I am really sure that you were all terribly worried that I bit the bullet, took the long nap, aka the big sleep, went six feet under, said Goodnight Irene, bought the farm, was swimming with the fishes…..meh, enough of this stuff, you get my point. Nope, I am not deceased and lying in the cold, dark earth draped in a beautiful satin casket entombed by concrete for God knows how long. Giving you some nice visuals today eh? My internet site decided to take a dive on me for oh….let’s say about six months or so.
I think my last message went out in August 2015 and then kaput, I couldn’t sign on to my site any longer. The screen would come up but the cursor wouldn’t even move no matter what I did. Now you gotta understand, I really know NOTHING about computers which is why my site has looked exactly the same way since the day I started it. I am terrified to try something and screw it all up. I don’t even know how to put a link into a post. Pretty sad eh? I have to write it out and you guys have to copy and paste it which really sucks because it is so much better when you can just click on it from my page and it would take you right there. I seriously have to learn how to do that. But anyways, I’m off topic as usual. The LymeLens site freezes in August so I call my computer guy.
Let me begin this by saying that my “computer guy” happens to be the most talented film, video, computer media editor of all time. He has worked in Los Angeles, on all sorts of shows for all of the famous cable TV stations and he just finished editing a NOVA episode called “Memory Hackers” where he will be entered for Emmy consideration next year. He’s done sports, he’s done music video’s, he’s done National Geographic, he even did the 25th anniversary episode of the Discovery Channel show. The dude knows his sh*t. Luckily for me….he happens to be my big brother!
So, when I said that I wanted to start a blog who do you think I called first? DUH!!! My brother!!! This man has been gracious enough to put together this blog for me from the beginning, REMOTELY because we live 1400 miles away from each other, in his “free time” while balancing freelance editing jobs, a family and commuting 2 hours each way to Boston on the train to teach at Emerson College as a Professor. Not to mention, he is on all types of subcommittees for Emerson for everything from screening new applicants to the Graduate Program to buying all of the fancy equipment in their television stations (plural). I don’t know how he does it all.
Well, I told him back in August that when he was done his editing job but before he started his new class schedules could he please take a look at the blog because it wasn’t working. He said, “Sure, no problem.” About another month goes by and I still can’t sign on so I call him back. “What’s up with the blog dude?” He says, “Well, I am having trouble with my main server so this is going to be more complicated than I thought. We may have to switch to an entirely different platform do you care? Don’t worry I already backed up all of your stuff. (this is all greek to me at this point).” I said, “I don’t give a crap what you do with it as long as the name stays LymeLens. Please just get it working so I can start talking to my peeps again. They are depending on me!! I just want to turn on the computer and be able to type and press send, that’s all……FIX IT!”
The holidays come around and the damn thing is still not fixed. I have lost hope that I will ever be a blogger again at this point. I know that I have lost all of my former readers and now I have to start all over again even if I do get back on line somehow so I am totally disgusted. We just slug ourselves through the holiday bull crap like most Lymies do and Bloody Yippee it’s 2016! Another year on the calendar to wish that things will change and yet you know that by December you will still feel just as shitty as you do now. Not to mention my damn website is still broken. Now it’s something about some “other guy and his server and blahblahblah,” none of which I understand at all so I am only partially listening. If I knew how to do it, I would have done it myself. That’s why I sent it to you….the computer genius in this family. If it was a medical issue, I would expect my phone to be ringing from you because I am the paramedic and physician assistant in the family. That’s just the way it works ya know?
Anyways, I had bigger things to worry about because on top of the Lyme, I was suffering with a bad hip. I was trying to prevent a surgery that was going to be inevitable. I did every conservative measure that I could to stay out of that OR but there was just no way to get the leg strong enough to compensate. I had right hip surgery on February 29th (yes, a couple of days ago) for what turned out to be TWO tears of my labrum. We thought there was only one. That’s a story for another day. So, last weekend I got more promises that my brother almost has the blog figured out and he thinks it should be all set by Sunday (2/28/16). I wasn’t gonna hold my breath but I was cautiously optimistic.
FINALLY, when I got out of surgery and was home resting in my bed on 2/29/16 I took the chance and put the website into the search box then hit send. *BAM* my beautiful page came up totally intact and I could move around it freely. Oh Praise Jesus, Hallelujah!!!!! I was so thrilled, I couldn’t believe it!! There are still some bugs to work out and some things seem to be different than they were before but I hope that I can get writing again and get LymeLens to be a part of your lives on a regular basis once again.
One other piece of big news for my followers is that I was asked to contribute to a book that will be coming out soon. It is a compilation of the works from roughly 40 authors/bloggers who all have a chronic illness of some type. We are each sending in a piece we wrote with our biography and photo and it will be included in the book, hopefully with little to no editing. The book is geared towards living the fullest life that you can while still having a chronic illness. It’s very exciting and I was so pleased to have been chosen to participate!! This will be the second time that I am “in print” and that is quite a surprising feeling for me. Hopefully a sign for the future!!
I will wrap it up here by telling you that I am so happy to be back and there are plenty of stories to fill you in on from the last six months. Oh my word….the drug bust, the eviction people who cut the screen on the porch, the cat on the deck at midnight, the holidays, visitors from out of town, the hip saga, and just so much more. Get ready for a wild ride. There will probably be some doggie stories in there too because Pootie has been awfully hilarious as she begins to grow into a teenager. For now, I will let you go. Hope to see you coming back soon…..