Kosciusko

Ok, I have had this rant before regarding Kosciusko on another blog... And I am back at it now. I live in Kosciusko County. There are several towns and burgs in this community, but none of them are named Kosciusko. If someone told me to drive to Kosciusko, I would be befuddled. Should I drive to Pierceton, Leesburg, Syracuse, Warsaw, Winona Lake, Clunette, Claypool, Silver Lake, Milford, North Webster, etc.....?

The Journal Gazette newstaff is once again referring to Kosciusko County as Kosciusko. Fact is, the story they are reporting about took place at a cottage on Ridinger Lake which is just outside of Pierceton and has a Pierceton mailing address. I know, this is petty, but its my pet peeve and it just really bugs me. I know the last time I posted about this on another blog, it stopped for awhile, but it has started again. Since my site meter indicates that I get visitors from fort wayne dot com, perhaps they will take note again.

Tragic Week

Reflecting on the past week in the area where I live reminds me of just how precious life is and how quickly our lives can change forever. The week started out with the news of a Warsaw Senior losing his life in an auto accident following prom. The students and community mourned the loss of this child who was taken much too soon.

On Wednesday, a double murder took place in this small community where we all like to say, "it can't happen here", but it did. The murderer is still on the run with speculation of him either killing himself somewhere locally, or hiding out somewhere in Chicago or Mexico. He killed his wife in front of their children ages two and seven...

On Friday, as everyone prepared to enjoy a long holiday weekend, yet another shocking tragedy hit, this time a man killed his girlfriend's two year old daughter, not only did she die of blunt force, there is also unconfirmed speculation of sexual assault. On a two year old.

All of this sickens me and saddens me. I truly love the area in which I live and have often boasted of the peace and quiet of the area and how nice everyone is, it is a community that pulls together and comes through for each other. But in this day and age, nowhere is safe anymore and we all need to be one guard a bit more than days of old.

Beginning to think I could use a fainting couch...

I have not had a lot of good luck since my last surgery. It seems to have taken a bit more out of me than I expected. During the first week I had several dizzy spells and nearly passed out at home several times, falling across the bed or a chair to break the fall, but not actually passing all the way out. Then on my first trip to the doctor's office to have the staples removed (one week later) I had a major pain attack and a bit of a mental meltdown which sent me straight to the hospital for a couple of days.

After returning home and taking it easy for a few days I felt as if perhaps I was on the mend. My surgeon had been on vacation during my first checkup and his partner was the one who saw me and admitted me to the hospital. I had another checkup yesterday with my surgeon who was now back from vacation. He came in and started explaining my test results from the previous week to me and going into great detail as to why I was still in so much pain.

In the midst of this very detailed explanation I told him I was feeling dizzy, he didn't hear me, just kept on with very graphic details. My mother looked over at me and asked me if I was alright. I said no and fell over sideways into the empty chair between us. When I opened my eyes, there was a funny smell (smelling salts) and two nurses, my mom and the good doctor all staring at me. The got me a cold wet rag and told me not to get up because I would pass out again. How totally embarassing.

My first question was if I could drive yet. The answer. Not today. And, use your judgement, if you continue to have dizzy spells and faint, you probably might not want to drive. Use common sense. Practice patience. And remember, tincture of time, you will start feeling much better in 6-8 weeks the pain will be almost gone, oh and the pouch in your tummy will start lessening in a month or so and you "should" regain feeling in your lower abdomen in time also. I guess with all of the other pain I am feeling, I am glad my lower tummy is numb.

In a nutshell, this sucks, I am tired of being sick and puny, and the thought of not riding a jetski for another month or so is breaking my heart.

Too close to my old house....

A double murder took place in Warsaw on Wednesday evening. I first heard of it when my daughter's friend called her and said she had seen a dead body at the gas station when she and her boyfriend went to wash his truck. Later on in the evening I heard of the second shooting. This one happened less than a half mile from where I used to live. My ex-husband lives there now. My boys were with him Wednesday night, they sat out in the front yard and watched the constant stream of emergency vehicles and later the news vehicles. More excitement than we are used to in this little corner of the world. My oldest son asked me if I realized that they probably saw the murderer drive right by the house? Wow.

Full story here.

I am really glad we moved away from town. Not that it can't happen here, but I hope not.

Whew!

I am back amongst the living on two counts. After another stint in the hospital last week, I feel as if I am starting to mend from my surgery. It turned out I had three herneas (tears along the incision in my abdomen wall from the previous surgery last winter) and they were all repaired better than new. That was until I tore a few stitches loose and landed myself back in the hospital living on morphine for a couple of days. That morphine is some fun stuff I tell ya, I am still having some pretty wild, and realistic in my mind, dreams. Myself and I got into an argument one night while in the hospital, I am not sure about what, but they were talking so loud that they woke me up! Sigh.....



So......besides all of that, I tried to do some handy dandy repairs on my computer all by myself, thus knocking myself offline and rendering the computer pretty much useless except to play freecell and solitaire... This required a visit from the computer doctor, who could not even believe what all I had done to it. My computer ended up in the "hospital" itself for a day or two but the good doctor delivered it back to me today, better than new! (I am not sure, but I bet there are some secret parental controls installed to keep me out of trouble now...


I have not driven for the past two weeks and I am going stir crazy, besides my trip to the hospital, I got one outing on Mother's Day and one this past weekend to the local drugstore. I have read two Harry Potter novels in the last five days and am starting my third, (contributing to my weird dreams perhaps?).... So, how has life been in your neck of the woods in the past couple of weeks?

Surgery...Again

Yep, here I go again...Monday, surgery, again.  Turns out I have two hernias, God only knows how I did that, but I did, so Monday the good doctor will cut me again.  This time, the good news is, he is going to start me as an outpatient and if all goes well I will be home Monday night, if not, Tuesday.  Whew.  The bad news.... 4-6 weeks recovery again. 

Sweet, sweet 16

 Sixteen years ago today I gave birth to the most beautiful baby girl.  Now today she is the most beautiful young lady.  Sometimes I just watch her and am amazed by her beauty and strength.  Does this mean I have to admit to being a bit older than 29?

Abdominal Wall Hernia

 Ain't life grand?  Almost six months post surgery I am still feeling really awful.  Having all kinds of weird symptons.  Finally last week I went to the doctor and told her all of these strange things going on with me.  So she ordered a CAT Scan.  You get to drink lots of white chalk for that test, yum. (The things I have been through all in the name of good health...) Anyhow, the results are in, it seems I have an abdominal wall hernia and now I get to go back to my surgeon.  More to follow...

Oh What a Weekend...

Whew. Thank God its Monday! This weekend was a huge case of spring fever, summer planning and SORE MUSCLES!!! On the weekends that my boys are home, I plan to get as much work done as possible and schedule in some fun too. So, my goal for the weekend was to get the deck power washed and the lawn furniture out, powerwashed and strategically placed for maximum enjoyment.

My stepdad has been laid up the past few weeks with a bad ankle so we agreed to get all of his furniture out of the barn and cleaned up and in place also. My furniture was one trailer full and his was three trailers full...hmmm and my son decided his fishing boat and lift had to go in the water too...

The major discovery made this weekend is that my son and I do not work well together. He will be 15 soon, and he has taken on the role of man of the house and sometimes thinks he is smarter than his mother. He is bigger and taller and somewhat intimidating...but I am still MOM! His work plan is he has all day long to do it, so stretch it out and take the whole day. My work plan is I do not want to do this so hurry up and get it all done so we can move on to something fun... You can see where the conflicts began ( hehehe). When moving something heavy I am an absolute wuss who is unable to lift very much for very long and he has a plan of where he is going with it and where he wants to turn, he just doesn't communicate that part and ends up getting ticked when you don't read his mind and so he just pushes you with the heavy object being carried. This resulted in me in the bath tub for a very long period of time trying to soak the pain away! Oh my goodness the Bayer Back Pain pills only work for a short period of time.

We did manage to complete all tasks on the list with a relatively few amount of arguments and got some play time in also. I am in the process of moving my flag pole from the back yard to the front yard which is also going to involve some sort of pretty flowers around it and maybe some strategic placement of a couple of Adirondack chairs that I would like to add to my lawn furniture collection. It seems the front side of my house is much more entertaining as far as watching what's going on in the neighborhood. I did put my swing out by the pond and am really looking forward to relaxing out there this summer. Well....when I am not over at my mom's tearing up the lake on the jet ski and aggravating the fishermen!!!

Ducks

M R Ducks!!!

No! M R Not ducks!

O! S M R ducks, C M wings?

L I B! M R Ducks!

Spring Break and Easter

 My goodness, there had to be two records this past week, the shortest spring break (hehehe) and the coldest spring break and Easter!  It really did seem like it flew by all too quickly, my boys spent part of it with their dad, but came home on Thursday and seemed very happy to be home. They did however come home with really bad colds and my daughter caught it from them within a day. 

Friday morning my son and I did some work for my stepdad at the barn to get ready to get the piers in (hard to think of summer when it was 27 degrees and snowing.)  We loaded all of the plastic caps and bumpers for the pier onto the trailer and brought them over to the house.  No matter how cold we were, the guys who installed the pier later in the afternoon were even more cold!!!  Can't wait for summer tho!

Friday afternoon my kids and sister and mom and I took a shopping trip over to Fort Wayne.  We had fun.  The kids got a few things and they were very happy.

The main point of this post is the fact that I have really worked on realligning my priorities in my life and I have made my kids my main focal point.  There will be plenty of time for my life later, but for now it needs to be about them.  We went out Saturday night and did the tokens and tickets thing then went over to Somethin' Funn again and did the go karts and laser tag.  Everyone had a blast and I was really proud of how all of my kids interacted with each other so well.  We are finally feeling like our own little family.  I know that sounds odd, but since the divorce, we have truly struggled with this, my oldest son is always very quick to point out we are not a "real" family, but he seems to get it now, two or more people living life together and loving and caring for each other's well being.

Oh, and along about Saturday, I got a sore throat, and its now progressing into a full-fledged cold....sigh.  Damn that global warming.

Daylight Savings Time Revisited

Did you all remember that today was the day that we were supposed to have advanced our clocks for daylight savings time? Yep. Today was the day. Those of you who know me, know that I was having a hard time figuring out if I was going to get more sleep or less sleep a few weeks ago when we advanced our clocks an hour. It creates a state of confusion for me for about 12 hours, a few hours before I make the change and a few hours after wondering if I did it right...

So. Why am I bringing it up again? Well its like this. I was having a hard time getting up this morning to get around for church. I had exhausted the snooze option to the point I was going to have to hustle to get there on time. I finally got up and stumbled into the bathroom, then out to the kitchen to take that lovely blood pressure pill....and I looked at the clock and it was off an hour. WTF??? I looked at another clock and it too was off an hour. So was my cell phone. So was the tv. Hmmmm. Guess what? I have one of those fancy dancy newfangled alarm clocks that changes the time all by itself when it is supposed to. And it did. Because today is the day that we WERE supposed to change the time. Ah well, I am laughing about it now because I wound up with an extra hour to fiddle around and really make myself late for church.