Just Another Manic Monday

Yesterday morning I got up and thought, "if I can just through the party today, my phone conference with the disability attorney tomorrow morning and picking the girls up tomorrow afternoon, I'll be done for the week." That is not to say that I didn't completely enjoy yesterday or that I don't appreciate the work that the disability attorney is doing on my behalf. It's not to say that I don't absolutely love spending time with my nieces. All those things are good things but all those things required me to be stronger than I feel like being sometimes.

Yesterday the pain was mostly manageable but it's the first time I've gone out in public on percocet and I don't like that one little bit. I didn't drive so that helped. It was a lot of time in the car and a lot of time sitting and both are never painless but honestly, I was able to function. This is good news on one hand because I was able to function but bad news in that I don't want to live my life doped up. I don't think I slurred my words or was an embarrassment to my family or anything.

This morning the conversation with the disability folks was brief, succinct and productive. I am now at that stage where a judge has to review my case. The good news is that 80% of cases are approved at this level. The bad news is that it's currently taking on average 12 to 15 months for those cases to be heard. I knew going into this process that it was a marathon, not a sprint but to realize that I'm realistically probably a year away from approval. Wow. And I can't even think about what happens if I'm in that 20% that still doesn't get approved at this level. I don't even know what happens after that. I haven't let my mind wander that far.

The pain of the day is a sharp, burning pain in my left hip and a flare up of the arthritis in my spine. I think the colder weather is affecting me and I'm also feeling a backlash from yesterday. I cranked the electric blanket a little higher and that seems to be helping. Since I took strong pain meds yesterday, I will do anything to avoid them today. My own personal rule is never two days in a row unless I really can't stand the pain any more.

This afternoon with the girls was absolutely delightful. Last week I bought some clear glass ornaments for them to decorate. I brought them markers and glitter glue to use but didn't really give them any instructions because... well, I haven't really done this before. I have used sharpie to write names on glass ornaments. I did that with my kids to memorialize people who passed away that year so that each Christmas when we decorated the tree we would remember those who have gone on before us. I didn't really want to put any boundaries on the girls' creativity so I just said, "do what you want to do. they can be gifts or you can use them yourselves."  Sarabeth enjoyed it more than Jamie and even made some specific ornaments to be given to people she loves. Jamie looks rather unhappy in this picture but she was just playing.

Jamie was all about indoctrinating me on the world of My Little Pony. She even painstakingly wrote out the six main horses and their characteristics. She explained their "cutie marks" and even found episodes that gave the most background. This was amusing to me because Austin is not an empathetic storyteller. He doesn't give you enough information to spark your interest in what he's interested in. Jamie, on the other hand, made me want to watch every episode of My Little Pony. She's persuasive, that one.

I forgot to mention this yesterday but it was so funny that it has to be shared. On the way home from the party we had Jamie in the third row of the car, me, Sarabeth and Mawmaw were in the middle row and Jim and Angie were up front. Angie called back to see how Jamie was holding up and Sarabeth said, "she's squirreling". Squirreling? Huh? Then we realized she meant, "playing possum". It was hilarious! I told her that was going in the blog and she was ok with it.

Sarabeth has a field trip to the middle school tomorrow. They will show them how they do things and (I think) tell them what sports and clubs and things they can do. I think Sarabeth is going to be in band. Her mommy is a very talented percussionist and SB already has a full drum kit at her house so she could be good. I can totally see us on Friday nights being the pack of relatives who travel with the band kids. I would totally do that for her. I'm trying to work up to going to basketball games... either way... they know I'm interested in what they're doing, even if I can't do it with them.

There's more stuff... but the time change and the past two days are catching up with me and I just want to go back to watching my Mad Men marathon. I'll have time to include more from the book tomorrow. Hope your week has started well. Love and hugs, y'all.