Sick Sickly.

It all started last Thursday.

I ate a BK veggie burger for lunch, and a Boca "chicken" burger for dinner.  Then my tummy started hurting. I thought I can sleep it off.

Friday morning I felt awful.  But I got up and went to work, because I thought getting up and moving would help.  I made 4 bathroom trips before 7:30, and pulled the trash can right by my desk, because I was sure I was going to barf.  Fortunately, I didn't.  Eventually I felt a little better, and made it through the day.

I drove up to Sonora with the dogs on Friday night.  They were pretty well behaved.  But the drive went on and on, and I was so tired.  I felt pretty crummy when I got there, and went to sleep pretty quickly.

On Saturday I got up early to go and pick up some treats for the staff.  I did my normal things; walked the dogs, picked up litter.  While picking up litter, I got really light headed, and nauseous.  So I stopped and went back to the cabin.  I took a quick, cool shower, and laid down.  I again put the trash can near by.  I slept a couple hours, and felt a little better, but not a lot.  Aaron asked if I wanted to just stay there, instead of going into town.  I said no, I'd be ok,

I did ok.  I still felt lousy.  We saw Wolverine, which wasn't great.  Went to Walmart, got dinner (which Aaron dropped on the floor at the grocery, but they were nice enough to not charge us.  I felt asleep really early.

Woke up sick again.  Got on the road too late, 10:40.  When I got home, I took my temperature, which was high.  I took some medicine and went to bed.

Stayed home sick today.  I'm staying home again tomorrow.  Bleh.

Busy

I've been doing a lot of yard work lately.  I'm trying to make it look like someone who cares lives here, instead of hobos.  Last week I did a lot of the bushes and tree.  I had 7 wheelbarrows and one trashcan full of yard waste.  This week I mowed the lawns, and did edging.  We only have a hand (non-electric) edger and it is A LOT of work.  I did about a third of the front yard.  I still need to finish the edging and clean out the flower beds.  I've been watering the lawns a lot too.  Usually I let them get too dry in the summer.  I'm trying to keep them looking... nice?  Better?  The back lawn in especially bad.  I think I need grass seeds, or something.

This week has gone by slowly.  I've been counting down the days til I get to see Aaron.  Since I didn't see him last week, it's been too long. But tomorrow is the day!  Yay!

I switched my nose stud to a ring.  I really like it.  Not the best picture of me, but you get the idea.

I started the cancer prevention study today.  It's a long term study 20-30 years.  So far I've done a couple surveys, and today I got a couple measurements, and had a blood draw.  Easy Peasy.

After almost 4 months, I finally got my period.  Geez, it's been really crazy.  I've been talking to my obgyn.  She said after a year of trying I could see an infertility doctor.  But that's not covered by my insurance.  Grr.  Fingers crossed my ovaries start doing the right thing.  

Today, I was walking the dogs.  My neighbour, Steve, was his yard playing with his dog Dennis (either a full Pit, or Pit mix.  Dennis is the nicest dog.  We walked the other way, and I didn't think Dennis saw us.  Then I heard Steve yell "Dennis!  No!"  Dennis came running towards us.  I wasn't worried about him, because he's nice.  I was a little concerned about how Zelda and Yoie would act; they both get nervous around other dogs.  I held Yoie back.  Dennis came and smelled Zelda, she smelled him.  Eventually Yoie's barking caused Zelda to bark.  And then Steve got Dennis, and apologized profusely.  This whole thing was maybe 5-10 seconds.  I was pretty happy with the result for the most part.

Work is going well.  I've been pretty busy, but I actually was completely caught up a couple times.  It's been a while since that happened.

That's it for now!

This afternoon sucked balls.

What was supposed to happen:
Come home, finish the rest of the yard work, tidy up, walk dogs, lounge, Humira.

What actually happened:
I went out to finish clipping all the bushes in the back (which is a huge job, and really needs to be done); only to find that the electric hedge clippers that I'd borrowed from my FiL were busted.  As in, I broken them yesterday.  I thought they'd over heated, but nope, they're actually broken.  So I couldn't finish the yard work.
While in the garage (trying to fix that damn clipper), I noticed a bad, rotting kind of smell.  I started investigating.  I threw all the rags in the washing machine, since I thought they might be the source.  Nope.  I kept sniffing around.  I bent over to look at something and felt the carpet was wet.  (I know, carpet in a garage?  That was my FiL's doing.  He thinks carpeted garages are great.  No clue why, since stuff like this happens...)  I felt more, a large portion was wet.  Then I looked at our water storage shelf and saw that a 2.5 gallon bottle was 2/3 empty.
Of course this happens while Aaron is gone...
So I emptied the shelf, which was really full.  Moved the dog food tub, and dragged the shelf out of the way. That was difficult.  Also, it was super hot in the garage.
Once all the crap was moved out of the way, I went at the carpet with a utility knife.  More hard work.

Here's what it looked like after I got the shelf are carpet out of there.  See how wet it is?

 
Here is the disaster I made of the garage...

The carpet I tossed out.

While doing all this, I also came across a major ant invasion.  ...yay... 

Now for an aside.  Last time there was a major ant invasion in the garage, I grabbed the bug spray and the vacuum.  For some reason the ants where all in the dirty clothes pile.  While trying to vacuum around the clothes, I sucked up a pair of gym shorts... and broke the belt in the rug-beater (I have a Kenmore canister vac).  I found the manual online and tried to take it apart so I could potentially fix it.  But I couldn't get the thing to come apart, like it was supposed to.  Fortunately (I guess) the vacuum also came with a mini-rug beater (to use on stairs, or upholstery etc).

So then I was crawling across the floor (with a lantern) following the ants, using the little vacuum attachment to suck up the ants. Once I found where the trail was coming in, I sprayed the hell out of it.  

Then I realized I needed to drag the rest of the yard waste to the curb.  I dragged the really heavy, full can to the curb, flipped it over, and nothing.  I think 3 leaves fell out.  O_o  I turned it up right, then upside down again.  Nothing.  I left it upside down and slammed it on the ground a few times.  Still nothing.  Then I flipped it on it's side, and started pulling the stuff out by hand.  It was all pokey, and humid.  Ick.  Then I flipped it upside down again.  Still nothing.  Slammed it on the ground and it was still stuck.  At this point, I started to loose it.  I kicked it, and punched it.  That, of course, didn't help.  I put it back on its side and started pulling the leaves and sticks out again.  While doing this, I stabbed the broken blister that was on the side of my thumb.  That started bleeding.  I finally got the stupid can emptied and went back to the backyard.  On the way there, I started sobbing.  And didn't stop for about 10 minutes.

Also, Fiona has not stopped barking.  And Zelda has been whining a lot.  Good times.

In other news, I decided I'm going to do 30 random acts of kindness for my 30th year.  I've started on a few.  Today I paid for the car behind me at McDonalds.  I'll write more on this sometime in the future.  But I just wanted to throw that in.  Everything before I got home from work was fine.

Road-tripping (with Dogs)

Aaron is up in Sonora running the boy scout camp, all Summer.  It's about 120 miles away, or 3 hours, with no traffic or stops.

We (the dogs and I) have traveled up to see him twice now.

I made a lot of mistakes the first time we went.

• We left at rush hour on a Friday.
• I didn't take the girls for a walk first.
• My Adderall wore off part way through.

We left right after I got home from work, and hit the road at 4:10.  We hit major traffic in Fremont.  Then, while we were stuck (the traffic was crawling a long), Zelda announced that she needed to go to the bathroom.  She started whining and didn't stop until I was able to pull off about 20 minutes later.  And then it took her a long time to find the perfect spot.  The whole excursion took up 20 minutes.  Then it took a long time to get back on the road.  By the time we'd been on the road for 2 hours, we'd only traveled 40 miles.  It was a long day.  We were stuck on 680 a long time, then on 580 for a long time too.  

We stopped in Manteca for another potty break.  There wasn't any traffic after that, but I still had to stop a few more times for Zelda to pee more.  That was pretty annoying.  We didn't get to camp til after 10, so I 3 hour trip became a 5+ hour trip.  

The first trip home was more or less the same.  Lots of stops, lots of whining.  It's all Zelda.  Fiona is a great travel dog.  She's quiet, and she stays in my lap the whole time.  Zelda whines, lays down, gets up (has jelly legs) whines, lays down and repeat (ad infinitum).  It's frustrating.  Anyway, the trip back took about 4 hours.

Last week we went up again, this time on July 3rd.  Still a bad travel day.  But this time, we didn't leave until 6:30, in hopes of missing most of the traffic.  Also, I got a sedative for Zelda.  We still got stuck in traffic, but not nearly as badly as the previous week.  The trip still took 4 hours.  But the sedative seemed to help some.

Today's trip home was much better.  Zelda slept most of the time, and we made the trip in 3.5 hours.  

Zelda at a happier moment.

Fiona's standard riding pose.

Zelda sat in the from seat for about a minute while we were stopped.