My first survey on OD

I’m having a baby shower! Please visit:

http://www.webbabyshower.com/mullen

Okay, I "borrowed" this from my newest fave, Golf Widow (She STOLE it from one of her faves… I would NEVER steal anything!  LOL ;).    )  I NEVER do these things in my diary, and I rarely do them via email either.

So here goes:

1) Do you like blue cheese?
Gag, no

2) Have you ever smoked heroin?
No way.

3) Do you own guns?
I don’t, but not opposed.  I just don’t think I have enough training, and not sure it’s worth getting it.

4) What flavor do you add to your drink at sonic?
The closest Sonic is about a 45 minute to hour drive away…would YOU spend 20 dollars in gas to go to Sonic?  Me either :).

5) Do you get nervous before doctor appointments?
Not usually… lately I’ve been PISSED OFF before going to the doctor, because I know the crap I’m going to have to put up with.

6) What do you think of hot dogs?
I think Shabree is addicted to them.  For me, they have to have cheese melted into them to make them palatable, and don’t forget the ketchup and mayo (or miracle whip)

7) Favorite Christmas song? 

Angels we have heard on high… and you should hear me sing it, it really shows off my voice very nicely.  No ego there 😉

8) What do you prefer to drink in the morning?
Soda.  Water if there’s no soda

9) Can you do push ups?
I doubt it very much, and I sure as heck am not going to test the theory 8 months pregnant!

10) Can you do a chin up?
I don’t think I could EVER do one.

11) What’s your favorite piece of jewelry? 

I can’t wear jewelry, it makes me itch, it makes me break out, and even earrings lately have been causing my ears to get infected.  Sigh.

12) Favorite hobby?
Oh, like any of my regular readers REALLY have to be told?  Scrapbooking of course!

13) Ever been in a car wreck?
Wreck?  Like a totaled car?  No.  Fender bender?  yes… my fault too.

14) Do you have A.D.D.?
Possibly… but undiagnosed.  I CAN read a book from cover to cover without stopping though, so I have my doubts.  It’s probably just the ADD world we live in 😉

15) What’s one trait that you hate about yourself?
Where to begin?  Sigh, laziness, I guess. 

16) Middle name?

Jean, same as Samantha.

17) Name 3 thoughts at this exact moment?
1. Um… answering this survey

2. AM I A.D.D?  (LOL)

3. How to get OUT of having a C-section, which I find TOTALLY unnecessary.

18) Name 3 things you bought yesterday?
milk, oil, and soda, and that’s it.

19) Name 3 drinks you regularly drink?
water, diet cola (usually the 67 cent 2 liters from Wal mart), and Diet Dr Thunder, again from wally world.

20) Current worry?
Oh… another one where to begin.  Do you REALLY want to know this?  It could turn into a book…

1) The whole C-section thing… I want to do a VBAC.

2)What ARE we going to do if this deal doesn’t close?

3) Should I tell my dad to keep his blasted money? (this is new)

You know what… that’s enough. 

21) Current hate right now?
My baby doctor for sure.

22) What’s up?
Dunno.

23) How did you bring in the New Year?
Watching tv with the kids… it was nice (but boring!)

24) Where would you like to go?
Disney.  Sigh.

25) Name three people who will complete this?
Anyone, anyone, anyone?

26) Do you own slippers?
Nope… have found I HATE them. 

27) What shirt are you wearing?
My "Big Dog Mom" shirt from the Big Dog outlet store.  "Rule number one: Mom is the boss"  "Rule number two: See rule number one!"     I LOVE this shirt!

28) Do you like sleeping on satin sheets???
Gah, NO!  Cotton, cotton, cotton.  I hate the way satin slippy-slides.  By morning, they’re on the floor, and I’m freaking COLD!

29) Can you whistle?
Yes.

30) Favorite color?
Purple.  I even had a boss at Apple call me purple girl.  Though lately, red is often the choice of color for clothing (well, maybe not while pregnant!)

31) Would you be a pirate?
Could be fun…

32) What songs do you sing in the shower?
Oddly enough, as much as I like to sing, I rarely sing in the shower.  I suppose the types of songs that go through my head are what’s on the radio, which is typically some sort of rock… but then Disney songs HAVE been known to come out of my mouth too, lol 😉

33) Favorite girl’s name?
Shabree

34) Favorite boy’s name?
If we have a boy, Jerry’s naming him.  I guess I like the sound of Lucas though.

35) What’s in your pocket?
Nothing

36) Last thing that made you laugh?
Shabree…  I forget what she said, but it was so funny, I told her "thanks for the laugh"

37) Best bed sheets as a child?
I don’t remember.  My mom undoubtedly never bought me any special sheets.  Now, I had a quilt that my grandma and her friends made that was very special to me.

38) Worst injury you’ve ever had?
When I was at Girl Scout camp in 1980 or 81, a rock came flying out of nowhere in front of the nurse’s station (of all places!) and hit me in the head!  They had to take me INTO town to the nearest hospital, and I got to have four stitches.  Poor mom, she had to come up, and then go back, because I wanted to stay at camp.  It actually made that camp experience a better (and certainly more memorable!) one, because all the girls treated me better in sympathy :).

39) Do you love where you live?
No… sadly enough, I’m not loving this.  It’s better than Galt, but the neighborhood, while supposedly "middle class" has too much of a ghetto mentality.

40) How many TVs do you have in your house?

3.  Living room, our bedroom, and the "band room" which triples as an exercise/play room as well.

41) Who is your loudest friend?
I’m NOT friendless, but I can’t honestly answer this.  No… Ellen’s little sister Kathleen.  LOVE her.

42) How many dogs do you have?
Now… one, Paula

43) Is there anyone who has a crush on you?
HAR HAR HAR… though my dear wonderful husband… if I say "I’m hot" He tells me "You sure ARE!"  What an ego booster that man is!

44) Whats your favorite book?
MUST I stick to one?  Well… when I was 18, which I realize was aw

hile ago, It was The Vampire Lestat (did you realize Anne Rice converted to Christianity, and will NOT be writing any more Vampire novels?  I read that the other night, and was like WOW!)  Now I’ll read just about anything.  John Grisham, Steven Frey, Michael Connelly, Patricia Cornwell, they’re essentially my favorite authors… and Anne Rice.  Though I have NOT read her in a few years now.

46) What is your favorite candy?
anything that’s chocolate, Starburst (yum!) and skittles.  I REALLY like candy, have a sweet tooth a mile long.

47) Favorite Sports Team?
Sports?  Eh… not so much.  Denver teams… I developed my alliances early on.

48) What song do you want played at your funeral?
Can’t we discuss this in say, 80 years?  I don’t know.  The previous person had an Eagle song by Dolly Parton… since I’m SO not into country music, but like the idea of an eagle song, let’s say either "Fly Like an Eagle" or "When Eagles Fly" by Jerry’s favorite, Sammy Hagar (maybe I should save that one for Jerry.)  Though my ALL time favorite song ever is "Africa" by Toto… and it’s appropriately mysterious enough for a funeral… maybe. 

49) What were you doing 12 AM last night​?
Oh… well, I was intending to go to bed… but NO…went to Wal mart instead.  Came home to Sydni crying pitiously that she was SO scared because she couldn’t find us ANYWHERE.  And yes, we left a note, and yes, she had seen said note.  Poor kid.  It’s easy to forget what it’s like to be 8.

50) What was the first thing you thought of when you woke up? 

I don’t really remember.  Either something to do with my bladder, or Sammi.  Or cursing the LIGHT that won’t let me go back to sleep!

The End

That was a LONG ass survey.  Jerry came in awhile back wanting to know WHO I was talking to (lol, I HAD been chatting earlier w/ a fave, Greywolf Borealis).

I guess I’ve been spending too much time on the computer.  But I did want to add a little about my day.  I THINK I mentioned my mom wanted to give me some money to help out a little… tide us over or whatever.  Her solution to this was a stock owned jointly by her and my dad… which was supposed to GO to my dad in the divorce THIRTY YEARS AGO.  Well, he never took her name off it.  So now her attitude is "half mine."  Ten years ago, she tried to get me to get HIM to sign off on it, so it could be cashed in, and I forget what she wanted to do with it, but I refused.  And I must be so frigging desperate now, that when she suggested that she would give me "her half" of this stock, I said I’d talk to dad about it.

In retrospect, that may have been a stupid thing to do.  Dad has said yes… but has accused "us" of sandbagging him, wanted to know why MOM didn’t do the asking, and "Fine, you can have the money, but you have to pay the taxes, which are going to be 25%"  He’s pissed off, can you tell?

I wrote him back, told him that I really didn’t mean to sandbag him, that hopefully this deal of Jerry’s will close, but due to their being a couple of different banks on different continents involved, the various holidays are screwing things up, and they’re talking Tuesday, and also laid out the problems I’ve been having with the doctor, and the finances, and applying for Medi-CAL, etc.  So he writes me back that "This is money laundering, and you should RUN far far away from it."  And he went on about how we shouldn’t stay in this house, he doesn’t want to finance it, if the doctor wants to do a C-section he’s just being lazy (amen to that!), and OMG, it was just a RANT at me.  It REALLY pissed me off, especially the part about the money laundering.  Because WHY THE HELL WOULD WE GET INVOLVED IN ANYTHING that involved money laundering?   HELLO?  My apologies for being stupid about things in the past (NOT escrowing the Mexico money comes to mind!), but just HOW stupid would we be to do anything involving money laundering?  Part of what’s taken so danged long is all the checks that had to be done because of concerns of money laundering.  I even pointed out… You can’t get away with that crap in America anymore.  The laws have been clamped down because of terrorist funding.  My dad hasn’t got the first clue.  I sent back a pretty scathing email about the money laundering, and then actually went and read the REST of the email… (ironic lol), and got pissed again.  I trashed the second email before I sent it.  Oh, also… he writes me how that money was always going to go to us kids, and how he’s SACRIFICED to make sure it does (he can’t GET the money unless mom signs off… or dies.)  I LOVE my dad.  Okay?  I’m the one who talks to him, my brother calls ONLY when he wants money or something else from him.  But I HIGHLY doubt that he’s been oh so nobly saving that money for when he dies so it can go to my brother and I.  The fact is… dad has NOT got a lot of common sense.  He just doesn’t.  He doesn’t invest wisely… he’s lost a lot of money on things gone bad.  I have joked if it wasn’t for bad luck, he wouldn’t have any luck at all.  Because he IS one of those types that things seem to happen to.  It’s not all his fault… in a very metaphysical sense, he draws bad things to him.  So I can’t REALLY believe that given the opportunity, he wouldn’t have lost that money on a bad investment, or simply spent it in day to day living.  Fair enough… no better, no worse than ANY of the rest of us.  I just don’t appreciate being told that it’s some sacrifice on his part, when it’s more that he just didn’t do what he should have done in the first place, which was removed mom from the documents.

THAT being said… I don’t even FEEL right taking the money.  I could care LESS about the taxes, about WHOM it belongs to, whatever!  I’m not a person who believes my parents owe me anything.  They have every right to spend their money as THEY see fit, and leave me NOTHING when they die.  Fair enough that NO parent in their right mind wants to do that to their children ;), but I just want to stand on my own two feet.  And looking at the big picture… if THIS deal doesn’t close, and it’s the only one in a long time that has felt like it might ACTUALLY close… then what?  This money, mom says it totals about 17,000 dollars (the half she’d give to me), and that’s going to last… 3, 4 months?  Five?  I can’t see it lasting five.  We seem to go through about 5 grand a month between house payment, utilities and your basic budget blowing (sorry… I should maybe not joke so lightly about it… but we don’t budget.  It’s a BAD habit leftover from when we didn’t have to worry about it)  So it only buys us a few months.  It’s just a band aid to a deep laceration nee

ding stitches (or whatever they do these days…staples?) 

My point being… I’m not sure it’s worth it to take the money, and end up blowing it trying to make Jerry’s dream a reality.  He’s been at it for over a year now.  I even want to say it’s been a year and a half now.  He hasn’t made a dime in that time.  Well… not counting the 10,000 in Feb (was it only just Feb?  Yikes…see what I mean?  It’s gone now… paid the house payment, and that was essentially the last of it) that came from one of our old houses in the old business.  So I guess he earned that, in a way.  But then, it WASN’T from THIS business, was it?  I’ve been keeping most of these thoughts to myself.  I don’t want to upset Jerry, don’t want to make him feel bad.  But I just feel increasingly, that if this deal doesn’t close, he really needs to throw in the towel, call it a day, and do something else.  Preferably something that pays.  Now, he’s talked to the bankers, and this deal is GOING to go on Tuesday (Monday is Cinco De Mayo in that part of the world… Thur was May Day in the other part of the world, and many of those bankers took Friday off too, so they could have a long holiday weekend.  We got screwed for this thing going yesterday by all the holidays)  Of course… we’ve HEARD that before.  I can’t say too much about any of it, because Jerry is paranoid.  I don’t blame him.  So I won’t give out any real details about any of it.  It’s a deal, it’s supposed to close on Tuesday… there’s NO money laundering involved!  There’s NOTHING shady involved whatsoever.  The deal’s been checked out, Jerry AND his partners have been THOROUGHLY checked out, there are international banking laws to contend with, American laws governing terrorism to contend with…  we could not get away with anything shady, even if we wanted to WHICH WE DON’T.  We happen to be in the minority that likes being law abiding citizens (evidently anyway!  Excuse my hormone-driven pissy attitude) 

Anyway, what difference is Dad’s (Mom’s?) money going to make, really?  I guess that’s my thought.  I don’t know.  It’s hard not to feel cynical, angry, and like it’s just TIME that something GOOD happened for a change!  I can’t even really talk to Jerry about this.  He takes it almost… as a personal attack.  And it’s not.  I just want some stability already.  I want to know that we’re not going to be piece-mealing money here and there, that we’re not going to be scrambling when the money runs out to find more…somewhere.  That we’re going to quit taking money from other people to get us through.  Cashing in my Apple Stock was one thing.  Begging and borrowing is completely another.
Hell, I should have just gotten a job ages ago.  I just never really wanted to.  If I was on the outside looking in, I’d really wonder what the hell was wrong with me.  Able bodied woman… freaking GET A JOB!  Though I did put in a FEW resumes when I was around 5 or 6 months pregnant, when I could still get away with not telling anyone I WAS pregnant.  And that resulted in nothing… so of course, COULD we even GET jobs if he decides to quit doing this?  There is a worrisome thought.  So the money COULD help us there.  I just want to feel like something productive is happening.  So far, that feeling is absent. 

Tomorrow, we’re going to go to cash in the coins my mom gave me, locally.  THAT will be helpful.  The original dealer was in Southern California, and they’re willing to give spot price, but we have to mail them in… AND wait two weeks!  This dealer is willing to give spot price cash when we walk in the door :).  A smallish blessing there (a blessing nevertheless… and I will take ANY blessing I can get these days.)  That will get us through the baby’s birth, I think.  Might be more… should be more.

SUPPOSEDLY, one of Jerry’s "partners"… though I consider him flaky, has set up health insurance for us… if so, it’s a MAJOR blessing.  I will FIND a doctor that will take me and do a VBAC, and bye bye to this C-section (insert bad word here).  LOL… I guess MY priorities are on the birth, if I’m feeling like health insurance is a major blessing and being able to cash in the coins locally (and not wait) is a small one.  I think something is wrong with me.  Let’s just see what Monday brings, because Jerry’s supposed to get the details then.  In the meantime, I have a sonogram on Monday at 2:15 that I will NOT skip, and a doctor’s appointment that I WILL skip if it turns out we do have insurance.  🙂  I will be SO happy never to have to see that doctor again.  AND if it turns out we have Kaiser for insurance, I’ll be doing a MAJOR happy dance.  I LOVE the doctors at Kaiser… don’t love the bureauocracy, but I’ve learned how to work around that… and the ability to call in and get an answer to a simple question of what to do in a certain situation without having to wait for a callback from a doctor is one of their BEST services, IMO.  Or just to calm fears about something that happened.  Is this serious?  Should I go to the hospital?  More often than not, calling Kaiser saved me money, because I simply didn’t go to the doctor or the E.R. because they were able to tell me WHEN I should go, and obviously, whatever it was, wasn’t that serious.  Except for ONE doctor, I have really loved all of them, especially the women ones.  I think it’s FANTASTIC that it seems like they only hire females for OB/GYN services (a cover their ass move, I’m sure… but ask me if I care more about that, or the fact that since they’re women, they seem to understand what I’m going through more?)  And they were completely open to a "trial of labor" which meant basically, I got to do a VBAC.  Oh, and the nurses…. Okay, I’ll STOP going on and on about what a GREAT experience I had giving birth to Sammi.  LOL… It was just so incredibly different from giving birth to Shabree, though I doubt even Kaiser would have tried to turn her while in labor… Shabree’s doctor probably did all he thought he could safely do with trying to turn her before the birth, and when that didn’t work, did a C-section.  I WISH that they trained doctors to do these things these days, but they really don’t… My doctor at Kaiser told me that if Sammi hadn’t turned, they would do a C-section.  And they could not induce labor, so if she wasn’t born within a week of her due date, they’d do a C-section.  And knowing what I know NOW… I’m grateful they were willing to try a VBAC at all.  1 in 200 VBACs result in a scar tear.  It’s a high percentage.  Those numbers go down the more VBACs you’ve had, which you’d THINK they’d go up… but by about the 4th or 5th one, you’re up to a percentage of having a problem free birth that you’d have if you’d NEVER had a C-section.  I hope that makes sense.  The numbers are something like 67% chance of a problem free birth the first one, 73% the second one… by the fourth or fifth, the percentages are up to 90% of having a problem free birth.  Interestingly enough however,

a scar tear isn’t actually the thing that happens the most.  There are other complications that happen more often.  It helps if the doctor who did the original C-section did a double layer stitch instead of a single layer stitch.  I don’t remember it all… but C-sections are actually more problematic to FUTURE pregnancies and births than the birth requiring the C-section.  As a nation, we should really be trying to prevent them in the first place (NOT that we’ll do that.  C-sections are MUCH more profitable to the doctor than a vaginal birth… this is how they fund their kid’s college tuitions.  Take away THAT incentive, and I’ll BET the number of C-sections would PLUMMET.  It’s freaking ALWAYS about the money, isn’t it?)  And that made me wonder if Kaiser, in an effort to bring down costs, don’t pay their doctors more for C-sections?  They’re about double the price of a vaginal birth… the mom and baby are in the hospital longer (I was in for ONE day with Sammi…two for Shabree, but most moms stay about double what I do, on average.  I don’t like being in the hospital… at ALL)  Anyway, I’d LOVE to have another VBAC, let Jerry do the vas thing, which from what he told me is REALLY simple now.  The pain of birth does not scare me.  The fear of having needles stuck into me, of my skin being cut open, THAT scares and bothers me.  And I’ve been there, done that with both.  I’ll take natures way ANY day.  Of course, the fact that I was only in labor for two hours, and I don’t like hospitals probably factors into all of that.  AND, I don’t even LIKE this new doctor, so that makes me dis-trustful…  

I’ve been typing this entry for something close to two hours now, I THINK…  Maybe I should stop already.  There is just so much to puzzle out.  Sorry if it was too much of a rant at times…