FEELING LIKE CPAC

My husband has severe sleep apenea.

He snores - and then stops breathing - and then gasps for breath, waking himself up - and then begins snoring again.

His doctor prescribed a CPAC machine for him a few years ago, but he was uncomfortable enough with it after just a few mintues that he never used it.

My second daughter has sleep apenea.... ditto.

I just got a CPAC machine... and I love it. But I don't look anything like the lady on the right - however, the photo on the right is almost a perfect representation.

I don't have sleep apenea, but after undergoing two sleep studies (see my blog from 1/26/10), I had low-enough oxygen intake that hey, it couldn't hurt. My doctor was very much, "hey, if it helps, great, if it doesn't, you don't have to stay with it."

And it's only two nights, but I now know how much of my regular day was ruled by feelings of sheer exhaustion - all of it.

Right now, after six hours of sleep with the stupid, loud, sputtering CPAC machine right by my head, I feel WONDERFUL.

Please, may it continue.

MOTHER AND CHILD

Haven't you heard people say, "Oh, I learned such-and-such from my mom."  (Well, the "such-and-such" part isn't something you have normally hear, right?)

But you know, like "My mom taught me how to make the best cakes," or "My mom was the one I'd call whenever I needed advice," or "My mom showed me the best way to kick a guy in his testicles." 

I didn't ever have that kind of relationship with my mother - I learned to cook from college room-mates, I called my dad when I needed advice, and I learned how to knee someone on my own.
 But I do have this kind of relationship with my oldest daughter.

It's just flip-flopped.

Earlier this week, I was wearing Harmony's jeans jacket, wearing her brown shoes, doing "the loop" in Target, with a not-quite-iPhone-but-almost in my pocket and her iPod in my ears. I went home and made the chicken salad recipe she gave me. And called her that night to ask advice.

Is this healthy?

A BLANK CANVAS

The word, antidisestablishmentarism, was taught to me at an extrememly young age by my older brother as the longest word in the English dictionary.

It has since been superceded by pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis.

But one of my favorite all time words is anthropomorphic, meaning ascribing human characteristics to animals and/or objects.

This descibed my actions perfectionally.
 

Every car I have owned has been given a name, and has had a personality. I have had Charlie (whose real name was Charlene, but she was sort of a tomboy, and hated being called that) - The Blue Goose (VW van - guess which color) - Grey Ghost (an extremely reliable Honda that was traded in for a new car by accident - I meant for them to take my husband's red Honda instead of mine) - and most recently my pickup, Blanca.

Today driving my new (new to be,albeit a used vehicle) Ford Ranger 2003 Extended Cab home, her name was obvious.

 
Maggie.
 

It's the first automatic transmission I have had in years and years and years - the tag on it says it's green, although I think that is a stretch of some male imagination (it's a beyond grey dark but not black) - and the interior is almost EXACTLY the same as my now-demolished Mazda pickup.

 

I feel almost as though I have Blanca back - does anyone know of a word that combines  anthropomorphicism and reincarnation (Google only comes up with a link to www.mfn.org.au/newsletters/2008/2008_06MFNnewsletter.pdf, so your guess is as good as mine).

USED CAR SALESMEN

I might be sexist, but I did expect to find at least one female car salesperson.


I approach car lots with sheer dread, thinly veneered by a bravado of a no-nonsense attitude. I literally tell the first person I see, "Can you find me someone who wants to sell me a pickup today?"


I walked around a lot of lots - I sat inside quite a few cabs - and I drove one truck I may actually end up purchasing, if I can talk them down to a reasonable APR rate (by sheer misfortune, the Toyota Tacoma is selling well enough that they don't need to offer the 0% they have on almost all of their other vehicles).

But why can't they just put them on a shelf (theoretically, of course) with a price, and you pick them up, put them in your cart (still figuratively), and check out? Yes, people make money the way it is done now - and I don't live outside a large-enough town to do the bargin-comparison-who-can-make-me-a-better-deal.
 
Okay, girlfriend, take a deep breath, and just get ready to make the plunge. 

DOUBLE HOMICIDE

When does a murder become an assassination? Do you have to be at a certain level of political influence?

And why do assassins always have three names? ("David Berkowitz, Ted Bundy, Richard Speck... . Serial killers only have two names. You ever notice that? But lone gunmen assassins, they always have three names. John Wilkes Booth, Lee Harvey Oswald, Mark David Chapman..." - can anyone tell me where that quote is from... and is it a little bit sad that I know?)

Today I was involved in two deaths... well, symbolic ones, perhaps, but extremely emotional ties. I had to sign the death certificate... er, well, "Total Loss" insurance agreement, for my truck. I could console myself that it was at the very least an organ donar (it's parts will be recycled), but I was also abandoning my constant (and completely paid-off) companion of the past seven years.

I also have invested a (conservative estimate) $450 in bumper stickers over the years.

The other was a sudden but not completely unforseen termination - I opened my cell phone not five minutes after ratifying my poor truck's decease, and it, quite literally, fell apart.

Now, some people can do okay without a cell phone - but it is my only phone. I don't exactly live and die by it - but I count on it.

And, just like my truck, I have invested a lot of time and energy in this phone - individual photos, ring tones, short-cuts, background.... and a WHOLE lot of phone numbers.

So this period of mourning may go on for a while; I will need time to recover.... as well as a new truck (I've already replaced the phone - have you seen the ads for the new "Android"? I got one!!!).

A PERIOD OF MOURNING, PLEASE

AP: Tuesday, April 16, 2010: Sierra Vista, AZ: HEADLINE NEWS: A national day of mourning has been announced to honor the demise of Hope Wiltfong's 2003 Mazda B2000 Pick-Up Truck, affectionately nicknamed Blanca.

Officials representing GEICO insurance this morning declared the vehicle "not worth the repair costs" following a low-impact collision with the official Little Old Lady of Pasadena (no, wait, that should be ME, not the other driver, right?). Family members were contacted, and will be with the truck when it is officially taken off life-support early tomorrow morning.

Known county-wide as "that stupid pick-up with all those asinine bumper stickers," Blanca provided years of casual reading for all behind her at traffic lights, the drive-through at Dairy Queen, and the parking lot of Target. Her owner, Hope Wiltfong, insisted that "I will continue to cover her with bumper statements until you can no longer see any white truck" while also categorically denying that it was intended to be any sort of racial statement.

Black armbands will distributed at Mazda dealers nation-wide, with one minute of silent tribute to be paid at 12:34 p.m. Arizona non-Daylight Savings Time. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that donations be made to the American Motor Engines Nation-wide (A.M.E.N.).

MUSKRAT LOVE

There are fictional examples of cross-species love - Beauty and the Beast - the cat and the fiddle had something going on - King Kong was willing to do a lot for Fay somebody - and Miss Piggy and Kermit the Frog, of course

So... hey, who knows.

Well, there is Sally, my mare, is old - old enough that she can't chew hay, and needs to be fed a special senior equine meal. However, she still regularly comes into heat, and believes, in the exact same manner that all of us hold an image of us in our best teenage-or-early-20's years in our heads, that she is a young mare prancing around attracting all the stallions that exist... at least in her fantasies.

And today her stud-radar was up and running about something directly east of her pasture - and enough dancing was going on that I actually walked out to see if there was possible a loose horse out there... or a cloud shaped like a horse... or signs of any possible performance-enhancement drugs that Sally is taking....

And guess what she was fixating on?

A pig. In the corral on the next property. A big, white sow.

Ah, true love, at last.