Wednesday, May 12, 2010

awakening.......from the long hibernation.....

I haven't added to this blog since November though there has been quite a lot going on. Here is the nutshell. The big nut: Around the end of November, I sneezed one day and lost my voice. Strange I thought, but no big deal. and it wasn't really. Fast forward to December and I had been having just a little trouble with hoarseness but it ' any big deal. I went to the doc, who sent me to the ENT, who shoved a tiny camera up my nose and down my throat to look at my vocal chords, then told me that mt cords looked good an healthy and I may have some overuse problems. Christmas Eve, on the special song for the "Let It Be Christmas" Which was in fact "Let it Be" by the Beatles, my voice began to fail. nobody else noticed it, but I did. Something was wrong. a few weeks later, the hoarseness moved from my singing voice to my regular talking voice. All of the sudden I couldn't get any volume to correct the kids or keep them from running into the road. Back to the ENT who scoped me again and said, nothing wrong. Fast forward to February, when we were finally ready for a second opinion and went to an ENT a friend recommended who, in about 5 seconds of looking with the up-nose camera found a "really big" polyp. Therapy wasn't going to help so I went under the knife a few days later to have it removed. I am now working on vocal therapy and am singing again but not back to 100% quite yet. The ENT who missed the "really big polyp" refused our request to refund our $90 in copays and basically said the the polyp may have formed after my second visit. Sure Doc, how's your ego today? it was a pretty dark time for me when I didn't have my voice that wasn't helped by the excruciating long dismal winter that Michigan always provides. The main issue was not being able to read to the kids. I couldn't sing either but it was dealing everyday with the kids that was the most depressing. Hopefully, I am on my way back to a strong singing voice but can read and make funny noises again so I'm working back into the positive.
I started roasting my own coffee at Christmas when Azsure got me a small home coffee roaster and some beans. It has been a blast! so much so that for my birthday in February, I took all my dough and gift certificates and upgraded to a bigger coffee roaster. It fills a lot of my thoughts and focus learning about coffee and drinking coffee and reading about coffee. It is a lot of fun and great new hobby to help me relax after a few days of craziness with the kids. It may be a future enterprise someday down the road. We'll see.
We are gearing up for the summer here. We used to say "ohhhhh the summers are so beautiful in Michigan that it makes the rest of the year worth it." That no longer applies. The 9.5 month dreary winter in Michigan blows. The only way the summer could make up for it is if it rained candy and ice cream for an hour every day during the summer. This past winter was a killer.
That's all for now. hopefully, I can keep up a little better from now on.

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