Flights from HELL!!!

So, some of you know about my trip last month, to be with my grandmother when she passed away. This was VERY shortly after my husband had his stroke. Needless to say, I was a little stressed when, on Sunday, I boarded a plane in Indiana, ready to be home that night.

I got as far as Cincinnati before the torture started. Apparently, because of storms that hit the Midwest all weekend, flights to my NEXT stop were being delayed. This would have been a minor inconvenience (and a bit annoying) if it wasn't for the fact that I needed to connect from THAT flight to my home in Sioux Falls, SD. So, it became painfully clear that I was NOT going home that night.

I cried a little.

I cried a lot.

Noah's Ark couldn't have withstood this torrent.

Then my cell phone started to go dead... and guess where the charger was! In my checked luggage. Great. Wonderful. Fan-fucking-tastic. So there I was, sobbing my eyes out, calling everyone I could (while I still had enough phone juice to do so), letting them know I wouldn't be home that night.

My husband had planned on us having a late Thanksgiving dinner that night, so he had been cooking happily all day, knowing he'd get to see me again that evening (after a month apart, remember). He handled the bad news well... ok, he handled it beautifully. My mother was worried I'd be stuck in the airport all night, and so was I, on learning that EVERY SINGLE FLIGHT from Minneapolis (my next stop) to Sioux Falls (my destination) was overbooked the following day! So, even if I COULD get to Minneapolis, I wasn't getting home that night, and possibly not even Monday!

The crying began anew.

Around 8 PM, my wonderfully brilliant hubby called me with a last-ditch effort. If I could be rerouted to Denver, I could get home Monday. It wouldn't be that night, but I could have a guaranteed seat. I talked to the agent at the gate about it, and then my phone finally died completely. So Liz (the agent) let me use HER phone to call Jerry back, and the three of us put our heads together and figured it out. (Ok, they put their heads together. I played secretary and repeated messages back and forth because my brain was completely fried by this point.)

I had to rush through the concourse to get to my Denver flight, but was lucky enough that Liz knew to put me in my own row. So I got to stretch out, and even sleep (in between bouts of weeping). Delta Airlines paid for a very nice hotel room for me in Denver, so I didn't have to sleep in the airport, and even gave me a meal voucher to use on Monday to get some lunch while I waited for my flight home.

My flight from Denver to Sioux Falls was ALSO delayed, but fortunately that was my last leg, so I didn't really care HOW delayed it was, as long as it got me home.

Of course, my bag didn't make it with me.

I had to go back to the airport today to fill out a claim form for it, all ready to spend the next four days in my travel clothes (being the genius I am, I didn't think to pack some clothes in a carry-on), when I was given one more piece of GOOD news. My bag was there! They just had to scour the airport to track it down.

I am now home, wearing my deceased grandmother's rosary which is covered in Celtic symbols for our Irish heritage, in my pajama pants, and finally able to let everything out. It's about damn time, too.

Woot!

We're getting a new bed today. We bought it yesterday, and they're supposed to deliver it sometime between 1 and 3 this afternoon. So of course, this is officially one of the slowest moving days of my life. I think I've checked the clock three times in the past 10 minutes. Or more... I just know that it's been 11:36 for WAY too long.

I need one of those old "Tell us about yourself" surveys. Those usually take a few minutes to complete. I need a distraction, and I refuse to watch Twilight a second time just for that distraction. Don't get me wrong, the movie wasn't BAD, it just wasn't my style. *pause* Ok, it was PAINFUL to watch. I am glad to say I got through the first two (the second one was better), and still have no desire to read the books. And that's saying a lot coming from an avid reader like myself. There isn't much I REFUSE to read, but the Twilight series tops that short list right now.

The whole reason I started watching them was because my brother had told me about the parody, "Vampires Suck", and I wanted to watch that, but I also wanted to be able to understand all the inside jokes from it. No, that's really the reason. So I watched, I suffered through the most angsty, codependent, paranoid teenagers in the history of cinema, and it worked! The parody made a LOT more sense that way. Now I will go pretend that I never watched the abominations in the first place.

We finished cleaning up the bedroom this morning, getting it ready for the new bed. I'm so excited about it, I can hardly contain myself. I'm going to pick up a pack of cloves later for my back, hopefully that'll shave a few minutes off of this.

I'm listening to Squirrel Nut Zippers' album Hot. It's been FOREVER since I heard their music, and I forgot how much I love it. There's something about the jazzy big-band combination that's just so beautiful to me. My dad reintroduced me to the music, he has a song or two of theirs on his party mix CD. I got to hear it when I was out there visiting last month, and fell in love with the genre and the band in particular all over again. Sure beats listening to nothing but Reba for hours .... and hours.... and... HOURS.

My computer was having trouble earlier this week. I went to boot it up, and it just cycled, unable to find my hard drive. I was so afraid of losing all of my work. All of the images I use for photo manipulations, all of my music, my writing... I'm determined to get an external hard drive soon, or at least a flash drive, to hold some of this stuff. I figure, if I can hold off for a month or two, I can get something really cheap at Best Buy for Black Friday. My friend wanted to go stand out there for the early morning sale, so we might do that. Or I might just order something from the non-frozen region of my house. Since the end of November means SNOW out here, I'm not too sure I want to be up and out at 3:00 AM.

Time to go find one of those surveys. It's now 11:50, and I'm still feeling like I look at the clock every 5 seconds. I wish my bed would get here so I could go out and buy bedding for it, then just collapse for a few hours. I've been up and anxious since about 6 AM.

Computer Crashes

My computer is now dead. Or at least dying. Hard to say when it won't even boot up properly. The hard drive isn't recognized, which means it's either come loose somehow (I'm looking at you, Zot), or it might have fried. And thus I lose all my music... again.

I'm reading through old MySpace messages, and finding that I actually HAD friends at one point. Don't know why I lost touch with them. I guess it just happens sometimes. Have you ever noticed that pattern with friends online? For a while you message back and forth multiple times a day, then something happens and you just lose touch completely. I haven't spoken to this person in over a year. A YEAR! It seems like the time just slips by without my notice, until too much has passed to really catch up. I suppose that's how life is supposed to go, though. People come in and out of our lives in such a way that they either make a huge impact, or no impact at all. I hadn't even thought of this person since the last time I heard from him.

I've also been checking my OTHER MySpace account, one specifically geared toward a particular group of people. It's fun to read the messages there, but some of them are a little insistent. I'm using it to learn how to say "no" to someone, and not care if they unfriend me. I guess it's a good exercise in human interaction. After all, not everyone is always going to like you, so it's probably a healthy idea to get used to that fact.

I'm going to go sketch for a while, and watch some television. Somehow the brain-numbing activity of television gives me the creativity I lack on these meds.

Huh

So here I am, listening to Reba McEntire, and refusing to even contemplate how long it's been since I last updated this. I refuse. I won't even look at the dates of the previous entries.

I'm well medicated now, which is good. Really, it is. Even if it means that I rarely have the desire, inclination, or ability to write these days. It seems that most of my creative inspiration came from my manic episodes, which I am no longer suffering from. At times, it's even been tempting to stop the meds, just to have that pipeline to creativity back. It was such a major part of my life for so long that without it I feel like less of a person. Or, at least, less of ME.

NaNoWriMo is coming up in a little over a month, and I don't even think I'll participate this year. 50,000 words in 30 days was difficult enough to do when I COULD come up with something to write. Now I just feel like a dry, empty well. I have one idea for a story, but that won't fill 50k words, not by a long way. And it's mostly just an idea based on the music I listen to. Not really that great, actually.

I feel like I'm forcing things right now. I'm forcing the happiness I show to other people, and forcing the relationships I have with them. All I really want is to curl up and ignore the world, but I know I can't do that. I start taking an anti-depressant next week, and I'm hoping that will break the funk. I'm also starting therapy next month. Maybe talking some of this out with someone who understands will help.

South Dakota is killing me slowly. I feel like the ficus tree that is planted in a pot instead of allowed to grow wild. Stunted in my growth, unable to really achieve what I'm capable of, because of my placement. I don't dare tell anyone about that, though. It would hurt Jerry so much if he thought I was that unhappy here, and hurting him is top on my list of things not to do. If I don't get out of here soon, though.... hurting him will fall lower on the list, to be replaced with "stay put". Does that make any sense? It does in my head, though I don't like the implications. My life is just so... stagnant! I don't go anywhere, I don't do anything but surf the web and lament the lack of writing. Our marriage hit a brick wall about 3 years ago, and it doesn't seem to be climbing over. At this point, I'd be happy with high-powered explosives bringing that wall down. A part of me feels like I want to leave, but I don't have anywhere to go, or any way to support myself if I did go.

Yep. South Dakota is killing me.

Just a quick note

Yay! My language packs for Rosetta Stone arrived today! I am now set to learn several languages, each of which I will be testing the RS format with. I received the following:

Chinese (Mandarin)

French

Dutch

Danish

German

Greek

Irish

Italian

Latin

Japanese

Russian

Spanish (Latin America)

I'm starting with French.

Pain, Meds, and Other Lifestyle Choices

See, this is what I was talking about back there. Here it is, four full days after my last post, and I'm really only updating out of guilt. Well, guilt and a desire to actually stick to a writing project, even if it is a weblog. And maybe a little bit of narcissism. (Just a bit, though!)

My husband's shoulder started giving him trouble (he has the beginnings of arthritis), and after a nice long battle with the ER doctors who were convinced he was just after morphine (it confused them rather satisfactorily when he refused the nasty drug), we finally got him an appointment with a REAL doctor, in the same clinic as my own primary care doc. This man is amazing, folks. He listened, did all the right tests, even wrote out a note for my husband to take some much needed time off work to recuperate! (With arthritis in his shoulder and arm, working at a computer is damn near impossible for him right now.)

The doctor gave him better medications, including an anti-inflammatory (think ibuprofen, with a kick), and the best pain-killer/muscle-relaxant known to mankind. I won't share names, but this medication comes in a little yellow tablet... a little tablet of sunshine, if you ask me! It takes his pain down to a dull ache, just as if he'd had a rough day working on the car.

We hit up Walgreens to fill the prescriptions, and to pick up some essentials for pain management. A heating pad (electric, great buy and works wonders with its 3 settings), an ice pack complete with a little cloth sleeve to keep from burning the skin, a tube of muscle cream (gets cold, and then slowly warms the pain right out of his joints), and of course, the biggest necessity... Rocky Road ice cream. That last one is mostly for me. ;)

Our days have been spent enjoying each other's company, and commiserating between his shoulder and my kidneys. We laugh about what a fine pair we make, watch old TV shows about men screwing in space, and take naps. This little speedbump in our lives may have prevented us from doing what we'd originally planned for Valentine's Day, which was to go out of town this next weekend, but instead we get a full week to spend, at home, just focusing on not stressing out. With any luck, it will help in some much-needed areas of our lives. This is kind of it on some levels, and I think I'm dreading life going back to normal so much more than he is.

It's a dreary day today, which means that the windows are of course all wide open, letting in that gray light, and whatever cool air I can get my nose buried into. The crabbed trees and snowdrifts outside make it seem almost otherworldly, giving the impression that, much like his work schedule, the entire world has stopped for these few days. And for all intents and purposes, it has. Our bills are caught up, our rent isn't due yet, and we have food in the refrigerator. I have my books, he has his Sci-Fi stuff (I refuse to call it "SyFy", that's just an insult to any real fan of the genre), and we get to act like a stable old married couple for a few days.

In travel news, I have been glued to the Delta website, waiting to see good deals. I have an account set up with a few other programs to earn miles, and we'll see how quickly I can get to that 25,000. :) If you have a Delta SkyMiles account, there's a great program that partners with it, called "SkyMiles Dining". The way this works is quite simple. You register, link your SkyMiles account, and then supply a debit/credit card number. THERE IS NO FEE TO USE THIS! The reason for the card number is that it is then linked to that account. Every time you use THAT card at one of the approved dining locations (and they have a million of them), you earn miles. It's like having a Diner's Card with FF miles, but without needing the credit. ;)

To try it out, go to http://skymiles.rewardsnetwork.com/ and sign up. Again, it's totally free. They never charge a fee to use their service, and you can have family members link THEIR debit/credit cards to the account as well. I have my husband's card and my own, along with a card from a family member who doesn't even live with us. The more cards you link, the more likely you'll earn miles. :)

Now that the sales pitch is over, I have to say... that 25k looks pretty distant right now. I'm hovering around 4,000 miles, from my last trip out to CA, but I have a great deal of hope that I'll get that number up fast. Even with my bad credit. I would love to be able to get a Delta SkyMiles credit card, but since I'm not working right now, and both my and my husband's credit stinks, that's just not going to happen. :)

New World

So here I am, making yet another blog. Yep, I have been here before, making a first post on a new blog, talking about how often I will be writing in it.... and then inevitably falling through on that. I don't know, it just always seems hard to stick to something like this, knowing I'm the only one reading it. I'm the easiest person for me to let down, I guess. :)

I still don't know what I want this thing to be about. I'm working on several things right now, each of which would make interesting topics to chronicle, but I doubt highly that I will keep track of them well enough here to make it worthwhile. I already have a surgery blog, on a more appropriate website (which I just remembered I need to update today as well), and a religious discovery blog right here on Blogger. So what is left? Plenty! I am working on immersion language learning (for several different languages, mind you), drooling over volunteer-abroad programs that would allow me to spend time in Asia (one of my biggest dreams), and determined to finally pin down what I want to do with my life...

Why does it always have to be "what I want to do with my life"? What if what I want to do doesn't involve college, but I still want to go? What I really want to do with my life is pack a bag with a few essentials, put some money on my debit card, and travel. All over the world. I want to go to Japan, China, Romania, France, England, Germany, Norway, the Cayman Islands, Brasil, Puerto Rico, Thailand, Greece, Egypt... Even just traveling around the US would be spectacular. I was raised to embrace the desire for these experiences, but I lack the funding. So either some rich relative kicks off and leaves me a fortune large enough to do this, or I wait until I can get enough together for the first leg of that journey.

Every couple of years I get this bug... I need to travel. Taking frequent trips out to California has helped, and at the same time it has made things worse. Now I've got a taste for booking a flight for the next morning, hopping on the plane, and jetting halfway across the country for a weekend. And I'm hooked. I spend half of my free time right now looking up more flights, trying to find the best deals from my little airport here in South Dakota. Fortunately, I have friends and family that love the chance to pitch in and help pay for these luxuries. If not for them, I would have to spend my "trips" in a mental institution, flying on Klonopin Airlines.

So here's to hoping. Hoping that I stick with this blog enough to actually make something of it, that I get my dream of traveling around the world, that I actually learn more than just "bonjour" and "merci" with this language course. Here's to hoping this blog will at least keep enough of my sanity intact that I won't go do something profoundly stupid, to break the monotony. ;)