Hello All,

Well, work is still so busy it is crazy.  I work 7 days a week and try to keep up with the house and all.  Ugh.

Okay, I have lots to do today so this is just a quick update for you all.

As I mentioned before, I had a lot of debts to take care of after being sick all those months.  I am down to taxes when tax time comes up.  I don't have the estimated $5000 I need for them but am looking into the info about paying it to the gov't in installments.  I had hoped to have the money come tax time but life has lots of surprises including coming home last week in the middle of a freak wind storm to discover that all the shingles had blown off my house.  Sigh.  That meant I had to take the next day off work to have the insurance people and roofers in to fix my house.  Oh well, I guess it comes with owning a house and I should just be grateful that I have a house.

The real Joey is doing okay.  He still has a happy little face and follows me around.  I had to buy him a winter jacket because while he loves to sit outside and watch the world go by, he gets cold.  Silly little guy doesn't come in when he is cold, he just sits out there shivering.  I have learned to put a coat on him, get him to lie on a blankie instead of the snow and bring him in after 30 minutes whether he wants to or not!!  I had to take him to the vet yesterday to get a prescription for an ear infection.  I weighed him and my poor little baby has lost 10 of his 55 lbs in the last month.  Time is certainly running out.  I just hope he lives to see spring.  I am feeding him soft food now...but even that he turns his nose up to more often than not.  Today I am going to look for liver for him.  While I can't eat the stuff and even the smell of it when I cook it repulses me...I will do it for him twice a day if I need to. 

The ex is STILL not working apparently.  Thank God we don't have kids that he would have to pay support for.  A friend of mine worked out that over the 9 years I have known my ex, he has worked less than 2.  Isn't that impressive????  He is still living with his mom and his sister is too because she 'can't' work either.  Mom must be so proud that she has raised 2/3 kids that wont make their own way in life!!!  As I have mentioned before, it is not even genetic because all the kids are adopted.  It is purely upbringing.  So sad since, while I never met dad since he died 10 years before I met my ex, dad had an industrial park named after him and made the family very comfortable financially.  Sadly the kids think he was a terrible dad because he was out working all the time.  Heck, the man died in his early 50's after 5 years in a sick bed.  Most people in their 40's are working hard...just not my ex's family I guess.  Oh, and he told me a couple of months ago (the last time we spoke) that he had a new girl who had an 11 and 13 year old.  Poor girl, now she has 3 children. It won't last.  He is toooooo selfish and lazy to have any kids around.  I am just sorry that the kids will get hurt in the process.  Nothing I can do about it though.

Me, well I am still single and not looking.  I have no time.  My animals are aging and take a lot of work (which I am glad to do to keep them comfy and happy).  I work a lot.  Soon I will have to tell my bosses it is too much.  I thought this big push would be over by the end of Jan and needed the overtime to pay off my debts....but now it looks like it will go until June/July which is tooooooo much.  But then there is that issue of $5000.  Sigh, my health because I am working too much or my health because I am stressing about debt... tough decision.

I am still as big as a beached whale.  My tendons in my legs are not healing so I cannot start running again.  I am going to go to a sport medicine doctor about that.  I need to start running at lunch just to cope with the overload of work!!!!

Hair: Well, I have to admit...I have not had time to do much for it.  It still has a nice shine to it and looks good but not because I have done anything good for it other than wash it 2/week at most with a very gentle cleaner and use Curly64's spray.  I don't even have jojoba oil in the house to oil the ends.  I am going to fix that today!!!  I am also going to do an EVOO infused with herbs deep moisturize!!!  I haven't measured it for a couple of months so I have no idea how long it is.

Some of you may recall that my finger nails were falling off because of psoriasis.  I have a medication I can take now that will supposedly fix that.  It will take 6 months to fix things because nails grow so slowly!!  It should also stop the scaling of my skin.  I LOVE THAT IDEA!!  Oh, and I am going to a sleep lab in April to figure out why I can only sleep 2-3 hours a night.  Hopefully that will increase my energy levels during waking hours!!

What do I think 2008 and hold for me?  Well, unlikely to be a man since I don't want one right now.  This is a time for me to figure me out.  I still hope to be happily married...but my dreams of having kids are becoming dim despite me desire.  Hopefully losing at least half, if not all, of the extra 40 lbs I am carrying around although I haven't gotten on to a diet just yet.  I want to do work on the house.  Because of finances I will be limited on that but my family gave me money for Xmas and I have some materials here from last summer to do things so hopefully I will get some stuff done.  K. out of room.  Sorry for the long rant. 

J

LD, thanx for the ideas.  I checked into payments (I am actually in Canada so I don't do the IRS...but it is all the same really).  I found out that I would pay 8% interest.  I will have to check out what prime is when the time comes and think about doing it with my bank.  They will give me a loan for prime +2 which might be better.    Sigh, if I could just lose the weight, get past the psoriasis and pay off my taxes, this whole round of being sick would be behind me!!!  Hopefully by 2009 it will just be a bad memory.

I have taken tomorrow off work.  It is kinda funny to take a Tuesday off but the weather is supposed to be really bad tomorrow (freezing rain which is the worst in my opinion....I would rather a big snow storm when I have an hour long drive to work).  Sooooo, tonight I am going to watch a movie and am taking a moment to work on my hair since I have been neglecting it.  I just put EVOO infused with rosemary and sage into my hair.  I am going to wash it out in a few minutes, do an ACV rinse, do a scalp exfoliate with my conditioner and brown sugar mix, moisturize my scalp with aloe vera and then put on a leave in mixture of aloe vera/water/jojoba oil.  Once my hair dries I will put some jojoba on the ends.  I know it sounds like a lot in one night....but my hair has been soooooo neglected.  Maybe tomorrow I will do an avacado deep condition (Curly 64's recipe).  I should get it out of the freezer tonight so it thaws for tomorrow.

I haven't measured my hair for months.  I think the last time I did that was in October.  I wonder how long it is.  Well, I can't measure it myself but maybe on the weekend I will get Mum to measure it.  I can't even remember how long it was the last time I measured it!!!  22.5 inches I think?

Well, my movie is about to start.  I will have to wait until a dull moment in it to wash my hair out.  I ordered the movie on my satellite so I am stuck with the time it is on as opposed to being able to pause it.   .

See you all soon,

JD

RTG, I still cannot get over your hair!!!  It has grown soooooo much.

It is a rough week.  I have done nothing for my hair.  In fact, I need a shower period!!!  Ugh, I feel gross!!


Dad went into congestive heart failure on Monday and Joey (the real Joey) almost died on me this week.  Joey is 100% better today.  Dad is being treated and doing well.  Work is driving me into the ground!!

On the bright side, I am about to go grocery shopping and buy health food and hopefully I will finally get a good "diet" going.  When I get back I think I will shower, exfoliate, do stuff for my hair and all that good stuff.  A little pamper me time.  Heck, why not, after 6 days of diarhea from Joey, my house is sparkling clean from the constant cleaning!!!   Work can lay off for the rest of the day as I have already put in my 8 hours.

Gotta run,

JD

I hope your dad's recovery is quick and full and the same for Joey!  Hope today is a better day for you.

jd-i hope your dad and little joey are doing better soon. that is a lot to deal with.
thinking of you.   

((((hugz)))) you hang in there!  I hope all will be better soon!

Well Folks...the dreaded day has come.  Today I will put the real JD to sleep.  I don't think I could be in more pain than I am now.

Every where I go, I see him running around as a young dog.  The memories are flooding my life.  Yesterday, having made the decision, I took him for a two minute walk (it was all he could manage), a long car ride, down to the 'candy store' (the pet food store), over to see 'grandma and grandpa' and brought him home and fed him liver (yuk, but he loves it and it is all he will eat now).  Last night many people stopped by to say goodbye to him.  To be honest, I didn't want anyone to come here but I thought it best for him to have company other than my sobbing self.  My little dog walker had eyes as red as mine.  Joey enjoyed the day.

This morning Joey woke me up at 4 am wanting to go out.  I took his collar off and let him wander outside with Tatty (my other dog).  I fed him a bowl full of liver which he loved.  Tatty loves it too.  Poor Tatty.  She does not know that by bedtime tonight, the love of her life will not be here anymore.   I am not sure if she will fret away or get past it.  Only time will tell.  Right now Joey is sleeping comfortably.

Joey and I will enjoy the few hours we have left when he is awake.  At 3:30 my parents are coming over and we will cook a prime rib roast (that I will not be able to eat a bite of) and Joey and Tatty will be given freshly roasted meat, enjoy the smells and have the family around them.  At 6 pm my vet will arrive, I will try to say goodbye, Joey will go outside and lie on the blankets I have prepared for him...  I don't know if I will stay with him while it all happens.  That I am leaving until the last minute to figure out.  If I can't, my father will stay with him.  Then my vet will take my baby away and he will be cremated and ashes returned.  As for me, well I have asked my parents to leave right away and let me disintegrate alone with my poor Tatty.  Oh, I forgot, Tatty is getting valium ahead of the ending.  She has always been such an emotional dog, I want to make things as easy as I can for her.  She will have a nervous breakdown because I am having one.  By morning she will have figured out what has happened.

I have taken the week off to heal myself and to heal my Tatty as best as I can.  I bought her a tonne of doggie junk food when we went to the candy store yesterday in hopes of getting her to eat.  I have also asked my dog walker to come and walk her each day (after tomorrow) for the next two weeks so that she gets some time doing different things other than hanging with me.  I wont wash Joey's bedding for a few days so Tatty can still smell him.  I plan on taking her out each day to new places to walk and to distract her as best as I can.

As for me....I dunno how I will get through the next few days.  I see Joey is awake.  I think I will take him for a little drive right now.  I have found that I cannot download the pics from my camera and I only have space for 6 more photos.  Maybe we will drive to Walmart and see if they can download the pics to a disk for me in a very short time.  The candy store doesn't open until 9 so maybe I should wait a few minutes and then I can let him do a little walk around the candy store one last time.  I was sorry I didn't have my video camera with me when I took him yesterday.  He still had to sniff everything...even if he didn't want any treats.

Ok, gonna run.  I can't believe how fast time is going.  My beloved Joey will be gone in in less than 12 hours....after 15 years of joy.  I wish I had some poetry in me....I would write a poem for him.  I guess the song 'Ole Shep' will have to do.  It is by Elvis.  Don't read it if you are prone to  getting teary.  It is a heartbreaker.

God help me through this day.

JD