  I kept reminding myself I have a healthy immune system and a cast iron stomach.  Plus, I was starving.  My 1^st breakfast had already worn off.  Tai Chi is hard stuff.  =)
 

Okay, enough of that.  Let's see... I just came back from a fabulous trip to Naples to see my good friend & her new boyfriend.  By the way, they had so much less tree damage (from Hurricane Wilma) than we did and I think it's because the East coast of Florida did NOT stick with native trees while the West coast mostly did.  Her boyfriend has a house on the beach which is absolutely gorgeous.  It's an older home and much close to the Naples I remember as a kid than all of those McMansions that keep going up everywhere (here especially).  ON THE FKN BEACH!!!  Did I mention that part?  :p  My room looked out onto the ocean, and I listened to the waves gently crashing against the shore.  ON THE FKN BEACH!!!!  I didn't realize how much I missed her until I saw her again.  Haha, we had so much fun just goofing and laughing everywhere we went.

I have 2 restaurant reviews to give.  The first is a trendy sushi joint in downtown Naples called Blu Sushi.  The food was incredible, but I would never go back because their service (with the exception of our bubbly waitress) was horrible.  We called in advance to ask if we could make reservations and were told we didn't need them.  Of course when we got there, we had to wait 45 minutes for a table.  Then (here comes the kicker where I normally would have walked out if I had even stayed originally), I asked if they could substitute cream cheese for mayonnaise in one roll and was told No.  WTF???  NO????  Then, he says it's all prepared ahead of time.  My face literally had WTF written all over it so he checked with his chef (or went to get a drink) and came back and said that they couldn't.  Their menu does in fact say, please ask and we will create whatever you desire.  Prepared ahead of time???  Does he know he works at a sushi restaurant?  I didn't make a big deal cuz I didn't want my food spit in, and I was out with friends, but for the love of Mike!

The 2nd one was called Bella Maria Cafe and was fabulous!!!  I was overly hungry and wigging out (almost ready to eat at Subway FFS).  This was just down the road, so I took a chance, and omigod I had a fiesta in my mouth.  Yum!!  Plus, the service was great, and the prices not too crazy.  They sat us immediately and served us soon afterwards.

However the most important news today is that Bertram was granted a reprieve!  Long live Bertram!