I’ve never been a trendsetter… I’ve never followed the latest anything, wore the latest fashions… Hell, I didn’t even listen to modern music exclusively all my life, preferring to listen to whatever I was in the mood for at the time. I marched to my own drummer as a band of one. No one followed me, admired me or wanted to be anything like me. I was the weirdo… I was the girl who was born into the wrong era, misplaced in time. It was as if I lived in another era within the current one, always. Oh, I kept current enough… I have a smart phone (though it took me a long time to make the switch to one without a slide out keyboard), I have BlueTooth speakers, a BlueRay player, I finally got rid of cable and stream the things I watch, I have an Apple Watch now instead of a traditional one (though I still have a traditional one), I have a newer car with a touch screen stereo… I’m not totally behind the times. I stay current enough, but I keep myself retro enough that I still live in that other era. I am, by no means, a trendsetter… Never have been and, as far as I know, I never will be. Especially at my age… I’ll be– um– old enough to know better in a few weeks. Old farts don’t become trendsetters, end of story…

I had some appointments earlier this week (and goody, I get to go for more tests) and, since it was such a nice day, I decided to slap on a little makeup and wear one of my favorite t-shirts, my faithful bell bottom jeans and my brown faux leather boat shoes. I can’t tell you how many compliments I got on this outfit (shown here)… I literally just threw clothes on and people go out of their way to tell me how much they love my outfit… I get not a word when I put time into what I wear, mind you, haha! The irony… I get a lot of compliments on my jewelry, too. Everyone wants to see it, tells me how much they love it, that they love how I stack my rings… I’ve had people compliment my coats, my retro look, my hats… If they only knew I’ve been wearing my hats because my hair is getting a bit thin because of my health issues and that’s why I’m wearing them… But I think I pull them off well. Either way, I’m not doing anything special and I’m getting all this attention and it’s just fucking weird and a foreign concept to me. I don’t like it and I wish it would stop, I really do…

I also seem to be getting people to jump on another bandwagon… I’ve been taking one of my needlepoint kits with me (my sunflower one, it has less colors) when I go to appointments to have something constructive to do. Ive had so many people approach me to tell me they haven’t seen anyone do needlepoint in a long time, they ask to see what I’m working on, ask where I’m finding the kits (Amazon, of course)… It seems there are a lot of people who would like to take up needlepoint because they, too, hate any kind of cross stitch like me. But I don’t think the thought really crossed their minds too terribly much until they saw me working on one. That was when they suddenly got the desire to start looking for needlepoint kits and start going crazy sewing one. Of course they’re still not easy to find. Needlepoint is becoming a dead craft. I’m hoping to bring it back because I really hate cross stitch with a passion.

One of my appointments this week was to see the GI doctor… I actually got to see the doctor this time, for the first time in a fucking year! The rest of the time I’d been seeing whatever twelve year old that got her degree to be a nurse practitioner from a Happy Meal… I thought maybe the doctor would listen, give better advice, do something to help me… Nope, I still got the , “It’s your IBS,” shit… His grand master plan to make me feel better? It’s to follow this diet here. So you eat all the foods in the “do” list until you feel better, then add foods from the other lists, one at a time, to see which ones trigger you and put them on your “don’t” list. The problem is, the first night I ate dinner with nothing but stuff from the “do” list and I got so fucking sick… So much for the elimination diet. I can’t even eat from the “do” list without getting sick! But this is his solution and I’m fucking done with it. I got the name of a really good doctor, so I’ll be going for a second opinion I shouldn’t have to live in abject misery the rest of my life because the doctor is an idiot…

But the week did come with a joyous occasion… My marshmallow, Sebastian, turned 14 this week!

You know, it’s hard to imagine that he’s 14… A little over six years ago, I wasn’t sure he was going to be here to see 8… When he began having trouble with bladder blockages and I did some research, it looked grim. And in the short span of just a few days, I was faced with a grim reality. If I wanted to save his life, he needed PU surgery. In essence, they cut his little knob off and rerouted his urethra to give it a larger opening. I had to borrow the two thousand it cost from my sister, braved the beginning of what was to be a horrendous snow storm and drove him to the vet with no idea whether or not he’d even survive the surgery. But I knew if I didn’t do anything, he’d die a horrible death at home. I did what I had to do… He was just shy of his 8th birthday, he had a lot of years left. He wasn’t ready to go yet.

The aftermath was a disaster… But he pulled through and has made it six years so far! I don’t know how much longer he has left, but however long it is, I’m letting him decide. He’s been through so much already… At this point, it’s his call when he’s ready to go. But, until then, I plan to make a fuss over every birthday he’s here to celebrate. He’s earned that.

Speaking of… I have a birthday coming up very soon. And, I assume to remind me of that, my sister (who is five years my senior) sent me this in a text… I actually did get this, which I assume anyone who watched Hogan’s Heroes would get it even if they weren’t old. And don’t get me started on those absolute shit new Star Trek movies and what a joke they are… I was just flipping shit about how horrible they were a day or two before she sent this to me (how weird is that). But old as this made me feel, it’s okay… Her birthday is exactly a month after mine and you can be sure I’ll return the favor and send her something that will make her feel even older. Even if I don’t, I’ll irritate her by doing my normal thing and sending her the video for the song “Happy Birthday” by Altered Images. It was made in the early 80s, which makes her feel old, and she hates the fact that it gets stuck in her head all day long just by seeing the title of it. She hates that song! I’ll have my revenge for her making me feel old, haha!

So what was the point to all this…? I guess just that, no matter how ld you are, apparently you can find your groove even if you never found it before and you can be a trendsetter even when people thought you dressed like you bought all your clothing at the worst thrift stores before that. But who cares… Do your own thing, be you and, if people compliment you, figure out how to take it as one. I have trouble with that part, but I’m working on it…

And buy these mints! If you love strawberry flavor, you need these mints! Oh my god… I could literally eat the entire tin in one shot if I didn’t stop myself, they’re that good! I bought them on a whim because they sounded good and I don’t think I ever want another mint in my purse! So if you’re going to do one thing for yourself today, go buy these! You’ll be glad you did!