When Sad Things Are Good Things

It's time once again for that Friday phenomena begun by Shelley Tucker of This Eclectic Life" where we take events or thoughts that might possible be not to great and try to put a good spin to them. If you think you'd like to play along in this venture, here's Shelley's link and the instructions for doing this on Fridays.

Yesterday was a beautiful day in many ways. The weather was lovely -quite cooperative for a change this week and Mandy and I left home around 9 a.m. for our drive down to Pittsburgh and my appointment to see the surgeon who did the colostomy on me 2 1/2 years ago in October of 2007. We've been making this trip twice a year now, spring and fall, for my checkups and truth be told, Mandy and I both enjoy these a lot too for various reasons.

As long as my appointments were always in the fall or spring-time, the drive to see my doctor there is not really that bad. We can make it -point-to-point -in about 3 hours and that even allows us a little extra time in case of construction and/or a stop for a snack, beverage or potty as well as finding a spot in one of the parking garages at UPMC (University of Pittsburgh Medical Center).

The garage thing sometimes is the most daunting part of the whole trip. Finding a parking spot often is the least problematic item there though. Back in October on our visit, we got lost trying to find the garage and level on which my little jeep was parked! It took us close to 45 minutes of wandering around in the bowels of UPMC and wandering up to guards, strangers too, asking for directions to a point where we could again get our bearings.

Yesterday, Mandy took a picture with her cell phone of the level in the garage where the jeep was parked in case we got lost again! Forearming us apparently worked though as we had no difficulty find the spot at all!

Another thing we like about this trip to the big "burgh" is that after my visit is over with the doctor we either head up Route 79 north to Grove City Outlet Mall and then usually manage to squeeze in a visit of some sort after that with my niece (Angie) and her family -or we go south to a newer outlet mall just outside of Washington, PA and there, we can hook up with a bit of a visit with my youngest cousin, Becky, and Mandy can even wrangle a get-together at the mall with her friend, Rychelle, who she met through some online autism support groups.

But probably the nicest thing about these visits to see Dr. Hughes is just plain seeing him again, talking to him, discussing any and whatever problems I may have had in the past six months or issues he thinks I should be aware that could occur, joking with him about children too as he has three children and he's always willing to chat and compare notes there too. The absolute best thing though about him -ranking right up there with his knowledge and skill as a top surgeon in the intestinal region of one's body has got to be his overall appearance and most particularly, his eyes! Oh my yes, those eyes!

After the very first time I met with him and had both my daughters with me on that trip, all three of us I think spent the bulk of the ride from Pittsburgh down to Washington, PA to visit my cousin Becky and have our last opportunity to see her mother then too (sadly, that Aunt passed about a week or so after our visit) discussing and comparing notes with each other on just how much of a hunk Dr. Hughes is and how gorgeous are those beautiful blue eyes.

Well, my visit yesterday was good in that after checking out a few things -the normal routine check-in stuff and a few things beyond that for colostomy patients, Dr. Hughes then decided that he feels the bulk of the problems that could occur with a colostomy are behind me now and unless there is some major emergency or other, I don't have to return to see him for these routine checkups.

Yes, that is good news, sure it is. And yet, why do I feel a let down from hearing that? Thing is, so did Mandy! I'm pretty sure he is already more than aware that many of his female patients all drool over him but I wonder how many of them told him upon being basically released that they will be telling another family member that these checkups are still necessary and using his name in vain to have an excuse then so Mandy and I can still squeeze in our twice a year, shopping expeditions along with a potential to visit some family and/or friends too in the process.

Needless to say, he chuckled over that aspect that Mandy and I already have in our plans.

But apparently we must have impacted on him somewhat too as he told us when we were ready to leave that he will miss not seeing us on this regular basis as he's come to know both Mandy and me quite well over these past two plus years.

Yesterday, after leaving his office and finding the jeep with no problem, we headed out and away from Pittsburgh. Found Route 79 with no problems whatsoever this time and arrived at Grove City Outlet Mall around 2 p.m. My niece and her two little girls, Lizzie and Gracie, met us there and were able to wander around the mall for a little over an hour with Mandy as she was trying to find some good deals for the kiddos. I took off on my own for about two hours -got some new pajamas (much needed) for Kurtis as well as pj's, a pair of shorts, two tops and two pair of knee-knocker type pants for Maya too. Even managed to snag a couple bargains for myself as well in the "unmentionables" department. Also items very much needed and aren't they always the last things on our shopping lists too? Why is that anyway?

We stopped in Brookville on the way home and had a huge supper at this buffet-style restaurant there at the interestate exit -Pyler's. Normally I love this place but last night's fare while decent, wasn't as good as what we've often enjoyed there in the past. Guess the items on the dinner buffet just weren't hitting our taste buds the way they normally do is all but we still managed to eat more than enough anyway.

From there, we stopped at Dubois so I could pick up embroidery floss at Joann Fabric's store there -to replace the floss Mandy had bought for me on Saturday over in State College but which mysteriously had managed to disappear over the weekend -without a trace!

After that, we had to stop at Mandy's best friend's place to gather Miss Maya up and bring her home as Jen-Jen had come down to the house after Maya got home from school yesterday and took her to her place to kind of give Bill and Katie a bit of a break from the child-care stuff ongoing here.

Once home, relaxing a little bit, the aches began to fire up in my legs from all that walking around the mall! I know if I would indulge in doing a bit more walking around town here -like maybe daily -that kind of exercise wouldn't bother me nearly as much as it does. Note to self: Remember to take some walks as often as possible. Might even help take off a few very unwanted poundage too as a result of that little bit of exercise!

Then, before getting ready for bed last night, I decided I needed a nice cool drink so I got out the iced tea from the fridge and poured myself a glass of it. That's when I saw a cereal bowl filled with macaroni and cheese -the kind made from a box, ya know (not that there's anything wrong exactly with box mixes as we always try to keep several of those on hand for emergency purposes at meals when we know Maya and Kurt will turn their noses up at whatever it is I have fixed for the family) but the thing of this discovery yesterday was that I had mentioned Wednesday night to Katie and Bill that they wouldn't need to worry at all about cooking anything yesterday because there were leftovers enough from three separate meals we'd had this week that they could nuke and which both Maya and Kurtis would eat too! One of those was a fairly large container of leftover homemade mac and cheese from supper on Tuesday night and that alone would have easily fed all four of them here and sure no need then to cook up another big batch of the stuff. And then, to stick it in the fridge, uncovered -well, that was just adding insult to injury in my book and ruining a good leftover too! Why put it into a cereal bowl, uncovered, when we have a whole cupboard full of various sizes of Tupperware and/or Rubbermaid storage containers and all but three of them have lids that go with them too?

Sometimes, I swear, I'll never understand the logic of a certain male who resides here too!

But then, I have to think about this a bit and that he was good enough to take a day off from work to stay home with the kids even though the bulk of the care for Maya and Kurtis did fall on Kate's shoulders -well, mainly Kurt's since Maya had school yesterday and I know there's not really an overabundance of men who would concede to doing that so their wife can transport their mother-in-law for a medical appointment 130 miles away -one way!

So looking at it from that perspective, yes indeed, I do see the good things there and can overlook the cooking of more food that was definitely not necessary!

And so today, I've been trying all morning and afternoon to finally get caught up on my blog reading and now that I did that, wrote this post, I'm gonna try to get Mandy to give up the recliner chair to me so I can get busy and begin working some more on this lovely tablecloth -now that I have enough of all the colors that I needed!

Maybe doing that embroidery stuff will relax me and free my mind up to think of something good to plan to serve for supper Sunday when our minister is coming here to share dinner with us. I love how Mandy springs these things on me!

Seriously, I don't really mind doing the cooking as long as I have a bit of an idea what others would like to eat from time to time too. Ok, a little help in the preparation would be nice too but just some meal ideas is my main issue right now.

And Sunday a.m. -at church -in honor of the high school and college graduates from our parish, the Children's Choir -which of course now includes Miss Maya -will sing with the Senior Choir the song "I Was There To Hear Your Borning Cry" and most of the congregation will dissolve in some tears over the music and the words as well as the under-lying reason for the choice of that song.

Yeah, sad but good, isn't it when so many folks become what a lot of others might consider to be sentimental fools.

That's ok with me as I'd much rather be with people like that than those who have no sentiment whatsoever, wouldn't you?

Have a great weekend now to all.