Gettin' old ain't for sissies

**You men might want to skip this particular blog post!  :)

This has without a doubt been the best year of my life.  Larry and I are enjoying our normal, every day existence and I have welcomed the changes in my home, my routine and my heart.  Healthwise, though, it's been a nightmare for me.  Beginning in March when I got miserably sick with Epstein-Barr and CMV simultaneously and spent eight days in the hospital to what has now become an almost literal knock-down-drag-out with Mother Nature.  I am usually a very private person but it's my hope that my experience might help another woman or at least bring comfort to her if she's going through the same thing I am.  I am 47 and way too young for this mess!  I have begun my journey through "the change".  Menopause.  I am only 47!  I'm still getting pimples!  But it's true, a truth that I have accepted and even embraced.  I got my first period at NINE YEARS OLD.  NINE.  FOURTH GRADE.  I didn't even have boobs then.  And as far as I know, I was the first in my class.  So I'm ready to be free of it.  I embraced it, looked forward to it.  It's part of my journey as a woman.  It's cool.  Until this.  I have been bleeding for 54 days now.  I have been in constant contact with my doctor since somewhere around Day 30 and we tried medication to get it to stop.  It hasn't.  Not even close. And while this is not unheard of, it is not normal.  Larry and I have gone through two rounds of Clomid, to boost my ovulation to make it easier to get pregnant, since the two of us ain't getting no younger.  Well, that's on hold.  Obviously.  Anyway, I'm having a little outpatient surgery Monday to fix this li'l situation we got going on heah and get straightened out so we can get back to normal and do another round of Clomid.  Ask Larry how many times I've said, "I want my life back!".  A girl tends to whine a little when she's been bleeding for two months.  Who knew?

I had a sweet neighbor who passed away a year and a half ago in her sleep, peacefully, during a nap, right across the street from me.  Her name was Gladys and she used to tell me all the time, "this gettin' old shit ain't for sissies".  I never really understood what that meant until this happened to me.  It ain't for sissies.  You gotta be strong, you gotta be tough, you gotta face growing older head on and fight.  That's what I'm gonna do.  For Gladys.

I'd appreciate your prayers Monday.  For me, for Larry, for our baby. 

Treasure Huntin'

We started this weekend by hitting an estate sale in Perry early Friday morning.  The people have moved to Alaska and they have an estate company selling their stuff and the house.  Beautiful house out in the country, complete with walk-in pantry, huge closets, shop, garden area, greenhouse, chicken coop and clothesline!  All of my dream house must-haves.  $214,900 is all they want for it.  Since I couldn't load that house up on the truck and bring it home with me, we brought home what we could.  I'm always on the lookout for baking dishes and I found a 9x13 Cerutil stoneware casserole dish marked $5 on a rack in the kitchen!  I found two other Corning French White pieces that I quickly scooped up and placed inside the Cerutil and went on my merry way toward the pantry.  Did I mention it was a walk-in pantry??!  My heart skips a beat and flips completely over when I see a walk-in pantry.  I could've stayed in there all day.  They even had canned goods, spices and pickles and jellies that were put up last summer still on the shelves for sale.  This lady comes in there and tells me she saw the stoneware dish first and acted like she wanted me to give it to her.  Um, no.  You want it, you have to PICK. IT. UP. and hold on to it like I was doing!  That's the rules.  I think.  I was nice, I laughed a little and said, "yeah, it's nice, huh?" but that was it.  Well, four other times during our tour through the house, this lady said, "I saw that dish first" to me.  Lady.  Don't.  Just don't.  I meet up with Larry and he's found an Indiana Jones fedora that he's decided to get.  (I'm glad, too, 'cause it looks awesome on him!)  Well, that same lady's husband comes up to us when we go to pay for our stuff and says HE was gonna get that hat!  We decide to gather up our things and pay and get out of there 'fore somebody got hurt.  Namely my casserole dish.  

Then I spied an adorable little patio set out on the deck! There's a lady sitting out there at another table and she tells me she thinks it's sold already and she was going to get it but she couldn't find the tag.  Well, the tag's right there, tied to one of the chairs.  $75.  I go inside, ask the folks if that set is sold yet and they say no.  I walk right back out there and grab that tag and then go find Larry again to get him to come look at it.  We were going to buy a set for our deck this summer anyway and this set was in perfect condition for $75!  While we loaded it up on the truck, Casserole Dish Lady and her husband are STILL goin' on about the dish and the hat!  Then the husband says the dish is too big for them anyway and I said I was getting it to make enchiladas in and boy, they really DID hate me then.  Lesson learned.  You want it, don't leave it.  :)  We got out of there and went to Home Depot, got us an umbrella for our little glass top table and went home and set everything up and we're so proud of it!  We sure have enjoyed it this weekend.

Saturday, we got up early (again!) and went yard saleing.  This is only the second time we've done this and I think we've discovered a passion for both of us.  We love spending the time together, just jumping in the truck with a stack of one-dollar bills, our list of yard sales we want to check out and Mapquest on the phone.  We love it.  We got some really good stuff this time, too!  Here are just a few of the treasures we found --- a vintage wooden high chair for $10 that Larry's gonna refinish for hopefully some future use in our dining room, a pretty carpet runner for the hallway, some shelf brackets, a telescope for $5 (!), a Pyrex casserole dish (definitely NOT a hoarder!  Ha!), a pound of pecans that I put into a pie last night, a The Lord Is My Shepherd throw blanket that Tabbie Hoffman LOVES already and the main thing we went after, a vintage Scrabble game!  We found a 1953 edition for 50 cents!  On the way home, we found an end table and entertainment center on the side of the road and Larry loaded them up for his next project.

Since we got done before 1:00 (and we had some ones left!), we decided to go up to Smiley's Flea Market and look around.  My favorite find of the day was at Smiley's.  Right after the 2nd Annual Atlanta Pop Festival July 4th weekend, 1970, a Macon publishing company, Drinnon Inc., published a handful of pictorials about the festival and Larry and I stumbled upon this tiny little booth yesterday at Smiley's that had old campaign buttons, old issues of Easy Rider magazine, old coins, military patches and tiny little tomato plants for sale.  Larry's always on a quest for military patches so we stopped in there to see what he had.  The fact that he had a cover draped over his booth helped, too.  It was hot and shade was precious.  While Larry looked over the patches, I spotted five of those Pop Festival books!  I showed one to Larry and told him we HAD to get it.  He agreed and so we did.  Fest On The Fourth.  I love it!!  I can't stop looking at it.

Such awesome pictures!

We got some campaign buttons, some patches and a very old incense burner (top left in the picture with the book's cover) from him and promised to come back!  His cool (in more ways than one!) booth was right up our alley.  All groovy and stuff.  :)  We got a loaf of pumpernickel bread, an old wool Army blanket (still in the bag!) and a lady bug wind spinner for our backyard.  

Cute, ain't she?

Memorial Day Weekend!

We have had such a wonderful weekend!  Saturday, we met our friends, Mike and Brandy Nichols, up in Lilburn at Mike's parents' home and then we all jumped in our cars and went over to Lilburn City Park and had some nature and play time with the kids.  Mike and Brandy have three beautiful children and we so enjoyed our time spent with them.  Willow saw right through Larry's teasing and called him out on things when she knew he was not exactly telling the truth.  That was just so funny to me!
 
When we were all swinged and slided out at the playground, we walked across the street to Main Street Market for some popsicles.  King of Pops popsicles, actually, and I got a key lime pie one.  It was so delicious and cold and yummy and I told Larry when we got home that we're just gonna have to order a box this summer!  We also picked up some tomatoes, fresh zipper peas, some Fuji apples, a grapefruit and a block of Amish Vidalia onion cheese.

We left and drove over to the Little Five Points area for some Fox Bros barbecue and on the way, the March Against Monsanto protest was going on and that was pretty awesome to behold!  You'd never see anything like that here in Warner Robins.  We need to spend a little more time up at Little Five Points.  :)  I found out later that Saturday was actually a worldwide protest to try to raise public awareness of the absolute disaster that is Monsanto.  It's no accident that our babies are born with more birth defects now and we're getting more and more cancers.  It's the food we're eating and the styrofoam we're putting it in.  Monsanto has been at this for over 100 years.  Remember Saccarin?  Remember how nasty it tasted?  Like poison, right?  Right.  It was.  I'm glad we got to be a small part of that protest Saturday.  As a woman about to embark on a journey in fertility, I want to fight.  I want to stand up for my health and the health of my baby and not sit idly by, waiting for somebody else to speak for us.  

Okay, stepping down from that soapbox now.

Fox Bros was amazing!  The best pulled pork sandwich I've ever had and they have really, really good sweet tea, too.  That's important, that sweet tea.  :)  After lunch, we said our goodbyes (sniff) and then Larry and I went to Stone Mountain.  And we went to the top.  In the skylift.  OMG.

I do not like heights.

  

At the top of the rock! 
 

 Stone Mountain feetsies!
 

We had so much fun.  I am so proud of myself for getting in that skylift and going all the way to the top!  All 825 feet!!  But I will admit going up was a lot less scary than coming down was.  I think Larry told the conductor to stomp on the gas or something.  Ha!  The view up there was spectacular.  You can see all of Atlanta and sixty miles or so surrounding as well as the Appalachian Mountains.  Yep, I'm glad I did it. 

Today, we're relaxing at home.  Grilled some steaks, shish kabobs and corn on the cob and had deviled eggs and of course, buttermilk pie for dessert.  Later, we're going to play The Walking Dead on our new PlayStation. 

Life is so good.  :)

And at the end of this day, there were brownies

Tabbie Hoffman and I both had doctors' appointments today.  Mine, this morning, was just a blood work appointment at Dr. Shirley's office to get my hormone levels and a complete premenopause panel just to see where we are before we start trying to have a baby.  I'll get the results next Monday.  Larry and I have wanted a baby together since the day we met but time hasn't really been kind to us in that department.  My doctor is very optimistic because I am healthy and have led a somewhat gentle life.  I may be 46 years old but those are just road miles on this old girl.  I'm in excellent health!  Blood pressure is fabulous, blood sugar is awesome and since I've lost weight, they shouldn't be a problem during my pregnancy.  Besides, Michelle Dugger is 47 and trying for Baby #20 OMG and Halle Berry just had her baby boy and she's 47, too.  Seriously, though, we know there are certain risks involved but we also know that God is in total control of our lives and the life of our baby and if He wants it to happen, it will happen.  If not, it'll just be the two of us.  Well, and Tabbie Hoffman.  And probably a dog named Banjo.  :)

I have never been very good at giving blood.  I have veins that absolutely don't want to do right.  I only have the one, in my right arm, that will even pop up high enough for them to stick and then it completely, utterly and desperately closes up on itself as soon as they get the first drop of blood out.  I ended up getting stuck twice in my right arm, once in my left and once in my right hand.  It took two nurses and the office manager diggin' and stabbin' to get the six vials of blood they needed for my tests.  I walked out of there wrapped in enough green medical tape to be the Hulk for Halloween.

Tabbie Hoffman had his yearly checkup and shots this afternoon and I dreaded it so much.  He is so scared of every.little.thing.  I've been using Rescue Remedy rubbed on his head and around his ears but it doesn't seem to be working yet.  I had to just force him into his carrier even though we did a trial run yesterday.  I put his blanket in there with him along with a couple of treats. He immediately hid underneath the blanket until I had to drag him out to see the doctor.  And when he couldn't get back inside the carrier ('cause I zipped it up quick before he could!), he got underneath it.  So pitiful.

They took his picture this time for his online account profile.  They took him from me and he was so scared and shaking and shedding like crazy, had a temperature and was just freaking the hell right on out when they took the picture.  But he looks adorable!!

I really like the doctors and staff there at Southwood Animal Hospital.  Dr. Penner is so sweet and gentle with him.  And the nurses and staff just kept saying how beautiful and handsome he is.  His ears looked good and clean and I think we've pretty much beaten his chronic ear infections with flushing and cleaning them at home.  She said his teeth looked great and I told her that we brush them twice a week!  :)  He weighs 14.2 pounds now and she commented that he has doubled in size in a year but she didn't say he was too big.  She said he was healthy, happy, soft and beautiful.  He's just a big boy.  Now if we can just get him to be more comfortable around people.  I know when Larry's home with us, that will help him.  Bwess his wittle heart.

We came home and took a long nap and then made a pan of double fudge walnut brownies.  We'd been stuck six times between the two of us and we needed some chocolate.  Well, one of us did.  :)