Not to be a Pill, but...

          Well, it had to happen. When you’re taking 30-plus pills and vitamins every day

and they are divvied up into daily reminder boxes—one for morning and one for night—

          the day will come when you grab the wrong handful.

          And, unfortunately, I have no history of bulimia so I have no clue how to make myself throw up to undo this mistake.

Now, this might not be a problem at all, except that three of the ones I take at night make me drowsy.

One is an antihistamine that, in a surprise to all medical personnel, helps prevent bone pain from chemo.  Another is a hot-flash preventer that has the weird side effect of inducing drowsiness.  And the other is an anti-nausea medicine that can knock you on your sleepy little butt if you don’t cut it in half. At least that’s why I cut them in half.

I stared at the now-empty nighttime compartment of the pill organizer and realized what my day would be like: Night. 

First, I decided not to telephone anyone in what will sound like a drunken stupor.

          Second, I canceled a doctor appointment because there’s no way I should drive today, and

          Third, I crossed off “gardening” from my to-do list because I do not need to be found face-down in a bed of zinnias.

          I figured the only safe activity would be sitting at the computer, and as luck would have it, I decided to research forgetfulness.

          Shazam, Eureka, and Woo-hoo all rolled into one, I found an article that claims forgetfulness means you’re a genius. 

          So I shall sit here and contemplate what it’s like to be such a smarty-pants that I took all the wrong pills.  I’ll bet Einstein did that all the time (notice he does look a little sleepy).

But don’t forget to order my books! You can find them all here.

Is This Really Germ-ane to My Life?

          My doctors are party poopers. They don’t want me to fly, be around crowds, or be around kids. This would include the parents of kids, who are evidently covered with all manner of elementary school cooties.

          Furthermore, I’m not to accept meals from people who have children in the home, because the very dishes they bring could have sneezes on them.  PLEASE!  What if someone is a great cook and I really want that meal?  Too bad, apparently.

          It’s as if I’m quarantined like a dog trying to emigrate to Hawaii. For as long as I’m on chemo, I have to live like a germaphobe, stuck in the house.   If I do have to go out I'm supposed to wear rubber gloves and a face mask. Yes, our geologist son, Richie, has offered me a hazmat suit.

          When I told our next son, Brandon, about this quarantine, he was quick to point out that many rappers did some of their best work while under house arrest. Is that saying much? I'm not sure. 
          Worst of all, I can’t go to church because hugs and handshakes are all around, obviously threatening to give me typhus or malaria.  I’m to use hand sanitizer like a fiend, should I venture anywhere at all.

          But I’ve been sneaking.  As long as I know I won’t have crowds pressing in on me, I’ve gone with St. Bob to the occasional restaurant on off-hours when we’re the only ones there.  And I’ve seen movies at unpopular times.  I’ve also made the quick illegal foray to the supermarket, especially to pick up one of the zillions of prescriptions I’m suddenly on.

          But now I’m reconsidering this. Last week I was standing in line to get my Rx and the woman ahead of me was arguing loudly with the pharmacist, wanting her Lithium now, even though it wasn’t time yet for a refill.

          Mind you, I am standing behind the privacy line, but I can hear every elevated word and the Lithium Lady is not happy.  She is slowly—actually not slowly, rapidly-- becoming unhinged. I could feel myself stepping back, lest this woman be carrying a firearm, or perhaps has a black belt in karate, or the notion that certain people simply need strangling. She can’t actually reach over the counter and grab the pharmacist, but she could turn around, see me, and decide I will do.

 Just give her the Lithium, I found myself thinking, wishing I had telepathic powers.  But the argument continued, so I just quietly sauntered off to the greeting card aisle, and then I picked up my pace and got the heck out of Dodge.  I decided St. Bob could get my prescription later.  He’s not only permitted to swim in the swarm of germs out there, but he’s a tough hunk of manly man strength.  Even a woman short on Lithium would think twice before attacking him.  I think.

You can stay inside and never encounter scary people if you just buy all my books and read them.  Safety first!

Breaking and Entering and then Breaking Again

          Folks, we had an invasion last night. First, how many individuals have to get involved to call it an invasion? I think, when it comes to raccoons, one is enough. 

          At least I think it was only one, based on the footprints:

          It crept through the doggie door then padded over to the laundry room where the cat and dog food is kept. Pertinent info: Our dog slept through the entire crime:

          So did our cat:

          EVEN WHEN THE RACOON BROKE THE CAT’S FOOD BOWL!

Yes, she knocked the thing to the ground where it broke into smithereens. I say she, because, like many of us, I assume she loves dishes and is just trying to expand her collection.

And still no one awoke.  Quietly the thief tore into the bag of cat food, scattered it everywhere, and then left on little cat feet. Cat-ish. Okay, raccoon feet.

So now we’ll be leaving the laundry room door closed and just hope the raccoon doesn’t come tip-toeing upstairs, looking for people to snuggle with. Or a closet full of new disguises.

You can patrol your perimeter for raccoon evidence, or sit quietly inside with one of my books. I recommend the latter.

Check it Out

          Lately St. Bob has experienced a windfall. Check after check has been pouring in from his Game Show days (you do know that he hosted and announced game shows, right? That he’s the Bob of “Bob, tell ‘em what they’ve won” fame, and has a Wikipedia page?)

          Anyway, for years after your shows air, you get residual checks for every re-run. Sometimes these are enough for a nice dinner, sometimes a great little deposit in the old bankeroo.  But as the years go by, they dwindle. They go down to six dollars, then 78 cents, and then—as has been happening for years now, less than the price of a postage stamp.

          Here’s the latest batch of 15 checks, every one of which, after taxes, contains a whopping ZERO cents. 

Yes, that’s right. We are recipients of wasted money on the part of companies we used to think were pretty smart. I figure the man-hours to calculate this astronomical sum, the people to enter it on a computer somewhere, the folks to print it out and lick the envelope, then the postage, and I’m guessing that at least $20 worth of labor went into every mail-out. 

          Kinda woulda liked it if they had just written us that check. And REALLY hoping this trend doesn’t continue into the negative digits and they start sending us bills!

Have you bought my books, yet, or watched my Youtube Mom videos? You must, you must, before I get so many checks that I drown in them. Find everything right here on my website.

A Vile Situation

          Can I please be in the Vial Olympics? I don’t expect to be in the real ones. Heck, I doubt they’d even give someone this unathletic a seat on the back row.

          But blood samples I got.  At my last lab appointment, this is what I saw waiting for me on the table:

          That’s right. SEVENTEEN vials to fill. Have you ever heard of such a collection? There should be several gold medals hanging around my neck right now. Although I’d probably be too weak to support them and they’d pull me down onto the floor.

          It’s not that I don’t appreciate thorough testing.  It’s that I start to wonder if this sort of thing could be sponsored by the transfusion center. And how can you get an accurate reading of anemia if you withdraw all your blood? (Yes, I came out anemic.)

          Seriously, doesn’t this make you want to start humming that old “99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall” song, only with the lyrics, “99 vials of blood on the wall”?

          Among the many tests we ran, one was for my Vitamin B-12 count. You’ll like this.  The normal range is from 211 to 911 pg/mL.  Guess what mine was?

                                       5,353

That’s right. Five THOUSAND something.  And I don’t get a gold medal for this? I say it’s just time to end all the vial-ence.

Time to check out my short Youtube Mom life hack videos, too, before I keel over. 

A Hoot and a Half

For all you irony lovers, this is a topper. (And that last word was for all you pun lovers). I just got billed for a Groupon to HOOTER’S.  Yes, folks, an establishment where I have never set foot—nor have set any other body parts—and of all things, this hacker chose HOOTER’S when I’ve just has a mastectomy!  Is this not mockery beyond the pale?

          It came into my email box, thanking me for my purchase, with this photo and information:

Hooters —  $30 eGift Card to Hooters; Dine-In Only

And right away I know someone has stolen my credit card info. The next question is, are they currently buying a car or a new set of furniture?

Naturally I began an online chat with Groupon. I explained the theft and the urgency of finding out what card was used, so I can cancel it.  I received this thoughtful suggestion:

If you wish to print the voucher, just open it up and print it like you

would any other document.

And now I realize I am not going to get anywhere with Groupon. I dash to the bank, find out what card was used, and cancel my own. However I now get to choose between several appealing backgrounds for my new card, including Yosemite, Lake Tahoe, kittens, puppies, an American Flag, a rain forest frog, sports balls, a misty forest, a flower, and many more. Maybe one of these will distract me from my future purchases, who knows?

And then I consider the absolute irony of being billed for Hooter’s but instead of feeling bad I recall a recent painting by the name, "Save the Hooters!" by my dear friend, PerriAnn Allen, and the great laugh we had when she brought it over. 

           See, it’s okay if a friend does it.

Might I add that some of my books are a hoot? Readers’ words, not mine. I’m just saying some of them laughed so hard they pulled out stitches in the hospital. Find them all here.

Truly Beet

          Once again I have been duped in my garden. I feel like Jack-and-the-Canola-stock, but I’ll come to that later.

First, I want you to look at this pathetic little beet that took months and months to grow, being a winter crop:

It was time to harvest the cold weather stuff and make room for the summertime plants which always include tomatoes, herbs, peppers, basil, and squash.

But what you don’t know is that last summer I painstakingly chose seeds from a catalog so I could grow all kinds of goodies the average nursery doesn’t even offer (Tennis Ball Lettuce, for example, which never sprouted). My favorite was the Chioggia Beet, which looks totally festive and fabulous with its peppermint stripes:

But it was not to be. Instead I got the sad-looking little sprout pictured above, and it wasn’t even striped when I cut into it. Come on! I have pulled plumper weeds! 

          But then get this: In my row of Brussels Sprouts, we suddenly have this humongous bush: 

Obviously a mustard seed (or a canola seed, even farmers struggle to tell them apart) got into the envelope and now St. Bob has staked this out as his personal project, thinking he’s going to grow mustard seeds for a faith lesson of some kind. But what if it’s the faith of a canola seed?

All I know is that this reminds me of the dreadful summer when I calculated that each of my tomatoes cost $18. And that lousy beet was $7.  Time to hit the Farmer’s Market instead. Wish I had a cow to trade for some interesting beans.

On the other hand, my books are a true bargain. Nothing seedy, nothing that will beet you up.