Category: Daily Blog

This is my Daily Blog category.

Day 5 After Parotidectomy Surgery

On By Michel McDonaldIn Daily Blog5 Comments

surgery scar 5 days

My surgery was on November 20th so it has been 5 days and I thought I would take a picture to show my progress.  It appears that my ear is swelling up and my face is a lot redder than it was.  I had just gotten out of the bath tub when I took the picture on the right, but it has been more than an hour since then and it is still just as red.  All of the red area is completely numb.

The way the doctor cut my face and stitched it up was perfect.  He followed my ear all the way down and went behind my ear lobe before going down following the line of my beard.  Genius!  In my opinion, he did an excellent job.  I saw pictures of other people who had the same surgery and their incisions didn’t look this good, so I feel very blessed that I had such an artist.

My face has a golf ball sized hole in front of my ear where my gland used to be swollen.  I figured it would have filled in by now, but it is still dented.  I’m sure it will fill in, I’m not worried about that.  It is still numb too.

The only thing that isn’t numb is where the tube is sticking out.  I don’t really care too much for having a tube sticking out of my neck.  It would be awesome if I didn’t have to have it in me for 2 whole weeks.  It was supposed to be removed after 7 days, and they even wrote a note on the paperwork that said “Follow-up KMC ENT Clinic next Friday.”  Well, that is the day after Thanksgiving and they are closed that day.  The reason they said Friday and not Wednesday is because that surgeon is only in the surgery clinic on Friday.  I guess he is the only one who can take the tube out so I will have to wait until December 6th.

I have been catching up on my sleep.  Today I woke up to the sound of my alarm on my phone to tell me to take my pills at 8am.  I had other pills to take at 10am and it had to wake me up again for those.  Then my partner woke me up at 12:30pm and I decided I wanted to get out of bed.  I don’t like sleeping the day away lol.

Another good thing about this is that I am losing weight again.  That’s not always a good thing because the reason I am losing weight is because of the medication, but I am using that to my advantage.  I am normally always hungry, so since I don’t feel too hungry all the time, I am eating the same amount of food I ate when I lost 70lbs.  I have been eating a bowl of Honey Nut Cheerio’s for breakfast with a banana and Silk Vanilla Light Almond Milk.  I ate a Yoplait light Strawberry yogurt at 10am which is my usual snack time and I ate a Weight Watchers Smart Ones meal with Fettuccine Alfredo and Chicken.  It is my 3pm snack time now so I will have a banana, then at dinner I will have another Weight Watchers Smart Ones meal.

When I stopped losing weight in July, I was still eating this same diet, although I was eating a little bit more food and I wasn’t getting a lot of sleep which seems to be the key.  I am getting more sleep now and eating the right foods, so I am losing weight again.  When I stopped losing weight I was 192lbs, but then I went back up to 202lbs and fluctuated between 202 and 210.  Last week when I had my surgery I was 208.  Today I am 199.8.  So I will just keep doing what I am doing to help get me back down to 192.  Whatever it takes, right?  This was the boost I needed and hopefully I will continue to lose weight.

Well, back to bed I go.

Recovering from Surgery

On By Michel McDonaldIn Daily BlogLeave a comment

I am still recovering from surgery.  Been laying in bed reading the 12th Xanth book “Man From Mundania”.  The meds make me very sleepy though, so it’s hard to concentrate, but I do my best.  My face around my ear and my ear are still numb and it feels very odd to be numb and itchy at the same time.  I’ve never had surgery so naturally I had no idea what this would be like.

There is a tube sticking out of my neck to drain the fluids that I was only supposed to have for 1 week, but since the doctor is only there on Fridays and they are closed the day after Thanksgiving, I have to have the tube for 2 weeks.  It doesn’t bother me, but I was hoping to not have it any more than I have to because it hurts sometimes when I accidentally pull on it.  It’s also very disgusting lol.  We usually go to Golden Corral on Thanksgiving because it’s easier to have them do all the work, but with the stitches and the tube, I just can’t see me walking around a restaurant filling my plate without feeling like I’m being stared at and judged.  I already had someone blatantly staring at my stitches while talking to me and seeing the disgusted look on his face which made me never want to leave the house again.

I honestly don’t mind the cooking and cleaning, but since it is just the two of us and we really don’t need to cook that much food, it doesn’t make much sense buying and cooking so many different dishes.  I think if we can just get some chicken for the crock pot, a couple of potatoes and a couple of yams and a pumpkin pie we should be fine.  That’s really all I care to eat anyway.

I haven’t been eating as much as I normally have been.  I don’t know if it’s the medicine, but I’m just not hungry which means I am losing weight.  Yes, I have literally lost 6lbs since Wednesday.  I love knowing that I am losing weight, but not because the medicine is making me sick, but because I’m eating right and trying to lose weight.  I don’t know if that makes sense.

Well, I really just wanted to do a status update, but I was up to 3 paragraphs and I figured it was big enough for a blog post so I switched over to blogging lol.  I’m finished so back to bed for me.

Surgery Day

On By Michel McDonaldIn Daily Blog1 Comment

operation

Tomorrow is the day I have been waiting for since August.  It is the day that my parotid gland will finally be removed and I will no longer suffer from the pain that it causes me.

There have been some good days and there have been some bad days, mostly bad days.  There was a whole week when I didn’t have any pain at all and I started wondering if perhaps I should just not have the surgery and live with it, but then the pain would come back and that would confirm that I do in fact want to continue with the surgery.

I have been quite depressed lately, not just because of the pain that I’ve had, but also because of the fact that I am having surgery 1 week before Thanksgiving and I will have a fresh scar on Thanksgiving day.  If we were staying at home or visiting family that wouldn’t be a big deal, but we always go to Golden Corral for Thanksgiving.  It’s just easier and less expensive.  I’m not depressed about the fresh scar anymore because I’m sure it will be fine in a week.  I don’t know that for a fact, but I’m sure it will be fine.

I will have a tube (I don’t know how they are going to do that, will there be like an IV port coming out of my neck?) draining fluids for 7 days which will be removed the day before Thanksgiving.  I can deal with that.  I mean, it’s only a week, right?  I don’t have any plans on leaving the house during that week.  I plan on lots of bed rest and catching up on my reading.  I’ve neglected my Nook for such a long time, it’s time for an excuse to read a book or two, or three.

Anyway, I’m not scared or nervous.  I’m sure it will all work out and I will take pictures when it’s over and more pictures next week when the tube is removed the day before Thanksgiving to show how much I’ve healed.

What more is there to say?

On By Michel McDonaldIn Daily BlogLeave a comment

What more is there to say?

Before I discovered Twitter and Facebook, I used to blog up to 6 times per day.  With Twitter I can sum up my thoughts in 140 characters and with Facebook even more.  That took the fun out of blogging which is why I don’t blog as often as I used to.

I’ve come to the point where I honestly can’t think of anything to say, even in a 140 character tweet.  Yesterday I was bored and said this:

“They say if you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all, but something is better than nothing.”

I think this was directed at myself because I don’t say much anymore.

Lately all I do is sit here looking at all the wonderful and sometimes snotty things other people say in their tweets and/or Facebook updates and think to myself, why didn’t I think of that?  Why can’t I think of anything to say anymore?

Today I was bored and said this:

“When you don’t get any mail you think “No news is good news.” But sometimes it’s nice to get SOMETHING, even if it’s just coupons.”

What’s the point of even having social networks anymore?  I become friends with people and never say a word until their birthday and then all I say is Happy Birthday.  I’d love to read more books or play one of my MMORPG games, but I can’t even get into those because I’ve become bored with them.  Is the problem that I’ve just become bored with everything?

I’ve been playing The Sims Freeplay on my phone a lot more than I used to play it, but only because I have something to accomplish and I’m guessing when I accomplish all of my tasks I will get bored with it again.  What I need is something to be excited about.  I remember playing EverQuest for sometimes 16 hours a day every day for 8 years until I became bored with it because everyone in my guild left to either go into another guild or to play the newest game.  I also started playing other games, like Lord of the Rings Online, but I had nobody to play with so I eventually got bored with that and the same thing happened with EverQuest 2 and DC Universe Online.  MMORPG games are more fun when you have people to play with.

Well it seems that I had more to say than I thought, but that seems to be all I can think of for now.

BoLS Board Games

On By Michel McDonaldIn Daily BlogLeave a comment

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of bols board games for SocialSpark. All opinions are 100% mine.

Scrabble Dictionary

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I have actually use that while playing Words with Friends and it does help, like a lot.  Although I feel like a cheater, but the other person uses words I know he or she doesn't know in real life so I know they're a big cheater too lol.  So somehow that doesn't make me feel bad.

I am not that into playing board games, I'm more into playing video games, that's just who I am.  Board games make me feel stupid and when I use these cheats, I feel even more stupid when it finds words I've never even heard of.  It does give me more of an education and when I do play Words with Friends, I end up learning words I never knew existed and end up using them in daily conversation.  What is more impressive to people is that I use the words correctly in a sentence.  At least when I use the words, people think I already knew them, so they don't think I cheated lol.

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Why does Target want my social security number to help me save 5%?

On By Michel McDonaldIn Daily BlogLeave a comment

target logo

So I finally got a new rim and tire for my bicycle so I can start riding my bike again, but I didn’t get a tube, so we went to Target.  The new tubes were only $4.99 each and I bought 2.  At the check stand, the checker asked me if I was saving 5% with them and I said no and she asked me if I wanted to apply, it’s free, so I said eh, why not.  Naturally she had to void everything and start all over.  She asked for my ID and she asked me to tap something on the screen that you pay with a credit card on, then she asked me to type my social security number.  RED FLAG!  No, nope, nuh uh, no way, forget it, not gonna happen Baby Jane Hudson.

Why does Target need my social security number to help me save 5%?  It makes absolutely no sense.  I can see if I were applying for a credit card or if I were applying for a job, but she said it’s a rewards card, not a credit card.

She had to cancel it all out again and start over.  I paid for the 2 tubes and a bottle of soda and we left, grumbling about it all the way to the door and out to the car lol.

I just don’t understand why Target needs my social security number for that.  I had a rewards card with Albertson’s and all they asked me for was my home address, phone number and email address.  No problem.  I don’t mind giving out that information, but when it comes to my social security number I become suspicious.  Where is my tin foil hat?

I love Target, I really do.  I was upset when I couldn’t shop there because they had donated money to an anti-gay politician and was thrilled beyond belief when I could shop there again.  I was thrilled when they started carrying LGBT t-shirts and had a gay wedding registry.  I have always loved Target since I was 16, but this is just going too far.

So no Target, you can’t have my social security number to help me save a measly 5% on my future purchases.  Perhaps someone can explain to me why they need that.  I would love an explanation.

Xanapus.com is NOT for sale

On By Michel McDonaldIn Daily Blog5 Comments

xanapus is not for sale

Yesterday morning, July 17th at 7:43 a.m., I got an email from someone in China with the subject “Notice of Internet Intellectual Property” and at first I didn’t know what to make of it.  I thought it was spam that Gmail missed, and I was going to delete it without opening it, but then I thought, I want to know what this says for shits and giggles, so I opened it.  This was the email.

Dear Manager,

(If you are not the person who is in charge of this, please forward this to your CEO,Thanks)

This email is from China domain name registration center, which mainly deal with the domain name registration in China. We received an application from kenpo Ltd on July 15th, 2013. They want to register “xanapus” as their internet keyword and China/Asia (CN/ASIA) domain names. But after checking it, we find this name conflicts with your company. In order to deal with this matter better, so we send you email and confirm whether this company is your distributor or business partner in China or not?.

Best Regards,

Abby Wang

I responded with “Yes, I have owned Xanapus.com since 2002.  It is my personal website.  I am not in China, I am in California USA.”  I gave it no other thought, but I didn’t delete the email.

Later, at 6:37 p.m. I got another email from someone else saying this:

Dear Sirs,

We are Kenpo Ltd based in Chinese office, our company has submitted the “xanapus” as CN domain name and Internet Trademark, we are waiting for Ms. abby’s approval. We hope your company will not object our application, because this name is very important for our products in Chinese market. We don’t want your company to use this name in China, we believe our company will become the legal owner of this name in China. Even though Ms. abby advises us to change another name, we will persist in this name and permanent registration of this name.

Best regards

Ye Yun

Kenpo Ltd

It then occurred to me that perhaps I need to find out the value of my website, you know, for shits and giggles.  I found out that I bought xanapus.com in 2004, not 2002, but still.  I found several websites all giving my website a different value.  One said it was only worth $1 while another website said it was worth $16,500 give or take.

Well, the way I see it is that my website domain name is more important to me than it is to them.  They want to use the name for business purposes, but I have the name for personal purposes.  Xanapus is the name of my Gnome Wizard in EverQuest (image above).  I played that character from 2002 until I believe 2009 when I stopped playing EverQuest, but I still play him from time to time and I never stopped using the name Xanapus.  I created a hobbit named Xanapus in Lord of the Rings Online and I have also created a Xanapus in World of Warcraft and in EverQuest 2, 2 Xanapus’ in EQ2 in fact.  The name Xanapus is like my child and I’m not going to give it up or sell out my child for a mere dollar, or even $16,000.  It’s just not happening.

I am Xanapus everywhere on the internet.  Ebay, Amazon, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Flickr, Multiply, MySpace, Hulu… you name it, that’s my handle.  Google Xanapus and see how many results you get, it’s all me.  I am so emotionally attached to the name that if I could, I would change my own name to Xanapus.  No last name, just Xanapus.  Not Mike Xanapus, just Xanapus.  I am that dedicated.

I know I shouldn’t have, but I responded to Ye Yun with “Choose another name.”  I would hate to give up my name for a company who will probably go out of business in a year or less and not be able to get that name back.  It’s just not happening.

This actually happened once before.  A couple or few years ago I got an email from a company, I don’t recall which country, but I got an email asking about taking the name away from me and it sort of became threatening just like this one seems to have gotten (where he says “We don’t want your company to use this name in China, we believe our company will become the legal owner of this name in China.”) but I simply ignored them and I never heard from them again.

I have invested way too much in the name, this blog and in my website to give up Xanapus.com.  I won’t give up without a fight.

Oh and by the way, at the end of that email they said “Even though Ms. abby advises us to change another name, we will persist in this name and permanent registration of this name.”  Well, that was the last I heard from them after I said “Choose another name.”  So much for being persistent lol.

Update July 18th, 2013 at 9:41 p.m.:  Got another email from “Abby”.  Apparently, they are being persistent.  What they want is xanapus.cn, xanapus.asia and xanapus.com.cn.  Since I have the right to the word xanapus, I have bragging rights so if I want to register those 3 domains with them I can, but if not, then their clients have that right, as well as internet keywords.  I’m not sure if this is just a scam to get me to buy those domains, or if there really is a company in China who wants to legitimately use those domains.   You know what?  I am not biting.  If they want to register those domains, fine, but they can’t have xanapus.com.  They can’t have Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, MySpace (even though I don’t use it), AIM, Amazon, Ebay, and all those other websites.  They can’t have them because they are mine and I will not be threatened and I will not be scammed into paying China for those 3 domain names.  Here is the latest email.

Dear Michel:
Thanks for email. 

Based on your company having no relationship with them, we have suggested they should choose another name to avoid this conflict but they insist on this name as CN/Asia domain names (.asia/.cn/.com.cn) and internet keyword on the internet. In our opinion, maybe they do the similar business as your company and register it to promote his company.
You must know Domain name takes open registration, this is international domain name registration principle. Any companies or individuals have rights to register any domain name and internet keyword which are unregistered. Because your company haven’t registered this name as CN/ASIA domains and internet keyword on the internet, anyone can obtain them by registration. As a domain name registrar, we have no right to dispute their application. However, in order  to avoid this conflict, as the owner of the name or trademark, your company will get the priority to make this registration in our audit period. If you think these domain names are useful for your company and want to prevent anybody from using them, please inform us. We can send an application form and the price list to you and help you register these CN/ASIA domain names (.asia/.cn/.com.cn/) and internet keyword within dispute period.

Kind regards.

Abby Wang

Today I looked into trademarking the name Xanapus, but that’s like $250.  FUCK THAT!  If I trademarked it and any company used the name Xanapus, I could sue them, but I can’t afford $250 on the off chance that that will ever happen.  All I can do is just ignore any future attempts at trying to scam me into buying domain names in China lol.  Look, if you want those specific domains, go for it, but you’re not getting my social networks and you’re not getting .com.  It’s just not going to happen.

After doing a little research, I found out that this is a scam.  http://hosealim.com/2442/domain-name-renewal-scam-from-china/.  I just reported both emails to Gmail as phishing which will most likely block them so I won’t get them again, hopefully.

New Hypoallergenic Hooks from Uncommon Artistry on Amazon

On By Michel McDonaldIn crafts, Daily BlogLeave a comment

michaels hooks vs uncommon artistry hooks

I ordered these “Hypoallergenic” Surgical Steel Ball & Coil Earring Hooks (X100) from Amazon on July 3rd, 2013.  When I bought them, I didn’t realize they were coming from China.  If I had known that, I wouldn’t have bought them.  In fact, I tried to cancel my order right away, but they wouldn’t let me.  I was able to click the link to cancel, but the drop down menu for the reason for returning didn’t have any options, so without a reason to choose from, it was impossible to cancel.  My other reason for wanting to cancel was because of the reviews saying these aren’t actually hypoallergenic which I did not read until after I bought them.

So what I did on July 4th was I went to Michael’s and bought some hooks because I was so excited about making earrings and I wanted to buy the hooks because the sooner I could make them, the sooner I could sell them.  But I found out that they weren’t actually hypoallergenic.  I wore a pair for a couple of days to test them out and my right ear lobe started to get infected.  I decided to just keep making earrings and when I finally got some hypoallergenic hooks from Etsy, I took all the Michael’s hooks out and replaced them with hypoallergenic hooks.

The earrings in the image above are the Michael’s earrings on the left and the “hypoallergenic” surgical steel ball & coil earrings from Uncommon Artistry on the right.  When you are looking at the 2 bags next to each other, you can tell there is a huge difference in the colors.  The Michael’s is like a silver, while the Uncommon Artistry is more of a gray or like a blue gray color.  They actually look exactly alike in the image above with the exception of the curvature of the 2 earrings.

I am testing a pair out on my own ears just like I tested the Michael’s earrings because before I write a review on Amazon, I want to make absolutely sure they are hypoallergenic.  If they aren’t then I can say that they aren’t, but if they are then I can say they are.  If they are hypoallergenic then I can use them and say without a shadow of a doubt in my description that they are indeed hypoallergenic.  Otherwise, I have to note that they aren’t and indeed mention that if you have allergies, don’t buy these, buy the hypoallergenic ones.

So I’ve only been wearing them for like a minute and my right ear is already starting to pulse lol.  It’s like I can feel my heartbeat in my ear lobe.  I’m not quite sure if my ear is still recovering from the infection from the Michael’s earrings.  I haven’t worn anything in my ears for weeks, or since that first test that I did.  I started wearing plastic earrings in those holes yesterday.  When I put the plastic earrings in yesterday, both ears were a bit sore and they were hard to put in at first because I think the holes started closing up or perhaps they were closing because of the (for the lack of a better word) infection juices were causing the holes to close.  LOL I didn’t know how else to say that.  Anyway, I had to clean my ears yesterday because the earring was a little red from forcing it through the back.  They are still sore, so if something is going to happen, it’s probably going to happen fast.

For reference, I finished typing this out at 2:25 p.m. on July 17, 2013.  Will update on my findings…

bent hooksQuality:  I have been reading the reviews and more than a few said there were some that were bent and the coil and ball were missing or whatever.  Well, I was curious to see if there were any like that and as I was putting the normal ones back in the bag, I was counting them.  I counted 112 hooks and there were only supposed to be 100.  But, I think that makes up for the fact that 4 earrings were bent, well, 1 of those wasn’t too badly bent, but well, you see in the picture.  And 2 of them were hooked together and as you can see 1 is missing the ball and coil.  I think I can deal with the loss of 4 earrings and I can unhook those 2 good ones and replace the ball and coil from one of the bad ones.  I still come out on top with 108 good hooks, well 2 of which I am wearing for testing that I cannot actually sell, so 106 good hooks lol.

Update 8:39 p.m.: I had to take them out.  I’m in agony right now.  My head feels tight and my jaw is in a lot of pain, more pain on the right, but in pain on both sides.  These are worse than the Michael’s earrings lol.  At least with the Michael’s earrings I was able to wear them for 40 hours, I couldn’t wear these for more than 6 1/2 hours.  Heck, I was ready to take them out after the first minute because the pain started immediately.  I will not be using these earrings, not even for people who don’t have allergies.  These are going in the trash.  At least it was only $2.32.  Next time I will make sure I read the reviews first.

Scrabble Word Finder

On By Michel McDonaldIn Daily BlogLeave a comment

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of suzilove for SocialSpark. All opinions are 100% mine.

Who doesn't love playing Scrabble or Words with Friends?  Who hates it when your friends are picking the most obscure words that you never even though existed with just a few letters?  People used to get the dictionary out, but I mean come on, it's like finding a needle in a hay stack.  Who has the time for that?  Just use this Word Finder Widget instead.  Type the letters that you have and let it find you some words.

The widget is also in my sidebar, so feel free to come back any time and spend as much time as you'd like.  I don't mind.  While you're waiting for your friend to respond with their word, click the chat box and say hi.

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