A Much-Needed Interruption

**We interrupt your regularly-scheduled apartment wall fixer-upping, sanding, and general Stuff Mayhem to bring you the following announcement . . . **

I'd been having trouble sleeping, breathing, constant headaches, general tiredness and blehness for a long time, though if it got too extended I'd go to the doctor to get checked out and drained of fluids to find out that everything was normal. Did the usual medical circuits to try to figure out the culprit(s) and ultimately ruled everything out except possible new allergies.

I mean, really, I can't breathe! It's like I'm breathing through a straw all the time . . . surely this has to contribute to the headaches and tiredness and general blehness, right? Oxygen is important or something, I understand.

Anywho, I went last week to the allergist (and I SWEAR TO YOU I'm not a hypochondriac at all, it's just medical issues are not that big a deal to talk about for me, and it's been a weird health year or two, so it's kind of front-line, plus the was the LAST doctor visit for all this stuff) and I got retested for just about everything. Third time in about 10 years:

First time (1996-ish): moderately allergic to dust mites and highly allergic (with 4+ delayed reaction) to cats.
Doctor: "Get rid of your cat."
Beth: "No."

Second time (2005-ish): moderately allergic to dust mites but not cats
Doctor: "It's entirely possible that with just the one cat and your following allergy-reduction procedures that keeping the cat was like having an allergy shot every day."
Beth: "Cool."

Third time (2009-ish): highly allergic to dust mites
Doctor: "Since you've been following all the allergy-reducing procedures, you basically need to step it up a bit and dust every week, as well as greatly reduce any dust-collecting surfaces or activities in your home, particularly the bedroom. My advice to you: think "sterile room."
Beth: "Hahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahah!"

So this week my sister and I are taking our semi-annual sojourn to IKEA, where we will both stock up on stream-lined crap we can live without but are going to buy anyway because this year it comes in blue or something . . . and I'll also be loading up on bookcases and glass doors and storage boxes of all types so I can rearrange and address The Worst Offending Areas of My Apartment (also of note, they are in my bedroom--the area where I haven't started stripping the walls . . . yet):