Thursday, June 26, 2003
Posted
10:00 AM
by Eileen Kramer
OK, I tweaked the template and it is NOT showing up. It should now.
Posted
9:57 AM
by Eileen Kramer
Well it took a while to get in here and I am desked in eleven minutes. There is never time enough to do anything I want these days. All that is going to change by the weekend. Well I work this weekend, but Lou is leaving. He says he is going back to Utica to help his brother supervise work on the roof of their house on Bleecker Street. Yeah...sure. People who live alone get contractors and don't need twin brothers to watch them. I told Lou this and he said that he needed to be there to sign papers. I reminded Lou there were such things as Fax machines.
I am angry but it is white hot anger or maybe anger that is white cold. I had plans for the last time Lou noshowed. I guess those plans start tonight or after this long working weekend. Here they are:
I need someone else. Lou is not it. He is simply not dependable. I spend way too much time waiting around for him.
I don't want to do meat market dating. I loathe bars. I'm going to join either the North Utica gym or the Y. The Y has a pool and I hate gyms because they are cold and noisey. Having a place to swim will be good and I'll meet men who swim. I hope they are not too much the jock type because I am not.
I am also going to volunteer down at the nursing home. I figure this is a good way to meet likeminded people as well. I am going to get a whole social life to replace waiting for Lou.
Of course I have a life on the net too. This is strictly a case of dancing with the one who brought me. Right now I have a huge backlog with the RAOK guestbook. Thadea can not recruit any more vote exchange partners until I pick up that guestbook and fix the backlog. Yes, I am glad I did not quit site fighting. What a relief.
Thursday, June 19, 2003
Posted
1:17 AM
by Eileen Kramer
OK, big news. The new graphic on this blog has a lot to do with the big news, but first the obvious stuff. Lou finally made it down here. He came too late for us to plan for or leave for Las Cruces. I have had nearly a week off and I go back to work on Friday. I need one day back to work before starting an eleven day week. Thadea was defeated at Crystal but it was a second place out of three defeat and she has some of the best scores of her campaign.
Today I had a routine mamography. When the tech took some extra shots of my left breast, I figured I was just a nervous patient. Then she sent me to the ultrasound room and I knew something was up. Ultrasound was painless, unlike the mammogram. I also got to see the screen which was turned in my direction. The doctor was very nice. All of this helped because she found a lump.
The technical name for my lump is a fibro-adenoma which means normal breast tissue growing as a lump. 98% of these little things are benign so there is a good chance this is nothing serious. The lump measures 14mm, by 11mm by 6mm. 14mm is about two thirds of an inch long, by half an inch wide by a quarter of an inch thick. I can have the lump removed if I want. I can have it needle biopsied. I can just leave it alone and see if it grows. That means breast self exams and another left side only mammogram in six months. I like this last option. If I have surgery and the thing is benign, I get a scar for my trouble. If it is benign and they leave it be, I have no scar, no hospital stay etc... I'm not sure if a needle biopsy falls somewhere in the middle of this.
The radiologist warned me not to obsess, but how can one not do some serious thinking. No I'm not dying but there is a chance I will not live as long a life as everyone thinks. Facing one's own vulnerability and morbidity is always a bit of a shock. I started thinking about what I am going to do. I started thinking about what I want to do. I want to write a story other than the bits and scraps of web fiction and performance art that I have indulged in for the past two years. I also want to write the site fighting article. I care about these two things more than I care about my job though I can do more to get more out of my job. It's just a matter of attitude.
This little lump puts a crimp into my job hunt. I am not sure how my next health insurance will handle a benign breast tumor which is an ongoing/preexisting condition. In the event that the tumor is malignant, I become unhirable elsewhere while undergoing therapy. If I get sick, I'll be damned if I'm going to work until I drop.
What I need to do now is just sort some things out. I don't want any miracles. I don't feel I deserve them. Ever since I was in my twenties and started working professionally with older people I've watched people around me get sick and felt a wonderful feeling of exemption. Even when I started seeing a shrink, I still felt invincible and healthy as a horse. Now it's my turn to enter the sicklick club. Suffering is the lot of all humanity. Why should I be exempt. I was a fool to think I would always be the healthy one.
Anyway, I finally asked my boyfriend to mind the house while I went out for a walk. He can no longer walk long distances due to a bad back and being unused to it. I walked for about an hour in the posh neighborhood and saw not one but two, red headed woodpeckers. This was very cool. I've only seen these in the little paperback bird book that used to lie around in the bathroom when I was a kid. I've been seeing all kinds of neat wildlife lately including a fox a few nights ago. I think the red headed woodpecker is kind of a symbol of hope so I put an illustration of one up on my blog.
Later this evening, Lou did his part by taking me for dinner at China Moon. As we were pulling out Julie in Apartment 12 asked for a ride to her sister's so she could pick up some nitroglycerine for her father who has heart trouble and who is recovering from a stroke. Julie's sister lives in one of the housing projects near Rose Hill. She didn't want to tell us this straight up. I offered to do some baking and bring her either a quiche or some pizza. I have the pizza dough rising. I did not count on the yeast working like greased lightening. I am going to have to punch down the dough and put it in its pans for the second rise. I'll add the toppings and bake the pizza in the morning. I guess Julie will get pizza for an early lunch.
Friday, June 06, 2003
Posted
11:30 PM
by Eileen Kramer
My life has just been up and down. I nearly broke up with my boyfriend and he unbroke up with me. He says he is going to try to drive down here again. Wheeeeeeeeeee! Last night he said he was breaking up with me. Then three hours later he called to "unbreakup" with me. I told him I was angry. I was going to ask him not to call for three days. Never is too long but three days is enough time. I decided not to. We are talking again. He is going to have me on the roller coaster again come Monday. Mario, his twin brother, is also on the roller coaster with all this coming and going and then not going.
I've had enough of the whole business. There is a daylily show tomorrow at the mall and a potluck dinner at the Temple of Isis downtown. That is a spiritualist church. I don't pay dues there. I pay them at the schul. I went to Shavuos services tonight. We had a lovely oneg shabbat but could not make a ten person minyan until almost the end of the service. A.J. changed the time of the service with less than a week's notice. Those who come all the time, really don't want a big crowd though they'll never admit it.
I hope when I go to the potluck that it's actually scheduled for the Saturday they say. This is the first Saturday of June. I don't know what kind of people I can meet. I may end up working out at the North Utica gym too. If Lou does not return, I'm back in the market with a vengance. I'm too young not to date. That's a funny way of putting it but that's the truth.
Georgia, my sixteen and a half year old blue cream alpha half Siamese kitty, has just curled into her nest after a social round of arch back walking and lots of pets and face rubs and scritches. She was purring through the whole thing. She is very sweet and will miss Lou if she never sees him again. She has been with me longer than Lou, my boyfriend who is fast heading for exhood. Lou and she get along though because Georgia enjoys men. That is unusual for most cats. I think an old man raised Georgia as a kitten. It's also the Siamese blood in her. She has a Siamese personality.
My cats are my best friends these days. I can snuggle and scritch them any time I'm home and they appreciate it. I can tell them anything. They go "brrrrooop" and they purr for me in the morning and at night. I go to bed and rise to purring. There is much to be said for an affectionate and responsive animal.
