I've been sick with a flu virus twice in three weeks.

I was really sick for a week, felt great for a week, then have been super sick for a week. I'm not sure if the virus was hanging around inside me, without me knowing it, or if I somehow re-infected myself, but here I am, recovering from the flu for the second time this winter break. Yep.

*Well, I am over the flu, but got an ear infection Friday, which I kind've ignored at first, and then it became excruciatingly painful right after all the doctor offices and urgent care facilities closed. Trips to the emergency room are always fun, but the doctor said it was one of the worst ear infections he had seen, and prescribed me plenty of meds to take. Gotta love that tylenol-codeine mixture.

On the one hand, this has been a bummer, since winter break is when I can see most of my friends from high school, and what not. On the other hand, if it means I won't get sick for another semester, I'm down. I would rather be sick while on break than be sick while needing to work and be on top of a busy schedule.

In other news, you should watch some (or all) of this video, and either be impressed by and jealous of these skilled and disciplined people, or be glad that you're not out doing those crazy dangerous things (or both, probably). 

Also, what's with those people in flying squirrel suits? Is that a thing now? Apparently so, because Wikipedia says the sport is actually 'wingsuit flying.' 

It seems as though the first attempt at a form of wingsuit flying was done by a French tailor in 1912, who jumped off the Eiffel Tower to try out his suit. It may be fortunate that he died of a heart attack on his way down, because he hit the ground with his head. There was not much head left, after that. 

About a century later, these wingsuits are much safer and pretty cool looking, but with how terrified I am of heights, there is no way I'd do more than watch videos of other people doing it.

So, that's basically what I do when I'm sick: watch people do crazy dangerous things on YouTube, binge-watch The Beverly Hillbillies, and read the fully unabridged The Count of Monte Cristo. 

(1,243 pages, ladies and gentlemen. Don't get me wrong, I've definitely read this classic before, and even a mostly-unabridged version, but not the full thing yet, so that's what I started doing the other day, when I was too tired to be on my computer.) 

Good stuff.

Probably going to sleep through the day,

The Purple Writer

Christmas in December

Yes. I figured it was only fitting, seeing as my last post was about Christmas in July, to start with Christmas in it's appropriate month.

Well, before we get to any of the Christmas, holiday goodness, which I know everyone is dying to know about, I really should talk about the elephant in the room. Or, well, the lack of an elephant in the room. (May I say pegasus instead? The elephant metaphor is a bit overused.)

I haven't posted in 5 months and 7 days.
or 22 weeks and 6 days
or 160 days
or 3840 hours, give or take a few, of course.

Crazy stuff, right?
(If you want to be able to impress people with your own list of expired months/weeks/days/hours between two dates, I went here.)

Why was I absent? I'm not really sure. It's not like I had a particularly challenging semester or schedule. I guess I had just gotten burned out while doing my mini, [unpaid] writing internships, and decided I didn't want to write any more posts. That was probably it.


But, no more! The purple pegasus [referring to myself, and in no way connected to the Purple Pegasus consulting/business group] is back on the internet, and therefore very accessible from any room you happen to be in (if you have access to the world wide web, that is). What can you expect from future posts from the purple writer? I will continue talking about whatever recipes, projects, experiences, things found on the internet, etc., that I think you may be interested in. Well, at least ones that I'm interested in, and you can decide if you want to read them all or not. Your choice.


To begin with, how did I know that the term 'purple pegasus,' which just connects two of my favorite things, happens to be linked to a full-fledged company? This is how.

They even have beautiful stickers that you can buy.

That's right. LMGTFY.

Is your mind blown? (Mine was, when a friend first introduced me to lmgtfy). If someone asks you a question, instead of googling the answer for them, you can instead go through one extra step to let them know how easy it would have been for them to find the answer for themselves. Pure genius. 

You can support their genius by buying a sticker. Just one dollar for that beautiful piece of sticky paper. I know I'm tempted.

So, hopefully that was enough randomness for you, in this re-introductory blog post. I acknowledge that I'm a horrible human being for neglecting my blog for so long. But, I also acknowledge that now I have a full 230,400 minutes (give or take several minutes, of course) of content to write about. Are you excited? Because I know I am a lot more excited to be back than a normal person probably would be.

Acknowledging my strangeness in every post,

The Purple Writer

Christmas in July

So, July has been a pretty busy and fun month. Lots of exciting things happened, like seeing the workers at Costco wear elf ears, to celebrate Christmas in July.

I feel pretty bad for neglecting my blog. Like, I've majorly neglected it. It seems that writing two articles a week for my internship (articles like this), on top of running around and doing stuff, generally fills my writing craving for the week. So, I will try to summarize my summer in this one post.

To start off the month of July, I went down to Houston on July 3rd, and spent a week there with my grandparents and relatives. For several years, my grandma has had July 4th be everyone's birthday. The whole family gets together, exchanges cards and gifts, and then it's not such a big deal if you forget someone's birthday later on in the year. This was the first year I went down there to participate, and it was fun. I will probably try to head down to Houston in future summers, mainly because it's a great reason to see family, and July 4th is a holiday, so it's pretty plausible.

 I then came back and celebrated my birthday with my family and boyfriend. I spent most of the weekend hanging out, watching movies, and playing board games. I'm pretty chill like that.

But, I did turn 21 on July 12th, so my sister bought me my first legal drink. She is a pretty fun person, and spending time with her has definitely been a positive side of me spending the summer at my mom's house in DFW.

#crazysistersatfunkybajascantina

I spent the next week, the 14th through the 18th, out in Lubbock. It may sound strange, but Lubbock is my home. Not only do I spend the majority of my year out there, but most of my friends stay/live there year round and it just feels right when I return.

Anyhow, I went to Wild West that Thursday, and it was the first time I didn't have to get the giant Xs (well, usually hearts) on my hands, and I got the 21+ wrist band. Exciting stuff. I had to buy a drink, of course, because it was my 21st birthday week. So, I asked for something strong and fruity. Man, drinks are expensive! (But they're also pretty yummy. . . especially when they're fruity and strong.)

Since I'm such a party person, I only had that one drink at Wild West, and my friends and I left around midnight. The next morning, I drove back to DFW to make the final meeting with my mission trip to mexico team. . . .

Somehow, the phrase "mission trip to Mexico" always makes me think of this song:

It's been years since I last listened to those old, Christian CDs, but this is just one of those iconic songs, I guess. Is it stuck in your head now?

So, that Sunday, July 20th, we got up early, piled into vans, and drove down to Reynosa, Mexico. That week was a blast. The team was filled with great people, and we were able to interact with fantastic people in Mexico.

Our sports outreach team had 60 teens participate, the VBS team had 280 children show up, the Bible Study had 35 ladies attend, and the medical team was able to provide eye care to several people.

We stayed at Big Heart Orphanage for the week, and we were able to hang out with the kids there, which was lots of fun. One of the girls was pretty upset that we were leaving so soon (possibly because I had the magic phone which played the VBS songs we sang and danced to every day), but was pretty ecstatic when I told her I was planning to come back in December with the house building team. That is one promise I really can't break now.

We drove back to the U.S. on Saturday, the 26th, and I've been chilling this week. I was actually pretty sick for a few days, all congested and coughing and headaches, and all that fun stuff. I had started losing my voice on Wednesday, it was really bad on Friday, and it's taken almost a week to get to get it back. That was mostly just annoying when I would try to sing, and nothing would come out. Singing is a part of my life (I start singing randomly without thinking about it, if there's no music to distract me), so that was lots of fun (sarcasm).

My boyfriend finished his 7-month internship last week, so we were able to hang out some this week, which was great. I think we watched six hours of Sherlock on Wednesday, and then we played board games with  my brother and his girlfriend yesterday (Thursday) evening.

Today, August begins, and July is a fun month of the past. I also finally got motivated to write this overly long blog post. You are welcome.

A fan of July (and Christmas),

The Purple Writer

A not-so-fun spring

This past Spring, I've been dealing with a bit of stuff. Well, a lot of stuff. Not-so-fun stuff.

One of the biggest things has been my thyroid.

Now, I've had doctors watching and treating my hypothyroidism since I was about eight years old, when my blood was first tested for thyroid problems. It's always been part of my life, but I've been on medication to help balance my thyroid deficiency, and it's worked well. I've lived a pretty normal life in that regard.

Well, about a week into 2014, I went in to see the general physician about the results from my blood work, like always. However, instead of hearing that everything was the same and getting my prescription, like it was supposed to go, I got a surprise.

The doctor told me that I had abnormally low TSH levels, and that she had to immediately lower my dosage of thyroid medication, or I would start having heart and bone problems. (Low TSH levels as in, the doctors at that clinic will allow patients to get down to 0.3 or so, but I was at 0.015.)

When the thyroid gland doesn't produce enough T3 and T4, the hypothalamus tells the pituitary gland to send out TSH, which literally 'stimulates' the thyroid so it will produce more T3 and T4. Low TSH indicates high levels of T3 and T4.

Especially in the previous three years, I had been feeling great. I had started martial arts again in high school, was finally able to mange my weight decently well, hung out with friends a lot, and had started to really enjoy life. I even had moments when I got excited and jumped or ran around just for fun.
So, when my doctor said my TSH levels were so low because my thyroid medication was too high. I sighed to myself, and figured that sure, with all my energy and hyper moments in the past months, maybe my thyroid medication was too high. I'm not supposed to have extra energy, and never had until recently

So, I went along with the doctor's advice (although I didn't have much choice, as she only wrote me  prescription for 120mg of Armour Thyroid, instead of 180mg), and by the middle of February, I was feeling pretty bad. I was tired all the time, was more stressed than normal with classes and my groups, got mad/upset more often, and felt depressed.

I saw one of the university's doctors, and he confirmed the low TSH problem. Then I went back to DFW in March, for Spring Break, and met with a doctor who focuses on hormone balancing, and she reaffirmed the problem and lowered my thyroid dosage again, this time to 90mg.

After however many years on 180mg of Armour Thyroid, I was down to half that amount in three months.

No worries, I was sure the doctors knew what they were doing. After all, I was dealing with a lot of stress from classes and my parents' divorce, so I kept telling myself I was fine, and went back out to Lubbock.

I cried a lot in March and April. Not because anything bad in particular was happening, but because I couldn't keep myself from crying. My emotions were a mess, and I couldn't focus on anything. My brain felt like it was in a fog, but I couldn't even try to clear it out.

I went to counseling. I started taking anti-depressants. I kept putting one foot in front of the other, but it steadily kept getting worse throughout May. I had lots of stuff going on, and to be honest, maybe the anti-depressants were finally working, because I just didn't really care anymore. Everything was painful and I just kept trying to ignore it.

My dad wanted me to see a thyroid specialist that one of his neighbors recommended, so I got an appointment. I went to see him the week after being told by the hormone doctor that I had to go down to 60mg of Armour.

You know what this new doctor said? Using TSH levels to treat thyroid, in the way that my other doctors were doing, was about fifteen years behind, in regard to research and studies.

He told me that he would treat my symptoms, and while the low TSH levels indicated an overactive thyroid, I definitely have the symptoms of an underactive thyroid. Therefore, he raised my thyroid medication back up to 120mg, added lots of vitamins and supplements for me to take daily, and is running other blood tests that the other doctors didn't bother or know to do.

It will probably take three to six months for my thyroid and blood levels to balance out again, and I'm pretty relieved that there is a way out. but it isn't an easy fix. Going up to 120mg of Thyroid hasn't appeared to do much, besides giving me some stronger headaches. My hair is still coming out in small clumps. I'm still not sleeping well, and I'm probably not going to come off my anti-depressant medication any time this year. However, at least it shouldn't get worse.

I'm pretty mad at myself for letting this happen. I should have done more research earlier, and maybe have seen more doctors throughout the spring, instead of figuring that two normal doctors and one hormone specialist would be enough. I think the only thing I'll have gained from this whole experience, besides a distrust of doctors, is knowing that I don't have Hashimoto's auto-immune disorder, which is good, I suppose. That extra blood test was worthwhile.

 Also, I now have some boring, medical stuff to write about for my blog. Small wins, right?


Apologetic for the lapse in writing so far this summer,
The Purple Writer

All the boxes.

Literally, all of the boxes.

I have been moving, along with my mom and brother, to a new house. It is crazy.

First of all, you should understand that we had lived in our previous house since I was five years old. That's about sixteen years in a single house.
It was nice. I enjoyed the house. But now, as we have been moving out of it, I see how much stuff we have accumulated over the years. A LOT OF STUFF.

When I came back for Spring Break, I cleaned up quite a bit in the two closets in my bedroom - Yes, that's right, two closets. I stayed in the ridiculously large bedroom that we used as a guest bedroom and with the pull-down bed and my trundle bed, could house four people with minimal inconvenience. - My first two weeks home from college, I went through and either threw out, packed up, or put everything in the ginormous give-away pile.

(and that was just in the beginning stages of the piles' growth)

Moving is a healthy thing. I think it is a good plan to move every couple or five years, if for nothing else than having to go through all of your belongings and decide what you really want to keep or not.

I had a lot of stuff with me both my years at college. In fact, I rented a storage unit for this summer, so I could keep most of my college stuff there, as I didn't want the hassle of carrying it around in this move (and it would never all fit in my car in a million years).

I thought I had just about everything I needed out there in my storage unit, besides my clothes and the other few things I thought I would need to have this summer (like my computer, my comics, my Doctor Who Monopoly game, my writing beret, etc.).

I even left two of my pillow pets. That's right. I left pillow pets behind in Lubbock. I've never left them behind before. I have to be satisfied with my other three pillow pets for these three months.

But, actually, when I came back and started packing up my stuff that I had at home, I came to a realization. I have too much stuff. I don't need all this stuff. I never needed to have all of this stuff at one time. That's craziness.

So, I have gotten rid of and given away lots of stuff. Yet, there have still been plenty of boxes to move to the new house. Quite a few have already been unpacked, but there are still boxes everywhere. Boxes in the garage, boxes in the living room, boxes in my closet, boxes in my car. SO MANY BOXES

This is not even mentioning the boxes of stuff left at the house that we have been packing and moving to my dad's storage unit here in DFW. I'm glad that we have boxes, because they make moving stuff much easier, but it would be nice to not have so many around right now.


Living out of boxes,
The Purple Writer

My brother graduated from high school this weekend.

If you haven't been spammed by me already, about my brother's graduation, on some social media site, then here you go.

(He's the handsome fellow in the middle)

Charles graduated from Coram Deo Academy this past Friday, having earned summa cum laude (overall weighted 100-point GPA of 98 or higher).

He is an impressive guy, and has had a very successful high school career. He's a star athlete, a math genius, an eagle scout, and lots more, including martial arts and playing piano. He can succeed at just about anything he sets his mind to, and is also a pretty funny guy, who can make anyone laugh.

He is going to Texas Tech with me in the Fall, with the top tier Air Force ROTC scholarship (as well as Tech's top Presidential scholarship). 

It will be good to be out there in Lubbock with him. Our paths will likely never intersect, as he will usually be in the engineering key while I essentially live in the English and MCOM buildings on the other side of campus. 

However, we will be a lot closer, living in the same town, instead of five hours away, across Texas, and fun times will ensue. 

Watch out Lubbock. The Clinkscales invasion is beginning soon.

We've always been cool kids

I really like my brother. It was too easy for me to get disconnected while off at college, doing college-y things, but I'm really excited for him to come to Tech. We will have several more opportunities to talk/play games/chillax together throughout the school year.

I know Charles will enjoy being at Tech. He has already accomplished so much in high school, and I look forward to seeing how much more he will do, in college and beyond. 

Anyhow. . . I feel like I digressed a bit, but yes, my brother is finished with high school, and everything is awesome.

Never done bragging,

The Purple Writer

So, I've abandoned you for a month.

I could try to excuse myself with the fact that I had finals, packing, moving, etc. But really, the main reason I didn't update my blog for a while there was probably my News Writing class. (JOUR 2310 at Texas Tech, with Mr. Wernsman.)

Sure, I should be good with writing, since I'm an English major. However, I am #notajournalist


I am so glad I am finished with that class. We had to write so many informative news stories and sidebars, with the occasional service journalism. We were constantly told to use the least amount of words, to make our writing clear and concise.

That is all good, but the reason I love writing is having the ability to create something beautiful, and putting together words in ways that give shape to my thoughts and ideas.

I felt so restricted in this class, and then we had a multitude of assignments to write over the semester. I only had enough energy left to complete my papers for my superheroes seminar, before being unable to write anything more. Hence no posts for my blog for the last month of school.

I have attempted to follow the advice (pictured above), which was taped to the bubble wrap given out in our dorm by a few CAs, trying to help their residents deal with stress.

As a heads up, I am planning on updating my blog on Wednesdays (and occasionally Sundays), since my deadlines for pieces for my College-Social Magazine internship are on Monday and Thursday.

Glad to be done with journalism classes,

The Purple Writer