Pure Love

I had to post this picture because I love my Scooby soooo much. She just got married to a terrific guy and I cannot believe she is all grown up. Thanks for the pic, Mom. Steve called it "Teeth and Cheeks". :)



Sorry I cried during my entire toast to you and Stewie at the wedding. :)

Interesting Cemetery

So while we were in New Orleans, we decided we wanted to experience a bit of the more ghoulish side of things. We were headed to the Ninth Ward, where a significant amount of Katrina damage can still be seen and where you can still feel the the walking souls and death, when we passed by a very old, very decrepid above-ground cemetery. Of course we had to stop and of course I had to take *too* many pictures.

In the above picture - seriously - a drain???? What's down there???



It was almost like walking into an apartment complex for the dead.



Some of them (below) made me feel like the souls were sealed off and banished to the grave forever:



I expected someone to come out and mow the lawn on some. Or maybe the soul of a doggy to come running out and bark at the fence?


Was there any soul here, kneeling, praying? Did I walk right past someone?




It's hard to read, but this was the grave of a PFC from World War II. It gave me a sense of creepy patriotism:

This one was like a mini prison grave:


The one below just looks like a darned kiln (crematorium). I looked for any remaining bones but didn't see any. (haha)



And yes, someone was actually squatting in this one!!! I tried to get Steve to lay in it but it grossed me out too much.


And this is what you get if you don't have much money:



I believe this particular cemetery is one of the ones that supposedly is haunted. Of course we didn't know that until later, when we were looking at some flyers for "things to do in New Orleans" and we saw some pictures of this exact place. Considering we walked around in here for quite some time, I'm certain we absorbed some spiritual energy without even knowing it!! :)

Crawfish

Now, down south where I'm from, eating crawfish is a pretty big deal. It's kinda like the BBQs we have out here (we have the BEST weather for that!!) except on a larger, more social scale. There's just something about hanging out, drinking beer, swatting mosquitos and boiling crawfish that brings a family together. :)

Steve had crawfish a few times, but never quite like we do it in the south. We had our first taste at a small place in New Iberia, La. It wasn't the usual, large social gathering, but that was coming up a little later. I told Steve he had to "suck the head" to get the spices out, and so he did:


I neglected to mention at the time that I don't actually do that. :) But *Real Men* do. :)

So when we got to my sister's house in Houston, we all decided that boiling a bunch of mudbugs was the thing to do. My BIL, Kenny, got 40 lbs of 'em and away we went. He taught Steve how to purge the crawfish, and Steve just found this to be entirely too much fun:



He almost couldn't wait until they were boiled!



But eventually we got 'em boiled along with corn, potatoes, mushrooms, deer sausage, etc. It put a huge smile on my face.


I miss the south. It's so much more interesting than any place on earth.

Best Vacation So Far!

Steve and I took off for the south a few weeks ago. We drove from New Orleans, La to Houston, Tx and had a fabulous time!

It started with this at Harrah's in New Orleans:


The coolest bar I've ever seen! Yes that is a tray encircling the bar, chilled and coated with ice. You just keep your drink on it and it stays cold. GREAT idea!!!

This, of course, led to this:




Which then led to this:



I ended up winning about $640 with this little lucky slot! It was still counting when I took this picture. :)

After leaving New Orleans, we headed to Avery Island, La. Steve had never been south before, so showing him my neck of the woods was a ton of fun! I thought that knowing where Tabasco sauce is made is pretty important in the grand scheme of things, so off we went.

Yes it really was this beautiful! This is a photo of the entrance to Jungle Gardens, a 4 acre garden of gorgeous trees and plants, along with swamp. It's a driving tour so you don't have to walk it, but you can stop your car and take pictures along the way. And believe me, this is how to do it. 4 miles ain't much, but it's halfway around the world when you have to battle the mosquitos this place had to offer!

The day wouldn't have been complete had we not eaten some boudin and some hot links along with some icy cold beer in front of the Tabasco store.


After Avery Island we headed a few hours west to Lake Charles, my home town, for the most part. We saw some significant Katrina damage that *still* is not repaired, and found a cemetary that I swear I never saw before, despite knowing that town pretty darned well. There was a crazy statue of Jesus in this cemetary and, well, being the atheistic heathens that we are, we had to make some fun:



Okay so we're not *that* bad, but we just could not resist taking this picture. But seriously, this cemetery was so cool and I have a huge interest in exploring these old places. There is just something cool about seeing graves that are over a hundred years old! And this particular cemetery held the graves of the founders of Lake Charles. Pretty darned cool.


I'm gonna start a new thread so this one doesn't get too long. I haven't even gotten to the best part of the trip yet!

Nasally Stuff

Last October, I got a cold. Nothing out of the ordinary, but it hung on. Because we were getting married on Thanksgiving, I called my doctor and she put me on oral antibiotics. No biggee, except that I didn't really get over the cold. In fact, I was sick on my wedding night with a sore throat and extreme exhaustion. My honeymoon was spent sniffling and coughing and resting. :(

I sort of got over it but never 100%, and at the end of December, I got sick again. Went on antibiotics again. Sort of got over it but not 100%.

I got sick again in Jan. Went on antibiotics AGAIN. Sort of got over it but not 100% and at this time, had been coughing since October. I don't mean a light "cough cough" I mean a loud, honking "HACK HACK" kind of cough.

At the beginning of March, we headed to Yosemite for our annual trip and on Day 1 of the conference, I got so sick I missed the REST of the conference. There we sat, in a great hotel room, in one of the world's most beautiful National Parks, and I was sicker than I'd ever been.

At this point I was convinced I had lung cancer and Steve and I were extremely emotional. We got a hold of our doctor and scheduled an appointment with a CT scan and chest xrays - results showed a severely abscessed sinus cavity!

Surgery was scheduled. Thank god.

So they roto-rooted out my sinus cavity, and it helped quite a bit. The only part that sucked, and I mean SUCKED, was that after surgery, they packed my sinuses with a strange torture device known as a "nasal tampon". Not so bad, until they pull the darned things out!

Just imagine having your nose stuffed full of fully expanded tampons. Now imagine someone YANKING it out it right after having the sinus cavity scraped clean (read: raw and irritated and bleeding and painful) without giving you any good drugs to aid in the process.

Did I say it SUCKED?

So now I'm here, about 2 months since surgery, and I have to say that while I'm not totally normal yet, I do feel a LOT better. No more colds, headaches, coughing, etc. Hopefully this thing will work. I am a bit more "nasally" than before, which I think is due to the new holes they cut into my sinuses to facilitate drainage, but it is what it is... as long as I'm not sick, I'm happy. I'll give up my singing voice for now.

I just had to post this one because of the SUCKAGE of the nasal tampons. I just can't reiterate that enough. So let me know if you're going to need this procedure - I'll be sure to lie to you like my doctor did to me, and tell you "it's not so bad, just a little uncomfortable". :)

On Turning 40...

I have to say that I had the BEST birthday this year and I have Steve to thank for it. Last week, on my actual b-day, he gave me my first "gift": a Wii!! We've been competing ever since. :) He got us several games, the Wii Fit and a lot of extra gadgets that go with it. Since I'm pretty compromised at operating these things, it's definitely something that we are able do to "together". (read: he has to show me how to work it)

Then on Saturday, he threw me a big party here at the house. Lots of fun! Old friends, new friends, staff members, etc came and helped me celebrate. Everyone ended up in the pool at least once, of course, and I hung out in the spa while Poppy grilled the food.

After that, all I knew was that 1.) we were going somewhere and 2.) I'd need an overnight bag. This isn't the first time my love has done this; he's really good at giving me surprise prizes. So Sunday morning, we packed and headed out.

First we went and saw the new Star Trek movie. Yeah! It was great! And, we both had been wanting to see it so that was a nice thing to do at 10am when it wasn't crowded. Afterwards, I was thinkin', "he had me pack a bag to throw me off so he could take me to a movie?". I should have known better. WAY better.

We headed down the hill and he still would not tell me where we were going. It wasn't until we were almost there that I figured it out: he had reserved us a large, beautiful suite at the Mission Inn in Riverside! This is one of my FAVORITE places to hang out! Simply gorgeous! So after checking into our beautiful room, he tells me there's one more prize and that I need to change clothes for that; then we headed down to the spa for a surprise couples massage. Those are ALWAYS great!!

This is a view from the window in our room:


After our massage, we headed to the bar, enjoyed some good drinks, some halibut ceviche, and then went off to dinner. I had one of the best prime rib dinners I've ever had, and Steve had a Surf and Turf special. It was absolutely fabulous!

Another view, from another window, in our ginormous suite:


We slowly got up and out of bed on Monday and headed back home to the real world.

Thank you, my beautiful husband, for making me feel loved and special and beautiful and all of those things that a husband is supposed to do for his wife. There is no bigger motivation to make a marriage the best it can be than for both spouses to simply love and be kind to each other.

Everything else falls into place. :)

Bruce!!

The Boss

Oct. 29th, 2007 was a very special night for me. See, my super cool boyfriend (now Hubby) surprised me with Bruce Springsteen tickets! My ex couldn't get a clue for 13 years that I really wanted to see him in concert but I mentioned it to Steve ONCE and he came up with tickets! He's a keeper. :)

When we showed up to get our wristbands, we were assigned a number somewhere between 1 and 1000. We were 612 and 613. The way Bruce lets the floor ticket holders into the building is like this: a fan picks a number and that number becomes Number One for the count, on who gets to enter the building first. Well, well... the number picked was 597 - we were the first 20 people to get into the show!!! What that means is we were in the first group to get to the stage - so not only did I get to see my favorite performer of all time, I got to stand 5 feet away from him the entire night! I got to see everything, including the sweat pouring off his body and the snot running from his nose. :)

It was absolutely an amazing night. Thank you, Honey. :)

What My Babysitter Did on Easter

Some things are just wrong:

Poor little blind doggie. :)

Another old blog...

I really love this post. It's an oldy but goody.


Monday, November 28, 2005

Loss of Innocence
Current mood: thoughtful
Category: Life

So I've been thinking about and talking about the loss of innocence quite a bit lately. It's one of those phrases that pops up in threes - you don't hear about it too much but when you do, it's all over the place. The loss of innocence to me, is that feeling you get when you realize something simply isn't true for you anymore. It all started with that realization that there was no Santa Clause, no Easter Bunny, no Tooth Fairy... the disappointment you feel as a child, when something you believed in wholeheartedly becomes a thing of the past. When my mom and sister informed me that Santa Claus was a farce, I argued with them - there was no way that could be true! I believed with so much of my soul and I KNEW I had heard him on the roof one night - I was sure they were simply playing an evil trick on me! As we get older, it's more of the same on a grander scale. I was talking to Val last night and of course we ventured into the land of this topic - the loss of innocence now means a loss of that feeling of happily-ever-after, of love solving all problems... losing that ability to love and trust blindly. The realization that you cannot get to know a person for years and years and the risk you take during that timespan. It is the feeling of being jaded in our thirtysomething years. It is feeling a little bit more alone on the inside, despite having loved ones around us. People give out information about themselves in bits and pieces. It is up to those around them to assimilate that information into a map of who we are. Being married for 12 years... my loss of innocence is the realization that I am sliding down hill, kicking my feet madly and wildly against the rubble that is slipping down with me... trying so hard to ignore that loss of ability to love and trust blindly. Don't worry, Val. I got your back.

Early Morning Desert House

Just wanted to post some pics I took this morning. It's beautiful outside, cool with some clouds. Very different from how it'll be in a few hours, which is why I plan to stay in the pool ALL DAY.

Everything's a-bloomin'....




My Yuccas look GREAT!

You can see my one large Ocotillo that is still trying to survive. It sometimes takes a few years before these will get going, and this big guy has only been in the ground for less than a year.



While I do miss Louisiana Rain, this is my favorite time of year in the desert!!! Just simply gorgeous and soul soothing.

Early Arm Strength

I said I'd post pics of my pull-up journey. Here's me hanging just to toughen up my hands:




Here's the 2 inch curl that I can now do. Don't knock it; it's more than I could do a week ago!



Definitely a work in progress, I am looking forward to getting to the bar in proper form both in curl position and lat position. :)

And, per my beautiful husband, no gym pics would be complete without a shot of our rec room, created for us by us. We stripped the whole room down, painted, added indoor/outdoor carpet, installed a refrigerator and put the equipment of our choice in there: a pilates machine, my 5 year old faithful treadmill, the pull up contraption and of course, free weights. We also have a t.v with cable in there, strictly so we can get some good tunes during our workouts.


Anybody wanna come over and work out with me?? :)

The Pull Up Goal

I've always struggled with my weight. It sucks. But it's my reality, and the cycle of up-and-down is just part of living for me. I actually love to exercise (walk and run) but having the time or lifestyle to always get it done is just not always possible.

However, despite my love affair with exercise, something I have never been able to do are pull-ups. I mean the kind that made Linda Hamilton famous from Terminator II. I want to do that. And I want to do them well. And it has become my obsession for my 40th birthday.

So, I invoked the knowledge of my exercise guru, Steve My Husband. I've never in my life seen a man who could do pull-ups like him, and I have to admit, it was one of those initial reasons why I fell in lust I mean love with him. He told me that, first, I must learn to hang from a bar. My response was, "oh come on, that's just retarded!" So I hang for about 2 seconds and well, he was right. How can you expect to pull yourself up on that stupid bar if you don't even have the strength much less toughened hands to just HANG there?

So my first week started off as hanging for as long as I could from the bar. I hang in the pull-up position and the curl position.

Second week, I got smarter. I bought some workout gloves. They help! But I still get a painful red line where the skin on my hands revolts and resents me for even trying this cockamamie idea.

I'm now on my third week of trying to do pull-ups. I can hang for a while now, and I can even pull myself up a few inches! I know, baby steps. But hey, you get out there, at 40 years old and overweight, and act like Linda Hamilton. I don't even remotely care about skinny people who can do them - I'm 40 lbs overweight for pete's sake!! If I can do them at this size, I'll be mimicking Linda Hamilton with EASE when I get back down to a normal weight.

Bring it on, skinny show-offs.

More to come on the pull-up adventure including some way-too-funny pics of me attempting to accomplish this goal. :)

The Progression of Our Abode

I wanted to share the progression and improvement of our house. What started off as a boring old house is slowly transforming into our Den of Peace. It began with a small landscaping project last year that morphed into a 110 ton rockscape! I thought it would never start to look good because all of the plants were new, scraggly and not blooming, but this year - WOW! I am so proud of it! I walk around on our little acre every day and just absorb the sunshine and happiness exuded by my yard.


It started off as this with crappy grass and out-of-date hedges:

This is an in-process pic from summer 2007 when we started painting:

We changed it from dark and dreary to bright and airy:

Started with the landscaping in summer 2008:

And these were taken last night. Everything is so green and blooming and even though it doesn't look like it, it's actually desert friendly!!!!

I even have my favorite, a blooming ocotillo!

It's been quite the journey but it brings so much peace after a busy day, it's just incomparable. Love it!!

Passports and Repeatable Processes

It occurred to me the other day that my sister is nearing 50. Okay, so she's not there yet, but the initial thought of having to say "my sister is 50" hit me and it was just so weird. Say what you want, but we're not that old. We're not about to hit the halfway mark of our lives. In my mind, my sister and I are still in our twenties, still trying to figure out life and make sense of it all. But I'm turning 40 soon and while it doesn't *bother* me to be 40, there is a strange sensation present when I think about it.

One thing that's kind of cool about getting to be this age, is that you start to *really* see the patterns in your life. I don't mean patterns like... you keep making the same bad decisions over and over again. I mean... you now have had several bank accounts; you've probably had at least a few houses; you've moved at least a few times; maybe you've had more than one marriage or maybe you've even had more than one kid with more than one marriage. You've traveled, you've experienced things and for most of us, experiencing things for the second or even third time is now occurring.

When I renewed my passport recently, it got me to thinking about this repeatable part of my life. Not so different than a repeated home purchase or a car purchase, a driver's license, or hell, even a new marriage. It's the ultimate of reality of "nothing is new anymore".

It's not a bad thing; I welcome the comfort of repeatable processes. It's just a different reality than when I was in my twenties and everything was "new". We'll all get to this point eventually, and hopefully everyone will enjoy the comfort of it as much as I do.

Chip Lids

I had to tell ONE bragging story about my eyes. :)

Two days after my surgery, I woke up at 2am with a feeling of dried potato chips behind my eyelids. I immediately panicked, and had terrible visions about having to have corneal transplants because I'd just detached my corneal flaps and would never be able to see again. I was scared to even wake up Steve and tell him how stupid I was and that he was now the proud owner of a blind veterinarian!

At 6am, Steve woke up and I told him what happened, and I started crying out of extreme fear. He asked me if I could see... and I could - perfectly. But my eyes were miserable and no matter what I did I could not get them to feel comfortable. So I called the emergency number and they told me to give it a little time, and to call back if it wasn't better in a few hours. They suspected severe dry eye.

But, wake up to the sensation of potato chips behind your eyelids and see if you don't panic!

So at 8am on a Saturday morning, I called my regular optometrist, who was also my LASIK referring doctor. He graciously met me at his office 30 minutes later, and examined my eyes. He told me I was having an allergy attack, and put some drops in my eyes that solved the problem.

I cannot convey the sense of relief I felt! Steve was glad that he wasn't going to have to support his now-disability-thriving girlfriend for life. :)

As he was examining my eyes, the doctor asked me if I had put make up on before coming to his office. I said No, that I never wear it - literally. He said, "so your eyes are naturally that beautiful?"

I beamed. :)

Going down the road of Lasik in July, 2007

In other news, I recently gave up the battle of wearing glasses, bit the bullet of bravery and had LASIK done on my eyes. The procedure sucked, I kid you not; and, given the fact that I am a scaredy-cat, I nearly peed (how do you spell that?) my pants while it was being performed.

They give you a half dose of Xanax before the procedure, but it barely has time to kick in before they start. They expect you to lay there and let them stick things in your eye without moving, they expect you to be still while they put something called a suction ring on your eyeball; they say, "you'll feel a little bit of pressure..." and so you expect *a little bit of pressure* on your eye, but it feels like a CAR was just set there. It's over REALLY quickly, thank god... but scary as fuck.

Halfway through the procedure the Xanax kicked in and I was chilling, and the part where they actually peel back your corneas and perform the procedure on the underlying tissue of the eye sounds really scary, but it's actually a hallucinogenic light show that you get to watch in awe. It takes only about 30 seconds per eye, and the nurse actually counts down for you while it's happening.

Then it's over with, you get up in a drunken state and go home. You're supposed to keep your eyes closed for at least 6 hours post-op, which was not a problem considering you've just had a milligram and a half of good drug and you want to sleep.

I vaguely remember Steve making me eat a baloney sandwich before I fell asleep, and 2 seconds later (6 hours later) waking me up to eat dinner. I love that drug. :)

Today was my 2 week recheck, and my doctor told me I'm the poster child for the surgery. I am seeing a little better than 20/20 and my eyes are healing wonderfully. Suffice it to say I've been extraordinarily anal retentive about them - whining if anyone gets near my eyes - but it's paying off.

I can't tell you how wonderful it is to wake up and see the mountains from my window without having to find my glasses first. :)

The last post on Myspace from Mar 23, 2008....

Category: Religion and Philosophy

I’ve always been stuck in AP (analysis paralysis). Never escaped it. I’ve always analyzed life and tried to understand the universe and tried to figure out my place in it. One thing I have discovered, though, is that as I get older, I have more questions to ask, and every so often I get a glimpse of what the world will be like without me in it. I remember my dad telling me when I was about 10 yrs old, that when you get to your 30s or 40s, you start to "feel your mortality". He was right.

I don’t have kids and won’t have kids, at least not intentionally. :) But that fact does create an emotion of feeling how finite you truly are. I won’t pass anything along. When I’m gone, everything that is me, will be gone.

Some days that is big. Some days it makes me cry and I go to Steve and ask him, "what is wrong with me? Why didn’t I have kids? Why didn’t I WANT kids?" But it passes and on top of that, the desire to have them still does not permeate the decision and make me long for something I did not do.

Then one day I realized something else: if I died tomorrow, who would take care of my dog child? I instantly understood those "crazy" clients who give me letters asking me to euthanize their pets in case of their death, so that they won’t suffer and so they can be buried with them. I don’t see that as being so crazy now - I understand where they are coming from. And, I also realized that if I had a child, that feeling would be something that would make me want to live forever because the idea of leaving that child alone in the world without me would be just too much to bear.


My mom once told me that her greatest gift from the universe was having 3 kids who could all take care of themselves. I think I understand that now.


Owning a practice sent me into yet another deep, long journey of self-discovery. Maybe it’s the super hard work. Or the super long hours. Or the renewed sense of fear and failure that I am feeling. But either way, it has reinstilled my pride in myself for achieving the goal of being a veterinarian - of being a part of a very small, elite group of individuals who help those who cannot help themselves.

And I am referring to the humans, not just the animals.

So what I hope is that my mark on this world will not be in the form of another human. It will be in the form of my kindness and concern for others, so that somewhere down the line someone will remember me because of the extreme kindness I showed them, and for no reason other than that.

Tell me dad, what will I feel in my 50s?