I know all of you have been waiting anxiously for the results of my book count. But I confess I've been reluctant to share, since I didn't quite make my goal. I was oh-so-close. But not quite there. On October 16, I finished my 60th book and was well ahead of schedule. But on October 19th everything fell apart, and I spent the next two months sleeping. Literally. I did very little else, including reading. In mid-December I woke up and started reading again, but it wasn't enough to catch me up. And so the grand total for 2009 was...
You know how it is when you haven't written in your journal for a year? Or two? And it becomes harder and harder to even think about because you think you're going to have to record a year or two of events? Pretty soon the journal is abandoned altogether. Until you have a great lesson on Journals, and you decide to try again. I gave a lesson on Journals once, and told them not to try and catch up. Give a very brief summary of how you got to this point, and then just write about today. And then keep writing about every day.
So that's what I'm going to do, because this blog has been abandoned so long it has become a burden. So here's what I've missed since Halloween:
Ben turned ten. All he wanted for his birthday was an old-fashioned egg beater. Funny boy. He got it and was thrilled.
We went and cut down a Christmas tree.
Jennie turned four. She wanted a My Little Pony Coloring Book. She's very into coloring lately.
Emily danced beautifully in her Christmas recital. (Robyn decided she would be far too busy to take dance this year.)
We got some new pajamas on Christmas Eve
And had a great Christmas day.
Have you ever seen a stop sign, a sailor, a bunny, a kitty, Robin Hood, and a Japanese princess doing the caterpillar dance?
Here's all our pumpkins! I carved three of them. (The best three, of course.) Jef did the spider face. I mean... can you tell what Jef's pumpkin is supposed to be? Sorry, I ruined it. But you can tell, right?
I actually stayed home and handed out candy this year. It was really weird. Really quiet and really long and really quiet.
So, for a while now I've been having some pretty bad headaches. Most recently, they've started waking me up in the early morning. Early last Saturday morning, (like 2:00am-ish), I got my worst one ever. We went into the ER in Richfield and got a CT scan, and they noticed some enlarged ventricles. They recommended an MRI, and scheduled one for Thursday. But we didn't make it to Thursday. Not even close. By Monday morning we were on our way up North. They rushed us through the ER process, and got us an MRI quite quickly. Once the brain surgeon had looked at the scans, we were immediately scheduled for surgery within 3 hours. I had a colloid cyst in my brain, which was blocking drainage from both lateral ventricles. The fluid is supposed to go down the spinal cord, but mine was stuck and building up pressure. The big white marble in the middle of the scan is the problem. Now it's gone, and I've lost my marbles. :) The other big white balls are various lights in the room and the flash from the camera. There was only one cyst, and it was centered between the two halves of my brain. But one is enough, since it can cause serious brain damage and death. There's an article about colloid cysts in this month's Reader's Digest that will make this seem so much more dramatic for you, if you'd like. So I had brain surgery, and now I can't lift anything heavier than 10 lbs for the next month. Or go running. Which is a problem, since it's the Turkey Trot on the 7th. Now what am I going to do? All that training for nothing...
So there's your proof. Running causes brain damage.
In my mind, we spent the rest of the week driving between Provo and Vegas hospitals. That may not be true, but it's what I remember. And there was this big snow-covered field with headlights and shotguns. I'm hoping none of that really happened. Jef kept confusing me about what hospital we were in. He kept taking me up to see the Y from the windows of the hospital. Apparently that was supposed to prove something... Who knows? But thanks anyway, Honey. You were great this week.
Well, I have to admit that the details are still a bit sketchy in my own mind but I did apparently have brain surgery this week. Either that, or my hairdresser has played a terrible trick on me.
I'm still trying to catch up on exactly what happened, but in the meantime, here are some of my more humorous comments during the ordeal. (Happily recorded for you by my dear Jefry.)
"How did you get here?" (asking me)
I said, "Katie drove me. I started driving, but then switched to go to Vegas, picked up my mom at at a Wendy's, or something. There was this boy named Simon that was in the backseat on the way to Vegas, but got lost. He went down the hallway, and I pushed the black button, and he disappeared. His dad was mad at me because he disappeared."
When switching hospital rooms from ICU to regular, Jef asked me if I knew where we were. I said, "We left someplace, and we went the wrong way. I saw some people that were taking off their pants, or something, and Jef said, "I hope it wasn't embarrassing." And I said, "I don't think I was paying attention." "Good job," said Jef. Thanks
"The ducktape tried to save me when I went through a hole in the fence, but the secretary girl got mad at me."
"What did we do with the grouchy doctor? Is he still in the bathroom? He thought he could drive better than us."
"I thought we decided this last night with astronomy."
"What did we decide?"
"How many people have your name."
When trying to leave the hospital room at 5am, I said, "Momma needs me in the kitchen." I apparently couldn't find the kitchen, so I came back to the hospital room and went to sleep.
"So are Tom Hanks and Eddie Murphy still at our house?"
"Are you going back into that hole with the fish and the tomatoes?"
"I tried to stay friends with the reading light guy."
"What guy?"
"The one across from me in the blood-taking room."
Then came playoffs, and we were kicking everyone's trash. It was awesome.
Everyone showed up to the championship game pretty sure that we had this one in the bag. We stayed ahead of them the whole game, but in the last couple minutes they scored a couple goals and tied with us.
So we had to go into sudden death overtime - whoever scores first wins.
And the other team scored first.
But no one moved. Even the other team. We all stood there in shock. Finally someone asked the ref if the game was over. None of us were quite sure. But it really was over, and the other team had won.
It was SO sad. Really. I don't think Jef is quite over it yet, and that was two weeks ago. Ben was doing alright, though. I think it was a lot harder on the coach than the players. They all got second place trophies - plus a treat - so that was good enough for Ben.
Poor Jef.
Oh, hello there! Haven't seen you around lately. How've you been?
Good, good. Glad to hear that. Have you met my brother, Tom?
No, you wouldn't have. We don't really let him out much.
You just never know what he'll do next.
Yes, yes. Nice to see you, too. I've got to be getting my brother back to his room now. I'll see you later!
Bye!
P.S. Tom played Othello for the Shakespeare competition, and did an amazing job. Really, he was brilliant. They're going to be doing the whole play a little later in the year. So you'll get a second chance to see this scene for yourself. :)
