The Last Day

Today was my last day at my job.  I'm pretty darn depressed about it right now; I really love this job.

I love the people I work with, the work I do, and the work environment.  It's hard to find something that good, and it's very hard to leave something that good.  My coworkers took me out to lunch today, and even got me a graduation/going away present--they got me a Longs Peak bench mark paperweight.  It's symbolic because I have graduated, and hence hit a "peak" in my life worthy of noting and measuring future accomplishment against.  I believe I will return to get my PhD and become a researcher; I feel that I belong with these people.  Onward to the next big thing, the next bench mark, as it were.

In answer to Fuzzy's question, I've been sick.  For the last month.  I was sick all of last week, but worked anyways in a desperate attempt to finish up all of the work I had left before leaving my job.  I failed, but it's okay because it's all ongoing type work that I can continue to contribute to (blah blah blah "but you're not getting paid" and whatever else--it's called pride in workmanship, people; my name is going on it, and I will be satisfied before I call it done, paid or not).  Then, I forced myself to take a camping vacation last weekend, where I unintentionally hiked a nearly 3 mile trail with a runny nose, cough, and not as much water as I would have preferred.  I complained the whole way, which probably wasn't much fun for the others on the hike, but I didn't die, which was a plus.

All in all, I am expecting to have a low week.  I am crawling into a hole to reflect and figure out what I'm going to do with myself now.

Alula

Melted

Re: Fuzzy's post

I melted. Hotlanta is too hot for it to still be May. But otherwise a normal boring life, not getting up to anything crazy. Spring start-itis is over, and into the summer doldrums.

~DoHP

Hello?

Hey just wondering where everyone has gone?! Just curious, love you all!

Blogger was down?

All,

Something was going on with Blogger at some point this week.  It deleted my most recent post (Pictures from my Illness) so I reposted it; it had posted before, as evidenced by the fact that it through on my feed reader.  It also deleted a comment that Fuzzy left somewhere--the comment was emailed to me but then mysteriously never appeared on the blog, and when I tried to go to moderate the comment I got a message that Blogger was running in "read only" mode for maintenance.

Bottom line--if anyone posted anything and it went missing, please repost it.  It was not maliciously removed; Blogger was just having some issues.

Alula

Pictures from my illness

Thought you might enjoy pictures of my quality of life while I've been sick this week.  

This is what it looks like when I lie down: 

Note the expression on Count's face--it says "try to make me move and I will hobble you, warmth bringer."

Here is what it looks like when I get up:

Alula

Gross

So Sunday night I came home from a whirlwind weekend feeling pretty low.  I had some bad allergies and muscle aches, which I had attributed to walking five miles for various graduation functions, volunteer shelving at the library, cleaning out and doing home improvement on 3 of our upstairs closets, being outside too much during allergy season, and generally not sleeping well for a collection of reasons.  I hurt, but I thought it was nothing.

Monday morning I woke with a major sore throat, which I thought was just a run-of-the-mill head cold.  I got them all the time as a kid.  I wrote in to work that I was taking a day to sleep it off.  Within an hour, the pain had moved from my throat to my ears, and I texted my sister (the audiologist) for advice and my mom for a heating pad.  I took some OTC painkillers and laid down to ride it out after a Google search turned up that most doctors recommend the same unless the ear infection is "serious" or lasts too long.  

Within three hours, I was in so much pain I was unable to get up from the couch.  I still hadn't heard back from my mom or sister.  Then fluid started to come out of the afflicted ear, the pain dropped substantially, and I thought I was going to be okay--I texted my sister with this information, and she quickly called back to tell me that the relief had come because my ear drum had burst (relieving the pressure) but that I was in for a good deal of new trouble soon.

I went to sleep with a tissue pressed against my leaking ear, and I woke up at 4 in the afternoon once again in too much pain to do much of anything about being in pain.  My mom dropped off a heating pad and I put on a brave face while she fixed me some noodles; she had the kids with her, so we both wanted her out of my house before anyone got infected, but she promised to send my sister over.  My sister stopped by after work with her ear scope thingy and gave me a look before saying that yes, my right ear drum had perforated and was leaking blood and pus, and the left ear drum looked like it could follow.  She asked for my insurance card and started making calls while I continued to lay on the couch moaning pathetically.  My husband got home somewhere in there, they shuffled me into less revealing sleepwear and then Mr. B whisked me off to the after hours ER. 

My heart rate was 150, my white count was 20 (the doctor told me she considered 7-9 to be "high range"), and I was severely dehydrated.  When I told them that my ear drum had popped after only about 4 hours of ear pain preceding, they went into emergency containment mode thinking I might have Bacterial Meningitis because it had come on so fast and so serious; however, this was quickly discounted due to a lack of other symptoms.  They IV'd me and put me on drugs to calm my body down.  Four hours later they were still looking for the missing infection somewhere in my body to make my white count so high, but they never found it.  They sent me home with prescription painkillers, antibiotics, and advice to stay on the couch for a while.  On the bright side, everything that happened during the visit--the EKG for my heart, the medications, the blood tests, everything--only costs us $100 because we're on Kaiser right now, and have a flat rate for ER admissions.  

I now have temporary hearing loss in my right ear until the ear drum closes and heals, and my ear is discharging some gross stuff.  The biggest issue has been the pressure--the tear in my ear drum is small, which is good because it will likely heal on its own, but is bad because it doesn't drain efficiently.  Fluid keeps building up until it reaches critical mass and pushes out, and the pressure is hella uncomfortable.  

Exciting, right?  My word of the week is gross.

Alula

I refuse to take the train again!!

OK so in an attempt to save money on gas, I took the train back home from a visit to the city. Plus I really needed to get away from my mother we can only stand so much quality time together with out problems. So me and little man took the train home. The trip was long, tedious and boring! So I refuse to take the train again, making it a little difficult to get back to the city for a plane ride to my uncles wedding. So my insane solution to this since Mr. Man said to take the bus if the train was so bad, once again I refuse got my fill of buses in high school. Basically that was Mr. mans way of saying he won't drive us down and my step dad has his head buried in books. He offered to come get us the day before the date to leave on the plane, which is another bad idea that seems like it would be more stress than its worth. Well any way my insane solution was to ask my mother to come get us. This will put my mother and Mr man under the same roof, and they really don't get along so well. And since they are both trying to not stress me out due to last months miscarriage will therefore make it more stressful by completely and utterly ignoring each others existence. And added to that since my mother I think is feeling a little left out since we are all leaving for the wedding she doesn't want to go to anyway, feels that getting us 2 1/2 weeks before the trip to the wedding is a good idea. I was thinking a week would be a better solution, that got shot down real quick. The only good thing is that my mother will go wine tasting with me which is kinda fun to get a sample of the drink all the flavors and textures is actually fascinating. So I will be leaving home 2 1/2 weeks before we leave on the 31st to spend 11 days on this trip and I haven't even figured out how I am getting home yet. Lets all count down to my descent into insanity and my doctor said I need to not be very stressed for the next month, yeah she has never met or dealt with my family. Oh add school work to my stress load and a way to active 3 year old at least my sister will be around to help with him. And I might be having another one eventually Mr. man and I talked about it, OK I talked he didn't say anything back, I decided we would just leave it up to mother nature. One thing I refuse to stress about. I seem to be refusing a lot of things lately must be me attempting to control my life in some way. I am starting to get my energy back and my blood chem levels are also back to where they are supposed to be. I still have a bruise from that blood draw. Well that's the rant for now, keep a look out for another one in the not so distant future.