They say it's your birthday

"It's my birthday too, ya"

Yup, today is my 35th birthday. And what a day it's been! Got up at 6, was at work by 8. Got a bunch of well wishes, an entire carrot cake from my favorite bakery which will be cut into tomorrow, an iced coffee and munchkins from Dunkin' Donuts and very little stress from the regular cast of characters that seem to go out of their way to annoy the living crap out of me.

Our Marketing guru put together and sent me this wish from my man, the pitching god, Curt Schilling. She rocks.



Yum.

We have tickets for tonight's Red Sox game but we're not going. The weather is looking pretty scary. Plus I feel like I'm heading for a migraine so wouldn't mind staying home curled up on the couch tonight. Went on a cleaning rampage last night so can rest comfortably this evening. We're still considering going out for dinner but The Man may have to work late. Right now I'm pretty content staying home anyway. We've got all weekend to celebrate!

Left work early today. Initially it was to give myself time to come home, change and head into town for the game. However, I ended up taking my little sweet pea (pictured here)...



...back to the vet at 2:30 this afternoon. Already brought her in last Friday. She's been having some bowel issues. Poor baby. It appears she has colitis. Her brother has IBS. IBS seems to be more controllable than colitis. She's already used 2 bath mats instead of her pan to let me know something's up with her. She's been on an antibiotic/anti-inflammatory since Friday evening but she hasn't gotten any better yet. Today the vet gave me special food to give her. I hope it helps.

Well, I hear thunder rumbling so better turn the computer off. Will be back later with more gnus!

Hope this works

Messed up my template somehow. Will make it right when I'm not falling asleep at the keyboard.

All-clear

It was a heck of a week. Not sure if I'm ready for the next, but here it comes anyway.

First things first. Once again I have been given the all-clear. There is NO cancer! The shadow was just tissue on top of tissue that created the illusion of a mass. And although the fibroid has grown, at the moment it's still benign. I'm thrilled to tears, but I'm getting mighty tired of these scares! Have an appointment with my regular doctor this Thursday and am going to be firm about having the fibroid removed. The doctor who read all my prints on Thursday said she felt I was too young to have the fibroid removed because it's going to leave a scar.

*Gasp!*

A scar! Boy, oh boy, whatever shall I do? Behind Curtain A there's living with (another) scar which only myself and The Man will see. Behind Curtain B there's living with a little time bomb ticking away inside my boob.

I'd like what's behind Curtain A, Bob!

On Friday I emailed The Man and said with the good outcome I had on Thursday and the fact that summer is winding down pretty quickly, hows about we get out and about this weekend? He wrote back saying he'd been thinking the same thing, so we decided on the Museum of Science. There's a new baby monkey there. Here's a picture of Mama monkey with the baby on her back. So cute!



This is Papa Monkey. Every time The Man was trying to take his picture he kept giving him this look like, "Dude!"



Silly, silly monkeys.

We had a great day yesterday. Spent a majority of the day at the museum and took the time to check out a lot of exhibits that we've only skimmed over before, like the dinosaur exhibit.



The Man made that his desktop picture when we got home. Looks very cool.

When we left the museum we considered going to Houston's for dinner, which is right next to Faneuil Hall, but the tourist to native ratio was grossly out of proportion, so we skipped it (for now), came home and ordered delivery from our favorite Chinese restaurant. And had a drink. Mmm... White Russian.

I made a Diaryland entry last weekend about my cancer scare. Only one person out of the few people who read me there had the decency to leave a note (Fred-X please don't think any of my wrath towards my D'land readers includes you!). So, spiteful bitch that I am, I'm not posting my results there. I'm emailing that one person to let her know my good outcome, because she truly cares and wants to know how I'm doing. The rest of them can ROT!

MWAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAA!!!

Speaking of Fred-X, I want to share a more recent, and accurate, picture of my fridge.



This evening we're having leftover pasta and sauce with garlic bread and various sliced veggies. The sauce has been made more palatable with the additions of ground beef and my very own secret hobo spices. Supper's at 6!

Asshole magnet

Well, I thought I liked the new guy that lives in the unit directly below us. That was until he stole our freakin' doormat!

I swear to God the building we live in is one big asshole magnet!

Here's what I'm thinking. We either:

A. Steal the doormat back;
B. Steal the doormat back, tape a $5 bill to his front door and leave a sticky note saying "Sorry you couldn't afford your own. Steal ours again and we break your hands."; or
C. Steal the doormat back and replace it with one that says this.

I’m just amazed he had the audacity to take it and then put it in front of his own door. Did he think we wouldn't notice?

WTF?!

Spam boobs

I want to see an episode of Iron Chef where Spam is the secret ingredient.

Other than my boyfriend, the only people that currently know this blog exists are Fred and Fred. That's cool. I don't know if I want to alert anyone else to the existence of this blog now.

I'm tired of calling my boyfriend "my boyfriend" here. He was simply "D" on Diaryland. For now, I shall call him... The Man. Sensational name, eh?

The Red Sox lost with authority last night.

I fell asleep at 8:30 last night and slept until 8:20 this morning.

I made killer spaghetti sauce for lunch today. Well, neither of us died, so I suppose I shouldn't call it killer. It was wicked... Wicked good...

Today I added crushed red pepper flakes to my spaghetti sauce, which I haven't done in a long time. When I did I could distinctly hear my grandfather saying to me, "Atta girl!" He put red pepper flakes on everything. I miss Gramps.

I might take a picture of the leftover spaghetti sauce to push Fred-X over the edge and make him fly out for dinner. I think he and The Man would get along great! The only night that's not good is Thursday.

My mammogram/ultrasound isn't until the 18th, unless they get a cancellation between now and then. Keep your fingers crossed! When The Man and I were talking about it the other night, I told him if worse came to worse, whether now or down the road, and there was cancer and I ultimately had to have a mastectomy, that I could get implants and have porn chick boobs. That'd be cool. I could lay on my back and they'd still be nice and perky. Perky boobs are good.

Maybe the Iron Chefs could make Spam boobs.

Mmm... spam boobs.

Damn boob

I've mentioned in my Diaryland entries that I've had a few scares with spots on my right breast. Had my regularly scheduled mammography in June, not long after I'd had an ultrasound because I was experiencing pain in the area we've been keeping an eye on.

So.

My doctor called this evening. I have to go back for a follow-up mammography and yet another ultrasound. The spot we've been watching has grown a little, and one of the prints showed a shadow on the right breast but in a different area than the one that's being watched. I had a brief meltdown after I finished talking with her. I wasn't going to let myself have the meltdown but my boyfriend seemed to just sit there and wait for me to get it out. I'm glad he did. We were chuckling (me through tears) at the end of it and I'm feeling a little less anxious now.

But it still sucks.

In talking with my boyfriend about it, we agreed that I'm not going to get the area biopsied and then wait and see what the doctors find. I'm going to ask to have it removed - then they can do whatever they want to it and tell me what's going on.

Freakin' boob.

WHOOPEEEEE!

I made whoopie pies on Saturday. One of my boyfriend’s buddies is on vacation with his family at the beach this week and invited a bunch of us over on Sunday, so I made them to bring with us. We didn’t go, though. The weather was dreary, my boyfriend was pretty tired and I was in a funk over having to go back to work. The filling is made with Crisco. Yeah, that’s right – Crisco! And it’s damn good!

We had a thunderstorm Tuesday night that made me just about jump out of my skin. Typically thunderstorms don’t bother me, but I was in the middle of a very creepy dream when I was woken by a nasty clap of thunder. I was so petrified I couldn’t move until I realized my boyfriend was still in bed (he often gets up halfway through the night and goes out on the couch). Yeah I’m a wuss. I know it. The storm lasted a good half hour and was pretty intense the whole time. It was just one in a large string of storms that stretched across much of Massachusetts. The lightning was like a strobe light. If we had a disco ball in the place we could’ve pretended we were in a dance club.

“Yeah, baby! Shake that ass!”

When I got into work yesterday our phones were knocked out, the air conditioning wasn’t working, nor was the drive-up teller’s area, and our ATM machines were fried. We’re not sure if lightning hit the building directly or hit surrounding wires and the current traveled into the building. We got the phones and air-conditioning back just before noon. Before the A/C came back on some of us were trying to convince Marketing we could write off an office kegger. They weren’t going for it, but it was worth a try!

The first day back to work went as well as could be expected. The weather Monday morning was gloomy and rainy – fit my dreary mood like a glove. It took until early afternoon just to get through and deal with all my email. Fortunately I had no voice mail. I don’t know how that happened but I’m not complaining!

I received a lot of “You look so rested”, “You look great”, etc., compliments on Monday, too. It was nice. One person told me my spirits were too high for it to be my first day back from vacation! As I always say (and try to always do) – It’s better to laugh than cry.

I need to get back on the *healthy eating and consistent exercise wagon*. Weighed myself this morning and was annoyed to see I gained back 5 pounds while on vacation (I'd lost 15 before we left). Half way through our week at the beach I stopped paying attention to what I was eating. And drinking. Alcohol isn’t exactly diet friendly. The only time I really drink is when we’re at the beach. The rest of the time I’ll have a drink here and there but when we’re at the beach, I want at least one cold drink in my hand every single day, thankyouverymuch! So, I’m back to eating healthier today. I'm following the Weight Watchers Flex Points program. As for exercising, I need to figure out if I’m going to a) renew my membership at the gym and get diligent about going, b) invest in a piece of equipment such as an elliptical trainer, or c) just use the exercise tapes I currently have. But I can take just so much of Richard Simmons.

But...

I don't wanna go back to work. :-(

Mmm... cookies

I made peanut butter cookies today. I haven't made peanut butter cookies in a long time. Dug around for the recipe and ended up calling Mom for it because I couldn't find it. They're nice and crispy on the outside and chewy on the inside. And they're reaaaally good with a cold glass of milk. Mmm...



Betty Crocker can kiss my... buns.

Mmm... buns.

Sweet nectar of the Buffalo gods!

Buffalo bliss in a bottle.



If you don't have it, get it! If your store doesn't sell it, torch it! I mean, demand they do!

Deadbeats and refrigerators

Well, the (deadbeat) neighbors I mentioned yesterday got into a little bit of trouble with the law last night. We've had our suspicions about them, and even after what another neighbor told us about when we got back from the beach on Saturday we were hoping we were all just overreacting. Well, they're drug dealers. And Lord only knows what else (I have suspicions of other things that I'd rather not mention right now). I heard a ruckus outside last night, saw the flashing lights and tried my best to peek out the curtains without being seen, but saw nothing other than two cops walking around. Heard a dog too but didn't see it. Found out this morning what happened from the neighbor who told us about last week's goings-on. I hope these people go away very, very soon. Either to jail, wherever they moved here from, a ditch - I don't care so long as they just.go.away.

On a lighter note, as promised, here's a picture of my sparkling clean refrigerator!



Went grocery shopping this morning so it doesn't look so sparse anymore. Actually it doesn't really look sparse, there was just no real food in there when I took the picture. Picked up a bottle of buffalo sauce marinade and am getting ready to go slather it over some chicken and throw it in the oven. Hope it's good!

Fonts, pictures and visits (oh my?)

Please pardon me while I play with different fonts during the next few entries. I'm almost ashamed to admit I've spent most of the evening here just playing around with settings and stuff. There's so much else I should be doing around here.

I wanted to take a picture of my insanely clean refrigerator to share with the world, but my boyfriend took the camera to volleyball this evening. If I remember to take the picture tomorrow I'll be sure to post it right away. I know everyone is waiting with bated breath to see what's in my fridge...

Called my parents a little earlier and had a good chat with my dad. He knows how much I want to visit but also knows how much I've got going on here and told me to stay home and get a good handle on everything before I have to go back to work next week. Should I listen to him or go visit anyway?

My spiritual life has been lacking lately and I'd like to go to morning Mass tomorrow. Trouble is, my usual church (I say that as if I go regularly... who am I kidding?) has a tendency to halt weekday morning Mass during summer vacation. So... do I show up at 9 and look like an idiot if they've suspended morning Mass again or suck it up and go to the 6:45 Mass down the street? Will I even be awake then? Either way, I need to get my butt back to Mass on a regular basis. I've had a few issues with the Catholic Church which is why I go only sporadically. But as my trainer told me, "Honey, you've got to go for God, not for the church." I know she's right.

I love being home. I love planning dinner and actually having the time to cook it. I love not being too tired to keep my place picked up, clean and comfortable. We have got to win the lottery.

I'm going to get away from the computer for a while and watch the end of the Red Sox game. Hope Matt Clement's all right.

Where did the time go?

I've spent a mere 15 minutes checking out blogger.com (thank you FRED!) and am already much more impressed and pleased with it than I am with Diaryland. Now I can't wait for my D'land membership to expire.

On Saturday my boyfriend and I returned from a week at the beach. We go with many members of his family and aside from the occasional screaming child and one or two annoying family members, we typically have a great time. Right now we're still trying to figure out where last week went. One night we were all sitting in a circle on the beach, tiki torches ablaze, cold drinks a-plenty, listening to music, doing the hand jive and AC/DC impressions and next thing we know, we're home unpacking and finding things out about our neighbors we wish we hadn't (which I may or may not elaborate on later).

I'm still on vacation this week and am debating taking a few days to go visit my family. Thing is, I finished unpacking just this morning and am now trying to straighten everything back to the way it was before we left. The living room and dining room are once again tidy and relaxed, but I'm still trying to get the bedroom situated. That could easily take up the rest of the day. Still need to vacuum as well, but wanted to wait until everything was unpacked as sand can hide everywhere.

We haven't hooked Lappy (our laptop, so named after Strong Bad's laptop) up to the computer yet to transfer pictures we took at the beach this year, but as soon as we do I'll post a few.

Have a great afternoon!