A couple weeks worth of updates with nothing major, but that's why I want to write these update posts. Lots of little things worth mentioning. Lets get into it!
Health
I'm not sure if I mentioned my weight loss, but I know I went over my weight journey. I graduated highschool at about 220 pounds. I remember at the time a lot of older people talking about wanting their highschool weight back and thinking I'd never want to be that heavy again. Yeah, I want my highschool weight back. I ballooned up and down quite a bit in college and the heaviest I ever weighed myself at was 320 pounds. I stopped weighing myself at that point as it was just to much to comprehend, but I knew I continued to go up from there. So figure my heaviest was around 340 pounds.
After dad passed away and I had to get a physical to get into nursing school I weighed in at 280 pounds. Through the three years of school I continued to lose weight. I just figured it was grief and depression. When I got my job as a nurse, I weighed a little over 260 pounds. We're fast approaching the eight year anniversary of that time and weight. Now, as has been greatly documented on this and my other blog, I became happy at that point and don't feel bad about gaining weight again. I was enjoying life and eating/drinking like most people who enjoy life does. I started bouncing between 268 and 278. I think I saw 280 once, but it was on a sus scale (sus, btw, is a term my nephews have introduced me to and that I now love. sus=suspect).
Then, this past January, when I went into the endocrinologist I was at 286 pounds. I figured this was the diabetes getting the best of me and that I'd probably slowly sneak back up to that 300 pound mark. Instead, the doc changed some meds around and suddenly I just got full faster. Instead of eating two plates of food when I enjoyed it, I'd be full before finishing my first plate. I wouldn't drink two or even three cans of soda a night, I'd barely finish one. When I opened a pint of ice cream before I'd finish it in one fell swoop but suddenly I was throwing more than half of it away.
I saw the weight went way down when I had my neurology visit in March, but I honestly figured their scale was off and didn't bother about it. Then when I saw my general practitioner in April, I saw it was down even further. I actually disbelieved it so fully that I made the nurse taking my vitals weigh herself then go compare it to a few other scales. She came back and was happy to say that they were all accurate... and she was quite happy because she had lost three pounds. Me? I was over the moon because in three month's I'd lost THIRTY three!!!! 263 pounds!
And even though it's not even a month later, I weight myself this morning and my home scale now shows 257 pounds. So, can I get down to 220 pounds? I highly doubt it. And it's not all GOOD weight loss. My wrists are actually smaller than they used to be as my watches no longer fit like they used to. I'll take it, but it's not like my gut is getting a lot smaller. Maybe half an inch there? Just enough size differnce to make my pants fit less securely. But I'll take as much of it as I can as I know any weight loss is good for the heart.
Speaking of the heart, I saw the cardiologist. As expected, he was a dick about smoking. Actually, he was a dick about everything. But, I'm not there to see a friend, I want his knowledge and experience to tell me what my chest pain is. He had an EKG taken, did an exam, took a good long list, took a full history, and finally came to the conclusion that it's no likely to be cardiac in nature. That didn't stop him from saying I need to quit smoking or die, and that I need to exercise more or die, and that I could lose some weight... or die. He actually wasn't THAT bad, but he'd not a doctor for most people. Anyway, he scheduled a stress test just to be sure as that will tell us what my ejection fraction is and if there's any blockages in my heart's circulatory system.
YAY! More sick time from work /sarcasm
The one thing that I wasn't happy about was when he looked over the EKG and said there were no problems there. Now, I agree there were not any problems that would explain or even hint at the chest pain, but there WAS a problem there. And not just a problem that someone else later found, HE actually wrote it into my chart. I have an incomplete right bundle branch block. It's not a big deal and not anything we have to even treat. BUT it's something I need to know so that if I have a problem in the future, I can say "oh, by the way, I've had a Incomplete right bundle branch block since at least 2021" so that some other doctor doesn't see it as a new contributing problem.
Seriously, he's a dick. Thank God he's a well respected cardiologist.
I've had a few more migraines. My two month reporting point for the neurologist is June 9, so I think I'm going to gather up all my migraine information and report it to the doc. The uptick in med isn't working and we need to consider something else.
Finances
So, an May 1st I got my oil changed. I'll go more into that later, but it's the first time on Nina that they said there might be more work ahead. The tread depth on three of my tires were in the range of 'you should really consider getting these changed soon'. I figured they were over exaggerating, so I didn't even consider the cost of tires before buying the computer on May 5th. Again, I'll go more into the tires below, but it turns out that I indeed need new tires. Putting the computer on the credit card was a hit, but paying an extra $1300 made it feel better.
Well, the new tires cost more than $1300! Fuck. My wiggle room on my primary credit card is now gone. As I've talked about before, it's not a huge deal as I should make some money on my computer and put that toward the card and I'll be making fairly large payments on it... but it's been awhile since I had the card near that max level.
Not that a $3000 computer and $1300 in tires isn't a lot, but I'm normally hit by a ton of smaller purchases that add up. $100 here, $300 there, and for the past couple months I've been fairly good. There have been things I've wanted, but I've talked myself down from them.
The one thing that might come up soon is a vacation. With the mask mandates coming down and an honest feeling of safety settling around everything, I think it's time that E and A and I get back together. I mean, I normally travel two, three, or even four times between our get togethers. But my last trip was with them in San Fran in November of 2019. Fucking COVID! Anyway, we're at the earliest stage of picking a where. Our three biggest ideas so far are... you know what, I'll talk about this more below, but let me say that a trip like this can cost me between $1000 and $3000 depending on time and flight.
After the computer and tires, I'd say I should just do a smaller trip and catch up... but damn I really do need to travel. I need a vacation and since COVID took most of my time I can't just take a long weekend off to get some rest and then travel later. It's one or the other. So I'm going to take that dive. All the more reason to be frugal for the next few months and pay down the primary credit card!
Family/Friends
Two things to talk about here. Mom planning for both upgrades and the end, and the trip with A and E.
Mom first. Mom is on a spending spree... or at least considering a spending spree. I know mom has a lot of money saved up. Tens of thousands of dollars. It's just the spendthrift built into her DNA. Well, a big chunk of that is the extra insurance money from when that guy ran into our house. We figured we'd invest it into the house as we got the money from lost value to the house. Mom has chosen 2 things she wants to change (or 4 if we count them a certain way).
Floors for the kitchen and bathroom, and new entry doors. The bathroom and kitchen floors are both vinyl tile and I don't think they've been redone in about 30 years. They're LONG overdue. Not only are they no longer stylish, they're just pure worn down. So she's looking at real wood veneered floors. They'd look really REALLY nice and it's something that my brother R could install. Or we could have them professionally installed and it wouldn't be all that much more. That's the easy part as it's really just picking out the style she wants and then getting them in.
The doors are much harder. This house is old. As in parts of it are from the 1920s, long before there were standards to meet. Our doors are very narrow. It's almost impossible to get good furniture into the house. So we can either get a custom made door that fits the space we have now, or have a contractor come in, widen the door space, and get a standard sized door for far less. To be honest, if we don't do anything else, having the contractor come in would be cheaper, especially since we would also want to replace the screen doors and could then use standard sizes on them too. But as long as we're going that far and bringing in a contractor (R wouldn't be comfortable with it as it would literally be removing part of the external load bearing wall to the house!) mom would also like to have a side panel put in with the front door. More work, but it's really going to class up the look!
Now, the front door is just that. Rip out some of the wall, build up a new space for the panel and door, and install the new door. The back door, however, is another thing entirely. That door is far older than just about anything else in the house. it's because the frame is so far out of square that a replacement door wouldn't be a rectangle. But where there are stairs up to the front door, our back door is at ground level (with the stairs inside). The bottom third of the door isn't just in the exterior load bearing wall, it's in the stone foundation of the house. Major MAJOR work to get that done.
But, I think overall it's going to be worth it. Mom just has to settle on getting it done and we can start making actual plans instead of dreams in the sand.
Then there's Mom talking about the end. Just in the last few days she's wanted to talk about her final wishes, her power of attorney for healthcare, her property power of attorney, and some other end of life decisions. We've actually talked about most of this and have a good plan in place for almost all of it. I'm her power of attorney for healthcare, her property is in a trust so if she needs long term care they won't make her sell the house, my brothers and I know more or less what type of care she wants when it comes to life saving techniques if she weren't able to make the decision herself.
So, what her desire to talk about it tells me less that she wants to make these dcisions, and more that its just on her mind. She's thinking of dying.
I don't believe she's suicidal or welcoming death, but it's a known fact in healthcare that people who give up will often die soon thereafter. It's why its not an uncommon fact for couples to die so close to one another in time.
Writing this out reminds me that I'll have to have the suicide talk with her as I don't want my "belief" to be clouded by hope. That has to happen today.
For A and E, we're in the early planning stages of a trip. So far, after going our separte ways, we've done Chicago, New Orleans, Dallas, and San Francisco. We generally meet up about once every two years and this is the year for our meet up. When I first posed the question in our group text, E was initially hesitant, saying he needed to find a new job first. I think he gave it some more thought though and decided its worth spending money he doesn't' have right now to meet up as he changed his toon a few hours later.
He said he could do it if it were in Dallas or Las Vegas. Now, I know Dallas would be cheap as there are cheap flights from San Fran, where he lives, to Dallas, where A lives. Then we stay with A and his family and have some fun in the big D. Las Vegas? I have no idea why that would be cheap.... ahhh, that's it. I paused to look at fight costs. Without going into extras like baggage or first class or things, San Fran to Dallas is about $400. San Fran to Vegas is under $100. I don't think he could drive for that cheap! Plus there are always deals to be found for hotels in Las Vegas, so that must be it.
Dallas would be fun as that's normally where I go to visit A. We'd go to his gun range, go downtown, hit up a museum, and of course enjoy their huge beer scene. But it's also fun that A and I do fairly often. Vegas could be a blast, but we get into cost problems for me. I'd fly out of Detroit and round trip flights are about a grand when going first class. Remember, I've only flown first class and really don't want to change. Now, I could drive but I know my normal drive to Dallas is a little less than 2 days. Google maps puts it at 16 hours and I generally hit 10 to 12 hours on the fist day and then a short 4 to 6 on the second day. My hometown to Vegas is almost 30 hours to drive.
Sure, it would be a blast to drive through the mountains of Colorado... but 28 hours is three longer days or two VERY long days. I mean, with stops and all we're talking of starting a drive at six in the morning and not stopping until after ten in the evening. Twice. And then doing it again after a few days of fun in the bright city. So, I'm not sure driving to sin city is my best bet.
Now, my thought would be Austin. It's about a 3.5 hour drive from A's house (technically he lives a bit north of Dallas). I don't believe any of us have spent any time in Austin, it has museums, beer, music, is liberal, is full of younger and younger in the mind type people. It sounds like fun to me! E can still fly into Dallas, we can stay with A for a night, drive down to Austin for a couple days with maybe only a single night in a hotel there... we can even do that old school with two of us in beds and one of us on a couch... and have a blast.
I think that's what I'm going to push for.
Work
Not much has improved here. We lost an RCA, are going to lose an LPN, hired a couple more RCAs, and the HUM is now on vacation.
The RCA we lost was a blessing in disguise. She did her work, but she got really mouthy. She seemed to be one extreme or the other as she'd cry at the drop of a hat, but then she just got potty mouth. The reason she was fired was a completely unacceptable comment. She was showing our new RCAs around and, referring to one of our male RCAs, said something like "...oh but you won't have to do much work if you have a dick in your pants."
What!??!! She's talking to both a female and a male RCA, is surrounded by staff, and even had inmates in the vicinity. That's discriminatory sexual harassment and isn't only inappropriate, is a possible legal problem! And when she was confronted about it, she wasn't remorseful or sorry or even able to acknowledge that it was wrong in any way. She just said that if we (she was talking to the HUM and referring the supervisory staff) didn't like it, then she wouldn't say stuff like that any more.
Fired.
The LPN that's on her way out... well, she just dug her own grave over time. She's a contractual employee so she can have any day off she wants, so long as she tells me in advance. Once I have the schedule out, it's locked in and she can only have it off if it doesn't' cause overtime or she covers the shift herself. Well, she uses that way to much. She takes three, four, five, even six days off in a row several times in a four week period. I've taken her aside and said that while I can't do much in terms of denying her requests, that she's not making any friends with taking so much time off.
Then she just compounded it. She had a weekend off, would come back for 4 work days, then take a five day mini vacation. She had her weekend off, worked a single day, then called in sick. When I asked her what was going on, she listed symptoms and I don't know if she wasn't thinking or what, but she listed symptoms of COVID. Fine... you want to play sick to get days off? Go get a COVID test. We also called her contractual company and complained loudly about her taking so much time off and faking sick calls... we of course said we couldn't prove the sick calls were fake, but we had strong suspicions. Understand... we don't need good reason to get rid of contractual employees, so this would be good enough right there.
Her contractual manager talked to her and said he'd take care of it. Well, he was wrong. She went on her vacation, came back for a single day, then called in sick. This time it was a twisted ankle that she was 'fairly sure' would take three days to heal up. Fine... we told her to go to a doctor and get a doctor's permission to return to work before coming back. We also told her contractual agency. She just manipulated the system in place by calling a minute clinic, having a telephone visit with a doctor, and getting them to sign off on her returning to work... 3 days later.
She's going to be gone soon.
And then there's the HUM vacation. I'm first and foremost happy that she's taking the time. She needs it. Her job is hard, and I'm no longer gunning for that position. At least not in COVID times when she works every single day. That being said, my supervisor counterpart and myself have to cover her. Which means, we both now get to work every single day. Here on Saturday morning, I'm going to have to stop soon to call the clinic, get some information, and send out an email this afternoon. It's not much, but it IS interrupting my weekend. Both Saturday AND Sunday. I'll even have to do this on Memorial Day! M, the other supervisor, and I split up the HUMs tasks and it really does fill up our day. And it's not like we had time to spare before.... so yeah, we're all just fucked.
But hey... I'm ot going to make any complaint as M didn't complain when she took a vacation and I won't complain when I take my vacation.
Entertainment
I've watched some more Doctor Who and... wow, it's really bad in the beginning. I'm going to power through it but it's WAY worse than early Star Trek The Next Generation and that came out in the 90s (Doctor Who reboot was in 2005).
My brother B, mom, and I were all looking for a movie to watch the other night and having to scroll through the selections on Google Play Movies, Netflix, Amazon Prime, Paramount Plus, Disney Plus, and other services reminded us all of those early day in VHS rental places. While there was a Blockbuster in town, we actually used Hollywood video and we all recalled walking the aisles and trying to pick out two or three movies for the weekend. And much like some of those trips... we didn't find a single thing we wanted to watch.
We had just watched the new Angelina Jolie movie "Those Who Wish Me Dead" on HBO and that was a real stinker. Yesterday mom and I watched Army of the Dead on Netflix and that was far more enjoyable. Funny and still kinda scary. I'm sure dad would have loved it as there was plenty of over the top gore and acting alike.
One oddball piece of entertainment I found in the past couple weeks was a video on youtube. It's just an edited scene from Captain America The Winter Soldier set to some ABBA music... but oh my god its so good! Forgive me for not being able to embed it, but you can find it here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gvto9UvsSrI
I also found a version of the song (Lay All Your Love On Me) that I adore:
Nina Tires and Glass
I considered making this an entire post on its own, but it should be fast enough to just tag it on here.
I came away from the oil change with them saying my tires might need changing soon. They actually listed the tread depts as 4, 5, 6, and 7mm. I don't know what tool they're using, but when I finally got around to measuring them myself, the two front tires were below 2mm. They need changing NOW.
Have I mentioned that I got Nina with the 20 inch wheels? That her tire size is 265 35R20? Yeah, those are pretty freaking expensive. I obviously didn't want to make a quick decision, but at the same time I didn't want to dilly dally and have a major problem. The research began.
My first assumption was that I'd be using summer tires. I mean, I have winter tires now so why bother with all seasons? I learned fairly quickly that summer tires are really just that. Summer. Not spring, not autumn. Summer. I'd have to use my winter tires MORE than my the summer tires as the summer tires could easily lose grip below 40 degrees. It was in the 30s for my commutes LAST WEEK!
What I learned is that there's a category of tires that I'd never heard of. Ultra High Performance all seasons. Basically true summer biased tires that could handle wet, dry, and cold roads. They all generally suck on the snow but aren't unusable on snow like summer tires are. I kept researching and going back and forth between summer tires and ultra performance all seasons, going so far as to watch tire reviews on some of the ones I liked. Yes... there are review videos on tires.
I was considering doing more research through the week when I got a warning from Nina, saying that I had low air pressure in the rear drivers side tire. When I got home that night, I filled it up with air and was happy. Then three days later I got the warning again. FUCK, I have a slow leak in one of the tires with better tread depth. So, a decision has to be made now as it won't be long for me to lose the rear and still likely that something will happen to one or both of the front tires.
I found out that there are three at the top then everybody else well below them. The best Ultra High Performance All Season Tires are the Michelin Pilot Sport All Season 4 tires. 2nd place goes to the Continental Extreme Contact DWS06 tires with 3rd place going to Goodyear Eagle F1 All Season tires. Nina came with the Goodyears, so I know what I'm going to get with any of these. They're actually priced in that order as well, but the pricing only ranges from $1200 to $1350. I really wanted to go with the Pilots as they're better, but I decided to save a bit of cash and to stay with the service center I use for my tires. Belle Tire doesn't sell the Pilots.
Just this morning I paid for the Continentals and set an appointment for next weekend.
Then there's the glass. Last Friday I drove to work without issue. I generally park into the rising sun, so I don't exactly take a close look at the windshield... I'm being blinded by the big ball of burning gas and want to just get out of the car. When I got back in for my lunch/smoking break, I noticed a crack. It was roughly in the middle of the windshield coming up from the bottom then turning fairly sharply and heading over to the passenger side. Damn IT!
I filed a claim that night as I have glass coverage and only have to pay a $100 deductible. I actually had it scheduled to get replaced this past Wednesday, but they found out that the company that said could replace the windshield could only do that part of it. Since I have all the safety systems (lane keep assist, automatic headlights, rain sensing wipers, adaptive cruise..) the cameras have to be re-calibrated with the new glass. So, since I couldn't do it all in one, I canceled that appointment and tried to get another appointment.
I had a similar problem before with Ginger, my red hybrid Ford Fusion. I had the glass replaced, they couldn't calibrate it and said I had to take it to the dealership, and then the dealership couldn't get it recalibrated and had to order a new camera. After eight months, it NEVER got fixed. Not again. This time I wanted one stop shopping and to me that meant doing it at the dealership. I had a whole run around to get the insurance company to agree to use the dealership, but then I got another curveball... the dealership doesn't work with glass. They'd be happy to re-calibrate the camera, but they couldn't do the initial replacement.
So, I'm rolling the dice again on another company that claims they can both replace the glass AND calibrate the cameras. Talking on the phone with them was hilarious as they really wanted to push some third party glass. I'm sure the glass from some other manufacturer is just about as good as the Ford glass, but I don't want any signs that there's been a problem. You know damned well it will reduce the trade in value as the OEM Ford glass is emblazed with a big FORD emblem (its one of the only places it says Ford on the outside of the car!). I had looked it up and a normal replacement piece of glass goes for about $100 to $150. Ford glass? $300 to $600. It doesn't make a bit of difference to me as I only pay the deductible, although I think Ford charging such an upcharge basically for their logo is BS.
Anyway, the guy said that the OEM glass was on a national backorder and it would be an extreme delay unless I wanted to go with a third party piece of glass that would meet or exceed all safety requirements of the original glass. When I asked just how long of a delay it would be, I swear to the Goddess his answer was "An EXTREEEEME delay." He didn't raise his voice, he just lengthened and emphasized EXTREEEME. Well fuck it, I still want the OEM and will just wait. I told him so and we moved into scheduling the new glass.
It gets installed on Wednesday.
Evidently the EXTREEEME delay is about 2 days from the non OEM glass. What a POS. Again, I think it's BS that Ford charges such an EXTREEEME markup, but that doesn't mean its okay to blatantly lie about a national shortage giving me an EXTREEEME delay of 2 days because it costs them some profit.
I feel bad as I don't want Nina's cracked windshield to get hit with the brushes in the car wash, so she's getting dirty. And even with me babying her on a deflating tire, four low tread tires, and a cracked windshield, the crack has still grown by 5 inches. Oh, I should say that I followed their directions regarding replacement vs repair as I didn't even have to have anybody look at it and got to make that choice myself. If the damage is in front of your face, they say to get it replaced, not matter how small. If the crack or damage is larger than a dollar bill, you should get it replaced. Nina's crack was 12 inches high, turned, then was 12 (now 18) inches long. A little bigger than a dollar bill, no?
Updates
The only recent posts I have are the video card and computer posts. They had predicted it's ship date as June 2nd, which I was fine with considering COVID and all the other normal delays that come with building a computer. It shipped last night and should arrive here May 27th. Next weekend I'll be setting up my new Computer.
I finally got a good writing session in on Just Dance. It wasn't much, but it broke through a dam where I had the hero(ine) and the guy he/she has to date on their first date. I realized while writing about their first, second, third, and fourth dates, how I'm going to connect that to her first sexual experience at the hands of the director. YAY! Maybe as soon as this weekend I'll be writing that hesitant, shameful, forced, blow job scene!
No comments:
Post a Comment