Best Of

I'm using the end to sit on far more as I get older.

Sandy, hope you get your weight control med adjusted properly. I now have a sister and a niece (her daughter) taking one of the meds. Use of them is becoming very common as the cost becomes more affordable. I'm still a little leery because they're so new. I hope they prove to be more positive than harmful with SEs. I will continue to struggle on my own, for now, anyway. My BMI is 28, overweight but not obese.

Petite, good luck with repairs on your NC home. On the FL home, maybe you will end up with some great new neighbors. If the new homes are upscale, it will be good for your home value.

My haircut was good. I discussed with my stylist not liking that the sides and top of my hair is silver while the back is a mingled gray. Next appointment she will do low lights to make back and sides and top match. If I don't like the change, I can just let it grow out.

Happy New Year! Sorry I've been remiss checking in, but between the holidays and now the Bar Show rehearsals heating back up on 1/2, I've been crazy-busy.

Had s rough patch when, because I was starting to lose weight again, my endocrinologist wanted me to titrate my Zepbound back down to 5mg weekly, I had 3 vials of 7.5 and 2 of 5mg remaining. She suggested I space the 7.5s out to every 10 days rather than weekly until they were gone, then back to 5mg a week later.

Day 10 rolled around, I took the shot of 7.5; and about four hours later I awoke with midepigastric (upper ab) pain that—but for the absence of GI effluvia at either end—felt just like when I had norovirus in 2014. (The kind of bug that makes you feel so awful you're not afraid you're gonna die, but rather afraid you're NOT gonna die). It was so intense that Bob suggested I hit Urgent Care once it opened, but I was in too much pain to drive and he was late for work. It was only by patience and Gas-X I was finally able to burp & fart the pain away. But I was chilled despite the room thermometer reading 70F (my core temp was 96.1) and my teeth were chattering). I was also anorexic, which brought on hypoglycemia. I forced myself to eat some chicken soup as well as miso. But I didn't realize that the seaweed I'd added was kombu and not wakame, so I got bloated again. Took a couple of days before my body normalized again—courtesy of pushing water, protein (soft-boiled eggs & all the roast beef & turkey in the house). I called my endo and she agreed that the main culprit (pre-kombu) was the fact that since Zepbound's half-life is 5 days, waiting 10 days between doses of 7.5mg is like starting out at 5mg rather than 2.5mg. That's rough on the gut and the metabolism. So it's back to weekly 5mg, and watching my calories & protein like a hawk to "stoke the furnace" without going into either calorie deficit or surplus.

Of course, that sleepless night was on a rehearsal day. A couple of days later I overdid it at bedtime: a couple of biscotti, a hunk of fruitcake, and two chocolate truffles. I had forgotten what too much sugar at bedtime does to me…and I was awakened about 5am with a L calf cramp and R shin cramp. OWWW!!! Had to get up, grab a cane (for balance) and walk around the second floor and stretch before the muscles quieted down. Went back to bed, rolled over onto my L side…and this time my R leg got both a calf and shin cramp! The type of stretch that loosens one kind of cramp aggravates the other, So another near-all-nighter.

Of course, that one was the morning of the "sitzprobe" for the Bar Show (the first rehearsal with the band), in a conference room because we didn't have the theater yet. I needed several cups of coffee and a protein bar to get through it, but I made it.

We moved to the theater on Monday, to settle into the dressing rooms and do a tech run. Tuesday was tech/dress (costumes, wigs, but not makeup) with mics so the sound guy could get levels for each of us (and each number we were in). For the first time, none of us had to share a mic pac because we have only 32 cast members (in years past we'd had as many as 60). There were enough mics for everyone, which gives us a little breathing room between numbers because there was no traffic jam at the mic table nor anxiety as to whether the person from whom we were to get our mic would take it off and turn it in on time.

But by now 1/4 of the cast is out with the flu, so there was a lot of shuffling people like a deck of cards. I had to understudy a couple of roles I'd wished I'd gotten, but memorized my lines as fast as I could. I knocked it out of the park. The challenge was, as always, insanely fast costume changes—and this time with entrances from opposite wings. Of course, the person for whom I'd subbed is due back today (taking off her mask to sing); I'm glad she's feeling better, but a bit disappointed that I won't get to do those songs for a paying audience: tonight is our "open" dress rehearsal (audience gets a reduced ticket price in return for having to see how the sausage gets made). We're off Thursday (that's when NPR's "Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me" gets the theater). We officially open Friday, have a Saturday matinee, and close Saturday night. (When I first did the show, we had 6 performances, which dwindled down to 5). I have people coming every night except tonight.

BangBang is nagging me to go up into bed—and I'd better obey lest she knock stuff off surfaces and threaten an anger bite. (She reminds me of Glenn Close in "Fatal Attraction:" "I will not be ignoooooored!").

Your living is determined not so much by what life brings to you as by the attitude you bring to life; not so much by what happens to you as by the way your mind looks at what happens.

Khalil Gibran