Some Good Things, Some Not So Good.

First off, the not so good.

K came home from school with an infestation of head lice. I am guessing she had them for a few days, so we have been super cleaning, we washed her hair with RID, did the whole nit comb thing (so far 3 times), washing tons of laundry, etc. Well yesterday, she still had some of the nasty beasts living in her hair, so I took her to urgent care last night we got a prescription for stronger stuff. We are going to do the whole shampoo and lice cream thing later this morning, when I get ahead of some of the laundry.

Met with the haematologist on Wednesday. I was really nervous, but everyone in that practice was sooooo wonderful. They ran an initial CBC with differential, and it was weird. My platelets came out at only 157 (when they were 666 three weeks ago). Seems like a rather large swing to me. The phlebotomist took like 8 tubes of blood so they can run all kinds of tests. Then I had my consultation with the doctor. This consultation happened in his office and not in an exam room (HUGE deal, in my estimation). Dr. S. spent 45 minutes with me, going over my health history, planning out what to do next, and talking with me about what the high platelet thing means and why it might have happened. He explained that because my spleen was removed back in 1987, that my platelets may always run a little high, because it is the spleen that breaks the platelets down. VERY informative. And a bonus was finding out that he did his haematology residency at the University of Minnesota!

Yesterday, K and I went to Barnes and Noble to spend her gift card. It was also K's school's Barnes and Noble bookfair day so a percentage of what we spent went to her school's library. We chose three of the "Little House" books - "Little House in the Big Woods", "Little House on the Prairie", and "By the Banks of Plum Creek". We also chose "The Giver" and "Number the Stars". After we got home, K started reading "Little House in the Big Woods" and she discovered that the main character in the book had the same name as the author of the book. We had a discussion about the difference between autobiography and historical fiction. She understands that the "Little House" books are more historical fiction, even though the stories are based upon Laura Ingalls Wilder's childhood.

And I found my sunglasses, which had been missing for almost a week.

Bittersweet

Today, in the mail, my mom sent me her spritz cookie press. She really does not bake much for Christmas anymore, and my Wilton plastic cookie press broke in the middle of baking Christmas cookies last year. Her press is all metal, so I have no worries about the trigger breaking on this one.

It makes me kind of sad, I love to bake cookies with my mom, I am now terribly homesick. Mom and I used to make a weekend of the cookie baking. We would do rosettes, spritz, snickerdoodles, "brown eyed susans", Mexican wedding cakes, and these wonderful cherry pecan shortbread cookies. The kitchen always smelled so good, and we had fun with the baking.

K will be helping me bake this year. Our list of cookies will not be so ambitious this year, I do not have a rosette iron, and I can't find the mint chocolate drops for the "brown eyed susans". We will probably do either chocolate chip cookies, or some of the double chocolate cookies (I have containers of that dough in the freezer).

I am feeling really homesick right now. I am hoping that someday, either we can make it to Minnesota for the holidays, or my family can come here so K, my mom, and I can bake Christmas cookies together.

Blank

I cannot think of anything to write today. I might be able to think of something later but for now, I am blank.

Second Thanksgiving

For the past few years, we have had what I like to call Second Thanksgiving. We go to either my sister in law, or my parents in law's house for actual Thanksgiving, and then a day or two later we have our own really small Thanksgiving feast for just the three of us. We love turkey leftovers, and really enjoy cooking our own turkey with dressing, potatoes, string beans, gravy, and pumpkin pie. We then get to make our own turkey stock, and have all the yummy leftovers. It is a win-win situation.

Yesterday was Second Thanksgiving 2009. M and I kind of fought over who was doing the cooking, but it all worked out. M chopped up the vegetables and giblets for the stuffing/dressing. I prepared the string beans for steaming, and sauteed the sliced almonds. M had to run to the store to get a few things, so I stuffed the bird and put it in the oven. Then I peeled the potatoes, put them in the pot to be cooked, etc. I pretty much did most of the cooking (grin) and although we kept the bird in about 1/2 hour too long, everything turned out nicely. We served dinner with sparkling apple cider (or as we like to call it - tickle juice) and served a Sara Lee pumpkin pie.

All in all it was a fairly relaxing day, there was no pressure to have dinner done at a certain time, we were able to take our time with it all. I like it when things are quiet and calm.

I know this is probably not my best writing, but I am posting it anyway.

Sea World

We went to Sea World yesterday. We have annual passes, so we usually go 3 or 4 times a year. The vibe at Sea World is so different from Disney. Disney is so much over stimulation with everything, and Sea World is a lot more mellow.

First thing we did after purchasing the all you can eat passes ($22 with our passholder discount), was go to the Pet's Rule show. All the animals in the show are rescue animals and it really is a fun show to watch.

After that show, we ate lunch at one of the food booths. We had barbecue chicken, brisket, and spare ribs. Yummy. Then we headed to the "Believe" show (Shamu). I really miss the old Shamu shows which were more whale and more educational and less cheesy showmanship. "Hey, , what do you want to be when you grow up?" "I want to be a Shamu trainer!" Ay yi yi!

The dolphin show is closed. Apparently they are re-creating the show and refurbishing the "stadium". Somewhere in the early part of our day we also rode the Sky Tower. We love the Sky Tower. During our ride, I sat next to this guy who was on his phone for the entire ride, talking some sort of construction business. He was going on and on about "I called the polack about that and the crane should be there and ready to go". UM, polack is really not a nice thing to say about a someone of Polish descent. And gee, nice quality family time there. Not to mention the fact that I really do not wish to hear about your business when I am having a mini-vacation with MY family.

We went and saw the flamingos, and went to the bat ray tank. There was a bat ray that kept sticking its head out of the water and splashing everyone in the vicinity. It was really funny to watch.

One of our favorite shows is the sea lion show. The sea lion show does not take itself too seriously, unlike the Shamu show. They also had a "holiday" sea lion show, which we stayed in place for. I put quotes around holiday because the only holiday they were honoring was Christmas. Not even a mere tip of the hat to Hannukah, or any other winter holiday. I would think they would be a little more ecumenical than that, but oh well. The sea lion's Christmas show was really quite funny (in a physical humor sense) and we really enjoyed it.

We then went and ate dinner, hung out at the tide pool (with the sea stars), and got our "Shamu photo". The Shamu photo consists of getting up and straddling a large plastic orca and having a photo taken. Our photo turned out really cool.

We then went to the Shamu "holiday" night time show. In my humble estimation, the show was almost painful to watch. It was all Christmas with no mention of other winter holidays. It was as if the management at Sea World believes that everyone who attends Sea World is Christian. There was a choir that also doubled as an "interpretive dance troupe". The lead male singer was unable to keep pitch (he was singing about 1/4 step flat the entire time). There was much human performing with a little bit of orca performing thrown in, seemingly as an afterthought. I guess when I go to see the Shamu show, I want to see more of the orcas. And I would like to actually learn more about the animals. And the show was seriously cheesy, and not in a fun way. I found my brain giving the entire show the MST3K treatment. It was bad.

Overall the day was good. I enjoy going there, but I found the Shamu Christmas show disappointing.

Tired tonight

Went to Sea World today. Good day. Too tired to write more for now, so I will write it up tomorrow. :)

Happy Thanksgiving Dear Readers

Just a quick note (kind of late) to say Happy Thanksgiving.

We had Thanksgiving dinner at my sister in law's house. Today is also M's birthday. So we had birthday cake AND pumpkin pie for dessert today! Did I mention that my sister in law went to chef school? YUMMMMMMMMM.

Great turkey and fixins, and a nice and mellow afternoon was had by all. Too bad the football games were so one-sided.