multifarious miscellany

Ever since the weekend, I’ve been dealing with an incredibly annoying tingly sensation around my left shoulder and upper arm. By “incredibly annoying”, I mean “don’t even think about touching my skin because it hurts and I will rip your arm off if you do”. At first it was bearable, then got increasingly more uncomfortable until last night when the husband voiced the concern that maybe it was shingles. He took a look at my back and discovered the beginning of a rash, so an appointment with the doctor was made this morning.

Yup, it’s shingles. It took the doctor all of about 20 seconds to diagnose it after looking at my back. She then proceeded to tell me that not only would I be in a lot of pain, but that I’d gotten it in the worst possible place to get it - smack dab in between my shoulder blades, along the spine. I left with a couple of prescriptions and the promise that I should be over this in roughly two weeks. Thankfully, I will never have this again.

I’ve spent most of the day in a vicodin induced haze, but am currently attempting to be coherent for as long as it takes to get some stuff done. I’m slightly amused by the fact that the majority of people who have heard about this have responded with some variation of “Oh wow, shingles is SO PAINFUL”. The pain didn’t really start until this morning (up until then it was more of extreme discomfort), so, uh, thanks for letting me know what I’m in for :P

I’m nothing if not consistent about not being consistent. With the annual camping trip, new geek gadget, and now Vacation Bible School at church, blogging’s been the last thing on my mind. Actually, that’s not true. There have been several instances when I’ve thought about it, but have been too lazy to follow through with it :P

This was probably the best year so far for our camping trip - six families from church, kids that all got along, perfect weather, and plenty of food. It took a little longer than usual to get completely set up due to one of our sites being occupied until 2:30 (checkout is 2:00), but by the time we were all situated I was definitely ready to slip into camping mode. Friday was (mostly) a chill out and do whatever kind of day, with the entire group going down to the amusement park after dinner. After a Saturday morning session of laser tag for half the group, everybody headed over to the pool. I was perfectly content to just relax in the water, but the husband had fun dunking all the teenagers (who still think they can sink him) and generally acting like, well.. a kid in a pool :P The plan was to stay around for most of Sunday, too, but we ended up heading out around noon. Overall, it was one of the better group vacations I’ve ever been on.

I say Friday was mostly a chill out day because the Friday we were gone was also iPhone 3G release day. The husband was nice enough to be dragged away from the campsite before 7am so I could go park myself in line. Truth be told, the wait wasn’t nearly as horrendous as I expected. The campground is in a tiny town, so there just weren’t many people around - probably 20 people in line, total. It took longer than it should have because of all the activation issues that have been written about time and time again, but at least the store employees were nice about everything and came outside to talk to us every now and again. At some point they decided that they were going to stop activating in store, so I ended up leaving with a totally non-functional phone and was completely disconnected for the rest of the weekend. Kinda nice, actually.

Yesterday was the husband’s birthday, which we will celebrate once VBS week is over. I don’t know how we did it last year without the week-long break between camping and VBS. It’s only Wednesday and I’m already tired :P At least with this year’s Western/Cowboy theme, I don’t get picked on for saying “y’all” all the time. Now if only I could get them to learn that the plural form is “all y’all”…

Why is it that the week before you leave for vacation is when all sorts of things break? It’s times like this that I need to be reminded that good things do happen in life, no matter how small they are.

The Bad:
Something in our car went kerflooey. We were on our way to my mother-in-law’s for a family get together on Saturday and after 15 minutes of random squealing noises, the air conditioner died. Then the car overheated in the span of about 3 minutes, and right after we pulled over into a parking lot was when the smoke started.

The Good:
The husband is a mechanic :D I really have no idea what happened, aside from one of the hose clamps coming loose, which was causing liquid to be sprayed on one of the belts (hence the squealing). All I know is that one screwdriver (the tool) and lots of water later, we were back on the road with everything working ok, including the air conditioner. The determination was that we need a new radiator in the car.

The Bad:
We discovered a leak in our roof last night. While it was raining outside, it was drizzling in my front hallway, too :P

The Good:
Well, since this was discovered at about 9:30 last night in the pouring rain, there wasn’t a whole lot we could do about it then. It was determined, though, where the leak was most likely coming from and how to fix it. And it stopped raining inside when it stopped raining outside, so no standing water above the ceiling. I suppose you could also say it’s a good thing that the leak is above linoleum instead of the carpet.

The Bad:
Ok, I have to admit, I’m still holding my breath for the Third Thing. These things always happen in threes, right?

The Good:
It was 4th of July weekend, which meant fireworks. Fireworks meant a reason to play with the DSLR - although I couldn’t remember all of what I was taught for taking pictures of fireworks, except for needing a long exposure time and to hold still. I don’t do “still” well :P

    

Even if it was even remotely close to being affordable, there’s absolutely no way I would want to have a dinner party while dangling 164 feet up in the air. No.

1. Birthdays are an annual event.
2. Fall is my favorite season because it’s the most comfortable (weather-wise).
3. I feel my best when I get more than 3 hours of sleep a night.
4. Mac & cheese of any variety is my favorite food!
5. First impressions are rarely given a second chance.
6. The best piece of advice I ever received was “it’s not a problem; it’s a challenge”. However, I need less challenges in my life :P
7. And as for the weekend, tonight I’m looking forward to visiting my sister-in-law, tomorrow my plans include a playdate with Nean and Sunday, I want to get some sleep!

1. A smile is apparently one of my best features… it’s been commented on a lot lately.
2. Ziggity is [one of] my favorite board or card game[s], mostly because it takes less than 10 minutes to play :P
3. I would love to have more financial freedom in my life and less stress (doesn’t everybody?).
4. When I think of the Summer Solstice, I think of summer… imagine that.
5. I just remembered I need to go to the bank today.
6. One of my favorite song lyrics goes like this: “then he took and he ate up all of my corn”. Seriously. Makes me giggle every time I hear it.
7. And as for the weekend, tonight I’m looking forward to yard sale-ing, tomorrow my plans include a variety of “maybe we could do this” things and Sunday, I want to be able to relax after church!

FDA Requests Seizure of Animal Food Products at PETCO Distribution Center. This does appear to only affect the following states, though: Alabama, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, and Wisconsin.

I’ve been tagged by several people for this, so here goes:

1) What was I doing 10 years ago?
If my memory is right, I was trying to figure out where I wanted to be as far as college went. I was still living at home and working at the college’s computer lab on the help desk.

2) What are 5 things on my to-do list for today?

• Take kidlet to church tonight
• Possibly get started on some Brain Toys for NYCSR
• Laundry
• Weeding
• Photographing things for eBay

3) Snacks I enjoy:

• Sour cream and onion chips
• cheesey poofs
• …most forms of junk food, really
• apples w/peanut butter

4) Things I would do if I were a billionaire:

• Hire a financial advisor
• Buy a house that is sufficiently roomy enough, but not overly huge
• Pay off the bills and all that practical stuff
• Yarn!

5) Places I have lived:

• Stillwater, OK
• Lansdale, PA
• Stockholm, Sweden
• My house ;)

6) Jobs I have had:

• Retail monkey at Toys R Us survived two Christmas seasons there)
• Loan processor
• Credit analyst
• F&I manager

7) Friends I want to know more about:
Hey, if you want to do the meme, do the meme. If not… fine then :P

1. Kidlet finished school for the year last week, so she has spent nearly every day living at the pool. Thank goodness for the fact that the pool is within walking distance of our house.
2. Firefox 3 = sweet. Looks like they blew past the 5 million download mark that they were looking for, too, since as of this writing there are over 6 million downloads.
3. I am once again updating on Twitter… somewhat.
4. 21 days until vacation. I think the husband and I have been ready since April.
5. New phone coming soon. Super sweet.