Monday, January 27, 2014

still...never a dull moment

hi lolly friends.
just a quick post to solicit more prayers. :o)
after being up late to post about our latest ordeal, i ended up sleeping in late.
when i did wake up and go the bathroom, my stool was back to being black and tarry.
Juan had to carry me back to the bedroom, and i passed out. When i came to, i ended up throwing up and stooling blood again. yada, yada, yada... i'm back at the hospital again.

Juan just said to me, if he had ended up with somebody else, he thinks his life would have been so boring. lol Another funny thing, one of the ED doctors came in to say hello. Turns out, he went to eat at Juan's restaurant last night, and Juan was his server. This is the same restaurant that the infamous ceviche came from. :o)  small world.

well please say a prayer or two for me.
lots and lots of love...
little lisa lollipop

Never say Never… by the bieb

Never Say Never once sang the Bieb, and i bet he never thought he would be arrested.
Well... never in a million years did i think i would be posting about this
And never in a million years did i think that i would be riding in the back of a police car tonight… only 6 hours after getting home from my hospital stay.

See… a little after midnight, I was sitting on the sofa watching the biggest loser on my dvr, waiting for Juan to come home. I heard our screen door opening signaling that he was finally home from work. Except... it was not followed by the much anticipated sound of his keys opening the door. Instead… i heard a scuffle outside. I hopped to the door, opened it, and saw Juan being assaulted right outside our front door… The guy had grabbed Juan's coat and was dragging him while he demanded money and kept trying to stab him with a blade.
Note: re-enactment

I just started screaming like a madwoman… like a truck driver. F bomb this and that… to scare him off and alert our neighbors. Juan managed to slide his coat off to break free and ran in the house. I tried to close the screen door behind him, but i fell backward and my foot got caught in the door. My poor only foot. The assailant and i locked eyes as i guess he decided his next move. He had those crazy glazed eyes… the ones that give your drug use away. I thought he was going to stab my foot. Ultimately, he took off casually walking down the street.


Well... never in a million years did i think i would be looking at mugshots at 0230 in the morning. I did think that all my hours of tv show watching were finally going to pay off… lockup raw, 48 hours, dateline, csi, the first 48… yes, I've seen them all. Well... no luck with the mugshots, but the detectives and police (who were so kind and awesome, by the way) are on it.

Here is the evidence that i, myself, have gathered so far..


Exhibit A: view from outside our front door. Note Juan's hat on the ground by the light post… that is where the assailant dragged Juan to.


Exhibit B: 
CEVICHE
Juan's spilled ceviche... got spilled on our doorstep during the attack.









Injuries sustained: scrapes and bruises




Outside of
left ankle
(from door)




















Inside of
left ankle














Right wrist:
from fall















I had also debated on naming this post, NO MORE CEVICHE.
See... back in November, Juan was assaulted around 10:00pm also on a Sunday night. It was right outside the Comcast building. Luckily, Juan had noticed the two men following him, so he tried to flag down a police officer. When the police didn't see him and drove on, they moved in. Ran up behind him and tried to grab him in a headlock. Juan managed to shake them off and slide his backpack off to get rid of them. They took the bait, grabbed his bag, and took off running. Unfortunately for them, all that backpack had in it was Juan's ceviche dinner. Suckers! But Juan was pissed that night, because he really wanted that ceviche.

But at any rate, Juan is no longer allowed to bring it home for dinner. Did you ever see those funny commercials about cable. Where they start off with the person getting only basic cable… cause and effect later… the person has ruined his life because of that decision. So in this case… don't get ceviche to bring home for dinner… cause if you do, you'll be followed and assaulted… if you get assaulted you could die or you wife could scream like a maniac… and you'll end up looking at mug shots at 2 in the morning… and if you're at the police station late… you won't be able to get some sleep cause your wife then has to blog about it. Just get some sleep, and don't eat ceviche.


Never a dull moment in my lollipop world.
Lots of love…be safe… and don't eat ceviche.
little lisa lollipop

P.S. Juan did not have his decoy wallet on him. It was a Christmas present from my baby sister. Perhaps it would have come in handy.







Saturday, January 25, 2014

crappy date night in the ER



Hmmmmm... perhaps a movie?
Had a crappy date night in the ER on Wednesday. Not quite the date night that i had in mind...
i should have known it wasn´t going to go well when it began with... not one but two rectal exams. BOGO, i guess. Worst part... they were in front of my husband :o).

But yes, Holy crap, i now have a GI bleed from an ulcer in my duodenum. i like saying that word...duodenum :o). It´s kind of silly sounding word… Well no wonder i felt like crap. I had noticed that my dukey was darker the past week or so, & my heart started racing with any kind of exertion too. Come Tuesday though, i noticed i was super pale… which all leads me to this…our "date night" in the emergency room. That's me super cold super pale. All dressed up & no place to go :o).



Got some blood and started to feel better, and i got my freckles back. Have never been so happy to see them.  Side note: my hemoglobin was 4.5 down from 12.8 earlier this month.

Continuing on with the date… cocktail time! After all it had to be 5 o'clock somewhere as they say. But this was not the beverage i had in mind :o). So in preparation of having an upper endoscopy and colonoscopy on thursday (to locate the source of the bleeding), i needed to drink 4 liters of this Golytly to clear out my bowels. Yes, i said 4 liters of this crap :o).

And if you've ever wondered what Golytly tastes like, picture this…











But not necessarily in this order. And then shudder!
Okay… so cheers to my bottomless cup of Goltyly and shudder on.

And now to my big bucket of popcorn, right?
Nooo… instead i got a big bucket to poop in… otherwise known as a commode, latrene, porcelain throne, or oval office… as the commercial says. See… i was spending the night in the emergency room, and my little cubicle didn't have it's own bathroom. But my nurse and i figured out how to improvise the whole sock on the doorknob trick for privacy when i was using my bucket.

Eventually… like with any crappy date… you just want it to be over. And in my case, I was praying for my crap to be clear. (That way i wouldn't have to drink anymore since i would then be cleaned out for the tests.)


And in the end, date night wasn't too bad. We did watch two good movies: Prisoners and Captain Phillips. Two thumbs up… no wait… keep those thumbs down :o).                                                  enjoying the newlywed romance…
 
   lots of love… little lisa lollipop

P.S. Shout out to all the great staff that took care of me :o)







Sunday, January 5, 2014

happy place… part 3: Cali trip

Continuing on our travel down the West coast, we stopped at San Luis Obispo… whose claim to fame i heard is to be the happiest place in the US. Well... i saw an Oprah report about it once, so if Oprah says it, it's true :o). And i had to check it out.

In Oprah's report, they said one of the the things why people were happier there... bigger side walks. Okay... i could see how that could make you happy. Another reason, no fast food restaurants in the town center… now that would just suck a@#.

I don't know... perhaps i was expecting to see everyone walking around San Luis Obispo with a big yellow smiley emoji face. But overall, i think we could have just driven past. And how do they really measure that it's the happiest place anyhow?

But... regardless of where you are or where you live… it's about finding happiness in just the little things... no matter how insignificant they may seem to someone else… like wider sidewalks. For my dear friend Kitzy, it's the perfect chapstick :o).

One of mine...the horsie Chessman cookie. I know, silly. But my grandmom, Omi, used to buy them when we were little and our favorite pix was always the horsie. So it's like nostalgia when i get one.





Wishing you happiness in all the little things in life…
along with lots of love!

little lisa lollipop


P.S. A new one: Habit burgers which we came across
in Santa Barbara: thumbs up




Saturday, January 4, 2014

What happens when you fall?

I think i've mentioned some of the silly questions that i get from kids…
about being an amputee.
Like... How do you put your pants on?
Or… How do you take a bath?
And a very frequent one:
What happens if you fall? Well... you get back up.
Sorry… it's just been taking me a little longer to get back up this time.

I know it's been awhile since i've written. Sorry... it's been too long.
Had a little set back... and i haven't been feeling that strong.
I guess i tend to shut people out a little bit if i don't feel that well.
The bad part of that is that you become lonely :o(

But... so far 2014 is looking better. I had my 28 staples removed today. Yay!
Oh yeah, forgot to tell you that i had surgery on December 18.

Let me give you the long story short, okay?
I started having some GI symptoms back in October, didn't think much of it.
After my Cali Love trip, the symptoms became progressively worse and included vomiting and intense pain. So late November and early December were kind of scary… we didn't know if it was anything related to cancer progression. Ultimately, thank God, all was stable with the cancer, but my gallbladder was the culprit. They said perhaps it was inflammation from the radiation blocking the gallbladder outflow essentially causing it to be full of gallstones. Gross, right? And painful.

From what I'm told, surgery to remove your gallbladder can be quite simple, but you know me...i like to go all out. hahaha. Because of old scar tissue and radiation swelling, they had to open up all my junk. So... healing has been kind of slow. Have had a lot of pain, especially with moving around. It's not like i have a 6 pack or anything :o). Actually that's what I have... the or anything :o). But you really rely on your abs and core muscles for balance and walking if you have one leg like myself. But... just taking it one day at a time. There's been some good days and some bad days. But everyday has pretty much been a Lifetime movie day. I think I've seen them all by now. And like most of their movies… I'm hoping for the happy ending too.


 California in early November
lots of love & happy new year wishes…
your friend always…

little lisa lollipop


(Don't worry, I'm back up now.)

P.S. Shout out to Jennifer in Orange County. Thanks for your encouragement: just what i needed :o)