Hungry, Hungry Hippo

So, there's this website called McSweeny's Internet Tendency. It's pretty funny. One part of the site is just dedicated to the most random lists that are submitted by people. This one made me laugh:

Where I Would Look for Hungry, Hungry Hippos
By Andrew Hoyt

Turkey
Chile
Cameroon
Cook Islands
Samoa
Hungary

If you haven't guessed, I'm really hungry and can't wait to go to lunch. While I was waiting to go, I decided to post to our blog and I decided that I just love us. Aren't we great? I knew you'd agree. I hope you all had wonderful Thanksgiving celebrations. Greece was impressive - I'm only sad that I have to be back at work now. Anway, I'm going to stop because I feel like each word is making this post less impressive. I love you girls!

I Love My Piano!

When my parents were here a couple of weeks ago, they wanted to get us a 'big' present before they left on their mission. I'd had my eye on this Yamaha Piano for a little while, so when the opportunity presented itself, I was more than anxious!! For me, it's certainly a gift that keeps on giving because every day I love having it at home more and more! I've forgotten how therapeutic playing the piano is for me. It's been fun playing all of the songs that I used to play when I was learning the piano oh so many years ago, and it's also got the fun functions of keyboards so I've been playing around with all the funky disco beats and dancing to the 'demo' song with Lucas. And my favorite function is I can record songs and transfer them directly to my USB jump drive!!! So if things go as planned, you'll be receiving my very first CD ever in a couple of weeks!

Hope everyone had a very Happy Thanksgiving and that Sarah had fun in Greece!

Recovery

Sorry, I'm not going to send any pictures with this one because I look terrible! However, I'm feeling pretty good under the circumstances. The surgery went off without a hitch last Thursday and I came home on Friday afternoon. The doctor did give me the option of going home Thursday night, but I decided not to take it when I couldn't quite wake up in the recovery room. I mean, I was conscious, but I was still so out of it I could barely keep my eyes open. That anesthesia is powerful stuff! Thank goodness for it though, I haven't felt too much pain.

Well, my mom told me in the recovery room that the nodule was benign and that was confirmed again yesterday by the official report from pathology. I'm so relieved. Although thyroid cancer is 100% treatable, if I don't have to go through any more treatment then I don't want to! I started thyroid replacement medication today though and will likely be on it for the rest of my life. If that's the only price I have to pay, I'll count my blessings!

Recovery is a lot harder than I thought it would be though. I've been feeling pretty loopy and not-quite-all-there for the last few days because of the pain medication. I'm extremely fatigued and it's about all I can do to lay on the couch and watch movies--I honestly don't have the energy for much more. At least I can type today! I was trying to type an email yesterday and it just about wore me out! Oh well, the thyroid medication should kick in in the next few days and I should start getting some energy and concentration powers back. It's truly amazing how much your thyroid controls: your metabolism (and thus your energy levels and weight), your calcium levels, your concentration, your hair growth, your body temperature, your digestive system--yeah, pretty much everything! Now I know why they tell you that you need a whole week to recover.

On Thursday I'm supposed to soak the sterustrips covering my scar until I can peel them off. I'm not too excited for that. Maybe I'll have to send pictures of it then and hold a contest. You can all judge how much I look like Frankenstein! If I don't try to find any humor in it, I might doom myself to wearing turtlenecks for the rest of my life. Maybe I'll just have to learn how to be fashionable with scarves . . . :)

the madness

Girls! How are you? I hope you all had splendid halloween celebrations. :) Mine was pretty low key, but lots of fun. My roommate and I had a dance party in our apartment and only four people were invited: Calamity Jane, Deb from Napoleon Dynamite, Jenny from Forrest Gump and some pirate girl whose name no one can remember. Ok, really it was just us. But we had a good time.

I can't believe I'll be home in six weeks. My time here is flying by. I can't believe that I thought four months would be so much time. Life just keeps speeding up. Wednesday was a holiday here. All Saints' Day, actually. So in proper religious-style celebration, we drove up to Den Haag to go to the temple. It was freezing! The temple was beautiful though. And so small! This picture makes it look like I've got some weird pig-tail thing going on, but it's just the wind. It was so windy.

I am trying to think more about life after this and thankfully I'm not too worried about things. I guess at this point I'm only a little worried that I'm not more worried! I am thinking more and more about starting an internet marketing business -- which initally would probably mean just a little bit of contract work while I took some more classes. We'll see what happens. I'm still not sure about where I want to end up. It's an exciting time and decision, but a kind of scary one to make alone.

Wishing you all a wonderful November!