Who Knew??

So, my sister has a mole on her back that started changing colors. She made an appointment to have it removed a few weeks ago. Well, they couldn't remove it because she had to have some shots and a physical to enter the nursing program. She had to schedule another appointment to have the mole removed.

My mom called me yesterday morning upset. When I asked her what was wrong, she said, "Do you remember the appointment Tonya had about the mole on her back?" I searched through my mind trying to remember if I knew when she had rescheduled for. I was, of course, thinking that she had it removed already and that she had cancer. I was wrong. My mom said, "She got her vaccinations for the nursing program and her TB skin test came back positive." Well, I didn't freak out. She had to have one in high school before she could work for the nursing home and it came back positive but her chest x-ray showed nothing. And, my TB skin test before coming to Catawba was iffy. So, I don't think they're 100% reliable. If they come back positive, you still have to have a chest x-ray to confirm that you have it.

Well, my mom went on to say, "They scheduled her for a chest x-ray and they found something in her lungs." At this point, my stomach sinks to my toes. I don't really know what TB does. I know it used to be called consumption and it affects the lungs. That's about it. All that was going through my head was, "Nicole Kidman's character dies of TB in Moulin Rouge." I was at the point of tears.

I've never heard of anyone getting TB in the U.S. I thought it was gone. Done for. Like Polio. I mean, has anyone met anyone who has had TB??

So, I did some research and it is still killing people all over the globe. Under 1,000 people die from it each year in the U.S. (ha! I didn't even know 1,000 people each year GOT TB, let alone DIED from it!). Those are mostly elderly people. It kills about 2 million people per year in the world. That's mostly people in 3rd world countries and especially people with HIV/AIDS.

There is a treatment for it. It lasts 6 to 9 months. Phew. That's a long time. She shouldn't be contagious after week 2 of the treatment though. At least, that's what the internet tells me. She has a doctor's appointment tomorrow morning to discuss it. I'm sure there will be more tests as well.

I'm not quite so freaked out now. It's very unlikely that she will have any problems recovering. However, she's supposed to start the nursing program in the fall. If she has TB, she probably won't be able to start. And she's already put in 2 years worth of work to get to this point. So, she will be devastated if she can't continue. If there is a problem, she will hopefully be able to just delay it for a year. But, that delay will suck. She's already had to transfer and had problems with credits transferring, so she's already behind. If she has to delay even longer, she's going to be in school for longer than Joe! ahahahahahah! :) Just kidding... there are very few people who can accomplish that! ;)

But, anyway... hopefully everything will go well with the doctor tomorrow. And then, hopefully she will get good news about the mole... which still hasn't been removed.

P.S. When I was making dinner last night, I turned on the TV and the news was on. The first story I heard was about a girl in Charlotte who tested positive for TB. Isn't it weird how when you find something out, relevant things seem to pop up?? This was really weird since I'd never heard of anyone getting TB in my lifetime!

Easter + New Addiction

I haven't blogged in a while. I haven't felt like it. I've mostly been reading. I'm have a new obsession with Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum series. There are 14 numbered books (One for the Money, Two for the Dough, Three to Get Deadly, etc.) and 4 between-the-numbers books (Visions of Sugar Plums, Plum Lovin', Plum Lucky, and Plum Spooky). I only have Fearless Fourteen and Plum Spooky left to read. And then Finger Lickin' Fifteen comes out in June. I've run through them in about 2 weeks. They are incredibly addictive.

I went home for Easter. It was wonderful. I got some time away and I got to spend some time with my family. I left Thursday, April 9 and came back Monday, April 13. It was a short trip, but I had a great time. However, I got my first speeding ticket on the way there. No bueno. I was doing 85 in a 65. Yuck. The officer told me that if I went to court, they would drop it to improper equipment and then it wouldn't go against my license. And that is good. I just got word from my insurance company that my insurance is rising because of a speeding ticket that Joe got. He's not even the primary driver. It used to be $130 every 6 months. Now it's $270 every 6 months. Insanity! I'm dropping him off of my insurance. If this one goes against his license, my insurance would be outrageous!

He is out of town this week. So, I will get to have a wonderfully quiet week to myself. Peaceful. :) It's good timing, too, because I need some time to myself. I'm feeling a need for isolation. My life is feeling claustrophobic. Joe doesn't understand my dislike for my job and we've argued about it too much lately. I'm growing resentful. It's probably the reason my breathing problems are flared up again. I haven't used my inhaler in over 2 months. I need it now. Unfortunately, I left it in South Korea and I haven't made it to get a refill yet. So, I'm dragging myself along until I can get to the pharmacy at a time when they're actually open. Ugh. Do you ever think to yourself, "Wow... this is not where I thought I would be at this point in my life"?

::Positive thoughts::

I have a job. I have a wonderful home. I have 4 beautiful pups. I have a boyfriend who doesn't drive me nuts 100% of the time. :)

Almost better...

Random Thoughts on The Land Before Time

Okay, so I was doing some landscaping a few days ago. When I'm working with my hands, my mind tends to wander. I think about incredibly random things. I don't know how or why I started thinking about it, but I started thinking about The Land Before Time. I'm talking about the dinosaur movie. There are like 147 of them now, but I was specifically thinking of the original. It was a good movie. It made me cry... a lot. It was one of the few movies I owned when I was little. That and The Lion King. And Mrs. Doubtfire. But, anyway, that's not really relevant to what I was thinking about.

I was thinking about the relationships that were shared between the dinosaurs. Sure, Cera was a pain in the butt sometimes, but things usually work out. And then, I started thinking about how all of them can understand each other when they talk. And then, I thought, why can't the "Sharptooth" talk?? All of the others can talk! Well, for a while Spike can't talk, but that's only because he's too young (or so Ducky says). And he prefers to stay rather mute throughout the series, but he CAN talk. Can the Sharptooth talk??

Well, I was all very curious about this, so I looked it up. It turns out that because the carnivores and herbivores are so different, they've developed different languages. The language that the sharpteeth have created consists of grunts and growls. Chomper (a character that I'm not really familiar with) is the only one who is bilingual and can understand both carnivores and herbivores. This is apparently because he was raised by both. Or something. I don't know.

Anyway, I have discovered the answer to my question. Sharptooth is not just dumb and doesn't know how to speak. He just speaks an entirely different language. :)

Don't kill yourself yet...

Haha... so, my previous post was very depressing, but something good has happened. And, it came out of the state of Iowa.

Gay marriage is now allowed in the great state of Iowa. Finally, something progressive for the midwest! :)

Of course, this may not last. California only had legal gay marriage for 5 months before it was taken away. And California is typically very liberal. Iowa may have more difficulty holding on since it's in such a conservative area of the U.S. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it sticks. And, I hope that this causes other states to see that homosexuals have the right to be married as well. I won't hold my breath just yet, though.

I came across a blog from a friend of mine from high school. She was actually bi-curious/bisexual before. Now, it seems that she has found conservative Christianity and thinks that gays should not be allowed access to any sort of marriage. She thinks that if people are gay, they should abstain from relationships.

She feels that the United States should not encourage sins. She said that if we are going to make gay marriage legal that we might as well make murder legal. Because all sins are equal.

I've come across more and more people like this. I'm frightened. It seems as though they just caught the Crazy-ass Conservative Christian flu. I don't want to catch it. I sure hope all of that vitamin C I get in my diet can fight it off.

I told her that the U.S. isn't a Christian nation, and therefore, we can't make laws based on Christianity's idea of what is right. Homosexuality is not hurting anyone (unless you believe that they are going to hell, in which case it's still only hurting them -- you can only tell them your beliefs; not make them believe... otherwise we could just make it a law that everyone in the U.S. has to be a Christian). Murder is taking a life. Big difference.

AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH! These are scary times we are living in. Everyone keep your fingers crossed that you don't catch that flu.

Bad News...

This past weekend Fast & Furious 4 came out. I knew that it would lead to more street racing this weekend. I admit that I did enjoy the first one. And, I did have plans to go see this movie. But, I am not a fan of racing in streets where there is a possibility of someone getting hurt.

Saturday night, a woman and her 2 daughters, aged 2 and 13, were hit by a street racer and all three of them were killed. The 20 year old who hit them is being charged with second degree murder. You can read a little more about that here.

It's really depressing. Someone was being stupid and reckless and 3 people lost their lives. Two of them were children. That kid is going to have to live with that for the rest of his life. And, he'll be going to prison. So, not only did he ruin the lives of the people he killed and their families, he also ruined his own. Because of a street race. It's so dumb that it's really depressing.

Also in the news this morning, North Korea launched a rocket. Woo hoo. As if President Obama didn't have enough on his plate, now he will have to focus energies on North Korea.

And, depressing news from Italy. An earthquake shook Italy. A 6.3 on the Richter Scale. So far, the death toll is at 92. So far, over 1500 people have been found to be injured. Thousands of people are homeless. And on top of the loss of life, there is a loss of history. Many of the destroyed buildings are hundreds of years old. Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has declared a state of emergency. A tent city is being created for the homeless people to live in.

Indonesia also had a quake early this morning, but there were no casualties.

And, finally, we are destroying our planet faster than we originally thought. Scientists say that Antarctica's glaciers are disappearing much faster than they thought.

Yay! Happy Monday, folks. :)