Jamie Danford

Let's talk about my titties...

After a handful of years of being told 'It's time for you to get a mammogram," I finally decided that I needed to get my little mama's checked.  

Okay, so I didn't really do it out of the blue.  It turns out that while texting a tata pic to Big Dave the other day, I noticed that my left mama was bigger than my right. (I've since named them Fat Patty and Skinny Marie.)  Big Dave agreed that there was a definite change in the situation, so just like when I take a particularly hearty poop or eat a guilty lunch,  I confided the issue to Mendy the Hottie Neighbor.  After which, she promptly emailed me an interview about a twenty something year old chick who ended up with breast cancer, blaming her habit of storing her cell phone in her bra as the cause.  

I've lost 9 lbs since January 1st, so I was guessing this was probably the culprit, but I'm also a long time phone-in-the-bra girl, so I sort of freaked out a little. Consequently, I made the appointment.  

Thankfully, Southcoast Medical got me in quickly, because I was feeling a little anxious.  So I showed up for my appointment bright and early Tuesday morning.  I made sure to not wear deoderant, per my Facebook friends advice.  I felt pretty confident, but then again, there's always that teensy bit of fear that niggles in the back of one's mind while chillin' in the waiting room.

Finally, it was my turn to be called back.  The lovely nurse lady showed me to a room where I could change out of my sweatshirt and put on a beautiful mauve half gown with snaps up the front.  

Okay, so maybe not the sexiest thing I've ever worn, but who needs sexy when some stranger's grabbing your titty and maneuvering it into a vice?  

I opted for the 3D mammogram, a $50 upgrade, but it can supposedly detect up to 30% more bad stuff than the regular one, so what the heck.  Go big or go home, right?

The process was totally easy.  Expose right boob, lady places it in machine which then squeezes it like a blood pressure cuff (14 lbs pressure on Skinny Marie, 11 lbs on Fat Patty.)  I'm not one to mind a lady's hands on my breasticles, so it wasn't awkward at all.  

It's kind of a weird experience, because you're wondering if the mammy tech saw something and if so, would she say so?  Or is she not allowed?  And what if she saw like a baby killer whale in there... what would her reaction be?  So the whole time, I'm like, "uh huh... I'm on to you lady."  But in the end it all turned out perfectly fine.

Two days after my appointment, I received this lovely postcard in the mail...

I didn't even realize how fearful I was until I opened this and breathed a big fat sigh of relief.  Whew!  

It was an intense experience, and I am 150% relieved that I don't have to sweat it again for a while.  And in the meantime, I'm going to embrace Fat Patty (well, I'll probably let Big Dave embrace her, but you know what I mean) and thank God that I'm good to go.  

My take on the situation:  It was NOTHING.  Stop waiting around and get your titties checked ASAP.  No pain, and the thrill of a stranger manhandling your lady parts... what's not to love?  

:)

Where did February Go????

Dude.  It's seriously the end of February already?  I've been a blog slacker again, so let's get caught up...

It's been a busy month... well, I mean busy for our DHU standards,  not the REAL world.  (I wouldn't know what to do out there.)

The month started with Mendy the Hottie Neighbor and I having a GREAT run at the Critz Tybee 10K...

Then the next weekend,  while Big Dave went to BAMA to visit with his mom, my niece Tay the Great came in town, and Mendy and I had an inpromptu fire pit party that involved wine bag tossing, my forcing a U of A sweatshirt on a poor unsuspecting teenage V Tech fan, and midnight ATV riding (Sid's first time... and me on the back... shrieking for my life, even though we never took the back brake off and were only going an estimated 5 mph.)  Thank GOD there are no pictures.

Big Dave had a great weekend with his mom and came home feeling happy that he could help her take care of some things.  It's been so hard for her since his daddy died last year, and I'm so proud of him for being the kind of guy who will do anything and everything he has to do to take care of his mom.  He's such a great son.  

The next weekend was Valentine's Day, and in a fit of love induced enthusiasm, we quickly threw together a VD get-together for our friends.  Yes, another weekend of sitting around the fire pit watching Jamie be stupid.  Hey, it's what we do.  

Guy was SO completely accurate when he said to Big Dave, "Look at Jamie.  All she needs is a couple of missing teeth, and she'd look like a homeless crackhead."  Haha... maybe I need to work on my fire pit look?  

We had a hilarious night with our friends.  I love these folks!

And last weekend, we enjoyed a neighborhood pig pickin' fundraiser for our friend Larry Hagins' medical expenses.  

Our little DHU community is such a cool place to live.  Raising Miss Lizzy in the same neighborhood where I ran around as a young girl has been such a gift!  It was so cool to talk to parents of the crazy guys I used to hang with when I was Lizzy's age.  They all have stories about me, and didn't mind telling Big Dave all about my antics.  (Crashing John Kinzie's motorcycle, stealing the Poppell's golf cart, speeding up and down Coffee Bluff in my little Honda... how did I survive??)

Which brings me back to the here and now.  In a mere handful of days, my baby girl will be celebrating her SIXTEENTH birthday (March 8th.)  Oh lordy.  Her birthday's on a Saturday, so she'll have to wait until the following Tuesday to go for her driver's test.  I'm guessing she'll pass.  And then the real fun begins.  I know she's ready... I think I'm ready.  We've been waiting for this for so long, which is probably why this last month has flown by so quickly!

And that was February.  Here today... gone (the day after) tomorrow.  :)

 

Fuck the Cold...

It's a Wednesday night in the DHU.  A full 24 hours until Thirsty Thursday, and there's not doodly poopers on T.V.  My hubby and kiddo have abandoned me to go cash in the kiddo's coins at the Kroger Coinstar machine.  So, I'm chillin' on the sofa with my favorite Dickey's cup of vodka and Crystal light lemonade.

It's frickin' COLD outside.  Yes. COLD... as in Witch's Titty. 

Okay, sure it's not subzero or anything, but I've long subscribed to the Savannah life, which means NO freezing rain or snow unless absolutely necessary. 

It needs to get warm...  SOON... even though my fat roll isn't ready.  I'd rather be fat and happy than cold and skinny.  Screw these freezing temps!

So tomorrow morning, we have a delayed start for school at SVA.  Thank goodness.  My kiddo would freeze her buns off if she had to report for class at 8am.  SVA is NOT cold friendly.  Constructed around the convent of St. John's Cathedral, the classrooms are located around the central courtyard. Lizzy's locker is literally OUTSIDE, but covered by a cement walkway.  It's fricking freezing!  Poor kiddos!  Thank goodness for the delay.  We Savannahians are NOT prepared for ice and freezing rain.  We need the BEACH... PLEASE!!!

So stay warm and safe my friends.  I know we're not anywhere near as cold as our Northern peeps, but this is as cold as it gets in the SAV, and we need to be tough. 

Fuck it.  This cold shit sux.

 

Tybee 10K Recap...

(We should probably call this one the 'Fat Roll 500', because both I and my Hottie Neighbor, MJ, were in LESS than stellar shape for it.)

So it goes like this... 

Mendy calls me up. She's at the packet pickup for the Bridge Run, and she says we'll get a discount if we go ahead and sign up for Tybee.  Oh yay.   We commit to running the half marathon (a pleasant 13.1 miles) and she registers us both.  We. Are. Stupid.

We think this is going to motivate us to train.  We print off running plans, make promises to increase our mileage, and lose those few extra pounds we've both accumulated through the fall and winter months.

But none of this actually happens.   I struggle with pushing my (hopefully healed) stress fracture.  Mendy struggles with her feet... WHY must they hurt so badly?  Even with her new Adidas from Fleet Feet?!!?! 

We basically whine and bitch and gripe our way through workouts.  We admit tha we've eaten Whoppers and Cinnabons.  It's freaking awful.

And all the while, the Tybee Runfest weekend is creeping up on us.  

I run 6 miles.  I say, "Oh we can TOTALLY run/walk this 13.1... no problemo."  Mendy buys in.  (The fact that she actually subscribes to my hairbrained schemes is one of the MANY reasons I love her.)

We become resigned to our fate.   We're going to spend 3 hours running and walking (emphasis on the walking) through the back streets of Tybee Island.  But dammit, we are gonna get our medal. (Medals are important to me.  Sorry.)

And then something happens.

The Thursday before the race, I find myself in Mendy's kitchen for our usual Thirsty Thursday cocktails, and I am saying, "You know, I think I can be talked into dropping down to the 10K instead of the half marathon."  And she is like, "OH HELL YES."  And then there we were. 

The realization finally hit me that it was entirely possible that I would injure myself if I pushed it to do the 13.1.  And for what?   A damn hunk of medal on a ribbon?  I can make one of those myself!  So we decided it would be prudent (something we rarely do) to actually run something that wouldn't kill us. 

We spent the night on Tybee at the Desoto Beach Club so we wouldn't have to wake up at 4:30am to drive down there.  We had margaritas and crab legs and watched reruns of Modern Family until we both passed out. 

And then, when our anxious bowels wouldn't let us stay in bed anymore, we rose in the darkness and pooped and ate bananas and dressed for the super cold weather we'd expected.

Oh but wait.

Neither of us expected to open our hotel room door and see POURING ASS RAIN. 

WTF??

Yep.  It was dark.  It was freezing.  It was raining.  AWESOME.

We contemplated just packing up and going to Sonic for a healthy breakfast, but being the gluttons for punishment that we are, we ended up driving Mendy's car down and getting as close to the the start as possible.  Once we were parked, and we could see the other runners warming up and stretching, we figured what the hell.  We'd just get soaked.  What's a little pneumonia between friends, right?

So we paid our meter, said our prayers, posted our status on FB and wandered to the starting line.  It didn't take long before we heard  the starter's horn and we were off!

As usual, we waited until the absolute LAST minute to decide on a race strategy.  I told Mendy that I thought I'd like to run the whole thing instead of run/walking.  It would be super slow, like a 12 minute mile pace, but I was hoping to do it.  She said she'd suffer through, and we headed out.

Sure enough, the slow pace allowed us to chat and laugh and run... it was rather glorious.   We contemplated slowing to a walk at the 3 mile mark, but ended up pushing through.

It was SUCH a great run.  I know there are folks who might laugh at my happiness about actually running a full 6.2, but whatever.  It's taken a long time for me to get to this point.  I was comfortable, but I still felt the weariness and pain of pushing myself to the limit.  We finished in 1 hour and 13+ minutes, which was only a minute longer than my personal best in the bridge 10k in 2012.  After dealing with the stupid stress fracture, gaining 10+ pounds, and trying to rediscover my running mojo, I feel like this was a damn good result. 

I'm SO proud of us!!!

A mile's a mile's a mile. And we ran 6.2 of them Saturday morning in the cold and the rain.  It was beautiful.   And I love you MJ.  Thanks for being my wingman, even when it's pretty much a dumbass situation.  I love you!!!!!

Tybee 10K 2014 DONE.  And a big fat HELLO to Jeremy and Liticia.  It's so fun seeing old friends... even in the COLD ASS RAIN.  :)

There are no guarantees in life, but dammit, I can pretty much promise you that if my MJ and I go into it together, we'll find at least one rainbow and possibly a unicorn.  It's how we roll... strippin' out of a soaking wet sports bra in broad daylight and all.