My Odd Sock

Good Morning!

It’s six in the evening and I’m already thinking about………breakfast.

Aren’t you?

I’m thinking about breakfast cereal in particular—I LOVE cereal!

The cereal aisle is my favorite place in the grocery store.  So many choices.  So many special offers.  So many characters I’ve grown to admire…Cap’N Crunch, Sugar Bear, Toucan Sam, the Trix Rabbit…..”Trix are for kids!”

That’s too bad cause I love Trix.  As a 46 year old adult, if I eat Trix will I be arrested by the cereal police?……”OK, just put it down.  Put-the-spoon-down.  And leave the prize at the bottom of the box!”

Magically delicious!

I like Lucky Charms too.  Not sure what’s so lucky about them.  I figure they’re so full of sugar, if you can eat a bowl without getting tooth decay—you’re lucky!

I play this game with my Lucky Charms.  The oatie bits are the bad guys and the sugary charms are the good guys.  I try to eat all the oatie bits first to eliminate all the “bad guys.”  That leaves me with a half bowl of sweet charms to devour all at once.  Yeah, my blood sugar must hit quadruple digits!  It’s like free-baseing with sucrose!

Cereal segregation.

Regular Rice Krispies are rather tasteless.

They make alot of noise, but give you little bang for your buck.  Kinda like our politicians.

Integrated cereal!

So I mix original Rice Krispies with Cocoa Krispies.

It gives me a perfect bowl of racial equality!  A harmonious blend of brown and white living together with a common goal of satisfying my hunger.  We all get along snapping & popping while bathing in two-percent.

Flakes are good.  Wheaties, Frosted Flakes, Raisin Bran.  But I have one quirk chowing on flakes—I let’em get good and soggy.  (Don’t let that get around, oh what the hell, My Odd Sock has already trashed what credibility I ever had!)

Cocoa Puffs?...........

.......Or, paintballs?

New Cocoa Puff shape?

Cocoa Puffs have a new shape. 

They almost look like a anatomically-correct Teddy Graham!

Alot of cereals are named after snacks….Cookie Crisp, Rice Krispie Treats, Ice Cream Cones, Cinnamon Toast Crunch.  What happened to the cereal?  They’ve skipped the main course and gone straight to dessert!

So goes my infactuation with breakfast.  I’ve just never found the same love connection with lunch or dinner.

Then again, I’m a morning person anyway.

Sunday was the Fourth of July, also known as Independence Day.

You knew that–I was just making it clear to the Taliban readers of My Odd Sock.

The Fourth of July is the one day of the year we honor our forefathers by saving an extra 20% at Kohl’s, drinking beer and setting off explosive devices. 

Some honor.

My Odd Sock celebrates the Fourth.

But for those of us with multiple sclerosis, Independence Day means something more.

Is it a day MSers celebrate once a year?

Hell no!

Much like you, I embrace every day I can put my feet on the floor. 

I cheer each day I can brush my teeth, change my own underwear, look up and see the blue sky or feel the rain on my ever-expanding forehead.

I even put my hands together for being able to think and put pen to paper in composing this garbage known as My Odd Sock!

I’m not gloating–just thankful, because there are many out there who can’t do these simple things for themselves.

It’s about independence…..and how long you can keep it.

Me

I get cranky when someone tries to push me when I’m in my wheelchair.

“I got it, I can do it” I say.

Not meaning to be a jerk (my typical demeanor), I understand and am grateful for your courteous gesture–I’m just trying to stake my claim to independence.

It’s one thing to being 80 years old and being pushed in a wheelchair.

It’s a whole other animal to being a healthy looking 46 year old man spinning in a chair.

Hecklephant

WAH WAH WAH, suck it up you goof!

You’re right Hecklephant.  I’ll quit belly-aching.  Sorry.

(To find out who is Hecklephant, see the “cast” page at the top.)

Independence is being able to move and see and speak and care for oneself & others.  To love.  To feel.  To respond.  To breath.

I hope you had a terrific Fourth of July. 

May your independence last for a long long time.

Sit back & listen

Healthcare costs keep rising.  But you DO have a choice. 

Screaming Mercy Hospital allows you get the proper medical care you need–at a cost savings to fit your budget.

To hear the My Odd Sock mp3 :60 piece, just click on the title at the end of this sentence for Screaming Mercy Hospital

Screaming Mercy Hospital was written by My Odd Sock and produced by Tony Gialluca Productions.

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Favorite Comments of the week.

“I’m nervous to be getting breast enlargement.  Can anyone reccomend a cosmetic surgery doctor in the Phoenix area?”

                                           -Fernando

My Odd Sock says:  Yes, Fernando, I would be nervous too about getting breast enlargement surgery–especially if I was a dude!  Good luck.

“Exceedingly well written piece you have here.”

                                       -Attracting Women Tips

My Odd Sock says:  This comment included a link to a site called “Attracting Women Fast.”

Unfortunately, this comment was in response to my posting titled “This Dribble Is On Me” describing how MS has ruined my bladder control.  The story also detailed how I tinkled in my yard when I couldn’t make it into the house!  The first tip should be….Don’t wee in your pants!

“I hope you don’t mind, I linked your website to my website.”

                                               -Richardo

My Odd Sock says:  Thanks Richardo, I appreciate it…..I think.

(Richardo’s website is “Enlarge-Your-Manhood-The-Natural-Way.)

After spending some time in my yard “tending the crops,” I thought of a new TV show (maybe I was in the sun too long).

See what you think…..

           “Gardening With Gimps” 

Welcome to HGTV’s “Gardening With Gimps.”  I’m your host My Odd Sock

“Gardening With Gimps” host My Odd Sock

here to share a few landscaping stories on how I get things done around the outside of the My Odd Sock corporate headquarters.

We’re on the clock, so let’s get started….

Tools For Fools.

They say a craftsman is only as good as his tools.  Well, if that’s the case, I would be slightly lower on a scale of tool evolution than a caveman because I have a motley collection of crap tools.  Fisher-Price makes better stuff.

My Odd Sock corporate broom

Take for instance my garage broom.

My incredible shrinking broom.

Someone must have done one helluva lot of sweeping because all of a sudden the bristles of this broom were receding faster than my hairline.

My son suggested a “varmit” was eating the broom.  The jury is still out on what happened to my scalp!

Trimming, not Praying

My neighbor commented on how nice my yard looks.  He said “You are always crawling around, working on it.”

Those of you with multiple sclerosis understand how difficult it is to walk on grass….loss of balance, foot drop….heck, I’d rather get down and crawl to do my trimming.

When crawling, ALWAYS be on "turd alert"

I’ve even been known to sit on my mechanic’s creeper and roll my way down the driveway, gleefully trimming away.

(Is it any wonder my antics have lowered property values in my neighborhood?)

 I have been asked by many why I don’t use my weed wacker to trim.

Here again, unless I suddenly develop  the dexterity of a lemur in my feet—I don’t have enough hands!

The weed wacker takes BOTH hands  to operate.

I need another hand for my cane.

Maybe if I had an “ass-cane”, I could clench a balancing stick with my butt cheeks!

My Odd Sock "Butt-Balancer"

Now, it’s beginning to sound like a vaudeville act.  I just need a few spinning plates and I’ll soon be doing two shows nightly in the Catskills.

Water Me

The hose grips my feet like a python

Watering my flowers is a whole other episode of fun.  Combine me walking on grass…holding a cane…AND a cumbersome, water-spewing hose.  I get more wet than the plants!

I’ve seen guys wrangle a rattlesnake with greater ease!

Don't let it get you

Rattler or garden hose?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Add it all up and simple, gardening chores get a lot more challenging when you throw MS into the mix.

Let’s hope your “tending the crops” comes easier!

For HGTV’s “Gardening With Gimps” this has been My Odd Sock asking “…Is that smell ME or the compost pile?”

 

Joran van der Sloot is the young Dutch playboy who was twice-arrested, twice-released in the 2005 Aruba disappearance of Natalee Holloway.

And now, five years later in Peru, this goof-ball struck again by beating another young woman to death, supposedly because she looked at his laptop computer.

Imagine what he might do if you were his roommate and you ate his leftover pizza!

You, like most, are bored by the overworked, over-hyped, Nancy Grace-like publicity this guy has mustered.

Yet, here I sit fascinated by this dumb Dutchman.  Here’s why…

My Odd Sock vacationed in Aruba just a mere month before Natalee Holloway vanished.

In fact, I stayed in the very same hotel—the Holiday Inn of Aruba.  (Yes, I am a high-class traveler….”Kids, steal a couple little soaps from the maid’s cart as you walk past.”)

When the Holloway case first broke, I recognized many of of the background shots taken by reporters in and around the hotel.  Plus, one of the early suspects was a security guard from the hotel.  I recognized him on the news because he gave me the evil eye during my stay as I rolled thru the lobby in my wheelchair.

From day one I thought van der Sloot was guilty.

I wanted to personally beat him with wooden shoes.

(Do the Dutch wear wooden shoes?)

Joran claimed to have buried Natalee Holloway’s body.  I never believed that either.  For one, Aruba is a volcanic desert.  You can only dig a few inches before hitting petrified, volcanic lava.  And two, the Slootmeister was 17 at the time—what teen carries a pick-axe capable of cracking lava rock?

Aruba is a small island off the coast of Venezuela.  It’s only about 17 miles long and 7 miles wide, so you can drive around the entire place in about an hour.

The Aruba Holiday Inn sits on the southern side (facing Venezuela) and has a beach with a waveless, smooth-as-glass waterfront.  But on the other side of Aruba (facing the Atlantic Ocean), the waves are vicious, forcefully hitting the rocky shoreline causing sprays of water to go 30 feet in the air.

In my opinion, Slooty never buried Holloway’s body—he dumped her into the ocean on Aruba’s wild side where she quickly became shark chum.

This is a cheery story—ain’t it!  And timely too!  My Odd Sock has become a “CSI” for morons!  Maybe next time, I’ll offer my thoughts on Amelia Earhart.  Holy crap, I can hardly wait!

So there you have it….a long post to simply say I am glad Wunder-Sloot has been put behind bars—finally.  Unfortunately, it took another young woman’s life to make it happen.

What will helmet-head-hair Nancy Grace yak about now?

I never really gave it much thought—vitamin D and MS?

I heard about a possible connection, but blew it off because my formative years were filled with plenty of sunshine and a belly full of dairy products every day.

How on Earth could I have developed multiple sclerosis?

But, about a year ago, a blood test revealed my levels of vitamin D were below average.  Very fitting I thought as “below average” was also a good description of my GPA, IQ and athletic ability.

Actually, my low vitamin D level was considered normal for folks living here in NE Ohio.  You see, many share a “D” deficiency as we have the fewest days of sunshine than anywhere in the U.S.  (Rumor has it that’s why the military built an arsenal here—so spy satellites couldn’t get a clear picture.)

So I now take a monthly vitamin D supplement as do many other MSers.

Although I have not been retested, I gotta believe my vitamin D levels have improved.

The Funny Meter

Yeah, yeah, I figured the Funny Meter would rear its ugly head.

Yo, Funny Meter, I’m talking about vitamins here—how funny can it get?

I never met a Nutritionist who plays the clubs in Vegas.  Give me a break will ya!

Sorry for the disruption.

Chocolate 1%

What I think is interesting is how my body may have been telling me it needs more vitamin D all along.

Like a pregnant woman with crazy food cravings, your body is a pretty sharp tack as it lets you know when it needs something.

Maybe my body has been craving more sunlight as I love natural, outdoor light.  I can’t stand a dark room as I must open curtains & blinds to let in the sunshine.

Thinking back, I have had this attraction to natural light for years.  (Much like my attraction to that poster of Farrah Fawcett!)

Are you one with MS who like me loves to throw open the curtains?  (Just make sure you are wearing pants.)

Do you pay attention to your vitamin D levels?

And if you’ve made adjustments, did you notice any improvement in the management of your MS?

Curious as a cow.  Moo.