Category: A Bit Of Randomness

This category is full of randomness that really doesn’t fit nicely into any of the categories having to do with my road to walking.

Mind-Blown!!!

I had my first successful virtual visit with my speech pathologist today. I was scheduled last week but I couldn’t logon so she just ended up calling me and we spoke about what we were going to work on. I was able to logon today after calling tech-support this morning. She was having difficulty logging on so it took a moment but we spoke via video chat.

I really like her and I’m comfortable with her. Today, we worked on annunciation of words and she gave me an acronym to remember. She told me that in my level of dysarthria and having multiple sclerosis that my, “Normal” is, “Slurred.” That statement blew my mind tremendously!!! I actually started to cry as I let that sunk in. We only talked for about a half hour but I was thoroughly tired! The fact that my, “Normal” sounds, “Slurred” to people without MS difficult is ato get my mind around! She told me that I am missing a feedback loop and that’s from having MS.

She gave me homework to do before next week. I have told her that I only text to people and I do not talk on the phone anymore. She said THAT will be my homework. I HAVE TO talk on the phone! I am a little bit nervous because speaking as she says is very, “Effortful.” I have to think about who I will talk to but says that the more I practice, the easier it will be for me to do this. but right now, I am way too tired to talk to anyone!

Just Once

I posted on Facebook yesterday that it was the first time that I have watched It’s a Wonderful Life. I wrote on that post that I bawled my eyes out from beginning to end! I have seen this movie so many times since I was a small child! Donna Reed (Mary Hatch) was my Mom‘s favorite actress so we saw that movie so many times every single year during Christmas time. I think it had to be four or five years ago that I saw it as an adult. I can say pretty much this entire movie verbatim but as a child I didn’t understand what the movie was about. Seeing it as an adult, crushed me! this is the first movie I can pretty much say verbatim but Hocus Pocus and Love AActually are kind of getting there but for this one, as an adult, I can only see this movie just once a year!

Hello Again, Cocoa Mint!

Last night, I pulled off the strip to unseal my Cocoa mint chapstick. I did that last night because I knew that I would not have much dexterity in my fingers in the morning. This was so I would be prepared to say hello again to my Cocoa mint Chapstick!

So as I got ready for bed last night, I listen to Bruce Springsteen one more time for my cousinT, Shannon because that’s her favorite song. Before I went into my room, and I put my ginger spice Chapstick on for the last time. That smell will always remind me of my a bola and bring such fun nest for Christmas is at her house:


I didn’t learn until this year that she loved bangle bracelets. Learn something new every day even though she has been gone for 31 years. I can’t wear bangle bracelets because my wrists are too small. I’m thinking of alternating the shortbread cookie chapstick just so it gets used up…

“…The Same”

I clearly remember when we (Sean and me) got our first wall-mounted TV. It was well past the time they first came out but I had just paid off a credit card and there were still papers in the waiting area at Olive Garden. Bright and the front page was a TV that they had priced and looked at with a friend at Best Buy! It was thousands of dollars but I knew I wanted it so I had them print out the specs and I sat and them for about three or four years. But looking at the sale paper, I saw the exact same TV for $899! I looked at Sean and asked him if he wanted to buy a TV tomorrow! We were going to an appointment to speak with the dental surgeon who was going to remove four of his molars. His 12 year molars. That was to make room in his mouth for his other teeth. These teeth needed to be removed before he got braces.

Sean was excited for that and the next day, we bought our TV. So, Sean must’ve been 12 and currently, he is 20. my TV has begun to blink and sometimes the sound will go out for a little while. In other words, my phone is dying after eight years. It has been blinking like that for months and just recently, it was blinking more often and The screen is pixelating. After some serious budgeting, I was able to get a new TV this past November. This morning, while I was still asleep, it was delivered and installed. The man had already left by the time I woke up and my Mom came to get me out of bed. I just finished washing my hands when I said to my Mom, “I have a new TV!” Went into the living room and turned my chair around to look at the TV on the wall. It looks the same! But, they no longer make 46 inch TVs so I have a 50 inch TV now. It looks a little bit bigger than my previous TV but it still is the same!

When I looked at the TV, I saw Collins say, “It tastes the same.” I first heard this song with my cousin Shannon. It was the Broadway cast and we both sing along to the entire show! When Brent came out in a movie, that’s the only version I can find on YouTube but even though the words are a little bit different, I just love hearing the guy from Law and Order sing!:

I still have to input my Wi-Fi password and the passwords for my streaming apps but I don’t know if that’s going to happen tonight or tomorrow. Tomorrow is a BIG day that I’m NOT looking forward to thinking about… 21 years with MS. 😒😒😒

“My Kids”

I thought about writing this blog post last night and I thought of my school leader conducting my very first performance review and commenting that I referred to my students as, “My kids.” I remember being touched by that observation and I was excited to write about it today. I was prompted by a Facebook friend’s meme. So many of my Facebook friends are former colleagues, former teachers of mine, former students of mine, and former classmates of mine!!!:

I reposted this meme and wrote on it that, “ I don’t teach anymore but anyone who was my student at CCA between 2005 and 2017 are STILL, “My kids”!!! Also, I love that another former teacher of mine commented that my brother did plumbing work at her house and he insisted on calling by her maiden name even though she has been married for 11 years and has a child now. That’s how we knew her when she taught at our school.

I remember telling Sean about students from the high school coming back to see me at the middle school. The young men who would come in, would walk-in and say, “Hello Ms. Rios.” To which I would always respond in a forced deep voice, “Hello [insert name here].” They always would laugh! I would remind them that I had them as students when they were 12 years old and before they hit puberty. Sean thought that was funny because he had already hit puberty. He thinks it’s funny that I would tell my students that but I liked it because they sounded so different from when they were my student and they are young men now!

The Orange Bowl

So, my TV was installed on Monday and I called (with my Mom) Xfinity today. We talked to an agent who also lived in Michigan. She liked talking with us because she said that she rarely talks to other Michiganders. She told us that I needed a different channel subscription to watch the orange bowl today. There was no question of me watching the orange bowl? IF COURSE I would!

I will never forget watching the exchange between Rich Eisen and Matthew Stafford regarding this game. Rich eyes and said to wager some thing and Matthew Stafford was OK with that. Which eyes and said that he will wear a Georgia shirt on his show if Jojo wins and Matthew Stafford will wear Michigan shirt for his media availability on Sunday. If I can see Matthew Stafford in the Michigan shirt, I will LOSE MY MIND!!!

I think it’s about time for pregame now…

New Year’s Day 2022

Today, I can post a song from my FAVORITE band that it’s only fitting TODAY:

And because this year will mark my 40th year, I had to get this shirt because it’s true now…

I think I look like my Dad in this picture. I think it’s the glasses that I have to wear now. What I am now discovering is the trifecta of symptoms in my 21st year -= vision problems, chewing problems, and speaking problems!!! 😒😒😒

January 2022 Faves

So, I HAVE TO write my faves this month! I cannot help but think about when Sean came over a couple weeks ago and laughed about the music that was playing in the bar Colin was at inWisconsin. He laughed even harder when I started mouthing the words to what Robb Thomas was saying!:


But then there was the blog post I wrote about Leia coming to my rescue at night and being a, “Beautiful Girl”:

This song made me buy the album from Matchbox 20 the summer after I graduated and I jammed to it on my way to work at 7-Eleven.

I remember driving to our softball field up the street from the school to have practice when I was a dramatic teenager:

Ah, to be hopeful about and long distance relationship…

And ultimately… I DO have, “A hole in me now [and] a scar I can talk about…”

A Melodramatic Teenager

My Mom and I watched the movie, Armageddon, last night and I haven’t seen that movie in such a long time! I remember just enough of it to know that I had just gone through the, “Most significant, life-shattering break up of my life!!! At least, that’s how I felt as a dramatic teenager who was going into their junior year of high school. That summer, I probably unhealthily exercised relentlessly! I would wake up in the morning and put my contacts in and brush my teeth and walk to the local park, hemlock Park, that was a couple blocks away and I would walk around the large track at the park 10 times. Hi think the entire circumference was about a mile but I would do that every day and then I would walk home and continue being a melodramatic teenager! I remember that summer that I walked to my friend Natalie‘s house on the other side of Warren close to our school One day and say remember putting on Moonlight Path Shimmering Lotion from Victoria’s Secret. I remember that that lotion smells so good and made my entire body sparkle in the sun.

Watching this movie last night made me think about my high school experience. In retrospect, that was the best time of my life but I did not know that then. I did not know that I would be diagnosed with a chronic illness eight months after I graduated. Looking at it now, I realize that I peaked in high school and I have been managing this chronic illness since then and right about now it’s getting to be a little bit more difficult. Why did I have to waste so much time being a melodramatic teenager?!

#MyGirlL: “You Look So Cute in Your Coat!”

Sean came over last night again and he took Leia out to go potty as my Mom was washing my legs. He put her coat on and commented as they were heading out the door, “You look so cute in your coat!” I thought the coat was cute when I bought it but I have yet to really see her in it. I turned my head as he commented because if he’s going to say she looks cute then she must look really cute!

I talked to my Mom this afternoon and told her that she had NOT sent me pictures of Leia in her coat. So she sent them to me today. She really looks cute! Even with her stoic ‘Kate Moss’ face!


How cute?!:

I really like these pictures and I am really happy with my purchase because she loves it! When we first received the package, and my Mom opened up her coat, she started to put it on her but Leia was trying to bite at the fur and the hood. My mom had told me it was a fail because of the previous coat I ordered for her didn’t work out because of false advertising on their part. It looked like it would fit our dog!:

When I saw this coat for her, I HAD TO get it! By the looks of this dog in the picture, it would definitely fit Leia because she is smaller than that dog. Well, turns out that it was too small and cannot be returned because she was wore it. Seriously?!:

So, this coat is definitely not the same coat from the picture! I’m not sure what we will do with it now. In a totally unrelated note, Sean recently bought a Carhartt Coat that has a hood similar to Leia’s and I asked him if I could take a picture of them wearing their coats together. He told me something like, “Probably never.“

We will just have to see about that!