Sorry for any spelling errors

My hands are shaking as I type this. 

It's not an earthquake, or an unsteady chair.  It's not that I'm an emotional wreck or vibrating with joy over something.  It's an autonomic response to the beta agonist I just took.  AKA the albuterol shakes.

See, I have asthma.  I've had it my entire life.  I was diagnosed when I was six.  I have what's called cough-variant asthma, which is just like regular asthma only the main symptom is coughing instead of wheezing.

I have my little arsenal of inhalers - some I carry with me everywhere I go, some I take on a schedule. 

I am a good asthma patient and still use my spacer, even if most adult asthmatics stopped using theirs ages ago.  I sometimes have to take steroids, which turn me into even more of a raging crazy person than I normally am.

(Side note - once, after I got a big ol' steroid shot, I went to the Olive Garden to eat dinner.  It was during their never-ending pasta bowl special.  And I am here to tell you today that it is NOT never-ending.  They cut you off after four bowls.)

8% of adults worldwide have asthma, and 9% of children.  Every day, nine people die from asthma attacks.  It's not something to fuck around with.  And, as a life-long asthmatic, I get pretty irritated when people imply that asthma is something that I could rid myself of forever just by losing weight.  People who can't breathe because they're morbidly obese are just as asthmatic as people who smoke.  Yes, they experience some transient symptomatic relief with albuterol, but it's a bronchodilator.  Everyone in the world would experience the dilation of the bronchioles with that treatment.  When the problem is that your body habitus or chest wall is so heavy that it compresses your lungs, your problem isn't asthma, it's your physiology.  When the problem is that you fill your lungs with smoke and toxins, your problem isn't asthma, it's idiocy.

Asthma isn't something that exclusively strikes nerds, as it has always been depicted in the media.  Although severe or uncontrolled asthma can certain limit a person's ability to play sports or spend a lot of time outdoors.  It's a chronic disease that can pretty significantly impact a person and those around them.  It can be pretty damn scary to watch someone have a full-blown asthma attack.  Not to mention all the missed school or work, doctor visits, medications, etc that families of asthmatics have to deal with.

But it's also something that, once controlled, can be no more limiting than allergies or nearsightedness.  Bill Clinton is asthmatic.  So is Jackie Joyner-Kersee.  And Martin Freeman, who is one of my favorite British actors.  So now you know a little more about asthma.  And knowing is half the battle.

PS - Lest anyone forget the reason for this blog in the first place, I must give a shout-out to Host Friend and his lovely wife for getting me these little beauties:

Crafty-time

Yeah, yeah.  Again with the sucking at posting things.  I know.  I'm going to try and do better.  For example, I made a new wreath for my door.

I think it's a pretty sweet wreath, and I'm going to tell y'all how I made it.  So if anyone out there in Internet-land wants to make one, you'll know how.  At least, you'll know how I made mine.  Anyway.  Here are the things you'll need:

1. Wreath form (I used a 12-inch smooth white Styrofoam to make the wrapping a bit easier, but you can use any style or size.)
2. Marabou feather boas (For my 12-inch wreath, I used three.  You don't need to wrap it super tight, just enough to cover the wreath form.)
3. Flower ribbon (I used daisy ribbon, but any springtime flower will do.  Also, I bought the ends of a spool, which ended up being about 18 inches, I think.)
4. Hot glue gun
5. About 15 minutes time

Start by gluing one end of the first boa to the wreath form.  Each of my boas had a little bit of rope at the ends, which is what I used.

 Once the boa is secured, carefully wrap it around the wreath form.  (I say carefully because if you're an impatient person like me, you'll start wrapping before the glue dries and end up burning your fingers.)

Like I said earlier, the wrapping doesn't have to be super tight.  You just want it to cover the wreath form.  My first boa covered about a third of the form.

Once the boa is completely wrapped, carefully glue both the end of the first boa and the beginning of the second boa to the form, and continue wrapping.

Repeat until you have completely covered the wreath form.

The idea is for it to look like grass.  I saw a similar wreath using fuzzy green yarn, but it just didn't look as lush as I wanted.  Once your form is wrapped, glue one end of the ribbon to the inside of whichever side you want to be the back of the wreath.

Loosely wrap the ribbon around the wreath.  Mine was just long enough to go around six times, and I wanted it to have a more scattered look.  If you want your grass to be just bursting with flowers, then wrap that ribbon to your heart's content.  Secure the other end to the back side of your wreath.  Voila!

One super cute spring wreath.  I think my wreath form was about $4, plus three $5 boas, plus $2 worth of ribbon.  So the whole project cost around $20, and I can leave it up for at least a couple of months.

See?  Isn't this better than reading about my incredibly depressing job?  I have two more big craft projects in the pipeline, so that means at LEAST two more blog posts.  And since this is what the stinkin' thing is supposed to be about, I present to you my socks:

Sparkly rainbow toe socks.  Could life get any better?

Typed up while wearing super-cute fingerless gloves

I'm feeling particularly Slytherin-like today (and if you don't understand what that means, I don't think we can be friends anymore).  And it's not just because of these:

Although that *is* part of it.  I mean, maybe a true Slytherin wouldn't have the little flowers, but I like to think that at least one would appreciate the dichotomy of liking ambition AND pretty flowers.  And you can't really tell from the picture, but my toenails are painted green, too.  I should be wearing a green shirt, too.  But I ordered this baby from ThinkGeek and it came in the mail today:

It's only the most amazingly epic shirt EVER.  I was so tempted to also purchase the Tim the Enchanter hat and evil bunny slippers, but I refrained - for now.  No promises that they won't be winging their way toward me at some point in the future.

It's been a lazy couple of days at Chez Erin because we got some snow, and as I mentioned before, snow means staying at home if at all possible.  It was very pretty snow, though:

I hesitate to complain about our paltry four inches when I know that New England is getting hammered by feet upon feet of the stuff.  But other parts of the country are far better prepared for it than we are.  Hell, we don't even have snow plows.  We have a couple of Bubbas that slap makeshift plows onto the fronts of their pickups.

So it's not the best of situations.  But it usually grants us at least a couple of days off of work or school, which is always appreciated.  Particularly those of us in college who are not required to physically make up snow days.  Sure, we're responsible for the work missed, but at least they can't add days to the end of the semester.

It's a red-striped kinda day.

In honor of the snow that effectively shut down my entire state:

I know it's kinda misshapen, but I promise it's a penguin.  With snowflakes.  I just didn't think to take the picture *before* I put the sock on.  And it's like 19 degrees outside, so I'm not about to take it off.

I have to go out and do real people stuff today and tomorrow, which will probably end in tears and/or tragedy.  But at least I'll be able to get a blog post or two out of my adventure.

This has never been done...

Holy cat crap, people.  I have had this blog for less than 24 hours and I've posted FOUR TIMES.  This is just insane.  Of course, it's also still Christmas break for those of us still whoring ourselves out to the gods of higher education.  On a usual day, I spend about six hours a day on my computer (between actually checking my email/facebook/journals, doing jigsaw puzzles on jigidi.com, playing KOL/The Sims, and StumbleUpon), but since I literally have nothing else to do at the moment, now it's more like 16 hours on the computer.  I'm looking forward to school starting because I'll get to pretend to be a responsible person who does important things like study and shower on a regular basis and go grocery shopping and vote.

I don't really want to talk about politics, because most of it makes me want to tear my hair out and set it on fire.  But I do think that you should have to take a basic intelligence test in order to be able to vote.  I mean, people should have to prove that they have put actual thought into decisions and know the difference between socialism and fascism and can count to 20 without removing their shoes before being allowed to select the people that should be running our government.

Also, my socks today are navy blue with green deer on them:

The deer look surprised, as if they have just spotted something startling.  Like a canary with a cannonball for a head.  Or Sarah Palin.  I used to not really care for hunting for sport - it seemed so silly to go around killing things for the sheer pleasure of the kill - but after living for a while in a very rural area, I say kill whatever you want.  I am tired of having to put cages around my vegetable plants and replace key pieces of my car every five minutes.

My socks? Totally awesome.

My mom is always at a loss for things to put in my Christmas stocking.  I guess in some traditions, the Christmas stocking is filled with candy and oranges, which is really confusing to me.  I mean, oranges aren't even in season in December.  Maybe it's a Christmas miracle?

Anyway, she usually ends up putting in whatever little random odds and ends she can dig up in my stocking.  Which means that come Christmas morning, I get the following items:

One tube of Burt's Bees lip balm, one nail file, one pair of brown shoelaces, two bottles of hand sanitizer (in Midnight Pomegranate and Clean Cotton scent), a set of Razorback nail tattoos, an Ambu CPR mask keychain*, a bottle of Extra-Strength Tylenol, and a pair of scissors.  Of course, this is better than what my brother usually gets, which is usually an assortment of toothbrushes, personal hygiene items, and pens.

This year, however, I told my mother that what I wanted in my stocking was socks.  The crazier, the better.  I have to wear very specifically colored scrubs at work, and my only tiny form of individuality/rebellion is in the wearing of awesome socks.  She came through in spades.  This is only one of the beauties waiting for me Christmas morning:

I am in LOVE, y'all.  Hot pink and green argyle toe socks with tassels.  TASSELS!!!  My mother was actually afraid that I wouldn't like them.  They are only the most amazing socks on the planet.   I wore them for the first time today:

 I felt like I was wearing those old-fashioned majorette boots all day.  Amazing.  Anyway, I got to thinking when I got home from running my errands today that someone with such incredible socks would be incredibly selfish to keep them to myself.  So I started this blog.  I can't promise it will always be about socks.  Sometimes, it may be funny, and sometimes it may be sad.  But rest assured that underneath it all, I will ALWAYS be wearing awesome socks.

*The Ambu keychain is actually a pretty awesome gift.  It's a little plastic mask to use if you ever have to give CPR to a stranger outside of the hospital.  Although one of my colleagues thinks it's stupid.  "Sex is rampant," she says.  "You can jump into bed with any old person you want to, but God forbid you give someone mouth-to-mouth."