Surviving the Heat Wave

The weatherman is giving us a scorcher of a week.  Seems we are under a "high pressure ridge" which will keep the remnants of Hurricane Hillary to our north, so no benefit in terms of rain for the next week or so.  Monday is the first of four days in a row predicted to top the 100 degree mark (F, of course).  The last time I remember a week like this was the summer Dad took us camping... I'm thinking 1963?  We drove up to Colorado, where in Lima they apologized for the heat (it was 90) and we said, "That's OK, it's 110 back in Lincoln, Nebraska."  And our '63 Rambler American did NOT have AC (neither did our house, back home).

On that trip, we encountered the concept of flash floods in the mountains.  Big Thompson canyon is known for them, but we first saw them at the foot of Pike's Peak.  That was one camping trip.  We begged Daddy to stop at a motel the next night, and he did, in Estes Park.

Colorado is an amazingly beautiful state.  But on that particular trip, I think we kids at least were "over it" by then.

Back to the present day:  Monday's eye appointment

I saw my regular dude that prescribes my glasses.  He did an exam of the eye that had the cataract removed, not paying much attention to the other one.  He tested my vision on just that side, shined a light and looked at its innards, and pronounced it healing just as it should.  He said they cannot prescribe new lenses until 3-4 weeks post-surgery, and we made an appointment for September 11th to do that bit.

He said I might expect to continue to see the floaters that are an aftereffect of medication for a couple more weeks, and that my vision could both improve and deteriorate during the next few weeks.  This is all normal.  So onward!

My older sister has agreed to drive me that day, since they plan to dilate my eyes.  So all ducks in a row for that next chapter.

Tuesday I can go back to the trainer

I have no restrictions on activity, but I expect I'll be doing a gentle re-intro workout. I'm looking forward to my warm-up on the elliptical, watching the activity across the street, with two eyes that see!

I did put on my "auto-hanky" (a.k.a. cloth mask) for my workout.  My nose was feeling a bit drippy, and I was prepared to work out sans glasses that way.  I enjoyed reading signs across the road without them.

Look who's out of her under-couch cave!

Rubia came up the stairs to greet me when I emerged from my bedroom for the day on Tuesday.  She's moving slow, but she's moving.  Monday I had got out the wet cat food to tempt her out.  Each morning I've been refilling the water dish, and that brings her out for a bit, too.  Little dear, still frail, but improving, and able to live as a geriatric cat as long as I don't disturb her routine too much (like having other people here, or heaven forbid, Carl).

Speaking of Carl... the plan is to meet him and his paw-rents at the dog bar this evening.  Give me my canine fix, not just Carl but all his furry friends, too.

Life is good.  Spark on!

Going to the Movies

 

See that big empty space?  That's half of the building where I used to work (remember the Spark blogs about the "Caves of Steel"?)

In any case, they are taking both this building, and one across the street from where I used to park down and replacing them with something else.  This is how we do things in the wide open spaces of Nebraska.  Economically, it's easier to tear down and build new than it is to "preserve"... so, here we are.

What was I doing downtown?  I so rarely go there!  But today I had tickets for myself and kid sis Alicia to go see The Barbie Movie.  We wanted a morning showing, to avoid the heat of mid-day, and the only place in town with morning showings was the big Grand Theater downtown.

We left Dexter in a nice shady garage and walked around the block to the main theater entrance.  We found the seats and discovered that I had misread the online map, but we were early enough to go get them switched to the ones I originally intended to book (or close to it).  There was plenty of room, not crowded.  But I put my mask on anyway, since the news folks are saying we have Covid cases ticking up again.  

Sunday dawned gray, hazy, maybe a little high level smoke from Canada?  It was already quite warm for the early hour, and I decided it was a good day to walk in the park.  I took a chat break as a lovely younger woman was walking a German Shorthaired Pointer, and they are my favorite dog breed.  There was a slight breeze so it didn't see quite as beastly as it was to become later.

The rest of the day will be dedicated to calm and quiet.  I did entice Rubia out from under the sofa with a fresh bowl of water.  Timid gal, after a short social session she tucked right back into her hiding space.

The Prisoner, meanwhile, is doing his usual in, out, in, out... come in and eat or drink, go out and collapse into a cat-coma on the deck.  As soon as he hears the latch on the door, he's right there to have another inside respite.  And yes, there is water outside, too.

The eyes are becoming "normal" to my brain.  I can still tell the difference in brightness between the one with the new lens in it and the one with a cataract "not yet ripe" in it.  Alicia was watching me play with it at the movie on Saturday, taking the glasses off, putting them back on, etc.  I'm just like my older cat who goes out and in and out and in.  The post-op instructions say I can wear or not wear the glasses in this interim period before the prescription is changed... "whatever seems more comfortable".  I take them off when at the computer, mostly, and put them on to drive or walk the neighborhood.

Monday:  the regular eye doctor, and new prescription for glasses anticipated.

Life is good.  Spark on!

It's Friday!

 

The Prisoner is not impressed with the Thank You card from the Surgical Hospital, but I was!  It was signed by all the "helpers"... from the gal who took me upstairs and checked me in, took my vitals, etc., to the anesthetic crew who gave me those "I'm not worried at all" drugs, to the gal who fed me a chocolate chip cookie afterwards.  They were all so kind, but I did not expect a physical thank you card!  I have to say this place had class and they did take "excellent care" of me, and I'm pretty sure of every other patient that crosses their threshold.  These attitudes are only present when supported by the leadership!

I slept without the eye guard Thursday night.  

Friday morning I filled 3 bins with volunteer weeds and trees, thus freeing the hose.

My morning's handiwork.  

Silly mulberry trees.  It doesn't take long for them to grow!

A year ago we were talking bare ground inside that fence... and trying to grow clover.  Oh, well, the "new" lawn service killed off the clover, and whatever weeds were not part of what they killed took over.

After my short "Frau Hackenbuscher" session, I have taken Friday easy.  I did go back in to Disney plus to watch another episode of The Mandalorian season 3.  Amusing bit of trivia:  my son set up the avatars for the various family members.  Who did he cast ME as?  Any guesses?  She Hulk!  I did not recognize the character, not being a modern day Marvel Universe fan, but here's one image I dug up online, doesn't quite match the Disney icon.  This one's prettier than the one he picked for me.

Rubia did another disappear for a day and a half, but she was back again this morning and is hiding in her cave under the couch for most of Friday.

So life is going on, and Life is Good.  Spark on!

The joy in watching Grogu

One of the most amazing differences of the past day or so.. I can read the subtitles from across the room!  And they are sharp, as is the TV image.  Since my son installed / logged in to his Disney Plus membership on my one TV, I'm catching up on season 3 of The Mandalorian, and who doesn't love a baby "Yoda" (even though his name is Grogu)?

Also part of my "taking it easy" time has been re-watching The Red Violin.  This would be the third time.  The first time I think I rented it from Blockbuster?  I don't know but it seems like forever ago.  I remember loving it as it went from the audio being in Italian, to German, to French, to English, to some Chinese language, and back, in the end to English, while the mystery of this specific instrument is intertwined with a Tarot card reading giving to the pregnant wife of the maker, before the violin was varnished.  As it turned out, she died in childbirth, and the grieving violin maker added her blood to the varnish.

The Tarot card reading told not the wife's future, but the future of the violin that carried her blood in its varnish.  Each viewing one notices something different.  It is time-sliced between the origin of the violin, slices of its history across multiple owners and players, and the current day when it is being auctioned off.  The ending has a fitting twist to it.

Wednesday marked 48 hours since the cataract surgery and I felt pretty normal.  I still was to put the eye guard on at night, but I walked with my sis on that hot afternoon, and took a careful shower before brushing my teeth after supper.  I left the Thursday workout off the calendar, though, which should make my first gym workout back on Tuesday, after I see the eyeglasses guy on Monday.

Thursday morning I let myself sleep a little later, "catching up" as is my habit when I've had a choppy sleep week.  

I have to state outright that I love having secure (supposedly) online access to medical records.  Thanks to this, I have already had access to my surgeon's report of my cataract procedure from Monday.  Technology is wonderful... when it works.  Last week I reported my distrust of some of the automotive enhancements, but I know that surgery has been enhanced a lot, too, to be more accurate, to reduce risks.

Thursday has also brought on my first trip behind the wheel since surgery.  Awesome!  I did my little close alternate eyes while stopped at a light and assess.  Yes, there is some blurriness on the right side when wearing my glasses... but it is so superior to what it was like having that cataract in the way as to be miraculous.  And the two eyes together, yes, I'm confident driving.  I expect when I see the eye guy on Monday he'll step down the distance prescription on that side.

I needed to fill Dexter's tank to take advantage of expiring fuel savings... and whup, it stopped at 4.49 gallons.  My 60 cents a gallon only saved me $2.80.  But $2.80 is a cup of coffee, so, there's that!

I went on over to the grocery store and filled in my list.  I found out they had actually got the dishwasher detergent brand I liked back at the beginning of the pandemic (they had not carried it before), and it was 30 more washes for 60 cents.  Hey, don't we all love a bargain?  This was a brand I knew and had tried and liked. I was not even taking a huge chance.

As I pulled my cart up to the checkout... I was behind the local firefighters.  Chiseled young men... and the checkers were making a big deal over them and taking selfies and all that.  In fact, the fire department guys often go here for their groceries (and there was a great special on chicken breasts, which seemed to be a lot of what they had on the belt).  Took me right back to when my son went into the military, and I suddenly didn't have to feed him.  My grocery bill dropped by about 66%.

My kid sis has talked me into going to the Barbie movie, which I had been prevented from seeing by the side-tracking RSV and surgery.  As a consequence, Saturday morning I will get my update on cultural references from this movie, and Alicia will see it for the fourth time.  Kind of reminds me of my reaction to seeing Apollo 13, and years prior to that, to The Sting.  Find someone who hasn't seen it to drag along and see it again!  I'm sure you all have specific movies that had this effect on you!

The process of going to the movies has been changed since the pandemic.  It was already changing before that with online tickets and such.  It's been about a year since I went to a movie in a theater, but the website remembers me from the last time I bought tickets online... so greeted me with "Welcome Back" message.

Now it's time to go do laundry.  Recovery keeps on keeping on.  Here's wishing you all a fine ending to the week!

Life is good!  Spark on.

Sunrise and seeing

 

I love the way the tree in my sister's neighbor's yard is in silhouette against the sunrise-tinged clouds.  Photo taken Friday August 11, 2023.

Good news:  I made it through to Saturday morning, and my sister's cats survived her absence.  Ran out of tuna juice exactly on time, Saturday morning.

Sis got home safely, to be greeted by her kitties, later in the morning.

Sunday morning dawned rainy.  We still need it, although my half of the city is down to "moderate" drought, rather than the "severe" it was the week prior.  Something about the way a Summer morning rain smells takes me right back to childhood... how about you?

Surgery morning (Monday) dawned cool.  I wore long pants and a zipper sweatshirt over a t-shirt.  It was a very interesting morning, and they were right on schedule with check in and procedure.  It was like an assembly line precision, and I was awake albeit the eye was drugged to inaction.  Inside my head it was like watching an abstract movie while Dr. S. did his thing.

Afterwards they fed me a cookie and sent me on my way.  My daughter in law was my driver Monday morning, right on time to the minute.  My older sis showed up at my house just as we also arrived, and things went well.  I tried to take a little nap but I was alert and not feeling it.  The nap was like my grandmother's:  5 to 10 minutes.

Here's the eye guard they put on.  I'm the mirror image of the man they were wheeling out as they brought me up to be prepped.  He had his left eye done, I had my right one done.  

Sis cooked me oatmeal, which is my normal breakfast, and that had been delayed by the procedure.  The post-op instructions said I wasn't to cook or drive, but have a "responsible adult" to do these things for me.

Sis and I had a good family catch-up.  We watched the tail end of the last episode of Grantchester (I hadn't finished it, she didn't mind watching it again). It did everything a season finale should, from wrapping up loose ends to setting up the possibility of a next season.  I do hope there will be a next season!

We also watched Jeopardy and did old fashioned fist bumps when one or the other of us got a question right before the contestants did.  We shook our heads and mourned over the Maui wild fire news.  We talked a little bit of spirituality and metaphysics based on her Bible study experiences.

The Prisoner took his time deciding my sis was a "safe" person, but once he did, she was fully accepted to pet the excess hair off.  

My son took over the babysitting when he got off work.  He brought his take-out supper with him.  We chatted about his day, his work, the decisions he and his wife are making about life (which fit in harmoniously with what she had chatted with me in the morning).  Good kids.  Well suited to one another, and they TALK to each other and LISTEN to each other.  Speaks well for their future together.

He set up my TV with his Disney plus account and we watched an episode of The Mandalorian together.  Then I was ready to turn into a pumpkin and did my dental hygiene stuff and put myself to bed.

Observations about living with the eye guard:  makes it harder to blow my nose... kind of like having glasses frames in the way, but not able to be shoved out of the way.  Also makes it a little harder to brush the teeth, as it restricts the movement of the cheek, just a tad.  I was VERY careful changing to my PJ's and again when I got up in the morning.  Then of course there is the whole sleep position thing.

The Prisoner wouldn't come in for me at bedtime, but sometime in the night, he allowed my son to let him in, and proceeded to go meow at him where son was sleeping.

My saint of a son got up in time to deliver me to the eye doctor, where they removed my eye shield.  OMG!  No reprogramming needed.  It's like the world is bright and shiny again.  I could also see all the dirty/dusty bits when I got home.  The spots on the windows, the cat hair everywhere... "is seeing better such a good thing?" asks my lazy/hazy visioned past.

But seriously, my bad eye instantaneously became my good eye and vice versa.  Dr. S. measured my eye pressure, pronounced that the eye looked good, and I'm already scheduled with Dr. J to adjust my glasses prescription in a week.

The shield was sent home with me, along with some tape to use to put it on for overnight for the next week until  I see Dr. J.  We stopped at the HyVee and bought some artificial tears "just in case" it starts to bother me.  Major instruction is the same as others have reported:  don't rub it!

I look a little like I have a black eye, but trying out wearing my old glasses, I see better than I did with the cataract, so I'm sure I'll be able to manage driving to that appointment.

I thought that I had good color vision.  I still think I did, in terms of identifying different subtle shads... BUT, once this surgery was done, it is as though a bright light has been shined on those colors.  I kept saying "Wow.  Oh, wow!  Look at my shoes... they are so shiny!"  "Look at that painting / print on the wall... it's like, three dimensional!"

So, anybody who's been dragging their feet on this one, I'll tell you the same thing that those of you who went before me said:  nothing to fear, and Oh, So, Worth, It!

Another vote to "go for it"!

And Life is Good!  Spark on!

It is almost like a "taper" week

The week leading up to the cataract surgery.  Rubia is supportive:  "I'll purr for you, mama!  Pet me and tell me I'm a pretty kitty.  

Help me up to the counter so that I can drink the running water from the tap, please?"

She's getting stronger and sassier by the day.  Funny what having a home will do for a cat!  She's regaining some of her jumping ability.

Meanwhile, Sleeping Beauty's forest has been greatly boosted by the recent rains.  Sigh.

My older sister called on Sunday morning to confirm arrangements to medicate the cats starting Monday morning.  It's going to be a busy week with phone call from the surgical hospital, pre-op physical and blood draw, two trainer workouts, and the cat-care.

Monday morning I had set the alarm for 6 a.m. and got up when it sounded.  I tend to sleep with the sun, and mornings are a trifle later than they were a couple of weeks ago, so I was at my sister's medicating, litter box cleaning and feeding her kitties at 7:30, an hour later than I was in June.  It was cool and cloudy, which is in keeping with the variable weather patterns we've been having.  Sometimes we do get a cool week in August.

Tuesday was my "busy" day.  Cats.  Trainer.  Phone call from the surgical hospital.  Pre-op physical at my primary.  I went into a whole lot of detail with the surgical admittance nurse about the RSV.  She says I'm right on the borderline for what the anesthetists like for symptom free from respiratory stuff pre-surgery.  She'll run it by them, and they will call me if there's a stop sign encountered from that communication.  As of Thursday, no call from them, so "no news is good news" on that front.

When I got to the doctor's office for the pre-op exam, they expressed surprise that the blood draw had been scheduled for later.  They went ahead and took my blood, and would have results on Wednesday.  Expect a phone call with results.

Wednesday was a dark and drippy kind of day, at least the first half.  Not solid rain.  Intermittent rain.  But thick gray clouds.  The cats were kind of in and out and in and out the sliding deck door.  Laundry was the order of the day for me.  The phone call from the Doctor's office came in the afternoon.  All bloodwork was normal.  So, looks like all the hurdles have been jumped, and Monday morning is a "go".

Kid sis Alicia showed up for our Wednesday afternoon walk, which had been waved off the past couple of weeks, due to my little bout with RSV and the heat and school year start stress for her.  She's living one day at a time as this is the school administration's busiest week of the year.

As we were getting close to done with our walk, my phone rang.  It was my son.  His truck is in for a couple of recalls, they are keeping it longer than originally planned for.  He has a loaner vehicle that he's kind of impressed with and wanted to know if I wanted to see it.  Sure... drop on over!

It's an electric Mustang, and it's fancy.  He took me for a ride in it and it's scary electronically controlled.  Got the Zoomies?  This thing zooms!  But sorry, it is not a Mustang to those of us who grew up with the original!  It did not trip the nostalgia circuits in my psyche.

Still, it has all those Tesla-like performance things on it, and a HUGE screen with all the controls.  The parking brake, for example, doesn't seem like a parking brake to me.  It's like the marriage of a computer (even more than before) and a car.  Supposedly it won't let you kill yourself (brakes for you, keeps you in your lane, etc.) but you know, some of those features YOU don't want to test for yourself!  And of course it's expensive.  Almost twice the price of the first house I bought with my husband in 1981.

In any case, after scaring the bejesus out of me with its acceleration power (wow, that could get you into trouble, or it could get you out of trouble).  Fortunately, my kid was raised by me, so he's as skeptical of these things as I am.  Programmed too many computers to trust that there would not be unintended consequences, that's me.

So... bottom line, I've been MIA from blogging, and probably will be again.  Will let y'all know how the surgery goes, probably late next week, after a few days of recovery.

Look who's all buff and healthy!  I was trying to get his photo while he was sitting back at that rail intersection, with the green leafy setting, but he came toward me as soon as I lifted the camera.

The Prisoner says:  "Life is Good.  Spark on!"

 

August already: Rubia Update

 

Rubia has chosen her "den", in a corner between the bookcase and an end table, and there she hides, safe from being disturbed by me or her brother.  Clearly she feels safe there.

I've been working at brushing her, to get the burrs out.  I give her breaks between sessions.  I dosed her and also The Prisoner with their regular monthly pest control "stuff".  

I have noticed as she's been home longer that she seems older than she did two weeks ago.  She seems frailer.  I can feel her spine.  She's light when I lift her.  Of course, some of that is being away from her regular food source, but not being willing / able to leap up to the tabletop or the counter and demand running water from the tap is part of this "seems frail".

So I baby talk to her, offer fresh water, food is always out.  The Prisoner has kept up his choice of being outdoors most of the time.  Rubia has yet to decide to leave the confines of the house since returning, and to be honest she had been more apt to choose to stay in even before her escapades.

I took a brief walk Tuesday morning, to see if I could last 15 minutes of steady movement (plotting ahead for the return to the trainer on Thursday).  Wednesday morning I went a little longer.  

Walking gives me "ponder" time, and I was pondering over the senses, specifically vision and hearing.  I was thinking about how totally subjective they are.  They can measure things in your eyes and ears but what really counts is how your brain interprets the signals.  I thought about this as my vision in my worse cataract eye adjusted to walking... moving into "motion sensor" mode, and adjusting to be the "helper" eye to the one with the less severe cataract.

Ears are helped by context, in the interpretation of speech, just as eyes are helped by it in reading.  

Based on these "test walks" I decided I was good to go work out with the trainer on Thursday.  He dropped the weights a shade, as I had missed three workouts in a row.  But it felt good to be back!

Life is good.  Spark on!