You'll Be a Song I'll Sing

make me wonder if I torture myself.  I went to Comfest for lunch and had fries, ribs, orange slushie and Jeni's ice cream.  Like clockwork, about an hour and a half later... and the stuff is still purging from my system.  I think it was too much sugar (which is why I'm having a Coke now - go figure).

It's been nearly a week since my last update but I have not fallen off the face of the earth.

Last Saturday I did this. Sunday we celebrated Mother's Day by going to church and having lunch with my in-laws. Later that night my parents came over since my dad was to have surgery at a nearby hospital on Monday morning. My in-laws came over to see my parents and all six of us had dinner at Northstar.

On Monday morning Sammy went berserk when my mom woke up early. Unbeknownst to us, she'd fallen out of the guest bed, scraped her hand, banged up her knee and nearly broke her nose. She said it was the most comfortable bed she'd slept in for years. I was so exhausted from so little sleep I called in to work and slept most of the morning. In the afternoon I did go to the hospital to see my Dad. Monday night my brother and his wife came over to have Chinese food with us and Mom. It was their first visit to our house. Monday night Mom slept on the couch. Dad's surgery went well and he was released on Tuesday. My brother and his wife took my parents home that afternoon.

Wednesday night I was planning on seeing Amy Bloom speak but I was just so tired from having company, I took my laptop to the Grandview library and wrote. Spent the rest of the evening at home.

Last night was busy and a late evening. I don't remember if I mentioned it or not, but someone backed up into my husband's car in the parking garage and tore up part of the grill and headlight. We picked up the car in the morning. The body shop did the repairs, fixed a sideview mirror (we said we'd pay separate for it) and cleaned up some paint scrapes on the side and on the bumper. It looked better than before the accident and it cost less than the estimate. After work I went to the Terry Moore talk at the Wexner Center. About 100 people attended. I had him sign the first issue of Echo. One of the girls/women gave him her Katchoo license plate which had expired two years ago. He was so excited! He's one of the most gracious signers I've ever met. Terry spoke to everyone and signed whatever they wanted. Strangers in Paradise was a comic I connected with because the women were drawn realistically. Francine would go up and down in weight and Terry showed it with some extra fat around the face which is more subtle and realistic than showing her as a size 2 (which Francine could never be) in one issue and then a size 22 in another.

Afterwards we had dinner at one of the best restaurants in town. By best I mean where the chef cares about the food and uses fresh ingredients. I was worried about being in jeans but Jeff was in jeans and so was Terry. There were eight of us total and Vijaya joined us later. It was the last night of the Columbus Symphony (supposedly forever though they're advertising two more shows this month) and Yo-Yo Ma was the guest performer. The restaurant closes at 10pm but we were there until nearly midnight. I ate too much and dessert sent me over the edge into colon spasms which ended up okay but really had me worried there in the restaurant. (I don't think it was the sweetness of the maple syrup creme brulee - I think it was from eating very little during the day and then a lot in three hours.)

Two of the guys at work today were talking about marriage (one is in a wedding this weekend and attending a wedding next weekend). And the one who was saying negative looks over at me and said, "Not you, Amber. Nothing like that applies to you." He went on to say, "You and your husband are really happy together and it shows." We have misunderstandings and miscommunications just like other couples but we know we're in it for the long haul and it's too much of a fun ride to try and get off early.

Due to all this family time I've gotten behind in my goal of writing a short story a day during the month of May. I'm at 6 completed stories, 1 is 3/4s completed and another barely started. Wish me luck! We have company coming from out of town tomorrow. :)

You know how little kids just get so excited sometimes that they use up all of their energy on excitement and fizzle out when it gets to the good part?  That was me tonight.

All day I was thinking about tonight and feeling all nervous and excited.  I ate too much ice cream at work and that with my nerves just had me all worked up.  Picked up hubby from rental car place, went home to get gussied up and then we drove to his work. 

A new show opened tonight and walking through the galleries was fun.  We looked at about half of the Jeff Smith show and I just couldn't see any more of it - I was about to cry from the wonderfulness of it all.  Good memories, little girl me and watching some of the drawing/writing process was all a little too much to handle.  

Harvey Pekar and Joyce Brabner were there as was Terry Moore and Charles Vess.  The man I thought was Terry was not and I had no clue what Charles Vess looked like.  I didn't talk to Jeff or his wife.  On the way out hubby asked if I wanted to talk to Jeff and I just had no clue what to say.  It was much easier when I met him a few months ago to listen to him talk about his trip to Spain than to try and make actual conversation.  But isn't it always that way?

Nicely paired, yet very different, with the Jeff Smith show is the Mary Heilmann show.  The colors are bright and cheerful.  

We spent about 2 hours at the VIP party and let me tell you, I'm one tired girl.

I was last in my aunt's house for a Pampered Chef party on Thursday.  Went there straight away after work, helped make a strawberry trifle dessert (which I couldn't eat) and the other team of people made a cheeseburger salad.  I was able to dig through some of the salad but it was kind of a pain.  The librarian at her job was just diagnosed with Crohn's.  Surprisingly, because I didn't have much to eat and had been worried about getting there on time, I didn't have a flare-up from drinking sangria.

In medical news, a research study involving 738 Crohn's patients in several countries shows Omega-3 fatty acids doesn't appear to help the disease any. I suppose that should relieve my guilt about not eating fish once a week, right?

I'm not expecting a cure in my lifetime but it would be nice for Crohnies who have severe cases to find a surefire method of relief.

With the new house came new pots and pans. We'd had the same set since we'd gotten married in 1994. (Yes, I've been married for a while.) On the advice of the Restaurant Widow I bought a Kirkland set from Costco. They are stainless steel and I think the core is copper and aluminum. Cooking has been quite an adventure here with the switch in cookware and method. I've grown up using electric and the stove/oven in this house uses gas.

As you can imagine I end up with a lot of burnt food. The Bon Ami has been doing a good job at keeping the pots and pans newish looking but every now and then is a stubborn mark that I need to really work at.

I made a variation of the Dragonbreath Chili recommended by themosh. I forget what kind of chili I used but I poured boiling water of it to make the pepper juice and didn't use the chili garlic sauce. Hubby was stirring it now and then so I thought he had it under control. During the last 20 minutes or so no one touched it. The chili powder never got added. At that point it was decision time "The bottom stuff is burned so do we eat that or do we throw it all away?" Since it was New Year's Eve and close to 11pm or so we ate what we could. Even with the added smokiness it was really tasty.

Another night I made Herb-marinated Grilled Chicken Paillards with Pan Sauce (which is a fancy way of saying chicken breasts with a sauce) along with the roasted potatoes from the same Gourmet Next Door episode. I used two chicken breasts instead of four and used only Yukon golds for the side dish. The chives had been purchased the day before but I'd foolishly left them in the cupboard instead of in the fridge so there weren't many nice green pieces. I didn't put enough oil into the pan so the breasts were a little bit burnt. I didn't use the white wine with the sauce (I don't remember seeing it on the episode) and I'd made a similar pan sauce before so I kind of eyeballed all of the ingredients to make it. I used a nonstick spatula that's supposed to withstand 500 degrees to get all the crispy chicken bits off the bottom of the pan. It's slightly bent now so I'm thinking the pan or the sauce was superhot. Overall, it was tasty. The biggest burn victim was not the chickens. Or even the spatula. It was the wooden cutting board I had used to chop the herbs. One burner had the teapot on it and the other two were kind of taken up with the pizza stone so I set the pan on the cutting board. It was a cutting board given to me as a birthday gift from my brother and sister-in-law. (One year they got me a little basket with crackers, cheese, wine and the board.) I threw away the glass one from the old apartment. You know how they have four little plastic knobby things to keep it off the countertop? One had melted off and I just haven't found any I liked.

And of course there is the night I got the call about Sammy and let the Skyline boil over.

We had a Christmas potluck at work and I brought my famous chocolate chip cookies. The first batch... well... was extremely pale and barely cooked. This was the first time I'd made anything in the oven. There is a thermometer stuck to the side and I need a flashlight to read it. The rest of the cookies after that were good. It takes forever for the oven to heat up so anytime I know I'll be using it I turn it on and give it at least 20 minutes to heat up.

Getting a new stove/oven is one of the things we'd like to do in the kitchen sooner rather than later. It seems a decent gas stove can be had for a few hundred dollars. Our stove is self-lighting but sometimes likes to stick and the burners don't come on right away.

With the house came a microwave oven installed above the stove. One of my standbys when I'm having a Crohn's flare-up is a baked potato. The old microwave had a baked potato setting that was awesome. So far I've not been able to make a decent one with the new microwave. It has a baked potato setting but comes out not fully cooked. Maybe it's meant for a regular potato from one of those bags and not a baking potato that I picked out for an especially yummy treat.

Hubby once told me that Sammy would like it best if one of us was home all the time. I think he was right. I called in sick yesterday (sinuses and general aches) and today (sinuses better but still have general aches). Both days Sammy has hardly left my side. He's also been a bit more vocal than usual. I have no idea what he's saying but he likes it when I talk back to him. Both days I've had the sleep signal of a flare-up but all's been well.

While writing at work yesterday I kept adding my word count to the 27th and yet I kept thinking it was Thursday. I got it all straightened out this morning. Last night I was falling asleep before 10pm which is almost as bad as my pre-diagnosed Crohn's days. I think I only woke up once but otherwise I slept entirely through the night.

Total Word Count is 17,837. Hopefully tonight after watching a really good movie I can write and do laundry. I'm almost at a really good scene that I've had in my head since September.

( Most of What I Wrote )

Things have been looking up in our household the last few days.

The Windows XP I ordered arrived. The install went smoothly and the data transferred to the old hard drive is there. Now I just have to reinstall all of our software (which is in boxes) and figure out how to get the data imported.

The off and on search for the camera battery recharger has proven to be unsucessful. Also, it's been difficult to find one at the stores. The lithium batteries aren't used as much anymore but I found a multi-battery charger at Cord Camera.

Last night's dinner was spicy italian sausage from Giant Eagle. It proved to be an unwise choice. My taste buds enjoyed it but the intestines protested. Thus I do not get a yummy breakfast of pancakes and bacon at Northstar today. Maybe tomorrow. :)

Hubby's aunt and uncle came over yesterday to look at the bathtub fixtures that spin around but have no stop. (Not a good feature if children should ever use the tub which is ironic since an 11-year-old lived here since she was 7.) After spending all day on it (while I was at work even though it was a paid company holiday) it is fixed! And so is the toilet downstairs. And the mirror for the dining room has been hung.

Now I get to look forward to getting crap cleared and put away so I can take nice pictures of the house.

Sammy is learning not to jump so much. Yesterday he wore himself out checking on what everyone is doing. A Corgi has to know where everyone is and what they are doing. Yesterday morning when we went for our walk, I forgot my keys. He and I spent about 40 minutes on the front porch. He was getting cold so I put him on my lap and held his little body to me. I tried a t-shirt on him this week to see how he felt about clothes and he wasn't happy. I still think he's going to need a sweater this winter.

I have no birdseed in the feeder but the birds are superactive today. I've seen two male cardinals, one female cardinal, two blue jays, something I didn't recognize, finches and sparrows. There is a large bush close to an alley by one of my neighbors. Yesterday morning or the evening before I noticed it was like the Laugh In tv set. They were all chirping and then it got quiet. As we passed the bush, a bird would stick it's head out at the top while another one did it at the bottom then stick their heads back in and more would stick their heads back out. Had it been a Whack-A-Mole game it would have been one of the more difficult ones.

I think today I'll need to skip the NaNo Write-Ins... but if I just write 6000 words a day (or something like that) then I can still finish with 50k at the end of the month. :)

Saw the tummy doctor yesterday. Before he came in I got to overhear a conversation with one of the nurses regarding patients who called in about their medications. It was really quite funny. I know he would react the same way if I had asked these questions.

No new tests to take this year. I may not need another colonoscopy or the other tests for about 8 more years unless I get worse. My medicine is the same. His office took some blood to check my CBCs and liver enzymes. I lost 4 pounds since last year. My ob/gyn and he are friends so we were laughing about what my ob/gyn said about him.

I've booked my flight for my October vacation. There is no turning back now! Well, there could be but it's not likely. :) Now I must figure out what my Halloween costume will be this year. The Magic 8 Ball was a big hit last year because it was an interactive costume.

Yesterday I stayed away from the television and barely had the computer on. The guest bed (frame, not mattress) is scheduled to be delivered tomorrow. The tv and living room furniture may or may not show up tomorrow morning with their morning deliveries. I'm supposed to hear from the furniture company by 10am. They get the deliveries at 8am and the person in the corporate office wants to make sure the items are there or not there before she calls me.

I called my mother tonight to see how she's doing but got the answering machine.

Thursday is my annual appointment with my gastroenterologist. It may not be the best week to meet with him since I've been a little stressed. Last night I didn't eat dinner until about 9pm and I was starting to get so cranky I was nearly ready to call sick into work.

As it turns out I think I have three sick days and another three or four days of vacation if I take all of the days I have planned. I can use sick time if I'm out a long time on Thursday. At my last job I think it took me about three years to realize I could use sick time for medical appointments. I was using my vacation time for them until I found out!

A new study ups the number of common genes from 2 to about 9. It took 10 years for one study to get to this point. Now get working on fixing it!

Did you hear the one about the Crohn's acting up? Stop me if you've heard it before...

I didn't drink much water today. Bad me.
I let a stupid guy stress me out towards the end of the day. Bad me.
The internal pressure I feel about finishing my NaNo is stressing me out. Bad me.

So the last two hours haven't been the greatest for me. I'm considering taking a half day tomorrow. The temp who has been helping me can take care of the schedules and tapes in the afternoon.

Offical Word Count as of 11/27/06 is 15020. I earned myself a board game!

Last week things just kind of clicked when it came to following through with my evening plans.

Movie passes were given out at work for Wednesday to The Science of Sleep. Things moved along at a brisk pace and I was able to get out just in time. The movie is in French, English and Spanish. Though I've seen him in a few movies I think I fell in love with Gael Garcia Bernal in the first scene. All it took was a shake of his tush. Animation, dream sequences, drawings, stop-motion... it's a lot to process in one film but for me it worked.

The next evening the system that tells us which spots are missing went crazy. Someone made an honest mistake when sending the schedules and the system didn't recognize any of the spots that were there. Funny how you never think leading 0's can mean much, huh? It still wasn't right at 6:45pm. I rushed home so we could get to Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan. Tool was playing across the street which made it hard to find parking. The theater wasn't busy. Three police officers were there to check on cell phones, tripods, etc. to make sure no one recorded the movie. They were funny and nice to us. We walked into the theater, saw about ten people, walked out to get popcorn, and then went to the reserved seating area. I think twenty people in the entire theater might be exaggerating how many people attended this sneak preview. While I didn't always appreciate some of the humor, I have come to the decision that Sacha Baron Cohen is a comic genius. He has a sense of timing that could only come through talent. Some of it was obviously planned or put together in a way that when you forgot about something it was brought up later for laughs. I have no idea how the first wedding could have been planned though. (No spoilers here!) By the end of the movie I was torn on how America is portrayed. On the one hand, I'm proud that so many people would have patience with someone from another culture but on the other hand I was apalled at the number of racists and homophobes.

I accidently plugged up the kitchen sink. Twice. The first time was with hamburger grease and the second time was with baking soda trying to get rid of the grease.

Saturday I had a barium enema to take pictures of my large intestine. It was a little uncomfortable but mostly it was awkward. Imagine having something in your behind while you're moving from one side to the other. I always wondered what the ledge at the bottom of the x-ray machine was for but now I no longer wonder. They can tilt the machine so you stand straight up. Yeah... with a tube in your butt.

My brother-in-law, his wife and ~C~ came into town Friday night. We saw them on Sunday. One of my husband's grandfathers was diagnosed with lung cancer and he really wanted all of the grandsons over for poker. Me and a fiance were the only women there. I went out early during the first game and had a mild allergy attack due to the cat. The fresh air was nice though. Hubby won second place. The second game had a lot less people but was also a little weird. Grandpa had too much to drink and his walker got caught on the rug when he was trying to turn a corner. Down he went. The aunt in charge of the food freaked out a little, yelling for 911 to be called. We got him up without problems but he scraped his arm on something and was bleeding something awful. After he went out he was feeling poorly and was telling our uncle how this was the last card game with the kids. Yesterday the news came back that the cancer has spread to his lymph nodes and there's some in his chest too. He may start chemotherapy.

Sunday I found a new joy. I like blowing raspberries on ~C~'s bare feet. He giggles. It's hard to believe he's walking now. We'll probably get a webcam and Skype setup so we can watch him grow up. When we first saw him he was finishing up his dinner. Green beans, tofu, and oranges. It was strange to hear my sister-in-law ask if he recognized me from the photobook she shows him of the family. She said he always smiles when he sees my picture. And for so many reasons that makes me smile.

I was told I set a record for barium drinking. Two cups in five minutes. It was a little bit sweeter and a lot less chalky and chunky than last time. As always, everyone at the health center was nice. The woman who escorted me back remembered my husband from last night. My time with the barium started at 8:22am and I left the hospital grounds at 10:30am after visiting with my mother-in-law. So this visit was a lot less time than the last. I walked a little bit to get the barium moving. Laying on the right side and thinking of yummy, delicious food are two tricks that work also. I know my gastro will want to do another colonoscopy. The radiologist doctor saw the old x-rays and was concerned at first since she knew what the stricture looked like last time. And when the barium got all over my insides everyone had a surprise. My stricture is gone. That's right... the stricture the width of a #2 pencil is gone. Gone! I still have a small area near the end of the large intestine that seems to have some scarring. Months of steriods, the right diet and the right medication does a body good, I guess. Now when my mom tries to tell me I should take probiatics I can just give her the finger instead of being polite, non-committal and nonconfrontational. I can just say, "I've done everything my gastro asked me to and I'm doing great. I don't need to monkey with it, thank you."

Hubby found out he does indeed have a kidney stone - in his kidney! It will get the sonic wave treatment and then we'll see what happens after that. The doctor thinks the recent pain was from passing another kidney stone.

Since I was home he came home for lunch. We napped most of the time he was here.

I watched Something New this afternoon. It had potential but the end just kind of wrapped itself up a bit too neatly and quickly for my tastes.

I'm on the fence about my Maryland trip now. With so much medical stuff for us both and my husband's Toronto trip I would probably feel better financially staying at home.

Yesterday my sweet husband gave up some of his day off to meet me for lunch at Old Bag of Nails. We went after the lunch crowd so service was pretty quick and I didn't have to leave for work before the check came. It was very leisurely and I felt like a naughty girl.

I was nervous about work today because I was invited to a meeting and as it turned out, I had no idea what we were talking about! Apparently when commercials don't air like they are supposed to, the account reps can still make good on those commercials through a verification process. Sometimes a tone doesn't sound signaling the end of the station broadcast, or the commerical played too many/not enough times to meet the contract's needs. So I got to learn more about the business today.

Mostly I've been sticking with the FlyLady's clean sink, but I've not been able to do everything else I'm supposed to do to get into good habits. The apartment is looking better but I'm certainly not happy with it yet. Some of it is finding what works; like Monday is designated as the day to change the bed sheets, empty all the trash cans, and vacuum the floors. I think I'd do better to do this on Sunday when I'm not tired after work.

My husband had some hip x-rays taken today. I took a peek. He has sexy hip bones. :)

I re-listed a pair of earrings on eBay earlier this week and now I have bids on both earrings I'm selling. That made me really happy.

One of the tv shows we've been watching is High Stakes Poker. I like how relaxed the players are with each other. They joke around and you get to see more of their personalities. During tournament play they can be really stiff and serious.

We did watch the Emmys on Sunday which was strange for us. Usually we don't watch them. Usually the Golden Globes, Oscars, and the closing Cannes ceremony are what we watch. As my husband's dislike for the shows, the popular tastes have grown and the hosts for the preshows get worse, I get to watch less and less of the Golden Globes and the Oscars. And IFC stopped airing the Cannes ceremony. However, since I will get to see the dresses in their real colors the next awards season might be different. Whee! Now that Star Jones' life seems to be falling apart professionally I might get to see Kathy Griffin again at the Oscars.

Last night I priced airplane tickets to Washington for the annual Halloween party of friends. I was happy to find them for $178. Now I just have to see about getting time off work and confirming the date of the party. I would have to leave on a Friday and come back on a Sunday or Monday. Friday is our busiest day; I will have used my 2 personal days at that point, and I still need time off right before the new year for the family friend's wedding. I will earn something like 5 vacation days this year and those can go fast if I'm not careful. Technically I haven't "earned" any yet even though I've been there about 2 months.

Tonight I was getting ready to tell my husband our dinner options when I heard a knock at the door. Lasagna-style pizza and wings delivered by Pizza Hut! I didn't try the pizza.

Tomorrow morning I get pictures of my stricture. Woo Hoo! I love the taste of barium (not!).

As it happens from time to time, I took Zilla for his morning walk while wearing my nightgown. I threw on a pair of pants, my fleece, socks, and shoes to make myself somewhat presentable. Today was one of those days where I should have dressed a little better to match the handsomeness of my walking companion. A female jogger smiled at him. A middle-aged man in a Volvo slowed down to a crawl to look at him. And a child yelled out "Hi" to him while she was driven somewhere in a SUV. We got to the last stretch of our walk when he got a bit of pep in his step and a smile on his face. And I knew it didn't matter to him one iota what I wore, as long as I was with him.

Thursday was my appointment with my gastro. As long as things keep going well then I don't have to see him again for a year. The nurse took some of my blood to check my liver levels and other things. I found out there is more than one size of endoscope used in a colonoscopy. He used the pediatric size on me. I have two strictures, one of which is by my ileum so there is a section of my colon he hasn't seen that could be completely diseased and need to be removed. Next week I'm having barium x-rays taken to see whether or not my colon has been responding to my treatments. If it has, then he'll have me do another colonoscopy so he can see that missing area. Part of me wants it to be a mystery (cause what you don't know can't kill you, right?) and the other part of me is excited to see if the stricture the size of a #2 pencil has changed for the better. Another colonoscopy means goodbye to our discretionary income and any hope of a house. Even with insurance, they aren't cheap.

Last night my husband stayed up late. I woke up a few times thinking, "He's not here." Then once I woke up and thought, "I hope that's him in bed with me." So I touched his butt. And I thought, "It's not hairy so it's him and not Zilla." Then I woke up another time thinking, "Oh, he's still here." Unbeknownst to my conscious self, he came to bed at 2:30am. He and I had a conversation about the book he finished. Sometimes I wish we had a tape recorder in our room so I would know about these conversations. I've been like this since I was little.

Next week should be bad at work. Our permanent encoder will be gone until the 5th. That means our two temporaries will be doing his work too. One is a go-getter and is always doing work to stay busy. The other is a little slower and sometimes needs to be prodded - in fact, I've stayed last most nights last week because the go-getter got tired of doing all the work and left it for the other one to do. So on September 1st they'll be encoding not just for Saturday, Sunday, and Monday, but Tuesday too! We started to get in Labor Day sale tapes this week so I fully expect to get more next week too. I really need to pick out a book to read for when I have nothing to do. Wednesday is the colonoscopy so I'll be out all day; I hope I don't come back to a mad house on Thursday.

Before going to bed last night I saw the weather advisory about the warm front and how that's going to set the temperature in the 90s for the next few days. About 2:30am I feel a hand petting my head. My husband woke me up because something was going on. I saw the little flashes of light through the blinds and thought it was a weird electrical storm or lightning. I told him about the warm front. "I don't think this is weather related." We peeked through the blinds and then we just opened them up on two of the windows.

The lovely part about living almost directly across from a restaurant/bar is that we never know when the patrons are going to intrude on our peace. Usually it's just drunks being loud. For some reason they think it's okay to yell down the street (to no one or their buddies). Um... buy a clue. The people in the apartments you are walking by are sleeping.

Two patrol cars with lights flashing were across the street. A car was pulled over and the officers were talking to a thin gentleman in a white t-shirt and baseball cap. We went back to bed but at one point I heard a woman yelling. For the next 30 minutes each time I woke up the lights were still flashing. I have no idea if the man was a patron of the restaurant or not.

Around 8am I went downstairs to sleep where it was a little cooler. Somehow it had gotten up to 89 degrees. I had a strange work-related dream about commericals but I don't remember anything about it. I woke up a few more times and eventually the dancing Corgi feet from upstairs woke me up for good. Zilla can give those hardwood floors a workout.

I was really groggy and felt like something was pushing down on me to keep me asleep. My limbs were heavy and my eyelids wouldn't respond. It's as if my body was under control of some supernatural being and not me. This is a reminder of how it feels when I have a flare-up. At least I'll have medicine soon and I'm not falling asleep at 9pm on the couch when I'm supposed to be spending quality time with my husband.

We went to Thurman Cafe today where I had half of one of their yummy hamburgers (next time I'll put a hold on the sesame seed bun) and their take on onion straws. Katzinger's was busy and we couldn't find anywhere to park. Club 185 was closed until 5pm. I may have mentioned it before... my husband gets to go to all these neat places for lunch downtown and in the nearby areas. I was looking forward to my new job as I would be able to have this same kind of fun. Well, other than one lunch at Subway with my co-workers and one lunch at Bodega with our cousin, I go home. Zilla loves the extra time with me and it's nice to just decompress. But I would like to have a lunch date now and then.

The Columbus Museum of Art is free on Sundays. We saw three exhibits. The first was In the American West: Photographs by Richard Avedon, the second was Uncommon Clothes: Photographic Inspiration and the third was the Ohio Art League's 95th Annual Juried Spring Exhibition. The Richard Avedon was the most interesting to me.

Afterwards we took some pictures of things around town.

This morning I was so sick. I woke up around 4:30am coughing and my husband wondered if I was okay. "Um, it's just sinus drainage, dear." I took the last Allegra D until next month.

For breakfast I had a piece of buttered toast. At work I had a bottle of water and a hot chocolate. Just before noon I was cramping up and made it to the bathroom in time. For lunch I had a baked potato hoping it would settle things down. I dipped into my Pentasa bottle for a second pill. For the most part, it did settle stuff. I was worried I'd have to call in for the rest of the day, "Oh, by the way, I've not told you about this directly, but um..." Yeah. I'd rather tell my boss when I'm feeling okay.

He showed me today how to check our ftp site and a new report. The new report hasn't really been used before and he wants to see if it might improve the productivity of the encoders. I told him about the work habits of the encoders and how they don't seem as motivated to work ahead in the afternoons. While my cousin and I were talking yesterday he was asking if I was interested in a supervisor position under my boss. I think it would be fine but I think it's in another office and I love the location I'm in! My company is building a facility on my street but the plans are for my department to stay where we are. The customer service, billing, network services, and other departments are supposed to be in the new building.

Thursday I submitted my essay about Zilla and I received a confirmation email from the editor today. She's not read it yet but should have responses and contracts out in October. October! That seems so far away. I was supposed to get a mention in this week's oncewritten.com newsletter but no such luck. Maybe next week?

Yesterday I got my act together and put together contest guidelines for my local writing group. We're not meeting again until October just before NaNoWriMo. Next week I'll start posting about the contest.