CHECK....CHECK....CHECK

28 August 2003

It was one of those annoying recorded messages on the phone when I raced to pick it up this afternoon. I started to growl, but then realized what it was and that this was one message I was happy to receive.

It was Singapore Air, calling to give me a change in my flight information (the plane leaves about 45 minutes earlier than originally scheduled...still takes 33 hours...still gets in at the same time, but I have to be at the airport earlier).

It's really almost here.

After thinking I would never have the opportunity to travel to Australia and then thinking it might actually be possible, and then planning it for so long, we are a mere ten days to departure.

We're so close to the departure time that there are things I don't have time to do. The mail brought a catalog with "travel items" in it--and I realized there isn't time to order something, even if I wanted to.

I broke a tooth on my trip to LA and have been waiting for Cindy to get back from her own vacation to see about having it fixed. I know it will take a crown. She hasn't called yet, and I know there isn't enough time now to get that fixed (fortunately I don't even notice it).

It's really almost here.

Yesterday I started the check-off list of things that need to be done before I leave, when I put my WeightWatchers membership on hiatus. I also turned all of Dr. G's stuff back to him and turned in my bill for all the work I've done since my accident. It was my "goodbye" statement, which I left with his wife (who was working as office manager).

Today I checked off more things: I had my last visit with the physical therapist, who says I can cut back the stretching exercises to once a day because my extension is coming back so well, but I should continue the rotation exercises (pulling on a ruber tube attached inside a door to give me some resistance). I'm to see her again when I return from Australia (and she is back at work following her upcoming knee surgery).

When I left Kaiser, I made a side trip into downtown Sacramento to pick up some gifts I had planned to bring with me. Little stuff, but things I wanted to take to some of Peggy's friends, whom I have come to know through not only her stories about them, but my own interaction with them via e-mail. I wanted to put off this purchase as late as possible, and it's now as late as possible, as I won't be back in Sacramento again, I don't think, before I leave.

There was a stop to be made at Kaiser in Davis, to get a prescription refilled. I don't need the refill now, but it will run out before the end of my trip, so I needed a refill. That has been done. Another item checked off.

And finally, there was the infamous appointment with Robbie, the hairdresser. His new place is great, his prices are higher (but include a shampoo now), and we had a great visit while he did my hair. In all the decades I've been going into establishments to get my hair cut, this was the first time I had that stereotypical customer-hairdresser chit-chat. I think there was something about not only my search to find him (he says that employees at his old establishment have been warned they will be fired if they let customers know where he has moved, even though it's just across the parking lot), and then my excitement about the upcoming trip. It overcame my usual reticence and we chatted away like he'd been cutting my hair for years.

It was worth the effort to find him. I'm extremely pleased with the results. He says that his mother had hair just like mine and that is how he learned to cut curly hair. It's amazing what a difference it makes when you cut curly hair the right way. The curls are so very happy and it ends up being much curlier than when you just cut it the way you cut everybody else's hair.

(this is without any blow drying or anything--just a comb)

When I left the hair dresser's, I came home to pack away the gifts I'd purchased in my suitcase and realized that my suitcase is just about packed, save for a few things I'll add at the end, which I'm still using. I can't go through and double-check to make sure I have everything, because most of it is sealed in vacuum bags, but I think I'm OK with what I have.

It's going to get down to the wire and all that will be left to do is sit here and chew my fingernails down to the quick and watch the second hand tick off the seconds for the next ten days.