Is the Sun Even Shining Today?

I am noticing a pattern.

Days in England that are rainy happen. Stereotypically, they happen daily; but in actuality it is far less than that. British people just like to make it seem worse than it is. In New Mexico, when it rains, it is sunny beforehand. Then the clouds pour in, thicker and thicker, until the sky is dark and gloomy overcast. the darker it gets, the harder it rains; and if it was really really dark, then you know you are in for hail and tornadoes and you'd better be in the house. Here, it is just... grey.

Today I can tell the sun is up because I can see. But there are no clouds. It is just like the sky is missing. Just grey. Sometimes lighter grey, sometimes darker. But still grey. This is a strange sensation. It feels like I live in a completely different world.

This other-worldliness manifests in other interesting ways too. Sunrise, for example. I don't think I told you all, but in the winter it was dark at 4. Yes, 4 in the afternoon. Kids came home from school in the dark. I came home from school in the dark. The sun would rise about 7:30 in the morning, and set at 4. People went to work in the dark and came home in the dark, having never seen the sun. I still shake my head at that phenomenon.

Now that it is fast approaching Midsummer the tables have turned. The sun comes up at god-early 4 in the morning! Sunset is at a fairly normal time... 8:30 or 9. But 4 in the morning? Perhaps that wouldn't even be something I would notice if I would close my curtains against the sun that early... but here's the thing. There is no AC here, which is fine... but the breeze at night is nice. And closing the thick heavy sun-blocking curtains also blocks the breeze.

I wake up less at 4 in the morning when the sun comes up. But for a while, everyday, 4:30 Amy is awake. Suns up! I'm slowly training myself to block out the sun, which feels a shame since there is so little of it at the other side of the year.

On an update note: I finished my anti-biotics today. Called the doctor yesterday, as I am still wheezy and congested, to find out if they wanted to extend the course of anti-biotics. Let's just say that not all doctors here in the UK are as nice as the one I saw. I was told that he didn't know why I'd been put on such strong anti-biotics, that I wasn't coughing enough, that it was all in my larynx, and that the first doctor probably hadn't even listened to my lungs. I tried to correct him... but sometimes it is better to be a duck and let it all just slide off your back. I get to meet this guy next Wednesday, as he DOES NOT want to see me before then. Suddenly, I am not looking forward to going to the doctor.

Danger, Will Robinson! Too Many Blogs!

I have spent my day transferring all of my old blogs from Myspace onto this blog. And I realised that I miss all of the people who read my Myspace blog and sent me comments. I'm not quite sure why it is harder to get people to read it here... perhaps the lack of reminder makes a difference. So, I have been thinking about a solution. Since it is harder for people to get to this family blog, I am going to start cross-posting my family blog to Myspace, and vice versa. Whatever is commented on Myspace I will transfer (don't worry... with no links back) to the comments of my family blog. I won't transfer any family blog comments to Myspace, though. I desperately miss everyone, but it is just too much for me to continue to have two separate blogs that I keep up with, as my lack of posting on Myspace shows. Maybe if they are one in the same, it will help. So as not to overwhelm anyone, I won't transfer the entire year's worth of blogs from the family blog onto Myspace. Just a few that I think are good. Plus the most current. Then I'll just cross-post, occasionally. So if anyone wants to read everything, there are going to have to go to come here. This family blog is the definitive spot for all of Amy's blogging from now on. On the same note, all of my old Myspace blogs have been moved over here, along with some of my LiveJournal Blogs. That explains why there are suddenly so many posts. I miss all you people so much. I want to touch base with all of you. Soon. So let's keep in touch, shall we?

Lovely Goodness... or Not.

So much to tell you all... and since I am stuck home in bed I have plenty of time to do it.

Why am I stuck home in bed, you ask? Well... that is part of the story. I wrote in the last post that I had been sick a while back. Well, I kinda lied to you all. I made it sound like I had gotten over it... but I never really did. I didn't want anyone to worry, and I figured it was just a persistent virus or something, so it wasn't a big deal. But I kept coughing and coughing, and coughing fits were actually slightly disgusting with snot flying everywhere and hacking up great green gobs of greasy grimy gopher guts. Breathing was difficult, liquid, and painful; and it felt like someone had wrapped a steel band around my chest. I was still pretty insistent that it was a virus, but I just couldn't shake it.

Then Ashley the Lovely ended up with a seriously infected ingrown toenail. Now honestly, you wouldn't think that much of a big deal, but it is. It is when you live a sedentary life as a couch potato, or a normal life as an active parent (As Kim did, once upon a time;) but it is a really huge deal when you rely on your feet as much as we do. And Ashley's feet are her mode of transportation, so when she couldn't walk on them without extreme pain... time to go to the doctor.

That in addition to the fact that I was down to my last scopolomine patch with much flying coming up this summer, and my job was being pretty insistent about my needing to have an epi-pen, since there are bees in these here parts... I decided that I would have my cough looked at too.

The doctor, a Doctor Barton, was the stereotypical older Englishman that you envision. He has a cane. He has white hair. He wears a bow tie. He has the accent that we Americans define as the epitome of English accents. And he took one listen to my chest. Then listened again. And again.

"You have pleurisy," says he.

Pleurisy is the inflammation of the lining of the lungs, and has a tendency to go hand and hand with pneumonia. Which is what he is worried about. The lower right lobe of my lungs is the most tender and goopey, and when I cough and Stephen pounds there, it helps because the cough becomes more productive. It was this lower right lobe that he said was where all these fun things were happening.

So, I have super strong anti-biotics. I am on day 5 of them now. The cough is slightly better, but is by no means gone. It doesn't hurt as much to breathe, and I don't feel like I am breathing through water. I will be having an X-ray this week, and then possibly another one the week after. That will either confirm or deny pneumonia, and may change what we are doing to treat this. I am desperately hoping it is NOT pneumonia. I am also desperately missing the dry windy hot places that this desert rat thrives in. I blame this lung thing on the weather and infernal cold of England.

Ashley is also on anti-biotics for her toe. It is doing much better. Dr. Barton did nothing for the ingrown bit of it because the infection was too bad, but that just means that we get to go back together next Wednesday. Me to be checked again and her to have the ingrown part taken care of.

In the process of all this, I now have 2 Epi-pens (one for work and one for home.. and watching Stephen read the directions and play with the Epi-pens was quite entertaining. At least now he can save me if I get stung) and 10 additional scopolomine patches. I also have acidophilus, and a yeast infection thanks to the anti-biotics. I love being sick. (ha!)

A funny side story that might just make up for being miserable: The anti-biotics that I am taking smell quite nice, as they are coated with some sort of stuff to make them easier to swallow. Stephen is attracted to nice-smelling things. He just can't stay away from them. He opens the medicine jar and sniffs them. Often. And asks if he can please just lick them before I take them as they must taste lovely too. Soooo...

I let him. Ashley watched and burst into laughter. He looked at me, then did. Slowly, with anticipation, he licked my anti-biotic before I took it....

... and was disappointed. He says they smell much better than they taste. So now he just opens the bottle and smells them. It makes me laugh every time... which turns into a coughing fit. Every time.

On the not-sick front, Stephen has sent in an application for a new job today. It is a learning technology job at a University in London. It is a significant (possibly 5 digit) pay raise for him. If he gets it, it means that until I graduate he will be commuting to London... but our potential plan is to move somewhere between here and there, so that his commute is shorter and balanced by the equal one I will have to make. Since the school that I think I would like to teach at is in London, that would make the transition after I graduate an easier one to make. No one will be settling for a job so the other can do what they want. We will keep you all informed of the result of the application. But, to be honest, Stephen is awesome enough that I can't imagine they won't want him. And I am not biased in the least.

It dawned on me that it is less than a year before I graduate with my Bachelor's degree.

Spring is here and though it is still cold to me, it is much warmer than it was. The rain is nice, though not as constant as I was led to believe. Ashley tells me that it is SO HOT, though I take a sweater everywhere I go because I get cold. She hasn't adapted...not at all. ;) My favourite part of the spring is the babies. Baby ducks and baby moorhens are everywhere. My favourite, of course, are the baby moorhens. Their parents stay together to raise them, and moorhen parents take the cake for trying hard... though they are really dumb about it. Most moorhen babies are lost, sometimes before they even hatch, because the parents were not quite as thoughtful as they could have been when placing nests. But they make up for it in hard work when the babies are actually born.


Moorhen babies are little black balls of fluff. On the river by the house, there is a family of moorhens with small ones. It is nice to watch them grow. They are very cute, and since they are not as good at swimming as ducks, they holler after mama and daddy to slow down and wait for them. And they eat all the time. I feel slightly sorry for the parents. I don't think they have had time to rest since the babies came.

Though resting is something I am now getting back to.

The Long Silence... an Explanation.

Yo ho ho friends and family. It has obviously been quite awhile since I have last spoken to you all. Last you heard I had many papers left to go. As of right now, I have one left for the year.

So, the quick update and explanation of my distance. Lots of papers to write, and a new job to boot. I am working at a 'nursery' (aka daycare) here. It is a daily experience. There are many things that I would change, but it is a lesson instead in keeping my opinions to myself. It makes me often miss Christi. I daydream about an early childhood center with her...

Anyway, on top of that, I have been really really sick. I am still not entirely over it. It started with the flu (or so I'm told) and happily moved into my chest and made a home there. I still hack and cough things up, and I still feel like there is a tight band around my chest. I make it through the night without coughing, which is an improvement. For a while, I thought I was fighting off pneumonia.



And while all of this has been going on, Kelley came for a visit. We had grand plans to post blogs while she was here; you can see how well that worked out. I am hoping that she still will help me post at least 1 blog. Until then, enjoy the few pics.


I don't want to post too many on the off chance that she will still post a blog with me here about her trip. She and Stephen spent most of their time together, as I still had school and I still had to work while she was here. (Insert sappy face sucking here...)


She and Stephen spent lots of time exploring London: she now has seen more of it than I have. Lucky for me she took lots of pictures, so I could see things too. She saw awesome changing of the guard stuff... I hope she tells all of you about it.

Mother's Day came and went, and it was a hard day for me. I feel it on a daily basis not being closer to Tristan. It doesn't get any easier the longer it has been. It just aches in my chest all the time. (And no, it ISN'T the cough!) I'm sure some of you will say that I brought it on myself. I'm not looking for sympathy, just commenting on the falsity of the 'it gets better with time' statement.

Related to this, it is definite that I am coming home for a visit this summer. My plane flies into El Paso at 10:45 pm on the 17th of July, and I leave to come back at 10:45 on the morning of the 7th. I'm grateful for the chance to spend time with Boo. And I will spend my entire 34th birthday on a plane. I won't even get home until the day after my birthday. Lucky Stephen... he can forget the day and it won't be a big deal at all.

While I am in the States, Tristan and I will be staying at Mom Holen's house. The plan is to go crazy with seeing everyone. I am not going anywhere or doing anything that doesn't involve spending time with the people I love. And Tristan's 7th birthday. I'll have my old cell phone number while I am there, at least until the beginning of August. I would love to see everyone. I am really looking forward to seeing people. But most of all, I can't wait to hug my little boy (who is not so little and graduated from 1st grade yesterday.)

Hope this fills everyone in on what is going on in my world. I hope to get back into the swing of posting, especially as there is so much I could be telling to you. One more paper to go, and then it is just the day to day things. Hopefully there will be a post from Kelley soon, and I intend to force Ashley onto the computer to fill you all in on what is going on in her world too. She has been a busy little beaver lately too.

kisses, and missing every one of you...