#also yay for 1700 followers ! :D

[songofsaraneth]

an incomplete list of the Bullshit ive gone through this year (2021 only), for personal edification:

I am in grad school trying to do research as well as TA a lab class during a global pandemic

My car is broken into in late February outside of my apartment. $1700+ of my backpacking/camping gear and personal items were stolen from it. Ironically they did not find the $20 cash I had. 

Car battery begins mysterious dying if left overnight and have to call for rescue from AAA 4 separate times over the course of March. I suspect it is related to being broken into but can’t prove it without a mechanic’s diagnostics.

First mechanic I bring my car to does nothing for the entire MONTH they have it, except break my air conditioning of all things. I live in a desert. It is now 90º every day. At one point they call me to say they can’t get the back doors to open. I walk 2 miles back to them from campus and demonstrate how the automatic doors work on a 2005 minivan. I begin to have regrets about my mechanic choice but the sunk fallacy cost keeps me there for several weeks.

Mid march I also wake up one day to severe jaw pain/a weird “loose” feeling, like my mouth is slanting sideways. It is midterms and I do not have time for this, so I take a lot of ibuprofen and eat soup for a week. After 3 days I shove pillows and blankets around my face one night to keep my jaw aligned and when I wake up the next morning it is severely tight instead of loose, and I have to carefully stretch it open whenever I leave my mouth closed for more than an hour. I guess I just have TMJ now.

At this point I am walking everywhere until bike supplies arrive to fix my flat tire since the bike store is too far away to walk to; including walking back and forth to campus since I can only bring 2-4 out of 8 students into the lab spaces at a time and so effectively have to run each weekly lab 2-4 times per week; as well as going back and forth for greenhouse experiment monitoring/helping undergrads on our NASA contest project

Early April I go to the dentist for a crown on one of my back molars, which I must pay for out of pocket because my new dental insurance purchased when I moved last September has a 1-year waiting period and so will not cover it ($1200). Stretching my jaw open so far for the procedure reignites my new TMJ back to high pain levels.

While still waiting on car in mid-April I have a severe averse reaction to the second dose of the Covid19 vaccine, resulting in painful ulceration of all the soft tissues in my body (mouth, stomach, genitals). It is a very bad time for 3 days and I book an urgent care appointment for the first time ever.

Urgent Care nurse-practitioner does not believe me when I describe what’s happening, and misdiagnoses me with herpes.

I am still biking everywhere but now I’m extra mad and in pain about it so take car back from mechanic so I can get groceries etc. I make an appointment with the dealership but it will be a week until they can take it. In the meanwhile I have to drive it every 8 hours so it won’t die which means getting up at 2am to drive it for 20 minutes in the middle of the night so it will still turn on in the morning. 

I have a terrible reaction to the numbing cream given to me for the painful open sores over my body, because of a lifelong mint sensitivity, resulting in an even greater amount of pain

The dealership can fix my car over the following week but its $1800 and now insurance isn’t sure they want to cover it after all

Herpes test comes back negative and nurse apologizes profusely and recommends a non-mint OTC numbing cream alternative that works (yay) and a numbing spray that does not work because it turned out to use an alcohol based propellant which should not be combined with open wounds esp on the genitals (ouch ouch ouch). I try to tell the nurse why I was right about my diagnosis and she was wrong but she still believes it was a latent virus of some other variety and and not an immune response alone, despite the published case studies I have brought to back me up. I decide I have bigger hills I need to die on right now and stop arguing. Sores persist into May but eventually do go down and numbing cream keeps me moderately functioning.

Car is fixed and I can drive again but it takes 2 hours of crying on the phone to my insurance company for them to agree to cover the cost of repair

I make a primary care appointment for the first time in years so I can have a doctor in this state if something like this happens to me again, in June I do intake/bloodwork/set up appointments to check out some other issues ive been having

Grad school finals happen which i wont get into but Yeah. Finals stress triggers another outbreak of canker sores, but mostly clustered in my mouth and only 2 on my vulva rather than 8-12. I eat only soup for another week. 

I get a referral to the local mental health clinic and call about setting up an appointment for an ADHD evaluation. They tell me to download and send in some paperwork and they will call when they have available appointments

I am supposed to be doing all my labwork over the summer but the committee member I need escapes my clutches and we don’t manage to set up a meeting to plan it out/for him to explain the protocols until late June

Bloodwork shows I am critically low in vitamin b12 and low in D, which may explain some of why I am so tired all the time

Ultrasound shows a 1.8cm mass in the adnexa near my left ovary. There are several options for what it can be (folicular cyst, other kind of cyst, tumor, ectopic pregnancy i nearly laugh at my Dr and reassure her the last one is not possible if nothing else). It may go away on its own or it may not. Follow up scan in 2 months

I remember I was supposed to email forms to the mental health clinic and finally send those in mid July. It seems cruel to make me be the one to remember this considering I am calling about a formal ADHD diagnosis.

I also finally pin everyone relating to my labwork down and have a follow up meeting + make a list of what we need to order, but the staff who place orders are on vacation and when they get back several reagents are backordered

I have my follow-up ultrasound. The tech takes lots of photos which indicates the mass is still present, but I won’t know any details until my next PCP appointment when they send over the analysis to her in mid-August

Beginning of August the reagents I need for the first steps of the process arrive exactly 1 day before I leave town for a wedding and the lab manager is about to leave town for the entire next week

After the wedding, severe thunderstorms and tornados trap me in Chicago for 4 extra days. I spend a lot of time at the airport or on my way between the airport and my parents house. A facebook friend gets video of the funnel clouds which at least gives me something to sadly email my advisor and committee members when I have to join our planning meeting from my gate at O’Hare

I lose my drivers license at the security checkpoint on my last trip through the airport and don’t realize until I am boarding the plane because of course that is happening to me now

On the shuttle from El Paso back to Las Cruces after this ordeal the driver stops and picks up a box labeled HUMAN BLOOD and puts it in the trunk and i am too tired to care anymore

I stay up all night making the world’s most pitiful r graphs for my meeting the next morning and everyone takes pity on me and does not call out how useless they are

I spend the weekend trying to motivate myself to actually go into the lab and start my procedures, and fail to leave my apartment. This reminds me it has now been a month (Aug 15th) since I sent in my paperwork and the mental health clinic has still not called me back about up an appointment

I get overwhelmed with Everything and make this list

So that’s where I’m at at the moment. And this doesn’t even include anything from 2020 thats just been continuous like, y’know, a global pandemic and having a bad breakup of a 4 year relationship and moving to a new city where I know no one for grad school etc. I feel like I’m falling apart/unable to do all the shit I need to right now but you know what? Actually its been a really bad time and maybe falling apart a little is justified ;_; 

#ramblings #wharglbargle #like Damn its been a Time and i need to cry about it i guess #negativity //

[davidpires578]

My Journey As A Creative Designer - Woodworking and Beyond #1829: Changes

It seems so long since I have posted, that I almost forgot how to do it. (Not really – but you get the point!)   The past month or month and a half have really been quite a change for both myself and my business. It is a good thing, but something that takes a bit of time to adjust to, and I find that I am finally feeling that I a getting 'caught up' and doing that. It has been a busy and crazy time for me, though.  Things really started to get busy when Lynne Andrews launched her "Inspirational Ark" series. 

I have been working with Lynne on this project for a little while now. Lynne is the fabulous designer and is offering the painting patterns for this series on her website (lynneandrews.com) and I am providing the wood pieces for the series on my own site (http://www.sheilalandrydesigns.com/painting-surfaces).  The response has been incredible.  I had fallen into a routine of two days of cutting and one day to box up and ship the orders for the past several weeks. Thank goodness Keith's mom came to help me package and fill out forms for the orders. I couldn't have kept up without her! Consequently, there has not been a lot of interesting things to blog about. You would have seen a series of  photos like this:

. . . and this:

over and over again.  To me, that isn't really 'blog-worthy'.  But I am happy to say that I am "kind of" caught up with things. I still have orders, but it is at a more 'regular' pace and much more manageable. One thing that I pretty much stuck to was to have a designated quitting time each night. Otherwise, I would have certainly became ill or gotten 'burned out' from the constant flow of work. I knew if I didn't protect myself, it wouldn't be a great thing.  Like many things, with a little adjustment, things are manageable. I am happy to say that we had our best month to date on our site and we are very happy that things are going so well. It just takes some time to get used to new routines.  I think I am getting back on track, though. I can't believe that we are already into the fourth month of the year already. Everything has been a blur. . .  But all is well and I should hopefully have lots of 'blog-worthy' things to write about in the near future. I am currently working on several projects and events with other designers, as well as working on some of my own designs. Every one of them is really cool (I think!) and I can't wait to share everything with you all to keep you busy and creative. It is just a matter of time.  Keith has been busy as well creating some new scroll saw patterns for our woodworking followers. He has three new patterns as follows . . . 

SLDK458 - 2nd Amendment Sectional Plaque, 

SLDK715 - Love one Another (John 13:34) plaque, 

and SLDK716 - You Can & You Will plaque pattern.  There is certainly something on our site for just about any taste and preference. :)  As for my 'down time', I am busy finishing up my "12 Days" ornaments sets by Lynne Andrews. I finished up the Day 11 ornaments last night and only have one more day to do! (YAY!)

I can see the finish line in site! :D    I will take better pictures of them for a future blog. I will also try to post a little more than I have been. It is funny how quickly you can get out of some habits. After so many years of blogging daily, it seems very odd not to do so. But the time needed to be spent filling orders for the time being. Hopefully, I will get back to it more often. I miss hearing from you all.  Add to that, the past couple of days have been spent trying to get my Facebook notices to work. On Thursday, Facebook decided it wasn't going to send me email notices on anything anymore. I spent the last several days trying everything to get it to work, but it is something that is apparently on their coding that got goofed up. I may never get notices again.   This is a problem for me because it really cuts off my communication with my colleagues and friends there. I can't answer questions or follow threads easily. I have over 1700 friends in my art world and business and it is nearly impossible for me to go through everything and search every day. I am very frustrated to say the least, but after wasting several days reinstalling, clearing cache and trying numerous things on my computer, I still am not notified.  I have to call it quits for the time being and just try to catch up when I can. I can't afford to spend any more time searching for answers that aren't there. I mention this so if you need me, please email me directly. I will be happy to help or answer. I just hope that people don't think I am being rude. You can always comment here on the blog and I will be able to respond to you here. I would like you all to do that, as I miss talking to many of you.  With that said, it is time for me to get to work. I have cutting to do today in my shop and then design work to do. It will be a good day.  I wish you all a wonderful day ahead. Happy Wednesday to you all! 

#woodworking #wood #working #miter #saws #Woodworking