2020 in review

Last year I was so very glad to see 2019 end. It had not been a great year for me, and I had high hopes for this year. I had some running goals, some health goals, work goals, etc. Yeah so that didn’t exactly go as planned, huh.

What did you do in 2020 that you’d never done before? 

• In January, I was 35 miles away from a major volcano eruption in the Philippines. What I thought were little flies biting me were actually pieces of volcanic ash bouncing off my face. At the time, we had no idea if we would be able to fly back to the States as Taal kept rumbling. Hard to believe that was this year.
• I ran the furthest I’ve ever run as I trained for my first ever marathon (not quite 18 miles, more about that later).
• I ran two virtual half marathons. Ugh, virtual races are just not much fun.
• My third metatarsal in my right foot broke right up high in the neck while running. 
• And of course I’m living in a time of pandemic (or to use a more Biblical term, a pestilence). 

Did anyone close to you give birth? 

Grace Elizabeth was born January 25, 2020. I'm still incredibly honored that she shares a name with me, and I am so glad I’ve gotten to visit her and her parents twice this year. I wish it were more.

Did anyone close to you die? 

No. But I’m definitely affected by the COVID-related deaths this year. I don’t see how you can be a normal human being with any kind of heart and not be affected.

Did you suffer illness or injury? 

Yes. Once again I broke a bone while doing the sport I love. This thing has taken forever to heal, which is very annoying. I’ve also had nerve pain from the top of my right foot shooting down into my big toe since last March. None of the orthopedists I’ve seen are concerned so while I have a scheduled nerve conduction test in April, I’m continuing to work out. If the weather ever cooperates, I will bike and run, foot pain be damned. 

As with the broken pelvis, I’m using a bone growth stimulator and will be for another 130+ days.

What countries did you visit? 

In January, I spent three weeks in Manila for work. Volcano and the start of the pandemic aside, that was a really cool trip and I’m glad I got to see a part of the world I probably wouldn’t have gone to on my own dime.

What would you like to have in 2021 that you lacked in 2020? 

A vaccine for COVID. 

I’d also like to break a pattern that seems to be emerging in my life:

• 2017—cancer diagnosis
• 2018—bone fracture
• 2019—cancer diagnosis
• 2020—bone fracture
• 2021—??

What dates from 2020 will remain etched upon your memory, and why? 

• January 12: Taal erupted 
• January 25: Grace was born
• February 3: I turned 60
• February 14: we met Grace
• March 13: my city locked down for COVID and we began working from home (I will be working from home at least through the end of June 2021)
• May 6: third metatarsal broke
• August 22: got my hair cut short and went blonde 

There are other events but the dates aren’t etched—we got to see Grace and her family over Labor Day weekend but sadly have had to cancel all other trips. 

What was your biggest achievement of the year? 

In April, along with probably every other sewist in the country, I fired up my sewing machine and cranked out nearly 100 face masks for friends, family and in one case, the family of a friend (that family lives in Ireland so I can truthfully say my masks were international!).

One real bright spot this year, or I should more accurately say two bright spots are our COVID kittens. I'm so glad we got them. 

I also decided to give veganism a try. Originally I planned to try for about a month but here I am, nearly at the six month mark and I think I'll stick with it. Health-wise I already had great numbers for cholesterol but saw huge improvement there anyway. My LDL dropped from 70 to 35, which made me blink! 

And I busted through a big hang up of mine when SheFit asked me to send a photo of me wearing their bra to be used in a social media campaign. 

But honestly this year has felt like I’m just marking time. I’d planned to train and run my first full marathon this year both as a way to say screw you cancer and to celebrate turning 60. I was very disappointed when the race went virtual but of course on May 6, it was all moot anyway when my foot broke. 

I did run two virtual half marathons, and I don’t think I’ll do that again. It’s just a real slog. 

What was the best thing you bought? 

I wrote a very long post about things we bought this year to make our home comfy and cozy.

Where did most of your money go? 

And of course, that post also describes where our money went (as it sure didn’t go for traveling). We did have a lot of medical expenses but not nearly what we had in 2019.

What did you get really excited about? 

I didn't know it was going to happen, but my mother, sister and brother surprised me so much I staggered when they were all at a restaurant to celebrate my 60th birthday. That was absolutely surreal and wonderful.

I was so excited to be training to run that marathon. I’d done a lot of research to find one that was not horrible in terms of the route but also not hard to travel to, and Grandma’s seemed like the perfect one. Plus it’s in June so I knew I could get in a proper training schedule since I wouldn’t have to do most of the training in winter. And I’d found a running coach because I wanted to train safely and sanely.

So words are inadequate, I cannot tell you how heartsick I was when I broke my foot. I sat in that urgent orthopedic clinic and knew, I just knew that it was broken and that I would not be healed in time to run the marathon. I’m not much of a crier, but I teared up there in that office.

And in November when it looked like I had a non-union fracture, I was crushed. I’d already been researching bikes so that same day I got that news, I went to a local bike shop and ordered a bike. I’ve been able to ride a few times but I need it to be a little less windy and I also need shoe covers to be able to ride in the Kansas winter weather.

For the second year in a row, it’s been a really hard year. I sometimes feel as though I’m digging a hole in dry sand only of course the sand will not stay out of the hole so I keep digging, digging, digging, all for nothing.

What book(s) did you love this year? 

I continue to be an indiscriminate reader (escapism at its finest) and devour all sorts of fiction, especially science fiction, some fantasy (I’m very, very picky) and a fair amount of post-apocalyptic fiction. 

However I don’t advise reading Station Eleven when in a foreign country as a pandemic starts (yes, I thought I would re-read it when I was in Manila and COVID-19 was breaking loose in China and Southeast Asia—not my best plan). 

What song will always remind you of 2020? 

Once again, I’m boring. I’ve been listening to the Housewerks playlist on Spotify. This song cracked me up last spring.

Update on the Shittens

It’s hard to believe but the kittens/Shittens are going on six months old. They’ve grown a lot, helped no doubt by getting rid of all those parasites and eating both their kitten chow and the adult cat chow. They continue to make us laugh (mostly), curse (sometimes) and shake our heads at the weirdness of cats (pretty often).

Little Annie has the sweetest personality and the longest tail. Our little Cow Girl (we call her that because of how her fur looks) is the one who wouldn’t take no from Eddie and was convinced from the beginning that he was her best friend ever (except for her sister). She cuddles with him all the time, whether he wants it or not, and it’s pretty sweet to see them grooming each other. She’s not a lap cat unless we’re on the couch with our legs stretched out, and then she’s right up there with us.

She’s also a huge water baby. She gets in the sink, any sink, and licks the faucet in hopes water comes out. She also tries to open the shower door when one of us is actually in there taking a shower. She hasn’t managed to do that yet but I think it’s just a matter of time.

Stevie also loves the water and is quite the jumper. She easily gets onto any high surface, it’s like gravity has no effect on her. She also can be a bit of a bully. All the cats prefer the bed on my desk as it’s got a light directly over it that acts as a heat lamp. I’ve watched her slither into that bed when Eddie is in there (she wouldn’t dare try this with Wally) and then start picking on him, batting at him and biting until he leaves. I stop her when I see it but I know she does it other times too. 

Unlike her sister, Stevie is definitely a lap cat and also still loves to chew wires. I’ve now replaced the earbuds to my laptop twice and keep them locked up when not in use. 

Here's a little collage from this past weekend. We put the tissue paper and wrapping paper from our presents on the floor so the kitties could have some Christmas fun too.

An update and a vegan Christmas

First things first.

I realized that waiting wasn't going to make that three minute plank feel any easier plus tonight Kent and I are attending a virtual wine tasting. I'm positive that planks are easier when I haven't had alcohol the night before, so I just went ahead and did the three minute plank this morning. My form wasn't the best there at the end but I stayed off my knees and finished.

Now to our vegan holiday meals. 

For our Christmas Eve meal, I made Kung Pao Brussels Sprouts with rice noodles. These were GREAT and definitely something I'll make again. In fact, they are so good I made them again last night.

We finally got around to making vegan eggnog, which my son calls a nut smoothie (he's not wrong). I'm not a fan of real eggnog, even before changing to veganism, but this was really good. 

I made pumpkin scones, which were billed as a dupe for Starbucks pumpkin scones. These were quite good, although next time I’ll boost the spices even more. 

I also made apple strudel waffles for Christmas breakfast. This was super simple—it’s puff pastry with thinly sliced apples in the middle, along with cinnamon and sugar. You basically make a grown-up pop tart and cook it in the waffle iron. I topped them with coconut whipped cream, and they were pretty good. I would make them again for Kent, but I personally prefer the pumpkin scones. They were also very filling so we didn’t even worry about our big meal until later in the day.

I'd promised Kent I would make him a mocha latte, so here's the mocha sauce in progress:

And a beauty shot of my mocha latte from this weekend:

We’d found this recipe for lasagna and wanted to see if it lived up to the reviews. In a word, YES. This was amazing, and we are still enjoying it. As written, she says you get eight large servings and she isn't kidding. We went with 12 and didn't feel deprived at all. 

I also made half a recipe of this festive kale salad and wow it’s so good. I’m now experimenting with the nutritional yeast without all the nuts as the nuts make for a much higher calorie count. But the taste was very similar to Parmesan and we both loved the salad.

I made the same dessert for Christmas as I’d made for Thanksgiving, the veganized NYT Pumpkin Sticky Toffee pudding and wow, yes, that one is a keeper.

Planksmas

 In my last post, I mentioned that I like challenges. What I didn't talk about was the planksmas challenge I've been doing this month, along with some other posters on the Breast Cancer Org forums. There's a group of us who post our daily workouts to help each out stay motivated and accountable. 

Here's the challenge:

Today was day 28 so the plank was two minutes, 30 seconds long. I have to say, this is tough. One of the other women who's doing this posted a modified schedule. She's going to take it slower and finish mid-January. I briefly, briefly flirted with doing the same but realize that was a big no. I want this challenge done ASAP. Just hope I can hit that three minute mark.

I like having goals

My niece (who's named after me) is into fitness. She loves weight lifting and is pretty good at it. She's also working on mastering her hand stand; she kicks up to the wall just fine but wants to get to the point where nothing supports her.

I saw the photo of her taking a foot off the wall and posted that I wondered if I could still do a hand stand. Years ago, when I was a little girl, I fell in love with gymnastics as I watched the 1968 Olympics. We had a dinky black & white TV with awful resolution but I didn't care. I was mesmerized watching those girls fly around doing their floor routines, the uneven bars, all of it.

I pestered my folks to let me take gymnastics and they found a place that met at my elementary school on Saturday mornings. So I walked there every Saturday morning and did my darndest to turn into a gymnast. But let's be honest. I am a stick, I was born a stick and I will no doubt die a stick so while I learned to do handstands, cartwheels and round-offs, I was too inflexible to master a basic back bend. 

That didn't stop me from avidly watching the 1972 Olympics when I and probably every other 12 year old in the US was captivated by Olga Korbut. I kept dabbling in gymnastics but I knew in my heart that will power doesn't equal talent and so I moved on to other things. I ended up falling in love with running, thanks to the Army, and have tried other sports as well (roller blading is fun, I'm not very good at it; I'm not a good softball player either but I sure tried, and so on). When I lived in Germany (thanks to the Army), I was the assistant coach to the girls gymnastics team from my Army post and loved working with them as they mastered their routines. 

Anyway, fast forward to this week and my rash statement about wondering if I could still do a hand stand (which I did master). My niece seized on that and said I should try and so I did. 

I have some work to do, although I'm closer than I thought I would be. But I think I can master it again, and I'm going to give it a try. My core is strong enough, and so are my arms but my right hammie did not like the kick  up at all.

I'd like to do one proper hand stand by my birthday on February 3. I'll be 61 and I think it would be a hoot to do a hand stand to celebrate.

Christmas with kittens

Means no tree. Well not our usual tree. Instead, I put this little tree on our dining room table with a tree skirt. This tree has a story that goes back to 2009. 

We'd flooded (for the first of three times) and were displaced, living in temporary housing while our place was made livable again. So we didn't have a Christmas tree, we barely had clothes to be honest because we lost a lot of stuff in that flood. And Kent had been notified he would be getting laid off and I hadn't been able to find work in Boston.

We were in Target to get construction paper to make a Christmas tree. I saw this tree and really wanted to get it only you know it was $20 and for where we were (no jobs, our apartment flooded and uninhabitable) that was money we didn't have. Kent insisted we get it so we could have a little Christmas decoration, and all of Target in the South End got to see me cry. 

Flash forward 11 years and the reason for no Christmas tree is positive this time. Our two little kittens would absolutely destroy any tree so I'm resigned to no tree until probably 2022. Not even kidding. That's ok, I would rather have the kittens anyway.

Here's our fireplace. My mother made that wall hanging decades ago and it's one of my favorite things she's made. Hanging that is part of our Christmas decorating ritual every year. We have five hooks for stockings, and until last year would hang all five: two for the humans and three for the cats. Then Chloe died and I was gone a lot last December and all of January. Now of course we have four cats but still only five hooks. So yes, the stockings are for the cats. 

I always think of Queen's Fat-bottomed Girls

I picked up my new bike last Saturday, plus a bunch of other stuff so I can ride (shoes, helmet, lights, water bottle holder, dinky little repair kit that fits neatly into the onboard storage compartment, a shirt, some padded shorts—all very $$). 

I was all set to ride Sunday morning but had gear issues. I work out first thing in the morning, so it’s dark. No worries, I have a Nox Gear Tracer 360 vest that lights up like crazy, and of course I’d bought the headlight and taillight for my bike. Only the batteries were dead in my vest. OK, I replaced them. And those batteries were dead. Grrr. I decided it would be OK to ride with just the headlight and taillight so headed out. Only I could not get the headlight on. So I scrapped riding that morning and charged both lights.

My first ride was on Monday, and I got a later start than I would have preferred. That meant I had more traffic, which frankly scares the snot out of me. I got a little lost and ended up on Mission, which has a lot of traffic and right now is down to one lane each way due to construction. I couldn't get off that street fast enough. Plus it was wicked cold—the temperature was 33 and the wind chill was 25.

Here’s where running in cold weather differs from biking in the same weather: I wore all my good cold weather running gear (tank top, long sleeve heat-tech shirt, long sleeve biking shirt, medium weight running jacket to block the wind, bike shorts, heat-tech tights, wind pants, wool socks, a winter weight headband plus my helmet, and my warmest running glove/mittens) and it wasn’t enough. I have not been that cold on any run, not even the one in 9F with the wind chill below zero. My thumbs especially hurt all day long as did my pinky toes. 

So I was super proud of myself for getting back out there yesterday in nearly the same weather for another ride. Fortunately, the wind was slightly less, and I felt a little more confident so was able to go a little faster (especially uphill, I do love hills). Once again, my thumbs hurt all day yesterday after thawing out. A friend suggested getting silk glove liners and I remembered that I’d bought a pair last year on clearance but not in time for that run.

I dug them out for this morning's ride. Normally I wouldn't ride back to back but the weather for the next 10 days looks like crap for cycling: rain tomorrow, snow on Saturday, and temps in the low to mid 20s through at least next Saturday. But today it was 40F with less wind. I also felt a lot more confident shifting gears and just riding in general. The silk glove liners helped some, but it’s clear I need better cold weather cycling gloves. 

That I’m even trying this is kind of a big deal. When I was 12, I had a pretty bad bike accident—I fell and hit the left side of my head on the curb and was unconscious. When I woke up, I was three blocks from where I’d fallen and a stranger was standing over me asking me loudly if I were OK. Being 12, I’d had the whole stranger danger drilled into me so I remember being really scared of him, and telling him I was fine. He asked where I lived and honestly it took a bit to remember. While I did keep cycling as a kid, I was always so very afraid I would crash like that again.

I think the fear will grow less as I get more proficient. It's hard being so bad at something, but I'm determined to master this. 

Neural flossing or what’s next with my foot

 Yes! Another update about my foot!

I saw the fourth doctor yesterday—this is the one who’s a foot/ankle specialist. He reviewed my MRI and examined my foot. He said he thinks the bone is healing based on what he sees in the MRI. The pain/discomfort where the bone broke is almost certainly due to how it’s healed. Because it’s the third metatarsal, and because of the way people walk, the bone has a tiny upward curve now. That’s not a malunion. He said the pain that I feel on both sides of the healed broken bone are the second and fourth metatarsals experiencing a bit of stress. It’s nothing to worry about. So that was good.

But I’ve had nerve pain radiating from the top of my foot down through the big toe since mid-March. I’d gotten seen for that right before lock-down and nothing showed on the x-ray. I re-laced my shoes, so the laces didn’t cross that top boney part and tied them quite loosely as sometimes runners have pain from overly tight laces. 

That didn’t help, unfortunately. Fast forward to today and I have the shooting burning pain through my big toe, up toward my ankle now also and pins and needles across the ball of my foot. That nerve pain caught his attention. He’s referred me to get a nerve conduction test and an EMG. He warned me those are not pleasant tests but said they’ll help identify any issues with how my nerves are working.  He also asked if I were using Voltaren (which I am) and, he said, some people have found relief with CBD oil. Well I don’t have CBD oil, but I do have a lotion and some ointments. 

He also recommended I do neural or nerve flossing for my foot, which may help with the pain. I’ve done something similar with my piriformis when I was in PT for that a few years ago, and found some tutorials on foot neural flossing on Youtube.

So the referral has been placed. Now that I’ve had a hot minute to think things through, I’m going to ask for those tests to be scheduled in January. As Kent says, we are in the stage of life where we’re probably going to hit our deductibles every year so no worries there. Plus I’d like to see if the neural flossing and various gels and ointments help. I won’t lie, the idea of that EMG test horrifies me, needles in my foot? Plus electric currents? YOUCH.

Bonus kitten picture collage of Annie. Both kittens are growing and doing well, no signs of parasites any more and they're still snuggly purr machines. Annie tends to flop around like this a lot and is proof that cats are liquid.