Curlychaos SoapDragon

is sending lots of hugs and curlycuddles to Wren and Sadie



I'm doing 39 things
 

Curlychaos SoapDragon's Life List

  1. 1. Learn more about classical music
    2 entries . 9 cheers
    15 people
  2. 2. Be healthier
    4 entries . 29 cheers
    790 people
  3. 3. Try to do a nice thing for myself every day
    6 entries . 38 cheers
    1 person
  4. 4. Relax. Implement relaxation techniques and habits to make me less stressed into my everyday life.
    4 entries . 47 cheers
    1 person
  5. 5. Lose 5 kilos
    4 entries . 21 cheers
    199 people
  6. 6. Post randomly
    71 entries . 21 cheers
    102 people
  7. 7. acknowledge and feel proud of all the things I DO accomplish
    2 entries . 61 cheers
    5 people
  8. 8. Reflect on things I'm grateful for
    95 entries . 23 cheers
    1 person
  9. 9. Get a map of the forest north of Oslo
    2 entries . 32 cheers
    1 person
  10. 10. Stop dwelling on my problems so much.
    2 entries . 52 cheers
    1 person
  11. 11. Not eat after 20:00
    40 cheers
    3 people
  12. 12. Get a long-term job in journalism
    34 entries . 52 cheers
    1 person
  13. 13. G2:Find a solution that will work for me and both my dogs.
    141 entries . 76 cheers
    1 person
  14. 14. Spend more time with my friends. Invite people over, take initiative to go out, and accept invitations as often as possible.
    1 entry . 48 cheers
    2 people
  15. 15. Practice piano every day. And remember to keep it fun!
    7 entries . 78 cheers
    1 person
  16. 16. Keep my apartment tidy enough to have people over on short notice.
    5 entries . 73 cheers
    1 person
  17. 17. Take control of my finances, and save as much money as I possibly can. And remember that small amounts count.
    4 entries . 31 cheers
    1 person
  18. 18. G9: Plan fun things to look forward to!
    1 entry . 34 cheers
    1 person
  19. 19. Speak my mind more often, and ask for what I deserve.
    3 entries . 26 cheers
    1 person
  20. 20. Let my soulmate find me. And focus on having a great life on my own in the meantime.
    62 entries . 93 cheers
    17 people
  21. 21. Make my trip to the USA happen!
    5 entries . 92 cheers
    4 people
  22. 22. Stop thinking in an "all or nothing" way.
    3 entries . 68 cheers
    10 people
  23. 23. Notice negative thoughts and replace them with positive thoughts
    4 entries . 63 cheers
    59 people
  24. 24. Go to more concerts
    1 entry . 50 cheers
    2,425 people
  25. 25. write and perform silly songs, make loads of money and fly around in a diamond-encrusted spaceship called the SoaP Dragon with my fellow Snakes on a Plane bandmates
    6 team members . 12 entries . 22 cheers
    9 people
  26. 26. Get contact lenses
    1 entry . 23 cheers
    109 people
  27. 27. improve my Stineglish
    3 team members . 2 entries . 20 cheers
    3 people
  28. 28. Attend the first international 43T Chianti party
    6 team members . 14 cheers
    6 people
  29. 29. Stop holding on to the things that clutter my home and my life
    5 team members . 5 entries . 27 cheers
    26 people
  30. 30. take monthly steps to reduce my ecological footprint
    3 entries . 23 cheers
    3 people
  31. 31. List 43 things about my life that are good.
    11 entries . 21 cheers
    2 people
  32. 32. Start a Buddy Check 12 team here on 43things, in support of Breast Cancer awareness. Do your self-exam the 12th of every month.
    13 cheers
    170 people
  33. 33. Give Gemmword lots of love and hugs
    4 entries . 10 cheers
    4 people
  34. 34. Put more effort into my appearance
    1 entry . 13 cheers
    9 people
  35. 35. Give crocheting a try
    3 entries . 23 cheers
    1 person
  36. 36. have a cathartic whinge from time to time
    2 team members . 14 cheers
    2 people
  37. 37. Help Cora become more confident and deal well with her new situation
    14 entries . 12 cheers
    1 person
  38. 38. Keep thinking good thoughts for Sadie
    7 cheers
    31 people
  39. 39. Wish RuthG a Convivial Frugal Birthday on July 4th with Fresh Poetry
    1 cheer
    31 people
Recent entries
post randomly (read all 71 entries…)
A rather scary walk today! 12 hours ago

And a good lesson that I need to start saying no to things I don’t want. I went out to a lake to do some barbequing with my ex, which was nice. But soon after we arrived, we heard thunder at a distance. I don’t like being outdoors during thunder and lightening, it’s quite scary. So I said maybe we just have to pack up and go back soon, we’re going to have rain and thunder. But he said “no,no, why are you so pessimistic, it won’t come here” and insisted we should stay and eat there. With the result of course that we had to run back to the car for 15 minutes in pouring, freezing rain, with thunder and lightening all around us.

Then just after we got back to the car and started driving, ligthening actually struck just a couple of meters from the car. I know cars are among the safest places to be during lightening because of the rubber weels, so it probably wasn’t really that dangerous. But still, it was seriously scary! I’ve never seen lightening strike right next to me before, that is a scary force.

Then of course, I remembered I had left all my windows open, it was sunny and very warm when I left the house. And when I went back, there was a serious flood in my kitchen. Sigh.
That was some weather change, we’ve had a serious heatwave for 2 weeks, nothing but sun, and all of a sudden it changed, and they say lightening struck 2000 times in Oslo in less than an hour.

I can’t believe I let my ex talk me into staying though. When dark clouds are building up all over and you can hear thunder coming closer, there will be thunder and rain. But he had gone through the trouble of buying food and things for the barbeque and I didn’t want to disappoint him I guess. Next time, I’m definitely leaving no matter what.



Practice piano every day. And remember to keep it fun! (read all 7 entries…)
I´m considering 22 hours ago

changing music genre now, and try to learn classical piano instead.
Piano just hasn´t been that much fun lately, and as a result, I hardly practice. Partly because my new teacher just wasn´t right for me. And partly because I´m just not getting anywhere with the jazz improvisation thing at all.
I think a lot of jazz pianists, the teachers I´ve had included, are classically trained first. Which means they have the technique, the understanding of music, they know the music theory, and then they move on to jazz. Starting with jazz on the other hand, has proved really difficult, and improvisation, which is essential in jazz, requires a lot of theory background and understanding that I just don´t have yet.
Plus, my teacher kept telling me to listen to more jazz. I did listen to a lot of jazz when I started playing piano, but then I discovered classical music, and after that, I have started listening to more and more classical music and less and less jazz. And learning to play jazz without listening to it is less inspiring and quite difficult.

Changing genre means I´ve wasted a lot of time though. My practice until now have not been a waste either way of course, any kind of pianoplaying is good to learn any genre. But it is very different. I for instance can´t read sheet music at all, and I mean at all, I am used to simply having the basic melody lines and list of chords, and playing from that. And none of my teachers have ever been very interested in teaching me tecnique, they focuson the creative playing from chords only. While classical music of course requires music reading and tecnique to play it the way it is supposed to be played.

Hm. Not sure about this though. I am a very enthusiastic sort of person who gets all excited about new interests. Two years from now, I may have moved on to being superenthusiastic about pop or rock or whatever, and I can´t keep changing genres, learning one is hard enough.

The good thing is, there aren´t any lessons until mid august anyway, and then I will get a new teacher. So this is the perfect time to try it. I´ve just been to the library to borrow some sheet music. I went for seriously easy stuff, to easy really, but I figured it would be more fun if I can start playing right away instead of struggling with something too difficult. And then we´ll see. If I do find it more fun, I´ll change. After all, I´m not going to be a concert pianist either way, it´s all about having fun, so if I´ve wasted some time on other things, who cares really. And if I try it this summer and realize jazz is actually more fun anyway, I´ll keep doing that.



Help Cora become more confident and deal well with her new situation (read all 14 entries…)
Cora's test results came today. 4 days ago

The vet called, and at the beginning of the conversation, I was very happy. He said she does not have addisons, and the nausea is probably caused by a treatable inflamation. But then he went on to say: Her lungs don’t look good at all though, but that was to be expected of course.
Turns out Cora was diagnosed with a chronic lung disease three years ago, they just didn’t explain that to me.
I took her to the vet in 2006 because she was coughing a lot. They did some tests, found the cause, gave me some meds to give her for 10 days and said it would hopefully go away after the treatment. And it did, more or less, so I didn’t think much more about it. But now the coughing is back, and the vet said he could see changes in her lungs that are to be expected in a dog with this condition as the dog gets older. But Cora is only 4, she’s still a young dog!

I’m just in shock now, I can’t think clearly at all. So many questions. The fact that Cora doesn’t like to walk on a leash at all, that I have just accepted as the way she is. Is that really a result of poor lung capasity, that she doesn’t want to run and cause heavy breathing unless she’s doing something that gets her really excited? And that very intense, fast breathing and panting she does constantly when she’s excited, very different from Agatha, that I have just interpreted as a good sign that she’s happy and excited, is it really heavy breathing due to a lung problem?

I asked the vet if there is anything I can do to keep her as healthy as possible, and he said no. There are treatments for the sympthoms, but there are serious side effects, so they don’t do that unless it is clear that the dog is very uncomfortable. The disease itself can not be treated.
I asked him if she will get progressively worse, and if this will affect her life expectancy. He said “well, not necessarily. She might just be able to have a reasonably good life”. That is not the worst news of course, it would have been a lot worse if he said it would definitely go downhill from here. But still. “Not necessarily” means there is a chance it won’t work out well. And I don’t want her to have a reasonably good life, I want her to be happy and have a good life, period.
And what worries me the most is that he said there are changes in her lungs that are to be expected as the dog gets older. But she’s not old. If her lungs are changing a lot already, at the age of 4, how will her life be when she’s 8 or 10? One of my greatest fears in life is developing a disease that makes it hard to breathe, I can’t think of many things worse than the feeling of not getting enough air. Am I going to watch my dog go through just that as she gets older?

I know I should call the vet back and ask more question when I’ve had some time to get over the shock. Maybe their answers will calm me down a little. But maybe they won’t. I’m not sure I can take hearing what they will have to tell me.



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