Happy Memorial Day

Happy Memorial Day Weekend!

Send an Illinois girl down south for a vacation and look what happens! Pulled pork sliders with slaw, corn fritters, green onions from the garden, and Claussen pickles, a new hot and spicy variety, and believe me, they are! The meal was delicious. I'm bummed that I forgot the jalapeno for the fritters.

I'm good at so many things. Too bad dieting isn't one of them. Maybe I should just throw in the fritter! Nah, I can't give up. I supposed to my friend that I guessed nobody was going to cut any more weight off me, I'll have to lose it myself, and lamented they couldn't have taken a bit off my ass when they took out the tumor. 

Nothing much new to report.  I decided the bushes looked fine and had been trimmed just enough . . . right after I cut through the extension cord, a fine Mallaney family tradition I guess I'll be carrying on.

My strained Achilles or whatever it is caused me to make yet another doctor's appointment. When it rains it pours. If I disappear suddenly maybe the insurance company put a hit out on me! I remember the good old days when I only went to the doctor once a year and never met my deductible. Those were the days! They are seemingly over. Heading to doc Tuesday a.m. Looking forward to getting this healed up so I can enjoy walking again. I finally get a good habit going and boom, a sore tootsie derails me.

Planted my tomatoes and peppers. Hoping for some rain soon. It has been quite dry since I planted. Everything else is looking pretty good.

Thankful for AC today. Blazing hot out there. Cats are laying around like slugs. I finally went out and hauled Finn in, and since it was not his idea, he was pissy. He felt the cool air and changed his tune and is curled up on the bed now. Something has Miss Midge all jumpy and she won't come in. Oh well. When it hits 97 later she might changer her tune.

Have a good weekend all. Off to Mark and Donna's for a swim this afternoon, perhaps a beer, or two, or three . . .

Kay :)

Well the old entrails look good! I met with the PA at the gastroenterologist's office today. She said the polyp they removed was teeny tiny, but it is of a type that can come back so they recommend another colonoscopy in 3 years. The reconnection site looks dandy, no narrowing or other bad stuff (that I can't remember any of lol). Seems my entrails look just dandy. Woo hoo!

The end.

Kay :)

Please note that I have not mentioned . . .

BOWELS! LOL John was playing some word game on line and the clue was intestines, and the correct answer was _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _. So, henceforth, should any mention of my bowels be necessary, I will refer to them as entrails. LOLOL  I have a follow-up on Wednesday with the doc who did the colonoscopy. I'm very excited about that.

Sigh.

Kay

Happy Mother's Day

Midge graciously let Mom sit in HER chair for a while. Midge loves her camo chair. 

It was a glorious day here. I had no sooner made the comment that we needed a traffic control device for all the butterflies when one alighted on my bosom! I was too astonished to try to get a pic though. Plus I don't think I'm that coordinated.

Midge's flower bed is thriving. She needs to weed it though. She let me plant some onions along the outside of the bed, and they are pretty tasty.

Finn looking warily at the voo doo stuff. Or maybe it's oregano. Not sure.

That huge radish on the right wasn't woody at all. It was perfect! Yum.

A lovely batch of lettuce from the garden and some radishes = a nice lunch salad. Don't be put off by the pea soup color of that salad dressing. John made it from garlic scapes and fresh oregano in his beloved vitamix and the flavor is fantastic.

That's all folks. Back to work tomorrow. Boo hoo.

Kay

If you only know Jack, you don't know Dickel

Hi Folks

Back from Tennessee. Of course we had to go to a distillery. Not the Jack Daniels Distillery, but the George Dickel Distillery. There were t-shirts there that read IF YOU ONLY KNOW JACK YOU DON'T KNOW DICKEL! lol I'm going to make some homemade Kahlua and Baileys for the girl's glamping trip, so it was nice to get the whiskey I need. And at a lovely fruit stand (we had strawberry shortcake for supper that night, yum!), I got some Scuppernong jelly. It is delicious.

We had some nice hikes. Lots of stairs. I did not make the 1200 steps at Cloudland Canyon State Park in Georgia! I got to the bottom of the first waterfall, and was starting to turn back up the stairs and my dang Achilles seized up! ARGHHHHHH It loosened up enough for me to make it back up the stairs, albeit slowly. John continued on to the other waterfall, 600 more steps lol and I made my way back up to the parking lot. It had seized up the day after my colonoscopy, and was very painful for a day, but after some ice and anti-inflammatories, it seemed to be OK again . . . until I travel hundreds of miles away and down 200 steps! It must have been a family member, or a friend, who suggested that some people get shoulder pain after anesthesia, and that perhaps because I am half-assed backward, I got foot pain. Ha ha. And then, good lord, my back seized up. It was very interesting. Luckily I was able to continue hiking, though I went slowly and carefully. I need to buy some stock in an ibuprofen company. Here are some random pics.

The name of this road amused me.

Ahhh. The river view from the Adirondack chairs around the fire pit where we stayed.. Just lovely. You don't even need to pack an alarm clock, as there is an obliging rooster more than willing to wake you.

Hazel, trying to find the vacation rental by owner place I booked. It was 11 (long) miles down a twisty, narrow, curvy, bumpy road! Seemingly there are dogs and chickens that live right on the road!

Cloudland Canyon State Park.

Danger Will Robinson!

Some of the steps at Cloudland Canyon.

I knew my luck had turned when I got a sour carton of milk at Julie Darling Doughnut shop (yum), and got a free doughnut from the clerk, who felt bad for me. Milk wasn't even out of date, apparently I'm just cursed lately. CURSED! We went to the shop to use the internet, because the charming place I booked didn't have  it. LOL

Pretty.

Weird crazy man!

It was a trip of doughnuts, BBQ, hikes, cheeseburgers, onion rings, injuries, aches and pains, and scary mountain roads. I also slept like a baby and laughed a lot. I had a good time! LOL  I'm going to reevaluate my purpose in life and my blog and will return when I have it figured out. So see you tomorrow probably!

Kay

I'm glad that is over!

Hi Folks,

I'm glad the colonoscopy is over! The prep sucks, with or without a colostomy bag. LOL I didn't see doc after the procedure, but he spoke to my mom and told her he removed one small polyp and wants to see me in three weeks. Part of the reason I went to the gastroenterologist is that while I was in the hospital after the reversal surgery I had a student nurse for a day. She was very attentive, and at one point she came in and started lecturing me on the diverticulitis diet. I said whoa, the colostomy was the result of the circulation of the bowel being impinged due to a large benign, ovarian mass, not diverticulitis. And the student nurse said well there are diverticula mentioned in the surgery report from the initial surgery. OK. Turns out the section of bowel that was removed had a couple of diverticula. So I had some questions about that and are there certain foods I should be avoiding, and what about the irritable bowel diagnosis from before the tumor, was it probably from the tumor, etc., and some other annoying little things, and given that I don't need to go back for three weeks, it would seem everything is kosher. The nurse told me they found no diverticulitis, so whew. Nice.

I swear, some day I will do a post and it will not mention bowels! LOL

Kay :)

Hi Folks,

BE WARNED . . . I learned something last week. If you have recently had a couple of surgeries involving your bowels, and you go to your gastroenterologist for a consult to ask if some little things that are going on are normal and to be expected, and you expect him to lecture you on some healthy dietary changes, he will want to do a colonoscopy and you will find yourself on a clear liquid diet (and NOT the clear liquid diet I enjoyed yesterday afternoon with my friends) AGAIN! ARGHHHHHHHHHHHH. After that sunk in (and it took a while lol) I said “What!? Really?! I thought you would tell me to eat more fiber and yogurt and get some probiotics!” That seemed to amuse him. Oh the wit.

I don’t think there is anything majorly wrong, but I admit, it will be nice to confirm that everything is in order down there. The doc said look, you are due for a colonoscopy later this year anyway. Let’s go ahead and do it now instead of later in the year and check things out. If everything is OK you’ll be set for 5-10 years. I asked him if you can do a colonoscopy so soon after the colostomy reversal surgery (duh, he is a doctor, I guess he knows lol), and he replied oh yes, sometimes we do them as soon as 6 weeks after to make sure everything is kosher (my word, not his lol) in there and it is not at all uncommon to have a colonoscopy as a follow-up to colostomy reversal surgery. So now I have the clear liquid diet to look forward to tomorrow and that wonderful (and a different kind than I have used before, maybe it will be more pleasant? hahahaha) bowel prep tomorrow night at 6:00. Whoop-de-frickin-doo. So back to the hospital (yuck) for a colonoscopy (double yuck) on Wednesday. Grrrrrrrr. It’s not happening so fast because there is a sense of urgency, just because the doc and date was available, and because of my upcoming vacation, and I just wanted to get it over with pronto.

Enough whining. The physical therapy on my shoulder is going well. I have one more visit left this Friday. The therapist upped my weights and my reps today. Ouch, but I can tell it is really getting stronger and the pain is gone, a very good thing.

Garden is doing well. I'll be eating a salad before you know it. I think this is the earliest I've ever had radishes from garden. They are small, but delicious.

Vacation and camping coming up fast! I’m looking forward to getting away and drinking some beers and camping coffee (yummo!), and taking some nice hikes, and distancing myself from the surgical/hospital/nausea/bowel/colostomy/colonoscopy memories of these last few months. I think that is just what the doctor should order! And where is this fictional doctor, I want to hire him! LOL I hope 3 states is far enough to get away from it all!

Kay :)