A long night and early morning

So last night at about nine o'clock or so, I decide that I should make some dinner. I headed down to the basement to get something out of the deep freeze and discover that our basement drain had backed up, badly, and not just water, if you get my drift. So back upstairs I went and woke Steve up telling him that we had a bit of a problem. Bless his heart, he put his boots on and took the plunger and tried to unclog the drain. About a half hour later with no results, I told him that i was going to call a plumber. I tried one here in town that had an ad in the yellow pages claiming 24 hour service. However, I got the voice mail and hung up. I looked through some more and found another one, out of Burlington, that also had 24 hour service. That guy answered and told me it would be about an hour before he could get here. Well, not like I was going anywhere. So I puzzled and fretted about how much this was going to cost us, and what could possibly be wrong for about an hour. The plumber, a very nice man named Tim, arrived at about ten thirty and went to work. Steve decided that the plumber didn't look like a serial killer and thought it would be safe for him to go to work. I agreed. Finally at about midnight he was able to get through and the water drained. Apparently tree roots have gotten into the clay tile that is our sewage drain. So he informed me about how to get the mess cleaned up and sanitized and to attempt to prevent it from happening again. He only charged me a little over $133 which I thought was incredibly reasonable given the time he spent driving here and the time he spent fixing it. I would have gladly paid him twice that much. I managed to get to bed at about 1am which is really late for me these days. Needless to say, the alarm came too early this morning and I had a bit of trouble waking up. So that was last night...

Today most of my appointments cancelled so I was working on getting my licensing paperwork all together. I swear I was on the verge of a panic attack for about an hour while I tried to get all that stuff figured out. I have no idea what I am going to do if, for some reason, I don't have all the necessary classes to sit for the exam. I am trying not to worry about that now and just get all the paperwork done. I wish I would have been aware that EIU had a community counseling program that was aimed directly at what I am doing today. It would have been so much easier than going through the Clinical Psych program and I probably would have learned a whole lot more! Not much I can do about that now.

I went to go see my dad tonight and helped him staple new velco straps on his tray table for his wheelchair. That was entertaining. I did have an easier time with the staple gun than he did, but I do have more leverage of course. So now, I am trying to convince myself to get up and cook dinner and then call people about the church newsletter. If I didn't hound people every month I would never get the information that I need. Very frustrating!

Fighting the good fight

I have been insanely busy lately with work and life and everything else. Things are slowing down a little bit and I still have plenty of things to catch up on but I'm getting there. I will have a CT scan done on my chest on Friday to see what the damage is there. Hopefully they will find something that will explain the pain I am having and make the car insurance understand that it is legitimate pain. I don't think they doubt that and they have no reason to, but it would still be nice to have some "proof". At least I think it is improving and my neck is finally improving so that is a major bonus. I have a busy few weeks ahead of me and then I hope it slows down a bit. Nedra's benefit is this weekend and I got the quilt all finished and it looks great. I am hoping to finally get the spare bedroom painted next weekend since it is a long weekend with Memorial Day. Then the weekend following that we have a wedding to attend for Steve's cousin. Well, only the reception actually as the wedding is private. After that it should slow down a bit, I hope. I know there is a million other things going on but I can't seem to formulate them into words on here so I will leave it for now. Perhaps I will add more later.

Falling Apart

I am beginning to think that I am falling apart physically. I am still having quite a bit of pain from the car accident. My chest has been hurting especially badly the last few days. I have been gaining weight back that I was losing and that is especially annoying. But I can't even do sit-ups because it hurts so badly. Then today my ear has been hurting whenever I yawn so I am hoping I am not getting an ear infection. No such thing as growing out of those for me. But I am going to be going to see my doc on Monday so hopefully he can get me straightened out. I am not looking forward to the possibility of another MRI but if that is what has to be done, well I will do it.

Work has been super busy this week, and I have already billed 19 hours this week and it's only Wednesday! But I feel like I am doing my part so that is a good thing. The whole office went up to a conference last week and while the conference wasn't that informative, it was fun to go up with everyone. I am blessed to work with wonderful people.

So I am going to relax now and chill out now.

Almost Easter

I went to a wonderful church service this evening at the First Christian Church here in town. I never thought that I would like going to a DOC church because I honestly didn't like the one in Eureka that we had to go and sing at frequently. But, a friend invited me to go to the Saturday Night Alive service and I figured why not. So after a full day I went to the service. It was great and full of contemporary music and honest to goodness truth about God.

Otherwise we had a full day as well. My older brother came down last night and stayed here so he could go to lunch for my little brother's birthday. So I got up this morning and had to go to the bank and close out the savings account that has been open since I was like three years old. Unfortunately it's at a bank in IL and I rarely go over there on weekdays so it was dormant and they said to put money in or close it out. So I went over today and just closed it out. Then we went to lunch for Thomas' birthday at Pizza Hut. I can't believe how much my nephew has grown in the week since I last saw him.

When we got home, we cleaned out the goldfish pond out back. It was really gross with rotting leaves and nastiness. Steve helped me a lot since I can't pick up heavy stuff and we got it all scrubbed down and cleaned out and then filled up again. So it will be all ready for fish once it warms up a bit more. Then I went to the church service and then we went out to eat. It makes for a full day that has left me feeling quite accomplished.

Now I just need to buy some rocks to circle the tree out front, purchase some mulch to put around the trees, flower beds, and my rose bush. After I get my planters out and get those planted with flowers, and get my other plants in the ground, then my outside stuff will be pretty much done.

I still have quite a bit to do inside the house, and it's hard to not want to do it all at the same time. I have another room that I want to paint upstairs that will be a guest bedroom/my craft room. Then I have to do something with the stairway area. After the upstairs is done, I want to paint the living room/dining room. Sometime after that I want to pull up the carpet in that same room and redo the hardwoods under it. I also want to change the hardware (handles and hinges) in the kitchen and possibly repaint in there as well.

So that's my project list for this year basically. I love having projects to do and it really gives me something to look forward to. I have noticed that I get a bit bored/down when I don't have something to work towards. So I try not to move too fast so that I always have something to do and look forward to.

Tomorrow is Easter, a celebration and remembrance of the sacrifice that Christ gave for us on the cross. We have breakfast at the church at 7am and then church at 8am. While it is early, I look forward to seeing my family. My mom has Trevor tonight too so I will be able to see him again. Then we have the rest of the day to ourselves.

I hadn't planned on making this quite this long, but oh well. It's what's on my mind right now I suppose!

A Short Update

Things are going pretty well here. My arm is feeling pretty good finally. I think this is my final week at the chiropractor so I hope that my neck holds out and stays in place. Eric is STILL moving out his stuff. I am trying hard to not get annoyed at the slow pace. I'm not doing so well at the not getting annoyed part. I want to be able to get the house cleaned up and prepped for painting. If I wait until it is really humid outside it will take forever for the paint to dry. I also want to get to work on the floor. Oh well, I guess it will happen eventually. I just hate working on other people's time tables instead of my own. That's about it in my world.

In pain yet again

I had been doing pretty well over the past few weeks and my arm has been healing up well. Then I tripped and feel at my church on Saturday and of course fell in such a fashion that I braced myself my right arm (my left hand was full of stuff). So it is sore again and I feel like I set myself back a couple of weeks. It is really frustrating to not be able to do things that I normally could.

Steve and I bought a couch and chair this weekend. We ended up finding a set at Ashley Furniture for a really reasonable price and even got 10% off for paying cash. We should be getting it at the end of the month. So I am hoping that Eric will get his stuff out so I can paint the living room and not risk getting any paint on his stuff. Hopefully we can get that room done in one day. I know we will have to primer it because the paint on there is somewhat dark and different shades. I am debating on painting the trim. I think it would look nice, but it's just that much more work to do. So we will see once we get the paint on the wall if the trim needs it or not. I am looking forward to getting the upstairs room made into a guest bedroom as well. I pretty much know the colors that I am going to use for it. But again, Eric has to get his stuff moved before I can get that done. That will be an easy room to pain because the walls aren't really tall and I can reach without having to use a ladder or anything.

I have to finish up some stuff now for work and then get to lunch.

The MRI

I got my MRI results back today. I have a small tear and a strained muscle in my right shoulder from the car accident. The doc says that as long as I am careful, it should heal itself without any problem. So I have to be careful not to lift anything heavy or strain it and I should be okay. I wonder what it would have looked like right after the accident when it was really sore. I think it has already healed up quite a bit in the past two weeks. So I got that taken care. Now I just need to see my chiropracter and get my neck and back straightened out and I will be good to go. Then I can be done with this whole mess. They are giving me a settlement for "pain and suffering" along with lost wages for the days of work that I have missed. It will help with some stuff that I wanted to get done but couldn't when we used the money for down payments on new vehicles. It was beautiful out today and I am looking forward to working a little outside tomorrow if my arm permits.