I used to work in Chicago...

I'm doing a presentation in my Gender, Crime & Deviance class in a few weeks on women playing rugby.  Well, the actual description is "Gender, Deviance, and Sports".  I found these great pictures of little ones playing rugby!  I think they're so cute.

Good news/Bad news.

Sweet puppy Sydney... this picture was taken in October '06 on our ride home for fall break. She looks so tiny. Today she weighed in at 72 lbs!

We got the preliminary test results back from Sydney's ultrasound today. There's good news and bad news. The good news - there is not a mass in Syd's abdomen. Actually, this is better than "good" news, this is the "BEST" news, in my opinion. But, the bad news - they still can't figure out what's wrong. Her blood counts are all screwy, and they did a tick test, and she's showing up positive for Lymes Disease. Which sounds simple enough ... except that Sydney was vaccinated against Lyme in the last year, and she's been on Advantix (flea&tick preventative). Plus, it's the end of winter..what dog gets a tick during the winter? Our vet seems to think that it may be a false positive. (?!)

So, Sydney is a mystery case. They are sending out her ultrasound and xrays to a radiologist for more information, and we should get those results tomorrow. Until we get a real answer, Sydney has a shaved tummy and Em and I are $600 in the hole...

Aside from the anxiousness from waiting for the phone call today about Sydney, it's been a relatively good day. We're discussing Personality Disorders in my Abnormal Psych class...which is really fascinating. Right now we're discussing Antisocial Personality Disorder (aka Sociopaths & Psychopaths). We talked about Scott Peterson for awhile today... creepy. After AbPsy I went to finish typing up a paper and then went to Gender, Crime & Deviance, where we discussed Sexual Deviance. Our two articles for this week were on Women in Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs and Strategies of Table Dancers (strippers). So that class was interesting, as it always is. However, I found myself somewhat zoned out, thinking about Sydney and wondering what is wrong with her...

I'm absolutely exhausted from going to bed at 3am last night and then waking up at 6:30am to drive Sydney to High Point. I really want to catch up on all of my sleep this week before we head to Arizona. Em is so excited, it's so cute! I know she's really excited to show me everything. We are praying for good weather, and Em says she thinks we'll get it. It's supposed to be in the 90s in Tucson on the day of the wedding!

Until next time
Kris

Sydney Hippie Dewclaws Smith

Today has been a trying day. I didn't get much sleep last night, and then had to go to a boring class and try to stay awake. After that I went to a meeting that was pretty emotional for me, and left feeling just really worn out in every way.

This morning Em drove me to class so that she could drop Sydney off at the vet afterwards. Syd has been having some stomach issues lately, actually for about two months, she's been throwing up randomly every few days. She seems really uncomfortable when she's not feeling well...she does this "army crawl" across the floor, where she drags her belly and is obviously uncomfortable and or in pain. So, Em dropped her off and picked me up from my meeting...on the way home we grabbed lunch, and right before Em left to go back to class at 2, she checked her phone and Banfield (our vet) had called her four times...

Sydney has one of two things wrong with her. She either has a tick bite and it's causing her some serious issues, which the vet doesn't think is the case. Or, she has cancer. Probably of the spleen. Our vet said that she has too much soft tissue in her abdomen, so much that she can't even feel her kidneys, which is unusual. Something is in there, be it a mass or a cyst or a tumor.

I'm trying my best to stay calm until she gets an ultrasound tomorrow. We have to drive her to High Point to get it done. I'm praying that it's just a tickbite or some weird fluke, but that's just highly unlikely. Her white blood cell counts are too low, which apparently signals that it may be cancer.

Please keep Sydney in your thoughts in the next few days.
Thanks,
Kristen

Post # 158

While at No Name Pub in the Keys last month, we were surrounded by over 20,000 $1 bills covering the walls of the restaurant. Waiting for our food, Em and I barely spoke, we mostly just gazed at the bills, reading names and messages and phone numbers. This one caught my eye, and I noticed "PSU". Then, I realized that it said "FTK" ... which stands for "For The Kids"!! Which is the slogan for THON!! I was so excited- this dollar bill was posted up behind this group of people eating their dinner and I didn't even care, I went right over to snap a picture. (Sorry for the blurriness... I didn't stick around to check the picture after I took it!)
I've been trying to make it to Penn State to attend THON every year since Liam was diagnosed with cancer and I learned what it was. Each year, something works out to make it impossible for me to get there (or perhaps it has to do with the fact that I live 12 hours from Penn State...) Either way, I WILL MAKE IT TO THON one day... I have to.
Yesterday was supposed to be our Serendipity Game (prom dress rugby!) against Guilford College, but the torrential downpours all Friday night and Saturday morning forced Guilford to close their fields, so we will have to reschedule. I'm nervous that they're going to try to reschedule for next week...which is when we will be in AZ! And this could potentially be my very last Serendipity Game, as next spring I will (hopefully!) be in South Africa.

Someone from our team found this picture from last year by Googling "UNCG Women's Rugby" ( I think? ) I think it's funny..you can tell I'm about to go down, look at the arms wrapped completely around my waste!

Alright, time to get some work done.
Peace.
Kristen.

Dusty Trail, Flagstaff in a faded photograph..

Em and I just finished figuring out all of the details for our trip to Arizona next week.  I know it feels like we're constantly traveling...well, we kind of are.  But we don't really spend our money on anything else, because we both like to travel, and that's more worth it to us.

We fly out of Raleigh around dinnertime on Thursday, and get into Phoenix at midnight.  The funny part is that we have a layover in CHICAGO... which is ridiculously out of the way, but it was worth it for the price of the tickets.  We're staying the night in Phoenix, then getting up Friday morning to drive to Flagstaff.  Em wants to show me around NAU (Northern Arizona University) and all of her favorite places in Flagstaff.  That day we're also visiting the Grand Canyon, which is no big deal to Em since she lived 1.5 hours from it for 5 years, but to me, it's SO EXCITING!  I know that there isn't much to do at the Grand Canyon except go to a lookout and look at it, but still, it's something that I am so excited to have the chance to do!!

That night we're staying in Flagstaff, and then getting up early on Saturday to drive south to Sedona, then continuing on to Tucson to stay Saturday night.  On Sunday we're going to hang out around Tucson, and then at 5pm we are going to Candice's wedding!  Candice was Em's roommate at NAU for two years, and Em is really excited to see her again and meet her fiance/husband.  

After the wedding, we're driving halfway back up to Phoenix and staying in Casa Grande, AZ at a random golfing resort (it was the cheapest!), and Monday morning we'll get up and fly back to Raleigh.  We're missing minimal classes, and I've been saving up my absences all semester because I knew that we'd have to miss Monday and Friday classes for next weekend.

I really am nervous to visit Arizona.  I'm so excited to visit somewhere new, I've never been anywhere in the southwest before.  But, as I've said before, I don't want anyone to be angry that I am going there.  I've been told before that I shouldn't try to be a part of Em's Arizona life..and that's never what I would want to do.  I am just excited for her to be able to show me the part of her life that she really loved for a long time, before she decided that she needed something new.  I'm nervous to meet her friends though, because I am 4 years younger than Em and some people just don't get it that age has never really been a factor for us.  I can be mature and Em can be ... well, if you know Em, you understand ;-)

Time to sign off... I'll post again soon.

Kristen

Random Things.

It's should be no surprise that I haven't updated since Monday. I had an 8 page paper due Tuesday, an exam Tuesday, then worked from 3:30-8. On Wednesday I only had one class, but I had a huge presentation today that I didn't have time to work on until yesterday, so that is all I did all day. Then, today I skipped my first two classes to continue preparation for my presentation at 4. I went to class from 4-6:50, and then came back here to work on a paper that is due tomorrow at 10am.

This week has been killer ... but I am one page away from freedom. I just can't get myself motivated enough to finish this paper. It's an interesting one though - I interviewed one of Kelsey's friends who was born in South Africa for this group paper that I'm doing with a partner from class. I just need to finish my part and then merge the two parts together.

Sorry for such a boring post. I'm so tired, so head-achey. I got the job I was interviewing for, the job transcribing interviews for a Sociologist at UNCG. I'm pretty excited, actually. You can't beat $13 an hour, working at home at whatever time I feel like. I'm so thankful for my professor/neighbor/friend Gwen, she put me in contact with the professor who hired me.

My presentation today was on Pediatric Cancer and Neuroblastoma. I've become somewhat numb to it by now. I can remember back to the days when I had a Livejournal and those horrible, gut wrenching posts that I used to make about Liam and other little ones with NB. I really enjoyed researching for that presentation though, and I loved that I got to spend about 5 minutes at the end just talking about the little man, Liam! I got a 49/50 on the presentation, I only lost one point for going over the time limit (20 minutes). It's funny...before I started working on it yesterday, I never thought I'd be able to get 20 minutes out of it ... and when I finally finished, I was SHOCKED that the first time I rehearsed it, it took 32 minutes!

Alright, time to finish that paper so that I can get some more sleep. I'll leave you all with a little piece of happiness...


My all-time favorite picture of Superman! You will live on forever through that beautiful smile and gorgeous eyes, little buddy. I love you.

Waiting on the World to Change

Sometimes I really miss my American Sign Language and Deaf Culture classes. It's so hard to be in other random classes with Interpreting majors or Deaf Education majors, and hear them talking about it... I miss it, even though I am now positive that I no longer want to dedicate my life to teaching the deaf. I do wish, however, that I could still be involved and still finish learning ASL. I was so close to becoming fluent! It's such a shame that I let that waste away in the past year. Sure, I run into my deaf friends on campus, and I can converse with them, but it's harder for me... it's tense, and I often forget simple signs like "how" or "hard".

Today Jenn Curren sent me this great video... and I think it's something you all should watch. It's awesome!

Cat Scratch Fever

When my mom visited we made her try Guitar Hero. She actually got to be pretty good by the end of the weekend! I liked this picture because she was laughing so hard... I love when my mom laughs hysterically. It's the best.

Our friend Jackie recently got Rock Band for her birthday...which, for those of you who don't know, is kind of like Guitar Hero, only it has the drums, a microphone, and another guitar. So, you can have the guitar, the bass, a singer, and a drummer. It's pretty awesome, especially when you have four people to play all of the instruments. The drums are my favorite. (you can see them in the picture...all the way on the left, in front of the fireplace.)

Em and I just returned from the Emergency Room. I have to have set a record by now for the person with the most odd issues that result in an ER visit. I have been having this odd medical malady lately that has been ongoing for about 3 weeks...and it is driving me up the wall. I'm to the point where I am covered head to toe in a horrible rash. I have been on steroids and antihistamines, which help but tonight I just about lost it when I realized that I have so many hives on my back and belly (and in my BELLY BUTTON! owie!) that it looked like one huge hive. The doc at the ER told me that I have eczema, which I don't know if I buy his theory just yet. However, he did prescribe me more steroids and an anti-itch pill...which is better because up until now, the only thing I've been prescribed for the itch is a topical cream, which hasn't really helped with the itching. Sorry if all of that was a little TMI, but I'm trying to chronicle my life here, odd rashes and all ;-)

Aside from the rash, it's been a good weekend. Sean Dolgin (my good friend Rachel's little brother) was visiting UNCG .. he's a senior in high school and deciding between UNCG and Michigan State. We tried to show him how cool Greensboro can be!! It was good because there was a lot going on this weekend. A friend of our from rugby had a little get together Friday night, and afterwards we took Sean to the Q for some pool. Saturday he went to an all day thing for admitted students, and afterwards we went to the Tate St. Festival, which happened to be this weekend - perfect. It was awesome! Saturday night we were going to go camping, but it was 40 degrees and freezing out, so we had a cookout instead, S'mores and all. Today we shopped for dresses for Serendipity, and then dropped him off at the airport. I hope he had a great time :)

About two weeks ago another good friend visited! One of the best friends that I made this summer - Beaker (Meg) visited for a few days to hang out during her Spring Break. Em and I felt bad because we had classes that week, and there wasn't really much of anything going on on the Tues/Weds that we had to play. Still, it was good to see her and we welcome visits from ANYONE at ANYTIME! (hint, hint!)

Well, it's time to take my sorry itchy self to bed. Hope all is well.

Kristen

Two Things

First of all, I recently re-discovered my love for Fruit Roll-ups. As a child, they were a big treat because my Dad did the grocery shopping, and he rarely bought us crap that would rot our teeth and make us hyper. I can remember very vividly opening up my lunch at school (although, I bought lunch about 98% of the time, from grades 1-12) and whenever there was a Fruit Roll-Up I would get so excited. (Or a Fruit-By-The-Foot...mm..) I had a Fruit-Roll-Up Ritual... First, if there were any cut-outs, I would pop them out and eat them bite by bite. Once all of the pop-outs were out, I would roll the remainder into a ball and put the whole thing in my mouth (which makes me cringe now..) and chewed on it until all of the sugar dissolved.





Today while driving home from class, I was suprised to see FIVE cars (three parked, two driving) that had Obama '08 stickers on them. Previous to Obama's visit yesterday, there weren't many stickers around. Maybe it's just a coincidence, but the fact that I saw 5 Obama stickers is a big deal for Greensboro, NC. It made me happy, along with the fact that it was 72 degrees and I had the windows down, blasting 'Everyday' by DMB.

2nd Half of the Pictures...

This was a result of me messing around with the shutter speed settings on Em's camera when we were out to dinner one night.

While in Key West we visited the Hemingway House, which was the home of Ernest Hemingway for a few years in the 40s.  While living there he wrote The Old Man and the Sea (which was about his Cuban best friend).  While there, he also acquired a bunch of cats, most of which had 6 toes on each paw.  The offspring of those cats still live there today - there are over 40 of them!  And they all have movie star names.  

Me with Zsa Zsa Gabor

Em with a cute kitty.

Ok I really liked these cats...

This really awesome restaurant called No Name Bar that was covered in about $25,000 worth of $1 bills.  I found a very special one that I'll post some other time.

Em in front of some pretty flowers!

SWEET TEA!  Even in Key West :D

A cute turtle at the Sea Turtle Hospital (I didn't take very many pictures there... I think because you can only take so many pictures of turtles in a pool...)

A GORGEOUS sunset that we watched on the beach at our hotel in Key Largo.

Me catching minnows!!

Snorkeling at the 3rd largest Coral Reef in the world.  Snorkeling was really, really fun - Em and I went on a trip with John Pennekamp State Park, which I would recommend to anyone because instead of pumping money into private charters or anything, you're paying money to the state park system, which is great.  The snorkeling was great... scary for me at first, because I'm not the best swimmer ever and I really am not used to seeing underwater (or breathing, while seeing underwater!).  It was definitely a great experience - probably in the top 5 of my life.  Em and I took a bunch of great underwater pictures with a disposable camera...Em is going to scan those in at school, so I'll post some of those soon.

After snorkeling for 45 minutes... you can see the lines on our faces from the masks.

After snorkeling we relaxed on the beach at the hotel.  I finished my book for class and Em read a novel.  It was probably the most relaxing day of vacation.  I took a long catnap after I finished my book, and woke up just in time to watch the sun set.

The End.

Great vacation... I really miss just the attitude of the keys.  Everything was so laid back and I never really felt like I HAD to do anything or felt obligation towards anything.  Sigh.

On another note, I got a job!  Well, it's not completely set in stone yet, but I'm 99.9% sure that I got the job.  I'll be transcribing interviews (pretty boring, yeah..) but atleast the interviews will be interesting.  One of the sociology professors at UNCG (actually, he's pretty famous in the academic world apparently) is doing a huge study on Hurricane Katrina victims, and he has gone there numerous times to interview them.  I'll make $13 an hour, which is better than babysitting.  I'm excited to actually be pulling in some money, even if it is sitting and listening to a tape and typing what I hear.

Em and I were just discussing that we hope things get back to normal soon.  Our routine has flown out the window for the past two weeks, and I think it's affecting my sleeping.  (I'm such an old man).  Things will get back to normal by next week, I think.

Time to go head to REI to look at fun toys!

Kris