Getting Older, Falling Apart

I'm getting older. I'm not really that old by modern standards, but I can definitely tell a difference. I'm heading for my 37th birthday this year. I'm getting gray hair. My temples temporarily went grey about 3 years ago when my daughter suffered a health crisis, but now, it's an everyday occurrence. Not completely grey, but a few more hairs go grey each month. My right shoulder has been giving me problems over the last 2 months or so. I think it's in the process of becoming frozen, although it could be a referred pain associated with gall bladder rouble. I did have an attack of which may have been gall bladder related about 3 weeks ago at work, but it only lasted a minute, and was the only one I received. Of course, there's my back, which gives me periodic trouble. Whenever I throw it out, it takes between 2 and 10 days to get back to normal. I have dry skin during winter. I think the correct term is seborrheic dermatitis, but it really affect my eye lids and ear lobes. Nothing seems to help. I developed a ganglion cyst on my right index finger a month or two ago (I developed one back in college on my wrist, but it went away). And last but not least, I've overweight. Of course, none of that is serious or life threatening in any way. We all have our aches and pains. I'm sure the list will only continue to grow.

Winter's Grip

We had another small snow yesterday. Here in Omaha, we received 3 to 4 inches, but from 6 to 8 inches fell across southeast Nebraska. In fact, school was canceled for today, mainly because the buses would have had a hard time getting into the neighborhoods. It was the first snow day this year. Over the last couple of weeks, we've had a couple of minor snows, an inch or two each time. But, it's been very cold. I'm not looking forward to seeing our gas bill for this month, I know it will be quite high, even though we've got a programmable thermostat, and generally keep things on the cool side. Definitely looking forward to spring, and present indications suggest it should warm back up later this week, with highs in the 40s and 50s next week. Thankfully. I guess I don't mind winter so much anymore (I used to really hate it), as long as it's not cold. Speaking of winter though, our garage is a mess. The floor is just a disaster with week upon week of salt and crud accumulating underneath of the vehicles. Bring on the winter thaw.

Annual Church Fundraiser

Yesterday was our annual church fund raiser. This year, we were raffling off a house worth $275,000. I won the cash grand prize of $3000 last year, so was almost positive that we wouldn't win this year. It was a really nice evening, the food was good, and our table mates were colleagues of my wife at school. We thought it was perhaps a little too crowded, with a lot of shoulder and elbow bumping, but that's OK. They also had free alcohol all night long, of which I made sure I got my money's worth. Ha. I was definitely feeling it by the end of the night (but not so bad this morning). We did bid on a couple of items, and won one. We purchased my wife's boss as a lawn boy for a day! Woohoo! I doubt we'll ever cash it in, but it's fun holding it over his head. We also went in with 2 other couples and purchased a wine tasting/gourmet dinner. It was a little expensive ($125 per person), but the money goes to our church so it's for a good cause. It sounds fun, and is something we've never done before.

The Tax Man Giveth

This year was the second year in a row that we received a tax refund from both federal and state. Yeah! Actually, our taxes really aren't that complicated, thus it's an easy matter to enter the data into our tax program. I figure if we're getting a refund back, we might as well do them early, and have access to the money now, rather than later. All in all, we're getting back just over $1000 this year. I initially thought we might just spend the money on a spring break vacation, but then again, we may just save it for a rainy day. It's a good feeling knowing that they're done though for another year though.

Daughter Doing OK

My daughter had her bi-annual checkup with her orthopedic surgeon today. Everything is OK. The pain she was experiencing a couple of weeks ago hopefully can be attributed to doing crunches in her PE class. Overall, she's doing great. In fact, the curve in her spine is now at 67 degrees, down from 73 degrees 6 months ago. And, she's grown an inch. Her doctor thinks that because the front of her spine is still allowed to grow (whereas the back of the spine is fused), that her kyphosis should continue to improve with age. That's a good thing. We'll see. But otherwise, Hannah is doing great, and her doctor is very pleased. Hannah did ask if she could ever ride a horse. The doctor paused, with great consternation, but did agree to her request. Now, she wants to go to horse camp. I'm not so sure about that, but at least she could ride a horse if she wanted.