A Small Christmas Miracle?

Last weekend, Jarrod got sick. He developed a bad cough, along with headaches and stuffy nose-ish symptoms. Luckily, he wasn't running a fever or feeling achy, so it seemed he at least didn't have the flu, which has been going around here lately.

We went into action to keep me from catching it... wiping down switches, door knobs, various surfaces; quarantining ourselves to separate parts of the house—with the exception of eating, Jarrod stayed downstairs and I stayed upstairs; we wore hospital masks when we had to be in the same room with each other; we slept in separate rooms. But...

Despite all of our efforts, I still got sick :(

I started showing symptoms on Tuesday afternoon, and I was so upset about it. We had tried so hard not to get me sick, but it didn't make a bit of difference.

I had my usual bouts of endless coughing that I get when I catch a cold, but this time things were different. By 5:00 on Thursday (only 2 days later), things started to look up for me. My cold-cough subsided, and I honestly wasn't feeling too bad.

I don't know whose prayer list I ended up on, but I am just simply amazed at how good I feel right now. This is just... wow. Aside from my awful couple days of coughing, I've been managing life pretty well. My nose never got that stuffed up, and my exercise tolerance has not dropped off the deep end either, all things that I expect when I get a cold; today, I walked on the treadmill for 30 minutes at 2.8 mph, which is what I was doing pre-cold.

I'm not even a week out from catching my cold, and I can honestly say that I'm confident I might be able to kick this on my own. I was almost for sure that if I caught something again, I'd be going in the hospital, or at least needing antibiotics. But this time? I'm not so sure I need them, at least not yet.

I obviously have been in contact with my doctor about all this, and I picked up the meds they called in for me, but for now I'm holding off on using them.

There was one, maybe two, things I did differently. One, I started using those Cold Eeze lozenges very early on, which is the key to their effectiveness. Since I knew Jarrod was sick, I didn't hesitate to start treating my symptoms as soon as my throat started to feel a tiny bit 'off'. [The Cold Eeze things are one of those home remedies that is like: really? Does this really work? Or do you just think it does? I read up on them, and if you know a little about the pathophysiology of a cold virus, it makes sense that they would work. Zicam is based on the same principle. So maybe I need to just take them every time I start to feel funny.]

The second thing was that I took off two days from work to get over this. Since I was coughing so much, it meant little sleep, so I tried to get it any time I had a small break in coughing. And even if I wasn't sleeping, I was still resting my body so it could work on fighting off the virus.

And prayers. If you've been praying for me, I'd like to say thank you and keep it up. I can't emphasize enough just how different this cold has been, and how amazing I feel right now. I mean, I'm not like 100% better, plus I did lose my voice on Friday (all that coughing really started to irritate my throat something awful) but compared to how I usually feel right about now? It's really great.

14 Books in 2014

I'm happy to say that last week, Monday night, I reached by goal of reading 14 books this year! I'm pretty much one month ahead of schedule too, so that's cool.

Last year I read 10 books, and this year I upped it to 14. Next year, I'm going to do 15.

Sadly, I didn't have any books that I felt deserved a 5-star rating. Most all of them I rated 3 or 4 stars. Although, looking back over things, the same can be said for the books I read in 2013, too. I'm just a tough critic.

So there, if anyone asks me in the upcoming month about a New Year's resolution, I guess I already have one: to read 15 books next year. Woo hoo!

If you're looking for something to read and find me a trustworthy book recommender, I'll add a few comments at the bottom about the books I read. :)

Crossroads—Written by the same guy who wrote The Shack, it was another story of reflection and thinking about your spiritual health. The Shack is better, though, read that one.

V for Vendetta—The second graphic novel I've read. Also heavily influenced by the same guy who created Watchmen, the illustration was spectacular. The story, however, differs from the movie version, which we are fans of. It was alright.

Bitter Brew—This book was really great! It is about the Busch family, and a well-rounded look at the history and scandal that has plagued their massive beer empire. I highly recommend this one.

Is This Tomorrow—This one was the most surprising. I read it on a whim and turned out really liking it. It's a fairly easy read, the story is about childhood friends dealing with a tragic accident that happened in their childhood but haunts them into their adult lives.

The Hunger Games Trilogy—For me, this series was good, but didn't really blow me away like I expected it to. After reading it, I'm kind of done with the teen trilogy thing for a while. It starts out really strong, but by the end I was just over it. The last book was a drag.

The Fault In Our Stars—Somehow, I only cried once. But this is a solid book with a less-BS approach to disease, dealing with it, and the struggles that loved ones face with you.

Steve Jobs—I've only been slowly reading this ever since it came out three years ago... but his life sure is a fascinating story. It's good, if you like biographies.

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time—Really good book about a child with some sort of autistic-spectrum-disorder. The neighbor's dog is killed, and the young boy sets out to solve the mystery.

Orange Is the New Black—Part 'insider's account' of being in prison, part 'platform to tell everyone what she thinks is wrong with the prison system', this started to feel a little snobby by the end. The writer's concern for her fellow inmates started to feel less and less sincere. Also, this book is nothing like the Netflix show; the show is loosely based on it, and I mean very loosely.

Brave New World—I finally read this classic, and just like other futuristic dystopias, it is frightening how much this holds true in the present day. Great book. I never want to live in a brave new world.

Bossypants—Tina Fey's book started strong, simply due to her wit and jokes. The book was written almost like one long standup routine, and by the end it was getting a little boring. Who wants to read a standup sketch? Put it this way, if there's an audiobook version of this with Tina Fey reading it, listen to that. I guarantee it will be better.

Friday Fast 5

Five quick things:

1. I learned how to make scrambled eggs this morning! [Ok, you can laugh at me now.] Last month I learned how to make an omelet, and now I know how to not make one. You could say I learned this a little backwards, and I would agree. It's like we're rediscovering eggs at this house—I think we've ate more eggs in the past 2 months than we have in the past 2 years. Omelet night has become a thing here when we want something easy, yet fresh and healthy.
2. I got my tree up this week! My mother-in-law helped me with it, especially the ribbon. I decided I wanted to use ribbon this year for a more updated look, and I'm really happy with the way it turned out. However: so... much... glitter... everywhere. The ribbon is pretty, but it sheds glitter more than a lab sheds hair. I'm sure we'll still be finding glitter around the house in June. Josie was trying to help and ended up having a blast attacking the used ribbon spools (she also got glitter all over her muzzle, haha.) At one point she had one in her mouth like a bone and it was hilarious. 
3. This year is definitely the earliest I've ever gotten my Christmas cards done, the earliest I've ever gotten the tree up and decorated, and the earliest I've ever had the whole house decorated. And I've got a good jump on shopping too, which is nice. More than ever, I'm realizing I just need to do what's right for me. I know it's only the 5th right now, but as it gets closer to the holidays there are always more and more things going on, making it harder to find spare moments of down time. There is no reason for me to go go go and run myself down (and my health) in the process. 
4. Yesterday Josie knocked off one of my S'mores ornaments—it was the lumberjack guy haha. She wasn't chewing on it, but was just sitting there with it. I got after her, so hopefully she doesn't think the ornaments are toys.
5. I discovered the iHeartRadio app this week, and it's been one of those "Why have I never used this before?!" kinds of experiences. You always hear it advertised on stations like 103.3 or K-Hits, but it's basically an app to listen to the local radio stations via the internet, and this week I've started listening to the radio thru the TV. It's quite nice, because my iHome radio in the kitchen has proved a buggy disappointment; for one, the antenna doesn't get a great signal, and it will go from clear sound to fuzzy with no apparent change in the house, and two, it's got a weird thing where after some time of listening, it turns the volume down, while keeping the volume number the same. But if I move my hand right near it, it turns it back up, and as soon as I walk away, it gets quiet again. It's kind of like how your phone dims after inactivity, except it makes absolutely no sense why or how a radio would "dim" the volume, and it makes listening to it quite annoying. I promise you all of this is true and it is weird and makes no sense. Anyways, not all radio stations are on it but the app has been a nice find and I could see it being useful at the gym or anywhere else wifi is available.

It's Advent! And so far, God's gift to me is...

...the gift of feeling better!

It seems that the burst of steroids has helped me out, and I have been able to exercise and work on getting back to where I was.

Last Tuesday, after I had already published my blog post, I was able to return to the gym, walking and finally lifting weights again. I can't do as much as before, but I don't care; I'm lifting weights again! Then on Wednesday, I was able to do the rowing machine for 12 minutes, so that was awesome! I walked on the treadmill here last night, and was able to push my speed to 2.8 for a little while, which is great news too. After a bit it got to be too much, but that's okay. :)

Since the steroids opened up my airways, I was able to exercise more.
Since I've been able to exercise more, I haven't been as short of breath.
Since I haven't been as short of breath, I'm hanging on and hoping to keep pushing off a hospital stay as much as I can.

Tiny Update

As a tiny update to yesterday's small update, I heard from my doctor yesterday. And the plan, for now, is to finish my course of steroids and sit tight. Basically, kind of wait and see what happens.

I see about 3 possible scenarios on how this could turn out:

1. I continue to improve a little even after tomorrow, when my steroids run out, and am able to get exercising back to the levels I was at pre-cold. (This is what I'm hoping for)
2. I finish the steroids and slide back, then we'll discuss a new plan or hospitalization.
3. I finish the steroids and maintain where I'm at as of today, no better, no worse.

In other news, my friend pointed out to me last night something like So thankful your hospital is not in St. Louis anymore. Yeah, no kidding, me too. I will reserve comment on the Ferguson stuff, maybe I'll let it out in another post, except for this one thing: It really bothered me when protesters shut down I-44 at Grand last night. That is the exit to get to SLU and Cardinal Glennon, both of which are fairly major hospitals in STL. 

I did a little shopping today for a couple items at Target and JCPenney. At JCP, all of the merchandise is perfectly displayed, everything is folded and stacked, and the whole store is looking quite sharp. There were hardly any people there, since I assume at this point most everyone is waiting until Friday (or Thursday, those family-hating shoppers!) to get the best deals. Once I used the 20% off coupon I had, the piece of clothing I got for Jarrod was 2 dollars cheaper than their "Black Friday Price". For the sake of my sanity, I will gladly pay two more dollars. Target was similar, with everything stocked as much as the shelves can hold, just waiting for holiday buyers to arrive in a few days. It was a little odd... like the calm before the storm, at Penney's especially. I'd love to see someone in retail do like a Tumblr of before/after photos from Black Friday. Because before, it looks quite nice, but I'm sure after only an hour or two, it is all completely trashed.

Small Updates

Good news first!

Good News—I'm doing the better. The prednisone is helping. It's not a home run outta the park or anything, but I have improved a little. I'm not nearly as breathless as before, so this is a good sign. As a refresher course: prednisone is a common steroid, and steroids are used to reduce swelling and inflammation. Ergo, my airways aren't quite as inflamed as they were and getting around has been easier.

Bad News—At this moment, I have no idea what this means for me. Does it mean I make it through this week and go in the hospital next week? Does it mean we try something and put off a hospital stay longer? No clue. I'm trying to call and check in with my doctor and give them a status update, like they wanted me to, so we can figure this out. I'm a little anxious over it, to be honest.

In other news, I started decorating for Christmas over the weekend. It's not something I have ever done before Thanksgiving, but not knowing where this whole maybe-going-in-the-hospital thing would leave me, I decided it would be best to just start on it. Trust me, I'm not putting the tree up or a manger yet, but I put up some garland and most of my snowmen yesterday. If I do go in to the hospital at any point between now and Christmas, it would be about 2 weeks of lost time for shopping or decorating. Plus, Jarrod wouldn't know where I'd want all my snowmen to go anyways, but he can still put up the tree and the manger in my absence, if needed.

But the other exciting thing is we got our treadmill out of our front room and downstairs where it will have it's new home in the "bonus room." It is so wonderful to have that space back, the house feels little less like we're still in a construction zone now. It is so much more open now that the treadmill is gone. I'm sure Josie will be excited to have more room to play ball too! This also means we WILL be able to put up a Christmas tree this year. We didn't last year because the treadmill was taking up too much room, which I talked about here. But I am glad we can put up the big tree, hassle that it is, and enjoy it.

And Now for Some... Sad News

It's a Dan Anchorman reference...

Well... I wish this could be a cheerier blog post, and I'll just cut to the chase: I'm going to be back in the hospital very soon. (And I just got the idea that I totally need to bring my Animaniacs DVD sets with me! Why have I never thought of this before?)

So remember that cold I had 5 weeks ago? I never really got much better from it. I mean, I did get 'better' but I did not get back to baseline, and in the past week I've slowly gotten worse.

Actually, the moment I realized I was most definitely getting worse was last Saturday. I went out with some friends for dinner (Jarrod was away hunting) and after dinner, I was suddenly very short of breath. During the drive home, I realized that I just needed to stay in for the rest of the night, and what I really needed was my oxygen tank. So Jeff & Johanna dropped me off back at home and I stayed in, did a treatment, and sat around with my oxygen for a little while. I started to feel better, but not by much.

Then this past Tuesday, I tried to return to the gym. I've been to the gym a few times just to walk on the treadmill, and I treadmill here too, but I have not lifted weights since I got sick. Tuesday I thought I was feeling up to it and was ready to return. I figured I might not be able to lift as much because, wow, [I realize in writing this that] it was 5 weeks ago I got this cold; that is a long time to go without going to the gym. But... Tuesday didn't go so hot. I only tried two machines and ended up having coughing fits both times. I gave up and told Jarrod I was going home... I cried in the car. I was so disappointed that I had made such good progress with gaining strength and a little bit of muscle, and right now I can't even maintain it. And I'm most likely going to lose most or all of it, and have to start all over.

Today I was scheduled for a PFT, and after those incidents, plus basically needing my O2 every night, I wasn't expecting things to go very well. Turns out my numbers are down to about where I was when I went in the hospital in September. We're going to try some steroids for a few days and see if I show any improvement with that. If not... I don't know what is going to happen. At this point, I don't know if they'll let me wait until after Thanksgiving, or if I'll be enjoying a hospital-turkey-dinner on Thursday.

So yes, I'm very sad that I only made it two months out of the hospital. However, circumstances were completely out of my control, and this is the exact reason why we have to be extra diligent, be so careful that I don't get sick: because it throws me in the hospital.

But, if I'm completely honest, I'm not all that surprised by this news today and I am also ready to feel better. It is a real struggle getting around, especially in the evenings like I said. It's like by the time the day is done, my body is so worn out that it stops functioning properly, and just walking across the house makes me winded. My house is a disaster because I haven't felt up to cleaning anything for weeks and now I feel even worse. It's hard to even get dressed sometimes, without getting short of breath.

So, let's hope that the steroids help and I can at least stay out of the hospital next week.

The TV Situation

Jarrod and I have been tossing about the idea of dumping our satellite TV for a while now; almost to the point where some may be asking 'Why don't you just get it OVER with already!?'

Well, we have finally made a decision on our TV situation. And...

We are going to officially "cut the cord" and no longer have TV on December 1st.

We did a two-week trial of living without TV, which started four-ish weeks ago. The rules were:

• you can only watch local channels (as it would be if we had an antenna)
• you can't record anything to the DVR
• you can't pause the TV
• but you can watch things already on the DVR, which would be like a streaming service

The first week was a little difficult, for me at least. Jarrod would have ditched satellite a long time ago if it was up to him. But I knew part of it was just a mental thing, really. Since I knew I still had the channels there, I just couldn't watch them, it was playing games with my brain; you always want what you can't have—just like really wanting a big hamburger on Fridays during Lent. But by week two, I had gotten used to barely watching local channels, watching a lot more Netflix, and kind of forgot all those other channels were even there. And I didn't care. 

Our satellite auto-billed, so with this month already being paid for, I'm not going to try to cancel mid-month and argue with them to refund me my money. Plus, this way we get a little more time to watch a few things stored on the DVR and time for Jarrod to build an antenna. 

We will be canceling in 11 days. And hopefully we'll never look back. 

I honestly doubt we will. While we "didn't have TV" I would watch things on Netflix. And the things I was watching were shows or movies I actually wanted to watch, instead of just whatever was on the channels. Because the sad truth is that, even though I could hypothetically do this anyways, while still keeping my satellite, the satellite is like the default. It just becomes habit: When I turn on the TV, I turn on the satellite and try to find something to watch. I usually just watch something, even if it's not that great, because it's right there and it's what's in front of me. Without that option, I immediately turn to Netflix instead, where I have all kinds of things queued up that interest me. On top of that, I swear that ever since we made this decision, more often there is nothing on TV that I even want to watch. And I end up turning it off anyways. Why am I paying for this?

I've found out that more people our age have this kind of setup than I originally thought. And it's common with my generation: no TV, just watch online. With the announcements of HBO and CBS creating their own streaming services, I think more channels are going to follow suit and the traditional definition of TV is going to change fairly soon. That's not to say television as we know it is dead, because there are still many reasons for some people to keep their cable, like watching live sports games, lacking a good internet connection, or just preferring the convenience of it.

But as more and more people like us "cut the cord" the networks are going to be scrambling for that lost advertising money and it's going to be exactly like the newspapers—which also means that it is going to take them a long time to figure out a workable model for this.

Somewhere back in the early 2000s, newspapers started to realize 'Hey, we're losing print subscribers, everyone's online, but they don't pay for what they read online... why are we giving away all of our news for free?' And then around 2010-2011 you started to see paywalls popping up. I predict a near-identical outcome for the big TV companies. The difference is that the networks can at least place ad-rolls on the videos, and those aren't that different from having commercials during shows in the traditional sense. For newspapers, an online ad is not a print ad and never will be a print ad, and online ad revenue rarely makes up for lost print ad revenue. But I predict that in the future, most every cable channel will either come up with their own streaming service, place everything behind a paywall in some form—either a "hard paywall" where you pay for all or nothing or what is called a "soft paywall" or a "pay screen" (like a screen door) where you get some episodes free, after that you have to pay—or they are going to place even more ads on the videos. 

On a random note: Hey remember YouTube before it had ads? Oh... those were the days...

So why are we doing all this? Well, for a few reasons:

• To save money—Even if we signed up for both Hulu Plus and Amazon Prime for streaming more movies and shows, we still save about $400-500 a year. We can put that towards things we'd enjoy way more than our crappy TV channels we barely even watch.
• To spend time in other ways—For me, I hope that I will spend less time in front of the screen and more time doing other things I enjoy, like reading or crocheting. Or once we move the treadmill downstairs, I can play the piano again. 
• Less frustration—I've touched on this one before, but TV really frustrates me in 2 ways. 
• 1. It is really frustrating to look through all of your 100+ channels and see that there is NOTHING on there that sounds remotely appealing. Now I won't have that problem. Yes, I expect there will be times I can't find anything on Netflix either, but so far I have not had that problem. If anything, I've had the opposite of having too many things that I can't keep up.
• 2. The stupidity of TV, in commercials and in shows. Almost any new reality show that has been introduced in the past 3 years is a regurgitation of some other kind of show. For example: Deadliest Catch was almost 10 years ago, and there have been a ton of other 'obscure careers that you didn't know were fascinating until now' shows. And then, of course, in 2012 we hit the bottom of the barrel with Honey Boo Boo. Because sadly, America likes to watch train wrecks. With the exception of Swamp People, haha, I just can't bring myself to watch this stuff. It just doesn't interest me in the least. So now I don't even need to worry about it, I won't even know it exists, so I won't have anything to be frustrated about. And as far as commercials, Netflix and Prime don't even have them, and Hulu only plays a fraction of the ads you deal with normally. 

So it's se la vie to TV in less than two weeks! If you're interested in switching to the dark side with us, feel free to message me. We did a lot of research while making this decision, I'd be happy to share what we found out.

Friday Fast 5

1. We should all enjoy this weekend because after that, the cold officially sets in. I'm not excited for it so soon, but I'm not surprised. I really don't know why anyone should be surprised; we had one of the mildest summers in a long time, of course the cold weather is going to happen even sooner because of that. Looks like deer season might actually be cold, unlike the past couple years where it was too warm.
2. I wish there were stricter laws for "mature drivers". In our state, you have to renew your license every 6 years, and if you're over the age of 70, it's every 3. To that I say: woo hoo... who cares? What needs to happen, I feel, is that they need to retake the actual driving test (there are states that require this, ours is not one of them.) Eyesight and being able to read signs are not the only components of driving; slow reflexes, not to mention having just the mental capability to think quickly, go completely unaccounted for. The reason I'm complaining about this is today, this old lady almost caused an accident with me three times! THREE TIMES, with JUST ME! First she pulled out in front of me at the stoplight (making a right onto Hwy. 100 while I was turning left from Hwy. 47; she pulled out so late that I almost ran in to her), then she signaled to get in the left lane and merged without looking, then I changed lanes and was trying to pass her and she just drifted back over (no blinker) into the right lane and almost sideswiped me again. I was blaring my horn at her for that last one, and I don't think she even noticed. This lady should NOT be on the road. Beware the turquoise Chevy Equinox with the white-haired lady in it! I know giving up your license can be difficult for older citizens, emotionally, but for the safety of others sometimes it just needs to happen. There are some who do it willingly, like my great grandpa I believe, and my grandma limits herself to short drives only during daylight hours, but there are many who don't.
3. I got some Starbucks today—which I haven't done in a LONG time. I think their prices went up... luckily I had a gift card. Wow, no wonder people can go broke getting a coffee drink every single day at over $4 a pop. Anyways, it was 470 calories of yum in a cup!
4. Speaking of high calories, my weight's been holding steady! I was worried I'd drop back a few pounds with that cold. Eating is not very enjoyable with a cold; nothing tastes right because you can't smell, milk sounds gross when you're all snotty and coughing, it's really hard to keep your appetite up. But looks like I survived, which is very reassuring.
5. I've started to see people putting up their Christmas trees. I really don't get that one... part of the 'specialness' of it is that it is up for a limited time. Less limited=less special. But that's just me. Am I weird?

It's That Time Again

Yes, it's that time again, where I take a few moments to complain about the now-commonplace

acceptance that the Christmas season immediately follows Halloween. And every time I enter a retail store for the rest of the year, I will let out a sigh of disappointment at the displays.

Christmas has been encroaching on August more and more for years now, but it is now accepted that every store—from the local mom and pop's to the national chains—will have everything Christmas starting on November 1. Which is just more proof that if you do something enough and repeat the mantra enough times, people will just roll over and come to accept it as normal.

As early as Halloween night, stores have cleared their shelves and moved in Christmas candy, those feel-good mug gift sets that no one really asks for, and all-things-Santa and no-things-Jesus. It is ironic, as someone stated, that Christmas has been turned into the most materialistic holiday ever, when it is about the birth of the most un-materialistic man to ever walk the earth.

So once again, I'm going to hold out and not buy anything Christmas until it's after Thanksgiving.

Poor Thanksgiving, no one cares about you anymore. No one wants to be thankful.

I think I'm finally turning the corner and starting to feel better, after well over a week of ridiculous amounts of coughing, low oxygen, and having a hard time falling asleep. I started a higher dose of meds Friday, and I really think that is helping. I came up with a good analogy to explain why it's so hard for me to fall asleep, in case anyone was confused by that. So, it's like a bottle of molasses. And when you tip the molasses over and lay it down, it starts to slowly shift place. That's what happens to me, laying down and the shifting of mucus tickles all of the little airways and thus: coughing galore! Oh yay.

I had milestone on Saturday... I had to wear my oxygen out in public for the first time. I've worn it around family and friends, but never before have I needed it out in public, around other people. We had a funeral to go to Saturday morning, our friend's father passed away, and that morning my sats were 90% so I felt it a good idea to bring a tank along. I wore it in the car ride there, and tried going without it for a time to see how I felt. It was more comfortable with it on, and I didn't feel I had to work as hard to just breathe normally. So... I toted my oxygen tank, strapped over my shoulder, into church. I know I received a few stares, a few eyes lingered on me more than usual. I understand, people are curious—What in the world does that normal-looking young woman need oxygen for? But honestly, it went quite well.

Still Coughing, Marginally Better

My cold is moving along, I suppose, but quite slowly. It's interesting how the symptoms come in phases, but when I try to remember how I felt yesterday, it all runs together. 

It started, as you know, with never-ending coughing. That went on for 2ish days, then there was the 'rattly gross cough' phase, then the 'more drainage' phase, then the past days have been 'more coughing with constant agitation in my airways' phase. Last night I was up until 2am when I finally calmed down enough to fall asleep. And today is less cough, since it all happened last night, but my nose is getting stuffy again.

Needless to say I am weak. I'm tired due to exhaustion. But I can't get much rest, because when I do lay down, it makes me cough. And I'm not really feeling all that much better than I did 3 days ago. I'm just feeling different sorts of sucky-ness.

However, my Josie has been cheering me up. For the past few days, she seems concerned and has been staying close near by me. So having her for my buddy has helped my mood, at least.

Napping with me in the recliner.

Thoughts on Ebola

The Ebola Microbe,
an adorable collection
of stuffed animals
shaped like microscopic
organisms.
Great gag gifts.

Ebola. The virus inciting fear in America. I can't keep track of the numbers, but a lot of people have died from it in Africa, one guy died in the USA, a few Americans were cured and survived to tell the tale, a few are currently in treatment, and a handful are being "monitored" or whatever the hell that means.

The yelly news media's coverage of Ebola is displaying everything I loathe about the news these days.

For one thing, they won't shut up about it. It's everywhere in the national news, and I'm sure it's on everyone's local stations too, I'm sure we are not an isolated case of reporting. Every single night, local news programs, who really don't have ANYTHING to worry about at this point, dedicate at least 5 minutes (1/6th of their program, remember) to talking about Ebola. Last week, KSDK had to have a segment to talk about the paranoia and fear about Ebola... that was caused due to the fact that they won't stop talking about Ebola! Does no one else see the relationship here? Cause and effect? Anyone?

Then last Friday, with the announcement of a person in NYC testing positive for ebola (which was bound to happen, it's NYC) the Today Show called in "experts" to talk about it. They started their report about what the man did the previous day, which included riding the Subway and going bowling. Then they talked to an actual doctor who said "Well, you can't catch Ebola until someone is showing symptoms." Which completely discounts everything they were just talking about, that were all things he did before he got sick! Today the conversation turned to a nurse who was quarantined because she 'might' be infected. One politician says it was unreasonable, one politician says it was completely justified. Oh waaaaa. Personally I think she's just whining and needs to get over it. But it brings me to my next point: Why in the world are they interviewing politicians about ebola? Why aren't they talking to, I don't know, doctors? And ONLY doctors? Or people in the medical field?

The news has successfully turned everyone into a bunch of whiney ebola-fear-ers. The proof was in the pudding last week as I was in Columbia for my checkup, when a lady got in the elevator. Myself and a nurse were already in there, and the lady proceeded to ask the nurse "Are you guys prepared for Ebola?" We are in for an interesting flu season, my friends. Since Ebola starts out with a fever—the same way a flu usually does—I predict many people are going to flip their shit and rush to the ER claiming they have Ebola. You just watch.

Vox has circulated the following graphic many times since the panic started:

vox.com

Calm down people. You don't have Ebola.

David Brooks wrote an interesting opinion piece about why Ebola is scaring everyone to death, and he argues that it is our culture's evasion of dealing with death itself. I feel that if the media actually aimed to inform and educate the masses, instead of trying to keep them gobbling up their news like Cookie Monster eating cookies, this might have turned out differently. For now, I'm done with the news. I am going to avoid it like the plague for a while. Or, rather, avoid it like it's Ebola...

There you have it, everything I hate about the news: non-stop coverage every day, inciting fear, discounting facts, and the public ignoring the facts even when presented with them. Gah!

John Stewart at The Daily Show summed it up quite nicely in this brilliant piece. Click here to view it.

PS—My favorite Microbe is the MRSA guy. He's the "superbug" so he wears a superhero cape, haha. Come on, you gotta laugh. Plus he's kind of cute.

I Wish They Made Vick's for Lungs

Oh my lungs... my poor lungs...

I have a cold. It came on hard and fast on Thursday, at 2:00 pm exactly. I started coughing at 2:00 and from that point on, until midnight, I didn't stop. I finally took the right combination of stuff and/or calmed down enough to get some sleep from about 12:30-5:00am, and since then it's been most of the same. I have so much throat drainage that it is causing me to continually cough. Ergo, my airways are so irritated and raw; the poor things just can't catch a break. It's not nearly as bad as last year, when I developed that mysterious cough out of nowhere and landed in the hospital at 1am, but it's still not pleasant. 

I went to the doctor's today to confirm what I had, because it could have been a sinus infection. I had my doctor here in town consult with my doc from the CF clinic, which was a good decision on my part I will say. I had never seen this doctor in the group before so she doesn't know anything about me. Furthermore, I felt she was blowing me off a little bit, not taking me too seriously, but maybe that's just her way. I just wanted to impart on her that this was NOT my normal CF stuff going on and that this was serious, we needed to do something about it quick before it throws me in the hospital. 

So it's time for the usual two weeks of oral antibiotics. I really hope I can kick this. Last time I got sick, I was able to come out of it just fine and stay on track for a while.

I guess you could say it is a blessing in disguise that this happened on a Friday. I have the entire weekend to rest and not worry about work or much else. 

My Flu Shot PSA

I'm writing what I hope to make my Annual Public Service Announcement on the Flu Shot.

I was inspired to write this, in part, due to a blog post like it from another CFer. What she wrote was so awesomely thought-out, I will do my best to not write an exact replica. So here goes...

In a week, we'll be into mid-October, which is the perfect time to get your flu shot. There is a time when it could be considered 'too early' because the antibodies you make can wear off after some time. So you want to get your shot around this time because we aren't that far away from or in to flu season, and we aren't so far away from it that come February, you would be less immune due to your super early shot.

No one likes being poked in the arm. I get it. I don't either. I have always gotten the flu shot for my entire life because I have to. My parents have too. Jarrod never did until well into our relationship, but now every year we go down to Walgreens so he can get one.

Maybe you don't feel like you need the shot, maybe you have a decent immune system. But I'm going to bet that you know someone who has a lesser immune system and cannot afford to become sick; someone who is pregnant, or is under 5 years old, or is elderly, or has cancer, or has asthma, or has an autoimmune disease, or has had a transplant, or has a compromised immune system... and sometimes, you might not even know it. See, for people like us the flu is not some thing where we catch it, get some Tamiflu, take a couple days off work, and then we're good to go. The flu is a BIG flippin' deal, and could potentially send us into the hospital for a few days, or more depending on the person.

You might be thinking 'Well, if YOU get the shot, and if I catch the flu, why do I still need the shot? You already got one, so we're good.' Wrong. Yes, I get the flu shot, but it has been studied and it is unknown as to how effective it is due to the immune system being compromised, therefore less capable of building up the antibodies needed to create my own personal flu shield.

Getting a shot may be a personal decision, but the spread of germs is not. Germs do not discriminate between old or young, healthy or sick. Germs spread everywhere, especially during "cold and flu season" when we're all cooped up with each other. So if you decide not to get vaccinated this year, you should realize that viruses like the flu take a day or so to even show symptoms, meaning you could unknowingly pass them on to everyone you know. But most of all, please realize that your health choices impact more than just you and your immediate household.

Whether you get the flu shot or not, you should also realize that you NEED to stay home if you're sick—no excuses like 'Well I have to work' or 'It's Thanksgiving, I haven't seen everyone in a while.' For the sake of everyone else, take one for the team, and stay home. Trust me, anyone who can identify with the list above will thank you later.

RBS

Two new things about CF have popped up in the past couple weeks. One was that song I posted about (which was good), the other is on a TV show that debuted last week... and it's terrible. (My short rant was on Facebook, expanded rant below.)

The new Fox teen dramedy "Red Band Society"... oh how this show makes me mad. It didn't look that great based on the previews, but then I learned that there was a character on there with CF so I thought Ok, I'll check it out, even though I doubt it's very 'realistic.' And let me tell you, the whole show is not realistic at all. Basically, it's a show about 6 teens in a hospital written and created by people who have no idea what it means to actually be sick and in the hospital.

The "hospital" itself is overly modern, pretty, hip, and very white. The kids' rooms are very dorm-like, decorated with expensive designer furniture, because they live there (which I've never heard of; living at a hospital.) They ride skateboards in the hall, they smoke pot in the supply room, there's a perfectly furnished rooftop hangout area, they smuggle beer into the hospital and the nurses don't care (they're all underage.) I could go on and on...

All of those things are mind-numbing stupid, but I can almost—emphasis on the 'almost'—look past them because it's a TV show in the teen genre. And I can look past the horrible teen cliché acting, because it's a cliché teen show.

But this Dash character they have on there who has "cystic fibrosis" and is "waiting for a lung transplant"??.... is bullshit. They have the kid smoking pot in the first episode, seemingly running around with no problem, with no IV whatsoever, and just in general having no trouble breathing. Ever. Except when he's trying to 'fake' it for sympathy to smuggle beer into the hospital (and I won't even go there on that one.) Plus he carries around a book from Twilight hoping someone thinks he's a good kid and will award him a transplant based on his fake tastes in books. Pa-lease.

I don't believe for one second that the other diseases portrayed on the show got out unscathed either; I'm sure they have elements that are just as ridiculous.

In truth, he would never be smoking pot because if he DID, no transplant team would ever agree to even consider him because he is a reckless, stupid fool who has a lung disease and is SMOKING SOMETHING! And if the show even kind of wanted to show a character with CF, they should at least throw in a few coughs and moments of huffing and puffing. I realize I may be taking this fictitious show a little too seriously, but come on!

I really hope this show doesn't last long, because this character is a disgrace to people who actually deal with this and anyone waiting for a transplant, lung or otherwise. They should have done a little research before just picking random diseases out of a hat, but hardly anyone is talking about this. Almost everything I can find about the show is good feedback.

Okay, glad I got that off my chest.

OneRepublic Song "I Lived"

Yesterday the band OneRepublic released their new music video for a song called "I Lived" and they feature a boy with CF. Could this be? Could my less-known disease actually be out there, in a famous band's music video? Yep, it's the official video, not like some lesser secondary video they did just for charity. The kid featured is named Bryan, and he's 15, and he's ridden his bike around Colorado raising money for CFF. He also hopes to be the first person with CF to get into the Olympics playing hockey for the USA. Go Bryan!

It's a nice song, and it might just be my new theme song :). It made me cry so much, but it also made me smile.

Anyways, I've included it here right below this. Watch it, enjoy it, cry like I did, and thanks for reading.

On the Mend

Hi everyone. I figured it was about time for an update. I haven't been feeling very inspired to blog lately, even though I am feeling better. I did a PFT the other day, and we are well on our way to getting me back to my normal. With a few more days, I'm confident I'll get there.

It Is Time

Welp, my nine-month run of no hospital stays is about to end. I went to Columbia today and did a PFT and my numbers are down, as I thought they would be. For about the past week or so, I've felt I've been on a slow decline. My goal this time was to catch it before I was ultra sick, which I think I've been able to do. Most times, my tendency is to just push through things (increased cough, more shortness of breath) until things are for sure, without a doubt awful. This time, I'm trying not to do that. So I talked with my docs yesterday about doing a PFT just to see where we were.

I talked with my doctor today and we worked out the details for me to come back for my hospital stay. Who knows how long I'll be there, but we had really good results last time when I was there for the full two weeks. I felt great when I left, and have been able to keep it mostly that way for the past nine months. It's been a good run, I don't have much to complain about. If I can have another similar to it, and go another 6 or more months without a hospital stay, that'd be awesome. If not, well, there are worse things.

TV Weirdness

We've had some weird things going on with our satellite TV service. Suspicious things, really. Not, like, the TV turning on by itself in the middle of the night, but these things are just... suspicious.

On Saturday our satellite lost its signal. It said "Complete Signal Loss", gave the list of idiotic things to check, and then said to give them a call if your problem does not go away. The dumb part is that it wasn't storming, it wasn't windy, and nothing was going on when this happened. Jarrod was watching the TV as it happened; he said it started to get fuzzy, and then it just went out.

After seeing this "Complete Signal Loss" screen for more than an hour, I knew exactly what this meant: we would have to call a service tech to come out here to fix it, which we would also have to pay for, which is stupid.

I knew this because exactly one year ago to the day, we had this exact same problem. At the time, there was a storm, and our TV went out during the storm, which is par for the course; I don't care how many times they tell you, when they're installing your setup, 'No, you have a perfect signal, no obstructions, it should hardly ever go out', they are lying, it always goes out during rain. I remembered it went out on Saturday, we called the company on Sunday, and they sent a guy out on Monday, Labor Day last year, to fix it.

Jarrod called the company today and was aggravated and stern with the service reps on the phone. He didn't yell at them, but he was firm and stayed the course with his point that: No, I'm not paying for a service call for you guys to come fix your equipment that we pay to lease when we did absolutely nothing to it. All of the error codes coming back were saying it was something with cables, and they kept asking if we had moved the equipment or whatnot. Again, Jarrod was sitting in the living room while he watched the signal go out, so no, we did not move anything around.

The first person he talked with wouldn't budge on the price. They kept insisting he either pay for the service call, which is $95, or buy the protection plan for a year, which at $8 a month works out to be $96, how convenient. Once he mentioned he'd have to talk it over with me and that we were thinking of switching anyways, they told him to hold on and they put him through to another person. No surprise there, as soon as you say you'll switch they usually try to work with you, but he wasn't lying. He talked at length with a guy from Charter yesterday about what their TV packages offered and would cost. Long story short, they finally agreed to send someone out tomorrow at no charge! Thank goodness.

Jarrod barbecued steak tonight, which on a normal day would be cool, but tonight it was really cool because he has not grilled anything in for-ev-er. He's been so busy with the basement that he has not had time for it; I seriously think this is the first time he's grilled all summer. After we were done eating dinner, he sat down in the recliner and joked "Let's see what's on the tube tonight."

He turned the TV on and funny story: we had channels again. We were both so aghast. I think I stood there with my mouth hanging open for ten seconds. Lo and behold, our satellite magically works again. No joke.

This entire thing is just so odd. And it's hard not to think up theories and suspicions about it.

• How weird is it that exactly one year ago TO THE DAY this happened, it happens again?
• And for no reason?
• And then after complaining and complaining on the phone, getting them to agree to eat the dumb cost of the service call, hours later, it just magically works again? 
• Really?
• It's almost like, if you put up with it for long enough, it'll fix itself. They just want you to have to pay for a service call. 

Clearly they didn't need to send someone out, because I have a hard time understanding how this went on for two full days with it never fixing itself. But once we called, and complained, and threatened to leave, and they would have to send someone out, for no charge, it fixes itself? Yeah, they had to have done something on their end, otherwise I'd really like them to explain this one to me.

I cancelled our service call. I thought about leaving it where it was and then letting the guy get here and then say "Oh, well, it works again." but I nixed that idea. I didn't want to waste his time. Who knows if we'll still have Dish by this time next year, or if we'll have "cut the cord" by then, but if we still do, I'll know to be prepared for my TV to go out Labor Day weekend.

Number Nine

It's nine months today!! Once again, I don't know how much longer I'll be able to make it without a hospital tune up, but then againi said something similar last month. And here I am!

Ice Buckets

Unless you've been living under a rock, you've heard of or seen the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge videos. My Facebook feed is slammed with videos right now of people of all ages doing this. The TV news has been showing videos as well, ones that celebrities and presidents do. And maybe like you, I complained about it.

Last night I was telling my husband "You know, I'm really tired of seeing these things." And tonight, I'm not even exaggerating, every. single. post. in my Facebook feed that was from a person and not a news source was an Ice Bucket Challenge.  I've seen them pop up from time to time for months, but suddenly this thing is literally EVERYWHERE! And I might be wrong, but I don't think in the very beginning that they were tied to a specific charity, because I definitely saw someone take an ice "bath" for CF.

I had a small bone to pick with the whole thing in part because it completely plays off of the vanity of Facebook. Like, do we really have to dump buckets of ice water on our heads to donate to charity? Why can't we just donate to charity? In private? Without telling people?

On another note, while we're talking charities and causes, there are millions of people in the world who are without clean water, and here we all are dumping it on our heads wasting it. Depending how you feel about that, you could easily be upset over that aspect.

Then last night, our local Orange Leaf store issued the challenge to my workplace. This morning we had a quick meeting about when and where we should do this, how we could try and get other employees to join in. And then I found myself researching what ALS is and watching a very emotional video of a 26-year-old man who was diagnosed with ALS. And he was talking about it and how much it scares him because it runs in his family, and then you see him taking care of his mother who is in, what I would guess to be, the late stages of the disease. It was heartbreaking.

I get it now. If I (via my workplace) had not been issued this challenge, I would never have done my research to find out what ALS is. And I never would have donated either. Yeah, I've heard of "Lou Gehrig's Disease" but I didn't actually know what it was. These videos are talking points, they're "fun", and the exact thing that I did is the entire point: to get people talking and educating themselves about it, and in turn hopefully donating towards it.

The skeptic in me still wonders if everyone who does this is really making a donation, or if they are just making the silly video and moving on. Or maybe they intend to, but the next day they forget about it and never do? But clearly it's effective, as donations keep climbing to numbers the ALSA has never seen before.

And you know, if the CF Foundation ever comes out with a campaign that goes viral and raises a ton of money, I will rejoice at that. CF affects nearly 30,000 people in the USA, and it is estimated there are 30,000 people in the USA with ALS. So we're kind of on the same level as far as how common the diseases are and, I would imagine, how much funding and attention they receive. But for now, I'm happy for the ALS community that their cause is getting the attention they hoped for. I donate to yours, you donate to mine, eh? :)

An Open Letter

Dear Evergreen,
the arborvitae bush in front of my house,

I hope you are feeling okay. You can blame my naiveté about bushes and plants in general for the fact that I didn't realize why you were turning brown, slowly dying.

Like a misdiagnosed illness, I thought you were simply dehydrated. But after a close encounter this morning and some quick googling, I found that was not the case. No, instead you have been infested with bag worms all summer, and I am truly sorry I didn't realize it until just now.

Please know that the 45 minutes I spent out there, sweat pouring down my face, picking off every single bag worm-pod I could find, were done with love. By the time I was done, my hands that were in the rubber gloves were so damp I had prune fingers. But while picking off your potential killers, I also discovered that the damage is much greater than I had realized.

I promise to keep a better eye on your for the rest of the season, and will come back for another round of de-worming if needed. I hope this will help and I hope that you can hold on just a little longer until the first hard frost when, hopefully, these buggers will meet their end (at least for this year.) Please don't die.

Yours truly,
Me

Friday Fast 5

1. Let me get this out there first, because I promise the rest of this post will be positive. About Ferguson... I posted some thoughts on Facebook after Wednesday night's craziness, and I realize now that I fell into the trap of judging quickly and that I was wrong about some of my points. And I admit that. But after the information that was released today about the robbery, I am done. I'm quitting Twitter for a while because people are getting stupid and it is ticking me off. No one is even listening to the facts any more, they are all just taking bits and pieces of the story and making their own assumptions from there. So I'm done. 
2. I was feeling kind of down tonight. And tired. And bored. And I really didn't feel like going to church for the holy day, but at the same time I knew that's what I needed to do. It helped, like deep down I knew it would.
3. Also, during the sign of peace, the man behind us shook my dad's hand and then my hand and instead of saying "Peace be with you" he said "God bless you." Not like a sneeze, but he really said it like he meant it. I've never seen this man in church before, I don't know if he was a visitor, but it was nice. It made me feel better, it really did. So if you ever feel so bold to try it, say that instead when you're shaking hands during the sign of peace. It might mean a lot to someone.
4. I dropped off three prayer shawls the other day at church! That brings my grand total to eight shawls made, plus I have four more in the works right now. I'm a busy-crocheting-bee ;)
5. I'm so excited that my favorite local Mexican restaurant El Ranchito is now smoke-free! This place was completely ideal to go smoke-free because the division between smoking and non- was really just an invisible line. I went there the other night with my mother-in-law and Jarrod's sister and it was as delicious as I remember! I was not let down. 

Death of a Genie

No one could have guessed that the next tragic celebrity death we'd be dealing with would be that of Robin Williams. My social media feeds have been so full of things about Robin Williams, be it simple signs of memorial with people standing on desks, quotes from favorite movies, or articles about him, that I'm almost getting tired of it. Maybe you are too, and even if you aren't I'm going to try to keep this as concise as I can.

I think there are two reasons the world is so shocked about his death. One, being that he provided so much happiness and laughter for others, and two being the reason of his passing. It is unnerving and hard to fathom that someone seemingly so passionate and joyful, who could bring so much laughter to the world, was in fact so isolated and joyless.

Many took to Twitter to post their thoughts, and many of them simply said there were no words to describe how they felt. But one very popular tweet has me unsettled and I think I finally figured out why.

The Academy tweeted out this last night:

As you can see, it's been retweeted and favorited many times. Some have called it the 'perfect' way to pay tribute, or memorialize, or whatever it is you're trying to achieve. 

At first glance, it seemed kind of nice. After about 3 seconds it seemed kind of... off. 

In case you're a little fuzzy on the ending of Aladdin, in the Disney Aladdin movie, Aladdin uses his final wish to set the genie free. It's a semi-emotional scene with the genie being taken aback that he would do such a selfless thing, and Aladdin declares again that is his intent with "Genie, you're free." Some magic happens, the genie rises up, his cuffs of enslavement to the lamp are broken away, and he is free.

It's a joyous occasion.

Suicide... is not a joyous occasion. 

The image could also imply that suicide is a solution to freeing yourself of your demons or your pain. I don't think that's the message you'd want to send to someone dealing with depression and suicidal thoughts. 

There is a much better, more proper way, to handle this, and that would have been with another quote that follows immediately after the scene where Aladdin frees the genie:

Yes we will, Aladdin, yes we will.

Thoughts on that Walmart Savings Catcher App

You may have seen a few TV ads from Walmart touting their latest app improvements, which includes this new little thing called "Savings Catcher." The premise is if you buy something at Walmart, then you can scan your receipt with this app on your phone (which means, you take a photo of the barcode), and Walmart will automatically price compare the items in your receipt with other local stores. If they find a store with the item for cheaper, they will refund you the difference in an e-gift card. Sounds great, right? 

Maybe, if you're okay with Walmart knowing a lot about you. Let's see what's going on here...

First of all, I'd like to start with the caveat that I have not downloaded this app. I don't know if it works well, if it is designed well, or if it's easy to use. I'm speaking solely about the idea for this app as a person who has a well-rounded understanding of tech and analytics.

Let's take a big step back and acknowledge that there are many, many companies that know a lot of data about you already online. Facebook is probably the biggest information grabber, simply due to people's compulsion to share things about themselves. So what I'm about to lay out shouldn't come as too much of a surprise, but I wonder how many people are aware of the amount of data mining that retail companies do to get to know you; it's a very big business. If you don't care and want to save a couple bucks here and there, download the app, if you're curious, then let's continue.

First of all, in order for this entire app to work, people will have to create an account for it. That doesn't sound like a big deal, but this app is going to generate a lot of new accounts for Walmart from people who wouldn't ever actually shop online at walmart.com. So you would most likely have to fill out your usual information like your name, address, phone number, email, and create a password. Bare minimum, that's what they would require from you. So let's pretend, here. Walmart now knows: I'm Susie and I live in Orlando Florida. 

To qualify for the price savings, you have to scan your receipt, which means you are linking yourself to your receipt. Now, I need to mention that stores will typically track a lot of this information on their own simply through credit card use. When you use a credit card in most stores, they will assign a generic ID number to you to track your purchases. However, with this app you are without-a-doubt giving away your information. This also means that you will have to give the app permission to access your camera and most likely your photos. Walmart now knows: I'm Susie, I live in Orlando, and I just bought 5 items which were milk, diapers, shampoo, carrots, and lettuce. 

One week later I go back to Walmart, and let's pretend I buy 5 more things (for the sake of keeping this simple, I realize most people buy LOTS of stuff at Walmart.) I scan my receipt again, Walmart now knows: This time I bought milk, diapers, a frozen veggie pizza, coffee, and butter.

Furthermore, Walmart now also knows: I'm most likely a new mom, since I've bought diapers two weeks in a row, and I bought coffee, I am maybe a vegetarian, since I haven't bought any meat and bought a veggie pizza and vegetables the week before.

To look for the price saving ads, you will have to enter your zip code or it will pull it from the store listed on your receipt so it can search for them. Walmart now knows: I'm Susie, I live in Orlando, I bought 10 things in two weeks, and I also shop in Orlando. 

Now let's pretend that it finds one item cheaper at Target, and it then refunds me 56 cents. It sends me an email. Walmart will then also know: if I opened the email, if I was on my phone, my IP address, and from there, they will be able to gather a whole lot more information about me and my internet habits. When I go to spend the money (which no doubt will be in the form of some barcode in the app or in the email they sent me) they will also be able to pinpoint the exact location of my cell phone.

If willfully giving all of this information about yourself to Walmart is okay with you, by all means sign up for it. But I wish more people realized that all they're doing is signing for up a marketing data collection system, with the "reward" of offering you a few cents here and there in price checks. 

Lowe's does something similar with their "My Lowes" program, except their slightly more blunt about what they're doing. They tell you upfront that they will keep track of your purchases, and the "reward" of it is making returns easy, and sending you reminders to buy replaceable household items like air filters. Lowes can, and does, also track your purchase through your phone number. So every time they ask you for your phone number at the end of your transaction, that's what it's for. Rewards programs work in this same way.

It should be noted that this Walmart app will only compare with other store circulars, not the entire store. The other thing of note about the app, versus other price comparing apps, is that it keeps you going to Walmart. Other apps will price check all stores when you scan a barcode at the store, allowing you to then choose where to make your purchase. This scans your receipt after you've already made it, then offers money to spend right back at Walmart.

Sugars

The Good News Train just keep rolling, my friends. Choo Choo!

I redid my glucose test yesterday (the one where you fast, they take your blood, you drink the super sugar water, then they take your blood again later.) Last year, my new doctor had me do one with the suspicions that I might have CF-related diabetes.

That time, my fasting number was normal, but my post number was high, yet not high enough to declare I had diabetes. I was in this odd gray area called "pre-diabetes."

I got my results today, and my fasting number is still normal, but my post number was only 103! Normal is between 65-130, pre-diabetes is 130-200, and 200 or over is diabetic. So I'm not even pre-diabetic anymore! Not even borderline close!

I thinks this shows two things:

1. The exercise is helping! Seriously, if you find yourself diabetic or almost there too, exercise. It really really helps. 
2. That my doctor's theory that I have diabetes when I am sick is also most likely true. Last year when we did this test, I was sick and on meds much more often. This time, I have only had that one little blip. The test shows an average of your blood sugars over the past three months (it has something to do with how quickly your body turns around and generates new red blood cells, I think) and since my sugars haven't been crazy due to illness, this was a more accurate test.

It's such a blessing that I don't have to worry about this yet. I was prepared for this test to go the other way, to show that I had diabetes now. And I was mentally ready and at peace about it, now that all the changes in my life have slowed down a lot. 

So yeah, awesome news! I think we are going to celebrate with some sugar... in the form of Dairy Queen Blizzards!

5 Kilometers!

I DID IT!

"I did it!"

I couldn't stop repeating "I did it!" this morning and jumping back and forth, to which Jarrod said "You have too much energy." haha. 

But I did it! I completed my first 5k this morning like I hoped to! And I even finished in under an hour, which I did not expect. That's amazing and makes me very happy. Jarrod stayed with me the whole way, and my finish time was 55 minutes 54 seconds, his was 1 second after that. 

It was a cool morning with a LOT of fog and I think that made for a great turnout; many, many people showed up. They have been doing this pre-fair event for 18 years now, but I believe this is the first year with a 5k. I'm sure they'll keep it, because I would guess that more people did the 5k than the other option, which was a 5-mile course. They said it was the first year they've ever seen people show up in long sleeves, it was that chilly for August. (However, I don't know how you could do this in long sleeves... once you're moving you're much warmer and sweating.)

According to the race results, I was 144th out of 158, which is partially a lie. There were many more people doing the 5k than that; there must have been many of them that did not have bibs to track their time. Also, my pace was 18 minutes per mile, which means that on average we were walking over 3 mph, which I'm impressed with. We jogged for a couple chunks of the course on some of the flat parts, and I was surprised at how much those small jogging sessions didn't wear me down. I mean, I know a lot of my limits breathing-wise, so I could gauge when to slow back down to make sure I wasn't dragging or exhausted the rest of the time.

Photo from emissourian.com of us
approaching the finish line.

But it was great! Although, I can't say it was exactly easy. I was breathing heavily for probably 1/2 to 2/3 of it, and the final half mile or so was difficult. As we neared the finish line, which was an uphill incline, we heard the announcer say that it was still 55 minutes, and then we were like 'Hey, it's not even an hour yet! Okay, let's finish!' So we picked up the pace a little bit. When we finished, most people were still there, grabbing food or drinks and watching the rest of the runners/walkers come in. And even though most of these people didn't know me, and didn't know what a big deal this is for me, and didn't know that I was doing this with one-third of my lungs working, some of them were cheering us on or just taking a moment to look our way and smile or give a thumbs up, small gestures to say "Way to go, good job!" 

Because no matter who you are, I feel everyone who runs and participates in these understands that everyone has to start somewhere, and it doesn't matter whether you're first or last, what matters is you tried and Good-job-to-you because you finished too! 

Friday Fast Five

Five quick things again:

1. I'm doing a 5k tomorrow morning! I know, I'm excited too :). On a whim this week, I decided maybe I could do a 5k taking place in town tomorrow as a kickoff to our local fair. And Jarrod said he'd walk with me too! So we are both going to enter the 5k. I've never walked 3.1 miles before, and I haven't exactly been training for this, but I'm feeling confident and good about it. 
2. I walked 2 miles Wednesday night with mom, dad, and Josers (Jarrod was busy laying tile) and I did pretty darn good. I did it in 45 minutes too! I'll let you know how the 5k goes! Cheer me on in spirit tomorrow morning around 7-8 am ;)
3. We got 45 extra days on our permit for the basement, but it's not like Jarrod all of a sudden gets a breather, he just officially now has more time. Jarrod is so done with the basement; I don't think it's possible to put into words how tired he is of working on it. And I realize that I can't quite understand it either, because I haven't been the one working away night after night for almost an entire year. He is so stressed out and trying to remember everything and get everything right so it will pass inspection and we can be done with that part. He told me it would be like me needing to crochet every night to churn out shawls at a set rate; once you have to do it all the time, and it's not a leisurely choice, it isn't very enjoyable and deadlines start to weigh on you. 
4. On that note, I am so excited for when the basement will be done too! Mostly because we will finally get to spend time together again. I can't really help with most of what he's been doing, so I'm upstairs while he's downstairs. Heck, we still haven't had any time to go out and celebrate our anniversary and that was two months ago.
5. If summer weather was like this every year, I would have no problem with that. But, I don't think we'll have this mild of a summer again for a while. At the rate we're going, fall will be here before you know it! I also realized that we haven't had many storms this year, so knock on wood that it continues like that.

Yopp!

Tonight me, Jarrod, and my mom and dad went to The Muny to see Seussical.

When The Muny announced their 2014 season earlier this year, I was excited to see this show in the lineup. However, I saw it was at the end of July, which meant it would probably be miserably hot so I didn't want to buy tickets until later, maybe even day of, waiting to see how the weather was. We have had some incredible weather, turns out, and tonight was no exception. I meticulously picked which show we would go see based on the forecast on Monday. I think it barely reached 82 today, was cloudy most of the day, with low low humidity. It was an AWESOME night to spend outside!

Seussical is a show near and dear to my heart for many reasons. First of all, it was my last high school theater show. Our school always did a play in the fall, a smaller play during the winter, and a musical in the spring. Throughout my high school theater career, I was in every show in some manner in tech or on stage, but in reality I only was on stage in the musical my Freshman year (and the second time, when we took that show to the State Conference) and my Senior year.

When I was a Freshman, we did Schoolhouse Rock, which was fantastically fun. It is a play full of all of those educational songs I knew from my childhood, which would air promptly at 10:57 am right before Looney Tunes at 11 am on Saturday morning cartoons (don't get me started on how much better those cartoons were than the ones kids are stuck with these days!) I was part of the ensemble and also had my own song as the "Figure Eight" girl.

Senior year we did Seussical, which is also a super fun show. If you're unfamiliar with it, it is many, many Dr. Seuss stories squashed into one musical. And I really mean that... I've discovered more and more stories that are in there since then, even if it's just for one line. It's quite impressive, the writing that went into it. I was cast as Jojo, the boy who thinks too many thinks in Whoville. Yes, I was a boy. I fooled some people, too, into thinking I was a boy (the bonus part is my name could be either a girl or a boy's name, so just reading my name in the program didn't give away my gender either! [best joke on the audience ever.])

Tonight's production also had me excited because it starred John Tartaglia as the Cat in the Hat. I saw him on Broadway in the original cast of Avenue Q back in 2008, and he was so good. Plus he's been on Sesame Street often, and we all know I have a soft spot for anything Sesame Street or Muppets-related.

He didn't disappoint and was superb as the Cat. He worked in so many original little jokes too, about Oprah, about Lindbergh, about The Muny. But the show overall was so much fun, they did a really great job.

I picked out some great seats too because, turns out, they were right underneath the fans. It's been a while since I've been to The Muny, but they replaced the fans there! The new ones don't make any noise like the olds ones did, so these can stay on the entire time. So not only was it cool air, we also had a steady breeze. We had no one sitting beside us, we were on an aisle, no one was in the row directly in front of us, but unfortunately we had a couple noisy ten-year-olds behind us.

They started out being cute. Before the show and during intermission, they were making me almost laugh. During intermission they were talking about time travel, almost word for word: "...It would have to be two times the speed of light! In theory it takes the same amount of energy to go into the future as it does to go in to the past, but in reality it takes more energy to go into the future." Do you remember the nerd kid from Boy Meets World, I think his name was Stewart? That is exactly how this one kid talked. Unfortunately, these two would not shut up even during the show, and the mom gave up trying to quiet them after Act 1. It would have been easier to overlook if they weren't ten, but they were well of the age to know how to act in a theater. So that was unfortunate, because they really ruined some moments of the show that were heartfelt.

But, it was still a great show. It brought back so many memories, and it was really, really hard not to sing along (Jarrod jokingly left open his page of the program that went over theater etiquette, and one of the points said Please do not sing along with the show. Haha!)

Hat's off!

PS—The "Yopp" title is a special word Jojo thinks up to save the Whos. It's a very big moment in the show, and I got to yell that word! It's fun.

It's an Uplifting Day

Well, I am on the mend. The meds have started to kick in, I've got my med-induced nausea under control now, and I haven't felt as short of breath. So far, so good. Hopefully they continue to improve me!

I've been napping a lot lately, partly to give my body rest, and also because the meds do make me more fatigued.

Today's weather is downright out-of-this-world: it is the middle of July and it's only 70 degrees. The windows are open, I'm wearing long sleeves, and I'm actually cold. It's been a great day; listened to classical music while the birds chirped this morning, the dog snoozed on her pillow next to me while I worked, cool breeze wafting through the house, coffee brewed... sigh... it was uplifting and good for the soul.

In this wonderful gift this morning, I also realized that God has granted me with another gift: work hasn't been that busy the past couple days. Which means, less stress and more getting-better.

Here's hoping for another wonderful day tomorrow!

It was a Good Run

Well, my friends, my 7 months of super duper health have ended—it had to happen sometime. I have somehow developed an exhaustive cough and shortness of breath. I guess all my lung germs got together to have a party after all the electronic music I've been listening to. I haven't been able to keep my oxygen sats up either, I'm hovering around 90, 92 tops. So, it's time for some antibiotics and some steroids.

But hey, it was a good run! Seven months of no meds is amazing for me, I'm thankful for it.

This all started on Monday, but really worsened yesterday. Sleep has been hard to come by, I have a dishwasher full of clean dishes, for two days now, and new dirty dishes piling up halfway across my entire kitchen, but I just haven't even felt up to putting them all away. Therefore, I also haven't felt up to cooking much because my afternoons have been spent napping (or trying to) to catch up on lost sleep. But, I just did an albuterol neb, so after I finish typing this, I'm going to go take care of those dishes while I feel best. Then walk on the treadmill.

The hard part about all this is, honestly, I kind of forgot just how sucky it feels to be sick. I suppose that's a good problem to have. I haven't caught a cold in forever and I'm sure whenever I catch one I'll say the same thing to myself "Dang, I forgot how awful colds can be." Anyways, in line with that, it is also harder to work out. Gosh it was so much easier when I felt up to it and could breathe. However, I need to get over it because it will help me in the long run, or else I will for sure feel even worse, plus I will be back to square one on the amount of muscle and tolerance I've been able to build up.

So say a prayer that these meds kick in quickly, that they take care of this little blip, and that I can get back on my feet decently enough this weekend to go to the gym with Jarrod and Jeff on Sunday. I figure if I can push off a hospital visit for even a couple more months, that'll be great.

The Fault In Our Stars

I just finished the book The Fault In Our Stars last week, which is sweeping the teen world by storm. It's a young adult novel by this John Green, and it sounds like ALL of his books are sweeping the teen world by storm. Teen super fans of his call themselves "Nerdfighters" and they are obsessed.

The book is about a girl and a boy who meet at a cancer support group. The girl has lung cancer, the boy had cancer that made him lose his leg. They like each other, and the story goes on from there. You can probably guess how most of it goes, quite frankly.

I became interested in the book once I started hearing about the movie buzz. The movie version just
came out a couple weeks ago. With images of a girl walking around with oxygen tubes in her nose, I figured 'Hey, I can relate to that. I'll read about a character with lung problems.'

The book was good, though nothing too ground-breaking. I only cried once, and supposedly this book makes everyone cry multiple times. Honestly, I feel this has something to do with the fact that a lot of what she talked about—dealing with hospitals, PICC lines, and oxygen concentrators—is quite familiar to me, whereas I assume a 'normal' teen might find it totally-oh my gosh-that's so awful-heartbreaking, whereas my internal thought is a flippant "Yeah... that sucks."

However, I do think one thing the book has going for it is a no-BS approach to disease. The girl herself is written as very witty, wise beyond her years (a little too wise, actually), and intolerant of bullshit cheesiness. I have a hunch his other books are written in the same voice, and I also suspect that's why teens are loving them to death. Since the book is written from her perspective, she lays it on the line as to how she feels and what things are like. I think that is helpful, and it in no way covers up the hardships of cancer or dealing with your lungs failing you.

So for that, I'm thankful for this book. I'm also glad this book/movie has taken off with teens like it has because maybe, once I start wearing oxygen full-time in future, I won't get stared at so often and it won't seem so out of place for a young-looking person to wear oxygen 'nubbins' in their nose. Granted, I don't have lung cancer like Hazel does, but still.

The characterization in the book is what disappoints me. It is very typical in teen fiction to have an extremely witty (not just smart but really witty) character. In this case, there were 2 or 3 witty teen characters, and their wisecracks and never-ending philosophical takes on the world get a little old. No one, in real life, is like that. I felt the same way about the movie Easy A; it's a good movie, but every single character was funny and witty. Teens like to think of themselves as quick-witted, I remember that, but in reality hardly any of them actually are. However, I realize that a book about boring ol' characters is also, well, boring.

The Results Are In

I began my day with some of the most wonderful news today.

I was doing my treatments, checking my phone for anything new, as I usually do. I was almost caught up on my Twitter feed when I saw this Tweet:

On here, I have mentioned that they are making great advances in medicines for treating CF at the genetic level; fixing the defective protein, the cause of CF within the gene. I mean how amazing is that? 

So today they announced that the results of a clinical trial are in. This trial studied people with two copies of a certain gene mutation and found that the drug showed "significant improvement in lung function" and other symptoms (like weight gain) and therefore, with these results, the drug company will be submitting a New Drug Application to the FDA by the end of this year, with hopes of drug approval in 2015!

I had tears of joy. See, I don't have the exact gene combo for this trial or this drug as it is right now, but I wholeheartedly believe that very soon (as in 3-6 years) it will be available and proven useful for someone like me. We are SO CLOSE to getting the closest thing I can to a cure! So close! If I get to start taking this drug, it won't completely remove all of my lung problems, they have suffered some damage and scarring that is irreversible. But to know that someday, there's even a chance that my disease could be genetically "fixed", and life could actually improve a little? That's... Amazing. 

There is another clinical trial in the works right now (Phase 2) that is studying use and effectiveness of this med in people with 1 or 2 copies of the gene mutation, and that's the one I'm anxious to hear about. 

But this is fantastic, blessed, stupendous, wonderful news that could be life-changing for half of the CF population. I'm elated for so many CFers who will have their lives changed by this. 

There are a couple other drugs being developed that have me almost as excited too. One of them is an inhaled version of an antibiotic I take when I'm in the hospital. If it is ever approved, it could reduce my hospital stays and significantly help me too. All great news, all the more reasons to keep donating to the CF Foundation because they put almost all of their funding into drug development. 

In other news, I'm still kicking my CF's ass at the moment :). I started doing more at the gym and I'm approaching 7 months out of the hospital, AND without antibiotics! The last time that happened was when I was, like, 10? 

If you'd like to read more about the cilinical trial, go to cff.org and it's on their home page.