No lunch for you!!!!

So we're playing waterball and besides me and Cam there are several other couples who play together.... There is often the talk of 'if momma's not happy, nobody is happy' especially if someone makes a sneaky play against their spouse.

This happened with one couple where the husband did a nasty play that caused the wife to lose her serve. She said to him 'NO LUNCH FOR YOU' - whereupon I cracked up and announced, "you know you're in a 55+ resort when......." Here, when you're 'cut off', it means no food!!!!! LOL. So now whenever Cam does a sneaky play to me, I always tell him NO LUNCH FOR YOU...... it's hysterical!!

Since we arrived here only a few days after my port removal surgery, I still had the stitches and couldn't go in the water. So for the first week, I watched from the sidelines. I would have preferred to be playing, but since my travel medical insurance won't cover anything for my pre-existing condition, I had to make really sure that my incision didn't get infected. So I stayed out of the pool for an entire week, and then when I did finally go in, I put a waterproof bandage over the incision. The only problem with that solution is that I had to have the adhesive area totally clean so it would stick. So I used alcohol prep pads to make sure any oil or sweat was cleaned off to get a good adhesion. Then, I was dumb enough not to put my sunscreen watershirt on. So now I have ended up with a sunburn in the adhesive area (because the adhesive part is CLEAR) - and where the actual bandage part was has no sunburn. And to boot, my skin is not adhesive-friendly - I usually get some kind of reaction. So when I took the 3rd patch off, it was a very painful process, removing a giant bandaid from sunburned and irritated skin.

I am happy to report that the incision has completely healed up and scab is gone so I don't have to wear the bandage anymore. The human body is amazing!

Cam has gotten back into his old photography habit - bought a new camera at Christmas time and new photo books and in general been re-inspired. He has been getting some fantastic shots - and this digital age is wonderful as you can take so many pictures guilt-free and never any wondering if they will turn out. I always used to hate the photo game after returning home from a holiday with film cameras. Cam would have taken 10 or 12 rolls of film, and anxiously rush them in for developing and rip open the envelopes with enthusiasm. And though his photos were ALWAYS good, they were never as good as he thought they were going to be and so he would be disappointed. Thankfully, that era is over with digital SLR....

Anyway, one afternoon he zipped up the highway to Morongo Reserve where he had gotten some decent pictures of scrub jay at Christmas. He came back with a really good pictures of bobcat!!!! He was standing still to try and look for birds when a movement caught his eye and he spotted the bobcat. He slowly raised the camera up to his face and snapped the picture without much time to 'organize' the shot and as soon as the bobcat heard the click of the camera, it looked up at Cam and when it saw him, bolted away. And so Cam has a great pic of the bobcat looking straight at him. As far as technical greatness, it probably could be a little sharper or slightly better composed, but for spotting something in the wild, lifting your camera and snapping a photo, it is a GREAT shot!! When we get home, I can post the pic. Cam shoots in RAW format so we have no way to retrieve his photos from his camera unless we are at home.

I have been diligently using my time here to eat well and exercise in my final last-ditch effort to get as thin as possible before my final surgery in a couple of weeks (no firm date set yet). And, I am happy to say that it has been working. When I weighed in at TOPS last week, I was down 2.8 pounds and was the big weight-loss winner for the week. In their chapter, each person hands you a quarter and congratulates you to give you added motivation. And it's a BIG chapter so I got 5 bucks!!! yee ha.

So I'm still working hard and hoping to break a 'milestone' if not this week then next. (that means going below a 10 pound marker but I won't tell you which one). when I was here in the spring, I THOUGHT I was doing a great job of eating healthy and exercising since I was playing waterball 6 hours a day. But I guess the chemo drugs just didn't want to cooperate in letting me lose any weight and in reality I ended up gaining weight! It was quite devastating - and before the cancer, I had lost 20 pounds and so after the chemo I was ready to get back down to the right place - but instead gained more weight.... So I was probably 12-14 pounds heavier than I am right now back in the spring - although I must admit that extra extra weight didn't last long - I lost the 5 pounds I gained fairly quickly but then just stayed and stayed in the same general weight area forever..... So now I am finally having success. And hope to keep it going.

Cam has been inspiring me to walk/hike more. There is a small mountain range behind the resort that has a path up to 'the flag' where people hike as a destination. There is a sign-in book up there in a plastic bag (at least Cam tells me there is...). Yah - I haven't made it up to the top, but I did go partway up with him once. The first time he went, he was huffing and puffing his way up to the top and then some 60-year old guy casually jogged past him without a sweat breaking on his brow cheerfully waving and telling Cam 'beautiful morning, isn't it?'..... We all cracked up when he came back and told us the story as his head is beet-red and sweat is pouring down and he is bent over huffing and puffing (I'm sure he exaggerated a little since Cam IS in excellent shape).... but he has been losing weight also.

When I attempted the hike with him, I got maybe halfway and then I waited for him on a rock. The dogs were with him, but we often play a game with the dogs where we try to exercise them by going to a park and each going to the opposite end of it and calling the dogs back and forth between us. So when I stopped on the mountain and Cam kept going, Molly kept running back down to where I was - meanwhile, Cam was getting further and further up the mountain so each runback was getting longer and longer. I think Molly ended up climbing the mountain about 6 times..... talk about great conditioning!! Both Molly and Cam have lost some weight down here - we had to bump up her food intake to keep the right padding over her ribs. Cooper is a free-spirit - he LOVES to roam free in the desert. He ranges way ahead exploring and doesn't return back and forth like Molly. When he gets just a little too far, we call him back and he always comes. He is a great dog - always listens to us (except when we tell him to stop barking). Molly mostly listens well, but sometimes on her own schedule....

We found a flyball team down here that has let us practice with them. She is so happy to have other people here who know how to play flyball as her whole team is new people and she is the only one with any actual experience. We skipped this past week due to paw injuries & birthdays, but we will take them again this week. If there is such a thing as reincarnation, I would want to be reincarnated as one of our dogs. Talk about spoiled rotten and loved beyond belief....

Well, I guess that's enough for now - this long blog is the result of no blogging for a couple of weeks!