Had a disturbing dream about Paula last night. In real life, she has two grown boys. In the dream, she had a boy and a girl between 8-10. I don’t know if she died or was going to die, but someone called to ask that we take her kids in. I tried to tell them we were in an adult community but they didn’t get it. They seemed to think of “adult” community along the same lines of an adult video or something and kept telling me that if we just kept it “kid-friendly” it’d be ok. I told them I felt someone who truly wants kids and has more money should take the kids who also live in a regular neighborhood. Besides, I added, we’ve got plans and we can’t just drop them for a couple of kids we never met even if we did live in a regular community.

In another dream, someone asked me to sing at some event the following night and I was to be paid for this, too. I was to sing to a karaoke machine and not a band. I agreed to do it and was there an hour early the next night so I could pick out what songs to sing. But then some guy handed me a list of about 12 songs they already picked out. I looked at the list and said I didn’t know most of the songs. Then I picked up papers with the lyrics to the songs and said I’d read from that on the songs I was less familiar with. They said I couldn’t do that, as it would look stupid with me reading lyrics either on paper or on a monitor, which left me wondering how I was supposed to sing songs I didn’t even know.

Tom’s thinking of getting us a 3D camera, which does videos and pics. Not sure we’d really use it that often, but if he wants one that bad and thinks it’d be worth having, then sure, why not? You can get a decent one for $200, he says.

Tom was reading about Maui and we both burst out laughing over this part that said, “Ka’anapali is all about the money. If you don’t have it, you’re not staying there.” LOL, well, it’d take us a year or so to save for a trip like this, but at least I could once win us trips like this. Hell, the staff will probably even want to run my bath water for me, haha.

The travel agent received the certificate, has bought our tickets and it’s official – we’re going to Hawaii in about 3 months and 1 week! Andy cracked me the hell up the other day saying he’ll be breaking in while we’re gone. Make sure you say hello to the rats, I told him, and he said he’d turn them loose to greet me with their destruction when I return. Haha, these rats aren’t that destructive, but I definitely don’t like to leave them out more than a couple of hours either.

While I’ll be somewhat active there, there’s no way in hell I’ll want to watch what I eat while on vacation. Vacation is simply not the time to not eat what you want when you want. But if I do that I’ll be coming home 10 pounds heavier and with an even worse weight problem. :( So… instead of taking 1-2 days off a week from both diet and exercise like I have been, I’ll be taking 0 days off till we leave. I’ll be doing a half-hour routine at the start of my day, another half-hour workout at the end, and also cutting out chips, cookies, candy and all those sugary weekend companions. It’s not the junk I’ll miss, but the hunger that’s hard to deal with cuz healthy food or not, I still gotta reduce the calories. This will definitely tell me if something could be wrong, though, cuz even Tom agrees I should be guaranteed to lose 10 pounds after a month of doing this. I just may not be able to lose 10 the next month, too.

Regardless of weight, I’ve had NO joint pain issues during my everyday activities since working out regularly. Do I think I’ll lose more than the few measly pounds I’ve lost? Probably not, but I still like being stronger and pain-free.

Still not always pain-free with my ear, though. Having to deal with it as often as I do TOTALLY overrides the joy of having the canal drilled back when I was 29. Totally. I’d take that day back in a heartbeat if I could, but it was the only way to see if I had the tumor they suspected I might have. We couldn’t know that it was the outside (they did plastic surgery in 1975 in Boston to build the outer ear) that was the problem. They dismantled the damn frame, but now I’m left with a canal that has little hearing and lots of discomfort.

Tom cracked me up yesterday when I was whining about not being able to win things like I used to. I said, “I feel like I’m losing everything I once was. The few things that were within my means to do, I’m no longer able to do. I can’t win things anymore. I’m not psychic anymore (this is mostly a good thing), I can’t sell books and am still under writer’s block, and today I even struggled with my French lesson.”

“Yeah, you’ve even been replaced as a vacuumer and have lost that job, too,” he said. LMAO!