the pattyo

Miles driven: 0

I’m going to keep a record to see if I can drive a lot less. I think it should be easy, actually.

We can walk to a lot of things: our bank, a drug store, bookstore, coffee shop, gift stores, post office, my hair salon (not that I’m cutting my hair these days) and plenty of restaurants. Walking is good. It’s free. Unfortunately our very local dry cleaner closed up shop, so I’m not sure I can get away without driving tomorrow, when I take some clothes in. We’ll see.

In other news … the sun rash is getting better. It still itches at times, but I think in a couple of days it should be gone. I hope. But I’m not ready to go out in the sun yet. (If I walk downtown I’ll go early in the day or in the evening. It’s just safer for now.)

Okay, so I freaked today. Sure that I had that “awful yucky thing I refuse to name” that I had years ago. My arms were getting worse … even the right one. But the left was (and is) especially bad. And painful. So I called Kaiser and the nurse agreed that I needed to come in to be sure it wasn’t that “awful yucky thing”. But the doc said not so. He said he really does think it’s just the sun.

I’ve gone back and forth today thinking it’s the “yucky thing” and believing the doctor.

So I finally looked up rash + sun + sensitivity and I came up with polymorphic light eruption and I looked at pictures and … well yes … that does look and sound like what I have. So oh well. It goes away. Might take 7 days, but it goes away. Eventually.

The after-the-wedding blues have hit me.

I didn’t think this would happen. :-(

Originally uploaded by katy regnier

How cute are they?

Another great picture by Katy!

I don’t go out in the sun a whole lot, and it’s not just that I’m a hermit. Although of course I am a hermit. Years ago (I was still in college) I began to get a rash if I was exposed to the sun. But not always. I never knew when it would happen. Sunscreen made (and makes) no difference. And once it starts, any more sun exposure “grows” the rash into a lovely mess.

Sigh.

I could feel this coming on yesterday, when I was driving home from SoCal. I actually wondered if I was getting it the day before, when I saw one bump, but then I thought it wasn’t going anywhere and I was safe.

So now my left arm is covered in these awful bumps. My right arm has a few as well. They hurt. And they are ugly, too. And there is nothing to do but wait until they go away. Meanwhile I have to wear long sleeves if I go outside at all, because once I get them, any sun exposure at all is a killer.

Maybe this is just a way to make up for the “I have no purpose now,” mode I was in, eh? Cool.

Or not.

Wanna donate to a worthy cause? My friend Kathy (Megan’s —Jameson’s girlfriend— mom) is doing a 3 day walk for breast cancer. Any amount you can give is helpful, of course!

Gee … I have no planning to do. I have a feeling this next week is going to be rough for me; when I have a purpose … a task to perform … I’m a happy camper. When I don’t, I’m rather lost. (And yes, the yard could be a task, but … well … um … oh never mind!)

You can read some of what I thought about the wedding (in regards to yours truly) at oboeinsight, so I’ll leave that out of this entry. I don’t want to go on and on about the oboe thing.

I will include these two oboeinsight paragraphs, though:

We had a lovely time. Kelsey was beautiful. Mel was handsome. (Hey, they still are!) And you can see two teasers over at Katy’s site. Katy Regnier is incredible. Truly. She was easy to work with, fun, and very patient. Thank you Katy!

Our guitarist, James Vita, was also a highlight, as far as I was concerned, and others complimented his playing as well. It was just so wonderful to hear him play. So thank you too, Jim!

I loved the weekend. I had a fabulous time. Kelsey and Mel were super and beautiful and handsome and sweet and all that. It was great to see Timothy, all the way from that east coast country, as well as Mom and Carolyn (hi ya’ll!). And Dan’s family … so many made it all the way to (very hot!) Temecula. What an honor that everyone trekked on over. Distance winner, of course, was Timothy. (Thanks, Timothy! I only wish you could have stayed longer … and “D-landed” with Jameson, Megan and me.)

And yes, I missed my dad.

Yesterday was great fun at the happiest place on earth. And it really was happy. Tired too, but happy. The only unhappy place was actually trying to get food at the Golden Horseshoe. I’ve never seen slower workers who never smiled. We waited in a somewhat short line for the longest time (longer than the rides!), only to find out that their coffee machine was broken! We had only come in for coffee, tea and dessert, wouldn’t ya know? I have an inkling that if the Disney powers that be had seen how that place was run they’d close it down entirely, when Jameson was saying he was bummed that they stopped doing the live shows there. It appears that “live” might be disappearing from Disneyland, which is too bad. Funny, though, that when I was a kid I thought all that stuff was stupid. Now I think it’s wonderful to see live performances. Gee. I’ve changed!

But still, the day was entirely enjoyable, and I can’t believe how many rides we managed to get on. (Hoorah for Fast Pass!) My dream is to stay at the Grand Californian someday … and according to the fireworks, dreams DO come true. So there you go.

FYI, here are the rides we managed to get on:

10 … 9 … 8 …

7 …

6 …

5 …

4 …

3 …

2 …

1 …

0!

… and here we go!

Tomorrow I become a mother-in-law.

Rent-a-Cake in Atlanta will rent you a tiered Styrofoam cake with icing on the outside, so it looks like the real thing. It’ll cost you about $145 to rent the cake including set-up. There’s a secret compartment in the back of the cake where you can hide a slice of angel food cake so guests think you’re cutting into the real thing. Then you serve your guests a less expensive sheet cake that’s hidden in the kitchen.

This is from an article about weddings and budgets. Read it here