Originally published at That Girl. You can comment here or there.

I don’t even know where to begin.  I went from thinking my Monkey was a pretty average 4 year-old, with more energy than some sure, but I never really thought there was something wrong with him.

Apparently I was wrong.  Husk and I had a meeting Friday with his preschool teacher, para, principal, Spec Ed teacher, and the school psychologist.  At our last meeting it was brought up that the Spec Ed teacher thought be may have ADHD.  Which is why we first contacted the psychologist.  Now, after all their evaluations, they are leaning more towards Aspergers or some other ASD (autism spectrum disorder).

Okay, I can deal with that.  That isn’t my concern.  Okay, well, let me rephrase that.  Yes, I am concerned about that and we are doing what is necessary to make sure Monkey gets the help he needs in order for him to succeed in school/life.  But it was the way they were talking about him.  At times it made me want to cry.  My sweet little baby has grown into an aggressive, unsocial 4 year-old.

Originally published at That Girl. You can comment here or there.

Having a bad day?  Grab yourself a chair, set it in the middle of the sidewalk, and have yourself a nice, cleansing cry.  It helps.

Originally published at That Girl. You can comment here or there.

Talked to the tax lady yesterday to finally get our taxes filed.  We’re getting back about double what we expected, and I’m not complaining one bit.  Bills are gonna be gone and savings is gonna go up, and there’s nothing wrong with that.

Monkey was supposed to have an appointment on Tuesday for a screening.  The doctor was going to screen him for ADHD, but called in sick, and the next earliest appointment we could get was the 26th.  I’m okay with that.  I’m not even sure the school psychologist has had a chance to observe him during class yet.  She hasn’t contacted me with her “observations” anyway.

I just feel like I’ve been running full steam since the beginning of the year and I’m hoping for a letup soon.  I don’t do well under pressure.

Originally published at That Girl. You can comment here or there.

February has started off with a bang.  On Friday what was supposed to be a simple weigh-in and blood pressure check (I lost 10 pounds last month by the way) turned into a morning of me running back and forth between the hospital and the clinic and getting a swab jammed so far up my nose I think she tickled my brain.  It was for an Influenza A test, and as much as I HATE getting blood drawn, I’d rather have blood drawn any day than to go through that again.

So, after the brain tickling and the friendly little meeting with the business office at the clinic (apparently they want money … who knew?) I was back home waiting for the office to call with my test results.  Fine.  It was only supposed to take an hour and then I could call Husk to pick up my meds before he came home from work.  Simple.

They finally call about 2 and a half hours later.  Negative.  They’re calling in a prescription for a Z-pack.  Fine.  I hurry and text Husk to pick it up on his way home.  Husk shows up and I nearly tackling him, begging for my drugs.  What drugs?  Oh, you texted me?  My phone wasn’t working.

…

Originally published at That Girl. You can comment here or there.

Peyton Manning, Tony Romo and Brady go to heaven to visit God and watch the Celtics play a game. God asks each quarterback a question to decide who will sit next to him: “What do you believe?”
Manning says he believes in hard work, commitment to loved ones and being generous. God offers Manning a seat to his left. Romo says he believes in passion, discipline and courage, among other things. God offers Romo a seat to his right.
Finally, God turns to Brady and asks, “And you, Tom, what do you believe?”
Brady replies, “I believe you’re in my seat.

Originally published at That Girl. You can comment here or there.

Yeah, I had one.

Why is it that last night when I reminded myself to “update that damn blog” I could think of all these things to write, but now that I am sitting here staring at the screen nothing wants to come out? I mean, yeah, there’s little things. Like my costochondritis, Monkey’s possible ADHD, Bean’s flat out brattiness, etc., but I am having a hard time figuring out where to start.

Bean, since he comes first alphabetically, has decided that he doesn’t want any of this sweet and innocent crap that people usually associate with babies. Over the last month or so he has started hitting, pinching, slapping, and biting. It just came out of nowhere. And the worst part is, he looks the sweet and innocent part right up until the very last second then *wham*

And no one ever believes me. Until they are on the receiving end of one of his “love taps”.

I had a meeting with Monkey’s teachers at the beginning of January.  They are very pleased with how he is doing academically.  He picks things up quickly; letters, numbers, colors, etc.  What they are concerned about is that his attention span and behavior “issues” have shown no improvement at all.  They recommend we have him checked out for ADHD or some other disorder.  Yay.

We took the first step last week by meeting with the school psychologist, who will observe him in class and decide if she thinks he needs further testing or not.  If yes, then we are supposed to try and get him into the KU Med Center’s Children’s Health department.  Which can take up to a year.  More yay.

I don’t know.  I’ve known for some time that he has issues with attention span, etc.  Which is why we tried to get him into Head Start last fall, and were subsequently turned away because we either made too much money (pah!) or he didn’t have any “handicaps”.  Which they could apparently tell from looking at him for .5 seconds since they did no screenings or testing of any kind.  But whatever, I’m over it.  He’s in preschool now, doing well, and has a group of teachers that I could not be more pleased with.

In the long run I have a feeling this is just going to be one more headache that turns out to be for nothing.  I could be very wrong.   It has happened before.

Originally published at That Girl. You can comment here or there.

I woke up this morning to what sounded like about 50 18-wheelers parked outside my house.  I looked out and there were four power trucks sitting out there and the guys were fixing the downed lines and broken poles across the street.  Upon closer look, the label on the side of the truck was for some power company out of Kentucky.  All of these linemen from all over the country are here in Kansas to help Westar and all of these other Kansas power companies get everyone back online.  Twenty-two states have sent men here to Kansas to help out.

The good … most people will have their power back before Christmas.  Without all of these other states’ power companies helping out, it could have been after the new year.  In a fifteen mile stretch my mom and sister counted 18 power poles down or broken.  Just within 15 miles.  Imagine that all over the state.

The bad … these out-of-state workers have received quite the greeting.  Idiots from all over are going out and stealing copper from their trucks.  Welcome to Kansas, please don’t judge us by the moron population.

Last night I had packed up and frosted a fresh batch of sugar cookies.  I got out a plate and put some cookies on it, but by the time I got dressed enough to go outside, the trucks had pulled away.  It’s not much, but I thought maybe some cookies as a thank you would help them to not think so badly of all Kansans.

Originally published at That Girl. You can comment here or there.

Finally thawed out (and got power and internet back).  I’ll update once I’m done SIMing

Originally published at That Girl. You can comment here or there.

The ice is starting, and supposed to last two days at least.  I have an ear infection and head cold and want to die.  Be back someday.

Originally published at That Girl. You can comment here or there.

If anyone stopped by at all today, there was a chance the site looked … um … different. I’ve downloaded and installed umpteen different themes, and none of them are right. I need widgets and basic and bold. Yeah, I could do the whole design and code things, but I’m way too lazy for that right now. Hell, I’m lucky to have the enthusiasm to even search for the themes anymore.

So, I mentioned it in my last post, but I am officially on the Weight Loss … trend? I stepped on the scale at my last appointment and the numbers, they were aplenty. So I talked with the man, and he ordered blood work to check my thyroid, which came back clean. That said, I’m going back in January and he’s going to prescribe Phentermine. I know, makes me sound like I have no willpower or something. But I walk, eat right, and for six months straight I exercised for 45-60 minutes a day everyday and continue to gain weight. That’s just not right. Right now I am the heaviest I have ever been, and it sucks ass. Major ass. I’m not comfortable, I have no energy, and nothing looks right on me.

Along with The Phen I am going to start South Beach. I hate diets. HATE. I’ve tried in the past to follow different ones, and nothing ever worked. But, (sigh) I am determined this time.

I’ve always been “heavy” and was pretty resigned to that. Even now I’m not trying to get skinny. I just want to be a healthy weight and to be able to wear the clothes I like. I don’t want the chicklets to be embarrassed of their mama.

I don’t intend to turn this into a weight-loss blog, but I may be updating about my (lack of) success from time to time.  See how I do that?  I’m so sly.

Originally published at That Girl. You can comment here or there.

First, Grandpa is out of the hospital.  Second, the “lack of updates”, hahaha, was affected by my friend, The Flu, who has taken over me and made me useless.

Now. For the Christmas list. Because I can.

1. Tony Romo aka The $65 Million Man
   
   
2. Peyton Manning … Mmmm
   

Okay, okay. So that’s not the real list. Can’t blame a girl for trying. Christmas comes for Husk and I in February after our tax return pays off bills and whatnot.

1. 
2. 
3. 
4. 
5. 
6. 
7. 
8. 
9. To lose 50+lbs

Okay, so I don’t expect to lose a bunch of weight before Christmas. In fact, I just talked to my doctor and I won’t even be starting my new weight loss plan until after the first of the year. Maybe that should be on my New Years Resolutions?

Originally published at That Girl. You can comment here or there.

My grampa is sick and in the hospital.  I won’t go into the family politics concerning this, but it may be a bit without any updates.

Originally published at That Girl. You can comment here or there.

I love sports.  I do.  I have jerseys, I listen to the games, I watch them on TV (or would if I had TV), and I attend local games.  Football and basketball mainly, although softball was the only sport I ever really liked to play.

Unless it was tackle football with the boys, then count me in.

I think this is one of the things that Husk likes most about me, which is probably sad in a marital kind of way, but eh.  He’s a big sports nut.  Football.  Cowboys and Huskers.  Hey, I never said he had taste.  We’ll watch/listen to games together, discuss defenses and offenses, rip apart coaches, and oogle at the guys in tight pants.  No.  That’s just me.  Sorry.

But with all of that, you’d think the man was smart enough to NOT try and tell me how to run my fantasy football team.  That’s right.  You read correctly.  Husk has gotten me hooked on fantasy football, and he tries to run my team.  Do men ever learn?  It all started when he signed me up for a league thinking he’d have two teams and he could steal all of the players from “my” team, stack “his” team, and that was that.  Heh, wrong.  I bitch-slapped pushed kindly asked him to move out of my way so that I could properly run the team that now I had my name all over it.  The rest, as they say, is history.

Or not, but I’m kicking ass and taking names and guys hate when girls do that.  For the record.

I have a buddy from school who should be playing professional football right now.  Not should be in the sense that everyone in our dinky hometown likes to gloat about their star player and have pipe dreams of him going pro.  No, he played college football and by all rights could have entered the draft and gone on to play professional football.  But he didn’t.  Why … well, that’s for him to answer.  But I am insanely disappointed that he did not.

I mean, who else is gonna get me tickets so that I can molest watch Tony Romo and/or Peyton Manning?  No one thinks of others anymore.

Originally published at That Girl. You can comment here or there.

Well, it is official.  The tree is up, presents are wrapped, and I have received the first Christmas card of the season.  It is that time.

Our first card is from my sister-in-law and her husband and boys.  It is one of those “stick a picture in a template” photocards from some online developing company.  Which is fine.  There’s nothing wrong with those kinds of cards.  In fact, I love getting photocards.  I send photocards.  The thing with this card is my SIL’s smuggishness.  Her “top this” attitude.  She’s probably sitting at home right now waiting for phone calls from all of her family and “friends” telling her how awesome her card was, how great the picture of her kids was, etc.  The first words out of The Husk’s mouth were, “That’s awful.”  And this from a man who could absolutely not care less if we even sent out a card, not to mention what it looked like.

It did remind me, though, that I really need to get ours ordered.  I may be ahead of the game on presents but I’m slacking in the card department.

Saturday night after the chicklets went to bed, Husk and I put up our sad little tree and then I wrapped all of the presents we have so far.  I was thinking, “Yay, I’m getting this done early!”, but really, all I did was create temptation for the chicklets.  Presents?  Under a glowing tree?  Score!  Luckily Bean is just unsure enough of the tree that he won’t get close enough to it to bother the presents.  Monkey on the other hand not so much.  He’s already tried to run off with and hide some of the smaller presents, which I had to hide up IN the tree where he can’t see them.  This is slowly becoming one of those ‘what was I thinking’ things.

Originally published at That Girl. You can comment here or there.

To be jolly?  For giving?

Initially I had planned to do Operation Christmas Child with the chicklets, well Monkey really since Bean has no clue what the hell any of this holiday crap means and would most likely just try to eat everything we put in the boxes, as our “giving” this year.  Because of some random crap, mainly that &$#@!!ing van, we don’t have a lot of money to do much else.

Well, then a lady on a forum posted about adopting a soldier overseas, and Husk thought that was a better idea than the OCC (he thinks they are religious freaks … not the kids, Samaritan’s Purse), so now we are filling a Priority Mail box and sending it to a soldier stationed in Iraq.  Monkey is actually having fun filling the box, even if he’s not 100% sure of what exactly we are doing with it.  But soon he will and I hope that it is something that sticks with him.

Not to mention, I’m really excited about doing it as well. 

Originally published at That Girl. You can comment here or there.

Okay, so you said Thanksgiving, and technically you’d be right.  But Thursday is also the day that I bust out the A Christmas Story DVD.  That’s right, folks.  No waiting for the 24-hour marathon on TV, we start on Thanksgiving and watch it whenever we want.  That is what brings true holiday spirit into this house.  Not Thanksgiving dinner, not Black Friday shopping, and not even putting up the tree.

Originally published at That Girl. You can comment here or there.

Me:  You’re cutting it too close, you’re going to hit that car.
Husk:  I know how to #$#&%$!! drive.

Engine revs.

Me:  Then why aren’t we going forward?
Husk:  I may not know how to put it in gear, but I know how to drive!

It was probably my fault for nagging on him after he had worked on the van all day, but I’m sorry … if you’re going to spout off about knowing how to drive, you’d better be sure and get that gear shift into drive before slamming down on the gas pedal to peel out of a parking lot.  Otherwise you just look silly.

Originally published at That Girl. You can comment here or there.

I have a turkey in my fridge.  I want so bad to cook it and eat it and dive right into the joy that is the Thanksgiving Overeating Stupor.  This, my friends, is bliss.

But the damn thing will not thaw out.  I bought it and stuck it in the fridge Thursday thinking we’d have a Big Sunday Dinner.  Ha.  More like Still Frozen Bird Carcass.  And since I am planning on brining it before roasting it, I have a good 12-24 hours after it thaws out before I can even start cooking.  And I thought this was a good idea because …?

Even better, this is a small bird.  10lbs.  For actual Needless Turkey Murder Day I have a 20lber.   In other words, I need to get that sucker out to start thawing now if it is going to be close to thaw before T-Day.

My sanity needs a refill.

Originally published at That Girl. You can comment here or there.

had one of those days where getting out of bed was the most you exerted yourself all day? No? Just me then?

Well, today was one of those days when getting out of bed was the most I exerted myself. I was tired, achy, my throat hurt, and I could feel a fever coming on. I relocated from the bed to a chair in the living room. Husk had already bathed and fed the chicklets, who were now watching Cars for the hundred-thousandth time.

Now Bean isn’t old enough yet, but Monkey knows. He just knows. He took one look at me and thought, “Mommy is having one of those days,” and took it upon himself to teach Bean how one truly acts when mommy doesn’t feel well.

Step One: Toys. Get them all out. ALL out. The family room toy box and the bedroom toy box. Scatter them everywhere. In the hall, in the dining room, in the living room, on the floor furnace. And for good measure, toss a few over the gate into the kitchen. Make sure they are the ones that hurt when stepped on because chances are mommy is concentrating so hard on just getting her leg over the damned thing she’s not bothering to look where she’s stepping.

Originally published at That Girl. You can comment here or there.

The van needs/needed:

• solenoid
• brakes
• brake fluid
• power steering hose
• power steering fluid
• tires

And other stuff I can’t remember right off.  $200 worth of crap easy.  $200 that was supposed to go toward Christmas presents/food.  I love this time of year.