Shortly before 4am the next morning, we loaded everything into the car, hugged and kissed the parents goodbye, and we were back on the road to the airport.
We parked the car in the rental lot, dropped off the keys in the after hours drop box, checked our suitcases and put the new ribbon tags on them, and then we were off to security.
There was no line at 5am for security. There were three or four people in front of us, and then we went through with no issues and we were at our gate.
The flights were fine; I slept about 90% of the way from Wilmington to Chicago, and was falling asleep in the gate at Chicago before we boarded our flight home, which I also fell asleep on for a good chunk of the trip. We landed on time in Omaha, if not a little early; we got our luggage, Daisy's parents picked us up as expected, and we were in the house, home, and with our cats before 2pm.
I wish there was more to tell you about the actual travel involved, but there's not. It was supremely efficient and absolutely uneventful.
And suddenly, we had three days to ourselves, off work, to do whatever we wanted.
The cats were fine; they ate like hogs while we were gone and our Catsitter took multiple photos and videos of them playing that she sent to us while we were in North Carolina, and all of them were perfectly happy and content. When we returned, Hank and Emmy were mad that we were gone, but they came around. Dolly, Gary, and Charlie all came running to us when we got into the house. Mable hung back for a bit until she realized she could once more run into my office with me and get all the love in private, away from the eyes of her mama or any of the other cats.
Daisy immediately showered and went to bed, where she's spent the vast majority of the past three days as she is still attempting to recover from the sick, which is still taking a toll on her. I remain feelin' fine and symptom-free, so I have no clue what this sickness is that's knocking her on her ass, but whatever it is, apparently my immune system is doing its job.
Everything is once again as it was. For better or worse, anyway.
I spent the vast majority of the weekend taking care of all of the laundry from the trip. It had all been washed, but because of the pollen and dog dander all over the parents' house in North Carolina, I was taking no chances; I apply a "scorched earth" policy to all of our laundry after returning from a trip -- any trip. I don't care how clean the clothes are or how recently they've been washed before putting them back in the suitcase, everything gets washed anew once we get home. I am slightly obsessive about it. It took two full days of running the washer and dryer day and night to get everything we had fully clean again. Daisy's suitcase was placed into her office, my suitcase was placed back into my own office in its usual spot, where it will be refilled shortly (stay tuned there).
And for the next two days, we rested. Both of us slept whenever we wanted, we ate when we were hungry, we watched TV when we were interested, and generally we finally got some downtime at home with just us and the cats and nothing pressing to do. This was good, because Daisy desperately needed some recovery time, some not-at-work, on-the-couch or in-the-bed recovery time to try to push the sick out of her system.
On Thursday, we ran some light errands and did some grocery shopping. On Friday, we watched some TV and lounged about the house. On Saturday morning, I had my eye appointment that was originally scheduled for before we left, but we couldn't make that work out, so I rescheduled it for the Saturday after we got home.
My eyes are...well, mediocre, I guess. Every year I can feel my prescription getting just a little stronger. I have to remind myself that I'm old now, and that this is likely going to be a thing every year until I die. Since I have diabetes, it is very important to get my vision checked and prescription updated once a year (roughly, anyway; sometimes it can be 15-16 months between appointments just because of how the days fall and how my work schedule is). This year, after a thorough exam, I was told that my eyes look fine, they don't have any macular degeneration or any blood spotting from diabetes, and my prescription was made slightly stronger -- the doctor's words, not mine, because when he compared my current prescription to my new one, everything looked super-high-definition with the new one and blurry with my current one in the tests.
It also turns out that my new vision insurance has a frame allowance that I used all of to get a new pair of glasses directly from the optometrist; normally I don't do this, but they're essentially paid for, so why not use the benefit? I found a pair of browline frames I liked, picked the color I almost always choose (black, of course) and had them write it up. Total cost of the appointment, including my new prescription, with all fancy extra diabetic eye tests conducted and new lenses and frames? $169. The new glasses will arrive there in about two weeks and I'll need to go pick them up when they come in.
I did, of course, immediately come home, go to my normal glasses website, and pick out seven much, much cheaper pairs of glasses (one of those being a pair of transitions sunglasses) and ordered them with the fastest shipping possible. Six of those were frames I've already had and loved over the years, but I will tell you they were not my favorites overall because all of my favorites have been discontinued or retired over the years, including many pairs that I would have immediately reordered with my new prescription were I able to. So that was somewhat frustrating.
But, it's done, and I now have new glasses coming to me from two different places in the next few weeks, and hopefully they will be as HD-vision as the prescription in the office showed me they would be.
Moving onward -- and this is the big news -- we're going back to Canada this summer.
This is probably not a surprise for you folks, as this tends to be the trajectory of our travels almost every year -- we go see my parents and we go to Nova Scotia to see the family. It's what we do.
However, there's more story to it this time around. Daisy's grandmother is, of course, always getting older and her health is declining as those years go on; the woman is nearing her mid-90s and it's sort of an unspoken thought that every time we see her could be the last. Well, this time around that could really be the case. We scheduled the trip for earlier in the summer out of fears that she may not make it to the end of summer. We're actually quite nervous about that. I am, anyway.
Part of the reason we waited to schedule the trip is that we wanted to see if Mama wanted to travel with us again to see her mother. I like traveling with Mama; she slows us down a bit, but honestly she's a blast to travel with and be around, and I adore that old woman. It's a delight to experience her hometown and her old stomping grounds with her, and she also gives us an anchor to her own mother. She finally told us this week that she wants to go with us.
We'll all be staying in the family homestead unless something major changes in the next couple of months; Mama will be staying upstairs in the spare room and we'll be downstairs in the basement, which will be cooler at night and we will have our own fridge, sink, and access to the washer and dryer, but (sadly) the only bathroom in the house is no longer across the hall from us but up the stairs and on the opposite side of the house. It is what it is; I'd much rather have to walk upstairs and across the house to use the bathroom compared to spending $1k on the local motel there for a week during peak tourist season.
So, Mama's onboard, all of the flights are booked, rental car is reserved, Catsitter has confirmed her availability, and we're set to travel to Canada again in a few months. Second verse, same as the first.
This will likely be a very subdued trip back to Nova Scotia for us; we don't have any plans other than to be in and around the homestead for a few days. As it will be summer, I'm sure we'll be going to the beach there a number of times and I'm sure Daisy will want to try to replicate the whale watching trip in Pleasant Bay if we have time for it, since last year they canceled on us. But other than that, we have zero plans, and we're there for a much shorter time this year -- about the same time we were in NC visiting my parents, maybe a little longer. Also, like flying to visit my parents, we're flying in and out of Chicago O'Hare again on both routes -- Omaha to Chicago, Chicago to Halifax, and back again in reverse. This helps cut down on a lot of travel time and waiting around in airports, generally. I do not know what model of aircraft we'll be on, but I do know that the layovers aren't bad in Chicago and we should be fine -- believe me, Daisy searched for two days for the cheapest, most accessible, and most streamlined flights.
Of course, for any trip to Canada massive preparations must be made; I can travel to visit my parents in the summer with the clothes on my back and a few spare outfits in my backpack, taking the bare minimum of toiletries and accessories. Canada is different; I'll likely need to take a light jacket (even though it's summer) and full shoes/socks, 3-4 outfits and underwear, and will need to leave a lot of space in the suitcase for anything we bring back. I am a huge sucker for Canada-themed merchandise and snacks, and it's not like I can ship a case of energy drinks up there like I can to my parents' house on the island (well, I'm sure I could, but it would be extremely inconvenient and cost-prohibitive). So, to-do lists will be made and every I will be dotted and every T will be crossed to make sure we have the most streamlined trip possible to the Great White North. I will, of course, document all of that here in the coming months.
Finally, to start wrapping up the wrap-up, I am now officially on Mounjaro. The prescription got approved while we were in North Carolina, and I ordered it off Amazon Pharmacy as soon as we got home. It arrived and I stuck myself with the first injection on Friday night, and...so far, so good. I have noticed zero side effects or digestive issues on Mounjaro, so we'll see as we move forward how much it actually helps. I'm trying to remain as positive as possible about the experience; no, I don't want to be on another injectable every week that I have to keep jabbing myself with, but...aside from the digestive side effects, I was doing really well and managing my diabetes amazingly with Trulicity, so I'm hoping Mounjaro is going to do the same. I also hope, of course, that it helps me continue my weight loss, which has plateaued since I've been off the Trulicity, despite increases in activity and further tweaks to my diet.
The diet goes out the window in Canada, of course. So, let's try to get a good baseline before we do that, shall we? My next doctor appointment should be riiiiight around the time we're readying to leave the country (it's not scheduled yet, so we have some wiggle room).
I also got a call while we were in North Carolina about scheduling the audiology appointment I requested in order to get my hearing checked. My hearing loss is slightly worsening the older I get, to the point where it has become very difficult to hear someone right next to me if there is any background noise around at all. I don't like that. I also haven't had my hearing checked since I was a teenager, when I was told at that point I had significant hearing loss compared to normal folks.
Meh, normal is overrated anyway.
So sometime within the next week I'll be scheduling that appointment. I don't know for when. It'll likely be on a Friday when we're both off work so I can just get it done and check what actual hearing loss I have these days.
There you have it, that's the whole story. Tonight, I return to work for the foreseeable future on my normal schedule. I have been off for eleven days straight, so here's hoping tonight is smooth and quiet as most other Sundays are.
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