and this is why you don’t fuck with Joe Biden

Our Joe was masterful. The press and the big donors and the republican plan to deep six Joe and cripple his campaign was working. No tax increases for the rich, the press getting all the clicks they wanted, the republicans already had Joe in a casket and then our Joe pulled the biggest fucking rabbit the world has ever seen out of a hat. No one in their wildest dreams thought that someone who had power would voluntarily step aside and if he did, boy oh boy, they were ready for the chaos that would consume the democrat party as they fought bitterly over who to replace him with that would ensure Trump’s election. They were all here for it. But they didn’t know our Joe. When it became obvious that the press was not going to let up, when the big money stopped flowing, when the traitors in his own party succumbed to the threats of their own campaign money drying up and refused to support him, Joe did what he has always done. He put country first. And he did it in a way that shot down every one of those fuckers and flipped the narrative on it’s head.

Joe developed a meticulous plan, got all his ducks in a row, maneuvered everyone for the result he wanted, kept it all under wraps, and had the timing down to a T. He blindsided the republicans, waiting until after their convention and their VP pick, deprived the press of the opportunity to drag him over the coals on the Sunday morning shows and crow about the future spectacle of a chaotic convention they were gleefully waiting for, and solidly handed the reins to Kamala Harris. Within 24 hours an enormous amount of money poured in and continues to pour in and the groundswell of support from not only the voters but organizations endorsing her has been unprecedented. As of now she already has the pledge of more than enough delegates to assure her nomination. Dark Brandon strikes again.

And the republicans? They are now stuck with the oldest candidate to ever run for president who exhibits obvious cognitive decline, whose massively unqualified VP is guaranteed to offend almost every single woman in the country and who has zero appeal or public presence, their entire planned campaign in the toilet, everything they have spent money on so far is now trash. Kamala Harris is going to eat them up. And now Joe can focus on getting as much done in the next six months as he can without being distracted by campaigning.

I was Riding’ with Biden all the way and my first emotional response was one of dismay that he capitulated to the haters but that was before I realized what a stroke of genius this was. He took a stumbling and divisive Democrat party that was losing support and eating its own and pulled it all together in an energetic and dynamic way. And after all, when we voted for Joe, we also voted for Kamala. Go git ‘em gurl!

So, I did indeed get out my colored pencils, sketchbook, watercolors and paper. I have even laid out the brief outlines for a  watercolor landscape, a picture I printed out months ago before I put everything away. 

I was hoping to get the first wash on before my niece got here and we started winnowing out some of Pam’s stuff but between moving as much storm debris to the street as I could manage, cutting stuff up with my mini chainsaw, with multiple short forays the last several days before the predicted rain for the week materialized and finally doing a major grocery shop today to replace so much that had to be thrown out, I’m probably not going to manage it. Especially since my niece and her husband are due to arrive shortly. And then Saturday all the family will come here for our final goodbye to Pam, heading down to the beach, her most favorite place in the world, as we return her mortal remains to the earth.

recovery of one kind and another and another

I found this blooming in the ditch this morning totally out of season.

Today it is seven days counting the day of my surgery. The incision is still ugly but healing, the bruise is fading, what’s left turning yellow and brown. Yesterday I picked up the rest of the debris, all small stuff, in the little backyard adding to the big pile there. This morning when I let the dog out I cleared the front yard making a small pile on edge of the street. The county is supposed to be coming around and picking up storm debris starting tomorrow. I’d like to move some of the piles around here to the street before they get to our neighborhood but it probably won’t happen because I’m still being very conservative in my activity. Maybe the small one on the side yard, maybe the small one in the front yard but the monster in the side yard and the one in the little backyard will take much longer to move. And of course, the big backyard hasn’t even been touched. I tried to torch the burn pile yesterday but with all the rain we’ve been having it wouldn’t catch. Maybe Monday as long as the rain holds off. Unfortunately, it’s forecast to rain every day next week.

Yesterday Marc drove me down the county road I take to get to the grocery store. There were five enormous, 50 year old at least, pecan trees down, keeled over uprooted, just on that short stretch alone. I’m still astounded by how much damage that category 1 hurricane did.

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My sister’s sudden and completely unexpected death had a profound impact on me beyond just the loss of my best friend and main companion other than my husband. It really just took the wind out of my sails and, in retrospect, made me hyper sensitive to my own mortality which I see as the core cause of all the medical stuff I’ve been going through the last two months. Instead of recognizing an intense afib episode for what it was, I basically panicked which sent me to the ER which led to all those tests which led to the false aneurysm diagnosis and everything that followed that. Really, the only procedure I needed was the afib ablation because the medication was no longer controlling it. How many years have I taken off my life as a result of two months of panic, all that anesthesia?

It impacted me in other ways too. In my grief I lost all motivation to do anything creative. The broken water pipe at the studio has been fixed but I still haven’t bothered to get Marc to go over and turn the valve back on (I can’t get it to budge), I put away my colored pencils, sketchbook, and watercolors. I have the fabric to make a new skirt but haven’t gotten my sewing machine out, I bought all those new crystals and still haven’t hung them. Gardening, yoga, and SHARE have been my only activities and it’s too hot to garden now even if I wasn’t still recovering from all those procedures.

Well, one of my readers, David, has, unintentionally I’m sure, kicked me in the butt. I’m going to get my colored pencils, sketchbook, and watercolors and paper out and put them on the small work table. That may be as far as I get today but it’s a step forward.

Tuesday my niece and her husband will arrive. Our plan is to go through Pam’s old house and start clearing away some of the stuff. Nothing has been gotten rid of at this point and it’s time to pack up her life. The furniture will stay except for two pieces that have no real value, just taking up space in an overcrowded house. Next Saturday all the family will gather once again to scatter her ashes as she requested and when that is done I think I will be able to finally let her go. I need to start making again.

 

some cleanup and a gnarly cut

It’s been raining nearly every day since the hurricane so I was told and it has rained just about every day since I’ve been home, not a lot, sometimes just sprinkles some, except yesterday. Jade came in Wednesday to help with the yard and get her dad to change the oil in her car but it was a bit rainy so nothing got done in the yard. Yesterday though was dry and she got up on the roof and cleared it of branches, twigs, leaves and other storm debris. Then she cleared the west side of the front filling the bed of the truck and making a huge pile of the stuff that wouldn’t fit including the stuff from the roof. 

She pulled all the plants in pots out of the barn and the big plumerias out of the garage. After work my grandson Mikey, who has moved back to Wharton, came over with a chainsaw and cut up the fallen trunk of the photinia in front and hauled it over to the burn pile and then cut down the trunk that was leaning drunkenly against the fringe flower tree and cut it up and made a pile of it in the front. We need to torch the burn pile before we add anymore to it and I thought I would do that today but it rained last night and is still overcast and wet. I may still try after breakfast. There was a pile of stuff in the little backyard when I got home from the hospital so I guess Marc did that. 

The front is still littered with small stuff making it hard to walk there and the big backyard hasn’t been touched but Mikey thinks he can take care of most if not all of the large limbs down and still hanging from the two pecan trees with a ladder and a pole saw. It’s also treacherous walking back there with all the downed branches. The back half of the big backyard is fairly clear but still has scattered branches. 

We’ve lost a lot of our summer canopy in the big backyard and it became very apparent last night with the full moon shining unobstructed right in the etched glass windows in my bedroom. Previously it was hidden by the pecan trees.

I missed SHARE last week because I was recovering from the angiogram and missed it yesterday, recovering from the surgery but I saw my neighbor and fellow volunteer as he was coming back from his walk and was glad to learn that we didn’t lose any food. Power was restored to that area first, which is why we were able to eat at the Italian restaurant Monday night, and everything had stayed solidly frozen. Yesterday was busy though with half being large families. The roof of the building took some damage though so they’re getting that repaired.

I walked around the yard and a few things are blooming, the Mexican bird of paradise

the indigofera,

the heritage rose. The orange cosmos are not blooming but I swear they have doubled in height since the hurricane.

I took the bandage off my leg and took a shower yesterday late afternoon. The incision is pretty ugly, a vertical cut right where my leg joins my body where my leg bends to sit so half the incision is on my body and half is on my leg. Sitting or standing is fine, no pain. Transitioning from one to the other hurts but less every day.  Everybody keeps telling me everything can wait and to rest and recover but I’m sick of resting. It feels like that’s all I’ve done for the last six weeks, rest and lay around. But I’m being a good girl, no cleaning up the yard, no yoga until I get the go ahead from the doctor, no housework. Ok, the no housework is not such a burden.

 

it ain't over until the fat lady sings

You may have noticed that I dropped out of sight again. Or not. It’s not completely unusual for me to get busy and not post for a week. You might have figured that I was busy cleaning up the yard. That would be a big nope. Nothing has been done about that. The only difference is that now everything is brown.

What happened was that the hospital called on Thursday to check on me after the angiogram, asked if I had removed the pressure bandage yet, no, and to go ahead and remove it, clean the incision site, and put a bandaid on it. So I did. When I went to bed Thursday night I noticed four or five small thumbprint size bruises on my inner thigh that had not been there when I took the bandage off. Two hours later those spots were all connected. When I woke up Friday morning it had become a red and slightly purple bruise bigger than my handprint. That was alarming so I called the doctor’s office first thing and reported what was going on. The NP called back, some bruising was normal but the doctor ordered an ultrasound for today and to call the imaging center and make an appointment. They couldn’t see me until 2:30 and by noon the bruise was still spreading and my thigh was swelling. Since I was starting to freak out a little we left at noon hoping they could get me in earlier if I was there but en route I called the doctor’s office again, reported the increased bruising and swelling and asked if I should go to the ER instead. Yes, she said, get thee to the ER.

I didn’t get the ultrasound until 5:30. By then the bruising and swelling had stabilized. I had been taking the blood thinner but when I saw my thigh that morning I didn’t take it. Turns out I should not have started taking it again until 24 hours after the angiogram but they failed to tell me that. Anyway, the ultrasound showed a ‘pseudo aneurysm’ at the site where the catheter was inserted in my femoral artery for the angiogram and even though it had stopped actively bleeding they admitted me to the hospital. The surgical PA examined me Saturday morning, paged the vascular surgeon who was slow to respond so he put another pressure bandage on the incision site and a sand bag on top of that to see if that would close up the pseudo aneurysm. Then another ultrasound Sunday which showed that while it had decreased some it had not closed all the way and surgery was scheduled for Monday.

While I was in pre-op Monday talking to the surgical assistant about the difference between an aneurysm and a pseudo aneurysm I asked which was more dangerous. Pseudo aneurysm. Great, of course it was. So the surgeon made a 2 1/2” incision to put one stitch in my femoral artery, declared the surgery a success and they discharged me from the hospital Tuesday. So now I’ll have another identifying scar if my headless body ever turns up.

I was supposed to have the Watchman procedure Monday to get me off the blood thinner but I called the electrophysiologist’s office when I was in the ER and it was canceled. I still intend to have it but I’ll wait a while. As the floor doctor told me on Sunday it was a good procedure for people my age on blood thinners to get because that’s when we start falling and hitting our heads and bleeding. Fun guy, but I suppose he’s right. 

All this because I mistook an intense afib episode for some sort of heart failure but at least I know my heart is good, my lungs are good, and my vessels aren’t all clogged up.

Can my life get more exciting?

 

and then it was Tuesday and the aftermath

Read the previous post first.

Monday night I washed with the special soap, clean sheets on the bed, no pets allowed to sleep with me, got up at 3:30 AM, showered with the special soap again, put on clean clothes all as instructed, left the house at 4:30 and arrived at the hospital a little before 5:30 AM for the diagnostic cerebral angiogram. Checked in, told us to be seated and they would call me directly and we waited and waited as person after person who arrived after us got called back. About an hour later the guy comes and asked me for my ID, they are having trouble finding my account. He comes back after a while to tell me that my procedure had been cancelled and that was why they couldn’t find my account. No one notified me, who canceled it and why? Some night nurse canceled it last night but the head nurse on the floor was calling the doctor to find out what was going on and as soon as she talked to the doctor, he would have more information. 

So we waited again and after awhile the guy comes back and says I have two options, the doctor is willing to go ahead and do the procedure but I’ll have to wait until he does the other two scheduled after mine for today and no one could tell me how long the wait would be or I could reschedule. I’m here, I’ve had the pre-op, I've done all the preparation, I’ll wait especially since the neurosurgeon is leaving town again next week. Finally they call us back to the staging area where the attendant gives me a gown, tells me to get naked, climb into the bed with a puffy space type blanket that warm air is being blown into (much better than the warm blankets that cool off in 5 minutes), puts support hose on my legs that come up over my knees (to prevent blood clots she says) and again we wait. About 9 the nurse comes in to start prepping me, says I’m next, scheduled for 10, takes my vitals and puts in the IV. I questioned her about the cancellation, did a nurse have that kind of authority? No, she said, that no one really knows what happened, that Monday was totally chaotic with doctors and patients canceling because they couldn’t get to the hospital and somehow mine got sucked into that, that the hospital was running on generators right now, no wifi and the internet was sketchy, she had to write down all the stuff to enter it into the computer later but this area was fine and they would move me to the pre-op area soon, which they did about 10. 

So now we’re in the pre-op waiting for the doctor, anesthesiologist, and the surgical nurse to come talk to me and while we are waiting we hear more horror stories about yesterday from the nurses who are very chatty. About 11:30 the neurosurgeon stops by, assures me that all is well, did I have any questions. Yes, how tired are you and have you eaten lunch? Says he’s not tired and he’s going for lunch now and they will do the procedure right after. The anesthesiologist comes by and the surgical nurse who stays with me explaining minute by minute what’s going to happen. I will be awake because the doctor will be talking me asking me at times to hold perfectly still while he takes pictures of my brain but I won’t feel a thing, which I didn’t, that she would be by my side the entire time. Once in the operating room and in place on the table and all the prep done getting me in place and immobilized she asked me what music I wanted...Stevie Ray Vaughn. So I lay there with my eyes closed listening to music, being completely still and not breathing when necessary and about 15 minutes later it was over and they wheeled me out to post-op recovery and after a while the doctor came by with the results. 

No aneurysm he says. He showed me a picture of my basilar artery and the junction that the MRI identified as an aneurysm but it was normal and the reason it looked like an aneurysm is because the artery that branches off to the right is sort of twisted around (but perfectly fine) and so didn’t show up on the fuzzy MRI image. So he says you don’t need to see me again and he left. I stayed there for about an hour and then they took me to a different recovery area where Marc joined me again and where I had to stay flat on my back for another two hours. And then they discharged me and we got home about 6 PM.

Still no power at home but we were able to get dinner at the other restaurant which was now open and then spent a miserably hot and humid night. Wednesday morning, still no power so we went out for breakfast and then I called my friends at the end of the street and daughter who also had no power to tell them if they wanted a hot shower or to fill up water containers to come here because while everyone else is on a well which doesn’t function with no power, we are on city water and have a gas water heater. I talked to Rocky about finding the shingles and he came down and climbed up on the roof over there. The entire ridge line of shingles was either off or loose and had to be replaced, all 77” of it. The man is an angel. He had already been sealing another neighbor’s roof who he looks after and he took care of it right away, getting his helper up there to take off the row of shingles while he went to get new ones, working up there in the sun and heat and got that roof repaired while his own roof suffered damage from a tree scraping it when it fell, but since he rents he had to get the OK from his landlord so he would get paid. My daughter also had several trees uprooted, one right next to her house but instead of crushing her house it fell away and demolished the chicken coop (all of the chickens are fine).

Finally we got the power back on about 6 PM yesterday, got take-out for dinner and slept well in the nice cool house last night. Still recovering from my procedure, having to stay off my feet the rest of this week while the incision in my femoral artery heals so I can’t get out there and start cleaning up the yard. And then I have the last procedure on my heart on Monday with another five days or so of recovery. So it’s going to be a while before I’m able to start cleaning up around here and emptying the refrigerator and freezer is the first big task anyway.

and then all hell broke loose

When I posted last Saturday, Beryl was bearing west and generally going to miss us and Houston except for a little wind and rain. Hahahahaha. Then it shifted west and hit us nearly dead on. Even so, only a category 1 storm. Hahahahaha. We got all our hurricane prep done Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning and then waited for it to come through Sunday night. It didn’t bring much rain, only about 4 or 5 inches but it did bring high winds that spawned a record number of cyclonic tornadoes in a short period of time that uprooted and splintered trees all over the place and did all kinds of damage. I heard that Houston lost 5 transmission towers, but I don’t know how true that is, but 3 million people there lost power and about a third still haven’t had it restored.

I moved the car over to the shop yard across the street late afternoon on Sunday since we park it here under a big oak and a big crepe myrtle. Beryl started blowing into Wharton that evening. I was up most the night listening to the wind and the sound of branches thudding to the ground and limbs creaking as they were torn from the trunks. At one point I heard a train (there’s a track that runs parallel to the road at the other end of the street) and could not believe they were running a train during  hurricane. The little dog was in full on panic mode. The power started flickering about 4 AM Monday morning and went out completely at 4:30. The wind started to abate some after that and the little dog finally settled down and I guess I got a couple of hours of sleep. We woke up as it got light, still very windy but the rain had stopped and looked out the windows to see the yard totally trashed…leaves, twigs, branches small and large, and limbs carpeted the ground. 

I looked out the back window into the big backyard to see that two of the pecan trees had lost major limbs, some on the ground, some still hanging from at least 20’ up or higher, topped by the tornado that had bounced around (the sound of the train). 

We finally ventured out around noon to get a closer look at all the damage. The spot where we park the car looked like this. We cleared that area and the rest of the driveway so we could get in and out. 

The maple next to the front of the barn lost three limbs which fell next to it and the pecan tree that was closest to the garage got topped

but the magnolia between them was relatively untouched, just some small stuff. The second pecan that lost major limbs is by the back corner of the barn but they fell away from it so no damage to the barn. 

The third pecan furthest from the house was untouched and the dead tree at the back of the property is still standing. In the front one of the photinias lost one of its three trunks.

Fortunately nothing hit the house except for small stuff covering one section of the roof.

Later I went over to see what if any damage there was over at Pam’s/Robin’s house and found five or six shingles on the ground but couldn’t see any obvious damage to the roof.

The radar at this point showed another band of wind and rain that was supposed to hit about 2 PM but it never materialized and so about 3 we got in the car and drove around. It looked like the whole town was out of power. We only saw one place open, the Walmart which was running on generators. Everything else was dark and closed. The contents of the refrigerator were still cool enough for us to have cereal for breakfast and sandwiches for lunch but by dinner time none of that was an option. So we got back in the car to see if anything had power restored and was open and found that the business district around the square had power and the Italian restaurant was open so we had dinner there. Coming home we passed the other business district with another restaurant that served breakfast, lunch, and dinner had power though everything was still closed. That night was hot but not horribly so because it was still overcast and still a little breezy. Marc had called the hospital earlier in the day to make sure my procedure was still on for Tuesday even though something like 80% of Houston was without power (so had we gotten a hotel, we’d have been in the same shape). 

continues next post…

 

medical stuff so if you're as bored by this as I am you can just skip it and, of course, a hurricane

Well, just fuck all! Fuck, fuck, fuck, and dammit all to hell. Finally the diagnostic cerebral angiogram to tell me what, if anything, is in my brain and what the doctor plans to do about it, is just a few days away and a fucking hurricane is supposed to hit Houston the very same day. Will the procedure still be on, especially considering I went through the pre-op yesterday? I don’t know, it’s the fucking weekend and I wouldn’t know who to even ask. The doctor’s office? The hospital? If it’s still on, we would have to leave here at 4:30 in the morning to get there by the arrival time of 5:30, in the dark, in the rain and high wind of an approaching hurricane. Really karma? Have I been that bad? Just…fuck.

I spent this morning searching for hotels within two miles of the hospital. Three options and I’m all for going in the day before even if there wasn’t a hurricane.

So I actually had the pre-op for both procedures yesterday. For the angiogram it consisted of bloodwork and instructions, a breath measuring contraption that I have to suck on 10 times in one hour three times a day every day until the procedure, 

special soap and sponges to wash with the night before and the morning of, brush my teeth two times a day and use mouthwash, change my sheets after my evening shower and close the door so the dog and cat don’t come sleep with me. Really extreme measures. For the Watchman procedure I had to undergo another transesophageal electrocardiogram (from now on TEE) to look for blood clots and measure the appendage in my heart they intend to block off so another bout of anesthesia and another sore throat. It’s much better today but I could barely eat last night. Plus, they went ahead and checked me in for the 15th so I have to wear this

for the next 10 days. Don’t take it off, the nurse said, because it will delay your procedure.

And I hate mouthwash. It burns my mouth and I don’t like whatever chemicals they use to make it whatever color, in this case blue, being absorbed by my mucus membranes and it turns my tongue blue.

So, yeah, fun and games. 

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I wrote all that this morning but didn’t get it published. The current track of the hurricane/tropical storm has it being a little more west of us about halfway between Austin and Houston but closer to Austin by Monday evening, well past us by Tuesday morning so shouldn’t be a problem. The local paper is predicting about 5” of rain which we could use. So now I have to decide if I want to bring the big plants in pots into the garage. A big wind has blown up just now with maybe some rain.

 

almost over, bloomers, and the Fourth

the buddha is reminding me to keep it serene

I’m bored. All this waiting for this procedure and that procedure and then recovering from this or that or preparing for this or that, trying to stay as healthy and hydrated as possible before and after, not getting over tired or heat stressed or dehydrated. I want my veins and arteries as plump as possible for all this. I don’t ordinarily mind getting hot and sweaty, getting out in the yard and weeding and watering and pulling out gone by stuff and pruning back and fertilizing with rolled up bandana for a headband, hat and another bandana for wiping off the sweat on the rest of my face. I’ll come in hair drenched, headband soaked and sit under the fan while drinking cold water til I cool off enough to take a shower. But basically the last six weeks all I allow myself is 45 minutes to an hour first thing in the morning and then the rest of the day just sitting around reading or playing games on my phone or streaming some show or other. All well and good but I’m used to being more active and the yard has gone almost completely feral. And the shop yard and Pam’s plantings, totally. If it weren’t for for Joe and Mary who come mow and trim over there twice a month it would be up to my chin. And even so the wild grape vines, virginia creeper, poison ivy, and briar are making great headway. 

Finally, I’m approaching the end. Tomorrow is the pre-op, some bloodwork and I don’t know what else, for the cerebral angiogram scheduled for next Tuesday, four days from now, as well as the pre-op for the Watchman procedure the following Monday which entails another transesophageal ultrasound to measure that little pocket or bulge off the left atria of my heart that the procedure will close off, preventing blood from pooling and clotting in there, so that they have the proper size screen, not too small, not too big. So another dip into twilight sleep for that.

The heat lovers are blooming…the rangoon creeper is coming into full bloom, the mexican bird of paradise which had a rough start with some sort of deformity has recovered and is blooming, the pink plumerias, and the night blooming cereus is putting on buds.

Tuesday night the evening air had a pink or orange quality to it, couldn’t decide which, so pinky orange. 

Of course, it’s the Fourth of July today. I've put out the flag. It may be the last true Fourth of July if Trump gets elected again considering the Supreme Court’s disastrous ruling about presidential immunity from prosecution of criminal conduct regarding ‘official acts’, which they did not define, all to protect one man. Trump is already calling for military tribunals and jailing of his perceived enemies; Liz Cheney, President Biden and VP Harris, Schumer, and Pence specifically. He’s made no bones about using the DoJ to retaliate against his detractors and still talks about rounding up millions of residents and putting them in detention camps, giving Ukraine to Putin and promising to prevent nations bordering Russia from being admitted to NATO. And so many things so much worse. Essentially, what the Supreme Court has done is remove all the guardrails that the Founders put up to prevent a president from becoming a de facto king. And those bastards on the Court deciding this issue, during their confirmation hearings, claimed that this nation was based on the rule of law and no one, not even presidents, is above the law.

I’ll leave you with the last paragraph of Heather Cox Richardson’s newsletter from July 2, 2024:

“The Second Day of July 1776, will be the most memorable Epocha, in the History of America,” Massachusetts delegate John Adams wrote to his wife, Abigail, on July 3. While we celebrate the signing of the final form of the declaration two days later, the adoption of the Lee Resolution marked the delegates’ ultimate conviction that a nation should rest not on the arbitrary rule of a single man and his hand-picked advisors, but on the rule of law.

mortality, weird dreams, and yard work

Minnie sunning her belly

The last six weeks have been a little harrowing and have caused me to really think about my mortality. Both my parents and my older sister having died in their 70s kinda of puts the skids on my projected end in my late 80s or even 90s like my paternal aunt and my paternal great aunt. I'm still aiming for that but I can't deny the fact that maybe I only have another 6 years. I was talking to my niece, my sister's daughter, several days ago on what would have been my sister's 77th birthday. (Paraphrasing a whole conversation), nope, she says, you are addressing the issues you are facing while Mom didn't (neither did either of my parents) and you are healthy. But so was my sister on the face of it…active, mobile, aging in place. I still have two procedures to go through, the first of which will have a big impact on my life, either absolving the fear of a ticking time bomb in my brain or confirming it. And the second, the third procedure on my heart, will at least get me off the blood thinner. One less medication to take suits me fine.

Turk’s cap

My sister was a little prescient and perhaps that’s why the couple of years before her death she started organizing her life and belongings. She had a whole notebook waiting for us that gave us all the information we would need except for the passcode for her phone though our brother did eventually guess that. She took photos and did research into those of her possessions that were valuable so that we wouldn’t just chuck it all out or sell it for pennies. She had a letter addressed to the family about what she wanted done with certain things (throw away her bras and panties instead of donating them, burn her journals without reading them, scatter her ashes on the beach, stuff like that). So I’m wondering if maybe I should start doing the same. I have written down all my passwords in a single document, have a list of important contacts, I have a will though if I go before I hit 80, Marc will outlive me as his family is long lived so it’s a different scenario from my sister who lived alone, her husband having died more than a decade ago.

phlox

The last week I have been having the weirdest vivid, involved dreams every night and morning. I’ll get up to go to the bathroom (which is usually what wakes me) and I’m like, what the fuck was that all about and yesterday morning was no exception. I’m not going to try to relate it because too long and weird but I did wonder if all these new meds I’ve been put on might have something to do with it and sure enough, the two beta blockers I’m on for blood pressure, metoprolol and lisinopril, both can cause vivid dreams and nightmares. I haven’t been having nightmares but the dreams have definitely been weird and vivid especially considering I don’t usually remember my dreams beyond a fleeting glimpse. No weird ones that I remember today but I had a hard time sleeping last night and spent over an hour between 1:30 and 3:00 texting back and forth with Jade.

daylilies

I torched the burn pile yesterday morning even though it was already well into the 80s but the morning was still, no breeze, and it had to be done because the truck is already overflowing with branches from all the storms last month, one of the garden carts is still full, still a pile in the little backyard, and another big branch fell two days ago. I stuck paper in four spots, doused it with charcoal lighter fluid and lit them all and then I retreated to the car I had driven over and parked in the shade close enough to keep an eye on it and sat there in the air-conditioning. It went up quick. I’ve burned bigger piles but this one for some reason sent up a plume taller than any before and it was alive with motion, dancing and curling.

fire!

Later I was clearing out a small area on the front east side corner and got nailed by a wasp on my arm, looked down and it was hanging there like it was stuck and I had to brush it off with the clippers I was using. It stopped stinging fairly quickly but it hurt all day. Wasp stings don’t usually do that so when I went to bed I got my pocket knife out and tweezers and started digging around the puncture and pulled out the stinger. Better today, still a little tender but doesn’t actively hurt anymore.

 

the week in review

rangoon creeper

I can’t believe it’s Saturday, that a week has gone by without a post or even time to read others and comment. I wrote the following yesterday with every intention of getting it posted, and this is kind of long, but we all know about good intentions and the road to hell. Not that I’m on the road to hell, at least I hope not or not yet anyway.

It’s been a busy week and I was gone three out of the last four days. Monday I went with my friend to her two doctor appointments in Galveston, a two hour drive from here. M was diagnosed with breast cancer last April and it has proved to be aggressive and spreading and they have yet to start any treatment. She’s had every type of scan and imaging you can imagine and more than once, just a constant series of doctors’ appointments. Usually her husband accompanies her but he needed to work so she asked if I would keep her company. I said yes and we left at 7 AM. Now she needs another biopsy, this time on spots in her lung and another lymph node. She met with the oncologist last Tuesday and they finally signed all the paperwork to start chemo in July. My own heart and brain problems pale in comparison. 

Speaking of which, I removed the heart monitor yesterday morning, boxed it up and sent it back. It had come with 4 sensor strips and I ended up using three of them. When I removed the last one in the shower Thursday morning this is what my skin looked like…

and these were supposed to be the ones for sensitive skin. It’s shiny because I had put antibiotic ointment on it before I took the picture. I’m glad I only had to wear it for a week.

Tuesday was grocery shopping for the week and my night to fix dinner. I made tostadas and a mango/peach/a little orange juice fruit salad.

I had a follow up appointment with the electrophysiologist Wednesday morning. He’s still not happy with my blood pressure even though it’s not terribly high so added another med to help bring it down some before the two upcoming procedures. He didn’t want to increase the dose of the one I have been taking because he felt it would slow my heartbeat too much. I asked him if I would still have to take the afib medication, too soon to tell, he said. Maybe lower the dose I asked, too soon to tell and really it’s only been a little over three weeks since the ablation. Feels like it’s been longer.

I usually get in within 30 minutes when I go see him but once in a while it takes longer. Wednesday was one of the long waits and it’s a small waiting room, only 10 chairs for two doctors and about half the people bring a spouse or adult child. My appointment was for 10:45 and I got the last empty chair and then a constant stream of people started coming. Nowhere to sit so they waited out in the hall. I have no idea why they were so backed up but it happens. Maybe there was an emergency earlier, who knows. I had brought a book so I just sat and quietly read while I waited. After a while an old guy with a walker (most of the patients were old and using walkers or canes this day) and his daughter came in and sat down and then another old guy with his walker and his wife with her walker came in. He sat in the only available chair and she went out in the hall. There was already one lady grumbling about the wait to whoever would listen and then this guy came in and he talked non-stop and LOUD, engaging the woman and the guy with his daughter and two other men waiting, talking about their individual heart problems and bitching about everything, the doctors scheduling too many people and making them wait eventually getting around to the bullshit nobody wants to work cause the government pays them to stay home (a total MAGAt). I just wanted to yell would you please SHUT UP! I mean, really, every time there was a lull of a minute I’d think finally and then that old fart would start up again about something else. I could have told you his whole life story, his medical history, and everything else he didn’t like if I’d have paid attention. I didn’t get in the room til 12:30 and was so thankful for the peace and quiet.  On my way home Abby texted me to see if I would lead the class that night so I did that.

Thursday of course was SHARE and then three errands and always feeding the not so wild wildlings every day unless I get Robin to do it for me, and yoga. Wednesday when I went to feed them Minnie slipped out and ran over. I always leave her at home because she will want to chase the kitties when I’m there to feed them. But she was a good dog so I’ve been letting her come with me the last two days albeit on a leash which I hook around a post to get her used to the kitties and the kitties used to her. 

Twin trying to keep cool under the back porch

I refused to watch the debate Thursday night, it would just have made me angry, waited instead to read about what people were saying. Apparently part of the rules were that the moderators would not fact check the candidates in real time which allowed Trump to lie relentlessly. And I read that Biden had a cold but got better as it went. if all people are going to look at is how they looked and spoke instead of what they said it does look bad. Biden is a measured and thoughtful speaker while Trump is bombastic and everything he said was a lie, projecting his own criminality and intentions on Biden, took credit for things that Biden has accomplished, continually trashed the country, didn't answer any of the questions. I don't think either candidate lost any votes, or gained any for that matter, as a result but I do wish certain democrats and news outlets would stop harping on Biden’s age. Trump is 78, so basically just as old as Biden, and in recognizable severe cognitive decline and if he gets elected again he will also be in his 80s during his term. Why does no one ever point that out? They want Biden to step aside and allow another candidate except there’s a big problem with that. No one else is running. It doesn’t matter who you would prefer or support, if that person doesn’t want the job you can’t make them be the candidate just because you want it. Everyone that has been suggested has said no, they support Biden. Fortunately, this is early still and will be long forgotten. And Biden on Friday gave a speech to a group where he admitted he may not debate as well or speak as strongly as in the past but he knew one thing, he knew how to tell the truth. Perhaps if he had prefaced his performance in the debate with ‘folks, I’m still recovering from a cold I got in Europe last week so forgive my raspy voice’, certain democrats wouldn’t have gone into a tailspin. His speech on Friday when he wasn’t being bombarded by one lie after another proved that Biden is still the man we need. Let’s give him the House and a bigger margin in the Senate so that he can finish what he has started and then a younger candidate can carry it on next.

red periwinkles