Our Itinerary

Sixteen days on the road...! And here's how it's going down. :-)

Stop One:

This is definitely the low part of our trip (we really don't enjoy LA that much...), but we're gonna try to make the best of it. :) Matt spends two full days interviewing first at Children's Hospital of LA, and then at UCLA. I'll spend two full days wandering Los Angeles with Seth. Can we say the Getty?

Stop Two—The Highlight of the Trip!:

Humboldt County is the most amazing, most beautiful, most fabulous, most wonderful, most..., most..., most superlatively lovely spot in the world. Ahhhhhh.... My mind feels clear and fresh just thinking about it. (No, that's not the pot talking. ;-)) It's really unbelievably gorgeous—you have to see it to believe it's even possible. Whole forests of 300-ft, 2000-year-old trees? Amazing.

(The Sequoias further south are "larger" because they're bigger around, but they're a lot shorter. The coastal Redwoods in Humboldt County are skinnier—though lots are pretty huge, still!—and incredibly tall. And on the coast. And ancient-er. Everyone needs to see the Avenue of the Giants sometime in their life! IN...credible....)

Stop Three:

Portland is our #2 if we ever have to leave San Diego! It's lovely! Plus, Amy rocks. And we're spending practically a whole week together. YES!!! Matt interviews at OHSU this week (prettiest hospital he's ever seen...).

Stop Four:

I may have misspoke up there calling LA the low part of the trip, because we actually aren't excited at all to go to Seattle. Only a few years ago, Seattle was on our short-list of places to live—we were just sure we'd LOVE it. Then we went there.... I've never seen a place so dead and grey in my LIFE. Does that shock anyone? Do you picture Seattle how we had? Green, green, green? It's not. Too bad...! (Guess what is green, green, green, and not very far away? Portland! Portland is totally the sort of pretty we had always pictured Seattle would be.... But Seattle was downright depressing.) Anyway.... Matt will spend a full day interviewing at UW's Children's Hospital (which is actually a really cool place!), and I'll wander around with Seth trying to find some evergreens or something without freezing to death. :)

Stop Three Revisited—It's Back to Portland for Some of THIS!:

We're that good, too. Haha!

Stop Six:

Ahhhhhhhh......... Need I say more? (Matt will spend a day interviewing at UCSF. He has an interview day at Stanford, too, but we totally got unlucky with scheduling that one and he'll have to fly back next month....)

Stops 7 through ?

Then we'll make our way back down the coast via lots and lots of this:

And then it's back home to our Number One! Ahhhhh.... San Diego, we adore you. :)

Should be a fun trip! We're really looking forward to the little change in pace for a while. Satisfy the travel itch for a couple weeks...! :)

P.S. For anyone who doesn't know, the interviews are for Matt's fellowship. In June 2011 he'll finish his Pediatrics Residency, at which point he could go get a real job as a pediatrician. Except that he wants to specialize instead. So July 2011 he'll start another three years of training in Pediatric Cardiology, the interview period for which is right now. Long road.... Good thing he enjoys it!

Why I'm Happy Today

Just snagged a reservation for this room:

At this place:

In THIS greatest spot on Planet Earth!:

It's our favorite place ever. We can't wait! Two more weeks, baby!

Click the Link.

To anyone who saw my last post on Google Reader (which doesn't show embedded videos, apparently), go back to my actual website to watch the video. Trust me. :)

Guaranteed to Warm You Up :)

This is the most beautiful thing.... It speaks for itself, but I can't help saying, again, how amazing are children?! Look at what this boy does to all these people.... The joy he brings to their countenances! And, also, how wonderful are people? There have been so many times—with tiny things and also global tragedies such as this—when it has been so profound to me that it's human nature to help one another. We sometimes act rudely to one another and often believe mankind to be really self-serving. But when one of our fellow men needs help, you almost always see total strangers scramble to their aid. So I was touched, so much, by this beautiful little boy—and also touched to see ALL THOSE PEOPLE who came together for his sake, who rejoiced for him, who loved this total stranger.

Pain: Part Three

What is it about not feeling pain that makes me lose consciousness...? It's bizarre. The first time I told myself it was just a fluke. But when two, three, and four happened a couple weeks ago, I was properly humbled. So here are my terrible, embarrassing stories. :)

ONE.

A year ago I went to have a couple of moles checked out. The derm PA said, eh, no big deal, but do you want them removed anyway? I said, hey, why the heck not? (I figured even if they scarred it wouldn't be any bigger or more unsightly than the moles. And those things bugged. Always itching and bleeding and stuff!) So, with Seth sitting in a chair nearby, they went forward with this little surgery. Injections. I'm fine. Slicing. I'm fine. "Ok, I'm just going to cauterize this now." [Sound of rhythmic sizzling.] I'm . . . ffff . . . . BOOM.

I'm GONE.

Never felt a thing. Never realized I was psyched out. (Was I psyched out?) Thought I was totally fine.

I wake up to the nurse reassuring a wide-eyed Seth that his Mom was ok, "she just went to sleep for a little while." Poor thing! And poor me! It took a good twenty minutes to not feel that cold, clammy, nauseated, I-want-to-die feeling.

TWO.

Last week I went to get new glasses. Note to self and to the masses: Don't let good insurance dissuade you from going to JCPenney, Walmart, or LensCrafters to get your eyes checked. :) I went to a for-real place—the UCSD Shiley Eye Center—and had no clue what kind of torture chamber they'd release me to. To think I showed up hoping they wouldn't do the puff of air in my eyes! HA! Child's play! I'll take the puff any day, knowing what I know now....

So they test my eyes. Figure out my prescription. Excellent. I'd love to leave now, thank you.

But no! Suddenly, without warning, she says: "I'm going to test your eye pressure now. These are some numbing drops. They'll sting a little." Before I can protest, she's hovering over me, prying open my eyes like a torture artist, dripping little yellow drops of death at me.

Gross.

I'm really creeped out by this. Numbing drops? I don't want my eyes to be numb! That's creepy.

THEN, she assaults me with this machine that comes toward me, toward me, toward me. Closer to my eye.... AGAINST my eye...!!! Holy cow! It's pushing my eyeball!!!

"Ok. And now the other eye...."

I'm beyond creeped out now.

Wow, I'm really dealing with this like a champ, I say to myself. I'm not even trembling or crying for my mommy, or curling up into fetal position chanting my demands to be released.... Such a stud. (Truth was, I couldn't really feel a thing with those numbing drops.)

It ends. I sigh to myself relief that it's over now.

I look up to see my torturer hovering over me again. "We're just going to dilate your eyes now." [Drip. Drip.]

And . . .

I'm GONE.

Haha! Seriously. Two drops in my eyes, and that infernal clamor in the ears that says you officially cannot talk yourself into staying conscious buzzed all the way through me. And I started to dream about sitting around with some people talking about happy things.

Here's the strangest thing about fainting (anyone else with me on this?): I dreamt a slow, easy, low-key dream about a scenario that lasted a good half-hour or more, but when I woke up she said I'd been out about two seconds. Bizarre!

She left me to dilate reclined in the torture-chair, checking on me every few minutes. And a half hour later, I felt totally back to normal again.

My torture artist comes back with some kind of mirrored light. She directs me to look various places while she reflects light into my dilated eyes. One. [Ugh.... I don't feel so good.] Two. [Oh gosh, the ringing is back.] Three. This time I don't look, I put my face down, and just as I'm thinking, "oh please, not again! This is ridiculous!!" . . .

I'm GONE.

Again!

An hour-of-dreaming later (really only a few seconds) I come to, but just barely, and this time I have to try in my delirious state to talk myself out of puking. I'm successful. I also start dreaming up revenge for my torturer which, luckily for her, I was too ill to go forward with. ;-)

I feel cold and clammy all from my ears through my toes. My bones want to puke. All I want to do is curl up in bed and, I swear, sleep for two years.

I start to dream about being in my bed and realize she's saying something to me. The fogginess of her words, and the way in which I come upon them halfway through makes me half-realize (a half-realization is all my brain could muster at that point :)) that I had actually lost consciousness a third time. I think. I'm not entirely sure.

It's all pretty foggy. :)

As I start to very, very slowww...ly feel a bit better, she starts plying me with crackers and water. Because, in a torture chamber, that's all you can count on for food: crackers and water. Am I right? :) She expresses concern that I'm hypoglycemic. I'm too tired to say, "Lady, didn't you go to medical school? I know as well as you do—or should—that 'low blood sugar' among non-insulin-shooters doesn't really exist." I just laugh inside and eat some cracker. Oh yes. I can feel my mythically low blood sugar popping right back up.

Then she postulates, "Maybe it's White Coat Syndrome," to which I replied, "Well, my husband's a doctor, so let's hope it's not that!" She thought that was the funniest thing she'd heard in years. :)

My torturer finally leaves the room and I try—oh how I try!—to send Matt a text message. But I can't see! Haha! I'm typing, typing . . . . And thinking with much internal laughter, "how pathetic! I can't stay conscious! And I can't even type an SOS to Matt! I'm dyin' over here!!"

The text didn't go through. Figures. (Can you expect a Torture Operation to have cell phone reception?) When it came through an hour too late, it looked like this: Save me i keep passing out'misery.

Hahahaha!! We had a good laugh over it. I only wish he had gotten that while he sat at the computer filling out application forms and thinking I should be getting home from my uneventful eye appointment any second. Haha! Oh man. It kills me.

When I'm finally feeling like I can stand up again—in spite of my bones still wanting to puke, and my numb, dilated eyes making my head want to explode through my sockets—she comes back to . . . finish the job. You kidding me? What is wrong with her? Is she really that concerned that I might have some hidden glaucoma she had missed? My goodness. Let me free! Let me free!!

I survived. I picked out my glasses. In my determination to never, ever, not ever get my eyes checked again, I spent what felt like a gazillion dollars on nice frames and lenses when an hour before I had planned on spending about nothing. :) I felt pretty good about that.

THREE.

Remember the moles? One of them turned out to not be entirely removed and has also scarred more than I like. Since it's still itchy as well as unsightly, I had a plastic surgeon finish the job the other day. (Doesn't it sound marvelously scintillating to say, "I got plastic surgery"? Haha!) I didn't think I'd be psyched out, but man! I just don't know myself anymore!!

I jokingly considered asking him to not numb anything since I apparently only lose consciousness from not feeling pain, while I'm a stoic with superhuman powers when it comes to feeling torture. But Matt had a better solution . . . .

I took Sudafed ahead of time to reduce my vagal response.

And . . . ?

It worked like a charm! :) Let's hope this madness has ended. Eesh!

Fun Seth Quotes Lately

It's one of my great sorrows that of the 30 times a day I think, "You've GOT to remember that one to tell Matt later!," I only actually remember Seth's goodie quotes every once in a while. Here are some of my recent favorites before I forget. I wish I could remember them all!

Returning from Sea World with my parents, asking repeatedly how much longer until they would get back to his house (he had a new lunchbox he couldn't wait to show me :)), he finally sighed and said softly: 

[sigh] It's just so hard for a little boy to wait for his momma....

After trying to convince himself he's a big boy now:
I can't DO it.... I can't be big like my dad. I just don't know how to get taller...!

A bedtime negotiation between Seth and Matt:
—It's time to go to bed.
—How about, in tennnnn.... minutes...?
—Sure, you can stay up for ten minutes, but then there won't be any time for stories. OR...you can go to bed right now and have three stories.
—How about.... Five minutes and two stories. [hahaha!!]

Morning conversation between me and Seth:
—What do you want for breakfast?
—How about.... Waffles! [For about the tenth meal-request in a row!]
—Wow, you really love waffles, don't you?
—[clearly disappointed in me] MOM, I don't LOVE waffles. I LIKE waffles. You can't love waffles....

After proudly, excitedly handing me a part from a VCR he dismantled a couple weeks earlier:
Look! [Grinning wildly.] I got a capacitor for you, Momma!

[Haha! So that's what it was...? I really would have had no idea!]

A few days later:
Ah! Here's a little, tiny hard-drive for you, Mom! It's real cool!

And tonight:
—Do you know what this is called, Mom?
—A wrench?
—Yep. A wrench! Do you know what kind of wrench it is?
—Um.... No. [There are different kinds of wrenches?]
—It's . . . a . . . HEX wrench. And THIS is a . . . another hex wrench. Wait, let me get my drill bit....

Protein and Calories.

One of my greatest skills as a mother (mind-numbingly amazing!):

I can get two large eggs on only two pieces of french toast.

I have this sneaking hunch this talent of mine is keeping our son alive.... :)

Typography.

Number One worst thing about the problem of old-school typers teaching new-school typers to still do the typewriter-era double-space-after-a-period:

ACK!! The extra space can spill to the next line and the wonderful justified margin is ruined! Ruined!

I thought I'd be clever and find text about this issue to illustrate the implications. The full text from the crop above is most enjoyable:

Modern proportional fonts have what's known as a "kerning table" that contains the optimum spacing for every possible combination of adjacent characters (including spaces). When authors create new fonts, they spend a lot of time compiling this information according to the actual shapes of their fonts' characters. When you stick in an extra space after a sentence, you defeat this wonderful capability the font's author worked so hard to include. But take heart: You've already made the far-more-challenging leap from typewriter to computer. (Well, I assume you have, if you're reading this.) Learning to drop that anachronistic extra keystroke is child's play by comparison. I know you can do it! –Ander

Well said Ander. As a professional typographer and type designer with over 35 years experience, I consider placing two spaces after periods to be an anachronistic typewriter convention perpetuated by high school teachers who don't know better. I suspect that the reason most people are taught to use two spaces in school is because their teachers were taught the same thing by their teachers (who probably used typewriters), who were taught by their teachers, and so on.

When personal computers finally brought real fonts and the capability to compose type to the masses, teachers and students who learned typing on typewriters failed to distinguish between the two. These people were suddenly introduced to real typography, but lacked training in the conventions associated with it. As a result double spaces, underlined text, double hyphens, straight quote marks, non-use of en and em dashes [another thing I love to see used appropriately! Or even used at all. En dashes and em dashes!! Woo hoo!], apostrophes instead of prime marks, poor kerning, inappropriate leading, three periods instead of an ellipsis glyph, and almost every other sign of bad typography became common.

Fortunately, this ignorance of standard typographic conventions has not spilled over into professional publishing. Pick up any magazine, book, newspaper or professionally published and edited material of any kind, and look for two spaces after the periods — you won't find them, they're not there, they don't exist. Professional typographers, designers, copy editors and printers just don't use use them and never have. In fact, they routinely remove them during the copy editing process in much the same way that errors in punctuation and grammar are corrected.

I'm (unfortunately) old enough to have caught the tail end of hot metal typesetting. In those days there was a style in use at some type houses of inserting a space and an additional "thin space" after a sentence. The use of this extra thin space wasn't common and was often dependent upon the font. I never remember an instance where someone thought it appropriate to put two spaces (or even a space and a half) after a period.

It's interesting that there are so many who lament the demise of the period followed by two spaces — not realizing that it is a convention that never existed, except in the old typewriter world. — Maylett 23:01, 20 August 2005 (UTC)

Perfect.

I always loved the Charlie Brown Christmas Special when I was a kid. And I had such a fun time watching it with Seth for the first time the other day. I had to smile—and, I'll admit, actually got a tad bit emotional (hehe)—when Seth exemplified the whole point of the story by just being the beautiful, radiant child that all kids are. When Charlie and Linus go to pick out a tree, he was wowed by all the beautiful "aluminum" trees in lots of colors—huge grin on his face. But when they found the tree—the famous "Charlie Brown tree"—Seth beamed. "That's a NICE tree! I LIKE that tree, Mom."

Sniff. :)

I love children. It's no wonder that Jesus Christ has told us to be like them—and that in the midst of important people and matters, He goes to them. They're beautiful. I love, too, that the Savior of the world came as a child—a baby. He was God on Earth—Immanuel. But He couldn't have come in any more glorious a way....

Beard Control for Babies

This story is a year old, but it's still a goodie. :)

When we went to Salt Lake for Bri and Janelle's wedding last December, we got to stay with our fabulous friends Kristin and John. I showed up first, since Matt's schedule was unrelenting.

Seth woke up early in the morning (he was 2 1/2 at the time...) and I thought, oh good, he'll be so tired that he'll sleep on the plane! (I think we had gotten him up at 5:00 or 5:30 for the first flight out. And—another story—we slept through our alarm and rushed to the airport in pajamas! Ack!).

Of course, he didn't sleep on the plane. ...Should have known, Auburn. Should have known. (How can a curious mind sleep when there are so many interesting things going on?)

By the time we got to Salt Lake and were picked up and taken to the hotel where Matt's family was staying, it was still morning and Seth was already clearly insane. At breakfast, he ended up wandering around the restaurant in circles all perplexed, arms outstretched, numbly chanting: "What am I looking for? What am I looking for?" Haha!

When I stole away for a nap later, he just wanted to play with Grandma and Grandpa.

When we braved the snow and ice all day, he stayed awake.

When we went to Matt's grandparents' house later that night for dinner with everyone, he ran around playing with cousins.

So then we go to Kristin's house.... It's late—very late—and he's a complete disaster. His body is giving out on him, his eyes look dreadful.... The kid is beyond exhausted.... I get him ready for bed right away and think, ah yes, he'll go to sleep no problem.

Well, after a little bit of him NOT going to sleep (and finding their art pastels! AAAHHHH!!), all was finally silent, and I thought, yes! And Kristin and I sat only a few feet away from the room to chat for the night. Matt was scheduled to come in but weather delays everywhere but San Diego were keeping him grounded in San Diego (I kept getting text messages from him—why would anyone leave here?! What am I doing?! Hehe). So we're waiting to get the word that someone can finally go pick him up in the middle of the night.

I can't remember what alerted me to the fact that Seth had actually been awake the whole time. I think he actually knocked on the door or something. Kristin and I shared a look of doom, and I went to see if he really could possibly be awake....

And at 1:30 in the morning, twenty hours after Seth had been awakened four hours too early with ne'er a wink of catch-up sleep, this is what we see....

Hahaha!

Never, ever, ever put your child to bed in the same room as your luggage.

My wallet was empty. My make-up had been explored. And, the horrifying part.... He had found all my drugs. The white things you see all over the floor are the contents of a Costco-sized bottle of Claritin (about 300 pills).

(Hopefully you can see these fine. I'm not sure why the videos get darker once they're on the blog....)

I peppered Seth with questions to try to figure if he actually ate any, and I was pretty satisfied that he hadn't....

Until I saw something like this...! [Dum-dum-dumdum!]

Little holes all punched out.... Haha! Beard Control pills. (I've been taking them for forever—since I was first diagnosed with PCOS. My primary motivation in taking them is to not grow a beard. Haha! Very important. So, yes.... Beard Control pills.) The idea of him finding this fascinating punch-hole contraption and working his way through it really amused me. But it also had doom written all over it since I knew exactly how many pills there had been. After scouring every nook and cranny for loose pills, we realized with certainty that he had eaten several. I think it was seven or nine. Seven beard control pills for a 2-year-old! Which, even more alarming, also meant countless claritin pills. Who could tell how many? Could have been fifty or a hundred for all we knew...!

Matt was on a plane by then, about to land, and I called every few seconds until I finally got a hold of him. Pictures of hospital beds were running through my head.... During a wedding! On a trip we only had a few hours for! Luckily, Matt is a wealth of information—saving us an ER visit. Also luckily, beard control and claritin in mass quantities aren't the worst thing ever to a 2-year-old.... Dodged that bullet. (I was glad he hadn't found a way into some of the other drugs! Tylenol?! I can't breathe just thinking about it. Someone was looking out for us....)

By far my favorite thing was that he used my eyeliner. Appropriately. Hahaha!! When I opened the door, he was in the process of putting more on—around and around and around his eyes, trying to get it in just the right place.

He had also put lip gloss on his lips. :) I love trying to imagine the things going on his mind as he discovered one thing after another in my bag.

My other favorite thing was how wired he was for the wedding—still sleep-deprived, and also high on an obscene amount of claritin. (Not to mention whatever a bunch of estrogen might do to a little guy.... Hehe.)

This picture, I think, says it all:

Haha! Yes, that's every other cousin sitting for the picture. Every one. Haha! (Where did this last year go? Look at him!)

Happy Anniversary to Brian and Janelle!!

Part Two

Pain: what I almost inflicted on a 6-year-old boy. Grrr.... Now I know what my mom means about the "Mother Bear" in you flaring up.

But, the best part of this story is not what I did (or wanted to do...), but what Seth did!

So we were at a park. I was sitting on a bench watching Seth play on the play structure a little ways off—he had made some new friends and they were having a great time. Suddenly I see some punk 6-year-old (or so...) sitting at the top of the twisty slide, pushing a littler kid down. I'm not sure if he thought her terror was funny, or if he just didn't notice the terror and thought going down a slide is surely fun...? I also thought it was probably his sister.... 

At any rate, when Seth made his way over, the kid hauls off and shoves him down the slide. Seth flops all around while he twists down, unable to keep his balance, and landed hard on his butt in the sand. He was clearly a little traumatized by this unexpected assault.

I keep sitting there, waiting to see what he'll do first.

He gets off the slide. He marches under it so he can be on the side where he can look up and see this kid's face. And he points a finger at him and says very, very forcefully:

DON'T!

DO THAT!

AGAIN!

PLEASE!

Waving his finger on each word.

Haha! And, I'm telling you . . . . This mother heart sighed a little sigh! And I thought, this kid's gonna be ALRIGHT.... Way to stand up for yourself, kid! He didn't exact his revenge. He didn't start bawling for his mom. He didn't run away, too scared to go back....

In fact, a couple minutes later, he went to go down the slide again, with the kid still staking out the push-people-down spot!

Seth starts to shimmy past him—the kid sitting down was only a little shorter than Seth was standing up, and he was also occupying most of the space.... He puts his hand on the kid's shoulder (hahaha! that killed me!) and says: "Now don't push me down. ...ALRIGHT?"

[This is my heart swelling with awe.]

And Seth actually sits down to try again, with this guy right at his back.

[Pitter-patter my mother heart.]

And this KID!!!

The kid PUSHED him AGAIN!!

[The pitter-patter was over!]

I was off of that bench SO fast...! It was really kind of funny, because I didn't even notice myself decide to get up. By the time I was thinking to myself, "that little PUNK!" I was already halfway across the sand. Stomping. And mad. And ready to bop that kid on his punky little head. 

My fury alarmed me. Hehe. (Somewhere inside—somewhere under the rage—I really laughed over it, too. :))

About 3/4ths of the way there, I realized that bopping the kid or throwing him down the slide was not going to be acceptable, and I literally stood there taking a couple deep breaths before I talked to the kid. I said something like, "Excuse me, he asked you to please not push him down again, and you really need to do what he asked. He doesn't want you to push him down the slide. He TOLD you this, you LITTLE PUNK!!" No, I didn't really say that last part. ;-)

[At which point his grunge-biker dad (this surprised me... :)) came over and shouted, "BOY! You keep your hands off of people!!" And I thought, whoa.... I sure hope he doesn't actually get bopped.]

So, anyway, I adore this story. I was surprised at the fiery rage that flared all through me in about a billionth of a moment. And Seth surprised me with his awesome, awesome finger-wagging, standing up for himself in a direct but polite enough way: "DON'T! DO THAT. AGAIN. PLEASE!" And his willingness to try again, put his hand on the kid's shoulder and say, "now don't push me, alright?" There are so many things to love about the whole exchange.... :) I just love this little guy. He's a fascinating and beautiful person to me. :)

Pain: Part One

People keep asking about my INFERNAL HEADACHE, and sometimes it comes out as, "do you have a headache today?" It catches me off-guard every time, and I always think "umm... well, of course I do... but it's not THE headache. Just a headache. And when—when, I ask you?!—does a person not have a headache? Huh... do you think... maybe... this person sometimes doesn't have a headache, and that's why they could ask this? Huh . . . ."

When I met with my neurologist, he kept asking me to rate my headache on the pain scale*. When the drugs and dosages were working awesomely, I remember telling him, "I feel great! I'd say the headache is only a 3." And he said, "Ah, well that's an improvement.... But we really need to get you to zero." I was totally dumbfounded. Seriously? Zero? Who ever feels zero headache? Zero?! I was totally happy with a three and, actually, I never went back to follow-up.... ;-)

It occurred to me that I had had this discussion clear back in high school: that if I really thought about it, I would always have to say I have a headache, but I just ignore it most of the time and don't really notice. It also occurred to me that ever since my 3-year recurrent Mono (slash CFIDS...?) ordeal in college, in addition to always being tired, I always seem to be in pain. I almost never really think about it, but when I do I can't help but wonder . . . how much of a FREAK am I? Is this normal? 

And you know what seems freakishly abnormal to me? That someone might wake up every day and live their life . . . comfortably . . . . Comfortably? What the heck? Does the human condition allow for this? I'm curious....

Question Number One: Are there some of you out there who sometimes DON'T have any headache at all? 

Question Number Two: If there ARE, are there others of you who are like me, and if you really thought about it would have to ALWAYS say yes to the question, "do you have a headache right now?"

Question Number Three: Is there such a thing—you?—as a person generally living with no discomfort? You just go about your day, and you feel . . . comfortable . . . ? I find this hard to believe. But when people ask me things like, "do you have a headache today?" it makes me wonder.... :)

In short, am I a complete freak?! :) This is the big-picture question. Hehe.

Here are some things I've noticed cause me pain. I'm dying to know if the general response from you readers will be that: A) I'm a freak or dying or something; or B) you can relate to SOME of these things; or even C) you can relate to SEVERAL or all of these things. 

Let me know! Comment! I'm dying of curiosity!

• When I cross my legs, within about one minute, both my knees are screaming with pain.

• When I put my hands in my pockets, my knuckles ache from being bent up against the fabric.

• I wake up a hundred times a night because the places where the bed, or the pillow, or even my own arm or ankle or something are against me are all hurting. It doesn't matter how good the mattress is....

• If I take a sleep aid or something and don't wake up a hundred times a night, I'll sleep in the same position too long and wake up in excruciating, paralyzing, incredible pain! I mean, really.... I can't describe how intense it is. (This is still occasionally worth it to sleep a little better for a little while.... :))

• When I hold a phone, my wrist and ear ache. I keep switching sides, but after about ten minutes that doesn't really help anymore....

• When I take a purse somewhere, even if it's the lightest purse in the world and it sits on my shoulder totally naturally so I don't have to change my posture to carry it, the area where the strap sits gets terribly, terribly sore. Enough so that I will cut my shopping trip short and wish I could have a nap or something. Seriously, it hurts! (Anyone else? A light, good purse?)

• Wearing jeans (which I do every day :)) makes my hip bones hurt where the material presses against them. And, no, my jeans are not too small. (In fact, they're a little too big.)

• Whenever I get blood drawn, most of my arm aches for a couple days. It always makes me feel like a total loser. :)

• Sometimes . . . . This is so ridiculous. Sometimes I wake up because the duvet is resting on my fingers, and the pressure is really making them hurt. Insane.

• Prayer is vital to me—but on my knees with my head bowed and arms folded is so distractingly uncomfortable that if I want real communion for more than about a minute, I often just trust God won't care that I'm laying in bed (or in the shower) talking with Him.

• My legs always hurt. Like I'm training or something.... Except I'm not. (Unless riding a stationary bike five miles a day takes years to train up for. :-| I don't think so....)

• Sitting down, anywhere, any way, any time, is fire on a gazillion joints and muscles. Like right now!

• Oh, and I take two long showers a day just to not feel destroyed. :) This part is great. :)

Anyone? Anyone? And have any of you been told you have Fibromyalgia, and if you have, is this list wholly, partly, or hardly familiar...?

Yes, I take vitamins. Yes, I exercise. Yes, I occasionally try Tylenol or Ibuprofen—Ibuprofen never works, Tylenol sometimes helps a little.

* Pain scale is going to be another scintillating subject in this series. I'm very excited about it. And, in case you're wondering if my pain tolerance is just poor, and also to clarify just how bad the INFERNAL HEADACHE has been, I might make my super-human pain tolerance another post. We'll see.... :) It's actually quite fascinating. :)

Lamest fight song EVER :)

I am a Utah Man, sir, and I live across the green,
Our gang it is the jolliest that you have ever seen.
Our coeds are the fairest and each one's a shining star,
Our yell, you'll hear it ringing through the mountains near and far!

DAVY!

DAVY CROCKETT!

King of the Wild Frontier....

[Haha! How long before Utah fans will finally notice their lame song is a rip-off of another famously lame song...? It'll probably take them just as long as it'll take BYU fans to realize their hymn fight song has way, way, WAY too many verses. We could probably start it on the "rah-rah" part and be right about average.... :)]

The Amazing Race *SPOILER ALERT*

Were any other Amazing Race junkies as bummed as we were to see the Globetrotters eliminated last week...? Best team EVER! The tears just won't stop flowing over here....

Especially because, MAN, it was such an easy task! And they weren't the only ones to struggle with it, either.... So they have five letters—FIVE—that they need to unscramble into some sort of word. They're in Prague. They don't know if the word is Czech or English or what, but I do think they had "Kafka" as a clue at some point.

The five letters are: Z F N R A

Never mind that within about two seconds you should be able to deduce that A is the middle letter, and in another two seconds figure out that the two pairs of consonants that make the most sense together are FR and NZ. Even if you have to make a list of every single possible combination, this takes, at most, five minutes...? I made the following list in three. And I put in bold letters any one that maybe, maybe could possibly be a word.... You'll see I was most generous with this.... :)

FARNZ

FARZN

FAZNR

FAZRN

FANZR

FANRZ

FNARZ

FNAZR

FNRZA

FNRAZ

FNZAR

FNZRA

FRANZ
FRAZN
FRNAZ
FRNZA
FRZAN
FRZNA

FZARN

FZANR

FZRAN

FZRNA

FZNAR

FZNRA

ZFARN

ZFANR

ZFRNA

ZFRAN

ZFNRA

ZFNAR

ZAFRN

ZAFNR

ZANFR

ZANRF

ZARNF

ZARFN

ZRANF

ZRAFN

ZRNAF

ZRNFA

ZRFAN

ZRFNA

ZNAFR

ZNARF

ZNFAR

ZNFRA

ZNRAF

ZNRFA

NFARZ

NFAZR

NFZRA

NFZAR

NFRZA

NFRZA

NAZRF

NAZFR

NAFRZ

NAFZR

NARZF

NARFZ

NZARF

NZAFR

NZFRA

NZFAR

NZRFA

NZRAF

NRAZF

NRAFZ

NRZFA

NRZAF

NRFZA

NRFAZ

RFAZN

RFANZ

RFZNA

RFZAN

RFNAZ

RFNZA

RAZFN

RAZNF

RAFNZ

RAFZN

RANZF

RANFZ

RZAFN

RZANF

RZFNA

RZFAN

RZNAF

RZNFA

RNAZF

RNAFZ

RNZFA

RNZAF

RNFZA

RNFZA

ARZFN

ARZNF

ARNZF

ARNFZ

ARFZN

ARFNZ

AZRFN

AZRNF

AZFRN

AZFNR

AZNFR

AZNRF

ANFRZ

ANFZR

ANRFZ

ANRZF

ANZFR

ANZRF

AFZRN

AFZNR

AFRZN

AFRNZ

AFNZR

AFNRZ

By my very liberal count, there are 11 possibilities. And only one when you consider that as soon as you write down FRANZ, it should be obvious! But people spent hours on this! Poor things....

And poor us, most of all, who lost Big Easy and Flight Time, the best contestants ever, ever, ever. Tears, tears.

Blame Kafka! Boo! :)

Thanksgiving

Things I'm grateful for. Seven.... That seems small for a list like this (don't people just love the top-25 or top-50 lists? ;)), but Thanksgiving Day was our 7th Anniversary! My marriage with Matt is the most important thing in my life.... It gets the big fat #1, and here are seven more to celebrate! :)

1) Seth! I love everything about this person. I'd love to fast-forward ten or fifteen years and see if we got the chance to fall this in love with another kiddo or two, but even if we never do, Seth is more miracle than a person should be able to hope for in one life. :) And he's awesome, too! To paraphrase the illustrious Tom Cruise, he completes us. (Haha!) I love my family so much more than I could ever say.

Ok.... With those two big fat #1's, the rest seem pretty silly. But I'll put six more anyway.... :)

2) The ocean. I love, love, love seeing it every day....

3) Waking up every day and assuming I'll spend most of the day outside, and it'll be pretty and pleasant. This keeps me sane! I love being outside!! (And, maybe even more importantly, Seth loves being outside. A happy, not-pent-up Seth also helps keep me sane. Hehe.)

4) Matt's residency program. Sixty-to-One Hundred-hour weeks and all, this program is perfect. They support the residents, they give him a breadth of experience that keeps him happy, they have a variety of excellent hospitals, and his fellow residents are high-quality great people.... With a schedule like this, it makes such a difference to have the perfect program. THANK you, UCSD!

5) The awesome mega-recording of Tosca, featuring the incomparable Andrea Bocelli. I could listen to this for all eternity.... :) (You know it's gonna be good when the best track is a freaking soprano aria.... Andrea Bocelli+Puccini+awesome tenor arias, and Puccini+soprano makes for an even better piece...? That's a recipe for complete bliss through all 45 tracks.... :))

6) The names Seth and Gabriel. If those hadn't existed, I don't know what we would have done for Seth! Consider the fact that in more than seven years of thinking about boy names, we haven't been able to come up with a single other one that we don't loathe on some level. Everyone says we could find something we love if we had to, but I don't think they understand how much we've thought about this and how little success we've had. I'm scared. Hehe.

7) We took a FABULOUS 24 hours sans-kid to celebrate our anniversary in the exotic location of...San Diego. Got a hotel in the gaslamp (and somehow snagged a great room on the top floor! On the view side!), ate INCREDIBLE Indian food, strolled through some beautiful, clean, pleasant downtown areas, strolled along the harbor, and just had a perfect time. I stood in our room looking out at a couple boats in the harbor, Coronado and the ocean beyond the harbor, the trolley going by, a pretty park underneath us, people strolling around together from all different backgrounds and races, the BLUE, blue sky and the green trees, autumn trees, flowers, and even flowering trees, thinking . . . I . . . LOVE . . . this city. Love it, love it, LOVE it. I don't think half a day goes by that we don't mention to each other how grateful we are to live here! Heaven.... (And a heavenly anniversary! :))

So many more things to be grateful for! I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving full of thankfulness and giving thanks and feeling thanks . . . and eating good food. Food that you were thankful for. Hehe. What a great holiday! (Even when it doesn't fall on your anniversary.... :)) Happy Thanksgiving!

Whoa! I found it! What the heck...?

[To all who enjoyed this post (hehe): as always I must refine my statement. Instances in which holding an elevator is perfectly reasonable: when the doors haven't started to close yet and simply holding the doors so they don't start to close will facilitate getting on; when someone has a kid tearing their hair out and you know waiting for another elevator will cause the mother's poor death; when someone has clearly been running to the building in a state of urgency; when someone is in hard labor trying to get to their epidural upstairs (hehe); um...that's all. :) Instances in which it is ridiculous: all of what I mentioned below, including the scenario where the doors are already closing as you come on the scene. Waiting outside for an elevator? Reasonable. Expected. Waiting inside a box while people keep showing up and slamming the door back open...? Abuse!]

That photo comes courtesy of Vanessa Preziose, by the way. Apparently.... :)

And now for a little venting about a pet peeve: when you get in an elevator, and the doors are closing, and someone runs up either motioning for you to open the doors or, even worse, slams into the button or rams their arm through the door to make sure they get on!

:-|

What the heck is that? First of all, they should be embarrassed to act so desperate about something like a stupid elevator. Second of all, the people on the elevator (even if they're making fun of you like the very nice people in the great picture :)) don't deserve to have to wait extra—in a box–so lame-guy (not in the box) doesn't have to wait at all. They already sat and waited for the elevator to come...! So calm down and wait your turn! The worst is when this happens more than once.... Ugh. Doors opening, closing, opening, closing—almost closed! Nope, opening again. Argh!! Will they never close?! This is especially bad when someone runs up like a maniac and then asks for floor 2. Seriously? You made a fool of yourself getting in, and subjected us to the drudgery of the open-close-open-close game [I don't mean open-close while ascending the floors—I mean the open-close game waiting to just finally get going!]—for floor two? And you're not weeping with shame?

And floor two or not, you couldn't wait an extra 30 seconds for the elevator you don't have to inconvenience people for...? Why ever not? You don't care that they're all stuck in a box? You should cry for yourself and your lameness. Oh, the shame! :)

Sometimes . . . . Hehehehehe . . . . When I'm feeling particularly evil . . . . [This story is why fate—or the gods, or whatever—killed this post, I'm convinced.... Haha!] When I see someone looking at me like, "oh, the elevator is almost closed, I don't want to wait, open the door! Open the door!!," I actually make a startled, "oh!" face, and rush for the buttons to, you know, "push the open-door button." [wink, wink] But really.... I don't. HAHAHAHA!! So sinister. Muwahahahaha!! But maybe seeing someone appear to try to pop an almost-closed door open only to get shut in a box a second time for twice as long, all so they don't have to stand in the open air another few moments—someone willing to be that stinking nice over something so unreasonable—helps them through their awful 10-second wait for the next-door elevator. Hehe. (And, really I was thinking.... Come on! You're making a fool of yourself!)

It always amuses me when I approach an elevator that is closing and the people inside all look at me like, "I suppose you want to get on somehow...," and instead we just wait for the doors to close. (I never, ever, NEVER ask people to hold an elevator for me. In fact, when they do it of their own volition, I'm a little disappointed in the inefficiency. Hehe.) I can tell, somewhere inside, they're all thinking: oh, wow—that unusual display totally made my day!! ;) Hehe. Ah, yes, manners: they're even more satisfying than being evil . . . . ;)

Pocket check.

So, you know how when there's a kid in the house, you need to be careful to check pockets before the laundry...? So that you don't end up with crayons in the dryer or something...?

Apparently, weird things can turn up when there's a doctor in the house. I just pulled the laundry out of the washer to put in the dryer . . . and intercepted a spinal needle!

What the...?

Before doing the laundry:

1) Check Seth's pockets for crayons.

2) Check Matt's pockets for spinal tap instruments.

Gotcha.

A better picture than that last one:

But I still wish it were bigger! Oh well. It should make you salivate anyway.

Here is my Thanksgiving present to all of you blog-readers. It's not only my favorite soup recipe of all time.... It's my favorite recipe of all time! Words can't describe.... Mmmmm...!!!

It takes a long, long time to prepare. But, oh is it worth it. I never realized just how much I could love squash, or cardamon, or cranberries, or pecans, until I ate this soup. It's perfection. Enjoy!!

(The Wolfgang Puck website allows you to adjust the serving size, which is kind of cool. It just doesn't have all the recipes together like I have below.)

Savory Squash Soup

Recipe courtesy Wolfgang Puck

Prep Time:30 min [that's a lie... :)]

Cook Time:2 hr 30 min
Level: Intermediate
Serves:
2 quarts

Ingredients
3 3/4 pounds pumpkin or butternut squash [choose the squash, obviously!]
1 acorn squash (about 1 3/4 pounds)
6 tablespoons (3/4 stick) unsalted butter
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/8 teaspoon freshly ground white pepper
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 white onion (about 4 ounces), peeled, trimmed, and finely diced
1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
1/8 teaspoon ground cardamom
4 cups chicken stock or vegetable stock
1 cup heavy cream
1 sprig fresh rosemary

Garnish:
1 recipe cranberry relish, recipe follows
1 recipe cardamom cream, recipe follows
1/2 recipe spiced caramelized pecans, recipe follows
4 tablespoons pumpkin seed oil [I don't think we've ever included this.... But I bet it's good.]

Directions
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

Cut each squash in half and discard the seeds. Brush cut sides with 2 tablespoons of melted butter. Season with salt, pepper, and nutmeg. Arrange the squash cut side down on a rack placed in a baking tray and bake until tender, about 1 1/2 hours. Cool, scoop out the insides of the squash, and puree the flesh in a food processor. Reserve. (You should have about 4 cups of pureed squash).

In a medium stockpot, melt the remaining 4 tablespoons of butter. Over low heat, sweat the onion. Do not allow it to brown. Add the pureed squash and cook over very low heat until heated through, stirring occasionally. Do not allow it to bubble up. Season with the salt, pepper, ginger, and cardamom.

Pour in the stock and bring to a boil, still over low heat, stirring often. Cook about 20 minutes.

In a small saucepan, heat the cream with the rosemary sprig. Remove the rosemary and pour the cream into the soup. Transfer to a blender or food processor and process, in batches, for 2 or 3 minutes. Adjust the seasoning, to taste.

To serve, ladle the soup into heated bowls. Place a tablespoon of cranberry relish in the center, top with a dollop of cardamom cream, then sprinkle with chopped pecans. Drizzle pumpkin seed oil over soup.

Note: If desired, bake small squash until tender, scoop out, and use as individual serving bowls.

Cranberry Relish:
2 cups fresh cranberries
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup verjus or 3 tablespoons lemon juice
In a small saucepan, combine all the ingredients. Bring to a boil, then lower to a simmer. Continue to cook until the mixture is thick and the berries are glazed. Allow to cool. Transfer to a covered container and refrigerate until needed.

Yield: 1 1/3 cups

Spiced Caramelized Pecans:
3 cups peanut oil [um...we ignore the peanut oil part, and just sort of cook up the pecans the way we know how]
2 cups pecan halves
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 cup sifted confectioners' sugar
In a deep-fryer or a deep pot, heat the oil to 350 degrees. (A deep-frying thermometer can be clipped to the side of the pan so that you can tell when the proper temperature has been reached).

Meanwhile, in a large saucepan bring 2 quarts of water to a boil. Add the pecans and boil for 2 minutes. Drain in a large strainer, shaking off all excess water. Sprinkle the salt and cayenne pepper over the nuts and then coat with the confectioners' sugar, a little at a time, allowing the sugar to melt into the pecans. Toss the nuts by shaking the strainer, adding a little more sugar each time, until all the sugar is used and all the nuts are coated. Do not use hands or a spoon to toss. The nuts should have a glaze of sugar.

Carefully add the nuts to the heated oil, keeping the oil at 350 degrees. Cook until golden brown, about 3 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove with a slotted spoon to a baking tray to cool.

Yield: 2 cups

Cardamom Cream [this is DIVINE!]:
2 cups heavy cream
1 tablespoon black cardamom seeds
In a small saucepan, bring 1 cup of heavy cream and the cardamom to a boil. Reduce until only 1/4 cup remains. Allow to cool. Reserve.

Whip the remaining 1 cup of heavy cream until stiff peaks form. Stir in the reserved mixture. Chill until ready to serve.

Yield: about 1/4 cup

Say what?

I want to go take a picture of the poster for you to see, but I just can't wait to tell you about the ad we saw yesterday! Hahahaha!! So, there are these burritos at ampm, and they look SO good, let me tell you. Let me show you (sorry it's a small picture):

Delicious looking no? (Yikes.)

And in big letters next to them on a big poster covering the front windows, the most unfortunate ad slogan of all time:

SO NICE

YOU'LL TASTE IT TWICE

Hahahahahaha!!!! Are you dying? We were!

Monkeys.

Seth and I go to the San Diego Zoo a few times a week—it's close by, it's gorgeous, it's safe and fun, it has a free SkyTram ride with an amazing view, and it's a killer place to get some exercise (the hilliness is insane!). Plus.... It's gorgeous. :)

Of all the things I love about the Zoo, though, I think there's one thing that stands out as the most fun:

The monkeys.

Obviously, by that I mean: the people watching the monkeys. Haha! I just love it! People ooh and aahh over lots of animals (and the enclosures at the San Diego Zoo are pretty awesome...), but everyone goes downright wacky over monkeys. The other day we were watching the gorillas from a little secluded part of the enclosure, and from the opposite end kept hearing roaring, hysterical laughter from a crowd of dozens who had gathered in front of the glass. It would be quiet for only a few moments at a time, and then..."HAAAHHHHHHH!!! HAHAHAHA!!!! WWWWAAAAHHHHHHAHAHAHAAAA!!"

I'm telling you.... It was hilarious! People-turned-monkeys watching monkeys (or gorillas... :)). There we were all by ourselves, and I'm laughing my head off at the crowd—it was impossible not to. We finally went over to see what all the excitement was about, and the baby gorilla was dancing for everyone—interrupting himself sometimes to go chase down an adult and try to climb all over them before they pummeled him back to the ground like he was a total pest.

The gibbons, the orangutans, all those monkeys with the long arms.... You know where to find them because you hear people laughing together hysterically. And when you see them, it's a whole lot of shiny, happy people pressed against the glass. :) There's just something so intoxicating about these cute, little, smart, hairy things who can swing from trees like we only wish we could, but who otherwise seem so much like...us....

People are lying if they say the monkeys aren't their favorite! Everyone's in love with monkeys. :)