Five for Friday, Edition #22

Warning: Number 1 is gross. Frankly, number 3 is kind of gross. Maybe this is a gross post.

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1) In the March What I Spent post, I mentioned that at Hannah's annual exam, we had a couple of her bumps and lumps examined. One was on her haunch and it had grown pretty quickly in the last few months, but it didn't seem to irritate her. The vet basically said it was the equivalent of cystic acne and if it didn't bother her, just leave it alone. 

Well, that went well until we woke up one morning to find that she had BIT IT OPEN. WITH HER TEETH. BIT IT OPEN WITH HER TEETH. Egads. So we put on her Thunder Shirt to keep her from poking it at it while we went to work because we had no other solution. When I came home, it was clear that the Thunder Shirt had not accomplished this goal. I put on some gloves and squeezed all the pus and blood (THE SMELL) out and cleaned it and then we went to the pet store where we bought a cone of shame. She's now coned up when we can't watch her because it's going to drive her crazy as it scabs over and heals up. 

It's no big deal, I don't think. As long as we can keep it from getting infected, it's going to be fine.

On the good news front, we have switched her to a new probiotic and it seems to have relieved a lot of her post-dinner tummy woes. I am so pleased with this and hope that it keeps up. 

2) Look at all the snail mail from my friends! I love how happy my mailbox has been recently. 

3) Feminine hygiene discussion alert. I am a woman who menstruates. I use a combo of pantyliners and tampons. I recently purchased a giant box of Tampax tampons (with plastic applicators) from Costco. For those of you who don't use tampons, let me set the scene for you. The kind I have purchased looks like the one in blue below. You basically insert the plastic applicator up your vagina and remove the plastic part, leaving the cotton in your body to absorb fluid. 

The problem is that in this box of tampons, maybe one-quarter to one-third of them have something WRONG with the applicator. I had one where one of the plastic teeth was bent at a 90 degree angle. I had another where it looked like a saw had been taken to the smooth round end. I had another where there was no plunger part to the applicator. 

I am terrified to use them. That is all. 

4) Last Friday night, Dr. BB and I went to an exhibit opening at the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art because one of our friend's art was chosen to be displayed. Date night for May accomplished on the second day of the month! Woot woot! The exhibit was fabulous and I instantly followed a couple new artists on Instagram. Oh, and there was another amazing exhibit by an artist named José Lerma where he painted these amazing faces with layers of thick of acrylic, so when you're standing right by the image, it's hard to see what it is, but as you move further and further away, it turns into an obvious face. If you're in Madison anytime soon, the exhibits at the MMOCA are amazing right now and admission to the museum is free. 

While there we chatted with my friend and his wife and congratulated them on how all his hard work is paying off. We also met up with a couple of other folks from our town who were there. As we were talking, the conversation kept veering towards the nasty news of the day. And guess who kept trying to veer the conversation towards happier, most positive things?

IT WAS ME.

My friend's wife even asked if I had turned over a new stone and I was a bit surprised when my husband piped up and said, "it took a second Trump term for her to become an optimist."

I'm trying so hard, friends. I could easily doomscroll and worry that my Canadian friends think I'm a terrible American and that if I travel outside of the US I won't be allowed back in, worry about stateless American children who are getting deported without due process, worry about war, poverty, and abuse, worry about my mother's health situation, worry that Hannah will eventually learn that I am not the coolest person in the world, worry about what is going to happen to this next generation of children who will not have jobs and won't ever learn how to read or write thanks to AI. I could.

But instead I focus on what's in front of me. Who can I help today? What can I dance to? How can I make someone laugh? Whose accomplishments can I celebrate? 

I worry about toxic positivity and I promise I won't ever be one of those people. But I am going to do my best to keep it as light as I can when I can.

5) On that positive note, on Sunday evening I washed all the winter clothes and put them away for the season. We changed from flannel sheets to regular cotton ones. I put Hannah's boots in the hall tree. I have worn sandals every day this week even though it has still been in the 40s in the morning. Temps are supposed to get in the 80s today and stay that way into next week. It is full sunlight when I walk Hannah in the morning and the sunset is after 8pm. SO MUCH SUNLIGHT.

Cold weather season is over!!!!

AND! There is stuff on the calendar that I am looking forward to. I have 20 hours of leave I need to use before July and I took off the day after Memorial Day and a random day in May. AND! Bestest Friend and I bought plane tickets for a long weekend together in July. 

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Is cold season over for you? Are you as pumped as I am for the warmer weather? Do you have gross stories you'd like to share with me? Do you have anything on the calendar to look forward to?