One of the Good Guys, Gone

May 30, 2011.

Rest in Peace, Stanley.

He had a quiet death at home, sometime between 3 a.m. and 6 a.m. We left him in peace, not because we wanted to, but because animals instinctively need to find their own way, alone.

We had been out visiting friends and when we returned home around 11 p.m. we noticed he was lethargic and largely unresponsive to stimulation. He did purr - and purr loudly - when we scratched his ears and told him how much we loved him. We made him as comfortable as we could, he wanted to be on the cold bathroom tile floor.

At first we feared it had just gotten too hot for him in the house, but he had thrown up earlier in the day, so he was not feeling well in general. We turned the central air on when we got home, thinking he needed to cool off, but he didn't feel hot. He was just sick with that stupid cancer.

Stanley was a great cat, a really great cat. I know everyone says that about their pet, but he truly was a good boy. He got along with everyone - people and other cats, was an excellent lap cat, slept in bed on his pillow between his people every night and didn't have any bad cat behaviors, save for eating flowers.

He made it to Spring, and enjoyed some beautiful days on the porch. He was eating and engaged with us right up until his last day.

We find comfort in the fact that he died at home, in his own time, on his own terms. He had had enough vet appointments in the last five months, he was due a little bit of ease.

The Pop Over

No, not this:

My friend The Hoff and her beau popped over. They did give me pee-lenty of notice, however, with a bad back it's not like I could use that notice to remodel the living room.

I don't host get-togethers at my house because there's too much stuff laying about/it's too messy/we don't have hosting furniture.

But you know what? She came anyway, and brought a giant serving dish of chicken parmesan and a bowl of pasta salad that she whipped up, and we visited and chatted and she witnessed My Shame, which is the back room where everything gets piled up until we decide what to do with it, and it was a nice day.

Reader, let me just set the table for you on how neurotic I used to be about having company. I used to wash THE OUTSIDE of the house if people were coming over. I didn't want them approaching the front door and seeing dirty siding. Not to mention cleaning out the trash can. I still do that, but not as regularly. So with my bad back, we did the best we could to clean some floors and clear off some tables, but other than that, we just had to let it be what it is.

The Universe is teaching me things. I used to be a little hoity towards people who lived amongst clutter and didn't have things tidy and arranged. So the Universe put me where I needed to be, in order to bring me a little understanding that sometimes things aren't up to whatever standards I think I have, and it's okay.

That whole thing that Oprah said, the Universe first whispers, and if you don't listen it'll throw rocks? It threw rocks, and now I understand just a little bit better that some things don't matter nearly as much as I used to think they did.

That doesn't mean I wouldn't like more space / a tidier house / more closets / less stuff. It just means that I'm learning it's okay to just live and let it be.

At least for today. And really, that's the only day you have so why worry about how I may feel tomorrow?

Why Would ANYONE Care About This??

Saturday Round Up:

1/ Listening to Lady Gaga's latest CD and it is such a rockin' little dance that my booty starts to shake before it's reminded that's not a good idea due to my engorged spine pieces poking out into my spinal fluid. So my shoulders are getting in on the shimmy & shake, because seriously? It's so good, you can't sit still with this pulsating through the house.

2/ Cleaning some things around the house, slowly slowly. Picking up this, moving it to there. Packing things into a laundry basket for Kenny to take to the basement. Kenny's cleaning floors, doing other things. I'm sorting papers and putting things in various garbage bags. People keep threatening to POP IN and visit me since I'm not my most mobile self, and that inspires us to clean up. Kenny's "wife" The Hoff may be coming for a visit, so he's cleaning off the coffee table so his wifey doesn't see how he really lives. Whatever it takes.

3/ Stanley is STILL hanging in there. He gets a snippet of Zantac before bed, and he's up and meowing for breakfast by morning. He's skinny, no doubt, but eating. I put on a pot of chicken for chicken soup today and he smelled it cooking and came in meowing. I put a piece aside for him, he's very happy about that.

4/ Cats are out on the patio. It's not 100% cute, but it's sit-able. My little tomato plant is growing. I've remembered to water it.

That's it for now. More to come later. I've regained some strength, time to go and put some shit from Christmas away. Little bits at a time, it will get whipped into shape around here. Maybe.

The Cats Will Be To Blame

The update for the day? I'm scheduled for an MRI on Thursday for my crazy back. I'm scared, I have a lot of crazy ideas going on in my mind about what's going to happen in that thing. I watch too many episodes of House. I anticipate I'll start stroking out, blood will pour from my ears and eyes, my liver will shut down and metal pieces will start pulling out of my body and shredding my skin. That's what always happens on that show.

And then House will figure out my back pain is caused from inhaling cat litter dust.

If It's Not Cat Ass Cancer, It's My Back.

Hobbled into the office today. Parked in visitors, up by the door. Called Security to alert them to my car not really being a visitor, but don't faux-ticket me as I need the help this week.

They brought me down a handicapped parking pass. I felt embarrassed, and then indigent, and wanted the pass to say "Differently-Abled". But I'll be using it, no matter what it says on it.

Then? It didn't get any better as the day wore on. I only really got out of my chair once today, to go to the restroom. And rest I did. Twice on the way there, twice on the way back. I counted, it was a hundred paces each way.

I don't have a hundred uninterrupted paces in me.

Went and picked up a cane from The Hoff tonight. As she so politely put it, "sometimes we all need a little extra help." And she said it with such genuine dignity, it made me puddle up a little bit, because that was my harsh German Hoff being gentle and she doesn't do gentle. I heart her. When I am better I shall do something kind for her.

So now I have a Mr. Peanut cane and a handicapped parking permit. Do I get any sexier??

Apparently not, because My Mister was eager to get a little of this since he returned home from his little trip. He has no standards.

I asked my chiropractor if this was a normal level of pain, he said that I'm in the 20% of his clients who are in exceptional pain. I'm not alone, but we're in our own special little segment. He said I have six pinched nerves. Those mothers hurt, let me assure you.

Calling Dr. one more time tomorrow to order up a steroid, not this non-steriod shit he's been prescribing which isn't doing a lick of good. Chiro told me that if he orders this one thing, I'll be markedly improved within two days. I need that, I've done the (im)patiently wait thing. Next step for me is a motorized wheelchair (don't laugh, Kenny's mom has one, we've dubbed it "Ol' Ironsides."

Before I'm scooting around in Ol' Ironsides later this week, something has to change.

Lessons From Our Elders

My hair hadn't been washed since Tuesday. The thought of standing in the bathroom for the whole blow-dry-style-thing was daunting. And what's the point of looking cute from the neck up when I'm walking like the hunched over witch who gave Snow White the poisoned apple?

To complement my unwashed hair, I had a good inch of trailer-trash roots and a strong measure of shiny greys popping up in the partline and along my temple. I swear, the stress of my back pain turned a clump of my hair grey right at the temple where my bangs swoosh over.

Lucky for me, I had a hair appointment for Saturday that I fully intended on keeping, regardless of my lack of mobility. It's a little shop with close-to-the-door parking so it didn't pose a big challenge.

However, I did not have the foresight to foresee the challenge of how the stylist was going to wash the color out of my hair once it was applied. As I've said, I can't lie back. At all. So how did I ever think I was going to get my head into the shampoo bowl? Again, I blame the drugs for clouding my thinking.

Again, lucky for me, my hair stylist volunteers at a nursing home, so she had a solution that she learned from some of her old folks. It was all very classy, In an up-on-all-fours-bending-over-into-the-sink kinda classy way. In an openish area.

Dignity? I miss you. But my hair looks great.

*taken by my Mac while sitting outdoors on my little patio Saturday. Where I saw that I have a tomato plant that I've forgotten about and hadn't been watered in at least five days. I'm sorry little plant. It has two little tomatoes budding on the vine. I gave it a healthy drink, but still worry that it was too little, too late.

Another One Gone.

What hasn't changed since we last met? My back pain. That's the problem with me; I'm just so LIKEABLE that everything wants to hang out with me. Including my engorged sciatica nerve.

I have been worthless since Wednesday night. No work for me Thursday or Friday. I can't work if I can't move. I mean, technically, I could sit in my chair and do computer work. But I wouldn't have been able to get into the building unescorted by a wheelchair, and the thought of the trek from my cube to the restroom had my heart panicking in fear. And my wee-wee. It's still a little bit panicked at the thought of going in tomorrow, I'm still not moving around all agile like. Right now I'm sitting on my required 30-minutes with the ice pack. And it's a pleasure to do so.

I'm worried, Reader. I have done NOTH. ING. since Wednesday night when I returned home from the bone cracker in a crying heap. My phone's ringing now, but there's no chance I could get to it so why bother making the effort? See!? That's been the whole attitude for four days now.

And I'm on so much pain medication, I can't even think clearly to use my immobile time for good vs. lazy. I had all sorts of intentions on Thurs & Fri of getting my laptop from work, but then it was eight o'clock in the evening when I finally noticed the time. Vicodin four times a day (as prescribed) will do that to you.

I finally got a new prescription yesterday, it's an anti-inflammatory drug. Not the one my chiro recommended, but my family doctor is so lame, I am grateful he called in anything for me to try. Not unprompted, of course. Why in the hell he never gave me something like this from the beginning, I'll never know, he is a terrible doctor and I'm going to be searching for a new one as soon as this mess of my body blows over.

The house is a disaster. My hair stylist asked me if Kenny was taking care of all the housework. Um. right. If by taking care of all the housework, you mean bringing in take out to eat, then yes, he's taking care of all the housework.

I will admit to being in so much pain/discomfort all I've wanted to do is shovel comfort food into my face. Pair that with immobility, and I've probably added another 10 pound cushion to my body.

The rundown has included Popeye's chicken, a pot pie from Bob Evans, Chipotle, Taco Bell, and a meal at a truck stop when we went for a ride late Friday night so I could get out of the house. The sitting position doesn't bother me, it's the laying down (so comfortable sleep is impossible) and walking around that does me in.

While we were at the truck stop the bathrooms were all the way around the back of the building. Kenny went and counted at least a hundred steps. I determined that I didn't have a hundred steps in me and had to wait until I got home.

I'm pretty sure there's a whole entire blog in here just about ending up at a truck stop diner at 1:00 a.m., but I don't have that in me, either.

He left today, he's going to southern Ohio with his mom to see his ex-girlfriend's son graduate. Yep, you read that correctly. Whatever floats your boat, as long as I don't have to go. I think they are going to spend the night since it's a 3-hour drive, so I'm looking forward to Sunday Alone Time. If only I could move around better to really enjoy it.

Only 52 weekends per year. I have not maximized this one.

The Crying Game

I found out what was wrong with my bayonet, and it's looking like it's NOT ovarian cancer! Yep, all this comfort from a diagnosis that didn't involve any instruments being shoved anywhere.

I went to a new bone cracker tonight, a recommendation from The Hoff. I explained when all this started, Friday in my ovaries. He told me that's a common start, the nerve wraps around to the front, north of the bayonet, right where I was having the pains.

So it's spine/nerve/fucked-up-edness.

I was a Hot. MESS. at the new doctor. By the time I got in to see him today, I couldn't keep the tears at bay. Seriously, Reader, I either have a very high threshold for pain and only pay attention when I'm dying, or I have a super-low tolerance and the least little twinge has me puddling up.

He got me on the table, face down. Proceeded to probe along my spine, found my neck pinched nerve that's caused me the last 5 years of arm numbness, and then found all the other problem areas. He was good at fingering all the problems. He fingered it so well at the bottom, the pain decided to show me who was boss (the Pain is the boss, in case you're asking), and it had me throwing myself off that table and into an upright sitting position. I was crying so much the doctor just gave up and rubbed my back for five minutes. I liked that.

Finally, shew, after I composed myself and got the puddles dried up, he asked me to lie back, face-up. Couldn't do it. Nope. Too much radiating pain. So he twisted and cracked me from a sitting position.

I was in too much pain to even look at him as my "date." My last chiropractor, I thought he was foxy, and pretend all of my appointments were "dates" - dates that I had to pay for in the end, after he was done twisting me into a lot of positions. You know, the typical. But this dude? He's purely there for medical reasons. Although I'm sure I made quite a sexy impression on him with my twenty minutes of a breakdown.

I cheered myself up with a Dairy Queen Blizzard. And then some vicodin and a muscle relaxer upon returning home. Those are the three best friends that any girl can have.*

*reference: The Hangover.

Death by Bayonet

I thought this would be the weekend I made up for lost blogging, but that didn't turn out to be the case. I'm going to lose my one lone reader if I don't come up with something to type here. I'm just not in the mood. Here's a few minor things, but I think you already know this, Reader.

1/ My friend had to put his dog to sleep last week. I watched that dog when he was an 85 lb., 6 month old puppy and it was an experience like no other. I only knew you personally (ahem. very personally, as you stuck your nose up my snatch and butt every morning, Mojo) for a short couple of weeks, but you made quite an impact. RIP, Mojo.

2/ On to other sick pets. Stanley is STILL hanging in there. He stops eating for a day, we feed him a concoction of shit I whip up in my Vitamix, feed him with a dropper and by the next day he's voraciously eating again. He's eaten really well since Friday night, and is perky and getting along just fine as a result.

3/ Shit leaks out of Stanley's ass. This hasn't been such good news. We just enjoyed a team-effort of cleaning the carpet with the Bissel Little Green Clean Machine, and surprisingly got it looking respectable around here. And sadly, I'm surprised at my level of tolerance for living with a few poop drops around the place. Just a couple little spots? No problem, we'll get to it when a few more show up. And that, Reader, is why I'm not inviting you over for a dinner party. You're welcome.

4/ I've had a pain in my abdomen, something in the area between my belly button and vagina. In there. That was Friday, and lasted til Sunday. This morning it seems to have travelled around and settled in my back, above my asscheeks. I'm not sure if it's backpain or intestines or what. I tried to visit an urgent care today, but guess what? Your urgent cares can only be addressed during their limited weekend hours. So suck it, sick people. Get over it. So here I sit, trying to get over it, but I'm not sure if I'm dying or what. The only thing I know for sure is that I am sick of being in some sort of chronic pain. I walk around hunched over like an old lady, and I don't know how to fix it.

Sidenote: When I typed the word "vagina" into my iPhone (don't ask why), it autocorrected it to "bayonet". What does my iPhone know about my vagina that it's not telling me??

That's it. I've got to go and get something ready to wear to work. While I'd like to go to the Urgent Care tomorrow, I need to fit that in around my workday. I'm very important tomorrow and have a lot of things that I need to do.

Goodnight Reader. At some point I'll have more thrilling things to share. I think.

Neglect

My little blog filled with nonsense has been extremely neglected due to my splotchy Internet connection. The nonsense has had no place to go. It's bottling up.

Now that my Internet seems to be working, put on your poncho. It's going to be a rainshower of nonsense-explosion.

Only not now. Now, I need a nap. This weather is making me lazy.....er...lazier. than usual.

F$%# Al Gore and His Internet.

I'm getting splotchy Internet from my server. Stupid server. I have been unable to type and post nonsense all weekend. It can't be trusted. I get a few minutes of connection at a time, then it'll freeze up and it's game over. So for now, just a quickie to let you know I'm not dead in a ditch somewhere.

Neither is Stanley. As of today, he's still alive. Zantac is helping his sour tummy and helping him to eat a bit here and there. I still hate his stupid cancer.

That's it, I'm posting before I lose my words.

UPDATE: As I went to post this last night, it froze up and I would have lost all my words had I not copied them in preparation of the need for a paste.

It's Star Wars Day

May the fourth be with you.

I wait all year for that. All. Year. And it almost got away from me.

Goosed.

It's a nice day for ducks in Cleveland.

Oh, And We Got Bin Laden, too!

Happy Day, Reader! I've got some blog drafts waiting to be finalized, but didn't get to it this weekend. Here's a few thoughts from my head to tide you over until I get the really important stuff posted ~insert self-mockery here~.

1/ Stanley is doing B.A.D. Bad. He's cranky and crotchety and just wants us to go to bed so he can lay down next to us on his pillow. My heart's breaking (which is probably why I have no real interest in typing up blog-nonsense at the moment), and I know it's just going to be a very short matter of time now. He's walking around hissing at all the other cats. We got him to eating a little bit tonight, some chicken lunchmeat that smells like farts from Giant Eagle. He is pretty crazy about the fartmeat usually, but even now he just has a little bit of interest and he grinds his teeth while eating it. I have no idea why the grinding of his teeth. I just don't know.

Sidebar: We originally purchased the fartmeat whilst shopping one time as our own lunch food. While we made our way through the store, we kept wondering aloud who the hell was farting. Imagine our surprise when the smell followed us home and we realized it was US who smelled like farts in the store. So that's why the cats got that, who wants to eat farty-smelling lunchmeat? Cats do, that's who.

2/ We booked our Fall vacation cruise. A freebee on the Oasis of the Seas (Royal Caribbean). Not too excited about the destinations, but am excited about the ship. I am telling the Universe I expect good weather, unlike that cruise in December where it rained and rained.

3/ I've fought the pressure to purchase an electronic book reader, with the argument that I enjoy the whole book experience - touching the pages, thumbing through the paper, going back and forth to read/re-read certain passages, adoring the cover, the credits and the author photo. Yes, I like all of that. It's my total book experience. However. I'm shifting my stance. It's such a pain in the ass to cart books around on vacation, not to mention the added weight of them in my luggage (I'm partial to hardbacks). Any input, Reader?

4/ We bought a grill for our little patio and are ready for summer. Even got the porch - mostly - set up. Just need to wipe down the furniture. Summer, I am ready.

5/ Picked out some new paint colors for the living room. Considering a re-do. But am avoiding making a commitment to it as it is So. Much. WORK!!! But I'd like to switch it up, I think. What else do I have to do in May, anyway. Squander my time, that's what.