I'm F#ckin Old

You know you're getting old when conversations with friends (or co-workers) go something like this.
"So, I was flipping through channels the other day and I came across the MTV Video Music Awards."
"I remember when all they played on MTV was videos. Now all I see are shows about teens in the 'real world,' none of which I ever encountered when I was that age."
"Anyway, it was hosted by some punk guy I didn't recognize."
"Oh yeah, he's in some band I think."
"Oh, that makes sense. He was wearing ridiculously tight black pants with spiky hair and lots of make-up. He really wasn't that funny either"
"Did you see that one singer, Re-hanna, Re-anna..."
"Re-ahna?"
"I guess so. Her pants looked like they were painted on. And she was wearing heels, no lie, that looked about eight inches high."
"How does anyone function in those shoes?"
"No idea."
"These are great role models for kids. Look like a slut and make it in the music business."
"Well, there are the Jonas Brothers with their virtue rings."
"Who are the Jonas Brothers?"
"Some boy band. They look about 15."
"Well geez, I hope they're still virgins at 15!"
"Remember when Jessica Simpson claimed she was a virgin? That didn't last long."
"But that was years ago before she got married. At least she waited that long."
"Yeah, and she was what? 23 or something?"
"I think so. That's a long time to wait in this day and age."
"No kidding. There are a number of famous teens right now having babies. Can you imagine? And I don't know any teen pregnancies that end up like in Juno. Or even Knocked Up."
"Yeah, but those are just movies, and comedies at that. They're obviously overdone to be funny. And I would hope people would recognize that."
"Older, wiser people, yes. Hormonal teenagers, not so much."
"Did I tell you a group of teenagers threw a rock at my car the other day?"
"Seriously?"
"Yup. Never mind the damage to my car, someone could get hurt."
"Damn punk kids."
We're calling teenagers punk kids.
I remember being a high school kid. I remember being a college student. But I don't remember making the transition from being one of those things to complaining about them.
At least I'm not calling them whipper-snappers yet. :)

Mosquitoes and Those Who Hate Them

For some reason, mosquitoes love me. Often times I will stand next to C, who is 6'8, and he'll come away with one or two bites, while I'll have 27. And that's not really an exaggeration either. We were at a barbecue a couple of weeks ago, when I noticed a huge bug bite on my leg after being outside for an hour. I asked for some bug spray and sprayed my arms, legs, and feet. I knew my hands might get one or two more, and maybe my neck if I wasn't paying attention. But for the most part, I thought I was safe.
Thought is the operative word there. The next day, I woke up with 22 bites. C, I believe, had less than a handful, and he never even put on bug spray. Bastard. :)
And this past weekend, we went to his mom's house and sat out on the back deck for less than 15 minutes, and I came away with eight bites, all on my feet. Again, C came away with none.
I was even in bed one night, covers up to my neck, when I felt something land on my eyebrow. I brushed it away and felt something sticky on my finger. Sure enough, when I turned on the light I saw a squished mosquito on my hand. In my own bedroom! ARGH!
I'm surprised I haven't died from malaria/West Nile/yellow fever.
I have no idea why mosquitoes are so attracted to me. One web site I went to said they are often attracted to men, those who are overweight, and those with Type O blood. I'm not particularly any one of those things, while C takes two out of three. It's just not fair.
I even have poor blood circulation. Whenever they have to take blood it often takes the nurse a good minute or so to find a vein. Apparently they should employ mosquitoes to do the job because they have no problem finding my blood.
My blood must be fairly sweet or at least giving off some kind of pleasant aroma that attracts those damn bugs because it never fails. Any time I'm outside, and not even for an extended period of time, I could just be walking to my car, I put myself in jeopardy of being attacked by one of those vicious predators. And, seriously, those red spots itch like a mo-fo! I finally got over the patchwork of bites I had from the barbecue, and the cycle has begun all over again. ARGH!
I should start a club: People Who Are Often Bitten by Mosquitoes and Are Sick of It!
Hmmm. I'll have to work on the name. :)

Labor Day Weekend

Whew, what a weekend! Thank goodness it was three days long, because I needed the extra day to get some rest! :)
I worked six hours of overtime last week, which is a rare thing (I think it's only the second or third time this year I've gotten any extra hours). So when my supervisor asked if I wanted to get any more this weekend, I did think about it for a split second. But after such a long week, I was ready for three whole days off.
Saturday C and I went to my parents place for the day, and to hang out with my grandmother. She's going to be 89 in November and is struggling with her breathing, weight, and energy level. As a very active woman it's tough for her to be unable to do most of the things she enjoys. But many of our family still live in that area and visit her frequently, and of course she still watches the Red Sox. Nothing can stop her from doing that. :)
Anyway, we then had dinner at my parents place- delicious ham of which we got to take a few slices home (that'll be at least two days of dinner for work this short week.) We chatted about the upcoming election and how McCain chose an extremely conservative woman from Alaska to be his VP. My dad told us he heard a commentator say that McCain chose her because he realized how important the Eskimo vote would be in this election.
"Because he wasn't a comedian I wasn't expecting that, and I almost spit my food out," he said, as we all laughed.
After that the rest of the night was spent trying to keep my two nieces from destroying each other, along with my parents house. They both have the energy of a nuclear explosion, so putting them together just might cause one! :)
C and I came back home that night, since Sunday was his mom's birthday. We went over there for dinner (two free dinners- it was such a great weekend), and to play a game of Scrabble with C, his brother, his mom, and me. Usually I'm not much of a match for C or his mom (they've actively played Scrabble together for a long time) but I scored a come-from-behind victory to convince C that I wasn't letting his mom win on her birthday. It was my strategy all along. Really, it was. :)
That brings us to today, Monday, Labor Day, where we had absolutely no plans and haven't gone ANYWHERE. That's what the holiday's all about, right? And that's exactly how we planned to "celebrate."

Fred, the Patient

As you saw in my previous blog about my cat, Fred, she was just getting over a rash caused by medicine she was taking for her hyperthyroid condition. When it was finally healed, I called the vet's office to order a new prescription of the name brand stuff, Tapazole.
The vet had told me I could get the medicine from any pharmacy, since humans also use the drug for the same condition. So I told them to call the Rite Aid pharmacy where I get my prescriptions, to keep things fairly easy.
Well this morning, I stopped in to pick up the prescription before I went into work early, so I could put it in Fred's food before I left. She's taking a lesser dose, only 1/2 a pill a day, and I wanted to get her back on the meds as soon as possible. So I walked up to the counter and asked the pharmacist for a pick-up order for me. As she looked for the last name, she came across one bag with a confused look on her face. She came back to tell me they had a prescription on hold for a Fred (last name).
"Um, that would be my cat," I said, smiling.
"Ohhh," she said. "That would explain why we don't have a birth date for the patient."
Thankfully they were able to fill the prescription right away, once they got her "birth date" (I can only give them the month I got Fred and the year 1992 since she is now 16). But I thought it was very cute that the prescription was indeed in her name. It does say Cat next to her name though. :)
But the best part was the price. Normally, the medicine costs about $55, since unfortunately my job doesn't have an insurance plan that includes cats under family coverage. :) However, the pharmacist asked me if I had a AAA card. I told her yes, and it got me a discount of 50%. The total bill came to less than $26 total. Awesome.
So now Freddie is back on her medication and even has her own account at Rite Aid. They grow up so fast. :)

No More Slacking Off

Boy, I've really been slacking. Five whole days with no new posts. I hope I'm not disappointing anyone. :)
On the up side, I have been working on my book a little bit, and I plan on continuing that trend over the weekend. C's brother, Z, is here for the weekend and they'll most likely be cracking out on gaming. So that pretty much leaves me to fend for myself in terms of finding stuff to do for the next two days. Fortunately though, I need that kind of nothingness to get my ass in gear and get some writing done! I'm excellent at taking random things and making them last ALL weekend, which is good to keep from getting bored, but bad when it distracts me from getting stuff done! But this time, the dishes are cleared, the laundry is done, and the Olympics will be over. Time to be productive.
When I graduated from college eight years ago, a bachelor's degree in English in hand, I wasn't sure where I was gonna go from there. I took the summer off to dog sit these two retired greyhounds who belonged to a fairly wealthy couple in Stockbridge. Their business gave them the summers off and they enjoyed traveling and being away from home quite often. It was an easy paying gig, (I mean, I got to stay at a cool house and play with dogs all day!) and it gave me time off from writing 20 page papers without having to jump into the work force immediately. Ah, those were the days. :)
But I also thought a lot about becoming a writer. Every time someone asked me what I got a degree in, after my answer they would say, "Oh, are you gonna be a teacher?"
"Um, no. I want to be a writer."
The response to that varied, depending on who I was talking to. Some people thought it was cool and asked what I wanted to write about, which at that time I had no idea. And others would ask me, almost mystified, what my parents thought about it. My father being an English teacher and my mother being the supportive woman she is, had no problem with that and were very proud when I became a reporter. I believe my mom still has all of the articles I've ever written, which is over three years' worth!
But the book thing never took off like I hoped it would. I changed my topic almost every month, never being able to find that one character, that one angle, that one story, that really captured my interest to develop it. I kept thinking, I've got time. I'm in a place in my life right now where I can do anything, go anywhere, be whatever I want. I'm writing on a regular basis so that should help to keep my creative juices flowing.
Unfortunately, though, writing other people's stories never left enough for me to write my own.
So I left. After three and a half years of town meetings, special events, feature pieces, even health magazine articles, I had had enough. It was time to go out and do something for myself, and that something was to find my story.
I left my hometown at age 26, the first time since graduating college at 22. I went east to stay with my sister and her husband while I tried to figure out what to do with myself. C and I were already dating by that time, which also helped in my decision to move away from home. Of course, at the time we said it was casual, but you obviously see how that's changed. :)
It was then I thought about writing about the quarter life crisis; you know, being in your mid 20s, out of school, but not quite in a career, where you feel as if you have every opportunity at your disposal. Your choices don't have to be permanent, they just have to keep you going forward. And even then, if you make a mistake, so what? There's plenty of time to fix it and move onto something else. The world is waiting for you to emerge and make your mark on it.
Now I'm 30.
Um, where the hell did all that time go??
So this is it. It's time to quit with all the excuses and weeks, months, YEARS of procrastination. I have found a story, which other people have told me is dramatic enough to be compelling, with characters I'm looking forward to developing. I'm outlining chapters, doing character sketches, and have had the first line down for awhile now. I even had a dream the other night that I had written the book and there were two publishers negotiating its publication.
Now I just have to do the work to make that dream a reality.
What is this book about, you ask? Well, I think I'll save that for my next blog.

Fred

Fred is my 16-year-old cat. I got her from my friend's grandfather after he died, because no one else in the family could take her. The grandfather gave her the name Fred because originally he thought she was a boy. I kept the name, not wanting to confuse her after having that name for nine years, saying it was short for Fredericka. Hey, it works. :)
I've had Freddie for seven years now. She has her own personality, as does every cat I think, where she likes to pretend to be aloof until there are a number of laps for her to choose from in the living room. Then she generally has to visit each one, especially after one person stops petting her. She's an indoor cat who is very curious about the outside world, but whenever she's accidentally gotten out into it, she's had no idea what to do. There have been a couple of times where she was closed out of the apartment by accident (here and at my first apartment, both places of which were only in a hallway, not actually outside) and after only a minute or two of limited exploration, she started meowing as if she was just tossed into a jungle.
We then decided to bring her out onto our back porch a couple of times while we were out there to keep an eye on her. She just stood in one spot at first, but eventually she started sniffing around the trash cans and then around the outside of the deck. Now, any time the door is open the slightest bit, she'll nose it open and escape out onto the back. Of course, the door has never been closed behind her, so I'm not sure how brave she would be, not being able to get back into the place which holds her food.
She also used to enjoy scratching up my furniture when I first got her, showing no interest in the scratching posts I bought. Finally, I tried one of those corrugated cardboard boxes that lay flat on the floor. Bingo. She loves it so much that she'll still lay on it from time to time (and thank goodness for that!). I don't think my recliner could've handled any more abuse.
Unfortunately, now that she's older, she's starting to get those older pet ailments. I took her to the vet to update her shots, and the vet discovered she had lost a couple of pounds and had a fairly significant heart murmur. After a number of tests they determined it was hyperthyroidism that had caused the weight loss which, in turn, caused the heart murmur. I was very surprised, because I hadn't noticed any significant changes in her behavior. There were a couple of days that happened months ago, where she was spending a lot of time underneath "her bed" in the guest bedroom. But once I brought her into the living room and blocked off that one spot that was difficult to get to, she started being social again, and has been ever since.
So we put her on methimazole and watched for any adverse reaction to the new medication. First there was some vomiting, which I fixed by switching her to a wet food only diet (her teeth were already in fairly poor condition anyway, so eating the softer food seemed to help). She seemed to be a bit more spry, jumping from the recliner to the couch and back again, climbing to the very top of the chair seemingly just because she could. But then I noticed more and more as I pet her, I could feel her bony frame more than her skin or fur (of which she still has PLENTY, and not just on her body but all over the apartment!). And that's when the rash appeared.
First it was just a couple of red dots above one eye. But then it became more and more dots, over both eyes, and then on her ear. And of course, they were itchy, which caused Fred to scratch out the fur around the rash.
That's when I called the vet yet again. At her appointment on Thursday the vet said to take her off the medication to allow the rash to heal (there was nothing to give her for that, because of her advanced age). And instead of giving her the generic medication, which the vet said often causes the most problems in pets, we'll start her on a smaller dose of the name brand, Tapizole. Hopefully we'll have better results with that.
Freddie is the first pet of mine to have this kind of medical condition that involves actual medication and multiple doctor visits. I had a mouse when I was in eighth grade, who lived for three years with no issues (well, except for his death of course). Then I had a turtle for five years who died a few months ago. We had no idea how old he was so I think he simply passed from old age. Even our family dog, Muffin, who I grew up with and who had problems as she got older, was a pet that my parents took care of most of the time. I wasn't the one who had to take her to be put down.
The only thing that keeps me hopeful about Freddie's health is that she doesn't seem to know she's sick. As I said, she still eats just fine and is fairly spry for a cat her age (although her gracefulness has definitely declined). She is still pretty amusing when she gets all ready to jump from one piece of furniture to the next and lands on all fours, boom, right on the floor. That's when she walks away, tail held high, as if to say, "I meant to do that."
Even when I checked on her rash she would turn her head or lightly bat my hand away, probably wondering why the heck I was fussing over her face.
My sister had a cat that lived into her 20s, and while I don't want Freddie to suffer in really old age, I do want her older years to be just as enjoyable as her younger ones. I just hope I don't have to make any tough decisions about her health during them.

Watching the Olympics

I haven't watched the Olympics, winter or summer, in years. I can't even tell you the last time I saw an event on TV or even paid attention to it in the news. I figured this year would be no different.
I did sit down and watch the last hour of the opening of the games, flying torch holder and all. I missed the first 3/4 of it because I was watching the Red Sox game that night. But after a friend of C's told him how awesome the very beginning of the show was, we decided to find it online and watch it. And it was pretty damn cool.
The next day, C and I were sitting around not really doing anything when he said, "Let's see if there's any Olympics on."
I was totally surprised. He doesn't even watch sports, any sports, except for UFC (Ultimate Fighting Champion. He likes the mixed martial arts). Even when I watch the Sox I'm usually in another room or he's on the computer doing other things when I'm watching it in the living room. So for him to actively seek out sporting competitions was a new thing.
And since then, he's been watching it for hours every day.
I'll come home from work and he'll give me the lowdown on some of the standings for the day. We'll watch gymnastics and he'll comment on little mistakes they make, like balance checks or taking too long a step in the landing. Volleyball, swimming, boxing, diving, we even watched archery today. I learned he enjoyed archery and was fairly good at it when he was younger, something I did not know. We laugh at the ridiculous comments the announcers say, and anyone who stops by sits down and watches it too, making their own comments as well. We'll sit around, order food, and do our own commentary on whatever event we're watching. I don't think I've ever watched this much of the Olympics in my life. Of course, the fact it's on some channel at every hour of the day doesn't hurt!
But if the goal of the Olympics is to bring people together well, it is serving its purpose. :)