Upswing?

Hi there!

So last night, around the time I should have been going to bed, it occurred to me that I felt better.

I had done nothing all day but read manga and articles about pop culture over at Cracked. For most of the day I was miserable, feeling tired and gaggy and dizzy when I stood up. I'd managed a few bites of my dinner--steak, from a Mexican restaurant--and was just trying to keep it down. But all of a sudden that wasn't an issue anymore. In fact, I found myself hungry again.

I ate a little more of my food, and I also ate a bowl of strawberry mini wheats cereal, while I continued reading and chatting with friends. It was a lot of fun. I stayed up extremely late, just reveling in not wanting to die. I told Brooke, who by that time had awakened for her Sunday morning, that I was afraid that if I went to sleep I would feel bad again. But eventually tiredness won out and I crawled under the covers.

I awoke not feeling crappy. In fact, I felt good enough to actually do things, like clean up the sink area in my bathroom, load and start the dishwasher, and start a load of laundry. I have the gross taste in my mouth, and a bit of sinus pressure, but I don't feel overwhelmed by it.

I read about Kimono Karen's amazing trip to Hawaii and for the first time in weeks thought that maybe I will be healthy enough to do something like that someday. That's pretty big given that just yesterday, when I was miserable, I realized I no longer felt like I could do anything I wanted to.

"Do I really feel better?" I wondered last night. "Or do I just think I feel better?" Then a better question occurred to me: "Does it matter?"

What the doctor said

Without running any additional labs or calling for any tests or procedures, my doctor decided today that I have acid reflux, which would explain the chest pain, why my voice is all wonky, and why I wake up coughing and have a gaggy feeling in my throat during the day. I asked him about the foot swelling, and he examined my feet and noted that there was indeed swelling, and said he thought it was because of too much salt in my diet. He said to take a double dose of the blood pressure medicine on days when I had swelling.

I asked him if being exhausted all the time was simply due to being out of shape. "Yes," he said, "and also because you're not sleeping well. I am convinced that you have sleep apnea." So the sleep study is on for October 19.

He prescribed me Nexium and I went home and took one. I had some pain in my upper back on the right-hand side, in the muscle I use when carrying my purse over my arm, and it seemed to just keep getting worse and worse, so I also took some Advil, and then I went to work.

My voice was still wonky, and I was tired, but I felt okay. I ended up not eating anything all day, though, because I kept putting off my lunch break until it was suddenly the end of the day.

After work I went to Wild Wing Cafe with Gene, Chris T., Chris C., and Gene's friend Mason, and eventually Kelsey and Shalah showed up. I ordered spinach dip, which was great, but the chips started to be too dry for my throat so I stopped eating it, and potato soup, which was terrible--it was like someone had pureed a loaded baked potato :P No one makes potato soup like Dad, I guess.

I was hoping to feel better as the night went on, but I just felt worse, and my back started hurting again, so I skipped out as early as I possibly could (our waiter was terrible and took his sweet time with my check). I picked up some dinner for Sean on the way home and crawled into bed almost immediately, trying to find a good position for my back. I called Mom and talked with her a little while before finally going to sleep.

I'm not sure why I'm awake now, but my back is feeling better, and I'm a little thirsty. I went ahead and did the football stuff for work that I have to do every Friday night/Saturday morning during the season, and now I think I'll drink some water and go back to bed.

Makin' it somehow

Twitter has been down all day, which is annoying because I like to use it to dash off quick complaints. Earlier, for example, I wanted to bitch about this production dude who decided to recite for me a complete plot synopsis of some anime he really likes. Yes, I enjoy anime, but you are boring the hell out of me. Shut up!

Time seemed to be moving awfully slowly this morning. It started when I was in bed waiting for my alarm to go off. The light coming in around the curtain in the bedroom looked the same every time I looked at it. I kept falling asleep and waking back up and still feeling tired but knowing I was going to have to get up "soon". Finally at 8:30 I actually checked the time and got up.

The first two hours of work were like two weeks. Very tired, trouble concentrating, and later, mild abdominal pain. I took the opportunity to call my doctors and create a game plan for tomorrow.

Today's symptoms include: coughing, nausea, gross taste in my throat, mild headache, mild abdominal pain, occasional burping, general feeling of tiredness. As usual, mild exertion exhausts me and I have to sit down for awhile to recover and catch my breath. When I woke up this morning, the wet raspiness was back in my throat and lungs. Also, I don't know if I've mentioned this at all, but I have had so much acne since this all started. It is driving me crazy. It seems like every time I look in the mirror there are five more zits.

Seeing my GP tomorrow morning to demand that he actually order some tests. Like a meeting with a cardiologist, and a chest X-ray, and more labs, and whatever else I can think of before then. I'm going to bring in my calendar with all my symptoms for this month written in it, to see if that will help him think of anything we've missed. I'm supposed to call my endocrinologist after that appointment and let them in on everything that's happening, so they can decide whether or not I should resume hormones.

My boss is back from Japan. I had asked her to see if she could find me a protection charm for my car, but apparently she didn't visit any shrines. She did, however, bring me a beautiful floral pattern drawstring bag and a cute bookmark with a paper girl sculpted on it, both handmade by her aunt, and she also brought me an adorable little desk ornament of an owl. It's hard to describe the thing. There's a big ball that sits on the desk, and out of that comes half a hoop of black wire, and then hanging off that is a smaller straight piece of wire, and on one end is the little round owl, and on the other are two colored balls to balance him. It's neat and it moves around with the air conditioning or with any vibrations on the desk.

She came in to talk to me today and told me that health has to be my first priority, because if we don't have our health, we don't have anything. It's a total cliche, but I know full well how true it is. I have never been so miserable in my life--well, maybe when I was hospitalized with cancer, but at least then I knew what I was in for and didn't fight every day to get things done.

I'm really lucky to have such a good boss. I hope I can get all this straightened out so I can go back to being the kind of employee I want to be--the kind of employee my boss deserves to have working for her.

ER

This morning at about 4:30, I woke up with severe lower abdominal pain. It was probably indigestion, I knew. But it was the worst abdominal pain I can remember ever having, besides the time in the hospital nine years ago when exploratory surgery revealed that my appendix had burst.

I tried going to the bathroom, but while I was marginally successful in that effort, the pain didn't go away. I tried relaxing my muscles as much as possible. I went back to bed and did my best to lie still and relax. But the pain just wouldn't go away.

On my way back to the bathroom I suddenly realized I was going to throw up...and I did, and from the horrible burning I'm guessing it was mostly bile. I kept throwing up and it didn't make me feel any better; the pain was still there and now my throat was raw and stinging. I was near tears as I left the bathroom again.

So I got dressed and asked Sean to take me to the ER. We went up the street to Doctor's Hospital.

I was in pain for the whole ride, and as I walked in, and as I sat down and filled out the paperwork. But after that the pain started to subside, of course.

They took my blood pressure several times, and my temperature, and did something to my finger, and then they put me in a room and had me give them a urine sample. The doctor came in eventually and did a standard examination. Eventually it was decided that since the pain had gone away, he'd give me a prescription for pain and nausea and I could then follow up with my GP. We waited on the urine test results, which were normal, and then Sean took me home.

Due to the drugs they gave me while I was there, or maybe because I was just tired in general, I slept until 6:20 in the afternoon. I did wake up long enough around 9 o'clock to call in to work, fortunately.

While I slept I had a couple of bad dreams. The first one involved one of my side teeth breaking into pieces. In the second one, my cousin Carl was married and had a baby, and the whole family had moved to Iraq for missionary work, and they'd been killed there. I actually woke up wanting to call my mom to make sure that wasn't true.

Since I slept past the end of the standard business day, I wasn't able to call my GP to talk about my ER adventure, and I missed a call from my endocrinologist. Also, I need to contact the people who made my glasses about the weird imperfection in the right lens that refracts light from monitors and makes it seem like there's a big fingerprint on the glasses. Kind of distracting :P

So I'll try to get all my calls done tomorrow during my lunch break, I guess.

Another sucky thing about all this is that I was already out of sick days at work, which means I have two unpaid days this week. I could use vacation for them, but then I would have fewer vacation days...:P

My boss has been very understanding of all this so far, but I imagine she's getting tired of it. I am too.

I just want things to go back to normal.

So, seriously, this boulder is not getting any closer to the top of the hill

I was hoping that this appointment I was scheduled to have today would magically light a path towards solving all my health problems. So it wasn't exactly thrilling to hear upon arrival that my appointment had been canceled, and the ENT's office was assumed to have told me.

Apparently this appointment was simply so the pulmonary specialist could decide whether or not I needed a sleep study, but the ENT had already decided I needed a sleep study, so the additional appointment was deemed redundant.

It would be nice if someone had explained this to me.

Well, at least it saved me the copay.

While I was there I arranged to have my most recent labs faxed to my mom, and I also set up the appointment for the sleep study, which won't be until October 19 because my insurance has to approve it first. Grr.

So I have to wait another month for a clue into what the hell's going on.

After that abbreviated visit I went to see Laurie, who recently left my workplace to become the executive director of a nonprofit. She's very into heart issues, and when I explained my symptoms, she said she wanted me to see a cardiologist. She also said I should fire my GP and get someone who will really be an advocate for my health. (Laurie's very passionate, which is why her nonprofit is going to go far.)

I left with a couple of names to look into, which I will. Feeling like crap all the time is starting to get old.

Before I went to the appointment that turned out to be canceled, I went through my blog and Twitter for the past two months to get an idea of my symptoms. It looks like I really only started feeling horrible in September. In August I was still functioning normally, though things were going downhill, and occasionally I would have the exhaustion/shortness of breath that has come to plague me.

It is definitely possible that the ridiculous heat and the lack of air conditioning at work compounded whatever issue I was already having. I know that for the entire summer I had been having trouble breathing, and I even had a time when I woke up gasping for breath, but it was an isolated incident. Maybe several things are all going on at once, feeding on each other as they work to destroy me.

Woo.

In the rain

I had another bad night last night. A few hours I went to bed, I coughed so much I threw up, a lot. This is the third time that has happened in recent weeks. After throwing up I felt marginally better, but it didn't last, and after awhile I was hungry again. Fearful of nausea, I had a Slim-Fast instead of food, which thankfully stayed down.

Later, I woke up in a panic, trying to breathe. I had stopped breathing in my sleep again. I haven't had that problem since I started sleeping with my head inclined and using saline nasal spray and Flonase. But there it was. My nose was clear and it didn't feel like my throat was stopped up. Instead, it just felt like I stopped breathing for no particular reason. I tried to go back to sleep but my breathing felt weird and I was terrified I'd stop breathing again, so I got up and messed around online for awhile.

I felt horrible. It was like there was a rock in my chest, and I kept having waves of mild dizziness, the kind of feeling you get when you take a sedative. I pondered going to the ER several times.

Finally I tried going back to bed and lying on my stomach. For some reason, this calmed me down and made me feel better. My breathing didn't feel as forced. I wasn't able to fall asleep, but I was able to relax, which felt great. Finally I rolled onto my side and slept until after noon.

Today I had a Slim-Fast for breakfast, again out of fear of throwing up. I still felt a little nauseated due to gunk in the back of my throat. And sitting there in 70 degree air conditioning, I started sweating and feeling overheated, which has been happening intermittently for at least the past week. My skin gets clammy and Sean says I'm freezing to the touch, but I feel so hot and uncomfortable I can't stand it until I take a bath or shower. But I don't have a fever; I've checked.

Another symptom I've had off and on is swelling/bloating in my feet, ankles, thighs, and hips, but thankfully I've had little or none of that today.

I wasn't feeling too hot, but I needed to run to the store and pick up a few things, like laundry detergent. So I went. Shopping when feeling this way is not fun; there's nowhere to sit down, and the cart I chose tended to roll away when I leaned on it, so the best I could do was stand still for a few minutes whenever I'd start to feel woozy or urpy. After a time I noticed that I was hot and sweaty again, from hardly any movement, in an air conditioned building. My skin was all pink and my clothes were sticking to me. Additionally, I felt very tired and run down. I wrapped up my shopping as quickly as possible and wondered if I should ask someone to help me get the stuff to my car. Ultimately I got everything loaded myself, returned the cart, and then just sat in the driver's seat for awhile to recover.

It was 98 degrees out, but I left the windows rolled down rather than use the air conditioning, and it was nice. The heat evaporated the sweat (although it did cause more), and the breeze felt nice. As I drove home it started to rain, just a slight spatter here and there. I stuck my arm out the window to catch some of the droplets. An inexplicable emotion came over me and I moaned as if I was going to start crying.

The on again, off again rain continued as I pulled into the apartment complex. I stopped in a space and turned the car off and just sat there, watching the rain pelt my windshield and die away. I eventually opened the door and let some of it smack me in the arm.

After a time the rain got harder and harder. There was no lightning; it was just a downpour. I got tired of my left arm being the only part of me to get wet, so I got out of the car and stood full on in the rain.

It felt so good.

My clothes were drenched within seconds, but I stood there anyway. The air was warm enough that the rain felt very comfortable. I glanced over and saw a neighbor sitting on his porch, presumably staring at me, though it was hard to tell through the sheets of water. I shrugged and went back to enjoying the rain.

It wasn't long, though, before I decided it would probably be best to get my purse out of the water, and also take the refrigerated groceries into the apartment. So I opened the hatch and grabbed all the perishables and lugged them up to the front door. Opening it, I set the sopping bags and my purse in the entryway and called Sean to ask him to put them away. "I'm going to stand in the rain for awhile," I said, and shut the door.

I stood outside until the air temperature started dropping and the rain started to feel cold. Water washed over me and I considered sitting on the steps to enjoy it, but ultimately I just stood there until I thought I might be in danger of catching cold. Then, reluctantly, I opened the door, removed my shoes and left them outside, wrung out my shirt as best I could, and made a bee-line for the bathroom, where I stripped down and hung all my clothes in the shower.

Emerging with a towel on my head, I informed Sean, "That was awesome." He looked pretty perplexed.

Honestly, I don't know what it is with me and water, but it just seems to rejuvenate me. And I've always loved standing in the rain.

I can't say I feel 100%, but I certainly feel better than I did when I was leaving the grocery store.

Happy Birthday, honey!

"Tomorrow you begin the last year of your 20s," I told Sean last night.

"Really?" he said. "I thought I was turning 28."

That's okay. He didn't even remember his birthday was coming up until I mentioned it this week.

Why does everyone love Lana?

Okay, so she has some "exotic" looks (for much of the US, anyway), but she's not particularly bright, whenever she's said "leave it to me" she's ended up failing, she passes out all the time, she makes decisions based on pride...no matter how much she wants to claim that she's not a prize or a trophy, that's really all she is. Her personality sucks, and she'll completely turn her back on her friends rather than admit she could be wrong, and it's okay because everyone inexplicably loves her anyway.

Also, she lives in Kansas and somehow doesn't know the proper way to react to a tornado? :>

Also, she'll choose to be with someone on the rebound, and then marry them within a year. What's the rush, toots? Afraid you'll be an old maid if you aren't married before 20?

I also hate it when she tries to be a badass, because she totally sucks at it. It's like she's trying to grow up, but instead of just, you know, maturing, she decides to play all these games. But in the end, her games are pointless, and she's still the scared wide-eyed little girl who gets victimized every week.

I don't know if all of this is supposed to prove that she's inferior to Lois, but if it is, producers, you can stop now. It's been proven, time and again, since season 1.

Can you let her be a real character now? After all, there's got to be some reason Pete ends up marrying her. (Man, I bet dinners at the White House with President Lex are awkward...)

Sclaundres

It always takes me awhile to get through one of Geoffrey Chaucer's posts, because, you know, I don't speak Old English, generally. So when I saw he had a new post up I refrained from reading it, saving it until I had the time to really hunker down.

Today, however, I accidentally loaded the post. As I was going for Bloglines' "keep as new" button, I glanced down to what seemed from the fact that it was all uppercase to be a particularly emotional sentence...and I saw:

STOP YOUR SCLAUNDRES OF BRITNEY!

Yes. Yes! Chaucer, I love you.

(And I admit it: I love Chris Crocker, too. That video has brought such delight to my life. After all she's been through!)

Inadvertent support

"Hey, you wore black today," my coworker said.

"Yeah," I responded, suddenly realizing what that meant. I hadn't thought about it when I got dressed this morning. "I'm in support!"

I suppose I am. Honestly, I find the situation to be a little more problematic than a simple "right" vs. "wrong". Injustice was done at least twice that I know of, and apparently on a regular basis (what's with a tree "reserved" for white people?) and it is important to stand up to that. But at the same time, I do not condone violence to solve problems.

There should be some punishment there, but it should fit the crime.

So yeah, I suppose I am in support :>

(My outfit is actually black and white...think that means anything?)

R. Gabriel's is gone :(

Not long ago, I met up with Mari and Jeannie at a little cafe on Davis Road for lunch. We had sandwiches and desserts, and I tried a smoothie.

"It's all right," I told my friends, "but next time I want a smoothie, it'll be R. Gabriel's. Best smoothies in the CSRA."

It's true. I have never found anything to match the smoothies at R. Gabriel's. Not too runny, not too thick, great flavors...I can hardly think about them without wanting one.

Little did I know the next time I wanted a smoothie I would look in the window expecting the cheerful coffeehouse ambiance I've grown to love and instead see...racks of clothes.

What?

It's been awhile since that perplexing day. I kept meaning to call them and find out what happened, but I kept forgetting. Today I got a smoothie at Sonic, and...well, it's just not an R. Gabriel's smoothie :/ But having it with me at least reminded me to make the call today when I got to work.

"Your call cannot be completed at this time," said an odd recording, which told me nothing. Their website still exists, too, with no mention of a closure or move.

Finally I decided to email the guy who does the business segment on our morning show, and he confirmed my fears: R. Gabriel's was forced to shut down due to the ridiculous construction on Davis Road. He doesn't know if the other two locations are still open, but the main one is gone. Not moved...just gone.

Life just isn't fair ;_;

Webcomics 1/2

Me (12:53:55 PM): okay, here's a question
Me (12:54:01 PM): why are there so many webcomics where men turn into women?
Jered (12:54:08 PM): are there?
Me (12:54:20 PM): why do guys want to be girls? do they think it's awesome to be marginalized?
Me (12:54:23 PM): they're all white guys, too
Jered (12:54:28 PM): must be because every web comic artist, or at least those responsible, are turned on by Ranma 1/2
Me (12:54:32 PM): maybe they just want to know what it's like to be a minority
Me (12:54:39 PM): hahaha
Me (12:54:48 PM): actually I'm sure the minority part doesn't even occur to them
Me (12:55:07 PM): when you're default, you think you can be anything, and the possible problems don't occur to you
Me (12:55:18 PM): the only problems these guys have with being girls is that they are no longer "manly"
Me (12:55:24 PM): and they get hit on, which is comic relief
Jered (12:55:30 PM): I always thought Ranma 1/2 was kinda sexy in some of the most absurd and disturbing ways possible.
Me (12:55:46 PM): there is one comic, Exiern, where they deal a little with prejudice and whatnot
Me (12:56:00 PM): but for the most part it's "hahaha that guy turned into a hot girl"
Me (12:56:07 PM): and they ALWAYS turn into hot girls, it's not just a girl
Jered (12:56:10 PM): lol
Me (12:56:34 PM): I want to see a webcomic where a guy turns into Daria
Jered (12:56:47 PM): I dunno if I can summon up the maturity level appropriate for this conversation
Me (12:57:06 PM): lol

Priorities

Occasionally I wonder if I should care more about stuff like Britney Spears' performance at the VMAs, since blogs and major news organizations and weirdos on YouTube all seem so intent on it. So I do a little research, I see what people are saying--maybe she had a broken heel, maybe she's just going through a rough patch in her life, maybe she was phoning it in and doesn't respect her fans. And I take a look at the actual video in question, which does seem a little lackluster.

But ultimately, I still find no reason to care, and now I've wasted ten minutes of my life.

Well, I'm awake

My nasal passages seem clear enough, but I still kept waking up gasping for breath this morning. It just felt weird because I seemed to be breathing fine, so I couldn't find a reason for that to stop.

Last night I slept in our bed instead of the guest bed, which felt great on my back, but I wonder if Mom's right and the flatness of it makes my throat get closed off. I guess tonight I can try sleeping on more pillows or something.

I went to bed early last night to try and get myself back on the good schedule. I'm thinking about trying to go biking later. But I don't know how that's going to work out if I get out of breath as easily as I have been. It shouldn't be exhausting to put sheets on a bed, for example. I'm frustrated and I want to just try it and see if I can work myself out of this, but if it's some sort of problem with my circulatory or respiratory system I'm just going to antagonize it. So meh.

Rex is coming over today to take the desk away. I need to get all my junk off of it at some point. :> Once the desk is gone I can reposition the second bedroom as a workout area, or something.

Right now I feel like there is gunk in my throat--not at the start of my nasal passages where I had been feeling it before, but instead a little lower--and it is grossing me out.

What a lovely, beautiful, wonderful night

After work I headed over to Pizza Joint to meet some coworkers for Gene's birthday. I was a little late because they planned to meet at 7 and I didn't finish up until 7:22. When I walked in the door, looking around for a familiar face, they spotted me first and called me over, and Gene had saved me a seat between himself and Chris.

So I settled in and we got to chatting. Elgin and Fichtel were there, and Kevin showed up shortly, as did a new girl, Kelsey, who turned out to be very cool. A guy Gene knows who actually went to UK and is now a chemical engineer at SRS was also there, which was neat. After awhile Krusher and Jessica arrived, and then Samantha and Kate.

I had a cheese calzone and Coke and just sat and enjoyed all the conversations. Sometimes I joined in and sometimes not. It's really interesting to hear the newsies talk about their jobs, since I'm separated from a lot of it by the fact that I'm in a different room. I also learned a lot about Gene and what he really wants to do with his life. For awhile there the big topic was football, which of course I know nothing about, but I was content to listen and laugh as the various fans called each other out--Krusher was especially impressive with his knowledge of player trivia.

There were plenty of unrepeatable work stories, of course, many of which are hilarious.

After awhile people started drifting off. Fichtel disappeared before I got a chance to talk with him, which I felt bad about because I'd told him if he came he could talk to me :> Elgin and Kevin and Krusher and Chris and Kelsey and Jessica and Gene's friend all headed out until it was just me, Gene, Kate and Samantha, and we sat and talked for a long time until finally Kate had to leave to resume painting a house, which apparently she plans to do all night. Yeesh.

I had assumed that I would leave fairly early on, so it was interesting to me that I had stayed to be part of the last group. Not only that, I was starting to feel more and more awake, like the evening had only started. When I announced this, Gene suggested that the three of us go for ice cream, an idea I jumped on. I hadn't eaten but a fourth of my calzone, but I figured I could handle a little sherbet or something. Kate suggested we go to Bruster's before she headed out, so we headed back across the river to North Augusta.

Unfortunately, Bruster's was closed, as it was nearing 11. I pulled off and gestured for Sam to flank me and rolled down my window.

"Wanna try Sonic?"

"Sure."

So we headed up the street a little until we got to Sonic, which was still open, and we parked and walked over to the metal tables and placed our orders. I thought about a simple vanilla cone but ended up getting a chocolate malt, and, shockingly, I finished it as we sat there and talked.

Sonic also closed while we were still sitting there, and we ended up staying 45 minutes after the employees shut down the kitchen and left--the lights and music were still on. I ended up telling my life story, which always happens when people ask me about myself, because one thing leads to another. My love story with Sean leads into having cancer, which leads into how I got into web design. As I told Sam and Gene, it's like my life has been a path :>

I ended up talking about my college boyfriend some, too, since Gene is from Jersey.

Gene talked about how he's always wanted kids, and it was so neat to actually hear the thoughts I've had my whole life coming from a different person. He said it's always been his dream to raise children and give them the things his parents gave him. I haven't heard someone other than me express those feelings in a long time, and of course in my case I try to suppress them seeing as how I will never realize that dream. But it didn't depress me to hear him say it. It was actually rather refreshing.

Samantha didn't really open up much, I realized later. We'll have to see what we can get out of her next time :)

I finally left for home at quarter to midnight feeling elated. It was just so good to spend time with people, outside of things that I have to do like run errands or go to work. I loved just being there because I wanted to be, and hanging out for hours, and only leaving because we knew we'd be useless the next day if we stayed up much longer.

I knew I missed hanging out with people, but I guess I didn't know how much.

I am definitely going to have to do stuff like this more often!

Normalizing one's environment

I decided that since the air conditioner is working again at the office, I will keep it on at home as well, to avoid putting my throat and nasal passages through lots of changes all day. At the moment my throat is dry and I'm able to breathe fairly normally.

When I got home I cleaned up a bunch of garbage, vacuumed, and started some laundry. I took all the bedclothes off our bed, intending to wash them, but with one load in the washer and another in the dryer I felt very tired all of a sudden, so I crawled into the spare bed and fell asleep.

I awoke vaguely when Sean came home, opened the door to the second bedroom, and looked at me, and I babbled something to him about thinking I was avoiding an allergen by being in a different room, but that it didn't seem to be working. He looked at me some more and then left the room. I think he was more interested in "where's my dinner?", but I obviously wasn't coherent at the time :>

It occurs to me that I still haven't thanked him properly for yesterday. I'll do that before I go back to bed.

After awhile I got up, brushed my teeth, folded the laundry in the dryer, and shifted the stuff from the washer into the dryer. Then I got on my computer and read manga for awhile, and ate some cottage cheese, which has really been a lifesaver lately. (I need to buy some more!)

Now I think I will give Sean a kiss and go back to bed. I have to be at the hospital at 9 to go to the ear, nose and throat clinic.

Now if I can just make it through the day...

Last night was not fun, and I hope it's not an experience I have to repeat anytime soon.

I tried to get to sleep at around 11. Thinking it would help clear my sinuses, I put a cough drop in my mouth. Three hours of fitful sleep later, I awoke feeling like there were gobs of mucus in the back of my throat and with that old familiar hitching in my lungs. Lovely.

I got rid of the cough drop and tried to get back to sleep, but no matter what I did, it was impossible. I got up several times and messed around online, but I was really too tired to enjoy or care too much about what I was doing. Whenever I tried to get back in bed, I couldn't breathe and I couldn't relax.

Finally I tried the decongestant that worked for me the other day. It dried my throat out, which was sort of a relief and sort of made me nauseous, but I still couldn't actually get to sleep.

It was around 5 or 6 when I finally asked Sean to please come sit next to me because I couldn't calm down. He snuggled into bed behind me and wrapped his arms around me and stroked the skin of my back and legs.

And I was able to concentrate on the niceness of that feeling, instead of all the other things that always race through my mind when I go to bed these days. It seems like every night I think about how I wish I was back in the old apartment, or I miss some item we used to own, or I think about how I've "chosen" not to worry about having kids since it's impossible, or I ponder how far away I live from my family, or I wish I could figure out if I want to buy a house here or move away. I think it would be pretty ridiculous at this point to try and claim that stress isn't a factor in how I've been feeling. I'm just not sure what to do about it.

Anyway, I am so thankful that Sean calmed me down enough that I finally slipped off to sleep. I'm not sure how much sleep I actually got, and I feel like crap right now, but I know I'd feel even worse if I hadn't gotten any sleep at all.

Side note: I noticed yesterday that the veins that normally stick out of my feet don't, anymore. It kind of weirded me out.

Side note #2: I think, constantly, "Remember back when I could breathe?" or "Remember back when I didn't feel terrible?" I'm really annoying myself. It's not that clever, Heather.

Side note #3: I'm going to a specialist tomorrow who will hopefully figure something out about my respiration/pulmonary function. I've had friends who've said it sounds like allergies and friends who've said it sounds like sleep apnea. Looking forward to a doctor's opinion.

Side note #4: Why am I so sweaty all the time?

Beauty secrets revealed

My Boss: Hey, I like your hair! What'd you do differently?

Me: I took a bath, then slept on it.

Totally hot

Young Bruce Wayne yes.

Can I keep him?

I saw the table I want on HGTV

So I have the TV on in my office today, and I'm flipping between the US Open and HGTV. There was a show where two 22-year-olds were buying their first house after living with their parents and saving up money like crazy. Neat story. The two of them had two inspirational decoration pieces that the guy's parents had brought back from Japan. One was a wood carving of a Chinese character that meant good health, good life, or something. The other was a painting that looked to be in the Chinese style, at least to me. The guy said he was definitely interested in "Oriental" designs--I think it's still okay to say "Oriental" when you're talking about decorating, but it seems weird to me.

The narrator kept referring to the new homeowners as "Grasshopper", as though kung fu had anything to do with Japan (I think the Shaolin monks might have something to say about that). Meanwhile, the designer decorated the kitchen cabinets with horrible renderings of Chinese characters, but at least he had a sense of humor about it--he mixed the traditional "honor" and crap like that with stuff like "candy" and "chicken".

The thing I was most interested in was the dining room, where they laid out bamboo mats to cover the ugly floor and then put in a low table. The designer made the table by hand, and he designed extensions for it so it could be used at a height that's normal for westerners.

I have been trying to figure out how to design a table with extensions for awhile now. I would prefer that the legs either fold out or be latched under the table, so the extra legs don't take up additional space in the house. I want either a black table, to go along with all my black furniture, or a more traditional natural wood, stained/lacquered? table.

It was neat to see someone actually doing something like what I want, even if in this case the extensions had to be stored.

I've also thought about putting down bamboo mats in my dining room, but it doesn't seem like it would work right with the kitchen entrance. Plus the chandelier just doesn't go with a Japanese style room, so I've been loath to decorate it at all.

Maybe someday when we move I'll have the Japanese-style dining room I envision :)

I also want a Japanese-style bath...

Dilated

I'm at home waiting for my pupils to, uh, de-dilate. It's taking forever. Then again, it's been forever since I've had an eye appointment, so I guess fair's fair.

When I'm good to go again I'll head back over to the eye place and see about getting my new glasses--it's kind of hard to select frames when you can't see them--and then go to my regular doctor to force him to figure something out about my allergies.

After that I'll finally head in to work.

Bleh, I've had way too many doctors' appointments lately...

Meds

In case you're remotely interested, here are this week's meds. Prescriptions, vitamins, the whole nine yards.

I swallow each day's portion all at once.

The pink pills are Benadryl, to be taken before bed. I take the rest of them in the morning.

Next year I'll be 30, but from this it looks like I'm two or three times that, doesn't it?