Humor Among Holiday Shoppers... at least for me

This past Friday as I was in the back magazine isle of Target and trying to stay out of the multiple, mostly grumpy shoppers, I found myself ease dropping for fun. Two women started down the isle I was in. Right behind me and the magazines is the "young adult" books. Things like "Harry Potter" or "The Vampire Diaries" can be found there. These two women were most likely sisters from the looks of them and one was petite but tall, while the other was short and frumpy (my code for she could push a meal or two back every now and then). I was listening to these two talk of the Christmas lists they had from their loved ones of their wants or needs. The shorter lady said her daughter had written down that she wanted the "True Blood" series of books but she must have misprinted it because surely she meant these. I looked around to see what she was looking at. The woman goes these say "Blue Blood". I'm sure these are them. I said excuse me ladies but there is a book series called "True Blood", by Charlaine Harris, but you won't find them in the young adult book section as they are probably not appropriate for young minds. The shorter lady looks at me and goes, "why is that?" I said because they are fairly explicit and filled with sex. The lady looked like I had mooned her. She goes "Oh, my. Maybe I shouldn't buy that for my daughter." Now these two women looked like they were somewhere in their fifties, but perhaps they didn't age well. Who knows. So I asked the lady, well how old is your daughter? She looked at me and said "She's twenty-one." I, being that I am bad, said "well I'm sure she knows all about sex by now then." But wait... without skipping a beat the lady that was with her goes: "Hell the way she looks I'm sure she's done it lots and could give lessons." The shorter lady was mortified to say the least and I had to choke back a laugh. Some how this did help my Friday Christmas spirit find it's place though. I hope it helped yours... gotta love a true story.

OUCH!

On the drive back from my Niece's pre-school graduation on Friday I snapped this photo as we drove by this accident. This was on US 27. I can't help but wonder if someone forgot to stop at the stop sign in the back ground or if someone turned into the path of on-coming traffic. Either way... OUCH!

How Do You Steal A House?

I thought my dad was nuts! My dad asked me to go to www.wane.com and look up an article about what he saw on the news. I thought he has to be kidding, but guess what, he wasn't. There is a new low criminals have sunk to. They can actually steal your house right out from under you. Good grief! How you might ask. I have a link here to the article and there is a whole website set up to help protect you. They can forge documents, get your title and take loans out on your home, which you could potentially end up owing or even have your home taken away through foreclosure. If you go to the link below you can read the article, follow it to the website and sign up for a FREE government service to alert you if someone attempts to steal your house. Just thought I would pass this along. I mean who knew?

http://www.wane.com/dpp/news/local_wane_fort_wayne_property_owners_at_risk_for_fraud_200904081612

Some People Just Need to "GET OVER IT"!

This week has been a long and stressful week for me on so many levels. As you recall I have been having a lot and I mean a lot of different health "quirks" or problems over the past year, which have caused me to rethink things in life. One of which has been that I have decided I don't care about pettiness anymore. Trust me I have a lot of great people in my life, good people, good friends and a great family, but I also have a lot of self righteous, hypocritical, lying and petty people in my life too. (No, I won't out anyone. You all know who you are and how you fit in my life.) Some of these "wonderful" people have been trying to see how much grief they can cause me in my life. One has taken it to new highs for making up stories. I don't have time for these people in any form or fashion so I try to ignore them, remove them as much as possible and be as polite as I can when on occasion I might run into them somewhere. I have also done a lot of soul searching for things that might have been wrong on my part. I'm human. For those people I am making every effort to correct my mistake, make amends and not recreate them. One person I did that way I really regret. This person I thought due to another person was doing things they were not. Found out way to late, trusted way too much and now I like this person. I get along with them and hope they have actually gotten to a point of forgive and forget. One person though cracks me up. I try to be cordial, I try not to pay attention to them and thankfully they are not a part of my normal life so I rarely have to see them in any setting for any amount of time. They constantly say things about hoping people can be happy and find and make peace with God. Funny. I think they have forgotten the part of the bible that talks about forgiving and forgetting themselves. Along with turning the other cheek. Then I believe there is a part in the bible about "Let he who is without sin cast the first stone." boy does this person ever need to put that stone down. Yet that isn't what this article is suppose to be about. I'm just talking and going on because it's hard to deal with some things in life. Somehow if you say them out loud they become more real. Somehow if you type them they become too real.

No this isn't mine... mine is a little lower on the breast, this is just an example.

I had my first ever mammogram on Monday, February 23, 2009. That started out my week. The test in itself, although nerve racking, was not as bad as I expected from tales I had been told. I had it done at MD Imagining over at Lutheran Hospital. The staff there is so nice. Then Tuesday morning I was awakened to a call from a Nicole from their office. She was very polite, not cold, not in any form sounding as if she had made this call a dozen times. She has made it plenty from what she later told me. It was to advise me that there was an abnormality found in my left breast. Nothing to worry about she expressed. It happens all the time on Base line (first) test with mammograms. But she also warned a lot of things could happen when I came back in depending upon what they found out. Only one appointment left in the week. It was during hours I was scheduled at work and the next appointment would be very late the next week, so I took the appointment. Waiting until the end of the week was torture enough for this sort of thing. I couldn't imagine having to wait another week. I then called my work and they were very good about letting me get a vacation day to go take care of this. They always are good about working with me and I appreciate that a lot.
Waiting in the lobby for that second mammogram was nerve racking, but there were three other women who were there for the same reason. I wasn't alone. Not sure this is one of those times that was actually comforting, but I wasn't alone. One by one they went back. One by one they each left saying nothing further was needed done and mine was probably fine too. The second mammogram concluded that yes indeed there is a free floating mass a little bit smaller than the tip of my pinkie finger in my left breast. They wanted a closer look, so they told me to wait and they would get a technician to do an ultra sound. Now that was a unique experience to say the least. I have very dense breast so it was very hard for them to find what they were looking for. I saw it on the ultra sound though. The girl said she wanted an on-staff physician to look at it to see if they wanted to do anything else that day. More nerves. More feeling of doom.
The doctor came in and looked at the pictures taken and looked at an ultra sound himself. He then told me that it's very hard to tell what this might or might not be. It could be cancer, it could be nothing. Whatever it is, it is very tiny and no immediate threat. His advise is to wait six months and come back and see if it's grown. Uh, what? He's male. I get it. But still is sitting and waiting for something to grow the answer? I mean I get the concept. If it grows it's probably cancer. If it doesn't it's probably benign. What if it grows past the ability to do anything about it though? I wasn't at all comfortable with this recommendation at all, but he was a hospital doctor on staff, not my doctor. Now where I go is to talk this over with my regular practitioner and my OBGYN and see what they think. How they feel. I also sent informational questions off to my insurance company on my options, second opinions, and if of course this six month later mammogram is going to be covered. So many questions. I also did a lot of web surfing. I bought a book on Breast Cancer to arm myself with information in case.
From everything I can tell from research odds are in my favor that it's nothing. Odds are it's just a worry that is there for me to deal with at this time. I've never been one good at beating the odds though so keep your fingers crossed for me and keep your prayers out there for me. So what is in the title of this article. Simply this... Life is short. Sometimes shorter than we might expect. I don't want to fight with anyone. I am not out to get anyone and I have no desires to have people in my life who are negative. I need positive people in my life. I need peace and calm. If you can do that you can stay in my life. The people who can't I guess can get over it because my calls or conversations with them will be fleeting and few if at all. Sometimes we just have to look out for ourselves. I suppose this is my way of doing it. After all I always have been tough - right? Anyone who has any stories they want to share with me or on my blog regarding breast cancer - good or bad I'll happily take them and post them if you wish. Oh and for those of you that know my mom and dad - please do not share this with them at this time. They would worry themselves sick and they just don't need that. Thanks.

Double Take

Sometimes office humor can make you look twice. It always makes me smile though!

Exercise Hell - The Road to Success?

I've heard that the road to hell is paved with good intentions, but let me tell you I'm pretty sure it's exercise. I started an exercise routine about two weeks ago. I have been adding a few every few days to the routine to try to get my optimal results. The first two weeks have been mostly trying to limber up some and loosen up some. So the first two weeks were not too bad. A little soreness but not bad. This week on Monday though I added the real exercises. The ones that make you sweat and make you use your muscles. Let me say OMG! I have sore muscles in places I don't think you're suppose to have muscles. Yesterday, Wednesday, I was so sore I could hardly move. It literally hurt so badly, especially my legs, that I wanted to throw in the towel and cry. I expressed this to my mother. She always has had really good advice but what she said wasn't what I wanted to hear. She said whatever you do don't stop. You need to work through the pain. She said it was really important to do the exercises last night. UGH! So let me tell you I did and I did so with great pain. Every exercise hurt but I did them and you know what? She was right. Today the soreness is not nearly as bad. It's at least sixty to seventy percent better. Just feels a little tender. Guess we'll have to see how long it takes me to get good results but the lessons learned are many. One you can do something even when you mind is screaming "What the hell are you doing?" and as one would expect, "Mother really does know best!"

Bee's Really Be Gone?

Just a quick not to let you know that my dad decided to play exterminator last night and get rid of the bees. That scared me half to death that he would try it on his own. I worried myself sick at work thinking all kinds of scary thoughts. He waited for it to get dark because bees are less active at night. He went in and cut a whole in my ceiling. Mom said they started pouring out of the ceiling by the hundreds so he ran out and closed the bathroom door, shutting the light off as he went. He then waited a bit and went back in with the lights still off and started spraying them with bug killer. Amazingly he only got 1 sting. I guess my bathtub had thousands of dead bees in it. They said it was a mess to clean up. They got the nest and it was filled with a bunch of baby bees ready to be born. So my thousands were about to grow. Hopefully though this time the bee's really are gone. I owe my cat Basil a big thanks for the heads up. Also I thank God for the heads up on the bee's. My dad could have been hurt seriously if he had gone in there to repair the roof and didn't know they were there. Again here's hoping they are gone!.

When It Rains, It Pours...

So is it just me or has anyone else noticed that when something goes wrong, it happens in three's? I mean normally if the washer breaks, a couple of other events follow shortly there after. Then there are days that are just "those" type of days. Now I'm not having one of those yet, knock on wood, however, a friend of mine is it appears. His clutch went out on his car which for him is going to be a costly endeavor and probably an aggrevating one. What it did for me though was send me back in time to a memory of a day where I got a call from this same friend. A memory probably twelve to fifteen years old. It was a day when yet another car had a problem and he needed assistance. I remember the location where I went to get him. It was out past Saint Joe Hospital. I believe the car was blue, but I couldn't swear to that. The memory is faint, but obviously it wanted to be remembered. Mostly I just want him to realize that after the rain the sun always comes out. Perhaps this is an opportunity rather than a problem. He always did like buying cars. Either way, I know when it rains it seems to pour, but for me it brought back a memory of times gone by and perhaps ones yet to come.

----------------------Bee's Be Gone.-----------------

OK.. so tonight didn't exactly go as I planned. While unloading my dryer this evening I noticed a bee (yellow jacket to be exact) flying around my ceiling light in my bathroom. Now I have a strict policy never to kill anything (other than mosquito's) intentionally if I do not have to. So I went out of my bathroom and got a cup and a piece of cardboard to catch the bee to put it outside.

When I came back to my surprise there were three of them at my light and then I looked and there were five. This was just odd but I knew I'd never catch them all without getting stung so I started killing them even though I really didn't want to. I flushed them and looked and there were five more and these bees seemed angry. I killed several more, flushed and went on with this pattern several times. One flew in my hair. I freaked out like any red blooded American girl would do. I went out of the bathroom and closed the door to keep them in and also did something else any girl would do, went next door and got my daddy. He killed dozens of them but they just kept coming. Finally we found where they were coming from. The little buggers had burrowed a hole in my bathroom ceiling on the very edge. It was so small it was practically impossible to see. So my dad went outside and found the nest under the over-hang on my bathroom. I on the other hand took some cardboard and tape and taped over the whole until I can get it fixed and killed the remaining bees that were in my bathroom. This little endeavor took two hours believe it or not. All in all though my dad got stung once and I got stung once. Didn't hurt for long though thanks to something my mother told me. I took a bar of IVORY soap, dry not wet and rubbed over the sting. It took the sting right out of it and it didn't swell. You can also hold a penny against them too. That works for me also, but since I was in the bathroom the soap was right there. Hopefully the bees are gone for now.