Protein Blows

I am really beginning to dislike being on a high protein diet. Most people I talk to would love to be required to eat lots of protein, but I am really getting tired of it. The doctors put me on a high protein diet after surgery because of the open wound and unfortunately 3 months later, I still have an open wound and am still having to eat lots of protein.

I thought this week that I would be able to get off of it, but we found another seroma and it popped open on Tuesday night. Needless to say, the protein stays.

Thankfully I am a cheese lover, so that is really enjoyable. The meats however, I could do without. I purchased some protein powder to mix with milk so I could have a little variety.

Okay, enough of the pity party. Hopefully I will only have to be on this diet for a few more weeks.

So Many Toys So Little Time

Poor Abbie has too many toys she doesn't know which one to play with first.

Big Ass

You know how sometimes you walk by a conversation at the wrong time and what you hear makes no sense at all? Well, today I walked by our VPs office and she was speaking with the Division President. When I walked by all I heard was "big ass." It took me by surprise and I immediately thought, "I know, but you don't have to point it out."

Shortly thereafter I realized they were talking about a title of a book called "Bright Lights, Big Ass" and I just happened by at the wrong time.

At least it made for a good laugh.

The Facial Hair

Sometimes good wives do mean things...........unintentionally.

A few weeks ago, I asked the hubby to shave his beard and mustache. It was beginning to feel scratchy when I kissed him and I didn't like the feeling of kissing a brillo pad. I knew he liked his facial hair, but he gladly shaved it without hesitation. As soon as the facial hair was completely gone, I regretted asking him to shave it off. Now he looked like one of his brothers and the thought of kissing that brother was worse than kissing a brillo pad.

I couldn't hold it in, so after a couple of days I told him I didn't like him clean shaven. Thank goodness his hair grows quickly. Now his beard and mustache are back to normal and I don't have to deal with the thought of kissing his brother.

The Mall

Today we went to the mall and ran all of our errands. This is the first time in over 2 years that I have been shopping and actually had an enjoyable time. Normally we would go out to do shopping/errands and after about 30-45 minutes the pain was unbearable, so I turned to a complete grouch and just wanted to go home.

Today we were out for almost 6 hours. We went to the mall, Payless, Target, Michael's, the book store, and the grocery store. All of that and still no pain. I was tired and exhausted but it felt great just to be out doing normal things again.

I decided while we were out that I was going to try my hand at making jewelry, so that is why we headed to Michael's. I don't like the flashy jewelry that you see in most stores, so why not make my own. We will see, since I have never been the craftsy type, it could be butt ugly. If not, mayble I have found a great past time.

Now off to take a nap.

TGIF

Another week done and I am really looking forward to this weekend. Even though I brought home lots of work that needs to be done, it is the first weekend that hubby and I are off together - and I actually feel like going somewhere.

I think we are actually going to go to the mall. The mall is normally the last place I can be found, but it actually sounds like fun this weekend.

Abbie almost made it a whole week without having an accident in the house. She made it all the way to this morning. I thought we had turned a corner. Better luck next week.

Cleaning House

Those who know me well, know that I am not a domestic type of person. I do not like to cook, clean or go shopping. I can do those things, but I prefer not to do them. You need a minor electrical or plumbing repair - no problem; if your fishing reel needs to be repaired - give me a call; you got a bug that needs to be removed from the house - I'm on it; but if your house needs to be cleaned - don't even think about calling me. Luckily, I married a man who does not mind doing the cooking, the cleaning, and he even does my clothes shopping.

Well, this evening when I was washing dishes (hubby cooks and I do the dishes), I decided to do something out of the norm and clean the toaster. I took the little tray out of the bottom and I even turned it upside down to get more of the crumbs out. Next thing I know, hubby is in the kitchen and has taken over cleaning the toaster. He pulls out some tools, takes the toaster apart, and is outside with the compressed air getting the remainder of the crumbs out of the toaster. Now, mind you the toaster was not that bad. There were no nasty smells coming from it when you turned it on and it still worked fine. But now, the toaster is like new.

I am very thankful that I have him here to do the cleaning (yes he even does the toilets). If not, I would only clean when I absolutely had to - and I certainly would not take things apart.

I am fortunate that I found someone who balances me out. I will handle the 50-60 hours in the office and he can run the household. That has worked perfectly for the last 20 years, so why change things now.

Hmmm, maybe I should consider renting him out to other women who don't like to do housework?!?!?!

I'm Ready for Winter

I can't believe this heat. The thermometer on my patio only read 96, but it felt much hotter than that. I have lived in Texas all my life, but I never seem to get used to the heat. In fact, I get less tolerant of it as I get older. I barely spent 10 minutes outside and I was ready to retreat to the comfort of my AC. The first official day of Summer isn't even here yet!

We have talked for years about moving out of Texas to a cooler climate, but honestly I don't see that happening. We are now talking about buying a home and I am trying to complete my master's degree; that will keep us here for several more years.

How come summer never felt this hot when we were kids? We used to run around bare foot in the sand and spend all day outside. We never once thought about going inside to the AC.

Since mother nature is not going to give me a break, I guess I better just suck it up and learn how to deal with the heat.

p.s. - Bitemeez has been repaired and Abbie has definitely been giving him a workout.

Where's Bitemeez??

Bitemeez is a toy that looks like a cow and is a padded glove. It allows Abbie to play a little rougher than normal without hurting us when she bites. It is one of her favorite toys. Recently Bitemeez has suffered from overuse and is beginning to lose stuffing. He has been put on "bed rest" while he is in the recovery phase. We need to either replace him or at least repair him until we can find a replacment.

It has been a couple of weeks since Bitmeez got hurt and Abbie has been diligently look for him. She pulls toys out of the toy box one by one looking for him. Thank goodness, she can't see where he is hidden in the laundry room!

Abbie and Peter

I have a new friend who likes to hang out in our yard - a little cottontail rabbit. I named him Peter. He likes our grass since ours is the only yard that seems to have any green grass right now. Thankfully he is really fast, because Abbie thinks he is just something for her to chase. Hopefully he won't go in to some of the other yards, their dogs a much bigger and I wouldn't want him to get hurt. He is so cute and looks so soft.

Abbie has been really good this week about getting back to her good habits. She has actually not had an accident in her cage all week. Thank goodness because I have been way too tired to clean out that cage.

I am looking forward to a nice quiet weekend. Maybe I can catch up on my posts and add some photos.

Abbie's Bad Habits

My day started with saying hello to Grannystein. She was leaving this morning at the same time I was leaving. Let me tell you, a 60-ish year old woman should not be wearing what she had on. She was wearing black clam digger style pants with at least 4 inche wedge shoes. Those shoes were so high she looked like she was standing on her tippey toe. She had on a top that was so low cut she was holding it together while she walked and her makeup looked like she had raided the makeup bag of Mimi from the Drew Carey Show. Maybe that is what 60-ish year old men find attractive. Since I am neither 60 or a male, I was not impressed.

Today was my first day back in the office and although I did miss the interactions with everyone, I didn't miss the chaos and tension that always appears throughout the day. I also thought a lot about Abbie throughtout the day.

Since her sister passed away, she has been reverting back to some old (and bad) habits. She does not like to be left alone. If we don't give her a treat or something to occupy her while we leave the house, she howls nonstop. It is so loud you can hear it in the parking lot. So, we started giving her a treat before we leave.

Since she has epilepsy we can't leave her out because we don't want her to hurt herself should she have a seizure while we are not home. So, we give her the treat in her crate. Unfortunately, she has started going to the bathroom in her crate. I think it is a combination of her getting out of her routine since we have both been at home so much and the fact that she does not like being alone. She has never had to sleep or be by herself - ever. She always had a sister to cuddle and keep her occupied. All I know is that I am tired of cleaning her crate and washing her bedding every day; so, hopefully, one day at a time we can slowly get her back to her old routine.

Tomorrow is a new day and another chance to get her one step closer to changing her bad habits.

Grannystein

We all have names for our neighbors that we do not know and we refer to them in some way that only we know who we are talking about. Well, one of my neighbors is Grannystein. She was so named because she is an older lady who sounds like Frankenstein when she walks. She is my upstairs neighbor and she sounds like she is always wearing heels or boots - even first thing in the morning. I picture her getting out of bed and slipping on these fuzzy stiletto slippers. She cleans house and does laundry at 6 in the morning. She has no idea how to pick up things, she drags them across the floors and since we have hardwood floors that sound vibrates into our apartment. I get the impression she has not lived in an apartment before.

Well, Sunday's are normally my favorite day of the week. We sleep in, make a big breakfast, and order a movie to watch. This morning, I didn't get the sleep in because Grannystein decided to get up at the crack of dawn and start doing housework. I decided to go ahead and get out of bed because there was no sense in just laying there looking at the ceiling.

We went about our normal routine and decided we were going to watch a comedy as our movie choice this week. We picked the Hilary Swank movie, P.S. I Love You. Well, there was some funny parts; but I since get very emotional with movies, I cried almost the entire movie.

Between Grannystein waking me up at the crack of dawn and crying for 2 hours, I was wiped out. I plan to make the rest of the day a really lazy one - if Grannystein will be quiet.

Abbie and the Cardinals

Abbie has been having a love hate relationship with Mr. and Mrs. Cardinal that come to the feeders we have hanging in the trees. Every time she hears them out there, she wants so badly to chase them out of her yard. They like to get just out of her reach and taunt her. Well, this morning I opened the door to let her outside and she took off in a mad dash - after one of the birds of course. She was so focused on chasing the bird that she didn't notice he was heading straight through the fence railings. She hit the railing so hard all I could hear was a loud thud and twang of the metal fence. She turned and looked at me like I had somehow caused her to hit the fence. After a couple of seconds she went about taking care of her morning business like nothing happened.

She quickly forgave me for allowing her to hit her head after I went to PetsMart and came back with a new loofa toy for her collection. She has a loofa dog for each holiday, so I went to find one for the July 4th holiday. They didn't have one that I liked, so she got a summer one instead. He is a little life guard and has a floaty around his waist.

They also had the rescue dogs outside of PetsMart and there was one little guy named Jose that was so cute. He was 1 year old and his owner surrendered him to the shelter because he chased things (hello, he is a dog!). He was really mopey today because he just had his little boy parts operated on, but he was such a little lover boy. I held him in my arms and he started to fall asleep. When I would talk to him, he would kiss me on the nose. He was quickly melting my heart. Ray had to drag me away. If not, I would have come home with a new baby.

In the Home Stretch Now

Well, the stitches came out today and let me tell you, it was not pleasant. I think he had the dullest scissors in history and it felt like he pulled them more than cut them.
While in the surgeons office today, I noticed somethat that I never noticed in my prior visits. Keep in mind that this is a spine specialist....his undergraduate degree was in electrical engineering. He completed that degree just 4 years before he was awarded he became a doctor.
All I know is that I am glad I am done with him. I get to return to the office next week and get my life back on track. Woo hoo.

Now, my next project is to decide what breed of puppy we want and to get a new puppy.

Tomorrow is the day!

Well, tomorrow is hopefully the day that I finally get my stitches out and can move past the problems I have been having after the back surgery. After having my back surgery on 3/25, I was on top of the world. I hadn't felt that good in such a long time that I was totally unprepared to be told 4 weeks later that I had an infection, a staph infection. Nor was I prepared for what was to be my future for the next 6 weeks. When I went to see my primary care doctor to see what I should do and she asked me how I was able to walk, I knew what I had was not a good thing. Having a high tolerance to pain, I just thought she was being over dramatic. I wasn't prepared for the pain that was to come from this hole in my back that was now about 2 inches wide and almost as deep.

I learned more about wound care, antibiotics, and staph infections over the next few weeks than I ever wanted to know. I took trips to a wound care specialist 3 times a week to be tortured while they cleaned the infected material out and packed my back. The antibiotics would only work for a short time, then they would stop working (4 of them in all). I began to learn why my doctor asked how I was walking; the more the infection grew, the worse the pain became. The day they finally admitted me to the hospital to have it surgically irrigated and debrided, I was in such pain I could barely walk.

Now 6 weeks after learning of the infection, it looks like I am finally healing. With any luck the stitches come out tomorrow and then I just have routine wound care appointments to close the remaining hole. I am so looking forward to being completely healed so I can have a normal life again. For over 2 months I have not been able to sleep comfortably and more importantly, take a nice long shower. Showers now have to be quick and at strategic angels so the wound stays dry.

I am so ready to have my life back. The one that I was hoping for after the original spinal fusion - no pain and being able to do normal activities with my family and friends. I am ready!

First Time Blogging

A friend turned me on to blogger.com and since I love journaling, why not try blogging. My life is relatively boring for the most part. It revolves around my family and my pets - well pet at the moment, but that will change as soon as we can decide what kind of dog to get. Personally, I would have tons of pets, but they would not all fit in to my small apartment. Ray and I enjoy geocaching, thus the name Team Scby-Do. That is what we are known as in the geocaching world. We have been sidelined as of late due to my back surgery, but we can't wait to get out there again soon.

Our "child" Abbie is a five year old Rat Terrier who is beyond spoiled. She recently lost her sister, Jasmine to liver failure and has been mopey lately. So, in order to keep her from being too mopey, we have been spoiling her even more. Our house has turned in to one giant toy box for Abbie. We even had a yard added to our apartment so she could have a place to go outside and bark whenever she wants. So, many of the posts you will see will have to do with our "child" and eventually "children" as they are the center of our world.