Author Archives: yearoffunsarah

Oct 28 2012
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Fun for Couples, Games

Day 34: Football. Nap. Football.

My husband is a Bears fan. Makes sense. He grew up in, and I’m really don’t like to use this term because it sounds like an amusement park but it seems very popular, Chicagoland. I am a Giants fan (Yes, New York. I lived there for three years and have many reasons why my football fanaticism landed there but they mostly involve Superbowl XLII in 2008). We both love football. Living in Chicago, his game is ALWAYS on. My game, well that’s a different story. But today, both of our games were on back to back!

I had another great friend brunch and came home in time for his game to start and some guests to arrive. The Bears won. Wahoo.

Then, after our guests left, my game started. He took our dog to the park and I got cozy on the couch. I saw the Giants field goal about 3 minutes in and the promptly fell asleep until dog and husband returned about half an hour later. The score was 13-0 Giants at this point. Great. I fell asleep again and this time I did not wake up until the third quarter when the Cowboys took the lead 24-23. What?! Not only was I upset that the Cowboys took the lead, but also that I had missed most of the game and had no idea! I became incredibly awake, and the rest of the game, in true Giants fashion, was a total disaster, nail biter, heart attack.

But that is why people love sports right? I mean maybe I have a better attitude about it right now because the Giants ended up winning 29-24 (what what!) and if they had lost I would be in total agony and curse them for putting me through it all. However, I enjoy how dramatic it is when a game comes down to the final minutes or, even better, the final play. I root for my team, you root for yours and we feel like nothing else matters in the world than that play. I am 100% invested in this one thing at this one moment and it is totally acceptable for me to yell about it whether I’m in a stadium of 100,000 people or my very own living room. I actually believe, and there have been numerous articles, books, theses, etc. written on the topic that go in to way more detail than I care to attempt now, that watching sports gives people the same emotional satisfaction as theatre. And that theatre and sports are more closely related–in terms of emotion and ritual–than say sports and television or theatre and movies. I think that is why I love both so much.

And maybe also why I am so competitive.

The many faces of a Giants fan.

Oct 27 2012
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Chicago Specific Fun, Friends and Family

Day 33: Didier Farms

I have this whole weekend off, which is amazing, so the hubs and I decided we would go to a farm/pumpkin patch kind of place to get fall food items like apple cider donuts and apple cider and decorative gourds. It wasn’t until we were on our way out to the suburbs that we thought to see what our friends, who live in the area and have two young kids, were up to. But, as luck would have it, they did not have much on the schedule for the day and said they could join us!

After stopping by their place first–and dropping off a gift I had for their 5 year old daughter (see pictures below. Giving a gift to a child could be its own fun thing) –we piled in to two cars and headed for Didier Farms.

We spent a few hours there. Highlights include: drinking hot apple cider, seeing baby potbelly pigs, watching all the kids, but particularly our friends’ children, enjoy the rides and games, and picking out the perfect little pumpkin to bring home. We did as much as we could before we got too cold and had to head back. It was everything I had hoped for and more!

Oct 26 2012
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Food/Drink Fun, Fun for Couples

Day 32: No Devices Friday

When I pulled in to our parking spot in the alley tonight, my husband and dog were watching for me from the window in our kitchen. He waved. She barked and whined until I arrived upstairs. We planned on having some quality family time tonight so after I settled in (aka ate some food and put on leggings) we turned off the tv, set our phones aside, opened a bottle of wine and just talked. And laughed. And played footsie. And made financial plans for the future. And put a thundershirt on the dog to see how she would respond. And planned our election night party food. And sang songs from Sunday in the Park with George (ok that was just me). And complained and confided and laughed some more and shared and plotted. And just really enjoyed each other and our little family.

We spent two hours without all that technology and just focused on each other. It was so great. I can’t wait to finish writing this and get back to no devices Friday.

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Oct 25 2012
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Rheumatoid Arthritis, Solitary Fun

Day 31: Reflections

I’ve completed my first month of this journey and I feel like a lot has changed. First, I can tell that my attitude has generally improved. Now I have never thought of myself as a negative person. It’s just that my attitude and energy level were low pretty consistently before I took on this project. But now I feel positive and happy more than negative and sad.

Having more fun has led to maintaining positivity and higher energy.

Second, my confidence has improved. Over just one month of sharing so many personal things, I’ve really started owning who I am more. It feels like a weight has been lifted or a door opened that was buried or shut tight before. My relationships with my friends and family who read this blog have grown, and it seems people feel like they can ask me about my experience with Rheumatoid Arthritis whereas before it might have felt like a taboo subject.

Having more fun leads to confidence and ownership of self.

Third, I often have to think creatively both to come up with new fun things to do and to then write what are, hopefully, funny, interesting, relatable blog posts. Writing every day is not easy. Some days I feel too tired to put in the effort that I should or would like to. But some days I am so inspired! On those days, I tend to feel most proud of the posts that I write. And I really do need more suggestions of fun things. I keep a running list, but it would be nice to get more ideas from any readers out there. I plan to do a suggestion from the ones I’ve received very soon.

Having more fun leads to creativity and inspiration.

And finally, my arthritis is doing better. There are a lot of factors contributing to this–the cortisone shot, taking medication regularly, acupuncture, walking/getting exercise, eating right–however all of the positive changes I have experienced because of this blog, especially when it comes to attitude, energy and confidence, must be factor, of this I am sure. I had an appointment with my rheumatologist this morning, and he said that attitude has a lot do with treatment. When you feel confident and comfortable with a treatment, it is more effective.

We were discussing treatment options because I had a lot of questions and reservations about the infusion (that I never started). From our conversation this morning, we decided to go back to a medication that has worked well for me in the past called Enbrel. It has been years since I’ve given this drug a real shot, so I’ll take it through the holidays, but if by January it does not seem effective, we will move on to something else. I feel good about taking Enbrel because I am familiar with it having taken it before. The dose is once per week, so my doctor and I will have more control over how much medication I receive (and therefore how suppressed my immune system is) should I contract any kind of infection. And, finally, Phil Mickelson, pro golfer takes it. (That’s a little joke. Well, he really does take it and do the commercials for it, but that is not a reason why I want to take it. Really. I swear).

Having fun leads to better health.

So as you can see, I am already seeing benefits and learning a lot from this project. A few of my goals before the new year include:

  1. incorporating more suggested activities
  2. taking more pictures and including them in the posts
  3. taking on a few larger projects or fun activities that might have multiple parts and include more people

Further down the road, maybe after the new year, I want to somehow include some kind of fundraiser for arthritis research. This is not a fully formed idea yet, but I would love to somehow use this blog or one or many of my fun activities to raise money and awareness for arthritis research. I am not sure if it would be through an existing organization like the Arthritis Foundation or through something of my own. (Please message me if you have any brilliant ideas about this).

So today’s fun activity is taking the time to reflect on what I am doing, acknowledge that it is working and set some goals for the future. Having fun can be work, but it is also, well, fun.

Oct 24 2012
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Fun at Work, Rheumatoid Arthritis

Day 30: Ready for my close up.

To be totally honest, I had no idea what my fun activity was going to be today as of 7:30pm when I finished work. As I walked to the back staff room to clock out, a co-worker approached me. She told me that, for each show, she does a funny video that she plays during the last week of performances when everyone is hanging around the theater after the show and asked me if I would like to be in this one. Apparently, she has been filming people lip synching to Kelly Clarkson’s Stronger. Each person does an assigned line and acts however they want. She will piece it all together over the song and voila, funny video.

Normally I would be very nervous to do something like this. The idea of being on camera in something people will see would make me very self conscious not only about my acting skills (or lack thereof) but also how I look. Now I love clothes, fashion and looking cute. Those things make me feel good and confident, however there are parts of my body that I don’t think look right–knuckles, knees, feet–that I think are ugly and super noticeable. In fact, one could probably argue that my efforts to dress cute could be a way to camouflage those parts of my body I do not like, but if that is true, it is certainly is not conscious. I don’t spend that much time thinking about this. And those parts of my body probably aren’t as noticeable as I think they are. But the thoughts bubble up when presented with a task like be in this video where you lip synch and look a fool because it is funny and we are all doing it to celebrate the show.

Despite all this I agreed to do it. To which she replied, “Great! We could just do it right now.” Ok…

My assigned line: “Doesn’t mean I’m over cuz you’re gone.”
My action: I’m singing in to the pay phone in our lobby (yes, we really have one) and by the time I get to “gone,” I’ve slammed the phone back on the receiver. Very dramatic.

She had her phone playing the song, so I would get the timing right, and we went for it. Two takes. Nailed it. And I only needed the second take because the pay phone started ringing in my ear during the first and I got scared it was calling someone and hung up without lip synching. Since we filmed my line immediately, I did not have any time to get worried or self conscious. I just did it. I let go, and it was really fun. I’d like to think writing this blog and generally opening up more has helped my confidence as well.

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