I'm here! I haven't disappeared! I swear!

Wow. I've disappeared for longer than I had thought.

Things have just been INSANE. This is the second year in a row where I've produced a play for the Philly Fringe Festival. It's an amazing experience, but it's a lot of work. This year was really successful, at least in my eyes. I rented Studio 5 at the Walnut Street Theatre (which is the oldest theatre in the country). It's a 52 seat black box theatre. I've been working on this since February. Falling Gnome Productions, my company, was founded to basically produce my work. This year's show was REALLY good. I figured I'd show a few pictures from the show.

(I'm hiding behind the red arm chair - next year I won't feel obligated to hide!!!)

I love working on my shows, but I'm crazy exhausted. Worst part? I go back to class this week. (My school is on quarters - summer term ends in early September and fall term begins late September.) At least this is SENIOR YEAR. I'll be finished. Best part? I'll be skinnier when I finish college than when I started. In 9 months (or a little less) I'll hopefully have lost another 40 to 50 pounds and I'll amazing and I won't be scared to start Grad school or move out or anything.

I've been amazed at how good I feel though. Energy. I can walk up and down stairs without getting too winded. I feel great walking around the city again! It had been really hard for me to walk. Anything from walking through a parking lot to walking city blocks to get around - I could barely do it 7 months ago. I feel so great now. It's ridiculous how much better I feel. 

Argh. I hate my back and legs.

It's 3:30 in the morning and I woke up a half hour ago with incredibly bad leg pain. 

I use to get this more than I have recently. I have two herniated discs in my lower back, and in addition to back pain, it usually causes some super annoying leg pain. And it decided to do that tonight, a night where I had gone to bed early and was attempting to get a good night's sleep.

After a few minutes of tossing and turning, I went to the bathtub. Usually, if I soak my legs in REALLY REALLY REALLY hot water, it'll help for a little bit. I guess it relaxes the nerves. Tonight, it did nothing. Great.

So I'm sitting here, wondering if I'll ever get back to sleep. Tonight was suppose to be the first night back on a better sleeping schedule. Apparently my body had other plans.

At least I'm being semi-productive. I had to send a few emails, so I did that. I think I'm going to try to get back to sleep. Tylenol first? Sounds like a plan.

You know, I think the worst part of this is that the doctors said it would get better as I lost weight. The less pressure on my spine would elevate a lot of the pain. 44 pounds down and the pain is still there. That's a significant amount! I wanted that to help! A lot of the reason I did all of this was to help the pain I've been having. I wanted to see results. I thought I was well on my way. It's very discouraging. 

Ugh. I'm going back to bed. Hopefully it's better in the morning and I don't have to go to work like this. It makes sitting in a chair really hard, but standing is bad too. Too much of either one.

Wooooo!

I've lost another 1.8 pounds in the last 4 days. This whole wisdom tooth thing may have been the jump start I needed. That brings me down to 246.3. I can't believe Im almost to the 230's! I feel so proud of myself. I don't think I can fathom being smaller than 230. I don't know if I remember being smaller than that, except when I was in 6th or 7th grade. Wow. It really just hit me how much I've lost. 43.6 pounds since February. That seems like a lot when I look at it like that. Wow. 

And now, to put it into perspective. These things both weight 43 pounds. 

I feel really good right now. I still find it strange that people in my family don't believe that the insurance company would cover my surgery. I don't think they get the concept. I'm not lying when I say I weighted 290 pounds. And I'm 5.7 And that all brings my BMI over 40. And, if your BMI is over 40, the insurance company is like "Heeyyyy! Let's make you skinny!" 

They don't get that. It bugs me.

I was suppose to go in for a fill today, but can't due to school stuff. I now have to put it off for 3 weeks. I know that I still need another fill. I hadn't eaten breakfast since I went to the oral surgeon to have my stitches out this morning, so I came home with the intent of making a breakfast/lunch sorta thing. I made a slice of Ellio's pizza. It's soft and chewable right now. I didn't mean to eat the whole thing, but I did. And that's far more than I should be able to eat. I don't feel as guilty, since it was both my breakfast and lunch, but still.

I ordered some pants from Old Navy and they SHOULD be here today. I'm really excited. All of my pants are really big on me. I even had a pair almost fall off when I stood up in class the other day. I'm pretty sure that no one noticed, but still. That's a problem. 

I think this weekend I'm going to really go through and clean out what is unwearable for me. I haven't been a size 18 since I graduated high school, and even then, it was a comfortable 18. And when I started all of this, I was bulging out of my 22's. 

Puppets, Not Muppets

Oh. I wanted to share the puppets I've been working on this term! They made this term considerably better. It's been so much fun working on them.

This is my shadow puppet. The puppet itself isn't meant to be see, but rather flash light behind it onto a white screen. The head moves up and down and he chases the little person. 

This is my hand puppet project. I wanted to make a gnome, so I did. He's really cute. When I brought him home, my Dad was using him to drive the car. It was pretty funny.

This is my final project. I let myself get a little out of hand and made two so far. I might make one more to go with them. They are hand and rod puppets. I haven't put the rods on their hands yet. They really aren't that hard to make, at least to me.  And they are both my Muppet-esque project. I'm a big fan of the Muppets and these are my tribute.  

So this is the class I'm skipping today. Given that most people hadn't finished their hand puppets last week, I'm not worried about falling behind, mainly because I'm far ahead. 

Either way, I'm really proud of the way they've come out. I've put a lot of effort into them and wanted them to be the best they could be. 

Ugh. My teeth! I want them back!

My teeth hurt. Correction, my whole mouth hurts. And it sucks really badly. It's like an overall soreness. 

But I've lost two pounds. Actually, it could be more, since I haven't gone number 2 since last week. I think my diet this weekend prohibited it. I think I've had spaghetti-o's, mash potatoes, ice cream and cream of wheat, at least for the most part. So I guess that's a highlight of this weekend and, hopefully, it keeps up. 

Right now? My stomach hurts. Terribly. Like cramping pain. 

And I still have to go to class later. I'm done my project, so I'm probably not going to stay for the whole class, but still. I just don't feel like taking the trip to go down to school. Oh well.

Correction. I'm not going to class. I can't get up. And so, I'm going back to sleep.

Spaghetti-O's!

So far today I've eaten ice cream, spaghetti-o's, cake and mash potatoes.

Gotta love it.

I've decided that I'm not worrying about it. If I'm going to be in pain, I'm going to eat happy.

The procedure went well today. They couldn't put me under, because they couldn't find a vein. My veins are hard to find to begin with, so without having anything to drink before hand (you're not allowed) and so there was no IV for me. Instead, they did laughing gas and novocain. And it wasn't too bad for the first half of my mouth. Then, they had to drill out the bottom right tooth, since it was completely sideways. Then, the top right actually hurt - not even pain, but the pressure hurt.

Either way, it's over with. 

And I'm going to eat what makes me feel better. It's really not too bad, since I can't eat a whole lot anyway. 

I hope I can get a lot done this weekend, since I will be home anyway. I have two essays, a press release and a few other theatre things to get done before Monday.

Bye Bye Teeth

There's about a week and half until all of my final projects are due for the summer term at school. 

Tomorrow I get my wisdom teeth out. I'm not overly worried, I just want it over with. The top ones should come right out, but the bottom teeth are difficult because they're coming in sideways. 

However, it is an excuse to eat ice cream all weekend. So I'm not going to complain.

The worst thing is that I have to take a steroid pack to reduce swelling. Steroids = weight gain. Always. Always. But what are you gonna do?

I go back to the surgeon next Friday for another fill.

And this was rather uninteresting. I'm exhausted and have been doing so much. I spent the afternoon and a good portion of the evening working on my final project for my puppet theatre class. It's so much fun. I'll have to post pictures so you can see what I've made. They all came out REALLY well.  I get really excited about making them. I love working on crafty things - whether sewing, scrapbooking or whatever. I'm starting to think I could easily make this a very fun hobby. 

I should probably go to bed. I have to be up early for tomorrow.

But, you know, I was thinking. I wonder how much my teeth weigh?