I know this is going to come as a HUGE SHOCK, but I’m not exactly the most optimistic person in the world. I KNOW! I hide it really well. And you may be dismayed to learn I sometimes don’t have that joy joy joy joy down in my heart, but it’s okay. Do not fret.
Because SOMETIMES, I wake up in the morning JUST KNOWING that today will be a Good Day. I cast aside my usual angst and embrace the morning. It’s a new day; a fresh start; and I am READY.
This morning was one of those days. Today would be the turning point. After a couple of weeks of ongoing suckitude, today would be the day I’d look back on and say, “That’s when it all started getting better.” I could feel it. I’ve never been so sure of anything in my life. Today would go down in history!
The children, oddly enough, did not share my enthusiasm. Although their heading back to school after a long weekend is always a source of glee for me, they were not sharing in my delight. This may have been due to the fact that this is No Pop-Tarts Week.
[Digression: Monkey did a milk-free week and spent the entire time crying for cheese. “I just want some cheeeeeese! Cheese and crackers! Why can’t I? I love cheese! Cheese is my favorite!” That was fun. Except not. And while his eczema did improve, his behavior remained wholly unchanged. We agreed that being a little bit itchy was a small price to pay for the favored cheeses and milk. So. He’s back on milk. Then I veered off track while dealing with the basement, and now we’re on to Experiment Number 2, which is eliminating artificial colorants. It occurs to me that if you or I ate a neon-colored pop-tart every morning for breakfast, we might be a bit hyper, too.]
Despite their lackluster reaction to being woken up early only to be forced to eat whole grains, the kids were pretty good this morning. There wasn’t any arguing. They were downstairs on time and Chickadee even asked me very sweetly to please do her ponytails. I packed their lunches with enough time to spare to actually take a shower before taking them to school.
Perfect. I knew today was going to be great!
I left them with instructions to please finish up and put their dishes in the sink before playing, and off I went.
In the shower, I took my time, letting the hot water loosen up my neck some. I couldn’t be sure, but it felt like maybe my neck was feeling a little bit better. More serendipity. When I got out, I wrapped up in a towel, checked on the kids, checked the clock, and realized my dawdling meant I now had about 60 seconds to get dressed and get us on our way. Hey, not a problem. I can do school drop-off with wet hair.
Towel back on the rack. Swipe the pits with antiperspirant. Moisturizer on face. Different moisturizer on legs. Gel in hair–
*plop*
*plop*
*GUSH*
Know what’s worse than having a raging nosebleed right before a conference call? Having a raging nosebleed when you’ve got to get the kids to school. Having a raging nosebleed when you haven’t gotten dressed yet, in particular.
(By the way? This makes the second nosebleed in… ummm… 4 months. Which clearly indicates brain cancer. Or something similarly sinister. Or maybe I need to cut down on all that coke-snorting I’ve been doing. But I’m pretty sure I’d be a lot thinner if that was the case. Oh! Maybe I should take up cocaine to help me shed those pesky pounds!)
Once I did the initial cleanup, I pretty much just shoved as much tissue up there as was possible and got dressed. My first attempts to hold the tissues with one hand while dressing proved miserable failures. But the jam-it-all-up-there method was compatible with getting clothed. It was not, however, compatible with my children.
“WHY IS YOUR NOSE FULL OF STUFF?”
“Is your nose bleeding? Is that BLOOD? EWWWWWWW!!”
I wasn’t sure I wanted to pull up at school with a box of bloody tissues hanging out of my nostril, either, so I removed my clumsy packing (“COOOOOOOOL!” said Monkey while Chickadee screeched and ran from the room) and grabbed clean tissues and held a new wad against my face and tried to hustle the kids into the car.
It’s not hard to drive while holding a compress on your nose, but it’s not much fun, either.
I was beginning to doubt my earlier assessment of this being a fine day.
But! No matter! I would return home and find out when the Super Cleaning guys were coming to spray the basement, and it could still be The Day Everything Got Better!
The good news is that the nosebleed was tapering off by the time I got home. The bad news is that my neck had perhaps been stretched or held in a funny way while I was trying not to get blood everywhere, and was now spasming. So much for the neck being better.
A quick phone call with the head Super Cleaning guy confirmed that they would be over by early afternoon. Great! Perfect!
I headed out again, this time to see my therapist, who works hard for her money. Yes she does. How would YOU like to be forced to listen to me whine for 45 minutes? Because I am not this amusing in real life. Also I cry a lot more. But usually I feel great after therapy. So THIS would surely be where my day started looking up.
A quick review of Basementgate progress led into my confessing that I have mostly been attempting to soothe my tortured soul with food, and I now have a drawerful of shorts that don’t fit, to prove it. Seriously. It was 90 degrees out this weekend and I didn’t have a single pair of shorts that I could fasten over my expanding ass. Not Good. I found myself getting rather more emotional about it than I wanted to. “And I can’t even work out more,” I sniffled, “because my neck hurts!” As if I was such a fitness nut before I hurt my neck. As if I didn’t opt for a nap over working out, half the time. I sort of wanted to smack myself.
My therapist’s sort-of brilliant suggestion was that I stave off nighttime eating by calling a friend when I feel compelled to snack. “You don’t have to tell them you’re calling to distract you from eating, just say you felt like chatting,” she urged me.
“Ummm, well, I could try that…” I said, “but don’t you think they’ll start getting suspicious when they realize I’m calling EVERY DAMN EVENING?”
She then recommended that I spread the calls out amongst a number of friends. She’s smart.
I can see it now. “Hi! Yeah, it’s Mir. I need you to talk to me until the urge to eat passes. It’s only 3 hours til bedtime, so I hope you don’t have anything else you need to do! Oh, I know! Let’s talk about my BLOG! Hello? Hello??”
After therapy I dropped off three large sacks of clothing at the Salvation Army (rescued basement stuff) and then did some shopping for shorts. For my fat ass. I ended up with one pair. ONE. But I did find some cool walking/running gear, too. The most expensive thing I bought was $4. Woo! Day back on track! Wooooo!
Home again, I iced my neck, took some more advil, and waited for the cleaning guys.
One guy showed up. He looked around. Took some measurements. Told me what I needed done. Told me how much it would cost. I said fine, great, do that. He said, “No problem, I think we can fit you in tomorrow.”
Tomorrow? What about TODAY? I thought he was there to spray, right then. Well. His shoes weren’t as nice as Ramon’s, but there was room for him under the shed, too. Hmph.
(I’m beginning to see why these places cost so much. They sent someone out on Friday, then again today. And they still haven’t DONE anything. I think I’ll adopt this work ethic in my freelancing. It will henceforth be necessary for my clients to allow me to just show up and hang around multiple times before I actually agree to do any work for them. Of course, this will necessitate charging them three times my usual rate, but I think that’s a small price to pay for my genius.)
The day pretty much continued in that vein. Right now it’s not even 10:00 and I’m about ready to turn in. This is good news! It means I’ll be resting my neck (and maybe sleeping through some of the spasms), plus it’s very difficult to eat while sleeping. Or call my friends and annoy them.
So. My ability to divine the future is shaky at best. I will not be quitting my day job. But if you would like to hire me to tell you that you’re going to have a really crappy day (so that you will then have a fabulous day), I’m available. I just need to come assess the situation, first, for a little while.
I had a whiplash injury, so I can relate to sore necks. They’re the worst! And, I have a drawer full of shorts that don’t fit. I spent the weekend saying to anyone who’d listen, “All I have are these itty bitty shorts! What the hell was I thinking? When did I wear those?” Two summers ago, and yet an eternity.
Sweetie, you can call me ANYTIME. And my children will scream in the background and you will say, “WHAT IS WRONG WITH THEM?” and I will say, “Whaddya mean?” and then you will realize how SERENE your life is and you will send all leftover pie to me. Who never gets any (looking at YOU, Amy-GO).
I finally stayed up late enough to read your post before 8am!
If you need my number to help shed those pounds let me know!
A new wardrobe never hurt anyone…
Coming from a family with very thin nose membranes, I’ve learned to do an initial stuff of kleenex while I tear another in thirds lengthwise and fold and roll into a nose tampax! So attractive! But better than the bloody was held to the face or blood washing down over your mouth.
Fun comment, no?
If it makes you feel any better, I only own one pair of shorts at the moment too. And by “at the moment,” I mean no other pairs have fit me since Troll Baby was born. Since he is nearly two, I’m thinking I should cut it out with the white cheddah popcorn already. Big asses unite!
If it makes you feel any better, I only own one pair of shorts at the moment too. And by “at the moment,” I mean no other pairs have fit me since Troll Baby was born. Since he is nearly two, I’m thinking I should cut it out with the white cheddah popcorn already. Big asses unite!
Sorry for the double comment – I got a weird error!
I am suspicious of this calling-so-I-don’t-snack trick, but I’m willing to give it a go. Email me for an emergency phone # and I will wait for that frantic call where you breathlessly say “Stop me, I hear my pantry calling me!” Like an AA sponsor, but with less coffee.
Look at it this way. Today you learned three ways to cheer yourself up. 1)Shop for new clothes. Always a good time! And, you NEED them, so no guilt! 2)Run up your phone bill chatting with friends across the country (hey, it’s your doctor’s advice, right?). 3)Use annoying workmen as a whipping post for your frustrations (and administering a good beating now and then is a great workout, too!). Now all you need to do is put this new information into practice. Today will be better for sure! ;)
I used to get nose bleeds ALL the time when I was younger so I can totally relate. I can remember bleeding all over everything and being super embarrassed! Fast forward to this past year, and it wasn’t nose bleeds, but gushing periods that were the problem. Yuck! I’m so happy to be done with all of that!
Also, funny that this week you cut out poptarts while this week my kids just discovered them. I don’t like them, so have never bought them before. My daughter had them at a friends house and is in love with them so I did finally buy them. Let us know how Monkey does without them!
I usually just lurk here and laugh, but I had to pass on this trick for stopping nosebleeds: roll up (tampax-like) part of a cold, wet paper towel and put it under your upper lip. I don’t know if this works or not; a friend swears by it and suggested it for my daughter’s nosebleeds, but my daughter is 2 and was extremely not interested in having a wet paper towel in her mouth!
HaHA! Kira, did you say leftover pie? Wasn’t that, like, a week ago? There’s no way that a pie that yummy-looking hasn’t been reduced to crumbs-too-small-for-a-mouse, even in a less stressful week than poor Mir’s had. And Mir? You can call me anytime. The three-hour time difference means I’m up after all your east coast friends are snoozing.
I hate talking on the phone, I’m sorry dear, but that just saved you a very long distance phone call. I’m like what number 200 on your phone list??? okay fine 400. And unfortunately, on the rare times I listen to people on the phone, I have no problem snacking. Hence the zipcode size butt.
I had a problem with mold under my carpet after last year’s hurricanes (got to love living in Florida!) that took a LONG time to get fixed because of crummy maintenance people. I started to wake up every day with a nosebleed, and it was because of the mold. While I know you didn’t have any when your last nosebleed occurred, be careful this time around. It COULD possibly be the mold.
My sympathies. Sorry I don’t have a more upbeat comment for you!
1. Take your Vitamin C!!! At least 500 mg a day, maybe 1,000 to start.
2. Start using saline nasal spray at least twice a day.
3. Email me for my phone number and since I’m on the West Coast we can chat while I ride the bus home from work. Perfecto timing.
Oh, and, could you tell me, what are these things called shorts? I have some vague memory that arises from something I may have owned about a decade ago, but it fades before it becomes fully-fleshed out.
Hey, I need a chat-with-late-at-night-so-I-don’t-snack buddy. Can we share our woe?
When you come, will you wear really nice shoes?
That sounds …. so …. cruddy.
So. Very. Cruddy.
Gah.
Sorry gal.
I live in Florida and don’t own ANY shorts (thigh issues, you know.) Add me to the list of volunteers who would love to chat with you any time. We can talk about your Blog… yeah… that’s the ticket!
Oh, you could totally call me and talk about your blog. Except I would screw the whole thing up by asking questions like, “So, what kind of food are you trying to avoid eating?” And adding comments such as, “Yeah, that DOES sound good!”
And then *I* would want some, too, and I already don’t wear shorts.
I guess I’ll continue admiring you from afar, for both our sakes.
If all of your blog fans sent you their number you could have a different person to call each night for at least a year! Think of all new friends you’d make. All the fans could brag about getting to talk to you and they could rave about how pretty you are too!