Seven Days...

Last Sunday,November 10th, a little after 2:18 a.m., the Husbandly One breathed his last breath and was gone.  Just like that.

I was trying to give him a dose of medication to clear his airways, and had just asked him to open his mouth a little wider so I could get the oral syringe in.  His eyes flicked toward me, his lips moved and he whispered... something... and then he was gone.  I had stared at him, then stood up and said, "Oh," in shock.

Our friend, K, who was there helping me with the night watch, stood up and leaned over him to look, then looked at me, her eyes wide with shock, and she said, "Oh," the same exact way I had.

The next thing I knew, I was wrapped tightly in her arms, and I was roaring with grief as my knees threatened to buckle, because the worst thing ever had just happened to me, and I was trying not to leave with him.

Most of that night is a blur.  I remember staring at his face earlier in the night, thinking death was coming soon as I noticed how his skin was molding to his skull.  I remember staring at his face after the hospice folks had cleaned him up and dressed him, touching his face and crying at how small he was, how thin, how... cold.  I remember sitting on the couch in the dining room, holding E's dear, dear face in my hands as she told me she loved me.  I said, "I know you do, because you came here without your teeth."

I remember how kind the hospice people were, and the policeman who came in with extremely neatly threaded eyebrows.  I remember my sister holding me so tight and telling me how sorry she was, and my other sister on the phone, telling me how much she loved me.  I remember the guy from the funeral home, who sounded like Barry White.  And I remember looking out the back door at this extremely beautiful sunrise and being startled that so much time had already passed.

And now, it's been seven days.  Seven days since my husband died.  Seven days since I last looked into his face, wishing I could relieve his suffering, and knowing there was nothing I could do except respect his wishes.  He'd been unresponsive since Thursday morning.  His last clearly spoken words to me were, "I can't breathe."

And because he was in hospice care, and had a Do Not Resuscitate order, I called Hospice and not 911.  They helped me calm him down and get him breathing almost normally, but he was practically comatose after that.  If you asked him to blink to answer yes/no questions, he'd do it.  He'd smile, or smirk, or waggle his eyebrows, and he would hold your hand, squeeze it, and tug on it.

We held his hand around the clock.  Seriously.  We took it in shifts, there was always someone there to hold his hand when I needed to sleep, or to eat, go to the bathroom, go outside and cry... someone held his hand continuously.  If you didn't, he'd look for a hand, reaching out and trying to find one.

So we held his hand.

It's been seven days since I held his hand.  Seven days since I ran my fingers through his hair and talked to him.  Seven days since I lost the one person who got me and loved me anyway.  Seven days since I told him I loved him and he squeezed my hand back to say, "I love you, too."

Seven days of pretending to be a functional competent adult.  Seven nights of sleeping alone in my full-sized bed that suddenly seems way too big.  Seven days of pushing down panic and staying calm so my kids stay calm.  Seven days of not going through the stacks of mail and papers on my desk to find out what OTHER bills didn't get paid.

Seven days of missing my best friend, the person I tell everything first, seven days of wanting to tell THO something, or ask him something, or just wanting to see him, just because.

Seven days of missing his Facebook Messenger icon being constantly up on my phone, because we sent jokes, memes, or photos we'd just taken of something interesting to each other.

Seven days.  And I will never, ever be the same again.

Fuck.  Cancer.

I'm Trying Not To Be A Wuss, But I Don't Think It's Working...

He's so damn thin.  I don't even want to speculate with how much he weighs.  His appetite is almost nonexistent, and warring with that is the  "don't waste food" mentality we were brought up with by our Depression era parents.

He thinks, "I can't eat an entire chicken pot pie, even though I want one.  And if I don't eat it, it will go to waste.  Therefore, I will not eat a chicken pot pie, so I won't waste the food."

He hasn't said that, but I'm pretty sure that's part of what's wandering through his head somewhere.

I had to change that mentality myself, especially over the last year.  And most especially where he's concerned.  So he can't eat an entire chicken pot pie, I'm just thrilled he ate some of it, you know?  Maybe I should do what I did with my mom when her appetite was decreasing.  You know, instead of cajoling her to eat, I would make a sandwich and say, "Oh, you know what, Mom?  I can't eat this whole sandwich by myself.  You want half?"

And because she grew up during the Depression, there was no way she was going to let that half of a sandwich go to waste, so she'd shrug and say, "Might as well."  And we'd sit there and eat our half of a sandwich and smile, and inside, I was cheering because hot damn, I got calories in her!

I just need to be even sneakier than usual, because he's always on to me.

Maybe that will take my mind off the thought of losing the love of my life way before I'm ready.  I'm really scared.  We go see the oncologist on Monday, and we'll see what we see.

I should probably go back to the doctor myself.  My ear is still bothering me.  It's kind of hard to focus on me right now, though.

I'm tired.  I'm hungry.  I'm scared.  And... I feel pretty alone right now.

Like A Thief In The Night...

Well, last night completely sucked.

No matter what I do, it's always there.  This... waiting grief.  It's so frustrating, and so.... time wasting.

I mean, he's here.  He's alive.  He's fighting.  He's actually doing pretty well on the treatment front.

But every once in a while, it sneaks up on me and sucker-punches me when I least expect it.  I can hear my mother's voice.  Don't borrow grief.  Well, I'm not borrowing it.  But it's very hard to live in the moment when your husband's having a rough chemo treatment, when he's cramping and going through diarrhea and spending hours in the tub, completely miserable, and you find yourself wondering how much he can take before it's too much?

Please let that day be far, far away.  Please.

I can't bear the thought of him not being here.

I can't bear the thought of him suffering.

I'm so... torn up and ... last night, I couldn't stop crying.

I hate this.  I hate what he's going through.  And I hate being so selfish.

Last night was full of dreams I only half remember, but I would wake up crying.  Not sobbing, just, I'd wake up with in tears, my face and pillow soaked.

Today is going to totally suck.  I hate letting him see how much this upsets me.  But I can't... I can't let him see this... I mean, I'm trying to be strong, dammit, not a child!

How do I do this?

It's Worst at Night...

Nighttime is the worst.  There are nights when I just can't sleep. 

I worry.  I worry a lot. 

I worry about my kids.  Granted, my oldest is an adult, and will soon be graduating with her BFA, possibly by next fall, and my youngest will be 18 in a month.  But I still worry. 

I worry about our finances.  I worry that we'll lose our insurance.  I worry that the Husbandly One will get worse, or he'll give up.  There are times, when he's asleep, that I will lay there and cry, dreading the inevitable.  I still have no clue how to deal with that.  He's 54.  I thought we'd be in our 80's or 90's before that became an issue.

But, unless some radical new miracle treatment comes along... I can't even think about it, even though I do.

I wonder, sometimes, if this ridiculous lingering illness I can't seem to shake off is really just extended broken heart syndrome.

During the day, we go along as always, trying to come up with enough energy between the two of us to get basic chores done.  Clean the kitchen, do the laundry, vacuum the house, hack back the bamboo that's trying to take over the back and front yards because the people who owned the house before us were idiots who really though they could keep the bamboo confined to one tiny spot in the yard.  We run errands, feed the cats, putter among the plants, watch the ducks, talk to the kids, you know, all the things you do during the course of the day.  And it's so much easier to push back the fear and anguish, the worry... I can focus on other things and do stuff.

But at night?  So much harder.  The house gets quiet.  I'm tired.  I lay down, turn out the light, wrap my arm around him and think, "He's thinner today." And then it starts.

It's so hard.  I lay there, my eyes burn, my face stretches as I force myself to breathe normally, fighting back tears as I think desperately, Please, please, don't take him away from me.  Don't take my husband, the love of my life, my best friend... don't take him away from me...

Sometimes, he just... knows, and he'll turn over, asking me if I'm okay. 

"I'm fine," I lie.  "Just... hurting a little, that's all."

No need to tell him that it's not my joints hurting.  Then we'd both be awake for the rest of the night.

Sometimes, I'm able to calm myself down and finally relax into sleep.

But some nights... some nights, I can't.  Some nights, I have to get up and go sit in the living room, or out on the back porch if the weather is nice.  Somewhere I can sit and cry my heart out, because... while I know the chemo is working NOW... I know that one day, hopefully years from now, but one day, he'll be done.  He'll have had enough, he'll be tired, and he'll say, "Enough."

Quality of life over quantity.

I can't even think about that right now.  It's really selfish of me, I know.  But I can't even bear to think about it.  The selfish, immature part of me wants to scream out, "DON'T LEAVE ME ALONE!!"

The selfless mature part of me is yelling it, too.

I just... can't even think of sleeping in that bed without him in it.  I can't think of being in that room without him.  In this house.  This life.

On the 16th, we'll have been married for 28 years.  I'm hoping for 28 more, but you know what?  I'll take every damn second I can get.

Tonight is one of those sleepless, full of worry, terror, and grief nights.  My focus for the last two years has been so narrow, just... getting through, day by day. 

Seriously, I am barely coping with any of this.  And I hate that about myself.

Day by day.

Now, if I can just get through tonight...

Life Comes At You FAST...

I haven't posted in a while.  2016 was... not a good year for us. The Husbandly One's job took a really... stressful turn,  to the point where it started affecting his health.  By July, I knew something was wrong.  Convincing him to go to the doctor, though, was another thing.  I also started suggesting a job change, because I was convinced this job was going to kill him.  He was so angry, and he'd come home all tied up in knots, unable to eat, and he started losing weight.  Lots of weight.

Labor Day, we took a family trip to Rockport that we almost didn't go on, because the Impossible Son caught a stomach virus earlier in the week that sort of... stopped up the plumbing, if you get my drift. He got better, and the trip proceeded as planned.  However, right after we got there, it was quickly apparent THO had caught the virus and was miserable.  I suggested we go home, but he was determined to have a good time and not wasted the money he'd spent getting the hotel room, he was stressed out and he wanted some beach, dammit!

Yeah, it was a pretty miserable vacation for all of us, but most especially for THO.

By mid September, his boss just... did that one thing too far.  Normally, the metals company he worked for gave the employees two weeks off at Christmas, because that's a slow season for them. However, an announcement was made that they would only have Christmas Eve/Christmas Day off, and New Year's Eve/New Year's Day off.  Okay, well, as THO said, that was kind of disappointing, but standard for most retail businesses.  To cap it off, though, his boss also announced that, starting in the new year, they would be expected to work Saturdays.  And even some Sundays.  In other words, six to seven days a week.  Mandatory.

WTF?

That was the straw that broke the camel's back, so to speak, and the Husbandly One tendered his resignation right then and there.  

I was so happy, because the week previous, he'd been in so much physical pain that I was terrified he was dying.  And I saw he was losing even more weight.

After he quit, though, he started feeling a lot better.  Which sort of supported my suspicion that stress had a lot to do with his issues.  We had fun, went exploring, paid the house and cars off, hung out with the kids.  It was a good time.  He looked at it as a sabbatical.  "Think I'll just take this time to fix what needs to be fixed around the house and yard, take little day trips, putter around, and relax.  Maybe we'll go all out decorating for Halloween and Christmas," he said with a grin.  "Then come January, I'll look for a more local job.  No more hour and a half daily commutes to Lakeway!"

Yep, I was totally cool with that.

This lasted until mid October.  He started losing even more weight.  He started having pain again.  Lower abdominal pain and anal pain.  We thought, irritable bowel?  I started trying to convince him to go to the doctor, but we weren't insured at the time.  The insurance he would have gotten through his company was extremely expensive... and absolutely useless.  And what we found through the Affordable Care Act in 2015 was... not great.  He was reluctant to go see our gastroenterologist, because I think he knew, he knew something was terribly wrong.

Finally, though, in November, it got to be too much.  He was in so much pain, he couldn't handle it and got... angry.  I put up with it, knowing from long experience that the more I insisted he go to the doctor, the more he'd resist.  I just had to wait him out on this.  Until I couldn't put up with it and exploded, pretty much letting him have it, because I was just so done with all the shilly-shallying.

He exploded right back, and after much tears and noise, he finally admitted maybe he should see the doctor.

No, I didn't do a victory dance.  I just called the damn doctor and set the appointment.

His weight loss was accelerating and terrifying me.  He was also suffering from restless leg syndrome, to the point where he was practically kicking me out of bed, and so uncomfortable that we couldn't sleep together.  I blew up an air mattress and set it up in our bedroom so we could at least be in the same room.  And we both, as a result, got more and more depressed and unhappy.  He started saying things like, "I know I'm not going to survive this.  I'm going to die," and "I have to make sure you and the kids are taken care of, I won't impoverish us by draining our money just so I can get treatment that isn't gonna work," and other cheerful pronouncements of that ilk.

Me?  I completely fell apart.  Literally and figuratively.  I spent hours walking around and bursting into tears at the drop of a hat.  He'd make a pronouncement of doom, I'd start weeping (I am not proud of this, by the way) because the utter thought of losing this man that I love so much was terrifying.  We expected to grow old together.  I knew one of us would go first, but I thought we'd be in our eighties, not our fifties.  I couldn't face the thought of a future without the Husbandly One, and ... I really, really didn't handle it well.

Throughout this, my oldest child, the Impertinent Daughter, was a rock.  She held us together, she made sure we all ate, she cooked dinners, did laundry, washed dishes, made sure her brother did his chores and his homework... and I'm sure wept herself to sleep every night.  

The Impossible Son, already having difficulties in school because of the stress the Husbandly One's condition since summer was causing, started failing his classes, but remained outwardly calm and cautiously optimistic.

So, we got in to see our gastro, Dr. K, who did a brief exam and listened to THO's symptoms (supplemented by me) and suspected ulcerative colitis.  He put THO on a low residue diet and scheduled him for a colonoscopy just before Thanksgiving.

Let me tell you something, keeping THO on that low residue diet took the resources of myself, the Impertinent Daughter and the Impossible Son.  But we did it, despite the whining and complaining.

He lost more weight.  And then... the day of the colonoscopy came.

We did the full prep.  It was supposed to clean him out.  

It didn't.

When we got to the hospital, THO was still having to run to the bathroom.  And when the procedure started... well, they had to go get a pediatric probe, because they... couldn't get in.  And when they did, Dr. K was very concerned.  

They took biopsies.

The Husbandly One had a stricture at the top of his rectum.  Two days later, we found out it was a tumor.  And a CT scan later, we found out it had metastasized to his liver.

The Husbandly One had cancer.

Part of me was... devastated.  The other half of me was relieved because this?  This I know how to deal with.  The unknown?  I can't handle. 

 Then it became an issue of trying to find an oncologist who would treat him.  Without insurance.

I convinced THO, however, to give the Affordable Care Act exchange, otherwise known as Obamacare, another try.    The oncologist Dr. K. had recommended us to rejected us, because of lack of insurance, and said they would refer us to Shivers Cancer Center in Austin, but wanted us to be aware that they would put us on a waiting list and would give priority to Travis County residents.

We don't live in Travis County.  We live in Caldwell County, just south of Travis.  There's not a lot of options for us in Caldwell County, and we also found out we could spend six months or more waiting just to be seen at Shivers.

The Husbandly One decided we should physically drive to the oncologist's office in San Marcos and talk to them, to be a physical presence and show we are real people, not just an abstract test result. He also explained to them that he fully planned to go on the exchange and look for a health plan, and asked plainly what A.C. A plans they accepted.  

Next thing we know, we've got an appointment to see the oncologist on January 3rd, and a list of plans to choose from, and something concrete to do.

Never underestimate the power of a face to face conversation.  No confrontation, just let them see who you are, and talk to them.

Things moved rather quickly after that.

His bloodwork showed he was extremely anemic, and his weight had gotten dangerously low.  In April, he'd weighed 150 lbs.  By December, he weighed 128 lbs.

Like I said, terrifying.

The first thing the oncologist wanted to do was give THO an iron infusion, to build up his hemoglobin and help him gain weight for treatment.  The second was to send him to a surgeon to have a port put in his chest, so that treatment could be administered intravenously through the port, rather than through his arm.  The plan was to do the infusion BEFORE the port was installed, but the moment the surgeon saw him, he wanted to do it ASAP.  

In the meantime, the Husbandly One was experiencing pain moving through his abdomen, which truly puzzled us, because he was experiencing near constant diarrhea (which wasn't helping on the weight issue at all).  He had the surgery for the port.  And afterwards, I was helping clean him up before getting dressed to leave, and as I wiped his bottom, he jolted and nearly hit the ceiling.  

We blamed it on tumor sensitivity.

Three days later, he's sitting in the bathtub, screaming in pain.  Literally.  Once again, I was done.  I picked up my phone, called the oncology center's on-call doctor, who said loud enough for THO to hear, "Go.  To.  The.  Emergency.  Room.  Now."

So we did.  The Impertinent Daughter drove and we got to Seton Hays in record time.  We checked in, he barely had time to sit down when we were called to the triage nurse, who took one look at his inability to sit or stand (he sort of hunched over the back of a chair) and had him in a wheelchair going to one of the treatment bays lickety split.  They tried to draw blood, realized he was dehydrated, and next thing we know, he's got two bags of saline hanging over him.  They whisk him off to do a CT scan, the ER doc stops me to tell me he doesn't have a mass in his abdomen, but he is concerned about the way the pain is moving and the fact that the Dilaudid they'd given him wasn't working to help his pain at all.

The Dilaudid was NOT working.  At.  All.

It turned out, however, that the Husbandly One was an over-achiever.  He had an anal abcess AND a kidney stone!!

One surgery for the abcess and three days of being in the hospital to pass the stone later, the Husbandly One's pain was practically gone and his hemoglobin levels were much better.

Things started to level out after that.  He still has pain, but Tylenol and Tramadol seem to work pretty well.  He's had three treatments so far, and the cancer markers in his blood have gone from 1800 to 370.  He hasn't gained any weight... but he hasn't lost any, either.  And now that he has a goal to focus on, things are easier.

I have hope that things will continue to improve.  

When Writers Meltdown...

Last night, I had a meltdown.

In times of crisis, I am usually pretty calm, mostly because of my dad and his, "if you panic, you're no good to yourself or anybody else" philosophy.  Inside, I'm freaking out and mentally flailing in whatever handy mental compartment I have available, but outwardly, I tend to focus on whatever the situation is and how to deal with it.

There are exceptions, however, and last night... was a pretty big exception.  

Over the years, I have learned to backup my writing.  I have an external drive for our desktop, and one for my laptop.  I also have various flash drives.  And I also use Google Drive and iCloud.  Yes, I know that's all redundant, but in light of the hard drive crashes and accidents we've had over the years we've had computers, I've learned that redundancy is my friend.  Because I've lost a lot of writing files in those hard drive crashes, and every single one of them hurt.  In fact, the hard drive crash of our last PC, combined with some comments from people who shall remain unnamed, drove me into a seven year writing block that was acutely painful.  

I need to write.  It's painful not to write.

So, I back up and back up, and that's great, but I admit that sometimes, I'll let things slide a little.  Maybe I'm up late writing, and I'll save what I was working on, but I won't back it up to the flash drive or Google or iCloud, etc, because I just want to go to bed and crash, and I'll do it in the morning.

Last summer, one of our cats spilled one fourth inch of water over my laptop in her never-ending Quest for Fresh Water and killed the hard drive, and the last chapter of the novel I was working on.

One new hard drive and and expanded iCloud later, I've gotten better at remember to back up.

I also have the habit of slipping my flash drives into the front pocket of my jeans for the portability of being able to work wherever I am.  I did that yesterday with the intention of working on getting the first fifty pages of The Pestilential Adventures of Mrs. Osgood Peabody into shape to send to a publisher, but I was having a bad Hashimoto's day and instead curled up on the couch under a blanket to watch "Criminal Minds" on Netflix with my daughter.  Later, I changed out of the jeans and into a pair of fleece pajama pants with big pockets, fulling intending to transfer the flash drives into those big pockets, because I still wanted/needed to write, dammit.

And proceeded to get sidetracked by having to answer a question from one of the kids, thus totally forgetting about the flash drives.  Problem is, it kept niggling at my brain that I urgently needed to do something, but could never fully remember what it was, because succeeding events kept driving back to the back burner of what passes for my mind.  Even after the Husbandly One got home for work, I could never get it to come up to the front of my mind and remember what it was I needed to do.

But it bothered me.

And because last week was pretty rotten autoimmune-wise, THO was working to get ahead on the Laundry Monster.  So he was gathering up random clothes to throw in the washer.  I reminded him that the Impertinent Son needed his running tights washed because he has a track meet on Thursday, and went to grab them while he picked through my stuff for things to wash.

He grabbed my jeans.

I noticed and thought, "Wait," but... nope.  Nothing.  

It wasn't until later when I thought, Okay, so I won't get any work done on it tonight, but I should probably get the flash drive and back Mrs. Peabody up to Google Drive... and that was when it hit me.

"Did you wash the jeans I was wearing today?" I asked THO breathlessly.

He looked up from his book.  "Yeah.  I washed both pair that I found on your basket.  Why?"

I didn't answer, I just ran for the laundry room, stopped the washer and opened it and started digging.  And found one of the flash drives almost under the agitator at the bottom of the laundry tub.

But not the Mrs. Peabody drive.

I pulled every single item of clothing out of that washing machine, dripping wet, and shook them out, felt in every pocket, every sleeve, every leg, every arm, every single nook and cranny... and no drive. I felt around under every side of that agitator in the washing machine.  And no drive.

I went back to the living room where I'd been sitting, on the off chance it might have fallen out of my pocket, and I was fighting back tears as I pulled the couch cushions off.  And no drive.

My son noticed and asked what was going on.  And by this time, I wasn't fighting back the tears any more, because it was sinking in that the drive had probably gone down the drain.  I filled him in on what had happened, and he said, "Don't worry, Mom, I'll get Cailly and we'll help you look for it.  It's probably not anywhere near the washing machine."

I nodded and popped the drive I'd found into a small container with rice to help dry it out.  And went back into the bedroom to look in the clothes basket and around the floor, just in case.  And felt progressively worse and worse and worse, and then... I completely lost it.

All that work.  Fighting through writer's block, and uncertainty, and finally getting my writing groove back.  Working on a piece that was getting positive feedback.  And it was gone.

It felt like the universe was trying to tell me something.  Stop.  Quit trying.  You're never going to get anywhere.  You're never going to succeed.  Look at how old you are.  It's never going to happen, so you should just give up while you can.  Give up, grow up, just stop.

In the meantime, the Husbandly One was disconnecting the washing machine drain hose to see if the drive had possibly gone down and doing everything he could to help.  The kids were alternately looking everywhere they knew I had been, and coming in to comfort me as I sat there, a completely wet mess.  

I gave up.  And it was as we were straightening the covers on the bed that I spotted something familiar on the quilt.

The missing flash drive.

After nearly suffocating THO with a tearful hug, then going to share the good news with the kids, you bet your effin' BIPPY I went and backed up everything on that drive to Google Drive and iCloud!!!

And from now on... NO MORE PUTTING FLASH DRIVES INTO MY POCKETS!!!!

To Chip, Or Not To Chip...

The Husbandly One and I have such awesome communication skills sometimes.

I only have two lunches to make in the mornings now, the Impossible Son's and the Husbandly One's, so it's not such a frantic thing as in the past.  As such, I'm a little more relaxed in the mornings, which is a good thing, considering how creaky the autoimmune thing makes me now.

So this morning, I'm making the Husbandly One's lunch and I admit, I was a still a little under-caffeinated and moving a little slowly.  Sandwich was done and it was time to add chips, so I hooked the step stool with my foot (because I'm fun-sized, yo!) so I can get to them.  They are kept on the top shelf of our cabinets which are, of course, way above my head.

As I stepped up to get them, I looked over at THO and said, "You know, I had quite a fight to hang on to these chips yesterday," as I reached for the bag of sour cream and onion potato chips.

"Yeah?" he said sort of absently, because he was at the table, drinking coffee and surfing Facebook.

"Yeah," I said, pulling the bag down.  "Your son discovered the bag and practically emptied the damn thing in a 'small' bowl.  He's doing the 'eating everything in sight' thing again.  I had to confiscate the bowl and rescue the chips!"

Both THO and Mr. Impossible love sour cream and onion chips.  Thing is, where THO has learned moderation and to ration them out to himself, Mr. Impossible is still at the Hoover stage of his appetite and will eat an entire large bag at one sitting if we let him.  So THO basically hid this particular bag of chips so he'd have them in his lunches this week.

I had opened the bag and was about to put some in his lunch when THO turned around and said, "Oh, we have chips at work, so you don't have to put any in my lunch.  Unless you just want to."

I frowned at him.  "So..."

"You can put them back," he said, watching me.

"Okay," I said slowly, rolling the bag up and clipping it, then getting back up on the step stool to put them away.

They are in my hand, about to touchdown on the shelf, when he says, "Or you could throw them in my lunch... if you want."

I stop, stare at him, then slowly start to take them back down off the shelf, preparing to unclip them again.

"Honey, we have chips at work," he said.

Breathing slowly and evenly, I don't unclip them, and start to put them back on the shelf.

"Unless, you know, you just want to put them in my lunch."

I study his face.  He's not teasing me.  He's entirely serious and has no clue. Okay.  I start to get them down again.

"Honey,  I said we have chips at work!  You don't have to put any in my lunch!"

"AAAAAUUUGHHH!!!  Will you make up your mind???"

THO looks shocked.  "What??  What did I do??"

"We have chips at work, unless you want to put them in my lunch, but you can put them back because we have chips at work, unless you want to put them in my lunch, which one is it??"  I glare at him.  "I have not had enough caffeine for this!!"

Yes, he apologized, and thus he has survived to live yet another day.

Because This Breathing Thing Is Harder Than It Looks....

This has been a really tough winter for us.  First, the Husbandly One brought home the flu for Christmas.  We were extraordinarily lucky that neither of the kids got it, but he got the H1N1 version... and I got the other one.  For once, our kids took care of us, and wasn't that a switch??

While the Husbandly One was initially much sicker, getting a dangerously high fever one night, high enough that I was ready to drag his stubborn hide to the emergency room, he recovered much quicker than I have.  We both took Tamiflu to reduce our symptoms, and the kids took it as a preventative, and we got through it.

But the flu hung on to me a little longer.  And when it finally left, we discovered it left friends.

Say hello to Mr. Secondary Infection.  Oh, and Mr. Bronchitis.  And let's not forget Mr. Lingering Cough!

But, I did start feeling better.  And I was kind of getting back into the groove when what is known here in Central Texas as Cedar Season hit... early.  And this year?  It was a doozy.  Think... CEDARPOCALYPSE.

Yeah.  That bad.

Guess who's allergic to cedar pollen in this house.  Well... all of us, actually.

But guess who it knocked completely flat?

Yeah.  Me.

The Impertinent Daughter got a sinus infection.  The Husbandly One got a sinus infection.  The Impossible Son hovered on the edge of a sinus infection, but seemed to avoid it.  Barely.

Me?  Well, I have asthma.  Asthma that has been remarkably quiet in the four or so years since I started taking Dexilant for gastric reflux.  I haven't had to take asthma medications in all that time.  Except the rare use of my rescue inhaler because of nearby grass fires, etc.  It's been wonderful!  It was like having my life back!

Until cedar season hit and all of a sudden, I couldn't breathe any more.  And the next thing I know, I'm back on Advair, I'm back on the nebulizer, I'm back to using my inhaler every four hours, and shaking like a leaf all the time.

Finally, the Husbandly One whisked us all away to Rockport for the weekend to see if it would help.  And it did.  I was finally able to draw in a deep breath for the first time in two and a half months, and we were all better for the clearer air.

It made coming back home a real bummer though.

And... I was back at the doctor's again today, because... now I'm coughing up yellow stuff, and for someone with asthma... that is a very bad sign.  So... now I'm on a antibiotic because the doctor informed me, as have many over the last few weeks, "You are absolutely not allowed to get pneumonia!"  Which would just be the total capper to the season, right?

*sigh*

The thing is, the very frustrating thing is, after you've gotten your life back, and you're used to doing things again, like getting out and doing stuff with your family, and going places, and just... being outside without worrying it's going to set you off or make you miserable... you kind of get to liking it and wanting to do it as much as possible.

And when you can't... it's very discouraging.  I have things I want to do.  My son will be starting his track season next week.  I would really, really like to go to his meets without worrying that I'll either have an asthma attack, make myself sicker, or have to go home after an hour because I'm too tired to stay awake.  Not to mention how crap-tastic that would be for the Impossible Son, because he wants his mom there.  He wants his mom cheering for him, taking ridiculous photos of him, and just being his best cheerleader ever.  Not curled up in bed at home.

My doctor, and my sister, who is a nurse and more than familiar with me, and with allergies and asthma in general, have pointed out that this was a huge shock to my system and I've got to give it time to... recalibrate.

My family needs me, and I need them.

Can you tell I'm frustrated?  Because I am.

I won't let this beat me.  But... it's very frustrating, inconvenient, and... did I mention frustrating?

Just breathe.  Just breathe.  Just breathe....

That moment when you realize you helped raise the next generation of the village...

It all started because the Impossible Son said, "One of my friends is pansexual."

I blinked, because this was a definite non-sequiter not related to the conversation we were having, but I'm well used to this sort of thing because... that's just the way my kids' brains work.  And I admit it, I'm kind of that way, too.  So, I said, "Really?  What makes you say that?"

"Well..." he hedged.

"Do you know what it means?" I asked while keeping my eyes on the road, because I had just picked him up from school and wanted to not, you know, run off the road into a ditch.

"Yeah," he said, "it means you'll basically have sex with anything that stands still long enough."

Wow, I thought, and knew I had to nip that one in the bud.  "Nope, not even close," I said firmly.

"But... that's what my friends said it meant," he protested.

"Yeah, well, they don't know what it means, either," I said dryly.  "Being pansexual means you're attracted to a person, not their gender.  Gender doesn't matter to you, it's the person themselves that attracts you."

"Oh," he said thoughtfully, then he frowned at me.  "Then... why didn't my friends know that?"

I shrugged.  "Because a lot of folks don't even bother to learn what those things mean."

"I thought that was being heterosexual..."

"No," I said, wondering how the hell he'd gotten so mixed up about this, "being heterosexual means being attracted to someone of the opposite sex.  And," I said before he could ask, "being homosexual means being attracted to someone of the same sex as you.   And being bisexual means being attracted to either sex."

We kept chatting until we got home, and I think I cleared it up for him, but wow...

I shouldn't be too surprised, though, that he's mixed up.  Last year, the 6th grade assistant principal told my son he needed to keep some friction burns he had on his hands covered with bandaging, not because it was hygienic, or would keep them clean, but... because he could pick up AIDS from the surfaces of the desks in the classrooms and the tables in the cafeteria.

*watches the collective jaw drop*

Yeah, that was pretty much my reaction, too.

So, going by that shining example, along with the fact that what passes for sex education in the schools in our small town is of the abstinence variety, it's no big surprise that my son's friends have no clue whatsoever what any of those terms mean.

No.  Really.

There is a disturbingly high rate of teen pregnancy in our little town.  My son is in 7th grade.  There's already a girl in his class that is expecting.  A girl at the Impertinent Daughter's high school went into labor on the first day of school.

I have news for all those parents who keep saying that they don't want comprehensive sex education taught in the schools because it might give their kids ideas and make them want to have sex.  Your kids have gone way past having ideas and they're already doing it.  Not knowing anything about it hasn't stopped them.  They're doing it, and they're getting pregnant, and getting STDs because you're too stupid to give them the tools they need to prevent it.  You're preventing them from knowing enough about it to make an informed decision, and you know what?  It's been proven that kids who take comprehensive sex education classes tend to delay having sex longer than kids who don't.

Anyhow, moving on, later in the evening, I was discussing this with the Husbandly One and the Impertinent Daughter, and she said, "You know, Mom, I'm not surprised at all, because my friends used to pop out with stuff like that all the time.  I'd come ask you about it and you would explain it to me and then I'd go back to school and explain it to my friends.  I mean, I knew they were wrong, but sometimes, I didn't know why, or I didn't know how to explain it.  So I'd go to you, you'd explain it, and then I'd go and explain it to them!"

That sort of boggled me and I laughed and said, "Wow, kiddo, you make it sound like I'm responsible for providing all your friends with sex education."

The Impertinent Daughter snorted as she headed to her room and said, "Duh, Mom, haven't you noticed?  None of my friends are pregnant!!"

Holy cow, she's right.  None of her little circle of female friends are pregnant, and none of the girlfriends of her male friends are pregnant.

That... is pretty stunning.  And you know, all I have done is say things like, "It's easier to prevent a baby than to raise one," and "don't depend on the girl to provide contraception unless you're prepared to be a father," and, "if he doesn't love you enough to wear a condom, then he doesn't love you and he's not worth your time," and "No is a complete sentence all on its own.  No.  Period.  End of story,"and "You have a perfect right to refuse to engage in sex if you're not ready, but it doesn't hurt to develop a good left hook, too."

It's not that hard.  You start when they're old enough to start asking questions.  You tailor it to their age, but you answer their questions.  You don't tell them the stork brings babies or that you go shopping at the hospital.  You tell them it takes two people to make a baby, and the process that goes into it.  You tell them about the changes it makes to a woman's body, and what it takes to grow one, and how it comes out.  And... you tell them what it takes to raise a baby.  Money, time, and patience.  A stable job, a good home, a willingness to love, nurture, teach, lose many, many, many nights of sleep, to sometimes go hungry so your child can eat, to forgo new shoes so your kid can have new shoes, or a band instrument, or piano lessons, or whatever they need.

You talk to them about relationships and what it takes to build them.  What it takes to build a good solid friendship with their buddies, then apply that to a relationship with a girl/boyfriend, a spouse, a lover... you talk about what it takes to learn to live with a completely different person than they're used to living with, sharing books, records, a car, a house, money, or a dog, and you talk about how it all changes when you bring a child into it.

You talk to them about responsibility and respect, for themselves, for others, and you talk to them about how to treat other people.  How to recognize when someone genuinely cares and when they just want to get into someone's pants.  You teach them how to put a condom on themselves, or on someone else.  You teach them about other forms of birth control and how to talk about it with another person.  You teach them about drinking responsibly, about knowing the people they're with and making sure they have a designated sober person in their group.  That they have a signal to let their friends know when they're leaving a party/bar/social scene willingly and when they're in trouble.  That they should have someone they check in with regularly when they go on dates, so that if they miss a check-in, their friend will know something is wrong and will react appropriately.

Doesn't everyone do this?  If not, they should.

SHINY!!!

The Husbandly One surprised me yesterday with a brand new MacBook Air!!!

I was not expecting a new laptop this soon at all.  I mean, I was hoping for one, since my Vaio died such an ignominious death (and I'm still hoping I can recover the hard drive), but not expecting one at any time before my birthday... maybe.  So... I'm really happy!

Writing while out and about has been difficult since losing the Vaio.  In fact, the last two times at the library while the kids were at their summer Animanga Club meetings was... frustrating.  Trying to use THO's netbook sucked, because... one, it's Windows, and two, THO spilled liquid in the keyboard and thus, some of the keys are sticky, plus it's only got a partial version of Windows 7 (it came that way, if you want the actual full OS... you have to buy it.  Extra.  Yeah.) so it runs a little slow and it doesn't like using Word.  I mean, it will run it, but it considers Word a bit dodgy and thinks less of you for using it.

I admire the Husbandly One's fortitude in using the damn thing.

The second time we were at the library, I borrowed the Impertinent Daughter's MacBook, and realized only after getting to the library that while I had installed Word for Mac on it (at her request, since her school uses Windows), I had not yet installed Pages... and the files on my USB drive were for Pages.  I managed a work-around and did fine after that, but that should be one of my goals today, to install iWork on her Mac.

I finally asked THO about taking the Vaio somewhere to get it fixed, because, dammit, I need something to write on, something portable!!  Dammit!!

And it wasn't like yesterday wasn't surreal on its own, you know?  The Impertinent Daughter finished up the classroom instruction part of the driving course offered at the high school (by an independent driving school) and came home much earlier than I expected, and hit her own version of the Wall of Fatigue.  So I left her at home to take a nap, with a guardian little brother, and went for a blissfully peaceful grocery shopping trip.  And I'm glad, too, because that's where the surreal part of my day started.

It started with an unexpectedly deep voice behind me saying, "Can I get that for you, Mrs. J?" when I was on my tiptoes trying to get to a package well out of my reach.  And I turned around, fully expecting to see my usual Helpful Tall Shop Assistant... and discovered one of my daughter's friends standing there.  And I realized three things.

1.  He was VERY tall.

2.  His voice has gotten deeper since I last spoke to him five weeks ago.

3.  He's old enough to work at the grocery store.




Two weeks ago, he was in first grade, shyly introducing himself to the Impertinent Daughter, with pale blond hair and apple red cheeks.  Last week, he was sitting on the sidelines of a soccer game, tears streaming down his cheeks as I cleaned and bandaged his bloody knee while his mom was gone on a snacks run for half-time because the parent who was supposed to have brought snacks forgot.  Yesterday, he was in fifth grade and excitedly telling me how he was going to be in marching band when he started junior high.

There is no way he's old enough to be working at the grocery store!!!  NO!!!

Later, I was grabbing a bag of sugar, and heard, "Hi, Mrs. J!!" And there was a girl my daughter has known since... third grade.  And... no.  Just... no.

I found yet another teenager that my daughter played youth soccer with in the paper aisle.  And it just went on and on, all these kids that in my head are still... little... and they're not.  And then, when I was checking out, again, a girl from my daughter's class at the cash register, and a boy sacking my groceries, and saying, "Hey, Mrs. J, let me get the ice for you so you don't forget it."

AAAAAAAAH!!!! STAHP!!!! NOOOOOO!!!!

*hyperventilating*

It was bad enough when I realized three years ago that I could no longer perv on the high school boy's cross country track team, because... it was now half populated with boys I had known since they were four and five.  But now, they're... turning into people!!

Totally skewed my world view, man!!

My daughter pretty much laughed at me when I got home and related all of this to her, and I had to confront the fact that my daughter is a senior and will be graduating next MAY!!!

*more hyperventilating*

Then, I went to get my hair cut, and she went along with me, and as my uber-awesome stylist was cutting my hair, she started saying, "Oh... my God."  She'd cut more, huff, then go, "Oh.  My.  God."  Then a grimace, another huff, and, "Omigod."  Then, "Oh, my fucking GOD."

After the seventh repetition of this, I finally said, "Uh... what's going on?"  Because the last time I heard that, I was 18 and the lady who had been cutting my hair since I was 11 was ready to kill my hair.

Ms. Stylist grimaced and said, "Your hair is frustrating me.  It's never frustrated me before!  I've been cutting your hair a long time, Jo, and I've never seen it do this."

"Do what?" I asked, stunned.

"Well... it's... baby fine, and so... thick... and it's just... every time I cut a section and start to move on, something pops out and I realized I missed something, and I have to go back and cut it, and then something else pops out, and... it's kinda making me nuts here," she said grimly.

And that's when it dawned on me.  My hair was coming back.  The endocrinologist changed me off the Synthroid/Cytomel combo he had me on and put me on Armour Thyroid, because the S/C combo just wasn't helping.  My hair was still falling out, I was still very fatigued, and just not getting better.

I knew my hair was coming back, and I was getting it cut because it was like wearing a wool mop on my head.  And I knew it was getting thicker, because I was having to use heavier pony tail holders to pull it back.  But... I didn't realize it had come back to the original texture of being baby fine and deceptively thick.

Ms. Stylist kept cutting and cutting, and fluffing and fluffing, and cutting more, and finally, she said, "Next hair cut, we're thinning this shit out!"

*dies laughing*

After we got home, the Impertinent One and I settled in for a "Bones" marathon while the Impossible Son went off to do boy things with his friend across the street, and the Husbandly One texted that he was going to have to work late.

Yeah, he was totally off buying my new SHINY!!!

*dance of joy, dance of joy*

Coolest.  Husband.  EVER.

Ch-ch-ch-changes....

My daughter went to her first prom this weekend, and it was one of those rites of passage that her father and I anticipated and tried to prepare ourselves for only to find those mental preparations were... well... woefully inadequate.

I tried not to make too big of a production of it, because I didn't want the Impertinent Daughter to freak out and hide.  After all, this was a big step for her, my wild tomboy daughter who doesn't think she's pretty (must be genetic, I swear).  First date, first time wearing makeup, first time wearing a dress and heels in public where it didn't involve a cosplay... all pretty huge steps for her.

So, she went to prom with a boy she's known since sixth grade, whom we will call "Toast Boy," because I crocheted a scarf for him that looked like joined pieces of toast with pats of butter on them.  He still wears it, I understand.

I had made an appointment at the salon we habitually go to for her to have her hair, face, and nails done (for which I am extremely grateful, because while I could have done her makeup, her hair would have probably broken me), so Saturday afternoon, that's where we went.

Now, salons in a small town are somewhat different from those in larger towns.  And I say this having grown up in Houston and having gone to small neighborhood salons.  You get to know the stylists, and some of the regulars, you chat and all, but you don't get to really know them.

In a small town, where everybody knows everybody, and knows everybody's business, it's a whole new ballgame.  You know the stylists because their kids go to school with yours, or played soccer with yours, or you know the same people.  Or you had to serve on the same parent volunteer groups at school.  Or your kids are in band together.   Or they live down the street from you.  So, you go in with your kid, and they already know what they're going to do to her and you'll hear them say things like, "I've been waiting to do your hair for prom for x number of years!!" or "I can't believe you're old enough to go to prom!  I gave you your first haircut when you were so small, you had to sit on two phone books just so I could reach you!  That was just last week, right?"

I heard a lot of that from the other girls getting their hair, nails, and makeup done, because, of course, small town, only one high school, of course the salons were packed with girls (and guys) getting ready for prom!  And a couple of the stylists, who I am shocked to now realize I have known for ten years, came over to chat with me and check on Miss Impertinent's progress.

What you need to know is this...

(photo by Jo Jandrok)

Was transformed into this...

(photo by Erin Hurd)

After we got home, her best friend's mom called, and they came by for photos, and this...

(photo by C. Jandrok)

became this...

(photo by Jo Jandrok)

Which is amazing.  Looking at them in that photo, you'd never have any clue they're both kick-ass soccer players who have played on co-ed teams and sent guys bigger than they are flying.

The look on the Husbandly One's face when we came home, by the way, was priceless.  I think in a lot of ways, he still sees the Impertinent Daughter at eight, with dirt smeared on one cheek and chocolate in the corners of her mouth, tangled hair and a big grin, ready for the next adventure.  Seeing her like this, though, was a major shock to the system, and I don't think he was ready for it.  Neither was I, really.  

Of course, I can't leave you with this... dignified photo of the girls, because really... it's just not them.  So, about ten seconds after the above photo was snapped, we got this...

(photo by Jo Jandrok)

Followed by a sisterly photobomb, courtesy of Super Goalie's younger sister...

(photo by Jo Jandrok)

And then it was time for Super Goalie to leave for dinner with her date, and the Impertinent Daughter to leave for dinner with her date and the group of friends they were going with.  And I got another shock.  Because this...

(photo by C. Jandrok)

Became this...

(photo by Jo Jandrok)

Of course, it later devolved into this...

(photo by B. Schaub)

Which shows my daughter and her friends have a propensity for dramatic gestures.  

Oh, and by the way, did I mention that my daughter actually had not one, but two dates to the prom?

(photo by Jo Jandrok)

They had an extra ticket, and can you believe, the Demon Lord Nevitz was actually not going to go???  Well, Miss Impertinent and Toast Boy had to fix that, so they promptly asked him to go, and here you see them, Demon Lord, Impertinence, and Toast, all ready to go to the prom.  The Three Amigos.  Or the Three Formal -Wearing-Teens of the Apocalypse (notice the formal skulls on the Impertinent One's wrist bag).    

Of course, they said the prom was boring (and I can imagine that it was, for them), and the high school should really worry if those three get it into their heads to take over next year's prom, because I am sure there would be Cards Against Humanity, actual danceable music that wasn't rap or country (apparently, the country music wasn't danceable, either) which may or may not include J-Pop and K-Pop, and decorations that don't consist of a box of popcorn and a movie clapper on each table.  There may even be some C4 involved, or zombies.  Maybe even pirates!  (She wanted to wear a pirate themed dress, but we didn't really have time to plan it this year).  I think if the Impertinent One had her way, it would be strictly cosplay, period.  

She'd make an awesome Black Widow, don't you think?

Anyhow, I think she did have some fun at least, and I can say that her father and I survived our first prom experience.  It was... challenging, and did require a margarita on my part.  Did I mention that the Husbandly One makes really good margaritas?

And that was our adventure with prom night!

How I love the rainy nights...

Lying on a couch on the back porch, my head on the Husbandly One's chest, his arms around me as I listen to the sound of his heart under my ear while warm rain patters on the leaves and the grass around us and lightning flickers through the clouds... what could be better?

Nights like this are why I am a very happy woman.

Because what you say, and what I hear are two different things sometimes...

Last night, after a very satisfying fireworks show at the city park, the Husbandly One was trying to reset his brain into work mode. The kids, most especially the Impossible Son, were still sort of ramped up and not ready for bed, but THO certainly was!

I was noodling around on the computer, and when he came in, I could have sworn he said, "Gotta go to bed early, I got STORKS!!" Then he promptly left while my mouth fell open and my brain sort of flailed around in my head and I went, "Wait...WHAT???"

WTF, storks???

And I promptly lost it in a burst of hysterical laughter.

By the time he returned, I had calmed down somewhat, and I said, "You know, honey, I'm really sorry to hear you have storks. Sounds kind of painful, and really, instead of going to bed, I think you should go to the hospital!"

I must not have been as calm as I thought I was, because I had to repeat that a few times before he understood me. And then he stared at me and said, "What the hell are you talking about??" before he started laughing and said, "Oh, wait... that's what it sounded like I said, isn't it?"

"Oh, yeah!" I said, wheezing at this point.

"Uh, well... what I said was gotta go to bed early, I gots to work, you know."

"Yeah, I kinda figured that out," I said, shaking my head. "The hearing glitch strikes again."

He shook his head, laughing, and went to go fuss at the Impossible Son to turn the TV off and get ready for bed.

"It was just my imagination, running away with me...."

So, after the Impossible Son's soccer practice, it was decided to head to our favorite local Tex-Mex restaurant, Mr. Taco. We were in the mood for fajitas, or at least the Husbandly One, the Impertinent Daughter, and I were. We have discovered that Mr. Taco's "fajitas for two" plate feeds the three of us nicely. The Impossible Son had his usual chicken strips, no gravy.

We forgot that Thursdays are live mariachi band night.

Did I mention there are all hard surfaces at Mr. Taco, with nothing to absorb sound?

o_O

Anyhow, yeah, it was loud, but the food was worth it! Once we'd eaten ourselves to a lull, the Impertinent One begged a pen off me, grabbed a clean napkin, and immediately began to sketch the mariachi band members, then took it to them before fleeing back to our table.

They passed it around among themselves, looking at it intently, then marched over to our table and serenaded her with "Just My Imagination," and a Spanish/English version of "I Just Called To Say I Love You."

Her smile was incandescent, and she giggled almost the entire time, hiding her face every once in a while, but mostly beaming at them with delight. I rubbed her back from time to time when it looked like she was getting overwhelmed, but mostly? She absolutely loved it!

I think she was also chuffed that two of the mariachi singers actually fought over who would get to sing to her! And if you've never seen a violinist and a trumpet player arguing over who is gonna sing to the pretty girl, then you have no idea what you missed!

I think she's just beginning to have an inkling of the doors her art can open for her. This is going to be an interesting journey to watch!

Because he's just cool like that...

Our marriage is twenty one years old today, and therefore, old enough to drink. The Husbandly One says we should take it out, get it drunk, and do wicked, naughty, evil things to it!!

*merry laughter*

He has the best ideas!!!

I'd like you to meet my husband... Fabio...

Well, in this picture, he kind of looks like him, don't you think?

*laughs*

It's the way his long hair is blowing in the wind, you know. And if you're wondering, that cute little fish was his catch of the night. He'd taken the kids salt water fishing for the first time, and while the Impossible Son caught the biggest fish of the night, and the Impertinent Daughter caught the second largest, the Husbandly One caught... the smallest. And no matter how hard he tried to catch something bigger, for the rest of the week, everything he caught was... pretty much the same size as that cute little Gulf cat in the picture. Heck, for all we know, it was the same fish the entire time, following him all around Rockport and Fulton, throwing itself shamelessly on his hook for one more look at its long haired hero! ♥ ♥ ♥!!

Oh, come on, I had to say it!

I find this an extraordinarily entertaining photo, on so many levels, and I'm proud of the Impertinent Daughter for taking it. She got a good shot of her papa!

I wanted to write more, but I'm just too tired to concentrate. School starts in three weeks, and... I can't wait.

Fun fun fun PLAY!!!

I'm trying not to be bummed. The Husbandly One was only supposed to go in for half a day of work today, but after he got there, he discovered he had to work a full day after all.

*sob*

OH well.

Let's see... Christmas... didn't post about that, did I? Well, Christmas Eve, my best friend and her family came over for dinner, and we had a great time reconnecting, and I was able to reassure myself that her oldest son was indeed whole, hearty, and did not suffer unduly during his time in Iraq... yes, yes, I know, but I was there when he was born, so he's like one of my kids, and it's not entirely logical, it's a mom-anxiety thing.

Anyhow, we had a good time, talking, laughing, eating, and reconnecting, and after they were gone, the Husbandly One talked me into letting the kids open one present.

Normally, we don't do this. And I have to admit, we have been unduly nice to the kids where presents are concerned, because we don't torture them by wrapping them up ahead of time and setting them under the tree where they are visible, and mysterious, and totally unknown for two weeks!! No, we've always kept them hidden until Christmas morning.

Of course, mostly, this was because we had a Labrador Retriever who couldn't stand seeing wrapped presents for his kids under the tree, and he would most thoughtfully unwrap them, and then start barking happily until the kids came running (and toddling) to see why...

Don't even get me started on what the Triplicats did.

So... no wrapped presents under the tree. My parents, of course, were the type who would wrap presents even before we had the tree, and start setting them out where the tree would eventually be.... just to torture us!! Then there's the Husbandly One, who wrapped my engagement ring in a small box and made it into an ornament on my parent's tree, just to torture me for two weeks, until he proposed to me in front of my entire family on Christmas Eve.

So, anyway, we put our presents under the tree Christmas Eve morning, and you'd think we had done it just to torture the Impossible Son specifically!! Heh. Anyhow, I had stood firm against opening before Christmas, but then THO said, "Look, the gifts I got you and the Impertinent One are the kind that... you should open tonight, and that's all I will say about that."

So...we each opened one present on Christmas Eve. And the Impertinent One and I both got... iPod Touches.

*SQUEE!!*

Okay, so the reason he wanted us to open them early was so we could get them set up for the trip into Houston on Christmas. Logical.

Now, the thing I have to say here is that setting up the Impertinent One's iPod was far too easy, and that should have told me something. It took 34 minutes to download the update for the thing, which should have also set my alarm bells ringing, but it only took five minutes to download music and a couple of videos into it, and she was done, off to her room to explore it and squee over it.

It took less than a minute to download the update for mine. But... it took fifteen hours for me to set my iPod up.

No, I'm serious. Techno-geek that I am, the thing frustrated the crap out of me, and I had THO hovering around behind me, determined that it was busted, broken, didn't work, etc. and I just needed to give up on the damn thing and let him return it.

I knew that whatever the problem was, it was ME, not the iPod, and I just needed to keep playing with it to figure it out. And when I did, it was one of those, "D'oh!" kind of things, where you can't believe you were so stupid, but then again, why was loading this thing so much more complicated than loading a Shuffle??

Anyhow, finally got the thing working, and I was a very happy camper.

And no, we didn't go to Houston. Mainly because Mr. Impossible woke up with a very nasty, very juicy cough, and knowing that he usually has a nasty, very juicy cough when we're leaving Houston, we decided not to push things toward, oh, I dunno... pneumonia, perhaps?

So, we stayed home.

And, let's see, on Tuesday night, the Impertinent One was working on a drawing at the kitchen table while listening to her new iPod, gets up to go get an eraser from her room, comes right back, and her iPod is off. Fine, she thinks it's in sleep mode, so she presses the menu button and... nothing. She presses the power button, and... nothing. It still had half a charge left, so she brought it to me, I plugged it into the computer and... nothing. She plugged it into her charger, and ... nothing. It was deader than a doornail.

Turns out some of the functions it had hadn't been working so well, either. Oooookay, well, THO had it insured through Best Buy, so we took it in yesterday to have it looked at... and ended up exchanging it for a new one because... it was deader than a doornail.

So, when we get home, she goes to the Mac to set it up, the update takes less than a minute, and I leave her to set it up, only to have to come back running when I hear her wail, "NO, WAIT, WHY ARE YOU DOWNLOADING MUSIC??? I HAVEN'T MADE A PLAYLIST YET!!!"

Wow, did that sound familiar!

Since I had already figured this out, it only took a couple of tries to get things working properly, and now she has a fully functional iPod that everything works on just fine. Heh.

Let's see... what else... oh, yeah, we went and saw "Voyage of the Dawn Treader" at our local theater, using the movie passes we'd won last month. And it was better than I expected. What really made it fun, though, was how excited the Impossible Son was, because he'd just finished reading the book recently. I was glad they'd stuck a little closer to the book this time, if only for his sake, because he didn't get scared or upset when things got scary (YES, my son, knowledge IS power!!), and when it did deviate from the book, he looked at me and said, "I totally get it now, Mom."

"Totally get what?" I asked, distracted.

"Why you get so upset when a movie isn't like the book. Why sometimes, the book is so much better." He nodded. "I get it now."

I nodded. "Yep. So, what do you do now?"

"Let go of the book," he said with a grin.

That's my boy!!

I'm sure there's vastly more stuff, but really, how much of the minutia of my life do you want here?

I'm going to pull out my DVD of The Quiet Man, make some popcorn, and settle in to warp my kids some more. Heh.

A glimpse into our relationship...

The Husbandly One walked into the bedroom and started taking off his shirt, which immediately got my attention, and he said, "I'm going to pop into a quick shower, and after I get dressed," he gives me a conspiratorial wink, "you and me are gonna get some wrapping done."

I snort, because he was torturing the kids with this yesterday, and on a whim, I say, "Okay, but I have to tell you, I'm not very good at making up rhymes on the fly." (Auntie, deliberately misunderstanding THO in order to make a very bad pun.)

"You are pretty fly, though," he said with a grin and disappeared into the bathroom, tossing his shorts out the door behind him just to torture me.

Heh, heh, heh... we're awful!

Because I like them fun-sized...

Somewhere around the beginning of September, I read a letter in Dear Abby written by a woman in Hawaii who was concerned about her vertically challenged male friend. He was handsome, outgoing, fit, lights up the room when he walks in, wonderful person, friends everywhere... but not married. This bothered her, as she wondered if it was because he was 5' 7", rather than say... 6 feet or more.

She wondered if it mattered, if height was really that important to women.

You know I had to answer, don't you?

*laughs*

So, though I am not in the habit of writing to Dear Abby, though I enjoy reading her column... I wrote a letter, and promptly forgot about it. It's not surprising, really, considering everything that's been happening around here, and how busy things have been.

This morning, I got myself a bowl of cereal and sat down to my morning perusal of the internet, and read Dear Abby as is my habit. And... that first letter seemed oddly familiar. I read it a couple of times before it occurred to me.

"A Very, Very Happy Wife In Texas"... is me.

The Husbandly One is 5' 6" and I am 5' 3". And that makes him just right. No crick in the neck trying to look up at him. No cramping feet and calves from standing on tip-toe just for a kiss, though he can tuck my head under his chin when he holds me. No reaching up to hold his hand and feeling like a five year old walking with her dad. We're not exactly eye to eye, but pretty darn close! And that's just all superficial stuff, because really, even if he'd been taller than me, I still would have fallen head over heels in love with him. Or if he'd been shorter than me. Are you kidding? I struck gold when I met the Husbandly One; I knew it then, and I know it now!

We fit perfectly together, and that, my friends, is all that really matters.

Catching you up...

You should all be very, very proud of me. I started walking again a couple of weeks ago, and I managed to walk a mile today!! YAY!! Once I work myself back up to five miles, I'll start running again.

I'm kinda tired of being "pleasantly plump."

We've had all kinds of adventures over the last week around here. Friday night, we had friends over, so I spent most of the week tidying things up, and Friday morning, while I was picking up shoes, socks, books, and other detritus that the kids tend to leave all over the floor, tables, couches, etc, I discovered the desiccated remains of... the gods only know what. Might have been a mouse, might have been an unfortunate member of the spiny lizard tribe... who knows. So, after about ten minutes of squeamishness and, "oh, ugh... blech... why am I always the one finding this stuff," among other complaints, I picked it up carefully and disposed of it. Found a few more, got rid of them, and thought that was it.

However, once our guests arrived, I noticed R kept wrinkling her nose, though she was trying to be subtle about it, and I thought, "Oh, great, there's probably more of whatever it was that I didn't find, and now it smells... wonderful."

We never smelled it, even after going outside and coming back in.

Then Saturday morning, I got up and shuffled into the kitchen for caffeine to wake my brain up... and beat a hasty retreat back to the bedroom, gagging and wheezing.

Seriously, guys, you shouldn't have to think, "Dear gods, what the hell crawled into my house and died," before you've even had enough caffeine to be even semi human.

A frantic search of the house narrowed it down to the kitchen/living room/utility room. But practically tearing those rooms up revealed nothing, and we had soccer to deal with, both with the Impossible Son having a game, and the Impertinent Daughter refereeing a U6 game. *sudden LOL at the thought of the "Impertinent Referee"*

Except... I started itching like crazy while we were out there, EVEN THE INSIDE OF MY MOUTH!!! WTF????

We came home, where Auntie ingested mass quantities of Benadryl and passed out for the afternoon, thus enabling the Husbandly One to take the kids shopping at WalMart and stopping by a local resale shop to buy a 10 speed bike for himself (for $20).

This is relevant, trust me.

I woke up and was hustled outside so he could show off his acquisition. Not quite with it, I nodded, and watched him ride it around, and tried to be properly impressed. However, being in a Benadryl haze, I probably didn't succeed too well at this wifely duty. THO decided this bike, being a Bianchi (???), should go in the garage. So... he opened it up...

... and we all promptly staggered back, coughing, gagging, eyes watering, and flailing as we struggled to find the edge of the Funk Zone for some badly needed oxygen.

OMG... whatever it was... it was in... the ... garage.

The garage. Filled with boxes. And boxes. And boxes of... unpacked stuff from our last move.

Pity the Husbandly One. We all abandoned him to the thankless job of shifting the boxes to find ... The Corpse.

Of course, there was a corpse. There had to be a corpse. With a funk that strong? Honey!!

And... it was. It was the corpse of... a possum.

We knew a family of possums had taken up residence either under our deck or in the bamboo of the backyard. Evidently, this particular possum found his way into the garage... but couldn't find his way out.

The Husbandly One removed le dead opossum and disposed of him/her/it properly, then sprinkled cat litter over the spot to dry it up and deodorize.

Eurgh.

Sunday, we needed to run into Austin to a Men's Wearhouse to get the Impossible Son fitted for a tuxedo. He is going to be an usher in my second oldest niece's wedding. And he is going to look unbelievably cute! And hell, yes, I'm going to take pictures!!

It was at the moment that we were walking out of the store that I suddenly realized...

1.) This was going to be a formal wedding.

2.) One cannot wear the very casual clothing I have to a formal wedding.

3.) I have to go shopping, for myself, and for the Impertinent One for clothes for a formal wedding.

4.) I have no idea what the hell to get.

Y'all already know, right, that I am absolutely hopeless at shopping for myself? That I should not be allowed to buy clothes for myself, because I am pathetic at it?

You see the problem?

I was not mentally prepared to shop for clothes. It did not go well. One should not bring a 9 year old boy along to shop for clothes when one is trying to get used to the idea of shopping for clothes again.

It did not end well.

I also realized that I have completely lost my "shopping at department stores" skills. The Husbandly One is dreadfully spoiled, y'all. I don't shop for clothes all the time, and when I do, it tends to be jeans and such, and sneakers. Because I don't shop for shoes like I used to, either. And I don't shop for makeup. Which... I need to, now. Ugh.

And I have until the 16th.

*flail*

Needless to say, I'm doing my research now. And plan to hit either San Marcos or Austin's Barton Creek Mall this weekend for clothes. Hopefully, the Impertinent Daughter will keep me from making a frump of myself.

And, the Impossible Son had a project due this week. They're reading A Paradise Called Texas by Janice Jordan Shefelman in his class, and the students were required to build a model ship based on the Margaretha, the ship in the book that took German immigrants to Texas. It's both a test grade and a reading grade for the class.

Fortunately, I knew about this several weeks ago, so I'd been gathering materials beforehand to get ready. We built it out of two 12-pack soda can boxes, one for the body of the ship, one, cut into two pieces, for the poop deck and forecastle, and two cardboard tubes that came from boxes of parchment paper for the masts. A pencil was used for the mast that juts out from the bow of the ship, and I drew the figurehead that hung below it. We worked on it for three days, and it turned out to be absolutely awesome! Plus, made from recycled materials, YAY!! Unfortunately, I did not get a photo of it before it was taken to school. Blame fatigue and not enough caffeine!

And now, I must get ready to get my hair cut. It is time. Since my hair is growing back, thanks to the new meds, it is getting very thick. While the curl hasn't come back, it still has a mind of its own, so the best way to deal with it is to cut it into submission. It's already getting long enough to bother me, and I know my stylist is going to fuss at me again for not coming in every six weeks. Well... sometimes I can, and... sometimes I can't. That's the life of a busy mom for you!

See you later!

*goes off merrily on her way*