Did I say slow?

 Well, this week has been different.  My wife had two doctor's appointments, one Tuesday and one Thursday, both in Vegas!  That's a quick 250 miles more on the car.  What the heck; it's just passed 78,000 miles and it's a 2016 model.  Well, at least we got to eat 2 lunches at BJ's Restaurant.  They have nice food, good beer and a desert they call the pizookie.  It is a small, freshly baked cookie-sized cake with a scoop of ice cream on top.  I'm sorry to report that I'm addicted to them.  I guess I should be glad we don't have a BJ's here in town.  

The good news from all that is that my wife is ok'd to walk using the walker.  It's not like she's going to be running around the block any time soon but walking is a good thing!  Check out the hardware in her ankle.  

 At any rate, the doctor liked the look and told her to go walk around.  He also got her signed up for a different, more complete sort of PT.  We'll start that next week.  Fun and games!

We got home and spent a quiet night; our dog was in a kennel.  I went and got him this a.m.  He's not too happy from being there but what can you do?  We fed him tonight and I went out with him in the back yard.  We had a nice but not spectacular sunset. 

Well, that's almost all the news.  There is a new house being built across from us and one empty street over so we get a great view of it.  They have a good sized area built for horses and now we have 4 new neighbors!  They are quiet but we'll see how they are when their humans come to annoy them.
 

Have a good one & try not to get arrested for saying bad things about Trump!  Take care. 

Yet more life in the SLOW lane!

 Yep, things are moving along but pretty much at a snail's pace.  My wife is still in her wheelchair; hopefully she'll get out of it in a couple weeks but who knows.  In the mean time she is trying out the walker for 20-30 feet at a time.  Honestly, for her that's pretty good.  I'm just happy that I can help her!  I mean otherwise we'd be in some kind of care home.

In other exciting news we have had the usual 6-8 doctor visits each month (not counting the physical therapist who is checking on my wife).  It's a good excuse for driving into Vegas so I can visit the Total Wine store.  Otherwise we just wander around our 'little' town.  I checked it on Google Maps and it worked out to be something like 11 miles east to west and 19 miles north to south!  As you might suspect, one of the most common places for us to go these days in the Intermountain Healthcare building.  They have a pretty large parking area on two sides of the building.  As I was leaving the other day I had to take a couple of photos.  

 

Yep, two wild horses!  There are a fair number around here but I've never seen them by the doctor's office.  Usually they prefer a little park over by the county office where there is lots of nice green grass and shade trees.  They even get into our local paper:  https://pvtimes.com/news/no-touching-or-feeding-the-horses-152526/.  There was at least one more horse in the area but it was hiding behind a cafe and I couldn't get a photo of it.  We have wild burros around as well but they are more likely to be hiding out in the desert areas.  BTW, those mountains in the background are in California.  

Anyway, that's all the news from around here.  Exciting stuff, huh.  Have a good one and try to keep out of trouble! 

Just creeping along

 Ok, it's been way too long but we are just having too much fun visiting doctors and other shit.  It is also true that there isn't much going on around here.  There are some houses being built; that is VERY different from a few years ago but, still, it's not really affecting us.  One of these days I'm sure it will and we'll get new neighbors.  The weather is being weird.  One day it is 50F and the next it is 85F and the next 105F.  One day it is quiet and the next we have 20 mph wind.  Again, what do I do?  I drive the car to the store and buy some stuff for dinner then drive home.  

Out in the world we've got Mr. Trump, AKA the Idiot in Chief, who just keeps doing stupid things.  I have to admit that he isn't as stupid as the people he's appointed to be in his cabinet but, well, that would be a stretch.  One of the really minor things Mr. Trump did just recently was to pardon a local politician who was appointed a judge and then found guilty of fraud.  She was in Las Vegas and started a support group to build a statue of a local policeman who was killed in the line of duty.  Then she used the money people donated to pay her rent, pay for her daughter's wedding and some plastic surgery.  She was found guilty of a felony of conspiracy and wire fraud.  So our felon of a president chose to remove the felony from this sorry ass judge.  Actually, on a scale of 1 to 10, it's way down there but it's still just so wrong!

OMG!  Here it is the 10th of August and I'm finding a post I started almost two weeks ago!  Well, to be honest there isn't much going on around here.  My wife's ankle is still causing her pain and she's still in the wheelchair.  Helping her around is my new exercise routine.  She has an appointment with her surgeon next week but I'm thinking she will have to be pretty careful for quite a while yet.  I'm going to the grocery store a couple of times a week and going to our favorite restaurants for take-out a couple more but that's about it.  A couple days of the week I don't even get to leave the house.  And an exercise routine, forget about it!

There are plenty of fires out here in the West.  They are pretty unlikely in this part of Nevada but it sure isn't impossible.  There are fire bans all over.  What they can't ban is the smoke from  the fires!  Most of the fires are in California but there are some fairly large ones on government land that used to be part of the Nuclear Test Site.  We have mountains to the east and west of us so the smoke tends to come down the valley areas.  Bottom line is that we can barely see mountains that are only 6 or 8 miles away.  Happily neither my wife or myself is bothered by the smoke but some folks do have problems with it.

So that's the story from here in Pahrump.  Oh, one funny story about the president.  We were driving out of a parking lot and a speed limit sign was blocking part of a sign naming the business in the building.  All I could see of the 2nd one was 'RUMP' and of course I was shocked that someone had opened an office for the president.  Turns out it was really something like 'JOHN'S PHARMACY PAHRUMP' and I could only see the last little part of it.  Whew!  That was a relief!  Take care.  Keep washing those hands and stay away from the sickies.

Happy Independence Day!!

 And a nice windy day it is too!  (Well, yesterday, I'm having too much fun to write a whole post in one day!)

In the good news department my wife had her surgery on the 2nd and seems to be doing fine even if she is in some pain.  She broke her ankle just a bit over 2 years ago and had it operated on then.  Unfortunately that surgery didn't work and now she is having it done over again.  She came out and basically feels ok but she is going to be in a wheelchair for at LEAST 6 weeks!  So Don is getting his exercise doing stuff around the house including pushing that chair.  With any luck at all I won't poison us both with my cooking.  Lots of fun but if it works, that will be great.  

The surgery day was kind of nasty I must say.  We live in the boonies so we went to Vegas on the 1st and spent the night in a hotel.  We were told she had to shower that morning, not the previous evening, so we were up at 04:00 am to shower and get to the hospital by 05:30 to do paperwork.  Yeah, special!  Of course we then waited until the surgeon showed up about 07:45.  She got to go in to her hospital bed and I got to sit in the waiting room.  They have a special room for people waiting for people getting 1 day surgeries but I must say I was there more than most of the other family members.  It was 11:15 by the time the surgeon came out and told me the surgery was successful and she was in recovery.  It was shortly after 1 pm when I got to see her and by 1:20 we were loading into the car to come home.  There were 2 nurses helping me get her situated in the car so you can guess that getting her out when we made it here was LOTS of fun!  But we managed it (by 3:20 pm) and she's been holding down the recliner, her bed or the wheelchair ever since.  She's got quite a bit of pain and tons of pills but who knows what is going to happen.  I'm sure I'll be talking about it here.

We live in a weird world.  We live in Nye County.  In our county it is legal to possess fireworks and there are 3 large sellers of fireworks and a couple smaller ones.  However, it is illegal to use the big fireworks in Nye County except in a designated area and for a few days around the 4th (https://pvtimes.com/news/officials-urging-safety-this-4th-of-july-144905/).  In Clark County, where Las Vegas is, it is not legal to possess fireworks.  So every year around Independence Day there are large signs put up saying 'Do not take fireworks into Clark County'.  And others saying 'Do not buy illegal fireworks'.  Of course people ignore all that.  Just this week some guy from Las Vegas came into one of our large stores and bought $500 worth of 'safe and sane' fireworks.  The problem is that Clark County does it's own testing and that stuff hadn't been tested so the the stuff was illegal.  He was stopped as soon as he entered Clark County, the stuff taken away and he's gotten a fine.  How did they know he was carrying fireworks?  There was a cop in the store observing him!  What a deal.

So now for the bad news which is, of course, that the Big Bill got passed and that's going to be nasty for lots and lots of people in this country.   I have no idea what something like my wife's surgery will be costing when the bill goes into effect.  But the real people I feel sorry about are in two categories:  very poor and immigrants.  I heard that children born here of immigrant parents may not be legal citizens.  Well, I don't have any problem making a choice like that for children being born today or tomorrow but to force that on some kid who is 15 or 18 or even 30???  From what I'm reading the kid loses his/her citizenship automatically if the parents were illegals.  Really?  That's just wrong. 

And, of course, there are the people depending on Food Stamps for dinner.  And now they are in limbo.  The federal law is being changed; the states laws are going to be changing; it's a unknown world.  I feel for those folks.  I read where $350 a month is the average benefit.  That's just over $10 a day; and Smith's Food and Drug is offering hamburger at $5.33 a pound.  Don't forget toilet paper at $2 a roll.  If you've got a couple of kids they'll take care of that $10 a day quick enough!  

Enough!  Sorry I'm in such a happy mood.   Have a great weekend; try to stay away from the fires and storms and crazy folks.  And keep those hands clean!

Another wonderful month!

 Life in the old lane!  It's been quite a month.  We can start with the 7 doctor visits we've had this last month plus my wife got one trip to the Emergency Room.  Around here the ER tends to be conservative and unless there is really something going on they just tell you to go home and that's what they told her.  Maybe with a new prescription or maybe not.  Anyway, that was fun even if we didn't get home until something like 2:00 in the morning.  And now that it is close to the 1st of the month I'm happy to say that we have 7 more doctor visits/tests scheduled for July not including my wife's surgery.  Yes, she's having another ankle surgery to hopefully repair the one she had two years ago.

Then there are our 'children'.  I'm talking about people over 50 years of age but still they did have parents!  Don't get me wrong, it was great to see both of them and we had a good time talking up a storm.  Anyway our son was here for 3 days and a week later we had our daughter for two days.  Her visit was part of a business trip; his was just to check up on his mom.  My wife is having trouble walking and talking.  When she is on the phone especially her voice will kind of break up and I'm sure that motivated his visit.  We have no idea what's going on there and her doctor is no help either.  Her walking is going to change dramatically on July 2 when she has that ankle surgery!  Then she'll be confined to the wheelchair for at least a month and who knows how the walking will end up.  What the hell happened to taking the summer and seeing new parts of the world?  Oh well.  

Otherwise it's been a pretty normal summer in the Nevada desert.  Our daily high is usually around 100 F (38 C) with breezes in the 10-15 mph range (15 to 25 kmph).  That's the reason we have one air conditioner system for each side of the house!  Nights get down to 65 to 70 F (18 - 21 C).  If I fall asleep in my recliner and wake about 01:00 I can usually open the windows a bit.  Rain?  You've got to be kidding!  We haven't even had snow on the mountains for at least 3 months. 

So I've been sitting here at my computer reading the news quite a bit.  How the hell did we get that group of idiots running our country?  I didn't agree with Mr. Trump in his first term but I wasn't really worried about the way the country was being run.  Now I'm getting pretty close to terrified.  Is there a law or article of the Constitution that he hasn't broken?  I think Mr. Trump is bad enough but that collection of sorry jerks he has 'helping' him is what is worrying me.  Suppose he were to be found incompetent?  President Vance?  OMG!  And Vance would be run over by the other idiots in the cabinet.  Jeez!  It's going to be a LONG 3 & 1/2 years let me tell you!   Already you go to the grocery store and see the price differences; in another year it will be in everything from electronics to vehicles to gasoline to drugs.  And, of course, when the prices of 'things' go up; so will service items.  Already we have seen prices of lunch items go up or the item just disappears from the menu.  We used to think that $30 for dinner at the local casino restaurant was a lot; now it's $50.  And, trust me, that doesn't include wine or a tip!  But we'll see what happens.  I'm not optomistic.  

So that's our world out here:  aches and pains, lots of warmth and a bunch of idiots running the country.  Talk about wonderful times!  Hopefully I'll get back here before an entire month is up!  Take care & be careful.

Life in the slow lane!

 Well, it's been a while but I really don't have much of interest to talk about.  We are still hitting the doctors way too much and they still aren't doing much to help either of us.  My wife's ankle fusion surgery just keeps getting farther and farther away.  My doctor and the ER people just don't have a clue what's going on with me so that's kind of dull too.  My wife has been going to the gym and meeting with a personal trainer trying to build up some muscle since after the surgery she is going to be confined to a wheelchair for a month or two.  I've been going with her and using the treadmill and the back strengthening exercises.  Helping her in and out of that chair, bed and everywhere else isn't going to be fun for either of us!

I did come up with my own version of excitement.  I was walking over to the window to close the window blind at night and managed to kick the leg of a chair with the little toe on my left foot!  Talk about fun!  Well, it slowed me down some but not all that much.  I had a doctor's visit a couple days later so I asked him to look at it and he doesn't think it's broken or anything so it's just hobble around for a bit.

Yesterday we got up to 105 F so if you want to be outside you do it early!  We've had some weeds growing in our front yard so I decided to work on removing them.  I can only do about an hour a morning so it's taken me 3 mornings and I've still got some little stuff right next to the street.  Now it's time for me to work on the back yard but I need to wait until next week; our trash can is full of weeds with no room for trash!  LOL  This pile is about 20% of what I did yesterday a.m.  This bending over and pulling weeds at 76 years of age is no fun!

 There was one fun thing I got to see.  This guy was thinking of landing his balloon.

 I don't have any idea why but he decided that he needed a different spot so he moved on to the right (south) in the photo.

 He's not really landing in those trees.  He's in a place about 2 blocks past (west) them.  That whole lot is a weird thing.  It is an acre just like ours.  When we moved in there was a hole dug like someone was going to lay gravel and put in a foundation for a house.  The trees were MUCH smaller.  There is a well on the property and it's been pumping water to those trees for the 16 years we've lived here but there has been absolutely nothing done about building a house.  Weird.  

Anyway, that's all that's fit to print about life out here right now.  We can't go anywhere because of the constant doctor visits so if I manage any more photos they will probably be either weeds or balloons!  Take care and have a good time!

Thrill a minute!

 Well things are going just as exciting around here as usual.  My wife and I are both bothering doctors or should I say they are bothering us?  Her primary care doctor keeps writing up orders for weird tests.  My wife's foot surgeon just seems so 'sometime' in the future.  He seems like a really nice guy but he keeps going somewhere else.  The April surgery is now more like a June surgery but that isn't even set up so it could be August if things keep sliding away.

Back in April my doctor asked for a blood test and found my platelets were low:  they should be around 150K and were measured as 11K.  But no one around here wanted to do anything about it.  Then a week or so ago they thought about it again and sent me back to the ER.  The ER decided they didn't have any specialist who could look at me so they sent me to Las Vegas.  They kept me for about 24 hours, took at least 15 or 20 blood samples and told me I could go home.  Grrr!  At least I got a couple prescriptions this time.  We'll see how all this works out.  The screwy thing is that I feel just fine.  But the doctors keep saying I could die at any moment.  

Other than all the medical crap it's being a typical spring.  One day 4 mph (6 kph) breeze and the next a 24 mph (38 kph) breeze.  Fun in the desert doesn't always mean wearing shorts!  Our house is turning 20 years old this year and when we get those 45 mph (72 kph) gusts it really shakes the windows!  But, no, we aren't buying new windows!

The new cable internet system is supposed to be installed tomorrow.  I have to admit to looking forward to that if only for the less 'twitchy' system.  Well, let's hope it's an improvement!  When some idiot takes out a telephone pole we might be out for a couple of days. 

That's all the news fit to print.  My latest photos are just dull so I won't inflict them on you.  Take care and stay away from all those sick people!