I appear to be breeding!

Cysts that is ;-) and no this one above is NOT mine!

I had 6 total, "look, count them" the Dr said! All very small and no need to aspirate, but 5 in a row where I had the lump last month! And all in that pesky left boob.

They digital mammo'd me (no discomfort), then ultrasound (always fascinating as cysts look like black holes!), then 2 final spot mammo's that were tender as right over the cysts. I was sent away with a follow-up in April that I can cancel if they don't swell or get tender.

But she said I am going to need a yearly check-up and to expect something to show everytime. Apparently a I have cystic tissue that is especially dense - which she advised me is great! Well I guess it is when you consider the alternatives. I certainly never seem to do anything by halves!

So all done and dusted, got in a nice bit of shopping, beautiful weather and a lovely chat to PamOKC.

It's 'the girls' big day out today!

And I mean 'OUT'...yep 'the girls' and I are off to the big city lights for our annual squish, pummel and flat-iron today. And seeing as I took a 'brutal' honesty pill this week, I thought what the heck I've covered facial hair, lets go for the boobies now!

So let's get serious for a moment, because it's not a joking matter and if I can convince just one of you to go get checked for the first time, then this has been worthwhile.

I am 42 and I had my first mammogam last year at 41, just to give me a baseline you understand, the plan was then to get one 3-5 years later. Well hey guess what, they found a shadow, so I was referred to the wonderful specialist clinic Breast Imaging of Oklahoma. It's staffed by all female technicians, aesthetically relaxing to women in decor, and tries to get everything done there and then. Well after a digital mammo' and an ultra-sound, turned out I had a cyst, which they quickly aspirated and I was good to go. But they requested I come back a year later for my next mammogram, as I have the kind of dense boobs prone to cysts and hard to self-examine.

My point though is I had no clue I had an issue before the mammogram, I also didn't know I had the kind of dense tissue that needs watching a little more regularly. All this just by going to get a baseline mammo' in my early forties.

And here is my next point; in the UK women aren't even offered a mammogram on the NHS under the age of 50, unless they are in a high-risk group. That's just considered 'old' for getting a baseline here, most Dr's will recommend it around 45, but some anytime after you hit 40. The thinking behind this is to get a baseline for future comparison, before menopause and all the changes it brings starts. Makes good sense to me!

But turns out 'the girls' have had a bit of a year, well the left one anyway! First of all I had mastitis in May and no you didn't miss me dropping a baby Brit' Gal, typically I was that 'rare' non-breastfeeding case! Then 3 weeks ago I woke up and found a very tender sizeable lump, that had literally popped up overnight?! I was a little concerned and very touchy as in "touch my boob and you're dead meat hubster", but also realised Breast Cancer doesn't generally appear overnight. After a week of anti-biotics and then a lovely steroid shot in the bootie, it finally went away and has not returned, probably just infection according to my Dr. But the Dr wanted me to get not just my annual mammo' but also a specialist consultation, on why my 'left boob' is determined to hog the limelight this year?!

So that's where I am off to today, pretty relaxed about it all and glad to be going to such a fantastic clinic, where I know I will get the best possible attention and care. Sure mammograms are not comfortable and this comes to you from a Gal who has alot to flatten! But I am now a total advocate of going in your 40's and getting that baseline done. If I was in the UK I would have paid to go privately by age 45, but I bet that cyst would have been an issue before then. I imagine most of us can say we know someone personally affected by Breast Cancer and these days it's got a high remission rate, so early detection is even more essential.

So if you're worried it'll hurt, go immediately after your period (less painful) and grit your teeth for the minute it takes to do each. No family history, well history has to start with someone! If you're in the UK don't wait for the NHS to decide it's your time, get that baseline in your 40's. And if you just can't be bothered, well look at your loved ones faces and do it for them.

And for all you men, just be grateful for that prostate exam, it could be so much worse! ;-)

Oh my...decisions, decisions!

Well I have been very touched to receive 4 awards in the past 24 hours, from some of my favourite bloggers.

Thank you to Lynne who you all have to thank or berate, for me starting my blog, she convinced me to do it! I met her and the other two lovely ladies who awarded me this, at the same time on a message board, so thanks to Mary and Vickie also. I think these three ladies were probably my first ever readers and I greatly appreciate them sticking with me.

There are the usual rules attached to passing it on, but I find this part so difficult and so I am going to award it to just two blogs that I never fail to read daily, love and highly recommend. It's all about being the 'Coolest blog I know', so I have chosen Daryl for her wonderful daily eclectic mix of photographs, funnies and writing. The other recipient is relatively new to me, but I just adore this other Brit' expat' in Spain's funny and often informative writing, so Stuart at The Writing Factory you totally rock!

Thank you to SRG of the very cute and entertaining Two Black Cats blog. I think she was impressed by my utter honesty about facial hair and so presented me with the 'Honest Scrap' award. Well the most honest blogger I know by far, sometimes painfully so but often funny too, is Holly a.k.a Anglophile Football Fanatic. Congrat's to all you lovely bloggers!

Digging through the trash for the truth!

The things people discard
tell more about them
than the things they keep

by Hilda Lawrence, The Pavillion

I read this and thought how wise and true! Then I thought about what I've discarded recently and what it says about me.

A few magazines everyday this week, was the first thing that sprung to mind. They reveal my inability to say 'no' to what I perceive is a bargain, reduced subscription rates in the mail!

Why so many...well that tells you, I might love magazines but I really don't have the time to read them. That in turn reveals my natural tendency toward untidyness, as I hoard them in piles around the house for months.

So why am I now methodically clearing them out? Two things revealed here: when I set my mind to do something I am always methodical about it. And finally the Hubster hates piles of anything left lying around and I hate to be nagged, especially when I know he's right!

Who knew discarding some magazines would be so revealing!

So what have you discarded recently and what does it tell about you?

I'm breaking a taboo!

I'm coming out of the closet in order to discuss what I often think is a taboo subject amongst women. So let me be quite frank...

"I have facial hair, the kind that needs dealing with - regularly!"

I remember having a conversation around a table in a pub a few years back with my girlfriends. We were all in our mid' to late thirties and up until that night, I didn't think there was much we hadn't shared with each other. Then somebody mentioned the sudden onset of their moustache and after a moments total silence, then nervous laughter, well the floodgates opened! The rest of that night was spent discussing where the hell all the hair had suddenly come from, could we end up as bearded ladies in a freak show, and why nobody had ever warned us in advance?!

These days I don't bother to beat around the bush with my female friends, if I'm having a facial hair issue I'll just open up about it. Usually after a moments stunned silence, invariably followed by some laughter, we get down to discussing the nitty gritty.

So for those of you who are female and under 35 reading this, let me warn you now....it's more than likely rapidly growing facial hair may be part of your future. Mine started at the ripe old age of about 34, with one particularly determined witches hair that refused to go away.

A witches hair is one of those coarse, often curly and ten times faster growing hairs, that just keeps coming back like The Terminator, however many times you pluck the sucker! They're usually not hard to either spot or feel, as they are (a) often darker than all your other hair, and (b) if you smoooth a finger across one the coarseness is a dead giveaway. Well after about 10 months of plucking on my part and stealth on it's part, I dragged it off to be nuked...aka electrolysis. Five sessions later, alot less wealthy and still avec hair, I gave up the fight and determined to just keep on plucking!

Skip forward about three years and I seemed to be growing a moustache on a monthly basis?! Quelle horreur...sure I'd always had a baby 'tache under my nose, but it had never offended me by growing, or sneaking in baby witches' hairs! So off I went to the beauty salon to have it waxed off regularly, with the assurance that over time regular waxing will cause it to grow back more sparsely. Trust me, there's about as much truth in that, as Posh Spice saying she hasn't had a boob job! Plus there isn't much more painful than having the hair under your nose ripped from it's roots. It'll make your eyes water like onions do, and send you back onto the street with a flattering red welt above your upper lip for thirty minutes!

So waxing went the way of electrolysis and I moved on to Nair, a facial hair removing cream, translation...it burns it off painlessly. Well it does if you don't accidentallly leave it for longer than the required time! Nair is strong stuff, I heard a story just a day ago about a man who thought he'd try it on his beard (DUH!!) and ended up with blisters! The problem is though, if you take it off within the allotted time, it will often leave a few determined hairs. Anyway I ploughed on with the Nair and tweezers semi-successfully until I hit 42, when all out war finally broke out. By this time I was 'nairing' my beard, not just my 'tache every month!

I kid you not, in the last six months I seem to have gained the power to grow certain individual facial hairs overnight. I am now at the point where I do a daily hair check every morning and every now and then, I will find an inch long straggler that definitely was not there the day before?!

Plus I seem to have kicked the growth rate up a couple of notches and applying Nair twice a week is just not an option. I'm now the unwilling host to a fine layer, of what can only be described as white blonde ducks down on my outer cheeks! I have two friends in their fifties who have quietly admitted they now have to shave, both beautiful ladies and you'd never know.....but is this what I have to look forward too?!

So now I tweeze and I trim lightly, keeping it all at a length where it goes unnoticed, but that does not cause it to grow more coarsely, which is a fine line. I regularly thank god the hair on my face is so blonde (apart from the rogue witches hairs). But then this precludes me from Laser Hair removal, which would have undoubtedly been my next course of action, it only works well on dark hair though!

So I am out of the closet for the sake of my readers. The younger ones need to know what's ahead, so ladies please warn your daughters and grand-daughters. Those of you who are fighting the same battle, you're not alone and feel free to share your experiences or tips. And to the men in our lives, don't take the 'p' when you accidentally catch your loved one with what looks like a white beard of Nair, or you spot a witches hair. Be loving, supportive and remember she could be making comments about baldness, ear hair, back hair or wild eyebrows!

Oh and I did finally terminate The Terminator after about five years of fearless plucking!

Believing I can fly....

Some of you may have noticed this piccie on my left sidebar and the ever increasing number beneath it.

Yep I am finally writing 'the book'! Not just a paragraph here and there, but my actual book I've been thinking about these past few years. In fact I am writing everyday and it's just pouring out of me. I have an ever increasing plot sheet full of story development and research.

I will reveal it's not 'our' story as many people have suggested I write. That just feels too personal and I have no real desire to write about it. I feel I am a fiction writer, always have and so that's what I'm writing, pure fiction but of course with bits of my life threaded through it.

It's about a woman, a big crazy family, an inheritance, in Cornwall, travel, some men, magical elements, mystery, I hope funny and shoes! I also intend it to be more than one book, but we shall see.

I am writing it in the first person, and my mind is obligingly thinking about where to take the story all day long. So if you regularly see me and I seem distant or quiet, I'm just off in another world, that someday I hope I can share with you all. I know what a battle it is to get anything published these days, but having threatened to try for years, I'm finally grabbing the bull by the horns and going for it!

I know if I don't, I will always wonder should I have gone for it. And that's the exact same reason why I am now married to the Hubster and living happily in Okieland. So I just have to go with my gut again, and believe my destiny in life IS to be a published author and the unlikely Brit' wife of an Okie!

2008 books read

At Home in Mitford - Jan Karon
A Light in the Window - Jan Karon
Julia's Chocolates - Cathy Lamb
These High Green Hills - Jan Karon
Lipstick Jungle - Candace Bushnell
Out to Canaan - Jan Karon
A New Song - Jan Karon
The Common Life - Jan Karon
In this Mountain - Jan Karon
Skipping Christmas - John Grisham
Shepherds Abiding - Jan Karon
The Virgin Blue - Tracy Chevalier
Angels and Demons - Dan Brown
Light from Heaven - Jan Karon
Deception Point - Dan Brown
Eat, Pray, Love - Elizabeth Gilbert
Remember Me - Sophie Kinsella
She's Come Undone - Wally Lamb
The Scandal of the Season - Sophie Gee
Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict - Laurie Viera Rigler
My Sister's Keeper - Jodi Picoult
Holly - Jude Devereaux
A Wedding in December - Anita Shreve
Playing for Pizza - John Grisham
One for the Money - Janet Evanovich
What a Girl Wants - Kristin Billerbeck
Out of Control - Kristin Billerbeck
With this Ring - Kristin Billerbeck

2008 was the year of reading books in a series for me, I've always tended to stick with authors I love, but not really done books that follow on. Well now I'm hooked and as a result my bookshelves will no doubt continue to fill!

If I had to pick my favourite read of the year I think it would be Angels & Demons by Dan Brown, a thrill ride from start to finish. Closely followed by the Ashley Stockingdale books I have just finished.

28 books in 12 months, not bad going considering I also almost got 800 blog posts done in 11 months. And now I have resolved to write too, something's gotta give!

Amarillo Tea Party!

So a couple of days ago we made the 6 hour round trip to Amarillo, Texas. Apart from a few other bits and bobs we purchased, our most significant shopping was done in World Market.

I literally cleared their shelf of Twinings Earl Grey Decaff' Tea, all 10 boxes were mine! Plus I threw in another large box of PG Tips Decaff, to replenish the stocks back home.

So that now brings the total number of teabags under the Brit' Gal roof to approximately 500. I now feel free to enjoy my tea as needed with no fear of rationing. So if you have ever wondered "Just how much tea does your average Brit' drink in a day or year?", then I have a new handy 'tea-o-meter'(thanks Rob') top right to answer this intriguing question!

Anyone care to place their bets now on the final total?

Skywatch Friday

'Mamma' clouds over Oklahoma, so called because they resemble a cow's udders!

If you'd like to join in, go to the Skywatch site.

Brit' Gal & Hubster...or Undercover Cops?!

Overtaking us? Then be very afraid!

The last three times another vehicle has come up behind us at high speed from nowhere, on a trip to or from Amarillo, the Hubster has said:

1. "You're gonna get a ticket driving like that, probably afraid he's gonna miss kick-off"; as a decorated football supporter passed us at very high speed. You can only imagine how much we laughed when we passed him pulled over with a cop 3 miles down the road - that was Nov' 20th!

2. Coming home yesterday, "alright I'll move over asshole and you can go on and get your ticket"; when we saw the flashing lights two miles further on and then realised it was the speeding SUV we started laughing. I put my window down and was sorely tempted to wave as we passed, but I just laughed instead.

3. Almost home yesterday, having been passed aggressively 10 miles back, we see cop lights and Hubster says "You're really gonna laugh if it's the darned welding truck that passed us outside Higgins"?! Well you can probably well imagine the hysterical laughter as we realised it was the same truck!

That's three out of three to us, over some real aggressive idiots. Neither of us are even close to being slow drivers, infact that couldn't be farther from the truth for me, and at all times we were a few miles over the speed limit too!

So you might want to think twice, before you pass a grey Mazda 3 with a British tag plate on the Amarillo route!

In 2009 I will....

• Write something fictional every single day without fail. Whether it be a few paragraphs, a short-story, or a full chapter of that book I have always intended to write.
• Take my vitamin supplements without fail daily.
• Reduce the sugar I eat even more.
• Get on my treadmill and walk daily WHATEVER!
• Take meditation & relaxation more seriously.
• Pray more and appreciate my many blessings better.

That's it for my resolutions, do you have any?

I WISH Y'ALL A HAPPY & HEALTHY NEW YEAR!