How 'Bout Dat?!

Dem Saints done won dem a Super Bowl!! 31-17 over the Indianapolis Colts.

What a great game. What a terrific outcome. This may well be the feel good story of the year. I think almost everyone in America was pulling for the Saints just a little. I know we certainly were. New Orleans is one of John's and my favorite cities we've ever visited. I'm sure Mardi Gras started 9 days early on Rue Bourbon last night and may go well after Fat Tuesday!

Still haven't done anything crafty. Working slowly at regaining my strength. Each day I'm feeling better. Still have a lingering cough and sniffles, but so does John. I'm hoping to feel good enough to craft some this week. Thanks for all the good wishes and thoughts!

I think...

the crud may be on it's way out! Finally! After only three weeks!! My right ear finally cleared late on Tue. And my left one cleared sometime overnight last night. I've still got some sniffles and coughing, but nothing like it's been. And I'm feeling the urge to craft. Haven't had that since I started getting sick. And while I'm not ready to do anything too quickly, I will slowly start getting back into things.

They had a neat story on my news last night. A pair of ospreys have built a nest close to a golf driving range in my little hometown of Dunedin. Someone set up a webcam to watch the birds, who have since laid three eggs in the nest. "Experts" seem to think the eggs should hatch sometime this week. I'll be watching! If I can ever get on the website during daylight hours that is. Every time I've tried, they have been exceeding their bandwidth and I've not been able to see. Maybe you'll have better luck! - Dunedin Osprey Cam

Last, but not least. I was sad to hear that Rusty Pickle is going out of business. I've been a fan of their funky, rustic, grungy papers for a long time. They are having a 50% off sale for all of their lines.
Site rustypickle.com

Ish Pish part duex

It's now two weeks and two days I've had the crud. My ears are still plugged and I am still walking like a drunken sailor (not that that's a bad thing...the drunken part that is!) The congestion in my head *seems* to be lessening. But still the ears are plugged. The right one tried to unplug yesterday to no avail. I'm slowly getting my gumption back. Not to the point of crafting or doing anything too taxing. I've done a load or two of laundry. Emptied the dishwasher a time or two. Cooked for John once or twice. I'm still pretty much eating soup. Still haven't vacuumed. The sound is too amplified in my pea brain with my ears being plugged. I said to someone the other day, perhaps if there were something there to absorb the sound it would be better! So it is what it is. Someday, this too shall pass. I hope!

Ish Pish

This crud that John shared with me has thrown me for a loop. I've been reading mail and blogs first thing in the mornings, then crawling on the couch and/or bed and that's where I've spent the better part of the last week. I have zero energy. I've done nothing creative OR domestic. And I don't care that I haven't. My ears have now decided to become blocked and my equalibirium is all out of whack and I walk (slowly) with a tilt. I am hoping that one day soon, things will return to their normal abnormal state. And while I'm at it, yes, my mouth is still sore. More precisely, the second to the back molar on the left side is still sore. The rest has healed nicely. There are days I want to yank that one tooth out of my head sans anesthesia.

Yuck

Despite my best efforts, John has managed to share the crud with me. I started yesterday afternoon with the hacking, sneezing, blowing. I don't think either of us slept well. If it wasn't him hacking, sneezing, blowing it was me. He's managed to run thru a box of Kleenex every day since he started with this, so I have to go out and buy more Kleenex today. Also more drugs. Because with both of us taking them, we're going thru them twice as fast. Duh! It's been years since I've been sick. I can't remember the last time.

Finally!

We made it to 68 degrees yesterday. John came home Monday with a scratchy throat. Sneezing, coughing, blowing. Sneezing, coughing, blowing. He laid about doing nothing on his two days off. Trying to fend it off. He wasn't too successful. So yesterday I went thru the house like a madwoman cleaning and disinfecting any and everything he had come in contact with. I even went so far as to put bleach in the Rainbow and vacuumed. I stripped the bed, washed everything. Washed his bath towels. We had a brand new house! Then he came home with his germie self and contaminated it again! ;) It's a bit on the chilly side this morning, but I've got the house open. For the first time since before Christmas. Run those germs out I say!

Perio visit

Had my two month post-op check yesterday.

First, can I just say how much I HATE the taste of latex?! It is still lingering in my mouth, despite brushings.

Overall, he was very pleased. Glad someone is! He said the back three molars have tightened up nicely. They were very loose at the beginning because of the extensive bone loss. He said that is a sign that the new bone is growing. However. The nerves that are giving me such pain/sensitivity issues will be part of the last to be covered by the new bone growth. That did not make me a happy camper. He said I could go back to my regular dentist on the 31st for my cleaning. He is sending them a letter telling them NOT to poke, probe or generally disturb that area because of the bone grafts. I told him there was no worries for them doing anything like that so long as I had breath in my body! I go back to see him in April. At that point, HE will clean them and since we will be at 6 months post-op, he will also probe and see where we stand. What was originally supposed to be a year long, once every four months procedure now looks like it will be closer to two years to complete. Because I am such a slow healer, he does not want to make it impossible for me to eat/chew/drink on both sides of my mouth at the same time. I don't know if that's a good thing or not! He did give me a Rx for a sensitivity toothpaste. It has more "stuff" in it than what you can buy over the counter to ease the sensitivity issues. He said it would take a few days for me to feel the effects of it. So I guess I keep on keepin on. And maybe one morning when I wake up, the pain will be gone. One can only hope!

When you've nothing else to do...

How about a little Periodontal surgery for laughs?

I have bad Periodontal disease. Really bad. To the point where yesterday began a year long oddesy of splitting open my gums and grinding down damaged bone and injecting cadaver bone to meld with the remaining bone so that hopefully I won't lose all of my teefs. Surgeries will fall once every four months or so, depending on how quickly I heal.

Once our co-pay was in the books, I was given a little blue pill and within 20 minutes, I was very relaxed and didn't really care what was going on around me. Susie, my nurse helped me float to the surgery room where she then hooked me up to the Nitrous Oxide tank and I got to sit on a toadstool whilst fairys and butterflies danced around my head. It was a lovely trip!! I was awake during the entire procedure, but neither cared nor could do anything about anything! Surgery took a little over an hour. We started with the upper left side, since that's where the worst damage was. I have a "play dough-like snake" in my mouth, surrounding those teeth to keep any small bits of food out. I have lots of "good drugs" to keep the pain at bay. They make me really loopy and I feel like I'm drunk and I haven't had anything to drink. Good thing I don't have to go to work or operate heavy machinery! I promised John that so long as I'm on the pain meds, I won't be driving anywhere. Yesterday my diet consisted of pudding cups, jello cups, yogurt, watermelon and canteloupe chunks. All cold foods. No hot. Today I can graduate to soft foods and I've already put in my request for sushi tonight since sushi's soft! I can't talk so good right now. It hurts to open my mouth to form words, so John is in his glory with a mostly silent wife!

Stitches Begone!

I went yesterday for the stitches removal. The Dr was very happy with how Doc John had kept the ear and neck clean and dressed! She said he did a fabulous job. I'm such a wimp though! I almost passed out twice while the nurse was removing the stitches! It was pretty painful, but sheesh! I'm such a gurl!! We have to keep a dressing and bandage on the ear at night, and then in the morning, I am to remove the bandage and re-dress it and leave it open during the day until it is completely healed.

They also froze 50 skin tags around my neck while I was there. I have a place on my left hand that they froze as well. She didn't seem to think it was anything, but she said if it comes back, they will biopsy it when I go back in 6 weeks.

Last. A shout out to my friend Nicole and her dh Jason and son Brendan. They welcomed the newest addition to their family, Kieran at 3:18 this morning in Japan! Welcome Kieran!

I will be so happy...

when John gets home today. My ear bled some last night, so the Kotex-like bandage on my ear looks pretty gross. And I can't get it off by myself. I've not been able to properly wash my face since Monday morning and my hair has not been washed since Sunday night. I think I could solve the current oil crisis just from the oil in my hair! And here I thought I was done with oily hair once I finished puberty. Oh no! The oilyness just goes on hiatus til you hit menopause and then comes back with a vengance! I am looking very forward to standing under the hot water and just letting it beat on the top of my head. Funny the things you miss when you can't do them. Even for two days!

The ear does feel a bit better today. I think I actually slept more than I was awake last night, so that's a good thing. I put off taking a pain pill when I got up this morning and have not taken one yet. Still taking it easy, per the Dr's orders. Hopefully I can get out and run some errands tomorrow.

Under Quarantine

John came home from work yesterday with the sickies. And I was just reading in yesterday's paper that the Tampa area is seeing an upswing in flu cases. Grreat!!!! Course he couldn't get in to see the Dr, but he did call him in an Rx, so hopefully we can nip it in the bud. We decided descretion is the better part of valor and are not going to his folks tomorrow. No sense taking whatever John has to them. He had to go in to work today. There was nobody to run his route. They have one man out for 5 months with knee replacement and another is out on short term disability, so there was no staying home for him. Good thing he's got the next two days off. When I went to pick up his Rx last night, I got a gallon of Gatoraid and a gallon of cranberry juice for him, plus 4 boxes of Lipton chicken noodle soup, so I'm keeping him hydrated and souped up! He's in his favorite sweat pants and 3 XL t-shirt with the blankie over him, sitting in the LaZBoy catnapping in front of the TV. Rest and sleep, rest and sleep; that's what he needs. Keeping my fingers crossed he doesn't pass it on to me.

Congested

Knock wood, I have never been plagued by allergies and such. Never been one to get sick. Maybe this getting old stuff ain't what it's cracked up to be! I have been soooo congested the past few days. The pine trees are blooming, leaving their yellow pollen on every.thing. It's the only thing I can attribute my stuffiness to. All I'm doing is blowing my nose and wiping my watery eyes. I bought some Claritin D and am taking it, but it doesn't seem to be helping.

I'm working on a couple of CTMH swaps but I won't be able to share them until after they are completed and sent to the hostess because she reads my blog. Debbie! And I don't give my hostesses sneak peaks on swaps! I had to order more supplies and they won't be here til Friday, so I've been doing "busy" work on the swaps, making my photo mats (and getting a blister on the tip of my pointer finger from the bone folder!) and planning and re-planning what my layouts are gonna look like.

John's been working 18+ hour days since Christmas. Thankfully he's got the next two days off, so hopefully he can get caught up on his sleep. He's working New Years Day, but it's no big deal for us. We don't do anything on New Year's Eve since it's "Amateur Night." All the idiots that don't normally go out and drink, do because they feel like they get a free pass to. We're supposed to have some rainy weather here starting New Years Eve day, so all the more reason for us to stay home! He'll probably be in bed at early-thirty anyway! Then by the middle of next week, we are supposed to see temps in the low 30's for a couple of days. Just a couple, then we'll warm up again!

Also want to give a shout-out to Rhonda. She's doing much better since she got out of the hospital. She is slowly weaning herself off the pain meds. The Dr told her she can once again mush up solid food and eat that instead of the straight liquid diet she's been on. You keep improving my friend! We're continuing to pray for you.