I'VE BEEN TAGGED...AGAIN!

Well, thank you Leah for tagging me again! I keep thinking there's nothing more to tell about myself that anyone would care to know. LOL! I'll try to come up with some more VERY interesting tidbits of non-important informative stuff that is time-consuming for the reader & truly informational information.

Here are the rules:

1. Link the person who tagged you.
2. Post the rules on your blog.
3. Write 6 random things about yourself.
4. Tag 6 people at the end of your post and link to them.
5. Let the person know you tagged them on their blog.
6. Let the tagger know when you've posted.

Let's see...

1. When I was about 12, & we lived in California at the time in a city called LaHabra (pretty close to Disneyland), up in the very beautiful hills. I rode a bus to & from school. One day, I wore a cute little jumper that I REALLY liked. Instead of regular straps going over the shoulders, decorative chains held the jumper up. Well, I got up to get off the bus, the chains had bunched up & loosened their hold on the buttons on both sides. Anyway, I stood up & there goes this REALLY cute jumper down to the floor leaving my underwear exposed for the whole world to see--including the boy that I had a crush on who was, of course, sitting right behind me, because I had worked it out that way--ya know how scheming we females can be. I burst into tears & Lorraine, the bus driver, yelled for the laughing bus load of kids to be quiet, calmly came back to help me, & asked my best friend to help me off the bus & get me home. Probably one of the most embarrassing moments of my life! I never wore my favorite jumper again! Sob, hiccup. I need a nap to "forget." I'll be back in a while...

Ok, I'm back & have collected myself for more torture.

2. In 2001, I moved into a gated retirement community (this is Las Palmas Grand) after living in a really cute little house that I had bought just after getting divorced in 1997. The move was encouraged by my parents who were/are living in Southern Utah & wanted to move back to Arizona to be close to the kids & great grand kids. My parents were/are "getting on" in age (sorry Mom & Dad, but you have to face the facts--YOU ARE) & so we decided to purchase homes back to back so I could help them & they could help me. We put our homes up for sale, I sold mine & my parents, after trying for a while, couldn't get what they wanted out of theirs so they stopped trying. Too late for me! I was already committed, house was started, etc. If I backed out I would lose $5,000. (They did.) So, I moved into a 55 & older retirement community at age 44 (there's a Federal law that allows a percentage to be younger...). For quite a while, I was the youngest & got lots of dirty looks--too bad, so sad...I'm still younger than the required age. So there!

3. I took a disability retirement at the age of 45, after working for the "phone company" for about 24 years. I'm bi-polar (along with several other crappy things they've diagnosed), so I guess you could say that I'm certifiably "Goofy Grandma." I've been told by about 3 different Psychiatrists that I've been their toughest patient yet to treat. Normal bi-polar meds don't work on me--but, hey...I'm not normal so what did they expect? One day I'll tell you lots more. I have terrible bouts of spending, speeding, lots of different stuff in excess, & because I'm a "rapid cycler," can go into a depression (sometimes deep) pretty quick. Once I cycled twice in one day! Anyway, there you go--now you know how crazy I am.

4. As you already know, because I've probably told you many times before, I was run over by a tractor at the age of 5. I was very tiny so I didn't die. (I guess you figured that one out all by yourself, huh?) The dr. didn't charge my parents because when my Dad was in high school, he had saved the dr.'s son from drowning in a canal. I guess he figured he owed my Dad a favor. Too bad for Dad--LOL! I don't remember this, but my Mom told me I couldn't walk for 6 months. So, after being run over by the tractor, messing around with motorcycles, jeeps, snow skiing, & everything else that was on the dangerous side, I pretty much did a heck of a job to my neck & back. (I've had migraines most of my adult life, probably due to all of that.) I got put on steroids & pain meds off & on for years & gained lots of weight--oh NO, not telling you how much--not THAT dumb! (I also became addicted to those pain meds.) In 1995, I had what is known as an "Anterior Cervical Corpectomy," which really means that they took bone out of my hip, fused it into 3 of my cervical (neck) vertebrae, & connected a titanium plate with 6 screws into the whole setup. The surgeon who did it was one of the guys who developed the surgery--otherwise I would have had to wear one of those painful halos for 6 weeks. A year before my surgery, he did the same thing on the Queen of Saudi Arabia. At the time, the surgery was a big deal & about a 5 day hospital stay. Now, it's been refined enough to the point that it's outpatient.

Dang...2 more to go! What else???

5. Ok, back to being bi-polar/OCD/ADHD, etc...When I was still working, the big craze at the time was Beanie Babies. EVERYONE at work was buying them & saying what an "investment" they were because they would be able to sell them in a few years after that particular Beanie Baby was retired & make lots of bucks. Well, I thought it was stupid. Then, one day I walked into the store across the plaza where I worked & saw the cutest little bear! Just HAD to have it! You guessed it--Beanie Baby! Well, the overspending & excess kicked in BIG time! Remember, I thought it was a stupid thing to do AND I DIDN'T LIKE BEANIE BABIES!! I ended up buying well over $1,000 worth of the things! Of course, I never was able to sell them like all the "smart" people at work said we would do. I ended up donating all of them--way over 100--to Toys for Tots. At least I got the tax deduction for the donation. Big freaking whoopdie doo!

6. Part of my kitchen counter quickly & often becomes a "dumping" disaster. Jodi will attest to this. I walk in the house from, of course what else...spending...& DUMP the stuff on the counter where it stays for however long, until I decide I feel like putting it away or dumping it in the spare room or my very messy closet for later use. I AM NOT taking a picture of this one! You can just forget seeing that. Too bad for you, huh? Neener, neener, neener...use your imagination, but not very much, ok? Please?

Whew! I got 'er done! I'm supposed to tag & let those people know that they've been tagged. Well, here it goes: Shannon, because I'll bet you REALLY have some fun stuff to say; Kaci, because you're awesome & I want to learn more about you; KJ because I STILL want to know more & you're cool; Deb because I want to beat Jodi to you; Dad, because you STILL have lots to say; and last but not least...Mom, because Dad always blogs about stuff in his life, but we also want to know juicy details about you (Dad...come on...help her out here since she "doesn't do computer.)