Vyxxan's Virtual Venture

Archive for the ‘Everyday stuff’ Category

I would have loved to post a photo of my rye bread. I should have, actually, the camera still works for some things. I just forgot to do that until I’d ate half the not so beautiful loaf, lol!

I’d love to post photos of all the birds that are coming to my feeders.

But I haven’t, because my camera isn’t working right. I’ve got a point and shoot camera with auto focus, and the auto focus isn’t working. Bad timing on that, I can’t afford a new camera, not with what’s been going on lately.

I’m thinking, though… that instead of going for another simple camera I’d like a digital SLR camera. More like a real camera, and able to focus it manually. It’ll take some saving up to afford one of those, so in the mean time… I’ll have to do the best I can with the point and shoot.

Which isn’t that great. I tried to take a photo of one of the bald eagles that was hanging around back in December. All I got is a dark blob in a blurry tree.

At the time I just figured it was because of weather and light being wrong or something. I don’t hang around outside taking photos a lot in the winter. The sun was almost directly behind the eagle, but it was at the same time foggy/cloudy. I walked to where the sun was a bit off to the side, still got a blurry photo.

I tried again in January. I took great pictures of my cinnamon rolls, but anything at a distance isn’t focusing.

Great photo of a kitten sleeping in a stainless pet food dish… LOL!

Photo that same morning of the field… all blurry. The camera is getting worse on that auto focus thing.

It’s starting to mess with things close up now. Blargh! Mostly what I take are close up photos. I’ve never had a lot of use for pictures of scenery, no matter how beautiful it is. But I WOULD like to take photos of the birds I’ve been feeding against my strict rules of no bird feeding because of outside cats. I’m getting LOTS of birds, a big variety of them. I must have the only feeders in miles… plus, it’s snowy and no one can find food.

I want a photo of teenager cat Stubby sitting in the tree, way out on a branch and covered with snow trying to stalk birds. Does he think he’s going to fly to catch them? Hah. I tried to take that picture, but all I have are a blurry tree, blurry birds… and a blurry snow covered cat. It’s NOT me… I know to lean on something to keep the camera from shaking. I got the green light… but the picture when transfered to my computer was a blurry mess and I wasn’t zooming. Sheesh. (nor was it in macro mode, after a year of using this camera I’m pretty much set in knowing how it works)

Anyhow. I guess the camera is no longer good for anything over 5 or 6 feet away. At least it can still take some photos… it could be worse. My last camera just started inserting static into all photos some of the time, that’s why I got a new one a little over a year ago. I love this little camera, although I’m not fond of how it can use up batteries so quickly. Selling point: takes regular AA’s. Bad point: only uses 2, instead of 4. Even with rechargeable batteries you can go through them rather quick. In fact, I thought the batteries might be the trouble, so I put two fresh regular AA’s into it to see if that was the trouble with the focus. Didn’t help.

Oh well, life goes on… and I’m not going to be taking a photo of Ron in his cervical collar anyhow. LOL!

Ron IS doing much better, though. I expect to go back to work on Monday, for a partial day. Shopping tomorrow for stuff we need and things he can nuke to eat while I’m gone… soups in manageable sizes and microwave ready stuff. I think I’ll pick up one of those long reach grabber things, too, because if Ron drops anything he can’t pick it up. Mostly because he can’t see it when he can reach it. Grabber might help with that.

Well, it’s almost time for chat, so I guess I’ll go do that now…

hugs,
Vyx

I had to take Ron to see his regular doctor yesterday. Needed to get the FMLA forms filled out for Ron’s workplace and they wouldn’t do it without actually seeing Ron. Never mind that it’s a very painful ride in the car for him and they could just see the records… Ron was a bit peeved about that.

Because everything is computerized now, Ron’s doctor had instant access to all the x-rays, MRI’s and ct scans. That’s very cool, saved a lot of time and everything.

Ron is lucky to be both alive and not paralyzed. The second vertebrae is not just fractured, it’s broken. Seriously broken.

Oh. My. Gosh. We are so very lucky.

Please keep Ron in your thoughts for good and rapid healing.

I don’t think Ron talked to his doctor about the cyst… not real high on priority right now. He did get a new prescription for pain medicine, but we didn’t stop and get that filled for some reason. He should be okay for a few days with what is left from the dentist. I was just trying to get him home before the car ride killed him. I guess you never notice how bumpy the roads are until you have a broken neck and can feel every bump.

Today we are snowed in. Before it started snowing it was freezing rain, so there is about a quarter inch of ice under the snow. Snowing like crazy, too, just blowing sideways and mostly from the north. That means that the deepest snow is in front of the house… the south side. It also means I’m getting a ton of snow on the front porch, have to keep going out to scrape it off.

Anyhow… I have another post to write here, just wanted to let everyone know about the Dr. visit yesterday.

hugs,
Vyx

Thursday morning after Ron got off work he went to the dentist to have 2 teeth pulled. He’s got twisty roots and firmly embedded teeth, it took 2 hours for the dentist to get the teeth out, and they had to come out in pieces. That was pretty traumatic, Ron ended up with a very sore mouth, both upper and lower jaw. (also had what looked like 2 black eyes later)

He came home, took pain pills, drank a little water and went to bed. Basically only got up every so often to take more pain medicine and drink a little water. Never ate anything, was pretty woozy from the pills and not feeling like he wanted to put anything in his mouth just yet.

So, about 1:30 in the morning he was up. (pretty normal, he never sleeps but a couple hours at a time, even on pain meds) His daughter Candice and her boyfriend were home and they were all talking. Ron was standing in the kitchen near the sink. That’s all he remembers. Candice said she turned away for a min and heard him fall and thunk his head really badly. I was asleep, of course. So, Candice calls 911 and gets her dad sitting up on the floor, but he’s sort of out of it. Neck hurting really bad. EMS comes and they are about to take Ron away… at that point Candice decided she’d better wake me up to tell me. Gah. I get up and see them put the neck brace on, get Ron on the backboard and start strapping him down, etc. On the gurney, so I ask him if he’s living or dying. Living. Okay good, because we ain’t been married long enough for me to be a widow. :)

They haul Ron off in the ambulance, and Candice is going to go to the hospital, too. She asked if I wanted to go with her. No, not really. I’d stayed up a lot later than normal and had some beers, was in no shape to go anywhere but back to bed. Which is what I did… I know how slow the emergency room is. Lots of sitting around waiting. Not something I want to do with so little sleep.

So, I went back to bed. It was about 2:30 or 3 at that time. Didn’t go back to sleep right away, had to worry a bit first. Got up when I’d planned to get up, at 7. I was scheduled to work at 10, but knew that wasn’t gonna happen now.

I got to the hospital at about 9 am. Diagnosis: Cracked 2nd vertebrae. Sent Candice home to sleep before she needed to go to work. Her boyfriend was asleep in her car. Then I sat there with Ron for 6 more hours in the emergency room mostly just waiting. Every so often I’d go and complain, and every so often they’d come take him for another mri or cat scan. They wouldn’t let him get off being flat on his back, and they wouldn’t let him have anything to drink, but didn’t offer any solutions to his drying out mouth. I found a washcloth and got it wet, to wipe his lips and such. Also tipped a couple tiny sips of water into his mouth from the water bottle I’d crammed into my purse.

I did leave the hospital at about lunch time… I needed to eat and had a phone call to make. Wanted to call my job and update them on what was going on. Eat before I fainted from hunger.

They finally put Ron on an IV, pushed it fast for the first half of the bag… and gave him pepcid ac in his IV line. That was weird, he wasn’t complaining about stomach pains.

Later a doctor came to see him and she was going to admit him as he’d be waiting even LONGER to get a better cervical collar. They leave papers in the room, to go with him as he’s admitted. I looked through them to see what was up… and they’ve got a page in from someone else who came to the hospital because of abdominal pain. I take it back out and give it to them at the nursing station. That might explain the pepcid ac, eh? Mixed up paperwork. Also makes sense why they had to cat scan his abdomen the second time they did it.

Anyhow, Ron got admitted…. and they put him in Pediatrics! LOL! It’s close to emergency and all the cat scans and xray and mri rooms, plus they don’t get a lot of children in that hospital so they always have empty beds there. Still, it cracked me up, and I joked that it was because he was being such a big baby. He wasn’t, really…. that laying flat on his back for so many hours had him in serious lower back pain. The same pain that makes him get up every couple hours when he’s sleeping if he happens to roll over on his back for too long. All that other pain… from his neck and from his back… totally wiped out the tooth pulling pain, though.

Finally about 4:30 in the afternoon the guy shows up with the cervical collar. It’s a rigid plastic deal but with better padding than the one that EMS put on Ron. It can only come off if he’s laying flat in bed on his back with no pillow. Finally Ron is allowed to sit up, get up, and go and use the toilet instead of having to pee into a bottle. Improvement of 1000 percent, being able to get up off flat on his back. Not happy about having to stay in the hospital, but he’ll manage now that he can sit up. They fed him right away, too, and he needed that food… ate every bit of it! He’s tethered to an IV cart and has a heart monitor taped to his chest with a portable thing that fits in a pocket… but hospital gowns don’t have pockets. So he unplugged that when he needed to get up.

I hung out until a bit after 7 pm. We have pets and no one was here to feed them. Before I left I turned on the tv and got Ron his glasses that I had remembered to bring with me but had left in the car all day. Crappy tv, there was something wrong with the picture so it was like trying to watch a 3D movie without the special glasses. Of course I remember back when the only time you got tv in a hospital was if you wanted to pay for it, so I guess free crappy tv is better than rental tv. It was hard on the eyes, though… and harder for Ron, because with the neck brace he was looking through the lower part of his bifocals unless he pushed them WAY down his nose. :)

This morning I slept later than I’d meant to, and didn’t get to the hospital until 10. Ron had another cat scan ordered, for his abdomen again. But they’d fed him breakfast and so had to wait a while. They brought him some contrast stuff to drink. It was clear, and didn’t taste too bad he said. I went out to find out WHY they are scanning his abdomen? Is the paperwork still mixed up? Most of it’s on computer, not actual papers… but after finding that print out yesterday with someone elses name on it I had to ask. Snarky nurse told me they were looking at his lower spine is all. Which wasn’t true, or they wouldn’t be feeding him contrast.

Today the nurses had no idea who I am. They didn’t ask, either, like they did yesterday. Our assigned nurse evidently did pick up that I can’t hear well, so she would talk softer when it was obvious I was having trouble hearing her. Snarky. Well, I found out later that for some reason they had Ron listed as Divorced and next of kin were just his children. I said Well that was a quick marriage, and who the hell divorced us? Heh. Anyhow, that explains the snark I guess. If I’m not his wife, it’s not my business, and there is that whole privacy thing that hospitals and doctors have to conform to.

Anyhow. Lots more waiting around today, but when the gal brought Ron his lunch she gave me a tray, too, as she had an extra one. I ate it… it wasn’t bad, and it was better than leaving the hospital to go find fast food. Ron cleaned his plate again, making up for the day of not eating after the teeth got pulled. The nurse checked on Ron and asked if there was anything she could get him… and he said Yes: Discharge papers. I piped up with How about a Doctor? One was supposed to see Ron this morning and never came. Need a doctor anyhow to get the discharge papers.

We got a doctor. Before she came, we got a Physical Therapist. Checking to make sure Ron didn’t have a stroke that caused him to faint. Ron told her his story, and she agreed, it was probably a combo of pain pills, no food, and standing up too long. The doctor came, she did some of the same stuff and said yes YES yes! Ron can go home. Ron is now happy…. he thinks hospitals are bad, being in one can kill you faster than being at home. He was sorry he ever mentioned the neck pain to EMS and got taken there… he was woozy from pain pills. But the neck pain is pretty bad, if he hadn’t gone with EMS he would have been there later.

He’ll have to wear the collar probably for a couple of months. Be on medical leave of absence from work. Can’t drive, can’t turn his head. Will have to shower with the collar on, but we have spare pads for it, and I know how to take it off and change the pads. They recommended we get a shower chair, and I think there is one in the family already, but Ron said to just get one of the hard resin chairs off the porch, that’ll work. It’s hard for him to get up and down from sitting to standing… but he’s managing. I’m not sure if there is anything that would help that other than practice. I don’t dare get him a walker, lol… but that might help him to get up and down easier. We’ll see.

Until I’m sure he can manage on his own here at home I’ll have to take a leave of absence from my job, too. So, figure a week at least of me being home… not so much to wait on him but to make sure he can do what he needs to do and NOT overdo it. He’s already apologizing for me having to get up and get stuff for him, but that’s part of my job as wife. It’s not like he can jump up and down. Sure, he’s supposed to get up and move around a bit, but no, not after he’s just sat down again. I told him not to be bothered about it, but he will be of course. This is the man who always jumps up to refill my coffee cup and likes to wait on me, do stuff for me. I had to retrain him a bit to not do all that, but he still likes to. I will be taking over all his stuff… even the stuff I never wanted to retrain him from doing, like unloading the dishwasher. I’m okay with that, it’s part of my job as wife. He’s never let me spoil him as much as he’s spoiled me. :)

Oh, and one last thing. Those abdominal scans? I don’t know why they did them in the first place, but they found a cyst on his pancreas. So, some of the follow up with his regular doctor will be to discuss that. Unless, of course, along with mixing up papers they also got scans mixed up. It doesn’t seem to be anything Ron has noticed, he doesn’t get stomach aches or heartburn or anything like that. Do need to follow up on that…. but I’m not going to worry about that until I have to. More important is that his neck heals up…. he won’t care about anything else until he can be his same old self and the neck has to heal first.

hugs,
Vyx

Ron and I got hitched as planned on the 20th of December.

We had an appointment with the Mayor of Prairie Grove for 9 am. That’s the next town over, maybe 10 miles away at the most. (Tried to get the Lincoln Mayor, but he works a real job, so couldn’t do it on the day I wanted).

So, Ron is rushing me out the door at not even 8:30 am. He KNOWS it doesn’t take long to get there, but we don’t want to be late, right? We were, of course, quite early. But the Mayor was there, so it was good. He has us come in to the empty court room and sit down to go over the vows.

Well, we had him cross pretty much everything out, LOL! The ceremony is required, but it doesn’t have to have all that stuff in it… and eeek, there must be a VERY long version, as there were pages and pages of it! So, we cut it down to what he was required to say at the beginning and then right to “I now pronounce you husband and wife”.

We kissed, and sat back down again while he signed the marriage certificate. I gave Ron his half of our Mizpah, and put my half around my neck. Ron tipped the Mayor, who shook our hands and congratulated us, and we were off to our next stop. We were out of there before 9 am, our appointment time. :)

Straight to the county courthouse to hand in our certificate to be recorded. Took us longer to get through the metal detector than it did to do our business… which was pretty much how it was when we got the marriage license. Ron has too much metal on him and sets the detector off every time, lol!

We were out of there in record time and headed down towards the National Guard Armory. Ron is retired Marines, and as his wife I am eligible for medical benefits but I need a military ID first.

So, we get there, it’s not far. Go in, and of course there is someone already there being helped. Only, from what I could hear they were mostly chatting. Finally it’s our turn and the guy does stuff on his computer and then tells us we need Ron’s divorce papers. Why? It’s been 5 years, he had her taken off as his dependent right away. Well… because she remarried that same year and to another retiree. Only, instead of adding her to her new husband, they put her back on as Ron’s dependent with her new married name!
Crikey! I’m like, you are kidding me, right? Someone was that idiotic? Not the guy running the show today… the normal person is probably on vacation. No way to fix it without the divorce papers? Nope!

So, we hop in the car again and head home. Made a stop at Sonic for breakfast, all we’d both had was coffee so far. It’s quite a ways to come home and go back again and of course we get back there only to find that everyone is gone to lunch. Sheesh.

Well, we had to go meet the electrician to pay him, so we did that and went back to Prairie Grove for that meeting. Then back to Fayetteville again to the National Guard Armory. AGAIN someone was being helped, but this time it was faster, not so much chatting. The guy dealing with us scanned the divorce papers in this time, and saved them in the file. He also scanned in my birth certificate, our marriage certificate, etc, etc. No messing up this time around… and pretty quick I was sitting in another chair for a photo. Got my card.

Finally we were on our way home. I was so glad I didn’t promise to be at work after all that… we were both exhausted after all the driving around here there and everywhere. We got home in the early afternoon and just plopped into the love seat we sit on for a while. Tired!

Anyhow… Ron took his Mizpah off right away. I wore mine for 3 days, until the chain gave me a bad rash around my neck. Neither of us planned on wearing them anyhow… I was just waiting to get to the craft store to buy some little split rings for them. We both now have them on our keychains. I love jewelry, but can’t wear much because of nickel allergies, and Ron doesn’t wear it because of safety things at work. The Mizpah was a great idea suggested to me by my buddy Rabbit. (thanks again!)

It was quite a long day for all the driving and when it got close to bedtime… my daughter Sarah arrived from Chicago. She’d planned on driving down the day before just so she could be there, but I said, nah… help clean up from your party and rest up, and then come down. Thirty seconds of wedding ceremony ain’t worth it.

Was a great start to the holiday season and me? I’m happily married now. But I was happy before, too.

hugs,
Vyx

I have certain topics I touch on all the time, but the story of the love of my life isn’t usually one of them!

Thing is… we are gonna get married. Sometime before the year is over. I’m trying to pick out a date… thinking that December 20 would be good. Subject to change of course… I may find a better day.

We won’t be having a wedding. This will be Ron’s 4th and my 3rd marriage. Just a “go to the court house, get license and find a justice of the peace to do the ceremony.” I don’t know why they require a ceremony, but they do. I would think that the license would be enough. But it isn’t, so we have to have someone say words at us etc.

Anyhow. I met Ron late in 2005 on an online dating service. He emailed me first, and he seemed nice enough… even without a profile photo. We made arrangements to meet, but it was not good… I’d been up too late the night before, up too early shopping for computer stuff for my b-i-l’s family, and just couldn’t hang around the bar we’d arranged to meet in long enough. Ron was in town checking out a car one of his kids wanted to buy, was late to our meeting and I’d already gone home.

So, before the next meeting I had him send me a photo. It was funny… I shared it with my Mom and we both thought we had met him before. We hadn’t, but he sure looked familiar.

Next meet up in person we met at Waffle House parking lot, and went out to dinner at the Mexican restaurant across the parking lot from there. I have no idea what I ate. Don’t even remember if it was any good! After we ate, we drove around here and there and talked and talked and talked. I’d never taken a potty break in all that time, so finally we got back to my car and I need to go HOME. Poor Ron was thinking… okay, never gonna hear from that girl again. :) He was also worried because I can’t hear well… and he could barely understand my California accent. Shucks, Californians don’t have accents! I don’t, anyhow… I have a funny almost British accent, not a California one.

I was thinking… OMG, this guy is like I already know him except for his stories. I really liked him. So we went on other dates… including a date that he brought me beer to drink and took me to a lovers lane so I could drink it. But I wouldn’t let him come to my house yet… I’d parked my car down the road a bit from there and he had to deliver me back to my car. Looked like he was gonna kiss me, so I ducked and got into my car before he could. Awkward!

But next time there at the lovers lane… he reaches into the backseat for something and I think he’s making his move again… so I kissed him first. Totally shocked the heck out of him, he was reaching for a paper towel, not making a move. LOL!

We finally decided we liked each other well enough to maybe introduce each other to family. First we go to his Mom’s house. I’m like GEE GOLLY! That “lovers lane”? That was the road to his family’s homestead. LOL! Ron’s Mom Beulah was happy to meet me, she said she hadn’t seen her son so happy in a long time. I got to hear lots of stories, but then it was time to go to MY family homestead.

Get to my Mom’s… and I didn’t realize it was Super Bowl Sunday. Great. Bunch of drunk people talking politics and only 2 nephews actually watching the game. Poor Ron got to meet not only family but neighbors, too… and he got grilled and I was cringing the whole time… But Bruno my big fox hound went right over and sat on Ron’s foot, so that was good. We left there and Ron made a couple comments about the political talk, but nothing about all the drinking!

We lived apart and just saw each other on weekends for quite a while… until fall of 2007… I got a new job on days, and Ron had been switched to days from his usual 3rd shift. I figured he could help me learn to wake up early… I’m more of a night person and had been working swing shift. So I thought I’d stay here until I got used to it and then go home again.

I never went home again.

This is my home now. More another time…

hugs,
Vyx