Friday, December 29, 2006

Follow Up, Part One

Ok, so you know how I said I contacted a friend out of the blue and all that? Well, she was going to call me on a particular day and then didn't. No big deal, right? Well, not usually, but when you're dealing with a person (me) who is already feeling a little nervous about putting herself out there, you don't stand that person up on a phone date! Not having been in contact, I had no way of knowing what her life circumstances are and what may have come up. Also, some people are much more lax about when they call someone even when they say, "I'll call you on Saturday." Anyway, it turns out that she got sick and then last week was a mess for everyone. So I took a shot and called her yesterday. It went really well. We chatted for about an hour and I'm really glad I took the initiative to look her up and then call. We're going to exchange pictures of our pets and stuff and we had new things in common that we didn't have before.

I can be really shy and feel awkward about the silliest things, so it was good for me to get such a positive response. It's funny, people who know me don't usually think of me as shy, so I guess I mask it well. I try to at least project confidence when I can. Really, though, I'm a homebody.

***also, I'm sorry I've neglected your blogs. I've been reading though...

Wednesday, December 27, 2006

CD11: I am envious of my sleeping kitty.

There's no reason for me to be tired, but I am. I feel lazy, apathetic, and completely unmotivated. To do anything. I have several started-posts for you and a couple things rolling around in my head, but up until this very minute (or succession of minutes) I have gone to blogger today only to navigate away because I didn't feel like signing in.

This cycle has been very tiring for me. The very first time I used injectibles I felt tired too, but not much since then. Now I just want to nap. Hopefully I'll feel better now that I've triggered. I grew my BiggestFollicleEver (BFE) from the ovary now known as PowerHouse. And I grew it in record time. It's not alone, but where my best one usually comes with three or four associates, this one has but a single sidekick. The nurse thought I was silly to be upset about this.

"One is all we want."
"But I've had four and got nothing."
"Twins are one thing, but-"
"No, no, I don't want four follicles and four babies! I just want a chance..."

and she nods at me, understanding, in the way that the really good ones do, that it's not just about risk management, but also about my life.

So, I'm pretending that BFE is healthy and that it will, free from the malevolent influence of endo, produce a chromosomally normal egg that is ready to fertilize, implant, and grow properly in the correct spot for the correct amount of time and that it's a good thing that even though I've had perfect cycles before that this time all the differences are going to come together to make that distinctly more important difference. What a hideously long sentence. Oh, also, since it's so big (and I don't think it's really that big, just bigger than I've ever had, and especially since I triggered early this month) I'm concerned that I'll ovulate too early and that P's contribution won't have a chance. In case you were wondering, I never run out of things to worry about.

Saturday, December 23, 2006

Friday, December 22, 2006

CD6: I've sprung a leak!

Today, I bled. I must not have put enough pressure on after my blood draw, but I bled through the gauze and bandaid and it was yucky all over my arm inside my shirt.

I've been meaning to give an update on the friend thing, but I don't have one yet.

There's something else that's happening, and I'd love any goodwill you all could think over in this direction (it's not baby-related.) I would like to post about it here, but... too many personal details out in the internet, I think.

Thursday, December 21, 2006

CD5: more fun with pharmacies

Last August I had a fabulous time trying to fill my gonal-f prescription. The problem, whatever it happens to be, did not get fixed and the pharmacy still wants to short me five pens, and I'm not at all happy about it. I WILL get this fixed.

Tuesday, December 19, 2006

CD3: lucky seven

  1. Ok, so I didn't exactly pull an Irish Girl, but I did eat some chocolate intended for P's stocking.
  2. I had cysts, but they were small enough to start fsh anyway.
  3. I discovered that my ovidrel prescription has refills, but I should have filled it before the 6th so I need a new prescription anyway.
  4. Some nurses do NOT have a sense of humor or ability to chat.
  5. Apparently, the time you're scheduled to come in is not always the time they PLAN to see you. For example, my appointment was for 7:15, I was on time, I waited until 7:45 and the nurse commented that they were "right on schedule."
  6. Some people take, "It seems like I bruise a lot, but not nearly as much with you!" as a compliment!
  7. Puppies got baths today because they smelled horrible. Then Girl peed on a rug. I washed the rug and put it back. Then Boy peed on the same rug. Washing it again. We haven't had any accidents in weeks, and they both had one today. grr.

Monday, December 18, 2006

CD2: the first casualty

This weekend we had our first gift casualty. Girl found and unwrapped one of P's presents for him.

P: Uh, thanks for the hat dear.
Me: Oh, yeah, you're welcome.

Later...

P: I got you three presents.
Me: I got you two so far, but there are two others that I want you to have.
P: Yes, I know. You got me... a hat.

Even Later:

P: I got a hat for Christmas. What's in the other one? Gloves or a scarf?
Me: Shut up.

Later still:

Me: Do you even like the hat?
P: Yeah, I needed one.
Me: It's moisture-wicking on the inside. You know, for running.
P: I see that.
Me: Do you want to just have it now? I could wrap it back up.
P: (puts the hat on in an attempt to prevent the re-wrap)

Going to sleep:

P: What are my other presents?
Me: You wanna just go open the other one up?
P: No, I have a hat.
Me: (grumbling) It would've been better with all the other presents.

Sunday, December 17, 2006

CD1: home therapy

Like CAT, I have some kitty + tree = trouble photos.

These are from last year:





Saturday, December 16, 2006

there's a single shoe suspended midair

In the interest of making the very most of our try-on-our-own post-lap month, I dusted (ok, washed) off my basal thermometer and pretended I didn't know any better. I hadn't tracked my temps in over a year, but my pattern was just the same as it always had been. Anyway, that's all just to say that my temp dropped yesterday and was low again today, so I expect my period any moment now. It's especially exciting in that P's been gone for a week and will be home today. And there's no anniversary baby.

Thursday, December 14, 2006

Maybe it will just go away?

I don't know what the deal is with comments.
I haven't changed anything.
I've been able to comment when I was already signed in and by signing in inside the comment box, so I don't know what the problem is.

It looks like I'm not the only one. I'm guessing it's a beta issue. Others have brought it up in the help section, so hopefully it will be resolved soon.

***Blogger update***
"Logging in with an old Blogger account to post a comment on the new Blogger is giving a “please try again later” error. Until we fix this, it may work to log in first at http://www.blogger.com/login.g, and then go to the comments page on the new version of blogger in beta."

I don't know if this helps any of you...

Wednesday, December 13, 2006

I'm a big chicken, but I did it!

I looked up a couple old friends.

And contacted them.

And asked them for a favor.

And even though my face got really hot and I realized that I was calling someone with the same name but who was not my friend, I still didn't puke out of nervousness.

Tuesday, December 12, 2006

sometimes, it just catches you by surprise

P is not the most patient person. He abhors waiting, be it in a line, in traffic, or waiting to purchase something that he wants. He's a tough guy to buy for sometimes because if he really wants something, he just buys it. I yelled at him in Target last week because he wouldn't stop asking if he could purchase something that I intended to get him for Christmas.

***

Like many people, I once worked in a mall. From my storefront I could see the center court where Santa and his helpers were making a tidy profit on crappy pictures. I always thought it must suck to stand in that long line of cranky children waiting to see the fake Santa (now, if he was the real one...)

***

P called me from a mall last night and told me how cute the children were.

He said, "I'd stand in line for that." And here at home my heart broke a little bit.

Sunday, December 10, 2006

searches

I started this post a while back and just found it in my drafts pile. I've added some recent searches because, well, the cat pee thing has made me mighty popular among urine-infused households all over the country(illinois santa clara. Usually I get hits from having Grey's Anatomy on my sidebar and I get people looking for the Buffy episode that's my title. However, I've also been found by...

"gonal-f" I still *heart* the gonal-f pen, by the way, and I seem to respond well to it even though I've been busy growing endo on my ovaries. If you got here by searching for "gonal-f," whatcha lookin' for? If you have a question, please ask! I'm no expert, but I know injectables can be scary if you're just starting, and the more info you can find, the better.

Sorry, I don't have any info on "burst cyst on cat" but I hope your cat is ok. Burst cysts suck, and kitties are wonderful.

Also, I'm very interested in "pillsbury frosting versus betty crocker." Is this some sort of taste test I could participate in? What did you bake? Ok, I know you probably read my blog just the one time, but just in case you were sucked in my my bitching and actually came back for more, I'd love to know your thoughts on this.

If you're curious about "implantation feeling" this is not the place for you. I promise, right now, that I'll never blog about suspicious twinges or pulling below the bellybutton. Especially since I'm still feeling the odd pain at my lap inscision sites and inside where my organs were manipulated and lasered. Go eat your pineapple and talk to me in a year.

Ohmygoodness, do I wish that it was as easy as "getting a flat stoach with fibroids."

Sorry, if you're looking for photos or an "interesting" story, the "wet spot on the bedsheets" here is not the fun you're looking for. Wet spot on the exam table when the nurse used too much gel during a wanding, maybe...

I'm currently #11 on "removing pee on mattress." My best advise: douse with nature's miracle, allow to dry, repeat as needed. My research indicates that the smell may take up to 1-2 weeks to go away as the enzymes in the nature's miracle have to take time to break down the urine. In a related (I think) story, "washing sheets cat peed on vinegar?" Um, your cat peed on the vinegar? If your cat peed on something, vinegar is not the answer. Vinegar masks the smell of urine to humans, but animals can still smell urine. When the vinegar dries, you'll probably smell urine again too. And it does not remove the stain.

Then there's my personal favorite, "i'm going insane."

Friday, December 08, 2006

research methods

so, in my sample of six (my four commenters, P, and me) there are four lickers and two pudding-wasters non-lickers. Thank you for your commitment to research, and you may wish to stop reading here. continue at your own risk with the knowledge that you'll never get that time back.

there are currently 300,364,113 americans (21:35 GMT (EST+5) Dec 08, 2006)

approx 5,000,000 are under 1, so they don't eat pudding

approx 39,948,427 are below the poverty line and possibly can't afford pudding (although if they do buy it, perhaps they're less likely to waste the part on the lid?)

this leaves 255,415,686 people

surely not everyone likes pudding, and some people may even be allergic. we'll go with 1/6 since that's how many couples are infertile, and this is obviously unrelated to that but.... that's another 42,654,420 to deduct leaving 212,761,266 pudding-consuming americans.

however.

2/3 of all americans are on a diet or are trying to lose weight. of those, 1/3 are being diligent, 1/3 are cheating but feeling guilty, and the remaining 1/3 are currently buying pudding. so we'll remove another 1/3, or 99,120,157 leaving 113,641,109 people.

some people don't eat individual pudding cups but will eat the boxed kind. for instance, my fatherinlaw only eats the kind you have to cook. we'll go with 1/6 again because I feel like it and because there are usually 6 puddings in a package. 18,940,184. this decreases our population to 94,700,925.

did you know I don't even buy pudding for myself? I buy it for P.

anyway, some 34,000,000 people watch american idol. I have no idea why. their opinions, however, can't be trusted, so they don't get a vote. i forgot to remove them earlier, but i'll do it here since you all can't possibly still be reading and we'll just pretend that's what they put the margin of error in for in the first place. 60,700,925 is a much better sample.

speaking of samples, no, we weren't speaking of samples.

the whole point was to tell you that my sample size of six people is very appropriate and yields a confidence interval of 35%. this means that my survey is probably over a third accurate.

there are lots of good things about one third. one third of women 40-69 are dating a man 10 or more years younger. good for them. i think. one third of parks have between 100 and 500 acres. who doesn't like a big park? approximately one third of twins are identical, one third same-sex fraternal, and the final third are the infertile's coveted boy/girl twins.

so you see, one third is very good, my sample is sufficient to say that you people throwing away unlicked lids are not only in the minority, but will also not date a younger man, go to a big park, or have boy/girl twins.

A 'yes' or 'no' coment will do

Do you lick the lid of the pudding before you put it in the trash?

Wednesday, December 06, 2006

6-6

Boy, 6 weeks



Boy, 6 months



Girl, 6 weeks



Girl, 6 months



Girl and Boy, 6 weeks



Boy and Girl, 6 months



Girl and Boy, 6 weeks



Boy and Girl, 6 months

Monday, December 04, 2006

On dieting

Says my verybestfriend:

I know, but I just don't care enough to put down the cookie.


Indeed.

Sunday, December 03, 2006

Oh, the stench

the answer is:
c) all of the above

I blame TSA for the shampoo thing. Because of my compulsive careful packing, there's really no other way for my bottle to have opened up in the way it did. No matter though, the damage was done. My travel case is pretty well wrecked and I am now out of shampoo.

Is there anything that smells worse than cat pee? We left a couple windows open while we were away and then had really high winds that slammed the door to the litter box closet shut. We don't know which day this happened. We did play a rousing post-anniversary game of "find the feces" which is always a romantic treat. Then we realized that they had to have peed somewhere too and we continued the search.

My big kitty has a wicked sense of humor and has, in the not-recent past has preferred to pee in symbolic places when he needed to make a point. When I first started dating P and was spending a lot of time away from home, Big Kitty would pee on my dirty clothes that must have smelled like P. This time, however, he left the laundry basket alone so I was stumped.

I thought I found the jackpot when I saw a large wet spot on the large puppy pillow. I was laughing inside as I threw it into the washing machine. Leave it to my boy to tell me what he really thinks of having puppies. I was a little surprised that that was the only spot, but we didn't find anything else, so I didn't worry about it.

Well, P found the money spot. Someone peed on our bed. It soaked through to the mattress. Back to the basement to wash the sheets and blankets. It's at freezing now, so we need them all clean. It was exactly what I had in mind after our travels. So grateful to be able to wash four loads of laundry in one evening.

How do you get pee out of a mattress? Well, I googled "cat pee on mattress" and "remove urine from mattress" and basically I got behavior advice (which I'm not really worried about, the boys never pee outside the box and I believe it was just about not having access and freaking out) and ads for various products.

Use vinegar. Vinegar never works, it just smells like vinegar. Begin with cold water. Don't use water because it will spread the urine. I ended up dousing the spot with nature's miracle and then wondering why, after washing my hands fourteen times that I was still smelling cat piss. Oh, it was on my sleeve. Add that to the wash.

At this point I had to deal with the wet spot on the bed. And we didn't even get to have fun first. After using a fan and an open window, I tried using a hairdryer to get the bed ready. It worked okay. I put a blanket under the bottom sheet and began to remake the bed. I tested it and nothing seemed to come up. I went to get my comforter from the dryer and it wasn't dry. So I dried it again. And again. And I gave up so it's air-drying in another room (I have since decided to have it professionally cleaned even though I don't see or smell a stain. It's new and I'm neurotic. Sue me.) Then I gathered up my collection of "I'm from the west coast" lightweight blankets and piled them on the bed.

The good news: We were not cold in the night.

The bad news: P eventually felt some wetness and was uncomfortable. I can still smell the pee and have gone for another round with the rest of the nature's miracle. Have re-googled for tips and cried to my mother. P wants a whole new mattress. I have re-washed the bottom sheet and under-blanket. Again.

Saturday, December 02, 2006

Charleston, SC (historic district)

Before I tell you about my trip, a little quiz.

Everything I own is covered in:

a) shampoo
b) cat pee
c) both
d) neither

yeah, welcome home. *eyeroll*