Had a few more sleepless nights.  Actually, last week, I had five hours sleep total over three nights.  Ugh!  I finally slept somewhat decently Friday night but woke up still very weak and groggy.  The headache was quite bad too.  Mostly took it easy for that day.  Slept better Saturday night and felt pretty good Sunday.  Yea!  Mike and I headed out to the airport for a flight to London for breakfast.  We hadn’t been there in over a year.   The Tower cleared us onto final for runway 27.  We noticed that the taxiway nearest to that end of the runway was quite close.  I told Mike that I was going to be a rebel and attempt to land short enough to get off on that taxiway.  He said there was no way I could do it.  We went back and forth – me saying I was going to try it and him saying it wasn’t doable.  When we were cleared to land, I made the decision to go for it.

Mike should have learned by now that if he says I can’t do something, I’ll go ahead a do it!  Here is an airport chart showing the layout of the runways and taxiways:

The end of the runway I landed on is up at the top right.  The red line is where my wheels touched down and the blue line is where I was almost at a stop.  Tee hee!  That was awesome.  It was around 500′.  Sweet!  We then taxied over to the Katana Cafe for breakfast.  I can be somewhat picky when ordering food, because I try to be as healthy as possible.  However, for the first time, I gave Mike the reins to order for me.  I even left the table and headed to the little pilot’s room while he was ordering, so it would be a surprise.  I was very happy with what he picked out – a breakfast wrap.  Great choice – yum!

We then headed back out to Vyctor to hit the skies again:

We had to make a pit stop for fuel in St. Thomas, just south of London.  There was none at St. Catharines because they were cleaning the tanks.  It was only a ten minute flight.  The nice thing is it’s the cheapest fuel in Southern Ontario ($1.39 per litre).  It was $1.90 in London.  Needless to say, I squished every drop possible into the wing tanks.  Aviation fuel (100 Low Lead) is blue:

After we took off and leveled off to about 1900′, Vyctor started riding a little rough.  I checked the mags and the right one was very rough.  I leaned out the fuel a couple times, which has worked on the ground when he was rough during start up.  About half way through the hour long flight, things started to smooth out.  I did some more mag checks on the ground and everything seemed fine.  I was still nervous so I phoned my awesome aviation mechanic when I got home.  He suggested I do another run up over the next few days and check the mags again.  Mike and I went to the airport after work today and I’m very happy to report that Vyctor ran great!  Yea!  It looks like I just had a fouled spark plug which is now cleared.  I’m so relieved!

I forgot to mention on Saturday, Jan came by for a visit.  We went to Giant Tiger to get her a new cord for her tablet.  She started snarking at me about some thing so I picked up this and handed it to her:

Mike got me the sleepy one.  Tee hee!  When I got home and told Pinky we didn’t get her a chocolate bar, she did this:

I made it up to all of the kitties with some treats of the cat variety:

I didn’t have any treats for Peanut so I gave a little chin rub instead.  Abby wasn’t too thrilled to see him:

I didn’t realize the flash was on when I took this pic:

Thankfully, I slept fairly well last night except for being up from 4:00 – 5:30.  Paws crossed tonight is even better!

Today’s symptoms: Far more energy than I had last week.  Didn’t feel nearly as weak or achy as last week either.  I’m starting to think that the weakness and extra nerve pain is mainly caused by extended periods of lack of sleep.

I’m still dealing with insomnia.  I’m very happy to say it wasn’t bad last weekend and I had a couple of really good days.  On Saturday, Mike and I picked up my Army buddy and we went over to the Casino.  We hit the box office for the tickets for I Tenori, then hit the buffet.  Ken is a Gold Card holder so we get to skip the massive line.  Then the next bonus was our great view:

The scenic circuit around the Falls was constantly filled with helicopters.  We also had the pleasure of great noms too:

The show was very good – better than I even thought it would be.  Afterwards, we hit the slots for a bit.  I was then starting to get fairly fatigued so I let Ken know I would have to take him back to the bus stop in St. Catharines.  We had about 45 minutes to cash out, get to the car then drive to the bus stop at the Fairview Mall.  We were within a couple minutes of the bus arriving once we exited off of the QEW.  At the next stoplight, voila:

Wow, that was close!

The next day, we got to the Airport before 9:00 and flew out to the Edenvale Gathering of the Classics.  We go to this awesome event up near Collingwood almost every year.  It was supposed to be Saturday, but they moved it to the Sunday rain date.  Glad they did because the weather was perfect.  In about an hour, the Edenvale Airport was in sight:

It’s always a lot of fun and a bit of a challenge to fly in to this event, because there are tons of other planes doing the same thing.  They have it very well organized and coordinated though.  We touched down and were marshalled in:

We sprayed ourselves down with sunscreen, put the sun shade up in Vyctor and headed out to the registration hangar (free coffee!)

After chatting with folks and wandering around the other aircraft and classic cars, we got some noms and headed back to Vyc to sit under his cute wing in the shade.

Mike got a burger and we split a poutine.  Yum:

We heard some munching and noticed this little one-legged fella chewing on Mike’s shoe:

We had a good view of the other planes taxiing by….

…and a few tractor loads of folks on a tour of the event.  I made sure to yell “Cutest plane here!” to everyone and got many responses in agreement:

It was so nice to chat with many of the folks walking around and stopping at Vyctor. Great day and flight back.  As we flew by, I gave a little salute to Canadian Forces Base Borden, where I’ve been many times back in my Army days:

I couldn’t believe how fast I fell asleep that night.  I didn’t take anything to help.  I just read for a bit and was petting Abby, who was laying on my chest.  The next thing I knew, I punched myself in the face.  I fell asleep while petting her and my hand fell back and punched me in the nose!  Oh well, at least I slept well that night and felt quite good the next day.  I was quite relieved as I had a few more flights on Monday night.  We had our Recreational Aircraft Association meeting in Welland, so Mike and I flew out.  I then had a couple of aerobatic flights booked with folks from our group.  I took up one right away – he loved it!  Made it through all of the maneuvers with no screaming or up-chucking.  Perfect flight!  My next planned victim decided he would wait for another day as he had eaten quite a bit since he arrived.  Sooooo, I took up someone else who has wanted to go up for some time now.  Awesome flight number two took place and everyone was happy!

What an awesome evening!  I figured I’d crawl into bed completely wiped out, which I was.  Unfortunately, I was unable to repeat the great sleep I had Sunday night.  Monday and Tuesday night were back to full out insomnia.  I had to take a sleeping pill to let me fall asleep, and I was up within two hours each night.  Then I just laid there like a big, blonde blob for most of the night.  Less than three hours of sleep total.  I felt bad yesterday but today was much worse.  I had to lay down four times today, for at least an hour each time.  Super weak and blah.  Like the title of this blog says, my body is a jerk.  I have enough MS symptoms to deal with after having a good night’s sleep – I don’t need insomnia making everything worse.  I see my GP tomorrow and I don’t know what the heck I’ll do if she can’t help me with this issue, which has been going on for two months now.  ***Sigh***

Today’s symptoms: As I just mentioned, today was not good.  I don’t know if the Restless Leg Syndrome I’ve been dealing with since around the same time the insomnia started is the cause.  When I went to see my neurologist about the insomnia a few weeks ago, he said we would just wait and see how the MRI (my fourteenth!) turns out on September 4th.  Ugh.

Oops – I wrote this yesterday and forgot to post it….

Mike and I enjoyed Ribfest at Montebello Park yesterday.  We’ve never been before.  Kinda silly since it’s less than a ten minute walk.  We could smell it half way there.

Mike got half a rack of ribs from Horn Dawgs and I got half a pound of pulled pork.  We split a piece of corn bread.  Dang, everything was delicious:

We are going back tomorrow to try another vendor.  Great day – glad the weather worked out.  Fortunately it was nice again today so we flew to Guelph for brekkie/lunch.  The restaurant at the airport is amazing.  It’s always full.  We were the only ones that flew in today.  Mike took a video and posted it to Facebook live as we came in to land:  https://www.facebook.com/elizabeth.murphy.77715/videos/10159310778900372/

Poor Mike gets a tad tense when we have to fly low over tress.  Tee hee!  We were so happy that there was a table available, since we usually have to wait.  We’ve only ever had breakfast there, so we decided to try something from their lunch menu.  Yum:

Little Vyctor looked so cute parked outside of the restaurant:

The flight back was interesting.  Lots of little small clouds along the route, until we were almost at the St. Catharines Airport.  We got a little nervous when we came upon a rather large cumulonimbus cloud, very close to the airport:

Mike checked the radar and there it was:

We had time to quickly fly over Ribfest and snag a pic:

We quickly scooched over to the downwind leg of runway 24, beating the storm:

Glad to touch down!  I’m sure this helicopter was happy to miss the storm too:

Now we’re back home and just chilling.  I just noticed that the shirt I ordered from Amazon has been shipped.  Tee hee – I’m such a dork:

How can I not get a shirt to honour my beautiful children?  Abby was impressed and screamed with excitement:

Boo was more interested in her toy:

Today’s symptoms:  I feel pretty good considering how much I did yesterday.  I did have to take a wake-up pill earlier, which has helped.  Very little nerve pain today – sweeeeeet!

What a great weekend.  Had a nice visit with my little mother on Saturday.  We went to visit our friend in the hospital (still improving!)  Then Mike and I went to visit my bestie at her house.  She’s so lucky as she lives very close to the airport.  Needless to say, Mike and I were frequently distracted by planes flying overhead.  We had a great visit and Mike really bonded with their dog, Bella:

Errrrrr……..maybe “bonded” is the wrong term.  Hehehe.  When we were leaving, he continued to sing the mini muffin song to me (which he had been doing all day and the day before).  Apparently he was seriously craving muffins.  So, we had to make a detour to Timmies and he came out with these bad boys:

I assumed he was just getting one.  Geesh

The next day we went up for an afternoon flight.  They were trying to break the World Record for the most water inflatables in a row, at the annual Floatfest event on the Welland Canal.  I emailed one of the organizers a couple weeks back to offer to take aerial photos and got all the event details.  I was right overhead for 3:00, which was supposed to be the time of the World Record.  Clearly from 1500′ up, this wasn’t the case:

All of the floaties need to be touching for the record, so it was pretty obvious it wasn’t happening at 3:00.  Kinda disappointing.  Grabbed a few pictures while we circled around, waiting for something to happen:

I didn’t go out of my way to try and get any great pics, since I wouldn’t be giving them to the organizers, as we discussed previously.  No record attempt pictures for me!  Nice flight though.

Mike snapped this pic as we came back over the canal:

As we were coming in to land, there was another plane up ahead so we followed him in:

We had to wait briefly after exiting the runway for this helicopter to land (no, he did not just land on the fuel truck):

Once home, we were both quite hungry.  We decided to go a place within a block from our homes, which we’ve wanted to go to for years.  Pho Dau Bo, which is a Vietnamese restaurant.  It’s always packed, so we went a little earlier (plus we had the hungries).  We both ordered the rice noodle soups, his with yucky seafood and mine with grilled beef:

We both loved it and managed to eat it all (there was a lot of food!)  We certainly recommend this restaurant.   Actually, I’m going back later this week for a visit with my friend.  Yea!

Since I haven’t mentioned the little goober in a recent blog, here’s a pic of Peanut from the other night:

He’s so cute.  Then there’s these two little cuties.  They rarely get along, but apparently Abby decided to tolerate Pinky enough to use her as a pillow.  She is pretty fat and cushiony:

Today’s symptoms: I’m happy to report I’m continuing to feel better.  The weakness is much better than it has been over the last month.  The headache has gone down quite a bit, but once in a while comes back quite strong.  More nerve pain in my left side, but nothing worth writing home about.

 

The main part of my mother’s birthday gift was High Tea at Prince Of Wales in Niagara-On-The-Lake.  I’ve been wanting to do this for so many years.  Our reservation was 12:30, so we arrived just after 10:00 and wandered around the town.  Of course, we had to stop at the Home Bakery to get Jan her usual Scotch Pies and mild sausage rolls.  Yum!  I also bought Moon Cheese.  I had never heard of it until I saw it on Food Factory last week.  It was delicious:

It was pouring rain while we were walking around so there weren’t too many people, which was nice.  We had no issue spending time until our High Tea.  Once we got there, all I can say is wow.  I completely recommend High Tea at Prince of Wales.   The atmosphere was perfect, the food was perfect – it was all perfect.  First, we each had to choose our tea:

I chose peaches and cream and Jan chose Heavenly Cream, which was an creamy earl grey (I looked it up).  Jan is not a big fan of flavoured tea.  I loved mine, and after a few cups, I tried Jan’s.  It was amazing.  Didn’t need milk or sugar.  Then our amazing food arrived.  I let them know this was a present for Jan’s birthday.  They did this:

So sweet!  The table looked like this:

The food was exceptional….warm scone, fresh pastry, homemade bread, wonderful desserts….perfect.  We had so much food, we couldn’t eat it all so they kindly brought us takeout containers for the rest.  We had a great dinner, sans the beautiful atmosphere.  Although, we had the pleasure of dealing with this:

And this:

Another perfect and highly memorable moment!

That night, I continued reading my awesome book.  Here’s a little book review for you.  I’ve never read anything from this author, but I recently finished Nest by Terry Goodkind.  I loved it!  I think the reviews are lower than they should be.  Anyway, I started an earlier book by him called Law of Nines.   Loving it so far.  About a third of the way through.  There is a paranormal twist to it, so if you’re not in to that, this might not be your thing.  I’m enjoying it though.  I love it when I’m reading and this happens:

Or this:

Good times!

Update: went to visit our friend today.  He has been moved to a rehab hospital to get therapy for his strength and speech.  He’s doing so much better.  We had a wonderful visit and looking forward to seeing him again soon.

Today’s symptoms: Was a little weak this morning.  I took some meds that perked me up a little.  Helped with the nerve pain that was shooting down my left arm all morning.  Speaking of meds, I must share this with you.  Since 2010, this is what my medication claim has been:

HOLY CRAP!!!!!!!!!  All I can say is being sick is expensive!

 

Yesterday was my little mother’s birthday.  Yea!  Mike and I decided to make her a cake.  She loves bunnies and has lots frolicking around her backyard.  Thus, I present to you Belinda the Bunny:

Not too bad, if you ask me!  I also bought her an enormous My Little Pony balloon.  I wanted to get a Sponge Bob one, but they were kinda expensive.  The Pony was on clearance for $4:

She loved the cake and pressies.  We figured it would be best to sample said cake:

After nomming some rabbit, we went to the hospital to visit our friend.  So glad that things are still improving.  We had a really nice visit.  It was a good day.

Mike and I went to the market on Saturday to get some flowers for Lil Jan.  We were a little surprised to see someone walking their pet pig:

I guess I kinda know what it’s like since I have Pinky.  When we got home, we watched a couple episodes of the Hammy the Hamster show.  My friend from work lent me the series on DVD:

 

Tee hee!  The one flying the orange airplane was pretty darn cool and cute! Almost as cute as this picture of Mya:

You may remember I mentioned in a previous blog that I attempted to give Mike an advantage at Call of Duty, by me donning my unicorn head.  I still beat him with it on so I had to try something else.  This time, I wore mittens:

  

Well, it seems the result was pretty much the same.  I’m Abby:

Poor Mike!

Today’s symptoms: Still feeling weaker than normal, but it’s certainly improving.  The headache is lessening each day too.  Yea!

 

 

I mentioned in my previous blog that I had to phone the ambulance for a girl that passed out in the hall after I got my blood work done.  Last night at 2:00AM, had another incident.  I was all snuggly in bed, surrounded by the cutest kitties ever, when I was woken up by a bunch of screaming outside.  I looked out my bedroom window to see a girl screaming at this dude who kept falling over.  She was swearing like crazy and kept mentioning “bleeding,” which I didn’t know if it was him or her.  She stood him up and he fell back down.  Then she yelled “Then stay on the ground then – I can’t deal with this anymore!”  She started walking away and came back thirty second later, screaming again.  She got him stood up and this time he fell pretty hard (he was clearly drunk).  Half of him was on the road.  She left at this point.  Soooooooo…..I called 911.  I told the dispatcher that I was up on the 10th floor, watching with my binoculars.  She asked if he was breathing, which was a little hard to tell from up there.  I said he wasn’t moving.  She said she was sending an ambulance, and I told her I would run down and check on the dork.  Ugh.  And the street he was on was behind my building and I basically had to run half way around the whole block to get to him.  I got to him and asked if he was ok.  He mumbled.  Oh good – I didn’t have to touch him.  I asked his name and if he was hurt.  More mumbling.  I said I called an ambulance because I didn’t want to see him be the next passing car’s speed bump.  He then asked if I would just come closer and make love to him.  I said thanks for the offer but I’ll pass.  Ewwww.  I stepped away from him, said to turn on his side and go to sleepies.  Thankfully, he listened.  I saw the ambulance way down the street so I blinked my iPhone camera at them.  They got him sitting up and talking and hooked up to get his vitals.  Two cop cars then showed up.  I told the EMS the story and then again to the cops.  Dude started to get a little rowdy at that point.  They thanked me so much for calling.  The cop said she wishes more people wouldn’t just turn their backs on these types of things.  I told them that I never could and never will.  I bid them all adieu then went around the block again to get home.  Back home, I had my bedroom window still open and could hear the guy screaming that he was going to kill everyone there and their families.  Good times.  You can kinda make out a couple of the paramedics here, a bit of the stretcher they had just loaded him up on, and the cop car:

I took a sleeping pill, as it was now almost 3:00AM.  I also decided to take the day off today so knew I could sleep in a bit.

I had a good day today.  Still feeling better each day, and even the headache is improving.  Mind you, I took some Tylenol this morning so it wasn’t quite as bad.  It’s been almost migraine strength for three weeks now.  Getting a wee bit tired of it.  At least the pills took the edge off.  I hate taking anything because I’m always afraid of getting rebound headaches.  Sometimes you gotta though.  I relaxed most of the morning then went to the airport for before noon.  I couldn’t believe what happened when I was leaving my apartment though.  I made it down to the elevator when the smell hit me.  My dearest Abby took a big, wet poo on the floor then tried to cover it up by knocking my flight bag over on it.  I didn’t notice when I picked it up and put the bag over my shoulder.  I looked down and had poo smeared all over my shorts, shirt, purse, phone and hand.  Ugh!  I ran in and changed, scraped what I could off my bag and phone and raced out the door.  Running a tad late now.  Even the guy in the airport tower noticed that I was taxiing a little fast and made a funny comment over the radio.  Fortunately, made it over Lookout Golf Course on time to do a little fly-over for the awesome Wise Guys Charity golf tournament, before the shotgun start.

It was a fun but very tiring flight.  It was hot, humid and I had full tanks of fuel, which adds a great amount of weight to the plane, making it harder to pull it through the maneuvers.

On the home front, I’m happy to report that Sarge came back home from Mike’s:

It was so good to see him.  Mya, on the other paw, wasn’t too thrilled and avoided him by jumping up on my bookshelf and engaged her laser-eyes.  Pew-pew!

Today’s symptoms: Energy was actually decent considering the night I had.  I’m glad the headache is slowly improving, but still has a long way to go.  ***sigh***

I decided to switch my full www.lizzymcfly.com website from GoDaddy over to WordPress.  Took quite a bit of time to figure out how to get everything set up, but I like it so far.  Right now the content is very similar to my old website, so I have to think how I can spruce it up a little.  The main thing is still going to be my blog.

Finishing off the events I discussed in my last blog……  I had to utilize my first aid skills (took the two day course every year for 11 years when I was in the Army) last week.  I was just purchasing a parking token after my blood work Monday when I heard the elevator doors open behind me followed by a large thud.  I looked back and there was this girl laying face down on the floor.  I told the token guy to go to the blood clinic and get someone to help me and to call an ambulance, then come back and tell me he had done so.  I checked her breathing and pulse – good to go.  I got her into the recovery position and kept checking her vitals.  Tried to wake her up, but she didn’t come to for at least five minutes.  Once she was conscious again, she was very spaced out.  I eventually got her sat up, but couldn’t get her to say anything.  I went in her purse and checked her license for her name.  She finally started focusing once I used her name.  The ambulance folks showed up within another five minutes or so.  During that time, I was asking her things such as if she had a seizure disorder, diabetes, history of passing out, etc.  At least I had some info to give the EMS.  So glad I was there to help her out.

I’m happy to report that I’m finally starting to feel better.  Clearly the increased B12 and iron doses are doing their job, as is my bone marrow, pumping out more cute, little red blood cells.  I’m sure it will take another week or so to get back to feeling like I did before (which is still cruddy due to the MS, but at least not double-whammy cruddy!) but I’m looking forward to it.

I went to my mother’s house today and we went to the hospital to visit her friend.  We were so glad to see how much better he was doing.  We stayed for about an hour, then went over to Walmart and Canadian Tire to look for a new mat for my balcony, which was just painted.  The previous owner had that green outdoors carpeting out there.  I figured it was time for a fresh new look, so I’m not putting it back down.  Need a mat for the kitties to lay on when they go out there.  They’re so spoiled.

Jan was showing me her amazing gardens in her back yard, while little Chippy munched away next to us.

I’d say that living in this apartment building, I miss seeing all the little critters, frolicking about outside.  But at least I get things like this to look at instead:

We had our monthly Recreational Aircraft Association meeting the other night.  Our summer meetings are held at the Welland Airport.  Unfortunately, the weather was yucky so we had to drive instead of flying in.  Bummer.  Still a great turn out:

Someone brought pickled beets to the pot luck.  I hate beets.  They are just wrong.  I ate one though:

Then I mock-kicked the guy that brought them:

Tee hee.  While there, a member of COPA (Canadian Owners and Pilots Association) gave me a copy of the local Port Colborne and Wainfleet newspaper.  He very nicely used my aerial pics of the Rankin Cancer Run:

I’m so glad I can do this for them every year!

Speaking of the RAA, I found this picture of me slightly altering this dude’s results while he weighed himself at a previous meeting.  Hehehe.  He was all upset because of the added weight he thought he gained.  I told him “No more donuts for you!”

I’m so mean.

Today’s symptoms: I’m SO happy to report I’m starting to feel better.  The only thing that doesn’t seem to be improving is this nasty headache I’ve had for weeks.  It’s nice that it wants to be friends and stick around, but I think I’m all friended out!

I’ve been feeling really cruddy over the last month.  I’ve had to lay down for a few hours every day because I’ve been so weak, fatigued and with a pretty bad headache.  I had blood work done on Monday and it shows my red blood cell count is down.  Since getting the results, I’ve upped my iron dosage (I was taking very little before) as well as my B12.  Hopefully things will start to improve soon, because I’m getting a wee sick of this silliness!

I was feeling well enough last Sunday morning and took up a passenger for an aerobatic flight.  He had been in a small plane once before (and subsequently jumped out of it), but never did aerobatics.  As always, I get my victim used to the plane and flight by first heading over Niagara Falls to see the spectacular view.  We then went back over the Niagara District Airport at 4000′ and did some maneuvers.  He did very well with everything – didn’t get too queasy.  He really enjoyed the flight, as did I!  I love being able to give people such an awesome experience.

I thought I posted this in a previous blog, but apparently I didn’t.  When at the airport for a flight the other week, the jet carrying Adam Sandler, Rob Schneider and David Spade took off:

The were performing at Casino Niagara.

The last few weeks have been a bit of a blur with how lousy I’ve been feeling, and I don’t even remember where Mike and I flew that day.   I did find these pics from either that one or the next one we did though:

This is either Crystal Beach or Sherkston:

While we were approaching Lake Erie, we saw a large plane which looked like it was flying low and slow over our side of the lake.  Turns out, it was the Good Year Blimp on the American side.  Pretty neat that we could see it so clearly that far away.  I had Mike look it up on his flight radar app.  It’s the red plane symbol and we were directly across from it.

It’s been so therapeutic to be doing these flights during the short periods of time I’ve felt decent over the last month.  I can’t wait for things to start improving.  Yea!

Mike brought me some small York peppermint patties the other day.  When he left, I tried to give him one, but he kept throwing it back to me.  I asked Sarge to run over to his place with one:

 

I texted Mike that he had a visitor:

I haven’t seen Sarge since:

 

 

 

At least he seems happy.

Had some really cruddy news the other week.  My mother’s very good friend became ill and has been in the hospital for two weeks now.  We’ve been to visit a few times.  While in the emergency department with him, I made him his first Mr. Handy:

Unfortunately, Mr. Handy was left downstairs when he was moved to ICU so I had to make him another one:

So glad that he’s improving and we hope to head there for another visit very soon.  I would have liked to have gone today, but had a neurologist appointment in Hamilton.  Blah.

Today’s symptoms: Felt a bit better today than the average day over the last month.  Yesterday was awful though – had to lay down for one to two hours three times!  Yuck!  Hopefully the increased doses of iron and B12 kick my cute and squishy bone marrow into popping out more red blood cells.  Always nice to have a little extra oxygen transported to the important things, like organs and brain!  Since I’m a little behind on my blogage, I’ll post another one within the next couple of days.  Stay tuned!

I bred my last batch of crickets and didn’t see too much egg-laying going on, so figured there wouldn’t be too many babies hopping about.  Boy, was I wrong.  I think I have over 300 again!  Possibly over 500.  My geckos are going to end up morbidly obese.  I’m going to have to make them little carts to wheel themselves around in.  I can only imagine how loud it’s going to be here in about a month, with that many chirping away!  I told Zim about the latest yield, and he didn’t seem too enthused:

He slept like this for about twenty minutes.  Not too sure why he has his little paw in the cricket food.

My friend at work struck again when I changed one of the pictures I hung up at work, between our desks.  I think she made Boo look quite regal and sophisticated!

I had the day off today and Jan and I went and renewed our passports.  I think our total wait at the passport office was less than five minutes.  Sweet!  We then went to Costco to pick up some vitamins – that place was a zoo!  Ugh, I hate going there anymore as there are just way too many people.  It was nice back in the good old days when it was Price Club and not nearly as many folks had a membership.  The only reason I keep my membership is for the well priced vitamins and supplements.  Just way too much hustle and bustle for me!  Pinky did a pretty good impression of me when I got home, all pooped out:

Today’s symptoms:  I haven’t been sleeping well lately, waking up at 4am two nights ago and 5:00 this morning.  I need to remember to take my sleepy time tea before bed tonight!  Hopefully it helps.  Other than that, the last two days were the first time in over two weeks where I didn’t have to lay down for an hour or so.  Paws crossed my energy continues to increase!  Also, have this nasty headache, which can nicely go away.

I decided to run to Giant Tiger today and texted Mike to see if he wanted anything.  He asked for two dozen eggs.  When I got home, I decided to take all of the eggs out of the cartons and put them in a Giant Tiger bag.  I texted Mike and said that they don’t have egg cartons anymore.  They have all of the eggs loose in a big basket and I had to count them out and bag them myself.  Then I sent him this picture:

He believed me and said he was going to have to get an egg holder.   Tee hee!  I’m so mean!  He had egg on his face!

It gets better/worse, however you want to look at it.  Last night, we played Call Of Duty.  I usually feel bad whenever I kick his butt (which is about 97% of the time).  I decided to give myself a slight handicap and play like this:

Tee hee!  I couldn’t breathe too well so the game was short.  Final score, 7-4 for moi!

Poor Mike (Sammytard).   I won by a nose!

Good times.  That unicorn head was worth every penny.

Today’s symptoms: Energy still lower than my “normal” but getting a bit better each day.  At least I didn’t have to lay down today, but started to crash just after 2:00.  It didn’t drop as low as it has been over the last week though.  Still the bad headache.

Last week, Mike and I met up with my Army buddy Ken and we went to the Casino again.  Ken had tickets to the Abba music show after an amazing lunch at the buffet.  Ken’s main concern while heading for noms was coffee.  He was not disappointed:

The Abba show was awesome – great singing and dancing.  After that, we hit the slots.  Ken played his favourite, the Buffalo Stampede:

I think he ended up basically breaking even.  Mike and I only played a couple machines for a few minutes.  I think Mike only lost $20 and I put in $40 and ran like the wind when I made $62:

It was an excellent day.  I had quite a bit of energy and we all had a great time.

On Sunday, we went for a fairly short local flight.  I brought my friend at the airport his birthday pressies, which included a bamboo plant.  This is why I can’t have any plants in my home:

Thanks for chewing all the leaves, Boo!  Just because it’s called bamBOO, doesn’t mean you get to eat it!

To make her happy, I bought some cat grass, which Boo and Pinky both seem to like:

Afterwards, they enjoyed smelling each other’s breath:

That afternoon, my energy totally crashed.  I spent a few hours in bed, figuring I would feel better the next day.  Nope!  The last week hasn’t been good at all.  I’ve spent 2-5 hours a day in bed.  Very weak, fatigued and a much worse than normal headache.  Not sure what the cause is – if it’s a bit of an MS flare-up or what.  The really cruddy part is Mike and I planned to go to St. Jacobs yesterday until today.  We had to cancel the hotel on Thursday night because there is just no way I could do the trip while feeling like this.  I’m so bummed about it and feel very bad about having to ruin our plans.  I suck.  😦

I mentioned in my previous blog that Mike and I attended the Pride in the Park event a couple weeks ago.  We saw a chiropractor who did a scan on our necks and upper spine.  I’ve had this scan done before and the results were the same.  We booked appointments to their clinic to have a full scan, referral for x-ray and an adjustment.  Mike had never been to a chiropractor before, but I go a few times a year.  My x-ray wasn’t too surprising as I knew I had scoliosis:

I’m all askew – pelvis is crooked too.  My scan results weren’t too impressive either:

I feel a bit more in-line after my crack-a-lackin.

My energy is a smidge better today so Mike and I went downtown to Timmies then to the market.  I thought this sign was a little funny, and there are quite a few of them around the area, all with the same spelling mistake:

I can’t believe they made all those signs with such an obvious mistake.  Tee hee!

Back home, Mya decided too stretch her adorable tiny body and look out the bedroom window:

I love how you can really see her cute muscles.  We certainly can’t see them with porky Pinky.  Right, Pinky?

Boo utilized Mya as a leg rest this morning while she cleaned herself:

Today’s symptoms: Bad headache again, but at least my energy is up a bit.  I’m hoping this is a sign that my cruddy week is coming to an end. 

Mike and I attended an awesome event here in St. Catharines yesterday.  It was Pride in the Park at Montebello Park.  We walked down there around 1:00.  City Hall was amazingly decked out with the Pride flag raised and all of these little pink and blue flags:

We were happy to see how many people were at the event, which included tons of vendors:

I had my tarot cards read, which was kinda neat.  We then had some bacon poutine from Smoke’s Poutinerie:

Yum.  I think we wandered around for a couple hours before heading back home.

From the Pet Valu tent, I got a cute little bandana, which I figured I could use for Pinky’s head.  She loves sitting out on the balcony, but her naked head gets burned pretty quick, so I don’t leave her out too long (the ham starts to cook!)  She was not impressed:

Mya wasn’t too thrilled either when I put in on her:

I asked Boo if she wanted to wear it and she gave me this look:

I’m pretty sure that’s her “Bugger off!” face!

We went back to the event later in the evening to check out the performers and music acts:

Check out those heels!  I wouldn’t have been able to stand for a second in those.

We also heard a great music group from Toronto called Riverse.  I loved their music!  I met them after their awesome performance.  They were wonderful to speak with – what a nice looking group too!

Apparently they were performing in Barrie earlier that day, then drove all the way down to St. Catharines, and back to Toronto.  Good grief!!!!  I’m exhausted just thinking of a day that long.

Today, I visited with my little mother.   We hit Timmies then a few stores around Fonthill.  It was a nice day.  I’m quite pooped out today because of yesterday, but I’m still smiling from the great time I had.  I’ll probably hit the sack early tonight.  I possibly have another charity golf tournament fly-over tomorrow, but am waiting for confirmation from the organizer.  It was a go when we first spoke back in December but I haven’t heard any more since then.

Today’s symptoms: Fairly fatigued, but to be expected.  Still having the weird warmth sensation along with the nerve pain down my left side and mainly in my leg.  Other than that, a bit of a headache and everything else is good!

Last week I had the pleasure of doing a charity fly-over for Heartland Forest.

My good buddy at the airport asked one of the co-op students to wash little Vyctor before I arrived:

I greatly appreciated jumping into a sparkly, clean plane!  But first, fill er’ up!

They lucked out in the weather department:

As they did the previous years, they invited me to the dinner after the tournament.  I met up with NHL’er Larry Landon again.  I’m still waiting for him to schedule a flight with me!  Not too sure about aerobatics, but he seemed up to a nice scenic flight around Niagara:

It was a great time with awesome food.  I had a full belly for what felt like three days afterwards!  Burp!

I had the day off today so Jan and I went to Walden Galleria in Buffalo.  I love the store Buckle, and there aren’t any in Canada.  We went to it in Rochester last year but for the first time ever, I didn’t find anything I wanted.  Today I was a bit more lucky.  I haven’t bought any clothes in over a year but came home with five shirts today from Buckle, Zumiez and Spencer’s.  Guess I’m good to go for another year!  Jan and I had a great day, although I’m a little sad that I didn’t come home with the awesome mug:

Back home, I opened up the doors to the balcony and the kitties didn’t hesitate to run outside:

I let them stay out a little longer than usual.  I figured I owed it to Abby, especially after the incident the other night.  I was holding my gecko Peanut up to her and he jumped on her face.  It looked like something out of the Alien movie:

Poor Abby……tee hee!!!!

I decided to use my little honey jar as a treat jar for the kitties.  They eagerly checked it out:

Mike was playing with Boo the other night.  She really likes to contort herself:

And in other weird news, Pinky is turning into a freak….she’s growing fur!!!!

It’s actually really cute.  I can’t believe how soft it is.  Might have to change her name from Pinky to Whitey.

Today’s symptoms: I actually felt quite good today!  Still dealing with the nerve pain on my left side, which can be quite annoying.  Other than that, my headache was minimal today and my energy was good!

It finally happened – I got all six of my children in one shot!

Front row, left to right: Peanut, Zim

Back row, left to right: Boo, Pinky, Mya, Abby

Aren’t they perfect and amazing???  Tee hee!

The lizards are happy because the crickets I’m breeding are finally big enough to be nommed.  I threw in a bunch of lettuce to feed the crickets.  This one piece was terrified:

Poor dude.

On a somewhat sad note, Abby went out on the balcony the other day.  I think she’s broken:

There was a pretty decent storm over Toronto the other night.  Being up on the tenth floor with my bedroom window facing north, I had a great view.  I took a couple pics with my iPhone….I was too tired to get up and get my good camera.  They turned out ok considering how far away the storm was:

Product review!  I mentioned in a previous blog that I recently purchased a can crusher.  I ordered it from Amazon.  It was less than $50 including shipping (from the UK).  There aren’t too many foot operated ones out there:

I must say, it does what it claims!  Here is a tuna can:

And a soup can:

I give it two paws up!

Today’s symptoms: Actually felt quite well for a change!  It was my day off and my mother was coming by for a visit.  She said she would call before she left.  She phoned at 9:15 and I was still asleep!  I could not believe I slept in that late!  I guess my body needed it though.  Still having weakness in my left leg due to my flare-up.  Some days are better than others, so I just ignore the not-so-good days!

I had the honour of being the aerial photographer for the Rankin Cancer Run again this year.  The weather was so iffy with forecast mist and clouds, but it cleared just in time for the event.  It always chokes me up, flying over thousands of people (this year was over 13,000) running/walking for such an amazing cause.  They raised over $1,000,000 again this year!

Here is everyone taking position, ready to rock:

And off they go!

One of the organizers did something so awesome for me.  Not only did she drop off some shirts for me, but she made one for Donkay!

Could this be anymore adorable???

I can’t believe how perfectly it fit him, since she created it just off of Donkay pics from my blog.

The flight was fairly short as I just flew around for the event, without leaving the Niagara District Airport airspace, then came in for a landing.  I accidentally parked Vyctor next to the Snowbird plane that was there.  While there, I met up with a photographer named Kerry who took some excellent shots of Vyctor next to his new friend:

And one of Vyc and I:

You can check out her amazing work on her website: Weather and Sky Photography.  Thanks again Kerry!

A fellow RAA member posted this on his Facebook page the other day:

I agree with it, but decided to spruce up the pic a bit:

I realize I angled the blue lines on the wings in the wrong direction, but close enough!

After reading this, I’m sure you’re all looking for your kitty fix, so here you go:

This is different – these two don’t much like each other:

Boo and Peanut:

You like their new LED high beams I just had installed?

Today’s symptoms: Still feeling very drained and run down.  Too much emotional stuff going on right now and it’s really having an effect physically.  I’m working hard at pulling myself up though! 

I didn’t end up flying this weekend but was up last weekend with a friend from work.  She won the flight from the Walk for MS pledge draw a couple years ago.  The weather was iffy, but cleared up as the morning went on.  The helicopters and gliders were out that morning as well:

We first flew over the glorious Niagara Falls, then back over to the St. Catharines airport for some aerobatics.  She was a great passenger – had no issues at all with any of the maneuvers.  We did pretty much everything I know how to do, minus combos.

Straight up toward the clouds for the hammerhead:

It was a great flight for both of us.

I mean, could we be anymore adorable?

The rest of the weekend was nice.  The kitties really enjoyed the sun.  I let them out on the balcony for about 20 minutes or so – don’t want them to get sunburned:

Pinky found another sunny spot once I dragged them all back inside:

That is a big side of ham!

Mya climbed up onto the window sill and offered her paw in support of her friend:

I wasn’t up in the air this weekend, but someone else was.  I walked into my living room to see a pair of legs dangling outside my window:

Looks like the new owners of the building decided to paint the balconies from white to dark brown.  He has quite the job ahead of him:

On Sunday, I met up with my Army buddy at the Casino.  We had just spent a couple hours there with him a few weeks ago.  I mostly watched him play, and did some people watching, which was entertaining.  Man, I can’t believe how much money some people drop while they’re there, especially when they play two machines at once!  I brought $55 and left with $77, so I can’t complain.  I played this machine for about 15 minutes, and cashed out as soon as I won:

I’m so not hard core!

I just watched an episode of good ol’ Judge Judy, and found this image a little amusing:

He stood there like that for about a minute!  Judge Judy made this face then “kindly” asked him to close his mouth:

Mya then did her impression:

Tee hee.

Yesterday, I had a neurologist appointment in Hamilton due to the ongoing symptoms I’ve been having, which started in January.  My left side, mainly my leg is weak, has decreased sensation, lots of shooting pains plus a weird warm and wet sensation.  A couple days ago I was standing there putting on my makeup and I thought I peed down my leg!  Apparently it was just one of the new and weird symptoms from this flare-up.  One thing about MS, you never know what’s going to happen next.  My neurologist is sending me for another MRI (I think this will be 14) to see if there are any changes to my cute, little brain.  He’s also a bit concerned that my lymphocytes have dropped again, which is caused by the MS med Gilenya.  Hopefully my next blood test shows they’re going back up.

Today’s symptoms: Been feeling pretty down and cruddy over the last week.  I don’t have much of an appetite and lost about six pounds.  Paws crossed things start to look up again soon. 

 

It was iffy up until the morning of the Walk for MS this past Sunday, but I was able to fly over the event.  The Walk in Port Dalhousie started at 9:00.  I flew overhead for at least fifteen minutes, texting the organizer on the ground continuously to let me know when to start the little aerobatics show for the Walkers. (Not too many people outside in this pic – I’m not sure if attendance was down this year due to the weather):

After at least twenty minutes of flying in circles, waiting for my text to say “Start the show!”, I looked down and everyone had started the Walk.  This isn’t the first year this has happened.

Needless to say, I was very frustrated that it happened again.  I did a few maneuvers, but people would not likely have seen them while they were walking.  I don’t think there are too many other cities in Canada that get an air show before the event is supposed to start, so I’m a tad surprised that it does not seem to mean enough to them to announce the show and tell everyone to look to the skies.  Bummer.  I have to think if I want to do the fly over during future Walks.  I will continue to do the fund raising, since that is the most important aspect, but the fly-over portion leaves me feeling a little bitter and frustrated when it ends up like it did again this year.  And aviation fuel isn’t exactly cheap!  I’m still VERY happy and touched with all of the amazing people who supported me this year!  This weekend I will do my final tally to see how much I raised, plus do the draw for the flight!

Due to the insane amount of rain over the last week, the flooding in Niagara was very clear:

At least we got to go for a flight that day – Mike came with me this year.  As always, Donkay was there too:

Coming in for a landing:

For the rest of the day, we chilled with the kids and watched some TV.   Here’s Boo booping Mya on the head:

This is clearly a very strong bookshelf….get off of there, Pinky!

When Mike was leaving that evening, I (for some unknown reason), started throwing gang signs at him.  Then I went to say South Side, but it came out Left Side.  That’s when the weird and abnormal wheels started turning in my blonde, little brain.  After he left, everything came together in about thirty minutes.  I created a gang called Left Side Aces.  I then drew the gang symbol – first just a pencil sketch, then I transferred it to Photoshop to tweak and colour.  Here is the end result:

All the details just flowed (which is pretty disturbing!)  I even created the organizational chart.  As the creator of this gang, I am the top member, known as the Kingpaw.  My second officer is the Undermew, and below that rank are the Paw Soldiers:

I told Mike he could be the Undermew, but as with most gangs, he would have to be beaten or jumped in.  That happened on Monday:

I asked my mother if she wanted to join and I would forgo the ass whooping.  I would also create a new rank for her called the Grandmewther.  She graciously declined.  I haven’t quite figured out the goal of the LSA yet.  We could steal kibble from the rich and give to the poor?  Hmmmm…….  (and yes, I know I’m weird!  It’s fun though and keeps me positive!)

Today’s symptoms: Had a couple pretty cruddy days.  Yesterday, I had six people at work tell me I looked very tired and not well.  I was a bit better today because I actually slept last night.  Dealing with some stressful situations right now (they all seemed to hit at once!) so that always takes a toll on me physically.  Things will get better though!

What’s up with this crappola weather?  It better not be like this for the Walk for MS on Sunday!  I wasn’t able to fly over last year because of the weather.  Enough of this silliness!  On a plus note, my pledges are coming along nicely….thanks to you contributors!  I have a bunch of cash pledges that I still need to add onto my participation site here:  http://mssoc.convio.net/site/TR/Walk/OntarioDivision?px=1375843&pg=personal&fr_id=5499

My wonderful daughters are all hopeful I reach my goal.  Just look at their hopeful little faces!

Please help our mommy support this great cause!  Look, even Peanut is hopeful:

I was possibly going to do a flight today, but as the last few days, the weather has SUCKED!  So, instead I had the pleasure of visiting with my little mother.  She came by and we went to Timmies then did some shopping.  I decided to buy a new mat to cover the cable cords going across my hall, but it turned out to be a little too short.  The backing of my old one is kinda crumbling.  I was Lizzy Homemaker today and sewed on a slip-free backing to the mat.  I figured it would take me a couple hours but it was only about 45 minutes:

Just look at that quality work!  I even sewed a little grey cat onto the front:

I also did something today that I feel a little guilty about (because I don’t like to buy myself things, except for aviation fuel!)  I ordered a foot operated can crusher from Amazon.ca:

I almost broke my foot (mainly because I was just wearing a flimsy slipper) while trying to flatten a soup can today for recycling.  Abby’s thrilled about my new purchase, as seen here:

My life will soon be complete!

Speaking of complete, I would really love to be able to completely make my bed one of these days.  There’s usually a cat or four in it, blocking my progress:

Boo was the culprit this morning.  She’s such a twit.  At least she looks stunning wearing a shrimp on her head:

Today’s symptoms:  Felt pretty gosh darn good today.  I didn’t start to crash until after 6:00, which is pretty awesome.  Had more stiffness and spasms in my left leg, but I’m sure that’s just the continuation of the flare-up I’ve been experiencing the last few months. 

What a perfect start to the day.  I got to take someone up for a flight this morning.  We met at the airport around 9:15.  The weather was great when I first woke up, but then the clouds starting rolling in.  Fortunately, they were just high enough for us to head out over Niagara Falls.  My passenger had taken flying lessons in the past, so he knew the drill.  Lots of activity in Niagara Falls – Great Wolf Lodge was thoroughly packed and there were a couple Maid of the Mist boats trudging about along the Niagara River.

Once we left the Niagara Falls scenic circuit, we headed south along the Welland Canal, almost down to Port Colborne before heading back north to St. Catharines.  He was all ready to rock for some aerobatics.  As I always do with my victims….errrrrr……passengers, I explained everything he would see and feel, then I did one maneuver at a time with straight and level flight in between.

He loved everything – the roll, loop, snap roll and especially the hammer heads.  Good times!  I must admit, I still to this day get a little disappointed I don’t feel a rush or anything from the aerobatics.  I still love doing them though, don’t get me wrong.  But still, there is no bigger rush or feeling of joy than looking to my right and seeing my passenger smiling and laughing.  It’s the best feeling in the world – far better than any rush I could ever have!  I’m so lucky to have this gift to share with awesome folks, like my passenger today (came all the way from London!)

Mike and I had a nice flight last Saturday.  We flew down to Tillsonburg for breakfast.  As usual, it was quite busy there, plus they had the Harvards out:

We flew by tons of windmills on the way there and back – they’re taking over Southern Ontario.

Back home, the kitties were being their normal selves.  Mya was sitting on Pinky:

Abby was looking cute but clueless:

And Peanut was just hanging around:

The kitties were thrilled when I brought him out of the tank for a visit.  Giddy up, Mya!

He’s not edible, Pinky….never mind staring:

This would have been a perfect shot, if Abby was in it too:

I noticed this morning that my one eye liner pencil was missing.  It could only be one kitty responsible….the infamous, mischievous, thieving Boo.  I kept calling her name but she was no where to be seen.  I then noticed the bathroom door was ajar.  That’s when I found Boo and my makeup:

Good grief!  Someone needs some lessons….you ever hear of less is more?!?  Hussy.

Speaking of not being true to one’s self, I walked into work to quite a sight.  I change the picture on the post near my desk about once a week, all different 8×10’s of my cats.  I guess my neighbour didn’t want to see Mya’s nakedness anymore:

Tee hee!  I was wondering why other people sitting near me were looking at me funny when I was approaching my desk.

Mike and I went to The Works burger joint a couple days ago.  He’s a bit of a burger addict and always goes for the biggest and newest.  This one was called the Chorizo Your Own Adventure:

I took this amazing artistic shot looking through an onion ring, of him eating an onion ring.  Yes, I should submit it to National Geographic:

Today’s symptoms: My energy was quite good today!  I’m having worse than normal crushing pains in my hands though.  The thing I don’t get is that it does not get any worse with pressure or movement.  It’s not like when you stub your toe and it hurts when you move it or your shoe rubs against it.  I guess it’s because it’s nerve pain?  My hands (mostly the left one) hurt quite a bit when I was flying today, but the pressure of the yoke, especially during the aerobatics, didn’t make it much worse.  Typing right now isn’t making much of a difference either – the pain is fairly consistent.  I’ll have to ask my neurologist when I see him in May, since I’m a tad curious.  I guess it’s a good thing as activity doesn’t make it worse, but it’s still annoying and frustrating to deal with (my mother would say the same about dealing with me!)