Surprise, surprise, Hubby and I are once again broke. Thank goodness his payday is coming up on Friday, and I’ll be getting a mini-payday then too.
I’m going to have to stretch this one as far as possible. We definitely need to pay the electric, phone and cell phone bills, as well as the auto insurance. His truck payment is also past due, but it will have to wait until I get my big payday, after the beginning of the month.
At least I should get paid fairly well next month, if I can get all the work that I have due this month finished on time. I know I’ve been saying that for months now, but I’m trying to remain optimistic. I’m fighting the constant tiredness and inability to concentrate with all I’ve got, and although it often gets the best of me, I have to keep on keeping on. I can’t let myself believe that it’s winning, or I’ll lose all hope. And hope is what keeps me going.
I’ve been wracking my brain trying to think of other possible causes of my chronic sleepiness. I haven’t come up with many ideas, but I have thought of some possible solutions.
The one theory I have come up with, and I think it’s something I should mention to my doctor if I can ever remember to, is that it’s connected with mono. I had mono when I was 16, and it made me horrifically tired and weak. I slept all night, got up and went to school (thanks to my then-doctor who refused to write me out), came home, slept a couple of hours, did my homework, and went to bed. Washing my hair made my arms tired and sore, and I couldn’t do anything that was the least bit physically demanding. I was that way for several weeks before I got better. There were times off and on since then when I would get tired more easily than usual, and I often attributed them to that since it stays in your system. I wonder if this could be related?
Now, on to the solutions. The doctor mentioned that ADD meds often make adults more energetic and cause weight loss. Maybe if she decides that I have ADD, she will put me on them and all will be well. Or maybe some weight loss pills would give me an energy boost. I would try something like Orovo and find out for myself, but I don’t have the money to buy anything over the counter right now. So if nothing else, maybe I’ll talk to her about giving me a prescription for something (which my insurance will cover). I have no doubt that it would be easy for her to justify that, because I’m not at a very healthy weight.
I’m not a doctor, so maybe I’m way off-base here. I’m just so desperate to find out what’s going on and fix it. But I guess I’ve just gotta be patient.
Well, I had my sleep study last night. It went much better than I anticipated, and although the tech that was there couldn’t really tell me anything, she said something that gave me hope that there was no apnea present. Still keeping my fingers crossed, though.
She and another lady who was in respiratory therapy but training to do sleep studies came in around 9:30 to hook me up to all those wires. There were 22 of them total! 
I told them that the whole getup would make a great Halloween costume. They laughed, but said that some people actually brought in a Nikon D90 or other fancy, expensive camera and had them take a picture with all that stuff on them. I considered asking them to snap one of me with my cell phone, but it’s not really something I felt inclined to capture for posterity.
I slept very well considering all those wires and being in a strange place. I only woke up 3 or 4 times, and I went right back to sleep. Then early this morning the tech came over the speaker and asked me to turn over on my back and try to sleep that way for a while. I obliged, but I didn’t do much sleeping after that. I just can’t sleep on my back. But at least I dozed a little, so hopefully that gave them the information they needed.
I got home a little before 7:00 this morning, and I put Pumpkin on the bus and turned on the computer. I planned on going ahead and getting to work after taking a shower to get all that sticky gunk out of my hair and off of my body, but I didn’t even make it to the shower. I ended up laying down, and I didn’t get back up until after 10:00. And I still feel like I didn’t sleep more than a couple of hours last night.
At least I’m a step closer now to finding out what’s keeping me tired all the time. Even if the sleep study reveals nothing out of the ordinary, we’ve ruled something out. And I’m going to make sure my doctor does everything she can to get it figured out. I’ve had enough of being too tired to get my work done and enjoy life.
Tomorrow night is the big night. No, I’m not being whisked off to the Caribbean for the honeymoon I never had. I wish. But I’m finally going in for my sleep study.
I know it’s no biggie, but I’m dreading it. I have a hard enough time sleeping in a strange place, especially without Hubby and Pumpkin nearby. Well, maybe not so much lately since I’m dead tired most of the time, but I doubt it will be as easy as sleeping in my own bed. Especially seeing how they’ll have me all wired up like some sort of sci-fi experiment. Not my idea of a good time.
But worse than all that is the idea of having to use one of those dreaded CPAP machines. I know, not a big deal either, but I really hope it doesn’t come down to that. If it does, we’ll definitely have to rearrange the bedroom. The way it is now, there is no room on either side of the bed for a table to hold it. I’ve actually been wanting to rearrange for some time, I just can’t come up with a feasible way to do it. But I guess necessity is the mother of invention, huh?
And last but not least, I hate the thoughts of having to wear such a contraption. It would probably interfere with both my and Hubby’s sleep, as well as my movement during the night. And it certainly won’t be very attractive. I guess I can kiss those late-night snuggles goodbye. 
But I guess I’m getting ahead of myself. Maybe, hopefully, they’ll determine that I don’t have apnea and it’s something else that’s causing me to stay so tired all the time. I’ll be keeping my fingers crossed.
I’ve been struggling with finding ways to feed Hubby and Pumpkin without upsetting their delicate stomachs. Pumpkin has had mysterious stomach problems for about a year now. Hubby’s stomach started giving him serious trouble about a year and a half ago. He was diagnosed with acid reflux and gall bladder disease, and had the gall bladder removed. Anyway, both of them have trouble with anything that contains a lot of grease or fat. But they’re such picky eaters, it’s hard to find anything that will agree with both their stomachs and their tastes.
That’s why I was so ecstatic when I was asked to do a review of a George Foreman grill on my blog. Yes, that’s right, a George Foreman Grill! I’ve wanted one for years now, but never got around to getting one when I had the money. Lots of people have told me how great they are, how well they get the grease out and make the food so much healthier and it still tastes great, and now I finally get to find out firsthand. Awesome! 
Not only will I be posting about how the grill works and how the food turns out, I’ll be documenting the whole thing on video. So if you’ve ever considered a Foreman grill but haven’t experienced the joys of owning one, stay tuned.
I haven’t been to a Christmas party in years. Actually, I don’t think I’ve ever been to one that wasn’t just family. Do people even have them any more?
The closest thing I’ve had in my adult life was last year. Hubby invited one of our friends, his girlfriend, and his immediate family over for dinner on Christmas Eve. We ate, drank a couple of beers, and talked for a while. But they only stayed about an hour or so, so I don’t guess that counts.
I’m far from a social butterfly, but I wouldn’t mind having an actual Christmas party this year. You know, invite a bunch of people over, have a potluck dinner, listen to some holiday tunes, and exchange egg nog recipes. I’ve got a while to think and plan. Maybe it will happen.
Hubby simultaneously amuses me and annoys me when he talks about what I do for a living. Up until not long ago, when someone asked him what his wife did, he would tell them that she was a typer.
I took a bit of offense to that, because typing is just inputting other people’s words into a computer. That’s not what I do. I did a little of that when I was younger, but now it’s my own words, therefore I’m writing.
I tried to explain that to Hubby, but he just looked at me like I was explaining the chemical makeup of Leptovox. He doesn’t get it at all. He reasons that since I’m not writing stuff out by hand, that makes me a typer. Not a typist, mind you, but a typer. But I decided to leave that alone and tackle one issue at a time.
After much debating, he finally told me he would start telling people that I’m a writer. But I can just hear him now: “She calls herself a writer, but I don’t see her writing anything. All she does is sit in front of the computer and type.”
Oh well. I don’t really understand the nuts and bolts of what he does for a living. I know he cuts down trees and brush around power lines, but when he comes home and tells me about the specifics of what he did that day, I just kind of smile and nod. I guess it’s all the same.
We’ve discovered a very annoying lighting problem in our living room. Up until we put a wood stove in, we were just slightly irritated about the lack of a light on one side of the living room. But the stove is on that side, and when it’s dark out you can barely see to do anything over there.
We tore the closet that held the furnace and some shelves out so we could put the stove there. We didn’t think lighting would be a problem, because there was a light in the closet. But as it turns out, the socket doesn’t work. Nice.
There’s a shelf sitting a short distance from the stove, and I thought maybe we could put a table lamp there for some light. But there’s not an outlet close by, so we’d probably have to run an extension cord across the floor to plug it in. Then everybody would trip over it.
As soon as we get the money, I want to get an electrician in here to put some more outlets in, fix the light socket, and check everything out. But until then, I guess we’ll be using a flashlight if we need to see much of anything over there.
A nearby radio station (WQUT) is having a really cool contest for the next couple of weeks. It’s called the Rock ‘n Roll Payroll, and they’re giving away $101 an hour. All you have to do is enter and listen for them to call your name during the day, and if you call in within 10 minutes, the cash is yours. Not only that, but if the next person doesn’t call in, you get their money too. And so on until someone else comes in. You know I just had to get in on this. 
So I’ve been listening to the radio from 10:00 to 5:00 every day. It’s getting a bit nervewracking listening to all those commercials telling me I need to vote for certain people and I should get a term life insurance quote. But at least they play great music, and the chance of winning that money is nice.
But as much as I want the cash, it’s adversely affecting my work. I mean, as you probably know if you’ve been reading this blog regularly, I have a very limited amount of concentration to go around. I’ll probably end up giving up… and then the next hour they will call my name. I hope it doesn’t go down like that!
The time has come for the annual Girl Scouts nut sale. Actually it starts tomorrow, but I’ve been drooling over the brochure every since we got it a couple of days ago. Everything looks so good! And I know it will be. We’ve ordered stuff from it a few times before, and it’s not that cheap junk that you get when you buy from some fundraisers. This is the real deal, the kind of stuff they put in gourmet gift baskets. Yuuuuuummmmmm!
If I ordered all the stuff that I’m dying to have plus what Hubby requests every year, I’ll be spending close to $40. No can do. So I guess I’ll have to make a sacrifice or two. But I’ve definitely got to have a can or two of the cranberry trail mix. That stuff is awesome!
I’m hoping to sell enough this year to get her a decent prize. Last year we didn’t sell much at all. With me not working outside the home and not knowing much of anybody around here, it won’t be easy. But maybe Hubby can sell some at work, and maybe our families will buy some. At least she’ll get a patch or two.
