Not as bad as last year, but it wasn’t a walk in the park either.

January, my first New Year’s eve without my mom. We had a tradition, just before midnight my mom would call and we’d listen to Big Ben strike midnight, laugh at the crowds going nuts in the background in London, and wish each other a Happy New Year. That was my new year, the apple falling in Time’s Square 5 hours later was an anti climax.

Then there came my tooth problem which landed me in the ccu for 4 days. Oh that was fun, NOT!

In February my bapeshoe store saga finally came to an end, 2 months after it started. We finally got a new pair of shoes, but the wrong colour. Lessons learned. Matthew’s 14th birthday post wasn’t filled with the usual mushy stuff – I was pissed.

March, what happened in March – oh yeah, I was drowning in dept. Well not drowning exactly, just poor budget management. Took me a while to dig myself out of that one. I missed my mom a lot this month, things were happening, things I needed to plan, and I needed to talk to her so many times.

April I became addicted to ‘brothers and sister‘ and thankfully it was available online so I didn’t have to remember to tune in on a Sunday night. My favorite radio station went poof due to new licensing laws, but I survived.

May was the month gas prices skyrocked – that but a dent in my monthly budget. May however, was a quiet month.

June, on the other hand was BUSY! Dad arrived for a visit, it was his birthday, it was C’s birthday, C graduated from Pre K and M graduated from 8th grade – sort off! He spent two weeks in summer school and I thanked God he was out of that crappy school. We had one barbeque to celebrate it all, and it rained.

July, was a blast! haha, the dental saga which I thought was over continued, there was flooding in the UK, the final Harry Potter book was released which I finished in less than a day, and I mastered ‘Rainbow Six‘ for xbox live.

There was Friday 13th and an important lesson learned with regards to kicking the fridge while NOT wearing steel toe-capped shoes. Oh yeah, and July was the month of the $600+ cell phone bill.

August, was the month of the green pool. It actually started in June but I fixed it, but the August green was not fixable. Other than working at summer camp, August was pretty uneventful.

September, was back to school for all of us. M started High school and did well, a far cry from that other school. His average went back into the 90′s, he made the soccer team – everything was peachy in that department. It was the first anniversary of my mom’s death, that was hard…on us all.

October, my pc started to blue screen, and I started backing up. It turned out to be the bluetooth controller, I fixed it, it stopped blue screening. That was it in October, nothing worth talking about I guess, nothing I can remember anyway.

November, C ended up in the hospital for a few days with leg pain, unable to walk which was later diagnosed as ‘toxic sinuvitis’. That was fun – NOT! The xbox red ringed and M and I suffered from withdrawal symptoms and frantically searched the house for the ps 2 for a gaming fix.

December, arrived with a vengeance. The day after receiving our ‘fixed’ xbox, it red ringed again. A family member pissed me off for the last time and something was finally done. The Christmas season began, the shopping took over and it wasn’t to painful this year. The xbox came back from microsoft just in time for Santa’s xbox gifts. I suffered from sciatica, but 3 weeks after it started I finally got relief in a little pill and I became addicted to ‘guitar hero’.

All in all it hasn’t been a bad year, I’ve had better, I’ve had worse, but most importantly I survived to do it all again starting tomorrow. Isn’t life grand?

Blwyddyn Newydd Dda!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Previous years of my life in brief:

2006 – 2005 - 2004

My Sciatica finally sent me to the doctor begging for a miracle drug. At one point I asked the poor man if he could schedule me for surgery and simply yank the nerve out – kinda like a root canal, it’s hurting – remove it. Unfortunately, I learned it’s connected to my spine, and removing it would result in all sorts of problems – darn it.

There’s a throbbing pain  from my ass to my knee, and my calf feels like there are athletes in there playing a game of tug-of-war.

I tried the heating pads, and the ice packs, and yes they helped, but I can’t walk around indefinatly with an  icepack stuffed down my butt can I? Sure it’s fine around the house, but I have to venture outside on occasion.

Over the counter ibruprofen simply wasn’t cutting it, Aleve (even 3 of the suckers) did n-o-t-h-i-n-g, and my visits to the chiropractor were useless. One visit actually resulted in me leaving with pain whereas when I entered there was none.  It’s no longer an annoying pain that comes and goes, it’s  a constant if I do everyday chores.

So I have nabumetone, a muscle relaxer and so far so good. Unlike most drugs, an hours later and I’m still awake with no desire to curl up in a ball and sleep for a week.

Pain has subsided somewhat, well almost, my calf still fells like it’s being stretched, but overall, I’m feeling better. Let’s hope it’ll be completely gone within the next few days, three weeks with this is enough already.