About a month ago, Blogger stopped sending comment emails which was pretty much like... the worst thing ever. I started using Disqus in the interim, but I won't lie.. I didn't love it. I missed the emails coming directly to me and I felt like responding through emails was much more personal and encouraged more interaction.
Recently, I came across directions for how to fix it... and I tried it... AND IT WORKED!!!
Here's what you do:
1. From the main blogger page, click on Settings in the left menu.
2. Click on Email when the level expands.
3. In the Comment Notification Email box, delete whatever email address is there.
4. CLICK SAVE in the top right corner.
5. In the Comment Notification Email box, type in whatever email address you'd like to receive comments at.
5. Click Save in the top right corner.
If you're like me, you'll want to test it by putting a comment on one of your posts, but I had zero issues and the email came in right away, just like it used to. There was a note about some comments going to spam folders, so be aware of that.
But can we get a FUCK YAAASSSSS for this issue being moderately resolved?
-I created a book list for Erin'sBook Challenge. She has left the blogging world due to IRL demands, but she's so devoted to the challenge that she still uses a spiral notebook and handwritten notes to keep track of her participants. Is that devotion or what? I'm not participating in the challenge to win, but to give my reading some direction. And by direction... I mean that 50% of my selections are some type of historical fiction. I may have a type. 3 of them at WW2 themed.
I cannot think of a more fitting time to use a Capt. America gif than after talking about WW2 historical fiction.
#GifinLikeABoss
-Holy fucking hot flashes. Tuesday morning I had blood drawn for testing to see if they can find out what is going on. I've never prayed for something to be really wrong with me, but I am right now. Mostly so we can correct the issue and this shit will get under control. It starts with a tingling in my face and spreads to the rest of my body. Sometimes, I'm almost certain that my upper thighs are going to leave sweat marks on my clothes.. I have stopped drying my hair and it's rarely down anymore because... hot flashes.
Of course, you can always find something wrong with you if you look up disorders/diseases on the internet, but if I did have some type of thyroid deficiency, it would explain the forgetfulness that I experienced during the spring semester. When I told this to Teh German, he told me to stop looking up medical shit on the internet. At least I did find anything that said I was going to die... from hot flashes.
I did, of course, mention my endometriosis history to my doc. She doesn't seem to think that has anything to do with it.. we'll see.
-When I went to my pew pew lazzzorrrs appt this week, I asked the anesthetist if she knew anything about HS (Hidradenitis suppurativa) or what I call my BJB (big junk bump) and she said yes. I asked if laser treatment would help with the issue and she said most likely. She has had other patients with HS in their armpit and groin areas who have had treatment done and showed positive results. She was awesome and did a zap of the area to test if I have any change and told me she'd leave available time at my next appointment if I want to go ahead and start laser treatment in that area.
-I came home after lunch and teleworked on Monday and accomplished the task of Preggers McGee's baby shower invites. They got printed, cut, stuffed, stamped, and mailed. BOOM.
-Finished that 2000 piece puzzle that has been taking up my dining room table. Once I figured out HOW to best go about doing the puzzle, it went much faster. I had to identify pieces from the box and put them in a pile with other pieces nearby (so I had character piles). Once I had a big enough pile, I would puzzle it out and then place the chunk inside the frame where it should go.
-I wrote a very personal post this week but it's under review. 1- I wanted to get Teh German's permission to post it, since it is personal. 2- I want to decide if IIII want to post something that personal. As I explained to him, I don't just share all the good things that happen, but also the bad shit too. I appreciate transparency and sharing the ugly is a huge part of that. Not every day is a good day. I don't ever want to be someone who is thought of as someone who only posts the good shit (my cute dogs and our awesome weekends and fun adventures). Also, I feel like sharing the ugly makes people feel less alone. I know I'm not the only one with this particular struggle, so not only do I want to make people feel comfortable enough to say, "Me too!" but also to help them realize they are not alone.
-We went and tried 9 Rounds yesterday. Turns out, I love punching shit. We're going to sign up.
ZWEI - Money Shit
Groceries from Sam's
Groceries from Bilo
Groceries from Walmart
McDonald's for breakfast after fasting until 0930. FML
Doctor's office copay
Shutterfly (had a free pages sale, #notsorry)
$30 for a $5 toll. FML and F California.
New Birkenstock sandals
and I'm planning on buying a 2nd pair on the 8th when the store is redeeming rewards (I earned $20 towards a purchase, and well.. who passes up that gift?)
I was really good this week. Ooooh, that's probably because summer school is about to start and I'm probably going to have to spend some ridiculous amount of money on overpriced textbooks or web access codes.
DREI - From My Phone Shit
How do billboards talk?
Sign language.
Tuna salad burrito wrap with potato salad.
I forgot to put my cheese in my wrap, sooooo this happened.
LOOOOOOL
In his defense, I do make some jammin' tuna salad.
New sandals and a cute outfit.
She totally called me out on taking a selfie.
VIER - From the Internet Shit
In "I hate everyone" news.... another rapist got a slap on the wrist this week. WTF is wrong with judges these days? And FYI, third-degree sexual assault is when you are over the age of 18 and your victim is between 14 and 16, so TEENAGE VICTIMS.
FÜNF - Things that made me happy this week
Punching shit.
DOING WORK. Yes, really.
Communicating effectively enough.
Gettin' my hairs did.
Walking in the AMs
Teh German ensuring that I have coffee each morning.
Responding to whiny bitches on the neighborhood FB page and telling them nicely to STFU.
Shutterfly saving my projects and being able to easily reorder our wedding photobook.
Planning on going to the Jewish Deli and Willie Jewell's this weekend. Yep, just planning it makes me happy.
Teh German being down for simple/easy dinners this week.
Some of the underwater photos have been edited for color correction. Some haven't. Some of the photos were corrupt which meant that time I had spent editing was wasted. You get what you get around these parts. There are still some pretty cool photos here.
It didn't really matter that I was jet lagged AF, I was wide-awake at 0430 and there was nothing I could do about that. So I perused social media until about 0515 and finally went back to sleep. Around 0745 we got up for breakfast. I found a place that served waffles on Yelp and we walked out to explore/get breakfast.
We split sweet and savory entrees.
#BestTeam4Ever
After a delightful breakfast, we walked back to our hotel, shuffled the stuff inside the suitcases around for our dive trip and got ready for the day. Around 11, we summoned an Uber to take us to the dive office, where we checked in, dropped off our bags, and then proceeded to kill time walking around Cairns.
We checked out several souvenir places, as I was on the hunt for kangaroo testicle bottle openers. We also stopped in Woolworth since I lurve walking through grocery stores in other countries. I like to see what is the same and what is different. We walked the esplanade, which was a water area that was at the shore, but wasn't the ocean. It was pretty cool. We learned that there is a serious jelly fish problem in Cairns, thus ocean swimming wasn't encouraged, thus the esplanade. We finally decided to grab a snack at a Bavarian beer garden where I HAD A BEER. I know, pick your mouth up from the floor. It was a radler, so it was really half beer, half sprite, but that's the way I can drink it.. sooooo that's what I did. After the beer garden we checked out a few miscellaneous chain shops (Billabong, etc) and we passed by a sign that advertised a massage place. We had seen several of these signs, but I figured why the fuck not? I asked Teh German if he was interested and explained that we had the perfect amount of time to get a massage and he agreed. After our massage, he said, "That was a really good idea, Babe." Why thank you, I'm here for forever.
There was a giraffe watching us while we drank our coffee.
This Stingrays fan had to get a pic with the stingray.
This is us.
I drank the whole thing!
After our massages, we headed towards the location where we were meeting the dive group for dinner before boarding. We walked the boardwalk where the restaurant was, stopping for me to take photos. Tired of walking around, we headed to the restaurant and hung out for a bit since we were early. Eventually, it was finally time for our meet up (4:30) and we noticed a man with a Mike Ball Dive Adventures shirt on and other people gathered around him. We had found our people. The man with the Mike Ball shirt on was, in fact, Mike Ball. Cool. Then he insisted on putting my name tag on my chest for me. Not cool.
We ordered dinner while we were getting briefed about our trip. Sadly, my food came out waaayyy too spicy for me to eat and Teh German had ordered a spicy meal, so there was no trading. Feeling like an epic douche, I brought my bowl up to the counter and explained that my food was too spicy for me to eat and I hadn't realized when I ordered it that the meal would be spicy. The lady dismissed my apologies and told me it was no worries they'd remake it for me with no spice. I still felt like an asshole. Eventually, my remade meal came back out and I was able to eat it. Thank God.
Mike Ball turned out to be super nice, but kinda all over the place, which really had me worried that he was going to be going on our trip and leading dives. Turns out, that was was not the case, and I was greatly relieved. After our briefing and dinner, we walked the boardwalk to the ship. Before we boarded, we received our room assignments, then we boarded to check and see that all of our luggage made it to the ship.
After a check, we headed to the "living room" to wait for our boat safety brief. After our brief and meeting the crew, we went back to our room and unpacked then went back upstairs to hang out. When we arrived back upstairs, the boat coordinator asked if we wanted to upgrade our room (from a room with bunk beds to a room with 2 unstacked twin beds and a window for $100 each). Teh German and I agreed that we would like to switch so no one had to sleep in the top rack. After we notified the coordinator, we moved all our shit and went back upstairs to hang out for a little while longer.
By 8, I was done though, and we headed to bed.
PS. The room switch was totally worth it because we had such rough seas the entire trip that those who were in the top bunk complained that they were unable to sleep because they kept thinking they were going to get rocked out of the bed.
Our room from the door.
Teh German's bed was on the right.
My bed.
Bathroom, where a lot of magic balancing acts took place due to the motion of the ocean, literally.
As this was our first live aboard trip, we had no idea what we were in for. We were just going to go with the flow. At 0630, our dive trip coordinator went through the halls "singing" his notorious "WAKEEEYYYYY WAAAKKKKEEEYYY". Yep, that was our wake up call. We woke up and headed up to the galley and had breakfast. After breakfast we had our first dive briefing.
Since Teh German had never done an ocean dive before, he had to do an orientation dive with a dive master/instructor, and that was ok with me. It really helped ease us into being actual dive partners. The first dive is always overwhelming because you don't really know what to expect and it's all new.
We came up after our first dive and were like school kids, super gleeful and excited. After everyone surfaced, the boat moved to another reef and we did our first dive on our own without supervision. This was also mildly stressful for us because we're both control freaks and there is no way to effectively communicate under the water (since we didn't wear the arm slates I bought specifically for this trip, for that reason). Nonetheless, we made it work. After our 2 morning dives, it was lunch time. During lunch, we relocated, and after lunch we did an evening dive, then took a nap. There was an option a night dive at the evening dive location, but we didn't go down since the water was extremely choppy and we assumed there would be a serious current. There wasn't. Oh well. Dinner was at 8, and after dinner, we collapsed into bed, completely exhausted.
0630 wake up with the fabulous song. We had a light breakfast, where I got to treat myself to hot tea with a splash of milk and a bit of sugar (a lovely overseas habit I have in place of drinking sweet tea) and cereal. After breakfast, we had our dive brief and went on a morning dive.
As is my standard, I'm always the one with issues. After we had surfaced and were making our way to the boat, I started to feel something odd on my forehead and my cheek... AND THEN IMMEDIATELY I WAS SCREAMING. A jellyfish had discovered land!... in the form of my face. I'm screaming that there is a jellyfish on my face and they can't really understand because there's waves splashing in my face and I'm pawing at my face trying to rub it off (of course, this makes my hands start to burn). One of the staff jumps in to assist me and get the jelly off my face. We are both slamming up against the back of the boat.
In my head I'm telling myself I need to be calm because I need to help them help me, but an ocean critter was stabbing my face with needles and it fucking hurt. I did stop yelling and tried to be still, but the waves were really giving us a thrashing. They claimed the jelly was off my face, but I couldn't tell because it hurt soooo bad. They eventually got me out of my BCD and lifted out of the water. I sat down and the dive coordinator sprayed my face with vinegar to help ease the stinging. It was everything you could imagine.
I had been stung across my forehead and on my left cheek. I also had stings on my hands from trying to wipe the jelly off my face. #ThisIsMyLife Fortunately, there was a doctor on board who had some sting gel, which she gave me. I applied it liberally all over my face and hands. I looked like Fiona from Shrek.
Fiona!
I took some benedryl at 2nd breakfast, knowing I would need a nap after. Rather than get in 2 dives at the same site, we agreed to relax in our room (so I could nap) and then we'd go down towards the end of the dive window. It was a good plan. When I woke up, I felt better and not as wiped out. We changed back into our swim suits and geared up and headed down. I think we were both super skeptical about coming up and getting out again, but our dive went without incident, thankfully.
After changing out of our suits, we had some screen time (I was reading, Teh German was probably gaming). In the afternoon we had another dive without incident. There was a laziness break, and then we went on the night dive at the same site as our afternoon dive. It was Teh German's first night dive, so we went with a group. We saw some pretty awesome things. Moray eels, sleeping sea turtles, fishiessssssssss, etc. I think Teh German had been worried about doing a night dive, but after, he was super pumped that he had gone. Hearing Teh German's excitement when he talked with other divers about the stuff we'd seen was pretty cute.
I often take some of my experiences for granted, so it's nice to see the excitement of a beginner and remind myself how cool some of the shit I do actually is.
After changing out of our wet swim stuff, we headed to the common area for dinner. I introduced the crew to Mezzo Mix (Coke + Fanta) and then dinner was served. After dinner, we headed back to the room to relax. I listened to some audiobook while playing on my Kindle and then it was sleepy time.
Sunday was our last day of dives. I won't lie, I was exhausted. Wakey wakey was at 0630, as usual. We had tea and cereal before heading to our dive brief. Our morning dive was super peaceful and Teh German and I agreed that starting the morning out under the water was a pleasant way to wake up. After 2nd breakfast we made the honeymoon official... with another nap.
We woke up from our nap for a pre-lunch dive. After our dive, we rinsed, then checked out the ship store and purchased some Mike Ball shirts (of course, I bought a shirt, who do you think I am?). After some down time on the upper deck, it was time for our final dive brief of the trip.
After our afternoon dive, which had to be completed before 4pm since we were flying the following day, we brought our gear to the top deck to dry, showered (as in, I actually washed my hair, in showers prior, I had just been putting conditioner in my hair and not rinsing it out (boo salt water, yall)), and went to hang out in the common areas. Because it was our final night onboard, the crew was doing a special BBQ dinner with karaoke, which I actually participated in because everyone else was acting like pussies. My song was "Take Me Home, Country Roads" because I knew the song, the "DJ" had the song on his phone, and the lyrics were one of 15 songs they had printed.. and with no mobile data... entertainment options were limited. I should have just sang Hello by Adele acapella, lol.
Shrimp on the barbie.
I didn't have a luau shirt, so Minnie had to make an appearance.
Dinner took FORRREEEVVVVEERRRR to prepare. Seriously. We didn't eat until after 8:30 and we were all getting pretty hangry and willing to go to bed hungry. After dinner, they wanted to show us pictures that the photographer had taken and the winners of the photo "contest" and the trip video. It was after 10 when I gave it up. I didn't care anymore and all I wanted to do was go to bed. It was after 10:30 when we finally made it to our cabin for sleeps and I practically fell into the bed.
Monday I woke up with a horrible headache and serious nausea. I medicated and begged Teh German to put me out of my misery. He refused. Rude. I finally got out of bed, knowing that I was pushing my time limits, vomited, brushed my teeth, and went and laid back in bed. I watched Teh German throw our dirty laundry in the suitcase and IDGAF as long as it fit. I'd reorganize it later after we were off the boat and not rocking around while I was feeling nauseous.
We went upstairs for breakfast. After breakfast was group photos, then we took a dinghy ride to Lizard Island from the ship. I was in just the perfect spot that I took 95% of the water that was splashed up and was pretty much soaked on my left side. We had to wait on our air taxi (plane), so I walked down the beach taking photos. Eventually, we had to head to the airstrip, by foot, so I packed up my camera and we all migrated to the "airport", which was a covered seated area equipped with 2 snakes in the rafters. While we waited, I took a nap since I was still feeling like a bag of ass.
Our plane finally arrived. Teh German was able to sit in the co-pilot seat, which was awesome since he's always dreamed of being a pilot. I sat behind the pilot and took a mabillionty photos of the Great Barrier Reef as we flew over at 500 feet. When we landed in Cairns, the driver returned us to the Mike Ball office where we were reunited with the luggage we left behind since we didn't need it on the ship and space was limited.
Before we did anything, I fished out some dry clothes and found a public bathroom to go change out of my wet clothing. Dry again, after 3 hours of being wet, we fetched a coffee, then had to have the Mike Ball office call a taxi for us to get back to the airport. /facepalm. Had I realized we could have had them meet us at the airport with our luggage, I would have opted for that....
We opted to go to the airport 5 hours early so we could relax for 5 hours with wifi instead of poking around town and then going to airport 2 hours before. When we got to the airport, I rearranged the stuff in our luggage to be the proper weights so we could check in. The lady checking us in was very impressed with our precise weights. That luggage scale was seriously one of the best investments of the trip. Time and frustration saved!
While we were loading on the plane, we noticed 4 people from our dive trip, one of whom was across the aisle from us, which was a funny coincidence. When we arrived in Sydney, we made it through the airport and took an Uber to what I thought was our AirBnB. Turns out, of the 2 options for the building number, our driver had picked wrong. We were at 52 and we needed to be at 361. I ended up hailing another cab who drove us down the street to our actual destination.
It was another one of those, "will I be divorced tomorrow?" moments.
It was one of those, "I cannot deal with your drama AND this problem right now" moments.
It was also one of those, "I've never done this before, how should I have known" moments.
Once we made it to the correct building, the instructions from the AirBnB host made sooo much more sense and we were able to get inside without further issues. When we arrived inside, we unpacked, I sorted the dirty laundry that needed to be washed, started the laundry, and then we went the fuck to bed.
