Thursday stuff

Doesn't seem like Thursday to me. Actually, I'm disconnected from days right now. I had minor outpatient surgery two days ago. A small hernia repair that the doctors seemed to think was necessary. I blogged about that recently. The surgeon disabled my pop-up timer. Yeah, I'm sore. It's a localized soreness, there at my navel. I'm fine if I don't move. Also taking Lortab. Hydrocodone. So yeah, I'm disconnected from days and a few other things as well.

Just talked to an old friend of mine. Received a Christmas card from her yesterday with a brief update letter to let everyone know their house burned down!! About 2.5 weeks ago their house burned down. They've lived there 20 years, raised five kids in it. It was an old farmhouse, and evidently there was some electrical short or something in the living room wall that started the thing. No one was in the house, but she and her youngest daughter were on the property. Poor gals had to watch their house burn down. They got the pets out before it got too smokey. I'm freaking out about it, but hell, it wasn't my house. I talked to her for maybe 20 minutes, and she sounds numb. They're managing. Going to rebuild. Have received a lot of help from friends and neighbors and the Red Cross. They live close to us, the next county over. She does our taxes.

The young kids are home now, on winter break. Or Christmas break, whichever term seems appropriate. I don't care what it's called, I just care that they are home. So far it isn't too bad. Had my surgery the last day of school, so I've been drugged and out of it since they've been home. I'm leaving them alone and they're mostly getting along.

I'm supposed to drive to Charlotte to bring Twitch home for Christmas. Was going to do that tomorrow, but might need to wait until Saturday. My boo-boo needs a bit more healing time before I drive for five hours. Light is leaving Pennsylvania this evening to head this way. She'll take a nap at Twitch's place on her way down, then she's going to Charleston before coming home. The weather between western Pennsylvania and here is a bit dodgy right now, raining with snow in the forecast. Hopefully she'll be far enough south by the time the snow hits so as to avoid it. I'm worried about her driving so far under such conditions, but hell, I've done the same thing myself many times. So I'm going to pretend not to worry.

If there was anything else to say I have forgotten. Kinda spacey. Might be nap time again. Sleep helps the healing process, right? And it's a cool, rainy day, the kind that 's good for naps. Yeah. Nap.

Mid December rambling

Listening to


at the recommendation of Victor. I recently discovered his blog, and boy, do I like it! I'm trying to add his blog to my blog list over there on the right, but Blogger isn't cooperating. Either that or I don't know what the fuck I'm doing. The latter is more probable.

As previously posted, Twitch graduated from college yesterday. Superman and I went to Charlotte for the festivities. We had a lovely time, but did not leave the city until nearly 10:00 last night. Two and a half hours (approx.) to get home, then I had some baking to do. I think I mentioned in a recent post that I have renewed my domestic efforts, vis. cooking and baking. I am baking all of our bread now. A couple of days ago I fed the bread starter and had rather a lot of starter to work with. As many people as we have eating all my bread, I decided to make a large batch. I failed to account for spending all yesterday away from home. Before we left home I put the dough in the bread pans for the second rising, hoping that it would rise slowly. This bread does rise much more slowly than typical yeast bread. But not that slowly. It over-proofed. Nevertheless, I baked all eight loaves when I returned home after midnight last night. I can only fit four loaf pans in the oven at once, and it cooks for half an hour. By the time the bread was all baked it was 2:fucking-late a.m. Fresh bread usually has a lovely rounded top crust. These crusts fell. The bread looks kinda pathetic. I cut one of the loaves fresh out of the oven, slathered butter on the end piece, and enjoyed. It looks a bit funny, the texture is too loose (don't know how else to describe it), but it tastes damn good! Four pieces of fresh buttered bread good. In related news, I'm not progressing well with my weight loss. This too shall come. Still, last time I checked, I've lost and kept off 30 lbs. Yay me!

But the point I attempted to make is that I am SO tired today! I got up before 8:00 to take Superman to work. He wisely went to bed soon after we got home. I was at least 1.5 hours behind him.

I recently bought myself a couple of long sleeved t-shirts. This is my current favorite.

I'm wearing it today. Coincidentally (on purpose) I'm seeing my therapist today. She likes this shirt, too. At this point my plan is to make it a shorter visit than usual with the therapist (tried and failed at that last week) so I can come home and take a well-deserved nap. Have I mentioned that I love naps?

I'm going in for a bit of surgery next Tuesday (the 18th). Sometime over the past few months I have developed a small hernia just north of my navel. I thought it was an umbilical hernia, but when the surgeon checked he said it was slightly above there. OK. He described it as a small hole in the integument.* He didn't use that word exactly, but I really like it. My belly fat pooks out through the hole when under strain. You know, the way hernias do. I suggested that since the fat was pooking out anyway, he might as well remove all that fat, too. He didn't think so. Shucks. The procedure for the repair is kinda cool. Rather than simply sewing up the hole, he'll put a mesh patch-type thing behind the hole to block it up, sort of like they repair small holes in tires these days. Superman says I'm gonna get a rivet. He also describes the hernia as like unto a turkey pop-up timer.
  It's a lot of fun to be married to that man!

During the pre-surgery tests and paperwork this week I learned that I'll be under general anesthesia. I suggested since it's such a small thing perhaps a local anesthesia would work. But no, they won't do that. In case things are more complicated once they get in there they want to have me already under so they can do what needs to be done. That's how the nice lady explained it. Whatevs. I actually kinda like being under general anesthesia. It's a fun kind of stoned, you know? I also like to have the minimum fuss and bother, hence the request for a local.

Seems there was more I wanted to ramble about, but it is now time for me to go see my Thurpist, so I must depart. Here's the post. Enjoy. (past tense, now, since if you've read this far, you've pretty much read it all)

* Epimysium

The epimysium surrounds the whole skeletal muscle. This is a dense layer of connective tissue. The fascia forms an integument around the epimysium.