Flu blues

I need to stay off of the internet. I swear it’s enough to make a person lose it. I’m a total info addict, but now that I’m pregnant I seem to come across all kinds of information that is not so much making me feel informed as totally paranoid.

My latest obsession is the flu shot debate. Some people say it’s best to avoid the standard flu shot because it still contains a mercury-based preservative that MAY cause problems for a developing baby. There are preservative-free versions of the shot available, but I’m having a hard time locating such an animal. You’d think they’d be all over the place in hippietown Boulder, Colorado, but that is apparently not the case. It’s so frustrating.

I considered skipping the shot all together until I was informed that having the flu during pregnancy seriously increases the odds that your child will develop schizophrenia later in life. And really, having the flu while pregnant is such a scary proposition. I had a wicked case a few years ago and I couldn’t leave the couch for days. My fever was near 104 at one point, and my cough eventually turned into bronchitis. It was brutal.

So I guess I’ll keep trying to find a preservative-free version of the shot and hope I get lucky. And what would I really be without yet one more obsession?

Charlie Brown no more?

For the past few years I’ve taken to calling myself “Charlie Brown”. You know, he of the black cloud and general downtrodden nature. To say I’ve been unlucky would be a gross understatement. I won’t create a laundry list of the ways in which I’ve been wronged (at least not today), but suffice it to say if something COULD get screwed up, it did.

Oddly, things seem to have taken a turn for the better. And yes, I just knocked on my desk when I typed that. I should probably knock on something larger to make SURE I haven’t jinxed myself. Something a bit beefier, like a mountain chalet. Or a pirate ship. Unfortunately, neither of those things are handy at the moment. So I’ll just have to hope for the best. So don’t screw me over, desk!

I’m not saying that EVERYTHING has been perfect. As I mentioned, we had to put Maggie down a few weeks ago and there have been minor things here and there. For example, our less-than-five-year-old washer broke last week and we had to replace it to the tune of $700. But IN GENERAL things have been going well. Scarily well.

1. Bye bye chemo
My dad just completed his last treatment. I can’t express the relief I feel. And I won’t even venture a guess as to how my dad feels about the situation. He has been through so much. There is no cure for his cancer (his prostate cancer metastasized into bone cancer) but making it through chemo means his life-span will be longer and he will have less pain. The most amazing part is that the man hasn’t complained once. If it were me I’d be bitching it up. But he’s so damn optimistic, and I find it insanely inspiring.

2. New job, new outlook
Have I mentioned how wonderful it is to work with genial, logically inclined people? Don’t get me wrong, there was something a bit addictive about the non-stop drama at my last job. But now I realize how much it sapped my energy, and how time and effort I spent complaining endlessly about various injustices. Now I’m a pretty happy person in general, and Jim is thrilled to be spared a nightly diatribe about how this person did a crazy thing and that person is a jerk, etc. etc.

3. The lion cut
Our cat Beast isn’t the cuddliest of creatures. Some might call him difficult. Or grouchy. Or just damn lucky that he ended up in our family and not somewhere else where people don’t put up with feisty scratching and advanced experiments in fang/hand interactions. Don’t get me wrong, he’s a cute cat. Deceivingly so. And he seems to get along with Jim OK (I’ve given up). He just doesn’t like to be pet for more than . . . oh, 30 seconds at a time. Jim’s theory is that he spends so much time grooming his fluffy hair that he gets royally pissed when you mess it up and force him to start over. Did I mention the hairballs? Frequent and disgusting. But all that changed this week. Enter the lion cut. We tried it out last summer and it worked wonders. And this time has been no different. Beast is seriously a different cat. He doesn’t mind being pet and he just seems happy. As a special bonus he looks hilarious, and the comic relief renders me incapable of harboring ill will against him. Here’s a before and after shot.

And there are more potentially auspicious items on the horizon if this trend continues. I still can’t help but think there may be a rigged anvil around every corner, but so far so good. And believe me, there’s nothing I’d love more than to kiss that black cloud goodbye for good and redub myself Lady Luck.

Massage Envy

About a year ago I signed up for a membership at Massage Envy, better known as the rapidly growing massage therapy chain with the horrible, horrible name. Because, honestly. “Massage Envy”? You would have to TRY to come up with a name that cheesy. It’s practically dripping in Velveeta. I’m surprised the logo doesn’t include Swiss cheese holes, arranged strategically about the a’s and e’s.

Anyway, I decided to buy a membership because for several reasons. The first reason will come as a surprise to no one that knows me well: I’m a bit of a stress ball. Tightly wound. Some might say I put the “A” in Type A. Because of this I often have trouble with my neck and shoulders. Namely, they start to feel like they are permanently scrunched somewhere up around my ears. This is compounded by the fact that I rear-ended someone back in 2000 and suffered some pretty serious whiplash as a result. Before that accident I always thought that whiplash was a load of hooey. Well let me tell you, it’s not. It’s real, and it sucks. And sometimes, it doesn’t go away in a matter of months. Or years. It lingers, and it gets worse when you’re stressed out. And when that happens, certain people get very grumpy.

Enter Massage Envy. For the low price of approx. $50 a month, I receive an hour-long massage. Tip not included, but still—it’s a good deal. In my case, an hour massage once monthly mitigates the whiplash problem and helps me feel like a regular person with properly positioned shoulders and a functional neck. It also reduces grumpiness, and as Jim would heartily agree, that’s worth it’s weight in gold.

Overall my experience at M.E. has actually been pretty fantastic. Granted, my local franchise doesn’t have the atmosphere of a fancy spa, but it’s clean and they have weekend and extended evening hours. So, super convenient. And early on in my membership I was lucky enough to stumble upon Lily, who might be the best masseuse ever. I mean, I don’t claim to be a connoisseur, per se, but I’ve had my share of massages. And while I’ve only had one really BAD massage (during which my male masseuse managed to seriously bruise my rib in a ham-handed fashion) I’ve had lots of massages that were just OK. Relaxing and all, but by no means transformative.

Well, I have to say the massage I had the other night WAS transformative. A real trip. I decided to spring for a 1.5 hour session and I was not sorry. It was phenomenal. SO relaxing. And Lily did this wacky energy field thing that is going to sound ridiculous, but it was amazingly effective. Apparently there are points on your body that activate beta wave activity in the brain. But touching these points you reach a deep level of relaxation. So, for example, she took a hold of my little finger and then with the other hand held one of my toes. I know, it sounds totally bizarre, but it’s for real. I felt like I had been meditating for 20 minutes. I really must do some research into this because if there’s a way I can do this myself, I totally will. That night I slept like a ROCK.

Do I sound like a complete hippie? Because I’m really not. I mean, I think acupuncture is great and I meditate on a somewhat regular basis, but I’m by no means a drum-circle-dancing, goddess-worshipping wood nymph. However, I do think the mind-body connection is really interesting, and I have to say that ANYTHING that will calm my anxiety-addled brain is a bonus. So bring it on, Massage Envy. Gouda-worthy name and all.

Name game

When my parents were deciding what to name me, they briefly considered Jennifer and Jenny before finally settling on Jena. My mom (an elementary school teacher at the time) decided that Jennifer was too long. She always felt sorry for kids with lengthy monikers because it took them forever to learn how to write their names. And I can see her point. I mean, if my name had been Savannah, I can imagine becoming discouraged right around the first “n”. And that’s just a little over half-way. It’s no wonder that kindergarten is the time when Jonathans transform into Jons, etc.

The problem with “Jenny” didn’t have anything to do with length. My parents both grew up in farming communities, and they were worried that kids might tease me because—get this—a jenny is a female donkey. I always thought this reasoning was hilarious, given the fact that I grew up in Albuquerque without a donkey in sight. The odds of some kid hee-hawing in my general direction were slim to none, because the other kids would have undoubtedly been like ” . . . the hell?”. And THEN who would have looked like a jackass?

Anyway, I’m happy my parents settled on Jena. Although I do get called “Gina” an awful lot, I still like the name. It’s a little unusual but not too wacky. Fitting.