Getting back on track

Finally, finally, finally - I may finally be getting over all of this stupid cold/flu business from the last few months. I hesitate to say too much about any of it, and I will make sure to knock on wood right now to not jinx anything.

I celebrated my 31st birthday last Wednesday, and it was an interesting feeling. I went out to dinner and a play with my mom, since L. is still away for work in Brazil. During our dinner, I talked with my mom about where my life is at right now, and how I'm not really sure what's next but I figure there has got to be *something* else coming along the way. She said that she felt the same way in her early 30s, and mentioned the book "Passages" by Gail Sheehy. She fished it out of her library over the weekend, and passed it on to me for a good read. Based on the first several pages, I can say that nothing as traumatic as having someone have their face blown off right in front of me has happened recently, or ever for that matter. So, I don't yet connect with what she is saying, but then I'm not quite 20 pages into it yet. So, we'll see. My mom swears that this answered a lot of questions for her, so I'm sure that there will be some good info to glean from the pages.

Other than that, I think I'm finally getting the point where I can focus on the diet and exercise stuff again, which will be good. Being sick for a few months can really throw a wrench into weight loss, and I'm frustrated that I've actually gained. That's what happens when my butt is glued to the couch instead of the balance ball. Oh well. This is going to be a lifelong issue, I'm afraid, so I'd better get used to times where I'm thrown off track and gain some, and then need to work hard to get it off again. Whee!

Again with the pills

So, all this time I've been complaining about having a lack of immune system. However, it appears that right now I have an overreactive immune system. At least, that's how I'm understanding the whole allergies-to-the-point-you-want-to-die phenomenon that I'm currently experiencing. This has, of course, caused my asthma to crop up again, which is always a lovely follow-up to having been sick and then being smacked with allergies. The last issue in this fabulous trifecta is acid reflux. I had problems with acid reflux for many years, and after having lost weight last year on the 20/20 program, I went off of my Prilosec for the first time in a very long time. Now, I'm not sure that was the best idea. Apparently the recurrent sore throat and increasingly severe throat and ear pain is likely due to acid reflux. And there is a link between asthma and acid reflux, so it's good times all around.

She also had me do a test for strep and mono, of which the strep came out negative (thank God) and the mono we won't know about until tomorrow maybe. I kind of doubt that it's mono though, because L. had it a couple of years ago and despite my exposure, I never got it. Turns out that most people get resistant to it after exposure as kids without ever developing the symptoms. So, I think that would be highly unlikely, especially considering I have no fever although I'm as cold as a freezer. I got up earlier and got out of my blanket for a couple of minutes and my teeth were literally chattering. Seriously. So, I'm not sure what's up with that. My body temperature is lower, but it tends to run about a degree lower than the normal 98.6 degrees that is "normal" anyway.

My doctor put me on three medications today in hopes that we can get this trifecta under control, AGAIN I might add. Plus the Ibuprofin for the extreme throat and ear pain. So, four things not to mention the existing asthma medication I use. Blech. You know, one day I'd love to know what it's like to be a normal human being with a normal immune system that either reacts properly to germs or doesn't overreact to stuff like plants and grasses, etc. That would be really awesome. With the way things are looking, though, I suppose I shouldn't hold my breath.

Theo Chocolate

Today, my manager took our team to an offsite morale event at The Chocolate Factory in Freemont, house of Theo chocolates. They have the incredible distinction of being the only organic and fair-trade chocolate factory in the US. We got to go on a tour of the factory (which even included hairnets!) and hear all about the history of chocolate and how they make chocolate at the factory. It was a really cool afternoon, and it was full of many wonderful samples of their goods. I had no idea how much work it actually takes to get chocolate into its yummy form that we are familiar with. I was also surprised at how much it smells like coffee beans when it starts out. I bought several bars before we headed out for lunch at a local Italian restaurant. It was a really fun day with the people on my team, and I think it was much needed. We've been working really hard and it was time to get out of the office together and connect on a different level than our normal day-to-day stress of trying to get our documentation planned, written, and published.

Huh? Come again?

I drove by a road-side billboard recently that just had my puzzled. It's an ad for Snickers candybars, which reads:

"Take a sabbatical to
Feedgypt"

With the "Feedgypt" in the same print as the normal Snickers logo. I'm sure there's a simple explanation, no?

Or it's because she's a plastic doll

The hypertext for this link read "Barbie & the Big 5-0: How the Birthday Girl Stays Georgous and Relevant." Then when you click on the link, you see, "A Barbie World: No wonder Barbie looks so great at 50—the ultimate blonde bombshell has 25 hair and makeup pros on call."

Ummmm. Right. Or it's because she's an inanimate object that does not possess the capability of aging. You know, because she's a pastic doll. Contrary to the article, I don't think she's had botox. Not to say that I didn't like Barbie when I was a girl. I had several Barbies, one Ken (who was shared by all of the girls at various times), the Barbie mansion, and the Barbie Ferarri. I also had the Barbie dance club, which had a dance floor that you could strap Barbie's feet in and move a lever to make her move from one side to the other. I'll never forget the endless hours my friends and I spent playing with our Barbies, doing their hair, and making clothes for them. But you know, at the end of the day my Barbies never grew back their hair or had their arms put back on when something bad happened (we also had many experiments to see how tough Barbie was), because she was a doll. No botox or lipo required.

Concern of the day

The DOW went under 7000 today - by a couple hundred points. Sure am glad that I've been stocking my money away in a 401K plan so that everyone can cash out of stocks and leave the rest of us behind wondering how we'll retire! Because we sure didn't lose enough money in our retirement plans last year. Good times... I'm thinking I'll need to work on a plan B for retirement. Of course, retirement is still many years away (unfortunately or fortunately, I can't decide), so I guess I have a little bit to figure things out.