Celebrations and Discoveries

So life is odd and a bit off kilter lately. I turned 30 on Wednesday and no, I don't feel any different. The day started off alright when Sugarbuzz sang happy birthday to me with my Mom. Then things started to slide downhill. Between painting some of the new apartment and putting down carpet I was exhausted. Add to that the fact that I forgot my pin number for my debit card and couldn't access any funds for celebrating and it seems bad but not awful yet. When you toss into the mix the fact that I got stuck picking up a friend for my party out of state when the car's headlights ceased to function at 10pm and I was frazzled and crying. It was a $25 piece of plastic that broke. That's it. The switch casing was causing the headlight on switch to not connect to the car's internal computer. So my buddy and I tore the car dash apart and duct taped the stupid thing together before hitting the road back to my state to make the party. The night significantly improved after that.

Yesterday I found something that causes most people to freak out completely. I found my first gray hair. Normally I'd be pissed, but the universe decided to apparently say it was sorry. I'm not actually getting gray or white hair. It's coming in silver.

You heard me. Silver.

Bright and shiney. It looks like someone just went and chromed a single strand of hair on my head. I like it. :)

But now that I've wasted enough time on this, it's back to pulling all the furnature to one room so that the movers can get it out. Won't that be nice. *sigh*

Aion Quest - Wedding Ring

So born out of frustration for the fact that I can't find a good help area for Aion that isn't in Chinese (even the google translations of these pages sucks), I've decided to start doing it myself. I've made a level one Scout named Trystal, and I'm going to be using her to write about the different quests so that if someone is stuck, maybe I can give them a hint. For now however, I just finished the Wedding Ring quest in Verteron Citadel with my Sorcerer Punky.

Here's how it's done.

1. Go out to the River, it doesn't matter where you do this.
2. Once you hit the water, go left.
3. Keep going left until it tells you that you're drowning.
4. On the shore there is a purple box. You can't miss it, everything else is green.
5. Now you have a choice, you can take it back to the husband or the wife.

That's it, pick which one you want to give it too and go drop it off. Easy peasy. I don't remember what the wife offered, but the husband coughed up 1800 kinah for it.

The Saddest Thing Ever

I cried... a lot... It was really sad. Maybe I'm just hormonal or something...

Blogs for the next generation

I'm going to be hosting a blog for my kid, who has chosen to call himself Sugarbuzz as a net name. Personally, I think it's pretty appropriate, but hey... I'm showing him what it looks like to make a blog entry.

Bizzare Injuries

Last night I managed to do the impossible. I injured myself in the most unusual way I've ever heard of. I actually managed to throat myself with the vacuum cleaner.

You heard me right, I throated myself with the vacuum cleaner.

Horray for bending the laws of possible reality! Ok, so it went down like this. I was out of smokes and wanted to run to the store to pick up another pack. I knew that my backpack was in the closet so without turning the light on, I reached in to grab the backpack. It was about 1:30am, so it was really pretty dark as the only light was the monitor on my laptop. What I failed to see was the handle of the vacuum cleaner as it is black. It impacted right on the left of my voicebox hard enough to knock the wind out of me. After making sure it didn't do any permanent damage, I sniffled for a bit and then went and got my smokes.

So in case anyone is wondering, no, nobody throat punched me, I did it to myself.

Oh! I also started playing this game that Jim got. It's called Aion. Apparently it's China's answer to WoW. I know I'm pathetic, but their character creation process is pretty neat and my character is nauseously adorable. :)

And now that I've revealed my sad and pathetic dorkdom... yeah, I'm going to go hide. I've spent so much time complaining about WoW, but at least this game has something WoW doesn't... a timer. After a few hours, it won't allow you to get xp or level anymore. It actually tells you to go do something else for at least 5 hours before it will let you play again. I like that... you can't blow your life away playing the game. Nice, go China!

Universal Advice

When you wake up in the morning and your first thought it "Shit happens." Take the universe's advice, roll over, and pull the blanket over your head. It is now time to take a mulligan with the day and wait for tomorrow.

*sigh*

So far I've bonked my head, coughed milk all over my computer, spilled a soda on the carpet, barked my shin, and have had my sinuses going ballistic due to allergies. Considering I've only been awake two hours, that's fucking impressive. And for my next trick ladies and gentlemen, I shall fall down the fucking stairs. Gods I hope not.

Oh yeah, before I forget, thank you ever so very very much Jim for the minor surgery kit that you gave me. I got to use it today to cut the palm of my hand open and pull out the very tiny piece of gravel that I missed yesterday. Remarkably, my hand feels tons better now that I've done that.

Life Lessons

Today I learned several very important things. One of them made me very happy, the other however, made me very very sad.

First off, there's been a lot of stuff going on lately. We did a lot of work at the site. Which is coming along nicely. Bonnie and Bill painted the hall and though the colors that were chosen were IL Dept of Corrections goldenrod and brown, the job that they did was not only very quick, but really spectacularly painted. We are however now stuck with 17 gal. of goldenrod yellow fucking paint that's going to go in the main room. I think if we get a gallon of Navajo Red stain and hit it with a sponge, it will look awesome. Before I do this however, I fully intend to run a photoshop simulation to see what it will look like. Yes, I will put the picture here so that others can see.

Today I learned that even though the workout machine says 3, it really means 30. So I felt like so much less of a total pussy with my workout. Before, I was kind of sad that my arms were all noodlely after doing fifteen reps with 3 lbs. I feel a whole lot better to know that it was after doing fifteen reps with 30 lbs.

The other thing that I learned today was that motorcycles and gravel roads do not mix. I did alright at first, but I braked too hard or too quick on my last run and dumped myself. Though I tore my hand up a bit, it looks more like I got into a pretty intense bar fight and not like I dumped my bike like a moron. After cleaning it with rubbing alcohol (that sucked beyond all rational thought), I slapped band-aids in place and we headed off to do a bit more work on the site.

From Motorcycle Whoops

From Motorcycle Whoops

The women's bathroom now kinda has toilets. Oh yeah... that's another thing I learned today, 80 year old poop smells really really bad.

Fuck it, now I'm just rambling and hurty... I'm going to bed.

Funny Gamer Shit

So a friend of mine sent me a link to this the other day and I laughed so hard I cried. The really sad thing is that I actually understand everything that was said.



I totally want that on a t-shirt. "Stop crying, Hitler wouldn't dare run a Spelljammer campaign."

ROFL

Doctors and Booze

So last night I went out to the bar to play darts and to goof off with my friends on possibly my last night of drinking. In retrospect, I'm glad I went because I can't drink anymore due to what the doctors have given me. So I finished my first beer and was about 3 dart games in when I realized that the women's room was out of order due to some goofy bitch puking in the sink when the perfectly good toilet was right there. So I did what I could and mucked around trying to fix the sink so us girls could use the bathroom. It took about an hour and I had to take the whole damn sink apart, but I managed to fix the bathroom.

Sadly this lead to the hardest night of drinking I've had in a while and the worst timed hangover in my life. This was actually more poorly timed than the drinking binge I went on when I was 18 and had to show up to take my GED early the next morning. I passed that with flying colors by the way, still loaded to the gills and my record still stands with the GED office... I checked. LOL

No, this one was brought about by the very grateful bartender who took to calling me his special little plumber girl all night and kept giving me beers and shots no matter the fact that I tried to say no thanks. I really really didn't want to seem like I just fixed it to get free booze, I actually just like the bar and frankly, when your friend's things get busted, you help if you can. I know... I'm weird.

So here I was this morning, partially still wasted and having to go in for the MRI, full blood panel, and Table Tilt Test. Yeah...

So Keith comes over early in the AM to get me moving since he knew I was going to be fucked up as he was the one that drove my drunk ass home last night. I seriously felt like I'd been hit by a truck at this point. After moping about for a while and being miserable, he suggested I go take a shower to feel better. Sadly, this worked. I say sadly, because halfway through the shower I felt better enough to expel the rest of the alcohol that was lurking in my stomach.

Now that I'd thrown up enough to restock a bar, I crawled back into the shower and waited for the water to go cold. I then dragged my ass out and got dressed and headed off to the hospital. I figured the only thing my blood panel would do at this point was intoxicate the machine that was attempting to read it, so I skipped that test and put it off until Tuesday. Keith and I made our way over to the MRI area where I figured they'd find much more dead brain cells than they would have yesterday, only to find that the MRI had been rescheduled to 8:15 that morning. So I had to reschedule it to Tuesday. Sadly, the table tilt test was still a go.

If you've never had a table tilt test it's pretty easy to simulate. Go stand with your back to the wall. Now scoot your feet away from the wall while you're leaning against it until you're standing at a 70 degree angle. Stay there for about half an hour. Didn't pass out? Ok, that's simple, take some speed so your heart goes ballistic and try it again. Now lay down. Did you pass out yet?

I actually didn't pass out from this. I know that's weird as hell, especially to those of you who know me. It was pretty close, but it didn't happen. The good news is I don't have Pulmonary Hypertension. If I did, I would have had serious problems. They told me this after they pointed out the crash cart that was parked next to the table. They did however find out one of the things that's wrong with me.

I have Vasovagal Syncope.

This actually has a pretty easy explanation. Have you ever stood up and gotten dizzy? Everyone has. :) Now about 50% of the world's population has actually passed out from this once or twice. That's actually pretty normal. About 3% of the world's population has this happen pretty often and that's what Vasovagal Syncope is. It's a reflex of the Vagal Nerve (the largest nerve in your body) much along the way that someone throwing a fist toward your face causes you to reflexively flinch. It is treatable with Beta Blockers, which means no more booze for the punky kitty. :(

Now this isn't the end of the story, since the doc said that it's only part of the problem, but he's pretty sure now that the rest of the issue has nothing to do with Cardiology at all and is strictly neurological. So it's probably seizures. Not so bad when you look at the alternatives.

Horray It's Spring!!

Ok, now that the sucktastic cold months are passing, it's time to get back to the bike. Now I may not be able to actually get it titled and registered and get my motorcycle license due to the doc revoking mine, but I can get it in top running order so that it's ready to go when I can do all that stuff again.

I think that the next thing I'm going to do is check the regulator and clean the points. And as soon as I figure out how to do those things, I'll be sitting pretty with this whole thing. :)

Artwork

I put some new artwork up on devArt yesterday. Two of the pictures are of people who play Ravnos in OWbN and will be going on the site once I have enough pictures to finish the site. Though I need about twenty. I should be able to get two more this weekend. Hopefully, the players will start sending me their pics so that I can get the site done and up. *Sigh*

I want to talk to Mike about changing my title from Webmistress to Web Subcoord since it's a pain in the ass not being taken seriously or being narked out for asking players for information on their characters that is supposedly 'none of my business and should only be available to the coord's office or STs'.

Blah... I'm part of the Coord's office, it says so right on the website. Though if you don't have Subcoord attached to your name, no one takes it seriously.

Dissapointments

So I had my neurology appointment today.

After a battery of test that could be done in the office, I had a laundry list of tests I now have to go do over the course of this month. I have to have a Tilt Table test, an MRI, an EEG, and a full blood work up.

The TT test is going to be strapping me up to a table and pumping full of drugs to make my heart go nuts. Then they'll flip me upside-down and right-side up over and over and over until I pass out. You've probably seen this on House.

The MRI, yet another thing they like to do on House, is where you get put into a magnetic tube and they take pictures. For instance, of your brain like I'm having. I cannot forget to take my tongue stud out or I will loose it in the most painful way. There would be lots and lots of blood and probably broken teeth. That would definitely suck.

EEG is the test where they monitor the electric impulses in the brain by putting wires on your head. They attach them with what appears to be marshmallow fluff. It's damn hard to wash out. I'm so not cutting it out of my hair, but that's always a possibility for guys anyway.

The full blood panel I skipped on getting today because I was too depressed to bother doing it. The very end of my visit, the doctor decided to tell me that as per Wisconsin Law, any time you loose consciousness due to a seizure or head injury, your driver's license is revoked for 90 days.

My driver's license is revoked!

... for 90 DAYS!

GAH!!!

I'm falling into the medically weird area again, because the Doc wasn't sure if it is seizures or not. She said it might be something else called POTS or POTTS...

Gimme a sec and I'll look it up...

Jesus Christ...

Pulmonary Hypertension

Fuck... I quit...

Please cross your fingers and hope for seizures.

Owies

So last night I went to head down to Chicago to catch the Flogging Molly show.

It was positively the best show that I've ever seen them put on btw, but that's beside the point.

I was eastbound on 94 between Touhy and Peterson and traffic was at a dead standstill. Bonnie was so very kindly giving me directions to the House of Blues while I waited for traffic to start moving again. All the sudden the world went white and pain happened.

Some days I hate the world, and this is one of them.

The guy that was driving down the expressway had stopped paying attention. He hit me. Granted it was only at around 30mph, but those of you that have been in accidents before know that it hurts anyway. Those of you that know me, know how tiny I am. Since my legs are so short, I had the seat scooted all the way up so I could reach the pedals. That's how my head bounced off the steering wheel while I was still wearing my seatbelt.

IDoT was really really on the ball and I was very impressed. No less than two minutes after we crashed, they were on the scene and moving us off the highway to a safe place so that we could wait for the cops they'd already called to show up. Then they stayed with us to make sure that we weren't alone until the cops got there. IDoT stands for Illinois Department of Transportation, just in case you were wondering.

So all three cars moved off to the Peterson exit and waited. Keep in mind that I'm moving off pure adrenaline at this point. The guy that hit me immediately started babbling away about who's fault was it, how much is it going to cost to fix the damage and the fact that he really really had somewhere else that he needed to be right now. His passenger hardly said a word, but upon prompting from the driver at fault, gave me his driver's license number. Said DaF then proceeded to try and give me $100 to fix the car. I looked at him like he was insane and refused. After I refused $200, $300, and $400, he threw his cellphone at me to talk to his sister.

She spun a sob story about how the car was a rental that was in her name and her brother had borrowed it. It was also uninsured. She tried to convince me to take the money and let them go, but I refused again. DaF then became severely agitated and just took off. The poor girl that I'd been pushed into just stood there watching all this. She just got a little scratch on her bumper, so she was pretty relieved. I'm really grateful she stuck around, it was beyond nice of her. Granted I think it may be required by law, but she was still really nice.

See, the DaF really screwed himself. In Illinois, it's illegal to leave the scene of an accident that has a) injured people or b) damages totaling over $500. It's a felony. Sorry to the passenger that gave out his information, but I doubt he'll take a felony for his buddy. Not to mention the fact that the front of the rental was screwed up. Did they think the rental company wouldn't notice?

People are dumb.

So it took an hour and a half, but the cops showed up, took the accident report, and then headed off to go arrest the passenger. At that point, still shaking, I headed off the fifteen minutes to head to the concert. I got to go in, but because I couldn't find my driver's license I wasn't able to drink. No big deal since I really wasn't sure if I had a concussion or not and didn't want to risk it. On top of that I still had to drive home. Steve and I hung by the bar mostly and watched. I missed not being able to be in the pit, but because the K-Town boys weren't out, I really didn't want to play in the amateur hour the pit had become.

After everything was said and done, Steve and I went over to his place where he grabbed his glasses and his car and he followed me all the way home. See now I didn't know this, but at this point, it was extremely unsafe to be driving the car. The roll-bar had deployed putting the car in defense mode. At any point I could have very easily hit a bump and the airbags could have gone off. That would have instantly resulted in a trip to the hospital via ambulance. My tiny body can't take a hit like that.

So this morning I woke up with a migraine. I also hurt everywhere. I woke up to Jim's mom coming over. Since it wasn't my car that was hit, but Jim's, his insurance was insisting that I go to the doctor immediately to be checked out. I had no problem with this since I already felt awful. So Pat and I headed over to the local walk in clinic. It took a while, but we got seen by a Dr. who totally didn't like the reactions I was giving. Apparently I kind of freaked her out since my irises were pinprick small and I kept not getting words right. For example, it's taken me over two hours to write this. Yeah...

Since it was important to make sure that I didn't have a small slow bleed in my brain, and to make sure that my neck wasn't damaged, I ended up having a CT scan of my head and neck. A CT scan is also called a Cat scan. Well, the good news is I don't have a bleed in my head and my neck is ok. So they didn't find any cats. :)

The doc was concerned however with the fact that I'm not moving right at all. She gave me Hydrocodone (pain killer) and Cyclobenzaprine (muscle relaxer). I'm also supposed to not really do anything for five days. I have to let the next doc know that when I go to my neurology appointment on Thursday.

*sigh*

All I want is to have one stupid weekend where I don't hurt or feel sick. I keep wanting to cry and pout and whine about how unfair life is.

Meh... fuck it...

The world is kind of woozy right now due to the pills. :)

Even More About Doctors

So yeah...

The cardiologist's office called earlier this week. They've gone over all my test results and shockingly enough, they've discovered something I didn't expect.

My heart is better.

Yeah, no shit.

I've spent most of my life not really making plans for the extended future because I honestly didn't expect to ever see any form of extended future. After fully reviewing my results, they've discovered that I have a mild arrhythmia and they can barely see my Mitral Valve Prolapse. I was pretty shocked all in all and kept asking questions. From everything that I'd read, once your heart was damaged, it didn't ever fix itself. So and wow... I am a medical freak of nature still. Saying that actually makes me feel kind of better.

I think that I'd adjusted so hard to the idea of just dying that the idea that I'm going to live is pretty fucking scary. What do I do with my life now that I get to actually have one?

Oh, at least I still have one bit of bad news to help keep the world in perspective in my own mind. The weird passing out thing that I keep doing when I get all pissed off and stressed out is actually catalytic seizures.

So at least some things are still normal. :)

Doctors

I'm really not looking forward to the eleventh. I have to go in to the cardiologist and deal with all the stupid tests again. I hate doing that. It hurts. They shove my ribs out of the way to get a good read during the echocardiogram and I always pass out during the stress test. Seriously, I'm getting sick of the nurses that administer those tests not believing me when I tell them that I have to stop or I'm going to pass out.

I'm mostly scared about the fact that I may end up on medication again. Every time that happens, I end having to take another medication to counter the effect of the heart meds, then more to counter the side effects that crop up from the second meds and sometimes the side effects of the third. It makes me dopey and miserable. To deal with that, the doctors normally toss more meds my way. If that's not bad enough, I have to be monitored pretty often to make sure that I don't suffer from other health issues due to the sheer amount of medication in my system.

Sometimes I just wonder if it's worth it.

If I end up on the drugs again, I can pretty much kiss dart night goodbye. Driving too if I have the same problems as last time. The medication made me have seizures, something I was very careful to hide from friends and family. They don't let people who have seizures drive however, so it took a lot of begging and pleading to convince my doctor that they didn't need to notify the state.

At this point, it's all pointless to worry. I guess whatever is going to happen will happen and there isn't much I can do about it anyway.