March: In like a lion …

On Friday, I went to work 30 minutes early specifically so I could leave 30 minutes early. My best friend, Emily, was coming to visit! Her flight landed at 4:24, so I needed to leave early to be sure I made it to the airport in time. Hee.

From the airport, we headed over to one of my favorite BBQ joints. (Well, kinda. 99% of the chain is in East Texas. There is 1 location in Arlington. And while it’s still delicious… it’s just not quite as good as the locations further east. 😉 ) So, we headed down there, and get in line … only to discover they are completely out of brisket. Now, they still had ribs and turkey… but. No. We were in the mood for yummy BBQ sandwiches. Which require beef! 😉 So, sadly we left (as did a few other people in line) and went to find our dinner somewhere else. After eating, it was time for home to watch some videos and goof off.

Saturday morning, we hit the road traveling all over the Dallas area to do some serious power shopping. I got a couple of cute tops, but Emily’s the one who really hit the jackpot at the stores. After a brief stop at home (watching more vids), it was off to dinner. We split a green apple frozen margarita, and ended up wandering around Target later, giggling like crazy. 😉

Sunday started out good. It was Emily’s birthday (YAY!) and after lunch with mom, we did even more shopping! We also drove around downtown Dallas, taking in the sights. After watching a few more vids in the afternoon, we decided it was time to head out for dinner. We decided on having dinner at California Pizza Kitchen, then we’d head over to The Melting Pot to have chocolate fondue for dessert.

Going out for dinner is when the day took a painful turn. We get to CPK, find all the outside parking is taken, so we head on to the nearby parking garage. Getting into CPK from the garage was interesting. We went down some back hall, and ended up entering via some back, upstairs entrance. We were very confused, but we finally figured out how to get downstairs (via a very tall staircase, which I descended without incident!) and then we were headed to the front of the store, to the front desk so we could be seated. I was moving at a pretty good clip (at least, pretty darn fast when it comes to me and my arthritic knees!) and then suddenly… I went down. There was a small, 2 step staircase that I didn’t see. So I took a step which turned into a big tumble. I twisted my left ankle as I went down, as well as wrenching my left shoulder and both knees. I think I scared the family sitting right at the foot of the stairs.

Of course, the manager and a couple of staff were all there in a heartbeat to make sure I was okay. Because of a mid-fall decision I made that involved me twisting around (and probably hurt my knee more), I ended up landing on the top step, instead of sprawled out on the ground at the foot of the stairs. After sitting for a minute, I used the handrail to pull myself to my feet, and hobbled to a chair the manager had pulled up for me. After sitting there for a couple of minutes, we got a table, and the manager came back a few times to check on me, as well as get my name, address, etc. (I find it very intriguing that, although she took my personal info, she never had me sign a waiver or write out what happened. I mean, I have no plans to try to sue them or anything, but she REALLY should’ve had me sign a waiver of some sort to protect the restaurant. Just because I’m not the kind of person to sue, doesn’t mean someone else wouldn’t if it’d happened to them.) My ankle was sore through out dinner, but I’ve injured myself enough times to guess that the ankle injury probably wouldn’t be very severe. After we were done eating, the waiter brought our bill. As I put in my card, I checked the total so I could start figuring the tip – and was surprised that the total was a lot less than it should be. The manager had comped my dinner because of my fall. (And yes, I did tip on the total pre-comp.) While he was running my card, the manager stopped by again, to let me know she’d comped the meal because of my fall, and she also said that they weren’t allowed to put up a “Watch Your Step” sign there, even though they’d wanted to. I’m not sure why they can’t, but trust me – I would’ve appreciated the sign! 😉

I/we decided that I wasn’t going to allow my injuries to ruin the evening, so we still headed out for fondue! Hee. It was absolutely delicious. I think I could’ve OD’d on chocolate if there’d been more. We had some … interesting women sitting at the table behind us. They had a lot of discussion about their boobs, and they actually had a stop watched and timed each other’s trips to the ladies’ room. Ummmm… WTF? They were also incredibly rude and kept talking about their urine and boobs the entire time the waiter was at their table, explaining the oils and cook times and etc for their entrees. I was mortified on his behalf! Haha. Once we were done with dessert, we headed back home (after a stop at the grocery store for ACE bandages) and iced and wrapped my ankle. It had swelled a small bit, but was mostly okay.

All in all, I think we had a lot of fun that evening — injuries excluded. Hee.

Today, we got up and I quickly learned that although my ankle was 95% okay, my knees were an entirely different story. They are both feeling incredibly weak and shaky as I walk, and are very sore. Getting up out of a chair – or sliding to my feet off the bed – is not an easy feat. I have to psych myself up for before I can push myself up and my knees scream in protest as I stand. It also doesn’t help anything that my left shoulder is sore – it makes pushing up out of the chair difficult. We had more shopping to do, though, so I managed to get myself up and going so we could hit Target and then somewhere for lunch. We also took some time (at both ends of our excursion) to stop and feed the ducks at Cottonwood park. There were some absolutely adorable baby ducks that I have to admit – most of my food went to. They were just too cute!!!

We came back home, and Emily had to pack to get ready to head back home. 🙁 I didn’t want her to leave, she definitely wasn’t here long enough this trip. But I don’t think her cat or her work would like it too much if I kept her, so I had to let her go. I managed to hobble into the airport with her, sat while she checked in, then stood nearby and watched her go through security until I couldn’t see her anymore. 🙁

I was roughly 10 minutes from home when I got a phone call from mom. One of the cats, Gypsy, had managed to swallow a threaded needle. Gypsy is an overweight kitty, but she’s been losing a lot of weight over the last 6 months. She’s still too heavy, but she’s down somewhere between 10-15 lbs. As a result, Gypsy is figuring out that she can now jump onto counters again! Mom had been doing some mending, and left the needle on a desk. Gypsy jumped up and decided she wanted the thread for a snack … not knowing there was a sharp pointy thing at the end! As soon as I got home, mom was loading Gypsy up into the cat carrier, and we took her up to the animal hospital. Thankfully – the needle had lodged itself into the roof of her mouth and her cheek. I say thankfully because, even though this was a painful thing, it could have been much, much worse. Since it was embedded in her mouth, the vet was able to just sedate her and remove it. If it had gone further down her throat, or into her stomach, we would’ve been looking at surgery to get it removed. It cost almost $250 just to get it pulled out of her mouth – I can’t imagine how much it would’ve been if she’d needed surgery! We probably could have attempted to remove it ourselves, but I was worried that it might make things worse, or cause too much bleeding or something, and figured we’d be better off letting a professional handle it.

And, as bad of a kitty-parent this is of me to say, I have to admit that I’m glad that it was Gypsy who did it, if any of them had to. Windy is 17 years old, and on a slow decline. It might’ve proven too stressful for her if she’d been the one to swallow it, and we might’ve lost her prematurely. And while Mali is the baby of the family, she’s also the most high-strung of them all. She was already highly agitated over having Emily here all weekend, something like this might’ve sent her over the top into extreme panic mode. I would be afraid she’d freak out so badly that she’d make the injury a lot worse. Gypsy is the calmest of the 3 cats, and while she was clearly in pain and unhappy with the situation, she managed to stay pretty quiet during the ride to the hospital and stopped pawing at her mouth once she realized we were attempting to help her. So, while I wish it hadn’t happened at all, I’m glad that it was my calm girl, and that she didn’t freak out and make everything worse than it ended up being. We know that she’s doing okay now — as soon as she was let out of the cat carrier at home, she headed straight for her food bowl to eat! 😉 If she feels up to eating, then she’s going to be okay. She’s currently snuggled up with my mom in bed, and was purring happily when I checked on her a little while ago.

I wish I didn’t have to go to work tomorrow. I think I jarred my tailbone again in addition to everything else. So, I can’t sit down without my tush hurting. I obviously can’t stand for long. And I have difficulties laying down – I can’t find a comfortable position to lay in, and it hurts to change positions. Ugh. I hope I don’t require doc visits for all this.

So, yes. That was my weekend. I had a lot of fun, in spite of the injuries. I wish Emily hadn’t had to leave, though. It sucks a lot that my best friend lives so far away, and that I only get to see her a couple of times a year. 🙁 I hope she had a fun birthday down here with me.

There’s no way to know when I’ll live my last tomorrow

The weather sets the mood perfectly today. It’s dark and grey, a nasty misty haze everywhere. The cold front finally moved in, so that extra chill in the air just puts the cap on the depressing mood of the weather. To make it even more fitting, that mist was beginning to turn into rain as I pulled into the parking garage at work, waiting to find out how much longer I’m here for.

That’s the part I’m hating most — the freaking waiting. I’ve been here for 5 hours now, and I still don’t know any more than I did when I left on Friday. Consensus seems to be that we won’t find anything out until closer to the end of the week, and that makes me crazier. I just want to know how much longer I have my job, so I can make doctor appointments, and make sure I’ve got the medication I need, or am off stuff that’s not as needed; since I won’t be able to afford most of it when I’m unemployed. Most of the stores know how much longer they’ll be open, so they are more informed than those of us here at corporate!

One of the amusing things though — the old head honcho of my department is actually back here as a consultant for the company that bought us/is closing us down. He popped in to see us earlier, just to say hi. It’s nice to get to see him again, even if it’s under these circumstances.

I’m pretty good, though, other than all the depressing unemployment crap. That MRI I had on my knees a while back came out ok – nothing torn/broken/etc. There was a lot of fluid on the knees, and the doc was pointing that out to me in the scans, as well as the arthritis. Final diagnosis was that I managed to severely wrench my knee. It’s pretty much better now, most of the problems I’m having with it are my normal arthritis ones. I’m still having issues with my heart, they haven’t been able to get the extra beats under control. I’m headed back in there this afternoon for a check up. While I’m in there, I need to let him know I don’t know how much longer I’ll have insurance, so we need to come up with a long term plan, since I won’t be able to go in every few weeks like I am now. Ugh.

Mom’s citizenship test is this coming Saturday. She’s getting more and more nervous the closer it gets. We’ve been over all her documentation a few times now, making sure she has everything she needs to take with her.

The owners of the building our offices are in are having their annual Christmas treat for the tennants today. They’ve got tons of cookies and sweets set up, different drinks, and a violinist playing. Someone in line joked that we had our very own violinist to play as the ship sunk. haha. It is ironically fitting, though.

I never seem to do it like anybody else

Today I feel this strange need to finish my “about me” section of the blog (well, attempt to finish) and create lists of everywhere else I can be found, (in case anyone wants to stalk me?) as well as about a zillion other wild and random ideas. The likelihood that any of that will get accomplished? Nil. Zilch. Nada. None.

The open MRI last week went well. The room I was in was all decorated like it was under the sea. Hah. At least it gave me something fun to stare at while I was immobile for about an hour & half. I get the results from the MRI today. I have a hunch the results are going to be good. I’m actually mostly able to walk today, no more constant intense searing pain. I know I messed it up pretty good though, and that’s one reason it’s taken so long to heal.

The heart ultrasound on Friday also went okay. I do have one valve that is a little “leaky”, but it’s minor and the doc wasn’t worried about it. Other than that, my heart looks healthy and structurely sound. But, when they did another EKG, I had 4 extra beats in the six seconds they monitor. So, obviously too many beats there, and that was with me on more meds than before. He wants me to up them again, and go back next week for another check on the EKG. I’m also working on cutting caffeine out again. I had my last soda on Saturday, and none since. I know I can do it, since I’ve done it several times in the past; it’s just difficult to actually stay away from caffeinated sodas. I think I went for a year or two once, we’ll see how long I last this time around.

I had a lot more I wanted to ramble about, but now that I have a few minutes, my mind is blank. Figures.