Friday at last, plus a Thursday recap.

First of all, I’d like to say good morning to my loyal Howdygramsters (hey! a new word!) as I reflect on yesterday’s events and look forward to an exciting Friday filled with deliveries. I am expecting no less than four packages today, including a leather shoulder bag, two pairs of pants, home fragrances from Yankee Candle and a carton of loot for the Howdygram’s BIG SPRING GIVEAWAY, which you should enter now.

It’s 6:45 a.m. and our landscapers are here — four hours early! — mowing the lawn. This isn’t good, because THE SUN ISN’T EVEN UP YET and poor exhausted Sam was hoping to sleep as late as possible after working a lot of extra hours two nights in a row. Even worse, now the neighbor’s nasty little rat-dog is outside on their patio screeching at a landscape crew it can’t even see. It’s awfully damn noisy around here. I think I need a Marcy-tini.

And now for a Thursday recap!

My visit to the rheumatologist went well. It’s a large practice on the Baylor Hospital campus in Dallas with nice offices and lots of staff, and Dr. Willis is a nice man with a nice nurse practitioner named Cathy who asks a lot of questions. Even the phlebotomist was nice when she drew blood. Dr. Willis prescribed 10 mg Amitriptyline Hydrochloride tablets to relieve the intense nerve pain in my hands. I’m supposed to start with one at bedtime and eventually increase the dose to three if I’m not having any side effects (yeah, fat chance). Let’s all keep our fingers crossed on this one. I mean it.

I spent the rest of the day sound asleep except for a brief break to eat pretzels. When Sam left for work at 1:30 I was so tired I couldn’t keep my eyes open so I got into bed and conked out until 4:45. The pretzel interlude began at 5, and half an hour later I was asleep again, this time on the couch watching Murder at the Gallop starring Margaret Rutherford.

It’s a tough life. Thank you for reading this.