Dancing With Only One Shoe On
February 20, 2009
Sometimes, I talk myself into the fact that I’m going to get organized… Tomorrow.
I say ‘tomorrow’ because most of my resolutions happen late at night. When I’m thinking about what all I need to get done, or haven’t gotten done, or don’t remember that I haven’t and still need to get done right before I figure out if I should go to bed or if that will just mean more thinking myself in circles and I might as well stay up and play on the internet while I think about it.
I keep telling myself that if I could just sit down and get organized, I would sleep better – because I wouldn’t lie there thinking about what it is that isn’t organized and therefore must not be getting done.
But the truth is that no amount of organization will keep me from wondering what it is that I’m forgetting.
There’s no end of things to worry about if you’re that way inclined. I worry that I’ll let someone down, or that someone will let me down. I worry about the big things – like Global politics, poverty, and the next Flu pandemic. I worry about little things – like whether or not I’ve posted to my blog, or whether I’ve mailed something I said I would (the answer is always no on that one – I suck at mailing things.) I worry about slightly larger things – like whether or not that cavity that is resulting from where I lost a piece of my back upper right molar is going to need a root canal sooner rather than later and what I will have to give up to pay for the procedure.
I can’t imagine why anyone ever wants to take over the world. I mean, how the heck would they EVER sleep at night? Worrying about an entire world? I can’t imagine the leaders of most countries sleep well, let alone empires.
And besides – if you were bent on conquering the world – how would you ever find an executive assistant to keep you organized for that one? How does one place an ad on Craigslist for that?
“Wanted: one executive assistant. Must be exceedingly well organized, be able to make travel arrangements, remind boss not to get engaged in a land war in Asia, and willing to take a cyanide capsule if World Conquest fails. 401k plan, dental and health included.”
Are you still with me? I worry that you’re not. I mean, you might’ve decided that this post is so chaotic that you just can’t stand it any more. I’ll put that on my list.
- Worry about whether or not people finish reading blog posts.
- Write more organized blog posts.
Oh… and if you’re wondering about the cryptic title? Well, it just refers to the fact that if you dance with only one shoe on? You usually find yourself just dancing around in a lopsided circle.
Where did I put that other shoe? Hm. Adding that to my list.
Ouch
February 18, 2009
I hate being sick. But even worse? I hate being sick sick.
I’m dying from a common cold right now – or at least, it feels like dying – lungs have hacking painful cough, sinuses are either aching or clogged with excess mucus production, voice keeps disappearing and throat is raw.
That wouldn’t be so bad if I didn’t have the damn Fibro.
Sickness makes it flare. It’s gotten worse rather than better over the past several years. Sometimes, late at night when I realize just how many pills I have to take to even approximate normalcy any more it hits me… this isn’t going to go away, is it? They don’t know what it is, they only know how to dull down the symptoms. They can’t cure it… and it doesn’t get better over time, it either stays the same or gets worse. Mine got worse.
I find myself doing “pain checks” in my head silently.
- Hands? pain? yes. Left worse than right tonight.
- Arms? pain? not really. Pretty good tonight.
- Shoulders? pain? yes. Achey. Pop when used.
- Back? upper and lower both having issues.
- Hips? nope – phew… surprising when the shoulders are bad
- Legs? nope, not really…
- Knees? mild or stabby – would be worse if the pressure were changing or I were standing Right worst than left tonight.
- Ankles? nope, popping but no pain
- Feet? cold as always… but no real pain comparatively
- Oops – Head? yeah, left jaw under ear – sinuses – miraculously no headache at the moment. huh.
This kind of “systems check” happens several times a day. Only *once* in the past year was the answer to all of the checks “no, no pain” – was very strange. For a brief couple of hours, I wondered if maybe it was gone. Silly me.
I have no immune system to speak of any more. If it’s around? I get it. If I get it? I get it as long as and unpleasantly as possible.
Travel? Wipes me out like I were a 98 year old woman. I try to hide it. I live on pills and 5 Hour Energys and then pay for it afterwards when it’s safe. A full day down, sometimes 2.
In some effort to “fix” my pH imbalance I gave up red meat, soda, and coffee at the beginning of the year. I’ve been trying to eat healthier in general too. Haven’t broken the red meat/soda/coffee prohibition even once. Want to. Desperately want to. Want coffee fiercely. Can feel the difference in my body and wish I had strength to go entirely veg. I don’t. Chicken & fish have saved my sanity. Green Tea is my lifeline.
I want to be “normal” again. I want to wake up, not catalog which parts do or don’t hurt. Eat normal food. Have energy, no pain, be able to work out and lose weight and be healthy without having to take a handful of pills every day.
But right now? I’ll just be content if this frakking cold would go away.
Oh, and sleep, I could use some sleep.
Quick Post – Congratulations to the iPod Touch winner…
February 15, 2009
Thanks to everyone who entered the iPod Touch giveaway.
The winner was drawn randomly from all valid entries received using a number generated by Random.org. Congratulations to Jennifer Beggs who entered the contest after hearing about it on BlogTalk Radio.
Thanks to everyone else who entered. There don’t forget to enter the contest for the trip for 4 to SeaWorld in Orlando for a chance to be one of the first people to ride the Manta roller coaster that opens in May!
Manta Mania!! Win a Trip for 4 from Izea to SeaWorld in Orlando
February 11, 2009
This past weekend, if you were reading my Twitterstream you know I got to go to SeaWorld in Orlando thanks to the wonderful people at IZEA & SeaWorld. I spent my weekend feeling like a kid again while getting to spend some of the most amazing moments with @eMom, @juliaroy, @pop17, @aschek & @tedmurphy! I keep blaming my laryngitis on ‘travel plague’ that I seem to get every time I’m in an airplane – but I think it actually started someday mid-way thru Saturday with all of the squeeing and screaming I did, if I’m being honest…
I went to SeaWorld in San Diego once as a kid. My big memory outside of Shamu the Killer Whale was that my older brother got a pearl out of his oyster from the pearl divers while mine came up with an empty shell. So when Ted Murphy told me that I got to go to SeaWorld in Orlando to experience a hard-hat tour of their upcoming Manta attraction? My first thought was “yeah, I’m going to head straight to the pearl divers! hah!”
You know what? They still have pearl divers – but we were so busy doing other exciting things? I kind of, um, forgot to go do that even tho I walked by more than once. Don’t worry, I’ll be doing it again soon enough with my own family (or so I’ve been informed by my daughter upon seeing footage of my weekend) so it will be on the list then I’m sure!
I’ll be honest that I wasn’t really sure what to expect. I mean, when someone says “Orlando” I used to think of that big park with the mouse, ya know? And before this weekend? When I thought “SeaWorld” I didn’t think “roller coaster” or “up close experiences with sea creatures” or even really much beyond “rotten-oysters-that-didn’t-give-me-a-pearl” and “Shamu” – so I didn’t exactly go in expecting to have the day of a lifetime. I mean, I didn’t even know that anything outside of the hard-hat tour was on the agenda before about a week out.
But dude. I had the day of a lifetime. I got to feed (and touch!) dolphins. Real, live, happy, frolicking, smiling, wonderful dolphins!! And it’s not an experience that is kept to the “select few” either. Sure, in order to get us through even a small portion of what the park offers visitors, we had VIP access that got us to the front of many lines – but there were lines. You? You can feed dolphins… and manta rays… and even sea lions (but man, those sea lions? a bit on the “fishy-smelly side” yikes!) All you have to do is go to Orlando, buy a ticket to SeaWorld and buy some smelly fish and wait your turn… well, for the dolphins anyhow – the mantas and sea lions are sort of a ’step-right-up and feed away’ deal.
Even with all of that, I was still totally stunned by all of the stuff that is going into the new Manta experience. I say ‘experience’ because it’s waaaay more than just an incredible one-of-a-kind coaster. There’s also the immersive aquarium experience and so much more than I can fit into just one blog post. (Yes, there will be more informational posts coming – I’m like that, remember?) Seriously, it’s not a “ride” it’s an experience. I personally can’t wait to get back there when it’s open. (See Ted Murphy’s video for a feel of how excited we all were.)
What? You don’t see it in the budget this year? You should. Seriously, I’m frantically figuring out a way to put it in my budget for later this year. But yeah, I understand – easy for me to say. I just got back from there. Not everyone is so lucky.
Aren’t you lucky then that you’re reading this? Because the awesome folks at Izea & SeaWorld have teamed up to create this wicked cool contest called Manta Mania.
Someone (You?) is going to win a trip for 4 to SeaWorld Orlando to be one of the FIRST people to RIDE the new Manta!! (Not to mention get to see all of the other cool stuff for themselves!)
What do you have to do to enter? Seriously, it’s so easy it’s almost done already:
1 – Blog Comment:
Leave a comment on this post sharing why you want to take your family or friends to SeaWorld to ride Manta. Make sure to include valid information so we can contact you if you win!
2 – Twitter Tweet:
Tweet out why you want to go to SeaWorld and ride Manta in 140 characters or less. Be sure to include http://bit.ly/gmswc, #mantamania and @GeekMommy in your tweet to be registered. For example:
I want to go to SeaWorld @GeekMommy I’ve got #mantamania because __ fill-in-the-blank __ http://bit.ly/gmswc
3 – Blog Post:
Write a post about why you want to take your family or friends to SeaWorld and ride Manta. Be sure to leave a comment or trackback on this post with the URL of your post.
Each tweet, comment or post counts as ONE registration. A person can enter UP TO three times. The winner will be chosen at random by IZEA based on all valid contest entries.
I’ll be giving away a SeaWorld Schwag Bag to one winner who enters on GeekMommy.net and IZEA will choose the grand prize winner randomly from all entries on the 6 blogs participating in the giveaway. The bloggers participating in the giveaway are the ones who went on the SeaWorld trip with me – Wendy Piersall, Sarah Austin, Julia Roy, Alex Schek and Ted Murphy.
Just don’t sit too close to Ted Murphy if you’re at the Shamu Believe show – it’s um, a damp experience
Important Legal Stuff
The Manta Mania Contest is open to anyone who is a legal U.S. resident and legal residents of Mexico, Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Venezuela, or Dominican Republic and is at least eighteen (18) years of age. The contest ends at 11:59 p.m. EST on March 10, 2009. Please be sure and read the full contest rules here.
Win an iPod Touch & $10 worth of Music
February 5, 2009
Call me crazy, but I kind of love Valentine’s Day.
Yeah, I know, I’m crazy. G’night to you too, Gracie.*
But it’s kind of nice to have a holiday devoted to Love. I mean, there’s one for just about everything else, including pretty much every sort of bizarre concept you can come up with from weather forecasting to beer guzzling – so why not Love?
Apparently, the folks at Walmart agree with me, so they’ve rolled out some spiffy stuff at http://www.walmart.com/sweetideas to help get you in the spirit – including blowing a Free Kiss from your iPhone to your sweetheart, sending a virtual valentine, or downloading one of the Top 10 Romantic Songs that were chosen by all of us ElevenMoms.
But here’s the part I really L-O-V-E about this Lovefest… Each one of us ElevenMoms was offered the opportunity to give away an iPod Touch and a $10 Walmart Giftcard so you can download some music to get your own romantic playlist started!!
Not feeling “in the mood” this year? That’s okay, you can enter, win, and put whatever stompy-angry-give-me-my-CD-collection-back-you-lousy-jerk music thrills your soul… and your Exes can eat their hearts out at how cool your brand new, Second Generation, 8 gb iPod Touch looks and how awesome you must be to have won it for free!
So what do you have to do? Well here’s the hard part… you have to listen to me! (I know, seriously, I make these things so difficult!!) Well, by me I mean “Tech Moms Talk” on BlogTalk Radio. Every Wednesday night at 8pm ET/5pm PT I’m found chatting away with some of the smartest women (and men!) I know over there.
On Wednesday 1/28, 2/4, and 2/11 – sometime during each show, I’ll be announcing a Secret Code Word (oooh!) all you have to do is come back here, enter that code in the form below and cross your fingers and hope for Sweet, Sweet Victory!!
Don’t have time to settle in with us LIVE on Wednesday nights? That’s okay – the shows are archived on the page so you can listen to them on demand!!
Additional Info: In the event the selected winner has not replied within 72 hours after being notified at the email address provided, another winner will be chosen at random. In the event that neither winner responds, the iPod Touch and $10 gift card from Walmart will go unrewarded. All prize taxes are the sole responsibility of the winner. Members of my family are ineligible to enter and win this contest, but are eligible to enter the contests of other ElevenMoms’ iPod Touch contests subject to their rules and participation.
*seriously, tell me that someone else got that joke…
Oops I Didn’t Do It Again
February 2, 2009
Some weeks, I wonder how I got by before the Internet brought all of these interesting, fascinating, and accessible-any-time-day-or-night friends into my life.
Other weeks, I wonder if the reason I can’t blog consistently anymore is that there are too many of them just a Twitter away, waiting to converse with me on any ol’ thing from Superbowl Ads to world politics to whatever falls out of my brain and onto my keyboard.
I really meant to get some quality blogging in sometime in the past week. But life was kind of chaotic with GeekDaddy out of town and Buttercup doing her best to keep my on my toes with illness, sleep deprivation, and general six-year-old related mayhem. So when things did settle down just a little bit? (tonight, at about 8:13pm Mountain time) I just relaxed and didn’t even think about the fact that my blog was starting to get that dusty, disused look about it.
Then I remembered that I have some serious things to blog about… I mean, heck, I’ve got a wicked cool upcoming contest/give-away for Valentine’s Day – and if I get organized, I might have a couple of other ones as well. (This would require me digging through my email inbox and finding all the ones that were nice people wanting to give my readers something fun for the holiday and actually, um, you know… emailing back again and if they’re still willing, post the darn things!) And I’ve had some thoughts on my mind, too. Hey, it happens!
Well, I think I did anyways. These days it seems like I have these great blogposts that are just itching to get written and then I get out of the shower and they melt away like so much soap down the drain. Maybe you guys should just come hang out in my bathroom and I can shout them at you instead? Nah… I know. It’s a small bathroom. And besides, I’m more likely to sing at you than verbally blog.
So then. Tomorrow isn’t just Monday – it’s also Groundhog Day!!!
I was going to have this big surprise on Groundhog Day – but then *cough* it got pushed back – so that one is right out. Maybe I can distract you with this picture of a groundhog… No? Okay, how about reminiscing about how great that Bill Murray movie called Groundhog Day is? Seriously, if I can’t get you with that one – we’re beyond hope. I love that movie.
Alright then – I give up. I’ll start writing content again tomorrow. I mean, after all… if Punxsatawney Phil sees his shadow, we have 6 more weeks of winter. If *I* don’t see my shadow I have 6 more hours of sleep to come up with something more exciting than this post turned out to be.
See ya tomorrow then. Shadow or not.
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