Busymom.net

Cause I can hear me breathe, it's time for me to leave

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 17:17:11 -0600

Seems I didn't cough much after last night's post because, well, in order to cough you have to be able to move air in your lungs and all and the BlogHerbola virus doesn't let you do that.

I went to bed around 11:45 or so and woke up 20 minutes later feeling mighty, mighty funny.

And not in a blog with a lampshade on your head funny, either.

My right lung felt very, very tight and I was making funny noises when I breathed.

I have an inhaler, and it helped somewhat, but not for very long.

I got out my stethoscope (I used to be a real nurse, I haven't always pushed papers, ya know) and decided, "Well, that ain't right."

I tried to sleep some more, but no dice.

Every time I did fall asleep, I'd wake up 15 minutes later gasping for air.

I took a shower around 4am and drank some hot tea.

At least I was clean and hydrated while I was ~~dying~~ short of breath.

Thinking I might have pneumonia or fulminating pulmonary edema or something, I decided to go see the doctor around 5am.

I went to the ER at my place of business and they promptly took me back and did an EKG.

Damn, I hadn't thought of cardiac issues in my worst case scenario.

The nurse did the EKG, looked at the paper and bolted from the room.

Now, if that doesn't do an already short of breath body good, I don't know what does.

He returned and started doing other stuff, so I said, "Hey, you'd tell me if I were dead or something, wouldn't you?"

He just kinda looked at me and said, "We have 5 minutes to get the EKG signed by the attending physician."

Oh.

Ya might wanna tell sick people that before you high-tail it out of the room.

Anyway, I got a chest x-ray and it was clear.

I don't have pneumonia, and they are saying it's "allergies".

Hmm.

Not so sure about that, but whatever.

I got a breathing treatment, some steroids (and my Olympic dreams go up in smoke), some narcotics (Lortab, go me), an inhaler and some nose spray.

I've never told y'all about my nose phobia, have I?

Coke addict? Ur not doin' it right. Fail.

CANNOT put anything up my nose, but I managed to act like a grown-up when they gave me the spray.

I was there for about 4 hours (yay for my new Nintendo DS Lite I won at Donna's) and was discharged.

I came home and tried to sleep, but was literally kept awake by the musical stylings of my lungs.

I alternately thought Busy D, was crying downstairs, the dog was howling and a car drove up the driveway, and it all turned out to be me breathing.

PSA: when you wear your pajamas to your place of business in the dark and leave your place of business in the light, you still have your pajamas on.

Pajamas. At work.

A new one, even for me.

P. S. I know you're on edge waiting for me to wrap up my BlogHer trip, I'll try to get to it after I make some sort of contribution to the household today.

Try to contain yourselves in the meantime.

Vapo Feet

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 23:25:01 -0600

As my Twitter peeps are painfully aware, I have a nasty cold and the coughing is out of control.

It even caused me to lose my dinner, actually.

You're welcome.

I have ransacked the cabinets, and have taken pretty much one of everything I can find, including some 5 year old cough medicine with codeine.

No idea why it was still in there, but I thought it was worth a shot.

No dice. Time passed and things actually got worse.

My coughing is now starting to make my brain rattle inside my head.

In a fit of desperation, I just broke out the Vick's Vaporub and put it on my feet.

I have coughed twice.

Lands' End free shipping code

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 22:28:52 -0600

The good folks at Lands' End have sent me a free shipping code for you, dear readers.

They've got lots of cool stuff for back to school, and summer stuff is on sale.

I don't get anything if you use it, but you are more than welcome to buy a gift for me if the spirit moves you.

Anyway, here ya go:

FREE SHIPPING CODE: Good from July 24-30
Code: BACKPACK
PIN: 2784

Gratuitous puppy picture

Mon, 21 Jul 2008 23:06:16 -0600

Sparky is the newest member of our family.

He joined us while I was away at BlogHer.

He's Busy D.'s dog, and was named by said 6 year old.

BlogHer 2008 - The San Francisco Edition

Mon, 21 Jul 2008 13:47:24 -0600

I have opened and closed Movable Type several times, not being able to quite organize my thoughts about the weekend at BlogHer.

Additionally, I thought about not even writing this because you can find any number of BlogHer 2008 recaps most anywhere, and I know from experience that it gets old to read about it when you weren't there.

I thought long and hard, and then I thought some more.

Then I remembered some words of wisdom I once heard: "Eh, screw it. I'm doing it anyway."

Of course, those words were what landed that particular philosopher in the Trauma Unit at work, but that's neither here nor there.

Last Thursday, Lindsay and I took our in-marginal-health selves to the airport, because nothing says, "Hey, new friends!" like hurling and wheezing all over them.

We chatted the four hours to San Diego away keeping one eye warily out the window (it was her eye, because like I'm really going to put one of my eyes out the window at 10,000 feet?) for Arizona because the pilot so graciously informed us upon take off that there was "weather" in Arizona.

No, no idea how we thought we were going to know when we were in Arizona.

Mercifully, Arizona turned out to be weather-free and we made a 3,000 mph one-wheeled landing in San Diego.

After this most unusual landing, the plane was silent and we all just kind of looked at each other until the pilot came on and said, "Heh, we're here!"

We disembarked into the rather snug San Diego airport for a brief layover, and got our Southwest Air "A" boarding pass selves into line and were reveling in our A -18 and A-19-ness when from out of the blue, or actually the next gate over, Carmen appeared having arrived from an impromptu Southwest Air trip to Chicago.

We all chatted the brief flight from San Diego to Frisco (kidding, and, hello, COLD!) away and made a much more conventional landing.

We shared a taxi to the Westin St. Francis and after a somewhat awkward arrival that may or may not have included nearly running someone down, we put bags over our heads and walked into the hotel.

I swear, we were greeted by the Internet come to life!

Roommate Jenn, Shannon and Liz were already in the lobby waiting for us

After much "Squeee! -ing" Jenn took me to our room to wait for Krisco, I was looking forward to meeting her since we would be sleeping together and all.

I hoped she might at least take me out to dinner or something first.

Meanwhile, there was a knock on the door and Dana appeared, needing to wait out her room technical difficulties with us.

My phone rang shortly after that, and guess who it was?

Go on, guess!

My good friend Anne Glamore from My Tiny Kingdom!

Blogging is weird, since I have never actually had the opportunity to actually meet my friend of several years, but she was coming up to my room in a second since she was Dana's roommate and they waited for their room with us.

Much more "Squee!"-ing was had and we eventually went our separate ways to get ready for the evening's festivities.

I was so hungry that Jenn was worried I'd make good on my threat to eat both of our left arms, we visited our new best friend, Lori.

Thursday night was spent at several lovely events including the Mom Central party and the Silicon Valley Moms treated us to a great time at the Slide Lounge where you could actually enter the club through a ~~chute~~ real slide if you so chose.

I so chose as I was challenged to do it by my roommate.

Wait, I think I forgot to tell y'all that I'm writing for Deep South Moms, a Silicon Valley Moms (as opposed to "Silicone" Valley Moms which someone who shall remain nameless kept saying) production.

Go over there and read stuff and comment.

One of the best parts of that party is that I (finally!) got to meet Erika, Plain Jane Mom, for more than 5 seconds like last year.

The reveling continued with the People's Party.

And then I slept with Krisco.

The end.

OK, maybe not the end, I'll write a part II and I promise that will be all, unless however, it's not.

But, this part took longer to write than I thought and I need to leave this way overpriced bagel place I hate but it has free wifi and I keep coming here, anyway and go back to work.

Because they like it when I, you know, work.

Updates Later

Thu, 17 Jul 2008 13:34:10 -0600

Busy Extortionist

Fri, 11 Jul 2008 10:17:59 -0600

Overheard upstairs at home last night:

Busy Boy (age 11, until tomorrow) to Busy D. (age 6): "NO! I will not give you money to leave me alone!!"

BlogHer Bingo

Thu, 10 Jul 2008 13:40:30 -0600

It's that time of year.

Many blogs are abuzz with one thing - BlogHer.

Some may find it interesting, others may not,

That's not the point here.

With more and more blogs talking about BlogHer, I've noticed a trend.

There are common themes, words, phrases and ideas and I thought, "Hey, why don't we involve everyone?"

Let's play BlogHer Bingo!*

Print your Official BlogHer Bingo Card and cover a square each time you read the word or phrase in that square.

When you get a whole row covered, stand up and yell, "BLOGHER!"

Or not.

It's up to you.

* (disclaimer - I'm going to BlogHer and I'm really looking forward to it.

I went last year and I liked it. I respect that people have lots of different feelings about it, this is a joke.

Batteries not included. Professional driver, closed course. Objects in mirror are closer than they appear.)

Ending an e-mail

Tue, 08 Jul 2008 21:09:37 -0600

I had to send an e-mail last week, and I stewed for the longest time about how to close it.

It was a personal e-mail that needed more than a "See ya" or a, "Thanks" and a little less than "Love" but, not having a closing wasn't right either as I needed to convey the right balance of intimacy and casualness.

Took me forever to decide.

What do you use to close e-mails?

I think "Best" or "Best Regards" is pompous, "Love" gives the wrong idea in certain situations, "Yours truly" sounds like a romance novel.

"Yours 'til Niagra Falls?"

"Smell Ya Later" works, but you know, not always.

Am I the only person who over-thinks this stuff?

My weenie has a first name, it's B-U-S-Y-M-O-M

Mon, 07 Jul 2008 18:24:37 -0600

July 7th, really?

Seems that the globe-hopping lifestyle I lead cuts down on time to write at this here collection of pixels.

Returned home from back to back trips, first to the beach and then to St. Louis for the Fourth of July.

Oh, and I had a lovely dinner with the (lovely) Linsdsay and my new friend, Tori in between trips.

We made plans to paint San Francisco chartreuse during BlogHer next week.

Next week? Um, yeah. Pack. Buy something to pack...

Anyway, our annual visit to (sometimes reader) Fourladsnme's St.Louis home was a blast, as always.

We went to a parade and party-hopped on Friday, eating more than our share of, well, everything.

Saturday brought hurling (the game, not a consequence of Friday, silly) and a trip to Six Flags.

More flags. More fun.

More slaps to that guy in the commercial.

The kids rode themselves silly on Batman, Mr. Freeze and the Ninja.

The adults partook in a few rides, and I was very grateful that there were younger, less puke prone adults (Thank you, Mr. Lange) with us, so Busy Boy and friends weren't all alone on the rides.

Poor Busy D.

We got on a couple of kiddie rides that turned out to be more than I he bargained for, but he was a trooper.

Since I have no ~~sense~~memory, I got on the Evel Knievel roller coaster.

Turns out I forgot I'm the one who gets sick and can't look at the roller coaster thing at the movies that advertises the concessions.

Actually, the log ride drop is enough for me.

I made it through, but damn.

Why does every roller coaster have to be X-treme!!?

Imagine my distress just now when I read it's only classified as "moderate" thrill.

"Moderate", my nauseated ass.

Not a digital camera abuser, really.

Tue, 01 Jul 2008 10:55:28 -0600

Knock on whatever, but our appliances have resisted their annual summer failures.

There's every possibility that it's due to the fact we've had to replace darn nearly everything, but we'll take what we can get.

However, the latest twist on busted stuff is that we've killed 3 digital cameras since last week.

Seriously.

No real explanation for any of them other than digital camera rapture.

It was just their time to go, I suppose.

I gots to have a point and shoot-ish digital camera before BlogHer.

I have my lovely Canon Digital Rebel, but I'm not sure I want to carry that with me every day and I always keep a camera in my purse.

I've taken to entering online contests to win a camera, but what is up with all of them being open to UK residents only?

I don't live in the UK, but I take lots of pictures.

Where for art the "Win a camera!" contests in the US?

We didn't mean to kill them, honest.

Great, now the digital SLR camera police are probably going to investigate me to see if I'm fit to have one, or if there's digital camera abuse going on in my house.

I'm calling you if I need a character reference.

Scene from a long car ride

Mon, 30 Jun 2008 15:21:18 -0600

Busy Boy: (Insert some injustice of life here, I don't remember what the problem was.)

Busy D.: "Busy Boy, stop whining. You sound like me."

Home again, home again

Sun, 29 Jun 2008 20:27:14 -0600

Home from the beach.

Yay.

Despite a few missteps, a good time was had by all.

One of the secrets of grown ups is that a vacation really isn't one when you're the parent, and double that when you're the Sandwich Generation poster child.

The fun doesn't end, though, as the house is crawling with non-native children.

Summer is exhausting for those of us who aren't teachers or students.

Back to work tomorrow, as they are funny about wanting me to you know, be there.

Vacation?

Sat, 21 Jun 2008 21:28:07 -0600

Vacation.

Our family, my dad AND my MIL.

Started out with a flat tire on the Interstate.

Beach house sort of not as expected.

Send ~~help~~ alcohol.

Need your help

Fri, 20 Jun 2008 17:26:18 -0600

Hey, I need your help.

I have to write a description of what my blog is about, and it dawned on me that I have no idea.

How would you describe it?

A little something for your trouble:

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