Monday, November 22, 2021

Another member of Mike's family joins the household today so now there will be 9 of us. Mike's son was traveling on business until Saturday. A couple of family friends are also supposed to come on Wednesday to partake in Thanksgiving Day. Bigger group than I have been used to! The big holiday in our family was always Christmas and we had small Thanksgiving groups with immediate family and/or friends. Very different for Mike who never even puts up a Christmas tree.

It looks like today will be a decent beach day. Yesterday we had sunny peeks, some dark clouds and a misty rain at times. We also had to share the beach with two incredibly obnoxious women who had their music on so loud that they had to shout to talk to each other (in between gulps of beer). Really rude. Hopefully they don't show up again today. Part of a good beach day is listening to the waves and the birds. That was impossible yesterday. If it had just been a couple of us I might have moved, but we had 8 people camped out in our grouping.

Time to get ready to take a walk. Have a safe and healthy Monday!

I love a big holiday crowd! Our family is so small, it's generally just the 3 of us.

Was nice to sleep in this morning. I didn't get up really until just after 8. But my alarm clock was Lucky vomit gagging followed by a full on seizure. Glad I was there to ease the fall and to hold his head. Not the way to start the day, but they don't bother me anymore. It's just about being there for my boy. He'll need a bath later today. He contracts so hard his bladder empties when the seizure starts. The urine gets all over his back legs. I give him a little time to recover before the bath. I think the seizure takes a lot out of him. Once he gets back up, shakes off the seizure and drinks a lot of water, he sleeps for a few hours.

Weight and eating are still stable. I weigh 79 pounds more than CC.... LOL! Yes, I actually thought that when CC posted her weight yesterday when she had to give her weight for the little puddle jumper plane. I have flown on those little planes only twice. The first time I was obese and I was told to sit in the middle of the plane and guided to my seat. The second time was post VSG. I was very thin. I assumed I was "used" to balance out the plane AFTER they seated the other 5 people on the plane because they didn't seat me until last and they did ask my weight that time.

Yesterday was spent trimming, filling out pre appointment forms for my dad, and looking at assisted living options for my dad. The happy part of yesterday's research was understanding that my dad is a ways off from needing "memory care". He currently falls into the assisted living category, but my brother and I want a place that has memory care available so if that transition is necessary, we don't need to move him to another living situation.

Liza has a full maternity trim, which makes her look a little bit larger than before the trim! LOL! Her babies were rather active during the trimming and every so often I had to stop and place my hand on her sides to feel the pups squirming around inside! I love this last week of pregnancy.

Well, gotta feed Liza her breakfast and be ready for the little Cairn Terrorists that are coming for a trim.

I would never guess you weighed 79 pounds more than me from your pictures. Goes to show what muscles can do for a body!

Poor Lucky. It sounds like dogs have the same post seizure effects as humans. Youngest DD has had 3 major seizures since she was diagnosed with epilepsy 11 years ago.

Hi everyone, We didn't get to see Belfast last night, so we saw it this afternoon. Beautiful, poignant story. Makes you think about what is home.

I used a bereavement day to attend a service for our friend's Father. They are Jewish, and a year to the day after someone dies, (I learned), there is a service to bless the monument (headstone in this case). There is a specific name for this service, but I don't remember it now. It was lovely, and I appreciated the sentiment that we will always miss the one who dies, but if we remember them and talk about them, they live on. My best friend's oldest boy was killed in a car accident when he was 13. He would have turned 37 this year. One of her saddest thoughts was that people would forget he was ever here. When we were visiting her in Mexico, one of her son's friends showed me a picture of him on his phone. He told me every time he got a new phone, he made sure that photo had transferred. It made me so happy and also sad. He's forever a Peter Pan to me, but when I see his contemporaries all grown up ....my, I guess the service this morning, and the movie have me in a bittersweet mood.

Another occasion of joy, but also tinged with bittersweet: Our daughter was accepted to the grad school program she wanted in Massachusetts. She starts in January. In some ways her life has been on hold since she became our Covid refugee. It has been a great joy and gift to have her home with us, but now she needs to go back to the life she was building. But we'll miss her.

I had a doctor's appointment as a follow up to my blood pressure med. My doctor said I was taking a very small dose, and she liked my numbers. So I will keep up taking it for now, and hope it keeps doing its job.

Liz, I love a big Thanksgiving. My family is more like Mike's. We have a large extended family Thanksgiving at my Uncle's house. Over 30 people every year. And Christmas is more each family in their own home. DH and I go to my parent's house Christmas Day with our kids. Much quieter. We typically host his family on Christmas Eve, and it used to be huge! I loved it. But now one of his sisters had passed away, and the nieces and nephews are married and living elsewhere, or have other obligations with their in laws, so it's become a smaller gathering.

CC, I read what Liz posted yesterday, and I kind of agree. I think Michigan guy could have been trying to tell you in a most awkward way that he wants you to be his girlfriend, but sort of in a jokey way so if you said that's absurd, he could say, yeah, it is, I guess that's what a few beers will do... Only you can know if that's a possibility. It reminds me of another weird encounter, before I was dating DH, a friend called me a bit buzzed from a bachelor party, and said everyone is telling me I should call you tonight. I got really angry, you're ou****ching strippers and that makes you think to call me? It was stupid, and juvenile (the man is now a partner in a law firm and has always had awesome social skills, so what the heck). But what I think he was really trying to ask was, did I have any romantic feelings towards him? I did not. We survived it, and are still great friends. Also, he is happily married to a man, so that adds another element to what must have been a confusing time for both of us.My thoughts, for what they're worth.

Well that's enough meandering from me. I'm thinking about making another big pot of chili and freezing it for lunches. That's my healthy eating plan, always have veggie rich chili on hand :)

Where will your daughter be in Massachusetts?