Surgery, Two Trips Ahead and Icelandic Road Conditions!

At last it is upon me, tomorrow is surgery day!  I am very excited at the prospect of no further pain.  However due to what this surgery involves I am some what trepidacious about the whole thing.  There is always some risk in the easiest of surgeries but this surgery won't be one of the easiest.  The fact that it is performed by a neurosurgeon instead of a regular orthopedic surgeon is telling.  Oh well - there isn't much I can do about that so as always I just need to suck it up and deal with it.

The details of the surgery are that it is scheduled for 9:00AM Monday morning at Littleton Hospital.  Unfortunately it is not an outpatient surgery and I will be stuck in the hospital until Tuesday.  There is a chance it could be longer than Tuesday, but I am hoping not. If the surgeon finds evidence that there is spinal fluid in the area surrounding the herniated disc, then I will be required to stay in the hospital for at least 3 days with two of those days spent on my stomach without me moving.  Hopefully that won't be the case as I think I would go crazy under those circumstances.

Well enough about that!  It is time to move to a more enjoyable subject.  One of the things that I forgot to discuss in my plan to get out of my rut is travel!  Over the next 6 months Zack and I have two international trips planned.  The first is occurring the last week in March and will take us to Costa Rica.  We will be traveling to Costa Rica to see a bunch of different areas of the country.  My good friend Ruben lives there and he will be tour guiding Zack and me around the country.  We will be doing a variety of different things from hitting the beach, to seeing the volcanoes, to visiting the rain forest, to experiencing San Jose (the capital) to experiencing some of Costa Rica's other cultural hotspots.  We are going to try and see it all!  We will leave Denver on March 24 and return on April 1.  I have already purchased tickets for this trip and we are quite excited to go!  It will be great to see Ruben again and I am sure Zack is going to love the experience!  The only possible down side is if my recovery from surgery takes longer than expected.  It could derail this trip - thankfully I bought travel insurance with my airline tickets.

In June we will be heading to Iceland for at least 10 days.  As of now I haven't purchased our tickets yet, but I hope to purchase them by the middle of February.  We are planning to leave Denver around June 18 as this will allow us to get to Iceland for the celebration of the summer solstice.  This year the summer solstice takes place at 12:09AM, June 21 local time in Iceland.  One of the best things about being in Iceland for the summer solstice are all the parties and fun events that happen!  Since darkness really doesn't come that day, most young people in Iceland stay up all day and night and just party their brains out.  I am not sure that we will get to do that given Zack's age - but we will participate in many of the festivals and celebrations that take place that day and through the following weekend.

The plan for the trip to Iceland is still evolving as I am continuing to read about where we should go and what we should see.  The overall plan is to rent a jeep and spend most of the time touring around Iceland on what is called the ring road.  The ring road is a road, and that might be a loose term for it, that circles the whole way around Iceland.  I say road might be a loose term for the ring road as from what I have read there are long sections that are just gravel or even dirty roads.  In a country of only 318,000 there isn't the need for a lot of paved highways.  The conditions of the road system is one of the reasons that we would be renting a jeep as you need 4 wheel drive to make it through a lot of the landscape.

The following are some examples of road conditions in Iceland that I pulled off the web.  In general when you head out on a long distance trip in Iceland you have to be prepared as you might face all kinds of conditions.  Furthermore, once you are out in the middle of no where, you are kind of on your own!)

(A good section of road in Iceland, but then you have to deal with other issues...  Like the gigantic ash plume from a volcano that is obstructing the road ahead.  It is not advisable to drive through ash plumes!!)

(Another common Icelandic road hazard - a sheep on the road.  Sheep in Iceland outnumber the people by a substantial margin.  Hopefully the sheep never decide to rise up and overthrow the humans as the people are outnumbered!)

(An example of roads in Iceland that are in less than stellar shape.  I won't have wanted to try and ride that rode on a motorcycle.  It looks very painful to me!)

(Another example of the dirt roads of Iceland.  Notice the washboard effect on this road.)


I can't tell you how much I am looking forward to these trips.  Zack seems to be excited about them too.  But for him they still seem so far away that he isn't thinking too seriously about them yet.  Though I have been to Costa Rice before I am really looking forward to that trip as it will allow me to explore so much that I didn't get the chance to see when I was there before.  And as for Iceland - this has been a place that is number two on my all time list of interesting places that I want to go.  Number 1 on that list is Mongolia and we will get there eventually, but given Icelandic Air is starting direct flights from Denver to Reykjavik (the capitol of Iceland) in May of this year, it something that we just have to do.

There is not much to say about our day today.   We got up relatively early this morning and I made a special breakfast for Zack - a cinnamon butter braid.  I had to take it out of the freezer last night and let it defrost and rise, but wow was it worth it, as it tasted so yummy!  Early this afternoon we went out to the movies and saw "The Adventures of TinTin".  It was a pretty decent movie - but the most important thing was that Zack liked it.  The rest of the day has been spent here at home working to make sure everything is ready for tomorrow.

I am not totally sure how tomorrow will play out as Nancy was supposed to come here and watch Zack on Monday afternoon/night.  She is not feeling well today so we might have to go with a fall back plan that Zack and the pups go over to my brother and sister-in-law's house for Monday night.  Not sure how that is going to play out, but I should know by later this evening if Nancy will feel up to leaving Cranbrook tomorrow.

I guess that is about it for the day.  To all the friends who called, texted or e-mailed me today to wish me the best tomorrow - thank you!  Your thoughts and concerns are greatly appreciated.

The next part is harder to write...  Shelly all I can say is that I wish you were going to be at my side tomorrow, but I know that is not part of our lives right now.  I wish it was the last time I was having surgery - made things won't be like they are now if we relived that time again.

I hope everyone has had a great weekend and is looking forward to the week ahead!

Thanks and peace to all! ~J.

"And he has a plan...."

For anyone who watched the SyFy channel's series "Battle Star Galatica" several years ago you will recognize today's title as a play on the words from the opening lines of each episode.  But the fact is I do have a plan.  Though fortunately I am not a cyborg or robot fixated on the destruction of the human race.

Over the last 2 - 3 months you all have read me complain about being injured - from my leg injury to my herniated back and you have heard me talk about being in a rut.  The fact is I am in probably one of the worst ruts I have ever been in during my entire life.  It is time for me to come out of it.  Realistically my extraction from this rut won't begin until I have the surgery on Monday. 

I do have a plan to transform my life and get out of this rut.  As I have laid awake at night or while I have laid around because I am in too much pain to do anything my mind has been in constant motion.  So I have laid out a plan that shortly after my surgery I am going to put into action.  It is specific and actionable, not some pie in the sky thing that isn't going to get me anywhere.  Here are the components of this plan.

1 - Escalate the purge of things from the house.  With one exception the house has been cleared of excessive clutter and now only the garage remains to have clutter purged.  I have to give myself some time to recover after the surgery, but the extensive purge of the garage will be completed by Spring Break (March 24th) of this year.  Though I have purged the excessive clutter from the rest of the house I want to take things a step further - I want to minimize my overall footprint of the possessions I have.  Yes - you heard it right, I want to embark upon a minimalist lifestyle.   It is hard to quantify a percentage of things I will purge but my expectation is that at least 30% of what I own will be purged between now and the July 1, 2012.

2 - Complete a design and decorating plan for the remodeling of my kitchen and family room by March 15, 2012.  I have two resources lined up who can help me with activity.  The first is a professional kitchen designer who I got through a friend.  References through the work that people have previously done is the best way to go.  Besides the professional kitchen designer I have a friend who is an excellent interior designer to guide me through the selection of what materials to use, the style of the rooms, etc.  My goal, providing it aligns with the schedules of the kitchen designer and my friend is to have the design complete by March 15th.

3 - Buy a substantial new portion of my wardrobe by April 1, 2012.  I tend to go through different styles of clothing at versus times.  For the last 2 years I really haven't had much of a style as I have gotten lazy and have been in jeans and short mode.  It is time for that to change.  I want to create a new image for myself and dress in a much nicer way.  This will help propel me out of my rut by just doing things differently like wearing a new style of clothes.  I won't be getting rid of all my jeans, shorts and t-shirts by far.  But what I will be doing is adding a new element of stylish clothes to my day-to-day rotation of stuff that I wear.  In general I will be a better dressed person and I will do a lot more to wear nicer clothes on more occasions.  Furthermore I will have the clothes tailored to my specific fit.  My build isn't exactly large and sometimes it is hard to find clothes that fit perfectly.  The sleeves are too long or the shirt is too wide - so whatever I buy is going to fit and fit really well.  Dressing nicely is a way to make yourself feel better about who you are and to draw positive attention to yourself.

4 - Select a contractor and get the kitchen and family room remodeled.  Once the plans are all drawn up it is just a matter of getting the work done.  Though I won't have the plans finished until mid-March, efforts will begin almost immediately to select a general contractor to get the work done.  I have a couple in mind and I intend to use the Colorado Home and Garden Show - which is held sometime in February to find some more companies I can look into.  All things remaining equal I would like for the remodeling to kick off by April 15th.  I am not going to put a target end date out there, because it really depends upon the contractor who is selected, the lead time for cabinets and the lead time for granite and other relevant materials used in the construction and decorating.

(These 3 pictures are pages out of Better Homes and Gardens Magazine about kitchen restoration.  I don't have any plan for the kitchen yet, but the kitchen shown in this article is absolutely gorgeous if you ask me.  This is the an example of the vision that I would like to create for the kitchen once it is remodeled.)

5. Rejuvenate the landscaping the whole way around the house.  This will be a project that I mostly do on my own.  I will use some contractors for specific activities like the removal of 2 large dead trees in the back yard.  Much of the rest of the work would be stuff that Zack and I could do.  It would be a fun experience for him as it would teach him a lot.  This would be a lot term project that would take me through the end of July to complete.

6. Diversify my assets and pay off all temporary debt by March 31.  Despite the fact that I have very good insurance, I have unfortunately gone through a large number of medical procedures in the last year.  As a result there has been a fair amount of temporary debt that I have built up.  Financially there is no problem to pay this debt but at times I have managed to get very favorable interest rates on keeping some of it around.  For example my one credit card offers 0% financing for all debt that you transfer to that card.  This definitely makes things worth while to keep some debt around.  Regardless as I finish what I hope is my last round of surgery I am going to pay all of this temporary debt off.  Additionally, because of negative market conditions I have kept some of my retirement funds invested in a number of European mutual funds.  Now that the market has recovered somewhat it is time for me to get my money out of Europe before it totally implodes and come up with a much more streamlined, diversified and balanced portfolio.  I am considering seeking professional advice to try and increase the overall return on my investments that I am getting.  This will allow me to do a number of specific things like pay for the kitchen and family room remodel, take action on the next action item I discuss below and then undertake what I will consider a "black box" spending program.  (The black box is a special program that I am considering that could pay serious dividends but it is not something I am talking about yet.  If that "black box" spending program comes to fruition I will write some lengthy blog posts about the entire program.  Until then....  it's a black box - LOL!)

7 - Though this next activity is not specifically needed because of any physical defect or mechanical issue, it is needed for my own sense of self.  By March 15th I want to have traded in my 2001 Honda Civic and purchased a new car.  I have a pretty good idea what I am going to get, but I am still uncertain so I don't feel like putting it out there and then having to pull it back.  This is something that is distinctly for me and that I have thought about for a while.  Yes - there might be a little bit of a flash to this car and no it is not a mid-life sports car for me.  I absolutely hate sports cars.  That is definitely not who I am.  More on this one later as when I purchase I will certainly be posting pictures

So that is the plan for the next six or so months to pull me out of my rut.  A big item that I didn't add to this list but is something I will really be thinking of is whether or not Zack and I will be staying in this house or buying something that is smaller.  I still don't really know where I am going to go with this decision.  But many of the steps that I am taking by seeking to minimize things and redoing my kitchen and family room are all aimed at allowing us to move forward to a new home if that is what I decide to do.  The unfortunate thing I face for the next year is that I want to remain in a place where Zack will be able to go to West Middle School.  So this does limit the places that I could purchase and perhaps keeps us in this house until Zack is completed with middle school.

We have all found ourselves in ruts at one time or another in our lives.  There are many people who have made significantly larger changes to get out of their ruts.  I remember reading a story in the newspaper several years ago about a guy from the UK who sold all of his possession and then took every cent of money he had and went to Las Vegas.  There he bet absolutely everything he had on one spin of the roulette wheel.  He put all of his money on black with a straight 2 to 1 bet.  Fortunately for him he won.  When asked why he did it, his answer was "I needed to make a change to my life".  I am never going to get that crazy in terms of making changes to get out of this rut, but I am going to do things that shakes stuff up and creates a new reality for Zack and me.

Thanks to everyone who sent me positive messages after my meltdown post of Wednesday night.  Your thoughts are definitely appreciated.  Stuff like that comes up every once and a while and I from what so many others who have lost a spouse or someone very significant in their lives it is normal.

I am down to about 60 hours til surgery.  Dear god, I can't wait.  The pain and absolute stiffness in my back, hips and leg seems to be getting worse.  I will be counting down the hours until Monday morning and when I head into surgery.

We have absolutely NOTHING planned for the weekend except one psychologist appointment for Zack.  I intend to keep it that way and just use the weekend to stay off my feet and try and keep the pain at bay. 

Well - I hope you all have a great weekend.  It will be very low-key for us but that is totally and completely OK in my book.

Thanks and peace to all! ~J.

Loss

There are days in which you feel nothing of the loss you have experienced.  Life continues and all is good.  Then there are other days in which the stupidest of things set you off and all the loss you have experienced comes rushing back into your head.  As the tears pour from your eyes and the hurt rips your heart apart there is nothing you can do to stop the pain.

This evening all the pain and loss was brought up in my head by a TV show of all things.  I was watching an episode of the show "Criminal Minds" and at the end, one of the main characters is shown talking with his son.  I had never realized it before but this character's wife had died.  In the episode the character is shown talking to his son and they were talking about his late wife and his child's mom.  I don't know why but it brought up every single solitary emotion I have experienced about Patty's death.  There was no way to stop the emotional tsunami that hit me in that moment.  All I could do was try and get my breath as my emotions exploded in a torrent of tears.  Why? Why? Why?  Why did she have to die?  Why wasn't it someone who didn't care about their spouse?  Why did it have to be Patty that died?  What a fucking horrible thing!  Did I do enough to help her?  Did I do enough to save her and prevent her from dying?  Why? Why? Why? Why? Why?

I can scream and shout as much as I like as I live in a house that is practically deserted.  It's just me, Zack and the dogs.  The dogs don't care what kind of sound I make and Zack is sound asleep.  So I can shout, scream, curse and yell all I want and no one is going to hear me.  NO ONE.  You get it Jerry - no one is going to hear.  No one is going to care!  All of that went away when Patty breathed her last - no one gives a flying fuck so you can rant and rave all you want at life's misfortunes and it isn't going to make a whit of difference.

So what do I do?  I can't call anyone - it is too late to talk to the few people that will care.  I can't sleep because I am now like a cat on a hot tin roof.  So I decide to drink.  But there isn't enough alcohol in the entire house that is going to make me forget what I am feeling.  So I turn to my f'ing blog.  Yep - put it all out there where a bunch of strangers for the most part can read about it and say to themselves - "Dear god, I am glad I am not that messed up individual".  Oh well - I am sure that's what many will say - but at least I get it out of my system for now.  Well - maybe I get it out of my system as I have been crying so hard that the snot is just running down my face and on to the key board.




(Was looking through old pictures last weekend and I found this picture of Patty.  She was so beautiful!)

As a friend of mine who lost her husband told me (yeah - Brenda that's you if you read this thing) you will never 100% get over it.  You'll think you are OK and then it will come raging back on you one day when you least expect it over the stupidest thing.  That's the truth!!

Now that I have written this maybe I will sleep - probably not as I think I need to finish my bottle of wine first.  Where ever you are Patty Rae, please look out for me as today is one of those days in which I just don't think that I can do it.  To this day I am not sure why you had to die.  I would have rather traded places with you 100 times over and died on that July day of 2008 then be here trying to raise Zack on my own.  It is the hardest thing I have ever done and I am failing miserably!  You should have never died - it should have been me as Zack would be doing so much better.  If it had been me who died, it would have been just like I was out of town on a long business trip.  He was used to that.  He wasn't used to you being gone.

(A picture I took of Zack a month after Patty died.  We were in downtown Denver waiting to catch the light rail home.  I think this picture captures a lot of the sense of loss he has felt since Patty got sick.)

And besides messing up Zack what have I done since you died Rae?  Not anything good that is for sure.  I fell in love with some one who doesn't love me anymore and it has made my heartbreak even worse. 

(Why didn't it ever work out between us Shell? I wanted to give you the world!  How silly am I as I still do?)

There is no peace tonight for me.  But for those who read this I hope you can find the peace that eludes me.

Good night.