Almost ready to sell
2007-03-05 - 4:16 p.m.

Our realtor came over today to check our progress on the house and see how close we are to being ready to put it on the market. We showed her the painting we've done in the front hallway, kitchen and my bathroom and she said everything looks great. B has someone coming over next weekend to put new azalea bushes in front of the house, and then we'll be ready. We're planning to have an open house either next Sunday or the Sunday after that, which means I can't put off cleaning out the closets any longer. :(

B and I did clear out the spare bedroom yesterday, though, so that's taken care of. We had all kinds of empty boxes, old chairs and bags of old clothes in there, plus my old monitor, so we put the boxes in the crawlspace under the house (we're saving them to use for moving) and put everything else out by the curb by the trash cans. Everything except one chair and one piece of wood was gone by this morning! I hope whoever took the clothes can get some use out of them.

Actually, there is one more thing that needs to be done on the house, and that is the side door. It blew open in a storm and cracked/tore the door frame and messed up the door closer. B took the old door closer off and the door is still usable, but it definitely needs to be fixed, so the realtor's husband is supposed to be here any minute to take a look at it. Apparently, he does some carpentry work on the side, so the realtor volunteered to have him come over this afternoon and see what needs to be done to it. Ironically, they live right down the block from us, so it's no big deal.

The realtor intially gave B the name of someone else to take care of the side door, but B has called this guy three times and he keeps saying he'll come over, but for whatever reason he doesn't. Then on top of that, the realtor was late getting here earlier today because of some field trip with her daughter's school, so we were kind of feeling like, hey, what's the problem with you guys? So when she was here, B told the realtor about her guy that won't show up and she felt really bad, especially after she showed up late, so that's partially why she volunteered her husband to come over.

I finally finished a sewing project today that I started a few weeks ago. I had a pair of jeans in my closet that fit me everywhere except the waist, which was too big, so I took the waistband off. Unfortunately, that didn't help because they were still too big around the top, and with the waistband gone there were no beltloops and no way to keep them up. I made the mistake of throwing the waistband away, so I figured that was the end of those jeans, but then I got the idea to take the waistband off another pair of jeans that DO fit around the waist but that are too short and use that.

To make it work, I had to make some little pleats around the top of the pants to make them fit the size of the smaller waistband. I did all this a few weeks ago, but somehow I didn't get it quite right because the waist was still about an inch too big. I've been wearing them anyway, because I've been too lazy to redo the waistband, so today I finally decided to do that and now they're done. It's not the most beautiful sewing job on the inside, because the sewing machine kept getting the thread tangled somehow, but they look fine from the outside. I even used some yellow denim thread, so it all matches. Now I have another pair of jeans I can wear. Yay!

Speaking of jeans and clothes that fit...I don't seem to have gotten any smaller during the past month or two. My swelling is supposed to be down by 90% now, and if that's the case, then I'm pretty disappointed with the results. I'm feeling pretty depressed about it. I'm supposed to see the plastic surgeon one more time in April for my 6-month appointment and I'm hoping that somehow, miraculously I will be much smaller by then. If not, then I'll have to ask, what's the problem here?

I have to admit that I have gained a few pounds since the surgery. How much I've gained, I'm not really sure, but the point is that I was hoping I wouldn't have to diet anymore after having this done. I mean, of course I'm going to gain weight if I go crazy eating all kinds of high-calorie stuff, but I haven't been doing that. For some reason, I gain weight if I eat regularly, and dieting only seems to keep my weight the same, rather than helping me lose.

I suspect that my body is all out of whack because I've been yo-yo dieting my whole adult life. Plus I've got the fibromyalgia stuff, possible thyroid problems and who knows what else going on. Sometimes my body feels 20 or 30 years older than it is. Now I've got a new problem that I'm hoping will go away on its own; for the past couple weeks I've had reflux that just won't go away. I've been taking B's Pril0sec and even that doesn't totally get rid of it. I thought at first that maybe I had a stomach virus or something, and maybe I do, but geez, does something like that last for several weeks? What the heck is going on with me????

�