Aloha 'oe

Ok, one last post.

Yes, Jordan is The Hashemite Kingdom.

I'm avoiding packing.

My eyebrows are stuck in neutral position.

I went and saw Wicked last night and it was awesome; those women are amazing!

I couldn't help myself!

I went back to the laser guy on Monday for the final zapping of my brown spots, and I didn't mean to but I ended up with a little more botox!

I showed him my Spock eyebrows and he's like, "Oh, I can fix that!" and before I knew it I'd received more botox to my forehead. It's only been two days but the dramatic arch business has already subsided--that's what I'm supposed to be demonstrating in the picture.

I think I'm going to have to take a little hiatus from posting--missed my Sunday post. Too many things to finish before departing for the Hashemite Kingdom. We'll see.

Botox Update

This is from Easter Sunday, not too bad when I do a regular smile...

Frightening when I raise my eyebrows!!

Um, yeah, really scary.

This is my mad face, very minor lines.

So, eventhough the frown lines are gone, the jack-o-lantern eyebrows are enough to persuade me not to do botox again.

I think I can tell who has had it done!

Ode to Stress

"Discourteous lout, you stink."

Not particularly poetic or lyrical, I never did excel in that department.

I started feeling guilty about my original post, so I edited it.

Wonder Drug or Poison?

What we're really talking about here is Caffeine, I just didn't want to generate a bunch of random responses by using that as the title.

My house was caffeine-free growing up and it was most definitely a Word of Wisdom issue. My mother calls it Poison. No caffeinated beverages passed my lips until my late 20's. What brought about the change? Well, I cannot deny the influence of seeing friends and siblings imbibing guilt-free; however, I'd like to think I'm not completely susceptible to peer pressure.

I was totally dependent on Excedrin and finally decided I was being ridiculousy self-deceiving in refusing to drink Mt Dew, coke, etc.

Here's the thing, can I function without it? Yes. Do I have to have it? Uh, sometimes. Would I be better served by getting more sleep? Yes.

I seem to be exquisitely sensitive to caffeine and just a little gets me into a terrible cycle. I get less than adequate sleep due to poor time management, have like 1/2 a diet coke at work so I can quit being cranky, can't fall asleep 12 hrs later, and need more caffeine the next day. Ridiculous.

The fabulous thing about caffeine is that it cures all my ills--wonder drug, as it were--headaches, bad mood, fatigue, inhibitions. (I get kind of animated and loud the more I have in my system.)

So, if I'm not dependent on it,physically/psychologically, is it ok to keep swilling the stuff?

My father and one friend point out that BYU does not sell caffeinated soft drinks. I point out that they are available for purchase at the Lion House and Joseph Smith Memorial Bldg--much to their consternation.

Clearly if I'm having this debate with myself, I should probably just give it up and go to bed earlier? Hmm.

Cello Master Class

So, last week my cello teacher had a master class for all her students and I was feeling vaguely smug and superior because I knew I was the most advanced student. Yes, it was me and nine children.

Have you seen the episode of Seinfeld where Kramer takes a Karate class with a bunch of kids? "It's skill level, Jerry."

Anyway, I totally choked! I didn't feel nervous, but my hands started shaking and I could barely play. To top it all off, we played a matching game at the end and I made a fatal error causing our team to lose and this 5 yr old kid says, "We lost, and it's all your fault!" Oh my gosh, it was hysterical, I could not stop laughing.

Brown Spots & Frown Lines

This is a picture from 2008, see the horrid frown lines?

This is today, still have frown lines, but are they a little less apparent? And is there slightly more curvature of the brows or is it just my imagination? It's supposed to take up to two weeks for maximum results. The brown spots clearly have not gone away.
I seem to favor this shade of green, I have 5 tops in this color.

Eek, this is a rather unforgiving shot. I clearly have brown spots all over my cheek, how embarrassing. The lasered area is just under my eye, it kind of looks like scabs but it's all below the surface of the skin and won't disappear until those top layers slough off, hence the 3 week time frame for full effect.

Not Joking.

I seriously did get botoxed--conservatively--and it's making my eyebrows do a weird arch thing that I hadn't planned on, but my mad-face lines are still as apparent as ever. And, yes, it has everything to do with being called a Grandma. I wrote a post on Aging awhile ago and I wasn't kidding.

The little brown spots on my face have turned dark and should be scabbing over and sloughing off in a couple of days.

I'll do a pre & post picture. The brown spots on my cheek make me look a little beat up, like not cute. I would take a picture right now but my camera battery's completely depleted. I've started doing a daily video diary and it eats up the battery rather quickly.

So, I've been following a Nurse Practitioner in a Pediatric clinic for the past few weeks. Today my professor said she'd met with all our mentors and we could come see her if we wanted to know what they'd said. I went to office after class and she's like, "Come in and have a seat." I did, she shut the door and I was thinking, "Uh oh!"

Apparently he told her my facial expression is intimdating/makes the patients nervous! Clearly I should have done botox weeks ago, although the current state of my eyebrows makes me look even more mad than usual. I was trying to decide whether I should ask my mentor what exactly he meant--was it a one time incident or an ongoing kind of thing, but I totally lost my nerve, couldn't do it. Dum dum--my mentor, not me.