Medical updates

I was called last year for a virtual 2nd opinion with Cleveland Clinic. I thought about it and thought about it and came to the conclusion that if I would GO anywhere it would be Mayo. So I called Mayo. I got their information on Telehealth appointments and decided to go for it. I had that call last Monday. 

I’m OK with the talk I had with the doc. He stated that the odds of me having a recurrence isn’t zero but at this stage it’s closer to 1% so about the same as normal person on the street. 

Scans will beget more scans and more questions than answers. One small thing isn’t cancer necessarily. 

So what does this mean?

I’m paranoid and I need to move past it. My odds of cancer again are no more than yours (I still scoff at that).

I will have a scan on schedule with my local oncologist as pre scheduled. We will let it go unless there is a spot that is a twin to the first. Two in a row is not a coincidence. But if it’s a new spot that’s not huge, we walk away and assume it’s my body being it’s lovely complex self. 

Sell it all!!

Of the four fiddle leafs (and one cane) I purchased pots for them all. $100. Two bags of soil $30. THEN sold two trees for $150. So I’m up three pots and $20. Bonus!  

What else have I been doing? Typing moms person history into the computer. I’m up to my birth in the story!  So only 58 more years to go!

I’ve been selling glass on eBay. Made some good profit. Some things I have bought aren’t so great. Some are. I need to gather all my info for taxes to see if I’m breaking even or not. 

Glass samples:

Errands and diving

Got up determined to be productive. I got up stripped my bed, started laundry. Did my laundry and the sheets. 

I then got dressed to go out. Why? Because I’m frustrated with Etsy and not being able to list craft stuff to sell it. Sigh. Maybe on Monday I’ll get it fixed with their help desk??

So off I went. 

I went to Goodwill, Lowes, Waffle House, it was noon,  then I went diving in lots of areas around town. 

At Lowes I picked up salt for the pool, drip trays, and potting soil;  The plants that I picked up before Christmas got some much needed soil. I had enough to full pot TWO and partially pot one. One remains. I need to go back to Lowes and get another bag of potting soil. But not tonight.

The corn plant is fully topped off.  The Fiddle behind him was actually potted at Christmas as he lost his pot and his pathos was looking a bit dingy. I got it potted in time to save 75% of the pathos. So all is well. He’s been hanging out here for a few weeks now. I need to get Butch to move the extra chairs in the living room else where so the corn plant can go there. 

I drove all over town. I got Alldees (don’t mention their real name so they don’t start locking bins). I got three bags of potatoes, a bag of spring onions two partial bags of onions two packages of zucchini’s. And 9 eggs. They were in there for two broken eggs that I dropped back in the dumpster. These have been washed and tested for their “health”. None float. There were so many more potatoes and other things buried in there but I’m not to the point of jumping in and really sifting for things. My grabber lacks some grip so some of the potato’s stayed simply because I can’t get them out. There were lots of heads of lettuce but honestly we wouldn’t eat them in time. So they all stayed. 

I found a box of dishes (looked like it was from a garage sale left overs?) Won’t mention the other bags in there that appeared to be catheter bags. What the actual heck?  I sanitized everything after that dumpster!!

I also found a bag from JC P full of clothes. I need to go through that one. I just grabbed it and left.  It was in a bin of garbage where there was lots of popcorn from the movie theatre. Part of me thought about packing BUT that would really be semi-yuckie as it’s a butter mix oil used to pop it!  

The JC P haul of young kid clothing. 

Wonder if they would fit and be enjoyed my Nicks kids?  All brand new. 

So. Four hours later I’m home, pots are planted as much as they can be and I’m laying on a completely unmade bed because that was not done before I went out!  Remember. Stripped but not remade. 

So blogging and having a snack and enjoying some downtime and debating if I should put my pants back on and getting some soil. (The answer was nope!!)

Oh, yeah, I got a car wash and went to the baby Walmart to grab some sodas because someone in the house is incapable of leaving said house. Sigh. Yesterday I got sucked into the vortex of sleeping and doing nothing all day. :( I started to take pictures of things to sell on Etsy. Then when I found out my account is still locked I got frustrated and quit doing anything and watched movies and slept. I did need the sleep as I was fighting a headache and yuckie feelings. I thought maybe it was Covid. I took a test. The answer was negative. So I was just done with everything and just slept and rested. I feel better now.

I still need a few plant dollies to let me move them around as needed as the pots are BIG. I will need to start a few more pathos for the top of the rest of the pots as well as I really like the way they look in the pots. 

So productive day. 

Happy New Year!

Headed to Florida and Sally’s to see her for New Years. While doing a car swap Butch says “did you see the cat?”  Uh, what cat?

IN the closed florist shop. My kind of store!!

I drove through sunshine and happiness. Crashed out for an hour and woke up to this. Yuck!!

You can see the rain in the distance over the car. Just dumping out of the clouds!  Glad I wasn’t driving!

BUT it makes for pretty greenery!!

Our spring blooming Camilla is just starting to bloom!

Lots of buds!

Our New Years was thrilling (actually just the way I like them!). Stewbys for dinner and bed before midnight!

Shrimp, hush puppies, and grits. Can’t be beat!

We had fog quite a few days while we were there. We ate well with ours of sausage and gravy for breakfast and great meals at night. Nice way to ring in the new year!

All-dees diving

I really HATE how wasteful our society is. 

I left about a bushel of bananas in the dumpster that were perfectly fine for banana bread  

Here is what I pulled out

Kids shirt - long sleeved pink

Dog elf feet ears

Partial package of girls socks

Two red-green washcloths 

A Mario brothers watch ban

Complete box of boys u does size 4

Package if TP sealed until I picked it woth my grabber :)

Box of granola bars. 

     (A few may be missing j haven’t fully opened it) 

A box of Lannxe cheese and peanut butter crackers 

     (all sealed)

A jar of peanuts (sealed)

A box of baggies (needed those!!)

Four grinding spices (you’ll see these later)

Single taco season package 

Under the taco is a package of died cranberries 

Bag of toast type charcuterie snacks

Four easy max type mac-n-cheese

Two sealed bottles extra virgin olive oil

1 flavor additive for water

Bag of lentils

Big of split pea 

Two round woven placemats

Three onions

Sealed jar of apple cider vinegar 

     (has floaters - need to see if that’s a big no no)

Can of corn

Details on the grinders. The middle one is duplicated to make four total. I tried the pepper one tonight. It’s pretty good. 

And chocolate. 

Every single thing in this hail was unexpired and sealed. 

Sad day! Moms returned to Utah

Mom is back home in Utah. 

I took her to her plane seat - found out after I was not supposed to. Oh well I blame the dingaling at the counter. I asked if I could wheel her down she said yes. She checked her boarding pass and never asked for mine (because I didn’t have one!) so I walked her all the way to her seat as she couldn’t quite get her sea legs after sitting and being beat up by her walker. It rode in her lap and I actually honked her once while getting situated to move out of traffic at the scanner. What a mad house that airport was with missed flights for some for days with southwest and just lots of flyers. It was crazy!!  Going OUT was much nicer. I tried to get to where I could take a picture of her plane. Nope. Too crowded and too many folks not happy. Oh well. I just blew mom a kiss and exited quickly!!

What we saw on the way to the airport

Yes that’s a swimming pool driving the Freeway!

We did stay in a hotel out by the airport so that was nice. No super rush in the morning BUT they weren’t serving breakfast yet and didn’t have grab and go meals. They offered mom a danish out of the fridge and I’m glad we got it as there was NO time to stop on the way into her flight. We had maybe 10 minute wait once we got to the gate before they were boarding. It took an hour and fifteen minutes to get up to the gate to check in. THEN a I found out the wheel chair request was across the way and it was an hour wait. Well that was too close so I had my escort pass and drove her in. That was nice. Then it was super crowded at the first shuttle entry so I walked us to the T gates to catch it. Much nicer. Got right in. Got yo D gates and of course it was D1!  All the way at the end. I didn’t even see any sandwich grab and go places open in the way!  Sad!!

BUT even though I was sort of in trouble and we cut it to within 10 minutes (even getting there 2 hours early!) it was a fairly painless effort. Now not sure mom would say that as the walker was a pain in the rump!  Maybe we should just borrow or buy her a little zip walked for when she’s down again?  Yeah!!

The hotel and shuttle was the way to go for sure!!

In the way home I went down Highway 41 and stopped at all the goodwills I could find. I even tried a Salvation Army store but they were closed!  Bummer. I stopped at three (if you count the closed one) before I found some goodies. Some LE Smith Amber Atterbury scroll canisters. Believe it or not this wasn’t until MACON. Yep. All those stops nada. Then Macon I found five. So I nabbed them all. I should double my money on those or more. 

Then I got the South Macon store and found the Hull vase on the left side. I had picked up a similar Hull case for $.50 at an estate sale and found that even damaged they can bring in $10. So for $2.06 after taxes why not. 

Then the Warner Robins store. JACKPOT   The moon and star covered candy dish on the right. It will more than triple its value I’m sure. I bought a purple compote (mush more desired color) for $3.95 and sold it for $70. So I’m hoping my $9 investment pays off by at least triple. 

I also took a chance on the resin geisha and man figurines as they seem to be worth something. That was not quite my area but we shall try them. They looked good on what is selling on eBay. 

The last thing is the the glasses and vase in the front they are vintage Murano. The glasses are undamaged so I really bought the set for them. They retail for upwards of $45 for a set so here’s hoping the chips on the vase don’t turn  folks off. We shall see. 

And last bit not least the cute glass urchin for me. $.99

So I dealt with my sadness by shopping. 

Moms probably super happy to be out if our dysfunctional house!  Hope we didn’t chase HER off!!

Now to plan my trip out to see her in March/April!

Christmas

Angie came over to spend Christmas Eve with us and have dinner. She brought her cat Lela. Such a soft pretty cat but still skittish around a new environment. 

She and mom LOVED the fire ;)

Christmas Eve Angela and mom and I went out to see Christmas lights. There was a video you can see on face book of the best display. 



This was #2 and 3

Christmas morning was really Christmas afternoon. 

Butch got His boat!  Hahaha

Angela had a good reaction to safety goggles that went with her new drill. 

Alex and Liz 

Mommy

Lela of course joined in on the wrapping paper fun!

The aftermath!

What isn’t pictured is our great dinner of brisket. Butch started it at midnight the night prior and we ate at 3 or 4. 

Brisket, potato salad, deviled eggs, Mac and cheese, sautéed asparagus. Non traditional but oh so good!

We wrapped up the night with games. We all played push the dummy then Alex, mom, Liz and Angela and I played boggle. Them Liz, Alex, Angela and I played her new game of Hocus Pocus Yahtzee. I haven’t played Yahtzee in forever.!  Fun night. 

A little drama over a missing cat when dad took the garbage to the garage and left the door open behind him and we opened the garage, but she was lounging somewhere hidden and came out in time to head off major panic. Thank goodness!! 

Dumpster Diving and Christmas prep (sort of)

Adventures in dumpster diving. So I was zipping around Home Depot to to to the other favorite dumpster and what do I spy? TONs of 6’ tall fiddle leaf fig trees!!  Yep!  I drove into the ramp in front of the HUGE dumpster and pulled out FIVE fiddle leafs and one Hawaiian Cane (according to someone on my diving site!)

Two have bonus pathos in the bottom if their pots. One is missing a pot as it stayed behind on the dumpster. BUT they need real pots. I left another 5 to 10 plants IN the dumpster! My car was FULL!!

Next to clean out the dirt from my car and buy some proper pots for these guys. I promptly peed my pants at the second stop. I hate my body and it hates me. No warning just the thought “I better stop on the way home after this stop” nope. Twisted just wrong and there ya go, you’re sitting in a towel in the way home, thank you very much. Sigh. Oh well doesn’t stop me, just delays me a bit!

We had all our Christmas parties. This was at our division party. Fun!


And these are my flowers I bought at Kroger yesterday because I’m worth it ;)

I also did some glass “blowing” which was really glass pumping. More to come on that one once I pick up the or ornament today after work 

Weekend work and adventures

What is this???  The BARN “floor” at the auction I went to on Saturday. What?  Yep. I got an invitation to go to an auction with some gal friends. It was sort of funny as I was meeting Amanda she was looking at me funny she worked at Childrens Best where my girls went for YEARS. She was pregnant with her now 18 year old son when my girls were there. Small world! There were four other gals that went and they knew the folks there fairly well. I got registered and actually won one auction. 

Looking forward to the auctioneer stand and the guy in the gray who was showing all the items up for sale. They had old church pews and it was “interesting”. It was weird as they would let items go super high then the two high bidders were told “no, that’s too much, back it down to XX amount” Then the high bidder and 2nd were given first choice and could buy it all OR just one depending on what they wanted to do. I got one good deal and paid retail for one set of items so it pays to know what you are buying. Oh well live and learn. I only bought four different things. It was fun, I would go again and the gals we went with were entertaining!  I didn’t get home until after midnight.  I was a pumpkin by then. BUT managed to sleep past 8am the next day. So that made Butch happy as Saturday I want to get up at 8am. Eeek right?  Not!!

Here’s what I hung:

Ignore the blue tape. I have to get putty for that corner as the frame is warped. 

And the hall. 

Pumpkin finale!

Liz and I finally went to retrieve our glass pumpkins we did on November 4th. Mine started out like this

And ended like this:

 

I LOVE the variation in the stem. Liz used that darker color in the body of the pumpkin and a dark brown on the stem. I should have gotten a picture of her finished one as well. They were both super cute!  Next up?  Glass balls for ornaments!!

Thanksgiving

Regretfully Angela was not able to make the trek down to Florida this year for to her work schedule. Regardless we had a good time. 

Flaming Turkey wings. Hahah. I think the browning got a little out of hand!

The start of the table setting with the good China. 

Seated ready to eat!

The spread. It was a good thanksgiving!

Orlando informer #2

Day two Saturday:

Liz doesn’t have to work. Yay!! Lunch at IHOP. The putt putt

That’s our hotel behind us as well. It was a fun putt putt course. 

Day two (night two anyway) 

Cow fish sushi - no pictures!!

Mummy ride

Hulk (not me!)

Carousel. (Cause ya gotta!) 

Kong

Velociraptor (not me)

Hagrids again always a fun ride!!  I rode side car tonight. 

We had a slightly longer wait so we opted for single rider. Much faster but still a wait. 30 minutes to get through (roughly).

Butter beer (cold and frozen by choice)

Bottles of water

Pretzels (can not go wrong but needed cheese sauce!)

Churros (yuckie)

Pretzel sliders (not too shabby)

Pizza tots (yuck)

Caesar’s salad (yuckie)

Turkey leg (meh)

And that was a wrap for the FUN two days. It was midnight before we started to make our way out of the park again. 

Each day was LOTS of walking and LOTs of fun. I’m glad my girls are patient with me and my slowness!!  

Sunday we woke to rain. 

Bye Orlando!

A view of the putt putt course from our room :). They had gators to feed as well. Hummm interesting.