The OK Adventures of Peppersloth and Annie

Hello Faithful Readers, assuming you still remain faithful after such a long hiatus. I’m not sure that I would be, so I appreciate that you are! You are far better humans than I. The hiatus was unintentional. I could blame writer’s fatigue from May, but I only wrote for a month so that feels fake. Is that Imposter’s Syndrome? I could blame vacation, which feels a little bit more legitimate. But it wasn’t that stressful, so that feels like an excuse. So, we’ll call June procrastination. July, on the other hand…well, it’s been a party. 

We got back from vacation, and I launched into two weeks of surgery prep. The first week was cleaning and organizing. If you don’t know, I am a bit of a minimalist (except for books! Don’t touch my books!), and my husband is…not. So, while he was working and I was home cleaning, I took the opportunity to purge the house room by room. It was so therapeutic! I was able to get rid of so much stuff! I even organized my pantry and made a list of things in there with expiration dates! It was so much fun! By the way, do you follow the expiration dates on herbs and spices? Like, is my husband actually going to get deathly sick if I give him expired oregano? And how sick is ‘deathly sick’? Asking for a friend…JK. I did run out of time to do the kitchen and the living room, so that was disappointing. But I’m looking forward to doing them in five weeks. 

The next week was my favorite! Meal prep! I love meal prep! Cooking is so fun! Even though I’m following recipes, there is still room for creativity. Example, one of the recipes called for soybeans and soy flour. Unfortunately, those were not things that Kroger Delivery offered. In our area, we don’t have access to Kroger stores, just the distribution centers. Sometimes, that creates limits. They did offer frozen edamame still in the pods as an alternative, but (of course) they were out of stock. We have a store that is similar to Kroger here, and they DID have edamame! And it was SHELLED! So, I bought four bags, spent an afternoon drying it all out, and made my own flour. Green flour is weird. But it worked! And, somehow, I was able to get 10 weeks of breakfasts, lunches, and dinners made and frozen in six days. Maybe not as impressive as a whole universe, animals, and people, but I’m still gonna pat myself on the back! 

Anyway, I do think there is some leniency for those two weeks. I was tired! And while writing doesn’t require physical work, there is a huge mental load that goes into it, and I just didn’t have the energy left. And then came surgery day!

A few days before, I started feeling some congestion, but decided to ignore it. I’d been waiting 30+ years for this surgery, and I was NOT going to let a sinus infection deter me. So, surgery happened. Everything was great. I actually started feeling a little bit better, and was thinking maybe something they gave me knocked the infection out of me. I was wrong. Two days after surgery, I came down with a high fever, high heart rate, and was struggling to breathe. We went to urgent care, who said, ‘Please go to the ER! Do not pass go! Do not collect $200.00! Go to the ER!’ The ER said, ‘You have bronchitis. We should probably admit you, but we’ll let you go home with an inhaler instead.’ The next night, things were worse. So, we went to another ER, and they admitted me for five days. So, again, maybe there’s some room for grace and leniency? They sent me home with oxygen and all kinds of breathing treatments. But, by the time I got home, Jerrad was also sick. More leniency? Also, it is so difficult when both you and your partner are down for the count and you’re in pure survival mode. Not an experience I would recommend. What doesn’t kill you doesn’t make you stronger, it just makes you want to poison your partner with expired oregano. 

And so, here we are three weeks later! Jerrad and I are both mostly recovered. There is a hope for some sort of normality. The dog is miserable and depressed. I kind of want to send her to daycare just so she can do something fun for a few days. My foot is good. They put two screws in my heel. When I went for my first post-op appointment, they took out 25 staples, and one stitch. I have some REALLY cool scars! I’ll be in a cast for five weeks, and then I should get to be in a boot and be able to bear weight. At this point, my goal is to start doing the healthy things that I’m able to do for myself. I need less screen time, and more sleep. I need to eat more consistently, and I need to be eating real food, not snack food. And, I need to be writing. And reading. I’m very behind in my Goodreads reading goal, and this is the perfect time to catch up. So, if you need me, I’ll be in my recliner, reading up on expired herbs.