The Sea is a Salty One

So I've had a physically rough day today. My health is a big reason I cannot be too involved in relatives hijinks. I wish them well, I just do not have the energy, which is why I started crying immediately upon hearing of this latest situation. I was thinking,"Oh no, I cannot do this!" Today I fainted and more. This morning I felt fine. I was working on NLQ, preparing a piece for tomorrow written by Michael Pearl where he makes a pretty crazy claim that being angry with your husband is like murdering him, or wanting to murder him. I can honestly say even at my most miffed with Jim it would be more like the throttling Homer Simpson does to Bart than any amount of murder. "Why you little..." I felt good. I made breakfast of grits and eggs, did some laundry, worked on putting back together our personal files that got soaked 8 weeks ago. And then we went back to the clinic and our doctor. Not for me. The day before they'd done my final foot and toe scrapin...

I feel like I should be singing and praising food like the orphans in 'Oliver' in the opening sequences. Today was the first day I was officially off the high powered antibiotics for my MRSA toes and off some of the stroke meds. I didn't feel like I might hurl at any moment. No acid reflux. No pain. No lingering dizzy feeling. No gagging. No repulsion to the very idea of food. About time because I've been living for the past two months on toast, yogurt, bananas, jello, soup, oatmeal and the occasional toasted cheese sandwich. Gagging them down like I was being tortured. Today we ended up going out for the business lunch and I had food, glorious food, and enjoyed it! My stomach has shrunken to the size of a small rock, but it was FOOD! Tonight I get to SHOWER!!!! something  I have only been able to haphazardly do with my foot wrapped in plastic, juggling soap and water to make sure I didn't get water on the bandages. A pain. It will be as glorious as the f...

Been an exciting few days. Epic. Not really, mostly it's been me schlepping around moaning with a blood pressure hovering around 67/50 and more extreme nausea. Like yesterday, when I had to ditch life and just go to bed as soon as we came home from the doctors office at noon. Cannot read, cannot look at the internet, cannot crochet, cannot anything because any movement makes me spew. On the bright side, today is my final day of high powered antibiotics so I'm hoping this means the nausea will fade quickly. Jim has been more amusing than ever lately. Some of it scary, least later after finding out he didn't injure himself. He fell off a ladder. Well, actually the ladder broke under his weight. He's been landscaping the yard after all my medical misadventures makes it impossible for me to do. A couple of months ago we put in a bunch of bougainvillea bushes, the bushes that line our walkway we replaced the failed ones and some other exotic plants. S...

Since one of my relatves to reading here and not answering my pm I have no choice but to anwwer her here, I made a stupid joke here last week in the wake of her personal difficulties.  I joked that I've gotten very worked up and too emotionally involved with her situation and I had decided to sit back to watch what happened next with popcorn and coke. Tacky maybe, but I have used that expression often when dealing with situations I can have zero influence on. It's a dumb joke that I will hereby retire because it hurts people. I have removed that bit from my journal. Never have I ever claimed to be perfect. I'm okay with that. I'm human like everyone else. There is a great deal behind my reaction.  When we first arrived home from the States I was rather worked out. Ask my doctor. I cried copiously and worried for a couple of days over her situation before I realized anew my hands were tied, that the best I could do for her was to allow her to vent to me and possi...

I am getting my ass kicked by the medications for the MRSA combined with the meds for stroke prevention. If throwing up was an Olympic event I would have taken the gold. I cannot sit at the computer more than a few moments without getting nausea and dry heaves. Which is why I didn'[t update NLQ today. They put me on one of the anti nausea drugs they give cancer patients and it's starting to work. Just a little. I kept dinner down. I've had to ditch many of the daily meds I take and concentrate on the most important for the MRSA. I'm turning into a pill head and not the fun kind. Got into a huge argument with my doctor. He started nattering at me about my blood sugar levels, I told him to relax  because I have Metformin and a meter so my levels will go back down as soon as I kick the MRSA. He said stuff about not taking diabetes seriously. I pointed out it only happens when I have MRSA or use certain asthma drugs and I take appropriate steps. He wants to give me an i...

Better today. No foot scraping and for the first time in more than a week I can get a shoe on my hurt foot. Perparing to shower shortly instead of taking a sponge bath. Yay~ We were returning from the clinic this afternoon when our car died. The alternator has been slowly dying, plus the battery we were sold last year isn't big enough to properly power the car. Worst place for breakdown, near the cow pastures about a mile from the gas station. Car would not start, would not even turn over. Honking cars and mucho traffic. Jim already knew that come Monday morning he'd have to take the car in for that alternator change out, but not how quickly it was going south. Here's what blows my mind about Costa Ricans. Within minutes some kind Ticos had stopped, pushed the car off the road and taken Jim down the street to get another battery so we could at least get home and get out to the mechanics in the morning. Was telling a friend about this earlier and she made the comment...

Still spending my days trudging back and forth to the clinic having my toes and foot debrided daily. It really sucks because it involves a young nurse with a glorified razor blade picking off dead skin. I do not recommend it, but then again I do not recommend getting MRSA either. I just cannot catch a break with my health, which makes me wonder if I really still want to be on this planet any longer tossing in pills. Add in that today's confloption involved a doctor I've never seen before coming in to lecture me about my blood sugar levels. Quite the head knocking because every time I get MRSA the sugar levels jump obscenely. The last time the clinic ran my numbers (during the stroke) I was well within normal ranges, like I am most of the time. When I'm having issues like MRSA I have a big old bottle of Metformin my endocrinologist gave me just for such times. Here's the thing that pisses me off about new doctors. Many times they barge in without bothering to loo...

Today between getting my infected foot scraped and napping we had quite the difficult phone calls with relatives involved in the huge confloption going on right now. ` !snipped because I am apparently not allowed to have an opinion, which is unfortunate since I entirely on the side of the relative~~ While all this was going on at the house I looked down and realized that the main diamond on my engagement/wedding ring has fallen out and I have no idea where it is. You would think I would be freaking out, but no, there was something about it that felt right, like a door being closed. The central diamond was a family stone, had been in my mother's wedding ring. It feels like I was severed today from that whole roiling family confloption of drama that keeps on rolling. Two carat diamonds can be easily replaced, if it does not end up turning up some odd place. Your peace of mind cannot. Your integrity cannot, nor can your values.

I learned something important today. Do not bring Jim with you when you go to the doctor and have procedures done. When we flew back to the States last Tuesday I had my foot pretty effectively squashed by a rather fluffy gentleman I'd been talking to during boarding. People lose their damn minds when the plane lands and they open the doors, you'd think that someone was lined up just outside the plane door tossing out million dollar bills the way people push, shove and rush. As I was starting to go down the narrow plane aisle this gent decided I was too slow moving, pushed past and trod on my foot. I yelled 'Ouch' of course, he said "Sorry!" and I thought no damage was done. Not quite. Foot started swelling up and eventually I went to the doctor only to be told I'd broken a toe or three and had a few little hairline fractures of my foot. Wrapped, given narcotics and sent on my way. Told to stay off the foot and prop it up. Never had that kind of pain ...

Traveling. It's been a crazy trip but I return home tomorrow, assuming I survive the lunacy of a 300 pound man stepping on my left foot, breaking several toes and foot bones. They'll be dragging my ass around three different airports tomorrow in a wheelchair. Yep, been that type of a trip. More later.

Just the very beginning of refurnishing the house. So far we've purchased and had delivered mahoghany rockers, chairs and a loveseat along with two teak wood chaise loungers to go on the cement deck next to the hot tub. Squeal! Jim is so tight with a buck that finding him making the decision and shelling out the money is surprising. We need to replace all of the living room furnishings next. After cleaning up the water it looks like the beds and nightstands are fine with no real damage.  The dozen bar stools handmade from Guanacaste wood are fine! My big old dining room set on the patio survived with no damage. We still have some furniture coming from the states, but will need to refurnish the living room and the guesthouse living room. Thinking about more mahoghany and leather furniture. Sometimes simple and tropic like the rockers we bought. This is my rocker at the foot of the bed. Jim's is much taller and bigger. Looks nice next to the intricately carved mahoghany ca...

Felled by the stomach flu today on top of everything else. Yesterday I finally started being able to shake it off, this week, after hearing that Jeff Flake called for an FBI investigation of Brett Kavanaugh's possible drunken assault antics. Started feeling like someone was actually listening. It's a good feeling. It was time for something good as I'd had a number of head knockings this week with Kavanaugh's defenders on NLQ's FB page and in the comments at NLQ. I gave up trying to reason with any of them quickly. I posted the craziest one at Jerks 4 Jesus. Deleted all the rest. It wasn't a basket filled with deplorables, more like a garbage can filled with bottom feeders with dirty mouths. Most of the relatives and a few friends that defended Kavanaugh online are pretty reasonable people, and I had some discussions with them. Unfortunately two I just deleted and blocked. One I told why, the other was someone pretty rotten that I had forgotten was on my frie...

I've been crushed for days now, cuminating in not sleeping last night and lots of tears. Not only was I molested as a child, but I was raped at 15 by a class mate. So watching Dr. Ford testify and the rage of one Brett Kavanaugh has been very hard to take. I'm feeling like a whipped dog I've been so triggered. It was November and for close to a year Tony kept asking me to go out with him, on a date. I kept telling him that I was already dating someone from my old school but thanks for asking. I had nothing against Tony, he was one a gang of kids that lived in a nearby subdivision. We all went to Catholic school together. I avoided Tony and pals because they liked to shake down kids for lunch money, they did it the first day I tranferred into that school to me. They were pretty rough and wild. It was November when Tony knocked on my door. It was afterschool and my mother was still at work. I let him in, why wouldn't I? He was a classmate, we were friendly. No reason ...

A few weeks ago I ran across a magazine article about the Surf Ranch , and a few days later watched one of the surf competitions taking place there. I'd been curious about it because I just cannot imagine that surfing a uniform artifical wave could possibly compete with surfing the wild blue ocean. I'm glad I took the time to watch because it made me think about what it is with man manipulated artificial thingsI don't like. It's the uniformity, the presicion. In life it is a rare thing to have the same thing again, and again, and again. The nature of life, and it's deepest beauty is in the endless variations. Conformity has never interested me. I think that's why I took to surf culture many years before with my father. You never knew what you are going to get in the ocean. I like the mystery of not knowing, of finding out in that moment when you stand on the board, and the challenges of the split second reactions. It's as close to something deeply prim...

I can always tell when it's full moon. I know science says that it's an old wives tale, but every single full moon the internet goes haywire. Around full moon is when I get the most candidates for Jerks4Jesus. It's when the conspiracy theories come out to pay, and when we see the nuttiest things quoted on a Facebook group I belong to that tracks people drinking their own urine and using Black Salve. Cindy and I end up talking every full moon and solar flare and documenting the cray cray. There was no craziness yesterday my orbit, it was calm, but that might just be because I spent part of the day getting these gross infected lumpens under my left arm probed and drained. I was either getting poked or laying down. I went to the beach to walk and dragged my exhausted ass back early. Just not having enteractions with life. Today, oh man has that been a different story! Crazy happenings so far and it's barely noon here. A pile of Ticos at my gate trying to sell everyt...

First let me say that I do not approve of face punching, no matter how evil or smirky the punchee might be. Violence is never right, no matter how you might think that it would be satisfying. Neither am I encouraging anyone to go out and punch the faces of anyone on this list. If I were to see anyone on this list being punched I'd be very upset, even while thinking they likely deserved it. This topic came up this afternoon with another Patheos blogger. He posted on his Facebook that he thought Ted Cruz had the most punchable face ever. Which might be true. But not for me. Ted looks like some Hispanic humped Star War's Yoda, right down to the sagging ears. It wouldn't matter if Ted was Don Draper handsome with the manners of Mr. Rogers and the sheer animal magnetism of Jason Momoa. As long as he keeps spewing hateful things like a Donald Trump Jr. Jr. and has that smirky expression on his dopey face someone will want to beat on him. He is not even top three with me. In...

Haven't posted in the last few days because life is boringly reptitious. Get up, check emails, write for an hour, go walk the beach, go swim in the pool and cook, cook, cook inbetween continuatlly cleaning the funk stink out of the house from the water. Drag around exhausted from the meds. Big freak whoop! Until today and my love hate relationships with the local iguanas. We have a pile of different colored iguanas living in the vacant lot due west of our finca. I see them primarily when they are coming up and over the now 15 foot security wall to raid papayas and star fruit. Rainbow of colors,  emerald green, dusty gray, gray and black striped, golden, and golden red striped. Beautiful but so annoying. A few days ago I had lunch at Witchs Rock Surf Camp when a smaller one darted across the lawn to tourist oohs and ahhs. The Tico bartender I know and I just looked at each other and laughed. He said something like 'Yeah, they are fascinating the first couple of times you see...

I forget sometimes that I have different facets of my personality. Some of those sides are particularly unlovely. They tend to pop up when I least expect or desire them. With extreme fatigue from the drugs and the fact that my emotions seem to be right on the surface these days I tend to be this girl when I'm tired, worn out, feel attacked, or just plain old vanilla scared. Even when relatively happy. Go figure. Yes ma'am, that's me yesterday, mixed in with that hateful trucker with the mouth.  Yep, me again, just add swear words. I can be a mouthy little thing. Yesterday I got gripped by sudden fears when Jim and I were walking on the beach, as usual he stomped down hard to the more populately stretch of the beach and I veered the other way, off to the totally abandoned stretch of Playa Grande headed towards the estuary. I like my peace and quiet. I need time alone to decompress and think. I like to wander, stop and watch the sunning crabs and scuttling hermi...

Today things came to kind of a head again and we had a squabble around noon today. I am not entirely up to speed, and someone seems to think I should be. I knew when he asked me about if he caused my stroke that he wanted me to absolve him of any stress, but I could not do that, which really pissed him off. I don't care. I cannot pretend. It just takes too much energy. Why are men so damn selfish? Why is everything in this world revolving around them in their mines. Life tends to disabuse women of the notion of their importance in the universe very quickly, and we realize we're one of many. Men? Not so. They mostly seem to think that the world literally rotates around their ideas, needs, and wants. Many never catch on. I know he only asked because he was feeling guilty, but there is reason for him to feel guilty. He has been living in fantasy land for nearly two years while I get to do the emotional heavy lifting. Hard times, man, hard times. But I won't back down. ...

The medication side effects are still here, but not quite as badly. We're still cleaning up after the water. The floor is fully dry, but it smells pretty funky still. Just mopped with straight up bleach so we'll see if that's good enough. Time for new furniture once the smell goes. Went to church today even if I'm dragging ass hard still. The exhaustion is overwhelming. Heard just as I was leaving that someone else in the expat community was having either a heart attack or a stroke. I think I saw them being airlifted from the same airport I was. The air ambulance took off and passed overhead in the afternoon headed for the hospitals of San Jose. I hope they make it. Still spending a lot of time laying down. But it's kind of nice because Stinky is cuddling me. What's not so nice is that Jim does not seem to understand that my new reality is a constant state of headache, dizziness and exhaustion. I'm not getting to do this or that, I'm guarding a...