My cheery self seems to have disappeared

I've been finding myself sort of up and down, restless, and out-of-sorts over the last few days but I wasn't sure why.

Of course I'm worried about my lower back; I worry that the marked increase in pain over the last bunch of months is mets. And I'm seeing my oncologist in a week so of course I'm going to be more worried about my back. But no matter how worried I've been in the past, I don't usually freak out until just about the night before (or the weekend before) the appointment.

So it's not (or mostly not) my back or my cancer that is causing me to feel this way.

No, I think the main reason I've been up and down is that I'm starting to remember and relive events leading up to my dad's death last year in anticipation of the anniversary date of his death. I'm finding myself flooded with memories and feelings... and I think that I'm sort of trying to suppress them because letting them come leaves me sad and crying. I suppose that it would be better to just let the memories come out - or to write them down - but I haven't been able to bring myself to do that.

I have my meditation class tomorrow and I hope to get some tips from the leader of that class on how to handle my grief and mourning over the next while. It's almost like it's happening all over again... at least in my head.

A movie in an actual theatre

Saturday is movie day for us, as you know. Tonight we actually went out to watch a movie. Yep, we left the house and watched a late-night movie in an actual movie theatre. I know it's hard to believe, but we used to see almost all of our movies in the theatres - it's only lately that we've watched so many at home.

The movie we saw was Repo! The Genetic Opera. It was AWESOME! We both loved it! It's a musical (an opera, really, because there's almost no spoken dialogue) set in a post-apocalyptic world where many people had died due to some disease or other. A biotech company found a cure for that and managed to set up a culture of elective surgery and transplants; those who couldn't make their payments for the surgery had the organs repossessed by the repo-man.

The backstory was revealed slowly throughout the movie, providing information and connections to the previous story, and each reveal managed to surprise us. Interestingly, some of the story was told via comic-strips and the rest of the movie looked sort of like a comic book. The movie tended to be shot with high-contrast and slightly blurry edges, giving a kind of other-worldliness to the sets. The costuming, makeup, and sets also lend a goth sort of look to the movie. Some of the main characters wouldn't have looked out of place in a vampire movie :)

The singing was pretty good throughout the movie, as was the acting. It is supposed to be a bit over-the-top, of course, and parts of it are definitely way over any top. That's part of what makes this movie so good.

We highly recommend this movie; we liked it very much and felt that it had more depth to it than most movies like this. As well, it was shot entirely in Canada :) However, since the movie centres around surgery, there's quite a bit of gore and blood throughout, and given that much of the movie is about organ repossession, some parts are very, very gory. There is quite a bit of sexuality (mostly in the form of scantily-dressed women dancing with men or each other) as well. Therefore, this movie isn't for everyone. This fact doesn't diminish the movie's awesomeness, though :)

A little shopping, a lot of love

I found the most awesome fabric today!!! It's a collection called "Rocket Scientist" by In The Beginning fabrics and the fabrics have a rocket theme. There's a border fabric with rockets and a countdown fabric (it comes in a white background with lime - I wish it came in a white background with blue writing, but oh well - the best part about them is the little blast-off swirl under some of the rockets) and a fact fabric. They're so cool!!! There are other fabrics in this collection, too, although I don't think they're available everywhere yet. I loooove those fabrics.

I haven't been buying that much lately - which you might have guessed because I usually talk about the stuff I buy - but I did buy a couple of patterns off of eBay tonight. Tonight I spent more on one pattern than I've ever before spent on a sewing pattern. As soon as I saw it I knew that I HAD to have it. I paid through the nose for it, but I got it... and it's worth it to me. Just look at it!

Isn't it beautiful? It's so gorgeous and I've fallen completely, utterly in love with it. I can't wait to make it up as I think it'll look good both as a casual and a dressy dress, with or without the bows (although I do like the bows). I can see it working in tons of fabrics, and I think that the dress might also work with some sleeves. I'm positively swooning over this pattern - oh, how I love it!

Obviously I'm not the only person who loved the pattern. Although the other main bidder was fairly new to eBay with only ten feedbacks, I wonder if they were buying the pattern to sell in one of the online stores. There are definitely profits to be made by buying patterns off eBay and selling them on your own site. If this is a rare pattern (and I think it is because I've never seen anything like it), it could go for a lot, because there are a lot of people who prefer to just pay a set price for an item instead of bidding on it.

Feeling pretty good

My temporary filling was replaced with a permanent one on Tuesday and I'm happy to report that I'm not sick! The last two times I've had work done on this tooth, I've ended up really, really sick. It turns out that the root of the tooth is right against the floor of that sinus, and that I had a chronic sinus infection. So when the tooth had work done to it, that irritated my sinus and made me sick. A couple of rounds of antibiotics took care of the sinus infection and so I'm not sick. Yippee :)

Getting rid of the sinus infection has left me feeling quite a bit better than I did last month; I'm actually able to get up at a reasonable time in the morning and accomplish things throughout the day. I feel like I have more energy than I used to as well. So far, this hasn't translated into cleaning the house... but I have made supper this week. That's something I hadn't been doing before.

It's interesting that I'm feeling less tired these days because I'm not taking the Ritalin anymore. I'd been taking it for a while to help with the fatigue that I'd been experiencing but it seems that I don't need it now. It's also possible that the Ritalin was making me more tired, of course. Either way, I'm just as happy to not be taking extra pills.

Of course when my lower back is acting up (as it did yesterday), I have no energy. That may be a result of the pain pills I take to deal with the pain, though. I do need to talk to my family doctor about the pain there but I've decided to wait until after I see my oncologist in two weeks. If my tumour markers are up, then I'll get my oncologist to investigate; otherwise, I'll get my family doctor to start booking xrays. I figure that it can't hurt to wait a couple of weeks.

For the world has changed, and we must change with it.

Today's subject line comes from Barack Obama's Inauguration speech today. Listening to that speech this afternoon, tears sprang to my eyes and I got goosebumps. I believe in Obama in a way that I've never believed in, well, anyone. I think that Obama may be the greatest leader I've ever known; certainly the greatest in my lifetime so far.

I watched with the rest of the world while history took place today: Barack Obama was sworn in as the 44th US president and that nation's first black president. I think that Obama, his leadership style, and the change he will bring is desperately needed... but I know that there are people that disagree with me, and I fear that some of those people are violent. I was afraid that someone would take a shot at Obama during the Inauguration speech and parade and destroy my (and other people's) hopes for his presidency. At least I know that he's protected while in his car.

The world is changing, all right, and I think (hope?) Barack Obama is the one to lead that change. I'd follow him, if I lived in the US. If you haven't read or heard Obama's Inauguration speech, I'd recommend having a look at it. Not only is it inspiring for the US and the rest of the world, it manages to bash the Bush administration all at the same time. :)

No one's perfect

So it turns out that my pattern alterations weren't quite perfect. Overall I'm quite happy with the dress itself but there are a couple of things that need to be tweaked. I didn't actually measure the bust before or after grading it and I think this pattern has more ease in the bust than I like. Not doing the measurements was just plain laziness on my part. If I'd done them in the first place, I'd have to make fewer changes now which would have saved me time in the end.

The lesson here is to complete every step of a procedure, no matter how tedious those steps might be. I thought I'd learned that lesson but apparently I haven't.

Anyways, I'm looking forward to making the pattern "for real" with the upcoming changes.

In some unrelated but exciting (to me) news, I'm getting that temporary filling replaced with a permanent one tomorrow morning. Yippee! No more temporary filling! I'll be able to chew non-soft foods on the right side of my mouth! This may not seem like much to other people, but it's pretty exciting for me.

Replacing the filling also means that I should be able to start receiving Pamidronate again. I'm really looking forward to this because I hope that the Pamidronate might make my lower back hurt less.

Neverending winter

We have an elephant in our backyard.

Ok, it's not a real elephant. After all, it's too cold here right now and our backyard is too small to support a real elephant. This makes us sad because we both like elephants - if they came in house hippo size, we'd so get one. For now, we'll have to content ourselves with the pile of snow on the cedar bush that looks just like a baby elephant.

We've had a lot of snow this winter and it's been so cold for so long that we're tired of brushing off (or scraping) the car, trying to walk in the snow, bundling up just to walk five minutes to the store, and all of the other extra things we have to do for winter. It's been so cold that I'm glad that we have a newer car that starts in the morning. We don't have engine block heaters here in Southern Ontario and if our car was older I'd worry about it starting every day.

Sigh. Can we just have spring now, please? Please?

We've hibernated this weekend and watched some movies. I gave Ian the Ghost House Underground collection for Christmas and we watched two of the movies from that.

The first was Room 205, a Danish movie about a woman who comes out of a mirror and starts killing people. The movie is a bit slow but visually it's quite interesting and beautiful. We started watching the dubbed version and switched to the subbed (subtitled) version about half-way through. If you're going to watch this, watch the subbed version. The dubbed voices are flat and lack the right emotions which takes a LOT away from the movie. At least with the subbed version you hear the actor's emotions, which gives the movie so much more depth.

The second was Dance of the Dead, which is kind of a teenage comedy-horror with zombies that take over the town on prom night. This movie is all about teenagers - focusing on the scifi club ones - and we found it quite funny. The zombies are pretty good, although different from some other zombies, and there isn't that much gore. The only thing we didn't like was that the scifi club members didn't make lots of scifi-type comments when things happen. We have lots of friends who are geeky in that way and they all make comments from their favourite movies/books/graphic novels/games when anything happens. That criticism aside, we both enjoyed this movie very much. If you like teenage movies and/or zombie movies (or like one and don't mind the other), then you'll like this movie. I suspect  my nephews would like this one, too :)

Finally, some sewing!

After having traced and graded a couple of patterns, I'm now finally starting to sew one of them together. I'm using fabric that I bought a while ago but that isn't really something that I would necessarily wear. It's one of those "what was I thinking?" purchases, and yes, I make them both in clothes and in fabric. At least when I buy crappy fabric I can use it for something like test garments; when I buy bad clothes there's no hope for them for me :)

Anyways, I really like the pattern for the dress that I'm making and I hope that I don't have to make too many (read: any) alterations to it. This pattern is a little different than previous ones and is introducing me to new techniques: in particular, the collar extends from the front piece, joins at center back, and then is joined to the neck. It makes a nice looking collar but I've never made one like this before. This dress also has buttons down center front to the hip and below that is a pleat; I've never done this before, either. Hopefully it'll all look good when it's done.

I also just ordered this blue yarn-dyed cotton gingham on sale ; I don't know what I'm going to make with it, but checks were used a LOT in the fifties and would look good made up as many of the dresses I'm making. And blue is a good colour for me. And it was cheap; this seller has more gingham in navy and red, and she's got lots of fabric in stock.

But I don't feel old

Did I mention that I saw the physiotherapist yesterday? Yep, I saw her yesterday. She suggested that I might benefit from some massage on my back and legs in order to loosen the muscles there - they're very tight.

She also said that I should be stretching the muscles as much as possible because then I'll be more flexible and (theoretically, at least) I'll have less pain. I asked whether yoga would be a good idea and she said that yoga might definitely be something that would help.

We also talked a bit about the pain and weakness I have along the outside of my left leg. She said that the muscle is probably weak because of my back and that I should try to strengthen it, and that exercising my legs while in water would be a great way to do this. When I took swimming lessons before, there had been a class in the deep end where the ladies wore flotation belts and did aerobics... I think those ladies were older than me, though.

The last thing the physiotherapist suggested was that I get a back support thingy for the chairs I sit in - like an obusforme thing. Ian laughed because it's mostly older people that need these..... it's like all of a sudden my body got old!

Sigh. I don't know how much I've whined about my lower back here - it feels like I whine about it almost incessantly in person - but when it hurts, it hurts a LOT. The pain has become so much worse in the last six months that I sort of wonder what's going on. Hopefully it is just me getting old and not something like more mets or something.

Oh - and one other thing she said was that when she's flying, she wears pantyhose or compression stockings that she puts on before she leaves the house and removes when she's settled into her destination. Since she's done this, she's more comfortable during the flights and she has less jet-lag. Go figure! I think that the extra compression would make me feel more comfortable so the next time I fly anywhere (which I think will be in the summer), I'll wear some nylons or something and see how it goes.

Where is it cold?

Everywhere!! It was cold when I was in Edmonton and the cold followed me home while also settling down all over the country. Apparently it's only about -15C outside right now but it actually feels like it's about -100C with the wind and the moisture in the air. I think it's around -40C or -50C in Manitoba right now, which is even colder than here. Brrrr.

I tell you, I'm staying inside unless I absolutely have to go somewhere (like curling). I have my patterns, my internet, and my tv to keep me occupied.

Speaking of patterns, I have traced the pattern I'm going to use for my cherry corduroy fabric. I was going to grade them up today but then I decided I was tired, so they're sitting there waiting for me. I hope to finish the pattern tomorrow so that I can cut out the dress.

Fabric and pattern matching

While I was in Edmonton I bought fabric, which may not come as a surprise to those who know me :) I bought most of the fabrics from Sig Plach, a fabric store and couturier. They're having a sale where all of their fabrics are at least 20% off - and wow do they have great fabrics! Their customer service is also fantastic; every employee made us feel comfortable and welcome, no matter how long we were there or how many questions we asked. If you're in Edmonton, you should go there.

In addition to the gorgeous fabrics I bought, I have tons of fabric here at home, and lots and lots of patterns.

I spent this afternoon sitting on my sewing room floor with my fabrics neatly folded around me, trying to figure out what to sew next. My boxes of vintage patterns next sat to me so that I could periodically riffle through them, searching for the perfect pattern.

I found pattern and fabric matches for my spring stuff - and wow, do I have a LOT of pattern tracing and grading to do - but ultimately I came up empty for my winter patterns and fabrics. While I could start working on my spring and summer stuff, there's still quite a bit of winter left and I'd like to give myself new things :)

I kept looking through my patterns and my winter fabrics and not finding patterns to use for the fabrics I have. I didn't know what else to do so I started drawing some sketches of what I want the next dress to look like. This way, I was able pick a pattern that will work with the fabric I most want to use - a black featherwale corduroy with a cherry pattern - with a bit of alteration.

Now I have to figure out what to do with all of my knits and all of the new, gorgeous fabrics I bought :)

Changes, they are a-comin'

My meditation group started again today. I'm so glad that I went, even though I was tired, as I find the meditations keep me feeling emotionally even. I wasn't sure that I would get there because it starts at 10am and Ian had the car today but I managed to get myself up and out of bed to arrive on time.

It was really important to me to go to this group, just as it will be important to go to curling this week. I've been pretty lackadaisical about going to these and other events in the past but now I'm going to try and show up for everything to which I've committed (unless I'm sick, of course). I made this decision because when I was in Edmonton and people backed out of plans with me, I ended up feeling disappointed. It's not like I'd never had people back out of plans with me before, but for some reason I really noticed it this time and it bothered me.

So I got to thinking, and I realized that if it disappointed me when people backed out of plans with me, then it's likely that other people feel disappointed when I back out of plans with them. While I don't usually care all that much about what people think of me, I don't want to break commitments and disappoint people if I don't have to do that. So if I commit to doing something or being somewhere, then I'm going to work a lot harder to me to honour that commitment than before (where I might have blown off the event because I was shy or a little tired or whatever).

I'd like to think that this is a step towards living honestly and mindfully... and maybe growing up a little? Either way, I'll get more out of my meditation group if I actually show up for the group each week.

Home again

I arrived back in Waterloo last night. Leaving Edmonton felt bittersweet as I had a wonderful time with my friends and family, but I missed Ian so much.

This year's Christmas visit was longer than usual as I was there for over two weeks, and I'm really glad that I stayed so long this year. 2008 was such a difficult year with so many losses that I wanted to spend some time connecting with my loved ones. I felt that I accomplished that goal :)

I was thrilled to stay with my mom and her cat because she made her home so warm, welcoming, and comfortable. I loved getting to know my mom and my sisters again by spending time with each of them together and separately. I really enjoyed watching tv and movies and shopping and hanging out with each of them; I felt at home and comfortable and happy. It was a great visit and it was hard to leave.

Of course I'm happy to be home with Ian :) As much as I enjoyed my visit, it's good to be home.

Happy New Year!

Since this is my first post of the new year, I wish you and yours a healthy, happy, and prosperous new year.

I hope that your New Year's Eve was as fun as mine, which I spent mine with my sisters and my nephews playing games and eating. There was a lot of laughter, giggles, general silliness, and an all-around wonderful time. You can't have too much fun, I don't think. :)

I spent New Year's Day inside doing nothing at all, which was quite relaxing. I woke up today feeling a little stir-crazy, though - I'd been inside so much that I really needed to get out of the house. Even though it was around -30C (at least it was bright and sunny and not too windy). So my mom and I went downtown and did a little shopping.

Have I mentioned that I've been looking for an early winter coat, one that will be warm between about 10C and -10C? I finally found one today. Yay! I'd tried on this coat in a larger size back in Waterloo and I liked it but it was too big. I saw the one in a size smaller and it fit perfectly! I'm so thrilled with it. My other one was a touch tight on my hips, the zipper had a tendency to come undone from the bottom, and the lining was wearing thin. It was definitely time to replace it, and I hope I'll get to use it next week when the temperature is just below 0C in the daytime.

For some reason, I bought more socks as well. Normally I don't buy a kabillion pairs of socks but for some reason, almost all I've bought here have been socks. It's not like I didn't have socks, but I'm always on the lookout for soft, squishy socks and I found a few pairs. Hopefully I don't have too many socks now :)

I also managed to get a vintage pattern altered today. It's a one-piece dress with only four pattern pieces and I was able to trace the pieces and alter them for me in only about three or four hours. It used to take me a LOT longer to make the alterations before but I'm getting used to the kinds of alterations that I need to make now. Of course I'll still have to test out the revised pattern - I'm not so confident about my skills that I'd use the pattern as-is without a test first. I'm willing to do that for current patterns, because I know exactly what alterations to make and they always work, but it'll be a while before I'm that confident with my vintage patterns.

Tomorrow I think we're not doing anything, which will be relaxing. Maybe I'll work on more patterns :)

For once, I'm caught up on sleep

This is one of the most relaxing Christmas trips to Edmonton that I've had in a long, long time. I've done a little shopping with each of my sisters, got as much sleep as I need, and have been hanging out watching movies with my mom. We've seen a LOT of movies over the last few days :)

It's pretty cold here in Edmonton so I'm trying to not spend too much time outside. The cold plus the elevation tires me out pretty quickly. That's just fine, though, because I'm here for long enough that I'll be able to see everyone and do everything without feeling rushed.

My one sister, her daughter, and I went to a quilt fabric store on Saturday; they had lots of nice fabrics but none that really caught my eye. Today I went to a Fabricland with the other sister and again, there were lots of nice fabrics but none that jumped out at me cooing, "buy me... you know you want me." I'm hoping to go to a different fabric shop tomorrow; I might find something there.

We looked at clothes in the Bay on Saturday and in a Winners today. I saw nice coats in both places but both were well over $200 on sale and that's kind of a ridiculous amount to pay for a coat, now, isn't it? I've had fun trying on clothes, though. In many ways it's more fun to shop with people who are also trying on lots of clothes because I get to share the experience and get/give advice on the clothes being tried. Both of my sisters and I are going to go clothes (and maybe fabric?) shopping while I'm here and I'm really looking forward to that. I think my mom and I will also be fabric shopping one day; I'm really looking forward to that, too.

As long as I get my sleep in between shopping trips, I'm good to go :)

Both highs and lows today

My family celebrated Christmas today. It was great! My one sister hosted the celebration and made a yummy summper with a roast, yorkshire puddings, sweet potatoes, and potatoes. She also made many yummy cookies. I ate a lot of the pink ribbon ones :) Everyone seemed to like their gifts and we all talked and laughed and laughed and laughed. We finally got physically tired but this was a year where I think we couild have stayed for a couple of hours more if we didn't get so tired so quickly.

The day was not all filled with fun and great times, though. I found out that Janet, one of the women that I'd met in Westport, had died of metastatic breast cancer on Christmas Eve. We'd known that she wasn't doing well; on December 14 she was having a shunt put into her brain to release the swelling there from the brain mets and treatment, and her liver was not functioning well.

But she'd planned to go to England in February and she's made other summer plans and we'd hoped she'd pull through, but she didn't. She was 36, married to a wonderful man, and had a cute little pug. I loved her: she was kind and funny and compassionate and somehow always said the perfect thing. Janet was the cutest woman - she was shorter than me, even, and she looked gorgeous in hats. Her taste in clothes was eccentric but definitely cool. She was one of those people who everyone wanted to stand next to, and who everyone wanted to get to know better. This planet will not be the same without her.

My heart is breaking because she's dead - selfishly, I wish she was still here. I'm glad that she's not in pain or suffering anymore but I already miss her so much. I can only imagine how difficult this is for her husband - she worried about him, you know, and whether he would be ok after she was gone. I hope that he (and their dog) is ok.

I hope to see you again in a long, long, long time, my friend. Until then, be at peace, jellykins.

Merry Christmas!

I'm sitting here stuffed and happy after eating a huge, delicious meal and yummy desserts made by Ian's mom. I'm so full that I can't even think of eating - and I'd saved room for dessert!

Tomorrow I leave for Edmonton; hopefully the travel issues that have been plaguing the country will be gone. The terrible weather across the country has made traveling very difficult. I'm very glad that I haven't had to be in the airport or a train station waiting for my flight. And that my luggage didn't go on a trip without me. :) At least I know that I'll get to Edmonton somehow and I'll get to see my family. I'm so excited!

I hope that you all have a good Christmas tomorrow, filled with good presents and wonderful company. I'm sure you've all been good this year so Santa should be quite good to you all.

It's almost Christmas!!!

I can't believe that it's almost Christmas!!!! I've got all my shopping done but none of it is wrapped yet. I'll be getting up early tomorrow to get all the wrapping and laundry done. I'll be leaving home tomorrow to spend a couple of days with Ian's parent's and then I'm off to Edmonton. I have a lot to do tomorrow to be ready. We're doing laundry now but I still have a lot of packing and stuff yet to finish.

I'd meant to do more last night but my leg/back started hurting a LOT. I don't know what I'd done all day to get that kind of pain, but there it was. I did the exercises that the physiotherapist gave me, which helped a bit. The physiotherapist and I have determined that the pain in my leg is referred from my lower back, probably around the sacroiliac joint . She said that if I have pain in my lower back not to do whatever exercise thing I'm doing and if the pain goes into my leg to stop doing the thing immediately. Ummm, when I go walking, the pain starts in my lower back and eventually winds up in my legs... I guess that's not good, is it? :(

Sometime after I get back from Edmonton in January, I need to see my family doctor about my lower back. My physiotherapist is encouraging me to find out what's going on there. I do think that it's related to improper dragonboat paddling posture and I hope that there's something that can be done to lessen the pain.

You wouldn't think that I'd be in such pain, would you, because I take a boatload of painkillers? Well, yeah, me too. But the pain in my lower back has been increasing steadily over time and since I'm not taking the painkillers for it, I'm not going to go and increase those ones. There is another one - Celebrex - that lessens the pain at night. But even taking that, the pain is going up.

I was reading about treatment for sacroiliac joint pain there and I suspect that there's not that much that can be done aside from physiotherapy (my physiotherapist says that I may be one of the most stiff and least flexible person she's dealt with). And maybe a chiropractor; sometimes (more often, lately) it feels like my vertebrae shift in my lower back, upper back, and neck will "thuk" into the right space, which feels awesomely incredible when it happens. If only I knew how to make that happen all the time :)

More sewing fun

All I have left to do on my dress is to tack down the facings and sew on the buttons. Yay! I spent most of my time today putting in the invisible zipper.

Once the invisible zipper has been sewn into the seam, the next step is to close the seam below (and possibly above) the zipper. This is currently the part of  inserting the zipper with which I have the most trouble. Because the zipper teeth lie right on the seamline and create a bump there, it's very hard to join the seam below without going off-track or making a bump or bubble on the right side of the garment.

In the past I've just sewn the last stitch or two by hand, which makes the seam look perfect. However, I'd rather avoid hand-sewing, if possible. So today I took extra time with the invisible zipper, trying to find a way to sew this part by machine. I think I've got a technique that'll work but I want to give it a try some more before I post it.

I'm really looking forward to finishing this dress - and the pants, too. I hemmed them today and all I have left to do to finish them is to sew the waist fasteners in place. Sounds like fun, huh? :)

Snowmageddon

We had a winter storm (dubbed "snowmageddon" by some local news people) blow through today so I stayed cozy inside instead of venturing out into the storm. I sewed all afternoon and part of the evening, and now I'm almost finished the vintage pattern dress that I'm working on. I'm so excited - it looks really, really good and I already know that it fits :) It's going to be so awesome!!!!

All I have left to do is put in the zipper and buttons/buttonholes, hem it, and hand-sew the facings down. It'll take a while to do all that but not as long as you might think - I have a procedure for putting invisible zippers in so I don't have to undo and redo the zipper if things don't match.

Well, ok, it's not much of a procedure, but it works for me: first, baste the seam to receive the zipper closed, making sure that the match points and cross-seams are matched. Press the basted seam open. Lay the invisible zipper right-side down on the seam allowances, lining up the middle of the zipper with the basted seamline and pinning one side in place. Sew that side of the zipper tape to the seam allowance only, keeping the rest of the fabric out of the way. Then make sure that the zipper is flat on the opened seam allowance, and pin and sew the remaining zipper tape to the other side of the seam allowance. Remove the basting stitches and stitch the invisible zipper in place using the invisible zipper foot.

I use invisible zippers for almost everything because I like to hide the dress fastenings. I kept running into problems lining up cross-seams and other match points when inserting the zipper and that's when I came up with the system above. I usually end up stitching the zipper tape to the seam allowances anyways because otherwise the seam can be too bulky. And there's your sewing tip for the day. :)

I can't wait to wear the dress! I wish it wasn't so cold out because I really do want to wear it. It's a cold-weather dress but it's not designed for a winter storm or the kind of cold that the West is getting. I mention the West because I'm going to Edmonton next week to spend a couple of weeks there. Of course I'll bring this dress with me - it's cold there right now but it might be nice before I leave. Stranger things have happened :)

Where did those come from?

I've been feeling out of sorts over the last few days: I've been alternating between rage and tears with calm times in between. I was driving around today and I was really angry at one point, which doesn't improve my driving (some might say that it has the opposite effect), so I calmed myself down and tried to figure out just why I'm so emotional. I can't be PMSing because I don't have the hormones around to do that.

I realized that part of the reason I was angry right then was because of the driving experience: there are more people on the road than usual, and many of those people seem to be unaccustomed to driving and/or don't know where they're going. I'm the kind of person who knows where I'm going and I want to get there; people who are meandering around in their cars drive me nuts.

But I haven't been driving all the time that I've been emotional lately. Of course I have been in quite a lot of pain lately because of my tooth and sinus.... and thinking back, pain makes me cranky and when I'm cranky I get moody. So I expect that a large part of my moodiness is related to the pain I feel - chronic pain is a terrible thing.

I don't think that's the whole story, though. I know that there's the Christmas stuff going on and I'm still mourning my dad, but I don't think that these are the major components of my present moodiness. Remember I was asking about what I could tell people when they ask what I do? I've realized that the real issue here is more that I need to learn to value what I do right now and not what I used to do. And I think this is what's bothering me most now: I'm searching for meaning in my life. You wouldn't think that this would make me angry and teary, would you? Well, except that searching for meaning tends to leave me feeling a bit down, and that easily transforms itself into anger and sadness.

So.... knowing this, I can hopefully deal with it in some way. I have more tools in my arsenal now with the meditation and journaling so maybe I can do this without avoiding the negative issues altogether.

Not really a seasonal movie, but still a good one

Any time of year is a good time of year for a zombie movie :) Land of the Dead was on tv tonight! I'd never seen it before and I'm really glad we watched it tonight. it's awesome! Even better, much of it was shot in Toronto - I recognize the lobby of the

The movie takes place after zombies have already wiped out most of humanity and lives in fortified cities with power and a sort of frontier culture. They have hardware and make runs out to the surrounding city to get things. One alpha-zombie starts to follow them and leads the rest of the zombies to the fortified city.

There are other things going on in the movie and there's a whole story to the whole thing, but for me the best part was the zombies and their behaviour. I found this movie a bit scarier than most of the other movies I've watched because in many ways it seemed more realistic. Watching the zombies learn to use tools and to overrun the city was breathtakingly frightening. There are scenes in the movie that are a bit disturbing (such as when the zombies are feeding, as well as some of the deaths) but for the most part, it isn't too gory.

We really enjoyed this movie and highly recommend it. Even during the holiday season.

Things are getting done

I chose the fabric for my dress today - after hemming and hawing and looking over many of my fabrics, I chose the fabric that I bought in Lexington. Apparently it was called Stratosphere by Robert Kaufman (although the fabric has been discontinued and is quite hard to find) and it comes in several colourways. My favourite colourway is the one I'm using: the one used in this bag. Isn't it gorgeous? The light and medium blue circles with the white lines pop off of the black background! I love love love this fabric soooo much and I think it'll look beautiful in this dress.

I only managed to cut out the pieces today because I got up late and had to get my port flushed. Fortunately, the home care nurse was able to flush my port without help. Unfortunately, the nurse was there for about an hour which cut into my available time. I didn't mind that much because it sounded like she had a lot going on with some patients that weren't doing well. So if it helped her to just sit for a bit and use my phone, well, that's ok with me.

After all that was done, I had an earring order that had to be packaged and mailed today. I tell you, even though I haven't put up much in the way of new products lately, I've certainly managed to sell a few things. I have some earrings that I'm part-way through photographing; I hope to have them up soon or else in the new year. :)

Thanks for your suggestions

I've finished working on one of my vintage patterns and I'm very, very pleased with the fit. I did a sample outfit to make sure everything was where it should be and, well, it is :) Even Ian said that the dress lines and fit were flattering on me. Now all I have to do is figure out which  fabric to use - I'm thinking of using my cherry corduroy fabric but I also have this houndstooth that's really nice. We'll see.

Thanks for all of your one-line answer suggestions and wording for when people ask what I do. I never really thought about talking about what I consider my hobbies - making jewelry and sewing - instead of talking about where I was working when I worked outside the home.

I was thinking about this today and I realized that one of the reasons I find this so hard is that I'm still not in a place where I feel that I'm contributing to society. And even though I know that it shouldn't matter, I worry that if I tell people that I'm not working in the workforce, they'll think less of me. If we had kids I could say that I was a mom and I feel that would be more socially acceptable than not working at all.

But being home without kids and not working isn't something our society really values, at least in my mind. Or maybe it's something that I never really valued - after all, I valued work over almost everything else - and so I'm having a hard time valuing my non-work contributions to society and the people around me. I think it would be healthier for me to accept my life and value it for what it is, but doing that will take time.

I was also thinking about whether or not to tell people that the reason I'm not working is because I have cancer. I usually don't to tell people about the cancer because I feel that it's too deep of a subject for a light social gathering and because I don't really want to deal with people's reactions to my cancer. Not to mention the fact that I want people I meet to see that there's more to me than just the cancer - in other words, I don't want to be defined solely by my cancer. So unless people push it - and make no mistake, some do - I think I won't mention the cancer.

Finally, I've also been thinking about whether and how to word the fact that I'm not working because of a medical issue. Do I say that I'm on long-term disability, on leave, on medical leave, on disability, or something else? I know that I'm on disability and all, but I don't like to think of myself as disabled, you know? I guess I'm not quite comfortable with that label so I think I wouldn't say LTD or disability, which leaves the "on leave" options. Of course being on medical leave is true whereas being on leave isn't quite as precisely true.

Hmmmmmm.... it just occurred to me that if I could just get over the fact that I seem to place more value on my work as an employee than on living my life, I wouldn't even need to tell people that I have an employer, would I? I could dodge that bullet altogether!

So all I have to do in order to find the optimal phrase - and believe it, which is important to me - is get over the fact that I don't work outside the home for someone, and learn to value my intangible contributions to society and the people around me, and talk about those. Thanks, everyone!

Where has all the time gone?

Christmas is less than two weeks away and of course we hadn't done much in the way of shopping before now. The holiday kind of crept up on me, which isn't that much of a surprise given that I've been sick and all. The days have all sort of blended together with the only remarkable days being the ones where I either get something done or I'm in pain.

The other day I was in pain; I thought that my temporary filling had come out. I saw another dentist to check it out and fortunately, the filling is fine; it's the sinus that's the problem. They did an xray and showed me that the edge of the root of that tooth rests against the sinus cavity - I knew the root was close to the edge but not that they were basically lying next to each other.

Today I got stuff done: Ian and I got much of our shopping done today. We didn't have to go to that many places but I was so exhausted afterwards that I needed a big 3-hour nap. There's something about being in crowds of packs of slow-moving people that is quite draining. We need to do a bit more shopping but we get to rest tomorrow. I hope that this means that tomorrow will be a day where I get some pattern work done. :)

I need a better one-line answer

Ian's Christmas party was tonight. I didn't quite finish the dress in time - if I'd had an extra couple of hours I could have done it but the time wasn't there. I wore the outfit I already had, which was fine - I looked good :) I definitely will finish the dress (and re-use the pattern) because it looks good on me.

The party was fun; we had turducken for dinner and some kind of creamy pudding thing for dessert. The opening salad was very elegantly displayed: the salad dressing was contained in a hollowed out cucumber and the vegetable toppings were spilling out of a tomato. It was both lovely and delicious!

I got to meet pretty well everyone at Ian's company that I haven't met before, so I'll know who he's talking about when he tells me what's going on :)

The thing is, whenever I meet new people, they ask what I do for a living.... and I don't know what to tell them. Tonight I awkwardly mumbled some stuff about "being on medical leave", or "on leave right now" from the company I work for. I'm uncomfortable telling people that I'm at home because I don't have kids and I feel weird about not having a job, you know? I feel like I need a good, one-line thing to tell people that is truthful, rolls off the tongue easily, but doesn't give too much away - do any of you have one?

Still sick and still sewing

Ian's company Christmas party is on Friday.... and although I have an outfit to wear, it's always nice to have something new. I have some black lace striped fabric and some shiny black lightweight satin stuff, and looking through my patterns, I thought the fabrics would work for the dress in this pattern (with the satin fabric used on the neck and waist part). I think it'll look good if I finish in time and if I don't, as I say, I have another outfit to wear.

Of course I didn't decide to do this until about 4pm today. :) Since then, I've managed to get the pattern altered, the lace cut out, and the lace top sewn. I thought I would do french seams for the lace seams and darts because the serger left the seams a little stiffer than I wanted. It takes a little longer, but I'm happy with the results so far. I expect to be quite lazy when it comes to the rest of the dress and so it shouldn't take too long to finish. I hope. :)

I am happy to report that although I'm still sick, I'm feeling a bit better - my throat is less sore, although my ears are still as stuffy.

I'm so, so, so tired of being sick

Oh, will this tiredness and sore throat never end? I saw a doctor about my throat today but there's no bacterial infection and so there was nothing that he could give me. He did prescribe some eyedrops for the eye that's infected - yes, one of my eyes has pinkeye. Again.

I also talked to the dentist who did the temporary filling, and since the tooth does feel a bit better since the temporary filling (it's hard to tell, because the rest of my face feels awful), I can have that filling replaced when I get back from Edmonton. I don't want to take a chance on getting it replaced before I go because I don't want to be sicker before I go. I just hope that the temporary filling isn't what's making my throat sore.

Later on, I saw the oral surgeon that had ordered the CT scan of my jaw. The CT scan came back fine - there's no osteonecrosis or mets there or anything. He did say that the tooth that's been sore is VERY close to the nearby sinus cavity, and that that sinus cavity showed thickening in the CT scan (indicating a sinus infection, which is probably chronic since I didn't have symptoms at that time). He thinks that the tooth irritates the sinus cavity which irritates the tooth and which irritates the sinus cavity and on and on... and that the chronic sinus infection flares up when that tooth is worked on - which is why I get so sick after the fillings.

So.... I'll be on amoxycillin for the next days and on the eyedrops for seven days. After that, if I'm not all the way better, the oral surgeon wants to send me to see an ear, nose, and throat specialist.

The doctor said I should feel better within two days of starting the antibiotics. I'm really hoping that Thursday brings me good health.

Starting to feel better

Finally, my sore throat is gone and I'm feeling mostly better. My ears - well, one ear; yesterday it was the left one and today it's the right - are stuffed up so I can't hear all that well. The tv is up much louder than usual tonight, much to Ian's surprise :) I have a small cough that is bringing stuff up which I don't like but until it gets worse, I'll try and ignore it.

While I've been sick I haven't been outside much which is all to the good, really. We've had a LOT of snow over the last week or so and it's starting to get cold out there. Bundling up to go outside is more work than it's worth. It sure looks pretty from here, though.

I've been working on my sewing patterns. I've made some adjustments to one and have traced out another top. It turns out that the table I use for making jewelry is a great size for working on patterns. I'm looking forward to trying out these patterns when I'm feeling even better.

How can I still be sick?

I'm still sick - ugh. My throat is still very sore and has little red bumps all over the place, making it difficult to swallow. I have almost no appetite, partly because it hurts to swallow and partly because I'm still tasting the anaesthetic in the zoe filling. I did a bit of research and I discovered that some people are sensitive to one of the components of the filling (one that's used in perfumes). I guess it's possible that my sore throat is from the filling.

Then again, I could just be sick - and since Ian is not feeling his very best right now, it's possible that I really am sick with something that I gave to Ian. We've been careful to limit contact and wash our hands and stuff so it's also possible that we've both picked up something that's going around.

At least I'll get lots of rest this weekend, even if I wish I could get some sewing done. Maybe next week.

How can I be sick again?

I'm sick again. My throat is sore, my ears are plugged, my sinuses hurt, my head hurts, I'm exhausted, and I think I'm running a fever. I can't find my thermometer, so I'm not sure about the fever but I woke up drenched twice last night and since I don't get night sweats I figure it's fever.

So Stephen Harper managed to prorogue Parliament until January 26. It's made the news around the world. I guess the thinking is that the time off will make the coalition fail and will give people time to think about things. I wish that the Conservatives would stop the rhetoric crap about how the coalition is wrong and unconstitutional, because they're wrong. The coalition's efforts are allowed by the constitution, in fact. It annoys me to no end to think that the Conservatives are deliberately manipulating people by lying to them and stretching the truth.

I got to go to the dentist today

Did you know that if local anaesthetic is injected very sloooowly, it doesn't hurt? It's true. The endodontist replaced one of my fillings with a temporary one today to see if that tooth is hurting because of the old filling. The endodentist also said that when the anaesthetic is injected slowly, the freezing takes better than if it's injected quickly. From now on, I'm asking anyone giving me local anaesthetic to do it slowly so that it don't have to hurt anymore.

My face isn't completely unfrozen yet and I look sort of like a stroke victim - my face is puffy from my lip to my eye on that side. Attractive it is not :)

My throat is a little sore as well, and it's occurred to me that the last time I had a filling done, I wound up with pneumonia afterward. Hmmm. How could that happen? I hope that I don't wind up with pneumonia (even the walking kind) again.

Oh yeah, I get to see my actual dentist tomorrow, too. I guess this is going to be a week of dentistry goodness.

These are interesting times

Normally federal Canadian politics are pretty boring compared to politics around the country. There aren't that many controversies or scandals, and things that happen during the Parliamentary sessions are unremarkable.

You might remember that we had an election about six or eight weeks ago and another election about two years ago, and that both elections resulted in minority governments. This means that no one party holds power and so in order to pass new bills, lots of compromise needs to be made with other parties to get them to vote for the proposals. This can be good because it brings balance to new bills and has apparently wrought some of the best legislation ever passed. A minority government is inherently unstable because no one holds all the power.

Right now, the Conservative party headed by Stephen Harper forms the minority government, and that's almost certainly going to change one way or another. The other parties that have seats in the House -  the Liberals, NDP, and Bloc Quebecois - have hammered out a deal where they will form a coalition government (well, the Bloc will support this government but not be part of it) for the next thirty months if a non-confidence vote in the Conservative government next Monday is passed *and* the Governor General approves.

This is so exciting!! Only one event , 80 years ago, comes close to this proposal. And there's no guarantee that this crazy proposal will go through - the Governor General can decide to hold yet another election if a House vote shows non-confidence in the Conservatives. Nevermind the fact that the last two elections resulted in minority governments and another election would probably do the same thing. Not to mention that elections are expensive and why, in these times, would we spend money on that - the Governor General could make this call.

Apparently there's a third possible outcome, and that's is if the Prime Minister suspends but does not dissolve Parliament (prorogues it). A non-confidence vote could then not take place - but then, neither could any other business. I suspect that this option would delay the inevitable non-confidence vote, but I'm not sure.

This is all very exciting and will definitely be an historic event no matter how it plays out. The non-confidence vote is set for December 8. I don't know what the long-term implications are for any of these options, so I expect to be doing some research over the next week. And glued to the tv/internet next Monday :)

What do you all think? Do any of these options appeal to you? Which do you think would be best for the country in the current economic climate (they're saying we're in a recession and the Big 3 automakers aren't doing well, which will have huge impacts on Ontario)?

Fun and games

Our fun today started with seeing Bolt , a Disney movie that came out about a week ago. It's an animated movie (available in 3D, in some places) about a dog who thinks that he really is the star he plays in a tv show. Thinking his person is in danger, he tries to help her and ends up on quite a journey. Sound sappy? It isn't. In fact, this is a GREAT movie!!!!!!! I was bouncing up and down in my seat because parts of it were so awesome (Ian said that it was fun to watch me watching the movie), and in some parts I laughed so hard I couldn't breathe.

Yes, this movie has a PG rating and so if you see it in the theatre, you'll share the space with kids, but there isn't that much downtime in it so the kids don't talk too much. The animation is spectacular and there isn't much gratuitous 3D imagery (you know, like where they show an object coming at you from the screen for no particular reason).

We strongly recommend this movie - go see it! This is a movie that I could definitely see again and again.... In fact, I'd love to see it with my family - we're similar in some ways and I can see us really enjoying watching this movie with each other.

After the movie, we played Rockband 2. I didn't really notice much in the way instrument upgrades (I sing when we play) but I really like the songs available for it. It has songs from bands that friends and I used to sing along to, including Duran Duran, Journey, Billy Idol, and more - see the setlist. It's awesome singing along to those old pop classics! Sure, I like the rock songs but I definitely liked the lighter stuff, too.
The increased variety of included songs in Rockband 2 over Rockband means that there's something for almost everyone, so it would be an even better game to play with a diverse group of people.

Black Friday shopping

Today is "Black Friday " in the US - the Friday after Thanksgiving, where US retailers have huge sales and expect to get into the black for the year. Every year there are stories about the sales and the huge numbers of people that vie for the best bargains. In addition to those stories, there's a much more serious one out there.

A Wal-Mart employee was trampled today after a huge crowd of people broke down the doors to get in and shop. Four other people (including a pregnant woman) were also hurt in the stampede. Photos show that huge numbers of people were massed up against the doors in an obviously uncontrollable mob.

I'm shocked and appalled at this news. I know that people like bargains, but is rushing in and trampling someone to get a bargain worth it? Of course it's not just the people seeking bargains that are at fault here. If Wal-Mart had controlled the situation better at a much earlier stage, that man might not have died. Why were people allowed to just gather in a mob behind the doors, pressing against them before they even opened? Why weren't some of the extra security people outside forcing the people into some kind of line? What the hell was Wal-Mart thinking?

I'm not usually one for litigation, but I very much hope that Wal-Mart gets their butts sued off over this. There's no excuse for this tragedy. Wal-Mart should be held responsible for failing to have adequate measures in place to control this type of situation. They should be held responsible for failing to protect their employees. I very much hope that the unions finally gain a foothold in Wal-Mart as a result of this incident. I'm not normally a huge fan of unions, but I think that the Wal-Mart workers need a safe place to work. And I don't think that Wal-Mart can be trusted to provide one.

I don't know why this particular incident bothers me so much, but it does. Maybe it's because it's Wal-Mart (I don't like them), or maybe because this death could have been avoided with a little forethought, or maybe it's because the person died because people were in such a rush to buy stuff and get good bargains. Ugh.

Happy US Thanksgiving, everyone.

There's more day when I'm awake for it

I can get so much more done when I get up early - well, early for me, which is about 10am. I was able to get some more sewing done and to feel like I was a real person. I felt like I had time for everything and that I could do as much or as little as I wanted, but I didn't feel lethargic or tired. It was a refreshing change from the last few days.

I did get the waistband attached to the pants (although I haven't attached the waistband facing to the top of the pants) and tried them on, and I think they look good. They seem to fit really well and I think I'll be happy with them.

I love it when pants come together

The fly zipper on the pants I'm making turned out to be not too hard. It's the first fly zipper I've ever done; fortunately, the instructions were fairly easy to follow and I didn't have to rip any seams out. There was a lot of basting but I'm learning that basting is a good thing :)

There's a wide, contoured waistband on these pants that is supposed to be cut so that the straight grain is horizontal in center front and back. You might remember that I'm using a herringbone fabric with several different gray warp fibers, giving the fabric a subtle stripe. I had actually cut the waistband out with the grain as designed but then I realized that this wouldn't be all that flattering. I've made that mistake before: the horizontal stripe in front goes downward at the sides and makes my belly look bigger. I don't need my clothes helping my belly look bigger :)

So I recut the outer waistband on the bias (adding a seam in center back) which will look soooooo much better. I can still use the previously-cut lining pieces because the grain of the lining isn't so important; as well, the straight grain (and interfacing on the outer fabric) will help to stabilize the outer waistband. Hopefully I'll finish the pants tomorrow, if I'm up early enough. I think (hope) that they're going to look good.

Of course I'm still making pattern grading adjustments to another dress (a kimono-sleeved empire waist with a full-ish gored skirt) and I want to start work on grading up a top or two. So much sewing, so little time! I wish I was faster at all this ... then again, if I actually spent a few hours in the sewing room each day instead of once in a while, I'd get so much more done.

I appreciate all of the support you've given me since I've been feeling down. It might be time for a new antidepressant, or it could be the time of year (it is gray out there with all of the snow, and there's less light). One thing that's definitely contributing is the uptick in pain I've been experiencing in the mets in my sternum. The pain isn't so bad that I need to take breakthrough painkillers (although even extra Tylenol helps) but it's now this constant, low-level ache with occasional extra twinges of pain. Add to this the pain in my leg and I've got a recipe for depression.

I know I should see a doctor about the pain and I will, eventually. I'd expect my family doctor to increase my pain meds, but if I don't quite need breakthrough medications, it's hard to increase the fentanyl. The mets pain could be from the Pamidronate, I guess, or I could be developing a tolerance to the fentanyl, maybe. I see my oncologist in early February and I'll definitely talk to her about this then. I don't understand how I can have pain in the sternal mets if the mets themselves are stable and not growing - unless the pain is because the bone is growing over the mets. Anyways, if the pain gets a lot worse  I'll call my family doctor.

Heck, maybe changing my antidepressants will make the pain go away :)

I knew the hospital was bad...

After what a friend told me about our local hospital, there's no way that I would want to go there if I was really sick. I don't want to give away too many details, but she was on chemo and very sick and they told her that there was nothing they could do - but they didn't do any scans or try and find out why she was so sick. If she hadn't gone to another hospital over an hour away, she would have died.

I knew that my local hospital - especially the emergency room - wasn't that good, but honestly, I had no idea that they were that bad. If I ever get really sick, please remind me that I want to go somewhere else.

Grey days

Maybe it's because I'd been sleeping so much, or because there's snow on the ground, or because I've been doing nothing at all, but I've been feeling a bit down lately. It's nothing major - I'm still on antidepressants and all - but I've been feeling fat, lethargic, and like the days are endless without meaning. Everything is looking sort of grey and colourless and I haven't felt really happy for the last couple of days.

I did feel a bit better today once I got up and did some pattern work - I finished some new-to-me alterations and need to test them. Hopefully I'll continue to feel better as I do stuff over the next few days.

One thing that brightened my day was that my wallet came back to me. The money was gone, of course, but everything else was still there. Including the earrings I thought I'd lost - there were three pairs in my wallet: the first pair of earrings I'd ever made, a pair with the first set of earwires I'd ever made, and a crystal pair that Ian and I had bought. Yeah, I was worried about the ID, but I was most distraught about losing the earrings. Silly, huh? But there it is.

Almost normal again

Ok, I got up at noon today and I think I've finally caught up on my sleep. This means that I can start getting up at a normal time - yay!

I forgot to tell you one thing that I learned at the physiotherapist; the pain I have in my lower back is NOT at the L5-S1 degeneration site. The pain is lower and goes along the edge of the pelvic bone (when the physiotherapist  checked that edge, it hurt like crazy). And here all this time I thought I knew why it hurt so much there; I was wrong.

Oh, and one other thing: the physiotherapist also said that it's possible that the pain in my leg could be a circulatory problem. I'm not thinking about that - my dad died after having surgery for his circulation problems, and while I know that if I've got circulation problems they're not that bad, I don't want to have the same thing wrong with me that killed my dad. You know?

Once again, it's not all in my head

Apparently I really do have pain in my leg. I saw a physiotherapist yesterday and she was able to see the area that hurts - it's red and swollen. She thinks that I might have pulled my hamstring ages ago - like two years ago - and the muscle has never fully healed. She said that my meds might have slowed the healing process.

I must say, it's comforting to know that the pain isn't all in my head. She wants me to wear a compression garment (either a stocking or shorts) and to heat and rest the muscle. I could ice it, too, but it doesn't like the cold. I'm also to cut down on the amount of exercising I do to no more than 10 minutes per session.

If after two weeks of treating it gently it doesn't get better, she said that we're going to be mean to it by stretching it. I already know that stretching hurts - it feels like it needs to be stretched but when I try and do it, it hurts like crazy - but I can see that I might have to suck it up and get it stretched anyways. And of course she'd give me exercises to do.

I don't know what's going on with me these days, but I'm exhausted and my mets are twitchy. I'm sleeping pretty well all the time right now. I'm hoping that this ends soon because sleeping all night, all morning, all afternoon, and most of the early evening isn't much of a life, you know?

My Westport trip

Friday night in Westport was pretty low-key; once all of us had arrived, we decided to go out to dinner. I chose Mexican because we don't have any good Mexican restaurants in Waterloo. We ended up driving around in circles for a while because the person driving wasn't able to get her bearings. The food was exceptionally good although the restaurant was full of really, really drunk people so the atmosphere left something to be desired.

Everyone who was going to be there was there on Saturday. Most of us got together for breakfast (it was included in the hotel price), after which I decided I'd walk down to the drugstore. I thought it was really close but it turned out to be about a mile and a half away. I saw a TD bank on my way there, which surprised me - later, someone said that they'd just taken over another bank. At least I was able to stop at the bookstore on the way back :) I bought a book I'd been interested in before: Books of Blood (Volumes 1-3) by Clive Barker. I'll have to get the volumes 4-6 as well - I looove the stories. I hadn't expected to go on such a big walk and slept while others went down to the beach.

That night, the person who knew the area best suggested we go to an Italian restaurant. She called the owner who said that he could fit us in as long as we showed up by 6pm as he had a reservation for 15 at 7:30pm. We're a group of 13 at this point, and if any of you are familiar with groups of this size, you'll know that getting the entire group together at the same time is like herding cats.

We were supposed to all meet at 5:45pm to figure out car assignments. Everyone finally showed up by 6:05pm and we all made it to the restaurant by 6:30pm. Remember our reservations were for 6pm? Yep, we were late. The owner was in a tizzy because he had this huge group coming in at 7:30pm but he assured us that he could serve us all within 15 minutes. Ha ha.

The meal was delicious and finished around 8pm. I don't know of any restaurant that can serve 13 people in 15 minutes :) We all met afterward in one person's room for some chatting, italian desserts, and fun. There was a lot of laughter (much of it inappropriate) and good times.

On Sunday, the person who knew the area arranged for us all to go to dinner at The Dressing Room , which is the restaurant that Paul Newman part-owned (apparently she knew the family). The restaurant serves only organic food. The food was *delicious*. For dessert I had angel food cake lightly pan-fried and then drizzled in honey, served with vanilla ice cream. It was soooooo gooooood. And it's something that we could make at home :)

I ate a little too much at dinner and my painkiller patches expired during dinner so I ended up feeling like crap afterwards. A lot of people got together that night but there was no way I could have done that - once I got my patches changed, I went to bed.

We all did a little bit of shopping on Monday at Anthropologie and Balducci's . I fell in love with a coat at Anthropologie but they didn't have it in my size, which is just as well - it was $328USD. I fell in love with many of the clothes there because they have such beautiful detailing on all of their clothes. I can make clothes and I want to put detailing on them, but I don't really know what would look good without looking homemade. I signed up to receive their catalogs as inspiration.

Balducci's carries a lot of organic foods and whatnot. After that shopping, some people went downtown and I went to bed, where I stayed until Tuesday morning. I kid you not - I slept through dinner and everything. I've been exhausted since then, as you know.

All in all, it was a fantastic visit. I'm so very glad that I went, even though I was nervous and anxious. I met some great people that I hope to see again. I hope that I gave everyone as much as I felt I got - there were so many wise, wonderful women there that I feel indebted to them.

Home again

Yep, I'm back! I'm still very tired so I'll give you all of the details tomorrow - for now, I'll say that I had a great time. I enjoyed meeting everyone and had quite a few laughs and a lot of food. I'm so glad to have met everyone and I hope to see everyone again.

The only dark spot on the whole trip is that when I boarded my last plane to come home 15 minutes before it took off, I realized that I didn't have my wallet. I got off the plane and looked for it but it was gone. I've already canceled my credit cards and whatnot. I guess it would have been a lot better if I hadn't had my birth certificate and SIN card in there. Yes, I know that this was stupid on my part.

Still, if someone fashions a new identity out of my stuff, I hope I end up young and glamorous and rich. You know, like they show in the commercials.

UPDATE: Someone just called me from the airport (at 11:30pm!) to tell me that they've got the wallet and it's still got the credit cards. Yippee! I have to make arrangements to get it here but at least there's a possibility that I'll get it and the important things back.

Leaving on a jet plane

Tomorrow I'm off to Westport, CT to spend a few days with some of the women from the Young Survival Coalition bulletin board who have mets. I'm excited about the trip and a little nervous, too. Of course I need reading material for my trip but I didn't want to have to buy it all in the airport as it costs a lot there.

I read a lot, you know - I mean a LOT. I read mostly fiction with a focus on science fiction, fantasy, and horror (of course). I've always loved reading and have a number of favourites that I read over and over again. However, buying books can be expensive and it's hard to try new authors if I have to pay for the books.

So after having lived in Waterloo continuously for more than five years now, today I finally went out and got myself a library card. I took out three books to read on the trip (I have a couple of layovers in the airports) and I'm very much looking forward to using the library.

I don't expect to be posting in my blog much while I'm away, so please don't be surprised if there's nothing new for a few days. I'll do what I can to keep you all updated, of course. :)

An answer to a Bird's Nest question

While watching the Olympics, I'd wondered why the Bird's Nest didn't have a retractable roof as it was raining down on the competitors and they were getting soaked.

Tonight, I finally got an answer while watching a National Geographic Megastructures show. The original plans did call for a less-open roof and a retractable roof. After the collapse in the Charles de Gaulle airport , construction on the Bird's Nest was suspended for five months while investigations took place. Apparently there were some similarities in construction between the two structures and no one wanted the same thing to happen again.

After the consultations, the design was changed and the retractable roof was scrapped. Now I know why the competitors were rained on. :)

From conception to construction, this was a unique, one-of-a-kind building. Even the steel they used was newly developed especially for the structure so that it would be strong and flexible, both able to withstand earthquakes and be flexible enough to bend and twist over the curves of the building. It's an amazing achievement. I think I'd like to see it someday.

Not have been the best idea, maybe

The Pamidronate infusion and de-access went well on Monday. Whew! I've been pretty tired since I got it but that's normal.

I had the chance to get the flu shot today and I took it. I'm supposed to get it each year anyways and getting it earlier is better. Of course the flu shot isn't without side effects - it leaves me tired and physically sore for a few days afterward.

So, umm, I guess it shouldn't have surprised me that this morning's flu shot, on top of Monday's Pamidronate, knocked me out all afternoon.

There's a part of me that wishes I'd been able to have more time between the Pamidronate and the flu shot. The fact that I was knocked out for the entire afternoon - and I'm still tired, feeling a little nauseous, and starting to feel a bit achy - tells me that the next couple of days are going to be less than productive. I'd kind of hoped to get some sewing or pattern work or jewelry done (yes, I have an idea or two about new pieces that I'd like to make) but I think I'm going to have to adjust my expectations.

If I could go anywhere, where would it be?

You know, I don't think of the things that I want to do someday as a "bucket list" but I guess that's what they are. One thing that I'd love to be able to do is travel. I'd like to see some of Europe, and Australia, and all of that.

But what I *really* ache to do is travel to the Arctic or the Antarctic. There are cruises that will take a person there, believe it or not. Personally, I think that being able to see those places would be just about the most awesome thing in the world. I admit that it's a little strange for the woman who gets cold to want to go to the coldest places on the planet, but I have my reasons. :)

One reason I want to see those places in particular is because they are so pristine and virtually untouched by people. They're an example of the raw, harsh splendour of the planet and of Mother Nature. To me, going those places would be the ultimate in being one with nature. I'd love to go into space, too (oh! to travel to other planets! My heart cries at the thought that I'll never do that), but since that's out of the question, our polar regions are just about the next best thing. There are hardly any people there; they're places where a person can be almost completely alone.

I'm also in awe of the people who discovered those regions and I want to see what they saw. Those places have changed but in many ways they're timeless; it's not like the areas were discovered and then overrun with people or tourists.

I suppose that these types of trips are another way of walking away and leaving everything behind because my current life wouldn't fit there. I wonder if going to these places would quench that desire? Or would it awaken it further?

More sewing fun

You might remember that I've started sewing some pants out of the fabulous grey fabric I bought. I think the pants are going to look great when I finish them (the skirt I made out of the fabric looks awesome!). I knew when I started making the pants that there might be some tricky things to do as it's a Vogue pattern.

The pattern has welt pockets just below the waistband. I've dealt with welt pockets in jackets and whatnot, but never in this particular location. Oh my goodness, getting them exactly right was a challenge! Both of them were supposed to be 4 1/4" wide and one of them was only 4 1/8" wide - I know that no one would notice but me, but I would notice, and so I had to add both single stitches I was missing on each side.

I'd sort of tacked one of the welts in by hand when I discovered that the top of welt pocket was in the seam allowance of the waistband. I looked at it at first and I couldn't figure out how I was going to sew the waistband with the pocket in the way.... and then I realized that I'd been approaching this the wrong way. It turns out that the parts that I thought were tricky weren't that hard at all - instead of matching some circles, I just had to match some cutlines and make sure the top of the pocket was just below the seam allowance for the waistband.

The next hardest part will be putting in the zipper - I avoid fly fronts but it works with this pant. After that, the pants should be dead easy to finish.

My Pamidronate is starting up again tomorrow - I have to be at the hospital at the crazy hour of 8am(!!). When the infusion is done, home care is supposed to come and de-access the port. I called them Thursday to tell the team and got a call back from one person confirming it and telling me that it would be scheduled. Then another nurse (the one who will be doing the de-accessing tomorrow) called today to ask whether I was getting the Pamidronate tomorrow because she wasn't sure what was going on and she didn't know I was going to be on the schedule.

Sigh. Can you tell I'm annoyed? I'd expect that the home care office could manage their own schedule without having to get in touch with the patient a second time. Grrr. I find the Pamidronate procedure stressful enough that when anything else goes wrong I feel extra-annoyed. I hope that things do go smoothly tomorrow.

Saturday night movie

We finally watched Night of the Living Dead. It is an amazing movie, not just because it's about zombies, but because it's a realistic portrayal of how people forced into a deadly situation act and react. I didn't much like many of the characters because I thought that they were acting irrationally and endangering themselves and others. Then again, those people were behaving as you might expect them to: the "big fish" becomes a coward when a "bigger fish" comes along; the woman who couldn't leave during the last major disaster overreacts; and the catatonic woman is catatonic with a textile fixation. These could all be real, annoying, random people you might get stuck with during an emergency.

We watched the non-colourized 30th anniversary edition which has a new score and some added scenes. I hadn't heard the original score so I don't know how the new one compares, but I thought it was ok. I didn't notice it most of the time which is the mark of a decent soundtrack to me.

The new scenes are at the very beginning and the very end and I really didn't like them. In fact, I think that these scenes detracted from the movie. One of the reasons that the movie is so good is that you start right in with the dead and finish with the cleanup in the end - the scenario goes from bad to worse as the movie progresses. The new scenes bracket the movie by adding a badly-acted religious component that references no other part of the movie. This new, unsupported message doesn't fit with the existing movie.

I'm doing some reading (that link is worth reading if you don't mind a little outrage and profanity), and it looks like other original footage has been taken out in addition to adding these terrible scenes. Apparently some of the important backstory is missing as are some zombies. What was John Russo thinking when he changed the movie?

Hmmm. I'm thinking that while I like the 30th anniversary edition of Night of the Living Dead, I'll love the original much, much more.

My cups runneth over

You know how I've had problems with patterns being too big in center front and center back, at least at my current weight, and so I thought that my shoulders were too narrow? I think I finally understand what's going on, and it isn't that my shoulders are narrow - it's that my bust is big.

There are two bust area measurements that can be taken: the bust itself, where the tape measure goes over the fullest part of the bust and stays parallel to the floor all around; and the high bust, where the tape measure is in the same place as the bust in the back but is raised in front to go above the bust fullness. A bust measurement no more than 3" larger than the high bust indicates a B cup while a bust measurement more than 3" larger than the high bust indicates a C or larger cup.

Most people can use the bust as a guide in choosing the pattern size because most people will be about a B cup. If someone has a C or larger cup and chooses a top or dress pattern according to the bust size, the bust will fit properly but the shoulders and armholes will be way too big. So the solution for those with a C or larger cup is to choose the top or dress pattern size based on the high bust measurement and then make a Full Bust Adjustment (FBA) for the bust. This means that the shoulders, chest, and bust will all fit properly. I should mention here that making an FBA is way easier than grading the shoulder area down :).

Note: I suspect, although I'm not sure, that if the bust and high bust measurements differ by less than about 1" this indicates an A or smaller cup. Those with an A or smaller cup could use either measurement to choose the top or dress pattern and then make a Small Bust Adjustment (SBA) to fit the pattern to them.

Anyways..... it turns out that right now, my high bust measurement is about 4" smaller than my bust measurement. I guess I'm not the B cup I thought I was :) I've been choosing my pattern size by my bust measurement when I should be using the high bust measurement! No wonder I was having fit issues through the shoulder and armscye.

I'm pretty sure that I knew about all of this - I definitely remember reading about how to select a different pattern size based on the high bust measurement and all that - but I never thought that it applied to me. I guess the difference between my bust and high bust is more pronounced right now because I'm carrying some extra pounds.

Speaking of extra weight, the other day I told my oncologist that I wanted to lose some of it. She said, "Why? What's wrong with your weight now?" I could have kissed her - who doesn't want a license to be chubby? :)

The fantasy of walking away and starting over

We were watching a tv show where the main character just walks away from his life. He meets a girl and travels with her without telling anyone where he is or where he's going.

Part of me would love to live that kind of life, moving from place to place whenever I felt like it and never really having responsibilities. I always used to say that I wanted someone to pay me just to sit in a room and be me and do what I like - giving everything up to live a paid, no strings nomadic life would definitely fall into that life (so does being on long-term disability, come to think of it). I could definitely get used to freely moving from one place to another.

At different times in my life, I've also very much wanted to just walk away and start over. Not that I've ever wanted to leave my family or loved ones, but there's something appealing about being able to go somewhere else where no one knows me and reinvent myself. Intellectually, I know that this wouldn't work, because wherever you go, there you are - in other words, you can never escape yourself so you're likely to make the same kinds of mistakes that you made before. That said, there's something about the idea that a person could just walk away and start over and have a good life.

Don't get me wrong - I love the person I am and the life I have..... but who doesn't love the idea of a little irresponsibility and reinvention sometimes?

Too sleepy for my own good

I'd run out of Aerius, the allergy drug I take, for a few days and so wound up not taking any for a few days. That turned out to be a HUUUGGGEEEE mistake.

The red blister things have re-appeared under my fentanyl patches and are itchy as crazy. So not only is my back kind of ugly due to overlapping patch areas, it's ugly AND itchy due to the allergic reaction. Blah.

To counteract the allergy effect, I took some Benadryl which acts as an antihistamine. I then tried to watch a movie. Ha ha ha - it's funny because I fell asleep during the movie (Benadryl is known to make people sleepy) and woke up watching only the movie menu. That's a bit of a waste of a movie, wouldn't you say?

Normal, sort of

The endodontist I saw today thinks that my tooth hurts because I either cracked it in the fall I had or the new filling put in is bothering me. He's taking a conservative approach to treatment and putting in a zoe which has anaesthetic properties. If the pain is still there after six months, then we'll either do a root canal or extract the tooth.

Let's hope that my tooth just doesn't like the new filling, huh?

If we do have to proceed further, then my oncologist wants to stop the Pamidronate for two months both before and after the procedure. I figure that if the pain is still there in five months, we can stop the Pamidronate, and do whatever procedure we need to do in seven months.

The reason I say that I will stop the Pamidronate is that my oncologist, who I also saw today, is putting me back on it. She doesn't have the jaw CT results but since no one has told me anything, we figure that the scan is clear. My oncologist is also going to start seeing me every three months instead of two because my condition is stable and I'm doing so well.

In great news, my tumour markers went down to 35.8 which is normal. Yippeee!

On a side note, we're looking at the US election results and so far they're calling Obama for the win. I hope that this actually happens - I didn't want to see McCain in power, and I think/hope that Obama will do great things for the US. In my opinion, he's a great leader and the world needs that right now.

Clearly, I don't know everything

I was able to get some sewing done today. I finished the skirt except for hemming it and got the pants ready to sew.

I've discovered that I've learned a thing or two about sewing over the years. In particular, I think I've finally figured out how to use fusible interfacing. I used to avoid using the stuff because it would always go lumpy after it was washed. Well, I've discovered that I wasn't fusing the interfacing properly - I was using a steam iron. I did some tests and it turns out that it fuses better with heat, pressure, and lack of steam. As well, I realized that the interfacing looks different once its fused to the fabric so it's easy to tell when it's fused properly.

Who knew all of these things? It's like no matter how much I know, there's still room for more.

Tomorrow is US election day - finally! It'll be a fun evening of watching election results; hopefully there will be a decision tomorrow.

I've also got a couple of appointments tomorrow: I see a root canal specialist (in case the pain in my jaw and face is due to common teeth problems) first thing and and then my oncologist in the afternoon. Hopefully it'll all go well.

A new sewing project

I'd bought a lot (five-ish meters) of some gorgeous dark gray herringbone fabric a while ago as part of my winter fabric shopping spree. It was super-cheap, which is one reason I bought so much - the other is that I love it, of course! It has a number of different gray warp thread colours, giving it an irregular striped effect that I love. The herringbone weave itself is so fine that it's hardly noticeable but it makes the fabric drape beautifully. Not only that, but the herringbone weave gives the fabric some stretch to it. I tell you, what's not to love about this fabric?

Since the fabric is gorgeous, drapes really well, has a bit of weight to it, and has some stretch, it's perfect for skirts and pants (and some tops and dresses, I think). Today I finally pulled the fabric out and cut out a skirt and a pair of pants. I can't wait to sew them! I've made the skirt pattern before and it looks awesome but this will be the first try for the pants.

Now, normally when I wear skirts or dresses in the winter, I wear tights with them because otherwise my legs get cold. Usually I wear black tights because most of my winter things are black, but since I'm working with these gray fabrics, I decided that I needed some non-black tights. I was thinking that gray, charcoal, or off-black tights would be perfect. I figured that it couldn't be that hard to find a pair of tights in one of these colours.

Well, it's exactly that hard. I spent two hours looking at tights today trying to find the perfect gray pair. I ended up buying three different pairs because I wasn't sure which ones would look and fit the best. Each one has slightly different colour, composition, texture, and opacity, and even though I tried to figure out what each pair would look like, it's impossible to know that until I put them on. Fortunately, none of them cost all that much and I think I'll get wear out of all of them.

I also bought a pair of black sweater tights - they're so soft, cushy, comfortable and warm that I just couldn't resist buying them. I have a lot of black tights but none like this pair; when I tried them on at home it felt like I was wearing a soft, warm hug on my legs. They're not that cheap but they are that nice - I highly recommend them!

Halloween weekend pictures

I know you've all been waiting anxiously for our pictures, so here they are! This post is quite picture-heavy; blogger and I have had quite a time getting this post up.

Ian's Jack pumpkin that he carved at work in 10 minutes:


Ian's Cybermen pumpkin (from the new Doctor Who series):


My Dalek pumpkin (also from the Doctor Who series):


Our house from the outside. Not quite as many decorations as in previous years but still nice.


The candy and Spooky Town table. Pretty :)



Tonight we went to a Halloween party and we got to dress up!!! Here are pictures of our costumes :)

Braaiiiiins! I'm a zombie!:


A close-up of my zombie face. Ian thought my make-up looked pretty good. I think so, too :) I really like the fake gel blood I had which makes the bloody parts that much more realistic. I hope it comes off easily. The shirt is an old one I had that we cut up and spread blood around on (it doesn't have to come clean).


Ian is Rorschach from Watchmen. This is what we spent so much time getting together the other weekend: the pants and trenchcoat came from Goodwill and I made the mask. I'm quite happy with how the mask turned out.


Finally, a picture of both of us:


Whew! What a lot of pictures and fun this weekend has been.I'm looking forward to sleeping and having a restful sewing day tomorrow.