It’s My First 2013 Friday!

Part of my plan for 2013 is that I’m going to let myself not be as committed to all 3 memes I usually do on Fridays. I enjoy doing them, but it is also quite time consuming to write all three and then visit other blogs who participate. I enjoy reading others’ responses, but I also feel there is an obligation to read other blogs that do the memes too. I mean, really, how rude is it to expect readers if I’m not reading, right? But the truth is that if I secure employment, which my bank account and the hospitals expecting coinsurance payments for their services really want me to do, I’m, not going to have as much blog time. That doesn’t mean that I’ll quit blogging! It just means some things will be streamlined. Mainly that means I’ll end up cutting down to one meme a week on Fridays. I’m not working yet. It’s just a busy day today.

I’ve had to do lots of updating because our new health insurance kicked in at midnight on January 1…just in time for me to use it in a big way! Since I didn’t get the power chair before the end of the month and my doctor’s office let me know they won’t work with the company I chose for my power chair, I’m back at square one. I have no idea what chair I want and I’m not in any big hurry after a hospital stay to start my relationship with the new insurance to ask for any big ticket items.

So it’ll be next Wednesday that my manual chair and I visit the Bureau of Vocational Rehabilitation to seek assistance in securing a placement. Maybe I’ll look for a work from home opportunity for now, which I can find legitimate positions in that area with the help of the BVR. If I can make a decent paycheck working at home, I might stay with that, but I really would love a job outside of the house to communicate with other people. We’ll see. Maybe that steady check will mean I can afford to do more, maybe even afford the power chair on my own – then I can have the one I want on my terms. We’ll see what happens. First I need to get the ball rolling.

Okay and as the pizza in the oven is calling my nose, let’s post already, huh? Joining Hilary at Feeling Beachie for this week’s Friday Fill-Ins.

This week’s statements:
1. When I __ I ___
2. It is pretty funny that ____
3. It may be strange but ___
4. How ______ made me ______.

My Responses:

1. When I don’t get enough sleep I am hungry the whole next day,

2. It is pretty funny that sometimes something very small can cripple something huge.

Years ago I was part of a large live cable TV remote at a major festival. I brought a coffee pot for Saturday morning, for which the crew was quite grateful, but the coffee pot drew enough power from the production truck that it caused a power outage that knocked the entire production off the air for almost a half hour. Needless to say, after that coffee was brought in from the local donut shop and coffee and donuts in the mornings became one of the meals we had brought in for the production in the years that followed!

3. It may be strange but I crave potato chips and French onion dip during the holidays. I don’t eat it or want it at any other time, but I have to have my one bag of potato chips and one tub of French onion dip between Christmas and New Year’s Day.

4. How David made a point of driving to Canada just for dinner for my 39th birthday with my family made me fall in love with him. (I was heading there anyway, but that was the moment of no return!)

Reaction To Challenge

I’m working on a rewrite of my goals post. When I used to do my annual goals in my planner, I used to include inspirational quotes with my various categories of goals and I want to do a little more organizing with my goals and projects for this year. That should have been my Hodge Podge answer #1 for yesterday; by the end of 2013, I want to have my organized goals and projects ready to post at the Chronicles of Nani before 11:59PM December 31. For now my most immediate goal related to that is that I want my goals for 2013 organized and ready to post my 11:59PM January 13. That’s Sunday Of course, 11:59PM because midnight is the first gasp of the next day!

While blog hopping the Hodge Podge yesterday, I visited a new-to-me blog; Joanne’s A Chocolate Bouquet. Joanne and I have man things in common aside from my obvious attraction to her blog name, A Chocolate Bouquet; the woman speaks to my heart. Well, okay, chocolate isn’t speaking to my heart, my taste buds, maybe, but hey they are important to me. I do, after all, call them my buds! Yes, I swiped that from a Sonic commercial, but I loved the idea of “I should call them my ‘taste bros.’” The chocolate is for my taste bros! Or maybe taste sisses? I’ll have to work on that one. But I digress. Joanne and I also share the need for coffee and supplies if there is nothing else in the cupboard and we both seem to like to inspire and motivate where we can.

So Joanne started A Chocolate Bouquet Blog Hop on Thursdays where anyone can join by linking to their motivational posts. Here is what she said on her blog about the types of posts in the hop:

Share with us:

How you stay motivated

What made you decide to make a life changing goal, and why you are sticking with it

Why making goals is important to you

or any other post that will be encouraging to others who would appreciate the extra boost!

So without further ado, here is my motivational thought for the week:


Reaction To Challenge

My quote “I cannot control things that happen to me, but I'm the only one that controls how I react to things that happen to me.” It's really my motto for life, especially post MS diagnosis. My own husband calls strong as I gimp around the house with cane and walker and he pushes me around with the wheelchair when we go out because he says I handle things better than he would. Keep in mind that David has seen me at my lowest too, but the smiling moments far outweigh the frustrated tears. That’s because they HAVE to. I don’t have a choice about the MS but I’m the only one that chooses how I react to it and I’m not giving up that power. It’s a simple choice, really. I can let the frustration overpower me and wallow in the negativity or I can adapt and do as many of the things I’ve always enjoyed as I can with those adaptations. No effort miserable, effort happy. Well, duh! I choose happy!

I know people who seem to choose sad or frustrated or defeated and really, their facing problems that are much more beatable than MS. It’s easy to dwell on the challenge facing you than it is to face it or to find a solution around it. It’s easy to blame someone else for your problems than it is to fix them yourself, but is there any satisfaction in knowing who’s at fault? You still don’t have what makes you happy. So, take a tip from she who doesn’t walk; adapt!

Adapting can be as simple as writing down the pros and cons of a situation and choosing to focus on the pros. It can be as complicated as shoring up your resume and seeking a new job. The important point is that in any situation that doesn’t work for you, you have to decide what you can do and focus on that. The solution to any problem has to start with being optimistic that you can succeed in finding that solution. That optimism has to start within you; you have to know what you can do and you have to do it. Choose to make yourself be happy.

Wednesday Hodge Podge

1. What is ONE thing or area in your home or life you hope to report is completely organized when 2013 draws to a close? Do you have a plan to make it happen? 

I’m going to get my goals up this week. I have given up on the whole organization thing because I try, I fail, I get depressed; My goal this year is to learn not to care if things are a mess, better for my psyche. Still one thing I can keep organized and I organize it daily to make sure it stays organized is my hard drive. My laptop and 2 extended hard drives are almost “anal retentive” in their organization as are the Mac and its EHD upstairs. It does help me stay organized if I scan and digitize as much as possible!

Believe it or not, my Smash Books also help me stay organized because they give me someplace to keep the things that used to end up all over the house. I can actually enjoy the little mementos I keep because they are in a format where I can find them and look at them, and also put together in a creative way. It’s something else that’s good for my psyche and does its ever so small part in reducing the clutter.


2. What's the worst uniform you've ever had to wear for a job?

I’ve never had to wear a uniform for a job. I did have to wear a WWII army-style outfit for a movie event I did with American Movie Classics when I was at Omnicom. I also wore black pants and a white button-down, server-style, at a 100th episode of a cooking show that was open to the public. I don’t know if those count as “uniforms” but everyone else working the events wore the same thing I did.  I wouldn't call them "worst"anything.


3. What was your last kitchen 'mishap'? This question comes to you courtesy of Betty who blogs over at A Glimpse Into Midlife...everyone go say hi to Betty!

Golly, I have kitchen mishaps all the time LOL. I guess the last big one was a few nights ago David left a burner on under and empty pot all night. I could smell it in the morning and fixed it as soon as I got downstairs. The burner was on warm and the pot was one of the thick ones so no damage was done, but that is something that I worry about all the time and I always double check the burners before I leave the kitchen. The light on our ancient 50s stove is burned out and we have no idea how to get in to change it, so there is no alert when the burners are on. Replacing the stove is on our home improvement list for this year. I’d love to have a Jenn-Air electric cooktop. David wants gas. I’m kinda hoping that eventually his “she cooks more often” and my “no open flames” will meet.


4. How do you protect yourself from other people's negativity?

I have so many challenges of my own and I still maintain a generally optimistic view of life. I try to bring a ray of positivity to people having a negative day but if they are just an outspokenly negative person I just try to avoid them. I =f I can’t avoid them, I ignore them.


5. Who in your family do you most resemble (physically)? If you have children, who do people say they favor? Do you agree? 

I look like my grandmothers. I have Grandma’s eyes and Noni’s smile. My face is overall a little more like Noni and because my aunt favors her mom so much, I look a lot like Auntie.

Rina and Tori were always confused for my kids when we went places. As adults, Tori looks incredibly like her mom but she and I share Noni’s smile. Rina looks like a cross between me and my mom. We all have/had Grandma’s eyes, but there are plenty of photos a Rina and Grams at similar ages that look alike.


6. January 8th is National Bubble Bath Day...will you be celebrating?

I might blow some bubbles, but an actual bubble bath is something I don’t do anymore. (But I don’t need a holiday to blow bubbles!)


7. Some of the 'world's best winter festivals' are - Mardi Gras (New Orleans), Quebec Winter Festival (Canada), Sundance Film Festival (Park City, Utah), Rio Carnivale (Brazil), Sapporo Snow Festival (Japan), Venice Carnival (Italy) and the Harbin Ice Festival (Northern China). Of those listed (and if cost were not a factor) which would you most like to attend and why?

Mardi Gras, but only if I can take Kelly because it’s something she has wanted to do for a long time. Okay, Louisiana is also one of the states I’ve never visited and it’s warm there during Mardi Gras when it’s cold here.


8. Insert your own random thought here.

I’m pretty much all recovered from the flu with the exception is my lower back still hurts more than it did before I was in the hospital. I think that has a lot to do with 4 nights of sleeping on my back. For the first three of them I had to call a nurse for assistance to turn over. The last night I was able to slowly turn myself.

I completed my first week of Project 52 this year, I decided to do it as a 52 and instead of journaling every day, this year I have a weekly topic that I journal about, mention how the week related to the topic and photos where applicable. I have all 52 topics selected (there’s my challenge) and the topic for week one was “healthy.” I figured it would be detox and healthy diet not healthy as in flu shots and the hospital. It won’t be as simple a project as I might have thought!

Here’s the first week 2-pager:

 Credits: Owie by Luv Ewe Designs and Blue Heart Scraps

The layouts were uploaded as big files so you can read them better is you choose.

Let’s Get This New Year Started

I need to do a little bit of a rewrite on the original goals post, but I will publish it soon. For right now, step one of rejoining normal life is rejoining my normal memes! Here is the Monday Quiz About Me brought to us by Heather at Acting Balanced, and Wayne at Touristic.

1. What do you think the biggest downside to being rich and famous would be?

Not having time to scrapbook.

Seriously, if I was rich and famous I’d be a Type-A with a staff. We’d already have the totally handicap friendly ranch over David’s model train layout. He’d be my publicist and perhaps by now our biggest event would be the annual MS benefit. I would completely thrive on having a major annual project. I really don’t have a marketable artistic talent, so the rich and famous must have been from a business venture that thrived enough to make headlines. It also means I have an excellent and skilled staff to keep me up to speed even as the MS slows me down.

I’d be a happy and active philanthropist surrounded by people I trust. I can totally see Kelly as the coordinator of all incoming requests for assistance and speaker appearances, HeatherH is my business manager, Tracy is the manager of Media Relations, which includes time off to work on her film projects. Rich would be her Number One and would handle things when she was on location. Scotty would be the superintendent for all new construction in the company (and that would include field visits only when he wanted to; he’d have a staff too) Sheri would be the chief author in the publishing arm of the company and would be n charge of arranging creative book tours. Neither Tori nor Rina would have a job, not yet anyway, because they’d be at the college of their choice with all bills covered and nothing to work on except grades. (Of course those grades are what earns next semester’s tuition, books and living stipend)

I’d have an insanely happy family, trusted staff that’s been with me forever and so much I’d want to scrap…but I wouldn’t have time.


2. What is the most interesting news article you read or heard about last week?

I was in the hospital and really out if touch, so I guess that 2013 really did start without me is the most interesting thing I heard about.


3. Who kissed you for the first time?

My first real kiss was Jeff, my “boyfriend” in fifth grade. At our end of the year bike picnic at Maybury State Park, we had a few alone moments on the bike path and I asked him if it wasn’t “about time we kissed” since we’d been boyfriend and girlfriend all year. He shrugged and said, “Okay.”

I could comment about how easy it is to get a guy to do what you want when it has to do with kissing or anything more advanced, but if you think about it, as an adult the moment between innocent kids of 10 and 11 years old, one simple kiss on the lips before we resumed biking, paints a cute picture. But it was special enough that it lasts in my memory so many years later. I could probably point to the exact place on the bike path where we stopped.


4. How much do you typically tip at a decent sit down restaurant?

I always tip 20% at any restaurant, a little more at nicer restaurants or anyplace the service was exceptional. I also tend to tip a little extra at more casual restaurants where the server is obviously swamped and still treading water. Seriously, been there and I appreciate the stress she or he is going through. If I was that rich and famous chick, I’d leave the occasional $100 bill for the sole server on the understaffed night shift with the surprise rush.


And don't forget to add a 5th Question on your own blog so we can answer as we hop around!


5. That rich and famous fantasy got me thinking about what I’d have done to become rich and famous. My question this week, is if you woke up in an alternate universe where you were rich and famous, what do you think you're rich and famous for?

I think in an alternate universe I’m a rich and famous motional speaker. I used to do quasi-speaking in small groups with interns and coworkers at many jobs I’ve had in the past. I love helping people love their jobs, what they do, themselves. I also love inspiring people to get ahead and to make the very most of what they’ve got. I think if I was rich and famous it would be because someone “discovered me” and wanted to put my inspirational ideas on a stage, video, and books.

Happy New Year?

Welcome 2013! Today officially starts my January detox. Yesterday was my last hurrah, enjoying the full-butter spoils of our New Year’s Day roasted turkey with mashed potatoes and buttered organic carrots. I used the last of the leftover butter from Davinities in making our start of the year meal special, and sort of a “Dimanche Gras” getting the last of the rich and fat out of the fridge. We’d originally thought we’d do the turkey breast for Christmas, but didn’t get it thawed in time so we thawed it in time for our New Year’s Day feast. Now, the second day of 2013, I am committed to behaving!

I hope I’m not being too confusing. It’s just as a digi-scrapper I understand that when something starts and it’s just not right, the best thing to do is delete and start over. So, happy day after New Year’s Day.

Last time I posted it was the morning of New Year’s Eve. I did the Monday Quiz About Me and promised I’d be back with my goals and projects for 2013. I got as far as having it in a document to post and everything. And then that pause was hit on New Year’s Eve. Here is the very beginning of the original goals post:

As I am finishing up this post establishing my goals and projects for the New Year, I’m being attacked by my last demon of 2012; a cold. I don’t get colds often, so I’m a total baby about them. I think the cold that’s attacking me probably has to do with my bad mobility being even worse today. Add achy to my usual; weak. So a blah year is kicking me out its door with a congested chest, sore throaty and nasty body aches to go with the sinus headache. Oh bring on 2013!

The cold? Notsomuch a cold as I was one of many people at Bortrail the weekend before who got the flu! But as I was one of many who got it, I was the only one who has MS that got it. By dinnertime I was fevered with fever aches and so incredibly weak that I could barely move from the kitchen to the loveseat in the dining room, even with a walker. I knew I wasn’t going to make it to midnight. David was feeling the start of the same bug that was hitting many of us too.

I medicated up and snuggled up in blankets on the loveseat, barely touching the Chinese dinner David picked up for me on the way home to enjoy while he ate his steak. He fell asleep on the couch after dinner and I vaguely remember hearing him say “Happy New Year, Honey. I’m going upstairs.”

I awakened at 3AM feeling worse than ever. #What’s more, I didn’t have enough strength in my legs to get up. I was in full tears and aches mode. David tried to help me, by bringing chairs and things to help me boost myself while he pulled me, but short of picking me up, which is honestly beyond a single-person job, there was nothing he could do. So, our neighborhood was warmed in the wee hours of January 1 by the quiet glow of fire and rescue lights and I got to go for my first-ever ambulance ride!

Things blur a little for me at that point. I had on jeans and a t-shirt; no bra, no coat. David says I was getting IV saline; don’t remember that and I do kinda remember the shot in the hip, but I have no idea what it was for. But the bruising tells me it wasn’t my imagination that it happened. Ooh! I also got my first-ever catheter experience! It’s preferable to a bed-pan, but I still prefer handling that process on my own and in private. I also got to meet the MS doctor in Toledo that I was going to try to see a long time ago but the waiting list was 6 weeks+. He was in to do his morning visits with patients and I was the one he saw in ER. I’m also the one he admitted to the hospital to get over the flu and get physical therapy so I’d be strong enough to go home. Saturday evening I was strong enough to go home.

So, I’ve deleted the first 5 days of 2013, cutting the timeline off just before dinner on New Year’s Eve, and pasting at just before dinner Saturday. I announced “Happy New Year” at midnight and after 4 nights sleeping on my back, alone, not being able to roll over without help because for the first two days I was just too sick and too weak and for the next two the mattress was a twin and the type of foam-style that just sucks your body into it, I slept on my side, curled up with my warm hubby. Ah! Life had returned to normal again.

Now, the New Year’s turkey fest is cleaned up and the turkey breast carcass is in the fridge and ready to be soup. It was my first full day awake and now I’m pretty tired, but I’m almost back in the swing of “normal.” I’ll check-in for the Monday Quiz About Me and I’ll try the whole Monday thing again. I just wanted y’all to know why I haven’t visited blogs and answered questions from the December 31 MQAM, participated in any other firsts for the year, posted my goals and projects like I promised or even thanked my Secret Santa! I’m not a slacker or rude! I just had to delete most of the first week of 2013! But I’ll make up for it, promise!