My Cousin Debra

This is an email that my cousin Debra sent out that made me laugh. She is serving her mission in Argentina.

Dallas

-----Original Message-----From: Debra Taylor Sent: Monday, February 18, 2008 8:30 AM

Subject: top 20 listTOP 20 THINGS I WOULDN´T HAVE DONE BEFORE THE MISSION (most of which have to do with food and bugs. In no special order...)

1. The "ant dance" - We have an ant problem in this apt. Raid is really expensive and so instead of poisoning them I sweep them all into a pile and dance on them . IT´s much cheaper and not as damaging to the body.

2. Squish a spider with the back of my spoon rinse it off and then eat off it (at least I rinsed it off)

3. Buy 2 tomates and an onion, cut them up into slices pour oil and salt over it and eat it - on purpose (it´s a very argentine salad... I love it!)

4. Wash all my clothes by hand - including dirty socks and underwear (TMI I know)

5. Find a 50 billion ants in my bread, shake them off into the sink, and eat...and continue picking them off the bread as I eat it (not all of them shook off)

6. Find lots and lots of spiders in my bed and not die and continue to sleep without problems

7. Wear the same dress 3 days in a row without washing it

8. Eat cow heart

9. Eat boiled chicken with many, many feathers still attached

10. Clean under the stove, find over 500 teeny little spiders that began to climb all over me, and not even get up to shake them off.

11. Buy bread twice a week from a guy that sells it from the trunk of his car.

12. Walk between 10 and 15 kilometers everyday without problem

13. Brush my teeth with a toothbrush that is crawling with ants (Like I said, this apt has an ant problem...really)

14. Pick up a spider´s egg out of curiosity to examine it

15. Exercise every morning

16. Kiss everyone, all the time, 50 times a day, when I enter and leave a room even if it´s 44 degrees C outside and everyone is sweating and nasty

17. Boil noodles to make macaroni and find the pot full of little green grasshopper like bugs...strain the noodles and keep going.

18. Put sunscreen in my hair

19. Eat in a member´s house...pull one hair out of the food... continue eating...pull another out...continue eating...pull another out....etc

20. Sing in front of anyone anywhere without problems whether it be in church or on the street corner.

Warning!! Graphic Images Below!!!

Well, I don't know about too graphic, but these are pictures of an open wound on my forehead :) Some of faithful readers might be too wussy to see these, so be warned.

Ashley and I have been lucky over the last month to have 3 trips to the hospital ER down the street from where we live. Don't worry, it's only a $100 co-pay every time we have to go visit the ER!!! I mean @#$^!!! Why can't we hurt ourselves during normal business hours, so we only have to pay a nice $15 co-pay to get fixed up. Oh well, it builds character I guess...

Anyway, back to the important thing... me. On Saturday night, I had just gone to the rest room (#1 btw, and this detail will be important later. I'm still getting to that). After that I was getting a drink of water. Since it was 10:00pm, I was tired and my body felt the urge to stretch really good. So I did. Now this wasn't just a normal 2-3 second stretch. It must have been 5-7 seconds. You know what I mean, right? A really good stretch. Well after I finished stretching my huge muscles, I walked into the hallway. I started to feel really light-headed, and decided that Ashley should know. So I said, "Babe, I feel kind of light-headed." While saying this, I thought to myself, "This seems to be more than a usual run of the mill light-headedness, and I think I should sit down because I might pass out." (I'm sure that was a verbatim quote.)

Anyway, the next thing I remember, I was waking up from this deep sleep. Ashley was sitting on the floor beside me saying, "Babe, are you okay?" When I realized that I didn't know why I was waking up on the floor instead of my comfortable bed, I knew that something must not be right. The only thing I could think to say was, "I'm all right. I just need a second." After a few minutes of regaining consciousness, I felt better and color had returned to my face.

The troubling thing was, the other 2 times in my life when I passed out and had small seizures, there was a clear reason as to why I passed out. This time, I didn't have one. The only thing I could come up with was that I really had to take a leak and stretch afterwards. On top of this, both of my grandfathers have died from Brain related issues that I don't quite know the details of except that at least one had tumors, and passed out with a seizure or something like that. So Ashley and I decided to go to the emergency room, and speak with a doctor about. (Looking back, I should have just called Todd, but that would have meant waking him up at midnight. And I had already done that when I was in China once throwing up something that... well never mind what it was.)

So we went to the ER, and checked myself in. They were pretty busy, so we waited a little while. My body was extremely tired and I couldn't stop yawning. A common symptom after you've had a small seizure of the muscular system. And also common after passing out. so I told the nurse everything that had taken place 10 mins before my wife found me stiff as board up against the wall in our bedroom. Then they took me into a small room, where I got to watch TV!! (I sure do miss sportscenter.) Anyway, back to me again. The doctor came in (The same guy who stitched up Ashley's finger a month before at 10:00 pm at night), and asked me a few questions. Talked to Ashley a little bit, then told me that stretching, peeing, getting out of bed too fast all can cause the blood to kind of rush out of your head and to your feet. It's common for people to pass out while they are peeing, driving, standing at attention, etc...

So, the bottom line was that I had 3 of these things all within about 5 mins time, and I whiffed it. Nothing was wrong, and I don't need a cat scan or need to worry about tumors. I just wish it hadn't of cost me $100 bucks to find out that I shouldn't stretch after I pee!!

I'll have Ashley post her perspective on what happened later, so you can here her fun details.

Well worth the read I must say. Man I love that woman!

Now, on to the graphic images. I passed out on Saturday night. On Wednesday night, I go to mutual. I was pretty excited because I was taking the boys to the driving range, and I was finally going to get a few good hits in after a long winter! Well, when we got there, I passed out some clubs to the boys and was delivering range balls to each of their areas. Next time, I'll pass out balls, and deliver clubs after that. Hindsight really is 20/20. So, while I was still looking for boys without any range balls, I didn't get out of the way of another boy with a 3-wood. On his back swing, My forehead decided to head-butt the 3-wood and teach it a lesson for good. Unfortunately, My forehead is stupid and I ended up with 7 stitches above my eye. I didn't pass out or really feel any pain and Brian Masse drove me back to my favorite late night ER, so I could get stitched up. Thankfully, Brian was also able to take some sweet pictures of my MAJOR surgery! Here they are.

Yeah, I'm a moron. We already knew that.

Here's kind of a close up. Don't worry there's more :)

Because I'm such a wuss, they had to put me under, so I wouldn't cry during the MAJOR operation.

Actually, I'm kidding. The nurse told me to keep my eyes shut, so I didn't get cleaning crap in them.

I do look peaceful and innocent though. Where's Ashley when I need her to see how innocent I really am!

The nurse tells me it was a pretty deep wound. That only makes me feel "slightly" cooler for getting in the way of a Boy Scout swinging a golf club. You would think I know better having been a Boy Scout myself. At least I knew to "apply pressure" to the wound...

See!! I told you it was a MAJOR operation!!

This is me on the phone while under the knife. I was telling my wife that I got jumped by some Boy Scouts who didn't have their totem chips yet, and they knifed me.

This look pretty much sums it all up.