Birthday Flowers and pill, pills pills

          Flowers from Toni                      My Morning Pills

Murphy in violation of Cat Law #7.  ‘Only two feet on the table’.  But then I guess it really isn't a law if it’s never enforced.  Oh well! He was admiring Jeaneanes birthday flowers.

That’s right!  Just my morning pills.  There’s more in the midday and evening. Some are duplicates like the big yellow potassium jobs that I have to take 8 of per day. And sometimes there are a few others depending on which phase of chemo I’m in.  And that doesn’t include my tummy injections for six days after chemo.  I’m getting ready to do that right now.  Kat fixes it for me and I do the pokin’.  What a team huh?
Had my last scheduled Chemo treatment on Thursday and I’m kind of waiting for that other shoe to fall.  The one where I really feel like crap for a week or three after treatment.  I kind of thought it did last night but this morning I don’t feel too bad so we’ll see.  Mostly I get nausea and just really get tired.  I mean tired to the point that it’s a real chore just to walk outside and sit down, much less do any carving or even reading.  Reading or carving requires concentration that I just don’t have.  I can look at a magazine on occasion or watch TV but that’s about it.  And food is kind of a guess.  Sometimes I can and sometimes there is just no way.  And I don’t know until I take a bite.  Strangely I have developed a taste for Ketchup, or is it Catsup, or maybe Ketsup?  Whichever, it can take the edge off or add a little to the taste.  Sweet corn has come into season here too and I have got a taste for that and fresh tomatoes.  But the medics don’t want me losing any weight and Kat heard that so she makes sure I have plenty of opportunity and choice of things to eat.  My Guardian Angle. 
But there is ‘light at the end of the tunnel’.  Chemo wise at least.  But now I have to wait for the next check up to see how I’m doing, plus have my monthly shot for my bones, I have an eye appointment for possible cataract surgery on my left eye, plus the check and replacement of my kidney bladder stents.  Sooooo…….  When I feel better we’re hoping for a month break or so when we can get out of here and get to Oregon/Washington to see the kids.  But we’ll just have to wait and see.  Arizona is working out for us right now.  The weather in Prescott Valley is just great compared to Phoenix in the summer.  We left Phoenix Thursday after chemo and it was 109o at around 1:00 PM and got here about 2:30 PM and it was 89o.  Our highs for the next few days are forecast to be around 82o.  And we’ve been having some good rain showers off and on for a week or more.  Pretty comfortable and nice.  We have Sunflower starts under our birdfeeders like crazy.  And we haven’t had to water our tomatoes for a while either.  Good tomatoes too.  I got two potted plants. I think all the sun makes the skins a little tougher than perfect, but the flavor is really good.  I think so far we have had 9 tomatoes, about six of those of the cherry size, which considering the cost of start up makes my tomatoes worth about $30 a pound.  But it’s early and I have lots on the vine and ripening. 
Right now it’s time to go outside and get some fresh air.  More soon I hope.

Murphy

                                            
Now for the real news. Kat finally talked me into another cat. We picked up a Black DSH (domestic short hair) on the 23^rd from the Arizona Humane Society. Good deal too. I guess this is kitten season and they have an overabundance of cats right now. They are taking donations on any cat adoption. We opted for a locator chip which was $25 and gave a $25 donation. Still a good deal and we didn’t go there knowing that, but it was a nice extra incentive. HARRY !!; his kennel name, is a very handsome with shiny black coat with two white spots on tummy and chest, although not visible standing, 4 year old (Best guess) male. Even declawed front and back. Mild mannered and as I said quite handsome. The introduction process is difficult for Jade. She is being a real bitch so far. Not surprising if you know Jade.  But it’s a done deal and she’ll have to get over it. She’s showing a little progress and Harry is trying and I’m good with it.  The first night we locked Jade in the bedroom with us but now they’re having to make do. We did put out another food and water dish and temporary potty box.  But now there sharing, Jade, reluctantly.

You may be handsome but..             OH Jade                                 Wanna play???
I think the name is Murphy although that is not cast in stone. Jake was in the lead for a while but we also have thought Tank, Angus (Gus) Abrams (the Army tank) and a few others.  Big Guy gets used a lot as does Hey Handsome and just plain ol’ Murph.  Jade has other thoughts but they’re not for use in polite society.  She is still into hissing and spitting.  And she is not declawed.  Murph respects her limits mostly.  But sometimes he can’t seem to resist.  Yesterday he trapped her in the litter box and didn’t want to let her out.  You should have heard that one.  Sometimes he just runs up to play or say Hi! They keep getting closer and closer.  Jade too!  She was playing with his tail a couple of days ago when it was swinging down from the dash and he had his back turned.  So…..  It’s not a problem but they are not ‘Best Buds’ as of yet.  Jade still spends lots of time outside until she turns into Coyote bait but Murph is an inside man.  Mr. Inside and Mrs. Outside.  And Jade has taken to sleeping above my head on the pillow, for protection I think.  Its OK unless Murph gets too close and then I hide under the covers.  Jade is my girlfriend still and Murph is really attached to Kat.  He even paws the bathroom door when she’s in there.  The good news is that Kat has her cat boyfriend and it seems to be a good fit and real easy. 

Chemo

A rock from Stone Impressions.  A business owned and operated by my daughter and Son in Law.  It says it all and, as you may remember, chemo sucks!  But here we are again. As figured, I’m going to have some more. For the curious, this time around I will be on Docetoxel. This is different than the Texas treatment which was some kind of a cocktail.  And I get four treatments at three week intervals.  The last being July 26th.  Then I have 6 weeks off and a reevaluation.  So the schedule is real good and my doctor is trying to coordinate treatments and other visits to cut down on the 80+ mile trip from Dewey.  Real nice.  And If you didn’t catch that last, we did make the move north to Prescott Valley. We are staying at Orchard Ranch RV resort in Dewey. 

Orchard Ranch                        Between here and there                 Good ‘Pie and Ice Cream’

It is a resort.  Nice place too.  All the usual stuff, pool, library, breakfasts and lunches, typical activities like cards and Bingo, pool tables, Bocce ball, shuffleboard, a putting green, and my two favorites, woodcarving and Pickleball.  It’s an outdoor court but well shaded and protected from most of the wind so it ought to play well.  Unfortunately I haven’t been able to play yet, but we’ll see.  I did go to woodcarving and it’s a good group.  We have a dedicated room for woodcarving and there were 12 folks there on my first visit.  They also meet at a church on the 2nd and 4th Saturday.  Missed the first one, but I’ll get there.  That is the Prescott Valley woodcarvers club I think.  I’ll probably join.  We have a nice site.  Not the one we thought we reserved but it is still nice.  We were a little perturbed at first and caused a little bit of a kerfuffle but its over now.  They just have a real stupid reservation policy.  But not one to cut off your nose to spite your face for.  Anyway we have good shade trees, birds to feed and I even got two container tomatoes to grow.  A Big Boy and a cherry tomato.  We’ll see!  You sure don’t dare and forget to water daily.  Oh, I forgot.  They even have a community garden here.  All raised beds.  Something I haven’t done yet but should check out.  The trip up here was kind of cool, I think?  Don’t tell Kat!  We had reservations to be here on the ‘1st and that was a week after my first chemo treatment.  And a week after chemo I am pretty much chemo brain and in a fog.  But I gotta’ tell ya’, I was not wanting to stay another day in the ‘Valley of the Sun’ at 100o’s plus.  So I faked it and we made the drive in the RV.  Poor Kat!  She worked her but off packing up down there and setting up here.  But! We made it OK.  I just don’t remember much about driving, although I did.  It was worth the move.  It is so nice up here.  Last night I sat out until almost dark carving.  Very pleasant with a cool breeze and then at night it’s about 55o or so and we can open doors and windows.  Just real nice!  I can sit out just about any time I want and carve, read, or brush the cat.   
Chemo curmudgeon!
As to the actual treatment, it went very well.  We had to watch a film about the whole thing.  With the change in drug the individual treatments are a little more involved.  I have to take a three day prescription the day prior to chemo for my immune system and another prescription after treatment and as long as needed for nausea. I also have to administer a tummy shot for six days after chemo to assist in taking care of my bones and bone marrow; we got instructions and demos on all that. Even had a private room for the first go around. So all in all this in a much more involved treatment plan and sounds so far a little more aggressive. But as I said, I like the schedule much better. As to side effects, we’ll see. I know to expect hair loss again. Sounds like that’s definite. And I got some stronger pain killer. Oxycodone, and it works real well compared to hydrocodone. No complaints yet. Heavy on the ‘yet’, I guess.

Medically Speaking

This might be a little slow and painful. I have a new laptop and the key board doesn’t fit as well as the last. My old laptop was really that, old, and slow to make up for it. But I knew it. It was comfortable. So last evening in the height of my angst and frustration I went outside all the while talking to myself and Jade saying, “I didn’t use to be technologically challenged, now I seem to be technologically challenged, is it age? Chemo brain? Maybe just a piss poor attitude and resistance to change? Maybe all the above? Change sucks! Obama sucks! Agent Orange sucks! Chemo really sucks!!! Older ain’t so bad. I get to be a lot more dependent than I use to be, Senior discounts are cool, I always wanted to have white hair like Spencer Tracy (you young folks will have to look him up), now I do. Ouch!! Maybe I should say I use to, see the previous ‘Chemo sucks!!’ Mostly I get to be as curmudgeonly as I want to be and pretty much get away with it. So I got frustrated, had an attack of curmudgeonly, and went outside and carved. No Windows that didn’t open, files I couldn’t find, shortcuts I couldn’t manage, icons that disappeared or programs I didn’t understand. Just simple tools with a business end and a handle. And I was equipped with an opposable thumb and one pretty good eye. The other eye, not so much. What a relief it was. I became one with my tools and wood.

But its day two of the new laptop and I’m gaining slowly. Bear with! Together we’ll get through this. I didn’t buy this. Wasn’t even wanting one yet. But Kat got tired of me throwing the old one around (true story) and yelling and screaming. It was a piece of excrement, but it was a comfortable piece of excrement. I’ll adapt. But ya’know, I can’t even set my coffee cup in the right place ‘cause the power cords on the wrong side and it doesn’t fit on the cooling stand, and I get all these corrections to what I write, that’s fragmented, this is spelt wrong, where in the hell were you educated you redneck son of b#$&gun? I was a little offended at the last one. I mean how in the heck did this computer figure out I was a ridge runner with one leg shorter than the t’other? There it goes again, correcting my stuff.

On the medical side. I left off with getting all of my appointments scheduled. Oncology ordered a PET scan and right after that I got called in. A little scary! So we got there and I asked ‘what’s the bad news?’ Dr Harrington said there is none. But there are some spots we want to look at on your lungs and then we might want to do some more chemo. Aarrgh!!!! Chemo sucks!! So I had a biopsy for that. And right at the biopsy the doc said and I quote “this looks like a cyst and I think pathologically it’s no big deal”. But we haven’t got the official report yet. We’ll see? As to the chemo, Dr Harrington said they would likely use a different formulation and this one might even be just one visit a month. That part sounded good, but then, we don’t know yet. A week before my biopsy I had my uretal stents exchanged. That went OK. I was having some pain that I thought might be related to the stents but it was not elevated by the exchange. The urologist thought I might have a little irritation from the tumor rubbing on stuff and causing a little nerve damage. When it didn’t get better Kat called and got me in to see oncology right away. To their credit they did see me within the hour when they found out I was in pain. So now I have a big bottle of hydrocodone and the doc said use it liberally. It helps a lot.

So things are going good. I’m walking some now. Kat walks every morning before dawn even makes a little crack. Good on her. I go a little later and I’m working up. No Pickleball yet, but I’m not going to rule it out. We go swimming most days and try to get a little exercise. Kat more than I. But I am feeling better and I think the exercise helps. It’s been a few months since I’ve been able to do anything. I am getting some carving done. I thought for a while I was losing my touch.  Chemo brain!  But I find, ‘I still got it’. So I’ve been doing a bit more woodcarving.  Of course we still enjoy our new car and we take a road trip once in a while. Phoenix is easy to get around in, unless you’re directionally challenged like Kat, but she’s getting it. With the news that we might be stuck here for a while and chemo will be in the Phoenix VA (assuming I will get it), then we may very well move a little north into the Prescott or Camp Verde area where it’s 3-4000’ higher than here and considerably cooler. So we’ve been checking RV parks out. The drive from there to here from there, for the chemo, would be worth it.  But!  You guessed it.  Chemo ………….  I knew you could finish that one.  

I’m Just Sayin’

For all of our BGR friends, “I’m just sayin!” Quite a kerfuffle going on with the Bobby and Bonnie thing eh? (That’s Canadian there, that eh? thing) So Bonnie is fired and apparently Barb is going to quit. The police and/or the sheriff have showed up a few times and the Y-Cook will never be the same. Soooo…… I better be careful here ‘cause sentiment is definitely running ‘agin’ me. But I just can’t get too excited about the whole thing. First I don’t know the whole story and from what I do know, I can’t see that there is going to be a big impact on what I do. Let’s examine that. I have, or do, go to woodcarving, play PickleBall, eat ice cream, play softball, play golf, been in Little Theater, eat at the Y-Cook, go to an occasional show, read the bulletin board, get the mail, go to the library, and use both swimming pools, feed the birds, ride my bike, walk, and enjoy time with all of my friends. So, “I’m just sayin’”! I think I’ll still be able to do that. OK maybe the ice cream and Y-Cook thing may be curtailed some but I need that anyway. The shows will go on I guess, ‘cause I’m betting’ the performers don’t need to be missing too many paydays, and I’m pretty sure all the other stuff was taken care of by volunteers. “I’m just sayin!” I think it’s a little too early for folks to be picking another park. So I expect that I will see all of my friends when we return. No ‘cutting off your nose, to spite your face’, as I use to hear as a child. I expect to see you all upon our return or shortly thereafter. Are we clear? I can’t hear you!! At this point you say ‘crystal’. OK! That’s better. See you in the fall, maybe early winter.

Oh! I forgot something. Maybe with a new regime we can get a bar. Margarita’s on tap! OK that’s probably wishful thinking. But we do need some forward thinking. And……………I’m just sayin’!!!!! Maybe it’ll speed up the line at the Y-Cook. Nahhh!! Never happen! But with the bar, who would care?

We went to “The Rally”. That’s the big Good Sam, Camping World rally that was held at the Phoenix Raceway. Didn’t do the motorhome thing of course. Being that we’re already parked in Phoenix. We just drove over for the day. It was OK, but quite frankly without doing the whole thing (parking there in the MH for the week) it’s just not nearly as much fun. With a day pass you don’t get all the neat seminars and entertainment. This year it was Bill Cosby and Tina McBride. And besides I’m still not at full strength and I slowed Kat down considerable. Kat looked at and bought a new GPS. From some of the language coming from the passenger side I don’t think she’s real happy with it yet. It’s the Rand McNally with the 5” screen. She didn’t want the larger one. I think it’s pretty nifty, and I’m guessing Kat will come around? In the meantime it sounds like I’m driving a longshoreman around. (I didn’t want to insult the Navy) Just kidding of course. Kat says she can get to Texas or Oregon fine, and find all the campgrounds and hotspots along the way, if it would just tell her how to get out of the Wal-Mart Parking lot. Rand McNally or Tommy in our case (that’s the voice she has chosen) starts out by telling you to ‘follow the highlighted route’. Fine, but the highlighted route doesn’t show. You have to get out of the parking lot first. Not something my true love is good at. To borrow a phrase, ‘she can’t find her way out of a closet.

So, I guess you’re all following the Obamacare/Supreme Court thing. I imagine everybody knows where I fall on the issue. The whole effort from Obama, his minions, and the media is really nothing more than puke inducing. Bunch a’ commies !!! The notion that Obama wants to do anything more than raise taxes and redistribute wealth is ludicrous. Don’t forget that the current $96 Medicare premium will be $247 in 2014. That’s Obamacare!! I did get a kick out of Judge Smith from the 5^th Circuit in Texas. He’s a real ‘eyeball in the soup’ for the regime. “Three pages, single spaced, please.”

69 and Oxley Field

69 years of age is rapidly approaching. Two and a wake-up and I’m there. Who’d a’ thunk it ??? I mean I really do recall not thinking I would make it here. Even before I approached retirement and gave thought to the early death of my parents. Then, given all indications I thought if I could get just a few years, two or three, out of retirement I would be happy. But even before that, going back to as early as 1957 I recall having a conversation with my best bud, Bruce Rogers, about the subject. I think it must have been about ‘1957’ ? Somewhere in there. It was a summer night in Grandview Heights, Ohio, where I grew up. A suburb of Columbus. And like lots of summer nights we were at Oxley Field watching Little League baseball. If we weren’t watching we were playing. Oxley Field had lights, an adjacent playground, basketball hoops, tennis courts, and of course a baseball field. It was also just a stones throw from Bruce’s house. Literally, about a hundred yards down the hill which was his front yard. This particular night there was a ‘Old-timers’ game. Mr. Guyton (I think it was Mr. Guyton? Pretty sure, and BTW all dads were Mr. back then) was playing center field. The batter hit a hard liner to Mr. Guyton’s right and he gave chase. He made a dive for the ball at the end and did a real good somersault to finish his move. Unfortunately he remained on the ground because he had broken his collar bone. This gave Bruce and I pause and we wondered if these guys who were in their 40’s and 50’s should even be playing softball? The thought gave momentum to a rather lengthy discussion of growing old. Remember we would have been 14 or 15 at the time. I really do remember talking about what it would be like to live into the 21^st century if we could possibly live that long. And Mr. Guyton; he walked off. But he didn’t make the catch. No matter though. The game was over. And after Bruce and I pondered all the possibilities of growing old, if we had any money in our jeans from cutting grass or delivering papers, we probably wandered over to either the DQ or Leonardo’s pizza. Ahh Leonardo’s!! Where you could get a really good pepperoni pizza with all the grease you wanted at no extra charge. And that didn’t count the grease already floating in the middle of the turned up pieces of pepperoni. That was just the regular ‘comes with it’ grease. Leonardo’s had anchovy pizza too. Brother in law Dom still maintains you are not a real man until you’ve eaten a whole anchovy pizza, anchovies of course live and flapping. I dunno ?? I think I made the real man thing, I just took a different route.
Damn !!! I just about broke my collar bone by tripping over our 3 dimensional carpet and RV site stain. Of course I’m talking about our favorite pet, Jade. She gets no respect. Well…… maybe some. She’s a good pet. Takes the blame and barbs with aplomb and the flick of a her tail and the showing of her rear end parts.
Do you know I have been breaking eggs regularly since about 1951 and still haven’t made a mess like those people on TV who need one of those egg breaker pieces of crap. How pathetic must you be to not be able to crack an egg without assistance? I just had to get that out. It’s even worse than Father Garducci’s Mister Tea. Remember that? I think it was Father Garducci on Saturday Night Live back when SNL was funny who did the take off on Mister Coffee. A stick on a stand with a ring at the top that you poured the hot water through into the cup on the stand that you put the tea bag into. So in effect you were pouring water through a whole into a cup the held a tea bag. SNL’s best, and it cracked me up. But it was a long time ago. Don’t watch anymore.
So we are well in Phoenix. I have all my appointments lined up now. I should know all of what I need to know by the 10^th after seeing urology and oncology. By the end of April we should be mostly done and ready to roll now that I don’t have chemo. Chemo sucks, as does Agent Orange, but, the hair is thickening.


Hooray!!!!!  An explanation of Debt Ceiling that makes sense. ___________________________________
THE DEBT CEILING

• Democrats don't understand THE DEBT CEILING
• Republicans don't understand THE DEBT CEILING
• Liberals don't understand THE DEBT CEILING
• NO ONE understands THE DEBT CEILING

So…. allow me to explain...
Let's say you come home from work and find there has been a sewer backup in your neighborhood. Your home has sewage all the way up to your ceilings. What do you think you should do?
Raise the ceilings or pump out the shit?
Your choice is coming in November. Don't miss the opportunity.


One of the benefits of age is that I don’t have to look forward to another 70 or 80 years of the direction this country is going. I know I’m not alone in saying “Thank God I’m old!” But I do wish with regret that I had done more to forestall what we have become. What a mess huh?

Gone today-Hair tomorrow

We had our appointment with the oncology doctor yesterday at the VA hospital in Phoenix, and the news is good. No more #@&%$* chemo. Whoahh, whoopee and yahoo !!!!!!!!!! It’s not like I am magically cured or anything, Consider this just a second opinion and a different approach. My lady doctor, Dr. Harrington and another oncologist have looked over all my stuff and think that the hormone therapy is a better approach. I am still not a candidate for surgery, and that includes Cyber-knife, because of the spread to my bones. It wasn’t that chemo was wrong, the thinking here is that that can be used later as it becomes necessary. You may remember that we heard something similar in San Antonio when they started me on hormone therapy. So now I have a new pill to take; biculutamide. One tiny pill a day and no more chemo. Yip yip whooooahhh!!!!!!! Did I ever mention that chemo sucks? This new pill is one specifically used in conjunction with the hormone shot (leuprolide ??) I already take. Anyway, I almost danced out of the hospital. All of this is based on the shrinkage of my tumor shown on imaging. As was explained to us before, the hormone therapy blocks testosterone which is the culprit in prostate cancer and is the equivalent of surgery. Kind of like cutting off the ‘boys’ as Kat would say. Much less disturbing I would say.

Gone today

So now I will see have to see the urologist and find out about the stents and have a ‘PET’ scan. That’s a whole body scan, kind of like a CT I guess? So they’re still looking. Mostly I can report we have seen the doctor, I am getting done what needs to done, and I like the results so far. Kat is happy!!! I’m happy. Now I can grow some hair !! Chemo still SUCKS !!!!!!!

Kat has been having some trouble with arthritis or carpal tunnel or ???? She says, I've had to put away my crochet and knitting because I have carpal tunnel in both wrists. And the computer mouse is bugging me too. So I need to spend less time playing FB (Facebook) games. Can't play on the computer, can't crochet or knit, can't hold even a paper back book without pain. Guess I'll just have Randy open my Twinkies and I'll sit on the couch and watch Oprah all day. Sounds kind of like a ‘THIS SUCKS’ to me. Where’d she get an attitude like that ??

In other news: Doris and John are moving in, minus one old coffee pot, Katy is all better, there is some kerfuffle with the Y-Cook, the China Sea is open, and the last I heard there were nine carvers who showed up. That, of course, all relates to BGR. We went to an RV show at the University of Phoenix sports complex. That’s where the NFL Cardinals play. We walked in to the arena and were greeted by 32 salesmen. I said “no fair, you guys outnumber us by 16 to 1”. I think my math is correct? I told them we were happy RV owners and were just looking but a couple of them wanted to waste some time for a while. So they did. Eventually they realized that they weren’t going to have a pay day following us around and gave up. It wasn’t like I didn’t warn them. We looked at most of what might marginally interest us but truly didn’t see anything that ‘blew our dresses up’. We did see a couple of things that we need to change or improve. We don’t like our audio-visual set up and the new ones seem less complicated. We’ve got this supposedly fantastic system but it requires a degree in engineering and robotics. We still need to exchange or modify our dinette table and get some new (better) cushions and we would like one of the new, smaller, non-movable, no cranking up and down, looks like an aircraft, digital TV antennas. Other than that our RV is just dandy.

Here’s a thought! There should be some strict qualifications to be qualified to vote. First of all, you should have some ‘skin in the game’. There needs to be risk involved. Non taxpayers and welfare recipients need not apply! If your only interest is to vote yourself a part of the treasury you had no part of creating, you shouldn’t be voting. It shouldn’t take more than a couple of moments thought of the Occupy crowd to convince you of that. Talk about ‘wastes of flesh’ and the need to ‘thin the herd’ (big grin here). I could definitely live with a required high school graduate, or equivalent qualification. I mean if you walk into Dunkin Donuts and can’t read the menu board well enough to order coffee and a donut, you probably shouldn’t be voting. I know that it’s the 2000’s and just because you have a high school diploma doesn’t mean you can read, but you have to draw the line somewhere. But don’t despair, I wouldn’t stop there. Mostly you should have some worldly experience hopefully giving you some semblance of knowledge that would justify the privilege. Let’s not forget that is what it should be, a privilege. Soooo…. I believe a hitch in the military, or maybe the reestablished CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps) or perhaps the Peace Corps. I guess you’d have to be careful about calling anything the Corps because Obama can’t pronounce that off is reader board. But, you get my drift! Man o’ man would that change the political landscape or what? Can you see the reaction of your liberal friends to that. They’d probably want military service to be a disqualification. Oh well, it was just a thought! Did I ever tell you about Coventry? Maybe I did?

My oldest wrote to me on news of the chemo and she said “Hip, Hip Hooray

I'm chuckling about your subject.. gone today - hair tomorrow, so funny.

That's great news, cuz I'm not sure if you knew this, but apparently - Chemo SUCKS!”

Like the idea of a little pill instead :)

I thought it was cute and I see some potential here for someone to perhaps carry on the recording of the family history. But that’s way down the road. My job for a while to come.

Hair tomorrow

Bentsen Palm to Royal Palm

Bentsen Palm Dr. that is, to Royal Palm RV park. It’s an OK park. True to its name, for you RGV folks, it kind of looks like Victoria Palms in the RGV from a distance. That is every site has its 30/40 ft Royal Palm. Pretty close-in, north of downtown Phoenix. Rather typical I guess? For a 55+, long term stay park. According to the brochure there are 334 home sites and 124 RV sites. All the RV sites are together. There is a nice pool, library, pool tables, laundry, and rec room. Typical !! I think it’s about 7 miles from the VA hospital. Where we have spent some time.

The VA is not as bad as you may have heard. We did spend 10 hours in Urgent Care/Emergency that one day and night but other than that it’s been pretty good. Kat just gets kind of protective and in that mode her claws seem to come out. Not a bad thing. It just makes it seem it’s worse than it is. But with some persistence and phone calls, Kats’ specialty, we’re getting results. We took my records in yesterday, for the second time, to be reviewed by the head of oncology. Being the second time, that was a little frustrating.  We got a call today and have an appointment with a doctor on the 15^th. So we’ll see what they have in mind here. Originally I was not really due anything until late April. Chemo was coming to an end and all I had was my hormone shot and stent replacement. We thought we would be heading west with nothing to do until April. But then my Texas chemo doctor thought we should continue chemo. Frankly, I’d rather not. Chemo Sucks !!!! Big Time !! It’s been a month since my last chemo and I’m just beginning to feel better. But I will do what I have to do. I’d just rather it weren’t chemo. Did I say Chemo Sucks !!!!!!!!! Guess I did.

Being further west is kind of neat. Stuff has familiar names and looks a little more like were use to. No more HEB (Harold E Butts). Now it’s Albertson’s and Fry’s and Safeway. Imagine that, more than one choice for groceries. We’ve been to Albertson’s and I got some good bagels. No more of those bollio’s Mexican rolls or whatever they were. Now it’s In and Out, Carl’s Jr. and even a Dutch Brothers coffee. One of Kats favorites. And they had almond syrup for her 16 ounce Almond latte, not too hot. I had to turn into that place real quick let me tell you! But it wasn’t like the experience in Missouri. I must have wrote about that a few years ago. Worth another tell. We had been traveling through Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Missouri for a while. If you’re familiar, there are no Starbucks, Dutch Brothers, Seattle’s Best or anything like that within a light year. It’s one of those second star to the right and straight on till morning things. A long way !! Kat is on the phone with her son Rick, I’m driving the motorhome and we’re approaching Interstate 40. It’s an unusual entrance on to the freeway given that there is a stoplight on to a busy freeway entrance ramp. Lot’s of semi’s and big rigs and stuff. And across the freeway is some sort of shopping mall. Now we’ve been in rural America for a couple of weeks. Kat who was very much use to the Northwest and a coffee shop on every corner is still addicted and fighting withdrawal. The only thing we had seen was Family Dollar, Dollar General and Dollar Tree. The last place we had stopped was a fruit stand combination antique store and the couple who ran it didn’t have a mouth full of teeth between them. So there we are, waiting at the red light to turn on to I-40. The light turns green, I start into the intersection to a blood curdling scream from the right seat. I didn’t know whether to crap my drawers or go blind. Rick is on the phone and I can hear him wondering if we have become a long grease spot on the interstate? I come out of shock enough to look for and expect the oncoming semi about to crush us, only to see Kat pointing across to the mall and a Starbucks sign. Holy Crap !!!!!! And we were on the freeway and didn’t even turn around and go back. Something you don’t do on the freeway driving a motorhome and towing a dinghy. It got so I good see those coffee house signs and just pull in and avoid the stress. But now Kat is pretty much over it and we don’t even stop that much, although I do ask. Just to be on the safe side. It’s those claws!!

Just kidding.

Texas in the Rearview Mirror

Now that’s hard to believe! We ain’t been outta Texas in 16 months or so? Don’t get me wrong, I like Texas. So does Kat. But we’re Oregonians. It almost seems like some higher authority didn’t want us to leave. As we approached the border with New Mexico I began to think about it and was afraid to say anything for fear something would happen. But it didn’t. We gassed up at milepost 0 and slid right across the state line. I thought maybe gas would be cheaper in Texas, but it proved to be the same price in NM. Actually it was 1 penny cheaper at one place I saw. Go figure! By the way, It was 980 miles, give or take from the RGV to El Paso. If you figure going backwards to get the tire repaired and some side trips to eat, park, and of course deviate to San Antonio for medical, I’m sure it was well over a thousand miles. But we made it. Most of the drive was OK. The wind was bad a few times. Mostly when we were climbing, like across the Continental Divide, or through the mountain passes. At times it was hard or impossible to keep the rig in overdrive, in our case, 6^th gear. I know buy a diesel !!! Not gonna happen. We like what we got !!! But we weren’t in that big of a hurry so we just stopped a little earlier. We had a little trouble with some blown fuses too. Our 12 volt plugs wouldn’t work for the Brake Buddy, tire monitoring system, and Susie (our Tom-Tom GPS). One of the plugs is on the chassis electric system and the other is on the coach 12 volt system. Anyway we blew them all somehow? But we looked in the book and figured out where the fuse boxes were and finally got them all replaced and everything working. Took a while though. And we had to replenish our supply of fuses. Good to go now!
Does anyone have any idea how much we could reduce the Federal or State deficit if we quit putting up stupid road signs saying that ‘bridges may ice before roads’? For goodness sake! We’re mostly where they don’t ice anyway, and if you’re not, you should know it happens. I say take’em down and if you’re too stupid to know about it………. Maybe that would just be a good way to ‘thin the herd’.
Well !!! Chemo still sucks. And one of the reasons is ‘chemo brain’. It just doesn’t seem like you can function at the same level as you could before chemo. It’s harder to concentrate and stay involved. At this point I know some of you would say, ‘what’s your point’, you didn’t function at that high a level before you started chemo. Well maybe so, but I didn’t read westerns to the exclusion of all other genres of fiction either. Not that there’s anything wrong with westerns understand. But I’m going through Johnston’s First Mountain Man series at a book a day. Maybe it’s just wholesome reading. The Code of the West, the good guys prevail or something like that. I’m enjoying !! Preacher, the First Mountain Man pretty much has it right. He’s the strongest, fastest with a gun, best tracker, injun fighter there ever was and he don’t kill somebody unless of course they really need to be kilt. Then he does it wholesale. My kind of guy!

Not so bad

In order to understand this you might want to read the previous post, if you have not.

The trip to San Antonio was uneventful. Just an easy trip up I-35. We didn’t pick the best RV park but it was the most reasonably priced and only 12 miles to Audie Murphy hospital where we had to go, and that is why we came here. If you remember that was by order of my PCP, Dr Barriero, in McAllen. She was concerned about some perineal fluid retention or some such that was found in my latest CT scan. So we got to San Antonio, set up real quick and drove to Audie Murphy. We probably waited about 4 hours in emergency, but it was ‘emergency’ so we were kind of prepared. I was checked out, got an X-ray, peed in the cup, gave about 8 pints of blood and then waited around. Fortunately I had a copy of my CT scan report so that helped the doctor understand the situation. My kidneys are always of concern because of the uretal stents. AND !! Ta Da and a drum roll. My kidneys are fine. As the doctor said, “they are functioning properly, perfect”. I do have another infection though. Urinary tract this time. Before it was kidney, and before that it was bladder, or visa versa? So I got an antibiotic and we were released after a total of 8 hours. I do have to go back and see the urologist today, but that shouldn’t be a big deal I think. We’ll have to let you know on that score. But, as usual we were treated well and had no complaints.

Speaking of being treated well; both Kat and I are amazed at our send off from Bentsen Grove. Even before that there were the many and continuous offers of help, support, and kind thoughts from all of our neighbors and friends. Speaking mostly for me, there just aren’t better people than those in the woodcarving group. Once again you made me feel like a Rock Star. I know Kat has similar feelings for her craft group friends as well. We will keep in touch and make every effort to get back in the fall. So for those who get this, please share our thoughts and thanks for those who didn’t.

And now I can report that we will resume our trip west in the morning. I saw the urologist in Audie Murphy and he says this whole kerfuffle (need some help on spelling there) about retaining fluid and a urinary tract infection weren’t worth the effort. We’re taking is opinion. “JACKS UP”

Such a Day

Here’s something new.  Kat’s first posting in the Blog.  As you will read it was a tough day and I pretty much just crashed after we got to Laredo.  As well as being tough it was eventful and Kat wrote about it.  She read it to me and I thought it was definitely worthy of being in the Blog.  So here ya’ go !!!

 

Left Mission, and stopped to have the front tire on the motor home repaired because it had a slow leak.  Well, they can patch it, but they can't put it back on the front, it will have to go on the back wheel now.  Well, okay, you might as well rotate the tires.... Not like a car, you can't just take the wheel  off the hub and roll it back to the rear, you have to take the tire off the rim and put in on one of the dual rims before you can put it on the back. "Do you want those balanced?"  2.5 hours later and $299.00 (which probably cheaper than other paces) Now, we are back on the road, but it's almost time for lunch, cripes. Well, we will pull into a Walmart, need more milk anyway. Quick trip, but the engine won't turn over in the motor home, this is the second time Randy had to hit auxiliary and start it off the house batteries. So, down the road, we go.  But what happens if we get to a park for the night and it won't start?  So, another Walmart stop. $110.00 later and a battery we had to put in ourselves.  Randy lifted that turkey and he really should not have but Walmart rang it up and they told us OH, we can't install it in a motor home. So rather than have to go through customer service get a refund and then go find a battery retailer who WILL  install it. Randy did it.  And between the two Walmart stops, Randy’s Primary Care doctor calls him and tells him that he is retaining fluid in his peritoneal cavity and he should see a urologist soon.  So, guess where we are headed tomorrow?  San Antonio !  That is the closest full service VA facility.

When Randy had the CT scan done, the fluid was mentioned in the report we took a copy of to the Oncology doctor and we ask about this fluid.  The oncology (chemo) doctor said it wasn't enough to worry about, but he isn't a urologist, The primary care doctor, who just got around to reading that same report isn't a urologist either,,, so, we are going to San Antonio again.  And with any luck on to Phoenix to the VA there, without further issues.

Randy and I are both itchy to travel, that is what we do, that is what we like, but health comes first and I've read good things about Phoenix VA Cancer treatment, so better there for now, than say Seattle. Not ready for that fog, rain, cold, gray, nasty weather.  We would love to see our kids though.  It's been forever !!  The grandchildren are driving for goodness sakes.  One of mine has a almost 2 year old boy I've never seen. But Phoenix will be fine until May or June lol

We are staying at Lake Casa Blanca (Laredo) tonight and there was a beautiful sun set.  Will start making phone calls to San Antonio VA as soon as we get moving tomorrow.

Pray, cross your fingers, spit and turn around three times. What ever it takes.

Oh, forgot about the basement storage compartment coming open.  This annoying little red car kept beeping at us and Randy saw in the mirror the door on the drivers side was up and open. Had to stop between Walmarts and close that, it was locked, guess just not latched.  Back on the road it dawns on me I stuffed the rest of the yarn for the afghan I'm working on in that storage compartment and it's gone.  The Linen color accent yarn was running short and I was afraid I wouldn't have enough to finish and I have already tried 3 Walmarts, Hobby Lobby and Michaels in the Mission area and can't find that color. But the same Walmart in Laredo where we got the battery had that color yarn so I bought 2 skeins which I hope will be enough. So, our luck is already changing.  It's going to be a great ride to San Antonio, with good reports from the doctor there. 

So there ya’ have it. 

 

Time to move

The Super Bowl is over and the Patriots lost. I really didn’t have a dog in that fight so it wasn’t a big deal but I still don’t like the Patriots. Neither the Patriots or the Giants were the best representatives I thought, but there they were. Another less than super Super Bowl. But how about Kyle Stanley? If you didn’t notice and you probably didn’t, he was the young golfer who led the PGA tournament of the week two weeks ago from start through the 71^st hole and then was tied on the 72^nd and final hole, after having a three shot lead, and then lost in the playoff. This would have been his first PGA win and meant all kinds of perks, bennies, invitations and exemptions. What a crusher!!! I mean this would have been like losing a 4 or 5 million dollar lottery after getting 71 of the first 72 numbers and losing on the 72^nd. Or maybe missing the proverbial chip shot field goal to win the Super Bowl or National Championship. Being a golfing fan I can kind of relate. Your heart has to go out !! And you wonder what would this do to ones psyche. Is that something you come back from anytime soon or ever? Well, you know what? He came back and won the next weeks PGA tour event. He made about a four foot putt to close it out. Not an easy task. But it was really cool !!

On the personal front I’ve finished my last scheduled chemo and had a visit with the doctor. Everything looks pretty good. My tumor and the whatever it was on my lymph nodes is reduced in size. Cool! But, the doc is in favor of continuing chemo a while longer. He thinks another three months worth or maybe nine more treatments. And he doesn’t want me to spend too much time getting started again. Maybe a month or so. But as I think I have said, “I am not spending another summer in South Texas. Soo.. with the doctors blessing we are fixin on heading closer to home. For now we’ll head up the Rio Grande through El Paso and the I-8, I-10 corridor into NM and AZ, then CA and on up to the Northwest. Leaving on the 21^st. Of course now we’ll be looking a little faster. Meaning we’re checking on VA hospitals that can handle it. We were thinking maybe Roseburg OR would work as a good base but now we’re not so sure. It will be somewhere between Phoenix and Seattle for sure. For now at least, I feel a little better every day as I get further removed from my last chemo treatment. But chemo still sucks. Although it’s hard to argue with my results.

Yellow Slippers

There is a term, which I can’t remember, for a phrase that describes a condition in terms that are immediately understood. That’s the $64 question, what is that term? Like I said, I forgot.  Anyway, as an example, the term ‘pizza face’ would describe someone with acne, or if I was looking at a guy and said “nice rug”, you would know I was referring to his hair piece. If you were a urologist, or go to one like I do, you would learn that the term used to describe a man with prostate problems is, that guy with a ‘rusty zipper and yellow socks’. “If the shoe fits.’ But don’t take me too seriously, although there is some truth to things like this, which is the reason they are humorous. Anyway, I got up this morning and was headed to the John to avoid the ‘rusty zipper and yellow socks’ thing when I was confronted at the bedroom door by Kat. She informed me that I could only pass after a kiss. I told her ‘this is no time to mess around and we better make it quick or your pretty blue slippers are going to be yellow”. I did make it and got a much better kiss later.

I did have what I thought was my last chemo treatment. But now I am scheduled for three more. My doctor thinks it’s best and I want to do what is right. I’ll have the next on the 18^th and then the last on the 1st of February I believe. Then I’ll have an evaluation and maybe we can get out of here. And the Doc knows that and agrees. We’ll see. Right now we’re thinking we’ll try the VA hospital in southern Oregon. Roseburg. The reports we’ve heard are all very positive. Neither of us is all that excited about Portland or Seattle. Just too much of hassle in terms of population and traffic. And southern Oregon is much more RV friendly. Not too far to the coast or mountains. The southern coast of Oregon is really neat. But! As is the case with extra chemo, I will do what’s right. If we have to go to a more complete facility like Portland or Seattle, we know the way. And we have the motorhome so we are likely to roam all around the Northwest most of the summer. I should only need to be at the VA hospital in late April for a while and then again in late October. That’s my six month rotation on the uretal stents and hormone therapy. And I’m really looking forward to doing some exploring in the Northwest. I don’t have much of a ‘bucket list’ but maybe I can dream up a few items just to cross them off.

Tidbits: A few days last week it almost felt like winter was upon us. Arrghh !!! Winter sucks ! Right next to chemo. But then just a few months ago up in Hondo in the throes of summer I would have paid big bucks for a couple of those days. Not now! This is a little out of date, but did anyone besides me notice that the Army-Navy football game as listed on Direct TV gave a subject description of “Military-War”. No kidding ! Right in the spot where they put the genre of a listing like Romance, Comedy, Action-Adventure, it was listed as “Military-War”. Does that kind of demonstrate a bias in the media or what ????? It was a freakin football game for Crisakes !!! We are nuts !! Oh and just so you know, I have now been cooking (off and on) for 59 years, 7 months, and 17 days (figuring I started at 8 years and some months) and have yet to need one of those egg crackers advertised on TV that I just can’t live without. And a Happy New Year to all. We braved the fallout, put on our flak vests and steel pots (helmets) and went out on New Years Eve and watched the fireworks all around us. Fireworks are huge down here. It sounds like a war zone on every holiday. And based on the fact that every once in a while a bullet hole is found in some building around here, all that goes up is not just a Roman Candle or Sky Rocket. Steel pots can come in handy.

Hope you had a Merry Christmas

Since I’m starting this on Christmas Day I’m guessing it won’t be read until after Christmas. So….. I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas; if you were looking for a Happy Holidays, you’ll have to go to another Blog. No political correctness here. Not a chance! I will go out of my way to avoid being PC. If you want PC go to CNN (the Commie News Network, or maybe MSLSD, any of the networks will work too. But back to Christmas.

We couldn’t wait to open gifts and not having kids around to so as not to spoil the belief in Santa Claus, we opened our gifts last night. I got a really neat set of wireless headphones so I can hear the TV while Kat plunks away on her laptop and doesn’t have to sit under a blaring TV. Hooked it up and it really works well. I would recommend it highly to all of you old guys out there who have the same trouble. You can even go to the bathroom and keep listening in case you miss something and need to hit the back button on your DVR. It’s not at all like the same thing I had tried from Radio Shack. Not knocking RS, it’s just that this set works. Name of Sennheiser. I got it working really easy but I do have to do a better job of hiding what little wire there is. Then I got a folder to keep all of my medical stuff in for when we go to the MD’s. I carry current things like appointments, vouchers, new records and stuff. Just a good thing to keep it tidy. Actually I had a better one, sorry Kat, but I lost it for being too slow to use it. Kat bought it for me but then absconded with it before I put it to use. She figured it was really neat for all her crocheting and knitting patterns and stuff. I guess it was kinda’ my fault, but I do think she took advantage of a sick old man in this case.

I got Kat a little crank up flashlight in the shape of a Black Kat. She just has a thing for cats you understand. She was giggling as soon as she started to open it all the way thru seeing how it worked. I felt like it was a real hit. Actually that was from me and Jade. Santa brought her a pearl Tennis Bracelet. Kat says that it can’t be a Tennis Bracelet because its pearl and it has three strands. I maintain that it is, but as long as she likes it I don’t care. Moot point! Correction. She found out it is in fact a tennis bracelet.

27 ??? Twenty Seven ??? I typed that in below what I was working on to remind me of something and now I don’t have the foggiest? Let me know if you figure it out and I’ll finish it. Old Timers or CRS?

Christmas day was the potluck and we did that. We have sign up sheets for about 4 different potluck groups that probably total somewhere around 400 folks. You may remember there were 337 for Thanksgiving. I’m sure a few more folks got here for Christmas. We took Creamed Peas and Potatoes and a Seven Layer salad. Kat made the Peas and I did the salad. I have been informed by family and friends at our table that I will return to my standard of Scalloped Potatoes for all future potlucks. OK! It’s nice to be appreciated. And it’s just as well. I sure ain’t doing no Seven Layer salads again. It must be a West Coast thing. Like I said we don’t have any West Coasters here that I’m aware of. It’s all Mid-Westerners. Maybe a more meat and potatoes, green beans and corn, and Jello salad crowd. I say that because by the time we got to the chow line somebody had stirred my Seven layers into One. And I think that was after they dirty picked the bacon and cheese and topping. Now I wonder if I can send this to my whole list of recipients. But I’m sure it wasn’t anyone I know so I guess I’m safe. And I’m just kind of kidding anyway. Although it is a true story.

So now I will wish you all a Happy New Year and get this off.

HAPPY NEW YEAR !!!!

Common Yellowthroat

Or so it seems. We have for the longest time, had this little, I’m talking 5” maximum, little yellow bird trying to get to the nectar in our hummingbird feeder. I think I mentioned it once before. I believe it’s a Common Yellowthroat. It’s the closest I can come by picture if I look at the range of the other little yellow jobs in the bird book. Some look like better possibilities but wouldn’t live in this neck of the woods. Anyway we’ll call it a Common Yellowthroat and today for the first time ever (a musical) ‘ta da’ and a drum roll here, it landed on the feeder. What a struggle, and it’s been a long time. So then the poor little thing, or dumb yellow job, DYJ, as opposed to the normal LBJ, finds it can’t get anything from the feeder anyway, except maybe a better sniff of the nectar. All those days of work for naught. So maybe I’ll look up DYJ and see if there isn’t something we can fix up to feed it. What a softie huh?  Alas, there is no picture. He may have landed but I’m not that quick. But here are a couple of other pictures. One you will recognize and the other is of two Green Jays.

 

  

 

At coffee this morning Kat says she had this dream and it was ‘maybe?’ about me. I ask if it was somebody with Fame, Fortune, and Good looks. She said ‘yeah’, I said ‘it wasn’t me’. That was the end of that! I guess I ruined her train of thought. Dreams are elusive buggers aren’t they. I did tell her that ‘I wasn’t dreaming when she kicked me in the shin last night. But it was probably my fault. I was trying to snuggle up too close. We do sleep well together. More information than that ‘you don’t need’!

So it’s about 12 days since my last chemo treatment and I am finally beginning to feel better. But my two week break is almost over and it’s time for my last, hopefully, three sessions. I start again on Tuesday. And if it follows the same pattern it will only be a couple of weeks until I can look forward to being ‘all better’. It takes about a week to get the full impact, so by then I’ve had two treatments and then one more week ‘till the third treatment and then I can look forward to feeling better. ‘Piece of Cake’, as they say. While I’m on the subject of chemo, Kat spotted a car from Washington State in the Texas Oncology parking lot and put one of our business cards on the windshield saying, “we’re almost neighbors”, Oregon-Washington you understand? Turns out the folks are from WA and are both being treated for cancer. They got back to us via email and Facebook and we got together and had lunch Thursday and again on Saturday. They are also fulltime RV people and stay at a park not to far from here, also in Mission. Kinda’ neat in that we don’t see many West Coasters down here in the Valley. They all go to California or Arizona. I haven’t seen any Left Coast folks in our park this year. My standard joke is that when we have our Oregon Potluck all we need here is a TV tray and two chairs. Sharon, of Sharon and Chuck, is scheduled for her first chemo on Tuesday so we’ll no doubt see them and compare notes.

One thing I forgot to report and that is I had to get a haircut this week. You guessed it! I’m losing my hair to chemo. Started a few days ago. I fill up my comb like you wouldn’t believe. So I decided to take the initiative and get my hair cut ‘high and tight’. I pretty much look like a recruit or as Kat says a Marine. But shorter hair falling out is better than long hair falling out, trust me. I suppose it will come back? That’s what I’m told anyway. And the Doc said I could lose some. How much, I guess time will tell?

I also see the Doc again on Tuesday and we will discuss long term plans. We have already made it clear, and will again, that we intend to head to the Northwest in the early spring. For us that may be as soon as mid February. I want to transfer my care to Seattle where the VA has a Cancer Treatment Center. I could go anywhere but that seems like a good idea to me. Other possibilities include, Phoenix, Southern Oregon, and Portland. We intend to check them all out. Because of my stents and hormone therapy I have to be treated every six months. Stents replaced and hormone shot. When you figure two weeks prior and two weeks post for what needs to be planned and then checked on, that requires a seven month stay in one location. As much as we like south Texas it is just too damn hot to stay here again in the summer. That’s April through October the way my treatment falls. So, I figure if we get to the NW we can be treated in April, hang out on the West Coast, and come down here in November for three or four months. The other thing about staying here is distances. It’s 1500 to 2000 miles from here to halfway to anywhere. So there isn’t much roaming around down here if we spend the summer. Not so in the Pacific Northwest. There we can go anywhere from Washington to California in a 1000 miles and throw in the whole Pacific Coast, plus Alberta and BC, Canada if we want. And there is always a cool spot even in the hottest of summers. Kat is a little concerned about being stuck in the cold and wet but I think it’s better than summer in south Texas.

Elizabeth Blossom

Huh? You say. Well, I’ve been doing some genealogy on the Randolph name which is my mothers side. So let me tell you about Elizabeth Blossom. Elizabeth was my Great, Great, Great, Great, Great, Great, Great, Grandmother. That’s 7^th Great Grandma if you weren’t counting. She was born in Leyden/Leiden Netherlands in 1620. Her parents were born in England so it holds that I am a lot British on my mothers side. Not that there isn’t lots of room for other stuff to be mixed in. And lots of that other stuff is German from my fathers side. But that is another story and right now we are talking about Elizabeth. She was born in the Netherlands because her parents, Thomas and Ann were from England and migrating to the New World in hope of having greater religious freedom. I haven’t done lots of research on the period but I’m guessing it was safer to reach the New World thru the Netherlands than directly thru England. Thomas and a son originally departed on the Speedwell accompanying the Mayflower in 1620. However the Speedwell proved not very seaworthy and was forced back. It was not until 1629 that the Blossom family left the Netherlands and arrived in the Plymouth Colonies. At the time there were some 300 folks living there. Among them one Edward Fitz-Randolph who would become my 7^th Great Grandfather. He was originally from Sutton-in-Ashfield, Nottinghamshire, England, and built the 38^th house in Scituate, Massachusetts, one of the Plymouth Colonies. Then in 1637 he married Elizabeth. Edward was a yeoman or farmer and referred to as ‘Master’ indicating he was from a good family. ‘Just saying’! The family wasn’t always just a bunch of ‘Rednecks’. He and Elizabeth had 12 children as listed in my genealogy record. They were born between 1640 and 1663 and three died very young. Edward and Elizabeth moved to Cape Cod and then Barnstable and West Barnstable Mass. Before finally settling in Piscataway, New Jersey, in 1669. Once again the move was precipitated by religious freedom, the religious practices in New England being too restrictive. There is a record of one of the daughters becoming pregnant at age 16 by a married man and he being taken to court where he agreed to support the child. But that was in 1673, four years after the move to NJ, so it wasn’t part of the reason for moving. Edward died in 1676 and Elizabeth carried on. She was granted 300 acres after Edwards’ death and then in 1685 married a Captain John Pike when she was 65 years old. Captain Pike passed in 1688 or 1689 and Elizabeth lived to the age of 93 and died in 1713. She is buried at St. James Church in Piscataway in the west corner with Edward her first husband. Although the headstones were lost when the British built breastworks there during the Revolutionary War.
So there you have it. Pretty cool huh? Maybe I could be so lucky as to have the age gene from Elizabeth. Or maybe it’s where I derive some of my love for travel, my wanderlust. How scary must it be to take your family, referring to Thomas Blossom, on a trip from England to the New World in the 1620’s. A trip lasting 10 years. What kind of courage and perseverance does that require. How many of us would be willing? I guess I’d like to think it is something I would do.
As to Fitz-Randolph? We’ll do some on them next.

Are we nuts?

I wanted to talk about all the crap happening on the political front but just can’t seem to figure out where to start. I had notes but they seem a little outdated because I just haven’t been either upright or in a seated position long enough to do anything. Chemo sucks! Fortunately I’m in the middle of my two week break before my last (at least for now) three treatments. So far, today has been pretty good. You couldn’t know but I just posted the last entry and then started on this one. Which will hopefully be posted today also.
So…………where are we? Well, they got rid of Herman Cain. The media I mean. I guess all you have to do is make the charge? Whether it’s substantiated or not is not at issue. Are we nuts? The Attorney General is lying through his ass about Fast and Furious. Are we nuts? The Keystone pipeline deal and 20,000 or more jobs will be vetoed by our Commie President. Are we nuts? There are larger oil deposits in the U.S.A than in the Middle East combined and they are off limits. Are we nuts? The New York Times is concerned that the Chinese governments interference in their economy is bad for the country. Yet they don’t have the same concern for the U.S.A. Are we nuts? The mainstream media is admittedly in the tank for Liberalism, the Democrat Party and Obama. Are we nuts? I really do think Commie is a fair description of our President. Am I nuts? And the worst cut of all, at least in my opinion, or IMHO, our education system is pretty much going to make certain it stays that way. We are nuts !! And I didn’t even mention the National debt.
We finally got some rain the last few days. Unofficially about 2.5”. I don’t know where that would put us with the yearly deficit but I know it’s a welcome thing. I don’t think we had experienced rain since August and that was just one day of T-storms up at Canyon Lake. I’ve even had to wear pants and a jacket the last few days. Today though is back to normal and I had to turn on the AC just a bit ago ‘cause it’s getting a little warm in here. Maybe now we (I should say Kat) can slow down a little on the watering. The trees here in the park are really suffering. Almost no fruit this year and what there is ain’t much good. We have almost no oranges or grapefruit on our trees this year. I think since we started watering we have 3 or 4 new oranges and some small grapefruit, but the trees seem to be all confused as to what season it really is.
So now I’m going to go outside and watch the fruit grow and do some carving while I have the opportunity. Later!

Chemo

I don’t think it’s a secret that I had prostate cancer and was treated in early 2007 and cleared. I must have mentioned somewhere in the ‘Blog’ that it returned as a metastatic tumor and the hormone therapy I’m on causes ‘hot flashes’, and I apologized for all the kidding I gave friends and family subject to those ‘hot flashes’. They can be a #@%@. Well now it has spread a little and has somewhat of a different signature so they have decided I need ‘chemo’. Not an exciting prospect but if I expect to live to be 125 and get killed by a jealous boyfriend, and I do, then it becomes a necessary procedure. My oncology Doc says what I am getting should be ‘well tolerated’. I was encouraged by that. I say ‘was’!! After two treatments I have learned that ‘tolerate well’ is a relative term. What it really means is that if you haven’t lost your hair or fingernails, you’re not puking your guts out, and don’t have blood pouring from at least three body orifices, then you are ‘tolerating’ chemo fairly well. OK, I’m mostly kidding! I don’t have any of that but I will be glad when the last of my 6 treatments is over. I have three treatments a month for two months and then a reevaluation. And I’m pretty sure my Doc was right. Not so bad but it’s still no fun. Each treatment is a 4 hour I.V. drip procedure with six bags of stuff. But I take a book and the I pod, and I’m really good at naps. Kat sits and watches and crochets or shops and gets us a sack lunch. All in all it has slowed me down but I am glad to have the treatment. This too will pass and I will be well! I can still carve and get around but spend more time in a prone position than I would like. No Pickleball or softball so far. I don’t feel up to that. I guess I could write more too. Oh joy !!!!!!
I’m guessing that this has been a pretty euphoric few days for the folks in Columbus, OH. First they sign Urban Meyer as the Buckeye football coach and then the basketball team really thumps Duke. But let them not be too over confident. They have a ways to go to catch the Ducks of Oregon. I guess you can surmise that I have now made the complete transition from Buckeye to Oregonian. I don’t even tan in the summer anymore. “I rust”!
Oh, just so there’s no doubt in anyone’s mind, as far as I am concerned, all the Occupy crowd can ‘eat @%$# and die. OK that may be a little harsh,………………. or not? Maybe it would be kinda’ cool if cities kicked them out and the gov’t stopped supporting them. Like Richmond where they charged the Tea Party for their rallies and let the Occupiers slide. I think I’ll write the Mayor a note on that one. Just for giggles!
I guess I’m going to have to blame chemo on my not getting this post out in a timely manner. I’m finding that the side effects of chemo are cumulative and maybe just a tad more difficult than I would like to admit. But I’ll stick with the original date which was a couple weeks ago and you’ll have to make allowances

Beans

I had forgot that I wrote this a few weeks ago and then never ‘posted’ it. So here it is if you’re interested.
I have always maintained that I eat a lot of what my body tells me I should eat. I suppose that is true, to one degree or another, for us all. So It’s not always hamburgers, pizza, steak and eggs (fried in axle grease), ice cream, or potato chips (potato chips, now there’s a food group all by itself), sometimes I do eat vegetables and I do have a diet somewhat south of being a true carnivore. Lately I have taken a liking to soups and especially bean soup or just beans. I’m guessing it’s related to my medical condition and the trouble I have because of it. Beans are easy to digest, I think, and they do help me do what I need to do. Or as you will read below maybe it’s just hereditary. But without giving you more information than you really wanted, let me get to the real point.
I was eating a bowl of Bush’s Best Great Northern beans and a slice of bread for lunch and thought of my dad. My Dad was a true bean eater. I remember having navy beans cooked with a soup bone lots of times growing up. My Dad liked beans and to some degree we needed to eat cheap. Money was tighter than most of us would find now and I guess we had to save money where we could. I grew up on peanut butter sandwiches for lunch and oatmeal or cornmeal mush for breakfast. Don’t get me wrong, I had plenty to eat, it was just cheaper stuff. Anyway Dad liked beans even to the point of eating cold bean sandwiches. And when we would go down to the ‘hills’ to visit family and old friends we went to this one old place where there was always a pot of beans on an old electric burner and I can still see him digging in. Beans, beans, beans!
That gets me to thinking of going to my Uncle Binks place. It was just on this side of the ridge from the ‘bean house’ in the previous paragraph, up at the top of Skeeter Hill. No kidding! Binks was a short, plump guy that wore nothing but ‘Bib’ overalls. He lived in the old Sines family home. At least as far as I know it was the old family home? And Binks was the only Sines relative I remember. I think my sister Sandy remembers an aunt and cousin and she may refute some of this, but it’s what I remember. And even though I have done quite a bit of genealogy on both family trees, it’s a little difficult to sort out. Didn’t ask when I could and now it’s too late. I’m sure a common affliction. And, ‘by the way’, the reason I write some of this stuff. Anyway, the house was relatively small, I only remember one bedroom, a parlor, and a kitchen/dining area. There may have been another small room. It wasn’t much but it was really neat! The parlor was virtually unused and had a big old overstuffed sofa and what I remember as nice stuff all covered with doilies. The kitchen had a coal burning stove as a center piece, a hand operated water pump next to a sink, and a wooden table with benches for seating. No running or hot water but a big kettle on the stove. And as I recall Dad liked a big drink of that cool well water from the pump. I remember being a little skeptical. The bedroom was lined with bookshelves holding every Louie Lamoure, Zane Grey, or any other ‘western’ ever written. That is what Binks did. Read westerns. No TV and I don’t even remember a radio. The kitchen had a bare light bulb hanging from the ceiling. To me it was like two homes. There was the real nice parlor and outside the door on that side of the house was a brick walkway with neat flower beds, two huge pine trees and a combination wood/wire picket fence. I remember peonies all along the walk and by the fence. Then there was the very rustic and utilitarian kitchen side and a porch where you would expect to see two rocking chairs and old folks smoking a pipe. But I really can’t remember the furniture. I do have a visual of maybe just a two or three person bench. Off the porch was an old shed just full of old tools and treasures and I remember playing there a lot. About 50’ up the toward the gravel and cinder road, on an old well worn stone path, just passed the outhouse, no indoor plumbing, was an old, old garage that probably had a model “T” in it that Binks took to town. But I can’t see a car. I just kind of feel it! Weird !! Beyond the shed was the garden. A large garden. I remember lots of potatoes and corn especially. And I remember Binks digging potatoes. Mostly though I remember cheese and bread. Saturdays Uncle Binks made bread in his old coal stove. That was a regular thing when we went to the ‘hills’ on the weekends back in the late 40’s and early 50’s. Fresh baked bread and big hunks of ‘longhorn’ cheese from the old ‘general’ store in New Straitsville, Ohio. The old ‘general’ store had a cool room that was built back into the side of the hill and that’s where they stored big wheels of cheese. Damn!! That was good stuff. Made more so by the years I’m sure. Anyway…………………… I guess that was my Dad’s home. I know that in the 1910 Census he was two years old and the youngest of 6 kids. Interestingly, what I learned from my Dad does not agree with the record. I can’t explain it, but the little that I remember from Dad and Uncle Binks just doesn’t match my genealogy search. But!! That is another story. Stay tuned for another exciting episode of ……………….

Hot Running Cold Water

Co. A 15th Ohio                                            Check the Outdoor temperature

Hot Running Cold Water is what you get when you turn on the cold water in a recreational vehicle when it’s 110 degrees outside and the water lines are not as well insulated as they might otherwise be in a ‘stick and brick’. We could probably run the water say………. till maybe……… November and it might cool off? Might? I’m not saying it’s hot or anything, but Jade took a drink out of her outside water dish and parboiled her tongue. Man! Did we get some dirty looks.
So in this heat we are likely to have a smoothie for breakfast. I’m trying different recipes but mostly it’s bananas and strawberries. I usually use the packaged mix but lately we’ve been trying yogurt too. So there’s a useless piece of information. But I think when I made a note to mention smoothies I had something else in mind. But if I did, I don’t now and you’re stuck with it. I think that’s in the scriptures somewhere, the Blog Scriptures anyway. And maybe somebody out there has something relevant to say about the whole smoothie issue? Kat says she might like to try an Ovaltine smoothie which sounds kinda’ interesting. Maybe that was it? But then wouldn’t that be just an Ovaltine shake?
We were talking to some folks here, actually the RV repair couple we have used here in Hondo, and they were telling us about a piece of property they bought down in the Carrizo Springs area. Turns out the area is another of the largest oil fields in the country. Now I don’t know about you, but I’m getting pretty damn mad at hearing about all the oil we have in this country while at the same time paying $3.60 a gallon at the pump. There’s the Bakken oil field in the Dakotas and Montana, the huge field somewhere under the Rocky Mountains that is supposedly bigger, and now the one in Texas. If you cast around the internet you will read that there is more oil within our borders here in the good ol’ US of A than in all the middle east combined. What the @#$%@ !!!! I don’t know how much of this is verified and certified by Google, or Snopes or whatever, but I’m relatively certain that I’m being screwed with. Yesterday we drove into San Antonio and happened to pass a manufactured home dealer who had this huge sign hanging over his lot. OIL FIELD Homes For Sale! I’m guessing they weren’t shipping these suckers to Saudi Arabia!!!!! I don’t much care what some Hollywood type or tree hugger says, it is time to tell them all to ‘put it where the sun don’t shine’ and kick their political dumb ass friends out. So when I hear that some pencil neck thinks Rick Perry or Michelle Bachman are too divisive or mean spirited, I know they must be on the right track, and I say good on’em, and keep it up!
And you think that’s bad?? We went to get some Black Oil Sunflower seed for the birds the other day. $25.50 for a 25 lb bag. What ???................ Yup!! Over a buck a pound. So I said we’re gonna’ have some hungry birds. But we walked around looking at the rest of the feed store. I mean feed stores in Texas are where it’s happin’in. Right up there with Tractor Supply on Friday night. Anyway I find this dead little mouse in the corner and go over and report it to the counter guy. He said “better dead than alive’ and I said “he must have heard about your sunflower seed prices too!” True story! Swear!! I did find a 25 lb bag for only $19.95 down the road. At an even cooler feed store. I’m tellin’ya! So when we get home I go out and have a talk with the birds. We have this whole discussion about rising prices and stuff and I think I’m pretty clear and all. Next thing I know, I look out and we’ve got 6 or 7 LBJ’s pushing out seed to a gaggle of lard ass doves on the ground. Ingrates. ………………………………….Jade is enjoying the carnage.
OK! I was kidding about Jade’s tongue, and the carnage.

And this boys and girls is how you……………………..