Kelly - are you by chance allergic to mold? I don't think I've ever had bronchitis, but I had sinus infections two years in a row. Knock on wood, but I am one who rarely has even a cold. Do take flu shots but dont' think I'm old enough for the pneumonia vaccine yet. Never had pneumonia either tho. My mold allergy got so bad though that I was tested several times for asthma. I don't have it but I was having times of wheezing. After antibiotics and several go rounds with predisone, my ENT said that I had to get my allergies under control. They also put me on singular which is used frequently with mold allergies (which apparently affects bronchial tubes). An inhaled cortinsone, an antihistime, an inhaled antihistimine and singular. I am happy to report that I am now on maintanance allergy shots and am taking meds only as needed (not often). My ENT and allergist love mucinex - it has been around for years in Robitusin. It thins mucus, making it easier to get it out. I'd really suggest to anyone having recurring bouts of bronchitis, sinus infections, etc. to see an allergist. It's made all the difference in the world for me. I'm a person who hates taking meds and especially antibiotics. Predisone has some very nasty side effects - you don't want to be taking it long term or often unless absolutely necessary. tina

I have a lot of days that are sort of like that. Makes you wish you had stayed in bed. I thought I broke my foot. Go to the emergency room and find out the doctor thinks I may have chipped it. Says I have to go to an orthopedic specialist. Great. I have no insurance. No problem, they will refer me to UTMB and can get it done at a reduced rate. Evidently regular old doctors don't put casts on any more...everything has to be a specialist. She gives me my x rays...faxes the referral. Tells me to call them first. I call. They say they will get back to me in 10 to 15 business days. I look at x rays...can't see a break. I see where she noted my little toe. That isn't even where the pain is. Was told to put no weight on it...sent me home with crutches. They did give me a boot. Made me promise to follow thru with going to UTMB. Decide, screw it! Throw away crutches. Wear boot...and walk on it. Doing much better. Swelling has gone down. Then today one of the horses knocked me down and I hit the back of my head on the driveway. Have a goose egg. No point in going to the doctor...UTMB would get to me in 10 to 15 business days. Anyway, I'm okay. I think I will live.

We got impulsive in the fall of 2005 when we realized that my good-paying job was not just for the year that had just ended, but was going on indefinitely. DH's dad had moved in with us in June, when his wife died. We loved having him with us, but he had to go to the basement to do laundry and down 6 steps to let our three dogs in and out, and at a very independent 86 years old, there was no getting him to NOT do those things. Plus, there was the only having one bathroom issue and the fact that we were using every square inch of that house before he moved in. So we got impulsive and went house hunting and within 8 weeks closed on a much more practical house that was 225 sq ft bigger (1450 to 1675) and had an extra half bath and a first floor laundry. Talk about minimum requirements! [We were very happy in the long run that we did not "win" the two-buyer bidding war on the slightly larger house with the finished basement, huge lot, and in-ground, heated swimming pool. It was 25% more expensive than the house we bought, and with what happened next, we needed the smaller mortgage.] With all of our stuff squashed into the old house, with peeling wallpaper I had lived with for 14 years because it was pulling off the skim coat of plaster and meant getting the room replastered, with a bathroom ceiling that needed replacement, with original oak floors that needed refinishing, and no room to put everything to do this work, we knew that we would need to move first, then do repairs and put the house on the market. We did this and got the house on the market March 1, 2006. I tried For Sale By Owner with a Realtor/broker back-up who would get a small fee and who got the house into the MLS. I offered selling Realtors a 3% commission. I had printed "Open House" signs with arrows that I posted around the neighborhood each Sunday, I had strings of colored flags like you used to see at used car lots and grand openings going from trees to the front porch and a big For Sale sign with info about the house on the front lawn. I baked cookies. Lots of lookers, no offers. I had the house assessed and he said we should UP our price! In June we hired a full-service Realtor. Over the months we lowered the price regularly. A year and a quarter later, I brought him a nurse I had met who wanted to do a rent-to-own with my house. We agreed to a price that was 84% of our original asking price. The nurse had recently gone through bankruptcy because of a husband with a drug problem and business debt that fell on her. So she needed a two-year rent-to-own. It didn't matter to us, her rent paid our mortgage! Since we had not sold the old house first, we had no down payment for the new house. Originally, we were going to do 100% financing with an 80% first mortgage and a 20% second mortgage on the new house. Then our mortgage guy came up with the idea of putting a second mortgage on the old house, instead. We would pay it off when we sold the house. It was a good idea, we thought, because it brought the mortgages on that house up to $25,000 less than it was appraised for, a good cushion, we thought in October 2005. When we got into the rent-to-own agreement, however, it was low enough that it meant bringing money to the table for the closing costs. In 2007 housing prices began to fall. In 2008, we all know that the entire economy fell. In late 2008, my DH was downsized into "early retirement" and it took him 7 months to get another job. No sooner were we comfortably back on track from that, when the nurse in our old house figured out that it was cheaper for her to buy a foreclosed house and lose her down payment on our house! That left us hanging in the winter of 2009 with an empty house in a housing market in which the empty house was now worth about $69,000 - precisely what I had paid for it in 1994 before replacing the furnace and ducts, kitchen, electrical service, water heater, concrete driveway, windows and doors, siding, trim, garage door, fence, porch, and adding central air and lots of insulation. Not to mention refinishing the wood floors throughout. Meanwhile, Dad had gone suddenly blind at the age of 91, then had prostate cancer, then skin cancer, and was bed-bound with daytime caregivers at our house. His favorite aide had left his employ and returned to her home state the summer of 2009. Her replacement was NOT comparable. Dad missed his Jenny so much, because Jen would go with the flow when it was okay and let him sleep, but force him to wake up and get food and drink in a gentle way that did not bother him, when it was necessary. She read to him and knew what he liked to hear. She read his moods well and could tell if he wanted to listen to a ball game on or wanted to rest. She kept a positive attitude even when cleaning up horrible messes from his hospital-acquired C-Dif. We could all see that he was declining without her. I heard through the grapevine that Jenny had her car and purse stolen and that neither she nor her husband had managed to get good jobs in the several months that she had been back home. After consulting with DH, I called and gave them an offer they could not refuse: a car to drive their menagerie of mammals and reptiles back to Mich and to use when they got here, shipping for their household goods, low rent in our old house. That way, we got Jenny back for Dad and had renters we knew, liked, and trusted in our house. Dad passed away several months later. Because he paid for unemployment insurance for his homecare staff, Jenny got to have free training and ended up with five health care certificates during our economic depression. She is working now, but her DH was hurt at work and is fighting for disability benefits and worker's compensation. They are still in our old house, so we have nothing to worry about as far as renters trashing our house, but they can't currently pay much. Okay, they can't pay anything, I'll admit it. It has been about three years that we have carried them. The husband has had multiple back surgeries and our Jenny is working as a nurse's aide and just not making a lot of money. But she studied hard and got her GED and all of those medical certificates, so she is trying. We don't have children of our own. I guess we got the boomerang phenomenon without having the first half where you give birth and raise the little critters, LOL! We were thinking that we might have to wait until my DH reaches the age of 59.5 and take some $$$ out of our retirement to finally unload this house. We have that second mortgage down to $25,000 from $40,000. The house is now worth about what is left of the first mortgage. It has been hard. Our new house had a expensive foundation disaster two years ago and needed a new roof last Christmas. The roof will be paid off at the end of this year, so we can be more relaxed after that. It does not help that my health has worsened and I am not working. DH is a saint! But now Discover is offering us $25,000 at 7.99%. We have to investigate it more, but if that is still being offered at the end of the year, we could use it to pay off that second mortgage and get the house on the market next spring. Incredible. We weren't sure when that could happen, but did not expect it for several years yet. In a couple, three years we might be able to have that Discover loan gone, too and be FREE! Buyer remorse. I don't know. Who knew that the market would tank so bad? I do like this larger house. My knees appreciate not having the steps. I agree with DH that it is a darned good thing that we did not get that house with the pool! We have thrown money around the past six years like it meant nothing, and I have come to the conclusion that this is partially true. As long as you can keep your heads above water, money is just a tool. It has allowed us to help our young friends have a place to live through their hard times. We will do it as long as we can. We will give them warning when we decide to do the Discover deal or not, but they will have to be on their own eventually. With luck, they will get Social Security to allow disability benefits by then. All the long timers here knew this sorry story. If anyone has read this far, I hope there was something to learn in all of this!

I thought you meant in a different way... We had hit/miss Uber the other night. We live where there is a high presence, so that was no issue. It was the night we went out in slinky shoes and long gowns. Hoped to be driven around like princesses. Didn't expect it. First one really wasn't our knight in shining armor. HORRIBLE driver (it was my child's Uber app and choice, and justly chose to tip a $1). Turned right instead of left to leave the neighborhood. Left is obviously the way out. Right was into what was the Dupont plant (still industrial plant). Why would he turn that way? Ran lights, cut in front of cars, slung us everywhere, car was in questionable shape, kept his phone app open talking the entire time to what must've been wife with small child (cuteness on that one though!) as the conversation was in another language that I don't speak so I can't confirm it, the venue was on the corner of 3rd and Demonbreun, but he asked if he was in the right place on a street that had neither of those in the address???, and it was a sketchy street he turned down. Opposite going home. Nice, clean, sumptuous car. Absolute gentleman, knew where he was going. And when we told him it was a delayed Christmas celebration, turned on Christmas music. Tipped $7. Kiddo has told everyone about that music everywhere we've gone. Takes so little to be nice, doesn't it? Both of these were in the $4-5 range of typical tips, given the fare amount and distance.