Trying new things on staycation

My SIL and my niece spent a week and a half with us after we returned from California. I decided that I would try to take them to places they hadn't visited before, and while I wasn't able to make that a daily thing, we did succeed in trying new places. One of those was the Chihuly Glass Collection in downtown St. Petersburg. The Morean Arts Center, where the exhibit is permanently housed, was celebrating its anniversary and was opening its doors for only $5.00 a ticket. I suggested we all go, and while we thought it would be larger and take longer than thirty minutes to wander through, we all agreed it was different and beautiful.

My husband and my eldest had been there before, but I hadn't. Dale Chihuly led an interesting life and was certainly very creative when it came to working with glass. Since I grew up visiting and watching my mother's friends who were glass blowers, it was very interesting. I would have loved to have seen a video of him creating one of the works, but alas, it was mostly just walking through and looking at his glass..

As art it was beautiful. It was all worth a small fortune, and certainly not for every day folks to display in their homes. Certainly not in my home that is currently crammed full of stuff not considered art, despite inheriting my mother's glass.

There were signs all over telling everyone not to touch the glass. That was hard. I wanted desperately to touch it. The colors were so bright and the glass so shiny, it was hard not to disobey. The cameras directed at us all through the center kept me in check, and I kept my hands in my pockets as much as possible when I wasn't taking pictures.

We left the glass collection and walked downtown which has gone through a huge renovation in the last few years. We ate at a tapas restaurant that Darcy recommended, having eaten their with her friend a couple of times. We all ordered different dishes and shared, and then climbed back into the car and hit the "mural tour", another Darcy recommendation.

Part of the renovation of downtown involved artists painting older buildings to brighten things up. Darcy led us to various buildings with murals so that my niece could take photographs. Tom did the driving from building to building, and we all made lots of comments to how he had been pulled over earlier on our adventure for switching lanes directly in front of a police officer.

It was a fun day, and we all agreed trying new things was a good way to spend a hot summer Saturday.

First job

This summer my youngest, the go-getter, went out and got herself a paying summer job. She did this on her own because she wanted her own money. She usually babysits, but lately that steady summer job kept getting cancellations, and so she went out and got a job as a camp counselor. She started the first of July and finishes up next week. Her friend, who works at a gymnastic camp, warned her.

Friend: "You'll start off all excited and think you'll have so much fun with the little kids. You'll ooh and aah about how cute they are, but by the second day you'll be yelling, "Get in line. Stop crying. Put that away. Quit touching little Jimmy's arm. Use a Kleenex. Get in line!" It's all fun and games until you realize kids are brats."
Me: "Welcome to parenthood."
Darcy: "I worked with elementary school kids for four months this school year. I think it will be great."
Friend: "Miss Cara, please text me the first time she comes home whining about bratty kids."

I texted her friend after day one. The first paycheck kept her motivated, however, and she is looking forward to another themed camp next week. We're pretty proud of her.

In case you're missing the Connie foot photos

Years ago, I had a cyst removed from the back of my neck. It got infected, and after a round of antibiotics, a dermatologist removed it. Later, another cyst appeared on my upper back, and until it too got infected, a dermatologist didn't want to mess with it. 

After the infection, a new dermatologist lanced it, squeezed it, and within months it filled back up. I went several more years with it like that, and while the revolving door of dermatologists ignored it, the thing drove me nuts. 

Epidermoid cysts run in my family. My mother had one removed from her neck after it opened on its own, oozing liquid without her knowledge. The only telling sign was a terrible odor only she noticed and attributed to dirty hair. She blamed it on aging and washed her hair fifty times a day before I discovered the rupture, and she had the thing removed. 

My brother has a golfball-sized cyst on his back that no one seems terribly concerned about, and Darcy had one removed from her arm last year. I suppose there are worst things that run in families.

At the end of our trip while still n California, the cyst grew in size and hurt. Knowing the signs, I had my GYN brother in law take a look at it, and after some probing and poking at it, he told me it probably should be lanced. Of course, by the time I got home, it was the weekend of the fourth of July, and no sane dermatologist was working.

By the time I got into the PA at the office where Darcy had her cyst removed, it was bigger, red, and sore.

I had assumed, having been through this twice before, I would be given an antibiotic and told to come back in two weeks to have the thing removed. 

The nurse took a look at it, hemmed and hawed some, and told me she would have to ask "him" what he wanted to do about it. I told her I wasn't seeing "him" the dermatologist, but "her" the PA. She looked at my chart and told me she would talk to "her" to see what to do, returning a few minutes later with the female PA, a pretty blond woman who was not the type I'd have guessed to be caught dead around something like a nasty, infected cyst. 

Her: "My worry is I'll put you on an antibiotic that will take a couple of days to kick in, which puts us to the weekend. If the cyst gets worse and starts leaking, you'll end up in the hospital, and I hate to see that happen. I want to discuss this with the doctor to get his opinion."

I didn't object, and off she went, returning in a few minutes with "him". I like this dermatologist, Dr. M. He was recommended by our pediatrician, and after he removed Darcy's cyst, I made an appointment to see him for my yearly check. Then, he said, much like the parade of dermatologists, I'd seen before, "if that bothers you, we can remove it." 

Now, Dr. M. poked at the cyst and pushed on it and around it.

Him: "While I don't think it's infected as of yet, it is getting there. My concern is that if I give you an antibiotic, and it gets worse we will be at the weekend, and you'll end up in the ER cursing me up and down."

Me: "So what I'm hearing is that you aren't planning on giving me your home number to call you over the weekend."

I told him his PA had said the same thing, and after a round of high fiving, they decided to lance my cyst for a small price of 300+ dollars. Dr. M. gave his PA instructions on what to do while she tried not to roll her eyes, and off he went. 

I removed my shirt, got into the paper vest, and laid face down on the table. The PA shot me several times with tiny, prickly needles to numb me, and then she went to work lancing and squeezing. She didn't get excited about the stuff oozing from the cysts as the last lancing troupe, which had then included the nurse and my mother, but she did apologize for pushing so hard on my back.

Her: "You'll probably be bruised back there, and I'm sorry for that."

I didn't tell her that I thought her pushing sort of wimpy but instead drifted into an almost slumber that she kept interrupting by asking me if I was okay. After four times of that, I told her I was fine, that she didn't need to keep asking me, and she finished the job, packing the wound with gauze. She said she'd see me in two days to remove it, sent off an antibiotic to my pharmacy, and left the nurse to wrap it.

Later that evening, I ran a fever of a 102. It lasted all night, and in the morning, the office requested I return. I called my friend SueG, and she picked drove me. I was very woozy and made her come in to retain whatever information might be given. By the time the PA came in, my fever was breaking.

She took off the bandage, poked around the wound, and told me she thought she would have "him" take a look at it.

Dr. M. appeared, and together they poked and prodded, deciding to leave it be as only blood was leaking. The packing was left inside the wound, and I was to continue on the antibiotic.

When he found out SueG was my pediatrician's brother, he plopped down next to her, and they chatted because he'd worked with her brother before choosing dermatology. Then he patted me on the leg and left.

I went home again, and I was miserable. The fever returned and lasted throughout the entire night. By morning I was running a temp of 101, and I drove myself back to the doctor's to have the packing removed. The PA was not in the office, so the same nurse removed it, poked around on it, and then told me she felt she should go get "him." 

Dr. M. came in and asked me if he could squeeze it hard. I told him to go for it, and when he did, apparently, the cyst spewed goop the packing had held back. He told me he was going to have to do the whole thing over again because the hole wasn't big or deep enough, and he left so I could get undressed and back into position.

Him: "I'm not charging you for this second procedure, by the way."

Me: "That's big of you."

Him: "You might want to be kinder until after I've poked you with the needles."

I had to go through the numbing, the squeezing, and more packing. Dr. M. kept showing me everything that was coming out, and he was more enthusiastic and vocal than the PA. 

He apologized for the deep hole he was making and for his squeezing. We both agreed the PA, while efficient, probably hadn't been strong enough in her squeezing. 

Dr. M. irrigated the wound and thought maybe I'd escape surgery as sometimes the cyst walls come out with the goop. He wrote a script for pain medication, despite declaring I was a "tough one" because he didn't want me to track him down over the weekend. I was to remove the packing on Sunday.

I left his office feeling better. The fever had broken during his procedure, and while I ran a low-grade one later that night, I was feeling myself by the next day. 

My SIL Susan was the lucky one who got to do the honors of removing the packing on Sunday, having gotten into town the day before. She gloved up, and got to work, carefully removing the gauze that was stuffed into the wound. Then, upon seeing the sight, she got very vocal.

Susan: "OH, MY GOSH! WOW. THAT IS THE BIGGEST HOLE. WOW, THAT IS DEEP! Want me to take a picture so you can see it?"

She washed the wound and then stuck in the antibiotic that he told me to shove down into the hole as it would "heal from the inside out." By the next day, it had done just that.

Susan: "OH, MY GOSH. IT'S ALREADY CLOSED. WOW. THAT'S AMAZING. THE HUMAN BODY IS AMAZING."

By the end of a week, it was scabbing, and now it is to a point where I'm only covering it at night. I can honestly say that the three days I dealt with the darn thing was the sickest I've been in a long time.

I worried the wound would turn into a Connie situation, and that probably didn't help. Thankfully, with the second procedure and the excellent nursing care I received from my SIL and my daughter, I will soon be back in the pool and the Gulf of Mexico, two places I had to forgo this summer. I see the PA on the first of August, and a decision will be made regarding the surgery of the casing. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

Out of the mouths of babes (apparently)

Times have changed, and while I consider myself to be quite "with" those changes, apparently I'm not as quick on the draw as I think I am. Recently, while dealing with a medical issue (blog on that tomorrow), the following exchange occurred. I was lying face down on the medical table while my friend, SueG, who had driven me to the office, was sitting at my feet in a chair.

Doctor: "Hey, thanks for bringing her in this morning."
SueG: "Oh, sure, no problem."
Doctor: "Are you going to be removing her packing tomorrow?"
Me: "NO"
SueG: "Sure, I can that. You don't want to drive all the way back here tomorrow for something that I can do in a few seconds."
Me: "I already made my appointment for tomorrow, and I don't trust you to be nice. She's in the medical field, but I'm not sure about her bedside manner."
SueG: "Listen. It's a long walk home today if you keep up that attitude."
Doctor: "So? You two are, what? Friends?"
SueG: "No, I just saw her on the side of the road and asked her if she wanted a ride."
Me: "No, I just randomly went through the phone book, and chose her number to call to ask for a ride."

We said that at the same time, both of us thinking it was the stupidest question we had ever been asked. I mean, what? How else would we have come to be in the office together if we weren't friends? Since we are both smart asses we just answered honestly, and he laughed.

Doctor: "Well nowadays you never know who is friends and who is..."
SueG: "Oh, God, NO."
Me: "Please! We're both married, but not to each other."
Doctor: "I guess I didn't put that very delicately."
Me: "Actually, we get this all of the time."
SueG: "We obviously would make good lesbians."
Me: "Yeah, mums the word, though, around our husbands. We like to keep them thinking they're the number ones in our lives."
Doctor: "Something tells me you two are trouble."
SueG: "Of course, we are. We're friends."

Tooting my niece's talent

My niece, Gabs, has been interested in photography for several years now and has taken her love up a notch in the past year. She took a photography class in school, and loves shopping thrift shops for various discarded cameras to hone her craft. She has an Instagram account where she posts her pictures, and if you aren't following her, you are missing out. She is that good. (Instagram: roygbvp)

My youngest, the now high school senior (WHAT?), hired her cousin to photograph her for her senior pictures when she visited us this summer. Darcy, in all her we-have-to-save-money wisdom, figured an up an coming photographer would not only allow her to get the pictures she wanted, but would also be less expensive in the long run. It sounded good, but well...

...the pictures were AWESOME. They were SO good, and she took SO many, and they were ALL mine. My niece took over 600 photos and gave them all to me on a jump drive. ALL of them. She had me narrow them down to 17 pictures that she then edited for me. I had to pay her more than she was asking. I had to! They were that professional. 

Back in my day we voted on the photographer for senior pictures. Once that was established we all made appointments through the summer months and went to the studio to have our photos taken. We had to bring along a couple changes of clothes, and we had inside and outside pictures taken right there in the studio. I thought it torture.

Today, here in our area, the school chooses the photographer. He schedules the date for pictures, and the sitting fee prices vary depending on inside/outside pictures. For Madison we had both. She had pictures taken inside for the yearbook with a black drape and outside in an outfit of her choice. I received a total of 12 pictures to choose from. I paid a sitting fee of $60 for that. We ended up buying an 8x10 of one from the outside. It cost us, with shipping, $100. WHAT? How crazy is that?

So when Darcy brought up the niece as the photographer idea I was like, sure what do I have to lose? The three girls (Madison as the photographer's assistant) went off together on two different days, with seven different outfits, and ideas of where to go, and they came back with the best pictures EVER. This weekend I sat down and chose 123 pictures out of the 600+ pictures. I sent them to Walgreens for 4x6 prints and picked them up two hours later, paying under $20.

The only problem I had was narrowing them down from 123! Oh, and now deciding what I want in an 8x10 to sit next to her sister's picture. But I LOVE all 123. One thing my parents both taught me was that when someone with entrepreneur ambitions proved their worth you paid them what they deserved. I paid my niece what I would have paid our school's photographer for Darcy's sitting fee. (I still have to pay him a $10 sitting fee to take her indoors draped photo for the yearbook) and for that I got the jump drive and 17 professionally edited photos. So now I'm tooting her horn.

Because seriously, she is good. I'm so darn proud of her, and I want a job as her manager, so toot, toot. I highly recommend her; graduation pictures, senior pictures, wedding pictures, baby photos. She can do it all. Now I'm working on saving up my money to fly her back down her to take pictures for our Christmas card. Thanks Gabs. I LOVE THESE PICTURES. You're talent is AMAZING. 

Babysitting, petsitting, what's the difference?

Before we left on vacation, we babysat my neighbor's little teacup Yorkie, Pita. Pita has lived in the neighbor for several years now, gets along well with Elliot, and loves the girls. She is quite tiny, loving, and has a habit of running around in circles counter clockwise when excited. While she stayed at her house in the evenings, we felt we she needed us socialization and brought her over to hang with us during the day after her breakfast.

While she has the run of her backyard via a doggie door and doesn't usually get walked, she loved to walk. I would come over after breakfast and she would run around me in counter clockwise circles as soon as I said the word, "walk". She sprinted down the street on her little legs faster than Elliot ever does unless he is chasing a car, plane, or imaginary things in the sky. I had to practical run to keep up with her, and decided that I needed a dog like that to lose weight since my dog refuses to walk in the summer heat.

Pita would come back from the walk eager to bother see Elliot and she would drink from his water dish, play with his toys, and run counter clockwise around him in circles while his head spun round and round trying to keep his eyes on her. By the third day, he would just sigh, climb on the couch, and pretend he was asleep, trying his best to ignore her.

 

Pita quickly got into her own routine. She would mess around with Elliot, sit with me while I had my coffee, and then she would disappear into Darcy's room where she would watch her sleep. When Darcy would wake she always gave Pita plenty of attention and good belly scratches. By the fourth day of that someone got a tad jealous. Darcy, of course, loved all of the attention by both dogs, especially Elliot who is usually loving on his own time.

She spent her afternoons with the kids, napping when possible, staring out the front door for intruders, and entertaining us with her counter clockwise running. She would come outside to watch us swim, but she didn't join Elliot in his barking and splashing, preferring instead to sit in the shade and watch.

  

We would walk her again in the evening and then take her home for dinner, returning later that night to play with her and get her ready for bed. By the end of the week we decided that had we not been leaving on vacation we would have told her owner we weren't giving her back.

Thanks to those who made it possible

Our trip to CA, a dream of Darcy's, was made possible by Tom's brother and his husband who welcomed us with open arms and dogs. We stayed with them in their beautiful home in the hills outside of Los Angeles, drove one of their cars, and of course, entertained them with our wit and charm.

Thank you to my wonderful BIL's, Richard and Clint, for an extraordinary visit to their lovely home. They wined and dined us, took us to a "comedy" show on menopause that mirrored much of my present existence, and ferried us around to various tourist traps. We, in exchange, ate their food, dirtied their house, used their car, loved their babies, took Richard to his first YouTube event and hooked him up with SnapChat.

We also have to thank our wonderful neighbors who took care of our own baby while we were gone. Elliot lived the high life the first week with our neighbors, Don, Missy, and Audrey, who sent us a picture of Elliot and Audrey chilling together.

Thanks too to my neighbors across the street, Bonnie, Brett and Gibs, for hosting Elliot the second week while Don and Missy hosted relatives from LA. We came home to find Elliot had enjoyed his vacation as much as we had, although he was very happy to see us back safe and sound.

Also, thanks to those readers who waded through the babbling that I am well known for when it comes to discussing events, places, and vacations. I can't thank you enough for your support for my little blog!

The Pacific Coastline Drive

Thursday morning we packed up, checked out of Wyndham, drove Auntie Marilyn back to her car in Berkeley, said our good-byes, and headed off to find the route that would take us south along the Pacific coastline back to LA. The day was a bit overcast and foggy as we got closer to the water, but it did not deter from the sheer beauty we experienced driving this particular part of California.

We hopped on Route 1 in Monterey and headed south through Carmel by the Sea, a State Reserve, and Big Sur. We wound through the twisting, cliff dropping, very-little-protection-so-you-don't-fall-over-the-side, road. I cannot adequately describe the beauty of the views we saw. Tom, who hesitated to take this route due to added distance and time, finally had to pull over at one of the many side viewing areas just to take in the sight.

We pulled over numerous times and got out to just stand with our mouths open. I don't feel like my phone camera did justice to the views, and I kicked myself several times for not bringing our Nikon camera. At one of the pull-offs we hiked further down toward the water as there were steps every so often to assistance in the hike. The ocean was on one side of the road and the hills were on the other side of the road providing the most different views.

The road twisted around the cliffs without barriers much of the time. I did a lot of sucking in of my breath as Tom drove, and I was torn between looking down the cliffs and closing my eyes. It was reminiscent of our drives through Ireland and Scotland, but as I did there I had to look at everything. The beauty was just too incredible.

Eventually we made it to the Piedras Blancas rookery where elephant seals cover the beach at various months of the year. In July and August there are hundreds an from January to May there are thousands. It was quite the sight to see these 5,000 pound animals up close. We pulled off and parked in one of the lots and hiked to each side of the viewing area to stand and watch them.

You can smell them and hear them before you actually see them as you walk to the viewing area. Most of them just lie there sunning, occasionally using their flippers to flip the sand on to their blubbery bodies. But as we stood there watching a male would slink around searching for warmer companions or bodies and another male would rise up and attack. At any given time there could be a handful of males jousting with one another, loudly barking, and I mean LOUDLY.

The males can be 16 feet long and weigh 5,000 lbs. The females weigh as much as 1,800 lbs. and can get to 12 feet long. The female loses 40% of her weight while she births, nurses, and weans her pup in an average of 34 days. The males take two four month trips to sea and dive continuously without touching land, averaging dives 20 to 30 minutes long. The females spend even to eight months at sea which is the ongest uninterrupted time of any of the elephant seals. The seals are protected by federal law since they were heavily hunted in the eighteenth and nineteenth century for the oil from their blubber. Their population has grown to over 200,000 and they have been coming to the California coast line since the early 1990's.

We left the seals and continued south, arriving at our destination for the night before dusk. Tom had made arrangements for us to stay in Morro Bay for the night, a smaller city on the coast named for the giant rock sitting in the ocean by the town.

The inn was an interesting place decorated in Victorian heavy cloths and colors, but the beds and pillows were the best of our entire trip. Our room was huge with an electric fireplace and a small kitchen area with refrigerator and microwave. We walked around the town for dinner and later some ice cream, getting some of the history from the locals. Stopping for the night broke up the driving, but we paid for it the next day by getting stuck in LA traffic for several hours.

I wouldn't change that drive for anything, however. It should be a requirement for all Americans to tour that coastline. It's breathtaking, beautiful, eye opening, and SO worth it if you are considering it. We were certainly glad we got to have the experience.