It didn't start out as one, of course. Far from it. About 12:30 - that's AM, after I'd gotten about 2 hours of sleep - I heard Steve fall. There are two closed doors between the garage bedroom and the living room, but yes, I heard him fall. I didn't know what exactly it was. Perhaps bumping into a piece of furniture? I tried to get back to sleep. I almost made it, too, but then I heard him call out for Paul. Loath as he is to disturb Paul's sleep, I knew it was more than a bump into furniture. So much for sleep.
Entering the living room, I found Steve on the floor with Paul standing over him. They were trying to figure out the logistics of getting him up again. Within a couple minutes, he was assisted up onto the couch, from which he could help himself to wherever. Turns out he had bumped into furniture... on his way down, after getting dizzy. The furniture was fine. Steve got two band-aids. Plus a few bruises. I got an interrupted sleep which persisted until nearly 5:00 AM. Two more hours then, and I was done for the night. It's starting to catch up to me now, twelve hours later. Meanwhile coffee got me through the day. Just one cup, one more than the doctor approves of. I won't tell him though. Don't you.
Breakfast consisted of a few leftover banana-coconut pancakes, no toppings, made the night before. (Lunch too for that matter.) Steve got the rest of them. This was one experimental recipe he approved of. Paul, not so much.
A little TV filled in a gap of time, but only stuff pre-recorded on the DVR. A fast moving storm messed with live reception for a bit. That will make a difference later.
Ten o'clock I had an appointment at my favorite bead store in Taylors Falls. I'd offered to teach one of the staff how to make a bracelet by celtic braiding. She provided all the materials, on hand because she teaches customers workshops there on a variety of things, and we both had fun. I also repeated my invitation from last year for her to stop by when a number of the store staff head to Arizona to stock up on - literally - new stock. A whole bunch of shows by wholesalers for beads and what-all happen annually. I made sure she knew I was completely sincere in my offer to show her around the club when she took the time to put that in her schedule. I think she's actually considering it.
Home for a spot of lunch was next. I had planned to take a nap before the next part of my day, but I just wasn't feeling it. So, off to Crex Meadows. It's just not a summer visit up here without spending a long afternoon or more driving around Crex and using my camera as often as possible.
Things you need to know about Crex: it's 30,000 acres of Wisconsin wilderness. Managed wilderness. They repair roads, do controlled burns to maintain habitat so trees don't take over, clean up deadfalls after storms. It's home to migratory birds in those seasons, and an abundance of varieties of plants and wildlife stay. It's the fall staging ground for about 20,000 sandhill cranes, much like the Platte in Nebraska is a spring staging ground. It's prime financial support comes from Ducks Unlimited, and they get to hunt waterfowl in season. Except, of course, a reserve in the middle where nobody can set foot, except staff. If any of that appeals, it's on the northern edge of Grantsburg,WI., which is just on the eastern side of the St. Croix River, the boundary with Minnesota, along US 70. Turn north at the light and follow the Follow the Goose signs. Seriously.
The visit always starts with the info center. In itself it's worth a visit, but after several years, I'm after current information. Where are such-and-such located in recent sightings? What's new? Many of the megafauna, aka those my camera will actually get pictures of, inhabit the same places year after year. This year they have one recent addition, which may or may not still be hanging around: a whooping crane. One visitor with a spotting scope was able to read its leg band number. Interesting as that news was, I already had fond memories and mediocre pictures / video of the three who arrived one fall and stuck around until all the cranes, meaning sandhills, headed south, several years ago. I filed away this one's recent locations, but it wasn't hanging around when I was in the area. I got info on roads, which flowages were full this year and which were being kept drier via their system of dikes, then headed out.
There is a path out the back side of the center, leading down across a waterway, which is as far as I ever go on it. Today was a wind day, making a lot of pictures not gonna happen. Hard to shoot a bee on a stalk whipping back and forth. To make up for it, the ripples across the water, looked down on from the bridge, made some interesting photos. Even better video.
From there, back in the car, I drove my usual route with just a few additions per the recommendations gotten at the info center. The birds which always fly off long before I'm near still did today. Even in the off season, they seem to know they are targets and don't take any chances. Or maybe they're just practicing for when it gets real. Hunting season starts soon.
So, photographically, no geese, no ducks. But I always go with a mental list, and check them off as I find them. Phantom Lake, kept dry last year, had grasses and weeds grown so tall that open water was hard to find, nevermind sighting eagles, osprey, or loons. I consoled myself with the quick view of an eagle as I was driving, gone before I could even think to stop.
There are a couple of dead logs in that lake close to the road which turtles come out and sun on, but even those logs were hiding in the vegetation. There was, however, one small turtle - painted or mud, not sure if there is a difference or what it might be - crossing the road. As I stepped close for a picture, it hid in its shell, but I picked it up and held it with one hand which got thoroughly clawed while my other held the camera for a shot of the under-shell. Gorgeous! Check that off the list.
Primary on my list every visit are the sandhills. The first major turn on that road startled three into flight. Drat! No photo here, but the afternoon is young. With three cranes, one can easily assume this late in the season that one of the flyers is a colt and the other its parents. (Colt? Who knew? I always called them chicks. Now I can name them properly and get people to look at me like I'm insane. What fun!)
There were several more chances to shoot sandhills, some photos, some video. While they haven't started their fall staging, there were twos and threes spread widely around. I even got a still shot as a pair took flight, waiting until they'd risen above the treeline.
The other big and plentiful bird species there is trumpeter swans. They do sound like an old fashioned toy tin horn, though in the video playbacks the wind on the mic was the predominant sound. I found them in several locations, mostly way across whichever piece of water from the road. There was one definite family with two cygnets, defined not by size this late but by grey feathers instead of white. As with all the pictures of the day, there was a struggle to shoot past the tall waving grasses along the roadside, not just from obstructing the view, but also teasing the camera to focus on them instead of the desired subject. Often the swans or cranes had gotten far away by the time the issues were dealt with and the shutter clicked. Halleluia for instant viewing of the shot. But DANG! those Pentax people who never turned the K-1000 into a digital camera where I could twist the rings in front of me to make adjustments rather than having to stop and go through the menu.... and opportunity has flown away. Those who read this faithfully will have heard that sentiment before. But Pentax... ARE YOU LISTENING YET?
Pretty soon most of the wish list was filled. I still had not seen an egret or blue heron since arriving. That discussion in the info center verified their apparent scarcity this year, with another voice to the thought that the late harsh winter likely killed several early-arriving species. Hopefully not all of any variety.
Late into this trip I received reassurance on that hope. Going over the video of about 20 trumpeters scattered along the far shore of one pond I'd stopped at, one of them moved and the silhouette changed. That was no swan, that was an egret! Yee-haaa!
By then my list was down to two missing sightings, a heron and a deer. Heading around the likely spot to spy a whooper, nothing whatsoever appeared. Well, one grasshopper, but.... Many sandhills and trumpeters had already been spotted, so I wasn't totally bereft. I tried one more road, outside the usual course I take. One heron landed, way too far away to do more than identify it. No shot would yield even a dot that would stand out from the background. OK, keep going.
There was a bonus sighting, something I'd seen lots of through the years but not yet at Crex: wild turkeys. Five crossed the road on a rise well up ahead, far enough away that they had time to hide in the brush on the other side. Patience rewardied me with a few shots of the pokiest of that flock however.
The likely deer spot was a few miles ahead. A sudden curve on the way brought my close heron sighting. By close, well, all things are relative. I took a couple shots, then proceeded to sneak up on it. Not subtly enough, however. There must be a well-developed sense of "prey" in herons too. It took off while I was still trying to get my camera to focus on something besides the waving foreground grass, but I was focused so close I wasn't able to follow its flight for a shot.
Oh well. If you look real hard at what I did get, I've got proof of life.
Turning onto the road where I always see one deer at least, I did. Immediately. Long before the camera was out. And speaking of that awareness of being a prey animal? Resigned to no shot, and at the end of my afternoon, I headed across to my starting point on that gravel road. The adventure began.
Remember where I said that the early morning rain would be important? Well, this road is the least improved in the preserve. Some years lately it has even been barricaded. At best, it's two ruts with potholes and grass or rocks rising up in the center. I had inquired about its status earlier, and was informed that it was navigable. (One person's opinion.) Just this week the crew had been out filling the (worst?) of the ruts with dirt. Not gravel, just dirt. No grading, but it was kinda flatter than the road had been. But still, just dirt. And now, pretty wet dirt. And when you drive over pretty wet dirt, it squishes out of the ruts it was filling, raising walls higher than the previous high points had been. Moreover, what hadn't been squished out by the two (apparently) previous drivers, lay like mud traps for the unwary.
I made the mistake of slowing down before hitting the first of these. My wheels threatened to start spinning. Luckily, I haven't been in Arizona so long that I've forgotten how to drive in deep snow. YOU DO NOT STOP! NEVER EVER EVER. Once through that one, I increased my speed to a steady 10-15 mph. The wheels didn't spin. Of course, I was traveling west on a narrow one lane road, still as full of holes and bumps as before, praying that nobody would ever be so stupid as to do what I was doing but coming the other way as there was no place to pull over, not to mention getting stuck while trying to figure out which of us went where. The lowering sun was in my eyes, and visibility complicated both by a dirty inside windshield and the sun-dark-sun provided by uneven vegetation. As a result, I didn't manage, while maintaining speed, to also dodge all those semi-visible ruts and high center spots. Grinnnnnnd! Klunk-klunk. And did I just hear something metal hit the road? I mean, as in separate(d) from my car? Don't even think it! Must have been something already lying hidden on the road. Right? Please?
The road finally evened out and I was fully prepared to head home. That's when I spotted a young snapper sunning itself along the road. It wasn't any bigger than the earlier turtle had been, and the three rows of ridges were still smooth bumps. I took two shots out the window, then pulled away. As soon as I passed it, I saw the sun gleaming off its eye, where the face had been in shade for the previous pics. So, one last shot for the road. I thanked it for posing, like that mattered to the turtle. If it had any coherent thoughts, likely it was just relieved to sit unmolested. Or ready to bite its attacker and never let go.
Then on for my favorite tuna Subway for supper, and home. Steve was waiting, doing well, just a tad sore. So yep, pretty darn near a perfect day. Yawn....
Thursday, August 29, 2019
Monday, August 26, 2019
Getting The Gas Back
It's normal for us to stop and restart gas service to the house when we're absent for vacations. It not only prevents possible problems, but the mandated recheck of all the connections when it's turned back on is another level of reassurance.
What's not usual is when the process turns into a 20-minute phone call. No, no problems, just a chatty company employee. I hope it doesn't get her in trouble. And no, I can't get her in trouble as I forget her name three seconds after she answered with it, followed by a how-can-I-help-you? That is usual.
It started when I asked for the gas to be turned on for the first workday after our return when we knew we'd be there instead of out and about. I mentioned we were returning from vacation. My fault, I guess, for starting it. Then again, she had asked whether we were just winter residents as a lot of policies for how companies resume service vary for the short-timers.
It morphed into a discussion of mosquitoes here vs, there, to cooking only via microwave, to the need for hot water vs. letting the climate take care of that for your summer showers while you put off reconnecting the water heater, to availability of cold tap water there vs. here, to fires in the Amazon Rain Forest, to rain starting there but not in AZ, to monsoon destruction of her gazebo, to ....
Eventually the reconnect was scheduled, I have a two hour window within which it will happen, and all the necessary contact info is in place. I did think several times about bringing the call to an end, but really, what was my hurry? She did the heavy lifting on keeping the conversation going, so perhaps it meant it was a slow morning on her end. It was a pleasant contact with a kindred soul with a nice sense of humor - and possibly an easing of the rigors of a strictured and lonely work day on her part.
What's not usual is when the process turns into a 20-minute phone call. No, no problems, just a chatty company employee. I hope it doesn't get her in trouble. And no, I can't get her in trouble as I forget her name three seconds after she answered with it, followed by a how-can-I-help-you? That is usual.
It started when I asked for the gas to be turned on for the first workday after our return when we knew we'd be there instead of out and about. I mentioned we were returning from vacation. My fault, I guess, for starting it. Then again, she had asked whether we were just winter residents as a lot of policies for how companies resume service vary for the short-timers.
It morphed into a discussion of mosquitoes here vs, there, to cooking only via microwave, to the need for hot water vs. letting the climate take care of that for your summer showers while you put off reconnecting the water heater, to availability of cold tap water there vs. here, to fires in the Amazon Rain Forest, to rain starting there but not in AZ, to monsoon destruction of her gazebo, to ....
Eventually the reconnect was scheduled, I have a two hour window within which it will happen, and all the necessary contact info is in place. I did think several times about bringing the call to an end, but really, what was my hurry? She did the heavy lifting on keeping the conversation going, so perhaps it meant it was a slow morning on her end. It was a pleasant contact with a kindred soul with a nice sense of humor - and possibly an easing of the rigors of a strictured and lonely work day on her part.
Saturday, August 24, 2019
Sipping Imagination Through A Crayon
Back and relaxed from heading up to Nisswa for an extended lunch with my brother and his family, down through his grandson.
The drive was like a trip home to my childhood, though I grew up a few counties from there. The plants, weather, lakes, smells - all were familiar. The drive was only 300 miles round trip, surprising me with how "saddlesore" I'd gotten by the time I was back home. After all, just a few weeks back I'd driver 1800+ miles in three days with no discomfort.
The restaurant, a place called Sherwood Forest, combined charm with a limited but delicious menu. I'd recommend it to anybody. A summer Friday lunch gave us enough of a quiet space that we felt perfectly OK to make it an actual family reunion without any pressure to keep quiet, hold an active 3-year-old to an adult standard of behavior, or eat quickly to clear up a table for others. The weather was perfect for eating out on their deck, so we all relaxed and enjoyed ourselves.
Star of the day, of course, was my grand nephew. While never motionless, he also never whined or had a tantrum. Being actively parented on both sides, he received the perfect combination of having his needs met and keeping his behavior in check. After the meal, the adults were still enjoying the occasion, some of us having not seen each other for 10 years. Little legs needed stretching, so planning ahead, Grandma wisely brought along a new pack of Hot Wheels, and the bench running along the outer rim of the deck provided a perfect racetrack for their use.
Pictures were taken. Of course. By the dozens. With the combinations of ages, geography, and lifestyles, who knew when a repeat might occur? Christmas family grouping shots were set with a forest backdrop. Candid shots were - attempted, at least, hence "candid" - during the meal. The most popular subject often moved from the perfect shot into a different expression, a turned head, a cap or cup in the way, any of a dozen other things to change the shot before the camera caught up with the event. (As they do: another great reason to no longer be limited by the expense of film.)
Returning home, I went through the results, my first step before what are often three levels of culling before saving the good pictures. One in there stood out, a real feat in a day of wonderful memories.
My great nephew had been given paper and crayons to distract him while we waited for food to arrive. We all got our drinks immediately, as usual, with his being fruit juice in a cup with a little spout. The picture shows him having inserted the pointy end of a red crayon in the cup spout, sucking on the other end as if it were a straw. No juice, but a full dose of imagination.
The drive was like a trip home to my childhood, though I grew up a few counties from there. The plants, weather, lakes, smells - all were familiar. The drive was only 300 miles round trip, surprising me with how "saddlesore" I'd gotten by the time I was back home. After all, just a few weeks back I'd driver 1800+ miles in three days with no discomfort.
The restaurant, a place called Sherwood Forest, combined charm with a limited but delicious menu. I'd recommend it to anybody. A summer Friday lunch gave us enough of a quiet space that we felt perfectly OK to make it an actual family reunion without any pressure to keep quiet, hold an active 3-year-old to an adult standard of behavior, or eat quickly to clear up a table for others. The weather was perfect for eating out on their deck, so we all relaxed and enjoyed ourselves.
Star of the day, of course, was my grand nephew. While never motionless, he also never whined or had a tantrum. Being actively parented on both sides, he received the perfect combination of having his needs met and keeping his behavior in check. After the meal, the adults were still enjoying the occasion, some of us having not seen each other for 10 years. Little legs needed stretching, so planning ahead, Grandma wisely brought along a new pack of Hot Wheels, and the bench running along the outer rim of the deck provided a perfect racetrack for their use.
Pictures were taken. Of course. By the dozens. With the combinations of ages, geography, and lifestyles, who knew when a repeat might occur? Christmas family grouping shots were set with a forest backdrop. Candid shots were - attempted, at least, hence "candid" - during the meal. The most popular subject often moved from the perfect shot into a different expression, a turned head, a cap or cup in the way, any of a dozen other things to change the shot before the camera caught up with the event. (As they do: another great reason to no longer be limited by the expense of film.)
Returning home, I went through the results, my first step before what are often three levels of culling before saving the good pictures. One in there stood out, a real feat in a day of wonderful memories.
My great nephew had been given paper and crayons to distract him while we waited for food to arrive. We all got our drinks immediately, as usual, with his being fruit juice in a cup with a little spout. The picture shows him having inserted the pointy end of a red crayon in the cup spout, sucking on the other end as if it were a straw. No juice, but a full dose of imagination.
Tuesday, August 20, 2019
Nostalgia
Memories are returning. I don't generally spend a lot of time dipping into the past. Thinking about Minnesota before this trip up was mostly a rehash of work, especially since I frequently wake from dreams where I'm struggling to find places to park, never having the correct paperwork, blanking out on where certain buildings are, nevermind what they're named. The "what" tower on 9th and 2nd in Minneapolis ...? It's probably been bought and renamed anyway, so why bother?
With the stress of waiting through much of the summer for Steve's accumulating aggravations in (not) getting his back procedure, and finally finding out we would have to leave immediately for a short visit, or miss summer north altogether, my emotional map was dealing with scheduling family and friend visits, and not the locations where I spent over 60 years of my life. Arizona has become home, and very comfortably so.
Now that I've been doing some driving around while visiting friends and family, old memories are shaking loose from the dusty brain closet. Last weekend we headed north along I-35 far enough for the landscape to change into all that accompanies entering a landscape underlain by sandy soils. to pull out the familiarity of where I grew up, leaving the density of foliage which - since Arizona - had felt stifling, replacing it with aspens, bogs with long-dead spurs jutting up where trees once dwelled, more open ground between trees instead of solid walls of green enclosing the roads.
Some of that nostalgia is from the change in fauna. About the only piece of Minnesota which also appears in Arizona is the sporadic flock of Canada geese snacking on the grass of a local golf course, then honking as they pass overhead to find a (created) lake for the evening. Oddly enough, I've yet to see a goose up here. I'm also missing herons (great blue) and egrets. It occurs to me to wonder whether they returned north before the last of the nasty weather retreated and were caught by the resultant lack of food. Many of the spots I've driven by were reliable locations for sighting them in years past. I hope I'm wrong. But this changing climate is fickle.
It's not just megafauna. Besides a female ruby throated hummingbird and a variety of bees, butterflies visit tall cup flowers outside the dining and kitchen windows: tiger swallowtails, monarchs, others I cannot recall the names for. Paul even picked up a luna moth caterpillar from the driveway and relocated it in the nearby foliage, something I rarely see since leaving the resort as a child. There we kept large yard lights on all night, and frequently had the opportunity to pluck one, or a cecropia moth, off the pole when one perched low enough for us to reach while it waited out the daylight hours.
It's not just the driving around that's dredging up memories. My sister-in-law send me a link to an article about taking in the attractions along the back roads. This was my response, referring back to our early childhood living on a resort on 2nd Crow Wing lake:
"Gee, feels just like home! I have great memories (Steve should too) of Daddy taking us out for Sunday drives, taking different roads "just because" - though I think a big part of his motive was searching out good spots to hunt partridge, pheasants and deer. as well as finding likely cranberry bogs, blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, chokecherries, hazelnuts, pine cones for crafts, an active eagle nest in the heyday of DDT ….
"Maybe more of it was pure entertainment, with no TV back then, working hard in the struggle to make the resort pay off when a second job was always needed. "Just" driving around was a relief from all that.
"We didn't do so much of finding the local tourist attractions - or maybe I just didn't register if we did. After all, I can visualize giant fish statues and Paul Bunyan with Babe.
"As well, there was always Gunsmoke on the radio, often followed by Point of Law. We had to be quiet to listen. And if we kids were still bored, there was always doing addition in our heads, way ahead of where we were in school. Steve was the one who helped me to the shortcut of adding three-column figures, introducing the concept of carrying the tens to the next column. "
Now, with something more than all the planning, organizing and implementing, this has become my vacation.
With the stress of waiting through much of the summer for Steve's accumulating aggravations in (not) getting his back procedure, and finally finding out we would have to leave immediately for a short visit, or miss summer north altogether, my emotional map was dealing with scheduling family and friend visits, and not the locations where I spent over 60 years of my life. Arizona has become home, and very comfortably so.
Now that I've been doing some driving around while visiting friends and family, old memories are shaking loose from the dusty brain closet. Last weekend we headed north along I-35 far enough for the landscape to change into all that accompanies entering a landscape underlain by sandy soils. to pull out the familiarity of where I grew up, leaving the density of foliage which - since Arizona - had felt stifling, replacing it with aspens, bogs with long-dead spurs jutting up where trees once dwelled, more open ground between trees instead of solid walls of green enclosing the roads.
Some of that nostalgia is from the change in fauna. About the only piece of Minnesota which also appears in Arizona is the sporadic flock of Canada geese snacking on the grass of a local golf course, then honking as they pass overhead to find a (created) lake for the evening. Oddly enough, I've yet to see a goose up here. I'm also missing herons (great blue) and egrets. It occurs to me to wonder whether they returned north before the last of the nasty weather retreated and were caught by the resultant lack of food. Many of the spots I've driven by were reliable locations for sighting them in years past. I hope I'm wrong. But this changing climate is fickle.
It's not just megafauna. Besides a female ruby throated hummingbird and a variety of bees, butterflies visit tall cup flowers outside the dining and kitchen windows: tiger swallowtails, monarchs, others I cannot recall the names for. Paul even picked up a luna moth caterpillar from the driveway and relocated it in the nearby foliage, something I rarely see since leaving the resort as a child. There we kept large yard lights on all night, and frequently had the opportunity to pluck one, or a cecropia moth, off the pole when one perched low enough for us to reach while it waited out the daylight hours.
It's not just the driving around that's dredging up memories. My sister-in-law send me a link to an article about taking in the attractions along the back roads. This was my response, referring back to our early childhood living on a resort on 2nd Crow Wing lake:
"Gee, feels just like home! I have great memories (Steve should too) of Daddy taking us out for Sunday drives, taking different roads "just because" - though I think a big part of his motive was searching out good spots to hunt partridge, pheasants and deer. as well as finding likely cranberry bogs, blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, chokecherries, hazelnuts, pine cones for crafts, an active eagle nest in the heyday of DDT ….
"Maybe more of it was pure entertainment, with no TV back then, working hard in the struggle to make the resort pay off when a second job was always needed. "Just" driving around was a relief from all that.
"We didn't do so much of finding the local tourist attractions - or maybe I just didn't register if we did. After all, I can visualize giant fish statues and Paul Bunyan with Babe.
"As well, there was always Gunsmoke on the radio, often followed by Point of Law. We had to be quiet to listen. And if we kids were still bored, there was always doing addition in our heads, way ahead of where we were in school. Steve was the one who helped me to the shortcut of adding three-column figures, introducing the concept of carrying the tens to the next column. "
Now, with something more than all the planning, organizing and implementing, this has become my vacation.
Sunday, August 11, 2019
Roadkill
Speaking of Minnesota nostalgia....
Have you ever been so long in a very different environment that you don't remember what you're missing until you finally see it again? Remember how that reacquaintance slaps you in the face?
For me this time, it was roadkill. Funny to realize there just isn't much of it in our part of Arizona. There are all kinds of reasons, from fauna to metropolitan speed levels, but it just hadn't been noticed. Not until heading north again.
The first noticible sighting was near Kansas City. My Minnesota-bound mind misidentified the shelled creature as a snapping turtle. Rich pointed out there were no lakes visible for habitat, adding he'd thought it to be an armadillo. Neither of us thought they roamed that far north, but he stuck by his guns. I stuck by mine contrary to the evidence until just a few miles further was an unmistakable flat armadillo. Migration happens.
Reaching Minnesota, squirrels began to appear, mostly fresh enough to be neither bloated nor flat. Further along was a coon, identified by its fluffy ringed tail attached to a wide swath of flattened nothing. Scattered feathers were identified by the colors of various songbirds. Deer left long, ugly trails behind their carcasses.
Who knew I missed these?
Or did I?
Have you ever been so long in a very different environment that you don't remember what you're missing until you finally see it again? Remember how that reacquaintance slaps you in the face?
For me this time, it was roadkill. Funny to realize there just isn't much of it in our part of Arizona. There are all kinds of reasons, from fauna to metropolitan speed levels, but it just hadn't been noticed. Not until heading north again.
The first noticible sighting was near Kansas City. My Minnesota-bound mind misidentified the shelled creature as a snapping turtle. Rich pointed out there were no lakes visible for habitat, adding he'd thought it to be an armadillo. Neither of us thought they roamed that far north, but he stuck by his guns. I stuck by mine contrary to the evidence until just a few miles further was an unmistakable flat armadillo. Migration happens.
Reaching Minnesota, squirrels began to appear, mostly fresh enough to be neither bloated nor flat. Further along was a coon, identified by its fluffy ringed tail attached to a wide swath of flattened nothing. Scattered feathers were identified by the colors of various songbirds. Deer left long, ugly trails behind their carcasses.
Who knew I missed these?
Or did I?
Minnesota Life...
There's a lot of different and same about this vacation.
Most obvious is the attempt to cram in all the visits and reconnecting into a short month. We're prioritizing visits, with Steve's first one being his daughter providing a ride from the airport, and the second being a while spent with his fishing buddy catching up while sitting along the edge of the St. Croix with their lines in the water. Note: No picene deaths occurred: fish were caught, then released.
Today we get to see how much our great-granddaughter has grown in a year. We scheduled this one ASAP into the visit, not only to make sure it fit in comfortably, but because recent Arizona housecleaning / organizing revealed a multitude of items needing to be sent up here to that family, and all those boxes need to be cleared out to make breathing room. Well, packing room also for the car's return trip which will also be an official relocation of Rich to Arizona.
The other major unpacking from the trip up included a sh**load of boxes of glassware he'd collected down there for his girlfriend up here. Haunt the local thrift shops, find treasures for a pittance each, and she can sell them on eBay - or keep for her personal collections - and make a sweet profit from people who appreciate their real value rather than the need to clean out Grandma's house asap after she died so they can go back to their "real" lives. Thrift shops in and around Sun City take in a lot of items that way and price them to clear out quickly before the next houseload arrives.
Rich is dividing his time between this house, helping me clean and fix things, and his girlfriend's apartment, helping her clean and pack. She's trying to decide whether to move back to the town west of the metro where her grown kids are, or the town north where her sister and mom live. Her sis is a nurse who has already been very helpful in providing care, support, and transportation while she is coping with cancer tests and treatments. I have my preference for where she should move, especially considering how non-supportive some of her kids have been, but it's not my life. Obviously she and Rich are ending their relationship, but that's been coming on for a while, and his assisting her indicates it's happening amicably.
Another family branch is getting their own visit from their daughter/son-in-lay/grandson, none of which I've seen since the wedding (theirs), so it was a high priority to arrange that get-together for the week we'll all be in the same state. That leaves the rest of the month to arrange the rest of family and friend visits, along with fishing for Steve, as much as his back will allow. We've already had to postpone one visit with one of his sons, but it's waiting to be rescheduled.
The reason we have limited ourselves to a month is that Steve finally got the call from the insurance company that all the snafus were fixed and he'd good to go on his back procedure. Monday he'll contact his scheduler for their first opening after the 6th when he's flying back. Rich and I, along with all his stuff, start our drive down the Tuesday after Labor Day. Can you count the remaining days? Yikes!
Other stuff has been going on meanwhile. We're relearning the remote for a different satellite system for the TV and different hookups to various equipment. Rich climbed through all the hoops to get his driver's license up here current so he can easily change his address to Arizona. I'm dealing with the local clinic, which no longer has any doctor on staff that I recognize, to not only manage my blood thinner levels but now monitor some weird and unexplained infection I have in one leg. Every question asked to help identify cause is answered "no." Cellulitis is about as generic a name as they can apply to something and still prescribe some hopefully beneficial treatment. In my case, antibiotics. The infection is subcutaneous, producing a rash that doesn't weep or itch, have any detectable point source or cause, but when pressure is applied feels painful about half an inch below the skin.
Weird? At least it's not believed to be contagious. Just ugly. It's likely the warfarin is aiding in the production of little red spots at surface level. So-o-o-o ... another reason to get off it quickly? Or a reason to thank it for pointing out (puns intended of course) there is a problem?
Meanwhile I am slowly getting reacquainted with the reasons Arizona has become home. It's cold up here. My allergies are starting to kick in again. The meds I take for those are blocking my sense of smell so I don't get that cue of "home" up here. Lawns need mowing, weeds taller than 1/2" - more like measured in feet - are taking over the world, mosquitoes climb in the car with you, everything is located in different places from space in the bathroom to layout in the stores. And it's too cool for pool-walking ... assuming you could locate a pool to walk in. The terrain is sans what passes for mountains around Phoenix, but the trees are so tall, plentiful and dense that it's impossible to tell anyway. Clouds are no longer a reason to stop and watch, having gone from rarity worthy of comment to ubiquitous backdrop. I'd hoped for a bit of stargazing in this more rural area, but....
Well, I'm told lots of places back in Arizona are designated night sky viewing areas.
On the other hand, flora and fauna have familiar forms, ones I forget I've missed until seeing them again. I recognize what's in the fields here. We've seen deer, turkeys, sandhill cranes, ducks, finches, and the windshield needs regular bug-scrubbing as well as replacing, due to one too many rocks along the way. The garden offers coneflowers, brown-eyed-susans, liatris, daylilies, lily-of-the-valley bearing still-green seed balls, milkweed bearing scars from very hungry caterpillars which Paul vouches have produced healthy Monarch butterflies. It also sports a plethora of young ash and maple trees, grass, ragweed about to bloom, and likely some very stubborn sowthistles which resist annual pulling. I haven't literally gotten around (the other side of the patch) to checking them. There are a few winter casualties to be cut down as well, had we time, now that energy is no longer the excuse.
Finally, sleep is more elusive. The bed is higher, its mattress harder and bulging up in the middle, and my share has been cut to half by sharing with someone whose every slightest move is extremely painful. It's hard to ignore, and a frequent reminder of my inability to do anything to help. Plus, did I mention that the bathroom is now out the door, up two stairs, across the living room and down the hall? Most of that trek is over a basement resonating chamber, and every creak is magnified. No longer can bare feet on concrete slab allow undetected movement so everybody doesn't have to know just where and when that journey occurs. As well, one bathroom is shared by three people, one of whom seems to be monopolizing it in the early mornings just because of a need to be ready for work!
Maybe I better go use it now before he wakes up.
Most obvious is the attempt to cram in all the visits and reconnecting into a short month. We're prioritizing visits, with Steve's first one being his daughter providing a ride from the airport, and the second being a while spent with his fishing buddy catching up while sitting along the edge of the St. Croix with their lines in the water. Note: No picene deaths occurred: fish were caught, then released.
Today we get to see how much our great-granddaughter has grown in a year. We scheduled this one ASAP into the visit, not only to make sure it fit in comfortably, but because recent Arizona housecleaning / organizing revealed a multitude of items needing to be sent up here to that family, and all those boxes need to be cleared out to make breathing room. Well, packing room also for the car's return trip which will also be an official relocation of Rich to Arizona.
The other major unpacking from the trip up included a sh**load of boxes of glassware he'd collected down there for his girlfriend up here. Haunt the local thrift shops, find treasures for a pittance each, and she can sell them on eBay - or keep for her personal collections - and make a sweet profit from people who appreciate their real value rather than the need to clean out Grandma's house asap after she died so they can go back to their "real" lives. Thrift shops in and around Sun City take in a lot of items that way and price them to clear out quickly before the next houseload arrives.
Rich is dividing his time between this house, helping me clean and fix things, and his girlfriend's apartment, helping her clean and pack. She's trying to decide whether to move back to the town west of the metro where her grown kids are, or the town north where her sister and mom live. Her sis is a nurse who has already been very helpful in providing care, support, and transportation while she is coping with cancer tests and treatments. I have my preference for where she should move, especially considering how non-supportive some of her kids have been, but it's not my life. Obviously she and Rich are ending their relationship, but that's been coming on for a while, and his assisting her indicates it's happening amicably.
Another family branch is getting their own visit from their daughter/son-in-lay/grandson, none of which I've seen since the wedding (theirs), so it was a high priority to arrange that get-together for the week we'll all be in the same state. That leaves the rest of the month to arrange the rest of family and friend visits, along with fishing for Steve, as much as his back will allow. We've already had to postpone one visit with one of his sons, but it's waiting to be rescheduled.
The reason we have limited ourselves to a month is that Steve finally got the call from the insurance company that all the snafus were fixed and he'd good to go on his back procedure. Monday he'll contact his scheduler for their first opening after the 6th when he's flying back. Rich and I, along with all his stuff, start our drive down the Tuesday after Labor Day. Can you count the remaining days? Yikes!
Other stuff has been going on meanwhile. We're relearning the remote for a different satellite system for the TV and different hookups to various equipment. Rich climbed through all the hoops to get his driver's license up here current so he can easily change his address to Arizona. I'm dealing with the local clinic, which no longer has any doctor on staff that I recognize, to not only manage my blood thinner levels but now monitor some weird and unexplained infection I have in one leg. Every question asked to help identify cause is answered "no." Cellulitis is about as generic a name as they can apply to something and still prescribe some hopefully beneficial treatment. In my case, antibiotics. The infection is subcutaneous, producing a rash that doesn't weep or itch, have any detectable point source or cause, but when pressure is applied feels painful about half an inch below the skin.
Weird? At least it's not believed to be contagious. Just ugly. It's likely the warfarin is aiding in the production of little red spots at surface level. So-o-o-o ... another reason to get off it quickly? Or a reason to thank it for pointing out (puns intended of course) there is a problem?
Meanwhile I am slowly getting reacquainted with the reasons Arizona has become home. It's cold up here. My allergies are starting to kick in again. The meds I take for those are blocking my sense of smell so I don't get that cue of "home" up here. Lawns need mowing, weeds taller than 1/2" - more like measured in feet - are taking over the world, mosquitoes climb in the car with you, everything is located in different places from space in the bathroom to layout in the stores. And it's too cool for pool-walking ... assuming you could locate a pool to walk in. The terrain is sans what passes for mountains around Phoenix, but the trees are so tall, plentiful and dense that it's impossible to tell anyway. Clouds are no longer a reason to stop and watch, having gone from rarity worthy of comment to ubiquitous backdrop. I'd hoped for a bit of stargazing in this more rural area, but....
Well, I'm told lots of places back in Arizona are designated night sky viewing areas.
On the other hand, flora and fauna have familiar forms, ones I forget I've missed until seeing them again. I recognize what's in the fields here. We've seen deer, turkeys, sandhill cranes, ducks, finches, and the windshield needs regular bug-scrubbing as well as replacing, due to one too many rocks along the way. The garden offers coneflowers, brown-eyed-susans, liatris, daylilies, lily-of-the-valley bearing still-green seed balls, milkweed bearing scars from very hungry caterpillars which Paul vouches have produced healthy Monarch butterflies. It also sports a plethora of young ash and maple trees, grass, ragweed about to bloom, and likely some very stubborn sowthistles which resist annual pulling. I haven't literally gotten around (the other side of the patch) to checking them. There are a few winter casualties to be cut down as well, had we time, now that energy is no longer the excuse.
Finally, sleep is more elusive. The bed is higher, its mattress harder and bulging up in the middle, and my share has been cut to half by sharing with someone whose every slightest move is extremely painful. It's hard to ignore, and a frequent reminder of my inability to do anything to help. Plus, did I mention that the bathroom is now out the door, up two stairs, across the living room and down the hall? Most of that trek is over a basement resonating chamber, and every creak is magnified. No longer can bare feet on concrete slab allow undetected movement so everybody doesn't have to know just where and when that journey occurs. As well, one bathroom is shared by three people, one of whom seems to be monopolizing it in the early mornings just because of a need to be ready for work!
Maybe I better go use it now before he wakes up.
Wednesday, August 7, 2019
And This Was Just Monday
On the road, start of a 3-day road trip. Plans were made last-minute, stress resulted in two of the previous nights shorting me to two hours sleep each. That may be the cause of what happened that day. Or should I say night, because both occurred after we got to the motel in Tucumcari. (By the way, great pillows there. Sleep issues solved ... sort of.)
First, I was way too polite. It didn't even occur to me until later that what was said thoroughly earned some snark in return, and of course several possible ways of doing it. We had checked in, unloaded into the room, and decided nothing we'd packed would quite do for supper. I made a MacDonalds run. I couldn't raise an appetite for more than a small ice cream cone, which I ate before driving away. Rich decided he was willing to try their new green chili double cheeseburger. (He liked it.)
So when pulling in back to our parking spot at the motel, a guy standing in an open doorway next to the spot, seeing me emerge with my pocketbook and a wee MacDonald's sack, for some reason felt entitled to say, "We all deal with our stress in different ways."
It shouldn't have ended there. Next morning I thought how I could have given him the slow look up and down, letting my contempt register, and asked him what was his coping mechanism for being an asshole. A bunch of other possible comments as well ran through my now thoroughly offended brain. But, of course, I didn't. Darn!
As soon as I reached the room, I changed into pajamas and hit the sack. I dimly realized the panel discussion on the TV had Rachel Maddow on it, verified that is was MSNBC, and found how marvelous the pillows were.
Zonk!
A ringing sound woke me. Could it possibly be time to hit the road again already? Didn't feel like enough time. Maybe hit the snooze alarm for 20? But I didn't remember asking Steve to set an alarm for this morning. Oh wait, he wasn't even in the room, he'd already flown into MSP well ahead of us. Fast as those thoughts flickered through my befuddled consciousness, I heard Rich telling me it was my phone (across the room), fetch it, check that it was Joan calling, bring it to me, and allowed me to open it and answer before she hung up. An hour experienced in 11 seconds!
If that 11 seconds jammed in all that, the two minutes which followed were like swimming through cold molasses. Joan informed me she had my remote. Uhhhhh....OK. She clarified my TV remote, and it was now safely in her house. Uhhhh.... What? She went inside the house and picked up the remote off the table and took it home? Why....? She finally went on to inform me that it was in just a little envelop outside the front door, so small and flat she almost thought it hadn't been delivered.
OHHHH, now I got it! That remote! The one we had been using was starting to flake out, several favorite keys no longer responding. For a bit, a harder touch worked, then hitting a particular corner was necessary, then pushing it to one side while pushing, then.... nothing. Nada. I had just ordered a new one ($16.) the day before we'd decided to leave, and was to be delivered the evening of the day we left early morning. I had asked her to please swing by and rescue it from potential porch thieves. Now it made sense, enough that I managed to thank her.
That was immediately followed by an apology for bring too zonked out to understand what she'd been saying, followed by blaming my sleep deprivation. She promptly ended the call, unlike our typical half hour plus conversations.
My head returned to its pillow, and I was dimly aware that Rich was still watching Rachel before sleeping the rest of the night. I knew I owed Joan an explanation, and she'd get it the next evening. When I'd had a more appropriate amount of sleep, of course.
First, I was way too polite. It didn't even occur to me until later that what was said thoroughly earned some snark in return, and of course several possible ways of doing it. We had checked in, unloaded into the room, and decided nothing we'd packed would quite do for supper. I made a MacDonalds run. I couldn't raise an appetite for more than a small ice cream cone, which I ate before driving away. Rich decided he was willing to try their new green chili double cheeseburger. (He liked it.)
So when pulling in back to our parking spot at the motel, a guy standing in an open doorway next to the spot, seeing me emerge with my pocketbook and a wee MacDonald's sack, for some reason felt entitled to say, "We all deal with our stress in different ways."
It shouldn't have ended there. Next morning I thought how I could have given him the slow look up and down, letting my contempt register, and asked him what was his coping mechanism for being an asshole. A bunch of other possible comments as well ran through my now thoroughly offended brain. But, of course, I didn't. Darn!
As soon as I reached the room, I changed into pajamas and hit the sack. I dimly realized the panel discussion on the TV had Rachel Maddow on it, verified that is was MSNBC, and found how marvelous the pillows were.
Zonk!
A ringing sound woke me. Could it possibly be time to hit the road again already? Didn't feel like enough time. Maybe hit the snooze alarm for 20? But I didn't remember asking Steve to set an alarm for this morning. Oh wait, he wasn't even in the room, he'd already flown into MSP well ahead of us. Fast as those thoughts flickered through my befuddled consciousness, I heard Rich telling me it was my phone (across the room), fetch it, check that it was Joan calling, bring it to me, and allowed me to open it and answer before she hung up. An hour experienced in 11 seconds!
If that 11 seconds jammed in all that, the two minutes which followed were like swimming through cold molasses. Joan informed me she had my remote. Uhhhhh....OK. She clarified my TV remote, and it was now safely in her house. Uhhhh.... What? She went inside the house and picked up the remote off the table and took it home? Why....? She finally went on to inform me that it was in just a little envelop outside the front door, so small and flat she almost thought it hadn't been delivered.
OHHHH, now I got it! That remote! The one we had been using was starting to flake out, several favorite keys no longer responding. For a bit, a harder touch worked, then hitting a particular corner was necessary, then pushing it to one side while pushing, then.... nothing. Nada. I had just ordered a new one ($16.) the day before we'd decided to leave, and was to be delivered the evening of the day we left early morning. I had asked her to please swing by and rescue it from potential porch thieves. Now it made sense, enough that I managed to thank her.
That was immediately followed by an apology for bring too zonked out to understand what she'd been saying, followed by blaming my sleep deprivation. She promptly ended the call, unlike our typical half hour plus conversations.
My head returned to its pillow, and I was dimly aware that Rich was still watching Rachel before sleeping the rest of the night. I knew I owed Joan an explanation, and she'd get it the next evening. When I'd had a more appropriate amount of sleep, of course.
Thursday, August 1, 2019
When They Say....
When the adults in your life talk to you about your "potential", what they're really saying is that they're disappointed in you. If they say you haven't lived up to their expectations, they're trying to guilt you into changing. When they say you haven't lived up to your potential, they're trying to shame you into changing. They probably think they're telling you that they love you.
So good luck.
When your HMO says you can choose between Dr. A and Dr. B, but Dr. C is not in the plan, what they're really saying is that these docs are cheap. They're cheap because they're not the best around and have to lower their rates just to get business. Dr. C is great, but.... They probably want you to think they're telling you where you can get good treatment.
So good luck.
So good luck.
When your HMO says you can choose between Dr. A and Dr. B, but Dr. C is not in the plan, what they're really saying is that these docs are cheap. They're cheap because they're not the best around and have to lower their rates just to get business. Dr. C is great, but.... They probably want you to think they're telling you where you can get good treatment.
So good luck.
Percoset: Side Effects
Sometimes the brain does work slowly. But it still works.
A few days ago Steve confided to me that his hands were itching ferociously, and they weren't the only new itch. We looked at his hands and saw nothing. No sign of rash, swelling. Nothing. Still, I offered him one of my antihistamines, just in case. Now an OTC drug, it seemed safe enough to give it a try.
No help.
It wasn't until the next morning the brain kicked in ... productively. I knew he'd been on fairly regular doses of Percoset for several months due to all the delays in fixing his back pain. I finally remembered why I quit taking it. Itching! It's also the reason I never take codeine. While I frequently got raised eyebrows when I never had adverse side effects from Perc, considering the two are related, I never thought I'd start to react to it after many years of it being a usable painkiller for me. I still bless the four months I had it after my knee surgeries. But after one of my heart procedures, when a few were prescribed for pain, I came down with a bad case of the "itchies". Everywhere.
Perhaps it just took that long for my body to recognize its similarity to codeine and decide to react to this too. Perhaps it was just that it wasn't really needed for pain this last time so there was a lot of unneeded chemicals floating around in my blood looking for something else to attack. I mean, really, who knows? But percoset is now off my available painkiller list. Let's hope I never need it like I did after knee surgery. Vicodin does absolutely nothing for me. In extreme cases ibuprofin can't quite cut it. What then might be my choices?
At any rate, Steve informed me this morning that all the itching has stopped, and he's now on a regimen of 800 mg. ibuprofin, 4 X day, waiting for his pain interrupter procedure to be scheduled.
And waiting....
And waiting....
A few days ago Steve confided to me that his hands were itching ferociously, and they weren't the only new itch. We looked at his hands and saw nothing. No sign of rash, swelling. Nothing. Still, I offered him one of my antihistamines, just in case. Now an OTC drug, it seemed safe enough to give it a try.
No help.
It wasn't until the next morning the brain kicked in ... productively. I knew he'd been on fairly regular doses of Percoset for several months due to all the delays in fixing his back pain. I finally remembered why I quit taking it. Itching! It's also the reason I never take codeine. While I frequently got raised eyebrows when I never had adverse side effects from Perc, considering the two are related, I never thought I'd start to react to it after many years of it being a usable painkiller for me. I still bless the four months I had it after my knee surgeries. But after one of my heart procedures, when a few were prescribed for pain, I came down with a bad case of the "itchies". Everywhere.
Perhaps it just took that long for my body to recognize its similarity to codeine and decide to react to this too. Perhaps it was just that it wasn't really needed for pain this last time so there was a lot of unneeded chemicals floating around in my blood looking for something else to attack. I mean, really, who knows? But percoset is now off my available painkiller list. Let's hope I never need it like I did after knee surgery. Vicodin does absolutely nothing for me. In extreme cases ibuprofin can't quite cut it. What then might be my choices?
At any rate, Steve informed me this morning that all the itching has stopped, and he's now on a regimen of 800 mg. ibuprofin, 4 X day, waiting for his pain interrupter procedure to be scheduled.
And waiting....
And waiting....
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
