LifeLines

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As expected, LifeLines wasn’t quite prepared for me 😀

I showed up about half an hour early thanks to Mom who has a habit of showing up here on the early side and driving fast. When we got there, I went to sign in and that’s where the fun started. I gave my last name, and the woman checked her sheet and looked at me, and checked her sheet and her coworker, the actual doctor, checked as well. And they went “but it says ‘miss’ here and it’s clearly a man”. That was very good to hear, but I figured I relieve them of their suffering so I was like “it’s okay, it doesn’t match, I’m transgender”. Which instantly made them very accommodating, they crossed and fixed their sheet and I was asked to accompany the doctor to the exam room.

There she double checked administrative things and fixed what she could there, and promised she would e-mail the head about this, so it goes better next time. Then I was measured and weighed and had my blood pressure taken (which was good), breath sounds listened to and the electrocardiogram done. For that I had to take off my binder, because it requires a handful of electrodes and those require skin contact. She was very nice about it, asking if it bothered me and such. Luckily for me, since I’m on hormones, I’m less bothered by them because I know they’re only temporary now, so it was no problem to take the binder off.

Then after that I got to do the lung capacity test, although I fear it might be slightly below what I would normally score as I was already back in  my binder by then. The whole thing ended with a jump test that measures muscle force when you push off the ground, it was fun 😀

The final thing this time around were two more computer things. First a memory test thing where it shows you cards and you have to press yes or no if you, for example, have seen them before, or if it is a repeat of the card directly before it. The second thing was a fairly standard stress and depression questionnaire.

The follow-up appointment is August 14, courtesy of their full agenda and mine. Then they take my blood, and I get to hand in a giant-ass canister with urine. I also got e-mailed another questionnaire to fill in-

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Today I discovered sugar buns 😀 I already knew (and love!) Frisian sugarbread, but today I went with Kim to the supermarket during lunchbreak and there they had sugar buns instead of a whole loaf. The texture is the same as the bread, but it has the typical top layer of a bun. The sugar is mostly in the bottom part and along the edges. I bought some small packets of butter to go with it and had these, later on the day, for dinner. They are glorious!

Tomorrow I have my second actual appointment with LifeLines. After the original intake a little over four years ago (may 2010) I have done a couple questionnaires, but this is the first come back appointment where they will retake blood and measure things and so on. Tonight I realised I’d forgotten to fill in the digital questionnaire they included with the appointment e-mail. Since it has to be done before the appointment, I quickly wrestled through it. I usually hate them since they are often unclear in their questions, and I find many hard to answer. The typical questionnaire has sections for what you’ve eaten the past 4 weeks and their intervals are kinda sucky as they go from 2-3 days a month to 1-2 days a week which is a different kind of measurement to the similar 4-10 days a month.

My eating habits are fairly irregular, so for me an answer like 4-10 days a month is much more likely than 1-2 days a week. Take those vitamin yoghurt thingies. I buy them occasionally, in six-pack. And since I share that with Nienke, it means I get three. I then drink those on three consecutive days. Then I might not buy another for two or three weeks. Then, when I do buy another, it’s another three consecutive days. So all in all I’ve had them 6 days a month, but not 1-2 days a week.

I give that same feedback on the questionnaires every time, but I’ve never seen a change. Ah well, one can always hope.

And another thing that pissed me off: my gender. The first page is always double check info. So I re-enter my date of birth, my gender and my weight. However, when I chose Man, I got an error message saying it didn’t match the previous entry (from 2010) and I should check my answer. In itself a valid thing, if you make a typo or a misclick, it’s good they force you to recheck. However, I could not progress past this page of the questionnaire unless I changed that answer. Eventually I did, I do want to give them all the data they need, but they will be getting a talking to, tomorrow.

I had already asked them to change my initials and gender when I mailed them a few months ago to change my address. I got a nice mail back saying it was changed. And the e-mail I got was nicely addressed with the right initial. But it still sad Mrs. *sigh*

It’s almost August. It’s almost August.

And a bonus: the hardships I have to endure when I want to type things 😀

Lapcat

That Was The Year That Was: 2010

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January

  • I started Working at KPN
  • We had a very severe winter, which resulted in public transport being down frequently, which is very! annoying
  • Had a tea party with friends at Mellien’s place, it was very fun

February

I’ve got nothing for this month. For some reason I only took 3 pictures in the whole of February… And I didn’t blog that month either. Sadness. Here, have all three February pics to cheer you up from this huge, huge let down 😀

March

  • Spring was on its way! Not that enthusiastically yet, but I saw the first real flowers peeking their heads above ground
  • Finally found a good design starting point for my future tattoo
  • Chocolate fondue with Eva & Ingrid, yum!
  • Bought new plants for my back yard
  • Found an awesome stick to turn into a staff. So far it’s still standing unused in my mudroom, but this year I strive to actually make something out of it 🙂
  • Went balfolking for the first time (no, it’s probably not a proper verb, and yes, I’ll tell you what it is; it’s dancing old ball and folk dances on medieval-and-slightly-later type music)

April

  • With Eva, Ingrid and Nienke to Lauwersoog, which was hilarious since we got stuck in the parking lot for two hours due to no traffic regulators being present
  • This was also the month mom turned 60, Happy Birthday!
  • Nienke and I added a garden door to our shared backyard to keep the neighbourhood kids from using our space as a shortcut path

May

  • Went to see the Men’s Choir of Warffum (of which my uncle is a member) perform at the museum estate Verhildersum
  • Spent Liberation Day in Parentville, where the whole street came together to decorate it for the festivities, great sense of community then, it should be like that more often
  • Ingrid came by, time for scrabble in the sun. Eva & Mellien dropped by a little later, on horseback.
  • Saw a hedgehog in the yard, awesome little critters
  • Joined the LifeLines research project about long term health

June

  • Dad’s birthday, 67 for him. Happy Birthday!
  • With the summer in full swing, Nienke and I tried outdoor computing
  • It was also the time for the yearly full family visit to my aunt and uncle in Harderwijk
  • Went to visit Soestdijk Palace with Mom and a friend of hers, it was awesome! I’m very glad I got to see the place before they closed it down

July

  • Celtic Midsummer Fest! Need I say more? An awesome weekend in which I went re-enacting for the first time. Great friends, great environment, great things to see and do, in short, a great time!
  • Also, aforementioned festival will (for me) henceforth always be connected to ‘that time I banged my toes into oblivion on a tent peg’ 😀
  • It got so warm I regularly spent my free time lounging outside with my feet in water. At first in two buckets (one for each foot) and later in a giant tub-like thing. Monkey approved of this, always enough water to drink nearby
  • I bought my binder this month, which turned out to be a huge step on the road of self-discovery and gender identity

August

  • Castlefest! Again, need I say more! Another awesome weekend! I’d not been able to go to Castlefest for some years, so it felt great to be back here. I love the atmosphere at this particular fest, plus being able to see Omnia live again for the first time in a couple of years as well was great, too.
  • Nienke had a BBQ in honour of her birthday, it was tasty!
  • Mom started knitting socks, after a conversation about how the warm socks we had were not getting any better.
  • Went out for a sudden and unexpected pizza with Eva & Nienke
  • Dad, on request, cut off the hedge in my front yard
  • Monkey got weird spots on his back leg, he ended up with a salve treatment and antibiotics and return appointments at the vet three times in a row. Fortunately, they have cleared up completely
  • And finally, this was the month I decided to continue blogging here, instead of trying to maintain both this blog and a LifeJournal

September

  • I burned my arm a wee bit by splashing hot olive oil on it. Fortunately I washed it off right away, so it didn’t go much further than some light second degree burning one one spot and some intenser first degree burning on the others. The second degree spot left a scar, it’s pretty 🙂
  • Had Tessa over to dog-sit, and got both her and Monkey in the same room without Tessa trying to eat Monkey, and without Monkey trying his best to hide as far away as possible
  • Had my own birthday, turned 26. Happy Birthday me!
  • Got the flu right after the birthday parties, ended up having to stay home for about a week, and had noticeably less energy the weeks after that while I was recovering further, not fun 🙁

October

  • Became obsessed with Glee 😀
  • Got my iPhone
  • Mom started knitting gloves, nice and warm for the winter
  • Went out to wok with Eva & Ingrid, yum!
  • Attended Julius’ birthday, which was a sort of High Tea type thing with a whole bunch of cakes he and his mom made, it was awesome (and very, very tasty!)
  • Bought two awesome pumpkins for Halloween and carved them; one a face, the other a sort of cheese with holes kinda idea with mice in the holes

November

  • Was a bit down for a good part of this month, a combination of Daylight Savings Time ending, winter coming up and some other random shit. Took a while before I saw the colours of the world in full shine again, instead of dulled
  • Mom knit me a pretty hat to match the gloves she made, my mom rocks 🙂
  • Discovered the Instagram iPhone app (among many, many other apps; I <3 apps 😀 ) which is fun to play with

December

  • Had a St. Nicholasmas (a combination of St. Nicholas and Christmas) party with Nienke, Eva, Mellien and Ingrid. It was fun and very nice to have a group get together again.
  • CATACLYSM! W00t!
  • The snow really hit. It looks awesome, but just like last year, it’s wreaking havoc on the public transport system. Which is kinda ridiculous as they spent the whole year winterproofing their systems and all, and they were sure it would be better this year… And then the first few days we have heavy snowfall, everything falls apart, again.
  • December was good, even though in the beginning of the month I wasn’t sure about that (residual gloominess from November)

ZZzzz…

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Bought the two Billys I’ve been wanting for my bedroom 🙂 The space look much lighter now, especially with the old, black, bookcase banished to the attic. Put all the things back in the Billy too, so, save for getting a shoerack to sort my shoes, the bedroom is all good. Now to find time to finish the attic. This week was no good for it, way too much to do.

I spent Tuesday and Wednesday at the parents since Dad had to drive me to Ikea. Tuesday morning I first went swimming with Mom and managed 45 lanes. Which equals 1.125 km, yay me 😀 Usually I swim a few lanes and then call it quits and just float about. I could, quite literally, do that all day. Floating like that feels like home.

After we did a few quick groceries before heading home to eat. The afternoon Dad and I went to Ikea. But while I could find all the small stuff I wanted (plus some small stuff of which I didn’t know beforehand I wanted it 😛 ), they were out of Billys. And I’d even checked the online storage checker to see if they still had them in stock 🙁 No fair. It all meant we had to go back Wednesday. We couldn’t go first thing in the morning ’cause Mom needed the car first, so we left pretty close to noon and thus we got late in everything else too.

I built the first Billy that day and packed it. Unearthing yet another crapload of stuff that had to be moved upstairs. Thursday and Friday I had to work so not much time for anything else. Friday evening I did build the other Billy and packed it after which I also brought the crap upstairs as well as the old bookcase. Which took some muscle, the thing is heavier than it looks 😀

Today is Saturday and I’m at the parents again. Dog-sat today while the folks were off to my aunt’s birthday. Tomorrow the three of us are off to another uncle’s birthday for the whole day. It’ll be awesome (we go every year with a whole bunch), but it does mean I won’t get anything else done this weekend.

Next week has four days working, although Tuesday is short so might be able to squeeze some stuff in then. Wednesday, my weekly day off, is taken up in the morning by the followup LifeLines test and then fooooooooood (I can’t eat anything before the test since they want my blood). Afternoon, if not so ridiculously warm and humid as last week, should be good for either attic or garden work, we’ll see. If it is the same crappy weather as we had most of this week I doubt I’ll get around to much. I don’t really handle warm, humid and oppressive very well. Gives me headaches and makes me grumpy and grumpier. I left work early on Monday because of headache and had one most of Thursday during work as well. I wanted to leave early then too, but they wouldn’t let me 🙁
Fortunately the rain of yesterday cleared the air quite a bit. I’m hoping next week will be slightly warmer, but keep the humidity and pressure away *crosses fingers and glares at sky*

Played WoW today, managed to find (and kill) King Ping, the second Northrend rare I’ve done for the Frostbitten Achievement. I decided that after getting Loremaster a week or two ago, Bloody Rare and Frostbitten are next. I found a handful of the Outland rares and now two in Northrend so far.

And now off to bed!

101, LifeLines

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I can hardly believe it’s only been ten days since I posted my list :S It feels like a month has passed. I’m sure that, as time goes on, I’ll slack off a bit in getting things done and posting about it, but I’m off to a good start. But first this.

I had my LifeLines (Dutch) intake today. LifeLines is a medical research program where they follow people for 30 years to see how health evolves, why some people get old and stay healthy and some get health issues early on. They’re looking at lifestyle but also genetics, so they try to get not just people, but also their parents and their children involved so they can see how things get passed on, what gets passed on and how that affects people and interacts with their lifestyle. It involves filling in questionnaires and getting basic medical exams every couple years, and maybe sometimes a more specialist exam if you fall in a specific group.

So far I haven’t been poked and prodded too much just yet 😀 Before the intake I had to fill in this mega questionnaire about my physical health. At the intake they took weight, height and blood pressure, looked at my heart, did a lung test and had me answer some basic psycho questions on if I’d been feeling depressed and stuff lately. Oh and a fairly quick problem solving test where you get the same pattern of dots and you have to connect the dots (minimum of 2 of ’em) and make as many non-repeating patterns as you can in a minute. This repeats a few times but they trick it up then by busying the background of the paper so it’s harder to see your patterns and stuff 😀 It was fun!

I have another appointment in three weeks, then they want samples of both red and yellow fluids 😀 Plus I got another mega questionnaire, this time about food.

It’s also slightly related to my list as well: 6. Loose weight, I’m not setting a specific goal here, just that the line ever goes down.
I wasn’t gonna put this here, and I’m not marking it on the list post itself as in progress just yet, but I was pleasantly surprised today.
I mentioned they took height and weight, and turned out I was 3 kilos lighter than last time I stood on the scale! Now, that has been a while, but down is down so yay me!

So, with that bridge, here’s the rest of my Irons in the Fire:

1. Finish transforming the attic from mess into usable space.
This is going really well, I posted about it a few days ago, but the attic is 1/3 done. Biggest part of the room area of the attic is done, there’s just some final pushing around of furniture that needs to happen. In contrast, the junk area of the attic hasn’t been tackled at all. Well, except for putting my pile of folders with my university notes and all that in a big box. For the rest, I first need to sort the shelf unit, then move it about and then repack that what gets to stay and get rid of the rest. Then, finally, I can block of the last openings into the crawlspaces so I can safely use the attic without risking the cat getting behind everything.

2. Finish the garden (tile the part in front of the window, put up a privacy fence between me and neighbour, get a picket fence at front, create a proper flower/rock garden in front of the privacy fence and get a nice looking piece of lawn in between the tiled area and the garden)
Nothing really done about it, but the plan has been made and drawn up, plus I figured out how many tiles I need and am getting a clearer image of what the gardeny part in the corner is going to have in it.

25. Buy a pretty colouring book and finish it. Try to do this as neatly as possible too (my fine motor skills could do with some training).
I found I don’t need to buy a colouring book, turns out I already owned three very pretty ones I totally forgot about. I bought them years ago while I was studying in England in a museum bookshop. They’re Dover books and two are Life in… types about Ancient Rome and Egypt, and another is about Egyptian deities.