September 10, 2007

• No surgery for me. Yay! The ENT said that I have plenty of room to breath, there’s no polyps, though one of my turbinates is blue. Blue?  The infection seems to be under control or gone and now all I need to do is go see an allergist. Once I have the allergy testing done we can figure out a way to get my (apparent) allergic rhinitis under control.  It’s a lot like having the flu for three months, thankfully without throwing up on top of all the rest.  But it looks like the end is in sight and just getting rid of the infection has helped my energy level soar.  Like I said yay!

  Yesterday was my 2 year anniversary!  As of yesterday I have NOT smoked over 25,000 cigarettes. Yes you read that right, if I still smoked as much as I used to…. in 2 years it is over 25,000 cigarettes and over 4,000 dollars. And that’s the price from when I quit not current price which I’m sure has gone up in the past 2 years.  Sin taxes and all. If your quitting or you have been quit for a while and want to know where your stats are here’s an easy way to find out.  http://www.quitmeter.com/index.php  You type in your quit date how much you smoke or smoked per day and how much your price per pack is, hit calculate and it will tell you down to the second and the cent how long and how much. Between me and Bear man together we have not spent over 7000 dollars on cigarettes. Quite the little savings.  In case your wondering if we really have put that into saving??? Well sort of, I stash away a little money every day, I call it my quit money, then I spend it.  We went to Rome for three days on our 24th anniversary, that was the first big thing. Then I started saving it again and me and my daughter Allie took that week long trip to Ireland where she met her honey Brian. And then as you all know I took my youngest daughter Emily to Paris for three days. Now I know if we didn’t live so close we wouldn’t be able to do all that on that amount of money but we fly cattle air (ryanair link, go play.) and I bargain for cheap hotel rooms and we don’t eat at 4 star restaurants. So that’s what I’ve done with our “saving”.  Believe me I like that better than being a slave to an addiction.  Even though I haven’t saved a penny of money.  The trick is not touching the money no matter how bad you want to and then actually spending it on what you set out to, sounds easier than it is in reality.  

  First cigarette money trip

  One of those places that everyone needs to see at least once. Even if you have to take a second mortgage.  We went for our anniversary but we landed in Rome the day before my birthday. Which that year fell on Good Friday. Not being Catholic we didn’t think about the implications of being in Rome over Easter weekend on the one year anniversary of Pope John-Paul II death.  The crowds were horrendous as was the heat but even with that, both of us still look at the pictures and say we need to go back and see more.  And there is ALWAYS more to see. Rome has more culture and history laying on the ground than most places have in museums. 

  On our 24th annie.

   

   

  This was the second cigarette trip.  July 2006

  Bear let me take Allison to Ireland and roam around.  Little did I know that Allie and Brian would fall for each other in less than a week. See what happens when you put two singletons in a car for a week They get bored and start plotting.  I could see they had a thing for each other pretty quickly but I really had no idea the depth of their feelings.  Here it is a year and some months later and now they are engaged and Allie lives in Galway with her Irish soul mate. See those Irish eyes a smilin’?  They laughed all week and have been laughing ever since.  If nothing else came of coming over here to live and work in Germany this one thing makes it all worth while. there is nothing in the world like seeing your children content. Brian and American Allie are perfect for each other and we never would have known if I hadn’t quit smoking….funny when you think about it like that.

   

   

  Ah, gay Paree…..

  Is it even possible to talk about Paris without falling into paroxysms of cliches?

  I know of one cliche that we never saw or met.  We were there for 3night/4days and never saw or talked to one rude Parisian.  Every single person we met or talked to was not only friendly and helpful but they were polite and thrilled that we loved Paris as much as we all did.  I looked and listened to people all around us and I’m telling you that cliche about rude Paris is way overstated. Katie said “you get back what you put out” and maybe that’s true.  I find I love the Parisians as much as I loved Paris and really isn’t that the way it should be?  I’ve never been to New York city I wonder if I would find that there?

  By the way driving in Paris is crazy, I had less trouble driving on the wrong side of the road on the wrong side of the car in Ireland than I did helping Mike navigate around Paris, traffic is insane.  But what a thrill to be able to say you drove all over Paris.

   

  I now have 4 friends trying to quit smoking, all 4 live stateside so I know that in 2 years you can’t save enough money to do those three trips but it certainly won’t hurt to make a goal and try to save for that.  I saved a dollar a day at first then 2 and I did my best not to ever touch it unless it was to put in the bank.  I know I never came close to putting away all the money I smoked in the last 30 years but i’m trying to make up for that in a better quality of life….rofl  I’m with you* in spirit.

   

  *read the linked blog, it says more succintly and honestly what a smoker thinks and feels than anything i’ve read in a long time.

  • 6:15 am
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