Demetri Martin on exercise: I go the gym and I try to run on the treadmill and I listen to music but it doesn’t motivate me enough. So I’m going to get a recording of a pack of wolves gaining on me. People would be like, ‘Why is that guy crying on that treadmill over there?’ ‘I don’t know, but he’s been yelling, ‘help’ for like 20 minutes. He’s getting a good workout.’
In case the previous quote didn’t cue you in, this week’s theme is a mix to get motivated to do, well, anything.
Trust me, I need all the motivation I can get these days, especially in the exercise area. While I haven’t gained any weight according to the scale, I am certainly gaining what is known as the middle age spread. I am not planning on subsisting on ten calories a day or eating nothing but cabbage for six months, so instead I am simply trying to spend more time at the gym. I already lift, but I hate cardio. My schedule doesn’t allow me to attend fitness classes like I used to, so I’m just trying to walk whenever I can.
So here is a sampling of the songs on my Iphone that motivate me to get moving. And I behaved myself this week and stayed as close to five as possible. Are they working? Ummmm… sort of.
Did I mention I saw these guys LIVE in CONCERT? What? I did? A few too many times?
Let’s Get Rocked-Def Leppard
Blame Percy Jackson…
My Songs Know What You Did In The Dark-Fall Out Boy
Fun to sing, especially in the shower.
As If-Sara Evans
I really don’t think I need buns of steel. I’d be happier with buns of cinnamon.-Ellen Degeneres
The video to this song is probably going to cause me to lose my “family-friendly” rating here. So do me a favor, if you watch it a) Don’t be offended-because trust me, this particular group has made waaaay more offensive stuff than this. b) DO NOT watch it with children in the room, unless you want to field some uncomfortable questions. “Mommy, why is that guy’s crotch like a light bulb?”
Now, forget all of that and please listen to this very motivating song.
Danger! High Voltage-Electric Six
Moving on…
Viva La Vida-Coldplay
I’m not a huge Britney Spears fan, but good lord that girl sings some catchy stuff that makes you want to move!
Til The World Ends-Britney Spears
I should work out. It’s hard to find time to work out when you really don’t want to.-Jim Gaffigan
I love this song. I don’t know why…
DJ Got Us Falling In Love Again-Usher
Hell yeah Josh Turner, I’d go with you.
Would You Go With Me?-Josh Turner
What songs motivate you to do stuff? Check out the links over at My Skewed View to see what gets other people motivated!
Now that I’m finally fully recovered from intestinal fortitude I’m facing the reality of having two kids here for another week all day long… Oh Calgon, take me away, PLEASE!
Thank goodness it’s almost a new year. 2013 was an interesting year for me. It wasn’t the best year but not the worst either. Here’s my year by looking back at a sampling of the stuff I wrote. I also added pictures that may or may not have something to do with the posts themselves.
But first, get yourself some tuneage to listen to as you read. Head to My Skewed View and check out what people have shared as their very favorite Twisted Mixtape Tuesday of 2013!
January
Not too bad. I was even complimented on my use of sprinkles by said local celebrity.
I made a cake that actually turned out ok for my son’s birthday. My husband told me as I began to plan for this year’s cake that the reason we don’t buy cakes is because it’s much less interesting to blog about. True… The ADD Kitchen Chapter 3: Why Duff Goldman Will Never Hire Me
February I went back to work subbing at the place I used to work before I had two kids. How cool is that? Things didn’t start out so smoothly, but it got better. My Life of Crime: Subliminal Criminal
I wrote a review of the book I Just Want To Pee Alone, and one of the times that maybe I should have been thinking a little more clearly before I allowed my daughter to photograph me became the picture seen round the world. It’s also probably as close to famous as I’m ever going to get so I guess I’ll take it. I Review Famous Toilets, Or At Least A Book With A Toilet On It
I took some real time off from everything because I was celebrating being married and stuff and had other people once again do the work for me. Talk about some great posts! I was blown away from the response I got from the week of guest bloggers. Weekly Wrap-Up: The Double Extra Special Edition
October
Somehow I was permitted to review another book! I still think it needs action figures… Meltdowns…Reviewed
The kids on Halloween in front of the tree that would eventually flood our basement. Damn tree.
I was a little busy, but I managed to keep writing some stuff.
Enter the family Christmas this past weekend: A little more than twenty four hours spent doing Christmas with two different families two and a half hours away from home. Plus a visit to a third on the way home. Busy, busy, busy.
My stomach was rumbly. I figured it was just all of the fish chowder I ate. Or stress. Or lack of sleep. Or kids. Or that I’m crazy. I downed a Coke or two or seven and ignored it.
And while we were doing Christmas we received quite a few gifts. However we got one additional one that we were not expecting. A wonderful group of people in the blogging world got together to help us out in our time of stinkiness by making sure that we didn’t have to wait until after the fact to celebrate our Christmas day at home. It’s something that I’ll never forget.
Again, for the zillionth time, thank you my friends.
Thanks to this thoughtful gift, the Monday after our weekend jaunt was spent at Target getting the presents that we had been putting off. Even though I’d been up all night the night before with a stomachache, I was dead tired, and I felt like my food had been sitting at the bottom of my throat for two days, I was going to get my shopping finished!
As it turns out, I was pretty much spot on. After I finished all of my shopping, I topped it off by puking for five minutes in the store bathroom. Pretty much everything I had eaten the past day or two. Isn’t that magical? I’m sure that the people in the bathroom who heard me making sounds like I was dying thought so.
Then I came home and slept and puked and slept and puked in a vicious cycle that lasted through Christmas Eve. I know there were things going on around me. My kids played, they checked on me, they asked me for stuff. At times I even responded with a half conscious “Honey I love you, I’m not being lazy I’m just really sick.”
I vaguely remember Evil Genius wrapping all the presents, doing the last minute grocery shopping, cooking all the meals, renting some movies, and even washing some dishes. If there was a medal for that, I’m sure I’d dip it in chocolate and give it to him.
I said I wanted to rest and not gain any weight this Christmas, I didn’t mean it quite like that!
Luckily, I recovered enough to enjoy my kids opening their presents, and a wonderful dinner and dessert cooked by Evil Genius. I was even conscious for most of it.
See the tie-dyed shirt that Evil Genius is wearing? Is that not the coolest shirt ever in the history of geekdom. And sadly not in my size.
Now that Christmas is over, it’s back to the real world. I’m still not feeling well *urp* but there are no more excuses and I have to work as well as attempt to do those things known as chores. The kids are for the most part well entertained by their gifts, except when they’re not. Yesterday as I attempted to do the working from home part of my job I heard my daughter yell at least once “Mommy I’m LONELY!”
Translation-she’s ready to go back to school already. We’re only a little ways into the SIXTEEN day break that the kids have this year. Wow. They have it rough. We may not survive this…
The Professor is good, because he has a lot of screens to look at and that makes him happy. Except when he’s not.
Oh… and the Christmas card? Remember that from last week’s Fly on the Wall post? After all that had happened, I thought I had better be a good girl and take them with me while I was visiting family and work on them in the spare time I foolishly thought I would have.
Then I left them at my mom’s house, because apparently the flu which infected my gut had already seeped into my brain, I just didn’t know it.
Once my brain began comprehending things, I mentioned something to my mom and she immediately sent them to me, only they no longer can be considered Christmas cards. We’re now in the beginning stages of turning them into New Year’s cards, with only a few days before I have to send them. The beginning stages as in I bought stuff to make them with and have felt too lousy and had too little time to do anything with them.
We’ll see how long before I just give up and figure that this year Christmas has just officially kicked my butt.
I hope you are all having a joyous holiday thus far! I hope you actually got your Christmas cards sent out, enjoyed a lovely time with your family, and are enjoying the stretch of time between the two holidays without any sort of poop or puke in your midst. Let me know how your holiday went by telling me in the comments!
And I leave you with my absolute favorite picture from the holiday…
Where else do you play with catnip mice but in a Christmas kitty bag?
HA! Made you look! This has nothing to do with underwear! Well maybe a little…
In case you hadn’t noticed, I’ve been absent the last few days. AGAIN. Once again this was not on purpose. It seems that once again I have been struck by the fickle finger of computer issues. And this time it had nothing to do with flaming laptops or mice that don’t behave.
Remember there are no funny pictures of flaming laptops. But mice…
Out of nowhere I got a message saying that I was running low on disk space.
My initial reaction to this was Huh? My computer has about 300 gb. How the heck I could possibly use up that much disk space was truly a mystery to me!
Because I am an insane anxious person I spent hours and hours transferring things and removing everything I could possibly remove. Not only did I move important things off of my computer like pictures, I also deleted a lot of extra pointless files. Like HP-there were so many little tiny files in my temp folder, I must have deleted thousands of them!
Yet it seemed that each time I’d remove something, my space would increase slightly and then decrease even more! At one point I angrily removed all of my printer software (after all, it didn’t even know where it was, right?) I tore my hair out. I cried a little.
The next day my computer said it had NO room left on the disk.
That was when I started trying to defragment my hard drive. For the lay person, your hard drive keep bits and pieces of files when you delete stuff and move them around and that clogs up your disk. Defragmenting does something to make this better. I’m not sure what it does, but it’s supposed to be better.
Only I had the Neverending Defragmentation. It’s like the Neverending Story, except really boring. It NEVER stopped… it just kept going and going.
Speaking of neverending, this guy came up during TMT duets. I thought Limahl was a group, not just one guy? Does this mean I have to repeat music history class again?
After hours and hours and hours of staring at my computer relocating and consolidating and relocating and consolidating and gaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah… a friend who knows computers told me to stop collaborate and listen. Then she told me to download a program because my goodness I certainly couldn’t tell what the bleep was messing up my computer!
A little more than an hour and a screenshot and remote assistance session later we had some answers. It was my antivirus software. Apparently certain options that you choose will create and keep files that are a gazillion kbs. Think I’m joking? Let’s do some math…
There were 308,000 mb lurking and taking up space on my hard drive. 258,000 mb of that was program files-255,000 mb of the program files was taken up by ONE FOLDER. Some of the files in there were 9,000 kb in size! Sort of made HP and its zillion little 1 kb files look pale in comparison
That ain’t right.
Sooooo… I disabled the offending portion of my antivirus and got down to business, deleting tons of files. I got 129 gb back. I went from having nothing free out of roughly 300 gb to getting almost half back from just deleting all of that stuff. Miraculous.
What does this mean to you? Why am I mentioning math here on my blog? What happened to the poop posts? Why is that light flickering over there?
What does this all MEAN????
This is my public service announcement. I want you to know that if your computer says it’s running out of disk space, you need to check your antivirus software! Something as little as checking the wrong box could cause your computer to hang on to tons of stuff it doesn’t need!
So since I have spent the last couple of days away from all the internet fun now I will be spending the next few days getting caught up on all the fun that I have missed. Returning comments, reading emails and friend’s posts, and maybe even twittering a bit. So please, remain on the line, I will return your comments in the order received…
You never know who you might be talking to on the internets…
What program was it that finally did the trick? It’s called TreeSize. It’s a free program that allows you to see how big your files are and where they are located. That’s all it does-it doesn’t mess with your registries or anything else. It’s just good basic information! . If you want to read up on it click HERE.
I didn’t receive any compensation from TreeSize to share this!
Welcome to Take One of June’s Secret Subject Swaps. This week, 11 brave bloggers picked a secret subject for someone else and were assigned a secret subject to interpret in their own style. Today we are all simultaneously divulging our topics and submitting our posts.
George Lucas just called you–he knows you are a HUGE Star Wars fan, and he tells you he is tweaking one of his older movies. He wants to cast YOU in the film as a new character, and lets you choose the movie and the type of character you would be. Tell us your role and how it would change the movie.
Disclaimer: I’ve been under a lot of stress due to neck, head, and back pain, therefore affecting my writing. Read with caution. I am not responsible for pants peed from laughing or followers running away and screaming and never coming back to my blog again.There, you’ve been warned. Now keep reading if you’re not too scared to do so…
What else do you do with the death star but make a death star bra?
It is with great pleasure that I write using this prompt, because 1) I am a huge fan of the original movies. 2) Marcia Doyle aka Menopausal Mother is a good friend of mine and
3) Anyone could play the part of Anakin Skywalker better than Hayden Christiansen, including me.
Today I will be enacting the second subplot within Return of the Jedi, also known as the worst of the original trilogy and the movie “with all those teddy bear looking things.” If you aren’t familiar with the Star Wars movies, or maybe you are, you might want to access this quick tutorial of the original movie before you read on…
Obviously I would have to be a shapely redhead with big blue eyes and mad typing skills. I’d play Red Solo, Han Solo’s first cousin seventeen times removed. But since it’s the Star Wars universe, and we can’t be too obvious that she’s a Solo we have to give her a pseudonym. It can’t be anything normal, it would have to be something like Fon Doo, Lap Dans, or Shasta Windbreaker. I like Shasta, we’ll go with that.
Shasta Windbreaker is the key to the entire Star Wars universe. She’s the assistant to the Emperor’s assistant. No one knows that she is a double agent. She’s actually a member of PMS-a secret order of Jedi that Darth Vader did not find and destroy during the Clone Wars. She organizes a resistance within the Empire luring Imperials over by bribing them with cookies.
Along with her droid 3M and her handsome but dumb companion Duh Mahn, she sets out to destroy the Empire from the inside out.
What she doesn’t know though is that her fellow PMSer Lady Vagisil has gone to the dark side and is planning on exposing their whole plan. She and her accomplice, Saran Rapp, are secretly organizing the PMS army of jedis to strike against the good guys. She also bakes better cookies, and therefore manages to lure the people that had just been lured to Shasta’s side back to her side. So poor Shasta is left without anyone on her side other than Duh Mahn, who is just not a smart guy.
Determined to complete her mission, Shasta and Duh make plans to leave the Imperial Cruiser They attempt to leave by taking their ship, The Flatulent Penguin, but quickly realize that the ship is unable to fly very far. Apparently Duh has a knack of picking bad spaceships. Several previous ones that he has purchased, including The Fat Emu and The Frolicking Platypus, didn’t pan out either for some reason. So instead they have to stow away on an Imperial Carnival Cruise Ship.
As they quickly discover it’s a tramp… I mean trap!
Our heroes are quickly discovered by the PMSers. Lady Vagisil decided to put an end to Shasta once for all by challenging her to a karoake sing off. The songs? “It’s the End of the World As We Know It” by REM, “Informer” by Snow, and “The Morning After” by Maureen McGovern. As Shasta goes up to sing, Lady Vagisil tries to choke her death with her Sith chokehold. It’s Duh to the rescue. He runs onstage with a folding chair and knocks her off the stage with it.
A duel to the death with foot long corndogs ensues. There is ketchup, there is mustard, but there is no mercy!
In the end, Shasta spares Lady Vagisil’s life. But why? WHY would she do such a thing?
Because Lady Vagisil is really… Princess Leia’s siamese twin sister, Lola Skywalker. They were joined at the feet, but were separated at birth. Shasta was able to sense this with her super force senses and underwear that glows whenever a member of the Skywalker family is present. Of course what really gave it away was the croissants on her head.
Having decided to go to the lighter side, Lady Vagisil and Shasta join forces to help finish the Empire once and for all. But before they can even leave the cruise ship, breaking news is broadcast on the Cruise News Channel. The Emperor and Lord Vader are dead, the Death Star is destroyed, the Empire is defeated, and the whole galaxy is cordially invited to a weenie roast on the forest moon of Endor.
On Endor she crosses paths with her distantly related cousin. She sees him and nods. He says, “Wassup?” (The Solos have never been known for being very affectionate.)
However, after a long talk, she and Han decide to go into the disposable cup business together so that Leia can stay home and take care of all of the Ewoks they ended up adopting. Now you know where Solo Cups really come from.
Here are links to all the sites now featuring Secret Subject Swap posts. Sit back, grab a cup, and check them all out. See you there:
She definitely looks better in a headband than I do.
While many of you were out enjoying the great weather earlier this week, I was lying face down on a table. Doesn’t that sound like fun?
It was actually means to an end. The beginning of finally getting some relief for the literal pain in my neck. Since nothing that I have been prescribed has worked thus far, I ended up getting sent to get physical with the physical therapist.
Ironically, I started physical therapy this time exactly five years ago to the day I first had physical therapy at that same facility. I had my tiny baby little girl in her carrier and an adorable three year old boy accompanying me back then. This was when I could barely walk without excruciating pain and had a horrible pain in the neck. Now I have two adorable and curious elementary school aged children who asked a lot of questions with me, and a neck and head that throbbed when I blinked.
I filled out paperwork. I squeezed stuff. I got smacked with one of those things they test your reflexes with. I got pushed and prodded and got my head almost yanked off of my body. I got some great deep tissue massage.
Meanwhile, my children were so good they were practically little angels. This may have something to do with the fact that they thought I was going to have electroshock therapy or something like that. No, dear children, the TENS machine does NOT deliver electric shocks. Apparently that is what my son took from the conversation we had the previous night about what physical therapy actually was.
Both children stared at me with wide eyes the whole session, whispering to one another and looked quite a bit worried. At the end when she hooked up the electrodes to me The Professor started jabbering a billion miles a minute. He wanted to know what exactly was going to come out of those things. The therapist was great, explaining everything that she was doing and how it all worked. Even then, they didn’t relax until she turned it on and I didn’t even react, or started smoking or anything interesting like that.
They got tootsie rolls in exchange for all of the stress that my session put them through. I’m probably in for it on Thursday when I go back, now that they realize what I’m really having done.
I have to go for at least a few more times. Next time I need to take a notebook, because I forgot pretty much everything she told me by the time I got home. Something about C1 and C2 (which disappointingly has nothing to do with cookies). Use cold instead of heat. Something about a something something muscle in my back. I was given three exercises to do every day at home.
Oh-and I was told no more blogging on the couch.
NOT THE COUCH!
In other words I need to stop being so lazy. I need to sit in a chair at a table or desk with the computer at a certain height. While sitting on my couch with my laptop most likely did not cause the problem, it certainly isn’t helping!
So I carried the desk from the bedroom down the stairs and set myself up for blogging in the living room where I could keep an eye on both kids. I found the fold up chair with the padded seat and back, but since I have to keep my elbows at a 90 degree angle I also have to sit on pillows.
Guess what? I hate it.
I can’t concentrate. I’m certainly not comfortable. I’m not inspired. My back hurts. Add the pounding headache that I’ve had all day and it’s SUCH a good time. I have posts scheduled for other people that I need to write. This with the realization that I haven’t written much that can be considered actual humorous writing lately makes me a bit frantic.
Who knew that I was really that lazy? I’ve always known that desk work isn’t my thing, but it’s necessary. I need to channel my inner couch so I can have some inspiration to write funny things.
What do you do when you need inspiration? How do you make the best of a situation that isn’t ideal for you?
You can hear this being said in our house any time there’s rain the forecast. That and “Oh nooooo.” Thank you Family Guy.
I for one am glad May is done! I think we saw every type of weather imaginable last month. Snow, cold, sweltering heat, torrential rain, severe thunderstorms, tornadoes. The last week was particularly maddening with having to be stuck inside for an entire holiday weekend due to torrential rain. Last year we had drought, this year we have flooding. What gives?
Welcome To June. So far I have been spending it trying not to itch my head. Don’t worry, no head lice or anything like that here. Just more complications from my ever lovely neck and head stuff that’s going on. I won’t gross you out with the details…
My cat refuses to use a scratching post, she uses a wooden banister post instead.
I will, however, let you know what I did this week, just in case you were wondering.
Monday Memorial Day Oversharing I was so tickled to participate in the Oversharing series at When Crazy Meets Exhaustion for many reasons, in particular I think Stephanie is the bomb and I got a day off!
Thursday Lots of Pain, So Far No Gain I thought I was so cool agreeing to co-host a blog hop with friends. Apparently I do not know what to do to co-host a blog hop. Neither do I know what to do about my pain… Not that there isn’t always great stuff written for Theme Thursday, but this particular one had some very entertaining posts! This week’s theme was what drives you crazy.
I was out of chocolate and I was miserable. Not a good combination, which added to the crazy. And this meme made me laugh.
Friday FTSF: Favorite 80s Movies I was supposed to pick my favorite movie of all time. No way I could choose. My list was long, then I narrowed it down to a few of the best from the 80s. I got such great feedback from this that I’m thinking about writing a sequel.
Stuff I Really Liked This Week
10 Bad Father’s Day Gifts for 2013–Divine Secrets of a Domestic Diva She truly has the best gift lists! I bet you can’t wait to run out and buy some bacon bedding!
I know there was other stuff that I really enjoyed, but this week has been such a blur that I can’t even remember what I had for breakfast this morning…
Best and Most Disturbing Search Terms
Naket Grils We don’t have none uh them naket ones.
Life is short naked-Short naked WHAT? Tell me! Don’t leave me in suspense!
Hypnotized pee pants giggle I really want to know what’s behind this one.
Recorded deaths from caffeine withdrawal People seriously google this stuff????
I wear glasses now So do I. ????
Next Week
I start Physical Therapy, so hopefully I will be back to my somewhat amusing self in no time… I’m pledging the fifth for the most part on what I’m doing this next week, though I do solemnly swear that Friday will be my latest Secret Subject Swap post. YIPPEE!
Maybe this is the type of exercise that will help me?
Theme Thursday is a magical place where dreams come true. All the magic is brought to you by Jenn from Something Clever 2.0.
This week’s theme was to write about what drives you crazy.
Crazy is right. I feel absolutely nuts about now.
I have eluded to the fact that I’ve been in a lot of agony lately. I don’t like to say a whole lot, because I don’t want to come off a complainer. Trust me on this one, and don’t listen to a word my husband says about there always something being wrong with me. He thinks he’s being funny, you know.
I’ve had a stiff, painful neck on one side for months, and it finally got so bad that I went in and got it looked at. I’ve now been in there threee times. Appointment #1-It’s stress and all in my head. Appointment #2-I got X-rays and oh that was FUN. My spine is fine, thanks for asking. Appointment #3-I don’t have shingles and it’s not going away on its own.
I’m sure I look like I’m possessed the way I’m walking around rolling my head these days. I’m trying to unkink my neck, even though I know it’s not going to help. It hurts like holy heck. Add to that the newest member of the pain family: The head. Whichever part of my body decided that this was a funny joke can really just knock it off now! Really? A million pin pricks of hot pain on my scalp? That’s real funny. Not.
You find this funny? I don’t, because I’m completely out of chocolate.
As one would expect, this is a huge challenge for someone who is considered a humor writer. It’s put a great big giant Charley Horse in my style. Although I’ve managed to maintain somewhat of a sense of humor during all of this, I feel like a horrible mom and wife. I’m crabby because I hurt so bad and don’t sleep well. I can do very little around the house. I’m sure that my husband and kids would like to auction me off very cheaply about now. Or at least trade me in for a mom without body issues.This past Sunday I felt totally useless as I lay on the couch and my family pitched in to do everything that I have been neglecting around the house. It was literally all I could do. I’m so happy that they stepped up-I fall somewhere between bad and terrible when it comes to housecleaning and maintenance as it is. This is not helping my image!
I think I’d feel about the same as I would if were to lean on a cactus… Or maybe I’d feel better? I’ve shared my pain with a few of the people I talk to regularly. My blogging friends in particular have been wonderful-I’ve received plenty of advice on things I can try:
Acupuncture: It’s needles. IT’S NEEDLES! Noooo! I’m deathly afraid of anything with a needle. No wonder I don’t sew.
Supplements: I really would like to take some, but I already take a multivitamin and I’m skeered of growing an extra head. One that would hurt just as much as the one I have.
It would be like the cars.com commercial but scarier…
Massage: Hell yeah! Who wants to give me one? Actually, Evil Genius has stepped up nicely in the department, but he can’t do much about my head.
Alternative Medicine: I’ve had all kinds of wonderful stuff suggested to me that I’ve never heard of before, and that unfortunately aren’t available here in corn country.
Chocolate Therapy: I understand that chocolate goes quite well with vicodin.
Alcoholism: Maybe a glass or two, but I really like my liver, thanks.
I personally think that if I were to cut myself in half I might actually feel better. I’d look pretty weird though.
As I said, we’ve tried to keep a sense of humor about the whole thing. Evil Genius has made sure to make plenty of jokes at my expense. Some of them were even funny. He’s had his own pain to deal with-his knee is going to explode any day now. Some snippets of things said at my house this week:
“You said you wanted to tighten up. I can’t help it if you’re an overachiever.”
“Come over here and put your neck against my knee. Maybe we can cancel out each other’s pain.”
The doctor referred me to physical therapy, FINALLY. She said I needed deep tissue massage and a few rounds with the TENS machine. Unfortunately I have to wait until Monday to get any relief. I’m really hoping it helps. I’d really hate to feel like this for the rest of my life!
Have you ever been in pain that just wouldn’t quit? What did you end up doing for it? Did anything work (or are you still in pain)? I’d love to hear your story, however depressing or funny it is…
Please be sure to see what drives other bloggers batty by clicking on the Theme Thursday link at the top!
I’m doing double duty this week by cohosting the Tattler Thursday blog hop. I’m a blog hop virgin, so I’m not really sure what I’m doing… We can’t get the links to work, so I’m plugging it sans links for now. If you’d like to link up, please visit The Wild and Wonderful World of Gingerssnaps and/or CHill Thoughts to link up your post!
My neck pain-perhaps I am the victim of a Vulcan nerve pinch and just don’t remember?
Yeah, I’m still hurting. I had my x-rays and the doctor called me a mere hours later and said it was all in my head. Actually, it’s all in my neck. Nothing is wrong with my spine, it’s all my muscles spazzing out. I can have physical therapy, but I have to wait it out a little bit.
In the meantime, I’ve developed a humungous zit on my neck right where the affected muscle is and it hurts like a *$(#_! The way it’s affecting me, I’ve gone as far to think that I might have shingles. Since I think my doctor thinks I’m crazy, I’m holding off on checking that out for now. So I suffer…
Today I shared my final post for the WAHM series over at Mommy Writings: Daughter of Maat, entitled “Life of Pie” (because I really like pie…). It’s actually something I’ve shared before as a guest post, but it’s a fun one that I couldn’t resist sharing. In my current state, it’s probably just as well that I did that instead of attempting to share something witty and original (perish the thought).
Get it? PIE.
Despite my pain, the week went on. Here is what I did this week:
Confessions of a Geek
My guest post for my friend Michael at An Old and Cranky Gamer. It took me a long time to be ok with admitting I’m a geek. Now as you can see I don’t care!
Wednesday Wordless Wednesday: BUBBLES! Beautiful pictures of our attempt at homemade bubbles. It was a great success!
Thursday Delicious Evil Lurks in the Downstairs Freezer The question was “Does Evil exist?” Yes. At Christmastime it existed in my freezer… If you liked this and want to read about other evil, check out this week’s Theme Thursdayand click on some of the blogs in the link up!
May Fly on the Wall posts-Baking in a Tornado-I love doing this every month, there were some really good ones in the bunch this time. I linked you up with the post by the big cheese, the queen bee, the creator of all the is good on the internets, Baking in a Tornado. Karen’s talking about me when she mentions the crap pockets… Yes I have a keen eye for detail! I hope you visited some of the other participants this week. If you’re having the disgusting weather that we are, you probably have time. This certainly rates right up there with crappy holiday weather!
Best and Most Disturbing Search Engine Terms Chad Knaus and his “nakedness”-I strive to make this a family friendly blog. However, I just can’t help it if the search terms get out of control. I commented on a hilarious post about search engine terms by Crakgenius, letting him know some of the more interesting things that people have used to find my blog. Somehow, a few people found my blog by googling “Naked Chad Knaus”.
Wellll, Mr Crakgenius took it a step farther. He plugged my information into google and using his great fact finding skills he found out that ‘Chad Knaus naked penis’ has my blog as #1.
If Chad’s mom is reading this, I can assure her I have never cared about her son’s genitalia. I don’t even root for his NASCAR team…
Homemade car antenna-I had to look this one up,if you scroll down on image results you get a picture of my car. I was disappointed. However, you do also get the following picture when you look it up:
Acronyms are evil-I love acronyms, does that make me evil?
Does Bon Jovi like straight or curly hair on a woman-WHY DO YOU CARE??
Ear horn-YESSSSSSSS! I’m not so sure why I’m proud of this…
Someone broke into my house and didn’t steal anything just peed on the front of my pants-Why would you google this????
Next Week
Tomorrow I’ll be hanging out over at When Crazy Meets Exhaustion, participating in her Oversharing series with my most famous post ever. It’s so nice to know that I’ll always be remembered for my incontinence… This next week I’ll be telling the tale in the latest chapter of my war against the mice in my house, writing about what I sing in my car, sharing what drives me crazy, cohosting the Tattler Thursday Blog Hop, among other things. It’ll be a good week. It would be better if I wasn’t in so much freaking pain!
Ever felt like someone was stabbing you in the neck with a large flathead screwdriver? How I’ve been feeling lately is exactly how I think it would feel. I say this because we have one in the garage and that’s the mental image I get as I’m in pain these days.
After five months of issues with my neck and upper back ranging from uncomfortable to excruciating, I had finally reached the breaking point.
Yes you saw that right. FIVE MONTHS. Why have I not gone to the doctor? There are many reasons, the first and foremost being that I’m used to being in pain. I’ve had back problems forever, this just seemed like yet another chapter in the ever popular saga of “Look what motherhood has done to my body!” I also live with a man who feels that if you’re not bleeding profusely it’s probably not serious enough to go see the doctor. Add to that the fact that I don’t make any money right now. Making the decision to pay to go see a doctor about something that may be something but could be nothing is almost viewed as a luxury. Believe me, I’ve shelled out my share of money for conditions that were unsolved mysteries.
Maybe I’m just questioning things too much…
So back to the breaking point. About three weeks ago I felt a small lump on the back of my neck where the pain seemed to be worsening, right around where the pinched nerve I’ve had forever lurks. I’ve had some lumps and bumps pop up on my bod lately, and they almost always turn out to be another zit. But this was not turning into anything. I don’t know how many times I played contortionist in the bathroom trying to get a good look at it in the mirror. I tried to show Evil Genius, who of course thinks that I think that there is always something wrong with me. Naturally I didn’t pursue that venue too long, since he has all kinds of coefficients to think about.
I didn’t look this up online, by the way. If you’ve been reading my blog for awhile, then you know that one thing I’ve learned is to never ever ever google your symptoms. EVER. You’ll think you’re dying. When all of this started back in December, I made the mistake of looking stuff up and wrote about it. I had what turned out to be bronchitis on top of everything else that was going wrong, and my subsequent neck pain was poo-pooed as being a little from being sick and a lot from anxiety. Another reason why I haven’t been back to the doctor.
Don’t do it!
Anyhoo, I’m rambling again. Back to this week. After the third night of very little sleep due to being uncomfortable and anxiety ridden thoughts like “What if it’s cancer? I will die and my kids will have no mom!” I finally called the doctor’s office. Often getting in to see the doctor around these parts is like playing a strategy game. I got to talk to the nurse, which is always F-U-N.
“And why do you need to see the doctor today?” The nurse asked.
“I’m experiencing neck pain.”
“How long have you been experiencing this pain?”
Um…ummmm… be honest, “Please don’t laugh at me, but five months.” I replied, and then quickly added “There’s a bump there too!”
Then I had to spend another few minutes describing this bump in detail. I must have done a good job, because I was in. Shockingly I got in that morning, but it was two hours away. I spent the next two hours in an anxious person’s hell, because I do this every time I have any kind of ailment. I spent two hours worrying about the doctor’s appointment. Should I live like I’m dying? What if I go in and she takes one look at the bump and whisks me off to have it removed immediately because it’s that advanced? Should I go ahead and name the bump something like Cher so I can talk to it?
By the time I made it to the doctor’s office, I was pretty much a basket case. Luckily they didn’t make me wait very long. I went in with my list of symptoms in hand (because I forget to mention really important things) and then promptly forgot about it the second the doctor walked in.
The doctor looked me over and asked some questions. She had me do some interesting things with my arms, because I am soooo strong and in shape these days. She felt my neck, including the bump.
“So what do you think it is? Do you think it’s serious?” I asked nervously.
“No. That bump is part of your muscle,” she replied with a smile.
Really?
More questions-had I been in any car accidents? Had I fallen from a great height recently? Did I fall down the stairs (this is a legitimate question-everyone knows my stairs are out to get me). Unfortunately, there is nothing that I could pinpoint that could have caused me to injure myself and thus explain some of the pain I was experiencing. Bummer.
After looking me over a little more, she declares “Looks like we’re definitely going to need some x-rays. Would you like to go to the main clinic (in other town) this week, or wait and set something up here next week?”
“It’s not life threatening? I’m not dying?” I had to be sure, you know.
“Nooooo…” she said, still smiling (STOP SMILING! It’s not funny!)
“I’ll do it next week.” I figured since I wasn’t going to die that I could wait and do it when it was convenient.
I was sent away with prescriptions for muscle relaxants and a pain reliever that wouldn’t upset my stomach like 800 mg of ibuprofen would. I don’t know about you, but whenever I think about muscle relaxants, I think of this scene from Sixteen Candles:
I can’t say that they’re working like that for me, which is a little disappointing. I feel a little weird, but that’s about it. I can’t say that the pain reliever is doing much for me either, which is a lot disappointing.
As for what I believe is going to happen next, I foresee some more physical therapy in my future. I’ve been there and done that in the past. If it makes me feel better, I suppose it will be worth it. And because I’ve been waiting for an excuse to use this meme again, here we go.
Demetri Martin on exercise: I go the gym and I try to run on the treadmill and I listen to music but it doesn’t motivate me enough. So I’m going to get a recording of a pack of wolves gaining on me. People would be like, ‘Why is that guy crying on that treadmill over there?’ ‘I don’t know, but he’s been yelling, ‘help’ for like 20 minutes. He’s getting a good workout.’
The Sadder But Wiser Girl 