It's not been a great couple of weeks. Saturday before Labor Day, I woke up with heart palpitations and my handy dandy pulse monitor on my exercise bike said 110 bpm. What?! I felt like crap, just totally beat. We don't have insurance until the 1st of October, so I didn't do anything for a few days. But, by Tuesday, I was REALLY feeling crappy, so I ponied up the cash and went to the doctor. She said, "yep, it's fast!", found that my blood pressure was high, did an EKG, said "hmmm...mostly looks OK", and then told me that I couldn't wait until October 1st, I needed to see a cardiologist. She then sent me for bloodtests ($$$), got me an appointment for the cardiologist on Thursday ($$$$$$$),and a prescription for beta blockers (fortunately pretty cheap).
So, last Thursday I went to the cardiologist (did I mention $$$$$?) and my blood pressure was even HIGHER (no surprise there, considering that I have to pay for all this!). He listened to my lungs and heart, listened to my sob story about no insurance, informed me that my heart sounded OK but my blood pressure was too high. He upped the meds, and gave me a bunch of free samples. If I'm not significantly better when I go back in mid-October, then we'll do the really expensive tests. I'm supposed to avoid stress (yeah, right!), limit my sodium (yuck), moderate exercise daily, and lose weight. (No surprise there).
So, this week, I'm feeling much better. I've exercised 30 mins every day on my exercise bike, ate saltless meals, kept my calories to 1600/day or lower. This morning I get on the scale AND I'VE GAINED ONE POUND! Argh! But, I'm not supposed to be stressed. Hmmm.... Someone told me that beta blockers slow your metabolism. I hardly have a metabolism to slow, so I'm not sure how I'm supposed to lose weight while I'm on them.
Well, off to the Santa Cruz County Fair to get my Navajo Taco. The only place in CA where I know I can get one. And I don't care if it's salty or too many calories. I'll starve tomorrow. :0)
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Friday, September 4, 2009
Random stuff and a parachute cake...
So, nothing earthshattering going on. Just home-schooling away, and Meg and I are doing our best not to drive each other nutso. So far, so good...most days, anyway.
We decided not to go anywhere for Labor Day. Bummer, but we have a ton of stuff to do around the house and we'll have a little fun in between projects. It'll be good to get some of them done. If anyone wants to take a last minute drive up here, the loft is open and we'd love to see you.
Oh, wait, the cake contest. THAT was earth-shattering, though I'm certain that wasn't the sponsor's (my niece Jespy) intent. She and the Smart Remarks Bookclub had a "Hunger Games" cake decorating contest. It turned into a hilarious soap opera and everyone did whatEVER they had to do to win. Jen got 800 hits on her blog with friends of bakers and friends of friends and then people we don't even know all voting. Lysa came over and helped me with my cake. I don't have any cake decorating stuff, so this was sort of necessary. This was our cake:
It was OK, the basket was upsy-down because it wouldn't cooperate any other way, but whatever. Sam engineered the parachute. We lost the popular vote because my other niece, Amy, has WAY too many friends, and I didn't think to recruit my Polynesian sister, Selai until the last minute. Selai has 1200 facebook friends, swears she actually knows them all. However, in the private vote, with just the cakemakers voting, I tied for first place! Cool, eh? Totally undeserved, there were are least three cakes better than ours. You can see all the cakes here.
Tonight we went up to San Juan Bautista (just up the road) to watch the full moon come up. There's an old cemetery on a hill that gives you a great view of the valley and lots of sky. We took a few pictures. This one is cool though. At first glance it just looks like three blobs. Actually, at last glance it does, too. HOWEVER, it's a picture of Jupiter with two of it's moons. Cool, eh?
Here"s the awesome shot Sam got of the moon. Look for it to be photoshopped into all kinds of things in the future. :0)
We decided not to go anywhere for Labor Day. Bummer, but we have a ton of stuff to do around the house and we'll have a little fun in between projects. It'll be good to get some of them done. If anyone wants to take a last minute drive up here, the loft is open and we'd love to see you.
Oh, wait, the cake contest. THAT was earth-shattering, though I'm certain that wasn't the sponsor's (my niece Jespy) intent. She and the Smart Remarks Bookclub had a "Hunger Games" cake decorating contest. It turned into a hilarious soap opera and everyone did whatEVER they had to do to win. Jen got 800 hits on her blog with friends of bakers and friends of friends and then people we don't even know all voting. Lysa came over and helped me with my cake. I don't have any cake decorating stuff, so this was sort of necessary. This was our cake:
It was OK, the basket was upsy-down because it wouldn't cooperate any other way, but whatever. Sam engineered the parachute. We lost the popular vote because my other niece, Amy, has WAY too many friends, and I didn't think to recruit my Polynesian sister, Selai until the last minute. Selai has 1200 facebook friends, swears she actually knows them all. However, in the private vote, with just the cakemakers voting, I tied for first place! Cool, eh? Totally undeserved, there were are least three cakes better than ours. You can see all the cakes here.
Tonight we went up to San Juan Bautista (just up the road) to watch the full moon come up. There's an old cemetery on a hill that gives you a great view of the valley and lots of sky. We took a few pictures. This one is cool though. At first glance it just looks like three blobs. Actually, at last glance it does, too. HOWEVER, it's a picture of Jupiter with two of it's moons. Cool, eh?
Here"s the awesome shot Sam got of the moon. Look for it to be photoshopped into all kinds of things in the future. :0)
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