the thin line between optimism and delusion...

Operation Day

October 7, 2013 by charlsiekate

I’m alive! I got to the hospital at 9:30, my surgery was at 11:30, and I was home by 2. I spend the rest of the day sitting in a overstuffed chair with an ottoman with my foot propped up on a bunch of pillows, eating lasagna, snickers, and the occasional Percocet (which makes me feel itchy and pretty antsy, like I want to get up and do something, and clearly I cannot).

When I haven’t been itchy and antsy, I’ve been passing the heck out. I will be watching television, or eating a snickers, and this wave of sleepiness will wash over me and I will wake up twenty minutes later with a crick in my neck. I think this is the third time I’ve attempted to write this blog. I assume this has something to do with the anesthesia, or maybe all the lasagna.

Briscoe and I are training Mr. T (Briscoe’s name for Trav) while we are in town. He brought me a glass of water today, but drank half of it on the way. It’s a learning experience, but he’s showing real potential. He claims to be toasting me a piece of pound cake as I type, we will see if that makes it to me. I can’t be held accountable for the contents of this paragraph because of the anesthesia.

Sweet dreams my friends! I appreciate all y’all’s support and love!

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Os Trigonum Crush Saga

October 6, 2013 by charlsiekate

I’m having surgery in the morning to have an extra bone removed from my ankle. It’s called os trigonum, and it occurs in about 10% of the population. It doesn’t bother most people, but a series of unfortunate events can lead to the bone becoming inflamed and it can cause all sorts of problems. It’s a problem that plagues ballet dancers, and can also be called “the nutcracker syndrome.” From what I understand, it’s hard to diagnose, and not a common injury unless you happen to be a ballet dancer. I am not a ballet dancer. I guess I’m just gifted at being different. Paul said maybe I’m just an especially evolved individual (the fact that I was born without my lateral incisor teeth supports this hypothesis).

In fall of 2012, I was going to yoga two or three times a week, playing tennis once or twice a week, and trying to get a few runs in. I started running a mile and a half before yoga, and I really enjoyed being outside and then getting the awesome stretch of yoga. I was playing enough tennis to not lose every game, and I had a string of marathon matches. At some point in October, my foot started to hurt. Towards the end of November, I had a really long, really cold tennis match, and I could barely walk by time it was over. Like an idiot, I went on with my plans for the Reindeer Run, and I played one more tennis match in December. I was convinced that if I stopped running and playing tennis for most of December and a couple weeks in January, that it would get better. Obviously, I should have curtailed the traipsing around downtown Charleston in high heels. But Christmas and the New Year just scream high heels to me, and being tall is fun, and I’ve been wearing high heels with no real problems for most of my adult life. I wore heels every day for four years, and I don’t wear them every day anymore, so who knew it was that big of a deal?

I mentioned back in January that I thought I had broken my foot. In February, I was diagnosed with posterior tibial tendonitis and planter fasciitis, and I wore a big tall boot for a full month, and I tried just about every NSAID imaginable. I was extremely diligent with my NSAIDs and my boot, and I basically went to work, came home, and iced my ankle for a month. I played a ton of candy crush. In March, Briscoe tried to keep my entertained, and I had an MRI, that was basically negative. I was able to get it together to walk around during the masters, but after the tournament my foot still hurt a lot, so I wore the boot for another three weeks. The hardest part was that the pain moved around. Sometimes my toes hurt, and some times the top of my ankle hurt, sometimes the back of my ankle, sometimes my posterior tendon was absolutely killing me. The bottom of my foot hurt, right in my arch. The most frustrating part was that I couldn’t figure out what made it worse, and what made it better.

I went to a foot surgeon in Charleston, and I went to a foot surgeon in Augusta. They both said that I had tendonitis, although the one in Augusta was sure there was something else going on. Neither doctor had much to offer as far as a game plan. The one in Augusta said I could try physical therapy, the doctor in Charleston said he was sure physical therapy would exacerbate the problem. The Charleston doctor diagnosed me with a “subtle cavus foot” and sent me to get orthotics to correct the fact that the arch in my right foot was higher than the one on the left. The Charleston doctor kept telling me how tight my ankle cords were in my right foot, and that my problem was never going to get better if I couldn’t improve my ankle range of motion. I promised him I stretched religiously, and he said I should stretch more. . Both doctors agreed maybe I shouldn’t worry about it for a while.

I stopped worrying about. I figured if it was going to hurt when I did absolutely nothing, then I might as well do something and have it hurt. I started going back to yoga, and I started running a mile once or twice a week. The orthotics essentially eliminated my planter fasciitis. With my planter fasciitis improving, I was able to increase my activity level without immediate pain increases. Strangely, I noticed that going to yoga two days in a row, even for just an easy 45 minute basic class, was something I could not tolerate. If tendonitis was the main problem, I would have expected the running to be more painful than the yoga. I also noticed increased pain when it rained.

However, after about three weeks of this new “screw it, I do what I want” attitude, I left my keys at the deli by my house on a monday night, and by the time I walked back to my house, I had about five minutes to sprint back before it closed for the night. I sprinted back, in my new Brooks glycerin and my orthotic inserts, and I got my keys, but I felt like my ankle was angry about the sprinting.

The next morning, a Tuesday, when I started to walk down my steps, my ankle locked up. I’ve never had my ankle lock up. I don’t guess I’ve ever really had a joint lock up at all, because this was a new, excruciatingly upsetting experience. My ankle was stuck in a pointed position, like when I put my foot on the ground and tried to take a step, I couldn’t put my entire foot on the ground, and the attempt caused me blinding pain. I hobbled around on my toe for a about five minutes, and then my foot magically corrected itself and I could walk normally.

I had seen the Charleston doctor the day before (of course), but I was able to see the Augusta doctor that Friday on my way to Athens for the Georgia South Carolina game. I explained to the Augusta doctor about how my ankle locked up, and he said he wanted to look at my MRI again. He came back in the exam room, looked at my ankle, and said, does this hurt? and I yelped, YES! He looked up at me and said, GOOD NEWS! I think I know what’s wrong with you! And I can fix it! (when I had my appendix taken out, after the CT scan came back, the doctors seemed extremely pleased that i did actually have appendicitis, and that I “got” to have surgery. To be fair, I think that kid was a med student, and I guess I sort of get it because it is better than the alternatives, but I feel like the enthusiasm can feel vaguely awkward).

Augusta doctor explained I have an extra bone in my ankle, and that he’s never taken this bone out of a person’s foot who didn’t see improvement from the surgery. I found that encouraging and said sign me up! (My ankle has continued to lock up off and on, and I would do most anything to have that stop happening, because it is most unpleasant.

So. Here we are. I originally took two weeks of sick leave to have this surgery, but since the government is still shut down*, that leave has been cancelled, and I have plenty of time to convalesce in the comforts of my parents backyard. I never have to have a real cast, and he said I can walk on my foot as soon as I feel comfortable, but that I should spend a week or two with it elevated and taking it easy. I will be in a short boot for the next month, but after that I’m allowed to ease back into whatever I want to do, which is exciting.

Wish me luck, I will be here catching up on all my television shows for the next week to ten days. XOXO

* if I wasn’t having surgery, I would buy a plane ticket somewhere and go on a trip. Tomorrow. Too bad.

Posted in CKP, Health, Working Out, yoga | 3 Comments »

Lazy Wednesdays

October 2, 2013 by charlsiekate

Briscoe was initially confused this morning during our walk, she’s never seen the Fort Sumter building closed.

So, the government shut down and I’m one of the 800k non-essential personnel who were sent home yesterday around lunchtime. Since then, I’ve been completely incapable of making a decision. First, I decided I was going to wander around downtown Charleston and play tourist. Then, when I got home, I realized that I had all this nervous energy about being unemployed and the government not working correctly, and I couldn’t calm down about it, so I cleaned out my pantry and my refrigerator. Then I peer pressured some friends to meet me for happy hour and hamburgers last night. I’m not entirely sure why I got so strung out – the federal employees who are working aren’t getting paid until this fiasco comes to an end, and those of us who aren’t working could also get paid. So a ton of people are in the same boat, and I truly believe that the government can’t stay shut down, and that it will all work out. I think I just didn’t anticipate being upset about it, and it made me realize how much I really love my job, and all I want is to do my job and get paid for doing my job, and it’s confusing to get sent home. That being said, no one should feel sorry for me, I’m not going to starve, I don’t need to apply for bankruptcy, my dog is not concerned.

But once we got home, she decided she didn’t care that much and got back in bed.

I had a lot of big plans today, I was going to clean out my closet, and go out for a wander and maybe make friends with some tourists, and take some stuff back to Target and get supplies. None of that has happened. I’ve watched a great deal of CNN. I never watch the news. I like to read news. The people talking on television and arguing grate on me and I generally can’t tolerate it. But this is a special situation, and I’ve been watching a lot of news. I flip around, because I do like to hear different sides, and I think most media outlets are spinning me a opinion, but I’ve watched more CNN than anything else. And I’ve learned a lot through this experience.

I’ve learned that the biggest concerns for the people who watch CNN during the day, according to advertising, are 1. “blood flow” problems of the sexual nature; 2. picking a nursing home for an aging parent, 3. life alert systems for old people who aren’t interested in a nursing home; 4, low “T”, and 5. the best biological drug for rheumatoid arthritis and fibromyalgia. And Wolf Blitzer is pretty feisty. And I like the blond girl who reports from congress. Clinton and Newt Gingrich are both aging better than Obama and W. There is something about Ted Cruz’s face that really freaks me out. I can’t put my finger on it. Does he look like he’s made of wax? Is that what it is? Like you could make a statute of him out of fondant. I know that doesn’t make much sense, and maybe it’s his mannerisms. It’s like he moves as though he’s watching himself in the mirror. Or like he can see himself on a live video feed. I do have to hand it to the guy, he’s been super effective in accomplishing his goals, in a situation where no one else seems capable of accomplishing anything. My approval and opinion of John McCain has never been higher than it is right now. I want to give John McCain a big hug and buy him a drink. Does he drink? Did you see the article about how everyone on capital hill smells like booze?

Who do you think the girl is on the Obamacare homepage? She’s been on the news more than anyone. I hope she’s happy with the photo. I thought Obama’s comment about comparing the webpage to the apple website was pretty interesting. I got on verizon today to see about ordering the new iphone, I have an upgrade. It’s backordered until November 11th. I find that sort of unacceptable. By the time I buy a new iphone, they are going to be talking about the new one.

Due to indecision, Briscoe and I spent a lot of time today sitting on the front porch. It was a beautiful fall Charleston afternoon. The strongest impulses possessing me today are the desires to eat and buy thing.s, Denise said that the government’s irresponsibility is triggering desires to be irresponsible. At high tide, Briscoe and I went and watched the dolphins. I anticipate my evening plans to including some pasta and wine, and tomorrow is a new day for congress to get it together. Stay classy, my friends.

Posted in Charleston, CKP, Current Affairs, Difficulties, Work | Leave a Comment »

The Adelante

September 18, 2013 by charlsiekate

Adelante is a Spanish word that means to “go forth” or “forward” and can be used as an interjection to mean “come in” or “go ahead.” The Adelante is my friend Dan’s sailboat, and Dan has been gracious enough to invite me sailing on several occasions. The Adelante has provided many long afternoons of laughter and happy times out on the water.

The Adelante, Race Week 2008

An intact Adelante being transferred from land to sea in 2012.

I think this is my favorite Adelante photo, complete with Meghan looking good on the mast.

High times on the high seas, Memorial Day, 2013.

_______________

The Happiest Hour

“Have you already left your house? Slight change in plans, I’m going to come pick you up, be outside in five minutes.” Five minutes later, I was sitting on the curb on the corner of my street. It was Friday afternoon, and I had escaped work early to join in a happy hour sail for Edie’s birthday. Dan had the Adelante all ready to go at the city marina on Lockwood, and we were going to leave Edie’s car at the Yacht Club on East Bay. The plan was to sail around the harbor, and dock at the Yacht Club. It was a perfect day, with a perfect breeze.

Friday, August 8, 2013, the Adelante is ready to set sail.

Friday, August 9, 2013, the Adelante is ready to set sail.

When Dan picked me up, I suggested that we stop at the Harris Teeeter and pick up some champagne for Edie’s birthday. He assured me that he already had two bottles in the cooler on the Adelante. Dan is smart like that. Edie and her brother, Brooks, were waiting on us in the parking lot of the yacht club. I was wearing my favorite patagonia dress, and Edie said she was glad I decided to go with “sailboat cocktail” attire. In no time, we were at the city marina, setting sail with a cold beer and a perfect breeze. I’m very much a sailing novice, but it is something I would like to learn to do. There are a list of things I feel like you should know how to do, most of which I do not know how to do. Drive a stick shift, sail a sailboat, clean a fish, apply a tourniquet, start a fire without matches, land a plane. You know, life skills. I do know how to call 911.

When it comes to sailing, I have this fear of over correcting and knocking the sailboat over, which Dan has repeatedly assured me is not going to happen. He says the worst that would happen is that I could knock some people into the water. I related a story of my mother requesting that I use a life vest at all times, and Dan assured me that we had plenty of life vests in the cabin, but that he did not anticipate anyone needing one. The cooler had a couple cans of Gosling’s Dark and Stormy, and I remarked that Dan was the first person to introduce me to the Dark and Stormy. Brooks assured me that Dan introduced the entire city of Charleston to the Dark and Stormy, and that Dan single handedly convinced all the bars that not having ginger beer available was unacceptable, and that we all have Dan to thank for the availability of this summertime staple. The conditions were perfectly breezy but the water calm, and I ended up at the helm, steering. Everyone tried to talk me through how to head into the wind, or fall off, and a lot of other terms I still haven’t grasped, but I’m working on it. I tried to “feel” the wind and to watch the little arrow at the top of the mast, and I tried in vain to catch the giant cargo ships in the harbor. I was instructed on the optimum amount of boat tilt, and tried to get my sea legs.

The trick to being at the helm, is figuring out a way to not get distracted. It went something like this – I would get comfortable in my abilities, and start feeling confident –

Edie: “Did you see that? Over there?”

Me: “Where?”

Dan: “Charlsie! Look Alive! What are you doing?! Head up! Fall off! Agghhh!”

Me: “Gah! I got it! I think, wait, I’m doing it wrong, hang on, I just spilled my beer everywhere. Are we going to hit that boat in front of us?”

Regardless, I did well enough where no one took away my steering privilege, and when we got out past Fort Sumter and turned around, I got to yell, “Prepare to come about! Coming about!”

Fort Sumter from the Adelante.

And we turned around with no problems! Sailing back into the harbor was easier, and Dan handled the docking of the Adelante. It was all in all a very successful sail. After the sail, we walked across East Bay to Edie’s friends Bo and Anne’s house, and participated in some porch sitting, and then some kitchen congregating. Edie left with her car to go to the mexican restaurant for Birthday Dinner, and Bo was nice enough to take Dan, Brooks, and me to the city marina to get Dan’s car. When we got to Dan’s car, we realized the keys to the car were on the boat, so we had to go by Dan’s house and get his spare set. This was no big deal at the time. Once we had Dan’s car, we met Edie and company at the mexican restaurant for a delicious meal. We all went home happy and full of good food and good times.

______

“If You Haven’t Run Aground, You Haven’t Been Around.” – Old sailing maxim

Saturday afternoon, Brooks and Edie were at the beach out on Sullivans, around station 28 1/2. Dan appeared seemingly out of nowhere, from the tidal pool.

Edie: “Dan! What are you doing? Where did you come from? Who are you with?”

Dan: “See that commotion off shore? The fire and rescue boat? I was out there, and now I’m here. Can I use your cell phone to call the coast guard?”

Turns out, the Adelante set sail on Saturday with Dan and three other friends for a fateful final voyage. Through a series of unfortunate events, more than half a mile of the coast of Sullivans, the Adelante hit a sandbar, and the rudder broke off, and in the process of escaping the sandbar, an unknown structural imperfection was exploiting in the 35 year old boat, resulting in a crack in the keel, and a short time later the Adelante went down. Dan says that there is a persuasive technical argument to be made that the Adelante did not, strictly speaking, sink.

She just fell over.

And took on some water.

All crew members were left on the sandbar, in four feet of water. It was too far to swim, but a kiteboarder was able to drag all four crew members to the beach. The news picked up the story. I’ve been singing the Gilligan’s Island song for days. A three hour tour, a three hour tour. http://www.wistv.com/story/23117498/stranded-boaters-saved-by-kiteboarder-off-sullivans-island?autoStart=true&topVideoCatNo=default&clipId=9191035.

The important thing to remember is that no one was seriously injured (one crew member required stitches for a leg injury), but it was a sad day. Remember Friday night when we went to get Dan’s spare set of keys from his house? Um, yeah, so that meant that on Saturday, both sets of Dan’s key were on the Adelante. And the Adelante was upside down, drifting into Breach Inlet.

That’s not Dan in the foreground, in case you were wondering. Those are classic, unidentified tourists.

Shockingly enough, the dry bag washed up on the beach, along with several other personal possessions that went down with the boat, and the keys were recovered along with a couple of cell phones. The water bottle I left in the cooler of the boat on Friday did not survive the wreckage. Sunday, Dan and George were left with the grime task of watching the recovery of what was left of the Adelante.

Sunday recovery of the Adelante. George was there for emotional support.

Presumably a bad time to ask about the sunglasses and water bottle I left on board Friday afternoon.

The former home of the 1200 lb keel.

The Friday after her last sail, the many friends of the Adelante gathered at Salty Mike’s for a farewell happy hour in memory of all the great times, and to thank Dan for sharing her with us. We all raised a Dark and Stormy in tribute, and felt lucky to have spent time on such a beautiful old boat!

Salty Mike’s D & S

Posted in Boats, Charleston, CKP, Difficulties, Favorite People, outside, summertime | Tagged city marina, happiest hour, long afternoons | 2 Comments »

The Railroad Tracks

August 28, 2013 by charlsiekate

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J4aTE5wB-q0

Just a little Georgia football history to get you through this last long day of life before college football starts.

In the video, when you see Coach Dooley and the player coming down the hill, that is the 1968 SEC Championship team, and this is the order of appearance, compliments of Trav.

Video Order of appearance:
Coach Vince Dooley
Coach Billy Kinard
Coach Ken Cooper
94 – Terry Osbolt
57 – Happy Dicks
80 – Dennis Hughes
31 – Trav Paine
Coach Jim Pyburn
43 – Ronnie Huggins
24 – Kent Lawrence
74 – Curtis McGill
T shirt – Jake Scott
88 – Phillip Russell
12 – Mike Cavan
89 – Charlie Whittemore

Go Dawgs!

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Woof!

August 25, 2013 by charlsiekate

This will be the longest week of the year. If I lived in Georgia, and/or regularly rode elevators, I would try to make this happen.

I would like to personally challenged any and all of you who do live in Georgia and/or regularly ride elevators to make this happen. Video evidence would be awesome.

Go Dawgs!

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Professional Appreciation

July 30, 2013 by charlsiekate

Today is a day every year that I feel thankful, no matter what happens today, that I’m not taking the bar exam. So happy I don’t even mind paying my bar dues. Heartfelt thoughts go out to all of the test takers out there. It will be over soon, and I’ll be pleased to welcome you all to this historic, frustrating, challenging, sometimes questionable, but never boring profession. You can look forward to a life time of bailing your friends and family out of jail.

Posted in Studying for the Bar, THE LAW, Work | Leave a Comment »

LIfe is a work in progress

July 29, 2013 by charlsiekate

Do you ever wake up in the morning and think, man, I’m feeling like a craft project? I really never do. And reading about craft projects on a lot of blogs and especially pinterest is frustrating. Because, let’s face it, people are lying when they tell you it was super cheap, super easy, and didn’t take any time. Maybe two out of three might be sometimes possible. But if it is cheap, it wasn’t easy, and it definitely took a long time. Christy is good at being honest about how long something took, and I promise you that her arts and craft skills are in the top 2 percentile of people under the age of 50. Unless you grew up in South Georgia and have a lot of patience, you shouldn’t attempt most internet DIY projects. Especially if the alternative is going to cost a lot of money. Like refinishing furniture. I know you don’t want to pay for it, but really, it’s not worth the heartache. Suck it up and pay the money, and cut corners somewhere else.

I want to be the sort of person with a tastefully decorated house that exudes my own personal style and actually looks “finished.” I also want to be the sort of person who makes up her bed every day and knows where the extra batteries are in her house. The sort of person who doesn’t run out shampoo or paper towels or dog food. The person with the clean car, who didn’t spill coffee on their shirt on the way to work, with the brushed hair, the right make up. The girl with the immaculate office and painted (not chipped) nail polish. If this person actually exists (I have my doubts).

It is hard to look finished, but when you’ve been to a truly finished house, you can tell. My life and my house have not been finished in a long time. Being finished is expensive, and requires nice fabric, well framed artwork, window treatments, throw pillows, the right accent pieces. These things can feel overwhelming, and time consuming. Plus, it is easy to get away without being finished.

For some reason the crafty urge hit me last week, and I really wanted to make window treatments for my living room. This is something I’ve been considering for a long time, but life is expensive. When I found out I was moving to Charleston, I had exactly ten days to wrap up my life in Augusta before I started work. Obviously wrapping up life takes more time than that. I was short on time, short on cash, and short on emotional stability. I had only owned my house for about 18 months, and most of my cash savings had been eaten up in the buying and fixing up process of house purchasing.

My old couch had seen better days and weighed about a bazillion pounds. The junior league took it off my hands. I had to find a renter for my house, and find a place to live in Charleston. I found my apartment through a series of frustrating disappointments, and I was able to negotiate down to a price I thought I could afford. I moved down here with a love seat and two pretty comfy chairs, but no ottoman and no real couch. I said I would get a real couch when I got my feet back under me. When I say things were tight, I mean I couldn’t afford to pay the pet fee and my security deposit all at the same time, so Briscoe had a wait a month to come to Charleston.

Due to a series of unfortunate expensive events (unanticipated expenses for the house in Augusta, having my appendix taken out resulting in unanticipated medical bills, my old trusty car finally dying and having to buy a car) that first year in Charleston was a doozie. I honestly don’t remember a lot about it, but I do remember that my dream of a new couch was not currently on the horizon. I was in survival mode with austerity measures. I didn’t have internet, and I had the most basic cable. At least swimming in the ocean was free.

After my first year, I sold my house in Augusta, I got a big raise, and I had a roommate for about six months. I was able to join a gym and go to yoga more often. I could afford internet and real cable. I felt like I could breath again. The shower pan in my bathroom broke, and my landlord evicted me for three weeks in August and renovated my entire bathroom. Being evicted was worth not paying rent for a month and the end result of a fantastically new bathroom in the place of previously vaguely creepy old bathroom. But still, no couch. And I couldn’t even think of window treatments until I got the couch handled.

Finally, in Spring of 2012, I ordered my couch from Pottery Barn. And I used the interest free option from the pottery barn credit card to pay it off over the course of a year. Since then, I have been thinking about my windows. Plotting and scheming, and returning things to stores that didn’t work like I had hoped.

Two weeks ago, I started trolling fabric stores and craft stores in hopes of being inspired. I found these curtain rods and ring clips at Big Lots that encouraged me. Finally, I remembered about the time I used a drop cloth as a make shift slip cover on that old heavy couch in Augusta, and how great that worked in a pinch. And I decided I would look into making window treatments out of a drop cloth.

Last Thursday, I found this drop cloth at the sherman williams by my house. I took it home, opened it up, and started thinking. The drop cloth had a seam down the middle of it, that made it two 4.5 X 12 panels.

I picked the seam out, which took a long time. I would say this was the most labor intensive part of the project, but I was watching television while I was picking, and it was sort of a soothing mindless exercise. Then I spent a long time trying to figure out how I wanted it to look. Briscoe was highly annoyed by the furniture moving and the overall disruption.

I finally ate dinner at 10 pm (this is another reason I don’t start craft projects, once I get going I can’t stop). By 11, I had a prototype hanging up on some nails, and I decided that was enough for one night.

Sunday, I picked back up on the project, and I worked on the length, and how I wanted the top to look, and I picked out the seam on another drop cloth for the other window. I didn’t actually sew or stitch anything, but I just used the little clips that were attached to the rings.

Oh, and I actually screwed in the hardware for the curtain rods, and hung the rod up properly. This is the finished product. The 9 X 12 drop cloth was $19 for the first one, then there was a sale when I bought the second one – $15. The ring clips were $8 and the rods were $6 a piece from Big Lots. And I probably spent, in total, at least eight hours. Depending on how much you want to bill me out for, the labor was the most expensive part by hundreds of dollars. I’m happier with the one on the left than the one on the right. More tweaking is anticipated.

Posted in Augusta, Charleston, CKP, Difficulties | 2 Comments »

The Tiger Mosquito

July 24, 2013 by charlsiekate

There is a striped mosquito in my house. I have mosquito bites all over me from walking Briscoe. This morning, I received three bites in about five minutes from these giant striped mosquitoes. I caught the tail end of a news report recently talking about a new invasive breed of mosquitoes, and after spending time observing the one in my house and realizing that it did not look like a normal mosquito, I googled striped mosquito. Yep. Here are some upsetting headlines –

Asian tiger mosquitoes have blood lust for humans.

Get ready for invading Asian tiger mosquitoes

Asian tiger mosquitoes expected to swarm USA.

Georgia mosquito population set to explode.

Asian tiger mosquito poised to invade.

It is almost more than I can do to even read these articles. Apparently these blood suckers were happily imported to Texas in tire shipments, because tires are notorious for having standing water. THANKS, TEXAS! This where I become a giant proponent of chemical warfare in the war against mosquitoes (and roaches and grasshoppers for that matter). Let’s fumigate stuff before we unload it next time. The mosquito is repeatedly described as having a “blood lust” for humans, but it will also bite your cat, dog, or whatever sort of strange creature you love and let live in your house.

This article gives some fact and fiction of mosquitoes. My favorite is – Mosquitoes are more attracted to women than men: FACT (this is why I always carry Off! and often times an Afterbite pen with me. And because I’m Polly Prepared according to Sister Natalie. My personal favorites are either the wipes or this little travel buddy. I like to keep the wipes in little formal clutches like for weddings, and the little travel buddy in my regular pocketbook. Afterbite is also helpful for a beach bag, great for a jelly fish sting. And Cutter is excellent and pretty much a necessity before a backyard party. I don’t think it encourages lightening bugs though, fyi. )

These mosquitoes are considered especially fearsome due to their fantastic disease spreading abilities. The Asian Tiger transmits more than 20 diseases, including West Nile fever, dengue fever, yellow fever and two types of encephalitis. It also can transmit chikungunya virus, an infliction that is rarely fatal, but causes debilitating symptoms, including severe joint pain, fever, achiness, headache, nausea, vomiting, rash and fatigue. People usually recover in a few weeks, but the virus is not very pleasant.

Right, so I read people’s medical records all day and I’m a straight up hypochondriac. In the highly probably event that I contract one of these debilitating diseases, and waste away in front of my giant television watching bad TNT dramas, this blog might suffer, and for that I apologize. Please send gifts of gatorade, baked goods, and dvds.

I get itchy just thinking about it.

Posted in Charleston, CKP, Current Affairs, Difficulties, summertime | Leave a Comment »

The rainy season

July 17, 2013 by charlsiekate

I was enjoying a little Sunday afternoon television, and the next thing I know, an extraordinarily loud alarm is going off in my apartment. It was the national weather service, via my television, interrupting my little doze, to tell me that more than an inch of rain had fallen at Marion Square, and that a near stationary storm cell was expected to drop torrential rains on my neighborhood. We are under a flash flood warning for the next two hours. The good thing is that the tide tonight is suppose to be especially high because of the full moon. The poor little drenched tourists.

This has become a common occurrence around here this summer. We’ve had more flash floods in the past two months than I’ve seen in the almost three years I’ve lived here. I’m currently literally trapped in my apartment, and my street is a river. We’ve all spent arguably a little too much time inside this summer, resulting in a lot of lunches at my desk.

The dinosaurs have the bear surrounded as his wife looks on in horror. *

Regardless of the rain, Charleston is an easy place to be happy, once you find a place to live and a job that lets you pay tourist prices for brunch. There is so much to do, and so many people to meet. I’ve been thinking a lot about making friends and the kind of people you want to be around, and what makes people want to be around you. It took me a long time to make friends when I moved here, but now I have so many fantastic friends I almost can’t remember how hard it was initially.

I’m convinced it can take a good year to make friends when you move somewhere, and that you just have to accept this and keep trying. I also think the best way to make friends is to treat people like you are already their friend, and go from there. Give people the benefit of the doubt, reach out and ask someone out for a beer, or lunch, or a dog play date. Accept the fact that people already have friends and might not think of you when planning something, and invite yourself. Don’t get your feelings hurt when people who don’t know you yet don’t go out of their way for you.

During my first year in Charleston, I almost made friends with this one group of people. I tried, I really did. And I just couldn’t break through, and I couldn’t really figure out why. I finally realized that I just didn’t have that much in common with these people, there was nothing wrong with me, and there was nothing wrong with them, it just wasn’t going to work. But it made me a little gunshy about trying real hard, and made my question myself and it confused me. Kind of like when you break up with someone after a fifth date.

Then, last summer, when I was finally making great strides in friendship, but still had not broken through to “included” in this one particular group with a lot of potential for friendship – I saw a Facebook posting that said they were at brunch having a Sunday funday at my favorite restaurant mere blocks from my house. Man, I wanted to go. I wanted Sunday funday friends, I really thought these people might actually like me. But I didn’t have any of their numbers, and I didn’t want to be “that girl.” I marinated on my couch.

Finally, I decided to stop being a wuss and called Drew, who was not there, but was my closest friend associated with this group. I told her I wanted to crash Sunday funday, and she gave me their numbers and told me to stop being crazy and to go have fun. And that is what I did. That day, I got contact info from all my new friends, and since then, they have been some of my closest and greatest friends.

Speaking of special friends, I received the following post card yesterday from Professor Space Law PJ Blount. Even thought it didn’t actually get mailed from Japan, it is still pretty awesome. You’re welcome.

*All of the gummy animals in this photo were consumed shortly after this photo, as humans are the top of the food chain in gummy world. I’m sorry I’m not sorry.

** I’m very pleased with all of the dinosaurs in this post.

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