Fortune Cookie

"look under your bed and what you have lost will be found"  Hmmmmmm

That could be a few things. My Dean Koontz collection? My organizational skills for the middle room? My ability to hang something straight on the wall?  Pictures that haven't seen the light of day in 10 years? Who knows.

The move has been great and it has been 4 weeks and I have to admit that the house is getting more organised as the days go by.  There have been quite a few things bought for the house that I will most likely enjoy ranging from a huge sectional in the "rec room" downstairs to the little Swiffer vacuum that I bought to keep all the puppy tumbleweed at bay.  Dark floor plus a Miss Mel Mel requires constant work.

I was glad for all the help we got for the day of the move.  My mom, NavyWife, Mr NavyWife, Maine, her kids, PizzaGuy, Grandma, Nash, and FerFord all stopped in to help. Big thanks from the DH and I really appreciate it!

We were able to get a bunch more done than expected and even Maine and PizzaGuy came back on Sunday with the kids to help out.  We had them all over earlier in the day since their AC is on the blink and it was way too hot to have them melting while we were just watching t.v.

The girls are loving the yard and there are times it is trying to get then back in when we are out there in the afternoon.  We have a fire bowl now with a permit so our Canada Day was spent with Maine, her kids, PizzaGuy, Aircoolin', Corrie Fan and their little one.  We had a fire with marshmallows and have talked about getting together again cook a whole meal over the fire.

Work is still eluding me but I have been on some interviews and there have been a couple that have emailed me or called me back before the date of the interview stating that there are allergies in the office.  Now don't get all defensive on my behalf, because if they were there first there isn't much I can do.  There is no discrimination that can be claimed or any HR policies that have been broken. So I am going to complete my EI reports and keep searching while working on the house.

The stuff for surgery is going along great as well.  I have been able to get cancelled appointments since I have been off.  I have had the Nutritionist appointments, I have met with the Psychologist and she has given me information to take back to Dr. Sarah to changed my meds up.  I was little concerned about decreasing my happy pills to almost nothing but after talking with Susanne and Dr. Sarah we have it all fixed up again.  I am able to stay on the Happy pills after surgery since I am going to sprinkle them in my food morning and night.

Ran into MommaHenry at Wal-Mart and we were able to chat for a bit.  We are talking about having a girly day at Wonderland with Jensen so we will see if this comes around.  But I do know that I am going this weekend with the DH and Nash and I think this is the first "outing" we have had that didn't involve the house LOL

Mel is working on her "issues" with bangs and the compressors from the bowling alley.  According to my trainer, Mel is to sit and wait out the stress until she lies down.  In the meantime we act like nothing is going on.  She had that test all morning at the Milton Market when we were at the St. John Ambulance booth. The tent beside us were using helium for balloons and they also had a few pop.  When it came to the 4 hour mark she had enough and was trying to get under the table to hide.  I guess we all have our limits.  Below is her and Cookie strutting their Therapy Dog stuff at the Market and I will post again soon.

I know, I know.......

It has been quite a while since my last post but I had every intentions to write a post and then something would happen.  At that point I would think "I guess I will add that to my next post" and it all just snowballed.  So be prepared for a long post today!

Well work has sucked.  I was walked out under "restructuring" and I can officially say my card was marked. The DoO was replacing the office with temps after someone left and it the were starting with the more senior ones first.  Kind of first in, first out.  So I have been applying to various jobs within my field for the last month with about 5 interviews at Temp Agencies since that seems to be the way employers are going to these days. So once I get something permanent again I am sure you all will hear about it.

Being off has caused Nikki to go a bit stir crazy.  She is used to being out and expelling her energy through out the day, even though I still post pics of her sleeping every once in a while LOL  So her and I have made a deal that if we aren't going out for an appointment we are taking a walk around the block so she can be goofy and Melodie can still see the light of day.  I am also getting a bit of a leg stretch from sitting at the computer in the morning looking for a job.

Now before you get worried about the house, we were able to get it sold and our great mortgage broker was able to use the existing paperwork to get the money we needed for a new house.  So our current place sold for over asking and the new place is still within our budget.  The DH is getting excited for the new house since he has been able to buy a lawn mower for grass we now have to mow ourselves.  He has also drawn up plans for a new shed to hold all the stuff that is in our existing garage.  The girls have taken to the new place too since they have already made friends with Charlie next door.

So with me being off I have been able to start packing the rest of the house, albeit it is slowly, but I figure next week I will realise the sense of urgency when it rolls over to June the 1st.  We get the keys to the new place on June the 20th and the new owners of the current place move in on June the 27th. Can you believe that we are already getting their post?  I can understand that if the house was empty to get mail sent here, but we still live here for another 3 weeks!

Melodie is doing great on her training, and I contacted the trainer to ask when she wanted to give Mel her last evaluation.  Last year we went to an event that was is the south central part of Toronto.  This year the event was earlier and on the far east side of Toronto.  With one of the major highways under construction I wasn't up to trucking across the city on side streets.  So we agreed that we are off to an Agricultural Fair for their Rodeo Day in November.  Keep your finger crossed!

Things with my surgery had me concerned for a bit in May.  I was to be scheduled for May the 28th for the Nurse's appointment but while I was meeting the Social Worker I was able to get it bumped to May the 7th.  Sweet!  Not so much.  Because of the construction on the highway that I was unaware of, I was 16 minutes late getting there.  Well they have a cut off of 15 minutes grace and then you get rescheduled to August.  I cried right in the middle of the waiting room because with the delay in this appointment my timeline if "Thanksgiving" now had been bumped to "Christmas" and was told that I can keep my rescheduled appointment and I can be put on a "cancellation list."  I agreed to that and figured I would be person #221 on the list and the chances of getting a call before August were none existent.  Boy was I wrong!  I got a called from the office on Thursday June 15th and there was a cancellation for a 1:15 appointment on May the 21st.  I was floored and you could have knocked me over with a feather!  So I left the house at 11:30 am to get down there and I was there early enough to have a sandwich in the food court before my appointment.  I was seen by the nurse as well as a nurse in training and passed with flying colours.  On the way out they asked me if I had to time to get some blood work done too so that I wouldn't have to come back another day.  Sure I can kill 2 birds with one stone.  In the meantime I got the next set of appointments and I have the 2 1/2 hour nutrition class next week on June the 3rd!  They also gave me my last 2 appointments before I meet the surgeon but the told me to check in for cancellations when I go for my nutrition course next week.

I am still going to the BWLSSG and I am still the only one there that is pre-surgery.  The meeting (more like get togethers) some folks gave me various protein shakes to try.  Picante gave me the chocolate premier protein shake to try and I have to admit it didn't go down that well.  Now SandyD gave me 2 flavours of her brand to try and I haven't had a chance since I have packed away the magic bullet LOL  So I guess I will be venturing to the local nutrition house in the mall to see if they have samples.  I would prefer the kind that are premixed so that I am not spending my mornings mixing and measuring powders.  There are guidelines that I will need to follow so I am looking at various ones when I come across them.

The last BWLSSG was in a public place since HeardingInTheSunshine (I think I might have to rethink the name on that one.....perhaps SunshineHerder) is having her place renovated.  My disassociation got pretty bad since it was in a public place near a street corner and everyone was trying to talk over traffic.  I suggested that we should take a camper chair and just hang out in SunshineHerder's back yard next month.  I think some of the group enjoyed the coffee that we were having too.  So I will see what the group decides for the next get together and I will make precautions to curb my disassociation.

Speaking of my disassociation, I have found a store that has really done me in more than Walmart.  BestBuy.  The DH and went in there to get something for the television and I figure that with all the large screen televisions playing something, the music and just trying to navigate through it all I was really overwhelmed.  I actually left the store with Nikki and headed to the truck to recover.

Mom is doing really well, she has moved to 4 hours away with round-about-step-sister and her hubby.  So she gave up her factory job with my cousin-in-law to do so and she has had interviews in her town to get her self set up again.  She is coming down tomorrow for her birthday and she is catching up with my brother and his girlfriend before heading back.

So I think that has you all caught up on what is going on around here so since I have been told that the pictures are the highlights to my posts I leave you with one:

Not Sure

What to call this post since there is a lot of little stuff to make up the post.

BWLSSG has been going really well.  I am learning a lot of stuff from Tim, Marvin and HerderintheSunshine.  HerderintheSunshine had to go back into the hospital since she couldn't keep food down again.  At least this time she is able get water down so they figured that her stomach didn't close over from before.  This time it was a blockage.  The cause of the blockage?  Romaine lettuce from a caesar salad.  That made me inquire how big the opening of the stomach was and I found out that it is the diameter of a dime.  That made the most sense on what Tim advised of "chew 40 times then chew 20 more."  I now realise that the body doesn't lose weight from the head down, you are just burning muscles from all that chewing! LOL

The house hasn't sold yet.  As I type this we are on Day 12.  We have had 2 open houses that were busy but not takers yet.  The agent wants to have a 3rd open house the weekend coming.  The house on the main street that was selling less than ours sold for asking price.  #25 with the different layout hasn't been sold but they are on the market the same amount of days as we have been.  We have had a new contender crop up on the street at #3.  They have the layout on 2 floors but their kitchen and living room are switched compared to ours.  They have updated it and are asking a substantial amount more too.  So I guess it is a waiting game.

We have been out of the house more times than in and I was actually happy to cook supper and so laundry last week!   I would like to take a personal thank you to Mister NavyWife and NavyWife since I sent them a sob text asking if they were busy.  They happily to invited me and the girls over so that their dog could have a good run.  I am hoping that there aren't any viewings before the open house next week because we had an offer and also so that we don't have to impose on them again at the Dew Drop Inn.

Hoping....

We have the agent coming over tonight to give us the last bit of details before the home photographer comes in tomorrow.  I see me working on some stuff tomorrow morning after the DH heads off to work.  I hope that the agent comes back on Saturday and plunks the sign in the front flower bed.

I was hoping that we would be the only house on the block when it came time to put the sign up in but it turns out that we will be the 3rd one.

The house on the main road is the same floor plan as ours but they are asking $5,000 less than what we are planning.  Also if you looking on the realtor website they only have a picture of the front of the house.  I am thinking that if it was a newer listing that they won't have time to load them up.  But I have noticed the sign out front for almost 2 weeks so that makes me think that the place might need work and they don't want to post pictures.

The second house is further down our street and they are a different floor plan that is over 3 stories.  I sometimes an envious of these floor plans since their garage makes a wall to put the television up against where our stairs going up are on the garage wall.  They are asking the same price that we are offering.  They have been on the market for less than a week and they have an open house on Saturday. 

Then there is us. I am hoping that the Realtor can work quickly and perhaps have an open house on Saturday for us too.  I would like to let folks know that there is an option out there in case they don't like the 3 floors for a townhouse.

I guess I won't really know until he comes over tonight.

Meeting of the minds

And it was very interesting!

Last week I had 3 appointments that were all about me.  I felt a little selfish but hey, I took a fill day off from work for it.

 

When I saw Susanne last week she asked me to keep track of my eating again.  I am to see if I am eating because the clock tells me to or am I honestly hungry.  The reasoning for this is to see if I can keep to the schedule that the surgery will have me on.  Apparently RNY patients will lose the ability to feel hunger because of the loss of the peristaltic wave action in the tummy.  So since we are to "graze" and I am already eating like that throughout the week I am curious to see what the clock has it at.

Then I was off to see Dr. Sarah about changing up my meds.  With the surgery my tummy won't be able to absorb anything that needs to sit in the body for a while including meds.  So that means my happy pills that are XR (extended release) will be pretty much useless in my tummy.  So we talked about reducing the dose to the minimum levels and then eventually getting off of them entirely.  In all honesty this kind of scares me.  As the DH can tell you, for me to miss a dose causes a dramatic change that is noticeable. I know I have Nikki for this but I guess it something I have to think about.

Next up was getting to Toronto (just north of the CN Tower) for my meeting with the Social Worker for the surgery. She is to see if I have things in place to have the surgery and the preliminary history write up for the following doctors and specialists.  I was there for an hour and in the beginning she was very cookie cutter with questions that required a yes or a no.  By the time I needed to leave she was giving me hints and tips on how to proceed.  She gave me a suggestion for my happy pills that she is going to send to Dr. Sarah.  The SW suggested that I go to the half dosage I am on but taking it twice a day opened up over food.  I would have never thought of that!  She also noticed that the next step that I have to take is to see their nurse.  The reason for seeing this nurse in particular is to see if my body can handle the surgery.  I guess I will get blood work done and poked with a bit of prodding in there.  Anyway, the SW noticed that my appointment was in late May and she resonated what Tim and HerderInTheSunshine said about seeing if there was a cancellation coming up so I could get in sooner to see the nurse.  Well lo an behold, there was!  So now I am back to Toronto for 4 pm on the 7th of May!  Whee!  Now I just need to see if I can get a few hours off early or will I have to work a full day.

A piece of the past.....

I was out on the other job and ended up driving past my old skating arena, or what should have been the old skating arena.  It is now a flat, grated lot with a view right to the back of the row of houses that looked down on it.

I was shocked to see that it had been gone, that I don't remember reading anywhere in the paper that it was going to be gone and how fast it was taken down.

The reason that it hits so close to home is that this is where I learned how to skate all through public school right into high school.  When you couldn't find me at home I was at the arena either working on patch pattern, learning a waltz or was in a skating carnival with my little brother.  Mind you, my brother only survived one year but I was bitten by the bug.

Things that I will always remember about that place is:
-picked up sharpened skates with masking tape on the blades so we wouldn't cut ourselves
-the popcorn vending machine that had the stale, orange popcorn in it.  It was a treat after skating if we were there over the dinner hour.
-watching my brother being a terrorist in our version of Back to the Future skating carnival
-being able to sit after our skating lesson and watch the next level up power skate to warm up.  Once I made it to this level I used to wave at the on lookers just like someone did to me.
-and who could forget warming up to Donald Duck and the gang!

As the DH said "nothing is static and things change"  I guess the rink was supposed to be there forever.

This is my golden playing in the snow that was left by the Zamboni that had emptied its hold during the summer at a charity walk behind the arena.

Wow what whirl wind!

Orientation went well in my mind.  I took the DH as my +1 and we had to pay for parking downtown that worked out to the tune of $24.  I would have taken the subway but the levelled parking at the mall was under construction so I told the DH to drive straight down.

We got there early and I got into line to register and I could hear setting up the chairs for the seminar.  The DH and I grabbed the near to last row and on an end since I had Nikki and settled into the “plus sized” chairs and waited.

We had a nurse give us the orientation and pretty much verified everything that was in the booklet that I got from Tim at the support group.  What I took away from the session (besides a file folder of papers that I have to fill out) was the reasoning behind the yeasty bread products not being allowed and also that Guelph isn’t an option for my surgery.  If I was to take the orientation at Guelph, I would be having my surgery at Guelph. So since my orientation was at TWH, I will be at one of the three that is included in their group of hospitals.  As I left they had my next 2 appointments set up so I have the social worker on March the 20^th and the nurse in May.  I thought that I could skip the social worker since I am seeing Susanne, but since all the people that I see through this all get together and decide if I can handle the surgery.  So there is no fast tracking and I guess I just have to be patient and wait it all out.

Group was fun this month.  It was at the usual hang out but we had new face that just had surgery 6 weeks ago.  She was actually the same date as Marvin and she was there because he told her about the group.  It is amazing how something as simple as side effects from surgery could bring out such candid chatter.  The room was still full of ladies and there were topics that I never thought might be linked to the surgery.  Well that all ceased to exist as soon as Marvin arrived but that is okay since he took the conversation in a whole new direction.   I think I am going to have to set an alarm for next time since no one has a sense of time when start chatting and there isn’t a clock in the area we sit.  I am sure that if the DH didn’t text me ask if I was taking Mel out we still would be sitting there.

The house is painted from top to bottom, the repairs are all fixed up and we have had enough trips to the storage locker the house sounds empty.  Now the only thing left is to steam clean the carpets and have the pictures taken so that we can have the agent put it on the market.  I have had a nanosecond of a thought about staying and then I think about this summer and I don’t think it is fair to the girls not to have any grass to roll in or the fact I would love to sit outside to read and not deal with onlookers trying to park or the trains. 

We have an appraiser coming in to see if the house is really worth the new mortgage that we have to temporarily need to hold us over to the new house.  According to the DH she is a bit of flake so I am hoping that she doesn’t undercut the value.  At least in my mind this will let me know that all the painting and stuff will be worth it and it translated into a dollar amount.  So I am hoping that we can have the house up on the market in a few weeks so that I can plan my first bbq J