Allergies are horrible, but friends make them so much easier to deal with!!!

Friday am, I woke up to find I had no voice...none, zip, zilch, nada! I coughed and hacked for 20 minutes just to get enough of a squeak so I could call in to work. Basically, I still felt fine, but this throat thing was really worrying me.

After reading online, the symptoms sounded exactly like strep, and I didn't want to take it to work with me.

When Mot got home, he called the doctor's office for me to set up an appt.

In my appointment that afternoon....they did blood work and strep tests. You know the one? Where the stick that really long Q-tip hallway down your throat. Ugh!!!

Anyway.....it wasn't strep, thank goodness. No, it was a viral infection of the vocal cords. I was supposed to be traveling to Des Moines to participate in a breast cancer run...and didn't want to infect the house I was staying in. When I asked her if I was contagious, this is what she told me.

"As long as you aren't sharing spoons, and wiping your vocal cords on people, you will be fine."

She's a cool doc...you want her to be your doctor now, don't you??? :-)

So, with most of the afternoon gone, I decided I didn't really want to go in to work for 2 hours, and I may we well get ready to head out.



The drive to Des Moines was nice. It was raining off and on the whole way, and the clouds looked like spring weather threatening tornadoes. I tried to take a pic, but it just didn't capture the creepiness of the sky. :-)

Once in Des Moines...Mel, Sheila and I ran to Wally World to drop of Sheila's car for a tire repair, went to Panchero's for dinner (burritos as big as your head), then back to Wally World for groceries and to pick up the car.

They really shouldn't let us loose in this store alone. I keep saying it, and they keep letting us in. :-)

We left with groceries and a Halloween gingerbread house kit. I got a red scarf and a red Mad Bomber/Elmer Fudd Hat.



Between my donald duck voice and Sheila's over-caffeinated state....people were looking at us. (probably didn't help that I was wearing my red scarf and hat while walking through the store)

Saturday

Mel and I left the house about 7:30 or so the next morning, to go to the run. (my voice was better, but my nose had started to run....allergies, man I hate them!!!)

She had to take me to her favorite muffin place, for chocolate (cream cheese filled) muffins. We thought better of eating them before the walk though. :-)



From what I'm told, roughly 22,000 people were in attendance at the walk/run this year.



Including people in pink tutus. :-)



So many people in fact, that we were neither walking, nor running. We were inching along as if waiting in line at the DMV.



Our walking with the crowd lasted all of 30 minutes = 1/2 a mile, if that!!! Mel and I (who both love crowds more than life itself - ha!) decided to break away.

No, we didn't take off running the route, no we didn't weazel our way through the crowd to an open place.

We merely didn't turn, when the course did. We kept walking straight....right down to the farmer's market actually.



Mel took me to her favorite place to eat at the market. I got a crab Rangoon (yummy)...and she got some sort of boiled bread ball...stuffed with veggies and such. I cannot, for the life of me, remember what the darn thing was called. Mel, post a comment with the name, would ya? :-)



After the race, we went to a local grocery store, for supplies we'd forgotten the night before, and meat for making jerky.

Back at their house, Mel and I changed out of our race clothes...then went down to the basement to play some Rockband!!!!

Sheila finished what she had been working on while we were at the race, and came down to see what we were doing. The three of us loaded ourselves into Mel's truck and headed out. Our first destination...lunch!!! Sheila and I were craving protein, so off to Outback we went. The sign on the door says they open at 2:00...it's was 1:30. The doors were open, so Mel went in to check it out. Seems the place was full of people eating. Maybe they meant 2:00 Pacific time?



Our final destination...Sheila's favorite store. I bought a garnet ring, and a green garnet rough stone. (after looking these up later that weekend - I found that they traditioonally have healing properties...specifically to reduce inflammation and help sore throats - funny eh?)



Once back at the house, Mel started slicing the meat we'd bought for jerky, and I got online for seasoning recipes. It actually turned out pretty good. The turkey was a little dry, but we weren't sure how long to leave it on. The beef was perfect.



Mike, their son (who avoided going out with the 'grown ups' most of the weekend) was happy to see us back and joined us on the back deck. Mel was making a fire and checking the status on our jerky.



The Cortez house loves to cook, and this weekend was no exception. Routisserie chicken, corn casserole, garlic mashed potatoes and green beans. I died and went to comfort food heaven!!!!

While the food was cooking, Sheila and I ran out to get a couple of movies to watch. The Eye and 1408. (Mel requested scary movies. We all have a love/hate relationship with horror films.)

We put them in after dinner. Sheila occupied her mind by playing solatair on her iPod, I watched most of the movie through my fingers, and Mel pulled her hoodie up over her head. What a sight we must have been!!!

Mel thinks her basement is creepy...but I've never gotten a bad vibe from it....not once. She walked down there with me after our movies, and we hung out and talked for quite some time.

#1 we were both wide awake
#2 she wanted me to not be spooked
#3 she wanted to not go to bed spooked herself

All valid reasons in my book!!! :-)

Health update: I had, by this time, completely drained one large size box of Kleenex, and had started on another. The voice was pretty good, but the nose WON'T STOP RUNNING. I had actually started carrying a plastic grocery bag around with me...so I didn't have to keep walking to the garbage can every two seconds. How can one nose produce so much crap??? I just don't get it!!!!

The next morning, Mel made her yummy breakfast dish. While she was preparing and cooking it, Sheila and I opened the Halloween gingerbread house kit. I'm not sure how long we worked on it - maybe an hour. The people that did the one on the box cheated....they cheated alot!!! They used actually cake piping tools, they used frosting that didn't smoodge down the sides of their castle. But, all in all, ours didn't look too bad, when it was completed. :-)



After breakfast, I packed up my bag, and drove me and my Kleenex box back to Omaha. There were actually high wind adviseries....and with good reason. If it had been any colder, and any moisture in the air.....there would have been many accidents everywhere. It was crazy windy!! :-)

Once home, I put on comfy clothes, got a plastic grocery sack, my box of kleenex....and laid on the couch the rest of the day. The nose wasn't running as badly...but a cough had developed. That crap in my throat was finally breaking up. Ugh! :-)