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Menopause
Or should I say not yet…
I have an app on my phone where I keep track of my menstrual cycles. I’ve been using the same app for years and had pretty good records of it all. Then my phone kind of died in June or July and Apple replaced my phone and I lost the data. (I did have the option to do backups and I used to do them but hadn’t lately.)
I hadn’t had a proper period all year. I’m pretty sure the last one was in December last year but I wasn’t totally sure. I had a bit of spotting one day in March but didn’t count that at all. My period had been showing up about every two months most of last year and I thought maybe they had just come to a stop. Anyway, I had gone all year and I said to the Scientist just a few days ago that I was going to be pretty annoyed if I had gone all this time and then had another period.
Well, I came home from tai chi tonight and went to the toilet and guess what I discovered? The really bad part of this is I have no idea what to expect this time since it’s been so long. I did notice some breast tenderness a couple days ago but shrugged it off at the time. That must have been a bit of mild PMS.
Although I felt a bit sad about reaching menopause, I had come to some acceptance of it. But now the counting starts again. One small plus is I will now have a date to count from. And I will back up my data regularly this time. :)
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New printer
Early last year it became evident our printer was no longer going to work for us and we set out to find a new one. We seriously looked at laser printers for a while but then found an Epson printer that uses eco tanks instead of the standard cartridges and that kind of won us over. We bought that at great expense and brought it home to set up.
The first thing we found was it was a lot harder than our earlier Canon printers. It took a while to get it set up so we could print from various locations. It was also noted early on that it wasn’t compatible with Airprint and some of the other more current applications for printing. I was a bit bugged by that…but I thought if it does the job, it will be fine.
I won’t go into much detail but we soon realised we both hated that printer. We really wanted to replace it but it was a bit hard to do when we’d spent so much on the purchase. Well, over a year post-printer purchase we started rethinking the idea of a laser printer.
After quite a bit of research it was narrowed down to a Brother printer and then further down to a laser color printer when one of the local stores had a sale via ebay.
It’s quite a big machine but so far I just love it. Printing and scanning are so much easier. I haven’t had to spend nearly as much time sorting things out just so I can use it. On top of that, the ink won’t dry out and since we really don’t print too often this could well last us ten years or more. Plus it has a feed for scanning documents for those times when we need it. Much easier than going back and forth.
Anyway, enough of my techno-gushing…:D
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Voted
I voted! I don’t ordinarily vote in mid-term elections because there’s just not a lot to vote on. But I realised I am registered in Texas and I had a way to cast vote away from Ted Cruz. So I requested a ballot and sent it off today. I know it’s kind of late but I think it will still get there within the two weeks left.
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Reading
I’ve been doing lots of reading of late. I started reading amateur writing on Wattpad and that’s been an interesting experience. Most of the writers seem to be young and much of the material I’ve read has been teen fiction. It’s interesting how I see the same sort of stories here as I do elsewhere. And although the writing is often lacking it’s not much worse than some of the published works in some of the free ebooks I’ve read. The one thing that would improve most of these stories would be some proofreading at the very least. Some of the spelling is really atrocious but I am kind if pleased to see the flow of story ideas even though they are keep to some of the same story lines. Something else I noticed in these stories is that they do a lot of building up and then suddenly the story is finished up quickly, skipping over the rest of the story. I can only imagine these are situations where the writer has lost interest or given up but want to do some sort of completion of the story. Some of the stories are reasonably good so it’s a disappointment when this happens because I feel it ruins what was working out to be a good book. I’ve also been reading at Radish and Inkitt which are similar sort of websites. All have apps to use on IOS so I have all three on my phone and try to check out material every so often.
Although Wattpad and similar are kind of fun, I am also back to getting through many of the books I’ve downloaded on my Kindle. Most of the books I have are freebies but some I have bought. The quality is pretty variable and some of them I finish just to get them out of the way. Others are surprisingly good and I read other works by the writers. So the idea of a free book isn’t so terrible if the quality is there. I also get some of the daily and monthly deals. I’m still reading the second book of the Outlander series but managed to buy a couple further titles at greatly reduced prices in the monthly sale a couple months ago. I also managed to get a couple Robin Hobb titles although I don’t think they are in the Farseer trilogy where I am currently reading the second book.
Another series where I got books on sale is the Paper Magician series. I won’t say it’s great literature but I liked the premise of the first book quite a lot. But it got stuck in the problem of the writer setting it in the early 20th century in England but there are teenaged characters behaving like modern day teens instead. This is an issue I felt the editor should have handled but didn’t. I read the second book, The Glass Magician, and it was much better. But I came to wonder why it was set in that time frame in the end. There was so little to tie it to any time period in my view. I still have one book left in the series and plan to read that soon. The books are fairly short and are generally quick reads.
I’m still fascinated with the teen romance genre. One thing I’ve noted lately is a number of stories in published and amateur situations where the female protagonist comes from some dark background (sometimes it’s the male love interest though) and then one bad thing after another happens to this character. I find this to be a bit of overkill and makes the somewhat unbelievable stories even more so in the end. I really do wonder how much tragedy one person could experience.
Which leads me to Twilight which suffers a bit of this sort of treatment too. While I didn’t love the book, it wasn’t so bad as so many have made out. I mean it was like a bandwagon of Twilight haters. Much like the bandwagon of haters on the rock groups Nickelback and Coldplay. I wasn’t too keen on the ending of the book, mostly because it seemed to be like the end of a chapter and not an actual volume of a series. I am in no hurry to carry on to the next book but probably will read it in the future. I will say it’s kind of good to know a bit more about the series than before.
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body woes
That bite or sting from the bull ant a few weeks ago still hasn’t disappeared. Most of the time it’s not bothersome but if I accidently scratch it, it gets really itchy. I am glad it was just the one ant that bit or stung me as I’ve heard it often happens with several ants at one time. Curious that I only saw the ant on two subsequent days so it makes me wonder if it was the same one. It also makes me less concerned about a nest being close by since I’ve never seen more.
Meanwhile my knee has swollen up the last couple of days and is achy again. It seems I take a couple steps forward and then one back. I’m sure it will be fine in a couple more days but this is a longer term issue than the last times it got sore and improved within a couple days. Still I think it’s okay enough that surgery won’t be necessary to fix the problem.
Well this isn’t a woe exactly but a comment. At 53 I still haven’t reached menopause and it looks like it might still be a bit off. My last menstrual flow was pretty light and lasted for about five days. I think this was around the beginning of the year or so. Last week I did have spotting for several days. I’m not sure how to qualify that in terms of menstrual flow since it really wasn’t a “period” but I wouldn’t say there was nothing either. I’m sure there’s more to come but I wonder if I might expect to find myself at menopause in the next year.
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Revisiting purple
The last time I’d gotten my hair done was at the end of October, just before I went home for my holiday. Earlier this month I noted it was looking a lot greyer than it has in close to a year and I decided it might be good to get it done before my birthday. I managed to squeeze in an appointment the Tuesday beforehand and I went to the hair salon in our closest shopping center. This place is run by the same person who runs the place I’ve gone the last few times and the pricing is pretty much the same but it’s a smaller shop.
This time I got the actual owner of the place and when I asked to get my hair colour in purple, she didn’t give me any fuss. This is different than the two male hairdressers I’d been to at the other shop. The first one steered me away from purple for some reason. The second one seemed to think it wasn’t a good idea and pushed for me to just stick to the colour I already had. So I guess this was progress in the end.
The hairdresser was quite friendly and she did her work in a reasonable time. I didn’t have my glasses on while she was working so I really couldn’t see the colour until the very end. She kept telling me it would look more purple once it dried but I really couldn’t see it enough to judge a colour. Anyway it came out darker than it’s been and the purple isn’t terribly obvious but it is visible, especially when in the sun and good light. And again it makes me look a lot younger than my 53 years. I think the ridding of the grey is the big part of it. I really like this colour and plan to get a touch up before we go on our trip to Thailand in May to keep the roots looking decent. The colour also seems to match my glasses frames so I think it works out. Too bad I didn’t get her to do my eyebrows…lol.
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A few words, finally
My intention back in October was that I would write all about my US trip. So now it’s six months later and the last I wrote was about being ready for Game Fanatic’s birthday.
I do have intentions of writing a bit about my holiday but today I am going to try to just get back into writing again after so long.
Yesterday I bought a pair of Crocs for the first time. I’ve heard many claim wonderful things about Crocs. I don’t know if I would agree but my goal was to replace some thongs that had broken after a couple years of use. I’d been rather frustrated with my efforts to find anything equivalent and then remembered some local markets have a store selling Crocs and Skeechers. (?) and thought they might have something that is suitable. Most of the shoes hanging there weren’t great but there were a few that I liked but didn’t have the right size. Then I found one pair that felt really good to wear. They didn’t require any work from my toes to keep it on and were low stress for wearing. They were pricey but I think they are worth it. At least they have worked well in the one day I’ve worn them, I can only hope they are as durable as the last ones I had to make it good value for money.
Yesterday I was at the library and I decided to finally tackle reading the book Twilight. It’s not that I have been against reading it to date but just hadn’t gotten around to doing it. I really would have liked to get the ebook but our library doesn’t have an electronic version. Alas I am stuck with a 10th anniversary edition of the book that also includes a reimagining of the book. Last night I started reading and got about a third of the way through. I probably could have read through the night but forced myself to close the book and put it aside at one point. So far, I am enjoying it. It’s no great literature but it is engaging and it’s certainly better written than some of the crappy teen fiction I’ve been reading on Wattpad lately. It’s kind of funny because I’ve read some Twilight wannabe books in the last year so now I can compare the original story. After I finish the first book I will likely watch the film. I may update once I finish to comment further. Unless what I have said is all there is to say. :D
Speaking of books, I also recently read The Paper Magician which I’d gotten on sale for my Kindle. I did enjoy some aspects of the story and I might have called it pretty good but the writer had some huge issues with the setting, which is supposed to be early 20th century in England. But it read more like a modern high school setting in many cases. There was never any sense of the social norms for that time included. I find it really shocking the editor failed to flag and correct this before it was published. There are at least two books that continue the story which I will eventually read once I steel myself for further inconsistencies.
In May the Scientist and I will celebrate our 25th wedding anniversary. While we were together well before we got married, this is the official date. We didn’t have much of a honeymoon back then due to work commitments so we are doing a bit more of a celebration now. We have a holiday to Thailand booked for five nights and we have splurged on a nice hotel on Koh Lanta. We’ll be leaving the boys on their own for the time we’re gone although there will be family and friends to provide support for them. I’m really looking forward to those days with just us in May. It will be our first real holiday on our own since we came to Australia. We could have gone for more days if we’d gone to Bali but it’s so crowded there and much of the population at any time includes a large percentage of Australians. It’s actually cheaper to go there than to go to other capital cities domestically. Koh Lanta is a lot quieter although it’s also a bit of a tourist area. Our room will have a private pool and there is also a private beach on the property.
Several days ago I had the “pleasure” of being stung by a bull ant. We’d seen it in the house earlier and I had collected it in a container and taken it outside. An hour later I felt something crawling on my leg and it was this creature. About the time I noticed it I was stung. My theory is it was the same ant getting revenge for being flicked onto the ground. The sting was really painful at the time but once it settled down I didn’t notice it much. Well until the next day when it started to swell and become itchy. I was okay until I gave into the temptation to scratch. Then it got much worse. Fortunately the itchiness didn’t last too long and now it’s just a small mark near my ankle that hasn’t completely healed. At first I didn’t think it was a bull ant but then the following night another one crawled up my leg and I caught that one and photographed it. It was clear that it was a bull ant. I didn’t have a bad reaction so guess I am not allergic. That said it was the first time I’ve been stung by one so I can’t guarantee it won’t happen again.
I’m hoping to write about the following topics with regard to my US holiday:
- The journey from Perth to DFW in Texas
- Road trip from Dallas to NC
- The wedding/new family
- Revisiting Charlotte after 20+ years
- UNCG reunion
- Road trip from Charlotte to PA
- Family in PA
- Road trip from PA to Indianapolis
- Visit with my cousin and family
- Road trip from IN back to Texas
- Hanging out in TX
- Journey from DFW back to Perth
I don’t know how much I will cover buy hopefully I will touch on everything above since there was so much that happened and so many people that I met and was reunited with after many years.
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Ready in advance.
I have already bought all the presents for Game Fanatic’s birthday this year. Usually I’m still looking or waiting during the last few days but I had everything finished by late last week. One of the items was a pre-order that was delivered and the others I got on sale. The last one was a particularly good price too.
On a related note, I have already submitted my tax forms and gotten my refund, which is about a month early. I often procrastinate until late October but the Scientist needed the amount of my taxable income so he could complete his tax so I got it done sooner than usual. (He wants this earlier every year but I still manage to put it off…:( .
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Aqua class
I ended up- taking part in the aqua aerobics class with my “client” tonight instead of just swimming. There are various reasons I did this, some related to this guy but I decided I would give it a try after a long time.
I think last time I did the class I was terribly unfit and found it exhausting. It was a different teacher, though, so perhaps it was a more rigorous class too. Tonight it was just about too easy. I didn’t feel like my heart rate increased all that much and I wasn’t all that tired at the end. The only benefit I seemed to gain was from the water weights workout, which did give me a bit of challenge. I think my upper arms will be sore tomorrow since I’ve not used the weights in the water before…or at least in a long time.
I will probably go back to doing mostly swimming while the “client” is doing the class. I think it’s also easier to keep watch on him that way than when I am trying to concentrate on the exercises at the same time. Also the thing I really don’t like about the classes is that there are inevitably sets of exercises that I get totally messed up on and don’t follow the pattern. I know it’s not a big deal but it bugs me enough to put me off doing them. Especially when it’s not the same routine all the time. It’s even worse when I do aerobics classes…not that I do them…but I have tried ones of video and found I was hopeless at keeping up without heaps of practice. LOL
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Anticipation
I’m getting a bit more excited about my upcoming travel which is now less than three weeks away from starting. After a bit of difficulty in getting a bank cheque sorted through my bank, I sent in my passport forms and it came back within less than a week. In the end it would have been less hassle all around to just go to the consulate to do it.
I’m still working on getting others to cover my hours of work. I think it will work out in the end but I was told by my supervisor to remind late last month but when I did he just said to contact the other carers and see what shifts could be covered. But I came to a decision that I want to cut back on the hours as a carer when I come back so perhaps I will just do that from the end of this month instead of down the road. I will still be looking at working the one day a week plus my plan is to look for a proper library/information management sort of job.
I’m really hoping no major traumatic events occur while I’m there. It’s causing a bit of anxiety for me but also for the rest of the family. I am trying to avoid thinking about that because there’s really no point to it. But it does lurk in the back of the mind.
On the plus side I look forward to meeting up with several people while I’m back home. I have lots of family to see in NC and in PA but also college friends and some online friends. Of course there is also the wedding to attend. I am looking forward to meeting my future sister-in-law too. Will be kind of weird to be going back to my old neighbourhood to the same street but a different house than where we lived.
I think I had more to say about this but I seem to have forgotten. Which is the problem of writing so late at night.