Tysabri tomorrow

Just a quick one to let you know I am off to get my next Tysabri infusion tomorrow. Yeah for Ty!

I also need to get my scrapbooking stuff together because Saturday is National Scrapbooking Day and I am going. It's at a local hotel and I am spending the day scrapping with some friends. It's about time I did something fun for myself!

Wishing everyone a wonderful weekend because today is my Friday.

Weebs

PS: Still looking for people to sponsor or join Team Weeble. Check out my Facebook page if we're friends IRL. I appreciate any help we can get. :)

Weeble's Googlemania Game

Googlemania (This is one of those things that are going around Facebook. I thought I'd do it with my alter ego and this is what came up.)

a. Go to Google
b. Type your name and the words "likes to" all in quotation marks. (e.g. "Ryan likes to")
c. Report back on the first ten things that come up for your name.
d. Tag some people who think might be amused and/or up for a time-wasting silliness

"Weeble likes to. . ."

1. Weeble likes to sit really still and look like a lady.

2. Weeble likes to help make dinner like this, too!

3. Weeble likes to poo in one.

4. Weeble likes to say, “My sport is your sport’s punishment.”

5. Weeble likes to jump up and lick a lot.

6. Weeble likes to redo work.

7. Weeble likes to game.

8. Weeble likes to be chased first.

9. Weeble loves to Meeeowwww really loud to get food.

10. We have seen Weeble run, and we say his sport is his punishment.

I had to bend the rules a bit because there weren't really ten separate mentions on Google but as you can see Weeble appears to be a popular name for a pet, or at least I hope so.

I'm not tagging anyone but I hope someone gets a kick out of this. If you do decide to do this please let me know so I can get a chuckle out of your ten responses.

Enjoy your weekend, Weebs

Tag, I'm it

Directions: Once you have been tagged, you have to write a blog with 21 random things, facts, habits or goals about yourself. At the end, choose 10 people to be tagged. Don't forget to tag them in the note. You can't tag the person who originally tagged you.

I was recently tagged on Facebook to write 21 things about me that you wouldn't know. So that will be today's post. Some of you may know some of these things so skip over those tidbits of my fascinating life (snort!).

1.) I love my birthday as if it's a major holiday. If I could have a parade or a show on TV, I would just to celebrate my oldness, err rather my aliveness.

2.) I'm a major geek and check my Feedjit link several times a day to see if anyone new has found me from another continent. I finally got someone from Asia and about peed my pants with excitement.

3.) I love the sunshine but hate the heat in the summer as it sucks the life away from me and gives me horrible spasms.

4.) I have to spray the cat with a spray bottle when he gets too frisky with the Christmas tree and knocks down the decorations. The sad part is I pretend I'm a cop and he's a perp on the run.

5.) Sometimes (hanging my head here) I pour chocolate syrup into the peanut butter container and I eat it!

6.) I was supposed to go in to the Army after high school but did not because of issues with my knee and cold feet. I also almost entered the military again after college.

7.) I used to be a slow but easy runner and I miss it. Nothing quite like running an easy 5 miles and seeing those great calf muscles when you were done.

8.) I am afraid of snakes but getting better at looking at pictures and being in the same room with ones in aquariums.

9.) The two places I'd love to visit that I've never been to are Italy and to Africa (I know Africa is a big place called a continent).

10.) I like to watch the Bonnie Hunt Show (I think she's a hoot) and I prefer the Today Show in the mornings except for on Saturday when I like the CBS Morning Show.

11.) I prefer pens with black ink for general writing and green or purple ink for when I am grading papers.

12.) I once wanted and received the Clapper for Christmas. Sadly, it did not live up to its expectations.

13.) I'm not sure what my favorite color is because I seem to like green and blue about equally.

14.) I abhor horror movies.

15.) I don't drink coffee. I drink mostly cold water and once in a blue moon some hot chocolate or diet caffeine free soda.

16.) I like Cap'n Crunchberries but generally eat Special K fruit and yogurt cereal.

17.) I once drove a little speedboat up on to an island in the Disney World marina when I was about 12 or 13. Oops.

18.) I have my Wii and the Wii Fit and I am terrified I will be unable to put it together properly.

19.) I adore the Jimmy Dean commercials on TV with the sun and the moon and the fog. Pure genius!

20.) Reading is one of my great passions in life, fiction and non-fiction. I also like to find ways to raise money for charities I find worthy, especially charities that support people in Africa.

21.) I am so glad I started writing again. That's a gift to myself that no one else can ever take away.


Here's my tagged list and don't feel bad if you don't complete it. I know it's a lot of work!

http://blindbeardsmsblog.blogspot.com/

http://brain-cheese.blogspot.com/

http://brassandivory.blogspot.com/

http://mylifeisachainreaction.blogspot.com/

http://hsfr.blogspot.com/

http://www.initfortheparking.com/

http://individualisticity.blogspot.com/

http://sarcasmandms.blogspot.com/

http://lazyjulie.blogspot.com/

http://thelemonaidstand.blogspot.com/

Happy Thanksgiving

I love Charlie Brown and his holiday special so this was the perfect graphic for today's post. I wish you safe travels if you're going somewhere and I wish you great patience if many someones are coming to your house for the bird or tofurkey.

Today I had a wonderful reason to be grateful. Some of you know that both my only brother and only sister are stationed in Iraq as proud members of the US Army. Hooah! This is my sister's second Thanksgiving there and the shine of Iraq is wearing a little thin. Obviously, I haven't seen her except in a few pictures and not heard her voice in over a year.

Today I got to "hear" her a little bit as we were both on Facebook at the same time and we chatted through their Facebook chat option. Just seeing her words made me start to cry and I mean cry, with slobber, snot and the whole ugly look going on. We had a conversation for about a half hour about different things but it was like a piece of her was with me. I am so thankful for that conversation.

Not to mention that track three of Josh Groban's 2007 Noel album was playing then which just about metaphorically kills me every time I hear it. If you don't own his holiday album and you enjoy Christmas music I urge you to walk or drive (according to the speed limit) and purchase a copy. It's fabulous and his voice has really put me in the holiday mood, especially with the tree being up. I derive no royalties from this free plug for Josh but if you have this CD and you like it or you get it and like it, please let me know!

Secondly, I got to see pictures yesterday of both my brother and sister in Baghdad because she was able to visit him last weekend (some sort of regulation when you have siblings in a war zone, they get one weekend together). They took some nice pics together and I saw the pics on Facebook before my parents even saw the pictures. My parents are getting a CD of the pics in the mail and I'll show them the Facebook pics tomorrow on Thanksgiving. Yes, it will be the three of us which is always awkward because everyone is sad that my siblings aren't there. Plus, my siblings relieve some of the tension that exists between just the parents and me.

Today, right this moment, I am listening to this lovely music and I feel peaceful and loving and joyous. In this moment I have faith and hope and I wish that for you, my dear readers, as this special holiday approaches.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Random shiny moments

1.) I love plays on words like the sticker above. The flair buttons and bumper stickers are one of my favorite parts of Facebook. Remember, if you're a Facebooker and want to be pals send me a note and maybe you can be part of my Facebook entourage.

2.) A note on my tiredness and fatigue. My mom thinks that if I sleep a lot I will feel much better. Now that is true up to a point. Provigil and my ADs help me to feel better, along with the sleep. I go to bed around 9:30ish now (late for me!) and sleep until sometime between 8 and 8:30. Then I take another nap for an hour or two after I've been up for a while.

So you can see that I sleep a lot. My mom thinks that all of that sleep will make me feel rested and I should be good to go the next day. If you have MS or know an MSer with fatigue issues then you know that's not the case. I live each day as if it was from the movie Groundhog Day with Bill Murray. I wake up and my body thinks it needs all the sleep it can get, no matter how much it got yesterday. I'm always tired.

3.) I've started watching Arrested Development on Netflix today in between my bouts of semi-coma like sleeping. I like it. It's sharp and witty and sarcasm at its comedic best. Sometimes not having good cable can be a blessing.

4.) Tomorrow is trying to put up the fake tree day. I hope we can survive it.

That's all I've got for shiny crow rambling moments. Believe it or not, I'm tired again.

Time to stop my b!tching, comment on a REAL hero

The man above is John Bul Dau, originally of Sudan, but now a resident of the United States. He's one of my true heroes in this world and I was about shoulder to kneecap with him the other day in the hospital.


Yes, dad's still a patient but hopefully coming home tomorrow. They did a second heart catherization last night, which normally takes about 30 minutes, and this latest one took two hours. That's an indication of the damage we're talking about.


The bad news is that of the three grafts from his triple bypass 15 years ago, one had been closed and two were "gunked up with crud" during the first heart cath in the hospital. As of last night's second cath, a second graft had closed in the past twenty-four hours. I spoke with dad today and he said he is scheduled for a third heart cath and some surgery in about a month.


He's not really a viable option to survive serious open heart surgery so that presents itself as a bit of a conundrum. I'll talk to my mother about all of this later on today when she's away from him.


But back to John Bul Dau...


This man is a true hero and to see him up close, to the point where I could reach out and touch his shirt just about made me foam at the mouth and hyperventilate. John is one of the "Lost Boys" of Sudan, if you know anything about their story. The lost boys and girls left Sudan during the civil war to find safety in Ethiopia where they stayed in refugee camps until forced back into Sudan at gun-point, crossing a river infested with crocodiles. He stayed in Sudan until they were forced out again to a refugee camp in Kenya. He lived at that camp for several years until he was chosen to come to America.


Here's a man who has overcome numerous difficulties in his life, most of them as a child. He's lived through starvation, civil war, mass murder, and so many other things that I couldn't list them all and I don't want to because the atrocities are horrendous.


But, there he was working in the hospital where my dad is a patient, not as a nurse or doctor, but someone who cleans or does what we might consider a more menial position. That's just John. One minute he's working two jobs to support his family here in the US and on another day he might be travelling to talk to famous people or large groups to tell his story and raise money for his foundation.


To learn more about John's foundation, click below:

www.johndaufoundation.org

His foundation raises money for health clinics he's having built back in Sudan. This is a man forced to leave his homeland as a child who is willing to turn around and extend a helping hand back to that same place. His story is written eloquently in his memoir "God Grew Tired of Us" and there is also a DVD (available through Netflix even!) of the same name which shows what this man lived through. I urge you to read and view and then put it all back in to perspective.

Regardless, this is a man who is a giant both physically, about 7 feet tall, and in my eyes. I wish I had been brave enough to go speak to him. He is a friend on my Facebook page and there is more information about him available on Facebook under causes, if you're a F-booker. (That sounded really dirty, didn't it?)

Seeing him gave me pause to think that yes, even though there is a lot of rough stuff in the water right now I have a boat, some oars, and a compass. Sometimes I have to remember that it's not all about me.

Wow, sleeping is great stuff!

Yesterday I was at work at 6:30 a.m. and then went back in around 2:30 p.m. I did the double trip for the purpose of getting more grades in and dropping off plans for the next two days. This brilliant idea was drafted so I could get more sleep the next morning, which would be today.

It worked!

The depressed dwarfette slept through until about 7:40! The cat started meowing around 5 something but with an occasional pat he would settle down and I could sleep some more until he meowed again and I patted him, and repeat until I finally got up to feed him.

I feel so much better and clearer. Wow, this is great stuff. I go to bed somewhere between 8:30 and 9:30 so sleeping a lot is clearly something my body craves (along with chocolate and most other yummy foods).

By the way, my Facebook is now working just fine. It seemed to fix itself by the end of the day that I was complaining about it. I swear it was acting up for me. If there is anyone out there who wants to be friended on Facebook, send me an email through my profile page and I'll add you to my list.

I just got a call from my therapist's office canceling my appointment for today. That's a good thing because I didn't even know I had an appointment for today. In my book, it's for next Friday but she said he'd see me in two more weeks. Now the schedule is all off but at least I didn't miss an appointment today! I would have felt like an idiot, moreso than normal.

That's all I've got for now. I might even try to watch Survivor tonight due to the extra sleep. Woohoo, I am a wild woman.

Stuff and Facebook ?

Anyone else here on Facebook? When I signed in today it was all different and I mean totally different. I know there is a new Facebook and I've been looking at it since I switched to Foxfire Mozilla a few months back. I have no idea what I'm looking at now and clicking on any of the apps doesn't do anything.

If anyone can shed light on that please do!

Hands are still off but not burning so that is a plus. I have started the paper work for the sick bank leave. I have one doctor note and a call into my PCP asking for that one. Today I will call the neurologist's office. Perhaps I will try explaining the claw hands and the depression, not that I think I will get anywhere.

My gyn called regarding my vitamin D levels which were low again. Back to the 50,000 IU weekly and then retest to see if it goes back up. I have recently started taking 2,000 IU of D3 daily along with my multivitamin since my 1st Tysabri infusion.

Also super news: My Tysabri is all paid for with my insurance for the rest of the year. I know how lucky I am with that but I will be looking to see what the next EOB's show as being charged to the insurance. Come January I will have to pay my $100 deductible and $400 out of pocket money and then Tysabri will be paid for for the remainder of the year.

I saw my students today which felt good. Many of them hugged me and have made me wonderful cards. Today they will be reading about exacerbations in science from the Keep S'myelin magazine and doing some pseudo-symptom experiments. If nothing else, they will learn a lot about MS this year.

My claw/hands are tired now so I'll call it quits. I hope everyone out there in blogland is doing okay. My depression is still off the charts in a bad way but I am hanging in there the best I can.

Namaste,
Weebs