Funerals, sketchy ghettos, and loose teeth

I had an interesting week! As you probably know, my sweet grandmother passed away on Thanksgiving Day, and her funeral was in Portland. I was gone from Thursday to Sunday. And man alive, that trip was fun. Now that may sound weird seeing as the purpose of my visit was to attend a funeral. But let me explain. I'm not very familiar with my family on my mother's side. I have cousins I don't know the name of and others I wouldn't even recognize if they walked right up to me and started a conversation. I loved having this time to reconnect and become friends with family I haven't seen in 15 years. Some even longer.

My brother and I flew out there Thursday morning in time for a family dinner and the viewing that night. My dad, other brother, and sister got in late after the viewing. Friday morning was the funeral. And the weather was terrible! There was a snow storm overnight. Nothing compared to what we have here in Utah, but apparently they aren't used to snow in Oregon? It took us 45 minutes to drive to the church from our hotel, instead of the usual 10. So annoying. Good thing we left so early! The funeral was really lovely though. Us grand kids all sang a song for the prelude. And it was great to hear all about my grandmother's life. I know what memories I have of her, but it was wonderful to hear more about how she grew up. After the funeral and luncheon, the cousins gathered together in a room and started having this talent show type deal. It's the weirdest thing in my family. I seriously don't get it. We can't all be in the same room together without breaking into song or making fools of ourselves somehow. My sister is playing the piano, and my brothers and I are singing at the top of our lungs. We saw some dancing, heard some jokes, found that my veins aren't as deep as the doctors think they are, the works. It was SO much fun. Then all of a sudden it was time for dinner, and we decided to go to Red Robin. After dinner we went back to the hotel and played games. We only had one person complain about our noise level which was probably a miracle. But it was only 9:30! Lame! Like you're really trying to sleep at 9:30. The last of us managed to stay up until about midnight. Saturday was a free day. Which basically meant we spent the whole day playing games. Literally. Until dinner when we went to my cousin's house, had leftovers, sang, and continued to play games haha. Sunday morning was when it was time to go back home. My brother and I took a shuttle to the airport and managed to get home just fine despite a REALLY close connection in Seattle because of delays. The rest of the fam wasn't as lucky though. They got stuck in Chicago because of a storm. They slept on cots "in the sketchy ghetto in the middle of the airport with a bunch of other homeless people." And by 'slept,' I mean they stayed awake all night, afraid they were going to get robbed or murdered. At least that's what my sister says haha.

Anyway, it really was a great trip. I LOVED spending that time with my momma, daddy, brothers, and sister. I get to see them again in 10 days for Christmas break! Yahoo! They are so exhausting though haha. I'm no longer used to being active and loud every second of every day. I'll have to get more sleep over Christmas, or I don't know if I'll survive the whole 2 weeks!

As for my eye, all is well. Like I said earlier, it had started healing itself last Monday morning. Thank goodness. Because of the whole prescription and meds fiasco. But my eyes are doing just fine. On the other hand, I have a loose tooth. Which SUCKS! Sunday night when we got home, we had tacos for dinner. I guess there was a piece of gristle in the hamburger, and I chomped on it HARD, and it HURT. I felt it was loose that night. I have a dentist appointment next week, so I'm hoping it's nothing serious, and it will just tighten up after a few days. But I'm keeping an eye on it. If it gets any looser, I will see if I can go in earlier. As of right now, there's no pain or anything which makes me think it will be alright. But it has only been 2 days. You never know. And it's legitimately loose. Like, I can wiggle it with my tongue. Gross. Someday my body will stop doing retarded things. I hope.

Needles make me turn wimpy.

My eyes are dumb. I wish they weren't, but they are. Let me tell you what's happened over the past few weeks.

About 2 weeks ago, I was experiencing some dryness and the tiniest bit of pain in my eyes. That usually means I need to switch my contacts. I'm supposed to do it RELIGIOUSLY every month, I know. But I just forget, okay! So I changed them and expected the pain to go away. It didn't.

Then they got really, REALLY red. With a particularly dark red circle around my irises. Not a little bloodshot red. Like the worst pink eye ever or like I was on drugs red. For real. So I assumed I had pink eye and went to get some over the counter drops for it. I used them for a few days, and they didn't help AT ALL.

So now it's the start of Thanksgiving break, and I finally realize I should probably go see a doctor about this instead of scaring my kids at school along with everyone else I see. I don't even know where to start. I haven't had to visit a doctor here in Provo since my freshman year. And let's just say that's when I lost all hope in doctors. So it's a good thing I don't get sick that often. (Sorry to all you doctors out there.) I searched online for a place that would take my insurance. I found one or two offices. Of course they were all closed when I tried to call and set up an appointment. Who would have thought with it being Thanksgiving and all?

So yesterday I wake up, and to my surprise, my eye doesn't hurt anymore! Yeah, it feels really dry, and is still pretty red, but all in all, it was like some miracle happened in the night. I was able to find a doctor to visit that night. When we called, the receptionist told us there was a 25 minute wait. Okay cool. We ended up waiting for almost 2 WHOLE HOURS!!! Unbelievable. I guess it was only about an hour and a half by the time I actually met with the doctor, but still. Geez. When he walked in the room, he shook Keith's hand, but then gave me a high elbow five because he didn't want to get my disease. Weird, but I think I actually liked him. He checked it out and told me that it wasn't an infection. (I sort of already knew that seeing as yucky crusty gunk was never one of my symptoms.) He told me that they were obviously EXTREMELY inflamed and swollen. He said it resembled what really terrible allergy cases can look like. He kept asking me if I just moved here or if there was some change in my environment or if I was allergic to anything. After all of my responses were no, he was just baffled as to why my eyes would have freaked out so badly. So he decided he wanted to do some blood tests. Apparently there are some weird diseases that could cause this to happen? I don't know.

Now I don't want to sound like too much of a baby, but I guess I am. I've never had to get blood drawn before. Lucky I guess? I've tried to donate blood a few times but to no avail, and let me tell you why. My veins like to hide. And not like, "Oh, it just takes a second with that uncomfortable elastic cutting off all circulation to make them pop up." I mean, "You've tried both arms twice already. I'm making a fist. I've been standing up and trying to shake all the blood downward for the past 3 minutes. This rubber band literally makes me want to cut my arm off. You're pressing so hard into the crevice of my elbow that I think you're touching the skin on the other side. And no, my veins are not visible at all."

Anyway, after like 10 minutes of searching, the lady thought she finally found one. She jabbed the needle in, and the first thing she said was, "Dangit." Bahahahahahaha! Wow, I just LOVE doctors! I guess she didn't quite make it in? But she jiggled it around and pushed a bit deeper and then all the blood started coming. Thank goodness. Then she said, "For future reference, tell them to go right in the middle and DEEP." So I guess that's what I'll be saying to anyone who needs to draw my blood from now on.

Seriously though, it hurt SO much. I remember this feeling. It's the same one I had the last and final time I tried to donate blood when my vein collapsed. (Yay.) Like, it hurt to move my left arm. At all. Like my muscle was spasming out of control and pain was shooting up and down my bicep. I could still feel it when I woke up this morning, but now I think the feeling is finally gone. Hooray!

The doctor wrote me a prescription for some eye drops with an antibiotic. They send their prescriptions electronically to the pharmacy. So I went to go pick it up like 30 minutes later, but they said they never got the prescription. It was close to closing time, so we just let it slide and assumed they would have it taken care of in the morning. When we called at noon, they still never received the prescription. We had them call the doctor's office to hopefully straighten things out. We're about to call again. I've gone another 24 hours now without the meds I need to help me not look like a freak. I hope you have your act together people!

On the bright side, my eyes is continuing to heal on its own. Finally. It felt even better when I woke up this morning than it did yesterday. I still want those meds though.

The End.