Why I am excited about grey hair and menopause

I love my grey hairs because for me each of them is a Badge of Courage.  Each course hair testifies to one the many hard, sad, stressful or traumatic days and events I have survived.  The resilience developed from scraping through those days and grieving the hard parts of life moves me towards the healthy, thriving woman I want to be. Woe to the hairdresser who suggests coloring them for a "younger" look!

A post of one of the new blogs I'm enjoying, Paleo for Women, explores why grandmothers are important to the health of the human species. It deeply resonated with my own thoughts on aging and community. "Why grandmothers kick ass" provides inspiring thoughts for those of us in our premenopausal age!

Give it a read here: http://www.paleoforwomen.com/if-reproduction-is-what-livings-all-about-why-does-it-stop/.

Paleo truths

Oh, never a truer word was spoken:

http://whatshouldwecallpaleolife.tumblr.com/post/60364316712/true-confessions

Passing of Glenn Doman

This spring the man originally responsible for my becoming a developmentalist passed away.

Glenn Doman was one of the pioneers of the neurodevelopmental model of treating children.  Through his intensive courses I found answers for the questions no-one else would listen to.  Through his passionate disciples I found support, programs and hope for my child who was hurt and stuck. Through his deep belief in mothers I found the drive to become the parent my children need.

Thanks, Mr. Doman, for your commitment and vision. It has forever changed my family's world for the better.

Remembering Glenn Doman

Glenn Doman often said that mothers are the best teachers the world has ever seen, and the parents that he inspired and taught continue to prove that each day. Champion of every child on earth, he never gave up on any child, and his dream of better kids for a better world lives on.

When Glenn founded The Institutes for the Achievement of Human Potential in 1955, he was a young physical therapist who, as an infantryman, had led his men through World War II. He had seen men destroyed on the battlefield and set about to save people. At this point, Glenn had begun to formulate the groundbreaking concept that brain injury is in the brain-not the arm, leg, or foot-and that brain growth and development is dynamic and ever-changing, a concept broadly accepted today as neuroplasticity.

Sitting on his mother's lap, Glenn learned to read before he went to school. His philosophy of learning was shaped by love and nurturing, and he always remembered that mothers were the key to the future. 

 read the whole obituary here

Can't.stop.making.snowflakes

I've developed a serious obession over here, making paper snow flakes.  Here's my latest batch.

Fortunately for my obsessed self, several people have asked recently for snow flake making tips. Let's start at the beginning, in case grade school was the last time you preformed this craft.

I like to start with an 8.5 x 11 piece of paper.

Fold it in half. Make your folds really clean, I run my fingernail along each crease.

And then in quarters.

Then fold the side with all the edges over to the single crease side.

Now trim off the excess, you know the bit where one part of the top of the paper is longer than the other. I like to make a snow cone shape, but just cutting it off square along the shorter piece makes for interesting shapes and designs, too.

Next comes cutting.  But before you cut, you need to know that there is part you can't cut.  I've highlighted the edges that need a tiny bit preserved so that your snowflake will keep it's shape.  As long as a few tiny bits remain along the blue edges, you'll be fine.  I've been daring myself to cut more and more away, with delightful results.

Sometimes I start cutting with a plan, sometimes I just follow my fancy.  For special shapes, I find it helps to trace them in pencil first.  If I cut 1/2 of a shape on the fold line, when I open the paper the whole shape will appear.   See the 1/2 tree on the left and the 1/2 heart on the right?

Start cutting. Remeber about preserving a bit along your fold lines.

Cut out more.  I find the more paper I take away, the fancy and more intricate the finished flake looks. There is also the exciting danger factor - cutting away more and more paper without accidentally clipping the whole project in half.

Think about the point of your fold.  If you leave it un-clipped the center of the flake with be solid.  Cut off a small bit or a large chunk for very different looks.  And, if you cut at various angles diamonds or stars will appear. Again, notice the little bits of blue edge I still have showing to keep my flake together.

When you've cut off all you can bear, start unfolding. It can be a little tricky to find the opening after all that trimming and the layers can be pretty stuck together, so go carefully. Here's the first fold.

I love the anticipation of seeing what I have created. Look at this 2nd fold!

And yay!  The full unveiling! I love how delicate and intricate my busy little snippings can be.

 

I hope these instructions and hints are clear.  Here's to the fun and delight of a simple project!

Not this crazy....

Mark's Daily Apple rates easily in my top 3 blogs that I'm following right now.  I value the information he shares, I like his tone as he writes and I'm fascinated by all the little tidbits he throws in.  I also really dig the personal testimony stories he runs each week.

In my Google Reader today is a follow-up from a previous personal testimony person, Tim. Mark's introduction includes that Tim is a Shovelglove Master.  Huh?? What the heck is Shovelglove? So of course, my curious parts lead me to click on the link and read a bit about Shovelglove. 

Shovelglove is, as best I can tell, an intense work out done by simply (and carefully) swinging a padded sledge hammer around.  My first reaction - these people are weird and crazy.  At least I'm not that crazy.

And then a tiny part of me, that might have possibly been a little draw-in by the idea of whacking a tire with a sledge hammer, piped up and said....

YET.

All bets are off as to whether or not Shovelgloving will be my biggest obsession 5 years from now. If I've learned anything in my life its is that I should NEVER say never. It just dooms me to participation in said activity.

But still, that's crazy.

Crying over spilt lotion

Homemade lotion has become a staple around here.  I make a big batch every few months and the family uses it for both hair and skin. 

I've been planning for our annual trip to Sleeping Lady.  There can be serious chapping that results from the dry mountain air, all the snow play and soaking for probably way too long in the hot pool. So I thought to make more lotion today.  In fact, I mixed up a triple batch - enough to get our family through the next 2 months plus some to share with our homeschool buddies that will meet us in the mountains.

But disaster stuck! While the Kitchen Aid whipped the lotion to a fine silkiness, the spatula I had carefully balanced on the edge of the bowl slipped in.  Theo howled with laughter as the spoon splashed waves of lotion around the room and I scampered around frantically trying to turn the machine off - of course flipping it to high for a final tsumani-like wave before managing to get to "off."  When I picked the now extremely well-oiled machine up to clean the puddle of lotion from underneath it, I lost my grip and toppled the whole thing, spreading yet more oil around (to the tune of more tittering from the peanut gallery).

At this point, about 1/3 of the lotion remains in the bowl, 1/3 is in the trash and the last 1/3 is in the dog who enthusiastically help with the 2nd round of clean up.

After grumping and pouting around for about 30 minutes, I came back around to the project and added some peppermint oil for a seasonally-appropriate bright smell and feel. 

Turns out this batch is smooth and silky, not too watery or too think. And the peppermint makes it truly delightful.  I don't know whether to be delighted or even more grumpy that I wasted 2/3 of it on the floor and dog. Below are my notes for this batch.  I'm hoping getting it into bottles goes extremely efficiently and cleanly.

Peppermint lotion - normally makes about 48 oz
1/3 c TBSP beeswax
1/2 c grapeseed oil
1/2 c jojoba oil
6 TBSP coconut oil
4 c olive oil
2 c water
36 drops peppermint oil (put only in the remaining 1/3 of the batch)

- Heat the oils and beeswax over the stove until the beeswax melts and the oils are uniform. 
- Transfer hot mixture to Kitchen Aid and add the water (I boil the water so it mixes more easily).
- Run the Kitchen Aid for about 5 minutes to mix oils and water thoroughly. Wait 30 minutes and run again.  Do this a few times until the mixture has cooled.  Color and texture is light colored and uniform.
- Transfer cooled lotion into a large ziploc bag, snip a tiny corner off the bag and carefully pour lotion into bottles.

Good for public safety, bad for public health?

In the past few months, city workers passed through our neighborhood converting all the old florescent streetlight bulbs to new LED bulbs.

I became aware of this city program because one afternoon I curiously remarked about workers on our street and that night our bedroom was *lit up.* Honestly, seriously bright.  With the curtains closed.  As I moved through the house I realized every room that had direct view to a street light, be it just on the corner or literally the other side of the block, was now bright enough to read by.

This alarms me.  You know how I feel about sleep, already.  A big part of good sleep comes with keeping non-natural light exposure low. Even the tiniest amount of nighttime light impacts our hormonal systems, both sleep related and others.  While I can and will purchase black out curtains for the bedrooms to limit the amount of light seeping in, our city's cost reduction program will inadvertently mess with the hormonal systems of almost everyone in town.

And their dinner.  In 2010 I wrote this post about my concerns for the lettuce growing in a hydroponic farm I drive by. I know it seems silly, but there is plenty of research to show that every living thing needs rest (and dark) as much as it needs light to thrive and mature.  As I look out the window at midnight, each individual leaf of my basil is brightly illuminated.  This just can't be good for my garden.

I wonder, too, about general light pollution.  I know there are guidelines, maybe even requirements, about how much light a streetlight should shed into the surrounding area.  Searching around on the internet, I couldn't find any exact numbers for what constitutes light pollution, but I'm pretty sure illuminating the interior of my house qualifies for "light trespass."  I wonder what the NASA light maps would look like were every city to install these new LED bulbs.

The New Jersey Astronomical Association feels passionately about light pollution and links to some interesting articles about it. NASA is concerned enough about it for their astronauts to drop a hunk of change on biologically adjusted bulbs.  There turns out, even, to be a documentary about light pollution called "City Dark," reported on here by the Huffington Post. This problem of light pollution is not new, but I think it is probably also not on the radar of most public officials. Really, light pollution is neither sexy nor is likely to capture most people's hearts and imaginations.

Still, I have to feel for the City.  Here they've found a great new way to reduce costs and improve visibility for drivers and pedestrians.  They've eliminated the issue of dealing with the mercury from the florescent bulbs (though this may be more my boogey man than theirs).   City leaders are getting props for being cutting edge.

Jet lagged this week from our trip to Ecuador, the LEDs have particularlly been on my mind.  Waking up after hours of sleep, I can't judge based on the light streaming into my bedroom whether I've finally adjusted to the time change and slept in until 7:30 or if it is hours before sunrise.  2:30am LED looks exactly like 7:30am sunshine.

LEDs must be great for the budget and for public safety concerns. And I think they're equally bad for public health. I wonder how it will all work out.

What sleep has to do with developmental attachment

One of my biggest soap boxes is SLEEP.  

I strongly believe, based on lots of reading and personal experience, that each and everyone of us adults needs at least 8 hours of sleep per night.  And that those of us with small children need to plan for 9-10 hours of sleep per night to make up for all the nights that doesn't go well. Heck, even for those of us with middle sized kids this is a good idea because I'm still amazed at how often I miss sleep caring for my children.

However, I've never found a direct link between my sleep soap box and my passion for development attachment.  Until today!  Reading an article on sleep by Chris Kressler (thanks J), I found this tantalizing bit:

          

      Insufficient sleep shuts down the pre-frontal cortex

Wikipedia explains the pre-frontal cortex:

The most typical psychological term for functions carried out by the prefrontal cortex area is executive function. Executive function relates to abilities to differentiate among conflicting thoughts, determine good and bad, better and best, same and different, future consequences of current activities, working toward a defined goal, prediction of outcomes, expectation based on actions, and social "control" (the ability to suppress urges that, if not suppressed, could lead to socially unacceptable outcomes).

From a developmental attachment perspective, the interesting part of this is that the pre-frontal cortex is where the brain mixes input.  In the same way information coming in from the left eye together with the right eye mixes in the prefrontal cortex to give us depth perception, the prefrontal cortex mixes our feelings for a deeper and more balanced experience.

I've always told people my being a good parent depends on me getting enough sleep, just because I know I'm too grumpy when I'm tired to be effective. Now I see that when I'm too tired, I've lost my mixed feelings.  I can't hold onto the "both and" - as in:

   I'm really tired so I hate everything 

AND 

  These are my dear delightful children for whom I want to be the warm and generous provider

It seems to me like almost everything in life links back, somehow, to developmental attachment.  Pretty cool!

Saturday is early bedtime night at our house - for both the kids and the adults.  Maybe you'll join us?

Culture mash up: lunch

This may be illegal in some states, but here is what I had for lunch:

- 2 grass fed hot dogs cooked in plenty of grass fed butter
- kimchi (to go with the hot dogs, 'cause we are out of sauerkraut)
- a giant pile of spicy Bengal bharta (smoked eggplant with peas) from our favorite Indian restaurant
- sweet potato fries with LOTS of garlic salt

The combination of flavors really wasn't as nasty as it sounds. The flavors and spices all sort of worked together.  I notice Bill didn't seem super game to kiss me after lunch, though.

CrossFit Personal Record - Backsquat

I'm so in love with CrossFit.  I pretty much have been since the very  moment I encountered it.  Quick, high intensity workouts that vary hugely, using functional movements.  They're fun, they're interesting and they make me so strong.

Way back when Rosie was about 3, I accidentally got into CrossFit thanks to the trainer I was assigned to for the 20/20 program at the ProClub while I was trying to lose the extra 30 pounds of domperidone weight from nursing Rosie.  So, last year when I found myself ready to start using my body again, I went to the closest local gym (they call them boxes at CrossFit because they are usually just small garage type facilities).

It turns out, the gym closest to me is awesome - Crossfit 206.  The owners are older than I am and really seem to hold a long-term view for health.  The trainers they attract are just the right combination of careful, supportive and pushy. The positive and enthusiastic attitude of the other participants makes the heavy weights and hard challenges seem doable.

Back on the 20/20 program, we were set up to work out 3x/week. My wimpy parts decided that going 2x/week was a good start, and I've been dithering about at that level for over a year now, on and off with travel and illness and childcare disasters.  This September I realized I needed to amp it up and promptly had that reaction to the vaccination.  So this week, feeling better, I've finally committed.

Here's my pay off - today I backsquatted 100 pounds. It wasn't even too hard, I could go heavier.  I'm thrilled to be in the triple digits!!

Functional again

A few weeks ago, I had the 2nd of theoretically 3 rounds of Hep A and B vaccinations for our upcoming trip to Ecuador.  And it didn't go well.  I got intensely sick with a serious migraine, terrible nausea and stomach turning plus a full night of vomiting every 20-30 minutes.  It was 5 days before I ate solid food and about 10 days before I wanted to do much of anything besides alternate between napping in bed and napping on the couch.

This week with Bill out of town, I've just had to buck up so I could get kids places and help them with school work.  Still did lots of sleeping on both the bed and the couch - even the dr.'s waiting room for a few minutes. I *never* fall asleep out in public.

Today was a new day, though.  I felt relaxed and rested when I woke up and mostly maintained that state with the help of one little power nap.  Here's proof that I'm back. Today, with little effort and much enthusiasm, I:
- ran the dishwasher twice
- ran three loads of laundry
- was clear headed and courageous enough to keep the kids home from playdates because I realized the amount of bickering and refusal to do work meant they needed more connection with me and each other
- listened to an hour of Neufeld's Anxiety course with riveted attention and didn't accidentally nap
- got out the Halloween decorations and exited the kids about taking charge of decorating the front porch
- harvested a planter box of cherry and plum tomatoes AND roasted them along side plenty of garlic
- cleaned out the cucumber box (I'm never planting pickling cucumbers again, they just don't work for me)
- ate about 10 hot wings
- took out Rosie's braids and didn't have to nap at anytime during the process

It is super nice to be functional again - for both me and my kids.  I can't wait to take on the rest of the tomatoes and the basil tomorrow.

The real problem with Gatorade

No, the real problem with Gatorade is not the high fructose corn syrup. Not the sucralose.  Not the glycerol ester of wood rosin (what???).  Not the FD&C color # of the day. Not even that it comes in blue.

The real problem is with Gatorade is that it tastes so darn good.  

This week I got really sick.  After way to many hours of throwing up, my dear hubby decided I needed something to keep me from getting dehydrated.  He provided me with a wealth of options - lovely purified water from our filter, organic lemon/maple syrup drink he made himself and a bottle of green Gatorade.

My body was wrecked, my liver was working overtime, and every 30 minutes I'd find myself waking up craving another suck out of the high-fructose, neon-colored sports bottle. Weird. I'm pretty sure the stuff is highly toxic, but maybe my body recognized its deep need for salts and chose the Gatorade to meet its most basic needs.  But I don't think so.  I think the stuff just tastes weirdly good.

Healthy enough to drive myself around town today but not really wanting to get too close to solid food or much water, I made the health-concious, responsible choice to pick up some organic, non-sugar plant based sweetened electrolyte powder.  It's great, I notice I'm feeling better with more fluids in me, and I'm not stressed about the secondary effects of what I'm putting into me.

But it sort of tastes like my 1980's memories of Crystal Light and my tongue is crying out, "Where's the Gatorade?!"

Karen Mangiacotti is my kind of feminist

This article/post/editorial by Karen Mangiacotti made me scream with laughter and agreement.  It is too good not to share.

The Penis Mom

When I was little I wanted to be a lot of things: Johnny Carson's replacement; A Dallas Cowboy Cheerleader so good I was the only one on the team; an artist with my own wing at the Boston Museum of Fine Art -- you know, normal stuff. I wanted to be a lot of things, but I never -- I PROMISE you -- ever wanted to grow up to be someone known as "The Penis Mom".

But here I am.

go here for full text

I am The Rooster

Cleaning off my desk today, I found a copy made out of a co-worker's Chinese Horoscope book about 15 years ago.  At the time I thought it a delightful description of myself and my goals.  Now I hope for more rest, peace and gentleness than it allows, though I suspect my family still easily recognizes me in its lines.

The Rooster
I am on hand
To herald in the day,
And to announce its exit.
I thrive by clockwork and precision.
In my unending quest for perfection
All things will be restored to their rightful place.
I am the exacting taskmaster.
The ever-watchful administrator.
I seek perfect order in my world.
I represent unfailing dedication.

I AM THE ROOSTER

A Very Full Life

I'm sure you've noticed I have not posted in a while.  Everyday I mean to - I've been learning so much I'd like to write about, both for my own internal processing and integration and to share with you all.

This year, Bill and I have decided to add back in neurodevelopmental programs to help shore up several places where each child seem to be struggling.  What does this really mean? Thanks to an evaluation with my friend Donna Bateman (one of the most dedicated mamas I know and a true delight), who trained with the Family Hope Center,  I'm helping the kids do lots of reflex stimulations (as explained by Donna here and by another site I found here) and creeping and crawling. Yes, creeping and crawling like puppies and crocodiles.  Remember, the brain is a muscle that grows through use and when we spend time on our bellies and hands and knees, we organize the pons and mid-brain, areas responsible for hearing, reading, writing, emotional control, following many step commands, plus tons more. And by we, I mean my kids!

To quicken the neurodevelopmental work, we're focusing on some important complimentary areas - especially nutrition, still sticking with the paleo theme (plus we're about to start chasing the Candida plague around here) and integrative manual therapy.

Of course there is always the academic work, though scaled back some, we need to get through in a day.  Plus all the fabulous classes our Seattle homeschool community provides.  Right now either one or both of the kids is doing: Japanese class, piano lessons, hip-hop dance, math class (with our math hero, Jenn), girl choir, guitar, soccer and scouts.  Whew.  And all the associated driving.

In what seems like a true act of self-indugence, I've signed up for the Advanced Studies Program with the Neufeld Institute.  I can't even put to words how much fun I'm having learning more deeply about the developmental attachment paradigm Dr. Neufeld has created.  I've just finished a training for his Vital Connections course and will do my first practicum facilitating it in January.  Somehow at the same time as my training class, I volunteered to host another Intensive 1 group.  Intense has been the correct word for doing two Neufeld courses at the same time!  So much fun, I managed to double schedule again for January when I'll facilitate the Vital Connection course while completing a training in his Making Sense of Play course. At the end of the 2 year program I expect to be facilitating both the Vital Connection and Art and Science of Transplanting Children for the adoption community in the Puget Sound area, helping moderate a dynamic Neufeld focused community in the Seattle area and using the knowledge I have as a parent coach to support other parents.

While I truly love the work Dr. Neufeld is doing, I also adore and deeply value Holly vanGulden's work with developmental attachment and adoption.  I did a 3 day training with her in Minnesota this September and have been integrating what I learned in my daily interactions with my kids.  I've also been sharing more about it with other adoptive parents as I see how much Holly's knowledge and experience speaks specifically to what we see in our adopted kids.  In the pause between my Neufeld courses, I plan to sit down and brush up on her training manual.

Not something I'm likely to post much about on the world wide web, I still put quite a bit of time and energy each week into my personal growth hobby.

My brag for the month is that 6 days a week for the past 3 weeks, I've been in bed asleep by 8:30, and mostly slept until 7 or 8:00.  I'll keep on sleeping 10+ hours a night until I'm naturally waking up rested around 6am.  Chipping away at my apparently enormous sleep debt may be the only thing that really helps me keep all these balls I'm juggling in the air fairly gracefully.

Add these to my daily attempts to run the household, connect with my husband, keep the dog well exercised, practice guitar, present delicious nutritious food 5x a day and somehow fit back in my beloved CrossFit, and sadly, I just can't post right now.

My hope is that once I have a few training courses under my belt I'll have more brain space to write about the things I'm learning.  For now, though, consider my blog on pause.

Feel free to email me or call if you have questions or want to say hi.  I'll miss you all!

Squash Happiness

Apparently I've been preoccupied over here seeing as how over a month has past since I last posted.  I think about posting almost everyday and have lots of pictures to share.  Just not much free time in which to post.

For the moment my recommendation of the day: both buttercup squash and blue ballet squash are really yummy!  Baked and served with butter or pureed into a warming breakfast soup.

Happy fall to you all.

Shampoo Bar?

Apparently I was in a total stupor when I wrote this post and my brain mixed Lush, the maker of the lovely shampoo bars and amazing bath bombs, and Kiehl's, another of my cosmetic-maker crushes into one happy store.

Sooo, edited for accuracy (million thanks to Erin):

Rosie and I wandered into Lush a while back, trying to escape the rain downtown.  We sniffed bath bombs, admired sparkly lotion and one of the employees indulged us to a hand treatment.

Somehow the bright 20 something also talked me into buying soap and conditioner bars. The amazing jasmine smell of the shampoo bar lured me into saying yes. Still,  I came home thinking, weird.

Now I'm in love with my shampoo and conditioner bars.  They're easy to use - 5 strokes in my hair with the shampoo bar and I'm all suds.  Conditioner bar takes about 8 strokes, still efficient and very effective.  The employee had said the bar would last longer than a medium bottle of shampoo.  Beyond skeptical I just nodded, but it turns out she's right, the bar lasts a long time. And super bonus, they are so easy to travel with.  Pop them in the little tin, drop them in my bag and off I go.  No issues with how many ounces of liquid they are or concerns that the pressure of travel will cause leaking.

The shampoo bar is gentle and it doesn't seem to strip my hair.  It feels as good as Dr. Bronner's soap on my hair without all the mess and crazy messaging. Check out the bar, you might become a convert, too.  Also, grab a few of the amazing bath bombs while you're at it.


From the other part of my cosmetic-crush brain:
I've been a fan of Kiehl's products for a long time.  I'm not sure they're super natural, but they smell and feel better on my skin than most beauty products. Their lip gloss tops my list, you'll probably love it, too.

Today's Workout

I'm feeling pretty proud of myself.  As a warm up, we started with some shoulder lifts (pushing a bar with weights over my head) at about 38 lbs until I just couldn't lift my arms over my head any more - I did about 25 in sets of 5.

Then I did today's workout which was:
squats and sit-ups
50
40
30
20
10

That means I did 150 squats and sit-ups in about 20 minutes.  Go ME!

Busy Summer Fun

Being gone for 10 days in August allowed our garden to go crazy. With Bill and Rosie off together on a business trip (her first!!), Theo and I took advantage of the lovely day to harvest some bounty.

We got giant squash and 16 (count them 16) cups of basil leaves.

Of course, that much basil calls for some serious pesto preparation. Theo and I took turns adding ingredients.  Our recipe turned out to be a little creative because I didn't have enough of most anything in the house to make 5x my normal pesto recipe.  For nuts we used almonds, pecans, cashews and pepitas.  For garlic we used some fresh, some roasted giant garlic I happened to have on hand and some whipped garlic from Lebanese Breeze.

 Theo adds in the first layer of basil for a lovely stratification of ingredients (if that looks to you like a lot of salt on top, it is.  I got a little confused in my converting).

After a thrilling time mixing the ingredients, we scooped out the pesto into 1/4 balls for freezing.

Now, we have a large bag of summer sunshine ready for those cold gray days ahead. As a bonus, we really enjoyed our time together as just two, and I got some good sidewards homeschool math and problem solving into the mix.

Next project: doing something paleo with those giant squashes.

I was going to post....

But my bedtime alarm went off.  Yes, I really have an alarm set on my phone to remind me to go to bed.

As you can see from my post times, I usually blow it off.  Sigh.  However, I have a bonafide prescription from my doctor to go.to.bed. and get at least 8 hours of sleep.  We all know I know this from the 23 previous posts I've done about sleep.  Double sigh.

I have a follow up appointment with her in 2 weeks, so the shame factor is kicking in and I'll be going to bed at a reasonable hour for the next few weeks.

Other posts in the works, look forward to talking to you all tomorrow.