ShannonAlbert.com - June 2009

Two adults, two kids and a dog. Moving to our Texas apartment. Wish us luck.

Last Thursday (I think? or was it Friday?), I checked in around 11:30 to get my gallbladder removed. The people at the outpatient center couldn't have been nicer. We've had such good luck (except for 1 doctor) with medical care in Wichita. The only problem was the Nervous Nelly dude next to me with his two sons that encouraged his behavior.

It took 3 tries for them to get the IV in me which made me a little queasy. When I'm dehydrated, IVs don't work so well and since I was told not to drink or eat, I was dehydrated. I was expecting a countdown under anesthesia but instead, I breathed from a face mask and I was out with no real transition. One minute I was there and the next minute, I was waking up.

They let me take about 20 minutes to wake up and then once I could move to a recliner, they would let my mom and husband come back. I got moved and they came back. I was stiff and tender and so, so tired. They gave me a painkiller through the IV and it made me nauseous so we had to stick around a little longer. The doctor said I didn't set a record for largest gallstone but I was up there plus they had to make the incision wider to accommodate the larger sized stone. The larger the stone, the more the pain I hear yet I never rated my pain higher than a 5. Weird.

Side note: I've a whole diatribe about traditional medicine brewing in my head. Administering meds unnecessarily has lead to all kinds of complications for me including depression as a side effect of one med, extremely complicated labor due to side effects from another, countless infections as a result of another. Can we just quit with all the meds already? I have a really, really high pain tolerance and have never felt the need to take them. I wish medicine wasn't given by default with little regard to what the effects will be.

I finally got to come home and take a nap. When I woke up, my mom had fresh fruit and other food ready for me to eat. I wanted to eat it but couldn't handle much. The meds were still making me nauseous. I just opted to not take them and called the doctor the next day and they called in a nausea pill and another type of painkiller. Even with the new cocktail, I only took them twice and at bedtime.

My mom was here for 4 days or so and she made all of our meals. It was so nice to not have to worry about it. Andy left for a job interview in Texas in the middle of her stay, I can't drive right now and it was just one less thing to think about.

Right now I am post-op about 4 days and I'm feeling good. My only remaining issue is tenderness on my abdomen where the 4 incisions are (and coughing hurts BAD) plus fatigue but that is getting better too. I go back to work on Thursday and I think I should be ok by then.

And, it might be a little late, but I'm not totally convinced gallbladder removal was the only solution though my doctors seemed urgent to make that happen. I'll never have the chance to make that decision again but I wish more options were presented.

On Saturday, I woke up with terrible upper back pain which continued into Sunday. On Monday, abdominal pain was more of my concern as it felt like a 9 month old fetus was lodged in my ribs and wouldn't move. Eating made the pain more intense. By Tuesday, I had decided that I needed to go to the doctor.

Appointment for Wednesday morning and the dr. sent me to see a sonographer a few hours later. The findings: a very, very sick gallbladder. Immediately I am sent for an appointment with a surgeon who schedules me for gallbladder removal tomorrow.

I am glad the fix is relatively simple and that I will get better soon. The timing isn't great as we were planning to all go to Texas this weekend. Now we are trying to figure out what our nee plans will be. I was told to expect to be out of commission for a week. I've never been down for that long so I am hoping for less.

So, this weekend the four of us are going to Texas and then Andy has his interview on Monday. We will spend this weekend doing some fun stuff plus driving through parts of the city we may want to live in. We hope to know more about our future plans by next week.

Andy has been off work now for about 10 days and this has been the first week with Blake. They've been having fun and spending time together and have met me for lunch a couple of times. (Payton is in KC for the week).

He's going to Texas on July 13 to meet with Lockheed. We may go with him for the weekend to do some scouting in the area.

I feel really fortunate that Andy has a good option for a job given that so many people don't right now. However, having said that, this is hard, y'all. We didn't want to move Payton. We don't want to lose money selling our house. We don't want to drive 8 hours to KC all the time. We don't want to move Payton....and we don't want to move Payton. I know she will adjust and I know she'll be fine but it's heartbreaking...and it's not our fault.

Dan's restaurant officially opens tomorrow to the public but this weekend was for family and friends to enjoy. To say that we are proud of him and super crazy excited would be an understatement. When he went from a restaurant manager to a corporate job some years ago, we stayed up at night talking about how he *needed* to have his own restaurant because it was obviously his calling and what he's really good at. The barrier to entry is scary for a not-rich person but after years of perseverance, he finally made it. What's even better is that we are big fans of Genghis Grill food and of the Power and Light District. A collision of mega awesomeness if you ask me.

There were lots of pictures taken of the night but here's 1 album that was put together by Tom.

Pics of family and friends night

I'm in the printed paper today (though I have yet to see it) and the info is online too.

Justin Timberlake makes Sullivan Higdon & Sink employee’s weekend

The last time I posted, I was feeling crazy excited about receiving 2 messages from JT because there's no celeb that would make me happier to hear from. I thought that was it. I was wrong.

On Friday, I got an email that said "Justin Timberlake is now following you on Twitter" which is what you get each time somebody new follows you. I've gotten 200 of them over the past couple of days but this one nearly made me pass out. The amazing thing is that he has over 300,000 people following him but he's only following 32 people. Now, I'm one of them.



This means I can send him a Direct Message (private message) on Twitter if I want to. People have said I'd be silly not to. The thing is, I really, really like him and have no intention to bother him.

EDITED TO ADD: He's not following me anymore. He removed about 8 people including me. I figured he would do that so I'm glad I got a screenshot while it (briefly) lasted. Ha.

My subdued mood today can't properly convey my mood at the time. I'm not going to lie. I was shaking and giddy about this. At work.

Then he Tweets me again. He says I should make a video of my squee. I don't have a screen cap of that because he removed it within about an hour which is good because I wasn't going to do it anyway. :) People sent me messages saying that I had to since he said so. They obviously don't know me because I don't do anything I don't want to....even if Justin Timberlake says so.

Lots of people have been asking me questions. Here are some of the most common.

Q: What does your husband think about all this?
A: He's known that I love JT for many years. I think some marriages have jealousy (even about celebs). We don't. He's happy for me though he can't think of who would make him react quite as insanely.

Q: What does your daughter think?
A: There seems to be some misconception that the JT love is due to my daughter. It's not. I love JT. She thinks he's an awesome entertainer but he isn't her thing. She's much more into Forever the Sickest Kids, Ludo, Pink and many others. I'm no cooler to her today than I was a week ago (which is to say, not at all).

Q: How can I get a celeb to reply to me or follow me?
A: No idea. I wasn't trying to. It just happened.

Q: How do you know it's him?
A: It's him. He's a verified Twitter user. And yes, he writes his own Tweets. Almost all people on Twitter do.

Q: Will you get me an autograph or tickets?
A: What makes you think I could?

This should just about be the end but I will be in the newspaper tomorrow to discuss it so I'll post a link to that when it's online.

It's been fun.

So I love Twitter. And I love JT. And tonight, those two worlds collided into a big ball of awesomeness.

I follow nearly 200 people and I keep up with all of them fairly easily but when Justin Timberlake sends a message, I squee. So, tonight, I tweeted this.



It's true, I contemplated unfollowing my second most favoritest celeb (Oprah is 1st, obvz) because I SQUEE when I get a message from him. I love him. For real.

Then......he replied.



OK. Ummm.....if him sending out a link to a website makes me squee, what do you suppose a question directly from him does?

MAKES ME SCREAM AS I RUN THROUGH THE HOUSE!!! And I so eloquently replied to him.



Yeah, I play it cool.

So I gather myself and try to remember to breathe again. Kami calls and says "umm...did you see what he said this time?"



Translation: he started a new topic on Twitter in my honor.

Honest to God, it doesn't get much better for me than this.

If you'd like to try to keep up with what people are saying to me, check out these messages people are sending to me. I can't keep up but it's so fun!

I am taking off work on Monday and Tuesday to work with Payton on house projects, Andy's attending a career fair on Monday, Blake is attending a science day camp at Exploration Place with Mia, Payton has a conditioning camp each morning, softball game for me Tuesday evening, Andy's last day of work is on Friday and then we head to KC on Friday for happy hour w/high school classmates and golfing for me, my dad, my mom and my brother for Father's Day. Didn't realize we had so much good stuff going on peppered with the difficult until I typed that out. Glad to have some things to look forward to.

On RemarkablyClever.com this week, I posted these 3 articles. Traffic has gradually increased each day and it's been really fun to work on this site and see the number of visitors to grow thanks to Google picking up my posts, repeat visitors and links from other people (including Amanda and Casey).

Jet lag is not necessary
Customize your Blogger, WordPress or Tumblr blog
How to find cheap beauty products that rock

Next week, I will have articles about how to personalize the Internet, legitimate work at home opportunities and the beginning of a series on planning a trip to Walt Disney World...which, of course, means that I *have* to plan a trip there, right?

Andy's brother, Dan, is (finally!) opening his restaurant this month, his brother Mark is (finally!) becoming a professor this year and the best of ALL.....his mom and my dad BOTH haven't smoked in 6 weeks! Hallelujah, there is good news to be had.

His last day is June 19. There is a severance package that should help a lot. Next steps for us? Getting our house ready to sell because there's a 99% chance we won't be able to stay in Wichita. He has a phone interview with a company scheduled and has been looking at jobs for a few weeks. Next few months should be interesting.

So you all know that I love planning trips (half the fun of a trip is the planning I always say) but the cruise thing was new for me. Here's a blog post about 12 tips I would give first time cruisers based on our experience.

12 tips before boarding your first cruise ship

One of our guides in Belize told us that there is no racism in Belize. Everybody is equal. He hadn't ever experienced it until he came to the US and saw people grabbing their purses when he would get near them. I remember hearing something similar about Sidney Poitier who lived in the Bahamas until moving to the U.S. as a teenager.

"I couldn't adjust to the racism in Florida," he says. "It was so blatant. ... I had never been so described as Florida described me."

But he wasn't having it. As he says, "Florida said to me, 'You are not who you think you are. We will determine what you are.' "

That was in 1943. Over 60 years later, the story is the same. What is wrong with us?

On Monday, I took Payton to get a physical at the pediatrician's office. When they called her name, I stayed in the waiting room because the last visit we had, I received a letter in the mail stating that teenagers should go back without parents. Payton went back alone.

Several minutes later, the doctor came out and got me to join them in the examining room. She said she wanted me there and I explained about the letter and she seemed confused.

Payton had her physical and afterward, she told me that before I got into the room the doctor was doing the normal lecture on drugs, alcohol and sex and Payton said the doctor also said "...and you know you should wait until marriage to have sex, right?"

Ok then. This bothered Payton and it bothered me. I have no problem with the doctor addressing the physical/biological effects of negative behavior but imposing morality for her future stepped over a line for me. I kept thinking about, discussing it with friends and coworkers and finally decided to call the doctor's office to express my concern that imposing morality (particularly one-on-one with a child) isn't really professional and that the doctor should probably stay with the biological discussion of various activities. They said they'd note it in my chart but I said it wasn't about me, it was about professionalism and boundaries.

Andy doesn't agree with me on this. He says that he sees nothing wrong with it. I see it as unprofessional and besides, the advice doesn't work. I think 18+ year olds should make decisions about their lives that are responsible and make sense for them whatever that may be.

What do you think? Was the doctor out of line? Or was it no big deal?

I would typically break our trip reports out by day and have multiple posts for the trip report. This time I'm going to summarize in just one post because I don't have the pictures I usually do and the days kind of ran together.

Getting There
We flew into Tampa the day before the cruise was scheduled to depart. We were picked up by our hotel and ate dinner at the hotel that night. We headed to bed and woke the next morning to be taken to the port by our hotel driver.

Getting on the Ship
We arrived at the port around noon to get onto the boat. People and taxis and vans EVERYwhere. Luggage was handled by our driver and we got in line to check-in. Multiple steps, lots of security and long lines. This was a frustrating and long process as thousands of us all were waiting to load the ship. I heard somebody say later on that it seems to work best to arrive very early (10 a.m.-ish?) or very late (3:00-ish) because most people seem to arrive right in the middle.

We are told we can go on the ship but our room won't be ready until around 1:30. We head to an upper deck to eat some lunch and have a drink. So. many. people. We weren't off to a good start as thousands of us were waiting on our rooms to be ready.

Finally in Our Cabin
At 1:30, we head to our room, cabin 7271. We have a balcony room on an upper level deck near the center of the ship. We were very fortunate as this is a good location.

The steward pulled the bed down from the ceiling and Blake had this bed, Payton had the couch below as a bed and Andy and I had the full-sized bed for ourselves.


Blake had fears of falling out of the bed so he strapped himself down.


Dining
Every night, we had an assigned dinner time of 6 p.m. and were seated at the same table with the same two servers. This was a highlight of the trip as we loved the food and our servers, Heshbron and Juan. They were delightful and we were spoiled by such great service.

Lunch was open buffet in various eating areas available on Deck 9.

Breakfast EVERY day was room service (included, no extra cost). Andy and I would often sit on our balcony and eat breakfast and chat while letting the kids sleep.

View from our balcony


Kids Clubs
The kids were enrolled in Kids Clubs on our arrival day. Blake participated in the Kids Club everyday at least for a little while. He's a challenge to keep up with 24/7 for a week and it was a nice break for everyone for him to have kids activities to do. He often opted to eat dinner with the kids club which was a kids buffet they got to eat from while Andy and I enjoyed a nice, lingering dinner with a bottle of wine.

Payton participated in her club off and on and met a girl who happens to live in KC that she would often do things with outside of the club.

Ports of call
- Cayman. Our first port of call was Cayman where FOUR ships were there at the same time and it is a tendered port so we have to take small boats to and from the ship. We just had plans to catch a bus to a beach this day so we slept in and avoided the rush from the early crowd. We were able to get right on a boat and get to the port easily.

Blake on the tender boat (he's sensitive to light and his old sunglasses didn't fit anymore. The first thing we did at the port was get him some new ones so he didn't have this face all day.)


Other ships also at Cayman when we were.


We got on a bus and took it for a few minutes to Seven Mile Beach (which is really more like 4 miles). Our plan was just to hang out on the beach and shop a bit on this day.



We ate lunch on the beach and Blake fed bread to the birds.


We all took the bus back to the port. Andy and the kids got on a tender boat to head back to the ship while I took a few minutes to shop. I got some rum cakes and headed back.


- Belize. Ummmm....I have NO pictures of our day in Belize. This was ANOTHER port with four ships and also a tendered port except this time we had to get off the boat really early to be at an excursion that we booked. We were fortunate to be on the first tender boat and met our waiting van at the port. We got in the van and headed out to cavetube about an hour inland. It was fantastic and we had a great guide that took care of us considering our group had three kids under 10 years old. We floated on tubes on a river and went in and out of pitch black caves. Payton ate termites on our walk to the river (not kidding...she ATE TERMITES and they tasted like mint). Payton also swung from a rope into the river. No camera because I didn't want it to get wet in the river! I'm very frustrated to not have any pics. Anyway, great day and interesting experience. Highly recommend Major Tom's Cave Tubing.

- Isla Roatan, Honduras. Oh baby! This was our last port and the best by far. First of all, it wasn't a tendered port so getting on and off the ship was much easier. Secondly, the excursion I had booked was waiting for us and we headed out with Pirates of the Caribbean canopy tour to zip line through the jungles of Honduras. Andy was very irritated with me for booking this excursion because he said Blake would never do it. I had shown Blake the pictures and videos beforehand and he said he was ok with it. I wanted to try to push him to do something adventurous since he can be pretty timid.

So we get there and they talk us into trying the Extreme course rather than the traditional one.

The four of us, all suited up and ready to go.


We get to our first zip line and our guides give us some basic instructions and I go first. It was scary to jump off the platform but once I was going through the air, it was so beautiful and fun and not scary. Next up was Payton.



She said she expected to scream but was surprised how unscary it actually was.

Finally, the boys went together.


Blake wasn't scared at ALL. He loved it sooo much.

We repeated this process on 7 more zip lines of varying length and height. On two of them, Blake went alone because they were setup in a way that allowed him to make it all the way despite his small size.

Bare with me as I share several of these pics. We just loved this.




My baby boy, all by himself!


My two babies, going together.





At the end of the lines, there was this pet monkey that was kept there that, of course, was glued to Payton. It is a proven fact that all animals and children love Payton.


We wrapped up our time at the zip lines and I had arranged for our driver to take us to a beach for the remainder of our time in Honduras. This is where we were.

My baby girl. What a gorgeous place.




Kids kayaking


Ok, so this place was amazing. We sat in hammocks and Adirondack chairs, we had drinks, we walked the beach. It was amazing. The kids didn't want to go but the driver arrived and it was time to go.

Days at Sea
We had 3 days at sea where we didn't stop at a port at all. The first part of the week, we had a hard time getting into the groove of the ship. So many things scheduled and we weren't sure how to navigate it all. By mid-week, we had gotten into a groove and split our time between time together, time apart, attending shows, going to the casino, napping, etc.

Returning Home
Got off the ship at 9:00 a.m. on Sunday and then took a taxi to the airport where we had about 4 hours until our flight. Flew to KC, picked up our dog and got home around 10:30 that night.

Our thoughts on cruising
After all the fun we had, it may be surprising that we don't think we'll probably cruise again. It's just not really our way to travel. We'd much prefer to go to a foreign country away from Americans and learn to speak the local language a bit, eat local food and have a bit more cultural experience. I am thankful for this cruise though because it was a lot of fun and introduced us to Honduras which I am planning on making our next international trip. Can't wait.

Cruise trip report coming up soon but here's my new blog that I've started. I wanted something separate from my personal blog to contain ideas that I had. I will be posting twice a week on various topics including travel, technology and just daily life.

Here are links to some of the posts I've done so far.

Creating professional greeting cards. Many people asked me how I made our cards last year and this is a very detailed tutorial on how including the files I used to create them.

10 fun things to do on a family road trip. We've spent a lot of time in cars over the last 12 years or so and have some ideas for making road trips a bit more fun.

Couch to half marathon in less than 6 months. This is how I started from nothing and trained for the half marathon that I ran with Marcy last September.

Subscribe to that blog so you'll be notified of new posts. If you have any content ideas, let me know!

It's a pretty busy one. Softball game, last days of school, dentist appointments, packing and then we drive to KC on Friday to begin our 9 days away from home. Oh, and I'm starting a blog as a side business but not really looking at making money yet. Just building content and getting setup right now. More on that in the near future.

Car window memorials are quite the trend here. Snapped a pic of this on the way home. Sad for their loss but not sure this is the best way to memorialize the death of their child.

Update: the last line of the decal says "died at 3 so horribly." So sad but so odd.