Monday January 3rd

Hello all!

Hope everyone had a great New Years! As I left you on Friday, I had said something about Germantown doing a Sausage drop into a bowl of Sauerkraut. It was great! The "kielbasa" was a sausgae-form wrapped in red blinking lights. The bowl was on the sidewalk in front of the Mad Platter. It had verying lengths of material cut and colored to look like sauerkraut. At one minute to midnight, the drop began and we celebrated 2005! A great turnout--looked like about 100 folks or more. We had fireworks, music, champagne and sparklers.

I still felt bad on Saturday, so I told Mom and Dad about it. They were worried, so they said they would come on Sunday. Since the Titans game was at noon on Sunday and I figured traffic would be bad, I told them to come Saturday night and stay. We had a good time. Went to Mass on Sunday morning, and then took a trip to St. Thomas Hospital Emergency Room Sunday about 1 pm. I finally decided I needed to have that chest and abdominal pain checked out, especially the chest pain. It shouldn't have been a hard decision to make, but it was for me.

But, after being poked, wired to monitors, IV'd and X-ray'd, they decided it is stress and acid reflux. WHEW!!! They said my EKG was fine--no damage to heart, my blood tests were all normal and my chest X-ray was normal. I still need to go to a cardiologist for a stress test, just to be on the safe side. Also, have to take prescription Prilosec for 14 days, cut-out caffeine, avoid spicy foods and avoid eating at least 2 hours before going to bed. Dropping some weight is a must too.

So, guess I have some big changes to make in my habits. Maybe they won't be so bad, especially after experiencing what could happen. Those pains were awful. I am told I have a high pain threshold. And these were bad...so I can just imagine what other people feel, or what a heart attack feels like. I DON'T WANT TO EXPERIENCE THAT!

So, I guess this can be considered New Year's Day for me too--day one of a new lifestyle year. Mom, Dad and I went shopping this morning to Rhodes Furniture--the folks are looking for a sofa--Target and Captain D's. No, I didn't have fried fish! I had their low-cal fish platter and it was really good--baked whitefish on rice, steamed broccoli and Tuscan roasted veggies. Only 370 calories, lowfat and only $4.79.

So, here I sit, deciding on what to do next. I know I need to clean out the pantry, cookie jar, refrigerator and freezer. Maybe I'll start on that tonight!

Take care everyone! Have a great week and you'll be hearing again from me soon!

Mark