They're playin' basketball....

Sylvester Seay, Fresno State basketball #30

Last night B and I went to the SaveMart Center to see the men's basketball game, Fresno State v Nevada. Tickets were courtesy of my boss - and seats were in the 2nd row ON THE FLOOR, CENTER COURT. Excellent seats. My sister asked if I wiped any sweat off me, but we weren't _that_ close. ;-)
And tonight is the women's game, same schools - AND if you bring your ticket stub from last night, tickets are just $1 and it's a breast cancer fundraiser, as well. So.... we may go again tonight. The women's team is leading the league in several places, apparently.

A good thing about living here is that we are only 10 minutes from Fresno State, so getting to/from any event there is quite different than going in to the City. So for a 7 pm game, we're home just after 9.

Friday - notes...

Will revisit these later to add details about the day --
Derma
Indian lady at hospital library
Ulta
Valentine presents - Kym and Mom
Lunch at Ramzi's
Pink Nail Polish
Notes on a Scandal
Rain
Pedometer: shopping = more steps!

Trader Joe's

Thank you for joining me again for lunch. Today we have: Trader Joe's is a great place, especially for weekday lunches at work!

I am also making some headway on the St. Patrick puzzle Kym gave me and B for Christmas. Take a look at it - it is the hardest puzzle I have ever worked on. Mom thinks her red bird one was hard - and it was!! - but, yowza, this one is fierce.

Monday's lunch

It's too breezy to take a walk, and since it is lunch time and I am at my desk, come sit and have lunch with me!
I started with this: -- Can you believe this salad is only 130 calories, including dressing? -- and ended with this:
Well, ok, just one half of one "baton," not the whole box -- Lovely, decadent heart-healthy dark choco! It's smooth and somehow very snackable for dark choco.

I am drinking green tea for my beverage. I am nowhere near my 10,000 steps for the day, but my pedomaeter stays with me and every little bit helps!

A coworker has decided to go on a liquid diet this week, thinking it will help her prepare for the stomach stapling she is to undergo in a week and a half.

Of slumdogs and nail polish

Work was better overall this week - it's still not "comfortable," but at least I didn't come home in a funk every night.
Unfortunately, though, I had 3 migraines over the past week, and I hope it's not a continuing trend.
In fact, I couldn't even make it to church this morning due to the pain, as I only started to feel better about 10 minutes ago... and I took the meds over 2 hours ago. I'm guessing that later today I'll work on swatching more of my nail polish stash - See here for an example: It helps me to compare existing colors and to see what I have without having to pull out the bottles.

Yesterday afternoon, B and I splurged on a matinee at a regular retail cinema to see "Slumdog Millionaire." I really wanted to see it before it wins all the awards and because it's about Indian society. After having seen it, I won't be surprised when it picks up its awards (so far it has won 4 Golden Globes and 5 Critics Awards, and is up for 10 Academy Awards and 11 BAFTAs) and it's really a universal story in that it could have been shot anywhere in the world's impoverished areas. A work of fiction and based on Vika Swarup's novel Q and A, it apparently is very true-to-life.

... Which brings me to Friends of Mercy, which is run by a friend of mine, of sorts, the Reverend Mark Sell. His organization works to educate on Hospice Care in the US and to support AIDS orphans/widows and victims of Female Genital Mutilation in Kenya, primarily in the Kibera slums of Nairobi, in conjunction with the Meekers at Springs of Life Lutheran Church. I am sure that many of the storylines in "Slumdog Millionanire" could be easily translated to this region. Pr. Sell's organization does amazing work in caring for the physical and spiritual needs of the population it serves. One of my dreams is to be able to go with Friends of Mercy on one of its expeditions. The adult and children's Sunday School at B's congregation have been collecting money each week to help in this project. Of course, it's my "baby," so the support hasn't been great, but what doesn't seem like a lot here will surely help in Kenya. If you want to support, there are links on the websites to which I've linked above, or you can just contact me.

Whee.

I am sorry I haven't been keeping up with this, but so many days I feel like I have nothing to say.

And now that I've started the job, I am too tired to keep up. I'm in bed by 8 - and "hopefully" by 7 each night. I just am not a person who's been given a lot of energy resources, so I need a lot of sleep anytime I have scheduled activities, even if that activity consists of only being in an office all day. Being around other people is draining, and talking, meeting, running things - takes a lot out of me.

Right before I started the job, I was able to schedule my yearly diagnostic tests (the 24th) - and one turned out fine... the other, the mammo, was questionable. Of course, my first thought was that all was ok, since I'd had to go back with my very first mammo a little over 3 years ago. NP called the very next weekday (which happened to be my first day of work, the 26th)) and told me to expect a letter from the Women's Ctr... so I figured I'd wait until the letter came. The day after that (27th) I got a call from the Coordinator at the Women's Ctr, who wanted me to come in "tomorrow," so I figured it was a little more serious. Thankfully, my boss let me take the entire day off so that I could drive to Fremont to get the recheck done immediately - but woo, 3 hours to Fremont, 2 hours with mammo, radiologists and ultrasound, lunch with Mom at Falafel. Etc and 3 hours back to Fresno. Thankfully B drove and went with me.

Mom and Kym were also at the Women's Ctr for moral support since they know I get anxious (heh) - Mom was in pink (aw) and Kym brought me a beautiful blue scarf that she made. I need to get a photo of it and post it. After all that, the determination was to wait 6 months and check that side again, and if all's the same, 6 months again for the regular bilateral. Most of what was seen was the same as in Oct of 2005, but the additional sono that day showed a new spot, potentially a cyst - the borders of which appear "textbook simple cyst" but whose interior may be unusual. So we'll see.

Work is going ok, and everyone seems really nice - but again, the energy thing - on top of not really knowing what to do and the employer not really knowing what they want me to do. They want me to get them into safety compliance but then they throw other things on me because they're in such chaos in terms of order - both on the $ side of things and generally knowing where things are. It's very tough and I feel lost.

Not even going to mention the church things, except that I can no longer attend my husband's midweek evening class, nor will I be able to attend midweek Lenten services because I will need to be in bed by the time they even start, much less attend then drive back home the 30+ miles.

So right now it's pretty much office and sleep. Can't really have dinner because I'm not up long enough for my food to digest before bed. But it's ok - I have a good enough lunch to carry over. I'm not hungry when I get home anyway.