9 Days Before D(eparture) Day: Sky Watch

Driving back into Chicago on the Kennedy Expressway we could see the Sears Tower in the distance. It used to be the tallest building in the world until it was eclipsed by the building in Malaysia.

For more great Sky Watch Friday photos, join us at Welcome to Wiggers World and meet our very wonderful and most cordial host, Tom Wigley.

10 Days Before D(eparture) Day: A Hard Radioactive Pill to Swallow

After fighting traffic and a computer glitch at the Great Lakes Hospital lab, I got my thyroglobulin blood panel test taken and headed out to the Lake Forest Hospital.

When I got to the nuclear medicine unit, the technician told me I would be given the radioactive pill and I'd need to swallow it quickly. I told her I wasn't very good with pills and wondered what other people do who can't swallow easily. No nonsense, she said, "They swallow it."

It was a little disconcerting to see the nurse take out a lead lined box, her hands covered with a glove, saying, "Open your mouth. Are you ready?"

Was I? No? I don't think so.... I nodded. But, by golly! I did swallow it.

That's done, now tonight I'm up late because I have to clean out my colon for the scan tomorrow. I'm not a fan of this procedure. Yuuuuck! I figure I have to do it for the colonoscopy every 5 years but I thought that would be it. I just hope they don't tell me I have to do it for the second scan on Friday! Uh, oh! Gotta go!

11 Days Before D(eparture) Day: 2nd Thyrogen Injection

I went in for my 2nd thyrogen shot yesterday. He said the thyrogen injections are supposed to stimulate whatever stray thyroid cells there are (both thyroids were removed last year) so that they will show up on the scan. Everything was going OK but then the endocrinologist, Dr. Rabinowe tells me I need to go and get a thyroglobulin panel blood test before I get the radioactive pill today at 11:30 AM. Oh good grief! It would have been very nice if he had mentioned this before so that I could have gone to the Navy doctors and gotten the authorization. The red tape for our insurance can be sticky. Ah well. We had to travel to the Great Lakes Naval Base to ask if I could come in for the blood test this morning. They said it would be OK. Thank goodness! As my husband said about this whole thing...."Two steps forward, one step back..."

You know, I can see why this doctor (He's an outside doctor and not one of the military ones that I usually go to.) had such bad reviews from some people. His office is rather disorganized and often give incorrect information and he does not have the best of bedside manners. However, he seems knowledgeable so if you can put up with the rest, you might be OK.

Still……….. after tomorrow’s pill and the two scans and one more appointment with Dr. Rabinowe next week for the results, I’ll be done! DONE!!! Woohoo!

After I take the radioactive pill tomorrow, I cannot touch my granddaughter for 48 hours. That’s going to be very hard indeed. Watching her delight and carrying her about has kept my spirits high. It will be the longest 48 hours for me before I can hold her again.

12 Days Before D(eparture) Day: 1st Thyrogen Injection

Yesterday was rather incredible. We had to leave the house because the people who will be conducting the sale would be going in and out throughout the week. They prefer owners to not be around to help.

It was also the day to start my thyrogen injections. The doctor's office told me to be there between 9-11:30 AM. However, when we arrived after over an hour's commmute at 10:30 there was only a substitute receptionist there. She said the nurse would be in at 2:00 PM and that the endocrinologist had taken the day off. We were not happy at all about it but it wasn't the receptionist's fault and the person who did the scheduling was also out of town.

Aggravation.

We decided to go to the mall right next door. When we walked in we saw that there was a movie theatre. We checked the times and found that Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull was playing. We had just enough time to grab a quick lunch of Cajun bourbon chicken and got to the movie with 10 minutes to spare. The movie was loads of fun! I'm not sure why the critics were so hard on it. Maybe we just wanted to be entertained, but we sure were! The 2 hours sped by like the blink of an eye and when it was over, arrived again at the doctor's office by 2:09. Got the injection and headed toward our daughter's Chicago condo. Not much traffic. How amazing is that?

After arriving at our daughter's condo where we would be staying for the week, we decided to do some shopping. I found three terrific $6.00 blouses at Target that I love and our daughter prepared a fabulous dinner.

What a nice day! After that brief aggravation, somehow those lucky stars realigned themselves again and we were cleared for sailing. I'm pessimistic though. When things go well too long, I start expecting some equalizing hammer to drop. I've always felt that life is a balance of experiences. There's good and then bad that equalize itself. I'll be watching my back, keeping my fingers crossed and preparing myself to deal with whatever.

13 Days Before D(eparture) Day: Aloha From the "Girlfriends Club"

This beautiful group has been my second family for almost the past two decades. Joan had a Hawaiian theme, having us all greeted at the door by her granddaughter who did an excellent job as a lei greeter.


Gerri's husband researched the net to come up with the perfect phrasing for the cake that Huong's mom baked herself. "A Hui Ho" means "Until We Meet Again" in Hawaiian.

Yesterday we attended a Farewell Party that was hosted by Joan, who used to be my 1st grade teaching partner. It was incredible. I’m still blown away. I don’t know how to explain it. I felt like it was an out of body experience. Then my good buddy, Gerri gave a heart to heart speech that had me retreating into that quiet spot in my mind to try to cope with it all. It was too beautiful, too overwhelming for me. Another friend there mentioned that I remained dry-eyed while everybody else had tears in theirs. I asked Gerri for a copy of her speech so I could hear her words again in private when no one was looking at me or taking photos.

When we returned home, I opened the beautiful Italian music box they gave me and listened again to it play the tune, Chicago. Today is the day I go in for my 1st thyrogen shot. The second one is tomorrow. Wednesday is the radioactive dye or something like that and Thursday and Friday will be the body scans to make sure there are no more thyroid cancer cells lurking in my body. I’ll be carrying that tune, the beautiful memories of yesterday and all your kind wishes to finish this coming week and move on to the final week of our time in Illinois.

14 Days Before D(eparture) Day: Moving Sale

The whole of yesterday except for our very delicious and happy lunch in Chicago with our neighbors was spent preparing the house for the house/moving sale next Friday and Saturday. We’ll be meeting the person who will conduct the sale this morning. It’s rather a surprise to see how much we’ve accumulated. We used to love to collect collectibles and kept a lot of them in the attic. When we started to bring them down they quickly covered our floors. I hope the weather forecasters are wrong. They’re saying it will thunderstorm all week. I’m hoping it clears up by next Friday and Saturday. Our good luck so far may be running out.

This afternoon, my incredible teacher friends are having a farewell party for us. I’m giving them each a purse hook for a farewell gift. I love mine. It’s a little hook you put on the restaurant table and dangle your purse from. I hope they like it. Gosh! I’m going to miss them all so much! We worked together for 19 years and meet once a month to catch up with each other. Thank goodness for e-mail! I wish they would learn to blog.

15 Days Before D(eparture) Day: Plastic Container Tears

Even with the house so altered and in disarray, I thought I was doing quite fine in dealing with the move. Therefore I was surprised that when I went to my kitchen plastic containers drawer to match lids to bottoms, I got very choked up. I normally have the lids and bottoms in two separate drawers but I needed to get the containers ready for sale.

I don't understand it. With the whole house turned completely upside down. It's the silly plastic containers that would cause tears. Go figure.

Ah well...our neighbors, Jiro who is Canadian and Ida who is Albanian are taking us out to lunch for a break today so that's something to savor and enjoy in between setting our house up for the moving sale.

Happy weekend, everybody!

The Night of the 16th Day Before D(eparture): Shipping Container

The guys arrived early this morning and Jose began checking his list and checking it twice.


The 20 foot shipping container arrived and it looked pretty big but we wondered if it would fit everything. Jose was still very confident.


These photos are a bit mixed up I haven't figured out how to rearrange them. Here's Art cleaning up the empty spaces in order to get ready for the conducted moving sale next Friday and Saturday.


Here's the fun crew! Art on the left with Casey, Jose, Victor, Robert and Scott


When we saw the container all loaded up, we were really surprised to see that there was STILL room. Scott joked that we should go out and buy a couple of sofas to fill up the space!


We enjoyed seeing Victor and Robert kidding around and having a good time. It was hard work in hot, humid weather. Casey is in the back wrapping up our son's surfboards.


Because there was so much extra room, Jose said we could pack two of our Odyssey van seats in the container. This would give us more room to pack our son's belongings to be brought to New Mexico.

You know... sometimes the stars, moon and sun all line up and things happen rather happily! The Nordic Track got packed, too! No excuse for not exercising!

16 Days Before D(eparture) Day: Insomnia!

Drat! I just woke up! It's 1:42 AM and I can't get back to sleep. We had a delicious dinner at our neighbor's home a few hours ago so we had a lovely end to a hectic day.

Jose, Scott and Victor arrived yesterday morning at 8:30 AM and proceeded to bring in heavy boxes and packing from Mayflower Moving. They got right to work. Jose is from Mexico. Victor is from Argentina and Scott is from Chicago. It’s fun to see how carefully but speedily they’re packing. When we asked them if it would all fit, they crossed their fingers and Jose said, ”It’ll be tight, but maybe...” They are such a nice bunch of guys and love to socialize as they work. They didn’t quite finish yesterday so they’ll have some packing to finish before they can load the boxes in the container. There was one problem early on when they had gotten high and low priority mixed up. Yes, I had tags. Jose reassured me that I shouldn’t worry because he was feeling pretty confident. But then I saw that tiny little roll of the eye and smile from Scott. Well, I won’t believe it until I actually see the doors close on the container.

The village called to ask me if anyone on the road construction group was working in front of our house because he said he made sure we’d have no problems. The weather cleared for a while and though it’s hot, it’s not raining. Tomorrow will be the iffy day because scattered showers are predicted. There is the threat of mold and mildew if the packages and boxes get wet.

Things seem to be going faster and faster. On Saturday, we’ve got the Estate Sale fellow coming and then Sunday, the teachers group who has been like a second family to me are having a farewell party for us. And then there’s Monday...

I was going to post a photo but I can't find my input cord. I'm not sure where it is. I hope it's not packed. I'm not sure where anything is. If you see a photo some day, you'll know I found it.

P.S. This is so strange! I just noticed that the dates on my last two blogs from this laptop are a day behind. How come? Looks like the computer is also not sure of anything.

17 Days Before D(eparture) Day: Sky Watch Friday

I’m doing the Sky Watch Friday early again because the movers are expected today at 8:00 and Friday might be a mess. We’ve got all our things prioritized and it’s looking mighty tight to fit all we want into the moving container. We’ll just hope for the best.

This photo was actually taken on July 11th, 1991. We planned our trip home to the Big Island to coincide with the total solar eclipse. However, when we landed, the car we rented was not available because so many people had come to the Big Island for the best viewing. We were stuck in Kona. Waikoloa is where there was supposed to be the absolute best view and you needed a car to get out there. We got a tiny bit of rest and then woke early the next morning, jet lagged but happy to be there for the eclipse. We got our special viewing glasses and went out to Kona harbor to watch this special show.

The morning started out cloudy but a couple of minutes before the eclipse the clouds cleared and we got the most amazing display we were so lucky to see. When the eclipse was total I remember bird songs stopping and grasshoppers taking over with their own nighttime melody. The street lights came on automatically. We could see jewel like sparkles around the sun. It was spectacular. I could certainly see why primitive peoples would have been frightened when day turned to night so mysteriously.

We learned later that the poor folks who had traveled to Waikoloa had nothing but cloudy skies and could not see anything. It was even clouded over on Mauna Kea (or was that Haleakala? Bad memory!) where the observatory is located. Sometimes things work out just right and you just have to savor the moment when the stars line up for you… or in this case, the sun and moon.

Here's a link to Mr. Eclipse.com that has better photos of the eclipse.

For more great Sky Watch Friday photos, join us at Welcome to Wiggers World and meet our very wonderful and most cordial host, Tom Wigley.

18 Days Before D(eparture) Day: Not a Whole Lot of Joy

This is it! It's the last day before the movers come. We're going to pack up the desktop computer today and clean out the desks. I'll be switching over to our very old unpredictable laptop. I'm feeling rather wistful about using my computer on my desk in my office for the last time.

I should buy a lottery ticket. After living here 34 years without much mishap on our streets, they've chosen these two months to replace all the water mains. While that's quite nice for our daughter and family who are moving in, it's torn up the roads and made them dusty. It's also been raining so the dust is now mud. Yesterday, we've noticed that out of about a 100 homes they're about ready to be right in front of ours tomorrow. I spoke to the fellow who seemed to be in charge and he says they'll work around us. How is it that in 34 years out of a 100 or so homes, they would be right here just when the movers come? Hmmm... maybe I will buy a ticket, one last time.

Remember me saying blogging calms me down? I keep rereading your comments telling me that everything will be well. Brit' Gal in the USA said the movers didn't break a single thing when she moved here from England so there's hope. (But maybe the British are better packers?) You're all keeping me sane. Thank you very, very much!

Oh, oh... I've got to go upstairs and bring down our son's surfboards! I forgot all about them. We had them in the "Don't Move" room. Good bye for today.

Tomorrow will be...will be.

19 Days Before D(eparture) Day: The Joy of Distractions

Low Priority Items

First Priority Pile

The pile of boxes to be packed and shipped on Thursday and Friday is growing. My husband, Art, ever the engineer (retired or not) got the actual measurements of the 20 foot moving container and proceeded to map out the volume we’d have for our belongings on our family room floor. Well, we could see that it’s going to be awfully hard to get everything we'd designated as first priority to be shipped into the container so now we’re severely prioritizing what we’re bringing even more. That old painted dresser that was left for us by the previous owners of the house may, just may have to stay behind along with this chair that we like so much. The chair had been painted beige and it took us forever to strip it and return it to its natural shade. Chairs, I’m afraid take up a lot of room. Maybe if I left behind that extra bookcase? Or maybe the extra cedar chest? Or….there is the china set for four that my mother saved to buy when I was a teenager? She figured I would have two children and didn’t think I would need china for guests. I’ve never used it because it’s too pretty to use for everyday and there’s not enough for guests. But no, I can’t leave that behind either……….

Ah well, our daughter and granddaughter are coming to spend the day so that's something to look forward to. We'll also be going to a farewell luncheon with our favorite "Friday Lunch" couple. It's ironic that our last lunch together will not be on a Friday that's been our usual day to get together. It's nice to have distractions to calm me down. Funny, but blogging calms me down, too!

Tomorrow will be the final day to make all the important shipping decisions before the movers come on Thursday. What are the chances for good weather? What are the chances that nothing gets stolen, broken or forgotten?

20 Days Before D(eparture) Day: The Joy of Sex

I hope this posting won't be too spicy for some of you. If so, please close your eyes.

We were cleaning out our walk-in cedar closet today and found deep within a book titled The Joy of Sex that was given to us as a joke by a friend some 35 years ago. We'd obviously hidden it from the young eyes who might be prowling about our house. I suppose we were also rather shy about the kids knowing that their parents engaged in anything not done at a proper dinner party.

It reminded me of the time when I had my first "birds and bees" discussion with our children. I sat them down and told them how babies were started. They sat opened mouthed as I explained hoping I was being as matter of fact as I could be and that my face was not pinking up.

My two dumplings pondered the whole thing and then one little voice piped up with, "Yuck."
Then the other child echoed the same sentiment by saying, "Sheesh! Oh well... at least you only had to do it two times to have us."

Riley, the Wolf Dog

Our neighbor has the most incredible dog. Understand, I am not a dog person. I’m not a cat person either. I’m just not completely at ease with animals except at a distance unlike my husband who had three dogs one at a time when he was growing up. They were all named Finnegan; Finnegan #1, Finnegan #2 and Finnegan #3. I guess his family felt that when you had a good thing, you may as well stick to it. Anyway, he loves all dogs and they love him. I love to stand back and watch.

The hosts of the party have a dog named Riley who is quite scary looking. (OK, I realize this photo does not do him justice.) When we first saw him he reminded us of a wolf. His face is fearsome enough to scare any burglar. And yet, if you look into his eyes you’d see the sweetest, most loving of hearts. At the party last night our granddaughter went over to Riley for a closer view. She’s very gentle with animals and other children even though she’s only 16 months old. When she neared him, I was surprised to see Riley cower and turn his head so that he wouldn’t have to look at her. Whenever KC came near, Riley would leave the room. At one point our neighbor gave KC a dog biscuit to give Riley. KC thought it was hers to eat but was not upset when Ed took it from her to demonstrate how to give it to Riley. A moment later, I saw Riley sitting there looking rather disconsolate with so many people roaming around his home. I had to walk over and pat him and murmur some encouraging words just as you would to a first day kindergartener. His wolfish eyes looked directly into mine and held them. I could actually clearly see kindness and friendship being communicated. It moved me as no other animal has. Like all my neighbors, I wish I had spent more time with him through the years.

Our First Farewell Party

Our neighbors hosted a farewell party for us last night. This was the first time that so many of us have gotten together, and as we were leaving I wished we had. We’ve all been too busy with our everyday family lives in the years that rushed by to have large parties, but we’ve shared our happenings with each other over fences and front yards and watched out for each other. We’re going to miss them all terribly. Our saving grace is that we’ll still be able to see them when we return to visit our daughter, Tiffany and her family. Never was I more relieved than last night to know that Tif and her husband would be buying our house whenever they’re able to sell their condo in this down market. As we were leaving, our very special neighbors across the street, who we’ve known since their kids were born and gone off to college gave us a beautiful blue and white boxed present. It reminded me of Tiffany’s wedding cake. (I don’t know how many of their wedding guests got the little joke that their cake was in the form of a Tiffany jewelers cake box.)

When we opened the box, we found that it was indeed a sparkling crystal bowl from Tiffanys. We were surprised and incredibly touched by this amazing gift. This will be a gift that will sit in our living room for all to see in Hawaii and stand forever as a loving reminder of the beautiful friends we will always have back home in Illinois.

The Countdown Begins!

It's 22 days before our move to leave our home of 33 years. This seems to start our countdown because our neighbors are throwing a party for us tonight. I'm rather bemused by the kindness of people. When my teacher friend told me a month ago that she wanted to secure a date before everyone else latched on to the available dates for a farewell party, I was a bit embarrassed. I had to tell her we really weren't expecting anyone to throw us farewell parties. We don't have big groups of friends. Our friends are rather spread out and don't know each other. But now suddenly, our schedule is becoming quite full. My husband, Art has even had to cancel his get-together with one of his EPA friends because he needs to take me for a thyrogen cancer scan in a couple of weeks. We are very, very touched by the affection everyone is warming and supporting us with.

Goals for today:
Empty out my nightstand and my desk.
Pack up some of our granddaugter's toys that are strewn about the family room. There's so little open space that it's hard to organize the first priority things from the low priority things to go into the moving container.
Change our credit card addresses.

Oh, oh! Gotta go. Art is going downstairs to make some pancakes. He's trying to use up a lot of our staples.

#3 Sky Watch Friday

Here's the blurb I found about this sculpture in Chicago
"Cloud Gate is British artist Anish Kapoor's first public outdoor work installed in the United States. The 110-ton elliptical sculpture is forged of a seamless series of highly polished stainless steel plates, which reflect the city's famous skyline and the clouds above. A 12-foot-high arch provides a "gate" to the concave chamber beneath the sculpture, inviting visitors to touch its mirror-like surface and see their image reflected back from a variety of perspectives."

I learned that it had a projected cost of 9 million dollars but that the final cost ended up being 23 million. It sort of reminded me of the Sydney Opera House... cost wise.
We were babysitting our granddaughter and decided to walk her over to Millennium Park to see the sculpture which Chicagoans actually call "The Bean." I think Mr. Kapoor has resigned himself to that title because that's what everybody I know calls it. We were amazed to see a wedding party pull up and have their photos taken in front of it, even as people swarmed all around them. You can see me in the 2nd photo almost dead center next to the carriage with the red top. I'm holding the camera. :-D

If you'd like to see some great Sky Watch Friday photos and join us just come on over to Welcome to Wiggers World and meet our very wonderful and most cordial host, Tom Wigley.

Retired Ties

I have this incredible friend in Hawaii who is gifted in everything she does. She's been like this from the time we were in kindergarten. If she wasn't such a good friend, I might have been jealous of her talent. After my husband retired from the US E.P.A., he decided to just donate his work ties. I knew that Mavis was doing all kinds of different crafts since she had sent many of her beautiful works of art to us for the holidays. I e-mailed to ask her if she'd like the ties to use for a project. Imagine our surprise when this arrived the following Christmas! It's hanging in our diningroom here in Illinois and will certainly hold a place of honor once we move to Hawaii.

Aaack! The movers are coming next week!!!

Forwarded Hummingbirds

A good friend of mine in Iowa just sent us this forwarded e-mail with photos of hummingbirds. I was so amazed that I wanted to share it with you. The following is the caption that came with it. Isn't it incredible?

"This is something I have never seen before, or ever even heard of. This lady lives in a Hummingbird fly zone. As they migrated, about 20 of them were in her yard. She took the little red dish, filled it with sugar water and this is the result.
The Woman is Abagail Alfano of Pine, Louisiana - she has been studying them daily and one morning put the cup from the feeder, with water in it, in her hand; as they had gotten used to her standing by the feeder they came over to her hand. She says in touching they are as light as a feather. Abagail also said, 'if she had known her husband was taking pictures she would have put on makeup."

"Make My Day" Award

I am very honored to receive the Make My Day Award from Dina of Jerusalem Hills Daily Photo. I am copying the text of rules that Dina wrote.

<><><><><>
Award Rules
1) Award and link to 5 blogs that make you think and/or make your day.
2) Acknowledge the post of the award giver: Reader Wil
3) Tell the award winners that they have won by commenting on their blogs with the news!
Now the part I find hard... I could give this to many. All the blogs I visit make my day or I would not keep going back for more, but I'm told I can only pick 5.
<><<><<><><

The first person I would choose is the person who sent this award to me. Dina encouraged me to do a blog, taught me the basics and made sure to send me positive reinforcement every time I posted something. It was hard enough to choose who to tag. However I'll do my best and hope that I'm not "awarding" people who have already been awarded or tagged or medaled or whatever. You all make my day every time I hear from you.

So here's my FIVE.
Jean writes Molly's Folks Down Under from Maine. I loved her stories of her trip to Australia/New Zealand and having pavlova. I remember our trip there as well, and it brought back great memories. I laughed out loud when I read her story about her dog, Molly's reluctance to take her medicine. Jean keeps me going with her encouraging comments and I love checking in to see what else she has written.

The Max Files is written by Max-E from South Africa. He just did a beautiful post about the hard working women of Africa. I loved reading about his fitness regimen and it has motivated me to get on the move.

Rambling Woods--The Road Less Traveled is written by Michelle from western New York. Her blog is one of the first that I visited and I enjoyed greatly learning about the birds and wildlife in her area. Her knowledge of birdlife is incredible. Reading her blog makes me feel like I'm walking in her woods with her.

Tranquility Cove is written by Chrisss in Vancouver. I've always wanted to go to Vancouver. Her blog full of gorgeous nature photos, described with humor and interest draws me to her site.

Heimdal is written by Marie who is from Norway. I used to have a penpal from Norway when I was a teenager and I love seeing Marie's beautiful photos of her country. The flowers and scenery are just amazing.