Adventures in Texas - part I

I always love going to Texas, but I really don't want to live there even though I always think I do. Austin's traffic seems to be worse than DC, but only because their highways have only 2-3 lanes instead of 6 each way. It doesn't help that we were there at Christmas and everyone it seems was heading to the same place - the mall. It was crazy and pure torture. I'll stick with my horrible DC traffic, thank you very much.

Because my white counts were so low, I wore a mask on the plane. My NP called with my test results before I left and they had rallied behind me to cross the mark of acceptability at 1,300, but I wore a mask to be safe from the germs. I felt insulated behind my mask from bad colds and coughing passengers. I also dragged some of that Airborne stuff with me and drank it on the plane, even though the flight attendant seemed annoyed that I asked for another cup of water (how dare I!) It was a good flight, depite stopping in both Jackson, MS and Houston on our way to Austin.

I haven't been to Gail's house in Austin in several years because she rented it out and moved up here for about four years and when she moved back last year, she was living in an apartment until the tenant's lease was up. She installed a pool and hot tub this summer, which was really nice. I got in the hot tub the first night, but the heat left me with ugly red hives on both legs. This is a common side effect I get now when I get really hot. I forgot all about it when I got in. The hives were gone by morning, but I didn't go near the hot tub again. Unfortunately, it was cold in Austin that week (and warmer in Maryland I heard!) so I didn't risk going in the pool, even though it was heated.

We had a great visit with both our families. I'll write about it next time. It's late and I've got a big meeting at work tomorrow and I don't want to risk oversleeping again (like I did on Tuesday-that's another story for another time.)