The Cat Came Back (And Now I Want To Hate Him)

The cat.

Grrrrr.

The cat is an indoor cat.

Occasionally I put the leash (that he came with) on him and let him snoop around my stoop. I'm nice that way. Part of the reason he is an indoor cat is that he doesn't have front claws and there are some large territorial tom cats in my neighbourhood. I fear he would get the snot beat out of him.

This morning while trying to leave the apartment with my laundry (which is a feat you'll understand if you've ever been to my place), the cat decided he too should exit. I hoped he would just stay on the stoop and I could put my laundry down, scoop him up and toss him inside.

Nay, nay.

Of course he wouldn't make things easy. He quickly made his way down the first flight of stairs, then onto the roof, then on to the roof of the garage.

There he is, perched, happy, delighted and filling me with angst.

I got some food to try and lure him back up the stairs.

As you can see, his level of care was not altered. And so he decided to keep exploring. He explored by walking on narrow things above the ground, leaving me to envision the conversation between me and his parents and just how he broke his hip.

Awesome. In his high wire exploring he found a friend. How neat.

Eventually he got down, explored one neighbour's yard, went under another neighbour's deck, ran around in the alley, got caught by me, fought me, won, ran into the neighbour's yard again, started eating the neighbour's plants and then got caught by me again.

He was very happy that I caught him. So happy in fact that he decided to give a little love nibble, right through my glove.

How delightful.

So now he is in my apartment (hopefully thinking about what he did) and I am out doing laundry (thinking about what he did). Somebody is going to lose their leashed stoop snooping privileges for a while.

Licking Their Wounds

This came courtesy of Twitter, via a blog:

A radio station in Buffalo, New York refused to play Canadian music Monday in response to Team Canada’s gold medal hockey win over the U.S. Sunday.

103.3 The Edge announced its plans on their website prior to canning Canadian content. American listeners joined in on the fun, by encouraging the station to continue to ban northern music permanently until the next Olympics.

“We hope you understand our passive-aggressiveness,” read part of the message on The Edge’s site.
The station said it’s nothing personal, but they needed to do something to make them feel superior to us, even if it was just for a day.

For All Those Lonely Dentists

Exhibit A - Lady Gaga singing a song from her new album - "Teeth"



Exhibit B - Lady Gaga accidentaly bashing out the teeth of one of her dancers while in concert

Where Was I When That Happened?

I was washing my hands after urinating this evening and looked at myself in the mirror. I noticed that one corner of my "eye skin" was all dark. I mentally chastised myself for having got my eye region so dirty and not realized it. Thusly, I began to try and wash away the dark spot. It turned out not to be dirt, grease or sin, but bruising. I have a partial black eye and NO idea how it got like that. Zero.

It's just a little guy, but still so strange.


I'll let you know if baby spiders hatch out of it, or if the police show up at my door looking for a statement.

Good Point

Open note to homemade soap makers - your bars of soap should not have corners so sharp that they can tear skin.

Ow.

Normative...Not!

Due to certain terrible, terrible pains while trying to use the left side of my mouth to chew I need to go to the dentist.

My appointment is at 8am this morning. Yup, 8am on a Monday morning, the dentist. Since I haven't been to a dentist since the summer of '03, I can only assume that this will be nothing but a pleasant experience.

Cough.

Birth Control

You know how they have Take Your Kids To Work day? Well I was thinking about another day/night they should have for high school aged people (or really anyone considering bringing spawn into the world) - a sort of birth control, abstinence, safe sex over night trip. The trip would involve staying with a family that had children while the children were puking or having bad colds in the middle of the night. The victim/teenager/adult would be on bucket brigade and mop duty (or carpet stain removal). I don't know, but dealing with multiple puking little ones at 3am doesn't make me horny.

I tried to come up with some pithy slogans for this initiative. This was the best I could come up with - feel free to add your own...

• Other people's kids: making you less horny since they started puking at 3am.
• Think you're ready to be a Daddy, tough guy? Explain to your 18 month old why he can't breath.
• Does puke make you puke? Then keep your pants on!
• The 100% successful birth control - a combination of other people's kids and abstinence.
• Don't be a chump. Before you hump, think about a night of runny stuff coming out of their rump. (too far?)
• Abstinence; it-snot the worst thing that ever happened to you.
• Cough, cough, cough, cough, what? Keep it in your drawers.
• Nothin' spells lovin' like vomit chunk covered laundry in the middle of the night!
  

Important Life Lesson

Even if you wash your hands after, it is good to remember to put your contact lenses in before you put muscle rub on.

Oh the burning.

Good For The Ego

I got legitimately beat in cards by a 5 year old this weekend.

Ouch.

And You Thought You Were Having A Bad Day

The Drama of Trauma

How To Be Sensitive

A quick update on the leg -





As you can see there is still lots of bruising, but slowly the swelling is coming back down. Unfortunately that seems to mean that the leg is becoming a lot more sensitive and hurting all of the time. I'm a little disappointed that its still so hurty and in some ways more painful. I knew I'd have a gross bruise but this lasting pain is getting a little much - to the point where its making me nauseous. You know its starting to get to me when I'm very seriously considering not playing in Thursday's game. I'm going to see Tony M on Thursday and see what he can do for pain relief and healing. I'm sure by Saturday's celebration of Kat & Joel's love it'll be fine and I'll be able to dance all night.

Realism is what I do best!

Tissue! I Don't Even Know You!

A few loving people expressed some concern over the state of my leg. I can say that I did share much of their concern. There was some talk that I should consult a live medical practitioner. I already had a chiropractic appointment, so I figured I would consult Tony. He's a chiropractor, but his practice specializes in accident and injury management. Initially he figured I bruised the ever living snot out of it. But after some poking and prodding he noticed that one of the ridges down my shin was well, missing. It was hard to tell if that was just a LOT of fluid from the swelling or something worse. So he busted out the tuning fork and the vibrations of that made me hurt more. Therefore he suggested a trip to the ER.

It would be summer, and it wouldn't be August without a trip to the ER for me. So off I toddled and can I just say - I got in and out in 2 hours!! Because it was an ambulatory thing I got routed through there rather than the regular ER. So I saw a doctor after only hour in the hospital and then in the next hour I got x-rays done and heard the results! Whoot.

The results were that there was no breakage or chippage, just a LOT of soft tissue damage. I need to keep it elevated and iced. Its still pretty hurty. Today's prodding made things pretty tender. So I'll keep trying to make it get better and make it stop hurting so much.

Thanks for your concern.

That's Swell Of You

Last night


This morning (after having had it elevated all night)

I Love This Game

We played 3 games this week. All of which we won. (yessss!) They were all good games, two of them close in score and with some almost epic battles.

Now, I don't know if its a family thing, or a country girl thing or a Canadian thing, but I really like a physical style of play. If I come home clean, with all my skin and no bruises I feel like I've failed.

As you will see from the following pictures. I did not fail this week.

These legs shots are of a footprint in my leg. There was a play between first and second, the runner was coming, the ball was coming. The runner began his slide and rather than the bag or the ground being the first thing his foot (with all the momentum of a grown man) hit, it was my leg. More specifically, my shin and calf. It was a little hurty.







Then in this morning's first game, I pitched for an inning. There was a rocket hit towards and middle and I caught it. The scorekeeper of the other team asked how I caught it. I told him I've just been playing for a long time. Someone else started calling me El Diablo - but personally I don't think that I am Satan or that he helped me catch it. I do know that my glove has a very little padding left.







I also know that I keep thinking the glasses I'm drinking out of have bumps in them. But it turns out that its my hand that has the bump in it. And I know that I every time I put my foot back on the ground (I've been trying to keep it up) it tingles and hurts like mad. The last thing I know is that it kind of hurts to type.

Good night.

Slowly

I began to make my return to life this week. It was/is exhausting. I had to pick and choose what I had the energy for. And when I wasn't expending energy I was lying down somewhere. For the most part I'm getting much better. I can breath out of my nose 90% of the time. Most coughing is for maintenance (unless I get riled up - which you know, never happens to me as I am very calm and am rarely excitable).

I went back to singing this week. Which may admittedly might have been a bit early. But tonight is my final choir concert as an undergrad and I am in a quartet for a motet and well, as I have said a few times this week - that I will be cold, dead and in the ground before I don't sing in the concert. You don't become the longest standing concert choir member ever by letting a little pneumonia get to you. Heck no. The singing hasn't been too bad. My voice sounds bad afterwards - which I'm guessing is just pure fatigue, but I can sing, and sing pretty well. It is still hard to breath - so I've had to break things up a little more than usual. Ha ha, I went to my voice lesson yesterday and tried an aria that I have to sing at the recital on Monday - holding the sustained notes and trying to get enough air in for them made me dizzy! It was crazy.

Rest assured that I know I am crazy to do what I'm going to do over the next 24hrs. I know I'll regret parts of it as I spend the rest of the weekend in bed. But I know I would regret so much more not singing in this concert (the line up is SO good and so are the singers!). My parents are currently on their way here. So I will have lunch with them and hang for a bit. Then they will do a couple things they need to take care of - I will lay down for a bit and then make myself pretty for the concert. We have a call time of 5:30, but since I am crazy and responsible, I will be there at 5. We have a rehearsal for an hour and then half an hour break (where I will find a couch to crash on) and then we get robed and do final preps. The concert will be a couple of hours with intermission. And then I'm gonna rely on the Holy Spirit to keep giving me energy so that I can celebrate afterwards with both family and friends. Finally Saturday morning my parents and I will keep our tradition of going to the Egg & I and doing a bit of shopping. Apres ca, I will crash.

So you can see that I've healed enough to be able to push. I take that as a victory. Last week I couldn't push. And really, I don't have anything scheduled after my parents leave on Saturday until Monday's voice recital. I'm golden. Right?

Seeing The White Light, Starting To Walk Towards It, Then Having A Rope Thrown Around My Waist And Being Brought Back

This is me. I'm recovering from pneumonia. And I'm being told that one of the best ways for me to recover quicker is to rest and stay quiet. Thusly, my bed, its many blankets and pillows are where I am based.

(click for larger versions of pics)






I have a pretty good set up here in my room. One of the keys to me just shutting up and not moving around is to have pretty much anything I could need within arms reach. In these next two pics you'll see my bedside table; complete with an arsenal of things to help me through this and my desk chair - aka the current house for my laptop. The laptop being my non-talking conduit to the outside world and my entertainment centre.








There are a few other things that help recovery. One of those is motivation. I decided that being sick is lame, and that I'm getting tired of canceling things, and ending up in tears because I'm missing everything that is fun or cool. In conjunction with the decision that being sick is lame, I decided that when my Levquin (the stomach eating, germ killing antibiotic I'm on) is done that I will be better.

Just so I can keep track of this better getting, I made a motivational count down board. You'll see the hand coloured (which I am pretty dang proud of) mini-banner that says Days Until I'm Better. You'll also probably recognize that Holy guy in the middle of the banner, His name is Jesus, we're friends. Underneath the banner are the packets of Levaquin, all labeled with the day I have to take them. As I finish the pack I break it down and change it's position on the wall. Ta da.








Another recovery thinger is the whole coughing/not coughing ratio. Coughing in many ways is good for me, so that I can get the "shit" out of my lung. But coughing hurts the throat (which I need to sing in this Friday's choir concert, where I have a special line to sing). And coughing really hurts after I woke up the other night in one my usual coughing fits, but managed to tear/pull/rip something in/on my left side. Three of my best friends in the coughing/not coughing battle are here - vapo rub, lozenges and cough syrup (with expectorant!).






And here is some of the collateral damage of the cold that turned to bronchitis that turned to pneumonia - 2 of the 4 empty boxes of kleenex, the empty bottle of all in one cough syrup and an empty bag of lozenges.




a few more pics, and hilarious sets up can be found here.

Things That Are Key To Healing

• bendy straws
• popsicles
• the world wide interweb
• frozen raspberries
• the film industry
• music
• the prayers of those who love me
• crayons
• shoppers drugmart
• so many blankets
• so many pillows
• a very well organized bedside table
• well timed mail
• well timed visits
• soup made specifically for me but not by me
• a dr who actually knows what he's doing
• people to delegate to
• sunshine
• Jesus
• God
• Bible
• structure/direction
• instant messaging - the way to talk without talking & my window to the outside world
• white cranberry - peach juice
• hot tamales
  
• time
  

Welcome To Pneumonia Town

Population LStew.

One Of My Parents Thinks I'm More Sensible Than I Am

(over msn this morning)

Dad: how ya feelin' this morning?

Me: pretty exhausted, but the pain is getting better

Dad: how was citb?

Me: good. loud. probably shouldn't have pushed myself that hard - but, well, when do i *not* do that

Dad: he he he.....i win

Me: you win?

Dad: mom was betting you wouldn't go, i said, 'heck yes!"



Sorry Mom, I hope the wager wasn't too steep.