Wednesday, April 22, 2020

    Yes, I skipped yesterday.  I made no effort to make an entry.  I didn't do nothing. I swept the kitchen and hallway floor; I weeded the garden; I did 10,000 steps, and I did some work on the book I'm writing on my reading method.  

    This morning, I woke up at 6:30 but stayed in bed till 7.  I wore a T-shirt without a sweatshirt on my walk.  I figured with the sunup; I'd be sweating by the time I got home.  But that was not to happen. Despite a clear sky and strong sun, a brisk breeze sometimes became a stiff one.  In fact, one gust blew my wide-brimmed blue Wallaroo hat right off my head. I tried to call Jean M. while I was walking, but the wind made both our voices unintelligible.  I waited until I got home to complete the call.

    I heard more about the year-long radiation and chemotherapy my friend Jean M. will have to go through.  The GYN doctor who diagnosed her breast cancer and operated on her acted inappropriately. She has put Jean's health at serious risk.  The oncologist said that it is required that a doctor who detects cancer in a patient is required to refer that patient to an oncologist immediately and not presume to treat it on their own.  Not only did this doctor not do that, but she also ignored Jean's complaints of pain at the surgical site. Jean went to the hospital to have that treated.  A cup of pus was drained from the wound that that GYN refused to consider a problem. The attending physician had to cut the wound open to be sure all the discharge had been removed. 

    Jean told me that when it became clear she had been badly treated by her GYN, her first thought was to ask," What would Mike do in this situation?" She had some image that he would have been forgiving. Boy, did she have that wrong! He would have filled out the complaint on his own for her and sent it to the AMA. He would have been clear that this is a doctor who should lose her right to practice. Either she is totally incompetent, suffering from dementia, or completely immoral.  Jean says she has a huge practice. 

    I took care of feeding Elsa and taking the garbage to the curb for pick up. The breeze had turned into a wind despite the brilliantly clear sky.  The windows in my living room rattled.  I have never heard that before.  I checked the weather report thinking there was a storm heading our way, but no, there was no such indication.  I had no idea what this wind is about. 

    After posting the April 22, 2019 update on the public blog, I was ready for my morning nap. More weird dreams.  I read an article in the NY Times that said that I'm not alone with this. Most of the dreams aren't even anxiety dreams; they're just weird. However, during this nap, I had an anxiety dream.  

    I was taking a test in a linguistics class.  I had done all the reading and studied hard. I love linguistics. However, I wound up not reading the directions on the test carefully.  I was done and rereading the directions when I realized my mistake. My first thought was just to give up.  I thought of having to tell Mike that I had failed this test. I was running out of time. Apparently, it was a test that I had to pass to remain in the program. Then I changed directions and worked frantically to correct my mistake.  I was having problems writing neatly.  Even after I had completed an answer, I discovered there was something I had missed. There were directions written under 'windows;" I had to lift a slip of paper to read what was underneath.  In one case, there was a window within a window. 

    I woke up at 1 and sat down to write this entry.  While I wrote, I listened to NPR. There were more talks about how damaging respirators are.  Mike was on one twice; he was in an ICU twice. That he made it out of the unit the first time was miraculous. He ripped the intubation tube out of his throat himself.  The second time, it was removed for him in preparation for allowing him to slip away without further ado.  The ICU doctors told us that they were thinking of removing the tube because he was breathing mostly on his own the first time. Then he was moved back to 'a floor,' meaning out of the ICU unit. Because he pulled the tube out on his own, he needed 24-hour attendants to make sure he didn't do it again. The good attendants watched him like a hawk, never taking their eyes off of him.  

    However, there was one attendant that wasn't going to get a letter of praise from me. And then there was the doctor who wanted to know if I remembered him.  He had told me that Mike was having trouble breathing and had expected me to fully understand what this meant.  No, I did not realize that his case had shifted from hopeful to hopeless once he was on a ventilator. No, I did not understand that.  I didn't understand that until the last two days when I heard about the impact of being on ventilators on the radio in response to the Covid virus. However thankful I have been that he isn't alive now to face the crisis created by the pandemic after he struggled to survive and recover for a full year, I am so much more grateful now understanding of how damaged he would have been after the intubation experience. OMG! I'm thinking refusing intubation is something I might do if I'm very sick. Why bother? You don't come out the person you went in. A seriously weakened condition is one thing, but brain damage from the drugs they give you to keep you calm. Forget it!

    Yay for Betty. I did some routine 'daily' housekeeping.  This is new for me.  It means losing out on some time, usually committed to playing FreeCell, but how bad can that be?  I am amazed at how much actual dirt I sweep up every day.  Where does this come from? Is this something I bring into the house on the bottom of my shoes?  Is this something that blows into the house because it is open air? Either way, it's impressive. 

    I'm developing an allergic reaction to words like "amazing" and "terrific," and "incredible." The Grammarly editing program calls those words' squinting modifiers' and recommends eliminating them from your writing. They are considered empty, meaningless words. 

    I heard from one of the 3rd-grade teachers I work with at Kealakehe Elementary School. She told me that she is working with 17 out of the 24 children in her class online during the pandemic.  When I first heard from her when the shutdown started, there were only one or two.  Yay! For those parents who are helping those kids move ahead. Too bad for those who aren't or can't.  

    Okay, I finally called my car insurance company to find out if I was covered. Last week, it came to mind that maybe the Ford wasn't covered by insurance because the registration was still in Mike's name. Would that invalidate the coverage?  The car is covered by the insurance plan, but if the titular owner is dead, does that cancel that coverage?  No. Ah! I knew that logically the car is mine, regardless of who it is registered to.  I am the sole beneficiary of Mike's estate.  The company agrees with me. Yay!  But it does occur to me that I might need a copy of the will and Mike's death certificate if I ever want to get rid of the car, particularly if I want to sell it. I'd better dig those documents up and have them on the ready. 

Monday, April 20, 2020

    My sleep was disturbed by troubling dreams. I don't even know what the dreams were, but I know they left me feeling lousy.  I woke up at 6:30 but decided to go back to bed after a short trip to the bathroom. I woke up shortly before 9.  I fed Elsa before I went for our walk.

    Because it was so late in the day, I wore a tank top instead of a T-shirt with a sweatshirt. It wasn't too hot because of the cloud cover, but I wasn't uncomfortable with my light dress.

    I got an email from Dorothy this morning saying her COVID test came back negative. I called her while I walked with Elsa, sticking to my first alternate route. We talked for most of the walk.  I was at my driveway when she said she had to get off.  I continued down the block and back again to make my 5,000 steps.

    She had mixed feelings about the negative results.  She was hoping she had a mild case and now had immunity—no such luck.  We talked about how we are feeling about our confinement.  It is getting on my nerves. I'm feeling helpless.  I think of food I might want and know I am dependent on others to get these items.  I can't wander the food aisles of a market, seeing what appeals to me.  When I think of something I might want, like the vegetables I needed yesterday, only one or two items come to mind, hardly a major shopping trip. Before the confinement, I could stop at a market after Bikram or after I finished at the school, scoot down to town, and pick an item up.  Not now.  I have to plan.  I have to think of how much to ask for, or I'll have too much food, and it will spoil. It's depressing.  

    Dorothy lives close to a farm in Lawrenceville with whom she placed a pickup order. She was going to pick it up but had her son do it because she was ill.  Now, she has this quantity of food she has to cook and eat before it goes bad.

    I ran into a few people on my walk this morning. A woman was coming toward me with something extra by her side. A dog?  She was at a distance, and my eyes are no longer good enough to make things out.  I keep an eye out for walkers with dogs because Elsa becomes a crazy lady when we pass other animals. There are those dogs that walk past us quietly at their owner's side.  Not so, Elsa.  In a few more years, she will be able to pull me over.  No, she will not get bigger and stronger; it is me that will get smaller and weaker. 

    As that woman got closer, I could see she was pulling a little red wagon with a young child, an amazingly blonde little girl about two years old, if not younger. I told the woman who I had had difficulty making out what was by her side.  She said it was her 'pet baby.' Love it! 

    As I came to an intersection, I saw a police car pulling up and a large grate standing up on end.  We don't have a sewer system here. Each property has either a cesspool or septic system. To deal with water runoff from downpours, we have water wells. They are just cement boxes dropped into the ground.  Digging a complete sewer system into solid rock would cost a fortune. As I think about it, that's what they did in Manhattan, which, as I understand it, is solid rock. 

    Some kids had turned the protective grate on one of those wells on its side, leaving a large open well exposed.  The policeman went to move the grill back into place.  It was clear it was too heavy for him.  I started to offer to help but remember that I'm almost 80 and warned not to strain myself physically for fear of damaging my pucker macular further. I suggested that it was the work of some kids.  There was a beer bottle lying next to the well. The policeman said there were more in the well.  

    The policemen said he would wrap the grate in caution tape and call the town maintenance department to deal with the problem.  

    When I got home, I washed last night's dishes. To keep the kitchen floor from getting completely out of hand, I have decided to wet mop the floor daily until I get the vacuum fixed or replaced. Because the Rainbow acts as a wet-dry vac, most of the dirty water gets sucked up, or at least a great deal more than would if you just got the water up with a mop.  This leaves the floor much cleaner than regular mopping.

    I have little to complain about.  Most of yesterday's problems have been resolved. My friend and I are reconciled, Dorothy doesn't have COVID, my tongue has healed, and B. delivered frozen broccoli to my door. The only remaining problem is my beloved vacuum cleaner. For some reason, the loss of the vacuum is more challenging than the much more serious losses of my husband and the simultaneous threats of losing my sister to Covid and my friend to irreconcilable difference. 

    As I write this, I am having difficulty seeing what I am typing. Besides the natural age-related decline in my vision, I have age-related drooping eyelids. I was supposed to have an appointment with a Kaiser ophthalmologist to be evaluated for this problem.  I had to cancel the appointment because of the shutdown. When I do get this surgery, I am told it will take ten years off my age.  It is a cosmetic surgery covered by insurance.  Not a bad deal. I think I will be more excited by my improved vision.  I have never been overly involved in my appearance.  Even less now.  I just try to maintain myself so people don't run in the other direction or call the police. That's good enough.

    I called my friend Jean, who is dealing with breast cancer. Boy, she got screwed by one of her doctors. If the doctor had dealt with her situation correctly, she would have been on chemo three months ago and only had surgery afterward. The doctor told her she only had a small tumor.  When her oncologist looked at the same report, she saw a sizeable tumor.  The oncologist is confident that she will live. But because of the mismanagement, she faces a year of difficult treatments she might not have needed. 

Sunday, April 19, 2020

  I was out for my walk by 6:30 am. I did alternate route #1 with a slight variation.  I had completed my 5,000 steps by the time I got to my driveway because whenever Elsa stopped to exam something, I did a march in place.

    Even though Yvette had plans of doing yoga in the driveway, the class hadn’t started by the time I got home. While I was in my typing chair, Elsa began to bark like a madwoman. There they were, setting up.  It was Yvette and two students.

    I had put out an APB to four people saying I needed a grocery run.  I had three people respond.  B. was first. He got the job. Scott stopped by, and then Judy called.  I am so lucky.  Dorothy only has her son to help her, and Jean and John have no one. The delivery system in New Jersey is so backed up, it takes two or three weeks to get an order fulfilled. John, jean’s husband, suits up in protective gear, gets up at 5:30 am to make it to the store early for the senior shopping. 

    I feel very virtuous today. I swept the floor, posted the daily blog for last year, wrote and sent out an entry for the 18th by email, weeded some of the garden, worked on my book on reading, spoke to Judy and then Damon.  What a good girl am I!

    I heard two things on the radio today. The first was about the effects of being on a respirator.  I had no idea. First, only 20% of people who go on ventilators survive. Second, being on one is very stressful.  It does damage to the mind and the body. People who have been on respirators are immobile. Mike was confined to his bed 24/7 after the first week.  I could see him getting weaker and weaker.  I contemplated what it would mean to get him back on his feet.  I understood that it would be a slow, painful process. I didn’t know that the drugs given to those on ventilators to keep them calm do brain damage.  They said that the person who survives a period on a ventilator is never the same again.  The thought of what that would have meant for Mike is almost unbearable.  I am so glad he is dead.  I am happy he didn’t have to face not being the person he loved being.  He would have been so miserable. And then to have to face the Covid virus pandemic and its effects on the economy. I would have tried to keep the information from him. But how would I have explained the face masks and the total absence of visitors? I feel such pain for him, knowing more about what he went through. It makes me so sad. It breaks my heart.  

    A cousin through marriage posted on Facebook that her sister, who suffered from dementia and was living in a nursing home, was admitted to a hospital with a serious urinary tract infection and the Covid virus.  These two women are very close.  It is all very sad. 

    B. dropped off the groceries I ordered.  While he was at Costco, he called me several times to check on items he was having difficulty finding.  How lucky am I?  

    A Facebook post says that sheltering in place and maintaining the necessary distance is the luxury of the fortunate, if not the downright rich. Some have no home to shelter in, no water or soap to wash their hands, not to mention food insecurity or perhaps even challenges to their physical safety. Me? I have a large, lovely home, access to water and soap, and at least seven people who watch out for me.  I have friends and family who I speak to frequently who love me and who I love.  I have a goddaughter and her husband, who live beneath me and watch out for me.  I have B. who lives on the property who also watches out for me. I am one of the luckiest people on the face of this earth.  I couldn’t be better situated for this worldwide tragedy.  

    Elsa and I did our before-dinner walk. I had salad greenies from the farm next door and a burrito that Sandor had brought for me unbidden.  I loved that burrito. It was a great taste change. Thank you, Sandor.

Saturday, April 18, 2020

    I was up by 6:30 and on the road.  My left leg was bothering me.  I walked an even gentler route than I had been doing the last few days.  Besides protecting the leg, I fear that if I challenge my body too much, I will revert to old habits. I did walk a short way up Kukuna St.  While walking that incline, something in my left hip popped. It was some sort of adjustment.  There was no pain; I assumed it was all to the good. I did manage to complete over 5,000 steps, just going back and forth on the street where I live.

    I texted Damon, asking him to call me.  I was in distress over the conflict I was having with a friend.  This would be a serious loss for me.  I hope it resolves over time, not only mends but also becomes a better relationship as we resolve differences. 

    My straightforwardness frightened Mike. He was afraid of conflict. I'm sure it affected his relationship with me too.  I would check every once in a while, asking him if he felt controlled because I didn't.  He said no- not much I could do beyond that. If he did feel controlled, I was prepared to work on making adjustments.  While some of Mike's behavior annoyed me, I trusted his intentions completely.  Not making someone uncomfortable is impossible.  Of course, there were moments where I failed, or he failed, but we both not only had positive intentions; we both did our best to change our behavior to accommodate the other's needs as well as our own.  I think our relationship made both of us better people.  I loved being his spouse.  He was a wonderful man, a wonderful husband, a wonderful life partner.  I couldn't have asked for better.  Was he perfect? Was I perfect? Nonsense on both counts. But we were both good enough.

    Boy, things are going from bad to worse. I'm isolated because of the spread of the Covid virus, I'm one year into losing my husband of 45 years, my sister may have Covid, I've had a major falling out with a very good friend, my beloved Rainbow vacuum cleaner is definitely broken, I cut my tongue, and I was out of fresh vegetables except for salad stuff. Bring it on. 

    I put out an APB for vegetables, broccoli, string beans, or asparagus.  Within hours, B. dropped off a package of frozen broccoli. It was also the day to pick up my food from the farm next door.  I don't know if I'm getting my money's worth, but it is something, and I am helping to support my neighbor. How bad can that be?

    The cut on my tongue was scary.  It bled and bled and bled.  I looked up what to about it on the Internet. Rule #1: Do not touch it with dirty hands.  I had been out weeding for about an hour and put those dirty fingers on the wound, pressing down to stop the bled. Okay, back to step one.  I washed my hands, rinsed my mouth with Hydrogen Peroxide, and then I pressed on the wound for 10 minutes with a gauze pad without stop. In other words, no peeking allowed.  It stopped.  I think I cut it on a rough edge of one of my teeth, probably the implant. 

    I called Dorothy. I'm calling every day to check on how she is.  She is doing well.  She is taking steps to improve her chances of survival, should it be Covid. She regularly walks around her house, does nasal and throat rinses several times a day, and is working on breathing deeply.  They discovered that people's oxygen intake improves when they lie on their stomachs. It forces people to use their back muscles for breathing.  Dorothy has been working on using her back muscles more.

    I learned about using my back muscles when I was in my early twenties.  I decided to take singing lessons. I managed to take one. I didn't go to a teacher in the area where I was living, which was Northport, way out on Long Island. No, I engaged a teacher with a studio on Broadway in Manhattan.  Now, that was not as big a deal for me as you might imagine.  I was traveling there every Saturday for dance classes at the New Dance Group, which was on 47th Street off-Broadway, so I was there already.  I only took one singing class, but the teacher showed me how to use my whole rib cage for breathing. I particularly remember him teaching me to use my back muscles. This may be why I became a deep breather. People have remarked on it several times.   I think everyone would be better off if they learned to breathe correctly. 

    Mike was a shallow, rapid breather.  He would take two breathes to my one when he was asleep, and I was awake.  I have learned that kidney problems can cause rapid breathing because the person has to work harder to reduce toxins in the system.  But Mike was always this way. He was that way when I first met him when we were in our early thirties. I don't know that it got worse over time. Could it be that shallow, rapid breathing can also cause kidney disease?  Just a thought.

    I have been reading a book on breathing. It describes the best way to breathe as well as breathing problems.  According to this book, you are supposed to breathe in by contracting the muscles around the diaphragm. When I focus on the muscles in the front of my body, I find it hard to do.  When I focused on using my back muscles to breathe, the contraction of those abdominal muscles happens automatically.  Very interesting.

        Scott and Yvette came up to deliver a fan to replace my broken one on the lanai. Scott had come across them for free on a job he was doing. The company he was working for changed out their fans and were getting rid of three of them. Yvette used two, and there was an extra one I could use. It had been sitting on her kitchen table for quite some time, and she wanted to finally get it out of her house.  

    I called Damon for comfort. The fallout with my friend was weighing on me.  He was wonderful.  He doesn't just take my side. He helps me to see the other person's side too.  He is getting more wonderful with age; I think the analogy is to aged fine wine. I can't begin to say how grateful I am to him for how he helps me think things through.  I can trust him to help me find the most peaceful solution possible. Thank you, Damon.

    My talk with him helped soothe me. Then I got an email from a friend that couldn't have been more delightful. Thank you, dear friend. There had been a delay in communication because it was a long message; she wanted to type it on her computer rather than peck it out on her phone.  However, she was having some problems with her laptop that had to be resolved first. 

    I'd say all's well that ends well, but it's stronger than that. While I don't think this works with the body, I think a healed tear in a friendship can make the relationship stronger.

  

 

Friday, April 17, 2020

    I woke up at 6 but stayed in bed till 7. I did the alternate path again, feeling that my left leg would be overworked if I took on the hill on Kukuna Street.  I ran into David as I turned on to Kukuna, heading down.  We said hello and wished each other well.  I hadn’t seen him for a while.

    There wasn’t much else to the day. The gardeners came.  I went out to the open yard area outside my bedroom to do some work.  I’m reluctant to do much because Sandor, my optometrist, has warned me not to bend down or lift anything heavy to prevent additional damage to my puckered macular. I was able to grab some loose fronds and pass them out to the men.  Hopefully, I can get that surgery done after the shutdown in response to the pandemic threat is over.

    The gardener brought his first-grade son with him to do some work.  I asked Troy if he liked working with his dad.  How are you going to get this boy back to school now that he’s been working side by side with his dad and a group of grown men?  Not that he’s not learning important things, very important things. 

    I did some surface cleaning, some work on the blog. I got caught up, a little reading, and slept.  I did my hour of work on my book while sitting outside in the bedroom yard.  It is comfortable. 

    I had a hard run-in with a good friend. I hope we can reconcile our differences. It made for a lousy day. No, I’m not going to share details.  Except for some comments about family members, I avoid saying anything negative about my relationships with people.  At one point, I wrote about a difference I was having with someone, without mentioning their name, but anyone who knew me would know how it was.  I presented the problem in what I thought was a balanced way, making it clear that I was also responsible for causing our problems. She felt that people would take my side because I was the author, see her as at fault no matter how I presented it. I agreed.  Ah, I am remembering writing about some missing objects from my home.  I guess my writing is not completely free from indictment.

    I ate the chicken I cooked the other night twice. It still looked a little pink inside.  I thought it was probably all right and finished off the leg with the salad produce from the farm next door. 

    After dinner, I went to the library to watch TV before going to bed.  There was something wrong with my internet connection, and I couldn’t get my shows to play.  I watched the last two episodes of Schitt’s Creek and the episode about the production of the series on my computer.  

    Elsa joined me in bed shortly after I got in.    

 

Thursday, April 16, 2019

    Elsa came to bed shortly after I did last night.  I have no idea what motivates her.  

    I was wide awake at 4 am after turning out the lights at 11:30 pm.  I thought of getting up and getting on with my day, but that would throw Elsa off schedule. I got up shortly after seven.  I don't enjoy those extra hours of sleep; they are usually crowded with troubling dreams.

    I stuck to the alternate walk this morning, the one running parallel to the ocean instead of perpendicular, and therefore less up and down.  While my left thigh still felt weak, the muscles fully contracted this morning when I put on my pants.  Now, that is a big step forward.  

    As I walked, the muscles at my waist on my right side were in mild complaint mode. Those were the muscles that had me flat on my back for a few days months ago. Now those muscles only inform me that I'm doing something different.  I choose to think they're telling me I'm doing something right.

    Elsa and I meet other people out on walks, several with dogs.  We ran into one man with his Schnauzer today. We've seen him before.  I know Elsa likes him.  I proposed letting them get within sniffing distance. We both had retractable leashes and could create enough space between us. The man said no because he heard that dogs could get be carriers and pass it on to other dogs who pass it on to their humans.  He said he hoped I didn't think he was being unfriendly.  No, no.  I assured him.

    I was at 4,000 steps at my driveway, which means that my stride has a constant length, at least for the time being.  I was able to pass my driveway this morning without a comment from my bladder and walk to the end of the block and back to reach the 5,000 steps mark.  On my way back to the house, a young man on a hoverboard came from the other direction.  I have been seeing him frequently of late.  I flagged him down and asked if he was hovering for pleasure or he was going to work.  He said it was for pleasure today, but he used the board to get to work – 18 miles away. Whoa! He said that he had to stop halfway and recharge the battery on his way there, but he didn't on the way home because the trip was mostly downhill.  He was so comfortable on this board; he was hovering and texting.  I do hope he doesn't do that when he on the highway.

    Dorothy called.  She thinks, and her doctor says she may have the virus.  She is getting tested today at a drive-in testing station. She has to post her number on her windshield, open her window only four inches, and sit on her hands. That last is to prevent her from reflexively pushing away the tester's hand.  I have heard the swabbing process is uncomfortable because they have to go deep into the nasal passage and the throat, but I hadn't heard about having people sit on their hands to make sure the process goes smoothly.

    Dorothy contacted her doctor to check if her symptoms could be COVID.  He told her he had it and passed it on to his wife, his daughter, and a college roommate of his daughter staying with them.  I assume their guest was an international student who couldn't make it home.

    When I went to the bathroom, there was Mike's towel on the floor. This only happens when I'm upset about something. No, I swear I do not touch that towel.  I stayed calm and tried to remember what I might be upset about. Oh, yes. Dorothy. The prospect of her being desperately ill or even dying. Wow! How's that a punch in the face. 

    She's alone now. David, her son, moved out to be with his girlfriend. Dorothy thinks he was also concerned about passing the virus to her. I texted her and suggested that she post a sign on her door with David's contact information, so he can come to unlock her door if she needs help.  David lives about twenty minutes away in Princeton.  It will be a quick drive, particularly with the now empty roadways.

    Scott came up and sprayed my vacuum filter with a lubricant. He finally got the filter-free. I had to clean the filter, the part of the vacuum it was attached to, and spray that part with the lubricant.  I suspect I didn't do much damage. A vacuum cleaner is a mechanical machine, not an electronic one, with no motherboard to destroy. 

    I've been seeing that large gecko in my laundry room repeatedly. He has been on my side door screen for the last day and then on the floor right by the screen. At first, I thought he was trying to get out, but I couldn't get him to leave. Then I put out a plate with water and some jam for him.  I am now convinced he is dying. I just have to wait it out.  Given his size, I assume he is an old animal just coming to the end of his life.  When he's gone, I'll sweep him out to the yard. 

    The taco Tuesday lady gave up on the taco get-together.  Yvette said she will do it some other time once she eats all the tacos she prepared herself.  I had baked the chicken back and thigh I had defrosted, cut it in half, and returned the back to the freezer.  When I cut it in half, I saw pink inside. I believe that means it wasn't thoroughly cooked. I put it back into the toaster oven.  The salad was a little slimy.  I washed it, lost some of the bits, threw my pumpkin seeds on top, and ate it.  I prepared the leftover spaghetti by putting a lump of butter on top and popping it in the microwave. I meant to set it for 30 seconds, but it went on and on. I had set it for 3 minutes. I mixed minced garlic and carrot greens in and ate that.  The chicken was in its third round of baking while I was eating the salad and spaghetti. By the time it was done, I was done with dinner.

Wednesday, April 15, 2020

    I have no idea what time Elsa came to bed, two, three in the morning.  I don’t know what is going on with this girl.

    I woke up at six but went back to bed. I finally got up at 8 and headed out for my walk. I did the same walk I did yesterday because my left thigh muscle was still feeling challenged.  Yesterday, my spine popped. There was some adjustment.  I hope it was a change for the better.  All I can say for sure is that there is no increased pain. My groin muscles continued to issue some minor complaints now and then but nothing to write home about. 

    I planned to walk past my house to the end of the block and back again to complete 5,000 steps. However, upon seeing my driveway, my bladder decided otherwise. 

    I had a 10 am appointment with my life coach. I wear a blue tooth when I’m working with her.  I bought one a while ago that works, but it is too big for my ear, and it looks like there a black crow sitting there.   Dorothy told me she had these great earbuds; they were so comfortable.  I went to Amazon, put in the information Dorothy had texted me.  I ordered the pair that came up.  They arrived a few days ago. I left the package by the front door to give the COVID viruses time to die in leisure.  

    I opened the box this morning and checked the earbuds. They didn’t look like what Dorothy had.  I checked her text. I had a different brand. I type in the name of the brand she had recommended.  It didn’t come up in Amazon.  I typed it into Google. I clearly hadn’t purchased Dorothy’s brand of earbuds. Hers cost $49, mine $120.  Mine have something to do with Alexa. What is God’s name did I buy?  I will have to check with the family techie to see if I should return them or not.  I decided to stick with my black crow for the time being.

    My life coach is fantastic.  She has the same view of human nature that I do, and Brooks. We have an evolutionary understanding of our psyches.  We don’t think that all behavior is rational. We think that the unconscious mind, with all its various conflicting needs and opinions, initiates our thinking.  The conscious mind evaluates the decision of the nonconscious and exercises veto rights.  Hopefully, the two sides of our brain work together to come up with the best choice for the individual and society as a whole. Let’s keep our fingers crossed. 

    After the session, I did some reading and took a nap.  

    It was overcast during my morning walk, which is great.  It makes walking at 8 am in April bearable. Once the sun is up, it can get hot, hot, hot. Unfortunately, it stayed overcast until the sky burst open and dumped its load.  I hoped it would clear up, and we could have the taco Tuesday today after it got canceled yesterday.  But no. It cleared and poured again. I don’t know what mother nature has against tacos. 

    It cleared up enough for Elsa and me to do our walk.  We met with the grey cat on the corner.  She must live with a herd of dogs because she’s not the least bothered by Elsa’s interest in her.  Elsa is very taken with cats.  When she sees one, she starts pulling. When she sees another dog, I have the strength to hold her. Not so when she sees a cat. 

    Since the taco party was canceled, I had to make my own dinner. I was planning to cook a chicken back and leg. I had started defrosting yesterday. I checked it.  I discovered a small section was still frozen.  I thought I’d better wait until tomorrow. Tonight, I finished off the leftover salad from yesterday, a slice of sourdough bread with butter, and three fried eggs. I continued reading Brooks The Social Animal.  It is still sounding familiar. I must have read this book before.

Tuesday, April 14, 2020

    I woke up again at 5:30. I forced myself to stay in bed until 6. I was off on my walk with Elsa by 6:20. The muscles in my left thigh are complaining in a good way. What does a good complaint feel like versus a bad complaint?  A good complaint is a degree of discomfort, letting you know that you are using the muscle in ways it isn't used to. A bad complaint is a sharp pain.

    In deference to the complaint, I decided not to take on the steep hill up Kukuna. Instead, I turned right at the end of Nehiwa and headed down Kukuna.  I made a right turn at the end of the block and continued on Holoholo. Nehiwa and Holoholo are parallel to the ocean. The lay of the land is flatter on the parallel road than the roads that run perpendicular to the ocean. No roads are entirely flat on the Big Island. The parallel roads are like gentle rollercoasters. 

    As I walked, I continue to emphasize using my abdominal muscles to lift my legs, and I took up air-punching my arms across my body, aiming the punch in the direction of the opposite thigh. This action stimulated the muscles in my mid-back. I can still feel those muscles that had me flat on my back for a few days after being triggered, but it is nothing like it was when it was really bad. Now when I stop moving, they stop complaining.

    I posted the April 14th public blog for 2019 today.  I had written about using my abdominal muscles and twisting my upper body in opposition the same way as I am writing about it today. Of course, now, a year later, my body is very different.  

    Yvette had a yoga class in the driveway when I came home.  Scott was in the class. Elsa went right to him, lay on top of him, and asked to be pet.  She knew why he was lying down in the driveway; it was for her.  I reminded her that she wanted her breakfast, and she came along with me.

    It occurred to me to ask Scott if he could free the filter from the vacuum cleaner.  After the yoga class, he came and tried.  When he turned the vacuum over, water ran out of it.  We have a way to go before I can sound the all-clear.  Scott couldn't free the filter.  He said he had a lubricant spray at home.  He would bring it over the next time he came.

    I'm becoming the housekeeper that Mike would always have wanted. He once came to a school where I was working. He took one look at the room, noticed how well organized it was, and declared, "I'm so jealous!" It does make me sad that I didn't do this for him when he was alive.  I feel like I've taken over for him in keeping the house neater. Cleaning wasn't his thing, and it's only mine occasionally. I clean like a maniac on the occasion of guests.  Mike and I used to say, "Where are guests when you really need them?" Then we would both get to work getting the house ready.  Mike was great at making sure everything was either out of sight or neatly, very neatly stacked. I'm getting much better at doing both.

    I finished putting together the towel rack I designed with PCV pipe. It's wide enough to hang up the bath towel without folding it.  I designed it for two towels, mine and the last one Mike used.  I decided to keep the old towel rack for Mike's towel.  Using the towel and the towel rack is his way of communicating with me. He throws the towel on the floor or moves the whole damn rack.  I plan to hang on to it forever. 

    Tonight, was going to be Taco Tuesday at our house with Elise bringing the tacos.  Yvette called in the mid-afternoon to say that the weather looked threatening.  She had some beach tents, but with a strong wind, they would get blown down, and how would we get 10 feet between each person. 

    In the late afternoon, it started to rain. I was standing at the side door.  I thought I would love to be sitting outside.  Believe it or not, there is a difference between sitting on a screened-in lanai versus an open-air one.  I grabbed the hard copy of my book, and I went out to sit on the chaise lounge on the back open lanai.  Houses in Hawaii have large overhangs.  We need them to shield us from the sun and torrential downpours.  

    I started rereading the chapters I had already written. Dorothy and Shivani both feel my writing is too meandering.  They want me to reorganize the introduction and chapter one. I do see that my objectives aren't clear.  I also suspect that they don't understand why I'm writing the way I am.  However, I love reading my own writing.  I can only hope someone else will too. 

    From some of the feedback I'm getting from Dorothy and Shivani, I wonder if they have a different concept of what I am trying to communicate than they do. Both feel I have to give a detailed definition of what a phoneme is.  I realize the definition may help some people, but it's irrelevant to my objective. My focus is on a process that teaches the student to discover aspects of language.  I don't teach third-graders what a phoneme is. I could teach this method to adults without mentioning the word or talking about the concept explicitly. Phonemes mean more than the sounds of English. The only reason I include it because there are teachers that have been exposed to the word.  I don't believe they are taught the concept. I think they confuse it with phonics rules.

    I can see readers who read my book anticipating something different from what I am presenting.  I recently had an experience like that myself. I picked up a book on Jung's theory of the God-image, The New God-Image.  I was expecting a psycho-social approach, anthropological in nature, covering God's changing image over the centuries. But that's not what I got. It wasn't a psycho-social approach; it was a psycho-epistemological approach. He asked what the changing god image says about the human psyche through the lens of Kant's epistemological views.  

    Because I approached the book anticipating something other than it was, it was a little like banging my head against a wall.  I would read a chapter and wonder when he would get around to discussing what I thought he was going to discuss. I was stubborn.  It took me most of the book to get the point.  I can imagine that those who read my book may have the same difficultly.  I was even familiar with the psycho-epistemological approach to the God-image discussion, but I still resisted.  I believe my method for teaching reading will be unfamiliar to most teachers.  I certainly not what is being taught in the teacher training programs.  

 

Monday, April 13, 2020

    I have been waking up at 5:30 every morning but not getting out of bed.  I got up at 6:30, inspired by an idea for the second book I'm writing on comprehension.  I thought of a title for it this morning, 'Comprehending Comprehension.' 

    The pedometer was on strike again.  It lags on the hill, both going up and down.  I had checked it, and when I rechecked it, there was no change. I had several incidents like that.  When I was ready to turn around, Elsa led the way further up the hill.  She knows she gets breakfast when we get home. What was this about?

    After completing a blog posting, I needed a nap.  It looks like this is a day devoted to sleep. Is this me avoiding working on the book?  I haven't worked on it since the night I took Mike to the emergency room. That's not exactly true, but close enough to make it an alternate truth.

    I did some housework.  I should have kept on napping.  The work I did straightening the kitchen went well.  Then I went to work on my Rainbow vacuum cleaner. There is a filter in the machine that has to be cleaned every once in a while. Problem: when I wait too long, it becomes hard to remove.  I tried to hit it with something hard. That didn't work.  I decided to pour boiling water over the filter, figuring it would create some expansion of whatever was gluing the filter to the machine.  That didn't work.  Then it occurred to me that the engine is sitting right behind that filter. Good work!  I do believe I am suffering from some neurological fraying.  Pouring water into an electric motor is the brightest thing I have ever done.  Fortunately, this understanding penetrated my dull brain before I turned the electricity back on.  I set up the machine on the lanai exposing it to air and sun.  What, you figure, three weeks before I can use the machine safely again? I love my Rainbow. How is losing the Rainbow different from losing Mike?  The Rainbow is replaceable. 

    I did some work on the book.  Some of it sounds good.  But I ran into problems pretty quickly.  I know I would feel lots better if I worked on the book daily instead of spending all my energy finding ways to avoid working on it.

 

Sunday, April 12, 2020

    Easter Sunday in the middle of the COVID crisis. There will be no public religious services. It’s just another day like every other day for the last month. My God, has it been a month already? March 14 was my last day at Bikram. Wow! How long will this continue? And who will we be when we come out of this?  What will the world be like?  It’s both worrisome and exciting, at least for me. I’m lucky; I can deal with uncertainty. 

    As I left for my morning walk with Elsa, Yvette was doing yoga again in the driveway.  She only had one student this morning. I hope to see ten students out there doing yoga by the end of this shutdown.  The mats were the appropriate distance from each other.  I wish I could participate, but when I look at the postures, my body says, “I don’t think so.” In the Bikram sequences, I have made adaptations that allow me to get benefits without struggling to keep up. 

    My leg was bothering me a bit this morning. As always, when I feel a new sense of weakness or pain in my left leg, I wonder if this is it.  Have I hit the wall? Is this as far as I can push that arthritic hip?  Have I gone over the edge, and will it all be downhill from here, ending in a total hip replacement surgery? Or is this the start of something good?  Only time will tell.

    I once had a chiropractor say that I shouldn’t push because eventually, I would trigger pain and a need for hip replacement.  I thought, so what.  Instead, should I have the hip replacement surgery now? Why?  When I hit the wall, then I’ll have it. So far, so good.  Each time I have hit this juncture, I have experienced improvement.

    I added a deliberate arm swing to my walk.  I swing my arms across my body, so my right hand is almost touching it when my left leg is forward. What is important isn’t just the arm movement but also the shoulder movement that initiates the arm swing and produces a twist in my spine and hip joints.  Doing this engages my glutes and abs in a big way. Maybe I’ll get a waist back yet.

    I made 9,000 steps yesterday. By the time I got up to the second fire hydrant this morning, I had completed 2,000 steps. 

    It finally dawned on me that walking down an incline engages the body as much as walking up that incline.  Unlike bikes or cars that just roll down hills, the walker has to maintain control over their body.  If you just drop onto your foot, your joints are going to be in an uproar in short order.  You have to control that down steps; that requires muscle engagement. 

    Judy and Paulette told me that they were going to visit me today in their Easter get-up.  I agreed to video it.  I was ready as they came out of the driveway.  They were too far away for me to appreciate what I was looking at, but I could clearly hear them.  They were singing a revised version of the song Easter Parade.  As they got closer, I saw they had flower-covered masks over their faces, and I could hear the words of their song.  I posted one of the videos on Facebook. 

    There was some inner pressure to get to work on the book I’m writing about the reading strategies I’ve developed. Nah! I lay down and finished the Dutch House. There was a section in the book fraught with interpersonal tensions that made me uncomfortable. I had to drag myself through it. But then the book opened up detailing reunions and reconciliations. Much better.  I don’t need more stress. I should read comedy.  

    I made spaghetti with fried eggplant for dinner, with a topping of olive oil, carrot greens, minced garlic, dill, salt, and a touch of butter.  I found I didn’t have to call Judy for directions. I could find what I needed on the Internet. While the dish wasn’t great because I drenched it in olive oil, it was edible, and I was pretty proud of myself.  The inspiration for my approach to cooking is my nephew, David.  He would play with mixing ingredients led by whim as an adolescent.  I thought I could do that.  Then it becomes a form of play.  Mike didn’t serve as my model because he was a very good cook with no failures.  There were some dishes which I wasn’t absolutely crazy about, but there were no serious failures.

    Brooks was my dinner companion, along with Mike. Damon gave me a glass Christmas ornament with Mike’s picture.  I prop the ornament up, so Mike is looking at me while I eat.  His eyes are filled with joy and love.  He wasn’t looking at me at the moment. I think he was looking a Damon.  Then again, I could have been Yvette.  Whatever, I loved his ability to love.  

Saturday, April 11, 2020

    Elsa hasn't been joining me when I go to bed for the night.  It used to be that she would be on the bed shortly after I got in, if not while I was brushing my teeth.  Now, she may come to bed in the middle of the night.  I have no idea what is going on. I do know I don't like it.  She still follows me around during the day, sitting near me. However, after dinner, she is fixed to a spot in the kitchen near the dental chews container.  She knows she will get two each night.  She is holding her post.

    I woke up in the middle of the night, realizing that the email I got from 'FedEx' telling me to sign in, giving my yahoo password, to get my package from the post office, was a phishing email.  Duh!  on my behalf, it was only my second one. The first one I caught.  I got up at that time, emailed everyone I could that I had that happen, and changed the password for my email.  A little like closing the barn door. 

    My pedometer read over 10,000 last night before I went to bed.  This is more repetitions without more miles.  Some people measure their walks by time, some by repetitions, and some distance covered.  I ran into Ron, my neighbor down the block, who used to ride his bike around the neighborhood. Now he goes on long hikes with friends all around the world.  Since he can't travel, he puts on his full gear, grabs his walking poles, and takes on the neighborhood.  He told me that from his doorway to the top of Kukuna, a mere .8 of a mile is a 500-foot increase in elevation.  He reminded me that hauling ourselves up a steep hill counts.

    Yvette was set up in the driveway with her yoga class when I got up at 8.  She was expecting four people, but there were only three students. The first thing I did was take pictures of the group as she had asked me to.

    I wasn't in the best mood this morning.  After I went back to bed after my 4:30 am emergency password change, I thought a lot of Mike. I had spent a lot of time with him in the hospital, reading, writing, occasionally talking to him, or rearranging his bedsheets.  Did I do enough for him when he was in the hospital? Could I have done more?   Could I have held his hand more? Could I have talked to him more?  I painfully remember him complaining about how lonely he was. 

    At the time, I told him to start a conversation with Jesus.  I never followed up to find out if he pursued this idea. I think that's one reason I'm thinking about this because I'm feeling lonely.  Another human being hasn't touched me in weeks. People are looking out for me, and I talk to people on the phone regularly, but that's it.  I turned to Mike and said, "You were lonely!?  Look what you left me with," arguing he had no right to complain about how I failed him.  Although, I doubt he would ever have complained or blamed me for anything.  It just hurts more and more to know how he suffered.  I believed he would recover for most of his time in the hospital, and this suffering was temporary.  I thought he would come out a deeper, richer person for the experience.  I didn't know how to help him get there, but I hoped he would do it on his own, forced to by his circumstances.

    Mike suffered from anxiety that drove him nuts. There is a good chance that the medication he took to deal with it caused his pancreatitis. He was taking more than the recommended maximum.  No, I do not blame the doctor who prescribed them.  I am sure he was told what the consequences might be.  First of all, Mike preferred a positive outlook. Like a teenager, he believed the adverse side effects would never hit him. Second, he hated his anxiety so much that he would do anything to control it.  I know he didn't look as if he was tortured by anxiety.  Truth be told, he rarely let me see how much it impacted him.  I knew about it because Mike told me that a doctor he had worked with told him he was surprised how high functioning Mike was given his mental state.  

    He did try therapy years ago.  He finally concluded that it wouldn't work for him and quit. Shortly before we left Ohio for Hawaii, he tried again. He worked with a therapist that used EMDR.  It offered some hope. Then we moved here.  Kaiser did not cover the people who did EMDR in Kona.  I offered to pay for it myself.  That didn't happen. 

    Then, I found out that Kaiser would cover it if his primary care physician prescribed it.  My dental hygienist son had been in a car accident, and his doctor recommended EDMR for him.  He asked his Kaiser primary care doctor to prescribe it, and he could see whoever provided that service.  Mike started seeing such a therapist.  He had only seen the woman a few times before the pancreatitis hit. I was hoping that he could reduce his medication with the success of EMDR. Oh, well.

    Brooks's The Social Animal is still my dinner companion.  He is as interested in neuroscience as I am and as McGilchrist is.  I find Brooks's writing on the subject more compatible with my own thing.  McGilchrist is an advocate for the revival of right-brain thinking; Brooks sees it as I do.  The object is finding a way for the two sides of our brains to work together to promote the best outcome for the individual and society. If either the right or left-brain dominates without the council of the other, we're in trouble as individuals and as a society.  It should be a partnership between the two halves of the brain, where both halves acknowledge their limitations and the strengths of the other half. 

    I continued watching the Australian court drama, Crownies.  I wondered why they changed the show's name to Janet King, only to discover that the Crownies show was shot after Janet King was well established to provide a back story. 

 _____-_____-______   

Musings:

    Human suffering is caused by our emotional response when we don't get something we want or get something we don't want.  The theory is that animals don't suffer because they don't suffer from the same expectations.  I would say that any animal that has demonstrated an ability to grieve about the loss of a person or an animal they were attached to is capable of suffering. 

    Animals don't manifest suffering the way we do. They certainly don't talk about it or write long blogs about it, but that doesn't mean they are not capable of suffering. 

How it compares to ours is another question? Do they continue to suffer after they have gone on with their lives? Are they capable of not going on with their lives because of a loss they have suffered?  We know that human babies denied physical contact die.  We also know that baby chicks who don't have at least one more chick to hang with also die.  Are those babies and those chicks suffering when they die because of not getting the social stimulation they need?  I don't have the answers. But I do know that the answers are not clear-cut.

 

Friday, April 10, 2020

    On my morning walk, I worked on using only my abdominals and gluts to move my legs. This leaves the legs feeling like puppet’s’ legs; they just swing. I wound up taking much smaller steps as a result.  By the time I had reached the second fire hydrant, I was close to 2,000 steps.  It was hard work. 

    Whatever symptoms I had of a urinary tract infection were gone.  I decided to continue putting off using the antibiotic. What I did notice is that that my urine was almost colorless. That's supposed to happen when you drink too much water.  I sipped water all day, but I definitely did not drink more than eight glasses.  I suspect that it was the doTerra lemon oil that did the trick. I continued watching.  Ah, I also used the infrared light last night, but I had used that before.  I would be thrilled to have found a way to deal with infections that did not involve antibiotics. 

    Moving like that reminded me of a scene from All That Jazz, where Ann Reinking does a duet with a twelve-year-old girl.  The young girl looked like she was hydraulically lifting her legs; Ann's legs looked just like a puppeteer manipulated them.  It was amazing to see. This way of walking stressed my left thigh muscles.  

    As I was about to turn into my street to return home, Terry came from the other direction.  He warned me that a big black dog was loose, and a woman was chasing him.  Because of where we were on the street, I knew it was the dog who had circled my legs with his leash and knocked me over.  Just then, a young woman appeared at the bottom of the driveway across the street from her house, dragging that dog by his collar.  Elsa barked like a crazy dog. The other dog barked and pulled.  I turned around and started walking back up the hill to get out of sight so the young woman would be free to get her dog home.  When I looked back, she was having no success.  The dog was a three-year-old black lab, strong, and that dog wanted to get to Elsa. 

    Since the young black lab was preoccupied with Elsa, I offered to walk Elsa onto their property under the assumption that the lab would follow her.  That is what he did.  

    As we were walking down the driveway, a fairly steep decline, the dog nearly got away.  The young woman hung on with her life. While she was tumbled by the dog, she managed to hold on to his collar; he didn't get near me.  While the dog wasn't on a leash to wrap around my legs, I was scared that Elsa would circle me to get away from this rambunctious young dog, and between the two of them, I would go down again.  It wound up that was the young woman's concern too.

    I walked Elsa right up to the point where the dog's outside lead line hook was lying.  The young woman secured the dog.  I asked her to hold on until I got away because I saw that he might circle me with the leash, and there I'd be again. 

    When I made it safely up the driveway, out of the dog's way, I turned around and asked for the dog's name. Chuck. Since I knew Samuel, the dog walker on the day of my fall, was German, I asked them if they were German.  No, they were Russian. Samuel and his father were just friends of theirs.

    I noticed a cage of birds. People have chickens around here, but these were not chickens.  The young woman, Victoria, and her mother, Nadia, explained that her father liked decorative pigeons.  He bred them. He just thought they were beautiful. That led me to mention how beautiful the wild chickens are here in Hawaii.  

             The young woman explained that Chuck had gotten away from her that morning while she was moving him from a walking leash to the yard leash.  She said he usually waits patiently, but today I caught sight of the chickens across the street and took off.

    If you have never seen an image of these chickens, take a look at this.  And this picture doesn't do them justice. The feathers are iridescent. This is what happens to are pale yellow chickens when they run wild for a few generations.

 https://www.activitykauai.com/why-are-there-so-many-kauai-chickens

    If you're wondering why we have wild chickens on this island. Easy: people leave and let their chickens loose. They go forth and multiple. But the island that has it the worst is Kauai. A hurricane hit there and busted open all the chicken coops. They went forth and multiplied, and multiplied, and multiplied, and voila, they changed from those dull, drab color to what you see in that picture. Amazing!

    All's well that ends well.  Chuck was back on his leash, I hadn't been knocked over, I got to meet folks who live on my block, and, as far as I know, no chickens were injured in this adventure. I also had a chance to tell Victoria and Nadia that an electric fence was embedded in their driveway.  This would save them a lot of grief with Chuck. I have no idea how to reactive it.  I left that to them.

    When I got home, I got around to finishing my cleaning job on the stovetop.  I did the last step with Dawn Liquid Detergent. I let it sit for a while. It soaks up grease like a sponge. Then came the stage where I had to get all the soap residue off, particularly off the stainless-steel trimmings. Soap is acidic and cuts into stainless steel, causing rust. Nothing needs any more encouragement to rust around here; the salt air already amply provides opportunity. 

    I sat down to do some more work or play on the computer. I'm setting my alarm for every 20 minutes, so I don't sit until my tush turns to mush.  I got up with the plan of napping, but I decided instead to do some more vacuuming.  I finished off two rugs.  Every time I vacuum now, I have the image of Damon vacuuming those rugs when he was here for the internment. What a sweet image.    I actually finished off the surface vacuuming of all the rugs. 

    Not being the domestic goddess type, I failed to realize that my vacuum, in fact, any vacuum, would do a better job on setting one than setting two. Setting two is for carpets; that's true.  But, setting two raises the brush and therefore provides less suction.  Since I have close pile rugs, setting one would do the better job. Oh, well. Next time. It amazes in how many things I still have to learn even at this late date in life.

    For my next break, I did some reading: the book on Jung and Patchett's Dutch House. The latter got a little scary because there's this mean, greedy stepmother who doesn't care if she brings ruin on everyone else as long as she gets what she wants.   I plowed through.  The two orphaned children seem to have survived. Life does go on.

    My next task was vacuuming up the Elsa-messes with the Rainbow vacuum cleaner.  I don't use it to do surface cleaning of the rugs, only deep cleaning.  When I do, I use the furniture attachment and go over the lanai carpet inch by inch. I wasn't up for that today.  If you're wondering why I don't use the vacuum attachment, it doesn't work. I've taken it for repairs two times already.  I just gave up.  

    Cleaning up Elsa-messes requires using the furniture attachment too.  I poured about six cups of water on the spot and sucked it up with the vacuum.  Damon watched me do this once and was gob struck to watch the color of the carpet change from dark, due to the wetness, to its original color with just one slow pass of the vacuum.  I don't think I could ever bear to be without one of these amazing tools.   Of course, if the world comes to an end and I wind up living in the rough, I may just have to.

    At 2 pm, I had to stop because Bill McLaughlin on Exploring Music talked about Wagner's Ring Cycle. I'm not an opera buff, but he is just a pleasure to listen to.  He is so excited about the music. Plus, Dorothy was singing the praises of opera the other day, and she inspired me to give opera another chance. 

    There were things about it I did enjoy.  McLaughlin played a tape of Anna Russell's take on The Ring Cycle. Afterward, I found it on YouTube and played it all the way through. The plot of the opera is ridiculous. A little too ridiculous for me to enjoy. The mythic value of it escapes me. Except, except. The story does say when you're up to no good, eventually, everything goes back to the way it was before.  I was thinking of Wagner being an icon of the Nazis. They didn't get the message. Abandon love and go for the ring so you can rule the world, and eventually, you will lose everything.  You can only deviate so far from a moral center. 

    Right after the show, I worked on another spot where Elsa had done some damage. I had several others to clean that I discovered the other day, all in the same area.  I caught sight of them because the light was just right. These are just pee stains.  And here I thought she knew to use the bathroom mat, preferably the bathroom shower. Oh, well. 

    As you can see, I continue writing. It is good for me.  Sharing my writing comes from the encouragement I got, particularly from Sandor. That's why I set up the blog. Trust me, I'm not competing with any Kardashian.  Still, I keep writing for some unidentified audience.  When people tell me they are reading it, I am surprised and thrilled.  I don't know if I would follow it if it were someone else's.  I keep at it because it is good for me.  I love figuring out how to put things into words, and it makes me feel like I'm doing something.