Seeing Red....

Today was a maintenance day.  I went to the hairdresser today to work on the ever evolving color.  I had decided months ago that I needed to go back to red (auburn) from the blonde.  The blonde was an idea of my ex-husband and although I like the blonde and think it looks good, I decided to get back to my "roots" so to speak.

So, I arrived today and was asked what we were going to do and I just went for it.  We have been working at this for a few sessions, baby steps.  Today I decided to just go for it.  Color the whole thing, go for it.  Go for it I did.  This picture isn't the greatest and the sun was painfully bright but you get the gist of it.

My son noticed for the first time that I colored my hair.  LOL!  He said, "Gee Mom, did you color your hair?"  Duh...  Oh to be a mindless teenager.....

I'm excited.  It has been years since I have been a red head.  I like it although I think it makes me look older but I could be totally off base on that.  Just trying to get the old me back.  :)

KitKat

Waiting for the Other Shoe...

Wednesday, June 23rd.  Today was a really great day.  Work went well.  Was very productive.  Everything seemed to fall into place.  The son has been great for the past several days.  He has been respectful and mindful and has done the few tasks I have asked of him...  Makes a person wonder where that other shoe is....

I Love You... Why?

27.  I'm a cryer.  Happy, sad, frustrated, etc.  I get all emotional and cry.  He doesn't mind

28.  He loves me in ways no other ever has...  Through everything he does.  I am never out of his mind or heart.

Wow!

I never cease to be amazed at what CC and I can pack into a weekend.  Never.  I left home Saturday morning, came home Sunday evening and we probably did more than most couples do in a week!  Maybe because our time together is so limited...  I'm not sure.  But by the time time I returned home last night, I felt like I had been gone longer than 36 hours...

Saturday after a "very thorough greeting", we spent some time out on the deck as the temperature outside had yet to get scorching hot.  We wiled away the time PLANNING OUR NEXT VACATION!!!!!! I'm so excited!!  After picking a few places and doing some pricing, budget checks, etc., we have decided on  New Orleans.  Not just go there, but to travel there.  We are flying up to Chicago and catching a train called The City of New Orleans!  Now, CC and I have a history with trains.  I believe I have mentioned it before, but the short story is we love them and they have a special meaning to us.  Sooooo, we decided to take one!  I have only ridden on a train once before.  I was very young and we rode the train from Louisville to Bowling Green.  We will be on the train overnight and arriving in New Orleans the following afternoon.  He found us a B&B on St. Charles to stay in on the trolley line.  We will stay a couple of days before flying home.   I will find us many touristy options and I am sure CC is already planning the number of places we will go to eat as I am sure he has some favorites.  :)

Vacation planning is hard work.  I was starving!  We changed clothes and went to dinner at a restaurant called Bound'ry.  It was sooooo good!  We arrived early and had the full attention of our waiter.  We had a nice bisque (cucumber and fish I can't remember which) with a seared scallop on the side.  Very yummy.  We also had a squash blossom stuffed with cheese on a bed of blue crab and a mango salsa.  There was a yummy mustard like sauce that really brought out all of the flavors.  Dinner was a Hawaiian fish called Opah.  It was cooked similar to a tuna steak and was an extremely mild fish.  (I could have used more of that mustard sauce).  There was a nice vege medley (almost casserole) as well.  Dessert was nothing short of heaven!  We had a Creme Brulee that tasted like a dreamsicle!  Orange and vanilla flavors all creamy with a thin crunchy topping.  We also had a dessert I think they called Phydra.  it had the equivalent of a blondie with a raspberry compote that was to die for!!  YUM!  Towards the end, I wanted to lick the plate!!!  I think CC and I share tastebuds because again, we pick the same foods.  :)

He took me to the Ryman afterwards.  What a neat place!!  As the big new venue for the Grand Ole Opry is still under repairs from the flood, it moved back to the old venue downtown.  I had never been before.  They have a lot of what made the Opry famous, multiple acts, radio commercials, square dancing.  The last act was Jo Dee Messina.  She sang a couple of songs.  I like her as an artist but I think I enjoyed all of the old time acts more.  It was a great night!

We were up early Sunday morning.  I had been awake for a bit trying to get Maddie to lie down with me and be still so as not to wake CC.  I had that under control when in came Daisy who decided to plop down on the other side of Maddie.  Both wanting attention, I tried to pet them and keep them still.  CC was awake within 5 minutes of Daisy's arrival.  As it was so early, we decided to breakfast at The Pancake Pantry.  Apparently, it is a very popular spot with legendary lines for entry.  BUT, as they open at 6 and we arrived a few minutes after, we were able to be seated right away.  We ordered pecan pancakes and a breakfast medley that essentially had every other breakfast food piled on a plate. Fried potatoes with onions and peppers and cheese and ham; topped by two eggs and toast.  We were all fat and happy by the time we left.

We ventured home and lounged in typical Sunday fashion on the couch with the newspaper.  There was a Fathers Day American Pickers marathon on TV so we watched.  It was the most multi-tasking we could do with such full tummies..

After a while, CC decided we have sat in front of the TV long enough. Sooooooo....  We went to the MOVIES!!  (At least we changed venues..)  :)
We quickly showered, jumped in the car and took off for the theater to see Toy Story 3.

Tangent time..  The BMW dealership was next to the theater so we cruised the lot.  Lo and behold, we found a late model Mustang.  Shelby Cobra blah blah blah.  Basically 50k worth of used Mustang.  CC said I should take a pic for the son.  I took the pic but added, "Look at what I'm buying!!!"  Well, very cruel joke to a boy with a need for speed.  He asked if I was serious and I told him I decided against it because it didn't have an ashtray...  LOL!  He was beside himself!

Back to the story....  We saw the movie which was very good.  I cried and everything.  I am such a baby..  We had to hunt down some lunch so opted for Taco Mamacita.  It was deeeeeelish!  I had this taco "Po'boy BLT".  OMG!!  It was so good!  Two small tacos and Mexican corn was just perfect.  Not too much food, but very yummy food.  We ventured home and before I knew it I was back on 65N, on the way back to the house.  I hate leaving CC.  I can't wait until we can be together all of the time.  It will be a first in the 24 years we have known each other.

Tangent time..  I looked it up.  We met and became an us on August 4, 1986. We may have been apart for much of that time, but he has never been out of my heart.

It's Hot

Wow... It's hot.  I mean steaming, fry an egg on the pavement hot.  The last week or so in this area has had the heat index at 105 during the day and muggy 70's and crazy storms at night.  Damn Al Gore and his global warming...
Weatherman today said, "Today we will only reach a high of 89 with the heat index at 97."  Gee, let me make sure to grab a sweater on my way out...

The heat was not helping this I have to wear a girdle post op thing one bit.  I might as well as wrapped myself in cellophane and ran a half marathon.  Now I know how heavy people must feel.  They are miserable!!  Cut them some slack!!!
Follow up MD apppointment was this afternoon.  YAY!!!  Apparently everything seems to be going along as planned but that the swelling will probably take a full 2-3 more months to completely dissapate.  Great....  So much for all the Thursday night bikini contests I've been planning on... j/k.  He did say that I did not have to wear the girdle all of the time but gave me the impression that the more I wear it the better.   DAMN!!  I am definitely not going to have my money go to waste so I am going to attempt to wear that thing as much as I can tolerate.  I did, however, ditch it for the ride home.

It felt a bit weird at first and then I kinda got comfy.  Stopped at the grocery on the way home.  BIG MISTAKE.  My girdleless  (is that a word?) self did not like picking up soft drinks etc. without a bit of extra support...  At least the son and friends (I feel like I have 4-5 kids, all male) were home and could unload the car.  At least all of the sutures and steristrips etc. are gone.  On the road to recovery.  I am starting to feel like myself anyway.

CC will be off of work soon.  YAY!!  I get to visit with my other half of my brain and my other heart.  Oh, might explain that.. 
I found a quote the other day that reached out and touched me...  Ahem... "We were given: Two hands to hold. Two legs to walk. Two eyes to see. Two ears to listen. But why only one heart?  Because the other was given to someone else.  For us to find."  ~Unknown
So I am one of the lucky ones who found their other heart.  <3

I Do It To Myself

I have become the needy person I have always made fun of. What is wrong with me? I am unsure and fall apart and read stuff into things that are benign. I don't know if I am just that lost without my other half or if I seriously need an attitudinal adjustment. Why am I crying?

Is it PMS?

Okay, so a couple of posts prior, I talked about all of the problems with my son.  Well the last two days he has been an absolute angel... Go figure.  WTF?  I really don't remember being that moody or riding the roller coaster of emotions to the extent of the son and I suffered with PMS!!

Summer school starts tomorrow.  $20.  On line.  Hmph!  Now he doesn't even have to get up at a decent hour to go to school.  Just log on....  What is this world coming to???  That will probably be too much trouble for him.....  We shall see.

Worry, Worry, Worry

I am a worrier.  Hello my name is KitKat and I'm a worrier.  Is there a 12 step program for chronic worriers?  I worry about the son.  I worry about my job.  I worry about my family. I worry about my future, and I worry about CC.  Thank goodness I don't usually do them all at the same time.

Today's worry is CC.  He is the love of my life.  He has always been the man I was meant to be with.  When we are apart, it is like a piece of me has been ripped away and I am not right until we are together again.  I have no doubt in my mind that he loves me.  This is not the worry...

My worry stems from his past.  I have seen people do mean, hurtful and even cruel things to others before but nothing compared to what the ex-girlfriend has done to him.  I cannot imagine going through what he has been going through since they split or going through the things she put him through during their tenure together.  I appreciate the fact he believes in me enough to allow me to read his blog.  This does come with some drawbacks.  You don't just get the synopsis of a relationship and subsequent breakup, you get the actual play by play accompanied by the raw pain felt in each word.

I have known the pain of being wronged.  I know how it can weigh on your mind, how it can eat at your soul.  People like CC and me have a really hard time with it because we could never imagine doing what what done to us to others we supposedly cared about.  It is unfathomable.  He puts on a brave face.  I know he still hurts.  Every time he hears news of her it's like it picks a scab on a wound trying to heal.  He doesn't want to care or allow it to bother him but it does.  On some level I fear that he still loves her.  Not consciously, but in some weird way she still has a hold on him.  I don't know if it is due to how she continually messed with his mind until he became someone those of us who have known him in the past would have never believed he could have become or what.  He is trying to recover.  We talk about it because we talk about everything.  That is the kind of relationship we have.  Everything is fair game.  The good, the bad, and the ugly.  I think it is because we are friends before lovers.  It is something that defines our relationship and sets us apart.

I won't lie.  I hate the fact that she can still do this to him without being present.  She has done so much damage to him, he may never fully heal.  I resent the fact that she can cause me at times to question why he is with me. I know he loves me but sometimes (because of her) I wonder if it is all for the right reasons.  It sounds a bit silly but damn, I never thought that anyone could hurt someone as much as she has hurt him either so now everything is possible and fair game. He loved me at one time in our youth.  I knew it was for me.  Just me.  Nothing influencing it other than just our chemistry.  I hate that she has been able to take that away from me.  It may still be that way but she has cast a shadow of doubt that I now have to fight.  Apparently her evil is far outreaching.  Maybe I should start referring to her as the devil's spawn...

The distance between us is a reality and it doesn't help things out one bit.  The time each of us spends alone only gives him time to dwell on whatever tidbit has been passed on to him about her and allows me time to worry.  My confidence level isn't great anymore.  Our rekindled relationship is very young.  Just a bit over three months.  Again, I worry.  Not two months before we got back together he was in a place where he would have taken her back.  It doesn't matter they had been apart for several months, he still would have taken her back if she had said and did all the right things.  Not that I think she will do that but it just goes to show how deep the damage is and I really don't know if I will ever have him all to myself.  So I worry...

The Guilt Trip

They may call it a trip but it definitely isn't a vacation.  At least not one I've ever taken and I have taken the guilt trip many times...  Tonight is yet another journey into the teenage mind.  It is not for the faint of heart yet due to the fact I am a mom, I get to take it whether I'm willing or not...

I get to hear the usual, "I am not stupid, I won't do anything careless", etc. so on and so forth... Yet I am still paying bills for a car he tried to make a submarine out of and bills from a "school yard fight"...

He "tries".  He respects me. He loves me.  He always feels like shit because I make him feel that way.  He tries to earn my trust back over the past two months..  Funny....  Report cards came in the mail today and he had 5 F's, a D+ and a B....  Hmmmmm....

I don't ask for a whole lot.  Respect.  Do what I say. Grades.  That's it.  Bring me dirty clothes when I ask... If  I say we need to wait - wait.  It really is simple from my standpoint.  No drugs...  Don't let your friends do them here.  I don't pretend I control what they do but just don't do them here. 

I hear, "I can handle myself.  I'm not stupid.  Other people's parents BUY the alcohol and just take keys at the door.  They GET ALONG with THEIR parents...  Yeah, right...

I'm sure any teen that gets that from their parents are REALLY pushing the envelope.  Maybe I should consider myself lucky.  I can't imagine BUYING alcohol for my son and his friends.  MAYBE on his 21st birthday...  That would be about it.

The thing is...  I love my son.  I want to give him everything and do my damnedest to do just that.  All I want is some consideration.  Since when is that a one way street?

I got to watch him bloody his fist on the brick wall of the house.  Yell...  Get in my face...  Cry...  I got the five star guilt trip...  Gee...  Am I to feel special?  What ever happened to having remorse?  I think HE THINKS he is doing the right things and trying...  I just can't seem to convince myself of that.  It could be because I remember exactly what I did as a 15, 16, 17, etc. year old....  Hmmmm.....  Is it genetic?  I believe I was a bit more sly.  Maybe because technology wasn't as advanced... Maybe because as long as I was home at the designated time, whatever I did didn't matter.  I'm not sure.  I do know my parents didn't give me a grad party with alcohol not to mention ANY parties beyond the age of 10.  Any wrong doing I did was off of the household premises (other than sneaking boys into the house which is another story entirely)....  Does it make me a hypocrite or just a really smart parent that I know what exactly a 15 year old is capable of???

I worry myself sick over him.  I love him and that is the bottom line.  There is no changing that.  If I didn't, I wouldn't care.  But I care very much.  That, in itself, is my greatest downfall...  I just hope I don't make it the son's....

P.S.  I will never entirely stop smoking if this continues....  I try.  I do well for a time, sometimes months...  But it is the fallback I take when I just can't take anymore..  Please forgive me for being so weak...

I Love You.... Why?

#312:  Diet Cherry Limeade

#264:  Just thinking of CC makes me all warm and fuzzy inside.  I think I might glow!!

Working Naked

I went back to work Monday as I mentioned in my previous post.  Not too bad.  It gets better every day and I am getting around without any trouble.  Due to swelling, etc. I have not been wearing a bra under my clothes.  It is so weird going to work without one.  It feels like I'm going to work naked and makes me very conscious of it.  Almost paranoid, like everyone can tell...  Getting dressed is a bit of a challenge.  I have to wear a girdle and I am still swollen so finding clothing that fits over all of that is a bit difficult, not to mention disguising "the girls" hanging free from restraints. 

I went for my first post op visit yesterday.  The doctor said if I had a bra that would fit, I could wear it, just don't buy new ones as they will change as the swelling goes down.  As my goal was to keep them the same size, I tried some of those I owned and found one that fit!!  Yay!! No more working naked!  It seems like such a small thing but today I felt soooooo much better at work knowing I was dressed!

I Did It.

 I did it. I wanted to have this done for my 40th birthday but better late than never.  I am bruised but all signs show the procedures were a success.  The surgery took 5 hours to complete.  I am three days post op.  Getting around pretty well. I went to work today but left a bit early to lie down.  I needed a bit of pain medicine.  I don't know how people take that stuff and function.  It totally wipes me out.

CC has been wonderful.  He drove up Thursday night after work.  I was very excited to see him.  In the beginning, he didn't know if he was going to be able to get the day off to take me to the surgery center.  My bff Nici was to be out of town and I didn't know how I was going to get there and back.  Then, my parents called to say they wanted to come up from Florida, CC got his day off and Nici's vacation was cancelled so I went from no one to everyone being available to transport and care for me. Funny how things have a way of working out.  I am happy with the surgery results.  I'm still rather swollen but you can tell how everything will look.  I'm very glad I did it and am very thankful to have someone as supportive as CC in my life.

CC and parents were able to meet.  It went really well.  They seemed to like him a lot.  At least much better than anyone else I have ever dated.  They didn't meet him in the past because they had already relocated to Florida long before CC and I met.  It was good seeing the parents. I am glad they took the time to get away for a bit.  It has been really tough for them with the economy and they did just need to get away for a bit.  I hope it did them both some good. It was really good to see them.

The time has come....

Well, tomorrow is the day.  I am finally getting the maintenance work I have wanted since the age of 26.  I'm excited and a bit nervous.  CC is coming up to be with me this weekend.  I am hopeful it won't be too bad.  After the pain I endured before my fusion, it can't be that bad... Can it??

Weekend in Paradise...

Many may think of some far off tropical location in the Caribbean or the Pacific, waves lapping up on the shore, fruity frozen drinks with small umbrellas coming to you nonstop when someone mentions paradise.  Others may think of the view from a zip line, speeding through and above a tropical rainforest.  This weekend, my paradise was right here in southern Indiana.  I know, Georgetown Indiana is not the first place that enters the mind when one speaks of paradise.  But, I had a very relaxing enjoyable weekend right here, literally, in my own backyard.

I'm not usually one to spend a lot of time in the backyard.  I'm typically too busy running here and there, only spending the time necessary to cut the grass, never to enjoy the space.  This weekend CC came to visit.  As it was a long weekend, I got to enjoy more time with him than the usual weekend allows.  We discussed our options for activities this weekend and decided we would make a delicious dish shown on a television program a few weeks back, a Bacon Explosion.  This required some shopping.  First of all, I do not have a smoker, which, is how this is cooked.  We got up and out on Saturday excited about the prospect of having bacon wrapped in sausage wrapped in bacon and then smoked, for supper.  Who can say no to pork, the other white meat?  LOL!

We went to a few different places but ended up finding a smoker at Home Depot at a reasonable price.  The store was packed!  Memorial Day Weekend is apparently a big "do it yourself" weekend..  At any rate, we headed toward the car.  The attempt to place it in the trunk failed, so we made room to put it in the back seat.  While I was busy getting previous purchases shuffled, CC took the buggy and put it away.  We were off to make a few last minute purchases before going home.

I pulled into the parking lot of a neighboring store and realized I DID NOT HAVE MY PURSE!!  We searched the car and the trunk and decided we must have left it at Home Depot, the busiest store in the whole town!!  My purse, come to find out, was left in the front of the buggy when CC put it away.  My purse, happened to be Home Depot orange and must have blended well enough with the buggy he didn't notice it was there.  My purse was found by a store manager, who placed it in customer service which is where I was able to retrieve it.  WHEW! (Note to self, do not carry an orange handbag to Home Depot)..

With that crisis averted, we finished up our shopping and headed home.  CC worked on the smoker assembly while I worked on assembling the Bacon Explosion.  (We make a great team!).  With time on our hands, we sat outside, read, talked, drank a few beers.  The Bacon Explosion was awesome!  I don't think we could have done a better job with it.  After dinner, I tormented CC with Wii.  We played my favorite game, Rayman's Raving Rabbids.  I know he KNOWS I'm insane now...  Bless his heart, he still loves me!!

Sunday was a duplicate of Saturday with the exception we smoked a pork butt.  it was a thoroughly wonderful day.  Just able to relax and enjoy each other's company. 

This is my paradise...  Spending time with those you love.  Enjoying their company and doing things together.  We had an excellent time and didn't have to leave the house.  Just goes to show it isn't where you go and what you do, it's all about the company you keep that makes life great!

P.S.  I want to apologize for the lack of visual aids to the blog.  My laptop is on the blink and closes down the program whenever I try to attach one.  UGH!  :)