Lindy, just saw your fabulous pics...looks more like a Street of Dreams home than a typical SW Portland item :) Such smart use of the space under a balcony for some very usable outdoor area (fireplace, grill). A very nice outside area in back, yet it definitely looks within the UGB kind of footprint (sidewalk up close in the front)--I'm really curious now as to where you're located (don't say anything specific on the forum, though). For folks who aren't from here, Portland did a very smart thing, IMO (although it made househunting hard for us because we actually wanted a garden!) -- they made a boundary around the city that dictated relatively small size infill lots when building in that area. It's called the Urban Growth Boundary, and it's prevented Portland from becoming like Charlotte or Atlanta or even like the Raleigh-Durham area we used to live in, where everyone had at least 1/4 acre and sprawl was getting intense already back just at the turn of the 2000s.

well..uhhhh...well, I been laying a little low since my wine induced post from Friday night. Do you ever wake up the next day and think, "oh, I know better then to post anything after two glasses of wine"? At the very least, wait till the next morning to decide whether to hit the send button or not. geeeeez! Also, I did not post a follow up yesterday cause my head was HURTING. I think you get my drift. Worse then that, I had to drive three hours to lake house yesterday with my head HURTING. But, all's well that ends well, I guess. My head no longer hurts, tall, dark and skinny hubby was glad to see me, and the near fatal car crash I averted yesterday by running off the road (even with me head HURTING) after other idiot driver crossed the center line was a good thing. And then today, after I lost my mind and let my two cairn terriers out on the deck forgetting to make sure the doggy gate was in place...that endend well, only by the GRACE of GOD, with me finding them wandering (but in one piece) on the street rather then smushed in a greasy spot. I was consumed with studying my bathroom that is the next remodel adVENTURE we have to look forward to. That's why I was not focused on my babies. Thank you God for helping the stupids like me. Lastly, I got a big kick out of all your responses to my question. Too funny. I'm glad that many of you got a kick out of my question/wino rambling. And Bill Vincent, I was pleased to see that you are not ALL ABOUT the tile. HA!!! Forever your pupwhipped, but no longer winewhipped

OK I had a lot of answers typed up and lost the post, so you can research them if you like, but here are the ones that are not true: Our eyes are always the same size from birth (not true, our eyes do grow) A shark is the only fish that can blink with both eyes (sharks don't have eyelids) Almonds are a member of the peach family (no, almonds and peaches are both members of the rose family) Babies are born without kneecaps (not true, babies do have kneecaps but they don't show up on xrays very well because they are not bony but are made from a cartlidge material) February 1865 is the only month in recorded history not to have a full moon (not true, there were 4 in the past century, the most recent being 1999) In the last 4,000 years, no new animals have been domesticated (yes there have been, the ostrich, turkey and hamster) Leonardo Da Vinci invented the scissors (nope, they were invented in Egypt over 1500 years ago) Peanuts are one of the ingredients of dynamite (not really, peanut oil is used to make glycerol and that is an ingredient in nitroglycerine) Winston Churchill was born in a ladies' room during a dance (no, he was born at home)

Thanks so much to all who took the time to read and comment on my post, and for the great warmth and kindness of your responses. I must say I was nervous about posting; while realising many of us are going through very challenging times with our and our loved ones' health, speaking about this always feels quite excruciatingly personal, like revealing an ugly scar in public... but I was determined to do something for awareness day this year, having failed for several years in succession to contribute. I'll try to respond to every comment, in order: KS: You're welcome, and I do hope the info will be helpful to your friend. S/he should definitely watch the movie! Re symptoms: ME/CFS has an enormous list of around 40-50 symptoms, involving every body system - someone once said ME seems to include just about everything you could possibly experience with any illness, or words to that effect. We each have our own selection of them, to varying degrees of severity, which, once we're sure we've got the hang of dealing with them, morphs into something else! Or so it seems... If s/he hasn't already, your friend may like to google the (most comprehensive) Canadian Consensus Diagnostic Criteria for ME/CFS and the (most up to date, I think) International Consensus Criteria, which between them have a full list of symptoms, and explain which ones are currently thought to be essential and which are optional for an ME/CFS diagnosis. A full set of blood tests, etc must be done too, to exclude all the other known medical and psychiatric conditions that could be causing that individual's symptoms. There are also some excellent websites/forums to visit for more support and info, such as Phoenix Rising and Health Rising. Please pass on to her/him my thoughts and best wishes. Fig Insanity: You're welcome too, and thank you for your kind remarks. I'm so sorry to hear of the frustrating time your sister went through for so long, just trying to get someone to even believe her. Unfortunately she was by no means alone in her experiences. The continuing level of ignorance and prejudice amongst doctors against this disease is actually really frightening, an actual, genuinely Kafkaesque situation, which is especially difficult to deal with when one is getting increasingly physically frail and cognitively wooly, and no-one will believe your story or take you seriously: thus the urgency of need for education and awareness, and MUCH more quality bio-medical research to help dispel persistent, popular myths of 'female hysteria' and other such bizarre, often misogynistic, non-evidence based psychiatric theories. (MS was similarly regarded, until the invention of the CAT scan (IIRC), which instantly showed the physical cause of the symptoms.) Some stunningly bad science in the UK, published in The Lancet in 2011, purporting to prove the psychiatric theory (heavily subsidised and enthusiastically pushed by the Government and big Insurance companies) set us back a few years, but has fortunately now been thoroughly debunked. However many doctors are not up to date with this, and still resort to offering 'encouraging' therapy aimed at dispelling our 'false illness beliefs', prescribing antidepressants, and forcing very frail sufferers to follow increasing exercise regimes, which have been shown time and time again to be at best ineffective and at worst, to have dramatically deleterious effects, rendering previously unwell but still mobile people bed-bound for years, and occasionally even killing us. Many of us eventually give up on the medical profession altogether. Unable to find or access knowledgeable physicians, we're forced to take care of ourselves as best we can, at home, sometimes for decades/the rest of our lives. Not uncommonly abandoned by disbelieving family, and friends with whom we're no longer able to keep up socially; invisible to the wider public; we use Dr Google and the worldwide online patient community, along with whatever inner resilience we can muster as our resources. In many cases, this is actually a far safer option than undergoing misguided treatment from doctors and hospitals. And this is not a rare disease; unseen millions of us are just coping, behind closed doors, with little or no medical care or basic social support. What this can mean in practice is too painful and embarrassing to go into. SunCoastFlowers: You're welcome, and thank you for committing to watch the movie! Do post a review (good, bad or neutral) should you have the time and inclination. Do you by any chance have a link to the series you mentioned, and the episode about making the garden for the little girl with ME/CFS? I did try googling it but didn't have any luck. Well, I've waffled on again for far too long and am going to have to take a break. Carol (PMR), my apologies, I seem to have jumped past you in order. Will come back and respond to you next, then Ingrid, Jin, Melissa and Sheila. And maybe, be a bit briefer... (unlikely). ;-)