What A Night

Veronica and I went to bed last night at our usual time...11:00PM. After falling sound asleep and less than an hour after going to bed, we were woke up by the sound of rushing water. The sound was loud enough to wake us both up. It turned out to be raining very heavily outside. We always keep our windows open in the Fall and Winter. We like the cold brisk air while we sleep. Because our windows were wide open, we both jumped out of bed without giving it a thought. Just like I have done many times in the past. This time was different. I did not take the time to think that I had just had foot surgery a couple of days ago. Both feet landed on the floor and it took a second to figure out that something was not quite right and that I might have made a slight error in judgement. Didn't take long before the pain woke me completely up and I immediately took the pressure off of my left foot. Using my walker, I hopped over to the window and closed it while Veronica went running around to close all of the other open windows. My foot hurt for a while after that incident but this morning it seems to be fine. Luckily I don't think that I did any long lasting damage nor anything that would seriously delay the healing process nor the positive outcome that I am hoping for. I have been using a walker rather than crutches to get around. The walker has 4 contact points on the ground whereas the crutches only have 2. I am not the most agile person around and balance has always been an issue for me. If they made a walker with 6 or 8 contact points with the ground, believe me, I would have one of those. One thing I have learned is that even with a walker, hopping around on one leg can really wear a person out. By the end of the day, I am usually completely exhausted. Today I plan on resting in bed all day and just taking it easy. The only thing that I haven't figured out is how to make hot coffee and get it from the kitchen and into the bedroom with me, without spilling the hot contents all over myself. Maybe a zip line or pulley system from the kitchen to the bedroom is in order. I might have to work on that idea today.

Happy Thanksgiving 2009

Today is Thanksgiving. Veronica and I are doing things totally differently this year. Partly because of my foot surgery and partially because we just wanted to. For our Thanksgiving meal we are having fried chicken, egg noodles for me, some corn, mashed potatoes for Veronica, dinner rolls and then some Pumpkin pie for Veronica. I am not a pie eater and decided to opt out of desert. Change can be good...at least for this year. For some reason I seem to be having the cold sweats today. Not sure what is going on but I will probably be headed back to bed in just a little bit....relax and watch a dvd or some tv.

Post Surgery First Night

Last night was a rough night for sleeping. I was literally up every 40 minutes or so. I had a hard time finding a good sleeping position. Around 3:40 this morning I said "the heck with it" and I decided to sleep on my stomach...my usual sleeping position. Because of my foot, I had to slide all the way down towards the end of the bed. This enabled me to dangle my foot over the end of the bed without putting any bad pressure on my foot. It seemed to work well and I was able to get a few hours of sleep. I wish that I had tried this way earlier in the night because I would have got a lot more sleep. Today will be spent in bed, making up for last nights lost sleep and maybe watching a DVD or 2.

Post Surgery

Here it is, a little past noon and I am already back in my "office", at my computer. Can anyone say "internet addict". All went well with my surgery and so far I have felt very little pain. One of 2 things could be going on with that...either the pain that I was in dwarfed the post operative pain or whatever meds they put into my system has not worn off yet. Either way...so far so good. More to follow when I sharpen up just a bit...at least mentally.

Finally....Surgery

I never thought that I would ever hear myself say this.....but I am so glad that I am having foot surgery tomorrow. Oh I say that with all of the male bravado that I can muster and I am sure that after it is done, I will be whining like a little girly girl....but....I really am glad that I get the surgery done tomorrow. For someone who is usually constantly on the move, as I am, this foot issue sure has put the brakes on my mobility. I have spent the last 2 weeks doing next to nothing. Even short jaunts to our local WalMart have proved to be troublesome. I got everything done around here that I could in the last week or so. Veronica starts her holiday retail hours, which are very long and I wanted to make it so she has little to do when she gets home. I even figured out a way to get the laundry basket up and down the stairs while I shimmy my way up and down on my backside. I have my crutches and a walker strategically located, along with a step stool that I use to hoist myself back up or down from a standing position. The step stool is mainly used when I want to get up and down the stairs. I used it 8 years ago when I had a broken leg and it worked pretty well. Thanksgiving dinner will be a picnic in bed and I have my trusty laptop and will have numerous DVDs to keep me occupied. We need to be at the hospital for my outpatient surgery by 6AM tomorrow morning. Surgery is at 7AM and it should be completed by 7:30. Then after however long it takes me to wake up, we will be back on our way home. I will be doing everything in my power to get healed up and back on my feet as soon as possible because we have some exciting things coming up in our future. More on that at a later date. See you on the "flip side".

A Snow Moose? What A Beautiful Animal!!

I received the following photos and story from my friend John Jacobs, from up in Ontario Canada. I am not sure where it originated from but I thought I would pass it on because it is something that very few people get to see. Thank you for sharing it with us John.

Beautiful Snow Moose A must see…… You probably won't see this again in your life time!

These animals were photographed just north of the Wisconsin border on a highway near Marenisco , MI ... Once in awhile there is an opportunity to take in a piece of nature that you may never see. In these days of unrest and turmoil it is great to see that nature still produces some wondrous beauty for us to appreciate.

The odds of seeing an albino moose are astronomical and to see this in the upper peninsula of Michigan, near Wisconsin, is even greater than astronomical. To see two of them together is nearly impossible.
We wanted to share these photos with as many people as possible because you will probably never have a chance to see this rare sight again.
This is a really special treat, so enjoy the shots of a lifetime.

Busy With Preparations

I have been busy as of late, getting prepared for my upcoming surgery. There are quite a number of things that I need to get done before Tuesday. Some of the things that I am doing are being done in the hope that it will make life easier for Veronica while I am down and out. I have to be at the surgical center at 6AM on Tuesday morning...the 24th. Surgery will start at 7AM and the doctor should be done by 7:30. Then it is just a matter of me getting fully awake so that I can go home. I have already started to get my bed area ready since that will be my primary living area for a while. I went out and got me a lap tray that is actually a computer tray with a built in lamp and mouse pad. I can also use it as a food tray. I plan on stocking up on videos from Blockbuster so that I will have stuff to keep me occupied. I hate being bed ridden. I like to move around and not be stuck in one place for too long. Hopefully the time will pass quickly so that I will get to a point in the healing process, that I can put my walking boot on and move about some. In 6 weeks or so, this will all be just another one of those memories.

Out And About Again

After several days of being couped up, I finally made my way to our local WalMart to do some food shopping. This was the first time that I had been out since the tropical depression made its way through our area. It was still drizzling out but the real rain and winds had died down to almost nothing. Driving through certain areas, I saw many cars parked on the sidewalks and other "higher" locations. This is usually done when the streets around certain neighborhoods get flooded with water. Almost all of the standing water in the streets has subsided. I did not see many trees or limbs down. This time around, it seems that a number of people had sections of their fences blown down. I must have seen 8-10 different fences that had been damaged because of the storm. There weren't as many people out and about today as there usually would be. Walmart was not packed with people either. It made shopping a lot easier.

Stormy Weather

For the last couple of days, the leftovers from Hurricane Ida have been paying us a visit. By the time it reached us, it was a tropical storm and is now considered a Nor'easter. We had a lot of rain...up to about 8-10" here and it was really windy. They clocked a couple of wind gust at approximately 75 miles per hour. We had to go out yesterday so that I could visit my doctor and get the pre-surgery checkup done. While at the doctors office, I got my pneumonia shot...I had already got my seasonal flu vaccine a couple of weeks ago. I am still awaiting the arrival of the H1N1 vaccine. My family doctor has not received it nor has my oncologist. Not sure when they will get it. We were planning on going shopping after my doctors visit but it was too nasty outside. Several streets were blocked off due to high water and you could see many vehicles stuck where they had tried to proceed through the high water. There also many locations where there is no electricity. There were many reports of electrical transformers blowing up. Today the winds have died down but there still is a little rain here and there. I was going to go out food shopping but I decided to wait until tomorrow and let the water on the roads subside. The last thing I want to do is get my vehicle stuck in high water.

Racist And Offensive or Just Plain Humorous

The following information was pieced together from an article written on 11/03/2009 for AOL Television by Daynah Burnett.
This interesting article is about a popular ventriloquist by the name of Jeff Dunham. Dunham has been a ventriloquist for 25 years and currently has his own show on Comedy Central called.....The Jeff Dunham Show...what???....did you expect anything other than that? Dunham's acts generate both controversy and passionate reactions. In his act, five of the seven puppets in his cast of characters are based on racial or cultural stereotypes (José, the jalepeño pepper; Sweet Daddy Dee, the jive-talking pimp; Bubba J, the beer-guzzling redneck), and although Dunham claims he skewers everyone equally, the skewering doesn't seem intended to bridge racial and cultrual divides. In fact, it seems to cement, if not widen, them. Take skeletal Achmed, the Dead Terrorist, whom Dunham claims is not offensive to Muslims in the least (though South Africans disagree). During the act it's revealed that because the dummy has a "Made in China" stamp, Achmed doesn't even think he's Muslim. But one only needs to get to the "72 virgins" joke in Dunham's Achmed bit before it's hard to deny that he's indeed Muslim -- oh, and homophobic, too!
Take a look at the video clip below and you make the call...Racist and Offensive or just Humor. To read the complete article, please click on this link.......
Jeff Dunham Story

Could There Be Light At The End Of This Tunnel?

It has been quite a long time since I have actually sat down and written a blog entry. Lately it has been all about exciting travels and photographs. But there is a flip side to all that appears good. There always has been and always will be. It is kind of like when you leave for an exciting vacation...something that you really are looking forwards to. Sometimes you can leave your place of residence unscathed but usually you must leave with a dose of drama and aggravation, which is kindly provided by others. Anything to start your adventure off on a sour note. And after the long awaited adventure is over with and you are returning to your temporary living quarters, you return with that nagging uneasiness and that ever present under current of trouble that will be awaiting you upon your arrival "home". About 7 or 8 years ago, Veronica and I made a decision to get rid of almost 80 percent of our belongings to move in with my parents, who were getting on in years. The move was made so that we could help out. For me it was to do jobs around the house...mainly on the outside. Veronica also gave up a job in the Savannah, GA area that would have paid a substantially higher amount than what she was going to make in our current location. As life usually has it, things never turn out as they were planned nor hoped for. For me, I did a lot of work around this house and as time has gone by, I have had to pick up more and more responsibilities. I have never really asked for anything in return other than an occasional "thank you" for the help that I have provided. As water and sun are important to a very small plant, the verbal "thank you's" were important to me, so that I felt as if what I was doing meant something to someone....had some worth to it. As the years have gone by, those "thank you's" have gone from few to almost non existent. Once a year I would get a birthday card and in it would be a check along with a brief note on the card, acknowledging my efforts. It was and never will be about the check...I can surely do without it but what was important to me was the acknowledgement. Over the last couple of years, with me doing almost all of the work outside and cleaning up many loose ends inside, I found myself just doing the work with absolutely no good feelings about doing it. I kept on plugging away and the more I did, the less I got out of it. It wasn't like what I wanted or needed would cost someone out of pocket expenses...all I wanted was 2 words that would have made it all worthwhile to me..."thank you". When I brought this up to my mother, she actually scoffed about it. It was easier for her to write a check once a year for a hundred dollars than it was to make someone feel worthwhile and appreciated by saying two words once in a while...once a month or even once every two months. Sometimes we just need a little stroking ....a little word here and there...something that is said that gives us feelings of worth....something...food to nourish the soul. I really got tired of feeling taken for granted and getting the feelings that I owed someone something or that they were entitled to what I had to offer. I have told her several times that I did not want the money...that there were things that are more important to me. I told her what I wanted and what I needed to hear and what I got in return was to be scoffed at. There has been so many bad things, things that are so totally wrong, that have happened to Veronica and I since we moved here. It really was a bad mistake...a donation of 7-8 years of our lives....years that will never be replaced. In a couple of weeks, I will be having my foot surgery and I need to do everything possible to get back into a healthy state and rather quickly. There is a good chance that things can change in the next 4-5 months. I have been here before...a place and time where I think that we might be moving on to a better life away from here, only to have it fall apart and not happen. I have very guarded hopes that this might really be the time that it truly happens. Maybe it will be time to close one really bad chapter of this book of life and open up a much happier chapter for Veronica and I. I will wait and see with reserved optimism for that day to come. A chance to start over from scratch and hopefully make up for that lost time. Could that be the light at the end of this dismal tunnel? The next few months will tell.

Final Thoughts of Vegas

After being back from Vegas for a couple of weeks, we have come to some final thoughts about Vegas. Veronica and I had a good time there. There is so much to see and do there, far beyond the gambling, that there is no way that you can see it all in a couple of days. We have both decided that we would like to return to Vegas at some point in the future....preferably at the beginning of the year...like around Jan or February. This is the "off season" and the weather is much cooler. Next time we go out there, we will take in a tour of the Grand Canyon along with a couple of more shows. Plus I want to take many more photos and video but this time using Veronica's good camera. More night photos are in order too. Can't pass up all of the nighttime glitz and flashing lights. Maybe we will return in 2011 and by that time my feet should be doing fine and I will be able to walk where I want to without all of the pain. All in all our Vegas trip was fun and we are looking forward to our next visit. And speaking of feet....I am scheduled to have my foot surgery on Tuesday, 11/24. Turkey dinner will most likely be held in my bed. Whatever it takes to get my foot back to normal.