Still Baffling

Well, this week certainly didn't go as I imagined it would.

While the gray spots in the field of vision in my right eye are definitely smaller than they were two weeks ago, they're unfortunately still there.
I was expecting a good progress report from the eye specialist on Tuesday.  That didn't really happen...

My eyes were dilated once again--a nuisance more than anything--those drops f*ing sting!  Then I was taken into the mad laboratory of my eye doc.  His name is Dr. Adams.  He's still friendlier now that I don't have a case of floaters.  Why is he friendlier?  Probably because I'm going to be giving him repeat business.  Ugh.

So Dr. Adams goes after my eyes with that bright-like-the-sun test to view the back of my eye.  Not a whole lot of talking until he finishes torturing my peepers extensively.  Finally, the lights go back on--not that I could see much, since my eyes were still lost in bright-light-afterburn land--and he lets me sit back.  Then he says, "Well, this is certainly a puzzle.  I have to admit I'm baffled..."  NO!  DON'T BE BAFFLED, DAMN YOU!!  TELL ME MY EYE ISN'T BROKEN ANYMORE AND I NOW HAVE SPIDEY VISION!..."because your eye looks completely normal now.  The spots of blood are gone and your optic nerve isn't swollen anymore.  Our options at this point are to have you get a lumbar puncture, see a neuro-ophthalmologist in Spokane, Denver, SLC or Seattle, or see a neurologist here.  I'd really like you to see a neuro-ophthalmologist.  Do you have any family in any of those cities?"
Why, yes, I do!  In Spokane, I say.  So he says he'll see if he can get in contact with the neuro-ophthalmologist (I never in my life thought I'd be typing out neuro or ophthalmologist as much as I have in the last couple weeks) in Spokane and get me seen.
Then he has me take another test that involves a bright flash and I return to bad-vision-acid-trip land again before sending me on my way.  Yay for sunglasses!

After not hearing from him earlier, I decided to give the good doctor a call today.  That's when I got more bad news.
The neuro-ophthalmologist he thought was available in Spokane is no longer there.  I have to pick another option.  Apparently N-O's are a very distinct specialty.  They can only exist in metropolitan areas with populations of more than the entire state of Montana.  The nerve!

At this point, I'm waiting to hear back from him with that contact info.  I might end up choosing a city further away where I know someone and can visit them at the same time.  I mean, really, if I have to get my eye tortured, and travel by myself (since the Mister is highly unlikely to be able to get time off again), I may as well make the best of the trip and hug someone I love.

I also managed to ask the good doctor if I could just see a neurologist here.  He'd apparently been in contact with the local neuro because he told me that at this point, a neurologist wouldn't be able to tell nearly as much as an N-O.  blah

So here's what I found out after I saw him, spoke to people who know stuff, and read up on things online:

• Some overweight people can have increased intracranial pressure, and increased pressure on their spinal column.  This pressure can lead to what happened to me.  The only problem?  If that were the case, it should've happened to both eyes.  How to see if this pressure is indeed increased?  The lumbar puncture.  Which I'd like to avoid at all possible costs--I've seen House, I know it can only lead to other unexplained symptoms!
• My MRI looked normal.  Good?  It should be good, but there are apparently some things that don't show up on an MRI until they're very advanced.  Hence the decision to send me to another torturer AKA specialty doctor for further tests.
• Dr. Adams keeps telling me that if anything worsens suddenly with my vision, to call him immediately.  I'm not sure if this is to scare the shit out of me or reassure me.  I mean, is he worried that my eye might actually explode suddenly?  Or is the current eye status possibly a forewarning of further problems he's not telling me?  Oh god, is my eye going to start deflating and ooze out of my eye socket, followed by liquified brain matter!?

I'd really, really like to not be an unexplainable case.  There's just nothing more unsettling and somewhat frightening than having a health problem that doctors don't understand.

An Interesting Case

Unfortunately, depressingly, distressingly (enough adjectives?) we had quite a night on Wednesday.  My vision went a little haywire at lunch, but seemed to go back to normal quickly enough.  It wasn't until I got off work at 5 that I noticed a spot in my vision.  Or a couple spots, I suppose.  It appeared somewhat in the shape of a snow angel.  

I explained it to the Mister and he thought it was a migraine without the pain.  I called The Mom and she just didn't know.  Then I called Cathy, my old physical therapist (who is also, luckily, a friend), who deals with neurological work.  I explained to her what was going on, and that the spots appeared in only one eye.  She suggested that I get it checked out, she was concerned and mentioned the optic nerve.

Obviously, I'm aware of the red flag that was waving due to the symptoms of only one eye--one half of my brain could be in danger.

So off we went to Urgent Care at 6.  I was seen by a doctor who went over what I was dealing with, checked my eyes, then stepped out saying, "I'm going to make a phone call to see if you need to be seen tonight"

Well, that's certainly nothing to feel freaked out about!

We waited and waited and waited another hour before he heard back from the eye specialist on call at the ER.  The eye doc thought what I had was a case of floaters, but said he'd see me anyway, at 8:30 in Belgrade.

Sooooo....off we go to Belgrade.  We get there, he unlocks the office door for us, no greeting, not even a "hi", just "here's some paperwork and read this notice and sign the sheet that says you've read the notice".  

I was asked questions about family history of disease, medications I take, had I ever had anything like this before, etc.  The doctor that I saw was an MD, not an OD.  He's an eye physician, not an ophthalmologist.

Then the torture began.

He numbed my eyes to check the pressure.  He put drops in to dilate.  He put other drops in for reasons I don't know.  Bright lights for a long time while he looked into my eyes.  When he finished the exam, I asked "So, am I imagining it?  Are they floaters?"  And he said, "No, there's something going on--your optic nerve is swollen and there's specks of blood in your eye."  Ok, so, what does that mean?  Well, he mentioned the possibility of one thing, which could be related to MS (let the screaming inside my head begin), then he mentioned something else and said he needed to look in his books to see what other possibilities it could be.

At this point, I look to the Mister with some genuine fear.  When a doctor has to consult books to try to diagnose your ailment, it's not a good feeling.  And my stomach just dropped when he said MS.

The doctor came back to the exam room/torture chamber and told me he wanted to get me in for an MRI.  He suspected that my eye could possibly get worse, ultimately leading to blindness, if I wasn't treated immediately.  His best guess: high blood pressure.

At that point, my bp was ranging around 160ish/105ish.  I suspected it was that high mostly due to the sudden stress I was under, but the doctor thought it needed to be treated in case it'd caused the eye problem in the first place.

Have I mentioned that we have no health insurance right now?

So when the good doctor told me I needed to go to the ER, a mild sense of hysterical panic set in.  The Mister and I looked at each other in horror, but we both knew it was necessary because, frankly, I like my eyes working.

The doctor then called ahead to the ER and told the doctor there, "I've got a very nice 31 year-old woman I'm sending in with an interesting case...."  I'd gone from a person with possible floaters who didn't even rank a hello to "very nice" because of my "interesting case".

When he got off the phone with the ER, he told me he wanted me to call his office first thing in the morning and make an appointment--he'd see me ASAP.  He mentioned how cruel I probably thought he was, since he knew I'd be in the ER for awhile, but he needed to do more tests.

It was after 10 PM when we checked in at the ER.  The service was pretty bad--I wasn't seen by a nurse or doctor for an hour after we'd been given a room.  I realize I was probably of lower priority than any accident cases, but the eye doctor had seemed concerned enough that I was sure I should be seen immediately.  In the meantime, I called the office I was temping for to let them know that I wouldn't be in first thing in the morning.  I tried calling the temp agency as well, but there was no answering service for them.

When someone finally did come in, it was a doctor who was going off her shift--she'd been the one the eye specialist had spoken to.  She told me that she was passing me on to the next on-shift doctor and had told him what my situation was.

A PA came in soon after to ask me more about my symptoms.  When she learned of my currently dilated eyes, she was quick to ask if she could take a look.  Apparently dilated eyes aren't something available on a regular basis--eye care specialists must be the only ones allowed to dilate.  So after having already had my eyes shined with bright lights for half an hour, she got to have her look, too.

I was then told that I was going to have an MRI, including a few scans with contrast dye, an EKG, urine test, and full blood screen.  

Thankfully, it wasn't long after that that I was given a mild sedative to help me calm down a little--my heart rate was up for some reason? hm--and then blood was drawn before the IV was put in.  The Mister had left to let the dogs out--we'd been out since 6 and it was now close to midnight--so I suffered alone, but the staff were all very, very nice.  The MRI tech showed up with a wheelchair and pushed me down to the MRI room.  I got as comfortable as I could, then the test started.  At least I finally know where techno beats are from--if you've never had an MRI, be assured that it's loud.  The MRI itself lasted about an hour.  I managed to almost fall asleep, even with it being so loud, and the sedative had kicked in so I was able to feel calm, but not loopy.

When the tech wheeled me back to my room, we discovered the Mister had returned--and laid out on my bed to fall asleep.  Poor guy was exhausted, he'd had very little sleep the night before as it was.

The MRI results showed that everything was normal--although I really don't consider my brain normal.  The EKG results were normal, too.  Blood and urine both managed to be normal, as well.  My blood pressure had lowered as I'd calmed down, so they didn't give me anything for it.  I was hooked up with a saline bag, just to hydrate me again since I'd had almost no fluids since 6.  The PA came back to tell me to see my primary doc in the morning, then unhooked me and sent us home.  It was after 2 AM.

I woke up just before 7.  So. tired.  I called the temp agency at 8 on the dot, told my supervisor of the situation and that I'd be in touch after my tests.  The primary doc's office couldn't get me in until 12:30, but the eye specialist could see me at 9:30.

When I got in, I was dilated again.  Talk about drops that burn!  No wonder he'd numbed my eye the previous night.  Ow.  He said they hurt worse because I had tired, dry eyes.  

More tests, more bright lights.  The good news was that my optic nerve swelling had gone down and that the specs of blood seemed to be going away.  The gray spot in my vision was now somewhat smaller--more like a butterfly than the snow angel.  The eye doc told me to stop taking my birth control to hopefully lower my blood pressure, he also wanted me to start taking an aspirin a day in case my blood was trying to clot.  I scheduled a follow-up in 2 weeks.  Then when I tried to speak to the office manager about the inability to pay the full bill at once, she got bitchy.  She treated me like I was a piece of trash.  It's not like I'd been expecting this strange situation.  I almost started crying.  I'd had maybe 4 hours of sleep, hadn't showered, was still freaked out, and here's this lady making me feel like shit for not having funds available to keep her happy.

Anyway, I then had my primary doc appointment--except she wasn't in this week, so I saw another doctor in the practice.  Once again, she wanted a chance at my dilated peepers while I was there, so my tired, sore eyes got one last blast with bright light.  She agreed with the recommended removal of birth control pills and told me to return in a couple weeks, as well, to see my usual doctor.  She didn't seem too concerned with my blood pressure because all of my previous stats in the office had shown a normal bp.  I think she agreed with me that it was spiked due to the stress of the situation.

I have to take my blood pressure for the next few days to see if it lowers.  The gray spots are smaller now, shaped like cat eyes.

It feels so weird that this happened to me.  Friends and family are all freaked out by it, and very worried.  I, on the other hand, even having gone through it, feel more stress about the bills I'll have to deal with.  

Universal health care?  One can dream....

A Bite of Meat to Eat

Humans have gnawed on, chomped through, and bitten off pieces of meat from animals for millenia.  Early humans in North America were hunters & gatherers, not farmers.  They followed the food source--herds of bison or other quadripeds--where they moved as the seasons allowed.
And, let's face it, our teeth tell the story of a meat-eating species.  Our front teeth scrape meat off bones, our molars grind through the tissues to make food easier to swallow.
I've been a meat-eater my whole life.  I grew up in an agricultural community that was surrounded mostly by big cattle ranches.  I ate beef a lot.
I also ate my fair share of wild game--elk, deer, antelope, etc.
Part of growing up in an agriculture-based community in the middle of prime wild-game habitat means learning that hunting benefits the animals as much as the humans.
In elementary school we played a game that showed the significance of hunting on herds of animals.  If controlled hunts weren't allowed, herds could grow and grow, habitat could be over-used and eventually animals would either starve to death or disease would wipe out large numbers.  Mind you, by third grade, I'd already seen quite a few carcasses hung up in the shop and gotten a chance to poke dead body parts with morbid fascination.  What can I say?  I was a tomboy.
Since then, as an adult who's gotten more education in the broader world of biology, I've realized hunting plays an even more important role in our society today.  Elk and deer meat have filled our freezer season after season.  It's cheaper, leaner and healthier for an ecosystem than beef.
Through my internet travels, I've recently discovered a very disturbing infographic.
Please read it--it's very enlightening.  (I promise it doesn't take long)


Infographic by CulinarySchools.org

After seeing this, I was inspired.  I'd already ordered a cleanse package--something to do for myself for a week and kickstart/reboot my system.  I've never done a cleanse before, but I'd heard they were uncomfortable and difficult.  This system promised no starvation or discomfort.
I got all the required foods--beans, veggies and fruit.  All plant-based food were accepted.  No meat, no dairy, no processed sugar.  No caffeine (not a problem for me) or other stimulants.
As someone who's a protein fanatic, I knew it would be hard.  I protein.  It gets me through the day.  But the cleanse was going to make me feel better.  And it was just a matter of willpower, right?  Right.  

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.

Day 1:  Wednesday.  I start my morning off with a quinoa breakfast dish--made with almond milk, cinnamon and fruit.  Finegreatgood.  Yes, quinoa is full of healthy stuff, but it's not exactly packed with protein--and I've always started my day with an egg or two.
But I could do this.  I would do this, damn it.
For lunch, I have a not-awesome, not-gross bowl of veggie-packed soup.  It was ok.  Still not a lot of protein, just a few lentils.
By dinner, I was absolutely starving.  I made myself a shake with blueberries and bananas and oatmeal before making the actual cleanse-shake.
Throughout the day, I was cold.  By the evening, while the Mister was sweating his way through the scooter fix, I was wrapped up in a blanket.  I was ready for bed early, to end the torture.

Day 2:  Thursday.  I start the morning with oatmeal instead of quinoa.  Try to liven it up with some cinnamon, berries and honey.  It's definitely better tasting than the previous breakfast.
Lunch meant more soup.  Seriously hungry by this point.  Trying to remind myself that I have the willpower, I can DO IT.  Ugh.
By dinner, I was fed up.  I'd eaten lots of fruit through the afternoon, but I really, really needed to chew through some meat.  A roast beef sandwich from the Pickle Barrel sounded unbelievably marvelous.  So I ordered one and almost passed out from bliss after the first bite.
At that point, I'm telling myself I can do two meals early in the day that are plant-based, but I need meat at dinner.  NEED IT.

Day 3:  Friday (I can't believe these days just keep showing up in order!).
I begin again with oatmeal.  By lunch, however, I'm feeling not great.  The cleanse has me taking two pills with each of the two early meals.  I feel like my pills are piling up in my gut, not moving or breaking down, and it hurts to take a deep breath.  I guzzle water, hoping to wash them along.  I eat more fruit, hoping to push them along.  No luck.  Don't even remember dinner.

Needless to say, there was no Day 4.  I gave up.  I have no willpower.  My body craves meat.  From my stomach, to my metabolism, to my mouth.  I love the time it takes to really chew through a bite of meat.  My stomach adores the time it takes to break down complex proteins.  My metabolism can't get enough of the energy meat provides.  Once again, I wax poetic about flesh.
So now I face guilt.  The guilt of being another person who is pushing the planet deeper into a climate spiral we have little chance of changing.
Yes, I know that eating meat is bad for the environment.  Yes, legumes are much better for the earth as well as our bodies.  Red meat in particular is bad for the human body.
I guess my only option at this point is to refuse beef that comes from unidentifiable sources.  The local co-op makes a point of listing the ranch their grass-fed beef comes from, as well as the family it supports.
I can also make the conscious decision to rely mostly on wild game.  Eat it throughout the year until our freezer is empty and then give other options a go.

I hope someone, somewhere, has seen the infographic and has the willpower I don't to give up industrialized meat.  If nothing else, at least I tried.  I just wish that thought comforted me more than it does....

Non-Knickery Knackery

I have recently realized something not very profound.  It's probably not something most people think about.  I'm sure to some women, it would rank up there with me not liking chocolate or diamonds.

I don't like knick knacks.  I don't collect anything in the knick knack category.  I have no shelfs on which to put non-essential items.  I can count on both hands how many unfunctional (I totally made up that word) things I have around the house that collect dust:  3 Fenton vases that my Mom got for me (she wants me to collect stuff like her), an antler sculpture, and 3 copper/viney votive candle lamps.  The Mister has a couple of Cowboys helmet stuff, but otherwise we're pretty tchotchke-free.  I don't know why that is.  I'm not a very decorative-friendly person.  We don't decorate for any of the holidays, including Christmas.  I prefer function to form?  I have a globe that collects dust, too, but I spin it every now and then and look at the basic info it provides.
I'm just not a chick.  I'd like to put up some cool maps on the walls, but otherwise they're pretty bare, too.

That's not to say I don't have shelving in the house--I do.  It's just full of books.  Mmm, books.  Of those, I must have a few hundred.  And that's ok.

A Different Rant

This has been brewing in my head for awhile, so I thought I'd better write it out before my words get too tangled up.

I realize that inequality has existed in human society for millennia. Lower classes of people were forced to live as servants or slaves because of their circumstances at birth.  It didn't matter how wonderful, awesome or brilliant they were--no chances were given to those unlucky ones.
Up until the late 19th century, people of a different skin color were only slaves in the United States.  Their ancestors had been attacked, packed up on top of each other on ships, and moved from one continent to another to serve people with money.  It didn't matter that all the people with money were white--black was slave, white was master, period.
Prior to that, groups of "heathens" and "savages" were killed by the thousands so that Europeans could take over the fertile lands.  Those natives that survived were "allowed" to live on small, minuscule pieces of land (compared to what they'd been able to roam freely before) and were told what they would get to do.  They were viewed as less than human to many white people.
In the early twentieth century, although strides had been made against inequality, women were still not allowed to vote.  When they fought for the right, men had them arrested and put in asylums because the women were clearly not right in the head.  Fathers and husbands physically hurt outspoken daughters and wives to keep them from rallying for equality.
I realize I'm barely skimming over the atrocities of the racism and misogyny, a few thousand words could be used to really dig into the history of the hatred of each instance, but....

And so it was in 1919 that women in the United States were given the right to vote.
In 1924 Native Americans were given "citizenship" to the country they'd fought to call home for decades.
In the 1960's multiple Acts were passed through the US Congress that protected people of all races and creeds, protected voting rights for everyone, and banned discrimination in housing.
1963 was the year that the Equal Pay Act passed.  Women still only make 72% of men in equal positions.
It wasn't until 2010 that Native Americans won a suit against the US government for mishandling of Native trusts.

Now, however, there is a new inequality people are fighting over:  gay rights.  Gay marriage, more precisely.
I wrote a paper in my freshman year of college about it.  I was 18.
I was raised in a small farm & ranch community in the middle-of-nowhere Montana.  It didn't get much more conservative than there.  Everyone was for gun rights and against big city folk coming in and changing things.
I knew one single gay person, a cousin of mine.  I didn't know her well, but loved her two sons, who were both around my age.
Beyond that, I had no frame of reference for the real fight for equality that homosexuals were in.  But I wrote that paper anyway.  It still surprises me a little.
Yes, homosexuality is more "out there" than it ever has been.  Cable sitcom shows feature gay and lesbian Americans.  Ellen DeGeneres came out on national tv in the 90's.  This week, Anderson Cooper came out.  Ellen is a comedian, Anderson is a newscaster.  I've been familiar with both of them for about the same amount of time.  Anderson was part of the Channel 1 news show that I saw as a teenager when I was in high school--I'm pretty sure we watched it every morning in homeroom.
There are a lot of homosexuals that are famous, putting their names and faces on the gay rights flag.  There are a lot more homosexuals who are just trying to live their lives day-to-day and hope for equality, I'm sure.

What is marriage?  Why is it SO important to family values now, all of a sudden?

Marriage, waaaaaaay back in time, was simply a contract between a man and another man.  A woman was collateral.  In some societies, marriage was used to strengthen ties between countries.  I'm sure there was a lot of religion involved in most ceremonies, because in those times, religion was THE thing everyone agreed on.  A marriage contract was only fulfilled once vows had been made in front of a religious man.
In England, a woman was only marriageable if she had a large dowry (AKA $$$).  The woman was pretty much a consolation prize/burden to put up with to get hands on the money.
But marriage has evolved since then.  The vast majority of weddings now occur because two people love each other and want to make it legally known that they're considered a single unit.  One person's belongings are also the other's, their children will carry on the name of the father (in most cases) and everyone tries to be the couple that makes it through the good and bad times to reach 40, 50, 60 years together.
I must not understand what it matters to family values.  If two people love each other, want to be able to make tough decisions for their partner, who am I to say "No, that's not ok"?
Let's pretend that there's a couple:  person A and person B.  Persons A and B have been together for 14 years and desire to get married.  They know marriage isn't going to necessarily define their relationship, but the legalities it includes are important because person A is starting to develop signs of Parkinson's Disease.  And when things get bad, person A wants person B to be the one taking care of the hard decisions, the estate matters, and the miscellaneous other things that can happen when someone loses themselves in an illness.  Person B understands that they love person A and no matter how hard it gets, they want to be there for person A, because their feelings for each other are stronger than any sickness.  Persons A and B already live together, have a home together, and are well-liked in their neighborhood and community.
So, what does it matter if Person A is a woman and Person B is a woman?  What makes their desire to legally marry any different than if Person B was a man?
My thoughts are, if a child grows up with no expectations of relationships and someday encounters someone they fall in love with, does it truly matter if they are they same biological sex?  Why is it so difficult for people to get their minds out of other people's bedrooms?!
I don't care if you want to hang upside down naked and get tickled with an ostrich feather until you pass out from laughing so hard--is it hurting you?  Is it hurting your partner?  Does it involve children?  If all of the answers are no, then WHO CARES?

Differences are a part of life.  Tall, short, fat, skinny, black, white, smart, ignorant, brunette, circus performer, typist, blind, old, young, vegetarian, omnivore--all, some, or none of these make people original.  Let people live their lives and concentrate on making your own something you can look back on with a smile and full heart.  Hatred, distrust, and discrimination hurt everyone.

One Year

I meant to write this out last week, since that's the anniversary date...

One year ago, I quit a job that made me miserable.  I had chronic headaches, gained weight (a lot), went on anti-depressants, and felt generally broken-spirited.  Pity party aside, I was in a very bad place.
So I left that behind.  In the year since, I've learned more about myself, my relationships with those closest to me, and I've managed to accept things and move on more easily.

I've also realized that staying home all day sucks sometimes and is the best.thing.EVER on other days.
Some other things I've noticed:

• Baseboards suck.  Seriously.  All they do is sit there and collect dust and hair, then shout at me about it every time I look at the floor.
• Bras are the devil.  I wonder if I would've made a good feminist ninja hippy back in the days when bras got thrown into the fire.  I feel like throwing mine in a fire all the time.  I'm really going to miss the days of relaxing bra-free when I go back to the land of employment.
• Owning a house is wonderful.  I get to put in a garden, new trees, flowers, paint and repaint walls and ceilings and no one gets to give me shit about it.  The only opinions that matter are mine and the Mister's (and most of the time when I ask his thoughts, he says, "I don't care, it's up to you").
• My dogs make me happier than most humans.  Lily and Amber have been my constant daily companions for a year now.  When we took a short weekend trip recently, I had a really hard time leaving them.  I need to find a job that lets me bring my dogs to work....
• Reading is only a hobby.  I thought that when I had lots of free time, I would just dive into book after book that'd been piling up while I was busy with other stuff.  Strangely, and somewhat of a relief, I've discovered that even with unlimited time available, I read only occasionally.  I think I've only finished a dozen books in the past year.
• Whether due to stress, constant contact with the public, or the combination of the two wearing me down, I got sick a lot when I was working.  I don't think I've had a cold in the year since I quit.  One of the best perks of staying home is avoiding sick people all the time.
• Hallelujah for air conditioning!  A couple of weeks ago it was spitting snow.  Yes, in June.  It happens.  Earlier this week it was almost 100ºF.  The a/c was running all day and could barely keep it cool in here.  I'm SO happy we invested in a heat pump last year.  Woo!

I'm sure there's more stuff I've discovered that I love or hate in the past year, but those are the big ones.

Blog Pictures

It looks like Blogger updated the photo interface, so if you click on a picture in one of the posts, it'll enlarge it and give you a bit of photo-only slide options.  Pretty handy!

Let the greening begin!!

Spring has finally begun here--it did snow last weekend, after all--and stuff is growing like crazy!
I got my first CSA share delivery.  It's my first year of doing this and I'm hopeful it'll make me more versatile with veggies, since that's most of what I'll be getting weekly for 4 months.  I'm pretty excited to have the opportunity to do such a thing.  CSAs can be wonderful efforts at getting access to local, seasonal produce in whatever area someone lives.  This week's delivery included micro greens, radishes (for Papa), some green garlic? (have to research this more), spinach and other salad greens.  Notice all the green stuff in there?  I think the radishes were the only other-colored item and from what I was told, the greens attached to those radishes are actually more nutrient-rich than the veggie itself!

Aside from the CSA, my strawberry plants are even more local.  And boy are they flourishing this year!
If you don't remember what they looked like last year....

Directly after planting.

End of the summer.

And now look at the little buggers!

Happy plants

Dozens of these pretty flowers--soon to be tasty fresh strawberries!

Last year, by the end of summer, the plants on the left were the only ones that produced--and then only a few berries.  The plants on the right just spread everywhere and this year they're finally flowering.  I think we'll have a really good crop.  Yum!
We also planted a raspberry plant and an apricot tree.  Hopefully those will bear fruit next summer.  I *heart* fruit!

Inside the house is our rainforest.  At least, that's what I'm calling it.

There's droplets of water forming on the flowers and leaves of my calla lily plant as well as on the massive leaves of one of the other plants (I have no idea the name--the plant was a gift).

When we lived in the apartment, I almost killed all of my plants.  Well, I guess I didn't kill them, but the lack of sunlight did.  The big-leafed badass won't stop growing now.  Before we moved, it was down to one lonely, pitiful leaf.  So I named the plant Pathetic.

Now it grows leaves so large that the Mister's wanting to pull them off and fan me with them.  His words, not mine.

And it's sprouting individual new leaves from the roots, something I've never seen it do before.  The damn thing is going to take over the house!

*drip...

*drip....

It's a jungle in here

Itty bitty baby leaves waiting to grow up into monsters.

Now to the front of the house....
I decided this year that I wanted to plant a small flower garden.  Of course, this meant doing so in the most difficult way possible.
I wanted local-native plants.  I wanted some bee-friendly flowers.  And I didn't want it to look like anyone else's flower garden.
The first two goals weren't so hard.  One of the local nurseries had an amazing selection of flowering plants to choose from.  I got columbine, which I call honeysuckle because you can suck the sweet nectar out of the petals, I got a couple varieties of shooting stars, some "different" foxglove that grows flowers in the opposite direction of other foxglove(?) and some fern-type stuff that the Mister liked, for ground covering.
They all ended up being in the purple family.  Yay!

Shooting stars

Columbine                            

Foxglove

The flowers were picked, but I had yet to decide how I wanted to edge it.  

There's so many options out there--and all of them, at least the ones available at home improvement stores, were boring to me.

So I hmm'd and grr'd and finally settled on what I wanted, a thin-variety stacked flagstone edging.  How hard could it be to come up with that?  Pretty difficult.

I finally got the number to a local place, thanks to a distant friend, that had lots of stone for me to look at.  I could buy it by the ton.  I bought 120 lbs.  In big chunks.

Which I then got to break apart into the pieces you see below.

I'm thrilled with how it turned out!

Now the flowers just need to establish and bounce back.

The completed garden

Corner.

Look at that pretty slate!

This month we celebrate a couple milestones.
Smudge came to grace our couch with her matching presence 2 years ago this month.  We got the couch, then we got a cat to match it.  And somehow lay precariously on the back without falling off.  And let Lily chew on her head sometimes.

"what!?"

About a month after Smudge joined the family, Lily arrived to wreak havoc.  We got her because she matches the floor.  And because she has got the softest face that needs to be kissed a few dozen times a day.

Lily was born this month.  She'll be 2 next week.  So hard to believe!

Who's a pretty girl?  Me!

Little Lily on her first day with us.

Amber, September 2010.  We bought a house with floors to match her.  :o)

Lastly, a little bit of celebration with Smudge & Lily.  I love watching them argue.

Memory Day

I was cherished from the first moment I drew breath.  As I've been told time and time again by my Mom, my paternal grandfather AKA Granddad loved me like nothing else in the world from the time I was born.
I have very few concrete memories of him.  I know, in my heart, he was just a man, but I also know he was the very best Granddad I could've wished for.
From what I've been told, he told Mom at one point that if he could've taken me for longer when I was a baby, he would've breastfed me if it'd been possible.  That always made me laugh.
He spoiled me and loved me, both immeasurably.  I remember sitting on his knee.  I vaguely remember the sound of his voice.  It's hard to put into words the emotional blanket that wrapped around me when I was with him--I was loved and important, precious and a joy.  I felt all of that and more.
Some things come back in flashes--standing in the garage with him, being out in the garden with him while he weeded and I played with the ladybugs on the asparagus plants, watching him shave in the morning.
Sadly, childhood memories have faded.  Heartbreakingly, my Granddad took ill when I was about 8, I think.  He became emaciated and weak due to the illness.  His spirit was still strong even though his body was not.  I was no longer allowed to sit on his lap or be a kid around him.  When I visited him and my Grandmother, I was reprimanded by her if I listened to him about being playful or hugging him.  It was during one such visit that I must've realized that Grandmother was suddenly something like Granddad's jail keeper and I couldn't be a child around him anymore.
I called Mom and cried and cried and cried to her that I wanted to come home, Grandmother was mean.  After that, I was only allowed to talk to Mom on the phone if I promised Grandmother that I wouldn't cry to her.
It wasn't much longer after that that Granddad died.  I remember being at the funeral.  My aunt got up to talk about Granddad and cried and cried while she tried to speak.  I don't remember crying at all.  Somehow I'd already grieved because he'd been taken away from me first by the illness and then by Grandmother.
If there was ever one person I'd want to talk to who's been in my life and is no longer here, it would be him.  Not just talk to, I guess.  I'd really like to hug him again, tight, for a really long time.  Then I'd tell him I still miss him all the time and ask him if I'm doing ok, have I disappointed him?
I don't know what year, but my Granddad wrote a poem about me.  My Grandmother included it in a letter she sent to me about 10 years ago.
My Granddad wrote a poem.  About me.  It's probably not the best poem in written history to anyone but me.  I don't know if he ever wrote anything else, stories or other poetry, but this poem may be one of the most cherished items I have because I know he must've loved me immensely if he'd written something like this.

My Granddad and Me

On December Eleventh from one to three,

I sat and played on my Granddad's knee. 

My temperament and demeanor was something to behold,

As I sat there enthralled without being told. 

The music was playing and the sun was quite bright,

As I listened and looked at the world with delight. 

My world is so small and requires some attention,

If only folks would allow it without all the pretensions. 

My Granddad doesn't encourage me to be cute or bright,

He lets me be me and do what I like. 

I jabbered and sputtered and took it all in,

As he watched with great joy and a silly little grin. 

He says no-no whenever he must,

But that's O.K. for I have violated his trust. 

He's reassuring and as loving as can be,

Especially those times I sit on his knee. 

All this is possible as you can see,

Cause I like him and he likes me. 

WHT

Thanks to my aunt, I know more now about what an incredible person my Granddad was, including more information about his service time in the Air Force.  So today, on Memorial Day, I remember him for the warm and lovely memories, no matter how foggy they may be, and am grateful to him, my Grandpa and my Uncle Mike for their contributions to our country.

Dear Republicans...

Republicans need to get in my vagina!

Yay for funny people!