Wicked Weekend Birthday Bonanza

Today, November 8th, 2008, I am 51 years old. It’s my birthday. What am I doing today? Hopefully, next to nothing. I have chronic migraine issues and have had since I was 12 years old. I have many triggers, depending on my body’s fluctuating chemistry – but among the triggers are stress, lack of sleep, MSG (big one here), chocolate (bummers), alcohol (double bummers), nitrates, and hormone fluctuations. The biggest trigger is neck problems. Back in the day, when I used to tell the doctors (and I’ve been to dozens over the decades) that most of my migraines are preceded by horrible neck pain, the doctors scoffed at me and told me how all the studies have shown that these two things are unrelated. Fast forward thirty odd years and when they did a bone scan to see if my breast cancer had metastasized, low and behold, turns out I have major arthritis and compacted discs in my neck. My physical therapist, who is amazing, tells me that many of the migraine patients he has have neck triggers. Hmm. Go figure.

So, anywhos, I have been suffering with a neck ache from hell and a migraine that, apparently, is immune to Imitrix since Wednesday. I went to work every day on meds since the students were finishing up a big project and I couldn’t imagine leaving my team colleagues with a sub.

Today the headache is gone, but my neck is sore. So I plan on napping and relaxing and not going out at all. When my daughter gets home from work she is going to make us some lunch and we are going to hang out and do nothing, except maybe pedicures and movie watching.

To mix things up a bit and take an old bag’s idea of a walk on the wild side, I thought I’d try a contest AND, OMG, post a picture of myself. I am Pseudo because I want to write freely and not have to worry about what admin and parents would think. But so far, no one from Hawaii reads this blog. And so far I haven’t written anything that I think is too bombastic and controversial. And OK, it’s not much of a picture because it is not recent, so I’m not being all that out there.

So here goes. This picture was taken 11 years ago when I went to Maui with a group of friends. These friends are all women I met the first year I moved to Hawaii as we all worked together and in this picture we had been friends for 15 years already; as of today they are all still my closest and dearest friends and we have now known each other 26 years. There’s a couple more in our gang who did not make the trip that year. I have to say that I don’t look a lot like I did 11 years ago, so I am playing it somewhat safe. I am 11 years older, 15 pounds heavier, and my hair (growing out from the bald chemo state) is shorter, thicker, and curlier.
Here’s the game. Guess which one is me. All those who guess correctly will be put in a tumble and the winner will get to select a hardback from this selection from my library. The post comes down Sunday 8 PM Hawaii time and I’ll announce the winner.

And in case anyone who knows me does read this blog, please don’t out me with my real name. And now I'm off for my first birthday nap.