A QUICK WAY to help yourself CATCH UP on reading posts if you're far behind (as I am), and THANKS!

[Guest guest]

Hey everybody,

My neighbor had the phone company out to fix her lines Friday. Before the guy

left, we realized ours were out! He messed up our lines in the process! The guy

said, " Not To Worry " , he'd have them fixed by the time we got back from the

grocery store. (We finally went!!!) We got back around five minutes to five. No

guy, no dial tone. Not only was there no dial tone, there was absolutely

NOTHING! Not even the usual buzzing sound that you hear when the dial tone is

gone. It was completely dead. So we called the phone company (using my husbands

cell phone) and of course, no human being to answer the call, only a machine.

They promised they'd have it fixed by today. But then Ike went through Cleveland

last night and we had gusts up to 60 mph - couple trees down on our street! (Is

everyone okay, especially those who live closest to the storm?)

Well, I thought, they won't be out to fix our phones tomorrow, they'll be out

taking care of business phones before ours. Irritating because I can't call my

kids or my mother or my husband OR GET ON THE INTERNET!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!... UGH!!!

:-(

I tried calling a couple times today, and sure enough, the recording kept

telling me that because of the high volume of repair calls coming in today, all

lines were busy and I should call back later. I finally got through to the

" machine " , but they said my " wait time " was " Greater than 15 minutes " . I'm

trying to call on my husband's cell phone, and he doesn't have 15 minutes left

on it so I had to hang up. I called again around 3 pm and got through to the

" machine " again. This time I was able to enter my phone number and hear a

recording that said our phones should be up and running by Monday, 9-15, which

is today. Okay, what else can I do but wait. Finally, at about 4 pm a guy comes

to the door to fix the problem. I tell him to let me know when he's finished. He

said he'd " call " to let me know. Forty-five minutes later there's a knock on the

door. He said he got the dial tone back to the lines on the pole and he tried

calling but there was no answer. I picked up the phone. Still dead. He said it

must be in the house. He went in the basement to where the line comes in the

house and it was dead. He went back out & 15 minutes later he had it fixed. The

guy who worked on it Friday had the wires all messed up outside! Well, I was

jumping for joy as I downloaded the 457 email messages since Friday, many of

which were from this group.

So during the last couple days I had no internet, which was driving me crazy,

but I DID have all my old messages to catch up on anyhow. Over 2,000 of them

from this group alone! I've been trying to read about a fifty a day, but was not

getting much out of them in terms of comprehension since I was trying to read so

many different stories at once. Then I tried put them in " Subject " order, which

helped somewhat, but some people changed Subject names just a little, maybe an

extra space in there somewhere and they were not coming up in order very well.

So I got the idea of using the FIND capability of Outlook Express and typed in a

couple words of each subject, such as " Handbags " or " Methotrexate " or

" Reynaud's " or " RA in Family " or " Worst ER experience " or " Progressive " , etc. Up

pops 20 or more e-mails all on the same subject. I can now peruse through the

emails quickly since they are all on the same subject. They made a lot more

sense this way and I learned a lot about this group and its members. I am now up

to the middle of August and have learned a lot about you guys (and gals)!!!

There were many I wanted to reply to, but they were too old, those subjects were

long gone off the board.

However, I do want to apologize for everyone who has suffered losses,

themselves or in their families, recently or in the past. (I read about so many

of them today - I'm so sorry - please hang in there, you are such wonderfully

'strong' people - God Bless You All !!! (BTW, I too had a stressful childhood /

life - alcoholic mother / absentee father) It's so important to keep this group

going (and growing) and sharing with each other. (This is what they refer to as

a FAMILY OF CHOICE). And to those who shared good things that happened to them -

CONGRATULATIONS! I'm SO HAPPY for all of you! But most of all, I'd like to say

THANK YOU to all the kind, caring, big-hearted people who give help and hope,

prayers and encouragement and COURAGE and other postive things such as medical

info or humor or cute videos to watch (I like the one with the moose in the

backyard - or is it " mooses " -lol - just kidding), or just your honest

vulnerability that helps us fight this fight (not only RA but all the problems

in our lives). You've shared so much of your time and your selves with all of us

in this group. Good or bad, you've been there... and you are still here. (Your

stories help us get through our days and have something to look forward to in

the future!)

It would take WAY TOO LONG to single each person out, so I am doing it this way.

This REALLY is a GREAT GROUP! And you all get along so well compared to other

groups I've belonged to in the past!

I haven't been here long, I haven't shared much since I've been trying to

research RA on the internet most of the time, (I'm in so much denial about

having to start taking the meds... ) but I usually get a chance to read about 50

emails on most days. Today I was able to get through about 500 of them and got a

LOT out of it doing it this way.

I'm starting to realize that diet is probably NOT going to do it, but I still

think it can help maybe, in some way, so I'm still going to keep researching. My

next areas of research will be " lectins " and " gut flora " - Sound familiar?

Probably not!!! - LOL - but like I said before, I enjoy researching medical

things. ;-)

Anyhow, I just wanted to let you all know what an unbelievable day I've had

today, reading all your posts, and getting to know each of you a little better.

Tears and laughter - all day!!! You and your stories, your triumphs and

tragedies - all mean so much more to me now. Thanks for being there (here).

Franz

Cleveland (Parma), Ohio