It's Getting Really Hot in Here, and I Don't Mean the Weather!!!

**I got a sore throat last Saturday and expected to have a full blown cold the next day but nothing changed. I went to work on Monday and still had the sore throat but wasn't stuffed up at all. On Tuesday I went to work but had almost no voice so I thought maybe I had strep throat. Everyone said I should stay home the next day so I did but I still didn't have anything going on other than the sore throat and no real voice. I didn't go to work on Thursday either. By this time, my nose was getting stuffed up and the miserable phase began. I was sneezing and coughing by the end of the day and Friday was pretty much a write-off.

I did, however, go up to Jay's apartment for Cooking 101, as I call it. I figured that, sick or not, I needed to eat anyway, and I didn't think I was contagious because whatever bug I caught had started a week ago.

One of the attendants has agreed to do some cooking with us once a month. This time she made pizza with home-made dough and fresh ingredients. She made 6 or so different pizzas so we got to try them all. They were really good. But I was disappointed that we didn't actually learn how to make the pizzas. With four wheelchairs in Jay's apartment, there wasn't much room to move around the living room, let alone having any of us in the kitchen with Belinda and her 9-year old daughter Chloe who was doing a great job helping out. I mentioned to Belinda that it would be nice to have the pictures of the pizzas (taken by Chloe) put together with the recipes for them. But Belinda didn't seem too keen on that. I guess it would just be more time consuming than she'd like. I'd volunteer to do it, but I don't know the recipes so that wouldn't work.

The idea is to learn how to make simple but good meals that the attendants can prepare for us within the half hour that we get for our supper calls. The attendants are not required to be able to cook when they're hired so it's up to the consumers to tell them what we want and how we want it done. But if we don't know how to cook, we can't tell the attendants what to do. So hopefully in the future these cooking sessions will be more hands-on so we can learn. Belinda was thinking about making quesadillas for our next lesson next month.

Al was supposed to come to the cooking event but he apparently forgot about it. Belinda phoned him afterwards and blasted him! lol He said he wrote it in his book but he only has one book and I guess he doesn't carry it with him everywhere he goes, as he should do. Maybe I'll get him a second one for his birthday which is coming up in March. I don't think having two is the right answer but if he thinks it is, then at least he can't use that as an excuse to not show up at certain events.

Al and I had discussed fitness during that talk we had here a few weeks ago and he said that since we are allowed to use the exercise room in the apartment building two doors over, he could take me over there and show me the machines, etc. We set it up for a week or two ago and it got cancelled so we rescheduled for this past Friday. But then he e-mailed me saying he was going to work out with Jay on Saturday and could he show me around at the same time. So we went yesterday and it was great.

The first thing Al did when we got into the exercise room was take off his shirt. I guess he knew he'd get hot running around helping both Jay and me. He had an undershirt/body shirt on and...let me tell you....he looked so friggin' HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT that I could barely control myself!!!!!!!! lol

I got on one of those exercise bike thingies for the first time in my life! At first my feet slid off the foot pedals but then Jay mentioned that he had some bungie cords with him and said I could use them. So Al put those around my feet to hold them in the straps and that worked out well. Once I started moving my legs, I found that my left leg just wasn't doing enough so I'd get to a certain point and I'd stop moving. So Al helped me with my left leg for a bit but then after a few rounds, I was actually able to do it on my own.

Keep in mind though that while all this is going on, Al’s right next to me with just a body shirt that exposed his muscles. Yes, it was getting reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeally HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOTTTTTTTTTTTT in there!!!! lol

Then later I got on a different machine and he had to offer his knee for me to use as support while I tried to situate myself properly on the narrow seat of this machine that had nothing around it to hold on to. Later I got on another machine that works the arms and he was demonstrating which muscles would be worked with which motions so he touched my arms to demonstrate. Now ask me if it was getting HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOTTTTTTTTTTTTT in there!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! lol

I really enjoyed the bike and the other machine that works the legs. The bike of course would give me a good cardio workout so it would be great to do it a couple of times a week. Al's going to see what he can do to fit it into the attendant schedule so that an attendant can go over there with me. Of course that won't be nearly as much fun as working out with Al but he said he could work out with us on alternate Sundays when he doesn't have his son.

We were supposed to do that today but Al called to say he wasn't up to it. He went out partying last night and he said he didn't get home till 5 a.m. and was a bit hung over. I've come to expect that sort of thing now since I know he parties a lot, so I wasn't upset but I was disappointed. But he was so adorable about it that he had me killing myself laughing. He begged for my forgiveness and of course every woman loves it when a man begs!!! lol I said "I guess this means tonight's (referring to our Sunday night get-togethers) out too then, eh?" and he said "Yes, for now, unless I feel better after getting more sleep," etc. I was hoping he’d call me to let me know one way or the other because then I would have just cancelled Jay and Steve since they're the only two who could have possibly shown up. Susan didn't book a ride and the other Al is in the hospital. But as it turned out, Steve and Jay didn’t show up anyway so that was okay. I just wish people would let me know their plans so I’m not waiting around for company that’s not coming.

It was my brother Leo's 50th birthday on Friday. We were all invited to go to Texas for the surprise party my sister-in-law was throwing him. We talked about it at my mother's birthday fondue two weeks ago and it seemed like it just wasn't going to work out for anyone. My older sister had found some reasonably priced flights but it would mean travelling all day with layovers, etc., and I said I didn't want to do that. My mother didn't want to do the all-day-travel thing either. She just didn't feel ready to make the trip yet. But I said that I would rather spend, and could afford to spend, more money to get a direct flight. Anyway, it sounded like it wasn't going to work for anyone so I thought that was that. Next thing I knew, my younger sister had a caption under her Windows Live Messenger nickname last week saying something about "off to Texas next week." I phoned her to find out about that but she wasn’t home so I left her a message. She sent me an Instant Message (no, she couldn't even be bothered to phone me back!) saying she, and my older sister and her husband were going and that they didn't tell me because I said I didn't want to go if it was going to take all day. I was really ticked off about that because, as I told my younger sister, if I had known they were going, I might have been able to work something out for myself. She said, "Well, you still could" or something like that. I was even more upset about that, because it showed a complete lack of understanding of all the preparations that go into my being able to travel. But, as it turned out, I wouldn't have felt up to going on Friday anyway since that's when my cold was at its worst. Still, I was not at all impressed with the lack of communication about the trip. The three of them were just going from Friday to today so I’m assuming they’re all back at home now.

Friday was also exactly two months since my father's death. I still find it difficult to believe he’s really gone. At the same time, I almost would rather not go to Niagara Falls anymore because if I do, I have to face not only the fact that he’s gone but the fact that my mother is different and everything has changed.**

for visiting our blog.