Month: February 2010

GOODBYE, ORGAN THAT SHALL NOT BE NAMED! DON’T LET THE CERVIX HIT YOU IN THE TUBES (?) ON YOUR WAY OUT!

 

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We’ll be leaving for the hospital in a while. I’m slated to have surgery at 7:30, so have to be at the hospital at 5:30.

I’m glad that this is almost over, and already bored to death with the idea of having to spend the night in the hospital. I don’t wannnnnnna. I wanna go home!

I’m sure I’ll be home before I know it, right? Right.

The Kindle is charged and loaded with books, the iPod is charged and loaded with the second season of Gossip Girl, and the phone is charged and ready to Twitter/ blog.

What do you wanna bet I end up not touching the Kindle or iPod? (Better to have them with me and not need them than wish I’d brought them.)

Someone told Fred the other night that while recovering from surgery, I wouldn’t be getting out of bed for two weeks.

We both snickered, because laying in bed for two weeks? Me? I hardly think so. (To be fair, she probably didn’t mean that I’d be literally on my back in the bed for two weeks straight. But still.)

Then I realized that she didn’t know that this wasn’t my first surgery. This isn’t, in fact, my second or third or fourth surgery, even.

Surgeries I Have Had

1. Age 5ish: tonsils out! What I mostly remember from this is that another child – a boy – threatened to tell my parents on me if I didn’t brush my teeth…?

2. Age 15: Giant Cell Cystic Tumor (benign) removed from my right knee; bone removed from both hips to replace the bone that had been eaten away by the tumor. What I mostly remember about this surgery: the fucking drains, one on each hip. Every single time the surgeon came into my room, I asked when he was going to take the damn drains out. They were not physically painful, but their mere existence caused me great physical anguish. I had a cast on for most of the summer, and good christ do those things get itchy underneath. (Hmm, here’s some interesting information about Giant Cell Tumors: A female predominance exists, with a female-to-male ratio of 1.3-1.5:1. GCTs occur most commonly in the third decade of life; less than 5% of GCTs occur in patients who are skeletally immature. In the Mayo Clinic series, 84% of the GCTs occurred in patients older than 19 years. I was a medical oddity! Color me shocked.)

3. Age 20: C-Section. The spud was due on the 22nd. On the 25th, they did an ultrasound and estimated that she weighed 10 pounds, 4 ounces. They recommended a c-section, I agreed, and it was performed the next day. (She ended up weighing in at 10 pounds, 2 ounces. And she wasn’t even the heaviest baby in the nursery!) I developed some sort of infection (they were never able to figure out what or where was infected, but antibiotics took care of it in any case) and ended up staying in the hospital for a week.

4. Age 22ish: Endometriosis removed from my c-section scar. The gynecologist hypothesized that during the c-section, a bit of endometrial tissue was dropped into my incision and grew there. A few weeks later I developed an incisional scar, and the gynecologist numbed the area, cleaned out the infection, and closed it back up. While I was awake. I had forgotten about that ’til just now. It didn’t hurt (since it was numbed), but good god am I getting the oogies thinking about it.

5. Age 25ish: Wisdom teeth removed. (I don’t really consider this a “surgery”, but they did knock me out to do it, and there was a recovery period, so I’m counting it.) All I wanted to eat while I was recovering from having my wisdom teeth out was Spaghetti-Os. Which sound pretty damn good right now, believe me. The worst part about recovering from this was that just as I figured the healing was done, it felt like the bones in my face were shifting. It ached horribly. Gah.

6. Age 32: Had a tube put in my left ear. I don’t remember a damn thing about the surgery except that the next morning when I woke up (at home – it was just day surgery), I ached from head to toe.

7. Age 38: Weight Loss Surgery.

8. Age 38: Gallbladder removed.

9. Age 40: Lower body lift.

So this surgery I’m going in for tomorrow will be my 10th surgery. I expect that, recovery-wise, it’ll be a little worse than the gallbladder removal (because they did that laparascopically) and not nearly as bad or prolonged as the lower body lift. She didn’t mention drains, so hopefully I won’t have any of those (I didn’t with the gallbladder).

Let me put it this way: with the lower body lift, where they made an incision alllll the way around my body and stitched up my abdominal muscles and stuck drains all over the damn places, I was doing dishes (“doing dishes” – putting dishes in the dishwasher) and some light laundry. There’s no way that having a little bitty organ removed from my body is going to keep me bedridden for two weeks, is all I’m saying.

Not that I’m going to push it, either, don’t lecture me. I plan to watch plenty of bad TV and take it easy. I have 10 episodes of Hoarders saved for just this occasion, and although Fred never did get the Blu-Ray player set up to stream Netflix movies, I’m sure I’ll have plenty of stuff to keep me occupied. That’s what remote controls are for, after all!

 

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Dropping the Magnolias off yesterday morning went just fine. Drum howled most of the way to the adoption center, because he’s elected himself the mouthpiece for the litter, but once I was actually in the room and getting their cage prepared for them, they were so interested in what was going on that none of them thought to complain any further.

When it was time for me to leave, all except Clairee were already in the cage, checking out the toys I’d put in there. I picked up each of them and gave them a hug and kiss, and then put them back in the cage and shut the door.

When I leave kittens at the adoption center, I always watch them from outside the room, through the window, to see how they act. The Magnolias seemed a little confused, but not scared.

Except for M’Lynn, who went into the litter box to hide. Oh, M’Lynn. Break my heart, why don’t you?

But guess what? M’Lynn AND Truvy were adopted last night! Not together, but still. My little skittish girl won someone’s heart, which does not surprise me at all! I’m keeping my fingers crossed that Drum, Ouiser and Clairee are adopted this weekend.

 

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Okay, I’m outta here.

Like I said yesterday, I’ll likely be Twittering, and maybe even posting here via my cell phone. I’ve changed the setup of the page so that the most recent 10 entries show up if you go to the main page. That probably means that the page will load slowly, sorry about that. Fred will try to remember to post something here letting y’all know I came through surgery just fine (feel free to email and harass him if he hasn’t posted anything by, say, 1:00 Central time.)

I don’t know when I’ll be back and posting regularly – I wouldn’t expect too much before Monday, if that. I don’t intend to spend much time in front of the computer, but who knows?

See ya when I see ya!

 

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Stinkerbelle sure does love her Tommy with a passion.

 

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Previously
2009: Usually, Fred’s Ross and I’m Chandler. Or Joey. Except that I’m kinda ditzy like Phoebe. I am an amalgam of Friends characters!
2008: No entry.
2007: No entry.
2006: Unless maybe it’s a magic leotard and the source of all her powers?
2005: “Life’s too fucking short to read books that suck.”
2004: Damn you, DVR! I WANT to love you, but you’re toying with my emotions!
2003: No entry.
2002: No entry.
2001: No entry.
2000: I’m not sure what effect, if any, it had on her.

One more dayyyyyyyyy!!!

Given that my surgery is taking place so early in the day, Fred may go to work for a few hours, and if so I’ll have him post something here letting y’all know that I lived. I suspect I’ll also be Twittering intermittently, so you can check there. I may even be blogging from my phone from time to time, depending on how out of it I am (the more out of it, the more fun the posts, right?!)

I don’t know why I’m telling y’all all of this, since I will be posting an entry before we leave for the hospital tomorrow and will likely tell you all of this again then!

 

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We had steak, beans and rice Chimichangas for dinner last night (and salad too, I swear we do get our veggies in even though I rarely mention them!), and holy moley were they good! The only thing I’ll do differently next time is leave the cumin out of the marinade, because I am not a fan of cumin.

I’m pretty sure I’ve expressed, in the past, my belief that cumin smells and tastes like B.O.

Nance once mocked me for pronouncing cumin like “cyoo-min” instead of “coo-min.” Is it a regional difference in the pronunciation of the word, or am I just totally pronouncing it wrong? How do y’all pronounce it?

 

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I started out yesterday with the biggest of plans, to get the house scrubbed in preparation for the fact that Fred will be responsible for keeping the house clean while I’m recovering from surgery. I was going to do some SERIOUS cleaning, but when it came down to it, the house is actually not so very much of a mess, so I ended up soaking all the humidifiers to get rid of the build-up (empty the humidifier, fill the base with white vinegar, let it sit for half an hour, scrub and rinse), did some laundry, ran the Swiffer Duster over various super-dusty spots in the house, and called it good enough.

Well, I also dumped the litter in each litter box through a sifter (looks somewhat like the insert in this litter pan combo), scrubbed down each litter box, coated each litter box with a light coat of Pam cooking spray (then wiped the excess Pam off), and dumped the clean litter back into the boxes.

This morning, after I take the Magnolias to Petsmart, I’m going over to Sam’s, swinging by Kohl’s, and then coming home to clean the foster room and vacuum the entire house.

The worst part of having surgery is having to wait for it to be time to HAVE the surgery. I feel like I’ve been waiting forever, and it’s still not time yet!

 

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I’m leaving soon to take the Magnolias to Petsmart. They’re all going to be in one (big) cage, which makes me glad, because I like that they’re going to have each other for comfort. It’s a moot point, though, because they’re all going to get adopted during adoption hours tonight, right? RIGHT!

All five in one picture! (Too bad they’re not all in focus!)

Obviously I was waving a toy over my head to get their attention. Hey, it worked!

Skeptical Truvy.

Drum has got the thickest, most luxurious fur. It’s such a pleasure to pet him (and a good thing, too, ’cause he can’t get enough of being petted!)

Sweet Ouiser. Have I mentioned that I’m pretty sure Ouiser thinks she’s a puppy? She loves to run around with a mylar ball in her mouth.

Clairee wonders if it’s time for the pettin’ yet.

I just adore M’Lynn’s markings. Basically, she’s a white cat that someone tossed brown tabby spots at!

Smilin’ Truvy.

Smilin’ M’Lynn.

 

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Miz Poo knows something’s up…

 

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Previously
2009: “They’re rejects from the nursery!”
2008: No entry.
2007: Beach Roses (fiction).
2006: Giggling like that is EXACTLY something Fred would do.
2005: Taking the day off.
2004: I don’t believe I mentioned that the Bean has tapeworms.
2003: No entry.
2002: No entry.
2001: And I yelled “Any fucking thing else?!”, addressing, I guess, God.
2000: Okay, so I don’t have much to say today.

I hope those of you who got hammered with all the snow these past few days have successfully dug yourselves out. Myself, I woke up this morning to this particular nightmare, so I feel your pain:

I don’t know how on earth we’re ever going to dig out from under all that.

It’s a good damn thing we have plenty of toilet paper and bread! God knows when we’ll ever be able to get out of the house again!

 

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So there was some sort of football game last night, I understand?

I kid. We actually sat and watched the whole Superbowl. Okay, Fred read and I surfed on the laptop, and we only paid attention during the commercials, but the TV was on the whole time.

A few hours before the game was due to start, I said “The Saints – New Orleans, right?”

“I think so,” Fred said.

“Who are they playing against?”

“The Patriots, maybe?” Fred offered.

I shrugged.

Fred sat down about half an hour before the game started, and then I wandered into the room and he said “They’re playing against the Colts.”

“Denver?” I said.

“I think St. Louis.”

Turns out we were both wrong. Clearly we’re not the sporty type. I’ve seen so many good Super Bowl recipes lately that it almost made me want to host a Superbowl party, regardless!

My favorite commercials were the Boost Mobile Shuffle (I canNOT believe it’s been 25 years since the Bears did the Superbowl Shuffle! I’m the punky QB known as McMahon! When I hit the turf, I’ve got no plan!) and all the E-Trade commercials.

Damn, I love me a talking baby.

 

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Over the weekend, I did a lot of cooking, getting stuff ready to freeze so that Fred won’t have to do too much cooking while I’m recuperating from surgery (two more days! Uh.. yay?).

One thing I made was a batch of Baked Chimichangas. Reader Brenda sent me the recipe a while back, and I made them and really liked them, then realized when I was making a batch on Saturday that I’d never posted the recipe.

So here you go – Baked Chimichangas! Easy to put together, easy to freeze and then bake when you’re in the mood to just pop something in the oven. And best of all, it’s a recipe that’s easy to mess with – you can make it spicier or wimpier, you can add rice to the beans, you can use steak or pork if you want. Yesterday, I marinated steak in this Carne Asada marinade, pan-cooked the steak with onion strips, mixed a can of refried beans with brown rice, and used that for my Chimichangas filling. It was fabulous! The world is your oyster with this recipe (hmm… shrimp chimichangas?).

Highly recommended!

I also made a lasagna and a chicken and rice casserole.

That should take us through at least two weeks, and hopefully after that I can get back in the kitchen even if I need Fred to do the heavy lifting.

I don’t think I mentioned it before, but my gynecologist/ surgeon told me that she won’t need to slice through my abdominal muscles to remove The Organ That Shall Not Be Named, she’ll just kind of pull the muscles apart to remove what she’s gotta remove. On the one hand, the idea of having my muscles pulled apart gives me the cringies. On the other hand, I’m thinking that if muscles aren’t being sliced open, the healing will go a lot quicker, no?

 

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Today, I clean the house. Tomorrow, I take the Magnolias to Petsmart, run to Sam’s to pick up a few things (god help me if we run out of litter in the next few weeks! Fred refuses to step foot into Sam’s.), stop by Kohl’s to return some jeans, and then home again to do a thorough cleaning of the foster room and probably a thorough vacuuming of the entire house.

So off I go to get started!

 

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If you missed my weekend entries, here’s the quick update: Steely Dan and Fagen were adopted Friday night, together (!), and the Magnolias are going to the adoption center tomorrow morning!

 

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Love & Hisses presents…

The Magnolias

Starring in:

COMPLAINTS? WE HAZ A FEW.

“I AM HUNGRY.”

“DRUM IS HOGGING THE CAT BED!”

“MY HAMMOCK IS TOO SOFT!”

“I’M TRYING TO TAKE A NAP AND OUISER KEEPS LOOKING AT ME!”

“I’M COLD!”

“I’M HOT!”

“MY PAW TASTES FUNNY!”

“YOU’RE TOO CLOSE! I NEED MY SPACE!”

“YOU’RE TOO FAR AWAY! I NEED MY SNUGGLES!”

 

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Spanky always looks so expectant as he sits in his box, and so disappointed when nothing happens. One day we’re going to be sitting at our computers and Spanky’s going to climb into that box, and it’s going to TAKE OFF and Spanky’s going to zoom around the house and then out the door for parts unknown.

 

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Previously
2009: No entry.
2008: Which of your cats, if they were human, would you actually want to hang around the most?
2007: I judiciously left off the “You fucking motherfucking asshole.” part.
2006: And then the spud said “Is he trying to go to Narnia?”
2005: I’ll take my anonymous life, thank you.
2004: No entry.
2003: No entry.
2002: “What?” he said. “I WASN’T geeky!”
2001: No entry.
2000: Tomorrow, I’m going to go see Dr. Judy for my ear, out of which I still cannot hear anything but constant white noise.