Monday, July 19, 2010

Tsk, Tsk, & Tsk Again…..Are You Blogging or NOT - Make Up Your Damn Mind Woman?!


Here it is July and I am behind as usual. One cannot expect others to follow one’s blog if they  are never blogging on it!    Sighhh  :o(

 It is my own fault, however, I hope you will take some small amount of time and stop to read my updated  content.

Allot has transpired since my last post which was much too long ago!

It has been weeks since I even sat down at this computer to do anything but glance at email,  and read everyone else's blogs.  I know that I don't post on mine often enough for people to bother following me. I hope I can change that for the better in the near future, since I am definitely planning on taking on another blog, lol! 

The next one will be totally about "Affiliate Marketing", and exploring it's venue.

In the meantime, on 'this', my personal blog, I have much of which to apprise.
We had company with us for approximately four days. These  two people are very good  friends, and we both, (hubby and I), enjoy their visits tremendously.  We didn't get to the  beach however, and for that I am sorry.  It was damn HOT and humid that week, and the  beach was packed with beach-goers.  It was around July the 4th holiday, so it was to be  expected.

I sincerely hope they enjoyed that visit as much as we did, as it was a wonderful time, and of course we all ate too much!  Isn't that the way of it! LOL!

Anyway, the next week or so passed rather placidly with no real fortuitous happenings. Then,  I got an email from one of my "Fan-pages'.  It was the local 'Country' radio station, emailing  me on "FaceBook" that I had won tickets to the Toby Keith "American Ride Tour" concert!   Imagine my total shock and truly happy surprise at winning these tickets!  I had only just  become a fan of the station on Facebook, and BOOM! …….I won tickets!

However, the tickets I had won were definitely NOT exactly what you would call VIP 'seats'. In   fact they were "Lawn" tickets.  Meaning, exactly that, we were to sit anywhere 'on the grass  surrounding the regular seats.

It was a good thing I had thought to bring a large beach towel, as we, (my friend and I),  needed it to lay over the grass! I wished then, that I had had the aforethought to bring binoculars, lol.  Oh....and NO, that is NOT me in the red shirt!


As you can see we truly were "On the Lawn" literally!  Although the stage was so far away that it was easier to watch the huge TV screens that they had erected on both sides of the Amphitheater stage.

Some people were sitting down, others were standing and swaying to the music as you can  plainly see.,,,,,,




Youth…..Ahhh,  if only!












As the evening wore on, there were more and more people standing up and dancing around  the lawn, but I must admit, most of those were YOUNG people, and most were '20' something  women, who looked to me like little girls playing grown-up!  Geeez, I was definitely feeling  my age at that point!  Young girls all around us…..with tanned legs up to their elbows!  It  was literally depressing to realize I can't dress like that anymore.  Oh wait!…….I never dressed like that anyway!  ROFLMAO!  However, IF one could get their youth back, then one has to think about what comes with it that is NOT so appealing, i.e. cramps, pimples, peer pressure , boyfriends, etc, etc.

The night was at first, hot and humid, but as the Sun fell off the horizon, the breezes picked up and the night ended up being very comfortable actually.  No mosquitoes  anywhere, so I assume that they must have rigged some type of repellent in the area of the lawn.  Usually I get attacked by them in swarms, but not one bite all through the evening hours. I was glad for that alone!

Trace Adkins was the first one to appear and perform, and Wow!  Did he ever!  I can describe him for you, but I thought maybe I would scrounge up a recent close-up pic from the internet.  For those of you who've never had the pleasure of seeing him live in Concert, well………the man puts his all into his performance.  I can tell you that he sounds exactly like his recorded 'CD's'  Nothing fake about this gentleman!  He has one song that kinda describes the way in which he portrays himself on stage.  The song's title is, "Dirty White Boy".  But truthfully he is a devoted family man, with a beautiful wife, "Rhonda (Forlaw) Adkins, and five daughters of different ages. Two of his daughters are from a previous marriages, but they are one great big very happy and centered family.


When he is performing, he protrays himself as a sexy 'dirty white boy', and he pulls it off with charm, true wit, and a great deal of talent!  Typical fans are the young ladies who attend his concerts, but there are a mix of all ages and genders who follow him and his career.

The other, and main, artist in this what is the "American Ride Tour", was Toby Keith.

This man represents everything America is about. Honor, honesty, integrity and assuredly presents himself as a down home "All American" country boy.  I have to say, in concert he is 100% as good as in his music videos!  He puts on an excellent performance! He was amazing to see and hear at work. 



Sometimes with a concert of this magnitude it is as enjoyable just to watch the reactions of the crowd of fans too!  The little twenty-something's went wild and it was a sight to see!

The concert was NOT in Myrtle Beach, unfortunately, but that’s okay.  It was at the "Verizon Wireless Amphitheater in Charlotte, N.C. Approximately a three & one half hour drive from home.

My good friend (female), and I spent the night in a nearby motel and drove home in the morning, taking our time  on Monday morning, since the concert was on a Sunday evening.

It was a good thing I'd had a relaxing and enjoyable Sunday night, and Monday morning, because as soon as I got home to the hubby, my enjoyment came to a quick and unhappy halt.

I had no more than unloaded the car and walked into the house, than the hubby was informing me that he wasn't feeling well.  He was looking pale, and telling he was very lightheaded. He had been checking his pulse and said it felt um, irregular.  He was right, I put my two fingers at his neck and it was beating very fast, and very irregular.  I walked around the couch he was sitting on and picked up the phone and called his doctors office. 

Fortunately they could get him in within the half-hour, so I took him in.  They did an EKG on him and they discovered his heart was beating at 169 beats per minute!  Yikes!  They instructed us to go immediately up to the emergency room at "Grand Strand Regional" hospital.. 

The triage nurses did yet another EKG on him and they diagmosed it as Atril Fibrillation. It was a matter of just a few minutes before they got him back there, however, they didn't as yet have a room for him, so they put him out in the hallway until such time as they did.

Once they did get him a room back in the emergency dept, they did yet another EKG. Guess what?  He was no longer Fibbing.  However, his heart was still doing a little jig every now and then, so they made the decision to keep him overnight and have his cardiac physician make the call as to what should be done. They got him a room on the 3rd floor. 

Now, it just so happens that this hospital is rated in the top 5 for patients with heart problems. They have excellent heart surgeons, and a heart department that is very competent, and almost incomparable. The hubby had a heart attack about four years ago now, and his heart doctor literally saved his life at that time.  He is one of the best in his field!

The next morning a technician came in and did an Echo-cardiogram.  I stood there and watched the screen and could see my husband's heart beating. It was amazing to see. I could even see the way it was stuttering, and quivering every few beats.  According to the doctor, my husbands heart had, for a lack of better words, "had it's wires crossed". It was sending constant electrical signals through the top part of his heart, causing the blood to not get pushed out to the bottom part like it should have.  This was why he felt light-headed. He was not getting the correct amount of blood flow.

The doctor added a new medication, and also increased the dosage on one of his other meds. He got my husbands heart in regular sinus rhythm by the end of the next day, and the hubby was allowed to come home, although, with strict orders to curb his intake of all salt, and eat healthier foods, instead of the junk he'd been eating.  You see, when he'd had his cancer and lost so very much weight, he was told then by the doctors to eat as much as he could, and whatever he wanted, as long as he ate something!  Well, he got used to eating what he wanted, and now he's finding it very hard to stick to this low-fats diet thing.  He doesn't understand that low-fat is as important as having NO salt.  His arteries are in no better shape than his heart. High fat foods, will, with time ,block an artery - no matter how much medication he takes to keep that from happening!

But he seems not to have listened very well to his doctors from what I have been able to observe this past week. I'm not going to nag him. He is a grown man.  If he wants to die a little sooner rather than later, that’s his choice.

I'm not going to yell at him, or force him to eat food that he doesn't like.  The funny thing is, while he was in the hospital, he ate almost everything he was brought to eat, and his meals were low-fat, and totally NON-sodium food.  AMAZING!  But then, of course, he was forced to eat it or starve, LOL!  But, he did tell me that most of it was really good stuff. But to him, low-fat transmits to low taste, no taste, bad taste period!  He is stubborn, and set in his ways, this is what he tells me all the time.  So be it. But if he ends up having a stroke, and being paralyzed or worse.....

Well, I can't or won't be able to take care of him. I do not have the energy or the strength for that.  I suppose I'll worry about that if the time comes, hopefully it won't!  My husband is not one for making sure his loved ones are taken care of upon his death.  He just doesn't care.  He feels that once hes dead, they (his family) can worry about it. Selfish, yes..........but what ya gonna do? Oh, he has life insurance, but the amount of insurance MIGHT be just enough to take care of his funeral.  Just barely.  
I don't plan to be that unfeeling of my family's feelings or expect them to take care of everything.  I'm getting life insurance soon, and making out my will. Not something one likes to think about, (dying), but it is a reality that must be faced.


6 comments:

  1. Hilarious! You've got a God-given talent to unburden your stressful moments with hubby! I like that. When under stress you can always recall what you did that evening at the lawn with those performing entertainers and the big crowd. It helps.

    As for your seeming absence online, we're on the same foot. I stumbled upon a blogger who says, if it happens that you haven't been around for quite sometime, , "don't apologize". We didn't do anything wrong. We were just too busy with other concerns and failed to update our posts. Hope this will make you less guilty. It worked with me!

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  2. Hey! I certainly appreciate your kind words, and I'm glad you enjoyed the reading. Yes, it does help me to unload now and then, and like you say, I try to remember happier times like the concert, of course, then I remember the little 20-somethings groupies, and I get depressed all over again, LOL! It's a vicious cycle I tell you!

    I was glad to read your comments about my long absences from my blog, sometimes I feel bad because others are so regular and post on their blogs daily, if not every other day.

    LOL, Okay.......from now on I'm NOT going to apologize for my absences, and I'll remember what you said. Thanks for commenting! It really was appreciated greatly! And, yes! It did make my feel much less guilty! (winks)

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  3. Hi JJ,
    First I wanna congrats you to get the ticket... so you can enjoy the performance of your fav. artist.
    then as Lita said you dont have to appologize to others coz you did nothing wrong..., sometimes we haven't been around here for some reason...all must have experienced the same..

    I also feel sorry for you esp. for your hubby ...hopefully you and your hubby will live more healthy and better in everything...

    God bless you both.
    hugs
    nensa

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  4. Hi Nensa,

    Thank you for your comments, and the words of congrats! :o)

    I am very grateful you took the time.

    I feel much better about the blogging thing now, or should I say, the lack of it! - Since getting the nice comment from Lita, and from you also.

    Also, I want to thank you for your kindness and consideration regarding the hubby. He's probably not eating as healthy as could be, but then he is obeying doctors orders as it regards NO BEER! This is a good thing! And you are right,since he has to eat a little healthier, it will certainly be beneficial to both of us. :o)

    God bless you Nensa and your loving family.
    (Hugs)
    July

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  5. Great post, JJ!

    My opinion is that fewer quality blog posts are way better than more posts that don't really say anything of import.

    Hope your hubby stays awap(as well as possible),

    Sherril

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  6. Hey Sherril,

    :o) Wow! Thanks so much for your comment, (blushing).

    I would tend to agree with you. IF a blog is of quality, with good content, information, pictures, etc... People are going to come back to it, especially if the information provided is either entertaining, and/or important and informative. One blog that I follow without fail is, 'The Adventures of Fred and Ethel. This woman has talent and a unique relationship with the written word. There is a link to her blog if you feel inclined to check it out. :o)

    As to the hubby, well.........on Tuesday afternoon this week, he had another small episode (A-fibbin). His pulse was up to 108 bpm. NOT good. We're not sure what caused it, but approx. one-half hour later, he was fine.

    Soooo, we're taking each day one day at a time. He checks his pulse rate at regular intervals just to be sure. He's stopped drinking beer, cut down immensely on his smoking, although he's not been able to stop completely yet. He has cut out caffeine, and he's cut all salt intake, and uses "NoSalt". That stuff is EXPENSIVE! LOL! The only thing that he's having a hard time with is the type of food's he is eating. He loves his junk food, and his candy. He used to tell people that 'fat, starch, and grease, are his favorite food group, LOL! He can't get it through his head that his 'FAT' intake is just as important. I'm NOT going to coddle him or rant at him though. He's a grown-up man, and he has to learn to take care of himself.

    Anyway, thanks again for your comment dear, it was greatly appreciated! :o)

    ReplyDelete