I have been Missing In Action from blogging for almost two months. So, what has been happening? Well, I have been dealing with some health problems since the beginning of May. After attending a Cinco De May party at a neighbor's house, I started having pain in the ball of my foot under my left foot. A lot of standing in old basketball shoes was what triggered the pain. At first, I thought it was Metatarsalgia. I saw a podiatrist last week, and it turns out I actually have a condition called Hallux Rigidus, which is arthritis of the big toe. It can be treated by getting some custom foot orthotics, and luckily my insurance covers it 100%. I sprained my right ankle last November, and it still bothers me, so the podiatrist looked at it also. He believes I had a Level 2 sprain, and I just need to continue with my stretching and strengthening exercises that I have been doing.
On top of all of this, while cutting down a dead tree in my yard three weeks ago, I unknowingly brushed up against a lot of poison ivy plants. It was so bad that I had to get a steroid shot, take Prednisone steroid pills for six days, and now I am on my fourth day of using a topical steroid.
At work today, I was one of about 25 people asked to attend a conference call on Monday at 9:00AM. Problem is there are 75 people across the country with my same position who were not invited to the 9:00AM conference call. All 100 people were asked to attend a conference call at 10:30AM. My company is merging with another company and the feds finally approved the merger. July 1 will be the first day the merged companies will operate as one company. It looks like I am going to be laid off, downsized. The two companies had paychecks on opposite bi-weekly cycles, and are planning to change this to sync the paycheck cycles. I am guessing that my last day will be either July 18 or 25. Considering my years of service and vacation not taken yet, I am estimating 48 weeks of severance pay. It has been a bad Spring for me this year. I am not looking forward to Monday's conference call.
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