Jamaica rundown: successes and mistakes

Almost immediately upon our arrival in Jamaica we started making a list of all the trip's successes. While it initially began as a "Successes" list, there were a few mistakes that had to be acknowledged. They all came late in the trip, though, and none of them were too monumental. Mostly they were just funny (except for the two "Epic Fails")

And now, in as best chronological order as I could recreate, I present Girlcation in Jamaica.

Successes:

• Staying at the Ritz on the cheap (thanks, Em!)


• Fletcher the cab driver


• Ralston and his amazing pina coladas











• The electric violin band


• Beachside pilates


• $7 omlette




• Christian Reggae music


• Leanna's discovery of the sauna and cold plunge













The hobie cat adventure







• Soft chairs and towels, beachside and poolside




• Pizza and Ruffles, The River Wild, The Holiday, Two Weeks' Notice, and Step Up 2


• Tennis




• Bocce Ball and Cricket













• Richard the Cabana Boy
• Monday morning: everything about it


• Outrunning the Jamaican storm


• Not being on the hijacked plane
• Leaving the Oreos in the drawer


• Leaving the Australian Gold "sunscreen" behind




• Jamaican pirate store
• Finding a cutout of Usain Bolt in the airport

• Catching our flight in Dallas



Mistakes:

• Hostage situation at the airport (EPIC FAIL)


• Australian Gold "sunscreen" (another EPIC FAIL)




• Fletcher's busted up Toyota Camry


• Jamaican Muesli


• Pool-side pina coladas, the slushy mess that they were





• Missing the Reggae Dance class


• $16 omlette


• letting (some would say I invited...) hobie cat man touch my leg


• the Oreos


• $3.50 water


• the mossy rope [shudder]


• Saph the tennis instructor


• the $1 bellman tip


• forgetting to get the sisters a ride to church, then dreaming all night about asking for their forgiveness


• Dominos pizza


• Sprinting with all our luggage to catch our Dallas flight

All weekend we kept seeing "signs" that we were meant to be in Jamaica, from the LeBron James Sprite bottles to the Sauna and cold plunge to the beachside Pilates, to dancing in a restaurant barefoot to "I Will Survive" ... the only word I could think of all weekend to describe it all was magical. The weather was perfect (we arrived at the airport just as a torrential downpour began...we liked to think Jamaica was crying over us leaving...), the water warm, and the quotable quotes flowing freely.

It was really hard to be back at work yesterday, especially the wearing clothes part, but alas here we are.

Kind of hard to believe this was us 48 hours ago...

Taco Tuesday Confessions - all dried up?

I've been trying to think all day of a really good confession, one along the lines of the one that birthed this blog. But alas, I can't think of any more incriminating confessions that I haven't already blogged about. Is it possible my reserve is all dried up? Have I really become so boring that I haven't created any more confession-worthy experiences? Or am I merely wising up in my propensity to share?

Maybe I should open it up for you to confess for me? Incriminating stories? That could be dangerous. Maybe you all should confess something for a change. (Do I allow anonymous comments on this blog? I don't think so.) Hmmm. What to do, what to do...

On another note: Not confession-worthy, but noteworthy (for me). I know I told many of you I swore I'd never do another marathon, but I decided to make an exception so that I could have a comeback story for myself (of sorts). i've been slowly working my way back for the last three months (well, five months really, but calculated training for the last three).  I finally went on a seriously long run a couple of weeks ago and felt great. It was the first time since August that I really felt like myself health-wise. I was beat, but it was the normal kind of beat. The beat you expect to feel after 18 miles. I felt really grateful that my body has healed completely (one month sooner than the doctor had anticipated even!) and that I'm right on target for a successful race. 7 weeks and counting until the big day. Then the real fun begins. Maybe another race in April (we'll see how this marathon goes), Ragnar Relay in NY in May, triathlon #1 in June, have fun and gear up during July and August for triathlon #2 in September. It's going to be a great race season. I actually have more than one person to train with this time around so it's almost like being part of a team again. It's made me the happiest I've been in a while (athletically speaking, anyway, which I guess does translate to general happiness).

But seriously, refocusing from the side note of the comeback.  Help the blog.  Confess.  Please.

4GB of RAM. Take that.

I finally broke down and bought a new laptop.  I told myself I wouldn't buy a new one until next year at the earliest but I have secretly been shopping around for the last few months. The decision was ultimately made when it took me a full 2 minutes to open my iTunes to play my brothers a song.  This may not seem like a big deal, 2 minutes shouldn't justify a multi-hundred dollar purchase, but it was indicative of a larger problem.  I could only run one program at a time if I wanted my computer to play nice.  Blogging was becoming increasingly difficult as my processor seemed to be stuck in molasses mode.  Defragging the hard drive had stopped working.  I was simply out of disk space and working with a processor that had simply run its course.  

So last week I braved the dreaded Fry's.  

Fry's = geek heaven.  It's actually a great place if you have money to spend.  If you don't, it's the worse tease of a store there ever was.  For those unfamiliar with Fry's, it's bigger than Costco.  No joke.  It was an old Incredible Universe store/warehouse, so the store is ginormous and they've filled it with every possible electronic you could want or dream of.  Displays of high-def televisions, Blue-ray players (I can't tell you how much I want Planet Earth on Blue-ray), washers, dryers, mixers, mini-laptops, sound systems for your car, house, bedroom, computers...the list goes on and on.  I went in focused: all I wanted was my laptop.  They had the one I wanted for a really good deal.  All the brothers and Dad came, which meant it wasn't going to be a fast trip.

Sure enough it wasn't, but it was okay.  It was actually fun to stand in the Bose demo room and try to talk my dad into buying a new sound system for the family room.  And to sit in the plush chairs and watch Indiana Jones in high-def.  The only downside was that they didn't have my computer in stock.   Ha.  So they gave me a raincheck and told me to call back in a few days.  Which I did.  No luck.  The boys "had" to make another run out there the following day.  They checked for me again.  No dice.  So I called today.  Only to find out that they had discontinued my laptop.  Pray tell, why would you give someone a raincheck for a computer you weren't ever planning on getting in?  [sigh]  I fumed internally for about 2 seconds and then asked Tom if he would help me find a new laptop.  Off we went. 

First stop: Circuit City.  Packed with customers, short on help.  Ugh.  They had my laptop, but...not in stock.  Of course.  At this point, I'm sure you're asking yourself why I didn't just order one online, and I have a good reason for that.  Because Dad has all the software I need right here at home and Tom has the skills to easily transfer all my files from one computer to the other.  It was just easier to do it here at home with the safety net of nerds.

Second stop: Fry's, to see if they had any satisfactory alternatives.  Negatory.  It was picked so over it really was a wasted trip.  And there were SO MANY SHOPPERS out today.  We couldn't figure out why people were out en masse on a Monday.

Third stop:  Best Buy #1.  Also packed.  What the?  Despite the packed-ness, we found a GREAT deal on a laptop almost exactly like the one I wanted out at Fry's but of course they were, you guessed it, out of stock.  By this time I hadn't eaten in several hours (and had gone on a long run this morning and been cheated out of the bagel I had thought about all morning [cough-Tom-cough]) and was starting to get very grumpy.  I started snapping at no one in particular.  Tom knew it was time to 1. feed me, and 2. find a computer. STAT.  The guy at Best Buy said they had my model out at the store in La Mesa.  I handed Tom the keys and said to drive me there because I was done.  He did.  Happily. 

Fourth stop:  Best Buy #2.  We walk into a deserted Best Buy.  Amazing.  We described the laptop to the salesperson.  They had no record of the model in their store, on their website, or anywhere in their system.  So they call the store in Mission Valley.  No one answered.  Why would they?  By that point I was ready to walk out of the store and eat my old laptop for lunch.  Low blood sugar really isn't good for me.  My brothers like to say "feed the beast" when I get like this.  It's fair. 

Finally another salesperson overhears the drama of the non-existent laptop and solves the mystery.  Well, not so much solves the mystery as to why it's not anywhere in the system so much as points out that there is a box with that model number in the cage behind us.  Sure enough, it rings up with the specs and price we had seen in Mission Valley.  Retail really makes no sense to me at times, so I didn't ask questions.  I just purchased the computer and we walked out of the store.  Tom then drove me directly to Santana's.  I was then not only in possession of a new laptop but also a California burrito.  It takes so little to make me happy.

Now instead of 512 MB of RAM I now have 4GB, along with a whole bunch of other cool things, including an unexpected remote control that wasn't in the computer specs.  Take that!!!  

(We still have yet to actually figure out how to use the remote, but it's still cool!)

Calvin may have had it right...

"Nothing helps a bad mood like spreading it around." ~Calvin

I feel better already. My apologies to my blog audience.

Meh

I know I've been blogging a lot lately but work has been slow and I've been feeling a little sassy. The sassiness caught up with me, though, and turned to a really foul mood sometime last night. I don't get in these moods very often, but when I do I hate it. I don't like feeling icky. I usually do everything in my power to squash it right away. Yesterday, however, I wallowed in the sick delight of a rotten mood for about an hour--tops--and then I was done. Maybe it's the indulgence that did me in...

I was doing mostly fine until I came home last night and started watching Hotel Rwanda. It's been on my list to see for forever, but it has always felt like one of those movies I needed to watch while someone holds me. I always want to watch those kinds of movies, but feel so vulnerable and sad during and after. Hence the need for human touch. Well, I really decided that three years was long enough to wait so I sucked it up and started watching it by myself. I think that's where I went wrong. I should never be allowed to watch these kinds of movies alone in my room with pop tarts (my current comfort food, and, last night, my dinner)...

I only got through about 20 minutes before I had to head to institute. By then I was beat from the day (when you get up at 5:30 it feels like bedtime should be around 8...) and not in the mood to have a somewhat remedial conversation about truth and revelation. Me=grumpy. I went home in a bad mood, went to bed in a bad mood, and woke up in a bad mood. I almost didn't go running this morning, but I knew to skip that was to subject myself to yet another reason to be disgusted with the day. So I went. Usually that is enough to dispel the mood. No dice. So I tried praying. Eh, marginal return (it was pretty proportional to my effort, really). I got a ride to the metro this morning. Nada. I got to work to discovery the tech guys had finally replaced my mouse. My pleasure lasted about as long as it took for me to discover that I no longer had to cajole my mouse to do its job. Once that was ascertained, my joy dissapated as I remembered I was at work. Zip.

I'm not sure what it's going to take. Maybe I need that hug after all. And maybe a kiss. And, while whoever's doing the hugging and kissing is at it, maybe a cookie as well.

Moving right along...

Nothing like an illness to make you feel like the most boring person in the world. I feel like the only thing I am capable of conversing about is the state of my health, my energy level, my disability paperwork, my weight loss from a week without food, etc. etc. etc. I am boring myself. Apologies to all who have had to listen, especially to the details that didn't seem so gross in the hospital but become completely disgusting in normal, civilized company.


I figure if I get it out of my system, by the time I return from my real two week vacation (starting Friday night) I might actually have something other than the above details to converse about. So I've decided to give the highlights of the last two weeks. Feel free to skip this week's confession...heaven knows I wish I could.


My thoughts on narcotics:
Just say no to drugs, kids. The narcotic level of the first few days of my hospital stay was heavy for me, a squeaky clean Mormon kid who has a hard time convincing herself that Advil is necessary after an 18 mile run. My memories of the emergency room are fairly foggy post-drugs, as is my first full day after being admitted to the hospital, the first day I ended up in the cardiac ward, and the day of my procedure, all of which involved narcotics. In fact, they think it was the narcotics that slowed my heart rate to the 35 bpm that landed me in the cardiac ward in the first place. It took us two days to get it into the 40s. Talk about a hangover.

Anyway, the docs initially tried to tell me my plummeting heart rate was due to the fact that I am so athletic. Right. Honey, Lance Armstrong might hang out in the 30s, but let me tell you this: I ain't Lance Armstrong. Not even close.


My thoughts on medical procedures:
CT scans: okay. The contrast tasted like gatorade. All in all painless. Two thumbs up.

X-rays: okay. I got to watch the dog show while I was waiting. I hate dogs, but the show is always strangely fascinating to me. You can blame Cherie for this one. I had never seen it until our first Thanksgiving together... Anyway, the x-ray was Tom's favorite procedure, since they were looking for free air. Tom knows what free air is. Apparently he has an overabundance of it. However, the doctors did not find any in my x-ray. Shocking.

Colonoscopy: I have no words to adequately describe my detestation. Already dehydrated, already weak, the goLYTLY (if ever there were a misnomer...) did me in. I don't know that I've ever cried for four hours straight before. But there I was, sobbing in front of my friends as they tried to convince me that there were curly fries at the bottom of every glass. Bless Jane and Seth for the timely bestowal of Colin Golightly, who I clutched for the entire four hours. Bless Katie for the four hour backscratch. Bless Arianne and Melinda for reading me Wordsworth and telling me stories. Bless Dan and Ryan for yet another priesthood blessing.


My thoughts on health in general:
I don't know that I've ever been so aware of how good my health has been until this experience. Sure, I've experienced some injuries (all self-inflicted from running) but never have I had my general health so swiftly stripped away from me. Two weeks ago I was running 35 miles a week and swimming or biking every day as well. Now I struggle to walk a mile without getting tired. I'm getting stronger with each day (today I walked two miles), but I am certainly more aware of what a gift my body is. Plus, being surrounded by those much more ill than I was also a deeply humbling experience. For instance, in between visitors Sunday night (during the goLYTLY), my hospital roommate said through our curtain, "with the faith and prayers of your friends, you're going to be okay." This coming from a woman with congestive heart failure, diabetes, and cancer. I was humbled to be comforted by someone in so much pain with so little hope of regaining their own health. I have offered many prayers of gratitude for this experience.


Favorite hospital moments:
1. Snuggling in bed with friends, watching movies, having JenG bring all the jello, ice cream, and cookies we could eat (I was the jello eater...everyone else got ice cream, sandwiches, and cookies). In case you were wondering, the hospital beds can fit three people snugly. You just have to get a little friendly.

2. Jane's rendition of "Do as I'm doing."

3. "You don't want to spoon this."

4. Bekah's curly fries. (p.s. Dan took me to get some as soon as I was released)

5. Drunk-dialing both Katie and Dan to tell them about my procedure. When Katie called me later in the day and referred to some of the details, I asked who told her about it all. She responded, "You did, Julie." I have no recollection of placing that phone call. Good thing being Mormon protects me from this being a regular occurrence.


Serious/special hospital moments:
1. The two blessings I received were inspired, powerful, and the main reason I have made such a quick recovery. The doctors were amazed. I, however, was not surprised.

2. For such a traumatic experience, I felt God's hand in every step of the way. Miracle after miracle occurred. One night, I was planning on praying for strength and patience. I knew it was just a matter of time before my patience ran out and I cracked. However, as soon as I started praying, my heart swelled with gratitude and I found myself thanking God for this entire experience. The tears flowed freely and I felt an outpouring of His love for me. I felt that this whole thing was all on purpose, that God was teaching me some very important lessons because He loves me. I knew at that moment what I was supposed to be learning and then spent a very long time writing in my journal. I also knew that the recovery would be the most difficult phase for me...and I was right. It has tested my patience to the limit, has left me too much with my thoughts, too much time to think about and plan for a future that I know it's not time to think about yet. I have learned that I need to focus on this: recovery. And once that is done, it will be time to move onto the next phase. What that is, I don't know. But I trust God to make it known to me when the time is right. Keeping that under control, though, is a daily struggle. But I can do it. I am doing it. Look at me go!

And with that, let's put all this hospital nonsense behind us. I go to Utah tomorrow and then off to Mexico for a lovely beach and ruins vacation with Tommy Chucky Waa. Family love. Rock on.

We Interrupt This Blog ...

I would like to take a moment out of the normal course of storytelling and rumination to send out an impersonal but heartfelt thanks to all those who called, visited, prayed, fasted, etc. while I was in the hospital. I'm home now and am very tired, but happy to be on the road to recovery. Believe it or not, I am extremely grateful for this experience; it was exactly what had to happen at this point in my life to teach me some very important and timely lessons.

I have some hilarious stories from the week-long hospital stay (some I remember, some I don't - just say no to narcotics...) that will give me lots of blog fodder, but for now, I'd like to just say thank you as sincerely as I can. My heart and spirit have been touched deeply by the love I have felt.

Regular confessions will resume tomorrow.

And now, I'm going to take a nap.

Bat Cave Update

No sign of the bat. It's hiding. My landlady may or may not think I'm making things up. Looks like I'll have to go down at night and make some noise to try to get the bad boy out of hiding. Animal control better work 24 hrs.

Also, I did not mean for my last expostulation - "Where are the home teachers when I need them?" - to imply that they do not come when I need them. I just needed someone in the day club, and Jay fit that bill.

Dumb bat.

Addendum, Courtesy of Animal Control

The following is found on the Arlington County Animal Control website:

Bats hibernate in winter, and their young are born April-July. They cannot gnaw or dig, relying instead on existing openings to enter buildings. Actual damage is minor, mainly stains and odor from feces and urine. Ammonia will drive them out of the attic. If a bat is flying inside the house, don't panic. Try to isolate it in one room and call the League for assistance. Do not touch it. Remember, bats eat insects, not people.

Problems I have with this statement:

1. It is winter. This bat clearly is not hibernating.
2. I'm not sure where the opening is in our basement but I'm not about to put ammonia down there to "drive the bat out." It would drive all of us roommates out as well.
3. Have they ever been in a room with a flapping bat? Don't panic? Right. Check.
4. "Bats eat insects, not people." Sure thing. Rabies, anyone?

And don't worry - they just told me that I have to go in the basement, spot it AGAIN, and then call them and they'll be right over. AND THEN told me not to touch it because bats carry rabies. Sick. Gross. Where are my home teachers when I need them? Bless Jay for coming to the rescue. More later...