State of the Union Blues

I really am beginning to scare myself. This morning once again I nearly burnt the apartment down. It's Tuesday morning so I have to act like I'm doing something because I'm actually getting ready to leave for my 11:00 meeting over at assist. So I'm a little focused on getting myself ready cuz I know it's going to take a long time and it did but I just kept pushing forward. I had gone to the kitchen and was going to take my medications to be sure that I had taken them before I left. It's amazing how many times I've mistaken my meds just cuz I didn't take the time. Anyway I wasn't paying much attention what I was doing and I was moving things around on the stove top to get to my meds and then advertently hit one of the control knobs on the front of the range. I know I feel like I'm a traitor cuz this is a theoretically disability friendly device. I would like to know how many people with severe disabilities of burnt down their units because of this device. Anyway I must have somehow along the way hit the switch and switched it on to high not knowing that underneath the wooden cutting board that I had on the cooking surface was turning red. I was in another part of the apartment and just by sheer luck Grand stop and saw smoke billowing from the top of the stove instantly I rolled by chair over to the the range and turned off the unit but by then, and for the first time, the fire alarm to the apartment went off. I ran over to the patio door slid it open and turned on the fan above the stove. Keep in mind that I just come from the bathroom so it's completely naked and I didn't want a bunch of people bursting in the door so I ran and got found something to wear. The smoke kind of cleared out but I haven't been able to smell it all day long. The resident guy came by and knocked on the door but I just yelled at him that everything was okay everything had been taken care of. Like I said I really dodged the bullet on this one I understand that this happens to other people in this apartment complex I don't know it just feels like it only happens to me.

I spent the next 3 hours trying to get ready for my meeting. I'm just having more and more difficulty trying to dress in this chair I'm in now and I don't know if it is the chair or if it's me I kind of think it's me but I haven't changed that much I don't know what's going on. I had weird dreams all through the night about my feet wearing out like holes in them then I started worrying about diabetes and everything else that happens when you get older. I guess I should just be happy to get on with my day in my life. So far I haven't burned down anything are closed at the apartment complexes. My meeting was okay I did actually stop off at the market on the way home and got some fruit I've missed the fruit a lot of late. I spent 45 minutes trying to listen to the president of the United States in state of the something. It was so much of a joke I couldn't take it any further anyway not bad for Tuesday

 

Monday's perspective

 I spend it for the day trying to get my head around this whole issue of what I'm going to do regarding on file Social Security years. I try to think of discussions I can have with us Social Security official about why didn't I file even if I didn't know anything. All the excuses with some pretty lame because they are. The best excuse I have right now is that my significant other and whatever relationship I was in of the three marriages took control of that particular event and such type of things that had to be done- - and done right. I would see them do these bureaucratic things and just wonder how they figure things out. I think it's all still part of my system trying to grow up and be the adult in my life. That's really a sad comment on my life. I could blame it on the wreck and that basically stopped my interior aging process when I had the trauma on or in my 15th year. Never had a real job ever anything like that for most kids start actually learning how to do all these basic things like paying your taxes or filing your taxes. I never really had to do that since I didn't have a job during those formative years but most kids are doing this kind of stuff. That's a great excuse to me but I don't know if the feds are goin-g to buy it. And I really don't want to play my hand before I'm ready. There's a part of me deep down saying I'm really making too much out of this whole idea of that they're going to really come down on me hard. I was visiting with my old friend who used to be my boss in another world and another time. He's been living as a out of the country America and Mexico the last couple of years almost a decade. Who is not far from the border so he can go across the border to do is American Business stuff when he has to. I was enamored with his whole life process living as in strange to American in another land. I thought he was kind of living the good life. Couple days ago things went crazy in Mexico when this major crime Lord boss was murdered. The city and state has seemed to explode with the cartels and mob bosses literally stopping vehicles on the street, pulling the drivers out and whoever else might be in the vehicle and torching the vehicle. My friend is now terrified to leave the house for fear that that might happen to him. He's questioning his decision to live in Mexico under the radar. His fear on returning to the USA would be what does he avoided? Has his Excursion into the Mexican Countryside been legal and what has he got to catch up on US citizen wise and probably most important how's he going to get out of a hot country even if it's Mexico and get back to good old San Diego? After hearing his story kind of put mine into perspective. I may get some good tongue-lashings and maybe even significant finds but they're not going to pull me out of my chair throw me on the street and sit fire to my power chair. My problems aren't happy problems but they're not dangerous problems either everything's.. perspective.

Sundays confusion

Fairly Pleasant Sunday today. A bit of a roller coaster temperature wise from the last couple of days where it's been so cold. The clouds were gone and the sun was out. Temperatures shot up into the low 50s and I was pleasantly surprised. I even went out a little bit more than usual anyway. Of course it's Sunday morning and I was lucky enough to be able to have the kids meet me at local restaurant where we usually have breakfast. It's an 8:00 a.m. breakfast so the day hadn't warmed up too much but I had a fairly heavy sweater on or sweatshirt and I didn't have to zoom too far and during this early hour I can jaywalk or cross in the middle of the street as opposed to having to go all the way down to the to the lights to cross over. Crossing the street in the middle like this also significantly cuts down on the amount of power I use going to the restaurant and went back. Still I think I had enough juice in the battery in case I wanted to go anywhere else but there wasn't a lot of stuff I needed to do or places I had to go and the overall chair itself this sort of painful in the seating and such so I just hung out at the apartment as usual. My Spanish speaking neighbor Juana brought lunch again. I don't know why she does this and I certainly appreciate what she offers. Today it was 3:00 flour tortillas wrapped around some meat mixture which is pretty good plus a couple dollars of sour cream. I'm sorry it's catches me off guard but she knocks at the door and sign languages with me about bringing me the meal. I wasn't a bit hungry since I've had a fairly large breakfast at the restaurant but I ate one and put the other two back into the refrigerator with the sour cream for dinner which was my dinner. This is another situation where I seem to be adopted by somebody and for this reason she brings me meals periodically I don't know why and my Spanish isn't good enough to really sit down and visit with her to find a reason well I can do is gracefully accept the meal and have her dishes cleaned by the time she wants to pick them up. I usually just wait till the next day have it Sunday and then wash up the dishes and send them back on Monday morning.

My backup chair continues to do a number on my body. Somebody noted this afternoon that I'm developing a wound on my foot where it's rubbing on the foot locks where my feet rub against the sides. I'm going to have to see if I can get Melissa to build me some kind of a Band-Aid or cushion or something on the side of my foot locks to discourage this friction. That's all I need is a long-term wound so that could escalate into something really bad really quickly. Play football's on my regular chair has large sides that would not allow the foot to rub just another reason why I hope my regular chair gets back this week sometime. I know I'm not too chipper this Sunday night all the very reason to get to bed early...

Saturday chills

 I struggled this morning dressing myself and I started pretty early actually. I was kind of thinking of going over to the coffee shop this morning and hanging out for a while but it just took too long to get dressed. By the time I was finished I couldn't get excited just to go over there and drink coffee by myself. So I stayed in part of the warning trying to clean up a little bit I even ended up pulling the garbage out of the main container in the kitchen and taking it out to the dumpster. I had been thinking seriously of going over to the market and cashing the $100 bill that I've got so I would have change to send the kids with the kid letters this month. But the trip to the dumpster convinced me that it was just too cold and I can't believe I'm wussing out like that. I just didn't feel like going to the bank meaning I'd have to wait at some point in time for the next bus probably after I finish my banking but I'd have to wait out by the bus stop and that would just be so cold. I still have quite a bit of time until the end of the month to get change for the letters. I did take some time and write a couple of the kid letters as well. The kid project seems to be going well this month I'm way ahead of schedule. I also spent time on the arm bike and got in a half an hour of pumping which brought me up to about 220 minutes on your own bike this week which is pretty good. I was pleased this week there were no malfunctions with the arm bike like I had the week before. I sense something is beginning to fail with the electronics in the arm bike. I've kind of scouted around trying to find a comparable piece of electronics as of yet have had no luck and I really don't want to purchase a brand new system. I don't think I'm going to be around long enough to really use it to get my money's worth out of the device.

My power chair continues to hold its own. It doesn't matter that I don't trust the item at all and will only use it just on the most important trips. I'm sure this coming week I'll have a meeting in Salt Lake on Tuesday. And I plan to do the trick that I did last week bye catching the bus going up to the turnaround catch the other bus go straight into the train station by IHC Hospital then take the train into the Library across the street to the assist office. This should work good for my return trip as well if I don't dally anywhere and just go straight from the bus to my apartment. At this juncture the weather looks like it'll be good and should have sunshine and temperatures in the mid 40s I'll also cart around with me my portable Transformer that should get things get really dicey I can always plug in tilt back and wait for a charge enough to be put into the battery to get me home.

Friday night Whine

 Melissa my caregiver actually spent time this taping up my foot pedals on my power chair. The the foot pedals are foot box has a . separation in the middle and my feet have been falling through there when I'm trying to disrobe in the evening before I get ready for bed and my clothes have been hanging up on them leading to disastrous results as far as trying to get them clear and destroying them in the process. It is hoped by strapping the pedals together will relieve that problem we'll see this evening. I guess what I'm saying as well is that I'm just trying to survive in this power chair and it's the only power chair I have at this point in time. The good news is that I've been notified that my Sunday sources have agreed to pay the $3,000 for the repair of my regular chair. Now they just have to get the parts in and who knows how long that's going to take. I hope it won't take much longer than a week cuz I just don't know how long this chair I'm in now is going to last me. I've gotten by with the side of the chair that's broke that had my brother in my apartment trying to fix it yesterday but to no avail. I can get around very difficult not dangerous yet anyway I don't think it will be. It seems like each day is a different challenge. Now it's basically just dressing and getting the pants on over my butt trying to sit down and push back at the same time high enough that the shorts will go out over my hips. It's pretty much a function of time but I've got to give myself at least 3 hours before I front schedule any type of meeting or anything. Like Sunday mornings are a challenge just because we have breakfast at 8:00 that means I'm up early doing the self-dressing. And once again I am imagining this is all going to cease once I get my regular chair back let's hope for the best. I'm having to be very careful with this chair right now because if I lose one piece on this chair that I use everyday I don't know what I would do not having access to another chair immediately. I can only hope that everything works out well and be very careful and gentle to how I treat this old war horse.

Oh I almost forgot also about this chair is that the battery pretty well worn out at least that's my perception. All I know is that on a full charge the charge indicator seems to just drain when I go anywhere. I didn't go in for today just because it's been really cold outside and I just didn't want to have to deal with the cold right now. However, I did want to get across the street and get some change in case somebody comes in that I need to pay to clean up the apartment. Have one person that comes in and I like to have a couple twenties and $10 bills available to give her when she cleans up. But I'm a little afraid to go anywhere because I don't want to get stranded. I might be a little paranoid right now but that's as far as I want to extend my risk as far as this power chair goes. Boy do I sound like a whiner or what?

Thoroughly Thursday

 

Kind of an interesting day to say the least. I was expecting interesting things to happen today just because I was scheduled for a dental appointment at 10:00 a.m. then later on I had a meeting which should have been downtown area at 3:30 p.m. I made both appointments but they were not what I anticipated them to be. My first appointment as I said was an appointment. I'd written about it before I was going for a basic tooth exam to see how many cavities I had how bad they were/are and what it would take to get them fixed, financially. I have been more and more uncomfortable with how much my mouth is going to cost over the next number of years. It's a race, a grim race, erase just the same as to how many teeth I will have before I die. Will I run out of teeth before I run out of time? Right now I'm just worried more about that the molars in the back and actually all the teeth which may have cavities. The best action I can take to ensure that I have my teeth as long as I need them is to do proper hygiene Dental wise as well as preventive trips to the dentist. I know I've got some cavities I just don't know how severe they are and that was why I was even going today so we can get the check up done so we can start the process. Took me quite a while to get dressed this morning I expected that but I was dressed in time even had time to get a bite to eat before I went across the street. I got there the place was packed that's okay I didn't have anything else going today until 3:30 anyway. I waited and I waited I was informed at some point that an emergency oral surgery had to be taken care of. This was not scheduled and it basically ran over into my time. I really didn't mind all that much. I told them that I was okay I'm not in any pain I can reschedule. I couldn't believe they were so astounded and relieved that I was not angry or upset or anything in fact, the office manager find the number of gift cards like playing cards in front of me and told me to choose one. I told them I didn't need a gift card for a restaurant but they said no they were so pleased that I handled the situation as well as I did they sell it I deserved one and I was not going to fight them on the situation. I tried to choose one that was relatively close to my living situation so I wouldn't have to travel too far. There's a steakhouse just up the road from my Apartments and I think maybe I could take it a steak what are these first days. I should do it soon because I don't know how long I'm going to have his teeth. The gift card is for $25. It certainly well that cover two meals if I ever did ever have a date but it should do pretty well with one. I still may have to kick in a few dollars of my own around the middle loud and I'm not sure when I'm going to do that anyway. If I were really smart I would have them deduct 25 bucks I owe the operation. I rescheduled for some time in March I think that sometime in the first week of March. I'm feeling no pain and I can deal with continual searching the cavities with my tongue I just want to make and keep everyone happy especially my dentist:-)

Wintry Wednesday

 We actually had snow today here in Salt Lake City. Not a lot of snow just flurries but it looked pretty vicious as the cold front wandered through earlier in the morning. For a little bit there was a little snow on the ground but it disappeared pretty quickly but the cold temperature and wind and dark clouds remained enough to keep me secured in the apartment most of the day except for when I was ruining back and forth from the laundry getting the clothes to the room to fold and hang. The clothes are on the bed folded and those that needed hanging or hung if you couple that with 1 hour of turning the crank on the arm bike that made for a full day for me. I even made a three-course dinner tonight still quite proud of myself. It wasn't like real cooking but I did take one of the burgers I cooked the other night chopped it up at the bite-sized bits open up a can of spinach got it hot and had a side of mustard potato salad it was a pretty good dinner. Tasty and filling. I still could have a desert of one sort or another. I have a little less than a half of an apple pie you know one of those cutie apple pies? Or I have a few dried up pieces of chocolate cake that might be good as well. Tomorrow should be a busy day as well. In the morning I have a dentist appointment which I am not sure how it's going to go. I know I've got some fillings I think the dentist is aware of that too but I don't know if they'll start work on the fillings tomorrow or just do the exploratory and find out how many that I have then set up a time to start the dental work. I used to be terrified of the dentist and all the things he might jab and stick in my mouth. Now I no longer fear the dentist from the physical standpoint but really frightens me is the financial standpoint. I don't know why I'm worried they've always worked with me over the years as far as setting up payments. However, now we're getting into big time with big money and I don't know if he'll let me do Time payments on the work he will do in the next couple days or weeks. I just want to get my mouth taken care of to the point that it's not going to go nuclear on me on some weekend or national holiday- - I hate that. I also want to make sure that I have teeth to eat with. I know it sounds crazy but never have I so wished that I had done better self care than now. I'm totally envious of comrades and colleagues that's still supporting full mouth of teeth and they can eat whatever they want no problem I could survive on much if I had to I mean like if I were an old coot like Scrooge and had porridge/mush every night for dinner. I understand now why he chose to have that meal because he probably doesn't have any teeth at all and it's the easiest thing for him to gum and swallow and still go to bed with a full belly good old Ebenezer.

Tuesday's Tattle

Not bad for the day after a national holiday. Things seem to have slipped back into order and systems just fine. Of course I'm not surprised difficult wheel just keeps on turning around and round. I was pleased with myself however being able to get myself out of bed no problems there and even though it took me quite a bit to dress myself I got the job done and breakfast made and eating before 12:00 noon. I count those all pluses fortunately I didn't have a meeting today which I talked about yesterday a little bit but no meetings. I just stayed home, in the apartment cooking and working out on my arm bike. And full confession watched a couple Marvel movies Avengers x 2 and one Spider-Man over the course of the day. I keep worrying about my teeth for specially my tooth. Tooth in the back one of the molars that does not have a mate above it but it seems to have a fairly large cavity. If I was smart I was just having yank it'll probably be the cheapest way to go but I just can't seem to do that. I know I can't put a tooth above it you know one of those screw in teeth cuz it would cause a lot of pain every cat time I put any pressure on the lower tooth Maybe when I go in for the checkup next week he didn't take a picture of that back tooth and see what the next approach will be. It's a big deal for me even though I think it shouldn't be a big deal it still is a big deal one by one my teeth are disappearing and as much as I don't want to do dentures it might be the way to go as opposed to trying to replace teeth at $4,000 a tooth. Maybe basic temperatures would be okay. That would cost a mint as well but not near as much as screwing in the teeth would be. I suppose other people in my age bracket are going through the same issues I'm always surprised talking to some of the people are here at the complex but they all seem to have gone through similar type situations. For the most part I'm still one of the younger ones in the building at least that's what I like to tell myself. The older ones have all gone through teeth one way or the other. I'm always amazed at how many people still have their teeth I mean like the whole set. Doesn't seem fair but they probably had really good hygiene dental hygiene oral hygiene as well however you want to say that the whole lives and the result is the end game. Whatever I have done orally / Dental I just hope it's not too painful financially. I wish I had had my stuff together enough that I would have trusted this chair to take me up to the bus stop and into you cat so I could talk to the guys about problems with this chair. Right now I'm trying to finagle us some batteries. That's what it's got to be it can't be anything else that caused me to lose power as quickly as I seem to in this chair and it's not been a constant thing it's just been in the last couple months I mean I've only used this chair for the last 3 weeks actually two weeks actually since I messed up my chair so bad. I'm still hopeful that the chair it's in the shop today will become my backup chair when and if I ever get another chair. Things are so hard to estimate at this point in my life will I even be around long enough for another chair?

 

President's Day

Another holiday another front desk desertion as well as a place with the exception that we're private nonprofit I guess that does make a difference. And I cannot fault the front staff for taking the holiday off I mean that's where I was all my life rent staff I took as many holidays as I could get I love holidays and I still love holidays even if it means tumble weeds as far as Services go. Actually I got one of the front and staff is the maintenance guy named Ted. Ted's great please a walking piece of art he's got so much ink on his body that he just stands out. Ink aside Ted is the master of many things and does so much stuff that's amazing as far as keeping things going here at the project. He's also helped me a number of times on the stuff that I have that need help on mechanical things like my power chair and such he's the only one I really do miss on holidays. Ted's not around as much as he used to be he's a great demand among some of the other properties we own. Luckily however Melissa was able to assist me today/morning with the part of my chair that I thought was really broken. She was able to fix the part and now it's relatively functional more than it was. This at least they used me not worrying about my control box falling off. I'm still quite concerned as far as batteries go or power to go anywhere.

Supposedly there's a storm coming in tonight I doubt it's going to be a large storm but there's going to be more clouds and possible precipitation I swear the weather person is just giddy that we may be getting snow, light snow, on the valley floor here even if it's a major happening it's not going to be much snow less than an inch at least that's what she's saying the first part of the storm later on we might get more but I still don't think we're going to get as much as we should and as much as we need. Luckily I have no place to go to speak of at least this week with assist tomorrow being canceled due to the President's Day. I know how difficult it is to come off a holiday and have to be ready for a meeting first thing. We're in for a couple weeks of Rocky weather according to the weather person I listen to. We may get some significant snow next week but then next week I've got two meetings that would make sense. About as I always state in late February even if it's snowing and cold it's not the same kind of snow on cold that we usually enjoy during the winter it's a spring snow event they never last long and they're always usually warm at least warmer or maybe it's the same temperature but the promise of spring and summer just around the corner makes everything survivable…

Shredding shorts

I have literally shredded my shorts the last two nights that I undressed for bed. It's another one of those weird things that's happening to me these days just strange things that are occurring that have not really occurred before. I of course I'm going to totally blame it on my backup chair and possibly the shorts that I was wearing. One pair was a tan pair that I've worn for a number of years down in fact they were very worn thread very even, the other pair was a green pair that I really liked but it too was beginning to show signs of the composition. Had I not got them somehow caught on my cherish they would have worn out anyway with it the last next couple weeks. Or months. I blame it on my chair because the foot guards I have on there that's supposedly keep my feet on the foot pedals - which they do somehow is reaching up in encouraging my shorts when I push them off with the stick to become wound up somehow in my foot pedals. I'm scared tonight about taking off my good pair of Sunday shorts that they might get caught up and follow the same demise if the shorts get caught tonight I'll just go to bed and have Melissa untangle them tomorrow. Somehow I'm going to have to pay attention to when I start taking my shorts off and making sure they stay free of the sides of the foot pedals where they tend to slide over if they're big and bulky enough. And I like him big and bulky because it makes it easier for me to get in and out of. This will however be a good reason for me to either go up to di or figure out some other way to get my hands on some more shorts. I'll just assume get ones that are already broken in and not have to go through the the hassle of brand new ones. Now I just have to have a chair that I've got enough faith in that I'll be able to go the distance and not have my batteries run down. I pretty much accepted the issue that I'm going to have to start carrying my charger around with me again in charge whenever I'm not in t he middle of transporting myself. The other problem I might be having with the chair is that there is a space between the foot pedals on the bottom. If I were to get a board of some sort too fill in that space one that was sit on the whole foot pedal box that might stop my shorts from getting tangled up in the foot pedals as well. This would be a job for Carl and I might need him anyway with this other problem I'm having with the arm or the control box of my backup chair. I'm just a mess. I have one meeting this upcoming week on the 19th I think that's Thursday. Luckily for me I can attend the movie on Zoom and that's good it's going to get for this meeting..

Happy v-day

 I did not send nor did I receive any Valentines at least that I know of at this point in the night. Valentine's Day after a certain age just doesn't mean the same especially if you've gone through the whole marriage divorce and marriage of a divorce thing. Just another day on the calendar and another day for capitalism to try to sell something to a group of folks who probably don't want it. Hopefully that's not too negative. I'm trying to adjust to living long-term in this power chair since I don't think I'll be getting my regular chair back very soon. I may have written about this yesterday briefly but I was contacted by I see let me know that a bunch of work needs to be done on my chair- - which I sort of Doubt because they just did a bunch of work on it. I understood that they would probably sell me two Motors just because they don't sell them individually which I think is a hype myself part of their system to make money. But they've got some other ideas as well $3,000 worth which I totally be surprised if my insurance company will cover that at this late date but they also warned me if they did it could put off getting the new chair for more time. That's okay I've given up on that anyway. If I see another chair a new chair in this lifetime I'll be totally surprised. I'm a little concerned about the backup chair because it seems to be really putting some pressure on my butt I shouldn't want any breakdown or pressure sores. I'm trying to have Melissa look at it very closely sometimes I worry that she doesn't know what she's looking for that what I'm looking for but then she always surprises me. You really is good I don't know what I'm going to do when I lose her. Maybe I won't who knows?

Because this whole backup chair thing is so weird and I really do believe the batteries are really bad in this chair. I can barely go up to the market and back before it's on 50% battery and at that point I start seeing yellow lights and flashy warnings about the problems that I will be running out of power shortly. Then that Rings age old question of puttding new batteries into this chair for however long I may have it questionable. But it would be nice to have a chair that would go the distance that I need to go in today's time when I want to go somewhere in the day's time. Right now I'm okay with just trying to get by day today to my regular chair gets back.

I've noticed that my apartment once again his atrophy to the point where is it's near 0 point chaos at least that's what it seems like to me and it's my own fault. There's no reason why I can't be more focused on trying to keep this place clean. Things fall on the floor and they stay there it seems like more and more than it used to be. However the sinks are relatively clean I've got grease on the stove from the last time I cooked some bacon. Tonight I made tater tots. They're okay only problem is they are in the freezer way too long and has the flavor flavor taste of too long in the freezer. And I couldn't even find the ketchup to drowned out the flavor I ended up using salsa which worked pretty good. Tomorrow I have breakfast with the kids as always and I've got enough premade food that I won't have to really cook tomorrow.

Oreo

On the second floor of the building in which I live it's a small room that has a craft table there's also a beverage machine you know a Coke machine as well as a candy machine. I don't know I was in the building for a week or so before I realized this place was there. Now I have some strange specification and romantic relationship with this room in that it's a place where even if there's a raging storm and snow piled up outside and all the sidewalks are covered or there's rain being dumped and bucket loads outside the building or it's just 100° and possibly two hot to go across the street to the market. Maybe it's just 10:30 or later on any given weekend night or any night and you want something sweet to eat or just a low level treat or whatever you can go to this little break room and insert your coins or dollar bills and baby warded with whatever delicacy treat you desire. So far the candy machine Crunch bars, major candy bars and cookies mostly Oreos that's what this is that Divine little delicacy that goes equally well with coffee and or milk. I will be the first to admit this machine has some drawbacks one of the most severe for me is that in order to pull your order out of the bottom of the machine you've got to reach down push your hand through this slid then grasp your item and pulled up through the door which is very difficult in fact reminds me every time I try to do this that it's like that trial give it to the monkey where you give him something he really wants but he has to hold on to it and pull it through an opening that will not accommodate his hand holding him five items. On a good day I can finagle the item I want out of the machine and I always have my hook that I've used before the snag something out of the machine.

Is today however I ran up against the real problem actually I've had the problem before but today was more problematic it seemed like more costly anyway. I want to have enough Sweet Treats to get through the evening as well as the weekend. I settled on a dollar packet of small snicker bar bites and I also wanted a package of Oreo cookies, a package of six. That would be enough to space them too a movie or some sort if I'm watching one then need a cookie treat. The Snicker bar came out quick that was only when I tried to Oreos thatI ran into problems. It seems like the packaging for the six pack is so stiff that when I actuated the button to drop the candy the edges stuck on the edge of the machine and the package of cookies wouldn't drop. It's a big machine and I couldn't rock it back and forth it could be just sat there staring, laughing at. I finally realized if I bought another package of cookies I could probably push the first one out and maybe probably the other one would follow suit. I was half right half wrong I did get my first dollars worth of cookies but the second package hung up as well. I did this early in the day I went back to check a few minutes ago and sure enough the Oreos were still there just hanging on wanting to be shaken free. I've come to the realization I probably had a dollar for those cookies. Someone else will pick them up and I hope enjoy them. I thought about putting a note on the window letting anyone who wants the cookies know that I purchased them and if they don't return them to me they should just enjoy them- - my gift. That'll be a cool thing to do but that's not going to happen tonight..

Game day! It's basketball time

 It's the middle of the afternoon, well actually now it's late afternoon, and I thought I would move around my schedules a little bit and do my blog update now versus later on this evening. Tonight the Utah Jazz are playing again and that will take me right up to 9:30 or 10:00 p.m. and that's just as soon not have to dictate after 9:00. I just spent a good part of the afternoon visiting with my buddy working days. We visit periodically he's lives in Mexico / San Diego right there on the border. I'm totally impressed because he's living this Mexican life and going back and forth across the border when he needs to do more responsible stuff like living in the American culture. Other than that he tends to live in Mexico and it works for him more or less. He might be getting burned out on the whole situation but that's his prerogative of that's what it does and likes to do right now but he said he's thinking on possibly moving back to America full-time. I personally don't know why anyone would want to do that specially now. I mean if I was living in a place like Mexico or some other third world country attached to the USA and I was getting my needs met and all that kind of stuff I don't know if I'd want to come back at least until they got a different legal regimen going. I mean I can honestly say I've never been more embarrassed to call myself America or American and my whole life as I have been this year. And I have not even been out of the country and I doubt that I will be going out of the country but still I didn't know what it would be like going to Europe or something like that now and having to declare yourself in America. Anyway he has a pretty cool life I'm somewhat envious of it but I'm not looking at it to the eyes that he is looking through which I'm sure would totally different for me.

As I alluded to it the Utah Jazz are playing basketball tonight here in Salt Lake. I have no desire to go down to watch the game in person except for to watch other people and I would do that in the heartbeat but to do that I would have to really use public transit and use it after dark and late- coming home. And I get such a better examination of the game on flat screen that that's not even a consideration on my part to go to the game in person. He played last night as well in another city and the team actually won! I could hardly believe that. I hope they do well tonight that would be totally exciting if they were to win again, I think it's highly unlikely but I don't want to sell them short. They're my team now I've done over to support them much more than I thought I ever would. I was thinking about this during the Super Bowl time- - no, I didn't watch the Super Bowl football is just way too boring- - that there's nothing else on major sporting events that I would spend time watching like I do basketball and the Utah Jazz so it's not even the basketball as much as it's the Jazz. There's nothing there in baseball that's way too boring absorbs a whole afternoon usually as well as football and then there's no other support in between whether it's skiing, curling, gymnastics heaven forbid soccer or rugby or whatever no other sports except basketball. I know I'm weird sometimes it's just the way it is.

Another, just one of those days

It was just one of those days. On any day or most days I wake up around 5:00 and have to lay around till 6:00 when I usually get up but not today- - oh no, not today. I woke up today around 6:30 which is amazing to me still. But today is Tuesday which means I have my assist meeting in Salt Lake which means I have to be ready and out the door to catch the bus bye 9:35 or 40. That will get me to the library downtown about right around 10:00 and then I can catch my breath and spend some time wandering around the library checking out what's new. However, for a number of reasons that wasn't supposed to happen today because I had to get ready so I can could be out by that. Time and since I don't have my regular chair makes dressing a bit more of a challenge and I wasn't sure if I could pull it all off in order to get there in time however I did! I surprised myself. I still worried about the batteries in this chair and if they would hold up for going as far as I have to go but isn't that far regular but with the battery starved chair maybe it would be so instead of driving my chair all the way down to the corner where I catch the 47 inboun d I caught the 217 just outside my back door and went to the transit hub and picked up the 47 there traveling probably no more than 50 ft. This saved me a lot of battery power I believe. I got to the library about the usual time did some book inspections and finally wandered over to my meeting. It wasn't a bad meeting and I got another check to cover the one I lost. I did not go the route that took me to the bank however I decided to go straight home to conserve the battery as much as I could power wise. Is it okay tonight I still have 71% of the charge in my battery. I know however that they'll start going down quickly from this point forward so I did good I think I did all right by taking the vessels extra routes those extra trips and saving the battery time.

My brother brought over the sticks I requested earlier this month after I broke off one of the other sticks he'd made for me. He made them a little bit different this time and I don't know if I'm going to be able to use them very well. I may need to have him rip one of them and two or whatever to make sure I have a lighter than usual stick in the edges sanded down. The sticks that I have now are quite sharp on the edges and don't know if it'll break the skin or not. If he could just run the edges down the sander that would be good. He did mention that one of the sticks cost $6 and so much cents a foot. I'm not sure but I don't know if he was indicating that he would need to be reimbursed for purchasing the wood which I should have brought up by myself anyway kind of strange. I've sent him a text to see. Hope it doesn't put him on the spot. It was good to get home from assist and take it easy for the rest of the day/ week. Looks like the weather might take a turn for the worst but I just don't believe anything the weather man says anymore. Today is supposed to be pretty grungy but it turned out to be fairly decent not too cold just cloudy/ a little sprinkler actually but not too much.

 

Just one of those days..

It was just one of those days. On any days or most days I wake up around 5:00 and have to lay around till 6:00 when I usually get up but not today- - oh no, not today. I woke up today around 6:30 which is amazing to me still. But today is Tuesday which means I have my assist meeting in Salt Lake which means I have to be ready and out the door to catch the bus bye 9:35 or 40. That will get me to the library downtown about right around 10:00 and then I can catch my breath and spend some time wandering around the library checking out what's new. However, for a number of reasons that wasn't supposed to happen today because I had to get ready so I can could be out by that. Time and since I don't have my regular chair makes dressing a bit more of a challenge and I wasn't sure if I could pull it all off in order to get there in time however I did! I surprised myself. I still worried about the batteries in this chair and if they would hold up for going as far as I have to go but isn't that far regular but with the battery starved chair maybe it would be so instead of driving my chair all the way down to the corner where I catch the 47 inbound I caught the 217 just outside my back door and went to the transit hub and picked up the 47 there traveling probably no more than 50 ft. This saved me a lot of battery power I believe. I got to the library about the usual time did some book inspections and finally wandered over to my meeting. It wasn't a bad meeting and I got another check to cover the one I lost. I did not go the route that took me to the bank however I decided to go straight home to conserve the battery as much as I could power wise. Is it okay tonight I still have 71% of the charge in my battery. I know however that they'll start going down quickly from this point forward so I did good I think I did all right by taking the vessels extra routes those extra trips and saving the battery time.

My brother brought over the sticks I requested earlier this month after I broke off one of the other sticks he'd made for me. He made them a little bit different this time and I don't know if I'm going to be able to use them very well. I may need to have him rip one of them and two or whatever to make sure I have a lighter than usual stick in the edges sanded down. The sticks that I have now are quite sharp on the edges and don't know if it'll break the skin or not. If he could just run the edges down the sander that would be good. He did mention that one of the sticks cost $6 and so much cents a foot. I'm not sure but I don't know if he was indicating that he would need to be reimbursed for purchasing the wood which I should have brought up by myself anyway kind of strange. I've sent him a text to see. Hope it doesn't put him on the spot. It was good to get home from assist and take it easy for the rest of the day/ week. Looks like the weather might take a turn for the worst but I just don't believe anything the weather man says anymore. Today is supposed to be pretty grungy but it turned out to be fairly decent not too cold just cloudy/ a little sprinkler actually but not too much.

I just hate pooping the bed

 

I kind of hate the day after I poop or blow out. Last night was a blowout the little blow out the blow out just the same. I thought it was just gas at first and really didn't know how bad it was until this morning when I went to get up but I did have enough thought process last night that I wrapped myself up in Med pads and large diapers as best as I could which caught a lot of the damage but still we had to strip the bed wash the sheets. I figured it was going to be kind of a bad weekend since my bow moving on Friday was very small. I probably ate too much this weekend as well all staging me for the blowout. Now I just feel uncomfortable at risk. I've eaten yogurt and some cheese in hopes of getting to plug myself back up again. Either faster famine with trying to maintain proper bowel structure. Luckily I had my caregiver coming in this morning and she certainly did a great job in cleaning up to the bed and the wheelchair as well as the floor and stuff in the bathroom. I'm doing okay I didn't go anywhere today. It was really too cold- - you know what that's not totally true I went across the street and got a half a pound of coffee that was probably last me till the end of the month. Is especially coffee shop which I like pretty much I write about it a lot. The days have moved in colder again. It now feels like a typical February day. We may get snow by the weekend it's not a lot but some more than we've had all winter long and possible rain. We might even get some of that as early as tomorrow which would make sense because I need to be on the road tomorrow to my assist meeting downtown Salt lake. It's going to be cold and somewhat dangerous for me just because I'm in my backup power chair and I think the batteries are pretty hammered. I think I might have enough juice to get back and forth from Boise I don't know for sure. But I just do a bunch of short jumps I should be okay. If I catch the bus right outside my back door which will take me to the Community College and then pick up the 47 which will take me to Murray Central then I can jump the train and take it straight into the library and the place I have to go is in back of the library and that would not subject myself or my chair to Too Much having to go back and forth or go around stuff I may even take my backup charger with me in case I go I run out of juice somewhere. It would take a while to charge up my batteries if I needed to but at least I would be able to. My care person indicates that I should just have the faith in my chair and take off and she's probably right. I can still hang my charger off the back of my chair and sip on down to Salt Lake assist Incorporated. I contacted my volunteer director person for the little group meeting. And I guess he'll come looking for me if I don't show up for the meeting. The biggest challenge now is too get up early enough that I can get dressed and hit the road and be sure to charge my chair all night long..,

Warm days old ways

 That's fine it's so distressing having to readjust to the backup chair that I'm using until I can figure out what I'm going to do with the primary care that I don't seem to be working since I drove it in or underneath the countertop the other day. This morning I was pleased to dress myself as usual for Sunday mornings and being able to go over to the restaurant to meet the kids. This morning again like I was a little stressed not knowing for sure how I was going to make the transfer into the chair since the whole foot pedal thing is so much different than what I'm used to with the big old box foot locks that I use. I was awake at 4:00 a.m. but didn't get up till 5:00 figured I would be able to use I am able to get dressed at least in 3 hours which I was able to do probably more like two hours. I think there were a couple points where I could have been in Jeopardy but for the most part it was a safe transfer from the bed to the power chair and then get myself situated in the chair to the point where I could engage the motor to drive itself around and get something to drink and shave and doing the whole morning process. I was able to get a full charge into the chair during the night but I'm not sure what that really means we how much security this gives me out driving around. Makes me kind of wanted just hang close by until I can get my other chair repaired. Of course tomorrow morning I think the first thing I'm going to try to do as soon as Melissa leaves and I feel that the wheelchair shop where I trade has gotten itself into Monday morning mode. Give them a call and schedule a time for them to come and pick up the power chair to look at the issue. I'm still frightened it's going to be a burnt out motor and I just don't know what the repair is going to be like since they have such a hard time trying to repair my chair for me anyway. But I'm not really going to worry about that until tomorrow mid-morning or whenever I can place the call. I have an assist meeting on Tuesday which kind of Spooks me because there's also possible rain on Tuesday as well. I don't know if there's a battery the batteries are charged well enough or they will charge well enough that I have Clear Vision that I'll have enough power to get from here to there. The two biggest areas of transfer I would have would be going from my apartment to the bus stop and then the train station then from the train station to the library and across the street to the assist office then reverse that travel so it's back to the apartments. I really kind of believe I have enough power on a full charge I could do that but just kind of Spooks me not to be sure and I don't want to get stuck out in the middle of nowhere or downtown or wherever. I rolled around a little bit after coming home from breakfast. It was a beautiful day today the temperature was I think in the '60s which is very rare. I rolled across the street looking for rice today I couldn't believe I couldn't find any white rice I went to two restaurants where I thought they for sure would be able to have rice there are Hispanic restaurants one across the street doing next to my building nothing there. I did finally purchase a bag of brown rice unfortunately my neighbor had some white rice. I have half a bag of rice somewhere but I couldn't find to save my life today and now that I don't have my elevator chair I can't really see what's on the upper shelves okay I've gotten used to. I'm ready to pop white rice for dinner to have with my burritos frozen burritos worked out really well and I was able to use the new bottle of super hot salsa that Jax bought me the other day. I was kind of surprised it really was quite hot that I had on my rice and two burritos for dinner. Now I think I've got to go put everything away. I'm ready to start a new week I guess a little weirded out with my chair but we'll see what we can do

Sad Saturday

I really thought I was doing great this morning I got up at 6:00 a.m. and started doing my regular stuff felt good I even felt I was going to cook breakfast for myself and still go over to the coffee shop at my usual 9:30 I had a bunch of bacon that I've been meaning to cook for a while and so I want to get some cooked this morning for breakfast have a couple eggs some of the nice toast that I just purchased red wise and enjoy the day. The day held a lot of promise I look warmer than usual outside I feel good about everything pretty much. I had finished making the bacon and I was putting things out on the plates thanks the bacon and I'd dried up a couple eggs I got them out as well and I had gotten the toast out of the toaster oven and then I don't remember how it happened but I was by the refrigerator and something got caught in the controls of my chair and kept pushing me further and further under the countertop pushing my control mechanism on my power chair all the way up almost breaking I can see it was very tested I was totally pushed into the corner and there's no way I could get out. I was totally stuck there wedged between the countertop and chair I couldn't move. I was totally stuck I wasn't going anywhere I was going to have to have somebody else come in and assist me. I had to take a few seconds or minutes to think about what I was going to do I was just glad that I was okay I was worried about my power chair and how I was going to get it fixed or relief or whatever. Then I did something I promised myself I wasn't going to do I caved in and asked Alexa to call my granddaughter she did! I was able to get my granddaughters boyfriend/fiance live in to come over and save me his name is Jack's j a x. He's very bright I'm very helpful. It took a while but you got here for the next 2 hours he spent trying to fix my chair. He's able to undo the clutches and hook the motors up and then push me and my chair back and we started to see if we could get the chair back online it didn't work. He's afraid that I may have hurt the motor out but I was totally driving into the refrigerator under DC countertop. We couldn't it's a power chair to turn on so it would work eventually we had to accept the loss and transfer me into my backup chair. I was totally surprised because the backup chair even had what it said was 80% charge but I don't really believe that but it was enough charge to get me around the house and that's where I spent my whole day just sitting in my chair hanging out. For a while I charged the chair with a charger out by my computer screen and got a fairly decent charge going I'll charge it again tonight hopefully I'll have enough power to get over to the restaurant tomorrow for breakfast. This chair is pretty squirrely I don't really like it very much but it's better than nothing that's for sure I don't know what I'll do if in fact I did burn the motor out on that chair. I've just been acting like I've been defeated all day long just watching movies on the flat screen. Again I should be thankful and happy that I have the backup chair and I'm able to get around and continue with my regular lifestyle. I'm hoping I can get a check pick up on Monday and then they can ascertain the problem and hopefully fix it. If I have to put another motor in there I don't know if that's wise then maybe they might have it a used motor that could last for a year or so about how much longer I have in this chair. So I didn't really get anything accomplished today just sat around feeling sorry for myself and trying to get my chair charged. Hopefully

Silent listener

I'm dictating this at a very low frequency just because I'm a little worried about the extra AI living in my apartment might hear me- - actually I know that she will hear me and that's kind of freaky. It's the one that starts with an A that's all I'm going to say fill in the rest of the words you can do it on your own. You know it's that entity that you put on your system unless you ask it to turn the lights on or play your favorite radio channel probably even flip the TV around too as far as that goes Channel wise. Anyway it all happened on my birthday when the kids came over to the apartment after we had breakfast. They came over for cake and gifts. I didn't even need gifts are you going to want any of these really just more things you have to clean on to. I'm at the point in my life where I need to diversify get rid of stuff make my burden a little bit lighter as I walk off into the sunset. Anyway I was so kind of freaked out when my grandson-in-law pulled out this device and started installing it in the apartment. I should have just said no I don't want it that seems such a rude thing to do for someone who really thought they were doing a great deal by getting this for you. It's of course one of those voice systems that do whatever it tells you to do in your apartment or your household now whoever knows what else. He installed it directly tied it into the television system and what other systems that might be usable in the apartment. I don't know cuz I haven't used it yet I don't plan on using it but I should be careful I may have to eat those words one never really knows. Of course because she tied it into the Amazon system that I use I started seeing pieces of email pop up on my system telling me about certain programs or services this convenience can be. It was strange because the second he turned it on felt like there was another person in the room- - and actually there was or is. Some one who is listening and wants to help you. Again, I feel bad that I don't just stand my ground and tell him to take it out. So I'm going to try it out for a couple weeks. I don't know if I'll use it or not but it's all set up and ready to go I can get can't get myself into too much trouble in that amount of time.

I thought about going out and doing something today but even though the sun was out and it looked like spring it didn't feel like it. I went outside early on this morning for some reason that I don't remember any longer but it was chilly and it was chilly that I didn't want to be out and if I didn't have to. But good friend Dwayne came over for lunch she brought me over a Italian sandwich it was really quite good and I had some for dinner as well I leftovers and I went down to meet him at the front of the building which is by the front doors which lets a lot of the atmosphere in from the outside and it was still feeling pretty cold even though it was probably in the 50s temperature wise. I went to a movie yesterday and I felt that was probably enough for this week of being out though I did put a few other things on my to get list and that is salsa. I want to get a medium sized bottle of salsa and get the real spicy kind the hot kind that's got to help me out quite a bit.

 

Thinking of Thursday

Today is Thursday and every Tuesday and Thursday I have to dress myself and typically that's not been an issue pretty straightforward I just crossed my legs use with my sticks to pray my leg up and over the other one and put my shorts on and then my shoes and then pull everything on after that. I've noticed in the last three or four months however it's becoming more and more difficult to pull this off I'm not sure exactly why. My first inkling is to blame my power chair that I've maybe bent it or Twisted it maybe the way I sit in it I don't know for sure but I think I want to blame the chair when the fact is probably me. It didn't require a while I'll bet it took me an hour to dress this morning primarily because once I put my shorts on this morning I don't know what I did wrong but I put the shirts so my foot went into the wrong hole which meant that I had to put the whole thing down and start all over again from the very beginning. I'd actually even put my shoe on at this point so I had to pull my shoe off and push the stick with my shorts on it off my foot and start over again and this took a lot longer than I had anticipated but I got it done then eventually and I was relatively civilized an appearance. Since it's Thursday that means it's coffee social and I was really focused on trying to get ready by 9:30. Fortunately I was ready by 9:00 which I felt pretty comfortable with. I may have to at some point engage somebody to help dress me everyday right now I have to dress myself 4 days a week on the other three my home health person comes in and she does a great job. I suppose if I were rich I would have somebody come in every day to do my dressing. I don't know what would happen if I tried this I would certainly go through money faster and I don't want to deal with that at this point when I can still just myself even though it takes a bit of time and commitment.

Do they look pretty good. There are minimum clouds and look like a very spring morning but it was still pretty chilly I was kind of surprised but I didn't want to spend a whole other day in my apartment watching movies or whatever I end up doing so after coffee I messed around the apartment for an hour or so and then when I cross the street and cut the bus and went up to 5400 South took in the movies. I went to zoo opolis too. It's animation but it was pretty well done it was pretty good I enjoyed it actually. There really wasn't the whole lot to really pick from as far as I was concerned but I really wanted to take advantage of the fact that that program I belong to as far as watching as many movies as I want to during the month offers me a free tub of popcorn and cold drink. That was really my main reason for going was too but sure I took advantage of of those things. Like I said the movie was okay and I was really quite ready to go home though when I was finished as well as I was pretty tired had a hard time sleeping this morning. I actually had to use my catheter in bed which I hardly ever do that's a whole another issue and probably a whole another days dictation anyway. I pretty much came straight home catching the bus finally but I was cold I was chilly plus I was feeling weird like I'm coming down with something. It seems like hearing people talk this morning in the front of the building people in the building that are all having some kind of flu or sickness of some sort and I was wondering if I was having some sort of issue like that. Felt like I was really feverish for a while this afternoon. I took a moment and did 20 minutes or 30 minutes on the arm bike then watch the Jazz they lost by one point or maybe two points. They worked hard though I must give him that I wish they had made some of the shots that they messed up on but they did good I have to give them that. I started feeling better once I took a couple of ibuprofen turn the heat on then sit back in my chair and enjoyed the afternoon and the game as much as I could and in the day finishing watching Independence Day the movie

So much money

 I get so confused with people. People just vexed me to a certain degree and it's not getting any better as I age. I'm wondering if this is all function of the aging process but it's just wearing me out. I've been looking forward to today for a week or so because it's the second week since my extraction. The molar the last part of the molar I had pulled out that was crumbling. My appointment was about 10:45 this morning and I rolled over there about 10:37 or something like that so I know that have enough time because I wasn't sure what the process was going to be. I knew it couldn't be a lot just because it was basically a follow-up from the extraction to make sure things were going okay. I rolled into the Sprite entrance that it's kind of a secret side entrance but it's enough that I can get my chair in okay it always surprises it when I come in that way but they are all sort of sitting there waiting for me this morning kind of I think there are more on break than anything else. Anyway, I come in and they're all seem to be pretty happy to see me and not genuinely feel they are is that I'm staying there the new dentist guy, son of the regular guy who's my dentist, the one who pulled my tooth comes up and starts talking with me and we Chit Chat he looks at my mouth explains how it looks great ask how the sutures came out I gave all that that was okay then I asked about were they aware of the other or any other cavities that I had. And they said they said they weren't but they could do a full check up in depth so they haven't had been done in a couple years. And I think that's probably true. When I told them what I was doing as far as since I didn't have any molars to really grind food up with I was masticating things by the front teeth and they warned me that that would wear the front teeth out quite quickly. I assume that that's true I know I had thought about that more than once. And they just acted weird when I started asking about the process of implants versus retainers and stuff like that. I could probably do a retainer but I'm not too sure about my hand function and being able to really work something like that and I don't know if I'd want to dump money into something like that without knowing. Same as true I guess to a certain degree regarding the cost of implants. I spoke with one of the ladies there and they're talking about about $4,000 and implant! There's no way I got to do that on a cash basis I would have to do something like that over time but even at $100 a month that would be like 40 months but just like almost 4 years. Well I suppose that would work if you're buying a car or something like that so I guess it can be done but I would have to have one or two I would think so that would even make it longer. They of course didn't know of any programs that might be out there that would assist on something like this. I doubt that there are any programs but I'd have to check it out. I know that there weren't any programs just for poor people that were basically young or had kids I'ma thinking I'd like to see if there's any kind of a program for seniors we're losing their teeth. I wonder if there might be something through the Labor Commission or through the senior services of the state of Utah to see if there's any kind of a system that set up to assist with dental care after the seventies. My cynical side will not be too surprised if there is not. I doubt if you cat or anything out wrong that line would have any assistance. Like I said I would be totally surprised if I were to run across anything but I'm going to have to do something. But still the feeling that permeated the dentist office this morning it's kind of a shock after we seem to be getting along so well it's not like they turned on me or anything it's just I had a real strong feeling that they weren't too excited to visit with me about possible options for implants. As well if I could do dentures and I don't want to do dentures just because finger dexterity that I have is limited and maybe that's what I want it to be because I don't want them but we shall see as they always say

Birthday hangover

I was going to go out today and do stuff I really was but I didn't. I'm not sure but that the tone maybe it was the time it took me to get ready just for the day. I actually woke up at 6:00 a.m. didn't get up till around 7:00 it was just a little difficult of my sticks which was different than usual but I still made the transfer. The transfer itself was a little difficult and it took me awhile to situate myself up to the point that I felt comfortable enough to go into the other room to start the coffee and stuff. But it was more difficult No Doubt. I don't know what if this spooked me about things to come or just was an off day. I really didn't even get ready until about 10:00 only then barely eating my breakfast. I did my arm bike earlier than usual got that out of the way the one hour. That's what I noticed that the electric device that keeps track of minutes and distance and stuff like that traveled is misbehaving. It's done this in the past but I kept a close eye on it and even with its problematic shut itself off and on it still kept very close to what was going on in actual cranking I feel like got my 60 Minutes in and they were honest minutes as well. I need to really seriously consider trying to find another arm bike or device that would give me as much exercise as this good old piece of equipment has done over the years. I would like to have the backup so I lose no exercise time at all if the machine I'm using now totally fails and will not come back online. I really don't believe that will happen but just in case I want to be ready.

I did not even watch that much television / flat screen today towards the latter part of the day. I watched the Utah Jazz they finally won the game. I was impressed. They actually played like the new what they were doing. I don't know if it was because the other team had so many of its regular team members on sick leave but it was a good game I'm glad I watched did not just listen to it. The family sent the leftovers from last night's dinner home with me for leftovers and I had those leftovers watching the game tonight it wasn't a lot part of a hamburger fries cheese stick some other mix so American Delicacies it was enough for dinner when I did not have to go in and fix though I have the fixes for some decent dinners. Yesterday, I had Jackson put the chocolate cake that was provided for my birthday on top of the refrigerator I think primarily so it would really keep me from eating it. I had this weird notion I'm going to offer the cake up for Refreshments at Coffee social on Thursday I don't know if I will now. However, after dinner just out of curiosity I wanted to see if the power chair would Lift Me Up High Enough that I could snatch the cake and guess what it did. There was just one piece of cake left over in the initial cut then that was enough for dinner or after dinner treat. I scooped up a little bit of the icing too just having something extra sweet and put talk back on the cake itself and snapped it shut. I may still offer up the delicacy for the coffee group really is too much sugar for me to handle except for I do like the dry cake and milk treat it's an homage to my dad.

Birthday boy

3It took me a minute to orient after I woke up this morning at 2:00 a.m. I couldn't believe it. I did manage to go back to sleep but woke up on the hour until 4:00 kind of dozed until 6:00 a.m.. like I said it took me awhile to orient that it was my birthday February 2nd, Groundhog's Day that day that you're living in for me. 75 years on the rock and I'm looking for more as many as I can get before the timer runs out. I knew it was going to be a packed day especially with two events and me having to make both of them. The first event was going to lunch with my neighbor upstairs DJ. This is our first time out together and a birthday is always safe ground. Elected to go to this Chinese restaurant north of my apartment complex. I must say I made all my appointments on the bus in good time today it was amazing. Anyway I went to the appointed restaurant Ming's Garden and waited for about 15 minutes before my person shows up DJ. I had a great lunch. I do like this place it's one of my favorites it reminds me almost of the old Chinese restaurants that used to be so ubiquitous not so anymore. So many have taken over our bed taken over by Vietnamese people. Seems the Chinese folks who owned the restaurants wanted to cash it in probably move to Florida. This restaurant like I said just still much like the ones that used to be everywhere. The food's good you have to wrestle with the order taker because she doesn't understand what you're saying and you want to ask specific questions. We finally got our order and it was relatively close mine was right on but DJ left a little bit to be worked out. She wanted gravy over her rice with the little note-taker person order taker wouldn't have it. It was great because it gave us something to talk about and to laugh about it I'm sure a memory or two. We ain't talked to enjoyed our company but I had to get back to the apartment to catch the workout this is on the arm bike. I did an hour on the arm bike and then it was a few short minutes that I rested and got the phone call that we were moving on to meal number two for my afternoon birthday dinner. I had to immediately get out and catch the bus to head south. I ran into my company as I was getting off the bus and rolling over to where the restaurant was at and we changed the restaurant to another very close in proximity Applebee's. I didn't care where we went as long as I could get there by bus relatively easily and this I could and I did. 

Everybody showed up and it was great at Applebee's. I got the fish and chips everyone else got more protein oriented meals a lot more beef options there are some other choices in there too but I got the fish which was pretty good. Can we get the gifts and the cake the chocolate cake which is also good and fun. We spent quite a bit of time just talking then we all reunited over at my apartment and they did an apartment cleaned which was great. There is one more gift to be had as they presented me with an Alexis the little bundle of artificial intelligence to run the apartment. I'm surprised they didn't realize that I didn't like Alexis are the Alexis type concept. The whole thing scares me it's the whole artificial intelligence thing. But I couldn't tell them no they obviously went to Major work and stuff to get this. I was surprised at how much work it took to interface the device to my living environment. I'm just going to accept it for now speak as little as possible and try to keep it out of my life as much as possible. I'm sure I'm going to hurt a lot of people's feelings at some point when they realize how much I dislike these kinds of options. With Alexis set up in supposedly working everybody went on their way they did a good job cleaning up the kitchen and sweeping the floors are the rest of the apartment- - I'm truly blessed no question about it. I'm exhausted just finished the conversation with my daughter who lives in Oregon, Salem. I'm glad birthdays come but once a yea×Wr and 75th birthdays once a lifetime. I really kind of hope I see another one. I just hope the event way less stressful…

 

Last day at 74

I hope my frustration will not bleed through on the presentation of this blog tonight. All day long I've been trying to charge this tablet that I use for riding my blogs. Just your regular Samsung tab I don't know the number on it or anything I got it pretty cheap if I remember right and possibly that's probably the problem. I've tried a number of different plugs but I can't get any of the plugs to really stay inside the tablet to charge the battery inside. I left one all day today after I finally got it to connect the only charge like 10 or 12% leaving me like 63% battery capability and it's getting low right now. I hope I have enough juice to finish this update. In fact I was looking at some newer tablets so I had the courage to purchase one. I really need to link up for somebody knows what they're doing to make sure I get the best purchase because we're talking about it device that's going to be more than a hundred bucks I'm always afraid I'm going to lose money on the project like this. Anyway..

I had a weird evening I woke up around 3:00 a.m. got back to sleep woke up again at 4:00 a.m. and really didn't get back to sleep after that. I haven't been super tired today but I haven't been really perky either. Had a pretty good breakfast with the kids this morning cuz Mark and me for the longest time then the other kids joined us after a bit. As always we had a good conversation and tried to make sure the times for the meals that I will get tomorrow for my birthday. That's correct tomorrow is the day I turn 75. That is really hard to Fathom for me kind of freaks me out. But I'm going to make the best out of it this is going to be one of my best years I could tell. It's going to be an interesting day tomorrow I've got Mark Anthony and Jasmine and Jackson for dinner in the afternoon then I plan to have lunch with DJ. Should be a very interesting day to say the least. Halfway tempted by myself a cake just to have something sweet to eat for the week. If it hadn't been Sunday I thought I'd make one today but too much work for the Sabbath. Maybe if I got up in the morning I could get one made or perhaps just flake out and go across the street and get one from the market. A very nice happy birthday cake is that too weird? I hope not. That would be a very useful gift as far as birthday gifts go. Something I could really enjoy and would eventually disappear. I don't want really anymore gifts that will take up space and remain After I'm Gone. I've got enough for people to get rid of as it is. No more art stuff no more pens inks or anything like that. If I was going to do the Great art piece I would have done it by now with the resources I have available. No more books no more anything that takes a space like I said just things I can use immediately and not have it hang around. Things like movie tickets perhaps, are tickets to other kinds of events but even that I don't know if I would go cuz it just takes so much energy to get up and go somewhere when you're in a power chair you don't have any regular means of transportation. It was a pretty nice day for the first day of February. It's a bit of a shame because we need much more moisture both snow as well as water. I shouldn't enjoy the nice weather that we're having because we really need the dark clouds in the rain and no moisture that storm spring. It's going to be a short month  always is in February. I have to make everyday account…

Last day Rambles

Today was the day of small things. Little bitty, by themselves, insignificant items that when you add them all up makes for a day. I was awake pretty early stayed in bed till 6:00 30ish getting up and getting ready for the day. I was going to be Swift and get over to the coffee shop early and hang out that did not happen. I dally too long looked at the puzzle too long filled in a couple spaces, decided I would make a breakfast which I did it was very good but certainly cut into my time frame finally I struggled to get dressed which I finally did. I didn't get to the coffee shop till almost a quarter to 10:00. In fact one whole table was leaving just as I was coming in that's really odd. I found a table however very easily this day only to find out that I left my cell phone at home. Do you know how hard it is to be alone at the coffee shop all by yourself with nothing to play with except the coffee cup, my stick/hook and the power chair I keep slipping out of, I swear if my safety belt didn't work crazily good I would be sliding out on the floor. Today I even had a round donut that's not a donut smathered with cream cheese bagel that's the word. I can't believe I ingested the whole thing too. Had I been really smart I would have just had a chocolate donut and or Maple bar. I probably crapped out on calories with the loaded bagel. I got out of there relatively soon probably stayed an hour but I got back to the apartment make sure that the phone was there and it was. Did they help promise but it was colder than I anticipated. I hung out at the apartment complex at my apartment watching the flat screen again started another series which sounds kind of intriguing, something put on my Netflix. I caved in and began watching Disney Plus a new series started and I am going to support this series Joy it till it ends or at least this season. Another insignificant item which happened today was I was struggling to put my shorts on Stick I was using to elevate my foot to cross my leg snapped. This is one of my favorite sticks I was surprised but not surprised that it broke I really do put these sticks under a great deal of pressure when I try to use them to pry my leg up or at least to get the Barefoot over my knee so I can pull my shorts up or put them on and then put a shoe on. It's important that the shoe goes on right after I get my foot inside the short leg. Today I forgot to put the shoe on and my leg fell to the ground before I put my shoe on. it took me quite a while then get it back up over my left leg put the shoe on and then do the same to the other leg. As I was doing this leg left using my stick as I always do it snapped on me. This is a shame because I really like the stick this evening I cut the stick down, cutting off the sharp edge or end and put blue stuff on the other end. It'll be a good short stick for things like pushing my pants down or shorts down to where I look fairly well put together with no back Skin showing. I may go to bed earlier than usual on the Saturday night just so that I can wake up early enough to make sure I'm dressed by the time I need to leave for the breakfast. What are the people here at the apartment complex whose name is DJ an interesting woman. I've been trying to take her to dinner out somewhere for the longest time. She really wants to take me to dinner for my birthday but I've already made plans with the kids now I've got to figure out how to juggle all these things together. This is why I don't get involved…..

 

Stamped, mailed, and done

 It was a significant effort on my behalf but I finally got them all off today. I was awake at 5:30 a.m. and found a drug my ass out of bed around   and piddled around the apartment cleaned up a little bit made coffee waited for my caregiver to get here. My goal today, major task in hand, let's do get the Letters Out. I finally got them all printed and the envelopes addressed and failed. I got cash in the envelopes that needed cash and everything was done except for the stamps and wouldn't you know it I only had five stamps and needed one more. I hope to get a hold of Jennifer the front desk person but she had a door closed all day she was doing rent reviews or something like that I need the Silence of the closed door for concentration and probably privacy as well. That meant one thing a trip to the market to the post office they have in the Macy's. It wouldn't have been my first choice for today but I did need to pick up a few things for the weekend. Finally after lunch I pulled the big red coat over my shoulders I head out across the street. Of course on the way I dropped four of the letters which means I had to backtrack to find them and then to put them up on my stick and drag him up to my lap. Fortunately the letters dropped just outside the door to the bus stop as I was bent over trying to pick up a couple of the envelopes. One of the people who live here stopped and retrieved them off the blacktop for me. At the market the first thing I did was go to the counter and get stamps then  finished stamping the envelopes and drop them into the mail return. I don't think there's a ghost of a chance that we picked up today but you never know it might just happen. I got my part out of the way that's all I cared about and now I have the whole month of February to enjoy before I start having to put together the March mail out. Since I'm still in the mailing mode I've almost decided to print out envelopes for March. That's not a promise but something I'm just considering.

Thoroughly Thursday

 For the past couple of days I've noticed something on my chest. I haven't really paid much attention and I thought it was just actual paint or something but today I finally got a better look at it and it's a wound of some sort! Of course, my mind immediately goes to cancer and I pray that it is not but I really didn't make a lot of efforts today to get it looked at or whatever. It's too late in the week and I want to ask my caregiver tomorrow to see what she thinks. I really value her and put on things dash dash of DD were here that would certainly bounce it off her. She has the best medical input on something like this. I'm totally hoping it's just nothing just my overactive imagination I somehow I got it the wound started somehow I don't know how I could have started it but I must have pinched at a torn it somehow unless it really is a carcinogenic skin breakdown of some sort right now I'm just scaring myself so I'm going to stop right there.

It's Thursday so that means it's coffee social. I was up around 6:00 a.m. as usual and farted around here and there just messing around made some breakfast took my meds finally got myself dressed I still haven't finished my folding my clothes like I need to and at this point I think I might just wait and have Melissa do it in the morning she's quick. I should have done today at some point but I was more involved with going to lunch with my old boss Claire. We had this appointment for like a week now we meant for lunch across the street at the Hawaiian restaurant. This is becoming my go-to place just because it's convenient it's fairly nice it's a good place to sit and visit. It's a little expensive but most of the folks that I go there with they paid the lunch so what can I say? Everything points to moki's. Today I had the fish the first time I've had fish and chips and such a long time they get primarily because Claire was paying the bill. I certainly enjoy this person I'm really always amazed that she is still alive. She's gone through some really Medical crises of late- - but haven't we all? We had a great conversation. I wished it could have been longer and we've committed to having closer times together or having our lunches more often. I even carved out enough time this day too finish my 200 minutes on the arm bike. I only have to do around 20 minutes on Thursdays after the first three one hour pumps. The rest of the day I pretty much watched episodes of a cereal that I'm looking at right now. I've seen it before but I really enjoy the first season and the actress. Whenever I have a few minutes of time I've got to fill, I'm doing it one of these series that I've enjoyed watching.

Sadly the only thing I'm really not doing, which I need to be doing, is finishing the mail out of the kid letters. At this Junction I think I'll be able to get that done tomorrow if not Sunday. It's really not that hard it was just hard…

Wildly Wicked Wednesday

 I had to turn off the game and come in and blog. My team is losing again and I just couldn't tolerate watching the game anymore. Basketball I never did really like the game when I was able bodied and that was a long long time ago. Now I think that's an adult and an old adult I probably would have enjoyed playing some backyard ball. I never played basketball with a team you know like high school or whatever and I just couldn't get into the whole group function. Instead I wrestled, my older brother wrestled and I think that's the main reason that I did actually. I always told everybody it was because I didn't want to share the glory or the loss on a team level that if I wrestled I individually was out there on the mat and if I won I won even if the overall team lost I still won my match and that was good enough for me. And honestly I really didn't like wrestling that much, wrestling was just something I could do and do well shocking to me as it were. I did not enjoy the pressure there sport put me under and not just wrestling anything actually where I had to “ perform”. The day before in the whole morning and afternoon of the day of my wrestling match I can hardly even eat anything I was so worried but once I started the the actual match I was into it as into it for all that I was worth tried to pin whoever I wrestled within minutes of the first round. I didn't want to go any further than that if I didn't have to. There were a couple times when I did go the three rounds and that was grim but I eventually won in the end. The entire 3-year career of my short wrestling career I think I lost only twice and I still swear the guy choked me and the ref didn't see it. It's not like I've nursed this this long time it's just stuck with me, the loss.

I've spent a good part of the day doing my kid letters. I finished I believe the last letter and I spent the latter part of the afternoon printing envelopes are trying to print envelopes. I don't know how much of the problem is my printer and how much of it is the envelopes that I use but they keep getting caught in the printer and I keep having to undo the printer pull out the finger in pull the crumpled up envelope out and start the whole process over again. I had to do that three times on today's print. I should someday consider getting another printer but this is basically a good printer when it works that sounds kind of weird. But it seems to be holding up though I did get one message from the printer showing what the level was of ink I had left I believe I have enough into finish printing three or four letters I have to do but I do need to seriously consider ordering another container of ink. I'm online however to get everything mailed out by the 1st of February sadly it's a short month and I'll be doing this again very shortly.

Tackling Tuesday

The day was chilly starting out but it was beautiful as far as no clouds in a nice big shining Sun to at least give me the illusion of heat when facing the fireball on this somewhat chili Tuesday morning. I was headed inbound for the meeting at assist inc. I'd actually made decent time all morning getting up about 6:00 and then just working steadily at getting ready to catch the 9:20 into the library then out over to the office. I even made time for a much breakfast, oatmeal mush and toast it was pretty good actually. I probably would have liked to have some kind of a protein options as far as the breakfast went even an egg would have been nice but I didn't want to go through the extra work of having to fry something up. And the only meat product I had available possibly was some unfrozen hot dogs / wieners. Again I could have opened up a can of spam but seem like an extra layer of work and I didn't want to jeopardize getting in to Salt Lake too late.

I was the only member of our three member group of volunteers that sign off on these requests for funding documents. Both of the others are now quite sick one not even coming back I guess, Robin who I really like actually has got cancer and she's a Goner. This is really quite a shock. Seems like I'm the only constant volunteer that usually makes the meeting nowadays. Knock on wood I hope I can continue to be the Dependable one. We, the folks of assist, should start searching for a couple more volunteers. I don't plan on going anywhere soon but the second you start thinking you're going to be there forever is when you get the rug pulled out from underneath you and there you go flat on your face. I was going to go to the bank today following the meeting but yesterday at some point I was looking for one thing and found an envelope and I think I had 200 bucks in there. $100 bill in 3 20s and four tens. The reason I was going to the bank would be to get enough cash to stuff the envelopes for those folks that I write that get cash it's not many but still I didn't want to run out of cash as it were. So I just went to the train station across the street and caught the train home stopping at the market to get a few items that I've been thinking about for the last couple of days. I even made a list but then the list was on my cell phone and my cell phone got buried underneath the box that I was putting the groceries in. I still missed getting a couple of the items I was considering. Even with that I forgot to get ahead of cabbage and possibly ahead of lettuce. I continue to write the letters. My big fear now, since I have cash, is that the printer is going to mess up on me and I'm going to have a difficult time printing these. Tomorrow I'll finish the dictation and hopefully begin printing at least the envelopes then hopefully Friday I can put the items together and get them out in the mail at least by Saturday morning. We'll see

Monday moans

 I almost went outside today but stopped myself at the last moment for what I don't really quite remember right now. I had been working all day trying to get myself with enough initiative that I would dress warm, cross the street do some shopping and get back in time for the evening news. I just couldn't pull it all together and pull it off. I've been working on kid letters off and on all day besides working on my word puzzles. Really have this weird belief that doing these word puzzles is doing me good. I can't prove anything but I still feel that way. Oh I did pump my arm- bike for an hour I felt that was productive. So the day hasn't been a truly lost cause. The days are supposed to get warmer by a few degrees so I'll be heading out more often. Tomorrow of course I have and my meeting downtown, assist for the first time in 3 weeks. I'm kind of getting excited to get back into the swing of things. I just hope my body will let me do so I'm feeling a little bit unsettled tonight. I'm totally free of Critters in my urine. This of course is a gift from the course of medicine I'm taking for my tooth or extracted tooth recovery. It's always a pleasure to see Crystal Clear urine. The bladder infection well come back as soon as I work through the last of the meds but that's okay I don't have to have a clear all the time. I'm not sure if I told you all about the fact that I run a low grade infection all the time because of all the catheterizationing that I do. My urologist indicates that that's common for people with spinal cord injuries who have to external catheterize. The body more or less protects itself one way or the other. I guess I don't really care one way or the other myself except for unless it gets me down and I can't be out enjoying my life or freedom. Everyday my room gets better in my mouth for the tooth was extracted. Now I'm just being bothered by the suture that seem to be striking out. I spend a good part of my day wiggling the sutures with my tongue just wondering if they'll stay in. As of the first of February I don't have a couple more days before I am seen by the dentist again to make sure that everything is going all right. I do at this point. I think I dodged the dry socket diagnosis. I don't think I've really ever had dry socket and it certainly scares me the way they talk about it and how I don't want to have it. It's very much that whole parent scaring the child into doing something supposedly good.

I'd better wrap up this blog now. I know it might be somewhat short but I just want to get the blog written before I try to write a few more letters tonight. At least that's my plan. I want to make sure I have enough time to either make corrections to the letters are to make sure that I'm able to print out all the documents and envelopes that I will need to in the next couple of days. I still have a week before I have to really mail them out so I'm sure I've got the time