Joan on the Road

I opened my online Verizon bill yesterday and got a shock! OMG! $152!! OK, just breathe. Somehow we'll get that fixed.

I called Verizon and Murphy answered. "How are you this morning?" Well Murphy, I'll be really great if you can help me!! I explained my situation which was that we have a family medical situation going on that I need to be on the phone A LOT! I never even thought of how many minutes I was consuming.

"Well I can see that you have been with Verizon forever! I'm here to take care of your problem." Magic words.

I kind of knew what he'd suggest and I was ready for it. Increase my minutes to 900 and he'd make it retroactive so rather than 95 extra bucks I'd pay $20 extra, as if I'd had the increased minutes for the past month. They call it 're-rating". So I'm good to go and in addition...I get to choose 5 family and friends for unlimited calls. Well damn. That will take care of the extra minutes I need. But i only get to do that at the 900 minute level. ....oh well.

Merry Christmas to me!

Posted by Joan at 04:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Everywhere we look it's cold! Bloggers are complaining about it. Big snow hits the east coast. Montana is snowed in and it's a chilly 45 here in Hemet. But that makes it more like Christmas! ....and we are ready!

Shopping is all done and the calendar is printed and waiting to be picked up from Staples. We got hit with a price increase on our family calendar which is now $15 each. Yikes! Some places are charging $30 so I guess we can't complain. One of these years we'll wind up just giving calendar's as gifts. I use Picasa to make collage pages and add our birthdays and anniversaries to the monthly page. Once again I had grandkids helping. It's always fun to see who and what pictures make the calendar each year.

Saturday we celebrated Bryan's 21st birthday. Uncle Jim brought him a few sample bottles of liquor just for fun. I guess he didn't want to open the tequila because he'd had enough of that at the party with his friends! Ahhh...to be 21 again. Renee made chicken enchiladas with a little help from Mary. Oh man, were they ever good. Covered with a white creamy sauce and lots of cheese. We had two big pans full and ate all but 6 of them.

We did a little Wii bowling and I watched the kids play a card game called Phase 10. Sort of a rummy game that I think I'll play next time.

Today we joined our next door neighbors for a "new trailer" warming. Snacks, wine, and a few neighbors around the fire. Most of the Canadians were in shorts and light jackets. We had on jeans, long shirts and jackets. Now we're bundled up inside....my feet still are not warm. I don't get where the global warming is because we're below average temps here every day! Bring on the sunny days!

Posted by Joan at 10:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Friday's surgery went just fine, actually amazingly well. Jim was in and out of the operating room in 2 hours, 4 hours in recovery / monitoring and then we headed back to the hotel. He had little pain or after effects and has a tiny 1/4 inch incision on his back.

We stayed at a Marriott hotel planning on a nice room service dinner only to find that room service doesn't operate in the late afternon AND the prices were outrageous! Renee and Tom were with us all day so they went out shopping and brought back Subway sandwiches and snacks which actually hit the spot better than the gourmet fare from room service. Overall we were not impressed with the Marriott services although the price of 93 a night and the lovely suite with a bay view were great.

We just relaxed Friday evening and Saturday morning watching movies and then headed home in the pouring rain. It's always good to get back home to our own Sleep Number bed. Oh, I forgot to mention that we asked for a feather free room at the Marriott because I'm allergic to feather pillows. We had a feather duvet on the bed and I was suspicious of the pillows but sometimes it's hard to tell. Well in the middle of the night I knew...I woke up all stuffed up and wheezing. Threw the pillows on the floor and tried to recover. They nicely fixed that situation for the second night.

Yesterday we did most of our Christmas shopping...online! Then watched a couple of movies and ate planned leftovers. All in all we got through this episode very well. Today is laundry day and restock the fridge. Tomorrow is doctor checkups with an xray thrown in. The surgeon said he thought the procedure went very well. Follow up xrays and CT scans will tell the tale....we are hopeful.

Posted by Joan at 11:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The long awaited day is tomorrow. Jim will have the RFA (Radio Frequency Ablation) surgery in the morning and if all goes well, we'll be out of there by late afternoon. We're going to stay at a Marriott in Newport Beach tonight and tomorrow night so we'll be closer for the 6:30 AM admission and then won't have to face the long drive back out to Hemet.

We are excited that this day has finally arrived after seven months of chemo for Jim. Thank heaven his side effects were not too bad. He says that the worst of it is the lack of energy and as soon as this is over he'll be into exercise and strength building. Guess I'd better join him in that effort.

We have good examples of exercise all around us. Every morning here at Golden Village Palms there are lots of people walking briskly by, trekking around the park. Some with dogs, some with music, moving quickly. Know why they move quickly? Because it's only 35 degrees outside!!! And they're wearing shorts!! Me...I'll be out there walking when it hits 50 maybe.

Ok ..now it's time for breakfast, showers, pack it up and head out. I may not be online for a couple of days so don't worry. I'm sure all will go well.

Posted by Joan at 09:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

...a tiny adventure.

Jim was cleaning up the kitchen mess about 10 pm last night and noticed that our little paring knife was missing. We had a late doctor checkup so didn't get home until 6 pm and then I started stuffing and roasting a chicken for dinner. So I'd been pretty focused on just getting the chicky in the oven and had made a mess :)

We looked all over the kitchen area, drawers, in, out and behind stuff....nada. No knife. We got out the garbage...now there's something you don't want to do late at night, especially when it involves old, cold chicken fixin's! Opened the garbage and pawed through....nada. No knife.

By this time I was ready for bed. I'd tried to recreate the day and remember what I'd done with the knife. It wasn't until I laid down and closed my eyes that I could picture what might have happened. I knew I had the knife when I fixed my lunch and cut tomatoes. I put it away. I knew I'd used it to slit open the roasting chicken bag at supper time and laid it on the counter. Ahhhhh.....maybe....

Got up this morning after a good, sound nights sleep, lifted up the stove top cover and VOILA!! There's the little knife. Black knife on black paint rim of the stove. (Our stove top has a hinged cover that becomes a counter.) Thank heaven! Now we don't need to shop for the perfect knife again.

Posted by Joan at 09:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Last night we enjoyed the Festival of Lights at U of Redlands. Our granddaughter Mary is in the chorus and got tickets for 10 of us. We love the sing-along! Evan seemed to enjoy it and I think I heard him trying to sing even thought he doesn't know the songs! The best part may be when they turned out all the lights in the chapel, read the Christmas story while lighting candleabra all around the chapel. Very enchanting!

Today was serious business....

Cookie baking and decorating at Renee's ....

and when the tough loose a rolling pin, the Mother of Invention steps in.....

I surely enjoyed the day with some of my girls and came home with a tin of yummy cookies including Peanut Butter kisses, Pecan Butter Crescents and Chocolate Crackles. I love these small Christmas activities...conversation, food, hugs....the warmth of a loving family.

Posted by Joan at 08:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Everything is moving along pretty well for us but it sure seems hectic. Jim's ribs are slowly healing, but still painful. We saw the radiology doctor who will be doing the RFA procedure and got a good desription of what will happen. If all goes well it will be outpatient surgery so we'll get a hotel room and stay by the hospital overnight...too long a trip home after a day in hospital. Surgery is scheduled for next Friday, December 11.

I passed another one year check up with my oncologist. I'm so glad I chose her to help me through the treatments. I asked her how the Health Care issues would affect her and she said she feared for her ability to continue in practice. Jim's oncologist said no matter what happens "we're here to treat patients and that's what we'll do." Both of them are adamently against the current health care proposals.

I had a real hankering to do some baking so I bought all the ingredients for Toll House Choco Chip cookies. Oh My! there is nothing like the smell of the cookie baking and the melt in your mouth flavor of the chips. I made a 5 dozen batch and am baking them 8 at a time. So we have our two cookie and tea evening ceremony.

It's also been a very sad time because my Auntie Alice in AZ died after a year long struggle with cancer. I was not able to be with her but did have many long chats over the past year. It has been a tough year for her family as they helped and cared for her. Alice was a fun person and a great Mom. I have many fond memories of her.

The last few days I've been on the phone a lot with my sister in Florida who is in hospital with gall stones and pancreatitis. Very ill, very painful. She doesn't have much family there who are able to help her...she's pretty much struggling on her own. We know well how hard that is. I've been trying to research stuff for her and give advice. She's not sure what the treatment will be as there are some complications. Jeez, I wish I could be teleported there.

Sometimes I think the old days may have been better, when families stuck together around the old farm, able to help in emergencies. But then I think of all the adventures we'd miss. Right now, I'm thankful to be here in SoCal with my family close by. But I also wish I could be near my sister and my Mom and Dad. Hmmm...no solution on that today.

Now...I'm off to do the laundry.

Posted by Joan at 11:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)