salt

They finally salted the roads. Wow. Took 10 days, but we finally have almost driveable highways. So I took the car for the first time in forever and went to town to do some errands.

Since they canceled my specialist appointment yesterday, I got whiny. And got a hold of my GP, who, since she is also a friend, I don't e-mail outside of the office about office stuff. My desperation had been caused by being in the middle of a flare and not seeing any potential for change in the situation.

She was kind and gave me an immediate pill solution, and then looked into my file, dug out my biopsy results (the primary reason behind my specialist appointment) and found out they were clean. Which probably means Irritable Bowel Syndrome.

So two days ago I got to start a new IBS diet. Eat things with soluble fibre. Okay. Soluble fibre. Hmmm.

Turns out that the types of fibre that I like to eat, that I truly enjoy, are insoluble. So they need to be eaten in moderation. The types of fibre that I'm not as fond of (but hey, anything is better than nothing) I'm supposed to eat. Oats are good, Wheat is not so great. Some fruits are good, others not. It's complicated.

And I'm supposed to cut back (actually cut out, but I don't know if I'm that strong) coffee. Decaf still counts as coffee. So that sucks. I just bought a new coffeepot (again) - one that pours better. Too bad I have to make smaller pots.

But, between the new diet and the allowance for imodium and tylenol as necessary I have been coping better this week. Supper is a bowl of cheerios, but that beats the heck out of boost. And, for those days when I still need to have boost (rink days - it's just safer when I'm driving), I can have fibre supplements when I get home.

At least it is a change. Things are not going to get better when dealing with my kids' activities. They will be busy, and therefore, so will I. It's really a short period in life, I keep telling myself. And maybe, when I have more control over my life's business (or do I mean busy-ness) my body will stop rebelling. In the meantime, coping sounds good.

...hath frozen over

One of my biggest pet peeves with this school division is that they keep the schools open even when buses don't run.

I don't care about the "extra" instructional time that town kids receive - they don't. There is no extra time - it is play time. I just think that in a rural division (we have six buses lined up end to end on a slow day) that no one should be forced to travel/walk on days when it is too cold for the diesels to run or too nasty on the highways for the buses to be safe.

I won't take my kids to school for that very reason - my own little protest. Today, I don't have to make the choice. The school division actually closed the schools. I think it has happened once before in the three years we've been listening.

Why? It's dicey out there. Men's league curling ran last night - Dale left the club early after a friendly neighbourhood constable (no, really, he is friendly) stopped by and said the roads were closed (they weren't, they should have been, Darcy just wanted to keep the guys safe.) It took him forty minutes to get home. On the gravel.

I took this picture while he was out last night. I didn't step outside to do it - Dale has put my canning salt just outside the door to try to melt some of the ice, but even the driveway is thick.

This morning it is all covered with a new, fresh blanket of snow. Which is treacherous in itself.

The highway information map is out of commission - I suspect it overloaded as yesterday it took a long time to load. But the text reports still show our major highways as closed. And more snow is forecast for today and tomorrow.

Doesn't matter though - Dale tells me I'm not going anywhere - Jo was supposed to get her new dental spacer put in today - we'll just have to reschedule. Hopefully the assistant who was supposed to put it in stays home - she's only got an hour drive...