Yearly Archives: 2010

Goodbye, Sandee

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I woke up yesterday to the news of Sandee’s passing away. My heart is heavy and I’m at loss of words to express how sad I am. She was the first friend I made when I moved to Montreal, someone who opened the doors of her house and her heart to me, no questions asked. She irradiated love and she was surrounded by people who truly and genuinely cared about her. She’s left a lot of sad hearts behind, but after so many years of battling against the cancer dragon, she finally had enough… and now she rests in peace, without suffering. And for that, I’m glad… somehow.

I can see images from the moments spent with Sandee going in front of my eyes. The afternoons spent at her house, her beautiful family around her, how warm she was, the awesome tea she made for me, her love for her pets (oh, the angry cockatoo!), all her efforts to raise breast cancer awareness, the Avon goodie bags. I am fortunate to be able to say I met this wonderful woman. And although we went through a rough patch, we were able to overcome human weaknesses and my affection and admiration for her grew with the years.

The last time I saw Sandee was the night before I flew to Chicago to meet the person I now share my life with (she kindly let me stay at her house and drove me to airport the next morning). She knew how sad I was for a while and she was happy for me; I’m glad I got to share that moment with her. I never saw her again, I knew she had too much on her plate, but I never stop thinking about her.

She will never be forgotten. She’s an example of strength, love and dedication. And I will always be grateful for having her in my life. To her family, all my love and my prayers.

The Spanish Hotline

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My office phone rang this morning and I promptly answered with my usual greeting, stating where I work and who I am. The first thing I heard is “Oh, did I just call some sort of Spanish line?” — No, dude! I have an accent… seriously? In this time and date, and especially in this melting pot the U.S. is, how can you get surprised when someone with a foreign accent answers the phone? Someone said I should have replied “Si” and continue talking in Spanish; unfortunately my smartassness is not working today, and who wants to get in a fight with ignorant people, anyway?

I’ve posted about it before, prejudiced people who seem to forget what world they live in, or people who have to blurt out that kind of line just because they 1) think they’re better than anyone else, 2) are afraid of the Spanish invasion or 3) apparently live under a rock. It makes me angry and then it makes me laugh. I consider myself lucky for having embraced different cultures and getting adapted to them. It’s opened my eyes, and which is even funnier is the fact that I come from a country where cultural diversity is so limited (people from other countries just don’t move to Colombia in masses like they do to the U.S.), we may be the ones who get the shock when there is too much added to the mix.

I work at a college and when I go out of my office and walk down the hallways of this place, all I can see if variety of races, accents, languages, beliefs. I love it, I learn something every day and I don’t, in any way, feel threatened by any of it. I don’t need to point at people’s accents, I don’t need to ask stupid questions like the one I was asked this morning.

I’ve heard all kinds of racist, xenophobic, ignorant comments from people. I’ve been rejected by a client on my first day of work because of my ethnicity. I’ve been yelled at by angry people who claimed I was probably providing customer service from a “dirty hut in Asia.” I’ve been told that education is bad in underdeveloped countries and that’s why immigrants can’t make it in the Big North. I can continue with the list, I’ve experienced it all… and I DO NOT LIKE IT. I will never stop voicing my frustration about this, people need to listen and learn.

Gracias por llamar a la línea en Español de Betizuka.com.

The Cataclysm

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It’s been 10 months since I started playing World of Warcraft. During these months I’ve not only become a good player (no, I’m not going to be humble here. I do my homework and I nag people to teach me. I hold my own!), but I’ve also gotten to experience what I consider the best game in the history of games. Mind you, I was never much into them, but from what I’ve seen there is no other video game that plays better with the human psyche to make you completely addicted. World of Warcraft will allow you to have fun, not matter what path you take. Call it being a raider, an achievement seeker, a PvP’er… you got it.

My first post about World of Warcraft dates from March 9, 2010 and I was only level 55. Now I have 3 characters at level 80. My warlock, Trizilla, is a Kingslayer (the biggest title in the Wrath of the Lich King expansion), my DK, Giraluna, is well geared but going through a DPS crisis; and my mage, Mafalda, just hit 80 last week and made me less afraid of PvP. The fun thing about it all is that while I’m still leveling other toons, I know there will be a lot of work to do when the new Cataclysm expansion hits us next week and I can’t wait! New gear, new dungeons and raids, new things to learn, and a whole new world to explore. Blizzard, I love you.

But like I mentioned in my Blizzcon post, the aspect I enjoy the most about this game is getting to know and make friends with really cool people. They’ve become such an important part of my life, that my husband and I are even making plans to spend New Year’s with some of them. They’ve become a family, people I care about, people I miss when they’re not around. That’s the beauty of MMORPG’s, human interaction. And Cataclysm will give us the chance to stick together, play as a team, have fun as friends and get to 85 so we can kill Deathwing one day. Guild achievements and reputation, FTW!

My husband and I were listening to podcasts from The Instance and they were talking about favorite WoW moments. Mine are: Hitting 80, getting exalted with Ironforge so I could get a ram mount (my favorite!) and seeing my husband scream when I finally killed the Lich King. Every day brings something new, I love seeing those achievements pop in my screen. It’s an awesome game!

So yes, I’m extremely excited about Cataclysm. I’ve already downloaded it and I’m sure I’ll be up all night comes Tuesday. No better time to release the new expansion, since my birthday is this weekend!

Ohai, Lazy Stomach!

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I’ve had an upset tummy for about 2 months. It’s not horrible, but it’s annoying. There’s nausea, a feeling of fullness, lack of appetite, etc, almost all the time. So I finally saw the doctor and of course the first thing she did was a pregnancy test. Negative. Other blood tests showed nothing abnormal except for a high white cell count that she wasn’t too concerned about. Next step was a gall bladder ultrasound and that was normal as well. Has it gotten better? Nope, symptoms are still there. So now the doctor wants me to go for an EGD and a gastric emptying study. She suspects I have Gastroparesis… oh, the joy! Diabetes, you may have played a bad trick on me this time.

A little Wikipedia here:

Gastroparesis, also called delayed gastric emptying, is a medical condition consisting of a paresis (partial paralysis) of the stomach, resulting in food remaining in the stomach for a longer period of time than normal. Normally, the stomach contracts to move food down into the small intestine for digestion. The vagus nerve controls these contractions. Gastroparesis may occur when the vagus nerve is damaged and the muscles of the stomach and intestines do not work normally. Food then moves slowly or stops moving through the digestive tract.

While the diagnosis hasn’t been made and I’m still hoping Gastroparesis is not the case, I’m here thinking how, when, why? Simple. When you talk Gastroparesis, you’re talking nerve damage, and that means complications. Complications, you say? But I’m only 36! Well, yeah… but I was diagnosed about 10 years ago; that’s quite some time living with diabetes. And I have to be honest and admit that my diabetes management has been really poor at times and anything that comes my way will be the direct result of my lack of discipline. So instead of wondering why and calling mea culpa, I have to roll with the punches, work with my doctor and do whatever I have to do to overcome something that is chronic and has no cure.

And no, I’m not feeling sorry for myself. In fact, I’ll be glad when this is over and done, even if I get diagnosed because then I’ll know what’s going on.

Save a Child’s Life!

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View it, share it. For every view of this video up to 100,000, Roche will make a donation to the Diabetes Hands Foundation up to $75,000. They’ll use the money to help the Life For a Child program, run by the International Diabetes Federation, and Insulin For Life. These two global, humanitarian organizations provide diabetes medication and supplies to children in the world’s poorest countries. So what are you waiting for? Gogogo!