Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Rich Man's Disease

So what do you want to hear about first? My gout or my savings? Or our trip? Man, do I know how to pull the reader in and leave them wanting more or what? Whoo!

Okay, let's start with the gout. Remember a few posts ago where I said I was getting a bunion? Well, I went to the doctor yesterday and he thinks it might be gout.

For those of you who are not overweight old men, gout is a disease that happens to overweight old men. (With all apologies to my father, who is currently quite svelte, but who has gout and had it worse when he weighed more.) What I am SAYING is, gout is this very painful thing where your body can't break down uric acid, whatever that is, and as a result you form these crystals in your body that hang around in your joints.

Now, that sounds like it'd be kind of pretty, doesn't it? Shiny little crystals decorating my joints here and there. How festive!

Yeah, not so much. The doctor asked me if I drank a lot or ate a lot of shellfish. I don't do EITHER! EVER! But those of you who know and love me know I eat like Jethro Bodine on The Beverly Hillbillies. I eat big slabs of red meat, and all sorts of processed fatty fat-fat foods, and so on.

Because it comes from drinking and eating fatty foods, gout is called "The Rich Man's Disease." So you know why I might have this, right? Because I've SAVED ALL THIS MONEY! Now I am rich, so I get rich man's disease.

So to make a dramatic story not so dramatic, the tests came back today and I might just have an inflamed nerve or something. The doctor will tell me more tomorrow. So yelling at my father yesterday for the bad genes was probably unnecessary. Sorry, dad. But I am still mad about when you put Shadow to sleep.

And speaking of being rich, we have distributed our savings and I have laid it out for you on the busy panel to the right of this blog. Since we have been not spending, we have paid our taxes, paid off our credit cards, paid off my car (which I just sold, by the way, to my mother! go, mom!) (we are shipping the dang thing to Michigan. I guess there aren't a lot of cars in Michigan. It's not, like, where they make them or anything. Perhaps mom was just helping us out a bit. Ya think?) and we still have $5,100 in savings.

When the check gets here from sale of the auto, we'll have $5,000 more in savings. Which is pretty exciting, even if it did give me gout.

Finally, I do have to tell you that we're, well, we're going on a vacation starting tomorrow. Now DON'T YELL. A very dear friend is getting married in Cape Cod. I paid for our room there last year already, cause I figured rooms in Cape Cod in July should probably be booked early. When this not-spending thing came around, I thought about not going to this wedding, but you know what? Weddings are once-in-a-lifetime events, and every time I HAVEN'T gone to one, I have regretted it. So I am happily going.

Besides, I have never seen cod wearing capes before.

After the wedding, we are going to Vermont to stay with my Aunt Kathy, and it will be my birthday and our wedding anniversary. Not my wedding anniversary with my Aunt Kathy. With my spouse. Geez.

So, maybe I will blob from Aunt Kathy's, but if I don't, here's Gouty, signing off for now!

12 comments:

Musings of a Housewife said...

GACK. Gout sounds, EW. I have a bunion. Hmmmm....

Well, congrats on the savings. And definitely go and enjoy that wedding!! Have fun.

Anonymous said...

The people I have encountered that had gout were heavy HEAVY drinkers and looked a little like W.C. Fields.

Have a delightful time on your vacation. I will send along a little birthday something with your Mother.

Anonymous said...

Oh...by the way... I know you are not a drinker and you do not look anything like W.C. Fields.

June Cutoff Cash said...

Thanks, Gwen. Do you like how I kept your anonymity?

When I was a kid I had a poster of W.C. Fields that I loved. Maybe he gave me gout.

Anonymous said...

Happy anniversary early.

Still talking about what a wonderfull time we had at your big day and was very glad you were at mine a year later. You are correct, a once in a lifetime occasion worth the trip.

Oh, btw, my brother has had gout and he is skinny and doesn't drink alcoholic beverages. Try drinking cherry juice.

June Cutoff Cash said...

"Hometown horselady." That was a good one.

Happy anniversary early to you. too. July 30th?

Unknown said...

Ouch! Sorry about the toe.

Have a great trip!

Anonymous said...

Have a good trip to the Cape. As to your sore toe...I occasionally am blessed with an excruciating pain in my right foot, actually in the bone two up from the big toe. It is right in the middle of the bone and hurts like all get out. I found that the way to get rid of it is to stretch, as in exercise, for a few minutes every day. I seem to have some sort of nerve impingement in my back which manifests itself as pain in the foot. This could be the result of vigourous swinging of a golf club at inappropriate moments, such as on the golf course. So, try stretching. All the best, Uncle Omar

Anonymous said...

Sorry about your foot. I do hope you enjoy the wedding and the trip to, um, Vermont, wasn't it? Happy Birthday and Anniversary!

Anonymous said...

You have gout and I think I gave myself a hernia from trying to use one of those balance balls. I should know better than to try something like that. I can't even ride a bike.

Have a great time at the wedding!

Anonymous said...

Wow, Gout. Gout to me is the funniest word ever. I love to throw it in the mix of a sentence. In fact, I might try to work it into my next post, just for fun.

Yay for weddings! I love them! Have fun!

Jamie

Tepidchik said...

oh my goodness the gout sounds AWFUL. But I will say you have a very amusing writing style! Interesting blog.