Dec. 6: The weekend

What I’ve noticed this weekend, more than anything else, is how god-awful much my back is hurting again. Sitting, lying down, standing… it all hurts, pretty much the same way it has for the past six months. Kim and I decided today that it’s because the tumor’s shrinking and taking some of its neighbors with it, who are fighting back because they don’t like that tumor. That tumor’s kind of a big jerk. Who’d want to go with him anyway?

So, please pardon me if I come off grouchy. I kinda am.

Yesterday I got my hair cut—the best way to describe it is a “pre-chemo cut.” I should post pictures, but I haven’t taken any yet. In fact, I should’ve had my hairdresser take pictures when I was still in the chair, because I took a nap as soon as I got home and that messed up the style; then I showered and took another nap with a wet head and then looked scared. Not scary. Scared. My hair was totally standing straight up. Pretty.

This morning I got up and showered and styled my hair, but didn’t follow through with makeup and all that. If you think I’m putting a picture of me in my new hairstyle on the Internet before I’ve got makeup on, do you even know me at all??? Of course, now I’m working up such a frenzy about this new haircut that even if it were THE BEST HAIRSTYLE IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD, it would still be a disappointment.

Sorry.

Also, GEEZ, I have a lot of grey hair.

Maybe you’ll catch my new ‘do in the background of a picture someday. Keep an eye out.

During my second nap yesterday, Victor got all the Christmas stuff out of the attic and had the exterior lights done by the time I woke up. They look great! I mean, for us. We probably won’t ever do the crazy, all-out exterior illumination thing that we’ve always wanted to do. That’s for people with better life insurance than ours. I won’t let Victor get on the roof until he’s worth more dead than he is alive. Anyway, we’ve got our twinkle snowflake lights, and our little front yard trees are aglow, and lots of that good ol’ stand-by lit-up stuff. It works.

Today we got the living room tree decorated. As always, my job was to unwrap each ornament and hand it off to be hung on the tree. The kids have a blast doing this. After they go to bed, Victor and I fix all the ornaments so they actually look nice. Definitely one of my favorite Christmas traditions, even when I feel like you-know-what. We had a nice afternoon.

We also enjoyed some visits from friends this weekend. My BFF April and her family came by Friday evening for a few hours. It had been months since we’d seen them, and we had fun catching up on all our family changes. Today Kim (F’n) came by for a short football-watching break. We also had dinner brought to us by Dina yesterday, and Fancy Lori™ today, both of which were fabulous—we felt completely spoiled! I feel terribly guilty about sitting around while company is here, but I guess I wouldn’t really want them here if they were expecting anything from me these days. I’m worthless.

Except for an echocardiogram on Tuesday, I don’t have any medical procedures scheduled all week. This is kind of a good deal. I don’t know what an echocardiogram is, but it sounds kind of like a cardigan and I kind of like cardigans. They’re not very exciting, but who wants exciting for a medical procedure?