and is this Jennifer?

Yes Sir.

Wednesday was an odd day. I was putzing around online and saw a news article that led me to go do a search for my biological son's adopted father for the first time in about a year.

I googled him and saw he has a LinkedIn account, so I pop over since I have an account there. Lo and behold, there was a link to his newish mini blog, so biting the bullet I clicked over out of curiosity.

OMGosh he has pics of his son on the site. I just about fell out of my chair.

As most of my regular readers know, I've been trying to figure out how to contact them since he turned 18 a year and a half ago. Just the parents, not him. I will not bypass them to contact him first. I am not his parent. So I mulled it over and showed most of my co-workers and my husband the pics of him. He's so tall!

I'm a smart person. I know where he works. There has to be some way to figure out his email address based on the information I had. I'd tried that once last summer to no avail (I was apparently having an off day brain wise), but yesterday I succeeded.

So how do you politely state that you are looking for a particular person without stating why in case the email address you just cooked up does not actually go to him? As vaguely as possible without getting caught by a spam filter.

I basically asked if this was such and such, husband to *** and father to *** and that it was not business related and could you please let me know if this was the right person.

I signed it Jenn Rinella.

And he responded:

"Yes, and is this Jennifer?"

Five magic little words. He knew who I was. Even though they 'know' me as Jennifer Maples.

So I had a mini freak out. I'm a bit dramatic, what can I say? It is how I am sometimes. And I had caffeine yesterday (really BAD idea).

I responded more or less that I go by Jenn now. That I wanted to let them know how to contact me. Gave them contact information, phone, email, blog, facebook, twitter, told him how I found him and I think their dogs are adorable (two Scotties - too cute). I gave a quick background regarding finishing school and where I am and what I'm doing now. I promised not to ever contact Alex first.

I stated that I was probably the last person they wanted to hear from and that I understood if that was the case. And I hit send.

He was kind enough to reply that they were delighted to hear from me. He thought it was neat that I found his mini blog. He let me know that Alex is a sophomore in college in Communication and Theater, but that he's also good at math. :-) They are very proud of him and love him dearly. He gave me his home number and home email.

At this point I was home and completely freaking out in front of Slug. Who just laughed, told me to calm down and ask the two questions I really wanted to know:

1. Does he know he's adopted?
2. Does he want to know anything about me?

So one more response.

1. Yes he knows
2. He's asked about me and knows my name and where he was born, but he's not ready to make contact yet.

They asked that I keep in touch for when he is ready.

I waited till this morning to respond. I thanked him and stated that I understand since I didn't start looking for my biological mother till I was in my 20s.

So I did it. I contacted them. I have a source of some information and possibly pictures.

They say do one thing every day that scares you. I think I filled my quota for the year yesterday.

But now I know. And there is hope. So I will wait.

Propylene Glycol and Bronopol

Are the bane of my existance along with a couple of other things today.

I have to keep my back dry through Monday when I go back for another reading.

79 - the PG is off the chart. Fills the whole area plus branching out to the surrounding areas.

Well this does mean I get to purge more than half of my medicine cabinet and its a good thing I stopped wearing my contacts since it's in my Saline Solution.

Oh and now I get to figure out what foods they are in.

Sigh.

When the Internet is not your Friend

There is such a thing as too much information. And heavens knows if it can be found on the internet I can find it.

Well Monday was my birthday. Unfortunately it was a rather sucky Monday since I spent my lunch hour getting a 80 panel patch test applied to my back.

Tape everything up. Mark everything up. Tell me I cannot get my back wet for the next 4 days. W00T! NOT. Happy freaking birthday.

Though thanks to all my FB and 'flurk' pleeps that wished me a good one. It's appreciated. I'm kind of a kid at heart regarding birthdays and I'm a little bummed that I only got one actual card in the mail (thanks mom). I need to grow up. lol And Slugbo gave me an iPhone as a wedding anniversary (the 13th) slash birthday present. Thank you baby! I LOVE IT.

So the patches came off yesterday and they said there wasn't anything to see and to come back on Friday. WHAT? Are you frakking kidding me? My back has been on FIRE since these darn things got applied on Monday. NOTHING TO SEE?!?!?!?!

Well I don't believe that's the case today.

Number 8, Number 15 and possibly number 45 are flaring. These were the three that showed up on the 29 panel test I had done in June. Turns out number 8 and number 15 are both related since they are BOTH IN RUBBER. Hugh freaking sigh.

New ones flaring are:

• Number 4: 4-Phenylenediamine base (reagent in hair dyes, lithography, photocopying, oils, greases, gasoline, rubbers and plastics)
• Number 65: Disperse Blue 106/124 mix (dye used in textiles. It is also sometimes used in other products such as diapers and seat belts) please please please don't tell me yarn is a textile
• Number 70: Benzoylperoxide (I've used that many moons ago)
• Number 79: Propylene Glycol (this is the worst flare of all and go look it up I dare you) - it's variant - polypropylene glycol - is only what helps give spandex, Lycra and elastic it's elasticity

Anyone else see the pattern above? More than half are found in rubber, spandex, lycra (which was SUPPOSED TO BE SAFE) and elastic.

I hope I'm wrong.

I hope I'm seeing things.

I will know tomorrow after lunch.

How Wednesday Ended...

Be kind. It's my first upload to YouTube. And believe it or not that was taken with an HD cam, so no idea on why the quality sucks.

And the munchkin is a neighbor's son. We don't have a current foster placement.

And we had a blast.

Some days being strong is just too much