SOLSC '26 Day Twenty-three: Spring highs, achoo!

 

Thirty-one days, thirty-one posts for the

Slice of Life Story Challenge.

Ah, spring in Central Texas!  Roses are blooming, trees are adorned with bright green leaves, wildflowers are appearing at roadsides.

Sideways pic of the knockout rose next to my house.

And everything is coated in a fine yellow dust.  Case in point, my car:

Note the dead junebug. Yep, here already, too.

Do other states run allergy counts and forecasts?  One of our more humorous local meteorologists, Avery Tomasco, has a few Facebook posts about the "very high" oak pollen count; here are my faves:

Photo from Avery Tomasco's Facebook page

Photo from Avery Tomasco's Facebook page

This comedian, specializing in Southern idiosyncrasies, pretty much nailed it, too:  https://www.facebook.com/share/r/1FXvjN1fCe/

And we haven't even peaked yet!  I lived all over the world for the first third of my life, and never had allergy issues until moving here.  Not sure there's enough allergy meds in the world to fight the pollen levels we have here; may have to go back to wearing that stash of Covid masks I still have on hand.  

SOLSC '26 Day Twenty-two: Windows and sliding glass doors, mirrors too

 

Thirty-one days, thirty-one posts for the

Slice of Life Story Challenge.

Today, online, I read

an article about the removal of 

almost one thousand, five hundred

books

from a school district's libraries,

just down the highway

from where I am sitting

reading a book that I would have placed

in the hands of my own older teenaged children

with some caveats, the overall story--

historical fiction, but well-researched--

a window, a sliding glass door

into the prejudice and maltreatment 

of people with skin darker than ours,

in a time that wasn't much darker than

ours is now.

We would have looked in the mirror, 

together, after sharing the book

and talked about our white privilege

and my own more modern experience

as a military BRAT in the same spaces

as many of the book's settings.

I bet this book would be on that list,

had it been on their shelves 

(it's not--I checked; did you know

that most public school library catalogs

have been available for public viewing

for awhile--the book banners

would have you believe otherwise).

I am glad that I can read this book

from my own public library.

It's not my favorite genre, but I

feel compelled to keep reading,

keep learning,

keep growing in understanding and

compassion.

SOLSC '26 Day Twenty-one: Making soup

 

Thirty-one days, thirty one posts

for the Slice of Life Story Challenge.

Definitely not soup weather

but what would I know, staying inside all day,

not wanting to relinquish my pajamas,

just feeling kind of "off".

So I got out the pot and the cookbook, found the recipe

the one with three stars, inked exuberantly

side notes penciled in--one I'll use, 

the other, ignore.

Potatoes

carrots

onions

diced small.

A lot of chopping ensued.

So much so, that I took a break halfway through

My core not quite healed to withstand being upright

for more than thirty minutes at a time.

Returning to the kitchen counter, I realized

I had forgotten the celery--how?

Gathered a few stalks, chopped them, too.

Potatoes boiling in the microwave, butter melting in the pot.

Onions cooked down first, easier on hubby's sensitive stomach.

Carrots and celery added, stirred, softened.

Throw in Bisquick, paprika, pepper--leave out the cayenne.

Stir, stir, stir.

Chicken broth and water next.

More stirring, waiting for boiling bubbles to appear.

Quick break to sit and breathe.

The kitchen smells so good.

Now boiling--take off the heat!

Stir in half-and-half, the potatoes (now cooked), and

two cups of grated cheddar.

Back on the heat; stir, stir, stir.

Tell hubby soup will be ready in five minutes.

Empty the dishwasher, pull out bowls and spoons.

He's not ready, but I am.

I ladle out my portion, and sit to eat.

SOLSC '26 Day Twenty: Silly food rules

 

Thirty-one days, thirty one posts for the 

Slice of Life Story Challenge.

I stood in front of the fridge and pantry for a few minutes apiece.  Nothing seemed appetizing for lunch.

"Peanut butter and jelly it is," I said to no one in particular.

Had to be plain white bread, not the fancy country loaf my husband and I like to eat for other meals.  Smooth peanut butter on one slice, raspberry jelly on the other.  Next, the chips...wait, there weren't any corn or tortilla chips in the pantry, only BBQ with ridges.  Nope, won't do.

I walked to my daughter's old bedroom at the other end of the house.  My husband set up shelves there to store extra stuff during the lockdown, and never really got out of the stockpiling habit.  We call it "H-E-B 2", after our favorite grocery store.

Score!  A bag of tortilla chips.  Lunch saved.

When it comes to chip-sandwich combos, it has to be corn-based chips with my pb&j, and potato chips with mayo- or mustard- based sandwiches.  Sometimes the chips end up on the sandwiches themselves.  Do you have any silly food rules?

SOLSC '26 Day Nineteen: Topsy turvy

Thirty-one days,  thirty-one posts. 

Showered and got dressed at four pm today.  Why?  Maybe because I wanted to wear my pajamas for bed again, and knew they needed to be washed after wearing them for eighteen hours straight.  Maybe because I was tired of my hair looking ratty, and knew the only thing to fix it was a good shampoo, conditioner, and curly hair routine.  Maybe because I knew that for the sake of my mental and physical health, I needed to go outside for at least a few minutes, and only "real" clothes would do.

These days seem topsy-turvy.  I'm not sleeping well, which means I'm tired during the day.  I don't seem to gather steam until almost lunch.  I only manage to accomplish one or two adulting tasks before dinner, the simplest chores taking me twice as long. 

It's occurred to me that having a hysterectomy is not unlike having a baby, having done both.  The body is in healing mode, insides rearranging to inhabit newly available space.  Days and nights are mixed up as meeting the needs of both baby and mother come first, all other tasks made subordinate.

Whatever the similarities, it doesn't change the fact that in two-and-a-half weeks, that four thirty alarm will ring again.  It may be time to start inching back toward that schedule.  

SOLSC '26 Day Eighteen: Stepping up on a soapbox

 

Thirty-one days, thirty-one posts for the Slice of Life Story Challenge.

I pulled up the lab report again, then pulled out my tape measure.  I'm a visual learner...found fifteen inches, matched it up to the zero at the end to make a circle.

A little more than a grapefruit, little less than a cantaloupe.  Either way, my largest fibroid had been taking up quite a bit of abdominal real estate.

****************

When I first got diagnosed, I went down a rabbit hole of internet research.  Figured out what kinds of fibroids I had, what the different treatments were, what the side effects could be.  I was shocked when I read the statistics:  up to eighty percent of women will experience some kind of fibroids, most during their childbearing years.  Eighty percent.

So then I started wondering--why don't we know more about this, especially with numbers so high? Why aren't we screened for them at every annual exam?  Why aren't we talking more about this?   

The answer, of course, is the lack of research on women's health issues.  The algorithm handed me one way to help with that problem today.  I made a small donation to the Foundation for Women's Health, after spending some time reading up on their mission and medical advisory board.  

I can only hope that progress will be made before my daughter faces a situation similar to mine.  After all, there is an eight in ten chance she will...

SOLSC '26 Day Seventeen: DQ for the win!

 

Thirty-one days, thirty-one posts.

Loafed away the morning.  Did some online banking, watched the live broadcast of the Dublin, Ireland St Patrick's Day parade on PBS, and finally put away most of the the Christmas candles, swapping them out for spring-scented ones.

I could have stayed in my pajamas all day (they were green, no danger of being pinched),  but then I had a hankering for ice cream.  A DQ Blizzard, to be exact.

Nothing like a sweet treat to get me moving!  Found a shamrock-patterned pair of Lularoe leggings--which have become my "pants" of choice recovering from the hysterectomy, the waistband reaching Urkle-levels, floating over incisions--and a baggy green sweatshirt.  A shower and some light makeup, and I was ready for the five minute drive to our local DQ, son in tow. 

It was good to be behind the wheel and out and about for the first time in ten days, even if it was just for a quick drive through the neighborhood.  Bonus that we got there for "Happy Hour", and I scored a one dollar corndog along with my Mocha Brownie Blizzard and a Diet Coke.  

Not the healthiest recovery meal, I admit!  But it sure tasted good, sitting on my front porch, enjoying the weather and my treats.