Friday, February 06, 2009
What would you ask St. Peter?
Tonight after dinner M was asking me if I'd ever watched "Night Court." I told him I watched it every week. He wanted to know if I remembered the episode where John Larroquette's character dreamed he died and went to heaven and got to ask an angel any question he wanted and it would be answered? He remembered that one of the questions Larroquette asked was "What's the grossest thing I ever ate?" The angel told him "You don't want to know?" The he asked "What's the 200th grossest thing I ever ate?" M remembered the angel telling him he didn't want to know that either. Anyway, I told M I remembered the skit distinctly, but that I was pretty sure it was Saturday Night Live, not Night Court. I had also always remembered that sketch, and those questions, but didn't remember who played the characters. So off to Google I went...

You can see the sketch in it's entirety here (transcript)

I'm not sure why that sketch has always stuck with me. When I think about it I don't think I want to know the grossest thing I ever ate. But I have thought of other questions. Like:

Who killed Marylin Monroe?
Who killed John F. Kennedy?
Who killed JonBenet Ramsey?
Where is Jimmy Hoffa?
What's the closest I ever came to dying before I actually died?

I'm sure if I think on it some more I can come up with other questions that I'd love to finally have answered. What would you ask?
Thursday, February 05, 2009
One hour glucose test fiasco
This thing has been a nightmare from the beginning. I was given the order at my last appointment. I called the local medical center, where I had it done last time, and they said they don't do it. OK, great, that meant I'd have to drive and hour and a half away to take it. Since it's a fasting test I planned to spend the night at Noni's and then go in to a health center over there and take it. I'd need to take at least half a day off from work. No great biggie.

Except the weather has conspired against me ever since. Every time I'd plan to make the trip over we'd have snow. There's no way I'm crossing four mountains in the snow. My next plan was to take a full vacation day this Friday to go for the test and then maybe enjoy some shopping. Except, I got a call from the medical director at our local medical center. I had spoken earlier with one of the nurses from there who said they were still buying the glucose, so she wasn't sure why I was told they don't do the test. The population is so small here they rarely ever give it, but she wasn't sure why I was turned away. She had finally talked to the medical director about it and then the medical director called me to tell me they'd do it. This was Wednesday. I made arrangements for coverage at work and then called for an appointment this morning. Yay! I wouldn't have drive 120 mile round-trip to do this!

I went in this morning and they took my base blood sugar level with the meter. It was 68. Then they gave me glucose, it was a lot grosser than I remembered from the first time. I went and sat for my hour (this was after waiting 30 minutes to get in to begin with). I came back and the nurse wasn't ready for me quite yet, but the medical director was standing there. She apologized again for the misunderstanding and while I had her there I asked her if she happened to know what the upper threshold number would be on the one-hour test. She looked at my chart and told me 130. Finally the nurse had time for me and we began with the meter test. It came back 148. Crap! Then the director made some comment to the nurse about "you gave her 50 mg. of glucose, right?" The nurse had no idea. She just gave me the whole bottle she had after checking with two other nurses that that was the correct amount. Turns out she gave me 100 mg. Ha ha, oops. The double-dosed me on glucose. No wonder my number was so high.

The director went and made a phone call to see if we could redeem the test. The answer was "yes" if we just turned it into the three-hour glucose test. You know, the test you're praying to avoid as you take the one-hour test?

So my morning did not go at all like I'd planned. They were very apologetic. Every nurse involved, plus the director and even office aides apologized. I ended up going to my husband's store and sitting for about 25 minutes while I waited to go back for my second draw at 11:35 a.m. Then I went home and packed my lunch during the wait for the 12:35 p.m. draw. I had to pick up Emma from school in there too so she stood by me while I had the last blood draw. Then I took her to the babysitter's and went to work. Needless to say I was feeling pretty hungry and weak by then.

The good news is according to the meter I should pass my test.
At one hour my number should have been less than 180, it was 148
At two hours my number should have been less than 155, it was 136
At three hours my number should have been less than 140, it was 123

We'll still have to wait for official results from the blood vials sent off to the lab, but I think I passed. All's well that ends well (until I get the bill) :)
Wednesday, February 04, 2009
Are you a Dish Network customer?
If you are I want to recommend two forums where you can check in to see the latest news. I've been following them for a while because I'm waiting for my locals to be offered in HD. These sites monitor the satellite uplinks and updates so they know ahead of time what's coming (soon). They also can tell when new channels are being added, or taken away. A lot of the technical discussion is over my head, but there's plenty that I do understand.

Satellite Guys

DBS Talk
Oh, happy day!
I finally got around to calling Anthem about adding a newborn to M's policy. It's totally doable! All I have to do is apply within 30 days after the birth and the baby is guaranteed coverage from birth. They're also guaranteed to begin at the best health level no matter what problems they may have when they arrive. Awesome! That means the difference between a premium of $405 a month on my work policy vs. $186 on M's policy. We may be able to afford this baby after all!
I've reached that point...
Where my waist is bigger around than my hips. Now all my pants are falling down. The worst part is they're taking my undies with them. I feel foolish running around hitching up my pants all day.

I only own two pairs of maternity pants, and one pair is a little too big so I end up pulling those up all the time too. There is nowhere in town (or Noni's town) that sells maternity pants my size. So I'm forced to mail order them, which is a total crapshoot. The last pair I got were three inches too long. I'm going to see if my mother-in-law will hem them for me. I hate mail ordering clothes.
Tuesday, February 03, 2009
My favorite quote on Michael Phelps
Look, I don't blame Michael Phelps for apologizing. He has a living to earn, so he did what he had to do.

In the meantime, I merely note that this broken wreck of a man's failure to win any more than a pathetic fourteen Olympic gold medals (so far) is a terrifying warning of the horrific damage that cannabis can do to someone's health—and a powerful reminder of just how sensible the drug laws really are.


-Andrew Stuttaford from The Corner at National Review Online.

I LOLed.
We all could have died last night...
It's been a long time since I've felt such terror. I can't even say when I've been so scared. We had snow last evening. It was a lot more than we expected. They were calling for an inch or two and we got more like four or five. Emma was scheduled to go to a birthday party. We knew the house was way up a long hill with a perilous driveway, but M offered to drive us up in the four wheel drive pickup so we thought we'd just make it an adventure.

It was still snowing hard around 6:00 p.m. when the party was supposed to start. I called the mom to make sure the party was still going on. She told me that the grandparents were there already, and other family members. By that point most everyone had cancelled. I told her I thought we'd try to come and she was really excited because she'd been afraid her daughter wouldn't have one kid to play with at her own birthday party. That made me want to try even more.

We'd been told the house was the first left after Smith's* Store. We found the first left. It led up a really steep grade cut into the side of a small mountain. The drop off on the left of us was a cliff basically. For a little bit there was a fence running up the road. It was a very narrow road. Only a foot or two of clearance on either side. I was practically whimpering as we went up the hill. All I could think off was the sheer drop-off to our left. Even in four wheel drive the truck was grinding and wobbling it's way up. Then the fence ran out. Then the truck started sliding consistently leftward. Emma was chattering nervously, picking up on my hysterical fear. We had to get her to be quiet. Then M had to tell me to be quiet.

We finally stopped. We couldn't go forward anymore. Then we were faced with backing down this narrow pass in the slippery snow without sliding off the mountain. My heart was pounding so hard and I had a death-grip on Emma's leg. Thank God for my husband, who was able to keep his cool.

We obviously made it down the mountain. Turns out the driveway is actually the "second" left after the store. That driveway had a sheer dropoff on one side too, but my confidence that it was actually a driveway kept me from bursting out in tears. We made it up the to house. When we went in we told them about our little detour. They knew that road and you could see the look of horror on their faces when they realized what we'd done. They were sweating a bit too, glad that we'd survived to tell the tale. Because A. They were the ones that gave us the bad directions and B. They knew exactly what we'd been up against on that old road.

After that I was emotionally spent. We had a nice visit with the grown-ups while Emma and one other child played with the birthday girl. The terrifying trip there did not detract from the party itself. However, when I got home all I wanted was my bed. I was done for the night.

Still glad to be alive today.

*not real name
Monday, February 02, 2009
Speaking of the Super Bowl...
This commercial was my favorite by a wide margin. I guffawed.

Sunday, February 01, 2009
Super Bowl XLIII
What a good game! Amazing comeback for the Cardinals and they came so close. I really had no dog in this hunt. I wanted to root for the Steelers at first. Then I watched some of the pregame stuff and decided that the Cardinals were who I should cheer for. Then after halftime I learned that the Steelers coach is a William & Mary grad and an underclassman! Amazing! So, it was not a tragedy when the Steelers came back and won. Still, I'm a tiny bit sad for Kurt Warner because this loss might cost him his possible shot at the Hall of Fame. Whisenhunt has nothing to be ashamed of. He's done an amazing job with the Cardinals and their fans should be proud. The Steelers can be proud of their record for the most Super Bowl wins. There is plenty to be happy about this time around at the Super Bowl.

The only thing to be sad about is no more football until September. Waaaaaah!