The Last Anniversary, by Liane Moriarty

Posted on February 11, 2022 by Thistle

Connie, matriarch of Scribbly Gum Island, has died and left her house not to a family member, but to her great-grand-nephew’s ex-girlfriend, Sophie. For the first time in nearly a century, someone outside the sprawling family will be living on the island, privy to the island’s secrets. Scribbly Gum Island houses the famous unsolved Munro Baby mystery, and has profited quite well off that mystery. But not all is quite as it seems, and with Connie’s death and Sophie’s arrival, this 75+ year old story starts to unravel.

Let me start by saying that I was so very confused at the timeline of this book when I began. Connie is somewhere in her 90s when she dies, and yet there’s a flashback from the early 1930s, when Connie is 19 years old. The numbers added up to make this story contemporary with the early 2000s, yet 1) the book is copyrighted 2020, and 2) there’s no indication of this being semi-historical fiction. The story never deliberately says, “Oh btw, it’s 20 years ago that this takes place.” Which again, just had me really confused, until I found out that this book was only re-published in 2020, and it originally came out in 2005! Everything made a lot more sense then.

So 20 years ago is not traditional historical fiction (when written modern day), and yet, in books that do take place 10, 20, 30 years in the past, there’s a lot of shaping that corresponds more to the publishing date. There’s nothing wrong with historical fiction, but to be honest, it never feels 100% accurate to me, so I tend not to read much of it. Going back and reading books from a former time period, written in that time period, is a different story, though. That’s what this was. Apart from anything about the story itself, this is a time capsule of the early 2000s. The R-word was still in use. Cell phones and texting were very new, and conspiracy theories about cell phones being dangerous to your health were common in younger folks as well as older. Floppy disks were still a thing. Homophobia was rampant, and there was a prominent theory that bisexuality was just a cop-out for people unwilling to truly commit. And so on. None of this was scrubbed from the book when it was repackaged for re-release. It’s all there, giving a straightforward look into what life was like two decades ago.

Of course, many of us lived through those years, and we can remember all the things I mentioned in that last paragraph. But it’s interesting to look back on that time period and see the way we’ve changed as a culture. It was frankly shocking to see how much fatphobia was in this book. Some of it was purposely blatant, making a statement about the cruelty behind it, but there was far more than that, so much that it felt like something entirely subconscious – just part of the collective mindset of the time period. Much of the discussion around postpartum depression – another major portion of the book – was handled with the uncertainty of a mental health issue that was only starting to grow in public consciousness. That’s just to name a few items.

Like many of Moriarty’s books, this one affected me on multiple levels, particularly in the discussions about motherhood and how not all mothers actually feel motherly, and in the disharmonies that begin to split apart relationships. Moriarty always manages to hit home in one way or another. But I can also tell that there’s a certain early-days feel to the book – some issues with timelines, and the need for a little shocker twist at the end (which was unnecessary and kinda took away from the book, tbh). It won’t stand out among my favorites of her books, but it’s not the worse I’ve read from her either.

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Wellness Wednesday – A Day at Inks Lake

Posted on February 9, 2022 by Thistle

Two weeks ago, one of my hiker friends asked in our hiking leaders chat if anyone wanted to spend the last Sunday of January at Inks Lake with her. Periodically, we like to spend some time hiking with each other rather than leading groups, so we plan these little outings. Inks Lake is so far my favorite state park (I’ve only been to 10), and I’ve been twice. I really, really wanted to go, but I wasn’t sure if my sciatica would allow it, especially after the two hour drive to get there. I let Sarah know that I was tentatively interested depending on how my body felt that week. After a no-pain walk around the neighborhood, followed by a no-pain hike with Sarah, I decided that I could indeed make it to Inks Lake as long as I could stop to stretch my back whenever it acted up. That last part wasn’t going to be a problem, as this was a group of friends who are all super supportive when it comes to health issues!

There were three of us who ended up on the trip. Sarah drove herself as she is not yet comfortable with carpooling, and Alia and I met up to drive together. This was their second time at the park and, as I said above, my third. During Alia’s last trip, she noticed a set of trails that led to a waterfall. None of us had been on those particular trails, and we planned a 3-4 mile route.

The think I love about Inks Lake so much is that it’s such a diverse landscape. You can walk down a path lined with cactus and scrub on one side, and ferns on the other. In a quarter mile, you cross into marshland, and in another quarter mile, you’re suddenly in a burned out forested area. The elevation isn’t too heavy (about 500ft is the max I’ve done there, I think?) and it’s gradual enough that you hardly realize you’re climbing. There’s so much wildlife – we saw skunks, pelicans (!!!), lizards, butterflies, and geese on this trip. It’s just a beautiful place and I’m sad that it’s a solid two hours away.

So back to our trip. We set out on our route, making sure to start with the more gradual incline so that we could get warmed up properly. At one point, we had to gingerly pick our way over a creek crossing. It’s a good thing there hasn’t been more rain or that might have ended that section of our route, since none of us brought extra shoes! After the creek crossing, we started climbing in earnest to get some great views of the lake and waterfalls (not to mention a million photos!). We could have gone further along the lake before turning back, but at that point, the trail became more “giant steps up boulders” and I didn’t think my back was going to handle too much of that. We decided to turn around – like I said, these ladies are so wonderful at respecting each other’s physical limitations! – and it ended up being a good thing (more on that in a bit).

Another creek crossing back to the other side, and we continued with our initial loop, which allowed us to climb down to the waterfall itself! We also came across this really cool tree growing out of a giant mount of rocks over 20 feet high (you can see the rocks with the tree on top in the right-most of the collage above this paragraph). Sarah and Alia decided to climb to the top, while I stayed on the ground to film and take photos. I didn’t trust my hips to climb, nor did I want to risk it with my nice camera on a harness around my chest!! They were rockstars, though!

Not long after that, about half mile from the end of the loop, Alia’s hip began to act up and she said she was really glad we’d turned around when we did because she didn’t think she’d be able to go much further than what we had left. We made it back to the original trail, took a rest in the shade by the lakeshore, and eventually meandered our way back to the parking lot. It took us something like 2.5 hours – including all our stops to enjoy views, take photos, and soak in the beautiful weather – to hike three miles. Heh. And this is why my group talks about hiking at a “natural-admiring” pace! It’s the best.

After our hike, we drove to nearby Marble Falls for lunch, passing a Bavarian castle along the way. (One day, when it’s open again, we’re going to tour it!) The Colorado River – not the Colorado River, but a Colorado River – goes right through the middle of Marble Falls, so we found a restaurant that had patio seating overlooking the river. We’d worked up major appetites and it was 3pm before we got “lunch,” so we really enjoyed the food!!

Then it was off to head back to San Antonio. I got home not long before sunset, after leaving my house at 8am, so it really was a full girls’ day out. And it really was the best day. I’m so happy to have found such wonderful friends and to be exploring so many beautiful places!

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The Second Blind Son, by Amy Harmon (audio)

Posted on February 7, 2022 by Thistle

From Goodreads: An insidious curse is weakening the Norse kingdom of Saylok, where no daughters have been born in years. Washing up on these plagued shores is Ghisla, an orphaned stowaway nursed back to health by a blind cave dweller. Named for a mysterious god, the boy, Hod, is surrounded by prophecy. To Ghisla, he’s a cherished new friend. To Hod, the girl is even more so. For when Ghisla sings, Hod can see. Unable to offer safe shelter, Hod urges Ghisla onward to become a daughter of the temple, where all the kingdom’s girl children have been gathered. But because of a magical rune, the two cannot be separated, no matter the time or the distance. Now, subject to a ruthless king, Ghisla enters a desperate world of warring clan chieftains and catastrophic power struggles. Who among them can be trusted is unknowable. So are the sacrifices Ghisla and Hod must make to defeat the cursed forces that could destroy a kingdom and the fated bond between two souls.

Two years ago, I listened to The First Girl Child, technically the first book in this series, though the events of the two take place simultaneously with overlapping points. I loved the book, and so when I discovered The Second Blind Son, I immediately bought a copy through Audible. And then I didn’t listen to it, because I was afraid. Too often, I’ve loved a first book only to be disappointed by the second, which from time to time actually ruins the first! I didn’t want that to happen. So I put it off, and only after I went through almost the entirety of my Audible backlog did I start listening.

Oh. My. I should not have waited this long.

It’s possible that I loved this volume even more than The First Girl Child. Or it’s possible that I’d love whichever I listened to second the most. Because 1) the audio narration is so amazing (more on that in a bit), and 2) whichever book comes second only enriches the story and world of the first. It was comforting, like sinking into a hot bath or sitting down for coffee with some of your oldest friends. I haven’t labeled a book as a favorite since late 2020, until this one. I never wanted to put down the audiobook, and when I had to – sometimes for a few days at a time – I never hesitated to pick it back up. It’s perfect in just about every way.

Are any of my readers familiar with Amy Harmon’s other books? She apparently has quite a few of them out there, and these two are my first by her. I hesitate to label her as a new favorite author, since I’ve only read books set in the same world/series. Some authors write differently for each book/series they produce, and it’s possible I won’t feel the same about her others. But I’d love to have some insight, and suggestions from fellow readers if you’re familiar with her work!

I admit, I’m leaning toward the books that Rob Shapiro reads. Above, I said that the audio narration is amazing. Shapiro reads both of these books, and his voice is so resonant, calm, comforting, and perfectly fitted to the mood of this story. I tried looking up other books he’d read via Audible, but most are not the sorts of books I’d read. I saw a few of Harmon’s other books, though, and that’s persuasive. I’m always more inclined to listen to books read by my favorite narrators (like Kate Reading!), and Shapiro has catapulted to my top-narrators list!

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Sunday Coffee – Ice, Ice, Baby…

Posted on February 6, 2022 by Thistle

The plans for this week: Opening night of Laurence’s musical on Thursday, followed by performances 1-2x/day through Sunday. Hiking Government Canyon Friday morning. Heading out to the Japanese Tea Gardens on Saturday morning with some friends before my in-laws arrived for the weekend to hang out and see Laurence’s musical.

The reality: Texas had other plans, starting with the cancellation of school and extracurriculars on Thursday. Overnight from Wednesday to Thursday, we lost power a few times, likely due ice on the power lines. Everything was coated in ice, dripping in icicles, and it was only meant to get colder. Friday’s school and musical got canceled, and it got down to 18 degrees overnight. Jason’s parents tried to cancel their flight but weren’t able. They chose not to come down despite that, because at that point, we didn’t even know if the whole production would be delayed. Then it turned out that the musical would continue on as scheduled, and only have three performances instead of the entire run. So at least all that hard work wasn’t for nothing.

It’s really weird to me that we’re now expecting a winter storm at least once per season. My family moved to San Antonio in 1989, and all through my teen years, I don’t remember there being a single winter storm. Jason and I moved to Wisconsin at the end of 2000, and moved back to SA five years later. From winter 2005 to when we moved to Boston in mid-2014, I have photos from every winter storm. There was the ice storm in January 2007, a tiny sprinkle of snow in 2010, a light snow day in 2011, and frozen rain in 2014. Already, the pattern was changing. (Yes, climate change is REAL. And OBVIOUS.)

(all the ice/snow since 2006)

We were only intermittently in SA from mid-2014 to mid-2017, and I know there was some rough winter weather during that time. Once we moved back here, things had changed even more: snowstorm in Dec 2017 – the first I’ve ever seen happen in December here instead of Jan/Feb! – and snow twice in 2021 including the snowpocalypse. And that list of snowstorms doesn’t even take into account the progressively lower temps that are becoming the norm without ice and snow. It used to be that it almost never got below about 26 degrees (and even 26 was abnormal!). Now the low 20s and high teens are happening a couple times per season…

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January 2022 in Review

Posted on February 4, 2022 by Thistle

It has been a busy and often odd month in the Gignacery. Jason and I have begun to experience what it will be like for us to become empty-nesters in a few months. Ambrose, after two fall semesters of community college, separated by a semester off where he went to work instead, decided to enter the Air Force. He and his friend Tyler are both doing this, and Ambrose finished up all his application, paperwork, and testing this month. It included spending two nights in a hotel near the joint base here, for extensive tests, interviews, etc, and he swore his initial oath. Sadly, we didn’t get to see that oath, the way we did with Morrigan, because of covid. (No family allowed in.) He’s on a two-month deferral entry, so he (most likely) won’t be going for awhile, but after almost two years post-high-school, Ambrose will soon be leaving the nest. Laurence, meanwhile, has been at drama practice to 9pm (or later) almost every day for the latter half of January. His performance was meant to begin last night (ice storm is interfering), and I think there’s only one more play left for the spring? Meanwhile, he’s starting the process to get a student visa for university in Canada in the fall.

Reading and Watching
It’s been a book-heavy month for the first time in ages! Also, an audio-heavy month. I read seven books this month, and enjoyed all of them, since I abandoned one and culled many others. This is why, for me, not finishing books that I’m not enjoying is worth it – I get some months when everything is good! My favorite for the month is actually the entire Cytoverse novella series, but since that’s three novellas and I prefer to only pick one, I’ve chosen ReDawn, which I think is the one I liked best overall.

Book-heavy generally means not-screen-heavy, and that was mostly true this month. I did finally watch the Nine Perfect Strangers series, based on the Liane Moriarty book, and it was awful. Not just the adaptation, which left a lot of info out despite being eight episodes long, but the ending put out an extremely cringy message (“Are you suffering true grief? Just take drugs!”). I should’ve known better than to watch it. In better news, Jason and I watched Don’t Look Up, which was excellent! Horrific and hilarious all at once, and the night we watched it, both of us ended up having nightmares about it all night, heh.

Goals
I’ve actually made quite a bit of headway on my goals already this year. I’ve read/culled 11 of 24 books off my 2022 priorities list, found a dietitian that I think will work for me, rebuilt our pantry, edged in the remaining side of the front yard, and begun a medicine to help decrease inflammation from RA. (Technically, Jason did the pantry and yard. I only did the planning portion.) I didn’t get as many miles walked in January as I wanted for my 500-mile year goal – at least 42, preferably 50 – because the RA was really, really bad for the first half of the month. But I did get in 35 miles, which isn’t too bad. I’m also in the process of modifying my yoga goal to accommodate my new physical reality, as I created the goal before I knew I had a joint-deterioration autoimmune disorder.

House
As I mentioned in my goals section, there were a few house projects we got done this month. Our pantry is pretty small and shares a tiny closet-sized room with the washer/dryer. It was made smaller by the fact that it had a large cabinet taking up the bottom of one side, with a granite countertop on it. We have no idea why this was there, as no other countertop in the house is granite. Someone must’ve thought this was a good idea. In any case, it made life difficult, because we didn’t really use the cabinets, the countertop became a dumping ground, and it was difficult to fit all our pantry and laundry supplies plus the cats’ litter-boxes! So we ripped out all the counters and built shelving on three sides of the room, which gave us much, much more space and allowed us to remove a large sideboard (where we’d stored half our food) from our dining room.

(Oy, I really need to start working on the next phase of this yard as it’s so disheveled right now!)

Additionally, we finally got around to edging in the remaining side of our front yard to match the other side. Plus, Jason built some really cool shelving in his bedroom to give the cats an area to play in without sacrificing the small square footage of the room.

Health and Fitness
I’ve posted about this more extensively already this month, so I’m going to keep this light. The sciatica and RA flare have been rough, and I’m adjusting to the new medicine, which brings along some odd side effects (like stabbing pains through joints that were just fine before). I had a lot of medical tests and results this month, and am lined up to see another round of specialists. Thankfully, in the latter half of the month, I was able to walk without crippling back pain, and I finally started leaving my house again. Sometimes it was just to walk around the block; sometimes I actually managed to hike a little, though I still had to listen to my body at do less at times than I wanted. I ended up going on six hikes altogether, including a glorious one at Inks Lake that I’ll post about separately.

Favorite Photos
I’ve tried to be very deliberate in my photos this month, which has made it difficult to whittle them down to a small handful of favorites!

Clockwise from top left: me at Inks Lake; Ghost in the sunlight; cardinal on the bird-feeder; Alia at her birthday party; lavender dying in the cold front; the red leaf

Clockwise from top left: Ghost and Atticus snuggle on my office chair; tiny pink flower on a very difficult hike; Alia and Sarah after an awesome feat of rock climbing; a checkered skipper on our copper canyon daisy; “they say to hide” – a minimalist look at fatphobia; sunset over a parking lot

Highlights of January
The first time I went for a walk and didn’t have my back screaming in pain/having spasms was probably the biggest intangible highlight of the month. I’ve spent so long thinking of myself as an active, fitness-oriented person (all the way back to childhood) that it’s hard to lose mobility. I’m not all the way back to 100% yet, but I’m moving that direction, and that makes me so happy! Beyond that, here are some highlights of the month:

  • first day journaling with friends
  • vision board party, and completing my board
  • yoga with cats!
  • birdwatching in my back garden
  • getting my hair professionally cut and colored for the first time ever!
  • celebrating Alia’s birthday with friends
  • sunset hike with Jason on his birthday
  • new-to-us bookshelf
  • Wordle (ha!)
  • new bed frame, replacing the one that got broken in the move to TX in Aug 2017 that I’ve been limping along, and this one with under-bed drawers!
  • Ambrose began calling Mitch McConnell “Bitchy Mitchy” and I am dead. Ha!
  • I got a new lens for my camera that is more of an all-purpose lens (like my original kit lens, except MUCH better quality and performance).
  • my amaryllis is blooming!
  • Jason got some Apple gift cards from work, so we decided to get (cheap SE model) Apple Watches. My Garmin hadn’t been working well for about nine months, so it was a good time to switch, plus the Watch has a wider range of what it can do. (My Garmin was primarily a running watch that I got while I was running, which I haven’t been able to do in ages…)
  • book club hike!
  • pretty much everything about my day out to Inks Lake State Park with friends Sarah and Alia!

Coming up in February
Nothing special. I’m going to continue to work with my doctors to improve my health, and hopefully there won’t be too many setbacks! Oh! And supposedly the next season of Murdoch Mysteries will start airing this month, and as silly as that is, I’m very excited about that!

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Wellness Wednesday – The Gluten Story

Posted on February 2, 2022 by Thistle

I mentioned in a recent post that I have a complicated history with gluten. A lot of that history took place when I was on a two-year blogging break(ish), so it never got posted here in any meaningful way. For my own records, and to put together a history/timeline, I’m going to post this now. Feel free to skip. All photos documented at the end of the post.

In 2013, I started testing potential food intolerances (for many reasons that are too complicated for this post). In Feb 2013, I did a “flour-free February,” which didn’t cut gluten specifically, just flour of all kind, which cut about 95% of gluten. The only result was a suddenly drop of a few pounds, which I attributed to water weight. When I added flour back in, I had some mild aches in my hips and shoulders, but they went away quickly and I moved on to testing other potential food intolerances. It wasn’t until August that year that I decided to specifically remove gluten as a potential intolerance.

I ate gluten-free for the first three weeks of August, and felt no change (no water weight drop either), so I added it back in to my diet. Again, I didn’t notice any change, but Jason pointed out to me that while I was GF, my feet/legs didn’t get as sore, judging by how often I asked him to rub them during those weeks compared to before and after. I decided to spend another few weeks eating GF to test his theory. The timing of this is very important, because the same week that I went back to a GF diet, I also began taking a new medicine. (Well, an old medicine. I got back on my old birth control, to test if hormones were playing an overly large role in my health. I’d never had any issues or side effects with this particular med.) Tbh, I thought the whole soreness issue was a coincidence, and I wasn’t careful with the GF diet this time. Until I noticed that every time I ate something with even a minuscule amount of gluten in it, my bones started burning.

This wasn’t like anything I’d ever felt before. It began in my shoulder blades and ribs, a burning sensation, like the bones were on fire from the inside. If I’d eaten a LOT of gluten, it would move outward to my wrists, ankles, and hips. There was nothing I could do but wait it out, and even the tiniest amount of cross-contamination could trigger the reaction. For example, at Thanksgiving, my aunt used the same strainer for noodles and green beans, even rinsing between them, and it was still enough contact to trigger pain. My body was suddenly stupidly sensitive.

And frankly, I didn’t understand. I’d NEVER had this kind of reaction before, not even after my flour-free February. Aches, sure, but none of this burning-bones thing. I never put together the reaction with the birth control, because I’d been on that particular pill for many, many years in my life without ever having had this kind of problem. That pill was perfectly safe and innocuous in my mind.

So I spent about nine months avoiding gluten with every fiber of my being. Then in late April 2014, I got off the birth control because I’d found it made no difference in the issues I was having. Then about halfway through May, I accidentally had some gluten cross-contamination. I braced myself for pain…but it didn’t come. For the first time since August, there were no burning bones following gluten consumption. So I took a risk, and I ate one bite of regular bread. I hadn’t purposely eaten gluten in 9-10 months, so I knew the reaction was going to be bad. Only I had no reaction at all. A month before, I was in pain if my GF food touched a utensil that had also touched a gluten food. Now, I could eat an entire slice of pizza or bowl of whole wheat cereal without any reaction at all.

So yeah, I figured out the timing, the birth control, the weird fact that I only reacted to gluten this way while on that particular medicine. And yeah, I considered the fact that I might be gluten-sensitive, and that it only screamed in my face when I was on that medicine. But also, eating GF is very hard, especially when you’re the only person in your family who eats that way. So since that weird nine-month period in 2013-2014, I’ve only eaten GF intermittently. It’s funny, because while I never feel like it’s doing much for me in the moment, I’ve looked back and found statements I’ve made (in my journals, on the blog, etc) that indicate that it is. (Like from a post in June 2020: “My stomach has hurt a lot since mid-May when I quit eating gluten-free.” Um…hmm…) And now my gastroenterologist and rheumatologist are both telling me that my bloodwork indicates a gluten sensitivity, even if I don’t have full-blown celiac.

So that’s the gluten story. I’m in the process of going GF again. I have to adjust to that new reality as well, and it’s hard. Hopefully it makes a difference. I want to stop feeling so much pain in my body – organ pain, joint pain, inflammation pain – and if going GF helps that, I’ll figure out how to make it work despite it being tough!

**Notably: In the past, I’ve assumed gluten had absolutely nothing to do with my sudden weight gain or health issues, but one reason I’m putting this timeline together is because I stopped eating GF in May 2014 – the very same month I started gaining weight. And no, going GF hasn’t helped me to suddenly drop weight the same way I suddenly started gaining, but I’ve never looked at, say, whether I can get the whole calories in vs calories out bit to somewhat work while eating GF. I spent too long focused on paleo and lower-carb nutrition, which was very bad for my body, and each time I’ve been GF since I started eating carbs again, I’ve felt better. So it’s time for more experiments! Wish me luck!

*****
Food photos (all 100% gluten free):

  • chocolate chip cookies (made by me)
  • glazed donut (by Katz, frozen section of the grocery store)
  • chicken and veggie open-faced sandwich on spelt bread, had at a restaurant in Portland, OR – I wish I had the name of it, because it was one of the best things I’ve ever eaten in my life!
  • Gignacery traditional sugar cookies (made by Jason and me)
  • scone with clotted cream (made by Jason) (well, the scone was, at least)
  • lemon Greek yogurt muffins (made by me)

Yes, we’ve made plenty of GF non-sweets over the years, but I can’t find any pictures of those, ha!

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We Are Okay, by Nina LaCour

Posted on January 31, 2022 by Thistle

It’s Christmas break after Marin’s first semester at college. She’s not going home. She doesn’t have a home to go to. Her grandfather, who raised her, passed away right before she left for school, and nothing she had in her old life feels real. Now her best friend from that old life, Mabel, is coming to visit her, after months of Marin ignoring calls and texts as she struggles to cope with grief, secrets, and personal identity.

Well. Tiktok has officially influenced my book-life for the first time. I follow a particular library on TT, and they recommended this book for some reason or another (I don’t even remember which list it was part of!). I recognized the author, so went to look it up. Back in 2009, I read Hold Still by Nina LaCour, a book that (I think?) I got from the ALA Conference that I attended in Chicago with a librarian friend. I was impressed by LaCour’s handling of a delicate subject in such a nuanced way, without it being overly angsty (like many YA books) or overly stuffy (like many adult literary books). LaCour has had a few other books out since then, but they were in years when I wasn’t really reading a lot of YA, so I didn’t pay much attention. I’m glad I did with this one, though, because my second experience with her writing was just as good.

Grief is so much more complicated than we make it out to be, and Marin’s grief is further complicated by the circumstances surrounding her grandfather’s death. I’ll be honest: I kept expecting some kind of dramatic plot twist – that Marin wasn’t actually his grandchild, and was kidnapped, or something of that kind – but in real life, “twists” can be very subtle things. Twists are just changes in perspective, altering how you view a person, subject to interpretation and emotionally charged. This is what I mean when I say LaCour’s writing is nuanced. Marin’s grief is real-world grief that comes at a natural time of upheaval in a person’s life (leaving home for school, living on your own for the first time, a giant change in your social world, etc). It becomes a pressure-cooker for mental health problems, and Marin’s method of coping – cutting herself off from everyone and everything she ever knew – is as realistic as it is unhealthy.

This is not a fast-paced book with big surprises or extreme redemption or perfect answers. What it provides instead is real insight, kind and unkind humans, a reevaluation of the meaning of family, an honest look at the ugly side of depression and mental illness, and an ending that gave me bittersweet tears. It was beautiful.

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Sunday Coffee – An Interesting Development

Posted on January 30, 2022 by Thistle

So. My house is for sale. Not that one. I guess I should explain a little something. Jason and I have owned four houses in San Antonio (and six houses altogether). The one we owned the longest – from early 2006 until August 2014 – was the one at the above link, the one that was put on the market in the fall for the first time since we sold it. It’s the house that historically felt most like my home, the one I was able to truly say goodbye to after doing a walk through this past November. I’ll call that one the Vista home. When we sold that home, we moved to Boston for Jason’s new job. (It sucked.) We only lived in Boston for a year, and we bought a house back in SA when we returned. I’ll call that the Hill house. A year later, we moved to Wisconsin to help out Jason’s family, and sold the Hill house (which didn’t end up working for us, anyway). When we moved back to SA, we bought our next house (I’ll call it Creek 1), which we lived in for about 2.5 years before buying our current home (Creek 2). The house currently for sale is Creek 1.

(Side note: Hill house went on the market the day we closed on Creek 2, as a bit of irony. So that means that all three of our previous houses have been on the market in the last two years. Huh.)

We bought Creek 2 two months before we sold Creek 1. We had some work we wanted to do painting, cleaning, etc on C1, and I didn’t want to shove the move into a single day or two. It’s just easier not to shuffle between houses, buying and selling simultaneously, even if said houses are only half a mile apart and on the same street. So we bought C2, got it cleaned up and any work done before moving in, moved in, and got C1 ready and put on the market. We closed Valentine’s weekend in 2020, which means the current owners are selling it less than two years after buying it. I don’t know – or care – why they’re selling, but I can say one thing for sure: I am so glad they are!

Unlike with the Vista house, I have no particular attachment to C1. It was a nice house, and I LOVE the beautiful xeriscaped cottage garden we cultivated in the front yard. (It’s too bad the new owners have let it go wild with no upkeep!) But we didn’t spend many years there, and it always felt more like a show-home than a home-home to me, never comfortable or really “ours.” I don’t need to walk through it, or see what the new owners have done with paint and floors etc. So why am I glad they are selling? It means that I can walk around the neighborhood again without feeling terrified.

(May 2019, when the garden was still in good shape!)

I don’t know what the heck is wrong with me, but ever since we sold that house, I’ve been terrified and anxious every time I pass it, as if the new owners are going to see me, run out, and scream at me for something they don’t like about the house. Maybe something went wrong, or there was a problem we didn’t know about, or ??? It’s irrational and silly, but in the two years since we sold that house, I’ve literally only walked by it three times. And I used to walk this neighborhood several times a week, at least during the cooler months. I LOVE this neighborhood, and the hills make for a great workout even just walking. But for the last two years, I’ve mostly just done a one-mile loop that keeps me far, far away from my old home. As soon as that house is sold, I’ll be able to walk by the house as often as I want without any weird irrational fear.

And hey, maybe whoever buys the house will actually take care of that yard Jason and I put so much effort into!!!

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Quarantine Stuff 1/28/22

Posted on January 28, 2022 by Thistle

More insanity, more bullet points. Though not quite as much of either this week.

  • Weeks 2 and 3 of January added up to over 80K positive covid cases in SA. As of Tuesday the 25th, there were over 125k new cases in SA in 2022. That’s over a quarter of all cases reported here total for the entire pandemic.
  • People are asking health officials if we’re almost done with this surge yet. Their response is priceless: “The first surge of 2020 was eight weeks long. The second surge was 17-20 weeks long. The third was also about 17 weeks. Looking at the trends, this surge could last about 8-20 weeks. We are currently in the third week.” Followed by, “I would hesitate to say it’s coming to an end.” Bwhahahah!
  • Supplies of covid treatments, like antibody treatment and remdesivir, are running critically low.
  • The city provided the following chart comparing the surges we’ve had so far. One of these things is not like the others… –>
  • Positivity rate increased again this week, though only slightly. Last week it was something like 38.8% and now it’s 39.4%.
  • Covid patients are occupying 21% of all Texas hospital capacity. In San Antonio, it’s around 16%, so we’re on the low end (so far). But we’re also one of the latest to get hit with Omicron, so we’ll see how that goes.
  • Yikes, I read a report that said diabetes in people under age 18 are on the rise in kids who had covid. CDC is reporting that if you’re under 18 and had covid, you’re 30% more likely to develop diabetes. That suuucks. Like everything else about this disease.

That’s about it. Mostly it’s more of the same. Numbers seem to be stabilizing around 5k-6k cases per day (holy hell, it’s crazy to say it’s “stabilizing” at more than double the highest peak of 2021…), so at least it’s not continuing up exponentially any longer. This weekend, I’m actually planning to go on a group hike again, and then possibly carpool for a close-friends hike further away from town – first time getting together with people since early in the month. Maybe the big O will buck the 8-20 week trend, going up much, much faster, and crashing down just as quickly. Who knows? Either way, I’ll be glad to stop writing myself these little updates…

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Wellness Wednesday – Medical Updates, Part 2

Posted on January 26, 2022 by Thistle

Last week, I gave a round of updates for my current health status, as my trio of doctors narrow down on diagnoses. This is the second half of my medical tests, now that I’ve seen my primary doc and gotten analysis in addition to the results I could see online about a bunch of tests. Here goes!

WBC/non-fasting glucose: Back when I was on my steroid pack in December, my white blood cell count and non-fasting glucose levels were extremely high. This is to be expected while on methylprednisolone, but my doctor worried they were too high. However, my blood work testing these levels post-steroid all came back perfectly normal.

Ultrasound/CT scan of head: This is a bit of a long story, but I’ll try to keep it brief. Some time ago (not sure when), the lymph nodes on my left jaw under my ear swelled up. (In the pic, my finger is just below the one I can feel.) They don’t hurt, so other than playing with what just felt like a small hard lump in that area off and on (I thought it was the end of a tendon), I didn’t notice when they first swelled. My doctor first felt them in October, and when they didn’t go away with antibiotics, she sent me for an ultrasound. Ultrasound revealed that there were three swollen nodes (rather than the one we could feel externally). A follow-up ultrasound a month later showed no change, so my doc ordered a CT scan of my head to see if there were any other nodes that we could see in the area. Well. It turns out that 1) there are no other swollen nodes they could see anywhere in my head, but 2) apparently these three were already there back in 2018 when I had a head MRI! Only back then, they were 0.8cm and now they’re 1cm, so they’ve grown. I have to see an oncologist now for an ultrasound-guided biopsy to make sure they’re benign and perhaps figure out why they’re swollen!

24-hr urine test: This was the first step in testing for diabetes insipidus, which I believe I’ve mentioned in the past during WW posts. (Essentially, it’s a fluid imbalance disorder, and has nothing to do with blood sugar despite the word “diabetes” in the name.) The first test was to determine how much urine I put out in 24 hours, as well as how much of certain proteins/etc. Most people excrete 500-2000 ml of urine in that time period. My output was just shy of 4000 ml, which was actually less than I expected. In addition to being double a normal urine level, the tests came back with abnormally high amounts of creatinine and urea nitrogen. These can indicate a high protein consumption (not my case), large muscle mass (also no), dehydration (very possible), and/or kidney issues (also possible). The tests were pretty much “inconclusive,” though, so I need to see two new specialists – back to the endocrinologist, and to a nephrologist (kidney specialist). In the meantime, I’m officially diagnosed with unspecified-origin polyuria.

That’s about it for now. I’m still feeling out the Enbrel, so other than learning this week NOT to do the injection in my thigh (ow ow ow!), I’m still about the same as a week ago.

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