I'm Bleeeeeding!!!!

So the blood thinning treatment progresses apace.

I go in to the hospital twice a week to have a Quick Test done, I guess to check my clotting, or lack of.

Yesterday, two funny things happened.

One, I took Her Doktor's secretary some chocolate chunk brownies. She almost fainted, and asked me for my recipe. I told her I would just bring her some boxes of Dunken Hines brownie mix. I've never seen brownie mix in the German stores. I'm hoping that this will grease the wheels a little and cut my wait for asessment down to 45 minutes instead of an hour and fifteen. They have the warmest office waiting area ever. I think I've fallen asleep three times out of five.

The second funny happened with my Phlebotomist. After taking my wee bit of blood, she put the "plaster" on my old insertion site, and not the one she had just made. I didn't notice until I ran up two flights of stairs and my arm inside my jacket felt wet. Holy crap! It was not dripping from my fingertips or anything, this was just a needle prick, but it was still a mess. My friend Mrs. Major said I should have faked a fainting spell. Maybe I should take the Lab some brownies too.

Just in case anyone is wondering what 175 EUROS looks like.

Here ya go



Yeah, woo-FRACKING-hoo, more drugs for me. Maybe this time I will take a picture of the belt of bruises I get from having to inject myself with an anticoagulant twice a day.

Probably not, that's not an image for public consumption.

When discussing my blood thinning treatment Herr Doktor tells me:
"If you have bleeding, you MUST come in."

Well, I'm no medical expert, but DUH!

Still kicking

The rash has worn off, and we've found a Lyme disease treating antibiotic that won't potentially kill me, so all's good on that front. If you consider good to be having to wake up at 12am to take the antibiotic good. At least there's no rash...yet.

However, not to be outdone by deadly antibiotics, I have found new and exciting ways to injure myself.

Did you know that people are crazy about apple butter? Me neither, I had no idea until I took my first batch to the school and handed it out.

"OH MY GOD!!!!! APPLE BUTTER!!!!! I LOOOOVE APPLE BUTTER!!!! NOMNOMNOM!!!!"

That was pretty much the reaction I got.

Anyhoodles, back to the hurting of myself.

Hot apple butter is freaking hot. And it splatters. Lots. I'm going to have apple butter burn scars on my hands and wrists. Sexy I know.

Then there is "Popcorn Thursday" at the elementary school. For those of you not fortunate to have ever experienced popcorn day at your school, we popped a bag of popcorn for every child in the school. That was about 450 bags. For the most part, I did very well dealing with the hot bowl, and oil and those obvious dangers. Until the very end, when I was cleaning the machine I managed to burn the heck out of my forearm on the edge of the bowl. Sizzle and burn baby.

I think I might need some new hobbies.

The Horror!!! The Horror!!

It continues.

Yep, I'm allergic to damn antibiotics. I have to flush my system, so they gave me the 'Roids!

I have to take a big dose of Prednisone once a day for 4 days, and hope that works a trick. I'm doubtful at this point because last night I couldn't sleep for the itching. I even took Benadryl to no effect.

This morning I woke up to find that the rash on my chest has merged into one HUGE hive that covers my neck, chest and shoulders. And yesterday when I said I was covered about 70%? Well, today, make that 95%, and that includes the tops of my hands, feet, my throat, and other...places...

Check it.

This is just my legs, so you can imagine.

Poor Piko deGallo, we were supposed to go swimming on Friday....I'm thinking not so much.

OMG!!

What. The. HELL!!??!!

Seriously, is it because I'm getting older?

Guess what I found out this week. Not only am I allergic to Amoxacillin (rash), only the most commonly used antibiotic out there. I'm also allergic to Septra (chills, nausea, difficulty breathing, persistent headache, achy joints), and freaking Doxycycline Hyclate(severe rash and swelling)!!!

Ok, so I already knew that I was allergic to Amoxacillin, but I had no idea until this week that I was allergic to anything else! I woke up this morning after one day on the Doxycycline to discover about 70% of my body covered with an itchy rash, and my lips, eyes, and ears are swollen. At least now I know what I would look like if I decided to get collagen implants in my lips.

NOT HAPPY.

This all started out with what I thought was a spider bite on my back that would not get better. Guess what? It's not a spider bite after all. The wound has taken on a decidedly more BULLSEYE shape!!

WTFBBQ?!?! People!!!

Dog Damn WebMD, how do you treat freaking Lyme disease if you're allergic to all freaking antibiotics out there?!? Not that I know for sure I have Lyme disease. But I might!! AGH!!!

The Edge of a Kinfe

It's official.

Tomorrow I will be walking that knife's edge between closer to 30, and closer to 40.

Not that I particularly care. I suppose that it helps that people are surprised to find out my age. I tell them that it's because I'm Aaaaasssian, and I use "Perrrrrr crrrreeeeaam" to keep my face young and soft.

Actually, that's not true, I use Cetaphil, and only when I can be arsed to remember.

Anyhoodles. How must I celebrate? Well, let me tell you, it sure won't be with a honking big cup of steaming coffee!!

That's right, the curse of my family has finally struck me. High blood pressure.

So I get to enjoy my the morning of my 35th year with a nice tall glass of cold water, and a 25MG tab of Hydrochlorothiazide. Oh yes, and don't forget that banana to stave off the potential potassium deficiency.

Damn!! DAMN!!! I miss that coffee. But Sarge says he'll kill me if I die.

Note to The Librarian

Dear Librarian,

Did you take a close look at the packaging that that g-damn fabulous High School Musical microphone came in?

If not, here ya go...
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.
.
.

AAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAAA!!!!

Inadvertant PORN!!!

P.S. Happy Birthday!

Alive and Doing Fine

Sarge comes home from the hospital tomorrow. Hoo-ray! The reason that they were keeping him there for so long was that his white blood cell count was very low due to the bacterial infection. So they were waiting for it to go back to normal, just to avoid a relapse or something like that. He's itching to come home in the worst way.

One good thing:
We have discovered the best walk to take Dog on. It's a loop that goes around the back of our house into the fields, and back down our road. It's easy enough that we can all do it and not be exhausted. This included Dog, because she is way out of shape. It is quick enough that we can complete it in 30 minutes, with one short rest half way through.
And we can lengthen it or shorten it, depending on our stamina and time limitations. We walked it twice the first day, but Dog was not so happy about the second outing. Sarge says she's a "one walk a day dog". She would much rather be upstairs sleeping on my bed.

One bad thing:
"Mysterious blue smoke" Yes, it was released from my less than one year old computer, when I plugged it into the 220V socket. And yet, my older than Piko de Gallo computer seems to be working just fine.

Now to find a computer repair shop where English is spoken.

Bleh!

We are currently without internets.

Hopefully posting will resume soon.

Mrs. S, if you are still reading, I have to post some pictures of all of the awesome tile in our house.

I'm crossing my fingers for internet service.

Too Much

Well, we're packing, again.
Do you think I have too much fabric?

See you all from Germany!

Holy Crud!

Well, we're back!

And we're leaving in a little more than a month!

I've officially had to start thinking about the fact that we're really moving to Germany, and all that entails. Crud. Packing, yard sales, last minute appointments, dealing with the dog, cleaning my house. All things I thoroughly enjoy of course.

Maine was pretty good though. Lots of snow, fried seafood, chocolate milkshakes, Piko deGallo milestones, and family. Low on privacy, high octane coffee, companionable silence, and privacy, did I mention privacy? I'll post some pictures later.

We also drove up (in 13 hours!! a deGallo personal best!!) in our Sienna, and drove back in an Outback! Seriously, Maine must be the Subaru capital of the universe.

We're off! Yay?

Maine ho!!!!

Woo-freaking-hoo. It's finally starting to get warm here, and we're heading off to the land of 6 foot snow drifts.

It's better than here though I guess. Monday night the PTA imploded, the new board cut funding for almost all of the student activities the previous board was supporting. They blamed the previous board for mismanaging the budget, and for sabotaging the latest fundraiser (whhhaaaa????). I did get my money for the Science Fair refunded though, so there was a plus for me. I'm seriously hoping that the next school we're at has a PTA that can actually work together, and do, you know, work.

So away from here, to the frozen north. It's going to be a great visit, I can already tell. The other night Piko deGallo tells Sarge.

"Do Grandma and Grandpa have more than one TV? I don't want to have to watch CRAP IDOL with them."

I swear, Sarge must have peed his pants from laughing so hard.

I'm looking forward to going to the discount fabric store. Thank goodness we got our tax return!

So...

So yesterday Piko came home crying. I though it was because we were making her come home so we could run errands. I'm all "Suck it up girl, you can play with them when we get back!" Not so much. Apparently her "friends" were calling her the "Queen of Losers!" And threatening to "tell on her" for what, I have no idea.

WHAT?!?!WHAT!!!???!!!

Now, I am the first to recognize that my kid can be somewhat of a namby pamby, and needs to grow some. But she's really not used to being called names. These girls that she plays with are sisters, and they can be pretty mean to eachother. Who knows, maybe the fact that they are now extending the name calling to Piko means that she's part of their family now.

I try not to get involved in this kind of crap when it goes down with my kid. But this time I'm a little torn between telling her to deal with it herself, and going over to talk to the mother. This mom's oldest child is being bullied in school, and she's under the impression that her daughter is not sticking up for herself, and is totally blameless in this bully situation. But based on what Piko is telling me, either she is not totally blameless, and/or it is affecting the way that she is interacting with other children.

Who the hell knows. I wasn't there to witness the interaction, so I don't know what exactly went on. The middle daughter is the one who walked Piko home, and was telling me a little bit about what happened, but I'm sure that she didn't really want to rat out her sisters.

Anyway, I'm really just venting, because it's anoying.

I ended up telling Piko that she was not going to be playing with them for the rest of the weekend. And that if they ever start calling her names again she is to stop playing with them immediately and come home. I don't care how much fun she was having, do not stay over there and take it. What else can I do? On a normal day she gets along very well with these girls, and they are the only kids on the block her age to play with.

Should I talk with the Mom? GAH!

P.S. We ended up staying inside, so we worked on Piko's science project.

VOLCANO!!!!

The Year of Healthy Eating

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!
Sarge's metabolism has finally caught up with him.
Pardon me a moment.
AAAHAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAA!!!!!

Ok.

So he has decided that WE are going on a healthy eating, meal overhaul. Oh joy. Well, admitidly we are both in need of this. We exercise, but don't necessarily always eat well. Lots of starches, bread, rice, potatos, pasta, too much butter and margarine, way too much salt and sugar. Yeah.

Sarge insists that he and I eat as few carbs as possible. This sucks. Our meals should be made up of fresh fruit, vegetables, lean proteins, and healthy fats.

Yay. Not.

He ALSO has it in his head that all grains are bad, no seeds, no legumes. WHAAA?!? Screw that, I'm still eating my cheereos and oatmeal.

Anyway, since we are on this "healthy" kick, I though I would put up my Sarge approved super simple Quinoa salad.

You need some Quinoa, fresh veggies, we use cucumber, tomato, red onion, all diced. One can of Black Beans drained and rinsed, one can of chickpeas also drained and rinsed (I know, legumes, but Sarge likes them), 1 package of crumbled fetta cheese. Fresh ground pepper, salt, and olive oil.

Cook your Quinoa according to package directions. Be sure not to over cook, or your Quinoa will lose it's crunch. I use about 8 oz, or half of a box of Trader Joe's Quinoa. Rinse in cold water, and drain well.

Mix together your veggies, cheese, beans, and Quinoa. Add about 3 Tbsp. olive oil, more if you find your salad to be too dry. Add some pepper to taste, and a very little salt; not too much because as your salad sits in the fridge the Fetta cheese will salt it up a little more (found this out the hard way). You may omit the salt alltoghther if you wish.

Store salad in the fridge. Eat it just as it is, or be like me, and mix in some baby spinach or arugula. Sprinkle with sesame seeds, almond slivers, rasins, or cranberies. I guess you can also add some grilled chicken to it as well.

Yum, YUM!!

Of course you can add whatever fresh vegetables you like. Other options would be heart of palm, artichoke hearts, beets, olives, The Librarian suggested some lemon juice. Really, you could add just about anything I think.

Anniversary of Horrors

The 16th was Sarge and my 8th wedding anniversary. I didn't write about it until now because I was trying to erase the horrors from my mind.

Actually it wasn't that terribly bad. But in my little, little world, anything that does not revolve around a quiet evening of brand new Mythbusters, and Project Runway on a Wednesday night (see my previous post) is a major disruption.

Just fair warning, this got pretty TL;DR.

Let me start by showing you what I got Sarge for our Anniversary.

Well, OK, so it's more of a joke than anything else, but that should give you an idea of what our day/night entailed.

Our whole family has been hit with a Norovirus type of ailment this week. It started with Piko deG emptying her stomach all night long on Friday night, not too bad right? At least it was Friday. She was absolutely fine on Saturday, we even ended up going to see a movie.

Sunday morning she wakes up with horrible, horrible, gigantic hives all over her entire body. AAAAA!!!!! Hives freak me out, combine with vomiting. We spent the morning in the ER, which by the time they saw us, the hives had resolved themselves. I hate wasting our, and the Doctor's time in the ER. Anyway, Sunday night, I'm up vomiting. Vomiting so much in fact that chunks come out of my nose. Nice, I know. Awful. Well, at least it's Sunday, Piko will be in school the next day and I can rest. Ha-Ha!!! What a cruel joke!

Monday morning, I wake up with body ache and a monkey laying on with a sledge hammer in my frontal lobe. Piko's hives are back again, this time it's migrated to her face, and she looks like Rocky Balboa in the 9th round. MOTHERLOVER! So, Benadryl for her, Motrin for me, and in bed all day. Ugh. Piko bounces back as soon as the Benadryl runs it's course and the drowsiness has worn off. Me, well let's just say that the monkey in my head has now used the sledge hammer on the rest of my body. It hurts to stand, it hurts to lie down. Well, you get the picture.

Then on Tuesday, SECOND VERSE, SAME AS THE FIRST! Piko, massive hives, other eye. Me, smaller sledge hammer. Luckily Piko will be happy to watch Star Wars while I sleep it off. And no appointments are to be had with anyone in our PCM's office. 6pm or so things are getting back to normal when Sarge announces: "Hmmmm, I don't feel so well". AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!! Yep, he spent the night spewing from both ends (sorry, I know that's gross).

Wednesday, Piko is ok, send her to school. Sarge is now entertaining my hammer happy monkey. We have a meeting to do paperwork so we can leave to Germany. Hey, it's our anniversary! We attend our meeting which involves me being questioned by some lady about my mental health, drug and alcohol abuse, and possible abusive relationship with my husband.

Ok. sidebar here. Now I have two major issues with this meeting. First, the questions ran along the lines of "Do you have a problem with drugs or alcohol? Have you ever been seen for drug or alcohol counseling while on this base? Have you been treated at the psychiatric center while living on this base? Have you been visited by a caseworker from the Family Services office while on this base?" WTFBBQ?!?!?! Please note that we were AT the Family Services office. Do they not keep freaking records themselves?!?! WASTE MY FREAKING TIME why don't you!! Second, and I think this is the worst one. IN FRONT of my HUSBAND she asks me "Do you live in an abusive household?" I just looked at Sarge and kind of giggled nervously and said no, as he rolled his eyes. I'm sure that looked good. Why in the world would they ask a spouse in front of the other spouse if they were living in an abusive household?!?! Like someone is going to give an honest answer. Freaking morons. On top of these horrors, it's apparently going to take another week to get our paperwork back from the Doctor who couldn't be bothered to show up for our meeting. Only then we can get our final orders for Germany cut.

So quick recap.
Piko- Sick, vomiting, hives.
Me- Sick, vomiting, massive head and body ache, dealing with stupid.
Sarge- Sick, both ends, massive head and body ache, dealing with stupid.

Wheee!!! It's my anniversary!!

Then at about 1am, Piko threw up her dinner in her bed. Aaaah, wedded bliss.
Sarge gave me the best anniversary gift though, he was still up, and so did 90% of the clean up, while trying not to wake me up. I just had to put the bedding in the wash, and get Piko setteled back into the hide-a-bed for the rest of the night.

Funny or Sad.

This is a picture of the number pad on our TV's remote control. Yeah, yeah, the numbers are almost completely worn off. You can still kind of see the 2, 3, and 6, but that's it.
I can't decide if it's funny, or just sad that I have proof we watch too much TV.

Take Away My Race Card.

For the first time in 34 years I vacuumed on New Years Day!!!

DOH!!! What a dumbass.

Ok, what?! You say.

Yeah, well, I've had it drilled into me that you should not sweep on New Years Day because you will be sweeping all of the good luck out of your home for the rest of the year. I'm guessing that vacuuming is the same thing.

I realized what I was doing about half way through the livingroom. And I actually considered emptying the vacuum canister into a Ziploc and keeping it. But how would I even begin to explain to Sarge why we needed to pack a Ziploc full of dog hair and dust to take with us to Germany.

Not that our new year got off to an auspicious beginning anyway.

Another saying that I have been brought up with is that you should do things that you enjoy or that are fun on new years day because that is what you will be spending the next year doing. Not that this has ever come true for me. This morning I was up at 5:30 cleaning up cat barf from under the bed. An old crusty crunchy one, and a nice wet juicy fresh one. Yay me.

Can't wait for 2008!

The Hair Affair is Over

I am officially no longer in love with my haircut.
This is pretty much the best I can do with it, without breaking out a bazillion hair care items.

And well, since the likelihood of anyone but the mailman seeing me is pretty slim. This is what I'm going with.

I suppose I can comfort myself with the fact that this is a very famous, iconic hairstyle, known across the land.

Unfortunately this is the icon.

Now The Hard Part

So now that the excitement of new orders (YAY GERMANY!) has worn off, we are left to consider the difficult-ness(?!?) of the impending move.

Sarge's orders have him reporting to the new base by early May. Well, Piko does not get out of school until early June. Does he go on ahead early and get settled, find a house, hook up the internets, etc, etc. I follow later after Piko gets out of school? That being so, I would have to be in charge of packing, cleaning, and clearing the house with the housing office, shipping the car, shipping myself, my child, a cat and a dog overseas. We have alot of things that we have to get rid of, washer and dryer, tons of small things that we've amassed throughout the years we've been here. And I don't really see the point of taking all of our 180 lamps, and other small electronics with us. Garage sale....meeehhh...Salvation Army...eeeeh....
How about do we pull the kid early from school??? Eeehhhhh....it's kindergarten....how much school can she miss before having to repeat? It'll probably end up being the last month and a half. That's just not acceptable to me.

GAH!!

See, one of the disadvantages of not moving in so long is that I have never actually been involved in a military transfer move. I have no idea what I would have to do, and Sarge, well, he's not all that forthcoming with the information. Well, he would have not other choice but to be if he leaves me here to do it all by myself. I guess other families have done it before, so I'm sure I can too.

Then there's the whole going to visit the in-laws trip we have to make time for as well.

I guess what's really bothering me is that there are no decisions that can be made immediately. It all depends on something, which depends on something else, depending on who you ask, and when. And of course, since Sarge works nights, who knows when he'll be able to go in during regular business hours to finally talk to someone. In my own perfect world of deGallotopia I would have had all of these questions answered the minute we found out we were leaving Maryland. But of course, I fail to remember that I don't live in deGallotopia, I live in Militariantia.

If That's Not A Sign...

Yesterday, I broke my computer chair.

Sat right down and the SOLID METAL bar that holds the chair onto the swivel snapped. SNAPPED I SAY!!!

FINE!!! FINE!!!! I'm GOING BACK TO THE GYM TODAY!!

My fracken chair just called me a fatass!

Update 8:40 am: The gym is conspiring against me. It's closed today for installation of new equipment! BAH! So I had to drag my unmotivated self home, and exercise in Sarge's torture chamber cold garage gym. And now I want to bake brownies. Poo!