March Wrap-Up

Once a month blogging seems to be my theme for this year.  It’s a little hard to believe that tomorrow is April 1st, but time flies, right?

March was pretty busy for us.  Howard and Joey both had some health issues, and several vet appointments.  Howard had an anal gland abscess.  Without going into too many gory details, it involved a trip to the emergency vet clinic, a minor surgery, and about a month of wound care twice a day.  He also had to be separated from the other cats, and use a special cat litter while he healed.  There were numerous vet appointments to check his progress, and for antibiotic shots.  Howard handled all of it really well.  He’s a fairly easygoing cat, so he tolerated everything nicely.  We moved him into our bedroom while he was separated from the other cats, and he seemed to enjoy the one on one time with us.  His vet is incredibly pleased with how well he healed, so we’re very happy about that.  He has an appointment tomorrow for us to talk with the vet about making sure this doesn’t happen again.

Joey’s health issues are a little more complicated.  He’s fourteen now, so he’s a little older.  He has fairly severe asthma, but it’s mostly well controlled with his current medications.  He also has some intestinal issues, and seems to possibly be on his way to developing a heart condition.  The vet made some changes to his medications, and he seems to be responding well to that.  Our vet has said that there are some more medications we can try, but we have to make sure we strike a good balance as far as what the medications treat and the side effects they cause.  For the moment, what we’re doing seems to be working.  Joey seems happy.  He’s eating well and behaving normally.  He also has an appointment with the vet tomorrow.

The weather has been all over the place this month.  We had some snow earlier in the month, and lately we’ve been enjoying temperatures in the 70s.  I’m hoping the warmer weather is here to stay.

We cut the grass for the first time this season on Wednesday, just ahead of the torrential rain that started on Thursday.  Nick did most of the grass cutting, and I started weeding the flower beds.  It’s always exciting to see what made it through the winter, and I love seeing the first blooms.  The little white flowers are from GrandMommy’s yard. She helped me transplant them to our yard in 2013.  I’ve always liked them, but it’s especially nice to see them now.  She’s gone, but her flower legacy lives on.

We’ve also been working on trying to Duke proof the fence.  We fixed all of the places he escaped from in the fall, and there were no more unauthorized outings during the winter, so we thought the problem had been solved.  Nope.  Apparently even Duke has enough sense not to go frolicking around the neighborhood during the cold weather.  Once the weather warmed up, Duke went right back to organizing his own outings.  We think we’ve found a better way to reinforce the fence, so hopefully I’ll be sharing a success story soon.

I’ve decided to participate in the A to Z Challenge this year.  I’ve been going back and forth about whether or not to participate.  I’ve barely blogged at all this year, so A to Z seems like a good way to get back in the habit of more regular blogging.  For those of you not familiar, during the month of April you blog every day except Sunday, starting with A and ending with Z.  The posts just have to have something to do with the letter of the day.  It’s a good way to get into the habit of writing posts regularly, and a fun way to connect with other bloggers.

So what about you?  How did March treat you?  Are you participating in the A to Z Challenge in April?  Any other big plans for April?

How Do You Stay Healthy?

I had grand plans for getting on a much more regular blogging schedule for this year, but obviously that hasn’t happened.

I have managed to catch pretty much every illness that has gone around work.  It seems particularly bad in my building this year, and we seem to be passing a lot of things around.

I started the year off with an upper respiratory infection.  A few weeks ago I had the stomach virus that was making the rounds.  I ended up in the emergency room for IV fluids and medication with that one.  If anyone around you has it, run!  For the past week it has been the flu.  One of my co-workers came down with it last Thursday, and I started coming down with it last Friday.  Nick started coming down with it on Tuesday.

I can’t help wondering what I’m doing wrong.  It kind of feels like my immune system has packed up and gone on vacation.  It certainly doesn’t seem to be doing its job.

I realize I get exposed to a lot of stuff at work.  Nick does, too, and it definitely seems like we bring a lot of illness home to each other.

I wash my hands constantly.  I periodically clean my desk and keyboard at work with alcohol wipes. I wash my hands as soon as I come home from work.  I go for acupuncture and reflexology regularly. We’ve also started using some essential oils.  There’s a blend that’s supposed to promote a healthy immune system, and Nick and I both use it daily.  We don’t have the healthiest diet in the world, but we definitely don’t live off of fast food or junk food.

I can’t help wondering what I’m missing.  Is there some magic potion that everyone else knows about?

So what do you do to stay healthy?  Do you manage to avoid catching every single thing the people around you come down with?  If, so how?!?  I’m hoping you’ll have lots of great suggestions.  I’d love to hear them!

Or, if you seem to get sick all of the time, too, and want to commiserate in the comments, that’s fine too.  Misery loves company, right?

And, to keep this post from becoming a total whine fest, I’m sharing a picture of Howard doing his meerkat pose.  He started doing this back in December, and we’re not sure why.  He just sits like this fairly often now.  He looks adorable doing it.

He reminds me of a meerkat when he does it. His vet says he looks a Buddha statue.  Nick’s mom says he looks like a weeble wobble.  What do you think?

I hope you’re all staying healthy, and I’m looking forward to catching up on everyone’s blogs.

Icy Roads, Books, and Movies

We still haven’t gotten above freezing, and our neighborhood hasn’t been scraped yet, so I’m home again today.  It’s supposed to warm up to the 40s tomorrow, so hopefully everything will be back to normal by then.

Between the cold, snow/ice, and being sick between Christmas and New Year, I’ve watched a lot of movies and TV and done a lot of reading lately.  So I thought I might share some reviews, and ask for recommendations.

Movies:

The Secret Life of Pets - This one was hugely disappointing.  We wanted to see it in the theater, but things kept coming up, so we didn’t get to.  I’m honestly glad we didn’t waste the money to see it in the theater.

From the previews we first saw it looked like it was going to be largely about all of the things the pets do when the people are away.  It looked like it was going to be funny, and really resonate with pet parents.

It turned out to be more of an “epic adventure” that didn’t really make any sense.  I realize cartoons aren’t based in reality (that’s what makes them fun), but it was just too over the top, and really not what the previews we saw lead us to expect.

Zootopia - This one was a wonderful surprise.  I’d seen a preview or two, and thought it looked like it might be good, but I wasn’t super excited about it.  It turned out to be great.  It was hilarious, and the music was excellent.

I think it’s the best cartoon I’ve seen since Inside Out.  I highly recommend both of them if you haven’t already seen them.

Pollyanna - This is one of my absolute most favorite movies.  Ever. My obsession with Pollyanna has been going strong for 30 years, and isn’t going away.  It’s a happy, feel-good movie about looking for the good things in life and the power of friendship.

I watched it as 2017 rang in because I wanted something positive and happy to start the new year off with, and Pollyanna absolutely fit the bill.

TV (Technically Netflix, but TV shows, so I’m counting it as TV):

Criminal Minds - I realize this one has been around for a long time, but I didn’t watch it when it first aired.  I started watching it on Netflix a couple of years ago, and finally finished all of the seasons that are on Netflix.

I like the characters, and I enjoy crime/mystery shows, so I really like this one.  Honestly, I’ve scared the daylights out of myself with it a few times when I’ve binge watched while Nick has been working nights.  It seems like that’s always when the episodes feature women home alone getting murdered.

Even though it creeps me out sometimes I still enjoy it, and am looking forward to whenever the next season is available on Netflix.

Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries - This series is excellent.  It features Phryne Fisher, a lady detective in 1920's Australia.  The mysteries are intriguing, the characters are great, the dresses she wears are gorgeous, and don’t even get me started on the shoes.  It also has some really great music.

There’s an ongoing mystery through most of the first season, as well as the smaller mysteries that are typically resolved within an episode.  There’s also a little romance.  There are enough storylines to keep it interesting, but not so many that it just feels like they couldn’t decide what kind of series they wanted to make.  I highly recommend this one!

Books:

Thrice the Brinded Cat Hath Mew’d by Alan Bradley - This is the eighth book in Alan Bradley’s Flavia de Luce series.  Flavia is a young amateur sleuth with a passion for chemistry in a small village in post World War II England.  She comes from a once wealthy family and lives on a declining estate with her two older sisters, father who’s dealing with PTSD from the war, and a couple of household servants.  She spends her days conducting chemical experiments and solving crimes.

I love this series!  Quite honestly, I had no interest in reading it when I first heard about it.  I thought it wasn’t something I’d enjoy.  I’m not a kid person (Flavia is 11 years old in the first book), and I have zero interest in chemistry.  It didn’t seem like my kind of book.

One of my co-workers basically forced me to borrow the first book, The Sweetness At The Bottom Of The Pie, and I had every intention of giving it back without reading it.  She kept bugging me about it, though, so I started reading it on a Sunday night. I had the plan of forcing myself though the first two or three chapters and then returning it on Monday morning, telling her I’d tried, but just couldn’t get into it.  I ended up staying up until 2:00 in the morning reading half of the book.  I’ve been hooked ever since then.

I’ve given all of the books five stars, and the most recent one has lived up to the standard set in the rest of the series.  I do recommend reading them in order.  There are a lot of what would be spoilers in Thrice the Brinded Cat Hath Mew’d if you haven’t read the rest of the series.

The Scent of Rain and Lightning by Nancy Pickard - I first discovered Nancy Pickard in a bargain bin at a used bookstore when I stumbled across The Whole Truth.  It was excellent, and I’m currently reading the third book in that series, The Truth Hurts.

She has also written a few stand alone books, which is what The Scent of Rain and Lightning is.  It’s a mystery that takes place partly in modern day and partly in the 80s.  

It is extremely well written, there are some great plot twists, and she does a great job jumping between times.  It’s smooth, but doesn’t leave you going back a few pages to figure out which time frame you’re currently in.

I highly recommend this one, and I’m planning to read all of her books now.  I’ve loved all three of the ones I’ve read, and am really enjoying the one I’m currently reading.

So what about you?  Have you read or watched anything good lately?  Anything you’d recommend as a must?  Or anything you’d recommend not wasting time on?

Snowy Weekend

It snowed here Friday.  It started Friday afternoon, stopped for a little while, started again on Friday night, and continued into the early hours of Saturday morning.  We ended up with about seven inches in our area.

We’ve been dropping down into the single digits at night, and haven’t gotten above freezing during the day, so nothing has really melted, and there’s a layer of ice under a lot of the snow.

If you’ve been around for a while, you know that I am not a fan of snow, or of cold weather in general.  I’ve been inside all weekend.  I did venture out onto the screened in back porch to take some pictures of Duke playing in the snow.  He absolutely loves it.

Duke seems to be the only one who enjoys the snow.  Chuzoo runs outside just long enough to answer the call of nature, and then immediately wants back inside.  I can’t blame him.  The cats don’t go outside anyway, but they’ve pretty much spent the weekend hunkered down in their beds, cuddled up together.  I think they have the right idea.

So what about you?  Do you have any snow?  Are you enjoying warmer temperatures than we are?

December Wrap-Up

I meant to do all kinds of posts in December; recipes, Christmas, etc., but the month just got away from me.  So I’m making up for it with one incredibly long post.

December was busy, and had a lot of ups and downs for us.  I’ll go ahead and start with the bad stuff first, so I can end this post with the good stuff:

On December 7th we lost a very good friend, Martha.  She was 75, an incredible person, and died suddenly of a stroke.  I’m going to write more about her at some point, because she was such a wonderful person, but I just can’t right now.  I know that I’ll cry when I do, and I have a really bad cold right now.  Breathing is hard enough right now without crying.

The next afternoon at work, two of the security officers came in to tell me my car had been hit in the parking lot, and that I needed to go outside for the report.  The person who hit my car left without notifying anyone.  Fortunately, we share a parking lot with the Sheriff’s Office, and a deputy happened to be looking out the window when it happened.  He took some great pictures of her looking around to see if anyone saw, and then driving away.  Once her insurance company saw the pictures there was no question of them paying for the repairs.

We took the car to the same place that did the repair after we were rear-ended in August.  They did such a good job then that even the most obsessive car guys we know were impressed.  They weren’t able to get it in until after Christmas, but we were okay with that since the car was okay to drive.  We dropped it off on the 27th and picked it up on the 30th, and it looks great.

Now on to some happier December happenings:

I did a lot of baking for various people. This year it was mostly pound cakes, apple cake, cherry crunch, and some banana pound cake.  I took desserts to various departments at work, including the security officers, the volunteers, and the janitorial people.  This year I added in the maintenance people as well.  We moved offices earlier in the year, and they were incredibly nice during and leading up to the move.  Our new office is also much closer to their main work area in the building, so I see them a lot.  That’s pretty much how I determine which departments to take Christmas goodies to; the people I see and interact on a daily (or near daily) basis.

We also have a water cooler now that we’re in the new office.  The deliveryman, Joe, is really nice, and we also chat for a few minutes, so I made him some Christmas goodies as well.  He seemed really surprised, but said he really liked them the next time he came.

I love it when people are pleasantly surprised to get their Christmas goodies, and when they seem to genuinely enjoy them.

I also baked for our vet’s office, acupuncturist, chiropractor’s office, reflexologist, and the lady who cuts our hair.  

We were planning to do dinner for our next door neighbors, but ended up rescheduling since we were at a funeral that weekend instead.  I think we’re going to try for sometime next week (once my cold is gone), and call it a New Year thing instead.

My aunt, uncle, and sister came for dinner the weekend before Christmas.  I made two giant trays of lasagna, Greek Salad, garlic bread, apple cake, and brownies for that.   We hadn’t seen my aunt and uncle since the summer, so it was great to see them and catch up.  I also took the opportunity to send lots of presents home with Gabrielle since Christmas was at her house this year.

I ended up not taking anything to the hospice house here for Christmas.  I feel kind of bad about that, but things just got really crazy in the days leading up to Christmas.  My parents’ 17 year old cat, Yum Yum, got really sick, and everyone was really afraid it was going to be time to ay goodbye to her, but she made an amazing recovery.

They ended up bringing her to the vet here that we take the cats to.  They live about an hour and 15 minutes away, but that’s just how it worked out.  Let’s just say that my mom thrives on drama, and my dad isn’t a decision maker.  I ended up making the appointment and helping get her back and forth to the vet.

Yum Yum had a major impaction that took three days of treatment and lots of medication to remove. She’ll most likely be on medication for the rest of her life, but is doing great now.  She’s eating, cuddling with the other cats, and even playing more than she has in a while.

It was very up and down with her for a while, so when the vet called with “wonderful news”, everyone was thrilled.  Yum Yum was the last patient they sent home before they closed for the holiday, so I think everyone was especially delighted to go into the Christmas break on a positive note.

Nick’s mom and step-dad came into town the Wednesday before Christmas.  Thursday they came over and installed one of Nick’s birthday presents.  They got him a new mailbox (it’s huge and really nice, so much better than the old one that seemed like it was going to fall over any day) with a firefighter topper.  His dad came over with tools and to help install it.  They managed to pull it off as a complete surprise to him.  He had no idea until he came home from work that night and saw it.  He absolutely loves it.

On Christmas Eve (also Nick’s birthday) Nick and I, along with his mom and step-dad headed to my sister’s house in Greensboro.  She just moved, and insisted that Christmas be at her house this year since she has enough room now, and had never done the big Christmas before.

We brought the dogs and Joey with us since he’s on daily medication.  He rode with Nick’s mom and step-dad, rather than with us and the dogs.  We also had what felt like a million presents between the two cars.

I like to use weird boxes to disguise things when I wrap presents.  Normally that’s not a problem, but it can complicate things when you have to pack them all in the car.  I was so glad we had sent so many presents back with Gabrielle the week before.  I don’t think we would have ever managed to get everything in the car otherwise.

Gabrielle cooked a ton of food, and we brought Nick’s birthday cake with us.  We celebrated Nick’s birthday that evening, and then stayed up until 2:00 in the morning to open Christmas presents.

It was the first time I had ever stayed up to open Christmas presents, and the biggest family Christmas Gabrielle and I had ever had, so it was a lot of fun.

Everyone seemed to have put a lot of thought and effort into the gifts they gave everyone.  There were a few big, wonderful surprises, and most of the gifts were something that at least one other person knew about, so there was a lot of excitement waiting for certain people to open certain things. Everyone’s reactions to their gifts was very gratifying too.  There wasn’t any fake enthusiasm.

I can finally say this, the earrings I got from Liz’s Etsy shop for Susan (Nick’s mom) were a big hit. She wore them pretty much the whole time after that.

We spent a very low key holiday, which I think was exactly what everyone wanted and needed.  No one even got out of their pajamas on Sunday.  Gabrielle made a few soups from The Unofficial Harry Potter Cookbook that were delicious.  I think I want to get a copy for the soups alone.                            
Later that evening  we burned 2016 calendars.  It was something we had decided on earlier since it has been such an awful year for all of us.  We all took turns feeding pages of 2016 calendars into the fireplace.  It felt good to watch the pages go up in smoke.

Nick came down with a cold on Monday, and was pretty miserable Tuesday and Wednesday.  I started coming down with it Thursday, and haven’t done much since then other than read, sleep, and sip tea.  I’m really hoping it goes away soon.  I don’t want to start the new year off sick!

So how about you?  How was your December?  How were your holiday celebrations?  I hope you all had a wonderful month, and were able to spend time with the people you love.