I'm going to become a better blogger. I AM. I miss it.
Thankfully, my thumb is actually... drum roll please... after a month of slow and painful healing... on the mend!!! So that should help. It's still wrapped in a big white poufy wad of gauze, but it's slightly less big and marginally less poufy than it was three weeks ago so I'm thrilled with the progress.
Hubs is in Boston this weekend for a friend's wedding, and I'm broken hearted that I'm not there with him. He's having a great time and visiting with lots of old friends and coworkers, so he's making the most of the trip. Hero and I are holding down the fort, which has been interesting to say the least.
The thing I've learned about Hero is, he's terrified of fireworks. Which makes 4th of July weekend an absolute blast (sarcasm and pun intended). Last night, after a day spent cleaning our house from top to bottom, I gratefully stepped into the shower. Moments later, I opened my eyes through the mist of water to find I was not alone. Hero was with me, curled up in the corner of the shower shaking like a leaf. In the shower!!! I heard the fireworks booming in the distance. He looked up at me with wide, terrified eyes as the water pelted him periodically in the face (and for those of you who don't know, Hero HATES getting wet). His fur drooped over his eyes and curled into tiny ringlets on his head as he inched close enough to be sure he was touching my leg, just in case. I've never seen anything quite so pathetically sad.
Try as I might I couldn't coax him back out - he was not about to leave my side. So I hurriedly rinsed as much shampoo from my knotted hair as possible and turned the water off with soap still clinging to my barely clean body. Poor little guy was drenched but wouldn't be pried away from me. I wrapped him up in a towel and put him in our bed. He was trembling so much that he couldn't even move. His adorable stub of a tail was tucked so far under his legs it wasn't even visible. He hid his face under the pillows and curled as close to me as he could get. He lay there in a tight little ball for the next five hours. About thirty minutes in he fell asleep, and the twitching subsided as his breath evened out. After three hours or so he loosened his body and stretched out a bit. I've never seen anything like it, and I'm dreading tonight. My poor little baby boy!!!!!
Regardless, I may keep the bathroom door closed in the future. It's a little disconcerting to shower with your dog, whatever the reason behind it.
Who's afraid of the big bad firecracker?
Thumbs sideways
I know, you thought I met my demise after unexpected thumb-related complications. Nope. I'm still among you. I'm just a bad blogger.
I got my stitches out last Friday night at a party after one of the two people involved threw back a couple glasses of wine. Unfortunately that person was the remover, not the removee. (Don't worry - the remover is a board certified pediatrician, it wasn't part of a drinking game or anything...) Sadly, my thumb doesn't look much different than it did in my last post. Now it has Steri-Strips instead of stitches but it's still pretty much good for nothin'. Which means my days continue to be filled with a million little annoyances, one after the other as I run into the roadblocks of a life without that one all-important digit. I'm getting so adept at living life one-handed that when I do finally regain full use of my thumb I'll fly through everyday chores!
Work is good but I'm in that early stage where it's still draining and new. I hate not knowing things, and am impatient when it comes to the learning curve. But so far so good. I hate to even jinx myself, but it looks like I could be able to work from home as early as the end of the year! Fingers, toes, and everything else crossed! It's far from a sure thing, but it's becoming more and more promising! Which would be so nice. The commute is a bit of a b*tch.
Turns out our yard is a magnet for baby creatures. Remember the bunnies from last summer? Well, this summer it's the birds.
Are they just to die for or what??????? They're up in the corner of our swingset. For a couple days their little eyes weren't even open. There are three baby birds in the nest, and they're piled in together like a lump of feathers that rises and falls as one as they breathe.
And, speaking of cute, I can't resist.
Hero had to climb up into the swingset to see what all the fuss was about.
Tomorrow after work we head north a friend's cabin, and then Saturday we have a wedding. I want to promise I'll be a better blogger, but I'm not sure I can. I promise I'll be a better blog reader though. I need to catch up!
Thumbs down
If you're wondering what's up, I've been spending my evenings in bed in a Vicodin-induced stupor after a little accident at the gym requiring six stitches, a high pain threshold, and a lot of patience. It's a hard life with only nine functioning fingers.
Hubs went out the night of the incident to pick up my prescription for pain killers and buy two lottery tickets. His rationale? "It has to get better sometime, right?"
Yeah, he'd be referring to our absolute SH*T LUCK!
Waits and weights
About two weeks ago I noticed a swollen lymph node in my neck just behind my collar bone. Having enough medical background to know that swollen lymph nodes are often nothing but should nonetheless be monitored, I immediately made an appointment with our clinic just to ease my mind. I figured I'd be in and out, and foolishly had even made lunch plans for an hour later.
But far from receiving reassurances, I and my suspicious lymph node were treated with the utmost urgency and seriousness. They immediately ran a CBC and I was sent for a CT scan because, as the doctor who handled my case put it: 'we don't like unexplained bumps' and they couldn't explain this one. It was my supraclavicular lymph node, which was worrisome. Apparently it's considered a red flag when that lymph node in particular acts up. A red flag indicating possible lymphoma.
So we've been waiting for a week and half to learn the results of that CT. We found out this morning that it came back normal.
I'm sure I'm not the only one who's ever been through a health scare, but for Hubs and I this is the first big one either of us has ever experienced. We consider ourselves in excellent health - we do all the right things and don't do all the wrong ones. But sometimes I guess none of that matters. Thankfully this isn't one of those times.
This shook us both to our core. On top of that, I started my new job two days ago. Needless to say, everyone in this household needs to catch up on some sleep now that we can breathe a little easier.
Shiny happy Elle Charlie
I had a wonderful birthday weekend - it was near perfect. Nice weather, fun activities, family and friends. It didn't seem over the top, but it'll go down as one of my favorite birthday weekends ever. I actually managed to get a bit too much sun, an amazing feat in Minnesota in the month of May.
Gifts (the material kind) were certainly not the highlight, but I did receive one very exciting birthday present: Hubs got me a Chi!!!!! I've been dying for one but didn't figure he, as a man, understood the importance. To be fair, he probably still doesn't yet he knew I coveted them. I believe with this gift I will usher in a brand new year in the life of Elle Charlie: one marked by great, styled, shiny hair. From good hair all else good follows.
